Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Cerebral Paladin" data-source="post: 4029866" data-attributes="member: 3448">As Spring and Twang proceeded, they encountered great stairs going up and down.  Without any definitive way to tell which direction was correct, they headed down a somewhat broken staircase for a considerable distance before arriving at a bottom landing.  A few guards gave them a cursory inspection but did not question them, and they passed into the lower level.Below ground, a great many more of the people were alive than dead, although there were some dead, here and there.  Faced with a choice of traveling east, north, or south, Spring and Twang went roughly towards the east, with Spring trying to form a mental map of where they were.  Twang later reported that the east smelled damper than any of the other directions.  After several hundred yards, they emerged into a large room.  A substantial number of black eums and some undead stood, or in some cases floated, at the side of the room they entered on, while a small group of figures, each about 4 feet tall with gray skin and dressed in matched armor, stood across the way by stairs elegantly carved out of the rock and leading down.  A eum hand reached out as they entered and grabbed Twang.  “Now don’t be going out there and be queering anything.”At that command, Twang and Spring stopped and watched what was apparently a delivery of barrels and crates.  The gray figures looked something like dwarves, but gray and with scragglier beards.  There was discussion, clearly about business, although in a language that they could neither understand nor recognize.  An officer on the side of the dragonhold held forth a bag of loot, apparently as payment.  The eum handed over the bag of old jewelry and ancient coins.  With that, the gray-skinned dwarves carefully ported the barrels and crates into the center of the room.  It was not obvious what they contained-- the barrels did not slosh, as they would if they were filled with ale or wine, and they were plain barrels, sealed with wax.  In due course, both sides tipped their hats, and the gray-skinned dwarves departed.  The heavily armed ones remained in place until the others were gone, and the heavy doors crashed shut as soon as they had departed.Twang turned to the eums and asked, in the kobold language, “What is going on here?”The lead eum officer simply tipped his hat and wished Twang good day, so Spring stepped forward and translated Twang’s question.“Mushrooms, fresh from the Underdark.  They make fine eating.”Spring raised an eyebrow.  “I didn’t know that there was Underdark around here.”“There is Underdark everywhere, is there not?  But that is just a small passage to a minor kingdom, I believe.”Spring indicated understanding and then continued, “We have an urgent message for Ripgut’s seneschal.”“You have gone far astray.”“We are tired from our long voyage.  We have news from the Shadowline.”“News from the Shadowline?”  From the sudden change in tone and attitude, they could tell that the officer viewed that as of the highest importance, and made them worthy of his actual attention rather than bored smalltalk.  “Head back seven crossings; there is a hidden stair on the right.  Ascend it to the main level.  Take the spiral stair up to the high level.  The seneschal is there.”“Are we permitted to take the hidden stairs?”“They are hidden only by disuse.  Those stairs are unstable, but you do not seem heavy.  That route will take you to Lord Dracul.”Spring and Twang followed those directions, though they thought the stairs were not so much hidden as obscured by a partially collapsed wall.  Twang’s weight posed no risk, but they could see that regular use by eums or other heavier individuals could lead to a full collapse.  At the top of the stairs, they went north to a great stair and further up to a large receiving area, where a group of things received people at tables.  Most were eums, but one was a magnificent half-dragon and another was undead, clearly the dracolich’s seneschal.</blockquote>

Verification