Shemeska's Planescape Storyhour (Updated 29 Jan 2014)
Veltharis ap Rylix
Legend
Looking forward to it, Shemmy, though I think I'm going to reread from the beginning, seeing as it has been a while. 
Shemeska
Adventurer
Merry belated Orthodox Christmas
Twenty four hours passed rapidly, with most of the time spent with the group’s resources divided between repairing the damage from the tanar’ri attack, and exploring sites further towards the Crag. It was an odd mixture of emotions too that crossed the minds of each and every one of them as well: distress and lament over their loss –as the bodies lay covered and magically preserved at the edge of camp- and excitement at finally having approval to explore the most promising of the crag’s many possible locations. A sample of Gautish was there on the forbidding, shadow swathed flanks of Howler’s Crag, and soon they hoped to find it.
But as Pandemonium had already shown them, the darkness held physical horrors as well as the terrors of pareidolia, borne of shadows and howling wind, and it would not be long before they discovered both.
Brennan Olerik stumbled forwards and fell roughly to his hands and knees as the ground shifted and fell away from beneath his feet with a soft metallic chorus. The darkness was overwhelming and claustrophobic, yet at the same time he had the distinct impression that the room around him was massive, even if he couldn’t see his own hands.
He hadn’t meant to do it. It was a mistake and he’d thought himself clever for figuring out the riddle, but now he was lost and along, stranded somewhere without light or any conceivable way of getting back.
“Beshaba f*ck me…” Brennan cursed. “Where the hell am I?”
He moved his hands forwards, trying to gain some bearing on his surroundings. Another soft chorus of clinking, sliding metal and some other scattered, hard to identify sounds. What the hell was covering the ground? It was cold, whatever it was.
Gingerly, Brennan picked up one of the small objects and felt its dimensions between his fingers. Even bringing it up to his face he wasn’t able to make out any detail, but even so, it was clear that it was a coin of some sort.
He shuffled his knees and spread his hands out again, and everywhere he touched the carpet of coins shifted and moved. Far from covering the floor, he was sprawled on top of a massive hoard of treasure as far as he could feel, and given his odd sense of the room’s monstrous size, it probably held more wealth than he could conceivably count in a lifetime.
“Forget your damned sister.” Brennan whispered incredulously. “Tymora, I love you. Whatever I’ve ever done to gain your fortune, it certainly paid off this time.”
He laughed and hurled handfuls of gold up into the air –presumably at least some of it was gold- and cackled as it fell to the ground all around him. He was rich beyond his wildest dreams. More coins sifted between his fingers along with what felt like cut gemstones, a necklace of some sort, and what felt like some manner of statuary.
“I’m f*cking rich.” Brennan exclaimed several times in succession before coming to another realization. “…but where the hell am I and what use is that if I can’t f*cking get back to use it.”
That sullied his mood for a moment, but only temporarily. Greed rapidly overwhelmed common sense, but he was no fool and his brain was already spinning his options. He wasn’t a mage, but it was very likely that the portal wasn’t one way, and it probably had the same or a similar method of activation. Had the riddle on the portal been just some archmage’s cruel joke from millennia past, he likely would have stumbled into a pile of skeletons rather than the sea of wealth he currently found himself marooned within.
Brennan rose unsteadily to his feet as the coins shifted in response to his weight. He still couldn’t see a thing, even though his eyes should have adjusted to the lack of light. That likely meant that there simply was no light to be found; the chamber of cavern he’d discovered was likely sealed off from anything else that might have provided any measure of illumination, natural or not.
“Probably in Agathion.” He reasoned. “Some sort of hoard forgotten for a damn long time. If anyone valued it, I’d already be dead because they would have left traps or wards. Plus, the riddle was probably a test of sorts. Only someone who could speak the language would have found this, so it’s probably mine for the taking.”
He grinned in the darkness, realizing that even if he couldn’t find a way out on his own, his group would be frantic about finding him. They might demand a share of his newfound wealth, but 9 Hells and a bottomless Abyss, there was plenty to go around.
“Let them take what they want.” Brennan shouted. “I’m f*cking rich.”
His voice echoed around the cavern, but the delay was so long that the chamber must have measured a mile or more across. That was when he noticed it though: the smell.
Concentrating so much on sound and his useless sense of sight, plus flooded with adrenaline as he was, he hadn’t really taken the cavern’s smell into consideration. There was the dull, heavy scent of stone and the sharp tang of copper and silver as they both slowly oxidized within a sea of untouched gold. But that was not all that Brennan noticed.
“Oh gods…”
White flashed before the mortal’s eyes, painfully stinging his retinas as the darkness was thrown back like a sash before his pupils contracted furiously. Grimacing, Brennan shaded his eyes and looked up as burning yellow light washed over him and the surrounding sea of treasure. Amid the wash of heavy serpentine odor that passed over him like a cresting wave, he gazed up at a single, gargantuan eye whose slit pupil was easily twice the size of a horse.
“HeLLo LiTtLE tHiEf…”
Tristol’s ears perked and then immediately fell back against his head. He sighed and hung his head.
“When did you notice?” He asked.
“Well… a few minutes ago.” One of the sages hesitantly said, noticing the mage’s expression of disappointment. “But umm… none of us really remember seeing him for at least an hour or two.”
Tristol turned away and muttered several uncouth words in Aquan, and at least one of the sages understood him based on how their expression twitched. It wasn’t a kind phrase, but after all that had happened in the past day, they’d wandered up to him sullenly with the news that one of their group had gone missing. It had happened before, but after they had killed the tanar’ri, it had seemed patently obvious that most of their problems lurking in the dark wilds around the crag were over.
Apparently not.
Clueless? Tristol called out over a conjured telepathic link.We have a problem… again…
Tristol’s portion of their current group of a dozen sages had already covered and recovered the ground that they’d been searching for writing samples that day by the time that Clueless arrived with his contingent. Tristol seemed annoyed and the sages were on edge with nervous guilt.
“One more time we go over everything.” Tristol said, his tail slightly bottlebrushed and twitching rapidly in short, back and forth motions. “With luck he just took a nap behind a rock and we left him behind hours ago as we moved up the edge of the Crag.”
Thirty minutes later though, they found not a trace of him, but they did run across something that they’d found days before.
Clueless glanced at Tristol and both of them looked up at the pair of partially fallen columns of stone and its keyed portal that lay in the space between them. It seemed like a stretch, and then was no way to know where precisely it led, not given the nature of the Crag.
“It’s the only place that we haven’t looked.” Clueless said.
“Assuming something didn’t eat him and wander off back into the dark.” Tristol replied. “But we’re not being paid to chalk it up to that without looking everywhere we can.”
Nisha? Tristol called out through the link. Have you or Toras found anything over on your side of the crag?
I found a bug under a rock. But I don’t think that counts. Unless a mad wizard is on the loose, transmuting his victims into entomology samples to pin to his collection board in a horrible display of depraved…
I really, really don’t that’s the case Nisha. Tristol replied, cutting her off. But you keep looking, and let me know if you find an insane wizard.
OK!
Tristol shook his head and smiled. “Nothing over there either.”
Clueless grinned, “Does Nisha count as an insane wizard? Technically she might.”
“She can only cast like three spells, but don’t give her that idea regardless.” Tristol said, one ear twitching at the thought. “She’ll run around asking people to call her the grand butterfly mage or something like that.”
“You’d find it adorable.”
“Yes. Yes I would.” Tristol blushed.
The wind whistled strongly, gusting through the pillars with an ear-splitting whistle, breaking their train of thought and bringing them back to the matter at hand. Despite the risk and question surrounding the portal, it was the only likely choice at the moment.
“So how do you want to do this?” Tristol asked. “If our missing sage is just trapped on the other side of a one-way portal, or hurt and unable to move, or just doesn’t know the portal key on the other side it’s an easy enough trip. But if there’s something on the other side that’s a danger, it’s not going to be a wise idea to have one of us go in alone.”
“I’ll go with you, but I can’t leave the rest of the group out here in the dark unsupervised.” Clueless glanced out towards where the other sages sat and waited for some decision for what to do next.
“Everyone! Listen closely!” Tristol announced to their assembled charges. “We’re pretty sure that our missing man stumbled through a portal here by accident. The key is a simple one, and he could have triggered it without intending to. We don’t think something came out and snatched him up, and most likely he’s just stuck on the other side, scared, cold, and thirsty. With luck it won’t take long to get him and then be back here.”
“Is the portal two way?” One voice asked.
“We believe so, yes.” Clueless answered. “But we can’t be absolutely certain, so we’re going to have Tristol go with me.”
Some mutters of discontent and worry drifted up from the group.
“We’re not going to leave you all here unprotected while we vanish into a portal.” Tristol explained, trying to pacify the crowd. “You’ll all be going with us. We could call one of the other groups over here and have you stay with them, but that’s going to take far too long, and in that time our man on the other side of the portal might hurt himself if he hasn’t already. It’s the safest way and the quickest way to get everyone back safe to the campsite.”
They seemed skeptical, but with all that had happened in the past few days, not a one of them cared to be left alone in the tumult. They’d be more at risk of an accidental fall or a demon’s claws if they stayed behind or walked back to camp on their own versus the unknown risks beyond the portal when they had a pair of more than competent guards, one of them a wizard and the other with his own pronounced magical talents as well.
“Is there anyone who wants to object to this?” Clueless called out. “If you do, raise a hand and let us know what your concern is.”
More murmurs and discussion went on with a low rumble, dampened by the wind, but after a few minutes of back and forth discussion between the sages, not a one of them raised a hand. For better or for worse, they were all going together.
“That settles it then!” Clueless said. “We’ll open the portal, and then we’ll let you know how we’ll handle it from there. Hold still for a few.”
The bladesinger turned back to Tristol and smiled. “That went well. I expected more dissent.”
“They’re more afraid of tanar’ri in the dark than they are of us apparently.” Tristol mused. “Which is either a good thing or we’re losing a bit of something as they get to know us more.”
Clueless chuckled. “Let me tell a few others where we’re going, and to send help if we’re not back in an hour or two. Take a look at that portal again while I’m at it.”
Tristol nodded as Clueless stepped off to one side and used their link to touch base with Toras, Florian, and Fyrehowl. Meanwhile he glanced up at the script on the pair of pillars leaning against one another.
“Howl into the winds of lament. Scream into the face of the storm and be not surprised to find the Howling answer back in turn.” Tristol intoned in the same language the runes were carved in. Simply repeating the words didn’t trigger the portal, but yelling into the gap would. Though one thing did stand out: the odd way that the words said “Howling”. At first he assumed that it just meant that the wind would scream back full-force when the portal opened, but the phrasing was imprecise and odd, used in a way he wasn’t entirely familiar with, and as such it didn’t cross his mind to consider that it might have been a proper name.
“You want the honors?” Clueless asked as he walked back over to the wizard. “Or shall I?”
“Be my guest.” Tristol said, turning his ears down slightly and back in case one scream triggered another.
Clueless nodded and stepped forward, directly in front of the pair of toppled pillars and their bound space. Inhaling deeply he let out a scream as loud as he could manage, and as the scream rebounded across the stones and echoed back, it seemed magnified, louder than it should have been. For a brief moment the surrounding wind simply stopped, snuffed out and left Clueless and the others pensive about what would happen next. The air was still, the darkness secondary to the unnatural quiet, and in unison the runes on both columns began to glow a sickly pale-yellow light.
“And there you go!” Tristol said, smiling as a swirling yellow portal formed with a crackle of energy and a sudden resumption of the wind. His ears twitched with some small measure of satisfaction. “Just get the group together and we can go in. Though I can’t say how long it’ll stay open, the key is simple enough we can just do it again.”
Clueless nodded and turned around to face the assembled sages. “Alright everyone, we don’t have a clue what’s on the other side, just that we won’t be heading to the Abyss or anywhere else blatantly hostile. But I need everyone to follow closely and above all, don’t bloody touch anything unless it tries to bite you.”
There were some murmurs of discontent, worry, and one or two questions about how precisely they knew that it didn’t lead straight into Demogorgon’s larder or Malcanthet’s bedroom. But in the end they packed together into a close group, following behind Clueless, with Tristol to bring up the rear, intending to force open the portal in the event that something horrific actually did wait on the other side.
At first there was oppressive silence, an utter absence of wind, and darkness. As their eyes adjusted to the gloom and the light provided by the slowly closing portal and their own quickly lit torches, they found just where they’d been taken. The cavern, a bubble inside the stone of Agathion, stretched out of sight while the cavern wall behind them was alternately smooth, or carved into massive and beautiful high-relief sculptures, juxtaposed with wide swathes of random draconic script rambling and meandering across the walls in all directions, reversing itself, written upside down or backwards at times like the end result of a windstorm and a draconic lectionary: or the results of rampant insanity.
“There’s gold everywhere!” Came the amazed voice of one sage as he realized that his shifting position and stance came from the clinking movement of piles of coin underfoot.
The chorus grew in excitement as lights were lifted high and they took in the truly awesome scope of the hoard. Piles of treasure heaped as high as a dozen men in places washed out over the floor of the cavern as far as the limit of the light, flickering and returning the illumination in the glitter of gold and silver and the sparkling, twinkling reflection and refraction in gemstones. In fact, they quickly realized that at no point could they even actually see the presumed stone floor of the chamber at all; for all they knew the treasure of a dozen kingdoms extended down even deeper underfoot.
“Tristol…” Clueless quickly and silently intoned over the link. ”naughty word we have a problem. Get to working on that portal NOW.”
Missed by the vast majority of the sages in their sudden tidal wave of overwhelmed greed were two things: the oppressive and building reptilian odor of the chamber that perfused the treasure with the electric, static charge of an impending thunderstorm, and the soft, desperate whimpering of a single figure a few dozen feet ahead of them – their lost and now found sage.
“Oh thank the Gods…” His voice trembled and broke with emotion. To a more sensitive nose he would have reeked with urine and abject fear. “Please, please help me. I don’t know where it is. It can move without a sound! It thinks that…”
His desperate, whimpered plea was silenced as without warning the chamber flooded with brilliant illumination as something titanic opened its eyes, washing them with a sickly yellow glow like flames from the yawning mouths of twin portals to Hell. One eye a pool of light centered around a tiny pinprick of a pupil, the other pupil blown, massive and limned with only the smallest coronal fringe of brilliant light, cross-dilated with the trappings of madness.
“ThE HOWL AnsWeRs BAcK MoRTaLs…”
Meanwhile, back in camp, Doran offered Ficklebarb a bit of candy. Ever since the tanar’ri attack the pseudodragon had been increasingly more and more skittish. Every errant noise was a monster beyond the firelight, each aberrant shadow a looming demon, and he seemed preoccupied and overwhelmed at all that had happened.
“Not hungry?” The elf asked.
“Not really.” Ficklebarb said, shaking his head as he slumped across a pile of books on his master’s desk. Leobtav was out discussing the plan for the next day with the first group that had returned to camp, and would speak to the others once they returned. There was apparently some sort of problem with Clueless and Tristol’s group. Something about a giant bug and a boulder, but Nisha hadn’t been very clear about it, just that she had the situation under control.
“I’m worried.” Ficklebarb lamented. “I’m scared that the bad person is going to come back and kill someone again.”
“Oh you poor thing.” Doran said with a smile, “There’s no bad man out there. We’ve had some problems with the wind and some monsters out there in the dark, but we have some very brave and very talented people working for us. They know what’s out there now and they know how to handle it. You needn’t worry. And besides, you’re a dragon. What does a dragon have to worry about?”
“But the bad man…” Ficklebarb began before Doran shushed him with a wave of his hand.
“Don’t worry.” The elf explained. “I’ll see if we can’t all do something this evening around the campfire that puts everyone into a better mood, and something that will put a more positive edge on your spirits. And I’ll see if your master can’t let you have some fun while he and I go over the script samples we found today. How does that sound?”
“That sounds pretty good actually.” Ficklebarb chirped, trying to smile. “I’d like that a lot.”
“See?” Doran said. “You’ve always been good like that since I’ve known you. No matter what happens you always seem to be able to pick right back up and be the same happy, mischievous, red-scaled terror I’ve come to know.”
Ficklebarb smiled as the elf rubbed him under the chin.
“I’ll be back in a little bit.” Doran explained, turning towards the door. “I’ve got to talk to Toras and his group, but I’ll have someone come back and chatter with you. Maybe Nisha; she seems to like you quite a lot.”
The expedition’s co-leader gave the tiny dragon one last smile and made his exit, but the moment that he did, the familiar’s happy expression faded considerably.
“The bad man isn’t out there in the darkness. He’s not a monster or a demon. He wasn’t something we found here. He came here with us. And I’ve seen him…”
Twenty four hours passed rapidly, with most of the time spent with the group’s resources divided between repairing the damage from the tanar’ri attack, and exploring sites further towards the Crag. It was an odd mixture of emotions too that crossed the minds of each and every one of them as well: distress and lament over their loss –as the bodies lay covered and magically preserved at the edge of camp- and excitement at finally having approval to explore the most promising of the crag’s many possible locations. A sample of Gautish was there on the forbidding, shadow swathed flanks of Howler’s Crag, and soon they hoped to find it.
But as Pandemonium had already shown them, the darkness held physical horrors as well as the terrors of pareidolia, borne of shadows and howling wind, and it would not be long before they discovered both.
***
Brennan Olerik stumbled forwards and fell roughly to his hands and knees as the ground shifted and fell away from beneath his feet with a soft metallic chorus. The darkness was overwhelming and claustrophobic, yet at the same time he had the distinct impression that the room around him was massive, even if he couldn’t see his own hands.
He hadn’t meant to do it. It was a mistake and he’d thought himself clever for figuring out the riddle, but now he was lost and along, stranded somewhere without light or any conceivable way of getting back.
“Beshaba f*ck me…” Brennan cursed. “Where the hell am I?”
He moved his hands forwards, trying to gain some bearing on his surroundings. Another soft chorus of clinking, sliding metal and some other scattered, hard to identify sounds. What the hell was covering the ground? It was cold, whatever it was.
Gingerly, Brennan picked up one of the small objects and felt its dimensions between his fingers. Even bringing it up to his face he wasn’t able to make out any detail, but even so, it was clear that it was a coin of some sort.
He shuffled his knees and spread his hands out again, and everywhere he touched the carpet of coins shifted and moved. Far from covering the floor, he was sprawled on top of a massive hoard of treasure as far as he could feel, and given his odd sense of the room’s monstrous size, it probably held more wealth than he could conceivably count in a lifetime.
“Forget your damned sister.” Brennan whispered incredulously. “Tymora, I love you. Whatever I’ve ever done to gain your fortune, it certainly paid off this time.”
He laughed and hurled handfuls of gold up into the air –presumably at least some of it was gold- and cackled as it fell to the ground all around him. He was rich beyond his wildest dreams. More coins sifted between his fingers along with what felt like cut gemstones, a necklace of some sort, and what felt like some manner of statuary.
“I’m f*cking rich.” Brennan exclaimed several times in succession before coming to another realization. “…but where the hell am I and what use is that if I can’t f*cking get back to use it.”
That sullied his mood for a moment, but only temporarily. Greed rapidly overwhelmed common sense, but he was no fool and his brain was already spinning his options. He wasn’t a mage, but it was very likely that the portal wasn’t one way, and it probably had the same or a similar method of activation. Had the riddle on the portal been just some archmage’s cruel joke from millennia past, he likely would have stumbled into a pile of skeletons rather than the sea of wealth he currently found himself marooned within.
Brennan rose unsteadily to his feet as the coins shifted in response to his weight. He still couldn’t see a thing, even though his eyes should have adjusted to the lack of light. That likely meant that there simply was no light to be found; the chamber of cavern he’d discovered was likely sealed off from anything else that might have provided any measure of illumination, natural or not.
“Probably in Agathion.” He reasoned. “Some sort of hoard forgotten for a damn long time. If anyone valued it, I’d already be dead because they would have left traps or wards. Plus, the riddle was probably a test of sorts. Only someone who could speak the language would have found this, so it’s probably mine for the taking.”
He grinned in the darkness, realizing that even if he couldn’t find a way out on his own, his group would be frantic about finding him. They might demand a share of his newfound wealth, but 9 Hells and a bottomless Abyss, there was plenty to go around.
“Let them take what they want.” Brennan shouted. “I’m f*cking rich.”
His voice echoed around the cavern, but the delay was so long that the chamber must have measured a mile or more across. That was when he noticed it though: the smell.
Concentrating so much on sound and his useless sense of sight, plus flooded with adrenaline as he was, he hadn’t really taken the cavern’s smell into consideration. There was the dull, heavy scent of stone and the sharp tang of copper and silver as they both slowly oxidized within a sea of untouched gold. But that was not all that Brennan noticed.
“Oh gods…”
White flashed before the mortal’s eyes, painfully stinging his retinas as the darkness was thrown back like a sash before his pupils contracted furiously. Grimacing, Brennan shaded his eyes and looked up as burning yellow light washed over him and the surrounding sea of treasure. Amid the wash of heavy serpentine odor that passed over him like a cresting wave, he gazed up at a single, gargantuan eye whose slit pupil was easily twice the size of a horse.
“HeLLo LiTtLE tHiEf…”
***
Tristol’s ears perked and then immediately fell back against his head. He sighed and hung his head.
“When did you notice?” He asked.
“Well… a few minutes ago.” One of the sages hesitantly said, noticing the mage’s expression of disappointment. “But umm… none of us really remember seeing him for at least an hour or two.”
Tristol turned away and muttered several uncouth words in Aquan, and at least one of the sages understood him based on how their expression twitched. It wasn’t a kind phrase, but after all that had happened in the past day, they’d wandered up to him sullenly with the news that one of their group had gone missing. It had happened before, but after they had killed the tanar’ri, it had seemed patently obvious that most of their problems lurking in the dark wilds around the crag were over.
Apparently not.
Clueless? Tristol called out over a conjured telepathic link.We have a problem… again…
Tristol’s portion of their current group of a dozen sages had already covered and recovered the ground that they’d been searching for writing samples that day by the time that Clueless arrived with his contingent. Tristol seemed annoyed and the sages were on edge with nervous guilt.
“One more time we go over everything.” Tristol said, his tail slightly bottlebrushed and twitching rapidly in short, back and forth motions. “With luck he just took a nap behind a rock and we left him behind hours ago as we moved up the edge of the Crag.”
Thirty minutes later though, they found not a trace of him, but they did run across something that they’d found days before.
Clueless glanced at Tristol and both of them looked up at the pair of partially fallen columns of stone and its keyed portal that lay in the space between them. It seemed like a stretch, and then was no way to know where precisely it led, not given the nature of the Crag.
“It’s the only place that we haven’t looked.” Clueless said.
“Assuming something didn’t eat him and wander off back into the dark.” Tristol replied. “But we’re not being paid to chalk it up to that without looking everywhere we can.”
Nisha? Tristol called out through the link. Have you or Toras found anything over on your side of the crag?
I found a bug under a rock. But I don’t think that counts. Unless a mad wizard is on the loose, transmuting his victims into entomology samples to pin to his collection board in a horrible display of depraved…
I really, really don’t that’s the case Nisha. Tristol replied, cutting her off. But you keep looking, and let me know if you find an insane wizard.
OK!
Tristol shook his head and smiled. “Nothing over there either.”
Clueless grinned, “Does Nisha count as an insane wizard? Technically she might.”
“She can only cast like three spells, but don’t give her that idea regardless.” Tristol said, one ear twitching at the thought. “She’ll run around asking people to call her the grand butterfly mage or something like that.”
“You’d find it adorable.”
“Yes. Yes I would.” Tristol blushed.
The wind whistled strongly, gusting through the pillars with an ear-splitting whistle, breaking their train of thought and bringing them back to the matter at hand. Despite the risk and question surrounding the portal, it was the only likely choice at the moment.
“So how do you want to do this?” Tristol asked. “If our missing sage is just trapped on the other side of a one-way portal, or hurt and unable to move, or just doesn’t know the portal key on the other side it’s an easy enough trip. But if there’s something on the other side that’s a danger, it’s not going to be a wise idea to have one of us go in alone.”
“I’ll go with you, but I can’t leave the rest of the group out here in the dark unsupervised.” Clueless glanced out towards where the other sages sat and waited for some decision for what to do next.
“Everyone! Listen closely!” Tristol announced to their assembled charges. “We’re pretty sure that our missing man stumbled through a portal here by accident. The key is a simple one, and he could have triggered it without intending to. We don’t think something came out and snatched him up, and most likely he’s just stuck on the other side, scared, cold, and thirsty. With luck it won’t take long to get him and then be back here.”
“Is the portal two way?” One voice asked.
“We believe so, yes.” Clueless answered. “But we can’t be absolutely certain, so we’re going to have Tristol go with me.”
Some mutters of discontent and worry drifted up from the group.
“We’re not going to leave you all here unprotected while we vanish into a portal.” Tristol explained, trying to pacify the crowd. “You’ll all be going with us. We could call one of the other groups over here and have you stay with them, but that’s going to take far too long, and in that time our man on the other side of the portal might hurt himself if he hasn’t already. It’s the safest way and the quickest way to get everyone back safe to the campsite.”
They seemed skeptical, but with all that had happened in the past few days, not a one of them cared to be left alone in the tumult. They’d be more at risk of an accidental fall or a demon’s claws if they stayed behind or walked back to camp on their own versus the unknown risks beyond the portal when they had a pair of more than competent guards, one of them a wizard and the other with his own pronounced magical talents as well.
“Is there anyone who wants to object to this?” Clueless called out. “If you do, raise a hand and let us know what your concern is.”
More murmurs and discussion went on with a low rumble, dampened by the wind, but after a few minutes of back and forth discussion between the sages, not a one of them raised a hand. For better or for worse, they were all going together.
“That settles it then!” Clueless said. “We’ll open the portal, and then we’ll let you know how we’ll handle it from there. Hold still for a few.”
The bladesinger turned back to Tristol and smiled. “That went well. I expected more dissent.”
“They’re more afraid of tanar’ri in the dark than they are of us apparently.” Tristol mused. “Which is either a good thing or we’re losing a bit of something as they get to know us more.”
Clueless chuckled. “Let me tell a few others where we’re going, and to send help if we’re not back in an hour or two. Take a look at that portal again while I’m at it.”
Tristol nodded as Clueless stepped off to one side and used their link to touch base with Toras, Florian, and Fyrehowl. Meanwhile he glanced up at the script on the pair of pillars leaning against one another.
“Howl into the winds of lament. Scream into the face of the storm and be not surprised to find the Howling answer back in turn.” Tristol intoned in the same language the runes were carved in. Simply repeating the words didn’t trigger the portal, but yelling into the gap would. Though one thing did stand out: the odd way that the words said “Howling”. At first he assumed that it just meant that the wind would scream back full-force when the portal opened, but the phrasing was imprecise and odd, used in a way he wasn’t entirely familiar with, and as such it didn’t cross his mind to consider that it might have been a proper name.
“You want the honors?” Clueless asked as he walked back over to the wizard. “Or shall I?”
“Be my guest.” Tristol said, turning his ears down slightly and back in case one scream triggered another.
Clueless nodded and stepped forward, directly in front of the pair of toppled pillars and their bound space. Inhaling deeply he let out a scream as loud as he could manage, and as the scream rebounded across the stones and echoed back, it seemed magnified, louder than it should have been. For a brief moment the surrounding wind simply stopped, snuffed out and left Clueless and the others pensive about what would happen next. The air was still, the darkness secondary to the unnatural quiet, and in unison the runes on both columns began to glow a sickly pale-yellow light.
“And there you go!” Tristol said, smiling as a swirling yellow portal formed with a crackle of energy and a sudden resumption of the wind. His ears twitched with some small measure of satisfaction. “Just get the group together and we can go in. Though I can’t say how long it’ll stay open, the key is simple enough we can just do it again.”
Clueless nodded and turned around to face the assembled sages. “Alright everyone, we don’t have a clue what’s on the other side, just that we won’t be heading to the Abyss or anywhere else blatantly hostile. But I need everyone to follow closely and above all, don’t bloody touch anything unless it tries to bite you.”
There were some murmurs of discontent, worry, and one or two questions about how precisely they knew that it didn’t lead straight into Demogorgon’s larder or Malcanthet’s bedroom. But in the end they packed together into a close group, following behind Clueless, with Tristol to bring up the rear, intending to force open the portal in the event that something horrific actually did wait on the other side.
At first there was oppressive silence, an utter absence of wind, and darkness. As their eyes adjusted to the gloom and the light provided by the slowly closing portal and their own quickly lit torches, they found just where they’d been taken. The cavern, a bubble inside the stone of Agathion, stretched out of sight while the cavern wall behind them was alternately smooth, or carved into massive and beautiful high-relief sculptures, juxtaposed with wide swathes of random draconic script rambling and meandering across the walls in all directions, reversing itself, written upside down or backwards at times like the end result of a windstorm and a draconic lectionary: or the results of rampant insanity.
“There’s gold everywhere!” Came the amazed voice of one sage as he realized that his shifting position and stance came from the clinking movement of piles of coin underfoot.
The chorus grew in excitement as lights were lifted high and they took in the truly awesome scope of the hoard. Piles of treasure heaped as high as a dozen men in places washed out over the floor of the cavern as far as the limit of the light, flickering and returning the illumination in the glitter of gold and silver and the sparkling, twinkling reflection and refraction in gemstones. In fact, they quickly realized that at no point could they even actually see the presumed stone floor of the chamber at all; for all they knew the treasure of a dozen kingdoms extended down even deeper underfoot.
“Tristol…” Clueless quickly and silently intoned over the link. ”naughty word we have a problem. Get to working on that portal NOW.”
Missed by the vast majority of the sages in their sudden tidal wave of overwhelmed greed were two things: the oppressive and building reptilian odor of the chamber that perfused the treasure with the electric, static charge of an impending thunderstorm, and the soft, desperate whimpering of a single figure a few dozen feet ahead of them – their lost and now found sage.
“Oh thank the Gods…” His voice trembled and broke with emotion. To a more sensitive nose he would have reeked with urine and abject fear. “Please, please help me. I don’t know where it is. It can move without a sound! It thinks that…”
His desperate, whimpered plea was silenced as without warning the chamber flooded with brilliant illumination as something titanic opened its eyes, washing them with a sickly yellow glow like flames from the yawning mouths of twin portals to Hell. One eye a pool of light centered around a tiny pinprick of a pupil, the other pupil blown, massive and limned with only the smallest coronal fringe of brilliant light, cross-dilated with the trappings of madness.
“ThE HOWL AnsWeRs BAcK MoRTaLs…”
***
Meanwhile, back in camp, Doran offered Ficklebarb a bit of candy. Ever since the tanar’ri attack the pseudodragon had been increasingly more and more skittish. Every errant noise was a monster beyond the firelight, each aberrant shadow a looming demon, and he seemed preoccupied and overwhelmed at all that had happened.
“Not hungry?” The elf asked.
“Not really.” Ficklebarb said, shaking his head as he slumped across a pile of books on his master’s desk. Leobtav was out discussing the plan for the next day with the first group that had returned to camp, and would speak to the others once they returned. There was apparently some sort of problem with Clueless and Tristol’s group. Something about a giant bug and a boulder, but Nisha hadn’t been very clear about it, just that she had the situation under control.
“I’m worried.” Ficklebarb lamented. “I’m scared that the bad person is going to come back and kill someone again.”
“Oh you poor thing.” Doran said with a smile, “There’s no bad man out there. We’ve had some problems with the wind and some monsters out there in the dark, but we have some very brave and very talented people working for us. They know what’s out there now and they know how to handle it. You needn’t worry. And besides, you’re a dragon. What does a dragon have to worry about?”
“But the bad man…” Ficklebarb began before Doran shushed him with a wave of his hand.
“Don’t worry.” The elf explained. “I’ll see if we can’t all do something this evening around the campfire that puts everyone into a better mood, and something that will put a more positive edge on your spirits. And I’ll see if your master can’t let you have some fun while he and I go over the script samples we found today. How does that sound?”
“That sounds pretty good actually.” Ficklebarb chirped, trying to smile. “I’d like that a lot.”
“See?” Doran said. “You’ve always been good like that since I’ve known you. No matter what happens you always seem to be able to pick right back up and be the same happy, mischievous, red-scaled terror I’ve come to know.”
Ficklebarb smiled as the elf rubbed him under the chin.
“I’ll be back in a little bit.” Doran explained, turning towards the door. “I’ve got to talk to Toras and his group, but I’ll have someone come back and chatter with you. Maybe Nisha; she seems to like you quite a lot.”
The expedition’s co-leader gave the tiny dragon one last smile and made his exit, but the moment that he did, the familiar’s happy expression faded considerably.
“The bad man isn’t out there in the darkness. He’s not a monster or a demon. He wasn’t something we found here. He came here with us. And I’ve seen him…”
***
Veltharis ap Rylix
Legend
Finally caught back up after rereading the Storyhour from the beginning. As always, incredible work Shemmy, and I look forward to your next update, whenever that may be.
I'm curious about who people think the "bad man" (as Ficklebarb puts it) is... What has been implied thus far leads me to think of Frollis, but that feels too easy, like he's an intentional red herring.
Let's get some speculation going! I hear it encourages the 'loth to write more!
EDIT: On a semi-related matter, how many of your Demented side-stories have you posted, Shemmy? I found 1-8 on Planewalker, but I thought I saw something that implied 9 ('The Chronicler') was out as well, though I couldn't find the story itself.
I'm curious about who people think the "bad man" (as Ficklebarb puts it) is... What has been implied thus far leads me to think of Frollis, but that feels too easy, like he's an intentional red herring.
Let's get some speculation going! I hear it encourages the 'loth to write more!
EDIT: On a semi-related matter, how many of your Demented side-stories have you posted, Shemmy? I found 1-8 on Planewalker, but I thought I saw something that implied 9 ('The Chronicler') was out as well, though I couldn't find the story itself.
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Shemeska
Adventurer
Finally caught back up after rereading the Storyhour from the beginning. As always, incredible work Shemmy, and I look forward to your next update, whenever that may be.
I'm curious about who people think the "bad man" (as Ficklebarb puts it) is... What has been implied thus far leads me to think of Frollis, but that feels too easy, like he's an intentional red herring.
Let's get some speculation going! I hear it encourages the 'loth to write more!
EDIT: On a semi-related matter, how many of your Demented side-stories have you posted, Shemmy? I found 1-8 on Planewalker, but I thought I saw something that implied 9 ('The Chronicler') was out as well, though I couldn't find the story itself.
My day job is killing me, so it'll be slow in coming. But not the 2 year hiatus it had been. I've gotten a good chunk of the next update done, and stuff for one or two after that as well. More hints on who the 'bad man' is on the way, along with the some side scenes from some other places and familiar faces. Just remember the Chronicler from the first post of the Storyhour, where he was and what he was talking about. That links in.
And The Chronicler is out there, let me try to find a link that's active. They were all (all the finished ones) on Planewalker, but after one of the site redesigns some of the links became invalid. Off the top of my head the Ineffable, the Architect, the Dreamer and one other are still unfinished.
