Archmage Vael Tarmyth

Archmage Vael Tarmyth is a powerful spellcaster, a reclusive academic, and a prominent political figure in the city of Neverwinter, the Jewel of the North. Within the municipal government, he is officially designated as the city’s high-level magic advisor. Despite the prestige and gravity of this role, particularly during a time of immense magical and martial upheaval, official records indicate that he rarely attends council meetings in person, typically sending a magical proxy in his stead. He resides and conducts his arcane research in the Cloaktower, the premier center of magical learning located within Neverwinter’s Arcanist District.

The Council of Neverwinter and the Holographic Proxy

Tarmyth is a key member of the small advisory council of Castle Never, which assists Lord Nasher Alagondar in ruling the city. The council is comprised of several high-ranking officials overseeing various sectors of Neverwinter’s defense, treasury, and intelligence:

• Aribeth De Tylmarande: Lord Nasher’s trusted Right Hand, Captain of the Guard, and champion of Erathis.
• Lucien Nightshade: The city’s Spymaster, who secretly operates as a chapter leader of the Zhentarim within his manor in the Blacklake District.
• Count Gelden Allfield: The city’s Treasurer, known for his frequent grievances regarding the lack of available public funds on the books.
• Aldis Trueshot: A Captain and the Master at Arms of the city’s forces.
• Finster Lionheart: The Lord Admiral and Shipmaster of the city’s fleet.
• Vael Tarmyth: The high-level magic advisor whose persistent absences and reliance on proxies remain a source of intrigue.

During council deliberations, Vael is typically represented by a bluish holographic projection. This proxy repeatedly and cheerfully declines to speak on deep strategic matters for his master, stating simply that it is “a large language hologram” and declaring that “no archmage attends meetings in person.” However, during critical moments, the illusion can be dropped to reveal the true Archmage.

The Cloaktower’s Bargain

Vael’s reclusive demeanor shifted dramatically when confronted with physical proof of the rising dragon threat brought by the adventurers known as the Magnificent Five. Upon realizing the immense, lucrative value of dragon anatomy, Vael’s hologram ceased being a mere projection, and the Archmage stepped in directly to strike a series of lucrative bargains:

• The Dragon Slayer: Vael examined and confirmed that the ancestral blade wielded by the party carried genuine dragon-slaying magic.
• The Sending Stone: He examined a cracked blue sending stone recovered from the Dragon Barrow. While he found it too fractured to identify its exact partner, he determined its magical connection pointed southwest, possibly toward Anauroch or the Serpentwind Coast.
• The Reagent Trade: He purchased the party’s immediate haul of dragon materials—including eight scales, a tooth, potent acid, and brimstone—for approximately 3,000 gold pieces.
• The Credit Line: He established an 8,000 gold piece balance of Cloaktower credit for the party, restricted to the tower’s specialized inventory of spell components, reagents, scrolls, and spellcasting services.
• The White Dragon Hunt: Realizing that dragon carcasses would yield a massive return on investment, Vael offered an advance of 5,000 gold pieces in spell components in exchange for a fifty-fifty split of any remains of the white dragon, Cryovain, that the party managed to harvest.

Leverage and the Folding Halls of Halas

During their negotiations, the wizard Farwald raised a significant piece of leverage: the legendary Archmage Elminster is currently trapped within the Folding Halls of Halas (an extra-dimensional tesseract manor created during the Calamity). The key to this pocket dimension, the shifting clockwork puzzle known as the Heirloom Sphere, sits forgotten on a shelf under a cloth inside Vael’s own domain in the Cloaktower. Vael expressed a genuine, though highly conditional, interest in recovering the Sage of Shadowdale, stating that if the party successfully brings back the requested dragon components first, he might be moved to consider breaching the extra-dimensional tesseract to free him.