The Cells of Death
Haelan and Festus set to doing as Alaria had asked, rifling through their packs to see if they had grabbed the emerald teardrop from the sack of behir treasure.
"It's gotta be in here. We grabbed everything from that sack!" Haelan said after a few frustrating moments. The sack was supposed to supply him with whatever he wanted...and while gems and coins were pouring "up" through his fingers, none of them matched the item Alaria was looking for.
Braddok, who was keeping an eye adjacent to the staircase, noted that Duor had backed away from the others, all of their attention on the satyr and daelvar.
The dwarf reached into one of his many pouches and began picking through a handful of gems he drew forth.
Braddok frowned.
"Hey! Heh heh aheh. Look here. Is this it?" the dwarf smiled and said in a very sad attempt to appear innocent. "Looks like I grabbed it when I was collecting my firestone shards."
He received disapproving looks from all of the companions.
"And your keen dwarvish senses did not notice one of your firestones was green instead of red?" Erevan said in annoyance.
"Honest mistake. It was dark in that cavern!" Duor defended.
Alaria simply rolled her eyes as she snatched the gem from Duor's offering fingers.
While she sat and began to concentrate, the rest of the party all but turned Duor on his head to see what else he had "mistakenly" grabbed from the treasure trove.
The magess steadied her mind and called out into the ether through the gem. Rhea's mind was powerful, to say the least. Surely she would be able to hear her "call."
A few moments passed and, while Alaria's mind's eye found herself in a vaguely greenish grey landscape...she could not discern any other presence. She called several times. And waited. Called again and waited. Nothing happened.
Why wasn't anything happening?!
In her trance, she could not determine how long had passed but when she again opened her eyes, the rest of the party was standing around looking and waiting for her.
"Did it work?" Haelan piped up immediately with a hopeful smile.
"No." Alaria snapped. Her frustration was entirely with herself and she apologized to the Hilltender or her tone.
"Do you recall, magess, " Erevan began, "when we were transported here? There was that abrupt...stop...and we fell at the edge of the swamp."
Alaria nodded. She had forgotten about that.
"What does that mean?" Festus asked.
"If the Feldmere and Nor Gorthok, specifically, are warded against intrusion, " Alaria replied before Erevan could voice his theory, "then it stands to reason that an ages old dragon would be capable of blocking other forms of magical entrance or egress."
The heroes nodded in their limited understanding of the ways of sorcery.
"Rhea did inform us that all of her and other diviners attempts to locate Tresahd were all met with failure. Perhaps I will try again when we exit the mountain. But I think it safe to assume we are on our own for the time being." Alaria said, somewhat defeated.
"Only way to go is up." Festus said with a smirk. "Who's first?"
After some discussion, it was determined that Duor and Erevan would scout ahead of them, at least for a distance, while the others remained in the goblin barracks. It was made clear that an exit was what they were looking for...not more goblins or gods knew what other things...and definitely not to take any risks even if they fell into the dragon's treasure chamber, itself.
Festus was a bit put out that he wasn't included in the scouting...he was a ranger after all. But it was decided that the elf and dwarf's silence would be more useful than the satyr's tracking skill and potential "clip-clopping" up the carved stone stairwell.
Erevan padded after the slow moving dwarf. The elf was somewhat annoyed with Duor for, what Erevan felt was, his "overly cautiousness" siting at one point that the goblins would not have a trap leading to their bedchambers.
Duor "Hmphed" a grumbling response under his beard.
But it wasn't just traps the dwarf was looking for. He was examining the stone around them in a way the elf could never possibly understand.
The stairs were carved from the natural stone...not "built" into the mountain. Like the goblin's chamber and, indeed, the chamber they'd slept in and adjoining passageway had been. They were not "in" Nor Gorthok...if indeed Nor Gorthok was the constructed citadel of Gorathgraard they had been led to believe it was.
He took exceptional care to feel and examine the rock face, the steps, the walls. Goblins were crafty, if nothing else. They could easily have made hidden corridors or doors, wrap-around passages and, yes (Duor admitted to himself), rock-based traps given enough time and care.
They climbed only a short distance, which still took some time, before coming to another shoddily built door to their right.
A few moments listening and both the elf and dwarf could tell there were goblins behind the door. At least two...perhaps three or more. The garbled tongue of the goblins and the odd pitches they incorporated in their speech patterns made discerning separate voices difficult.
They silently agreed to continue on for a distance before turning back.
They'd take care of these creatures with the rest of the party.
Another few tens of feet brought them to landing with a passage way on their left, no door. There was an opening they could see, another twenty of so feet up and ahead.
Duor first, and then Erevan (leaning over the crouching dwarf) peered around the corner to see an incredibly long and wide corridor. The walls on either side were lined with cells of iron bars, floor to ceiling. The passageway curved out of their view some forty or so feet ahead, but they could tell the cells seemed to continue around the bend.
Assorted moans, groans and garbled sounds told them there were prisoners in at least some of these cells. Though they could see no specific creatures from their vantage point.
The two jumped instinctively when they heard a long *CLANG* come from down the dungeons somewhere. Followed by a low voice in goblin growling "SHUT UP in there! One more peep and yer goin' to Rach'sha TODAY!"
Shortly after the echoing outburst, the corridor became very quiet and the scouts saw a very large and extra hairy bugbear come around the bed at the end of the passage. The creature carried a large club that had a band of metal spikes around the business end.
Being a bugbear it was impossible to determine where the creature's hide stopped and his furred tunic or loincloth began, but he jangled as he walked and Duor noted the large ring of keys at his thick leather belt. Looked like there was a thick curved "knife" (easily a short sword to any smaller creature) also tucked into the belt.
Duor pointed up to the end of the stairwell, indicating they should go see where it led.
Erevan vehemently shook his hed in the negative.
Duor scowled and them thumbed at the passage to the left. The two of them, Duor thought to himself, could easily take out a single bugbear.
Erevan scowled in return. Better, the elf reasoned to himself, they should return with the party. A scuffle with this bugbear might easily bring the goblins out of the room below and they'd be cut off. Likewise, attacking the goblins below might easily attract the bugbear's notice.
The decision was not yet made, as the two disagreed silently to each on their course of action, when their attention was caught by a, "Wutthuh!" of surprise as the bugbear came around the corner and immediately spotted the two demihumans.
Duor, seeing Erevan's expression of surprise (a rare treat for the dwarf), did not even turn around before slashing in circle with his ethereal dagger.
The blade swiped clean cross the huge goblinoid's shins and drew blood.
The bugbear, caught unawares, but definitely knowing he'd been hurt, let out a roaring bellow of pain.
Erevan's arrows flew into his bow and shot up, both striking with uncanny aim. The first in the chest, the second in the creature's throat...abruptly halting its roar.
The creature fell back onto the landing with a loud thud. Its club, raised in preparation to smash the dwarf, crashed down beside him.
Erevan and Duor stood poised for a moment, looking down the stairwell waiting for a troop of goblins to come rushing out of the chamber.
It seems the goblins were accustomed to loud cries of pain coming from the dungeon, as none bothered to appear.
Duor (in a moment of brilliance or a thief's expertise) grabbed the ring of keys from the bugbears belt. He gave the large knife a once over and opted against taking it.
"Shoddy goblin make piece of junk." he grumbled. "Well?" the dwarf said.
Erevan looked at the dwarf in confusion.
"Help me move it!" the dwarf said as if this were the most obvious thing in the world.
Between the two and with great difficulty, the elf and dwarf dragged the dead bugbear back into the passage of dungeons. Near to the door, before the cells began, was a large chair, a small table and a large trunk.
The trunk, neither trapped nor locked, opened to the dwarf's curious hands. It was filled with generic supplies one would need in a dungeon: ratty blankets, pewter plates and dishes, several sets of heavy iron chains and shackles, etc.
They could not prop the huge monster into the chair and opted to just crunch him up in the corner beside the trunk. Duor threw a couple of the moldy frayed blankets over it. He then looked at the floor and the very obvious and wide trail of blood that led straight from the landing to large lumpy cloth in the corner.
"Gonna do something about that?" the dwarf said in annoyance to the elf.
"Do you have a brush and soap?" Erevan replied ni annoyance.
"Yer magic, yeh daft point ear!" Duor voiced raised a bit in annoyance. He caught himself and continued quietly. "Alaria's cleanin' herself off all of the time. Can't you do that?!"
Erevan nodded in understanding. He was somewhat annoyed with himself that the dwarf was correct and that he had not thought of it himself. A simple "wiping" gesture and a couple of arcane syllables later and the trail of blood smear seemed to evaporate or soak in to the stone floor. There was no obvious trace of what had transpired.
"Back to the others." Erevan said when it was done.
"But wut about the end of the stairs?" Duor began to argue.
"Back to the others. Now." Erevan said calmly. "We can examine everything else later."
The two scouts moved back to the goblin barracks, as silently as they'd left. They relayed what they'd found. When asked about the end otf the corridor, Duor was all too happy to mention, "Mr. Elfy-pants was too 'fraidy-cat to go see."
Ready for, at least, the beginning of their delve, the party went up the stairs.
It was no great thing, between Braddok, Festus, Duor and Erevan, to dispatch of the other four goblins in the room to their right. They did so with practically no noise.
When they reached the landing of the dungeons, they moved with expert caution, however their need for a light source for the humans was sure to attract attention. Alaria stayed close (behind, but close) to Braddok and the steady cool bluish glow of his new bastard sword. Since it did not interfere with any of the other party's enhanced vision, they needed no other source than that...for the time being.
The examinations of the cells was a bit, disconcerting. Several on either side were empty. What they did see/found, were two goblins in a sorry state of malnutrition. They looked dumbly at the party, not quite undertanding what these creatures were doing there. One, said weakly, "hoomuns? hoomuns!" apparently attempting to raise an alarm. His voice was far too weak to be heard by anyone outside of the dungeons, but it brought a good bit of attention from the other prisoners.
Erevan, owing to his natural lack of sympathy for goblins, offered to put them out of their misery.
Haelan wanted to. Even goblins should not be left in such a pitiful state as starving to death. Fen concurred.
Alaria nodded a silent ascent and continued on with Braddok. She didn't want to watch it, but couldn't argue with half of the company.
"Let us out! We helps. We guide you. Release us!" came the pleas from a rather hearty looking hobgoblin in another cell. He had his orange fleshed face pressed up again his bars as soon as the goblins made their "call."
"Yeh can help us by gettin' away from the bars n' keepin' silent!" Duor said with a clang on the bars with the pommel of his green glowing dagger.
"You asks, we helps. Anything. Anything you wants!" the hobgoblin replied, imploringly, toward Alaria.
"Yeh wanna go visit Rach'sha?!" Duor said again full of menace.
This got the desired result and the hobgoblin slunk back into his cell and curled up on the floor. "No Rach'sha. No Rach'sha." he whispered over and over to himself.
"Duor, could we, perhaps, get some help and help them by letting them out. 'Sides we don't have any access to Rach'-" Haelan stopped mid-sentence when Duor shot him a fearsome look to shut. up!
"Haelan has a point." Braddok said, looking to Alaria for confirmation.
"What can you tell us of this place? What dwells here?..."Braddok asked at first, then added, "And where is the nearest way out of the mountain?"
The hobgoblin stood, cautiously and slunk up to the cell bars, though not close enough to be reached. "Lets us out? We tells everything." he said.
"No. Tells first." Braddok retorted. "Then, maybe we let you out...if the information is good and true."
"Fastest way out is through Rach'sha's belly." the hobgoblin said to the floor. "No ways out. Only death lives here...and the creatures. All creatures serve the master. But the master hates the creatures. Promises, promises, promises. Never does. No glory for the Blood-Cleavers. We honor. We fight. We does...just promises. Promises."
"What are the...um...'Blood-Cleavers'?" Braddok replied.
"Hundu's clan. Best clan of hogomors." the hobgoblin replied. "Was best...but master don't likes anymores. We hates the master."
"What's a hogomor?" Braddok said to Alaria and Fen who were close and listening to the inquiry.
"It's what hobgoblins call themselves." Fen explained. "And you are Hundu?" the druid added.
The hobgoblin nodded with a face full of remorse. "Was Hundu...now Rach'sha food."
"He sounds sincere." Haelan mentioned. "If he doesn't like Tres-...the, uh, master...and his whole clan doesn't...maybe they could help?"
"Can't trust hob's any more than gob's, Haelan. If you don't know that already, you should." Erevan said in cool reply. The elf felt his bowstring finger getting twitchy. The more it spoke, the more the others might be swayed by its, what had to be, lies.
"We need a way out of the mountain, Hundu. Do you know a way out?" Alaria now interjected. Leaving the hobgoblin in the cell was not any concern to her. Nor was attempting some alliance with a clan of hobgoblins. They had to leave, before they all died or, Manat forbid, Desaarthal returned to Nor Gorthok.
"Death is the fastest..." the hobgoblin said softly.
"GUYS! Get it! STOP IT!" Festus' voice came echoing down the chamber from around the bend.
All of the company turned in alarm, weapons at the ready, but with Braddok's sword as the only light source, saw nothing to stop!
"Azzkanz!" Alaria cried instinctively, not caring, and her staff erupted in a flickering ball of electrical white light, filling the wide corridor.
Immediately, a shadow snake reared into view, surprised by the sudden illumination.
"Oh crap!" Duor said.
It was one of the larger variety, not just for observation, but apparently, this one was trying to make its way out of the dungeons.
One of Erevan's few magical arrows flew from his enchanted quiver and thunk into the semi-solid creature. Haelan voice was heard rising in prayer.
It's glowing red eyes and maw hissed loudly down at the companions.
A swipe of Fen's leaftip spear, now ensconced in the druid's green aura stabbed into the beast, leaving a glowing red stripe in its side.
Alaria swung at the creature, but did not connect. The creature doing its best to stay as far from the hateful light as possible.
Braddok's glowing blue sword swept up and delivered a telling gash through nearly three quarters of the shadow snakes length.
It "dove" and "wove", slithering through the air, apparently intent on making its escape.
As it was about to leave the area of light, its glowing red wounds fading slightly as it reentered the darkness, the entire end of the dungeon's entranceway burst into sun-like luminance. The source was Haelan's pinecone-headed mace.
Again surprised by the painful rays, it looped back around and dove toward the only source of shadow in the immediate vicinity, Hundu's cell.
Hundu shrieked in surprise and fear as the creature coiled itself around the hobgoblin and hissed loudly.
As the hissing and shrieking subsided, the company realized the creature was not making the noise but the hobgoblin. Its skin immediately going a sickly yellow color and shriveling before their eyes, giving off a soft "ssss" sound.
Alaria and Erevan each sent a wave of magic missiles into the cell, unerringly striking the beast. Even as the shadow snake took full force of the magical energies, the wounds from Braddok and Fen seemed to be closing.
"It CANNOT escape!" Alaria cried in panic. "He'll know we're here!"
It released the hobgoblin who fell, dessicated to the cell floor.
"If he doesn't already." Duor added to everyone's disapproval.
Braddok and Fen stabbed and jabbed as best they could through the bars, but were unable to strike the again swirling serpent of shadow.
Alaria, lamentably, released another battery of energy missiles. The creature made a dive straight for the magess.
Festus now entered the fray, at once shoving Alaria aside with a none-too-gentle shove as he brought his magical short sword up to bare on the attacking snake.
The creature struck the satyr even as is "landed" upon his blade. Now outside of the cell bars, Braddok and Fen renewed their attacks with increased vigor.
In short order, and with an additional stab of Duor's ethereal blade, the creature hissed loudly in defiance even as its shadowy force seemed to shred and separate and finally disappear from view in wisps of shadow and green smokey energy.
"HA! 'Nuthuh kill fer the dwarf with the magic dagger!" Duor said triumphantly.
Haelan raced to the wounded Festus. There was no obvious wound, but the satyr ranger was shivering and shaking from the unseen bite of the shadow snake's fangs.
The Hilltender quickly invoked his goddess before any other effects could take hold and the ranger immediately felt renewed and (most importantly) warmed with a wave of the scent of honey and baked bread.
"Everyone else ok?" Haelan asked with tracemark sincerity and concern.
Braddok helped Alaria to her feet. The magess brushed off her violet robe/gown and held her arm which she'd landed on rather heavily, but was undamaged.
"Arkanaviz!" Alaria intoned and scanned the rest of the corridor as best she could see (up to the bend). There was no other indication of supernatural energies, other than the somewhat distracting auras of the litany of enchanted weapons her companions held.
"I think, we're clear....for now." Alaria said. "Festus, how did you see the creature?"
The satyr rubbed the back of his neck with a characteristic pride-filled smirk. "Well, ya know. I didn't exactly. I saw a tube of shadow slithering along the floor. And since you're the only companions I've had who ever had trouble with snakes made of shadow, I made an educated guess."
"Good guess, my friend." Braddok said. "But that was MUCH larger than the serpents I recall from Welford."
"Yeah, we'll fill yeh in some time. After we get outta here." Duor said. The dwarf looked into the cell where the entirely life-sucked hobgoblin laid. "Not gettin' anything outta him now."
Haelan bowed his head in sorrow for the attempting-to-be-helpful hobgoblin.
"Up side, don't hafta worry 'bout lettin' him out now." the dwarf added with a grin.
Haelan's lip curled in distaste at the dwarf's severe lack of empathy.
"What else did you see down aroudn the bend, ranger?" Fen asked stoically.
"Oh! Right. Something interesting. I'm not sure what it is though." Festus said.
The companions collected themselves and continued into the dungeons.
Festus signalled silently for everyone to stick to the left of the corridor as he came slowly up to one of the cells on their right. Just passed this final cell was a large thick looking door, banded in iron and obviously engraved with mystic symbols.
"Look in there." the satyr whispered to Duor and Fen who were the closest.
"Feorn's Beard!" Duor cursed.
"By the Balance!" Fen similarly gasped.
Inside the cell, hovering a few feet above the floor was a creature that looked a bit, in the various glowing light sources, like a giant floating jellyfish.
Closer inspection, as Braddok and Alaria neared with their light, revealed the creature's "body" appeared to be a giant brain...with a squid-like beak in the front. Hanging below it, for a good ten feet, was a tangle of long thick green tentacles. The twitching and weaving of them made their number impossible to determine.
It let out a weak but nasty sound that could, most closely, be described as a "caw." With the light now upon it, some of the tentacles reached forward, slowly. Whether this was out of some weakness or hunger or merely a ploy to lure them closer could not be determined.
"Abomination." Fen said with the usual seriousness he used with that word. "It must be..."
"No Fen. Not this time, I'm afraid." Alaria quickly interjected. "It is bound and it will remain so. We do not have time to waste on another battle. For all we know, Tresahd might be aware of our presence already. We must leave this place."
Alaria noted the feint aura of enchantment around the creature and had no desire to determine what else it might be capable of. The door before them, quite obviously even if she had not her mystic sight in effect, was magically barred, as well.
"Magess, I understand your urgency. But you must respect that such an affront to the Balance must be terminated. Such is my oath, at all times."
"Does the fact it is contained not meet your oath, killi?" Erevan attempted to reason. "It can not disturb the Balance trapped as it is.
"It might be released if left to live." the half-elf replied. He took a step closer to he cell and the leaf-shaped tip of his spear again flared with its spring-green light.
As the spear began to glow, the creature again cawed softly. A single tentacle now reached forward even as the blade neared the bars. The thick green appendage reached out through the bars and seemed to reach for the spear. It cawed and almost "cooed" over and over.
"It sounds sad." Haelan said.
"Well, lookit it. Wouldn't you be if yeh looked like that?" Duor answered. He was all ready to bolt for the entrance if this fool of a druid was going to try to let it out.
"Fen, we cannot. Erevan, do something." Alaria argued. The magess' notice was now entirely upon the creature, the aura that surrounded it was taking a more definitely form and color...what was it?...transmutation?
Fen stabbed at the bars which caused the tentacle to flinch but then reach again for the spear.
"Fen...why's it want your spear?" Festus observed.
"This is madness. Duor, the keys." Braddok now commanded.
"Are yeh daft?! I'm not lettin' yeh let that thing out!" Duor said.
"We end this quickly. Sate Fen oath and move on. The longer we wait, the longer our presence might be revealed." the warrior said sternly. "I think none of us are against fulfilling our respective vows."
"It's true, Duor. Think of Coerraine." Haelan said.
"I don not think, Fen, that this creature is what it appears." Alaria said.
"Of course not, it is abomination. It can not, should not appear as anything in the natural world." the druid replied again jabbing but not striking.
The druid was now easily within the grasp of the thing's tentacles, but it did not attack the druid. It just kept reaching, now with multiple green "arms" for the spear...but was careful not to get cut.
"No, Fen. I mean, I do not think it is an abomination. I think it is something...or someone...changed...by magic." Alaria explained.
The creature cawed again and several of its tentacles seemed to wave in Alaria's direction.
At this the druid quickly backed away. He whispered his own incantation for mystic sight in the order's sacred tongue. Sure enough, the druid immediately saw the slight flickering aura around the creature. The druid, however, could not discern varying enchantments as the magess could.
"Are you certain? It could just be the creature itself is magical...maybe it is enchanting you, Alaria. Or some worthless defensive glamour." Fen inquired.
"Do you understand me?" Alaria said cautiously. She refused to move closer.
The creature cooed.
"The keys, Duor. We do not have time for this. Are we killing it or not?" Braddok said, getting annoyed.
Now the creature cooed again softly and reached its green appendages toward Braddok.
"It...it wants to die?" Haelan said with some attempt at understanding from whence he knew not where.
"Then we are in agreement!" Fen said and again moved closer to the cell.
"Fen wait!" Alaria tried to stop him but the druid moved closer and severred two of the thing's tentacles that were sticking through the bars.
The cawed out, loudly, in obvious pain. Then it floated closer to the bars, or as close as its bulbous form could get. All of its remaining tentacles were now flailing about reaching for the druid...or the druid's spear?
Alaria's lips began to invoke the spell of Unmaking. It was, by far, her most powerful incantation and the only of her highest tier. She had hoped not to use it so early in the day, if at all, but this nonsense had to stop!
As her mouth formed each syllable, the power rose around and through her. The threads and streams of magic that existed, throughout the world, became evident to her entranced sight. The feeling of power was more intoxicating than any spell she had cast to date. She had such control. Such command. She was a mistress of the Mysteries. She was a Magess of R'Hath. She would undo what had been done to this creature..which was now in the trance of the spell, so clear to her senses.
Braddok now had moved in to protect Fen from the flailing tentacles. His new enchanted sword cut through the things like butter on a hot day.
As Alaria's voice rose to fill the corridor and the cell and the final syllable of power left her, the magess nearly felt her legs buckle at the release of energy. Somewhere in the back of her mind, Alaria subconsciously thought, "What a rush!"
There was a series of "stop motion" as flashes of sorcery competed with each other for dominance. With each flash of light (to Alaria and Fen's eyes at least), the creature was thrown side to side, up and down, crashing against the cell walls, the bars, the ceiling, the floor.
To the rest of the group, devoid of any magical detection senses, it just appeared the creature was thrashing about madly and shrieking caws erupted through the corridor from the thing's beaked maw.
Finally, the creature's shape altered and glowed and flickered and flashed. Each burst of visible energy revealed a shape similar but obviously different than the last. Ever-smaller. The tentacles and "brain body" shrank away. Were those legs? Did it have a neck now?
After a few tense moments of mystic strobing lights and flaring energies the significantly smaller form came to rest in the back corner of the cell. No longer a great bulbous "head" and mass of tentacles, but a very very elderly man with a long dirty and knotted beard and the remnants of what might have once been white robes, now utterly smeared with grey and brown and yellowed with age. The arms and legs they could see through the tears in his sleeves and robes were naught but skin and bones.
The old man's wrinkled face turned toward the party. His eyes did not open but he managed to weakly, hoarsely say, "Thank you." Then he slumped over unconscious.