Ptolus: Midwood - "The Dark Waters of Moss Pond"

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Katadid tosses a copper to Ragglus for the amazing neck shot.

"Let's see: three for Tock, one for Renraw, four for Ragglus. No, three now ..."

"Oh! That one went up his NOSE!" Renraw cheers. "My brother did that to a raccoon once! ... What?"

Ragglus puts the boards back over the pit and Katadid and Tock descend into the pit to examine the bodies of the zombies. One of the spears appears to be magical, but whoever murdered them has stripped them of everything but their unexceptional weapons and (somewhat funky) chain mail.

"Oooh!" Kat passes his hand through the glow that only he can see, under the effects of his cantrip. He takes a few experimental stabs with it, but his arm rapidly tires. Reluctantly, he hands it to Ragglus.

Renraw likewise hands Ragglus the bow and arrows he's finished with, not bothering to check whether or not Ragglus can hold it all.

"Leach! Wait up! I'm coming, too!"

Crossing the rickety bridge of planks, Katadid and Renraw attempt to elbow each other aside to get into the secret room first.

It's an irregular chamber about 15 feet by 20 feet. The room reeks of rotten dwarf flesh. It appears to be a hybrid bedchamber -- there are unused bedrolls and a long-unused fire pit (now growing a bit of cave moss) -- and storeroom -- iron bars, rotting planks, ropes and stonemasonry tools line the east wall.

Renraw goes to look at the hole in the wall, more clearly visible from this side of the secret door. Peeking through, it occurs to him that he could stab someone with a spear if they were attempting to lift the portcullis manually or bend the bars.

Meanwhile, Katadid has found a small scrap of paper, clearly part of a larger document torn to pieces. The writing on it is fragmentary, but appears to be in code. He stares at the paper for a long moment before looking back up again. His eyes burn with their familiar manic intensity.

"More paper ..."

Kat begins tearing the room apart searching for any more fragments. At the same time, he begins moving the letters around in his head to determine their significance.

"Huh," Renraw grunts, "Reminds me of the basement of Kem House. What is that paper, Katadid?"

Kat shoves the parchment into Renraw's hands.

"Help me find more ..."

Ragglus and Tock find the two wizards tearing apart the room and screaming with glee whenever they find another damp scrap of paper.

"Careful! Careful!" Kat screams as he sees Renraw almost tear a particularly moist sheet. He doesn't even notice his cousin or Ragglus enter, let alone the two of them exchanging glances.

Finally, with all the pieces firmly in hand, Katadid reassembles them on a mostly dry plank and begins making notes on a piece of parchment.

"It's a substitution code. Simple, really ..."

The translated message slowly takes shape on his parchment:

"Work Agreement

This contract is between the Azzak brothers (contractor) and Card Firmer Then (hirer).

In return for the sum of 450 gold thrones, the contractor agrees to provide the following:

1) Construction of an iron portcullis with a concealed lever;
2) A 10 foot deep covered pit;
3) A pair of simple traps.

These services are to be performed at an undisclosed location and shall be completed within 30 days of the start date. The contractors will keep this agreement secret and not disclose the location to any other persons.

Payment terms: Twenty-five percent advance with the remainder due upon completion of services. Contractor provides all raw materials needed."

He leans back, satisfied.

"Well, that explains the presence of the cavern and traps adjacent to a simple well." He looks up towards Ragglus. "The creature was a dwarf before he changed, correct? It's likely he was the hirer.

"This is a great deal of planning for just simple robberies. I wonder if he has anything else planned ..."

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Kat folds his translated copy and shoves it into the small sack hanging from his belt. He looks sadly at a bit of desiccated herb that falls out before turning and scooping up the paper scraps and keeping them as well.

The party, still in high spirits from their cathartic slaughter and recent discovery, cross the pit (stopping to open it and giggle some more as they remember some of the more amusing shots).

It isn't long before they come to the fork. Ragglus starts to turn north to head back to the werebadger's cavern, but Kat looks south, his lips pursed.

"Bird, what?" Tock asks. "What are you thinking?"

"We haven't ..." Kat points toward the unexplored southern tunnel. "It could be more evidence, maybe? B-but ..."

Renraw rolls his eyes and shoves past Katadid and Tock into the southern passage.

"Come with me if you want light," he says.

The musty southern chamber smells like an animal pen. The walls glisten with moisture in the light of Renraw's staff and the floor looks smooth in this roughly 20-foot diameter cavern. A pair of stalagmites almost reach the ceiling.

There are no other obvious entrances or exits. Shining Renraw's light around, though, the group does see a mass of matted straw and plants in the far left corner of the room, almost hidden by a stalagmite and the curvature of the natural cave wall.

Renraw slowly creeps his way over to the plants behind the stalagmite, careful to watch and listen for any movement. He suddenly stops, stands straight up, and walks back to the group. He tugs at Kat's waist, flustering the younger wizard, and grabs for his sling pellets. He thrusts his hand into the bag and pulls one out.

"Gentlemen, ready your bows. Leach, your sleep spell," he says. "If it looks like it may go wrong, head back for the pit and we'll try the last trick again."

Renraw then hurls a pellet toward the nest. It misses, and he tosses another, ignoring Katadid's whimper.

A four-foot long badger comes tearing out of the nest, snarling and racing towards the group.

It takes all of Kat's marginal will to keep from running. Instead, he takes another handful of sand, and prays that this giant beast is more susceptible than the last. The sand dissolves before reaching the oversized badger, who flops to a halt and begins snoring wheezily.

Kat breathes a sigh of relief, tiptoes around the creature and begins searching the lair. He discovers a wealth of dire badger feces, dried dire badger urine and a nest that looks like a mix of straw, grass and filthy scraps of burlap.

"Rags, put it out of its misery," Tock says, quietly joining the search.

"But, wait, it didn't attack until ..." Katadid begins, clearly unhappy with Tock's command.

"And then it DID attack, and it will again when it wakes," Tock says, raising his voice a little. "And I'm not willing to believe a dire badger and a werebadger have nothing to do with each other. I'd rather we kill it now and send it to dire badger paradise than see it tear up Rags as Renraw runs away."

"Runs away? RUNS AWAY?" Renraw screeches in outrage. "Did you happen to see me in action against the were-creature? I marched right into the face of death with no more than my trusty staff in hand! Ragglus and the rest of you would be dead if it weren't for me. Don't forget how I saved your bacon with the spider earlier, as well! And the hideous dwarf things that were also zombies? Whose brilliant plan was it to use the pit against them? The selective memory on display here is appalling. Next time perhaps I WILL run away, and then we'll see where you all wind up. Dead and justifiably in Hell, most likely.

"Rodger Cmelak doesn't run away from danger. Rodger Cmelak's bravery and know-how in the face of overwhelming odds puts the rest of you to shame. If I ever, EVER, hear another word like that, our partnership is through! Through, you hear me? Running away! Are you insane? Did you take leave of your senses? TOCK CHANDLER, HELLO? Are you still inside there somewhere? Lothian wept!

"I can't imagine where you would get such a notion, running away. Do you want to fight right here and now, in front of this sleeping badger? Because I'll fight you. I'm not afraid, and I think we should. It's the only way to settle this, man to man. Run away! We'll see who runs away!"

Renraw pumps his fists.

"Don't scoff at me, Chandler! Are you afraid? Why aren't you fighting? It's because you're a scared little girl inside of your trousers. You have lady parts, don't you? Let's have it out! I'm tired of this disrespect! Man to man! Put up your dukes, bard!

"Have at thee! Let's see what you're made of! Cowardly stuff, I bet! You don't seem to be answering. Perhaps it's because you know that anything you might come up with would be wrong, just like you always are! Wrong, and stupid! Hey, great idea 'rescuing' us when we didn't do anything wrong! Wonderful, putting us on the run and making us look even guiltier!"

Tock walks to the badger, shoots an arrow in its skull, and then walks back to Renraw.

"Cool it, Rod. I didn't mean anything by it. You think I'd make you my combat advisor if I thought you were chicken?"

"Combat advisor? You think that a ridiculous title could placate me, your combat advisor? I'm a COMBAT ADVISOR, for god's sake, I don't ... Say, what were we talking about again? Good show with that sleeping badger, Chandler."

"The worst part?" Kat mumbles, still sad over the death of the badger, "There's nothing here..."

"What a crying shame!" the badger corpse says to Katadid, the arrow protruding from its head. "Now, if you don't mind, you're in my bed."

Renraw releases the badger's jaws he had been working with both hands and dances away, chortling.

"Let's go, Gentlemen Delvers. We have a map to explore."

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Katadid wipes away his tears of fear and sorrow. Soon enough, the prospect of further exploration has driven Renraw's gruesome puppet show from his mind.

Using Renraw's staff, Kat sees if he can determine anything from them. The tunnels are dark, smell vaguely of old dried urine and are too twisty to see far down with the staff light.

"Huh."

Kat looks up and shrugs toward the others. He walks over to the chest and opens it, looking quite empty except for the rack of potions. Taking one of the bottles, he puts it in his sack. He takes another one and uncorks it to sniff experimentally. Looking toward the others, he shrugs again.

"This should be interesting."

"BIRD!" Tock yells. "Don't drink that!"

Katadid smacks his lips and looks around, seemingly unchanged.

"Yum. Tastes like almonds."

And then Katadid has the strange sensation of falling, of everything whirling away. When the sensation stops, he's less than six inches tall and the Gentlemen Delvers are as tall as trees. The two-foot high tunnels the werebadger vanished into are now enormous, far taller than any roof back home in Maidensbridge ever was.

Kat blinks. He looks at his hands and then up at the Delvers, whose shocked faces he can just barely make out.

"Huh." He feels to see if his clothes and equipment shrank as well. "Fascinating."

Ragglus stares down at Katadid in horror.

Renraw's eyes go wide with manic glee when he sees what happens to Katadid. He puts his face down low to the ground and whispers to his compatriot. The onion, bratwurst, 12-days-with-no-oral-hygiene-whatsoever halitosis almost causes the tiny wizard to pass out.

"What does it feel like? Does it feel temporary?" Renraw booms. "How long do you think it lasts? Shuffle your feet or something! Do a cute little dance for us!"

It takes a few moments for Katadid's coughing fit to stop.

"Well ... interesting. Perspective is different. I would IMAGINE it's temporary but ..." He blinks as if realizing something. "You have very bad skin, Renraw."

Averting his eyes from dirty pores the size of a plate, Katadid stares at the tunnels.

"Why do these exist?" Kat motions toward the holes where the werebadger escaped through, "He obviously doesn't need them."

"Bird, my buddy, they exist for the same reason other holes exist: To go into." Tock says as he takes a potion and gulps it down, wincing. "Come on, guys, no going back now. If this ends up permanent, I've heard pixie tail is even sweeter than elven."

Renraw thrusts his potion into Ragglus' calloused hands.

"Drink down, Chaplin! We haven't got all night!"

Before Tock can wonder about Renraw's sudden enthusiasm for going last in the shrinking process, he finds himself collapsing down, down, down, until he and Katadid are the only two normal-sized people in a cave full of giants.

"Huh," Tock says, feeling all his parts, making sure that none of them shrank any more than the others did. "Neat."

"Shouldn't someone stay big?" Ragglus asks uncomfortably. "Just in case?"

"Maybe," Katadid shouts up to him. "But could one of us fit through the holes regular size? Ooh!"

From this position, Katadid can see what he thought were pebbles are dried rat droppings. Lots and lots of dried rat droppings. He runs over and picks up one of the rat droppings, cradling it in his arms. Tock wrinkles his nose and sighs as he massages his temples.

"These are rat droppings!" Katadid yells. "I think the passages are rat warrens, as opposed to badger setts, which means the passages could get much smaller."

"Chaplin, dear man, if those tunnels DO get smaller as they go, the two of them could need someone a good deal brawnier to protect them, don't you think?" Renraw says, reasonably, attempting to guide the potion flask up to Ragglus' lips. "I believe I'm the best choice to remain 'large,' as it were."

Ragglus shuts his mouth and turns it to the side, like a recalcitrant child unwilling to eat yet another spoonful of applesauce.

"Confound you, Chaplin!" Renraw fumes, "Just come here!"

Renraw grabs him by the back of the neck and pours his potion down the other man's open gullet. With a growl that cuts-off just sort of becoming a furious scream, Ragglus drives an elbow into the wizard's nose. Renraw has no time to reel back before he finds Ragglus' potion stuffed into his mouth, its contents cascading down his throat.

And so, sputtering and spitting, the pair shrink down to mere inches in size alongside the bemused Tock and oblivious Katadid.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Blood trails down into Renraw's moustache, making it even greasier than it was before. He stands with his hands on his hips, frowning at Ragglus.

"It had to be done, Chaplin. You were invaluable to the mission."

Ragglus gives Renraw a look conveying that, unless the wizard wants to forcibly be the lone participant in a one-man giant rat turd eating contest, he'll give no further commentary on what just occurred.

Tock, following Ragglus' gaze, realizes in horror that Katadid has been carefully examining an enormous rat turd that the wizard is holding in both hands. Tock kicks it out of his hands, making a frustrated noise as he does.

"So," Ragglus asks, pointedly having turned his back on Renraw, "Which way?"

"Which first?" Katadid says, looking up, as though clutching a massive rat dropping to his chest was the most normal thing in the world. "The smiley?"

"Smiley?" Tock asks, a bit dazed by all that's just happened. "Oh, yes, the smiley."

Renraw, feeling something unusual in his whiskers, runs his tongue along his upper lip and tastes the familiar copper. He is shocked for a moment, but he stifles an outburst and makes himself a mental note about Ragglus.

"Yes," he hisses. "Forward to the smiling face."

He takes a quick, tentative poke the discarded rat turd with the end of his staff and then follows the group.

And so the Gentlemen Delvers find themselves now walking through a cavernous tunnel up to two feet high, picking the middle tunnel in the north wall of the dwarf's cave.

As they approach the first cave marked on the map, a strong animal smell fills the corridor.

The cave, to their new perceptions, appears 40 feet in diameter. Along the north wall is a large pile of straw in which the dwarf-badger lies, his wounds still wet and raw, his breathing shallow. A pair of 12-foot long badgers stands in the center of the room, growling at the Delver's approach, their fur on end.

"Renraw," Kat says, backing up and almost stumbling as he readies his sling. "A sleep spell would be nice ..."

"Nonsense, Leach! We shall subjugate them as our mounts! Chandler, you have an affinity for animals! Get to it!"

Tock's expression threatens shocking violence of a life-altering sort, and Renraw sighs, looking back at the badgers.

"All right, but before this is through, I want to ride around on something abnormal."

He briefly fumbles with his bag of sand, the other adventurers remaining frozen.

"Hurry, damn you," Ragglus whispers.

"SLEEEEEEEP," Renraw intones, hurling the sand with a flourish and using a deep baritone not quite within his range. "SLEEEEEEEEEEEEEP!"

One of the badgers slumps to the floor and begins to snore. The other, alarmed by this, begins to back up, until the wounded dwarf-badger barks something unintelligible and the badger advances on the party, snarling.

Simultaneously, the wounded dwarf-badger leaves the nest, straw sticking to a wet wound, also heading for the party.

Katadid pulls out a piece of cotton and tears it, shouting something out, even as Tock takes aim with his newly acquired bow and shoots at the wounded badger.

Katadid casts the spell perfectly and it takes him a second of rapid blinking before he remembers with a groan Professor N'dege in Nammor Hall giving him a gentle rap on the back of the head when he tried casting daze on an animal in class: "It only works on humanoids, foolish boy!"

"Oh, that's right ..."

Beside him, Tock does little better: The bow might be enchanted, but the arrow still cannot penetrate the shapechanging dwarf's hide.

But it's the regular badger that reaches Ragglus first. Ragglus grins when he discovers that his newly shrunken size is much more nimble than before, and he dodges the fangs of the badger easily. But that goes both ways, and the badger pulls back from his counter-thrust with the spear. A moment later, the shapechanged dwarf snaps his badger fangs at Ragglus, equally fruitlessly.

Kat takes a silver sling stone and whirls it above his head toward the werebadger. The silver sling stone goes wide, burying itself in the straw on the far side of the room.

"Crapweasel," Tock says. He begins to improvise a song as he draws another arrow. This time, he strikes the normal badger in the shoulder.

"Proicere," Renraw whispers grimly, pointing a finger at the werebadger. A magic missile flies from his fingertip into the creature, which roars in anger.

The dwarf-badger then swats away Ragglus' blow with one claw, snarling angrily before clawing and biting at the warrior. The first claw scrapes off Ragglus' armor, but the second digs into the flesh beneath, as does a punishing bite a moment later.

Lothian, Ragglus prays silently, I know we ain't been on good terms but if I'm about to die, at a size that makes a gnome look like a bloody giant, at the hands of mother violating badgers of all things, you got to admit, this is pretty damned embarrassing. Keeping that in mind, do me a damned favor for once: Make sure that every last damned Kem I ever met dies too. Painfully, if you can arrange it. Thanks.

Kat's next silver bullet bounces off the dwarf-badger's skull, making it wince, and an arrow sinks into the regular badger as it charges at Tock.

Despite favoring his shield, Ragglus manages to poke the enormous dwarf-badger in the nose with his tiny long sword, calling forth a gusher of blood from one nostril.

A flash of light from Renraw's spell sparkles in the werebadger's eyes, but it blinks at precisely the right moment, and it shrugs off the effect of the spell as it leaps at Ragglus again. The warrior bats away the beast's claws with his sword and his shield, but again, the teeth bite down on his shoulder.

The other badger is now upon Tock Chandler, blood mixed with its saliva as it attacks. The bard dodges its first claw, but the second one hits him soundly, almost knocking him off his feet. And then the beast finds Tock's neck with his jaws, sending a gusher of blood out across them both.

"TOCK!" Katadid screams, seeing his cousin shaken about like a rag doll. "NO!"

Tock breaks free and runs. The badger gives chase, snarling with rage at the intruder. A sling stone pings off the badger's skull, and it snorts in frustration, but never slows down enough to let Tock begin to entrance it with his singing.

Renraw squints his eyes at the gravely wounded Ragglus, making a few internal calculations, sneering in disgust. He charges into the melee, thrusting himself between Ragglus and the wounded were-badger and preparing to cast another spell at the creature.

"Out of the way, you oaf! Retreat!" he shouts, attempting to wrench the magic spear from the big man's hands. "But I'll have a poke or two before we go!"

Ragglus is in a daze, simply hears the word "retreat," and pulls back. He figures he must have dropped his spear at some point, not feeling it in his hands.

A magical dart streaks from Renraw's fingertip a second time. He locks eyes with the werebadger for a split second and then the beast collapses, dead.

The tiny adventurers remain in a cave now with one slumbering badger and a second, angry and frothing at the mouth, chasing their bard around the den.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Renraw, now clearly in some kind of insane power fantasy, charges the other badger with the spear, screaming at the top of his lungs.

"Good job, Rod!" Tock yells out on the run. "Now let's kill this one!"

Ragglus falls to his knees, grunting in pain as he grabs for his bow. Grip unsteady, hands shaking, he nocks the arrow, draws back, and fires on the badger chasing Tock.

Katadid takes out a piece of wax paper and smears the butter on his palm. Screaming the arcane words, the butter on his palm begins to sizzle as if his hand were heating from within.

Suddenly, the badger finds itself sliding on a greased rock floor, slamming into the wall and now surrounded by an area of slippery slime.

And so the badger is waiting as Renraw races at it, screaming for blood. The badger lowers its head and the spear slides harmlessly across its flat skull, the wizard now trapped against the badger by the slicked-up floor. Ragglus' arrow does no better.

The badger attacks Renraw, clawing and biting into the soft flesh pressed up against the beast.

The moment the spear slid over the top of the animal's head, Renraw felt the kill-frenzy drain right out of him. Then the jaws snapped down on him.

"OH, THE PAIN!" he howls. "THE TERRIBLE PAIN! SOMEONE DO SOMETHING!"

Katadid's sling stone goes whipping past Renraw's ear, but misses the badger entirely.

"Chase me, you disgusting piece of crap!" Tock snarls, firing another arrow.

Despite having to shoot around Renraw, Tock's arrow pierces the badger's eye. It quivers and falls dead, releasing Renraw onto the slippery floor, and he slides on his butt backwards away from the beast, stopping just short of the slain badger's slumbering mate.

"I did it," Renraw whispers to himself, panting. "I DID IT! I'M A HERO!"

He only celebrates a moment until he feels the pain in his raised arm. He lowers it and inspects it, seeing firsthand what it's like to be mauled by an animal. With his good hand, he makes some exploratory pokes at the open wounds.

"Oh, that quite hurts." He breathes heavily through his nostrils for a moment, looking up at the wall at nothing in particular and grimacing. "MEDIC!"

Kat's hands are shaking as he walks toward Tock, opening the healer's kit and wrapping bandages against his wounds.

"Stupid badgers. Bad badgers ..." His eyes are red as he looks toward Renraw, crying out for help against the snoring badger's nose. "Stupid neck breaking ... "

Tock looks up as his cousin rises, bandages and ointment falling out of the kit as he does so. Renraw looks up long enough from his crying to see Leach approaching.

"GODS! About TIME, Leach! Bring the kit over, yo-"

Renraw's eyes widen as Kat grabs his staff and starts running toward Renraw.

"Stupid! Stupid! Stupid! STUPID! STUPID!"

Kem shrieks girlishly as he dives out the way of the staff, which he finds was not intended for him after all. The staff clunks hard down on the badger's skull and for a moment it looks like it's about to wake up, but there's a crack and then Kat brings the staff down on the badger's skull over and over again with wet, slurping sounds.

"STUPIDSTUPIDBADGERSTUPIDSTUPIDBAGDERSTUPIDSTUPIDSTUPID!"

"Good job, Bird," Tock says, after a moment, in what he hopes is a soothing tone. "I feel much better now. Why don't you help Rags and Renraw now? Afterwards, we have theories to discuss."

Renraw, relieved beyond measure that he's not the one being walloped, takes a strange and obvious delight in Katadid's violent outburst. He stands triumphantly, favoring his good side, and points a menacing finger at the sleeping badger being beaten to death.

"Yeah! And tell 'em Glinty Rod sent you."

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

As Katadid binds his wounds, Ragglus leans heavily against the wall in an effort to stand. Once up, the comfort of the immediate threat being over and done with seems to raise his spirit, enough to keep him conscious and at least somewhat alert. Campaign mentality takes over, so he moves to collect his fallen weapon, recover the arrow he wasted, and make sure his armor is once again fastened and secure.

"Didn't figure you'd want to deal," he says, spitting at the now-dead werebadger.

Renraw, clutching his side, ambles over to the corpse and plops himself into what looks like a comfortable, chair-sized cranny in the thing's armpit.

"Actually, Card, I'll tell you something," Renraw says breezily, his trauma of a moment before having subsided with Katadid's bandaging. "Although you're of genetically stunted lineage to begin, and although you were revoltingly cursed with some wretched, foul disease, you weren't all bad. I'm sorry I had to kill you, Card. You had a pretty sophisticated operation going here. In another time, another place, perhaps we could have been associates."

The wizard taps on the creature's motionless skull with his fingertips.

"You shouldn't have screwed with me and mine, Card."

As the Gentlemen Delvers search the room, they spot a group of badger cubs huddling together fearfully in a passageway leading off the main cave.

"Oh," Kat looks crestfallen. "Of course."

The four juvenile badgers huddle together and hiss at Katadid as he stares at them. They have teeth and claws, although their fur is still lighter in color and downy. He's no expert in badgers, adult or otherwise, but they look as though capable of surviving on their own, he thinks as he takes a wary step backward and away.

After a moment, he's distracted by the werebadger's potion flask, and he murmurs an enchantment as he stares at it.

Katadid stares at the potion, turning it over and over in his hand as he concentrates. It radiates faint transmutation magic. Uncorking it, he sniffs it, touching a bit of it to his finger and is about to bring the touch of liquid to his tongue when he notices his fingernail is now a little longer and thicker than the others on his hand.

On the other side of the cave, Tock Chandler has continued searching, and there's a quiet noise of pleasure from him as a stone portion of wall clicks and swings forward, revealing a hidden cache of loot in a secret compartment.

The hole contains a beautifully made ivory flute, a silver bracelet, a silver ring set with a pearl, a pair of emeralds and a wooden wand with a silver handle. Something is written on the wand's handle.

"Oooh!" The potion forgotten for the moment, Katadid races over to the hidden stash, just narrowly beating Renraw there. Kat picks up the wand and ponders the writing. Finding himself unable to read it, he casts another spell, reaching into in the pouch at his belt for a powdery mixture.

The magical mist of soot and salt causes the writing to glow in Kat's eyes and he reads it eagerly. Once finished, though, his face falls and he grimaces. He looks torn, and even a bit disgusted.

Finally, he takes the wand and walks over to Ragglus. He begins chanting something in Celestial.

Unfortunately, nothing happens.

Kat raises an eyebrow. He tries saying a single word in Celestial.

Things stubbornly continue to refuse to happen.

Finally, Renraw has had enough.

"What is that?" he barks, attempting to snatch the wand away. "What are you doing? Give me that!"

Katadid pokes Ragglus painfully in his wounds while chanting both the prayer and the word, hoping physical contact will do the trick. Finally, absolutely stymied, but unwilling to hand the wand over to the grasping Renraw, he shoves it into Tock's hands.

"It's Lothianite magic," he says as he wipes his hands on his sleeves and sighs. "The prayer is 'Then your light shall break forth like the dawn, Lothian, and healing shall spring up quickly.' The word 'Dawn' seems particularly emphasized."

Tock shrugs, repeats the word for "dawn" in Celestial and taps Ragglus with the wand. Immediately, the big man's wounds begin to close with a slurping sound.

"Tock, what?" Ragglus says in confusion. Ignoring the antics of Renraw and Katadid has become second nature to him by now.

"A wand," Kat says simply as he wanders off. "Lothianite, apparently."

"Well, ain't that the cat's arse," Ragglus mutters to himself, savoring the irony.

Kat returns a few moments later, dragging a hunk of meat as large as his torso, speared by his staff like a kebab.

"Well, food's ready."

He motions to the others to come out to the remnants of the werebadger's camp, where a spot of floor has been cleared in front of the near-dead fire. While the others eat, Kat grabs an errant piece of badger fur on the ground and places it under his head and he quickly falls asleep.

Renraw, now full on stew meat, emerges from the badger den with animal blood streaking his cheeks like war paint.

"A nice six-hour nap, perhaps," Renraw yawns, curling up near Katadid.

The embers of the fire are just an orange glow and the Delvers are settling in for a well-deserved nap when it happens: They begin to grow.

Suddenly, each has sprung up to their full height, hitting their heads on furnishings now too close, finding themselves entangled up with fellows who previously had laid an arms length or more away.

A little more than an hour after drinking them, the potions have worn off.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

"BWAH!" Katadid awakes with a scream.

Renraw yawns and stretches his aching muscles, unconsciously tightening around Katadid's leg. When he feels it shaking him off, he jolts awake.

"Er, did you hear about that Spellflag match last month, Leach?" Renraw grunts, pulling away from Katadid as quickly as he can. "The Ermines are looking good this year, looking very good. Redhurst had better watch their backs. Of course, it's not like they'll shrink from the figh--"

Looking up at the others, climbing to their feet, Renraw can read it on Tock's face: Now too large for the complex, they're going to leave. Katadid looks as though he might have some of attack when his cousin makes the announcement.

With great reluctance, Renraw pulls the scroll tube with the puzzle mechanism discovered earlier out from his sack and holds it out to his young companion.

"I have a strong feeling this will help us create more shrinking serum," he says before pausing, frustrated. "I ... have not been able to decipher the combination. Perhaps with your help we can open it."

As one, the group turns, looks at the scroll tube in Renraw's hand and silently restrains themselves from murdering him.

Opening the scroll tube by opening it properly involves sliding pieces up down the tube. Unbidden, the image of Tosh Bergen's nimble fingers working a lock springs to the Delvers' minds, but the quiet faen's help isn't unavailable here.

While the group considers the tube, Kat pulls out the dwarf's flask. He takes a drop of the liquid inside and dabs it on his wrist. He then takes a drop of the shrinking potion and dabs that on his wrist as well to see if the two potions interact with each other in any way.

The two drops of liquid fail to do anything interesting, other than serving as dashes of very strange cologne on Katadid's pressure points. For the heck of it, Kat licks the combined mixture to see if there is any effect. They mostly taste like Katadid's wrist. It occurs to him that he hasn't had a chance to properly bathe since falling into Goblin Pond.

"Ew."

Katadid walks over to the glistening scenic cavern and disrobes before diving into the pond. Surfacing enough to cough, he dog-paddles around.

He spots the stream that empties out of the cave pond and looks at the opening that it trickles into. Katadid can slip his hand into the opening beneath the cold water, but after a little experimentation, he realizes he cannot get his elbow in. It takes him about a minute to get his arm back out after learning this fact.

Feeling freshly washed, Kat puts his clothes back on. He walks back to the werebadger cave where the other are beginning to gather their supplies. The Gentlemen Delvers have had no luck with the puzzle tube, passing it back and forth increasingly roughly in growing frustration.

"Wait, I think I just remembered a bard song I could use to open the tube!" Tock exclaims. Rags hands it to him and he concentrates on it. He mutters something in a strange language no one understands. He places it upon the ground, kneels, and bows a couple times making arcane gestures.

Then he picks up a rock and smashes the damn thing to pieces.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

A set of scrolls unroll in the wreckage of the puzzle tube and Renraw dives for the at them, slapping at Katadid's hands.

There are six scrolls, each with a spell on them. Although Renraw can't be sure without magic, it appears they are multiple copies of two spells.

"As I'd suspected," he says sagely. "Two spells, one for shrinking, the other for reversal of the shrinking process. We can cast them, but we need our rest first."

Renraw gathers the papers to his breast and lies down again, cradling them.

"Don't bother me."

It takes a little while for everyone to get to sleep -- the last rest was so recent, and everyone can't help but think of the beds above their heads at the Dented Coin -- but at last they do. The spellcasters awake, refreshed and their minds clear once more.

Now freshly rested and cleaned, Katadid wanders over to the bundle in Renraw's arms. He slips a few of them out and places them on the ground. The rest of the party doesn't seem to be up yet, and he prefers it that way.

He takes out a small hunk of quartzite and holds it up to his eye. He starts chanting and the crystal explodes with a tiny pop. Kat closes his eyes. When they open again, they ripple like water. He picks up the magic scrolls and starts to read.

"Hmmm, yes, one is the shrinking spell," he says out loud. "The other is commonly called 'Bull's Strength.' Redhurst had it listed as 'Oxen's Might,' but that may be a precursor. It may explain the other potion easily enough. And, well, there's enough scrolls and potions to give us another hour to navigate our way through ...

"Oh, good morning."

Katadid goes back to the scrolls as the others get up and begin to prepare for more delving.

"The spells themselves seem more potent. We wouldn't be studying spells like this until our fifth year at school. Maybe something in the method of brewing or compounding of solutions reduces the durations. Kat shrugs and looks at Renraw. "Two scrolls for you and Ragglus. A potion for Tock and I?"

Kat reads the scroll to shrink Renraw, then Ragglus. He and Tock each drink a potion. Renraw, now anxious to finish this and return to the surface, begins walking back to the tunnels even before he shrinks. When the Gentlemen Delvers arrive in the badgers' den, the juveniles are gone, with no trace of where they went.

"Well, good," says Renraw, relieved. "Less triviality to worry about. Now then, let's. To the water room."

"H-how tall do you suppose?" Katadid ponders aloud as they walk. "I mean us, in comparison?

He stops dead and his eyes widen.

"Oh my! I-it's ... it's a CIPHER! A CODE!" Kat grips Tock's shirt and screams gleefully. "Asenhigh! ASENHIGH! For gnomes! I GET IT!"

"Slow it down a bit, Bird," Tock says, as he extracts himself from his cousin's grasp.

"Ah, yes, of course ..."

Kat starts walking a bit more slowly and mutters to himself as they proceed down the tunnels.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

The Delvers continue a long way -- especially at a few inches high -- before reaching the cavern with water on it. It's far enough that several times they argue over the validity of the map before arriving, but when they do, it's clearly the right place: They enter a 20-foot-wide chamber, dimly lit by pockets of phosphorescent lichen, which cling to the wall and the 15-foot-high ceiling. A slow-moving river bisects the room into north and south areas. The water is clear and appears to be at least several feet deep. Three moss-covered stepping-stones are situated in the middle of the river.

"Huh," Kat says. He scans the river for anything that may pop out and eat the tiny Delvers, while also trying to gauge the distance between the stepping-stones. The small cut on his chin is deterrent enough to want to keep from missing another jump.

Even at this height, the Delvers are all confident that they could make the running jump to the first stepping-stone. The others will take a bit of luck to not end up in the drink.

"Any way we can make a-a bridge?" Katadid asks, unsurely.

"Yes, we'll design and construct an elaborate rope bridge using the spider corpse. It's the perfect solution!" Renraw's mock enthusiasm is punctuated with the jump to the first stepping-stone. Once again, Renraw surprises everyone but perhaps himself by gracefully flapping through the air to land on the first stone.

Tock takes a run and jumps to the first stone, landing neatly beside Renraw.

A really interesting stone on the shore of the stream distracts Katadid just as he's about to leap, and the rest of the Gentlemen Delvers collectively groan when they see the shallow jump that results.

Despite the outstretched hands of Tock and Renraw, Katadid falls far short, dropping into the icy water with a "KER-SPLONK."

On shore, Ragglus is the first to see it: A large fish -- good eating even when the Delvers would be full size -- suddenly breaks from the spot where it hid, camouflaged, and swims towards Katadid's flailing legs, its mouth gaping open.

"Quit being dramatic and grab on," Renraw says, holding out his staff. "OH, DEAR GODS! HURRY, KATADID, AND CLIMB OUT! CLIMB, BOY! MIND YOUR LEGS!"

"Ack! What?" Kat glances back where Renraw is staring. He begins a frantic dog paddle toward Renraw's outstretched arms. "ACK! GAH!"

"Never fear, gents," Tock says, striking a pose. "You've got Dargus Carter on your side."

He begins to sing a sea chanty and a moment later, a beautiful, multi-limbed creature appears in the water.

The octopus seems startled to find itself so far from Gharon, but confronted with a cave trout, instinct takes over, and it quickly grabs the fish in its tentacles and brings it to its hungry beak. When the spell ends a few seconds later, the octopus takes the remains of the trout with it.

"Sweet Hell!" Renraw shouts over the splashing, before smacking Tock's shoulder and pointing at him sternly. "You're going to teach me how to do that."

In the water, Katadid wears a similar expression of awe and wonder.

"I-I can DO THAT," Kat breathes reverently. He swims to the edge of the stone quietly, where his cousin helps him up. Kat keeps darting wistful glances toward the water. "Where do they come from? Has anyone ever asked?"

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Taking out his rope, Ragglus ties one end of the rope around his waist and tosses the other end to the trio on the first stepping-stone. He's pretty sure he can make the jumps, but the thought of "drowning under the weight of his own armor" is only slightly less a humiliating death than "killed by badgers." With a wary glance at the water, Ragglus backs up a fair bit and then shoots forward, leaping to join his fellow Gentlemen Delvers on the first stepping-stone. He easily makes the jump.

Working together, the Delvers carefully make it to the far side, although not without a return into the drink for Katadid along the way.

Katadid wanders off toward the next destination on the map, muttering to himself, only vaguely aware of the time constraints of the potion. His search as they walk turns up only rat droppings, but strangely, he seems cheered by the discovery.

Following the map, the Delvers discover that the next room, marked with the ear, seems to have no ears at all. It's roughly 15 feet wide. To the west are three round tunnels, wider than the rat warrens. A three-foot-tall pile of rocks occupies most of the chamber. Katadid starts toward the pile when Ragglus catches his arm, shaking his head.

The wizard opens his mouth to ask why, then he hears it: a clicking sound coming from within the pile of rocks. Standing on tiptoes, he can see the mound has a hole at the top, and a moment later, a pair of ants as big as large dogs emerge. They wave their antennae at the Gentlemen Delvers, but do not advance. More clicking comes from the tunnels on the far west side of the room and from within the mound.

"Let's try the Lady Parts Room, instead," Tock says.