Let me first describe the place, cuz descriptions always help, right? The house was really more of a shack, not very large or impressive, and with parts of it (i.e. the door) rotting away. It was surrounded by a low stone wall which wouldn't even serve to keep out a somewhat determined toddler, but which at least kept the place fairly dry (this only in comparison to the rest of the swamp, of course). Some of our company (myself included) had to ask just what kind of a wizard would live in such a dump. Not to spoil the surprise or anything, but as might be expected, the answer to that question is "a not very sane one." As if we couldn't have guessed that from his sense of decor!

While we were waiting there, trying to decide what to do, Merf knocked. I could have told him, based on the fact that the door was mostly rotted away, that he shouldn't have bothered wasting his time, but what would be the fun of that? It was far more amusing to watch him trying to get pieces of the door and the wall of his hands while the rest of us went in to look around.

This grand mansion consisted of three rooms, or so we judged based on the three doors by the entrance. Choosing, for no obvious reason, to go through the one in the middle first, we found ourselves in a library; most of the books had rotted away, but we were able to at least find what seemed to be a book of magic and something else which looked as if it might conceivably be a diary. Electing to read the diary later, we tried the next room, which proved to be a kitchen that had an utterly fascinating lack of anything remotely interesting inside. Turning to the last room in this oh-so-comfortable abode, we found it to be (oh surprise of all surprises!) a bedroom. Aside from some remarkably tacky furniture and the remains of what must have been truly hideous outfits, we found nothing of note there, either. At this point, we were (needless to say) less than entirely pleased with the progress of our exploration...

The rest of their group busied themselves with searching the place more closely, while I decided to try something a little more constructive; dragging Leighla with me, just in case I ran into something I couldn't handle, I paced off the dimensions of Rooden's hut, then checked for empty spaces and soon found one in the library (the rest of the group doesn't seem to think too highly of my intellect, but who ever heard of a wizard's lair without a lab?). We tried the door, but it was locked (as you might expect of the door down to the secret lair), so we decided to wait for the night and amuse ourselves by looking through the diary (also locked, but no real problem for one of my tremendous talents). Of course, the book was trapped (I'd been wondering what those red letters on the side meant; hopefully I'll remember about them for next time), and poor Merf got fairly well singed by the explosion, but hey, these things happen, right?

The journal seems to be written in Espruar, only with the letters and characters reversed. It was rather long, and we didn't read all of it, but the main thrust was that Rooden was originally a sorceror from Silverymoon (I visited there once! It was so neat! And I stol... err... acquired a really neat outfit there too!.). He specialized in necromancy and creation magic, and was apparently rather gifted magically (I quote: "Due to my own tenacity, skills, and genius, I began to learn the magical arts at a young age."). It seems he was trapped here by those same nasty mists that brought the rest of us into this pleasant domain; this made him understandably upset, the more so because he thought it would prevent any chance of him redeeming himself.

It turns out, you see, that he apparently was engaged in some particularly nasty necromantic experiment (the details or more up Haley's alley than mine), when he was interrupted by his niece Alisanda. The forces he was using got out of control, and rather than sacrificing himself, he let them take her (selfish bastard!). He was very sad about this, and wanted to make up for it somehow; it seems he had some plans to reanimate her body or recreate it and bring her back to life somehow. I thought this seemed less than entirely sane, and morally dubious besides, but Merf (as usual) disagreed with me. I swear that guy's got a log stuck so far up his wazoo that every time he opens his mouth, I can tell what kind of tree the log came from! (This observation was first made to me by a fellow party member who shall remain nameless, but it's the truth, and since it shows a certain rugged degree of poesy, I'm not above using it myself.)

After these interesting revelations, we decided to catch some sleep and go through the secret door later (it was, of course, at the top of a staircase, which Liss made sure of, even though it seemed fairly obvious that it would be like that, given that there wasn't anywhere else it could go). We had our usual encounters with nightmare beings; this time it was Maerlyan, and he didn't seem very happy to see me. Unfortunately, his pet ghouls attacked and killed Haley, driving her out of the dream just as Leighla showed up and saved the day. We were so worried (Haley is my best friend, and I don't think I'd ever get over her dying because of my nightmares!), but fortunately, although she was very shaken up, she recovered after Leighla and I sat up for the rest of the night, telling stories and singing songs to her and so on. At least some of us have the decency to be worried about a friend in need!