[1] The Lower Road

Not waiting for any other troglodytes to appear, you keep the one undead trog you have under your control and backtrack toward the stairway that appears to lead back to where you originally came in. The stairs lead to a wide hallway that in turn, leads to a door with a familiar-looking lever. Sure enough, when you pull it, it leads back to the room with the levers scattered through it. This time though, since no one's pulled any levers since it reset, the door out is still open.

There's no sign of any pursuit behind you, but it's probably best to keep moving, so you continue on past the broken pipes and back to your original entrance, where a small crowd of kobolds has gathered, quietly chittering back and forth to each other about the rumbling from the tunnels and conjecture on whether you're still alive. When they see you, a cheer goes up, but then they see the troglodyte following you and the cheer flips on its head to alarm and there's several dozen spears pointing at S'sylin's undead servant, along with a cacophony of shouts, most along the lines of, "Why you bring Trogtrog here? Kill it, kill it!"

The kobold crowd celebrates, probably more loudly than is comfortable, and they gesture forward to a young kobold decorated in glowy cave moss that presents you with an old sack. Inside are stones, and they look pretty ordinary, but as you're handed them, the elder kobold says, "See! We give gems! Uncut! We not want to damage them." If they are gems, uncut or not, they should fetch a decent price at the market. If only you could get into the market. Professor Alacandra might be able to get you in when she's well again, but killing a group of troglodytes might be enough to lift your reputations with the guards.

At any rate, your job here is done - for now. Do you want to go check back in with Alacandra, or let her rest?

Word has gotten around the lower district that a band of students - the same ones that survived the airship crash and helped to save the injured there - have been dealing with some of the 'vermin' that infest the sewers. Clearly, they don't have the whole story, as they're not aware that the 'vermin' - as they put it - are actually worshipping one of the students as the incarnation of one of their prophesied returning deities. But enough of the story has gotten around that the guards are actually impressed, so this time, when you go to ask them for permission to enter the upper district where the marketplace is, they don't stand in your way.

Broken arches and fallen columns are covered with awnings and surrounded by market stalls. The Marketplace is the natural center of this city sustained by trade both legitimate and illegitimate. The twisting, improvised streets are crammed with people, most of them visitors, making their way through the city and stopped at every turn by hawkers trying to sell them one thing or another. Everything from taverns to hawkers selling trinkets to scroungers of all sorts buying seemingly useless detritus for their own shadowy purposes are vying for your attention. Three huge buildings loom over everything in this quarter:

The absolute first thing you see when you pass through the gates is The Bazaar, a gigantic tent sheltering the city’s great open-air market. Patched and re-dyed again and again, the tent dominates the Marketplace and can be seen from almost every part of it. Inside is a mess of walkways, smaller tents, and market stalls, all lent a reddish glow when sunlight shines through the tent overhead.

Secondly you notice the Lorsmarch Palace - the Storm Lords’ seat of power. Diplomats and other high-profile visitors meet with the lords here, and their magistrates administer justice within the palace’s chambers. Public executions are held in the square at the base of the palace steps, one of the few places in the city where members of the Stormreach Guard can always be found.

And finally, Falconer’s Spire rises high above the Marketplace, even taller than the Lorsmarch Palace and the great tent that covers the bazaar. A great blue-inlaid edifice, the spire acts as a docking station for airships and as the enclave for House Lyrandar.

There's almost certainly a House Sivis presence here, all it will take is some asking around. In the meantime, there's only about a hundred merchants selling armor. How can you possibly tell which to buy?

@Khulod - Looks like armor prices are a bit high at the moment. Does S'sylin have any better luck?

After looking through the marketplace for a while, and picking up what items you can, you eventually inquire as to the House Sivis presence, and are directed south, through House Jorasco's holdings, to the Citadel of the Twelve. Following the directions, you make your way south to the district of Respite, where the conglomeration of races gives way to mostly humans and halflings, and where the ruins the city is built atop grow more elaborate and ostentatious - as ostentatious as ruins can be, anyhow. You pass by Coldwake Pond, which even in the temperate weather Stormreach is currently enjoying is much colder than other bodies of water in and around the city. Mist rises from the pond as warm, damp air meets its iciness. A large necropolis named Delara's Watch is here as well, and guards are posted to make sure the dead stay asleep - and ensure that no one goes in to wake them. House Jorasco's enclave is built on the district’s highest point, looking down the slope toward the district gate. The grounds in and around the enclave are filled with plants and flowers, perfuming the air and giving the area a feeling of being more alive than the rest of the ruins.

As healers, the Jorasco enclave is open to all, and so you're able to pass through and head for a rear alley where a small gate leads to a narrow path that twists and winds and eventually opens up in to Locksmith Square. It's quiet now in the daytime, but come nightfall it will be busier than the marketplace, and will probably not be a place where respectable students of reputable schools would want to be found. Not really relevant to you then. In contrast to the square, the rest of the Coasthold district is opulent and teeming with wealth. It's mostly dwarves here, with the entirety of the district owned by House Kundarak, and their colors fly in every imaginable place.

However, being the rishest part of the city, it's also home to the Citadel of the Twelve, which houses offices for all the dragonmarked houses, with the largest offices reserved for those houses that did not already have enclaves in the city. As you get closer, the emblems of several Houses become recognizable, namely: Cannith, Ghallanda, Medani, Orien, Phiarlan, Sivis, Thuranni, and Vadalis. You came here looking for Sivis, but it seems that you could possibly give a more direct report.

The door closes behind Astrid.