Session Ten, Part Four: Dirty Secrets Underground
Yeah, I know I said "Butchery and Bloodbath", but it took me longer to get to the butchery than I thought. So next time.
Eight of the Clock - A Deathtrap, Somewhere Under the Merchant's District
The trapped guardsmen turned their attention to the walls. "There's got to be another way out!" snapped Dru.
"This wall is hinged," grunted Di'Fier, as he pushed against it. "But I can't budge it...too heavy!" A head-sized chunk of rock rolled down a pile and slammed into his leg, nearly knocking him over. He scrambled away from the wall and over to a tiny window set in the side of the room. "There's someone out there...hey! HEY!"
The room began to tilt, and Di'Fier swung away from the window. "He's in on it. He saw me and kept going."
Dru growled, and in one smooth motion pulled her bow from her back, nocked it, and fired an arrow through the tiny window. It thudded home deep in the man's skull, knocking him over backwards. "Take
that," she spat.
Slowly, the room tilted ever upwards, and more and heavier rocks bounced down to smash into the hinged iron wall. It began to swing open, pulled by gravity, and the rocks fell into the grinding teeth below, skittering and spinning until they were sucked between the massive rollers and crushed to powder.
Suddenly, the rocks under Di'Fier's feet gave way, sending the watchman sliding downwards! Dru's hand darted out and latched onto his wrist as he slid past her, but his weight yanked her off balance as well. The elf grabbed desperately at the edge of the window, catching on with her fingertips. Her forgotten bow bounced once off the floor, and then was splintered by the grinding teeth of the rock crusher, revolving scant inches from Di'Fier's boots.
"Can't hold on much longer..." she gritted. "Looks like this is it..." She could feel her grip slipping.
Then, she remembered. "Di'Fier...in my pouch...spider climb potion..." With a mighty effort she pulled him upward. "Grab it!"
The room began to shake, and she could feel the sweat making her grip slick, watching her partner dig for the potion vial...then there it was, in his hand. He flicked the cap free and swallowed it as Dru swung him over to the side of the wall, and then slipped free of the window, barely catching herself on his back. The mage climbed to the top of the box as it shuddered and shook, dislodging the last remnants of rock and pulverizing them...
...and then began slowly to settle back to a horizontal position.
"I don't
believe he did that," growled Dru, as the pair worked on the concealed door back into the sewers. "When I get my hands on him..." The clenching and unclenching of her fists left little doubt as to the unspoken end of her sentence.
"He took the map, too," said Di'Fier. "But I'll bet it wasn't the real Brother Egil. It seems like
everyone we run into these days hides their identity with magic." The door finally opened under his prying fingers, and he stepped into the sewers and looked around. "I'll bet he went farther on," he said. "There must be another secret door."
"Yeah, or another trap," muttered his companion - but she pulled her punch-dagger, illuminating the tunnel with an azure glow, and moved on down the walkway.
A dozen steps farther on, she slowed, then began to study the wall. "I think there's another door."
"It's a lot better hidden than the last one," Di'Fier observed. "That looks promising..."
Dru grunted her assent as she studied the door. Somewhere was the key top opening it...ahh, there it was. She fitted her slender fingers into the mortarless gap between two bricks and was rewarded with the click of a latch. The door swung noiselessly open onto darkness. Stepping forward, she nearly tumbled down the steep slope behind the door.
"What kind of idiots put a
ramp right inside their front door?" she grumbled, descending more carefully. Above her, Di'Fier half-walked, half-slid down the slope, making her inch to the side.
Just in case.
The narrow corridor at the foot of the ramp led off into darkness, with open archways intermittently spaced along the walls. The first led only to storage rooms, but the second was a room filled with books and papers.
"I can't read this gibberish," Dru said, tossing the book back on the desk and beginning to rifle through the drawers.
"These books are written in Valossan," said Di'Fier. "Maybe Garto could translate them for us. Hmm...what's this?" He reached out and picked up a slender volume. "
The True and Secrette Historie of the Brotherhoode of Free-porte. And it's in Common." He shoved the small book into his pouch and promptly forgot about it - his partner had finished searching the desk and was fondling her throwing knives as she regarded the book-case. "Let's keep going for now," he decided hastily, and they moved off down the corridor, as it curved around in a semicircle.
Unknown to the two watchmen, their progress did not go unnoticed. A jangling of bells, unheard save for one person, marked their passage. The hearer slipped from the bed of pillows she had made for herself, and for a moment her silhouette was visible on the wall - a silhouette clearly not human. But any casual observer would think that such an impression was mistaken, for in moments the shadow had softened, changed, even as the flesh of its caster did the same.
The woman looked down at her naked form and tried to supress a shudder at the things she was forced to do in the service of the Brotherhood. A heavy, jeweled ring glinted in the dim light as she reached out for a garment to cover herself, and she slipped into a set of plain grey robes - the robes of an acolyte of the Temple of Knowledge.
There was a rustle of fabric, a creak of a door, and she was gone. Only a few stray scales left behind in the massed pillows marked that she had ever been present.
The passage curved around and opened into an enormous hall, hewn from the rock under the city - a natural cavern, enlarged to meet the needs of its present occupants. Despite it's size, the cavern was dominated by an enormous squatting statue: the tentacled reptilian horror known as the Unspeakable One - and carved into the stone above it was the all-too-familiar Yellow Sign.
Below, dwarfed by the idol: a black altar of basalt with a figure strapped to it, and another, robed figure pacing back and forth. The robed figure droned a chant as it swung its thurible back and forth, clouds of smoky incense pouring from the metal ball at the end of its chain. Beside the altar stood a brazier filled with glowing coals, and the handle of an unknown implement projecting from it indicated that it was not merely to warm the chill air of the room.
The Guardsmen hunched in the entryway long enough to take in the scene - until Dru recognized the figure on the altar. "Egil!" she gasped, and in one motion she was charging across the room at top speed, her rapier ringing as she pulled it forth from its sheath to strike at the acolyte. With a startled squawk, the priest dove out of the way, shouting for help and leaving the thurible to bounce and spin on the cavern floor.
Di'Fier drew his blade with one hand, the other already bent in the mystic pattern that would conjure forces to protect him from harm. He spoke the familiar words of the spell and for a moment was surrounded by a blue shimmer that quickly faded to invisibility. Thus defended, he moved forward into the center of the room. Behind him, he heard the clacking of claws on stone, and whirled to face a pair of the vile serpentmen as they entered from the hallway.
The second time, Dru did not miss - her blade found the acolyte's heart. But it was too late - the alarm had been raised. Moving to Egil's side, she pulled a potion from her pouch and poured it down the unconscious priest's throat, then began sawing at his bonds.
Meanwhile, Di'Fier was holding off the serpentmen - but more were emerging from the tunnel. A second of the creatures crashed to the floor beside the first, but two had already gotten past him and charged towards his partner and Brother Egil.
Dru shoved the battered priest out of the way, but for her trouble one of the spears found a home in her side. The blood only seemed to make her angrier, and her arm thrust forward, sending steel six inches through the ophidian warrior's skull and out the other side. The other serpentman raised his spear to strike as Dru struggled to free her blade - but it suddenly staggered. The hiss of pain blended with the hiss of burning flesh: Egil had delivered a two-handed blow with a red-hot branding iron!
Di'Fier moved forward to hold the doorway as another pair of the creatures entered. "How many of them
are there?" he wondered to himself as his heavy blade knocked aside their spear-thrusts. His riposte staggered the creature, and it managed one last feeble thrust at him before it expired. Its partner had already gone to the aid of the serpentman attacking Dru and Egil. Seeing no more appearing, Di'Fier followed.
Dru had leapt upon the altar, her blade a shining arc of steel as she parried the creature's thrusts. Egil's weakened state made his mighty swings with the branding iron go wide. But Di'Fier's charge from behind turned the tide, and the two remaining serpentmen were quickly dealt with. The stone statue of the Unspeakable One stared impassively down at the carnage.
Half Past Eight of the Clock - Temple District
In the city above, wheels were set in motion and plans advanced. But Brother Harmon, acolyte of the Temple of Knowledge, knew none of this. He was returning from an errand, hurrying, because the sun had already sunk below the horizon, and the brother firmly believed that the streets of Freeport were not safe after dark.
In this, the brother was perfectly correct.
A pair of shadows detached themselves from a nearby doorway, and moved to flank the unsuspecting priest. Before he could even cry out, a hand was fastened over his mouth, and the luckless acolyte was half-dragged, half carried into the shelter of a nearby alley.
Moments later, Brother Harmon emerged. His robe and tunic were askew, torn and bloody. He looked pale and disheveled. As he hurried towards the temple, one hand slipped inside the robe to caress the knife hidden there.
The scene repeated itself, all across the city.
Meanwhile, Dru and Di'fier had searched the blood-splattered temple. Di'Fier studied the paper he had found with a frown. Dru returned from her inspection of the statue to look at it. "What is it?"
"I'm not sure," the young mage replied. "It's in Valossan - or most of it is."
"Most of it?"
Di'Fier extended a finger. In more than one place on the page, words - or rather names - were written in the Common tongue: Verlaine...Drusillia Naïlo...and "Di'Fier". "I'm not sure what it says, but it can't be good."
"Well, come and have a look at this. There's a back entrance to this place." Dru led the others behind the statue, where a ramp twin to the one they had descended lead upward. "I think we should find out where this leads," she said. Di'Fier and Egil nodded their agreement.
As her partner struggled up the slope, Dru remained behind to help the battered Brother Egil with the climb. She extended a hand to the priest. "Come on, I've got you." Grasping his hand, she moved to pull him up, but even as she did, her foot slipped. Egil, his support suddenly removed, tumbled back down the ramp into the temple. "Egil!" she cried, running headlong down the ramp.
The priest lay in a moaning ball at the bottom. Dru fumbled another vial of healing elixir from her pouch and poured it into his mouth. As she watched, the scrapes and contusions he had suffered vanished, and the priest sat up. "Come on," she said again, but Egil held upa hand to forestall her.
"Thank you, I think I will climb on my own." On hands and knees, he made slow, laborious progress up the ramp.
Di'Fier waited at the top. "We're in some kind of wine cellar," he reported. "Again. There's more of those Bierce Vintner crates that the serpentmen had, but they're all empty." He paused a moment, then took a deep breath. "I think this is Verlaine's house."
Dru shrugged. "Wouldn't surprise me at all. Shall we check it out?"
Di'Fier nodded. "There's a stairway at the far end of the room. I haven't checked it out yet."
As quietly as possible, the trio crept up the stairs. Verlaine's home was well-appointed - lavishly so - but there was one thing missing.
"Where
is everybody?" asked Di'Fier. "No servants, no guards...I don't like this."
Dru frowned. "He's left his dinner uneaten," she said, looking into the dining room. "I
really don't like this. Let's check out the second floor."
Again, the trio crept up the wooden stairs, passing by paintings of merchant freighters owned by the councillor. As their heads reached the level of the floor above, Dru looked to her left - and froze.
Three doors opened off of the upstairs hall. From underneath one of them oozed a slowly spreading pool of red. A coppery tang permeated the air - a smell all too familiar to both watchmen...the smell of blood.
What fate has befallen Councillor Verlaine? What sinister plots were set in motion when the Watchmen discovered the serpent temple? Who yet lurks in the shadows ready to betray the Temple of Knowledge? Find out in our next episode: "Butchery and Bloodbath (for real this time)"!