NOW LIVE! Today's the day you meet your new best friend. You don’t have to leave Wolfy behind... In 'Pets & Sidekicks' your companions level up with you!

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="JollyDoc" data-source="post: 4900151" data-attributes="member: 9546">THE KINDNESS OF STRANGERSScarwall was proving to be a frustrating, potentially deadly, unsolvable mystery.  Some new undead horror threatened the companions at every turn, yet they were no closer to finding Serithtial’s resting place.  The castle was massive, and could take days, or weeks to search completely, assuming of course they survived that long.  Something had to give.The group backtracked their trail through the guest wing to the courtyard and the porter’s hall.  There, they chose another door they had bypassed on their first trip through.  The walls of the dismal room beyond were hung with innumerable bags of netting that held bottles, clay jars, dried plants, desiccated bits of animals and similar things.  Tattered, gauzy curtains had been strung throughout, creating a diaphanous kind of maze.  The whole was choked with a dank-smelling smoke that seemed to be issuing forth from a pitted iron brazier in the center of the chamber.  Incredibly, also suspended within the netting was a halfling woman.“Help me!” she shouted.  “The witch will be back soon!”“Who are you?”  Kat asked suspiciously.  “How did you get here?”“I’m Alimae,” the halfling replied.  “I’m an herbalist.  I was gathering herbs in the woods near my home when I was snatched by a horrible dragon!  It carried me halfway across the world to this nightmare castle, and then handed me over to the witch!  She’s been gone for several hours now, but if you hurry and get me loose, I can lead you upstairs to her home.  If you’re quick, you can break her crystal ball and weaken her!”“Hmmm…,” Kat said as she pursed her lips.  “Perhaps.”  The beguiler then spoke a spell, and her eyes flashed golden, allowing her sight to pierce illusions and glamers.  When she looked up at the halfling, she saw instead a monstrous hag, black-skinned, with curling horns and wickedly sharp teeth and claws.“Would you care to tell us the truth now?”  Kat asked. The hag cackled as she used one of her long nails to slice her way free of the nets, and dropped heavily to the floor, assuming her true form as she landed.“My compliments on your astute perception,” she laughed.  “How would such clever little people such as yourselves like to help me with a little project?”Kat’s eyes narrowed and she glanced at her companions.“Why don’t you start with telling us who and what you really are, and why we shouldn’t just kill you now?”“I’m Malatrothe,” the hag said, her face growing serious.  “I assume that you are here to defeat one, some, or all of the commanders in Scarwall.  All I want is to be there when you best one of them.”“We’re still listening,” Kat said, “…for now.”“There is a spirit…a force that powers Scarwall,” Malatrothe began.  “His name is Mithrodar, and he is a chained spirit.  His power derives from four spirit anchors…powerful beings, some living, some not, that he has bound to his will.  As long as these anchors exist, he cannot be destroyed.  Hundreds, if not thousands of spirits are trapped within Scarwall’s walls because of Mithrodar’s power.”“Zellara…,” Kat whispered.Malatrothe continued as if she’d not heard.  “Three of Mithrodar’s anchors I know:  the dragon Belshallam, which I gather you have already slain; Scarwall’s former military commander, Castothrane; and Nihil, a fiendish woman who dwells in the towers above.  I’m not sure about the fourth, but I think it resides within the chapel, inside the donjon.”“So why do you want to see these anchors destroyed?”  Kat asked suspiciously.  “What do you get out of it?”“Power,” Malatrothe shrugged.  “Souls carry much value in certain circles.  My motives, admittedly, are selfish, but I’m the only one who can show you where to find at least two of the spirit anchors.  What say you?”“I say to the Hells with you!”  Raelak snarled.  “Now, now,” Sial said silkily.  “We shouldn’t be so hasty.  After all, we are here to retrieve the sword.  If weakening this chained spirit helps us to accomplish this, what does it matter how that is achieved?”The debate continued for several minutes, with the company split over whether or not to trust the night hag.  In the end, there really was no choice.  They had no other leads on finding Scarwall’s secrets.  “We will follow you,” Kat said as she turned back to Malatrothe, “but if you seek to trap or betray us, you will think the Hells are Paradise by the time we’re done with you.”_____________________________________________________________Malatrothe lead them upstairs to the keep’s second level.  As they passed down a long hallway, she paused at a set of intricately carved doors.“Mithrodar lies within,” she said quietly.  “I warn you to avoid this place until you have destroyed all of the spirit anchors.”The passage ended further on at a single door.“The way to Castothrane is beyond,” the hag nodded.  “I do not know if he has placed guards or wards about him.”“What do you know of this person?”  Sial asked with interest.“He is no ‘person,’” Malatrothe chortled.  “He was already undead before Scarwall fell to Mandraivus.  He was captain of Kazavon’s guards.  I know that he was destroyed when Scarwall fell, but when the castle’s restless spirits reclaimed the keep, Castothrane was restored.  It was sometime after that he was bound by Mithrodar.  He is a wily one.  You should have a care.”Herc pushed open the door, revealing an oddly shaped chamber that apparently occupied most of the second floor of the gatehouse.  A large set of winches seemed to govern the gates and portcullises in the gateway below.  Troughs ran along the sides of the winches, just above a set of murder holes in the floor to the east and west of the gears.  Arrow slits pierced the outer walls in several places, completing the room’s defensive posts.  A half-dozen skeletal minotaurs stood about the room, and the companions beheld the source of the attack they had endured as they had fled along the causeway.  The undead brutes raised their crossbows as the door opened, but Herc was across the floor before they could fully shoulder their weapons.  The big warrior leaped into the air and came down swinging his shield and slashing with his blade.  Within seconds, he had smashed one of the guards to bone shards.  As he turned towards the others, they fired their crossbows.  Most of the bolts went wide, but one struck Michael like a hammer-blow, and another spun Raelak as he drew his own bow.  That was the only volley the minotaurs got.  O’Reginald conjured a hail of heavy stones in the midst of the room, pummeling the creatures beneath the deluge.  Simultaneously, Malatrothe hurled a barrage of magic missiles into the monsters, drawing a look of disbelief from Katarina.  By that time, Raelak had recovered, and he began to loose arrows in a steady volley, until the last of the creatures collapsed into a bony heap.Malatrothe stepped around the bones and pointed to a trapdoor in the ceiling of the guardhouse.“Through there,” she said.  “Castothrane is above.”Herc took the lead, climbing up the ladder and carefully raising the trap door.  He found himself looking out over a wide parapet.  On one side was a peaked roof with an archway leading to the chamber inside.  The mercenary climbed all the way out, then reached his hand down to help his companions up.  At that point, Raelak took the lead, his bow at the ready.  Beyond the arch was a long chamber with inward-slanting walls, much like an attic.  Many old barrels and boxes, broken and empty, were stacked at the base of the walls.  Stairs descended to the north, near two small alcoves with conical roofs.  Striding down the center of the room was an armored warrior.  He gripped a massive battle axe in one gloved hand.  Where his head should have been, however, there was instead only a grinning skull, wreathed in a halo of flickering flames.  Raelak drew back his bowstring, but then his eyes caught a flicker of movement from behind the barrels.  Shadowy forms moved there, and as he watched, several detached themselves from the general gloom.“’Ware the walls!”  the ranger shouted to his companions.  No sooner had he spoken, than the vaguely humanoid-shaped shadows began stepping through wall, passing through it as if it did not exist.  At the same moment, Castothrane stepped through the archway.  Silently, he raised his axe and brought it brutally down on Raelak’s arm.  The Shoanti pivoted at the last minute, and the blade merely sliced into his flesh instead of completely through it.  The shadows moved among the allies, reaching out with incorporeal arms to touch, draining the very life force from their victims.  Michael raised his hands to the sky and began to pray.  The clouds above suddenly released a deluge of rain, but when the water struck the undead, they wailed in agony as they were burned by its holy power.  Katarina took advantage of the moment to begin her own spell, conjuring a large, insubstantial fist out of thin air.  The hand seized one of the shadows, holding it fast.  Then, Laori rushed forward, her chain whirling around her head, and she proceeded to rip the ghostly creature to shreds.  Herc moved in as well, smashing and slashing at the shadows, regardless of the fact that half of his attacks passed harmlessly through them.  That was not true for Malatrothe’s arcane bolts.  They crashed into the undead relentlessly, felling one after another in rapid succession.Raelak reeled from Castothrane’s blow, but he quickly managed to put some distance between himself and the skeletal warrior.  Castothrane charged, but the ranger was faster, loosing arrow after gleaming arrow from his bow.  They tore into Castothrane like ballista bolts, and though Kazavon’s former minion did not falter in his resolve, his corporeal body could not withstand the assault.  Ultimately, he fell, and as he did so, Malatrothe was there.  The hag knelt beside him, uncapping a bottle she had pulled from her cloak.  The wispy form of Castothrane’s soul could be seen being drawn into the flask.  Malatrothe quickly recapped her treasure and rose, giggling.  Then, somewhere in the distance, the sound of a chain snapping could be heard, followed by a soul-chilling bellow from deep within the keep.“Mithrodar is not pleased,” Malatrothe laughed.  “Too bad for you!”  With that, she spun in a circle of darkness and vanished.</blockquote>

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