Realms of Enlightenment: The Grey Companions (final update posted 02.14.10)

[Jon Potter]

[Realms #501] The Voice of Aphyx

Morier snapped from his self-imposed silence at the sight of the advancing rat swarm. "We've got to get some protection on Ledare, NOW! Maleko,stay by her side with me until we can keep her safe!" He drew the mercurial greatsword and interposed himself between the rats and the Janissary. Ledare regarded his back with displeasure and nimbly side-stepped him, brandishing the longsword she'd borrowed from Maleko.

"I don't need to be surrounded and protected like a little girl!" she grumbled, assuming a defensive stance. She spared a look at Maleko and ordered, "We've got to close that portal!"

The elf looked at the Janissary and then at the rapidly growing pile of rats. He nodded. "Nothing good will come out of there. I am sure," he said and cast Web. He'd never actually cast the spell in any way other than vertically and he wasn't sure what the results would be as he did so now. The spell behaved more or less as he'd hoped, however, forming a sticky carpet that completely covered the forming rat swarm and the necklace portal, stopping a few feet from the companions' boots.

Ledare let out a yelp and Maleko cringed. He'd forgotten her reaction the last time he'd cast Web in her presence. He turned to apologize and saw that she'd forced a smile onto her face.

"Well done!" Ledare told him and then turned to look only at Morier. "Did we do this; bringing them here?"

"I don't know," Morier shrugged and began drawing on the power of the Heart.

"Morier, I think you need to make haste to get the Heart to the heart on this god's body," Maleko began, but before he could say more a strange vibration in his feet made him stop.

"What's-?" Ledare managed before the vibration became a violent shaking, the ground quivering and undulating like waves at sea. Maleko and Morier were both thrown off their feet by the tremor, but Ledare, bolstered by the divine grace she enjoyed as a holy warrior of the White Lady, remained upright. That left her in a position to see the fissures open in the rocky ground, spreading out from Morier like the spokes on a wheel.

One of them sped out, opening directly beneath Maleko and the elf let out a cry as he started to fall down the opening. She snapped out a hand and grabbed his wrist, hauling him up and out by brute force.

An instant later the fissures all around closed; the one that had threatened to swallow Maleko pinched shut on the hem of his cloak, holding him in place until he worked it free - and making plain the fate he would have suffered had he tumbled down the fissure.

He looked, wide-eyed and pale-faced at Ledare and started to thank her, but a curious squeaking voice spoke from the mass of Web nearby. It was the voice of the rat swarm speaking, somehow, through some bizarre modulation of the individual rat's voices.

"Ledare!" it said. "I'm so glad the gate didn't kill you. It'll be so much more fun to watch the albino keep using the Heart and do it himself. And he will you know. Eventually he kills all his friends."

Ledare turned to look at Morier - who was just getting to his feet.

And she knew what the rats were telling her was true. How is it that he among all of them had survived so long? He claimed that he hadn't killed Huzair, but how could she know? All she had was his word.

The word of a killer.

He'd likely do the same thing to her and Maleko.

If she let him.

 

[Jon Potter]

[Realms #502] The End of the Line

Morier staggered to his feet and stepped toward the others. "Stay close," he commanded. "We're getting out of here." He drew again on the power of Dridana's Heart and Ledare watched in horror as his doing so made the God Isle begin to tremble again.

"Maybe we don't need to drop everything and run," she argued, her face filled with uncertainty. "The rats aren't attacking yet; they're just talking. Maybe they can help us." Morier, who was concentrating on the miracle he was working, said nothing in reply, but Maleko looked at Ledare as if she were mad.

"They aren't attacking because I webbed them," the mage retorted, a note of alarm rising in his voice as the quaking of the ground mounted. "What makes you think they are here to help us?" But the Janissary didn't get a chance to answer because at that point Morier finished invoking Wind Walk and the effect was instantaneous and dramatic.

It was as if the God Isle were a sheet of glass and Morier were a dagger slammed pommel-first against it. The ground directly beneath his feet fairly pulverized as he completed the spell and an expanding network of cracks radiated outward from him. The terrible shaking of the ground drove both Morier and Ledare off their feet, while this time, Maleko kept his. As had been the case with Ledare moments before, it afforded him an excellent view of the shattered ground as fissures began to open up all around.

One yawned open beneath Morier and the albino teetered momentarily on the edge of the crevasse, limbs scrambling for purchase on the crumbling ground. Then he overbalanced and fell head-first into the fissure.

Maleko shouted something unintelligible and lunged for the eldritch warrior, trying to save Morier as Ledare had saved him, but he was a fraction too slow and the earthquake - godquake, Maleko thought absently - quieted, the cracks closing at once with gruesome finality.

"No!" the elf shouted, digging with his thin fingers at the tiny crack that remained on the surface.

"Oh, the irony is delicious," the rat swarm tittered as Ledare got to her feet. "Be a dear, Ledare, and see if you can't burn these Webs. I know how much you dislike anything to do with spiders."

 

[Hairy Minotaur]

Was that the first time you'd used cranium rats against them? I can't use them against my group anymore, the first time I say there's rats in the alley/trash/celler they yell attack and wipe them out regardless of how mundane they were.

 

[Jon Potter]

Was that the first time you'd used cranium rats against them?

These are actually something slightly different. It's a Demon Flock from the 3rd party PDF Bodies and Souls: 20 Templates. Essentially a demon that possesses a swarm. And this is the 3rd time the players encountered this Demon Flock, known affectionately amongst the faithful as The Voice of Aphyx.

The first time was way way back when they lost Kirnoth.
The second time was after they had gotten the four elemental swords.

 

[Jon Potter]

[Realms #503] Race to the Finish, part 1

Maleko stopped what he was doing and looked at Ledare intently. She in turn was looking at him with a somewhat glassy sheen to her eyes. She waved his sword at him and asked, "Maleko, have you anything to start a fire?"

It didn't take a genius to figure out what had happened and where it was likely to lead if he didn't act. And Maleko... Well, Maleko wasn't really a genius, but he was an attentive student with a wide breadth of knowledge and he was intimately familiar with the power and limitation of Charm Person. Both counted well in his favor now. He knew that, so long as the rats asked Ledare only to do things that she was already predisposed to do (like destroy a giant spider web), their control of her would be unbreakable by the Janissary's willpower alone. He also knew that there were some very simple ways to counter the effects of a Charm spell.

"I have a spell that will allow you to create fire," the elf lied as he got to his feet and began casting Protection from Evil. The rats, it seemed were attentive students as well.

"It's a trick, Ledare!" they hissed. "He's in league with Morier! He's a killer!" Ledare's sword - HIS sword, Maleko reminded himself - came up into a defensive position and she regarded him suspiciously. Then her expression grew swiftly surprised as she looked at something behind him.



Morier willed himself fully into gaseous form as the rock walls slammed shut, saving himself from a horrible death. It took a moment to orient himself in the dark confines of the fissure, but when he did it was simplicity itself to vent his body up and out into the misty twilight above.

He billowed up from the crack almost directly behind Maleko, who appeared to be facing off against Ledare, oddly enough. Ledare saw him and spoke his name, her eyes going wide with surprise at his sudden, gaseous reappearance. Stealing her distraction, Maleko reached out a hand and touched her lightly on the forehead and she twitched as if energy had flowed through her, which, Morier supposed, it probably had.



Maleko turned to look and saw a vaporous, Wind Walking Morier hovering behind him. The drow pointed up the God Isle toward the chest, mouthing words that neither of his companions could hear. And then he was gone in that direction, borne away by a breath of chill wind.

"Well, that was disappointing!" the rats chittered. "I was so hoping that-"
Ledare turned and casually thrust her sword through a squirming rat. It spasmed and writhed on her sword point, but as soon as she withdrew the blade it returned at once to health.

"A little upset that Morier got away?" the half elf asked. "Good! That means he's that much closer to doing good."

"He will fail," the rats squeaked. "You all will. Better to just sit down and wait for this all to end. Isn't that right, Maleko?" The elf looked into the many rats' eyes and felt the force of will that controlled them probing his own defenses. He smiled. His defenses were considerable.

"Not likely," he said. "I am an elf and a priest of Nethlar. Your petty mind tricks don't work on me." He dropped another Web atop the first for good measure and beckoned to Ledare.

"Just the same, Ledare, we should probably put some distance between us and... that," he suggested, indicating the rat swarm which was doubly entangled now. "All it would take is a moment's weakness on my part and I could become its thrall."

"I like that plan," the Janissary conceded. "My sword does nothing to this creature, as I feared."

They took off, loping along up the stone shin of the God Isle, but they hadn't made it more than a hundred feet when they heard the woompf of spreading fire behind them. Turning they saw Maleko's double web quickly going up in flames, consuming the entire mass in a few seconds. It was difficult to tell at this distance, but the rats seemed wholly unaffected by the flames.

"Please feel free to run," Maleko said to his companion as he watched more rats boil up from the unblocked portal on the stone ankle. "I can take care of myself if need be."

 

[Jon Potter]

[Realms #503] Race to the Finish, part 2

Not taking his eyes off the distant carpet of rats, Maleko dug in his pocket and produced a tiny vial that he held out to Ledare. It was little bigger than a shot glass with a stopper of pewter worked into the delicate shape of a hummingbird. "Ledare, with this potion you can Fly safely to Morier," the elf said, turning to look her in the eyes. "I will cast Expeditious Retreat and evade this rat swarm." The Janissary balked, gently but firmly pushing the vial aside.

"I won't leave you to-" she began but the mage-priest cut her off, thrusting the tiny bottle back into her hands.

"I have the power to protect myself," he said with total confidence. His apprehensive glance back toward the smoke from his burning Web gave away the truth of the matter: he was afraid, perhaps more so than he had ever been in his life. But he was trying to conceal it and Ledare could appreciate that. She'd known trained soldiers who quailed in the face of the enemy and did less to hide it than Maleko was.

"Go and do not look back," he explained firmly and she acquiesced.

"I knew Morier would surround himself with capable allies," she told the elf as she took the bottle and pulled the stopper. "Well done!" She brought the bottle to her lips, inhaling its fragrance - like boiled chicken - as she did so. The translucent yellow liquid was on her tongue by the time Maleko drew the proper roll of parchment from his Infinite Scrollcase. She felt a sensation of effervescent lightness spread through her body as he began to intone the spell on the scroll, and as that scroll crumbled to dust in the elf's hands, Ledare had lifted off the ground and was Flying away up the leg of the God Isle.

"Run while you can!" Ledare heard the rats squeaking somewhere behind her. "There's no where for you to go!"

Morier flew along at an exhilarating, dizzying speed, up the thickening peninsula of the statue's leg, and thence over twisted shapes that seemed imprisoned within the surface of the stone. He could glimpse them only in passing, but they seemed like stone statues of animals and people, half-fused to the rock as though they had been partially trapped when the god isle formed. There was a profound sadness in their frozen stillness, and Morier was glad when the growths gave way to the smooth hillock of the island's belly.

He shot upward, tracing the gentle curve as it steepened and when he crested its crown he had a strange, ant's eye few down the rocky torso. He could see the dark crater that was his destination some miles away, an ugly wound between the mountainous breasts. Seen from here it seemed ominous indeed, a rent that should have shown the inside of the god isle but instead showed only darkness.

As he paused, contemplating the view the ground beneath him and all along the slope of the belly began to crack and crumble. And from each patch of disturbed soil arose a creature of wood. Here rose a lion, there a trio of wolves, over there a crocodile of prodigious size - all made of living wood. Their limbs lacked joints or seams, but they moved with a whip-like speed just the same, creaking and groaning as they pulled themselves from the ground. The thorny horrors that served them as mouths left little doubt as to their intent and Morier willed himself away at once, easily outdistancing the strange, wooden creatures.



The ability to fly was exhilarating, or rather it would have been if Ledare's thoughts hadn't been consumed by the fact that Morier would easily reach their goal before she and Maleko did, making them of no help to the eldritch warrior. It was also darkly amusing that Maleko, running on foot below, was quickly outdistancing her. She had momentary visions of herself in her Janissary plate struggling to keep up with Finian and Kirnoth. Of course, Maleko was exerting a lot of energy running and Flying took only as much effort from Ledare as walking.

It was perhaps a minute or two later that Maleko was forced to slow his pace as the headlong charge took its toll. Ledare began to close the gap and was thinking that she might catch him in another minute or so when an expanding wave of sepia energy washed over them, dispelling both Fly and Expeditious Retreat.

Ledare felt the buoyancy go out of her body and she dropped gradually to the ground. Ahead of her she saw Maleko stumble and fall prone, propelled by his own momentum. Once she landed, she raced over to him.

"What was that?" she asked the mage as she helped him to his feet. Maleko straightened his clothes and smoothed his hair.

"An Epic Dispelling, I think," he said, sounding a bit winded from his run. "But magic at that level is purely theoretical. I don't know of any wizard who's passed the Ninth Circle limitation and you'd need to transcend that in order to cast magic of that magnitude."

"Perhaps Morier's reached the heart?" Ledare suggested and Maleko nodded.

"Perhaps," he agreed. "What do we do now? I have another scroll of Expeditious Retreat but I can only cast it on myself. And I don't have another Potion of Flying."

Ledare looked around. There was no sign of the pursuing rats, but she didn't suppose that truly meant they'd abandoned the chase. Ahead and to the left, at the limits of her vision she saw a strange warren of twisted statues. The strange misty quality of the air on the astral plane obscured them in part, but they seemed like stone statues of animals and people.

Those statues blocked the shortest path to their goal, and circumventing them would add time to their journey.



He made good time in vapor form and covered the distance between belly and breast in well under a minute. His attention was drawn to the vast black pit that filled the floor of the valley between the two stoney drumlins. The void seemed to fill his senses and tug at his guts, gaping, waiting to-

His thoughts stopped abruptly as an expanding wave of sepia energy washed over him, dispelling his Wind Walk (and, he realized belatedly, his Owl's Wisdom as well). He became solid and flew through the air at great speed for another thirty feet before plowing into the rocky ground and tumbling grotesquely along it for another fifteen. It would have killed anyone else, but Morier had the Heart and it protected him from most injury. Still, the crash was disorienting and it took him a few moments to collect himself and get unsteadily to his hand and knees.

"Sorry about that," a woman said from his left. He looked up and saw the speaker standing nearby. She was beautiful in a dark, unearthly way that was at once disturbing and arousing. Her hair was a wild mane of black locks and her eyes burned with a dark intensity that made the eldritch warrior's limbs go weak. And her eyes commanded his attention so much that for several moments he didn't notice that she was utterly naked apart from a leather cloak that was clasped at her throat and trailed down over grave-pale shoulders. In her hands she carried a greatsword in a sheath of leather that seemed to be perpetually crumbling away into dust though it never fell entirely to pieces.

She smiled and took a languid, enticing step forward. "Sometimes I forget my own strength," she said lightly.

Morier felt another wave of apprehension turn his guts to water. He'd felt this before. Before he'd gotten the Heart, when they'd been confronted by Dridana's demiurge. There was no mistaking the Primal Dread he felt. And it could only mean one thing.

Whoever this was... whatever she was... in some part at least, she was a god.

 

[Jon Potter]

[Realms #503] Race to the Finish, part 3

His body resisted his attempts to master it. His limbs felt like insensate things of lead. His guts kept clenching spasmodically, ready at any moment it seemed to disgorge the contents of his stomach. Every fiber of his being wanted to flee from this divine being. Well, almost every fiber.

"I am with you," he heard a woman say in his ear and found the will to move.

"I am Morier Thulien and I come to this God Isle in peace, to reunite the heart and body of the Goddess Dridana," he managed as he labored to his feet.

"I know who you are, Morier," the god-woman said, a note of amusement in her voice. "And I know why you're here. I've been following your progress with some interest. I must confess: I'm surprised that you made it this far. Surprised and impressed." She began to walk around him, slowly as she spoke, and Morier noticed that she wasn't really walking; she only seemed to be. Her bare feet trod daintily upon the air a foot or so above the actual ground.

"You've come a long way to get here and lost a lot of friends in the process," the divinity went on. "But have you even once considered the ramifications of what you propose to do? Think of the chaos you'll bring to Oerune!" Morier looked sharply at the woman, but only from the corner of his eye; it was easier that way. Who was she? He had supposed her to be Dridana, or some form of Dridana's essence, or demiurge, or another avatar of some sort... but given the circumstances around here she could be anything.

"What will be Calaam's reaction to such a flagrant disregard for his edict that what is dead should stay dead?" the woman asked. "And what will become of the poor Beastlords when Brogine's sister rises to reclaim her dominion over those things that grow in the ground. Surely Brogine will take back from the animal spirits his own concerns for those things that crawl!"

"Who-?" Morier struggled to ask, but the woman went on.

"And what of Kossuth, and Grumbar, and Istishia, and Akadi?" she asked him. "They only rose to power with Dridana's retreat. When she once more calls her own the power of the elements what will become of the Elemental Lords and those who revere them? Have you really thought this through or have you just plowed ahead through stubborn momentum alone?"

"Who are you?" Morier demanded through gritted teeth though he thought that he knew the answer already.

"I am a god, Morier. I am known by many names on many worlds," she said with a wave of her delicate hand. "To some I am Incabulos, to others Nurgle. On some worlds I am known as Abhoth. On others Moander or Marbas. Labels are really only important to you mortals. Gods transcend such limitations."

"Aphyx," he managed and the woman laughed lightly.

"Yes, I'm known by that one too," she said.



Ledare had been trained to assess battlefield situations and make quick decisions. Granted, their current situation was a bit beyond what he training allowed for. But she fell back on what she knew trusting the wisdom of experience to carry her through.

"We should make for the statues," she said, pointing in that direction.

"Are you sure?" Maleko asked, eying them suspiciously.

"Brogine and Dridana were twin gods of nature, so the animals may be an indication of something," she replied. "Perhaps Brogine tried to send aid in Dridana's final moments." Maleko considered this and shrugged.

"These statues can't be too much worse than the rats," he admitted and started to hustle in that direction.

As they drew closer, the sense of foreboding that seemed to hang in the air around the thicket of stone figures grew stronger. Eventually, while still some 100 feet from the nearest of the half-formed statues, Maleko staggered to a halt. Ledare turned to look at him and he held up a finger while he caught his breath.

"I have a spell that will offer us some guidance here," he said after a few deep breaths. "I can cast Augury to learn whether passing through the statues will bring weal or woe." Ledare spread her hands in confusion.

"Why didn't you do that before?" she asked before adding diplomatically, "I like the idea of having a little guidance here."

"It takes a minute or so to divine the future in this way," he said somewhat apologetically. "I didn't want to take time that would allow the rats to gain ground on us. I don't want them to catch up." They both looked back the way they'd come as if expecting to see the moving carpet of rats approaching, but there was no sign of them.

"You should do it," Ledare urged. "I'll keep watch." The elf nodded and started to pray, leaving the Janissary to scan the way they'd come for the rat swarm. After a minute, Maleko stopped his muttered prayers and shook his head.

"The statues are dangerous. Alone they would cause us harm. We cannot defeat them and the rats too. We must take the long path around them," the elf announced and pointed up along the mammoth slope of the God Isle's hip. Ledare sighed and nodded disappointedly as they started up and around in that direction. As they went Maleko drew an empty scroll case from his things and tossed it in the direction of the statues.

"Perhaps this will mislead our pursuers into thinking that we passed that way. And perhaps the statues will take care of the rat entity for us," he said optomistically. Ledare grinned at him.

"Good thinking, Maleko," she said approvingly. "Without the benefit of the gods' guidance they may well blunder into their doom as we almost did." The mage-priest nodded and fished a coin from his pocket.

"Quickly! We must go, And this may help us stay hidden." he said and held up the silver coin. "Nethlar will provide us protection by hiding the noise we make." He cast Silence on the coin he was carrying and all sound vanished at once, swallowed up b the magic. He clenched the coin in his fist and smiled at Ledare before pointing onward up the body toward Morier and the Heart. As they raced up the hillock of Dridana's hip he glanced back over his shoulder to look for pursuers thinking he would throw it at the rat creatures if they followed in range. Perhaps it would disrupt their spellcasting.

He hoped that was the case.



Morier shuddered at that as if someone had doused him with ice water, but with effort he brought himself under control. His heart was thudding in his chest nonetheless.

"Don't be afraid, Morier," Aphyx cajoled. "I put on this form because I thought you would find it to be the most agreeable. But if you don't like it, there are others..." As she spoke, her voice took on a curious change in tonality and glancing up, the eldritch warrior saw that her face was rotting off her skull. Her mouth was like a sagging leather purse full of corruption. Her eyes were two puncture wounds writhing with maggots.

He looked quickly away, feeling madness rising in him.

"One form is as good as another to me, Morier," Aphyx went on and her voice reversed its transformation until it returned to the womanly tones he'd heard before. "It is you mortals who attach such significance to the appearance of things." Morier took a shuddering breath and opened his eyes. She'd resumed her previous form.

"As a mortal, I don't believe that I possess the power to alter the course of events you foresee here," he told her, surreptitiously eyeing his surroundings for some advantage.

"You're probably right," she said. "But it's often surprising just what you mortals are capable of. I was being truthful when I said that you had impressed me making it this far."

"Oh," Morier grunted.

"Well, yes. You succeeded any number of times when I thought you were going to fail," Aphyx said. "For instance, I had Rake try to get even one of those druids' keys from Grandfather Plaque for decades without success. And you got them all in less than a moonsdance. That certainly surprised me!"

"So tell me, what do you want from me?" he asked , looking furtively at the gaping hole in the God Isle some short distance away.

"Nothing, of course," Aphyx replied. "I want you to do nothing. Leave here and go back to your world. Let events unfold in the natural order of things. Do that and you have my word that I will trouble you no more."

Morier said nothing.

"Perhaps I can offer you something else as a reward," she said."I know where Karak is; I could bring him here. Or I could take you to Dr. Akerman; there is a score to settle there is there not? Or Huzair... I could bring you a Huzair. Not the one you knew, but one as real as the Ledare I gave you." He looked at her and saw the dark face split into a toothy smile.

"Or," she said , wagging a finger at him as if he were driving a very hard bargain and she'd just caught on to him."Or, I can just promise not to make you watch me slowly strip the flesh from Maleko and Ledare's bones. Now doesn't that sound better than all that chaos you're thinking of causing?"

 

[Jon Potter]

[Realms #503] Race to the Finish, part 4

Ledare and Maleko had scaled the hip and faced the daunting swell of the belly rising up ahead to their left when the air around them sizzled with magic. Maleko looked around frantically, sure in his heart that the rats had caught up to them. Of course, he'd been vigilant about watching for them so it would have been a feat of magic in itself for them to catch up to them unaware, but still he looked for them again.

There was no sign of pursuit however and as energy arced through the air around them he felt the distinct tingle of conjuration magic. He opened his mouth to warn Ledare that they were being forcibly Teleported somewhere before remembering that he carried the Silenced coin. He couldn't warn Ledare of anything.

And the next second it didn't matter anyway. There was a lurch, the bottom dropped out of his stomach and then they were elsewhere.



Morier pondered the options that Aphyx had presented and for a moment the possibilites seemed worth considering. Maybe by walking away he could retain the Heart, keep the power, and possibly bring Huzair back... or find Karak on his own.

The thought was a fleeting one, however. He forced it from his mind and tried to refocus, looking desperately for any opportunity to avoid further confrontation with Aphyx and get to the spot where the Heart should be. The idea of sacrificing himself to put the Heart and body back together was one he had considered often in his private moments and he had resigned himself to doing just that if the need arose. Now, confronted with that possibility, he wondered if simply jumping from the edge of the stone breast into the giant hole below would do it. It couldn't be more than a dozen paces to the breach, he guessed. Six seconds was all he'd need to make that distance.

If he could manage it, he would try.

"I'm growing bored with this, Morier," the goddess sighed. "You're delaying... hoping for help to swoop in and rescue you, no doubt. But it's not coming! Ayremac and Ixin did what I expected them to do in the Cavern of the Self; they changed their own past and stayed at home to live the simple life." She said this as if it were a grave insult to desire the peace of a loving home. "That's why you lot won't succeed. You're weak!"

"I'm here," Morier said, goading her just a little, hoping to keep her talking while he edged slightly nearer the hole in Dridana's chest.

"Yes. You're here," Aphyx admitted. "But only because I sent another version of you to the same point in time to make sure that the Heart would end up where I wanted it to. Just like I sent Ledare back to face Del with the means to bring my servants here innocently around her neck. It's all gone according to my plan. In truth, the only surprise in all of this is the elf. Maleko didn't try to change his past; he completed the challenge of the Cavern on his own merits without any help from me." She shrugged. "I had hoped that Huzair would make it this far. He would have been easy to manipulate. His appetites were so... predictable."

"You're lying," Morier snapped. "You didn't plan this!"

"Am I?" she laughed lightly and that laughter was more chilling than a berserker's battle cry. "How do you account for it then? How did your own double make his way to the mountaintop test of the Air Walk? And how did Ledare... long dead Ledare... return from a test that Delaroux entered? I think you're too quick to believe in the power of coincidence, Morier. Or perhaps too eager to deny my influence in your life!"

She started to cast a spell then and Morier seized the opportunity to run for the hole. He'd made it nearly as far as the edge when he felt a powerful force grip him, as if a giant, invisible hand had reached down from the void and clutched him in its fist. He struggled but it was useless and though he resisted, the force spun him around until he stared back at Aphyx. Beside her, likewise immobilized by the goddess' magic, Ledare and Maleko hung in the air. Ledare tried to speak but no sound came out and Aphyx laughed at this.

"How nice," she mused. "Maleko's taken the initiative and Silenced them both so that they won't bother our conversation with their incessant screaming. I do imagine they'll scream quite a bit as I slowly draw the life out of them. Or can we end this now? You give me the Heart and I let you all live. I won't ask again without the taste of your friends' souls on my tongue."



When they reappeared a heartbeat later, they were still on the God Isle, though their immediate surroundings were different. The sky before them was dominated by a pair of mountainous stone breasts, demurely covered by equally titanic stone hands. The valley between the mountains was filled with a jagged opening in the rock that was in turn filled with a pane of utter black. Morier was there, his back to them. He was running toward that rent in the stone, but as Maleko watched, the albino jerked stiffly and was hauled bodily off the ground by some invisible force.

Maleko moved experimentally and found that he too was hemmed in by some force he couldn't see. He wasn't completely immobilized, so it wasn't Paralysis. There was no visual manifestation, so one of the various Bigby's Hand Evocations was impossible. Telekinesis, he decided after three seconds. Definitely Telekinesis.

Ledare tried to raise her sword, but whatever force held Maleko and Morier seemed to have grabbed hold of her as well. She was able to thrash around, but she couldn't seem to bring her weapon up into any sort of meaningful position. She tried to speak, but the Silence drank her words.

Maleko looked at her lips trying to suss out the words, but then his attention was drawn passed her to a woman standing - no, he noted, not standing - hovering. She was hovering half-a-foot above the surface of the God Isle - off to the side. She was beautiful in an abstract, otherworldy kind of way, and utterly naked, but her eyes were what caught his attention. They were dark, at once a poisonous green and the yawning black of an open grave, and they swam with madness. She smiled a carrion bird's smile and something seemed to emanate from her, a force that palpably struck both Maleko and Ledare filling them with Primal Dread.

They would have run if they could, but instead, they just writhed there, suspended by the magic of a being both knew to be a god.

 

[Hairy Minotaur]

She shrugged. "I had hoped that Huzair would make it this far. He would have been easy to manipulate. His appetites were so... predictable."

Heh, predictable in their chaos.

Oh for a few loadstones now.... that's a fun telekinesis breaker.

Aphyx gets her marionetes to dance for her now. Whether this series of events were planned or not, they are now. I think I hear the Jack-in-the-box turning in the distance.

 

[Jon Potter]

I think I hear the Jack-in-the-box turning in the distance.

That's very generous of you, HM. What you really hear is a mortally-wounded campaign dragging itself toward the finish line, inch-by-grueling-inch.