Dongle the Dungeoneeror--CLOSED--Adventure #52

[Gray Shade]

Details of the Armory

I removed my lantern and lit it to add a little light to the dark corners of the room and kept watch with a keen appraiser's eye along with my master's keen treasure-hunting eye; however, the gear in this room was all so decrepit, there was nothing of use or value (even when Dongle took a quick moment to shuffle through the piles and stacks of rusting equipment).

The double doorway stood in the back wall of the armory, just as the Cap'n Morrigan had described. Examining it, my master could surmise that before the fire and the new boards were put up over them, the double doors were probably concealed in this room. The sawdust on the floor and the boards seemed to match the age and workmanship of the sawdust and boards over the main entrances. There was no handle or hand-holds of any kind; the boards seemed to be attached to one another and the doorway from the far side.

As a precaution, while my master investigated the doorway, I leaned through the other two, smaller, doorways with my lantern. "All clear. Looks like a military bedchamber and an office," I said.

 

[Lazlow]

"Well, we can't be too thorough... And it's not like we're on any kind of schedule. Let's check these rooms for anything of interest, as well as the other buildings, before we start devising an entry strategy."

 

[Gray Shade]

Bedchamber and Office, overview

That said, my master went into the side doors, one at a time while I followed with my lantern trying to shed additional light as he needed.

The first of these small chambers once functioned as a bedroom for the soldiers assigned to the weapons’ store. There are the remains of two bunk beds, complete with molded and thickly mildewed bedding and footlockers of moist and stinking clothing. An initial search shows nothing of value or particular interest.

The second small room looks like it used to be an office or administrative room. There are stacks of paper that have become clumps and rotted into flaking moist bundles. An old desk is also here, with the frame of a chair both in front of and behind it. Again, an initial search shows nothing of value or particular interest and pulling open the desk drawers only results in the rotted handles coming off in Dongle's hand.

 

[Lazlow]

Sheathing his sword and pulling out a dagger, Dongle pried open the drawers to examine their contents, if any. Once satisfied, he said, "Well, I think this dead horse has been beaten quite enough, don't you?" and moved on to the next building.

 

[Gray Shade]

Digging through the gaping holes on either side of the skeletal remains of the desk chair, Dongle found in the desk the rotted remains of inventories and watchbills and other, unrecognizable, papers. However, just as he was about to call it a "dead horse," his hand struck something hard, within the drawer-hole, attached to the top of the desk. Feeling further, he could tell that the drawer had a lip cut into it, so that it would (in its day) slide in and out without being obstructed by the metal item. Taking a firm grip on the hard item, Dongle gave it a tug and pulled it out of its mounts. Removing it and holding it up, we both could see it was a flatish metal box (about 6" wide, a foot long and 3" deep). A key-hole was set in one slender side opposite a set of intricate hinges on the other.

 

[Lazlow]

"Aha!"

Re-sheathing his dagger, Dongle broke out his lockpicks and examined the metal box thoroughly for any sinister mechanisms before getting to work on the lock.

 

[Gray Shade]

A nice reward for curiousity

Not finding any traps, my master, with a flip of the wrist, unrolled his thieves' tools and snapped open the lock. Inside, he found 78 gold, 13 platinum, a large key, and a necklace, which I appraised at about 200 gold. The box was even more impressive, with an estimated value of closer to 500 gold.

"Very good, sir!" I said.

Returning its contents, except the key, which he pocketed, Dongle handed me the slender box and I put it in my Backpack of Holding. We looked around the armory building for a key hole that looked like it may fit the key we'd found, but no such luck.

I then followed my master out of the building and across the stone path, through the still drizzling rain, to the base of what used to be the old fire tower.

 

[Gray Shade]

The Fire Tower, base

The wide base of the fire tower was a large, three story stone building. After three floors, it tapered down to just the tower for the fire signal, which had risen another fifty or so feet with the fire place on top. The floors of the upper levels were of wood, and thus mostly burned, smashed, and rotted out. The roof of the fire tower was collapsed, mostly from the thinner fire signal part of the tower having fallen in on the base, and stones (and entire portions of wall) from the tower proper were scattered all over the large building. In places, we could see up three levels out into the sky and feel rain drops. In the middle of the tower, a large stone pillar, about thirty foot square went up all three levels, but disintegrated into loose stone after that--the start of the fire tower itself, where the fire signal had stood for generations, but now laid in bits and pieces at our feet.

There were several empty doorways through interior and exterior walls that created almost a maze of small antechambers visible (due to fallen walls and rotted doors) from certain angles, but invisible from others (where some walls still stood). We could have explored further, perhaps even trying to move up a level or two, or we could have moved on to the third and final building.

I waited to follow the Dungeoneeror’s lead.

 

[Lazlow]

"Let's save this one for last," Dongle said quietly, "the Grig mentioned that there is someone or something down below here. Best get the preliminaries out of the way, and then tackle the big one." He moved on over to the third building cautiously.

 

[Gray Shade]

The Living Area

"Quite so, sir."

We walked to the last building.

Just inside the wide doorway to this building was an expansive commons room with the remains of several tables and chairs about with ovens along the far wall. Wide double doorways, again, with the doors rotted and in heaps rather than on the hinges, flanked the ovens, one on either end of the wall. The ovens had been for heating the commons room, and on the other side, depending on what part of the wall, either heated the barracks or served for cooking in the kitchen.

One doorway led to a barracks room that looked like it once housed four dozen men. There were rotting footlockers and the usual detritus. Built into two walls were fireplaces, the other sides of which led to the other two rooms of the building.

Back in the main room, we went through the other doorway, where an enormous oven and scores of rusty iron bands amid copius sums of rat feces gave this area away as the kitchen.

I straightened my waistcoat while poking with my cane at a pantry of soiled pottery and said, “Sir, why would the kitchen and barracks be in such unlivable conditions when there were obviously men here at some point?" Seeing nothing of interest amid the pottery, I turned toward Dongle. "Why not put effort, admittadly, much effort," I looked accusingly at the thousands of husks of insects floating in spiders' webs around the ceiling. "into righting the place and give the workers a decent place to live while here? Why leave such bedlam?”

* * *

Because I had trouble explaining this layout, despite its simplicity: