A quick examination of the room revealed a book open on a less cluttered bench with a number of jars beakers and other containers surrounding it. Jito thought that the jars looked as if they had had some of their contents removed, and some time ago, if the dust was anything to go by. The book was open at a chapter on Lichdom and was called "The Lifecycle Arcane". Rather than touch anything the Mothers decided to leave the room by the western wall. Gaspode couldn't see any traps on it so Jito heaved it open grudgingly (the door that is). Beyond was a large sitting room with books covering most of the walls on the subject of plants and animals. A large fireplace dominated the opposite wall and the only other exit was in the northern wall. Jito reckoned that this lead back into the entrance room. After some prodding around the fireplace, the group returned to the hall with the wights and turned down the corridor that they had not yet seen the end of. It took some time stepping over the rubble and detritus of the ages and eventually they found that the whole south easterly portion of the corridor was blocked off by fallen masonry, soil and other rubbish. The double doors off the entrance room now piqued their interest so they headed back past the wights and allowed Gaspode room to see if the doors were going to animate and crush them. Nothing seemed to be amiss, although they were locked. Gaspode picked the lock easily and another large room of the size of the entrance chamber and the sitting room. Against the far wall was a large stone altar upon which rested an open book and above which hovered a flickering flame. The altar was carved with the symbol of Deneir. A cautious group approached the altar after Gaspode had declared that at least the apron of the room was free of traps. The book on the altar proved to be a treatise on the customs and practices of the church of Deneir, Lord of all Glyphs and Images, so the Mothers left it just where it was. There was nothing for it but to disturb the alchemical room! Guthranka and Fonesca had this wondrous thought and brought the rest of the gang back there with swords drawn and spells prepared. Guthranka flicked over a page of "The Lifecycle Arcane" and predictably enough the statue of the woman moved. It dropped the stone book from its left hand, whereupon it smashed on the floor, and took the glowing stone staff in both hands. Then, unpredictably, it stopped still. The Mothers were quite confused by this as they were about to lay in to the creature with all spells and weapons at their disposal. They waited to see if it would move again and then they noticed that Jito, Levi and Gaspode were all moving very slowly. As soon as they noticed this, the statue sprang back into action catching Levi a good blow with the staff. Gasp, Levi and Jito could not respond immediately, their actions a strange slow-motion caricature. Guthranka and Fonesca were able to act. Guthranka's sword bit into the arm of the creature to visible effect, but Fonesca's missiles of force seemed to just be absorbed into the torso of the statue without injuring it. The statue turned it's attention to Guthranka as she seemed the only credible threat, landing a heavy blow which put Guthranka onto the back foot and caused her to miss one of her attacks. Fonesca conjured a stony hand from the floor of the room to grasp the ankle of the statue, but it seemed to be able to ignore the hand's effects. Jito, Gasp and Levi were all able to land blows just as Guthranka also managed to hit the statue on her back-swing. It was Levi's FINAL blow that shattered the statue, leaving only part of the stone staff, which was still glowing, intact. Further examination of the room turned up nothing of great interest so the group reluctantly decided to clear the passageway of the rubble. The hour or so it took to clear a passage through the rubble was only interrupted when Jito unearthed a small group of rot grubs, two of which burrowed in to his left arm. Guthranka was on hand with her ability to cure his infestation and so he was only left with a couple of scars and a distinctly queasy feeling. They lit a torch to scorch the rest of the grubs. When the way was clear, they saw a short passage with frescoes painted on the walls, two on either side. There were small plaques under each of the scenes. Just beyond the art in the northern wall was an iron-bound door. The pictures showed robed and hooded figures battling undead, demons, dragons and the like with lightning bolts or other magical effects. Fonesca, who must have been curious as to the title of the first work, or perhaps she wanted the name of the artist so that she could commission her very own fresco on one of the walls of the farm near Silverymoon, leaned down and read the first plaque. Unfortunately the runes inscribed thereon exploded causing the whole group some damage. She resolved not to do that again, and perhaps to use a detect magic on any suspicious writings. Proceeding to the door and avoiding even looking at any other of the plaques the group stood back to allow Gaspode to do his stuff. No traps were found but Gaspode thought that it been magically locked. Fonesca stepped forward and released the lock with a spell. The door was opened by Guthranka and they stepped through to a brightly lit, but shadowy, room. The light came from four magical lamps that hovered in the air, the shadows from the piles and piles of books that were heaped everywhere, blocking the clear passage of the illumination. At the back of the room, past many stacks of books was a desk, itself somewhat of a shelf, and behind, clutching a book to his bony chest sat Adzerak. He was staring off into the distance with the one eye that he seemed to still possess and he was muttering about books. The Mother's gathered that he was a bit obsessed on the protection of his books, from thieves mainly. He'd gone slightly deranged and thought that his best solution would be to turn himself into a lich to protect them for the rest of time. He'd lost touch with reality, something the Mothers could identify with. So they suggested to him that he should give his books into the protection of Denier's great library. Adzerak perked up at this suggestion and roped the Mothers into helping him ferry all of his collection into the shrine of Deneir (remember that portfolio ?). Unfortunately whenever they got to close to him his innate lichy coldness froze them to the proverbial marrow, so they had to do a bit of agile dodging with piles of books in their arms. Then the two hour job was finally completed; Adzerak lay the final few books on the floor of the shrine and the presence of Deneir was shown as a great vortex of light sucking up all of the glyphs, runes, sigils and words from all of the books and drawing it all to Deneir. The wind also ate away at the form of Adzerak until he was subsumed in the maelstrom. Just before it disappeared the image of a grand old man appeared and spoke to them in Adzerak's voice thanking them for redeeming him and warning them of one who would look for all who had been in his home. All that was left in the room were five books. Fonesca immediately forgot her resolution and started to read the first one that came to hand, she dropped it and lay stunned for an hour while the others looked on helplessly, Guthranka prudently shutting the book and Gaspode stowing them in his sheet of smallness. When Fonesca recovered all she could say was "That definitely was not me". They rested up to allow Levi to recover his stone shape spells and left the lair of Adzerak sealed again before returning to Arabel. The war wizard again was employed to carefully discover the nature of the books, one effect of which he was clearly warned about. For the payment of a mere 1,000 gold pieces he was able to tell them that the books were most useful in the right hands. They were: A Manual of Puissant Skill at Arms (which Fonesca had not taken to); A Manual of Stealthy Pilfering; A Libram of Gainful Conjuration; A Book of Exalted Deeds and lastly a Manual Of Stone Golem creation. The Mothers pondered how they would use or dispose of these powerful items.