The The Green Dragon Brotherhood has been in hiding for several weeks. Having returned to Rainwall City, they discovered that time passes differently in In'thok and a year has elapsed in the Midlands. During that year, Ur-Balat believes them to have defied his orders and is actively searching for them, having burned down half of Rainwall City in the hunt.

He installed "a bell" in the center of town with promises of reward if anyone uses it to report the Brotherhood's return, and promises of punishment if he discovers the town is hiding them. That is to say: there is very little motivation for your average Rainwaller to not drop a dime.

Skarrow has so far kept the Brotherhood safe, but even he is beginning to worry about their continued presence in the city. In a strange moment of conscience, the party discusses allowing themselves to be caught to prevent further damage to the town. The moment passes when they are told what is happening in Crow's Keep: the Grey Guardian has infiltrated and corrupted the Temple of Graxus, turning the Iron Knights into strange mindless avatars of death.

The party decides they will escape through the sewers, with Skarrow promising to leave them horses by "the northeast exit." This is a smuggler's city, after all - ingress and egress are well known. The party decides to get to the horses and ride hell for leather to the Spine of Ulgoth in the belief that rumors of an ancient tunnel through the mountain are true and that they can shave weeks of travel time off their journey to Crow's Keep.

They do worry that The Uxul in their possession will somehow attract The Uxul taken by Ur-Balat and brainstorm some ways to shield it from prying eyes/minds/forces. Greer the Betrayer and Kraz Formalhaut kick around the notion of some sort of internal marsupial pocket but even this group gets quickly grossed out and decides to take their chances.

The group risks being seen and slinks to the sewer entrance under the cover of darkness. They find what they expect to find: a long hard slog through filth. They find themselves suddenly attacked by projectile leeches, taking a not-insubstantial amount of damage from these wretched pests. Learning from experience, they carefully sneak past a large infestation of rats, only to discover some members of the The Red counting up some loot.

Luckily, the sentry is dead drunk and passed out, which gives the group time to concoct a scheme. They don their silver fireproof suits (taken from a strange lab on the purple world) and adopt the role of city inspectors fumigating the sewers. The combination of strange clothing, bureaucratic doublespeak, and the imminent threat of poison is successful in getting the smugglers to flee.

The group follows them up some stairs only to realize they almost came right up in the center of the city, so they flee back into the sewers, locking the gate behind them. As they do, one of the smugglers asks why they're worried about the rats instead of the...

And that's all they hear before the guy runs off.