The Saviours of Salvation stay a few more days in Sharn, with Isabelle getting her nightmares literally punched in the face by Arishtava, who reveals she's travelling yet again -- this time, home to Fairhaven to visit her father and take care of "very secret Arcane Congress shit". Glayder begins studying Riedran and Quori with Khetari's help, and learns that Yune, the bird often seen around Khetari, is apparently linked to her quori spirit. Right before they leave, Glayder confesses her feelings for Ari with Isabelle's encouragement, causing them to panic and realize they don't know what they want. Frustrated, she seeks Flamewind's help, but the sphinx tells her to use her brain instead of running around the Cogs picking fights. Meanwhile, Elloven checks up on Jinx via sending stone -- she's unsure where her next assignment will be, but assures him that House Jorasco has everything under control and promises to keep in touch.
They opt to take a more... circuitous route to Salvation, assisting Sky Blue and Earl with a heist of the Excelsior -- the royal lightning rail -- to recover some important Prophecy-related documents on it and hopefully learn the whereabouts of Sky's father. They take a regular civilian train to Starilaskur, where they head to a loading platform about fifty miles outside the city to go over the heist plan -- the documents are hidden in a secret vault, and to unlock it, they'll need signet rings from Kor ir'Wynarn and Kosh ir'Stokk. After picking from a selection of trinkets to aid them, everyone changes into chef's uniforms for the first part of the plan: infiltrating the train via the dining car, with Earl hidden under a covered dish, to drop off the seagull in the signalmaster's office.
As the train thunders into view, the group boards and is immediately put to work by the head chef, an angry-looking dwarf with a shaven head. Glayder proves to be the worst cook imaginable, though Elloven and Khetari are easily able to cover for her failure. Meanwhile, Isabelle wanders about the dining car, specifically watching the signalmaster's office to find the right time to leave Earl there. She also helps out some off-duty guards by making them a bowl of soup without cilantro.
Khetari heads to the larder to find some ingredients, and pockets a bottle of Zil nightcap, which can be used to incapacitate people if given in a large enough dose. While there, she smells the stench of death, and opens a locked hamper with Isabelle's help to find a corpse stuffed inside. After alerting Sky, the group determines the body belonged to the train's conductor -- meaning, they aren't the only group looking to cause chaos here, and the other party involved is much more.... violent. Elloven distracts the signalmaster, a sickly-looking gnome, by offering him some of Isabelle's herbal medicine to cure his sneeze, then slipping Earl into the office when the gnome isn't looking.
As dinner service wraps up, Khetari spots a bottle of Aundairian Fireburst in the drinks locker, and attempts to ask for it, knowing it's Lord Kor's favourite drink. The sommelier is strict about only bringing it out on direct orders from Kor himself, so Glayder steps in and tries to lower his guard by flirting with him. This has no effect, so the group settles for a very similar-tasting red wine instead. They then move on to the next part of the plan: entering the casino car to steal Ambassador Kosh's ring, as well as to incapacitate James Sortan, the captain of the King's Shields, in order to make their heist easier.
Inside the casino car, they see groups of nobles playing a dice game called Dragon Flight, as well as Narcy of Xandrar on security duty once more. While Elloven, Glayder, and Khetari sit down to gamble and learn the rules of the game, Isabelle quickly grows bored and strikes up a chat with the archmage. Narcy acts very aloof and preoccupied with her work, to the point where Isabelle accuses her of "looking like she'd cast detect magic in a Cannith factory", but warms up and zones into reality a little more. They compare notes on spellcasting techniques, and Isabelle is surprised to learn that Narcy can throw around banishment and forcecage spells with relative ease.
In the meantime, the other three find a seat at Sortan's table, where his luck is so awful he claims to have been cursed by Olladra herself. He and Elloven chat a bit and compare fighting techniques, and Elloven suggests that the winner of the game buy a drink for everyone at the table. Glayder comes in first, but elects to go for water instead, leaving Elloven and Sortan to have a drinking contest, which results in Sortan eventually blacking out. Elloven quickly searches him and finds a slip of paper in his coat: "Our man has a feather in his cap". With that out of the way, everyone moves on to the high stakes room to steal Ambassador Kosh's ring, which is made much easier by the fact that he literally adds it to the betting pool, not anticipating the risk of losing it.
Glayder wins handily again, apparently blessed with supernatural luck, and takes a moment to look around the casino before leaving. In the bathroom, she and Isabelle find a few cans of neon blue paint, identifying it as Sky Blue paint -- a dangerous explosive that functions as a mini-portal to Fernia, the fire plane. When Sky is informed of this, she disarms the explosives, but takes this development as meaning that the Prophecy verse referred to the paint, not her, all along. She quickly grows sad and defeatist, until Isabelle assures her she's important no matter what some prophecy says. They then move on to the passenger cabin, to identify the undercover King's Shields and point them out to Sky so she can knock them out. Sky mentions that one of the secret agents is seated next to a nobleman with a monocle, and also asks the group to try and steal a case of military papers from an officer on board.
Khetari and Isabelle pretend to be lost and peers into as many passenger compartments as they can, overhearing snippets of gossip about the Armistice Day Ball and the worssening plague New Cyre. They spot the monocled noble seated next to a man in a beret, and the group quickly identifies all five undercover agents as wearing berets to identify each other. Elloven finds a man with a feather in his hat, seated alone with a hamper tucked under his chair, and offers him a glass of nightcap-infused tea to incapacitate him and steal the papers. Glayder, meanwhile, finds a group of passengers with yet another hamper -- this one flecked with Sky Blue paint -- tucked under their seats as well. None of them seem to know how it got there, and allow her to take it to show Sky, whose response is even more panicked than last time.
After Sky incapacitates the agents, the group moves on to the war room, both to steal Lord Kor's ring and find a dossier on the Mournland. Glayder dons her military disguise to distract the clerk by the file room while Isabelle slips in to grab the papers. However, while Isabelle is there, she notices a janitor carrying a few more pots of Sky Blue paint, supervised by a bored-looking guard. She puts on a very unconvincing performance of being a fellow janitor here to relieve her coworker from his duty, resulting in the guard not believing her, and the conversation going in circles for a while. She eventually sneaks out to the rest of the group.
Glayder, Elloven, and Khetari all get the proper authorisation to enter the war room, where they see Lord Kor and a few other Brelish officers drafting a plan for what to do if Thrane declares war. Kor asks the group for their input, and Glayder slips into full Empress of the Damned mode, laying out an entirely too detailed plan to use Aundair's vendetta against Thrane to conscript their forces into invading Flamekeep via Scion's Sound. Khetari is a little put off, as this is her hometown they're talking about, but has utmost faith in Glayder. Elloven and Kor, however, are having none of her war crimes. Isabelle slips back in partway through this, and picks the locks on a safe near the back of the room while Kor is distracted, stealing the vault keys from within. In the meantime, an extremely anxious Khetari, with Nimble's help, slips Kor's ring off his finger.
The group then decides what to do about the "janitor" and his paint. Glayder gives Isabelle her military disguise, and she casts alter self to look like Lord Kor, demanding that the guard turn the suspicious janitor over to "him" instead. With the guard out of the way, Elloven stabs the slippery crime boy with a tranquilising syringe, incapacitating him. Sky's anxiety grows further as she disarms the explosives again. On his unconscious body, they find a paper with the number 6372849 on it.
With everything in place, it's time to enter the vault car and finish this heist for good. Because they'd received both signet rings, the countermeasures are easy enough to disable, though Isabelle almost sets off every trap as she rushes towards the tigers crammed into a cage near the back of the room. Thankfully, Glayder convinces her to wait until the countermeasures are down, and the large cats get plenty of pets and food. Isabelle quickly picks the locks on their cages, allowing them to stretch their legs.
However, they're interrupted by assassins proclaiming themselves to be members of the Swords of Liberty, a revolutionary organisation that wants to assassinate Lord Kor and take over the monarchy. After fighting their way through with a little aid from the now friendly tigers, the assassins are quickly dispatched, and the group heads to use the vault keys on the door at the other side of the car. Instead of entering the vault, though, they step out into open air: the vault car had apparently been decoupled from the rest of the train.
Once back in Salvation, they receive a letter from Sky, saying that she is sorry for tricking them into creating a massive distraction for her, and that she and Earl will use all the stolen money to find her father and donate to the poorer districts of Sharn. She also sends them the Oracle dossier they'd been looking for.