I was just leaving the Golden Griffin, after a usually fine dinner there,
when I heard a disturbance in the park, which is nearby. At first it was
simply the area dogs barking at some disturbance, which was enough to make
me wonder since that is one of the better residential areas. Then I
heard a man's scream. I hurried as fast as I could to the scene, and saw
Mr. Ournel (at that time his identity was unknown to me) on the ground,
with giant plant roots entangling his legs, and a hooded man on top. The
pair were locked in a struggle, with Mr. Ournel frantically trying to keep
from being stabbed.

Within seconds of my arrival two other men arrived. The taller of the two
went to intervene in the struggle and just as he reached the cloaked
individual the assailant vanished.

His companion - a stout individual- turned out to also be a mage, and he
set to work at trying to break the anti-tracking spells put on the
assailant's teleport. While he worked we learned that the near-victim was
Lawrince Ournel, the missing Royal envoy. (Speculation about the missing
envoy had run rift around City Hall - reaching even the merchants that
have been helping prepare for the Bards' Festival.)  As for the two
gentleman - they explained that they had been enjoying the opportunity to
spend some of their pay while exploring some of Montfort's better
establishments. The tall one gave his name as Bran Crow and the stout mage
said he was Sven the Magnificant. Both recently arrived for the Festival.

It did not take Mr. Sven long in breaking the spell and he was able to
teleport us to a wooded area near the shanty town. Even from that distance
we could see flames.

Upon reaching the scene we saw a shanty on fire, and shortly upon reaching
the scene Mr. Crow grabbed up one of the locals. I think he must have
first thought him our quarry - maybe due to height or such - but many of
the people quickly voached for the man. Yals, a woodcarver of some talent,
had been helping douse the fire and was able to intervene and when he
learned of our search offered to help.

The presence of Yals was most welcome - for he is known to be a man of
good sense and calm demeanor, and _much less_ chancy than Mr. Crow and Mr.
Sven, who were obviously of the more violent ilk - like many adventurers
who travel through Montfort. But there was little to be done in our choice
of companions - if we had waited for the Guard the trail would have grown
cold. And so we were dependent on Mr. Sven's magical skills.

The next teleport landed us deep in the forest, which is Yals' area of
specialty as he often wanders the forest in search of wood for his
carvings. Particularly the fine rosewood that he uses for his smaller
statues. The trail led to a clearing, where we met by a sad little scene.

Ahead of us was freshly turned earth - about the size of a grave. Young
Lucc had also been alerted of a trespasser in the woods and had come to
investigate. He is a young man with a rather uncanny sense knowledge of
the forest, and very sensitive to anything that disturbs the area. Since
he is such a knowledgeable woodsman he too joined us on our search.

We all knew better than to disturb potential evidence, nor did we wish to
lose our suspect, particularly now that it looked like he had committed
another work of violence.

After more work at breaking anti-tracking spells the next teleport took us
to a blasted landscape, and there we found actual footprints. Sven
explained that the magic in the area was unstable and made workings hard,
so it probably had made it impossible for the man to place spells on his
trail.

The footprints led us to a gigantic ruin, which I have heard rumors of - I
think it was supposed have been a Church Citadel at one point but
destroyed in battle. Some of the distruction looked fresh - as if the
suspect had tried a spell and ended up destroying a wall - along with
breaking open a good portion of the floor. But this allowed us to
carefully slide down the rock debris to the lower level.

The place truly was out of a madman's worst nightmares!! With rats and
bones amongst broken rock! And worst yet - a wall of decaying flesh.

The nightmare scene must have working on the suspect's mind too, plus the
echo of our own movements, because (after a long, unpleasant hunt) he was
seen to run screaming through the halls.

Mr. Crow was well ahead of the rest of the party, since Mr. Ournel was
tiring from his long ordeal and I was hampered by my clothing. Mr. Sven
remained near to provide us some light, and Yals and Lucc were doing their
best to help us through the rubble. I'm sorry to say that by this point I
was more of an impediment to the search than a help.

By the time we circled back through the corridors we arrived in time to
find Mr. Crow questioning the suspect in a rather direct manner. This we
quickly put a stop to and tied up the young man so he could be taken to
the Tower Guard, the proper authorities.

And though Sven was kind enough to teleport us clear of the ruins and back
to the forest he and Mr. Crow took their leave of us. Despite our
entreaties that they give statements to the Guard on the matter. They
claimed that they didn't want to be caught up in anything long and drawn
out, since they had already gotten work and would be leaving Montfort in a
day or so.