"Well, Erifeci means nothing on its own..."
After three hours of climbing up through cold, rocky terrain the three adventurers stopped to take a break and discuss what to do once they found King Doom. As they debated the best course of action, Thalin unwrapped
Erifeci and began to look it over in detail.
Not being really sure who King Doom was and what he commanded, the adventurers went on what little information they had and built a rudimentary plan to attack the lair as quietly as possible and escape with the ring.
Torious muttered about the possibilities of failure, sighting the fact that they only had a map of where the lair was supposed to be, and nothing else. Milo peppered the pair with encouragement, until they agreed to meet back at this spot if they were separated. Milo casually asked what would happen if one of them was killed, but Torious remained quiet, and Thalin was absorbed in figuring out
Erifeci.
Thalin cracked the staff on the ground in frustration. The staff was undetailed other than the markings of “Erifeci” on the shaft and the two ends being slightly bumped and sculpted. Thalin passed the staff to Milo for inspection. Torious cleaned his armour and sword as the two talked.
“Well, Erifeci means nothing on its own... is it a password or something?” said Milo, looking at the staff in a scholarly manner.
“I’m not sure, but the ends of the staff are different shapes. This one is a crystal and the other is a sort of a flame,” answered back Thalin, pointing them out.
Milo mused this for a moment then leapt to his feet and holding the staff in both hands, shouted, “Erifeci!”
No effect. But Thalin narrowed his eyes and took the staff back, “Erif…”
He lets the word trail off and suddenly the staff hummed to life, the flame end throbbing with an intense red light. Thalin and Milo exploded into conversation and quickly decided to grab arcane annihilation by the tusks, and test the staff out. With a smooth swing, Thalin drove the red end of the staff into the ground. All three companions tensed for the almost inevitable fire-storm, but there wasn't any. With a thick whine the red light disappeared and for a moment nothing happened, then the mountain grass around where the staff had struck glistened red.
Each individual blade of grass in a perfect circle was now coated in a fine layer of red light. Other than the light, nothing else happened. Milo crouched gingerly, and once again eschewing the death-by-spell etiquette, touched the coloured grass. Once again, nothing happened. Milo jumped up and pranced across the circle, flaunting his safety.
Thalin nodded in encouragement as he handed the staff to Milo. Thalin was indeed intrigued by the staff, but had quietly decided to let the halfling play the instant-death roulette-wheel that he was now spinning around. Torious watched out of the corner of his eye. The Aasimar had hefted his shield in between him and his curious companions. Just in case, he told himself, just in case.
Both Thalin and Milo knew the next word, and like silly little kobold-children egging each other on, said, “Eci."
“It looks like an icicle,” mentioned Torious gruffly, now wanting to add his thoughts, but still feigning a stalwart disinterest. As expected, the crystal end had hummed into life with a sparkling blue energy.
Milo stared at the staff for a moment, his mind almost audibly grinding away at double speed, then shouted, “That’s it! Erifeci is Ice Fire backwards! There must be four code words. Torious, you’re a genius!”
Torious wasn't too sure of that, but accepted the halfling’s praise anyway. With a twirl of the staff, Milo screamed “Fire!” and drove the flame end into the ground. Thalin had yelped at the recklessness of the halfling's curiousity drive. Milo was not the person to play fireball-chicken with. The companions waited for something, but there was nothing. No effect.
“Wait. Discharge the Eci first, it might not be able to do everything at once,” said Thalin.
Milo touched the staff to the ground, making sure not to touch any of the red grass. With a similar dull whine the grass was coated with a fine white sheen, like a thin layer of paint. In a small area the two grass circles overlapped and the grass was layered with both colours.
Milo shouted “Fire!” again and struck the staff into the ground. With a whoosh, the fire end was surrounded with a nimbus of red energy. Milo screamed incoherently as a violent crackle of the staff’s power involuntarily arched into the ground. Flames coursed over the mountain grass as it spiralled to fill a meter wide circle. All three companions hit the ground, crouching behind shields, robes and weasels.
At the edge of the flames, the red circle overlapped ever so slightly and the flames were held at bay by the red light. But the heroes didn’t have time to notice this slight effect as a crude arrow clattered into the pot resting over the campfire, zipping only inches over Milo’s head.
A shrieked curse from the top of a nearby outcrop revealed the lone goblin scout to the three adventurers. With another shriek, the goblin jumped backwards off the outcrop and out of view.
Milo’s crossbow bolt splintered on the empty outcrop, moments too late to catch the fleeing scout. The halfling wound back a second shot. Milo hauled his pack onto his shoulders, threw
Erifeci to Thalin, then dashed after the goblin, followed quickly by Torious, then Thalin.
As the adventurers gave chase to the goblin, a shadowy figure detached from the nearby woods and crept after the companions, pausing momentarily to wind a black-feathered bolt into a bone-white crossbow.
- - - - - - - - - -
The goblin skidded through the last of the tree line and shouted something before dashing towards a huge scar in the cliff face. From inside the jagged cave, a curl of smoke rose from a smouldering fire. A number of goblins leapt up as the scout dashed towards them, abandoning their dicegames and woodland-animal-torture classes. They quickly grabbed up wicked looking shortswords, as the scout motioned behind him.
King Doom heard the ruckus outside of his lair. Spitting a hunk of meat at one of his aides, he swung down from his stalagmite throne and into his human leather boots. The goblin king adjusted the metal ring on his finger and strutted into the light outside. The barks of “intruders” and “attack” filled Doom’s ears like bee stings and elven singing. Hissing in anger, he moved to mobilise his elite troops. Raising a little staff with a dead bat nailed to the top, he squealed an order to his Doomguard; a select group of slightly larger goblins that sat idly in the corner of the cave.
A few began to complain, but King Doom levelled his ringed finger at them with a face of infinite menace. As one, they cowered to the floor, crawling to evade the pointed wrath of the goblin king. They quickly slung on their rightly feared platemail armour, and hefting bastard swords onto their shoulders, marched into the sunlight.
Torious reached the clearing first, being slightly faster than Milo at full pace.
“You have been judged for death goblins! Tyr will claim you now!” hollered Torious as he charged into the clearing. Sighting the nearest target, he valiantly charged the eight platemailed goblins who marched regimentally out of the lair.
King Doom emerged from behind the Doomguard, his helmet actually having 'King Doom' written on it in a thick black paste. Torious pulled to a halt in a plume of dust, and issued a challenge to the King.
Not understanding the filthy human standing before them, the Doomguard quickly circled the pious cleric and without hesitation launched a brutal attack from all sides. Torious disappeared under a blur of armoured greenskins, his screams of judgement drowned out by the clash of steel on teeth on steel.
Milo and Thalin dashed from the shadows of the trees and stopped to survey the scene before them.
Milo cocked his crossbow and sighted the strutting figure of King Doom beyond the milieu surrounding Torious. Thalin watched as Milo sprinted forwards and placing a boot on the backplate of one of the Doomguard, leapt fully over the circle of goblins and landed only meters from King Doom.
King Doom shrieked in disbelief and pointed his ringed finger at the acrobatic halfling. The King's mouth opened to say something, but was cut short as Milo smoothly brought his crossbow up and levelled it at the goblin's chest.
“Sorry,” said Milo sincerely as the trigger clicked, loosing a bolt into the King's darkly corrupt heart.
The eccentric monarch stood stunned for a moment, staring at the sombre halfling before he dropped to his knees and folded onto the floor in a crumpled heap of green skin and useless accessories.
Thalin twirled
Shard into his familiar Ulutiun style as he advanced towards the throng of goblins. Raising his arms to strike a poised goblin, a sudden searing pain surged through his right arm. A black-feathered bolt had sliced neatly into the mage's flesh. The sword strike hung in mid air, his strength suddenly gone. He gasped in agony and fell sideways, clutching his damaged arm.
Shard dropped from his hand. Thalin saw the scarred man from the tavern melt from the trees behind him.
The man sneered and quickly cocked another bolt, ready to loose it straight at the defenceless mage…
.
