Session #63
“There is another way out of here,” the Keeper said to Kazrack. “But it can only be opened from this side. Once you have gone through you cannot return the same way.”
Kazrack conveyed this to the others.
“Debo say take secret way!” Debo said.
“Zank you fur yer dawts,” Kazrack grunted out quickly. “If they can be called such.”
“Let’s go back to the other chamber and rest and re-group and decide which way to go, and then go in the morning,” Ratchis suggested. “Or what we hope is morning.”
Back at their camp, Kazrack said he wanted to spend the time to clear this entire complex out, and prepare it for re-habitation. The others disagreed, bringing up the danger of the place and the pressure of time.
“Zell, if ve ur going tuh go anywhere, let’s go where my jaw cun beh healed,” Kazrack said.
“Our choices seem to be limited,” Beorth said.
“Well, it seems like our choices are either Nikar or Abarrane-Abaruch,” Martin pointed out.
“Zuh ulfs?” Kazrack asked.
“Elves?” Martin guessed, and the dwarf nodded.
“I doubt Ethiel, or the other elves of Aze-Nuquerna have the means to repair your jaw,” Anarie said.
“Is there a library in Nikar?” Beorth asked.
“I think there is a temple of Thoth,” Martin said. (1)
“There is no temple of Thoth in Nikar,” Ratchis said.
“Oh,” was all Martin could reply.
“And what of Hamfast?” Beorth asked. “Do we leave him here to find his way back, or bring him with us through the one-way exit?”
“I don’t care what happens to him,” Ratchis grunted. “Every time we have let these monks go it has tasted worst to me than the last.”
“Uh zay we let him live wit’ food and uh potion,” Kazrack managed to get out. “To show we have given kindness and mercy.”
“Since when have these monks ever cared when we showed them mercy?” Ratchis fumed.
“If out of a hundred…” Kazrack began.
“Debo don’t understand! Why not kill monk. He an enemy!” the barbarian’s anger grew with his puzzlement.
It was agreed to let the matter sit until after the group had rested. In the meantime, Beorth spent his time trying to convince Kismet to part with one of her water-breathing potions for the monk; at least until Anarie pointed out that the magical potions that had been found among the monks’ things probably had the same effect.
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Later in what felt like night, as Martin and Kazrack took watch, the Academy Wizard went off on a long detailed explanation of all the resources they might find if they took the time to go to Nikar, and how helpful it would be to their cause.
“Uh-huh,” was all Kazrack replied, seeming bored of the talk. Or perhaps, his shattered jaw was hurting him too much to answer.
“My all accounts Hurgun’s Maze is going to be a grave danger, and heavily protected and guarded with powerful wards and who knows what else,” Martin began on a different tack. “We will need more and newer gear, and perhaps access to some magics that Anarie and I do not have, and perhaps we may want to consider hiring a sellsword or two…”
“Uh-huh,” Kazrack nodded. “We’ll discuss it with the others in the morning.”
“But Kazrack, ultimately it is you who must make this decision,” Martin replied, and Kazrack’s face took on a puzzled visage. “We do not have the funds to get these thing, but since you are the new keeper of this place, perhaps there are some treasures to be taken from here to help pay for them, you know, for the greater good.”
Kazrack was furious and would hear nothing more on the matter. He did not speak again to the watch-mage even after receiving an apology.
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“Does anyone know what day it is?” Martin asked. “I have lost track.”
He was packing away his journal after making some notes in it, as everyone else broke down camp and prepared to leave.
“The 22nd?” Anarie guessed. “I often forget to keep track of days.”
“It is late spring,” Ratchis offered. “Summer will be here soon, perfect for our march to Nikar.”
“But we sill have sufficient time before the equinox, correct?” Beorth asked.
“Months,” said Ratchis. “A little more than three, to be precise.”
“Ze cun find out whun we get back to Shummit,” Kazrack had to suck back his saliva every five or six words to keep from bloody drool pouring out of his mouth.
“Summit?” Ratchis asked. “Why do we need to go there? We are just more likely to get embroiled in something else that will keep us from getting to Nikar at all. Better we head straight for the town and then come back in time to find where the beam will hit, but keep a low profile.”
“But we may need to see what is going on, what if the gnomes are in trouble?” Beorth asked.
“That is exactly what we need to avoid,” Ratchis said. “This has become bigger than just the gnomes. I said before and I’ll say it again, if I have to choose between the gnomes and the humans, than my loyalty is with the gnomes first, but the truth is Mozek and his mother and what they can do with Hurgun’s Maze endangers everyone. We cannot afford to be sucked into some other conflict, perhaps killed or captured and then fail to be there when the beam hits and it is time to go into the Maze.”
Kismet began to softly weep.
“I need to at least return to Aze-Nuquerna to let Ethiel know where I have gone,” Anarie said.
“And while we are there I can see if they have more specific maps of the area to and around Nikar,” Martin suggested.
“Also, I think such moral gymnastics to avoid making the choice dictated by our scruples is a treacherous endeavor,” Beorth said, and then he moved to comfort Kismet and get her going.
The Fearless Manticore Killers and company, made their way back into the map room, and the Keeper brought Kazrack over to what appeared to be one of the huge rounded stones that made the room. Touching it gently and speaking a word in dwarven, the huge stone slid backward revealing a very narrow passageway to a spiral stairway.
“Up this way,” the Keeper croaked. “It will close behind you, and you must hurry. Anyone trapped in the stairway will be crushed. It also acts as one of the gears that moves the stone.”
“Master, I thank you for your unfailing loyalty to our people,” Kazrack told the venerable dwarven guardian. “What will you do now?”
“Once you have gone, I can lay down and crumble to dust,” the dwarf said. “I have fulfilled my duty. This place is now yours to look after.”
Kazrack bowed.
“I shall return,” he intoned, his dignity just slightly undermined by his drooling shattered lower face.
Kazrack stopped long enough to take the one of the ruby chips that they had needed to find the location of Hurgun’s Maze, to insure that even if someone made it here, they would be hard pressed to replicate what they had done. And then he led the others up the dark narrow stair.
Anarie spoke an arcane word and soon a ball of light that illuminated the area like a torch was following her, and then she followed Beorth, who followed Kismet and Martin. Ratchis took up the rear to insure that no one tried to get out with any other treasures.
At the top of the stairway was a small room, as the last of them came through, the opening they came through was sealed off by a rotating stone statue of Lehrothronar. There appeared to be no way of opening it from this side, and the addition of spots for prayer stones and low stone benches, made this tiny alcove seem more like a place for prayer than a secret entrance.
And so they began the long slow march up the narrow and low-ceilinged passageway, that had its constant slow grade only interrupted by occasional staircases of ten or fifteen steps.
The long dark march was so long, eventually Anarie’s spell ran out, and the group marched on in the dark leading each other along for a while, until Debo complained of the dark after tripping on Kismet.
Anarie cast the spell again, and they found themselves in a damp room with stone benches, and a twisted and rusted weapons rack. The skeletal corpses of two armored dwarves were found in a stagnant puddle. They were too far gone to determine what had killed them, but there was not evidence of arrows or weapons left behind, except their own rusted axes and ruined crossbows.
“Dwarf, you’re telling me this place is long enough to need a rest stop?” Gunthar complained. “Do we even know where this place lets out?”
Kazrack moved the two bodies, with Beorth’s help, and said a prayer over them, and covered them over with stone to create a makeshift cairn.
After eating some rations they moved on, until nearly an hour later they came to what appeared to be a dead end. However, there were very narrow slits in the thick stone wall that let in dying light.
A quick search revealed the hand and eye of Lehronronar carved onto one wall. Kazrack focused the divine power of his gods into the symbol and a secret door swung open onto a three foot wide ledge, high up on a canyon wall.
“Why in the Hells would they build a door up here?” Gunthar said, when the cold wind whipped into the tunnel.
“The geography was probably very different before the earthquake,” Beorth reasoned.
“Wait here,” Ratchis said, and he climbed out on to the ledge. It was a narrow ravine that he thought he remembered from his reconnaissance of the area from above with the aid of Martin’s spell of levitation. (2)
They were about 80 to 100 feet up from the trickle of stream that ran below. It was only forty feet to the plateau above.
Martin cast levitation on Ratchis and he was sent up to check the plateau above and to see if there was a safe way to get everyone up and out of the area from there without having to do too much more climbing.
Less than twenty minutes later, Ratchis was back to describe what he had seen.
“This ravine runs just about north-south,” he explained. “We only have a few hours light, so I recommend we use this spell to get everyone up top. The ravine will be too dangerous in the dark, and this upper way leads to the southern tip of the woods near the elves and Ogre’s Bluff. One thing though, I saw the silhouette of a large winged figure to the east. It was a shadow on a cloud. I am not sure what it was.”
“The wyvern! The wyvern is bad! It’ll kill us all. It killed Creedadal,” Kismet was hysterical.
“It was far away, and I hope that we will be even further away before sundown.” Ratchis said.
It was agreed. Martin would use levitation allow Ratchis to ferry people from the opening up to the plateau top. Kazrack was first. The dwarf straddled the half-orc from the front, and Ratchis held him in place with one strong arm.
“Ha! Ha! Stonefolk humps him like dog!” Debo guffawed.
“Why do you have to carry up this way?” Kazrack asked slowly, letting go to wipe the drool soaking his mangled beard.
“Because it is safest,” Ratchis replied. “I can hold on to you with one hand, while I use the other to pull us over at the top.”
“I would have preferred the extra level of danger,” the dwarf said, embarrassedly; Gunthar and Debo’s mocking laughter echoed up after them.
The barbarian refused to be carried, and climbed unaided to the top of the plateau.
Eventually, all were at the top. It was broken plateau at the edge of all the broken lands and ravines that surrounded the area around the Pit of Bones, that connected at a narrow point with the huge forested ridge that held Aze-Nuquerna and Ogre’s Bluff in the north where it met Greenreed Valley, to the southern edge where the party came across the stone giant homestead. (3) It was covered now with brown and green fuzz that seemed to be ready to bloom into life.
It was a long march to the forest’s edge, and they barely found a secure place to camp before night fell.
As they ate from their meager rations, Kazrack once again brought up the subject of going to Nikar, and Ratchis immediately called for a vote. Kazrack only agreed to come along if the majority were for going.
“But don’t you want your jaw repaired?” asked Ratchis.
“Yes, but that can be done in Abarrane-Abaruch, or it can simply wait,” Kazrack said, enunciating each word carefully. “My gods have seen fit to inflict me with such a burden, just like past burdens and if I must be inconvenienced so that others may live and be free, so be it.”
“But Kazrack, you can hardly cast spells!” Ratchis argued.
The dwarf shrugged his shoulders.
Martin and Beorth both voted for Nikar, while Anarie abstained.
“I’ll go to Nikar!” Gunthar said.
“Debo with Gunthar!” Debo complained. “We made plan!”
“Easy there you strained turd,” Gunthar answered. “The plan will still go off. You go and watch over the you know what, make sure it is still there and do your part of the plan, I’ll help them get to Nikar, and in return they’ll help me get my brother back when the time comes. Right?”
He looked to the Fearless Manticore Killers. They all ignored him.
“I say we go to Nikar,” Ratchis said.
“So, I am overruled,” Kazrack replied. “But I still say we go to the elfin compound to see what we might learn.
Anarie nodded, and the others compromised.
Watches were set and in the dark of night, Martin, Debo and Gunthar were stuck with the middle watch. Gunthar soon found a comfy spot under a tree and went to sleep. Debo went stalking off.
Late into the watch Martin heard something at the edge of camp, and he hurried over to grab a brand from the fire and see what it was.
There was a small figure in brush.
“Who’s there? Come out!” Martin hissed, unsure of himself.
It was Kismet.
“Kismet! Are you leaving us?”
“I…uh, was just going to relieve myself in private,” she feigned exasperation and rolled her eyes.
“With all your gear and your pack?” Martin put a hand on his hip. “You shouldn’t leave everyone without saying good-bye. That’s not right… At least come and visit the elves with us.”
“Oh… Okay,” Kismet walked back over to camp and plopped down. She did not bother to remove her pack, but sat there sulking through the night.
Isilem, the 23rd of Sek – 565 H.E.
Morning greeted the party with a cold light rain.
“This is late spring?” Martin complained.
“Is it different other places?” Ratchis asked. “Because this what it is always like in Derome-Delem.”
Martin the Green was in no mood to discuss the weather any further.
They marched north by northeast in a moody silence only punctuated by Kismet’s fits of sobbing, and Ratchis barking orders. The thick band of woods gave way to sparser area with muddy soil. The trees here were younger and thinner than in other parts of the forest, and many were broken or uprooted, and leaves, still green, scattered across the ground made slippery patches hard to notice.
After an hour of this, they came to a river that gave them all pause.
“I don’t remember a river,” said Beorth.
“From what I hear, you don’t remember a lot of things,” Gunthar laughed.
“We came out further west than I first thought,” Ratchis said. Martin had pulled out one of his maps nodding as if he agreed. “And we did cross this before, except that before it was a stream, and from what I can tell it has rained a lot while we were gone, and that with the melting snow from north of us turned it into this.”
As if in answer, the river gurgled, as white water rolled over stones and fallen trees roaring down a broad divot.
It amazed them that a river had sprung up seemingly overnight. Ratchis, unphased by the abrupt changes possible in nature, stripped off his armor and dropped all his gear but a rope. He then swum across the strong current and fastened the rope to a tree on one side, and then braved his way back across with one end of the rope.
After fastening the end on this side of the river, and Martin cast inglevitation on him, Ratchis then used himself as a human bridge, to pull his weightless self across the river while carrying various members of the party.
Debo grunted and threw his pack across the river with a running two-handed throw, and then leapt into the water, deftly swimming across.
Ratchis brought Kazrack across first, followed by Anarie, and then followed by Kismet and then Martin. The half-orc came back to get Beorth, but the paladin demurred.
“Take the gear and my armor, if you will” he said. “But I shall swim across of my own volition.”
“You may drown,” Ratchis said.
“I will not,” Beorth said. “If you will bring my gear across.”
Ratchis acquiesced.
Gunthar leapt laughing into the river, after having added his gear to the pile Ratchis was bringing across. He only wore his short sword about his neck.
Cutting across the rough water, shirtless, with his long blonde hair pulled taut across his back in the strong current, Ratchis could imagine Jeremy being the one swimming. But suddenly, the figure disappeared, and then cursing and coughing Gunthar broke the surface, waving his arms wildly, before being turned over twice by the river and washed way down stream.
“That could have been you,” Ratchis said to Beorth.
“Yes, but it wasn’t,” the paladin replied. “You had better save him. I shall be endeavoring to cross the river myself.”
Scowling, Ratchis dropped the gear and dove into the river after Gunthar, but after a rough going, he found Gunthar had managed to pull himself onto the other side a few dozen yards further down stream. He was sitting coughing and cursing.
Still scowling, he made his way to the west side of the river and walked up to get the gear. By then, Beorth had already made it across.
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It was late into the evening when Fearless Manticore Killers finally came within site of the fortress of wood and upon the base of stone that was Aze-Nuquerna. Lucky for them, the light grew longer and longer as summer approached.
“Debo hate elf-men!” Debo complained.
“Debo, it is an ass-lickin’ elf place!” Gunthar tried to convince him by dubious means. “It is bound to be warm, and comfortable, and elves… You know!”
“Debo hate elf-men,” Debo said again. “Debo go to town, come back in two nights.”
With that, the barbarian took off for Ogre’s Bluff.
“Well, it was probably better the dumb bloated ballsack didn’t come anyway,” Gunthar said, shoving his hand into his pants to readjust himself. “He’d probably do something to embarrass us anyway.”
AS they came near the last great clearing before the elfin compound, there was a scuffle in the underbrush accompanied by barking, and a small dark form bounded out of the shadows at Ratchis. The half-orc dropper his hammer and grabbed up the brown and black mutt, which went crazy yipping and licking and nipping at him happily.
“Is that his girlfriend or his mother?” Gunthar snickered, and Ratchis shot him a nasty look.
“That is Kwa,” said Anarie.
A humanoid figure stepped out of the shadows as well, a tall blonde elf in studded leather armor. He wore a dagger and a quiver, there was an unstrung longbow leaning on his shoulder.
“Greetings Friends!” the mellifluous voice issued from the elven man like a song.
“Greeting Finduilas,” Anarie said coming over for a chaste hug. Both of the elves eyes seemed to shine when they spoke to each other.
“Greezings Finfushfeeshphush,” Kazrack drooled.
“I see Valto has found you,” Finduilas said to Ratchis, and noting the half-orc’s confused look. “We call him the elvish word for ‘luck’ or ‘chance’. Is that not what the name you gives him means?”
Ratchis nodded, and Martin gave him a solemn look. (4)
Finduilas led them into Aze-Nuquerna where Ethiel greeted them with might pass for happiness.
“Well met,” the elder elf said. “It is good to have so diligent a group return.”
“She are pleeshed tuh be her,” Kazrack replied.
“You are always welcome,” Ethiel said with a smile.
They were brought to a common area where they had taken their meals and rested in the past. The elves brought them a warm mushroom soup with a sweet rose-petal bread to shake off the wet and cold.
Anarie introduced Kismet to Ethiel and some of the other elves, but the gnome woman barely said a word – whether it was from awe of meeting elves or the horrors she had endured was uncertain.
Gunthar was indeed dumb-founded by the place and the elves, and for once in his life was quiet, except when after dinner he blurted out to Finduilas, “Are you a boy-elf or a girl-elf?”
The elf warrior did not reply, but sneered.
“It’s hair was prettier than this one’s,” Gunthar said, pointing to Anarie.
Kazrack and Ratchis both glared at the Neergaardian.
They were brought to rooms to sleep the night. In the morning there would be much to discuss.
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Notes:
(1) Thoth is the god of knowledge and wizardry, and his temples are always libraries.
(2) See Session #53
(3) See Session #51
(4) ‘Kwa’, the orcish word of luck or chance, was the name Ratchis gave the stray dog in honor of the party’s former companion, Chance (see session #20)
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