Lotus

Lotus is a gambler of White City in the Sürgün Günlükleri ("Exile Chronicles") campaign, a man in his late fifties. Ephorus counts him as the one who taught him to play cards and how to live; when Ephorus was a child, Lotus helped him out of slavery and life on the street.^{1 2}

Reunion

When Ephorus came back to White City with Kemp Corvus and Sarah, he and Lotus met in a gambling house and embraced; they joked that Lotus had put on weight, and Lotus noticed Ephorus's missing arm. The house offered every kind of wager, card tables for twenty-one and poker, dealers dressed in red, its own guards and curtained rooms for wealthy patrons; there was talk of horse and cock races and of those who spoke against gambling yet still came. Lotus warned that some mages tried to cheat by seeing through other players' eyes. Ephorus recalled how he had once lost his lodging at these tables and stolen to get back into the game. Lotus ran the table with long experience and took most of the money, while the company spent most of the night talking.^{3 4 5 6 7}

Lotus lives in a handsome house of several storeys with only a very small yard; the companions brought him a bottle as a gift, and fine whisky from the Free Ports was poured. He asked whether they needed anything under the counter. Told of the rune master's materials, he said he had contacts who dealt in magical ingredients, that a dragon's heart had passed through his own hands, and that he could look for the feather, though the eye would be hard to find; he sent them to a halfling cook who could broker the deal with the Horned trader.^{8 9 10 11}

The night guest

That night, while the companions stayed in his house, a scarred guest came and asked Lotus, by the fire, for help in hiding and leaving the city quickly should he be pursued unofficially. One of the companions overheard. Afterwards Lotus admitted that he did not usually do such things and was uneasy, but that he owed the man a debt of life: years before, the man had caught him and, reloading his weapon in the rain, had taken the moment to listen to him instead of putting a bullet in his head. Lotus said he could arrange a hiding place and people who would keep silent, firmly denied that he was preparing a trap or a grave, and told the companions to stay out of it and trust only themselves. The guest proved to be the Scarred old hunter who was hunting the horned trader.^{12 13 14 15 16}

Spoiler: The Puppeteer's visitRevealSpoils: Sürgün Günlükleri #48; Sürgün Günlükleri #49 · Say what you have read

Returning on foot through a storm after a night raid, the companions found a glowing blue cage hanging in the air in Lotus's room, and at the table with Lotus sat the man known as The Puppeteer and a short-haired, bearded mage they had seen on the road. As the Puppeteer threatened them, Lotus stabbed himself and lay in his own blood; the Puppeteer said he could make others do the same. After a whispered word, Lotus's heart stopped and he died. A shot and breaking glass followed, and the Puppeteer's image flickered and vanished.^{17 18 19 20}

The companions spoke of burying him quietly in his garden by night before hurrying back to Osterhn within the three days the Puppeteer had given them.²¹