The Realms of Enlightenment: The Grey Companions

[Jon Potter]

[Realms #195a] What Now?

Finian gulped and the sound seemed very loud in the smallish chamber.

"Mendicants," Kirnoth whispered, his gaze moving over the statues with a mixture of curiosity and revulsion.

"Excuse me?" Draelond asked and the three who had been in the tomb of Mogrelden hurriedly explained what little they knew of the creatures. The Plaguebringer who had captured Finian, Heurist, identified the creatures represented here in stone as mendicants. They had been depicted herding smaller, pale creatures covered in red tattoos - called vectors - in some peeling frescoes the group had seen in the tomb. The evil cleric had attached a great deal of importance to both the mendicants and the vectors and had recovered some ancient texts of Aphyx's faith from Mogrelden's sarcophagus called the Scrolls of Vector.

"Didn't that traitor, Hawk, have markings drawn on him when we rescued him?" Finian asked while Draelond digested this new information. Kirnoth nodded and the Archer continued, "Perhaps vectors are victims of some horrible ritual with the disease queen."

"Nasser-Ubeen said that the writing on Omrixx's... err... Hawk's body was in a dead language - ancient Sobar," Ruze reminded. "Part of a ritual to create a Plague Ghoul."

"Perhaps plague ghouls and vectors are one and the same," Ledare pondered. She grimaced as she shifted her weight and a jolt of pain shot up her spine.

"Kitten, you look as bad as I feel," Ruze consoled as he approached the Janissary wth his holy symbol in hand. "Come here. Let me ease your pain." He touched her head with the twin crescents and muttered a simple prayer to his goddess, "My Queen, lend us your strength..." He finished the ritual by turning the symbol and touching it to his breast. Moonlight seemed to flood over Ledare as many of the aches and pains caused by the magical trap and her subsequent fall down the stairs drifted away.

"Thank you," Ledare said with a genuinely grateful smile.

Ruze just grinned back, nodded and then looked over at Draelond. "Come here, you oaf," the Battleguard chuckled and dropped to one knee. As he did so an involuntary groan of pain escaped his lips. The others looked concerned, but he waved it off with his usual aplomb. "You know, Draelond, I really could have done without you tackling me down the stairs. My back is killing me. Oi!"

"I'm sorry, Ruze," the big man replied with a sheepish look. "I slipped and-"

"I know," the Battleguard interrupted with another wave of his hand. "Now, lemme look at that ankle." Draelond offered up his sore leg and Ruze squeezed it and moved the foot in all directions. "You seem okay. Can you walk on it?" He looked up as Draelond nodded and then the cleric got achingly to his feet. "See Finian for some pain killer root if you need it."

In response to the cleric's stubborn refusal to heal himself, Finian shook his head and urged the Battleguard back down to his knees. The Archer unslung his satchel of herbs and began loosening the straps on Ruze's armor. "Let's have a look at your back," Finian insisted. "You three stay alert for trouble."

The others spread out, watching both the stairs leading up to the surface and the swirling archway of green vapor.

"Do you suppose that is some kind of portal?" Ledare asked Kirnoth in a low voice and the mage shrugged.

"If it is, it's unlike any I've ever seen before," he told her. Rethinking, he added, "Not that I've seen many portals before, mind you."

They looked up at the mendicants' vaguely pig-like faces and shuddered. Their expressions were carved in grimaces of unmistakable malice. Their thickly-muscled torsos were covered in scales like a snake's, but they were portrayed as having worn or flaked away in places revealing open sores and supporating wounds beneath. Their hands and feet were tipped by long talons. Discounting the height of the bases, and assuming that they were carved life-sized, they determined that the mendicants would tower several feet taller even than Draelond.

In all they were not opponents that any of them wished to face.

"Now we are ready to proceed," Ruze announced as he got to his feet with a clink of scale armor.

"To where?" Ledare asked. "Do we head into the mist?"

"Not until I've searched for trap doors. Runes. Whatever," Finian added and shouldered his way toward the glowing archway. He began examining the area in detail and located a section of stone to the right of the archway that was worn smoother than the surround wall. He pressed it and a narrow door popped open just beside the archway, revealing a narrow closet lined with pegs. Hanging within were a half-dozen full length, moss green robes trimmed in muddy brown, with pointed hoods that completely covered the face of the wearer save for narrow eye slits.

 

[Jon Potter]

[Realms #196] Maternity Ward

"Looks like a chance for a disguise!" Finian grinned as he held up on of the robes.

"Yes! We should definitely check these robes out," Draelond said excitedly. He stepped forward and felt the voluminous sleeve of the robe that Finian was holding up for them all to see. "If they seem to check out okay, we should wear them to conceal our identities as we pass into the misty area!"

"No," Kirnoth countered. "This HAS to be a trap! I really don't think we should try on those robes. It seems to obvious!"

Draelond scowled. "If there's something going on on the other side we may be able to pass undetected," he pointed out, but Kirnoth still shook his head.

"Trap," he stated flatly.

"Okay," Ledare interceded, holding up her hands. "Let's let Draelond try on one of the robes first. If he seems like nothing more than Draelond in a robe with a pointy hood, then I agree that we should all put one on and proceed through the portal."

Draelond nodded and took the robe from Finian. It felt greasy in his hands. "Kirnoth, could you detect if this has magic associated with it?" the man asked, holding the vestment out to the elf.

"I can, but that will leave me with only two of my most minor spells remaining," the mage told him as his left hand moved into the starting symbol for Divination. "I still want to do it, mind you. And if Ruze can detect evil, we should do that too."

While Kirnoth muttered the incantation for Detect Magic, the Battleguard shook his head, his ponytail wagging in the air behind him. "Not today, I can't," the cleric admitted. "I've all but used up my allotment of divine grace for the day. Detecting Evil is beyond me for now."

"Yaaa!" Kirnoth gasped, shielding his eyes from the mist filled archway. It flared with Evocation magic. He blinked and squinted. Beside it, the dweomored robes looked very pale indeed, but they radiated Abjuration magic. The statues of the mendicants weren't magical at all. "The robes have some sort of protection magic on them," he explained to the others. "The archway is tapping into some powerful energy. That would be consistent with a portal of some kind."

"Protection magic?" Draelond muttered, looking at the robe skeptically.

Kirnoth blinked again and the silvery glow left his eyes as he allowed the spell to dissipate. "Of the eight schools of magic, I would be least afraid of Abjuration spells," the elf said. "Spells of that school are principally defensive in nature."

"The choice is yours," Ledare told Draelond and the man nodded.



The robes were cut long. The hem nearly dragged on the floor with Draelond wearing it and the material pooled around the others' feet. The sleeves too were long and wide, completely hiding the wearer's hands. The conical hood completely masked the identity of whoever was wearing it. The vestment, likewise concealed the bulges of armor and weapons such that only Draelond's huge sword, Ledare's shield and Finian and Kirnoth's bows gave them away.

One by one, they stepped through the mist, feeling a cold tug at their guts as they passed, but suffering no injuries and appearing in a room that was the mirror of the one they had just left. The dark hexagonal chamber was only dimly illuminated by the green portal. Six familiar statues stood in the corners, this time with arms outstretched as if to strangle passers-by. Directly across from the portal was an archway leading to a flight of stairs leading to a flight of stairs that descended to a dark chamber. The air smelled rank - stale and filled with the lingering stench of decay and mold.

Ruze grunted and held his stomach. "Unhallowed," he cursed through gritted teeth. "This whole place is dedicated to the powers of Chaos and Evil."

They heard a door open in the room below and the frantic sounds of chanting and the discordant piping of some sort of reed instrument spilled out from beyond. Just before the door closed again, they heard the laborious scream of a woman echoing outward.

Without hesitation, the group moved forward and were halfway down the wide black stairs before they could make out the chamber below. At the bottom of the stairs, a lonely black brazier glowing with a greenish flame illuminated a small vestibule. Long green and brown robes hung on either side of the small room with piles of clothing arrayed on the floor beneath them. Across from the stairs was a set of heavy doors, beyond which came the muted sounds of chanting and the airy call of woodwind instruments.

A fair-haired woman with her naked back to the group was donning one of the robes. Her head shifted in a curious manner as she began to turn toward the stairs.

 

[Jon Potter]

[Realms #197] Behind Door Number One

Finian started to raise his bow as the woman turned, but Ruze put his hand out to stop him. "Hold," the Battleguard hissed in the Archer's ear. "She may not have seen us yet."

She did see them, however. And for half-a-second the woman looked at the group, confused. One side of her face, they could see, was studded with puss-filled blisters that seemed to grow out from her hairline toward her lips and left eye. She spied the bow in Finian's hands and the shield in Ledare's and her expression turned immediately to rage.

Draelond bounded down the remaining two steps and rushed the woman just as she turned. A look of surprise blossomed on her face and she dropped the robe she was about to don and dashed naked toward the double doors.

As Draelond's boots hit the floor he felt a twinge of guilt about attacking what appeared on all accounts, to be a woman. He instantaneously concluded that the severity of the situation merited such drastic action and put the thought out of his mind. If he could get to her before she had a chance to sound an alarm with a shriek, perhaps she could be "persuaded" to give him some information...

He thought all this in the two seconds it took him to charge across the vestibule like a rampaging bull - a bull wearing 40 pounds of chain armor! She managed to pull open one of the double doors, filling the vestibule with the sounds of chanting and discordant melodies. Then Draelond's hands lashed outward and slapped down around the woman's head, totally covering her mouth and smashing her nose to a pulp in the process. His momentum drove her backward, away from the doorway. She went limp and collapsed out of his grasp like a broken toy. Blood from her nose and puss from the burst blisters on her face were smeared across the fighter's hands.

The others hustled down into the vestibule and Ruze bent down to check the woman's condition while Finian and Ledare took up positions to either side of the open door. Kirnoth hung back, his bow ready and looked for anything that would fit with the prophecies that they had previously read.

After a moment, Ruze looked up at Draelond and handed him the hood to the woman's robe. "Wipe your hands," he whispered. "She's got a broken nose and a dislocated jaw, but she'll wake up in a few hours." He stood and added, "She's also got the bubbling pussties. So I'd wipe those hands really well."



The double doors opened onto a long, dark room. There were two doors set into the left hand wall, and a massive archway opened in the wall on the right. Torchlight and the cloying smoke of burning incense came from that direction. Maniacal chanting, the unnerving moan of woodwind instruments, and the laborious screams of a woman echoed through the area, coming from the area beyond the archway.

Invisibly, Finian poked his head around the edge of the archway. He looked into a scene plucked straight from the pits of hell, itself. Eight fiery braziers stood in shallow alcoves, creating disturbing shadows that danced upon the cold stone walls like deranged marionettes. A dozen armed guards stood near the walls and in the aisle, watching over pews filled with green-robed worshipers. The aisle ended before a raised stage, atop which lay an enormous altar of black stone and a monstrous tapestry depicting a skeletal woman whose slavering mouth drooled corruption.

Atop the altar lay a red-haired woman suffering the pains of childbirth. A figure was pushed forward by several cultists to attend the delivering mother. As the figure glanced back to stare fearfully into the faces of the chanting cultists, Finian recognized the man. It was Rherram, the healer from Strenchburg Junction who had acted as Finian's defender. The man had clearly been recently beaten.

Behind the altar, an imposing figure wearing brown robes and a helmet sculpted in the shape of a rat's skull studied the delivery with great anticipation. Behind the helmeted figure stood a horribly diseased creature, fully eight feet tall with glistening black scales and eyes that burned with bilious green light. The mendicant leaned forward to look over the robed man's shoulder and a look of perverse joy played across its orc-like features.

 

[Jon Potter]

[Realms #198] Endgame, part 1

Since he was invisible, no one saw him and Finian ducked back out of view of the temple and padded back to where the others waited on the other side of the double doors. As he entered the vestibule, he saw Draelond staring down at the unconscious woman. It was difficult to say what he was feeling given the hood that covered his face, but he was pondering those feelings deeply, all the while wiping his hands clean on the woman's hood.

"Clean those hands as best you can, and be careful not to touch your nose and mouth with that hand until I have a chance to cure you." Ruze said, snapping the warrior back to attention.

Draelond nodded and Finian slipped off the Ring and explained what he'd seen. He saw several of the others blanch at the odds.

Ledare let out a deep sigh and then nodded grimly. "I think we need to have a plan for moving into action and each take a target, but only do this if it appears that these evil-doers are going to harm someone," she said, looking pointedly at Finian. "We could quickly pick a target and then maneuver our way to the front, hidden in our robes."

"Well, I certainly don't think bursting in, swinging weapons is the best approach here," Draelond quipped and both Kirnoth and Ruze nodded.

"I say that Finian should be in charge of protecting the baby and the mother if he can get close enough using invisibility and the slippers," she suggested but Finian shook his head.

"I'm going to be focusing on the orc-like creature," the Archer said with such menace that for a moment no one spoke.

They all knew Finian's hatred for all things orcish. They likewise knew that his hatred stemmed from the manner in which his father had been killed - by ogre-sized, intelligent orcs. The mendicant bore an uncanny resemblance to just such a creature and not even Ledare thought she'd be able to persuade the ranger not to attack the thing.

"Do we have any spells or ideas of ways to cause confusion in the big room if we need to use that in order to get the edge on an attack or an escape?" she asked instead. "Any way to cause it to become suddenly dark or smoky?"

Kirnoth shrugged almost apologetically. "In terms of spells, I'm down to my last one or two cantrips," the elf admitted. "I could cast Daze on the mendicant or robed man so someone else could attack them, but I don't think that is particularly useful."

"Alas, Kitten, I am afraid that I am no longer able to seek my Queen's direct aid this day," the Battleguard told the Janissary. "I can, however, focus her lifeforce into that altar of evil, mayhap destroy it, and put an end to this den of evil for once and all."

Ledare nodded. "Okay, so you do that. I'll take on a few of the guards closest to the alter and then try to deal with the figure in the robes and helmet," she said. "And Finian, since you are going to be plain out fighting, give Kirnoth the ring so he can protect the mother and child."

"I was hoping to use the ring to sneak up behind them," the ranger responded twisting the ring around on his finger. "I have a hunch the mendicant will crush me in battle unless I get really good shots at it. They can use spells too."

Ledare sighed again and looked up at the big fighter beside her. "Draelond, do you think you can help Finian with the mendicant?" she asked.

"As always," he replied, "I will do my best."

"If Finian needs the Ring of Invisibility, let him keep it," Kirnoth offered. "I'll do my best with the mother and child without it."

"No," Finian said with a shake of his head. "I will give up the ring since it is not mine. You'll need it more than I will anyway."

He pressed the band of gold into the elf's palm.

Kirnoth looked at the circlet before closing it tightly into his fist. "If I get the baby, I will run for the doors on the opposite side and try to get out of here as fast as I can and return to Grey House with the baby," he explained and the others agreed that it was a good idea.



Finian entered first. He skulked amid the abundant shadows along the wall and quietly eased himself off the ground. Using the Slippers of Spider Climbing he made his way up the wall in moments and moved along near the ceiling, heading for the stage at the front of the temple and the grim ritual taking place there.

After a count of fifty, the others entered. Ledare came first, followed by Ruze and Draelond.

Kirnoth, crept into the temple invisibly and made his way forward along the side of the room as quietly as he could. Not that noise was a great concern in the current situation; the cultists were chanting wildly and the breathy cries of the laboring woman filled the smokey air, easily drowning out the elf's stealthy tread.

Ledare, Draelond and Ruze made it half-way up the center aisle before two of the guards, one man and one woman, both dressed in chainmail stopped them.

"Take yer seats, worms!" the woman sneered over the chanting voices.

"Yeah!" the man agreed and added, "None may approach the emissary!"

He shoved Ledare for good measure then and his hand pressed solidly against the steel breastplate she wore beneath the stolen robes. The look on his face changed abruptly from annoyance to confusion. The chanting rose to a fever pitch around them and Ledare's mind fumbled about for some possible explanation for her armor.

"What are you-?" the man started to ask when all at once the chanting stopped and for a moment silence filled the temple. The guard turned away from Ledare and looked back over his shoulder toward the front of the temple.

The silence was quickly broken by the cries of a newborn infant.



No one looked up. If they had, they might have seen the robed figure moving along the wall like a humanoid bug. But as it was, Finian made it unseen to a vantage point behind the edge of the massive tapestry, not twenty feet from the mendicant's back. He took a moment to ready his bow and arrows before he flexed his shoulders and drew notch to ear. He heard a baby's cry split the air and had a clear view of Rherram leaning forward unsteadily to cut the umbilical cord with a pair of rusty shears that one of the guards pressed into his hands.

He sighted down the silver-tipped arrow and waited.



Kirnoth was just scrambling, invisibly up onto the dais when the infant's cries ripped through the chamber. The joyous sounds of new life seemed woefully out-of-place in this dungeon. He managed to attain the stage and had gotten to his feet just as the old man performing midwife duty shakily swaddled the writhing infant in a tattered brown cloth and handed the child to the robed man behind the altar. The man smiled down at the child for a moment before holding it up before the congregation.

"Tonight, our destiny ends and a new destiny begins!" the man cried out in the common tongue. "This child - my daughter - will grow up and become our spiritual leader, a vessel for Lady Pestilence! Look now upon the newborn emissary of our dark queen, Aphyx! Rejoice, for she has come! "

The robed figure returned the child then to the waiting arms of her mother, who still sprawled sweatily atop the altar stone. The mendicant handed the man a twisted symbol of Aphyx wrought in some gleaming black metal. He pressed it against the child's chest and smiled down at her.

 

[Jon Potter]

[Realms #198a] Endgame, part 2

"We have to stop this," Ledare heard Ruze growl into her ear and she nodded, maneuvering herself so that she could squeeze between the two guards. The guards were having none of it, however, and they turned quickly to oppose her.

"None may approach!" the woman snarled at Ledare and the hooded Janissary felt a lie form quickly and easily behind her lips. She smiled and let it free.

"We've been hired to attend to the baby when it is time to move," she bluffed. "Word has it that this location has been compromised."

"Compromised?" the guard scoffed. "I've heard nothing..."

"No one was told," Ledare continued to spin. "The orders came from the top."

"You're a liar," the male guard challenged. "We would have been told."

The Janissary held up her hands and shrugged. "Fine," she said, as if she didn't care in the least. "But it'll be on your heads if anything happens to the emissary."

The two guards looked at each other, at Ledare, and then back at each other. "Fine," the male guard agreed at last, stepping aside so that Ledare and Ruze and Draelond could approach the dais. "But there's no way anyone can get in here. Our time is now."

'Sure, it is,' Ledare thought with a smirk well-hidden beneath her hood.



Kirnoth crept closer to the altar stone and the bizarre ceremony being enacted upon it. The mendicant was huge! It hunched over the robed man, looking nearly twice man's height. Its scales were slick with some sort of clear slime, and the elf could see fat insects lazily circling the creature's orcish head. The smell that surrounded it like a hot cloud was so horrible that it almost made him retch. He was reminded unpleasantly of the stench that had filled the bane midge tunnels in the sewer beneath Barnacus. The robed man and the exhausted mother seemed unperturbed by either the mendicant's noxious odor or its leering presence. They were both expectantly watching the infant as the man pressed the symbol of Aphyx against her chest. As he approached, he could see that the baby had entered some sort of cataleptic state. She lay limp and senseless between her mother's breasts. The air around the unholy symbol shimmered as if with heat and Kirnoth realized that there was some sort of magic being performed on the child.

With only a single hesitant glance up at the expectant mendicant Kirnoth made a grab for the baby.



That was when everything started to go poorly.



From his vantage point high on the wall, Finian saw some commotion with the infant. It seemed for a second to jerk in its parents' grasp and then Kirnoth appear standing beside the robed man. He'd managed to grab hold of the baby, but not to wrest it from the man and woman. They - and the entire congregation - stared blankly at the robed and hooded elf.

Kirnoth blinked back at them and took an automatic step back.

"Rake," the robed man said, calmly. "Kill him."

The mendicant let out a burbling hiss and sneered down at the man. "Do not seek to order me, Elgoth," the creature said in gargled common. "What I do, I do for the Queen." Then it turned and lashed out at Kirnoth with blinding speed. With its superior reach it simply slashed out over Elgoth's helmeted head with one claw and pierced Kirnoth's left hand. It wrenched back its talons and stripped away flesh from the bone.

Kirnoth cried out and nearly collapsed from the blow.

Finian meant to make certain that the mage didn't have to endure another. He fired his arrow and the mendicant howled in pain as the shaft pierced the scales covering its left shin and sank deeply into its flesh. Weakened by the sneak attack, the mendicant turned and looked up at the Archer hiding behind the tapestry. A murderous smile split its diseased face.

"Elgoth, you seem to have an infestation," it said with a tone of amusement in its phlegm-choked voice.



There were four guards stationed on and around the steps leading up to the dais. Despite her armor, Ledare darted passed them before they could react to stop her and she made it easily to the stage. The guard's hands went to their weapons, shouts of alarm on their lips and then Ruze and Draelond were upon them.

The Battleguard's scimitars flickered like lightning in the dim temple. The steel crescent in his right hand licked out and stabbed beneath the chainmail hauberk protecting the guard to his left. The man screamed as blood began to flow down his chest and he staggered, within a hair's breadth of death. Somehow, he managed to raise his longsword and slash it across Ruze's hooded face. The hood tore open and a bloody diagonal opened beneath. The cleric cursed.

Draelond drew Ravager and plunged the saw-toothed bastard sword into the guard on his right. The blade bit hungrily through the man's armor, cleaved his heart, and continued on out his back with a spurt of gore. Several inches of the weapon's point embedded itself messily in the neck of the guard standing behind the first. Both men collapsed as soon as Draelond jerked the sword free.

Atop the dais, Ledare turned quickly, her longsword appearing in her hand as if by magic. The blade arced up and then down, aimed for the only unwounded guard remaining on the stairs. He managed to raise his shield however, deflecting the blow harmlessly. His retaliatory strike came in low, catching the Janissary on the right ankle. The blow was a solid one and caused Ledare to gasp in pain.

She glanced quickly back over the head of the guard who opposed her and saw that the entire temple was in chaos. At least two-thirds of the cultists were cowering in their seats; some were headed for the archway that led out. The ten or so guards who remained alive were converging on the Companions. Likewise, a hand full of the cultists seemed to have found their guts and they were drawing daggers. Among them, Ledare saw a figure that stood head and shoulders above the rest.

The tall figure ripped off its hood, and in the instant before its features began to flow into a new, inhuman shape, Ledare recognized the face of Mother Bromson from 'Mom's Pie Shoppe'.

 

[dshai527]

Just made my way over here to see what's going on and I have to say that I am very impressed. I am enjoying your story very much. It sounds like it was a lot of fun to play. Meat pies, I love it.

It sounds like you have a very good group of players. I really enjoy how well they work together and for the benefit of the group. Good job all around. I look forward to reading more.

As a matter of fact, I demand more. Bath her and bring her to my tent. The streets will flow with the blood of the non-believers, or something. I'm the customer do my bidding.

 

[Jon Potter]

Just made my way over here to see what's going on and I have to say that I am very impressed. I am enjoying your story very much. It sounds like it was a lot of fun to play.

Thanks and it was... err... IS fun.

Meat pies, I love it.

I wish that I could claim sole responsibility for that little bit of nastiness, but I can't. Mom and her pie shoppe are amalgam's of Cyrus Kirby's "Mini-Encounter" Mom's Butcher Shop and the old Citybook location "Sweeney's Pie Shop". With, of course, a thankful nod to the orignal Sweeney, Sweeney Todd.

As a matter of fact, I demand more. Bath her and bring her to my tent. The streets will flow with the blood of the non-believers, or something. I'm the customer do my bidding.

You'll get more. But you'll have to wait until Sunday when we find out whether everybody survives or not.

[Insert Diabolical Laugh Here]

 

[Piratecat]

Hey Jon, can I talk you into putting in blank lines between every paragraph? I know you do between sections, but I find it really hard to read - no matter how good - unless there's a blank line after every carriage return. I dunno, maybe it's just me.

Thanks for considering it!

And I love the mendicant - he has style!

 

[Jon Potter]

Hey Jon, can I talk you into putting in blank lines between every paragraph?

For you, PCat? Anything. ;-)

Seriously, though, the only reason I hadn't done that is that I feared it would make the posts r-e-a-l-l-y l-o-n-g. And I have the terrible penchant for writing in lots of little tiny paragraphs; putting extra spaces in would further showcase that bad habit.

At any rate, I'll edit up the last post if you'll be so kind as to let me know whether the readability is improved. If it is, then it's a simple matter to edit spaces into the other posts and put them into future installments.

It's not as though your opinion isn't educated, Mr. 200,000+.

And I love the mendicant - he has style!

Yeah... the new improved mendicant - now with player character-mincing style.

 

[Piratecat]

Much easier to read. One thought - I would probably do this...

The two guards looked at each other, at Ledare, and then back at each other.

"Fine," the male guard agreed at last, stepping aside so that Ledare and Ruze and Draelond could approach the dais. "But there's no way anyone can get in here. Our time is now."

more like this:

The two guards looked at each other, at Ledare, and then back at each other. "Fine," the male guard agreed at last, stepping aside so that Ledare and Ruze and Draelond could approach the dais. "But there's no way anyone can get in here. Our time is now."

As long as the "descriptive paragraph" is about the same people as the "speaking paragraph", I think you're okay combining them, just so long as there is only one actual speaker per paragraph. For instance, you're probably okay combining everything from "The mendicant was huge!" to "grab for the baby" all into one paragraph. Or, for instance, combining things like this....

The mendicant let out a burbling hiss and sneered down at the man. "Do not seek to order me, Elgoth," the creature said in gargled common. "What I do, I do for the Queen." Then it turned and lashed out at Kirnoth with blinding speed. With its superior reach it simply slashed out over Elgoth's helmeted head with one claw and pierced Kirnoth's left hand. It wrenched back its talons and stripped away flesh from the bone.

Instead of having it separated as three different paragraphs. It's a slightly different flow, but I think it may be a style that works. I dunno.

Anyways, this is good stuff! I don't mean to tell you how to write, you sure don't need that; but I thought tying the paragraphs together might help condense the length a bit, while still making it easier on the eyes. It's all good either way.