Shemeska's Planescape Storyhour (Updated 29 Jan 2014)
Shemeska
Adventurer
Now normally, in most cases, blind trust in a yugoloth is a bad thing, something distinctly unwise even in the direst circumstances. Of course, this blanket statement assumes some manner of choice in the matter: something that Clueless didn't really have as he stepped through Helekanalaith’s gate. ‘Accept my offer of transit without question or stay here and die. That is your choice’: it was a very blunt and one-sided thing. And so rather than blind trust, Clueless simply had a reluctant, grudging acceptance of the situation.
In this case though, trust or not, it could have turned out much worse as the bladesinger emerged on the other side. It was cold, but not dangerously so, something in stark contrast to where he had just been, though the ground itself was disturbingly warm. Volcanism he realized, looking at the red, rocky landscape that surrounded him and the scent of windblown sulfur carried on the thin air. Then, turning around and gazing up at the source of the harsh, red illumination that bathed the landscape, he immediately realized where he was.
A giant, perpetually open gate hung suspended above him like a chancre in the sky, a crimson ulcer in the fabric of the Outlands, the portal to Gehenna. He was in Torch, the gatetown to Helekanalaith's home plane.
"It's better than Hopeless at least." Clueless said with a sigh. "Though I suppose that that's not saying much."
He glanced up at the portal high above, watching the threatening pulse and swirl of its harsh, lambent glow. It of course did nothing, but seemed to stare back, serving like a mute, symbolic proxy for the Keeper himself gazing down mockingly over all of Torch and Clueless himself, like Lovecraft's Pole Star.
Looking down at his surroundings, much like the portal looking down at him, he could see the volcanic cones that comprised the upper reaches of Torch, and then the shantytowns far below, huddled at their bases in the margins of solid land set against the ever encroaching Blood Marsh. It was all highly evocative of the situation on the other side of the gate, a recreation of the style and substance of Gehenna in microcosm, be it intentional or not. The powerful lived atop the mounts, be they yugoloths in Gehenna or rich mortals and mercilessly competing gangs of semi-organized thieves in Torch, and then the less successful, be they the poor of Torch or the petitioners of Gehenna, living in squalor below the notice or concern of their betters and simply below in raw spatial terms.
Clueless didn’t honestly care for the politics of the gatetown, or its attempt to model itself, consciously or not, on the plane it perpetually bordered upon, he simply wished to leave and return to Sigil. The further away from the reach of the fiends that he was, all the better. In fact, catching his breath in the rarified air there on an outcropping of rock on the eastern flank of the central mountain, Maygel, he pondered flicking the city and its denizens an obscene gesture.
It would have done no good though, so instead he simply turned his back and unsheathed Razor, whispering the words to a spell. Using the mirror bright surface of the blade to scry, an image took form within the metal: that of a ring shaped outcropping of rock located at the fringes of the Blood Marsh.
Spreading his wings and diving off the side of the cone, he plummeted through the clouds of vapor and volcanic sulfur, keeping his eyes closed to avoid acidic fumes. Bitterly cold, despite the presence of the volcanic mounts, the wind slashed at him angrily before he leveled his descent, slowing himself to glide out over the red tinted swamp surrounding the gatetown.
Shortly thereafter, he touched down in front of the outcropping of rock that formed the gate to Sigil. As a permanent gate, its portal key was common enough that Clueless had it on him, which saved him the undue and potentially dangerous hassle of finding the identity of the key, and purchasing it, from someone in Torch. And so after a few moments of fishing around in the assorted pockets and pouches in his clothing, he withdrew a slim piece of iron a few inches long and tapped it on the rock.
Instantly, the portal burst into being, and with a disdainful look back at Torch, he stepped through and into Sigil.
“Wonderful.” Clueless muttered, scowling at the way the evening had developed, now that he was back in Sigil and had the time to reflect. “Just wonderful. I go for a useful thing and I end up giving someone a ticket into my head.”
“Not that my head isn't already occupied...” He added with a bemused shake of his head. “But this time it's my own damn fault.”
He glanced around, trying to find his bearings, as he'd never -to his recollection- entered into Sigil through the gate from Torch. Somewhere in the Market Ward it looked like, in the warehouse district perhaps where it would be sheltered from the masses and open for the merchants sending goods to and from Torch and Gehenna.
"Hey there!" Came a shout from behind him.
Clueless reflexively put a hand to Razor's hilt and turned around, looking into the smiling, low-key face of Kiro.
“What are you doing all the way over on this side of the city?" Clueless asked, more than a bit taken back to run into the cleric out of the blue.
"I was wondering that myself to some extent really." Kiro replied with a shrug. "I just felt the urge to wander a bit, just get to know the rest of the city since I've only been in Sigil for a very short time."
"Sutekh telling you what to do again?"
Kiro smiled and chuckled softly. "Not this time, no. Sigil is Sigil. But granted wisdom doesn't always come to mind immediately, and I suppose that in the absence of anything happening I just got to thinking. Divine inspiration or not, I think the notion to wander the city seems to have had something behind it. I ran into you after all. That can't just be chance."
Clueless wasn't entirely sure what to make of that, but the cleric's expression and stance didn't suggest anything beyond fuzzy coincidence or divine guidance, certainly nothing ulterior.
"It's very different from the Outlands." The cleric said, brushing some soot from his shoulder.
"Is that a bad thing?"
"Well..." Kiro paused and hung on the thought for a minute. "Not bad, just very different. Many more people, much more crowded, rather dirty in places, but if Sutekh wishes me to be here, well then surely he has a purpose in that. I've been able to do some good so far."
"Where in the Outlands was your village actually?" Clueless asked as they walked towards the Guildhall Ward, passing by the sprawling sides of one of the Planar Trade Consortium’s many nameless, numbered but otherwise nondescript storage buildings in the district.
"I'm not sure that I could give you directions really." Kiro answered. "I was wandering for some time after I left. But I believe it was several... what is the term... rings inwards towards the spire, not very far from a branch of the river Ma'at."
Clueless listened while Kiro gave some further details about the region surrounding his village, at least before it was destroyed by a band of Khasta, something that happened with regularity in some areas of the Outlands. From the lay of the land, and what Clueless himself knew about the plane itself, Kiro's village might have been somewhere on the other side, away from the spire, from Thoth's domain on the Outlands. Somewhere in the back of his mind, the bladesinger had some inkling of a connection between Thoth, the Ibis headed Egyptian god of scribes and knowledge, and Kiro's divine patron of Sutekh, but for the moment he couldn't make a firm connection.
"So what were you doing out on this side of the city?" Kiro asked. "On your way across town to visit that one fellow... A'kin I think it was? I heard something earlier today about you going to visit him later on, or actually that might have been Nisha now that I think about it. Regardless, Florian mentioned that he ran a shop in the Lower Ward of some kind. I haven't met the fellow, but she was talking about him the other day, and I think Fyrehowl dropped his name at some point."
How ironic.
This was awkward of course, as Clueless didn't want to appear to be outright lying to the priest, but at the same time he really had no intention of letting it be public knowledge that he had a bloody archfiend using him as something like a scrying device at will. Yes, that would go over quite well, 'I'm rid of the Marauder inside my head and all that unhealthy business. But! Everyone meet my new cerebral renter, Helekanalaith the Lord of the Tower Arcane! I'm not quite sure how long he'll be with me, but get used to it, because he'll be watching everything when I'm around.'
"What was that?" Clueless asked, feigning not having heard the question as he mentally scrambled for something to say.
Were he observing any of this back in Gehenna, the Keeper would have been amused doubtlessly.
"It's nearly anti-peak, I was wondering what you were doing near the ugly end of the Market Ward."
"Funny you should ask about A’kin. I was on my way back from the Lower Ward actually, and there’s less foot traffic here than in the Market itself. I could have flown across the city but… meh.”
Clueless shrugged.
“Is he actually open for business at this hour?” Kiro asked. “Or was it a more personal visit? Nisha seems to be friends with him as far as I gathered.”
“It's all about a book you see." Clueless explained. "Tristol had given me a copy of a particular book, and actually he got it from someone in this ward too, though I didn't ask him much about them. But it got me to thinking about a few things, and I wanted to see if A'kin had a few things on hand related to that. I swear, he has just about anything under the sun if you ask him about it."
"Find what you were looking for then?"
“No, not really.” He replied. "The shop was closed, and I didn't bother knocking. I don't really know if he sleeps, or if he even lives there above the place when he closes up at night. I might have to ask, it'd be really sad if he doesn't sleep but just sits there, alone, all night long.”
"Sutekh preserve." Kiro said with a frown. "That would be terrible. But I doubt he does that, sit alone by himself all night, really any more than I believe any of the other rumors about him that I've heard passed around."
"Rumors are rumors are rumors and nothing more." Clueless said. "It's a bit of a shame some of them that get tossed about regarding him, probably by the other resident loth too. He really is a pleasant guy."
Kiro nodded as they passed into the Guildhall Ward.
"I'll have to get to meet him at some point." He said. "I guess I'll be meeting the 'other one', as you called her, rather soon too."
Clueless made an expression of absolute loathing.
"Yeah..."
Clueless didn't stop ranting about that ‘other one’ till they were well into the Clerks Ward, by which time Kiro was firmly versed in just how much the bladesinger despised the King of the Crosstrade. As they walked he learned just what she had done to Clueless, as far as he knew, and how things suddenly happened to be taking a turn for the bizarre with a 'loth, a different 'loth yes, but still a 'loth, behind the events that had ultimately led to Kiro being forced by circumstance into an association with them all.
"I am enjoying myself." Kiro said. "The transition has been much less difficult with you all to help me and openly teach me about all of this. I don't believe that I've actually had anyone in the city call me a Clueless yet, pardon me for saying so Clueless."
"Easier... heh." Clueless said with a chuckle. "What with undying assassins being sent after you by Ultroloths posing as Rakshasas. Easier..."
"Well, I'm still alive." Kiro said. "Sutekh has seen fit to preserve me thus far, and I think that being thrown in with you and the others was his intention from the start, both to help me, and if I can do so, to help you."
Clueless couldn't complain. The cleric had been more than he seemed virtually any time that they were in over their heads. Regardless of the odd circumstances that had thrown his lot in with theirs, or perhaps divine intent that he be so connected with them, they had been all that much the better by way of it.
"I won't argue with that." Clueless said, smiling. "We should talk more you know. I've been busy doing my own things lately, and I figure you've been learning about the city in the meantime, but we really should get to know one another better and maybe hang out some. Just because I think you're a nice guy, and also frankly because we don't know when what got you in with us is going to bite us back again."
And of course, that had been his intent from the very start.
These people were important. Events were swirling around them, bits of larger events themselves, and these people had touched too many things for that to be just coincidence. What he had been told in the Outlands was true, that was certain, not that he had doubted it, but he was seeing it himself all the more now as the situation developed in Sigil, in the Astral, in Carceri...
He could have told them more, and doubtless more was known than he had been told in the first place, but he was there to watch, to learn, and ultimately to intervene as he saw fit to do so, preserving what must be preserved.
"We should." Kiro said, returning the smile. "I'd very much like that."
Back in the Clerks Ward, Nisha and Tristol sat across from one another, blushing and grinning like fools. After having snuck back into the Portal Jammer and then snuck their way back upstairs, they had spent a solid part of an hour or so learning just how to kiss someone you were falling in love with. A few kisses were invariably followed by silence and the catching of breath, or a few comments or questions, and then right back to the fun that even though it was only a kiss, still felt naughty on some level to them both.
Time had started to slip away from them both however, and in their fun they hadn’t really noticed what hour it was.
"Wait, what time is it?" Nisha said, glancing out the window. "Is it after antipeak?"
"Umm... why?" Tristol replied.
"Something happens at anti-peak." Nisha replied. "Nothing to worry about."
"Huh?"
"I mean you don't turn into a pumpkin or anything at the strike of the clock or anything like that." She answered with a grin.
Tristol's ears kinked to one side in confusion.
"It's a secret." Nisha said, leaning in to kiss him again. "It's one of those things we talked about over dinner that I said you'll find out about eventually."
"If you keep kissing me whenever I ask about it, I think I might need to keep asking." He said, grinning.
A few kisses later, they were catching their breath again. It was a fun little activity, but you had to stop and breath eventually! Inconvenient air! Stupid need for oxygen messing up romance! The elemental plane of air had to be lawful, there was no other explanation for it! It was all a conspiracy by oppressive, quick-to-spoil-enjoyment-in-life Law! Arrrgghh!
"But my first question, is it after anti-peak?" Nisha asked, happy and giddy at what seemed to be, to both her and Tristol, a newfound guilty little pleasure to share.
"Just by a little bit, yeah I think." Tristol answered as a bit of a glow illuminated the room from outside the window, followed seconds later by a rapid series of tiny knocks.
"Eeep!" Nisha exclaimed.
Hovering outside of Tristol’s window was the glowing, grinning form of Amberblue. The faerie dragon was wearing some sort of tiny hat, a sailors cap actually, as he hovered there, tip-tapping on the windowpane, trying to get Nisha’s attention. He also didn’t really seem to understand what he had seen the tiefling and the aasimar doing, regardless of it not having really been much at all.
“Get blinds or curtains for next time.” Nisha said, self-conscious over being caught in the act by the drake.
“I don’t expect people to knock on my windows past anti-peak!” He said defensively. “Actually I don’t expect people to knock on my windows at all. I have a door for that!”
“You're a wizard, get a prismatic wall, or maybe a prismatic window or something.” Nisha said as she got up to open the window for Amberblue. “Next time I'm dropping a globe of darkness over us both.”
The tiny dragon fluttered into the room as soon as Nisha opened the window.
“Alright Amberblue.” The tiefling said with apology. “Sorry I’m running late. Follow me and we’ll get started.”
Tristol watched with bewilderment as Nisha did her best to herd Amberblue towards the door to the hallway, turning around as soon as the dragon was out of sight to blow the aasimar a kiss and wave goodbye, mouthing that she’d had fun on their first date. Tristol could only smile, the tiefling really didn’t want to leave but it seemed that she had some manner of prior commitment. Hopefully nothing exploded, and hopefully whatever happened it was reversible.
Out in the hallway, Nisha was doing her best to play ignorant of anything and everything the young dragon might have seen her and her boyfriend doing.
“What were you doing with Tristol in there just now?” The faerie dragon asked with befuddled innocence.
Nisha blushed in the relative darkness, thankful that the little fellow couldn't see her full expression.
"Oh nothing, we were just talking about something that happened the other day." She replied back, trying her best to brush off the question. "I was just..."
“You were so close to him, it looked like you were doing something to his face.” The dragon said, tilting his head to the side. “And why is your tail rattling?”
"Oh you little traitor!" Nisha whispered to her tail as she snagged it in one hand.
"Traitor?" Amberblue asked.
"Tristol! Tristol, yes Tristol. He had something on his cheek and I was just helping him with it... yeah..."
"Umm... I don't believe you…" He whined. “…I’m confused…”
"I'm confused... Captain." Nisha corrected him, holding up a finger.
"Opps!" The faerie dragon quickly corrected himself, straightening up in the air where he hovered. "I'm confused Captain Nisha."
"Dread Captain Nisha! Haharrrrggghhh!" Nisha said with faux sternness followed by a wink. "Don't worry about it First Mate Amberblue. We have much work to do now that it’s after Antipeak!"
"What will we be doing tonight Captain?" First Mate Amberblue asked his Captain.
"Oh, you'll see.” Dread Captain Nisha instructed. “A proper vessel needs a proper sail!”
Skalliska waited, watching to see just what the cleric of Kurtulmak would end up doing, waiting for the opportunity to do something herself.
She'd believed her story, that was the amusing part, and over the next twenty minutes she variously prayed and whispered about 'jink' to the idol of her deity, and collected together a large assortment of various ritualistic items.
"What -are- you doing?" Skalliska muttered, looking at the collection of objects intended for the ritual that she was never going to willingly take part of.
There was a collection of garments, two pairs in fact, one presumably for the priestess, and the other one intended for the newly re-exposed faithful, Skalliska in other words. There were a number of bowls, a number of small idols or fetishes, and an incense burner in the shape of a snarling head of Kurtulmak that seemed to double as a pipe.
And then there was the incense and the drugs.
Bowls of colored powders that Skalliska vaguely knew of, all of them intended to induce various intensities and durations of hallucinogenic trance.
"Saravtesh be praised," Skalliska said. "You're handing me this on a silver platter. With or without that tiefling, not a problem."
Of course at that statement, she twitched and recalled Nisha's curt reply to her earlier sending.
"Making out..." She muttered, mildly disturbed. "...with Tristol."
Skalliska stuck her tongue out and shuddered. "Mammals... eww.”
The cleric of Kurtulmak in the meantime had begun arranging the objects of her planned ritual. First she stepped to one side, out of common view, and dressed in the more elaborate vestments that she had selected. And that was when Skalliska took action.
The incense burner and the hallucinogens, they were intended for use together, but the latter were intended to be cut and mixed with the less toxic, more aromatic mixtures. They were all simply powders, with little but color to distinguish them from one another until they were mixed and burned.
By the time the cleric had returned, the colors had been switched and the bowls had been rearranged to match. The alterations wouldn't last of course, but they didn't need to. They only needed to deceive till they'd been mixed, in inverse proportion of incense of drug, the burner lit, and the smoke inhaled by the cleric.
After that, all bets were off.
“Oh most great one, first and greatest of us.” The cleric prayed, bowing her head to the idol as she placed the incense burner next to it. “Lord of buried wealth and holder of hatreds long simmering, grant me your wisdom as I bring one more of your children to your hands.”
“Not likely…” Skalliska muttered to herself.
“Accept her into your heart, accept her faith as nourishment and accept her wealth and power into service of your mortal church.”
The cleric moved closer to the altar and set the incense alight. Purple smoke welled up in the vessel’s basin, and to the cleric seemed to swirl and gather around the body of Kurtulmak’s idol as if the god himself was holding his breath, waiting to exhale with some great pronouncement. What the cleric couldn’t see however as she leaned forwards, hands clasped in prayer, was Skalliska whispering the words to a number of spells, manipulating the smoke and preparing to do her best impression of Kurtulmak himself.
“Guide me Kurtulmak.” The cleric whispered. “Empower and enrich me, especially with the jink of this new fool.”
Skalliska saw red and snarled as the cleric snickered with unrepressed greed. A moment later, seemingly in response to the cleric’s request for guidance, the idol exhaled, engulfing the cleric in a cloud of burning hallucinogens, almost immediately reducing her to a delusional, wailing idiot.
Thirty minutes later the shrine was in shambles, both from Skalliska’s actions and from the deluded thrashings of the cleric of Kurtulmak. The priestess was still screaming and hacking holes in the walls of her own shrine, trying to ferret out the greedy gnomes lurking therein who were waiting to steal everything when she looked away. For her part, Skalliska was openly laughing, both as herself and throwing her voice to make it seem as if Kurtulmak’s idol was laughing at the whole surreal scene himself.
Eventually the cleric passed out, drooling on the floor amidst piles of broken wood, shattered ceramic, and whatever spilled coins Skalliska hadn’t expropriated for herself.
“Serves you right.” She said, grinning as she left the shrine.
For their part, as Skalliska left, the other clerics in adjacent shrines did their best to not watch and not get themselves involved in any way. It didn’t affect them, and if anything the lack of one shrine in the end was a benefit to the rest of them.
As for Skalliska, after putting some distance between herself and the scene of her crime, she handed over her stolen jink to the first gnome she could find who didn’t run away from her.
“What the hell is this?” The gnome asked, looking at the bag of gold and silver coins.
"It's a long story." Skalliska said to the peery gnome. "If you happen to see the shrine of Kurtulmak, you'll understand, and I'm sure your pantheon's head will likewise appreciate it."
The gnome continued his peery look, but after examining the jink and finding it legit, he didn’t make any protest and simply watching the kobold walk off and around the corner. Jink is jink, even if it comes from a kobold he supposed.
"Sarevtesh's will be done." Skalliska said, brushing her hands free of the remnants of incense and dust that she'd collected in her vengeful little exploit. "Not as subtle as it could have been, but she's none the wiser and all the worse off, so all's good in the end. Intrigue is intrigue, and my hands are clean from the actions of swift mind, swift tongue and swift hand."
She chuckled, well pleased with herself and made a simple, subtle gesture, mixed with a hissed phrase in draconic: a prayer to her deity.
She walked away, light on her feet and swinging her staff, newly decorated with a number of obscured, embedded, and understated holy symbols. And as she walked away from the scene of her crime a pair of eyes from the shadows were keenly watching her.
It was another kobold, one who seemed to blend into the shadows themselves. In fact, he'd been watching her for some time, virtually since the first time that she had prayed and whispered the phrases of a prayer, a divine spell, eager to see what next step she would take.
"Indeed." He said, lifting his holy symbol to his lips. "Let Sarevtesh's will be done indeed."
Several days passed, and in that time Skalliska had been largely absent from the inn, Nisha and Amberblue had been doing… something… that both of them refused to pony up to when asked. Actually, to be fair, Nisha simply grinned and professed ignorance, while Amberblue said he couldn’t say because he’d promised to, and that he’d have to ‘walk the plank’ if he did.
Suffice to say, at least for that pairs’ activities, the others were curiously worried what was up.
That however was the least of the things on their minds that caused its own fair share of worry. For the last couple of days, several of Shemeska’s boys –and Toras insisted on referring to them as her ‘boys’- had been showing up at the inn and simply sitting and observing, casing the place, taking note of things. Their mistress was keeping tabs on any changes being made in accordance with her letter’s suggestions, looking for progress before she made her visit.
“Guys, we should probably talk about a few issues.” Florian said. “For starters, your foil and mine, the 12 Factols is still 'closed for renovations', thanks either to a flash mob of drunken dwarves or everyone’s favorite b*tch in a razorvine headdress.”
"And I should be concerned about them why?" Toras asked.
"Because it allows us time to capitalize on their misfortune." Florian replied.
Clueless smirked. "I think the b*tch would approve..."
“Incidental, but probably true.” Florian said with a nod. “And speaking of the b*tch, we have a week before she visits.”
“I feel so honored." Fyrehowl grumbled. "And now I know how Rhys felt the week before she skipped town before the faction war."
“As a Cipher... you don't have an unnatural sense of foreboding about this do you?" Tristol asked warily.
"Dreading it yes.” The lupinal replied. “Dreading it in that sense, no. Don't worry."
With that answer, the others collectively felt a sense of relief. Nothing good ever came with worried ciphers, unless of course you noticed them noticing something and likewise got the heck out of town when they did.
Behind the gathered group, Nisha stepped into the room with Amberblue perched on her shoulder, and a stuffed parrot perched on the other. As much as she could be, the tiefling was dressed in a makeshift pirate’s outfit, cobbled together from whatever stories she had heard over the years about what pirates where like, be they on the seas of the prime, the phlogiston of the prime, or the Styx. It might have been jury-rigged, but the oversized black pirate captain’s hat and the eye patch over one eye, not to mention the Jolly Roger pattern on the cloth tied around her waist, it instantly made her the center of attention.
Tristol grinned; he should have seen something like this coming.
"So yeah, speaking of renovations." Florian said, not having noticed the pirate-tiefer-Xaositect… Nisha thing approach. “I’ve already arranged to… what in the 9 Hells Nisha…?”
Nisha stepped past the dumbfounded cleric of Tempus and tapped the table with a wooden peg leg. Not one attached to her own leg replacing a lost limb, no, just a wooden peg leg held in her hand like a jury-rigged gavel or sorts. Odd yes, but given that it was Nisha, and given the whole pirate motif, it somehow fit.
"But first, if you don't too terribly mind." Nisha announced.
"Scurvy dogs..." Amberblue whispered in her ear.
"And now, if you don't too terribly mind, ye scurvy dogs!" Nisha said, slipping into character. "Not to suggest that two of you might happen to have scurvy."
Tristol and Fyrehowl glanced at one another.
"Having shanghaied this gathering of landlubbing berks, we have some renovations of our own to announce!"
"Aaaaarrrrrggggghhhhh." Amberblue quickly added.
In this case though, trust or not, it could have turned out much worse as the bladesinger emerged on the other side. It was cold, but not dangerously so, something in stark contrast to where he had just been, though the ground itself was disturbingly warm. Volcanism he realized, looking at the red, rocky landscape that surrounded him and the scent of windblown sulfur carried on the thin air. Then, turning around and gazing up at the source of the harsh, red illumination that bathed the landscape, he immediately realized where he was.
A giant, perpetually open gate hung suspended above him like a chancre in the sky, a crimson ulcer in the fabric of the Outlands, the portal to Gehenna. He was in Torch, the gatetown to Helekanalaith's home plane.
"It's better than Hopeless at least." Clueless said with a sigh. "Though I suppose that that's not saying much."
He glanced up at the portal high above, watching the threatening pulse and swirl of its harsh, lambent glow. It of course did nothing, but seemed to stare back, serving like a mute, symbolic proxy for the Keeper himself gazing down mockingly over all of Torch and Clueless himself, like Lovecraft's Pole Star.
Looking down at his surroundings, much like the portal looking down at him, he could see the volcanic cones that comprised the upper reaches of Torch, and then the shantytowns far below, huddled at their bases in the margins of solid land set against the ever encroaching Blood Marsh. It was all highly evocative of the situation on the other side of the gate, a recreation of the style and substance of Gehenna in microcosm, be it intentional or not. The powerful lived atop the mounts, be they yugoloths in Gehenna or rich mortals and mercilessly competing gangs of semi-organized thieves in Torch, and then the less successful, be they the poor of Torch or the petitioners of Gehenna, living in squalor below the notice or concern of their betters and simply below in raw spatial terms.
Clueless didn’t honestly care for the politics of the gatetown, or its attempt to model itself, consciously or not, on the plane it perpetually bordered upon, he simply wished to leave and return to Sigil. The further away from the reach of the fiends that he was, all the better. In fact, catching his breath in the rarified air there on an outcropping of rock on the eastern flank of the central mountain, Maygel, he pondered flicking the city and its denizens an obscene gesture.
It would have done no good though, so instead he simply turned his back and unsheathed Razor, whispering the words to a spell. Using the mirror bright surface of the blade to scry, an image took form within the metal: that of a ring shaped outcropping of rock located at the fringes of the Blood Marsh.
Spreading his wings and diving off the side of the cone, he plummeted through the clouds of vapor and volcanic sulfur, keeping his eyes closed to avoid acidic fumes. Bitterly cold, despite the presence of the volcanic mounts, the wind slashed at him angrily before he leveled his descent, slowing himself to glide out over the red tinted swamp surrounding the gatetown.
Shortly thereafter, he touched down in front of the outcropping of rock that formed the gate to Sigil. As a permanent gate, its portal key was common enough that Clueless had it on him, which saved him the undue and potentially dangerous hassle of finding the identity of the key, and purchasing it, from someone in Torch. And so after a few moments of fishing around in the assorted pockets and pouches in his clothing, he withdrew a slim piece of iron a few inches long and tapped it on the rock.
Instantly, the portal burst into being, and with a disdainful look back at Torch, he stepped through and into Sigil.
“Wonderful.” Clueless muttered, scowling at the way the evening had developed, now that he was back in Sigil and had the time to reflect. “Just wonderful. I go for a useful thing and I end up giving someone a ticket into my head.”
“Not that my head isn't already occupied...” He added with a bemused shake of his head. “But this time it's my own damn fault.”
He glanced around, trying to find his bearings, as he'd never -to his recollection- entered into Sigil through the gate from Torch. Somewhere in the Market Ward it looked like, in the warehouse district perhaps where it would be sheltered from the masses and open for the merchants sending goods to and from Torch and Gehenna.
"Hey there!" Came a shout from behind him.
Clueless reflexively put a hand to Razor's hilt and turned around, looking into the smiling, low-key face of Kiro.
“What are you doing all the way over on this side of the city?" Clueless asked, more than a bit taken back to run into the cleric out of the blue.
"I was wondering that myself to some extent really." Kiro replied with a shrug. "I just felt the urge to wander a bit, just get to know the rest of the city since I've only been in Sigil for a very short time."
"Sutekh telling you what to do again?"
Kiro smiled and chuckled softly. "Not this time, no. Sigil is Sigil. But granted wisdom doesn't always come to mind immediately, and I suppose that in the absence of anything happening I just got to thinking. Divine inspiration or not, I think the notion to wander the city seems to have had something behind it. I ran into you after all. That can't just be chance."
Clueless wasn't entirely sure what to make of that, but the cleric's expression and stance didn't suggest anything beyond fuzzy coincidence or divine guidance, certainly nothing ulterior.
"It's very different from the Outlands." The cleric said, brushing some soot from his shoulder.
"Is that a bad thing?"
"Well..." Kiro paused and hung on the thought for a minute. "Not bad, just very different. Many more people, much more crowded, rather dirty in places, but if Sutekh wishes me to be here, well then surely he has a purpose in that. I've been able to do some good so far."
"Where in the Outlands was your village actually?" Clueless asked as they walked towards the Guildhall Ward, passing by the sprawling sides of one of the Planar Trade Consortium’s many nameless, numbered but otherwise nondescript storage buildings in the district.
"I'm not sure that I could give you directions really." Kiro answered. "I was wandering for some time after I left. But I believe it was several... what is the term... rings inwards towards the spire, not very far from a branch of the river Ma'at."
Clueless listened while Kiro gave some further details about the region surrounding his village, at least before it was destroyed by a band of Khasta, something that happened with regularity in some areas of the Outlands. From the lay of the land, and what Clueless himself knew about the plane itself, Kiro's village might have been somewhere on the other side, away from the spire, from Thoth's domain on the Outlands. Somewhere in the back of his mind, the bladesinger had some inkling of a connection between Thoth, the Ibis headed Egyptian god of scribes and knowledge, and Kiro's divine patron of Sutekh, but for the moment he couldn't make a firm connection.
"So what were you doing out on this side of the city?" Kiro asked. "On your way across town to visit that one fellow... A'kin I think it was? I heard something earlier today about you going to visit him later on, or actually that might have been Nisha now that I think about it. Regardless, Florian mentioned that he ran a shop in the Lower Ward of some kind. I haven't met the fellow, but she was talking about him the other day, and I think Fyrehowl dropped his name at some point."
How ironic.
This was awkward of course, as Clueless didn't want to appear to be outright lying to the priest, but at the same time he really had no intention of letting it be public knowledge that he had a bloody archfiend using him as something like a scrying device at will. Yes, that would go over quite well, 'I'm rid of the Marauder inside my head and all that unhealthy business. But! Everyone meet my new cerebral renter, Helekanalaith the Lord of the Tower Arcane! I'm not quite sure how long he'll be with me, but get used to it, because he'll be watching everything when I'm around.'
"What was that?" Clueless asked, feigning not having heard the question as he mentally scrambled for something to say.
Were he observing any of this back in Gehenna, the Keeper would have been amused doubtlessly.
"It's nearly anti-peak, I was wondering what you were doing near the ugly end of the Market Ward."
"Funny you should ask about A’kin. I was on my way back from the Lower Ward actually, and there’s less foot traffic here than in the Market itself. I could have flown across the city but… meh.”
Clueless shrugged.
“Is he actually open for business at this hour?” Kiro asked. “Or was it a more personal visit? Nisha seems to be friends with him as far as I gathered.”
“It's all about a book you see." Clueless explained. "Tristol had given me a copy of a particular book, and actually he got it from someone in this ward too, though I didn't ask him much about them. But it got me to thinking about a few things, and I wanted to see if A'kin had a few things on hand related to that. I swear, he has just about anything under the sun if you ask him about it."
"Find what you were looking for then?"
“No, not really.” He replied. "The shop was closed, and I didn't bother knocking. I don't really know if he sleeps, or if he even lives there above the place when he closes up at night. I might have to ask, it'd be really sad if he doesn't sleep but just sits there, alone, all night long.”
"Sutekh preserve." Kiro said with a frown. "That would be terrible. But I doubt he does that, sit alone by himself all night, really any more than I believe any of the other rumors about him that I've heard passed around."
"Rumors are rumors are rumors and nothing more." Clueless said. "It's a bit of a shame some of them that get tossed about regarding him, probably by the other resident loth too. He really is a pleasant guy."
Kiro nodded as they passed into the Guildhall Ward.
"I'll have to get to meet him at some point." He said. "I guess I'll be meeting the 'other one', as you called her, rather soon too."
Clueless made an expression of absolute loathing.
"Yeah..."
Clueless didn't stop ranting about that ‘other one’ till they were well into the Clerks Ward, by which time Kiro was firmly versed in just how much the bladesinger despised the King of the Crosstrade. As they walked he learned just what she had done to Clueless, as far as he knew, and how things suddenly happened to be taking a turn for the bizarre with a 'loth, a different 'loth yes, but still a 'loth, behind the events that had ultimately led to Kiro being forced by circumstance into an association with them all.
"I am enjoying myself." Kiro said. "The transition has been much less difficult with you all to help me and openly teach me about all of this. I don't believe that I've actually had anyone in the city call me a Clueless yet, pardon me for saying so Clueless."
"Easier... heh." Clueless said with a chuckle. "What with undying assassins being sent after you by Ultroloths posing as Rakshasas. Easier..."
"Well, I'm still alive." Kiro said. "Sutekh has seen fit to preserve me thus far, and I think that being thrown in with you and the others was his intention from the start, both to help me, and if I can do so, to help you."
Clueless couldn't complain. The cleric had been more than he seemed virtually any time that they were in over their heads. Regardless of the odd circumstances that had thrown his lot in with theirs, or perhaps divine intent that he be so connected with them, they had been all that much the better by way of it.
"I won't argue with that." Clueless said, smiling. "We should talk more you know. I've been busy doing my own things lately, and I figure you've been learning about the city in the meantime, but we really should get to know one another better and maybe hang out some. Just because I think you're a nice guy, and also frankly because we don't know when what got you in with us is going to bite us back again."
And of course, that had been his intent from the very start.
These people were important. Events were swirling around them, bits of larger events themselves, and these people had touched too many things for that to be just coincidence. What he had been told in the Outlands was true, that was certain, not that he had doubted it, but he was seeing it himself all the more now as the situation developed in Sigil, in the Astral, in Carceri...
He could have told them more, and doubtless more was known than he had been told in the first place, but he was there to watch, to learn, and ultimately to intervene as he saw fit to do so, preserving what must be preserved.
"We should." Kiro said, returning the smile. "I'd very much like that."
***
Back in the Clerks Ward, Nisha and Tristol sat across from one another, blushing and grinning like fools. After having snuck back into the Portal Jammer and then snuck their way back upstairs, they had spent a solid part of an hour or so learning just how to kiss someone you were falling in love with. A few kisses were invariably followed by silence and the catching of breath, or a few comments or questions, and then right back to the fun that even though it was only a kiss, still felt naughty on some level to them both.
Time had started to slip away from them both however, and in their fun they hadn’t really noticed what hour it was.
"Wait, what time is it?" Nisha said, glancing out the window. "Is it after antipeak?"
"Umm... why?" Tristol replied.
"Something happens at anti-peak." Nisha replied. "Nothing to worry about."
"Huh?"
"I mean you don't turn into a pumpkin or anything at the strike of the clock or anything like that." She answered with a grin.
Tristol's ears kinked to one side in confusion.
"It's a secret." Nisha said, leaning in to kiss him again. "It's one of those things we talked about over dinner that I said you'll find out about eventually."
"If you keep kissing me whenever I ask about it, I think I might need to keep asking." He said, grinning.
A few kisses later, they were catching their breath again. It was a fun little activity, but you had to stop and breath eventually! Inconvenient air! Stupid need for oxygen messing up romance! The elemental plane of air had to be lawful, there was no other explanation for it! It was all a conspiracy by oppressive, quick-to-spoil-enjoyment-in-life Law! Arrrgghh!
"But my first question, is it after anti-peak?" Nisha asked, happy and giddy at what seemed to be, to both her and Tristol, a newfound guilty little pleasure to share.
"Just by a little bit, yeah I think." Tristol answered as a bit of a glow illuminated the room from outside the window, followed seconds later by a rapid series of tiny knocks.
"Eeep!" Nisha exclaimed.
Hovering outside of Tristol’s window was the glowing, grinning form of Amberblue. The faerie dragon was wearing some sort of tiny hat, a sailors cap actually, as he hovered there, tip-tapping on the windowpane, trying to get Nisha’s attention. He also didn’t really seem to understand what he had seen the tiefling and the aasimar doing, regardless of it not having really been much at all.
“Get blinds or curtains for next time.” Nisha said, self-conscious over being caught in the act by the drake.
“I don’t expect people to knock on my windows past anti-peak!” He said defensively. “Actually I don’t expect people to knock on my windows at all. I have a door for that!”
“You're a wizard, get a prismatic wall, or maybe a prismatic window or something.” Nisha said as she got up to open the window for Amberblue. “Next time I'm dropping a globe of darkness over us both.”
The tiny dragon fluttered into the room as soon as Nisha opened the window.
“Alright Amberblue.” The tiefling said with apology. “Sorry I’m running late. Follow me and we’ll get started.”
Tristol watched with bewilderment as Nisha did her best to herd Amberblue towards the door to the hallway, turning around as soon as the dragon was out of sight to blow the aasimar a kiss and wave goodbye, mouthing that she’d had fun on their first date. Tristol could only smile, the tiefling really didn’t want to leave but it seemed that she had some manner of prior commitment. Hopefully nothing exploded, and hopefully whatever happened it was reversible.
Out in the hallway, Nisha was doing her best to play ignorant of anything and everything the young dragon might have seen her and her boyfriend doing.
“What were you doing with Tristol in there just now?” The faerie dragon asked with befuddled innocence.
Nisha blushed in the relative darkness, thankful that the little fellow couldn't see her full expression.
"Oh nothing, we were just talking about something that happened the other day." She replied back, trying her best to brush off the question. "I was just..."
“You were so close to him, it looked like you were doing something to his face.” The dragon said, tilting his head to the side. “And why is your tail rattling?”
"Oh you little traitor!" Nisha whispered to her tail as she snagged it in one hand.
"Traitor?" Amberblue asked.
"Tristol! Tristol, yes Tristol. He had something on his cheek and I was just helping him with it... yeah..."
"Umm... I don't believe you…" He whined. “…I’m confused…”
"I'm confused... Captain." Nisha corrected him, holding up a finger.
"Opps!" The faerie dragon quickly corrected himself, straightening up in the air where he hovered. "I'm confused Captain Nisha."
"Dread Captain Nisha! Haharrrrggghhh!" Nisha said with faux sternness followed by a wink. "Don't worry about it First Mate Amberblue. We have much work to do now that it’s after Antipeak!"
"What will we be doing tonight Captain?" First Mate Amberblue asked his Captain.
"Oh, you'll see.” Dread Captain Nisha instructed. “A proper vessel needs a proper sail!”
***
Skalliska waited, watching to see just what the cleric of Kurtulmak would end up doing, waiting for the opportunity to do something herself.
She'd believed her story, that was the amusing part, and over the next twenty minutes she variously prayed and whispered about 'jink' to the idol of her deity, and collected together a large assortment of various ritualistic items.
"What -are- you doing?" Skalliska muttered, looking at the collection of objects intended for the ritual that she was never going to willingly take part of.
There was a collection of garments, two pairs in fact, one presumably for the priestess, and the other one intended for the newly re-exposed faithful, Skalliska in other words. There were a number of bowls, a number of small idols or fetishes, and an incense burner in the shape of a snarling head of Kurtulmak that seemed to double as a pipe.
And then there was the incense and the drugs.
Bowls of colored powders that Skalliska vaguely knew of, all of them intended to induce various intensities and durations of hallucinogenic trance.
"Saravtesh be praised," Skalliska said. "You're handing me this on a silver platter. With or without that tiefling, not a problem."
Of course at that statement, she twitched and recalled Nisha's curt reply to her earlier sending.
"Making out..." She muttered, mildly disturbed. "...with Tristol."
Skalliska stuck her tongue out and shuddered. "Mammals... eww.”
The cleric of Kurtulmak in the meantime had begun arranging the objects of her planned ritual. First she stepped to one side, out of common view, and dressed in the more elaborate vestments that she had selected. And that was when Skalliska took action.
The incense burner and the hallucinogens, they were intended for use together, but the latter were intended to be cut and mixed with the less toxic, more aromatic mixtures. They were all simply powders, with little but color to distinguish them from one another until they were mixed and burned.
By the time the cleric had returned, the colors had been switched and the bowls had been rearranged to match. The alterations wouldn't last of course, but they didn't need to. They only needed to deceive till they'd been mixed, in inverse proportion of incense of drug, the burner lit, and the smoke inhaled by the cleric.
After that, all bets were off.
“Oh most great one, first and greatest of us.” The cleric prayed, bowing her head to the idol as she placed the incense burner next to it. “Lord of buried wealth and holder of hatreds long simmering, grant me your wisdom as I bring one more of your children to your hands.”
“Not likely…” Skalliska muttered to herself.
“Accept her into your heart, accept her faith as nourishment and accept her wealth and power into service of your mortal church.”
The cleric moved closer to the altar and set the incense alight. Purple smoke welled up in the vessel’s basin, and to the cleric seemed to swirl and gather around the body of Kurtulmak’s idol as if the god himself was holding his breath, waiting to exhale with some great pronouncement. What the cleric couldn’t see however as she leaned forwards, hands clasped in prayer, was Skalliska whispering the words to a number of spells, manipulating the smoke and preparing to do her best impression of Kurtulmak himself.
“Guide me Kurtulmak.” The cleric whispered. “Empower and enrich me, especially with the jink of this new fool.”
Skalliska saw red and snarled as the cleric snickered with unrepressed greed. A moment later, seemingly in response to the cleric’s request for guidance, the idol exhaled, engulfing the cleric in a cloud of burning hallucinogens, almost immediately reducing her to a delusional, wailing idiot.
Thirty minutes later the shrine was in shambles, both from Skalliska’s actions and from the deluded thrashings of the cleric of Kurtulmak. The priestess was still screaming and hacking holes in the walls of her own shrine, trying to ferret out the greedy gnomes lurking therein who were waiting to steal everything when she looked away. For her part, Skalliska was openly laughing, both as herself and throwing her voice to make it seem as if Kurtulmak’s idol was laughing at the whole surreal scene himself.
Eventually the cleric passed out, drooling on the floor amidst piles of broken wood, shattered ceramic, and whatever spilled coins Skalliska hadn’t expropriated for herself.
“Serves you right.” She said, grinning as she left the shrine.
For their part, as Skalliska left, the other clerics in adjacent shrines did their best to not watch and not get themselves involved in any way. It didn’t affect them, and if anything the lack of one shrine in the end was a benefit to the rest of them.
As for Skalliska, after putting some distance between herself and the scene of her crime, she handed over her stolen jink to the first gnome she could find who didn’t run away from her.
“What the hell is this?” The gnome asked, looking at the bag of gold and silver coins.
"It's a long story." Skalliska said to the peery gnome. "If you happen to see the shrine of Kurtulmak, you'll understand, and I'm sure your pantheon's head will likewise appreciate it."
The gnome continued his peery look, but after examining the jink and finding it legit, he didn’t make any protest and simply watching the kobold walk off and around the corner. Jink is jink, even if it comes from a kobold he supposed.
"Sarevtesh's will be done." Skalliska said, brushing her hands free of the remnants of incense and dust that she'd collected in her vengeful little exploit. "Not as subtle as it could have been, but she's none the wiser and all the worse off, so all's good in the end. Intrigue is intrigue, and my hands are clean from the actions of swift mind, swift tongue and swift hand."
She chuckled, well pleased with herself and made a simple, subtle gesture, mixed with a hissed phrase in draconic: a prayer to her deity.
She walked away, light on her feet and swinging her staff, newly decorated with a number of obscured, embedded, and understated holy symbols. And as she walked away from the scene of her crime a pair of eyes from the shadows were keenly watching her.
It was another kobold, one who seemed to blend into the shadows themselves. In fact, he'd been watching her for some time, virtually since the first time that she had prayed and whispered the phrases of a prayer, a divine spell, eager to see what next step she would take.
"Indeed." He said, lifting his holy symbol to his lips. "Let Sarevtesh's will be done indeed."
***
Several days passed, and in that time Skalliska had been largely absent from the inn, Nisha and Amberblue had been doing… something… that both of them refused to pony up to when asked. Actually, to be fair, Nisha simply grinned and professed ignorance, while Amberblue said he couldn’t say because he’d promised to, and that he’d have to ‘walk the plank’ if he did.
Suffice to say, at least for that pairs’ activities, the others were curiously worried what was up.
That however was the least of the things on their minds that caused its own fair share of worry. For the last couple of days, several of Shemeska’s boys –and Toras insisted on referring to them as her ‘boys’- had been showing up at the inn and simply sitting and observing, casing the place, taking note of things. Their mistress was keeping tabs on any changes being made in accordance with her letter’s suggestions, looking for progress before she made her visit.
“Guys, we should probably talk about a few issues.” Florian said. “For starters, your foil and mine, the 12 Factols is still 'closed for renovations', thanks either to a flash mob of drunken dwarves or everyone’s favorite b*tch in a razorvine headdress.”
"And I should be concerned about them why?" Toras asked.
"Because it allows us time to capitalize on their misfortune." Florian replied.
Clueless smirked. "I think the b*tch would approve..."
“Incidental, but probably true.” Florian said with a nod. “And speaking of the b*tch, we have a week before she visits.”
“I feel so honored." Fyrehowl grumbled. "And now I know how Rhys felt the week before she skipped town before the faction war."
“As a Cipher... you don't have an unnatural sense of foreboding about this do you?" Tristol asked warily.
"Dreading it yes.” The lupinal replied. “Dreading it in that sense, no. Don't worry."
With that answer, the others collectively felt a sense of relief. Nothing good ever came with worried ciphers, unless of course you noticed them noticing something and likewise got the heck out of town when they did.
Behind the gathered group, Nisha stepped into the room with Amberblue perched on her shoulder, and a stuffed parrot perched on the other. As much as she could be, the tiefling was dressed in a makeshift pirate’s outfit, cobbled together from whatever stories she had heard over the years about what pirates where like, be they on the seas of the prime, the phlogiston of the prime, or the Styx. It might have been jury-rigged, but the oversized black pirate captain’s hat and the eye patch over one eye, not to mention the Jolly Roger pattern on the cloth tied around her waist, it instantly made her the center of attention.
Tristol grinned; he should have seen something like this coming.
"So yeah, speaking of renovations." Florian said, not having noticed the pirate-tiefer-Xaositect… Nisha thing approach. “I’ve already arranged to… what in the 9 Hells Nisha…?”
Nisha stepped past the dumbfounded cleric of Tempus and tapped the table with a wooden peg leg. Not one attached to her own leg replacing a lost limb, no, just a wooden peg leg held in her hand like a jury-rigged gavel or sorts. Odd yes, but given that it was Nisha, and given the whole pirate motif, it somehow fit.
"But first, if you don't too terribly mind." Nisha announced.
"Scurvy dogs..." Amberblue whispered in her ear.
"And now, if you don't too terribly mind, ye scurvy dogs!" Nisha said, slipping into character. "Not to suggest that two of you might happen to have scurvy."
Tristol and Fyrehowl glanced at one another.
"Having shanghaied this gathering of landlubbing berks, we have some renovations of our own to announce!"
"Aaaaarrrrrggggghhhhh." Amberblue quickly added.
***
shilsen
Adventurer
Very nice update. I'm looking forward to seeing what Nisha's next bright idea is. And the fact that she has a Wish-granting pseudodragon along for the ride can only be a bad thing 
Here's a DMing question: I notice that your PCs are often off doing things on their own when in Sigil. How exactly do you handle that? Handle it over email? Skip from one to the other in-game? The same thing happens a lot in my Eberron game when the PCs are in Sharn, and though I've never had a problem with it I'm curious to see how other DMs handle it.
Here's a DMing question: I notice that your PCs are often off doing things on their own when in Sigil. How exactly do you handle that? Handle it over email? Skip from one to the other in-game? The same thing happens a lot in my Eberron game when the PCs are in Sharn, and though I've never had a problem with it I'm curious to see how other DMs handle it.
Just a shameless bump and props for the story hour...
Shemmy, just wanted to give the story a little bump. The story hour still rocks. Hope the 9-5 isn't kicking you butt too much. It is definately a change after college (where the is a lot of work to do but you usually choose when to do it ).
Mike
Shemmy, just wanted to give the story a little bump. The story hour still rocks. Hope the 9-5 isn't kicking you butt too much. It is definately a change after college (where the is a lot of work to do but you usually choose when to do it
).Mike
Shemeska
Adventurer
mkb152 said:Shemmy, just wanted to give the story a little bump. The story hour still rocks. Hope the 9-5 isn't kicking you butt too much. It is definately a change after college (where the is a lot of work to do but you usually choose when to do it
Mike
It's been a bit rough. I've actually had to make my campaign every other weekend rather than each sunday. Of course I've also got my fingers in a lot of things right now, writing on a lot of seperate things at the same time. I've been getting a nice bit of writing done, but it's spread out enough that at the moment nothing individually has gotten done.
Stick with me though, things will be updated as I get a chance to devote time to 'em.
