Sagiro’s Story Hour, Part 229
Ice, Ice, Baby
Kibi finishes his dramatic reading of the Solfar transcriptions.
Ilyrio comments, “Ah, the rocks at your feet. We had wondered about that. They’re depicted in almost all the carvings.”
He rummages in his bag and pulls out a half-dozen more little statuettes of Kibi, all slightly different, some wood, some stone, but clearly made by the same hand. Scree is present in all of them, intricately carved.
“Can I have one for my collection?” asks Dranko.
“Certainly,” answers the Solfar. “We have many more. He had a constant demand for rocks and pieces of wood, and he was carving or chiseling whenever he wasn’t eating or sleeping.”
“Soooo,” says Dranko, scratching his head. “The crazy guy is the one responsible for this whole mess. And the Black Circle is the symbol of a Demon Lord of the Abyss, who they’re trying to rescue.”
“And we want to stop him from ‘trying again,’ that’s for sure,” adds Kibi.
That kicks off a long round of speculation about what’s really going on with all of this. There’s talk about the Abyss and the nature of demons, about the Far Realms (whatever that is) and how it might be connected to Wild Magic, about the Black Circle and its ultimate goals, about what the “Interstitial Matrix” is, and how all of these things are interrelated.
Ilyrio writes it all down for posterity, which makes Morningstar nervous. When she expresses her reservations, the scribe nods understandingly, and offers to keep the Company transcripts hidden and private.
“If I were an Big Evil God,” says Dranko, “and trying to get folks to help me, I wouldn’t tell people I was a Big Evil God. I’d tell them I was an abstract concept of knowledge.”
Flicker raises his eyebrows.
“Would you?” asks Aravis skeptically.
“Well, no, I personally wouldn’t. But I could see someone with more subtlety and intelligence deciding that was a good idea.”
“In other words,” says Aravis with a smirk, “it’s something Pewter might do, because...”
“Let’s just stop right there,” interrupts Dranko. Then he mutters, “the fact that your cat keeps beating me at chess is no reason to rub that in.” And then finally, “Er... I wasn’t going to say that out loud.”
“That’s all right,” thinks Pewter to Aravis. “I won’t tell anyone that I give him pawn and move every game.”
“Look at the bright side,” says Aravis. “You can use utensils.”
“Not that he chooses to, most of the time,” says Kibi.
“But I can,” protests Dranko.
Edghar thinks to Grey Wolf, “I can use utensils, and I’m smarter than him.”
“He knows,” answers Grey Wolf. “I won’t bring it up.”
Aravis notes with amusement that the out-loud portions of this exchange are being dutifully scribed by Ilyrio.
“Morningstar,” he says, “I don’t think we have to worry about anyone who’s following us learning useful information from the Solfar. Our transcriptions will be indistinguishable from any other ravings of a madman.”
The conversation gets back on track, but no one reaches any firm conclusions. Ernie brings up the disturbing idea that the “our lord” mentioned might be the Adversary, from whom the Traveling Gods fled before coming to Charagan. Everyone is reminded that whatever was going on in the Hets, the Black Circle thought it was dangerous enough to put a stop to it. Maybe because linking worlds is such a perilous enterprise? It’s certainly wreaking havoc all around them.
Kibi thinks, and the rest agree, that the Black Circle was using the Eye of Moirel to punch a hole into the Abyss. The Company decides that going into the Demon Slices will get them closer to finding out what’s going on, and they opt to leave that way rather than go to where the Screel are coming from. Kibi makes copies for himself of the “mad sculptor’s” transcripts and thanks the Solfar for their help.
Dranko seems happy with the decision.
“It’s okay,” he says, putting on a brave face. “I like demons....more than those stupid mechanical things, anyhow.”
“Which are coming,” says Flicker wistfully, “from a place filled with diamonds and platinum bars and adamantium thingies and...”
“Flicker,” warns Grey Wolf, giving the halfling a look.
“They’re immune to your sneak attacks,” Dranko points out.
“Well, you all kill ‘em, and I’ll loot ‘em,” answers Flicker. “How’s that sound?”
But nobody’s buying it.
* *
The party spends the night in a Leomund’s secure shelter, though Ernie and Flicker opt to stay in one of the empty tree-houses. The next morning they ask the Solfar about the first Demon Slice.
“It’s extremely cold,” says Reynoso. “Cold enough that we cannot survive without magical protections. We’ve seen nothing there but ice and demons.”
Dranko is feeling nauseated and chilled, and is disheartened to find that he once again cannot reach the inner-peace required to accept spells from Delioch. Ernie tries casting break enchantment (“Bad spell! Leave Dranko alone! Evil magic, I cast thee out!”), but it has no effect. A detect magic shows the hideous taint of the Cleaners still hovering about his body.
Morningstar brings out the big guns and casts greater restoration, willingly sacrificing some of her own life essence to cleanse her betrothed. As she touches him to cast the spell, she is nearly overcome with nausea herself. Then, as when a bandage is quickly torn from a healed wound, there is a flash of pain they both share, followed by a soothing sense of relief.
“I had no idea now corrupted and nasty I felt,” says Dranko.
“Yeah, you were corrupted and nasty,” Morningstar agrees.
“And she never knew quite how to tell you before now,” says Flicker impishly.
“So, this is a lesson to all of us.,” admonishes Morningstar. “No playing with tentacles.”.
With everyone fortified with endure elements: cold, the Company strikes out through the forest to the Way to the Demon Slices, less than an hour’s walk away. Flicker mutters his misgivings about the loot they’re leaving behind in the Screel Slice, but no one else cares. At last they arrive, and say farewell to the Solfar.
“Best of luck to you,” says Reynoso with a bow. “You’re the best hope we’ve seen to end this madness and set the world to rights.”
Dranko, rope tied around his waist, jumps through the blue portal. A few seconds later he steps out the other end and sinks up to his knees in powdery snow. A strong wind whips through his hair, stirring up the snow into opaque clouds. Fortunately the endure elements is holding; he feels cold, but not dangerously so. As the others tug on his rope he grabs a handful of snow before returning. Back in the forest he pegs Ernie with a snowball.
“We’re going to need our snowshoes,” he says, as Ernie splutters and wipes cold water from his face.
Fortunately the party has snowshoes – well, sand-shoes – that they bought from the folk of Green Valley for a magical halberd. Everyone puts on a pair, and they all dive into the Abyss.
It’s disturbing. They feel the same unsettling wrongness with the world that they experienced while pursuing Srapa through other Demon Slices. The Abyss is not like anything else in the multiverse, and it resonates jarringly with living souls.
The terrain itself is flat beneath the piled snow. Visibility is dangerously poor. No significant features, manmade or otherwise, are evident. Aravis looks around and exhales a steaming breath.
“So, does anyone have any idea how we’re going to continue?”
“Morningstar will cast find the path like she always does, and...” starts Dranko, but Aravis interrupts.
“No, I mean... what are we trying to find. I know our goal is get the Eye of Moirel, but how are we going to do that?”
“We’ve got the mad sculptor’s words,” says Kibi. “’Past the demons’. We go to the ‘Heart of the Hut,’ find the Eye of Moirel that’s taking chunks of the universe and sticking them in here, and we walk in, and say ‘stop!’”
“And the Eyes we already have will help,” he adds hopefully, with a glance at Scree.
“It’s about time they pulled their weight,” Ernie nods.
“You mean they’ll actually do something?” says Grey Wolf sarcastically.
“Well, they did just destroy an entire Slice,” says Kibi. “That’s something.”
* *
Morningstar doesn’t have a wind walk prepared, so after she casts find the path the Company strikes out overland on their snowshoes. Half the party is connected by a telepathic bond as standard operating procedure. Visibility being what it is, they stay in close formation, and all holding onto a long length of rope (which soon becomes stiff and rimed with ice).
For an hour or more they trudge slowly through the blizzard, feet crunching in the dry powder. Everyone is nervously aware that demons could be lurking close by, made effectively invisible by the blowing snow. Other than their own footsteps, the only sound is of the howling wind around their heads. Even marching in a close line, no one can see much further than the person ahead of them.
Suddenly there’s a tremendous cracking sound, audible even above the wind. One minute Grey Wolf is walking atop eight inches of snow. The next he is pitching helplessly forward into a crevasse. Only Ernie, last in line, sees what happens.
“Grey Wolf is plummeting!” he both shouts and thinks (being on the telepathic bond). Grey Wolf is also shouting, for his part.
Kibi hardly stops to think. He polymorphs into a small dragon and flies down into the revealed ravine after Grey Wolf. Dranko starts tying rope around himself, planning a rescue. Ernie doesn’t have time to do much more than shout his warning before the crevasse widens beneath his feet; a moment later he too is tumbling down into the icy crack.
Kibi’s and Dranko’s rescue attempts turn out to be unnecessary. Grey Wolf, bouncing, sliding and scraping along on a rapid descent, manages to grasp the wand of flying on his belt and use it before he is bruised to death. Ernie similarly activates his winged shield. The two of them are alarmed to see a silvery dragon flying down toward them, and Grey Wolf is almost ready to blast it, but on closer inspection he sees that this dragon has a suspiciously dwarf-like beard.
Less than a minute after Grey Wolf’s unexpected plunge, everyone is safe again on the far side of the crevasse. Morningstar peers down, wondering how deep it goes.
“Not something I expected in the Abyss,” she says. “I figured it would be hotter.”
“And shouldn’t there be demons?” asks Flicker.
“And Devils?” asks Dranko.
“No, Devils live in Hell,” corrects Aravis.
“Devils and Demons are the same thing,” says Dranko.
“No, they’re not,” says Aravis with a sigh. Hasn’t he explained this before?
“Yes they are,” insists Dranko.
“No they’re not.”
“Yes they are.”
“No they’re not.”
“Look,” says Dranko stubbornly. “Do bad people’s souls come here?”
“Some of them,” says Aravis patiently.
“Well, I know that when bad people die, their souls go to Hell. So this must be Hell and the Abyss. So Demons and Devils must be the same.”
“At the rate you’re going,” says Aravis between clenched teeth, “you’re going to find out, one way or another.”
* *
The slow pace and inherent vulnerability of the ground march prompts Morningstar to fill an empty spell slot with a wind walk after all. She can’t get everyone, and the ring of djinni summoning doesn’t work in Het Branoi, so Aravis polymorphs himself into a dragon to match Kibi. There are some logistical problems with communication and direction, but these are soon sorted out, and the Company makes much better time.
Twice the party stops to land, each time giving the dragons a breather and allowing Morningstar to cast a fresh find the path. When the last of the tracking spells runs out and the Company gets ready to make camp, Kibi and Aravis revert to their human forms. Scree is released from Kibi’s familiar pocket and immediately starts complaining about his master’s decision to fly.
“Would you rather I be misty?” asks Kibi. “Isn’t it better that I’m a solid flying creature, at least?”
“It would be better to be neither,” says Scree sullenly. “Better not to assume any form that loses contact with the ground. You could have cast xorn movement, and we’d be swimming through the ground like normal people. Aravis could have polymorphed into something big enough to carry someone.”
Kibi stands with his mouth agape; the others don’t know what’s bothering him, since this dressing-down is taking place over the empathic link.
“And besides,” adds Scree, “a big flying lizard isn’t very attractive, particularly with a beard.”
With that, Scree sinks into the ground.
Before turning solid some of the wind-walkers do a last fly-around to check the area. The wind has died down somewhat over the past hour, improving visibility. Ernie spots a group of creatures up ahead – six or seven – trudging through the snow. Dranko glides forward in mist-form to investigate.
>> ...prompting this exchange:
DM: Make me a Hide check.
Piratecat: “Only a 35.”
DM: Unfortunately, there’s a Sarcasm Penalty.
Dranko is not spotted. He can see that two of the creatures aren’t humanoid; they’re huge arachnid beasts over ten feet across. The remaining creatures are squat little bipeds with pot-bellies and long spindly arms dragging in the snow. They’re headed in a direction that shouldn’t take them anywhere near the party. The half-orc returns to the other to report.
“Well,” he says smugly. “They aren’t demons or devils. There are just two really, really big spiders and a bunch of small fat guys with long arms.”
“Sounds like demons to me,” says Aravis. “This little ones are called “dretches.” They’re the cannon fodder of the demon world.”
“Get out,” says Dranko. “Everyone knows demons are red, and have little horns, and tails, and carry pitchforks.”
“What do they teach you in those temples?” asks Aravis, throwing his hands up. “I’m telling you, those are demons. I’ll bet the arachnids are bebeliths.”
“Huh,” says Dranko. “Should we go fight them?”
It’s not a popular idea. Instead, Aravis waits until the demons are safely far away, and casts another secure shelter for the night. Since the spell uses local materials, they end with an igloo – warm but not comfortable, with glistening walls. The party burns the tables and chairs in the fireplace for extra warmth. Since endure elements lasts a full 24 hours, everyone should be safe for the night, and Scree volunteers to keep watch outside. (The cold doesn’t bother him underground, and he can sense vibrations if anyone approaches).
When he thinks no one’s looking, Dranko licks one of the igloo walls, just to satisfy his curiosity. Curiously, his tongue sticks, and he’s obliged to use a healing orison when he tears some of the skin off of it. Flicker, watching from his bunk, manages not to laugh.
* *
“Kibi, there’s something out here. Kibi, wake up!”
The dwarf shakes his head groggily.
“What is it?” he thinks to his familiar.
“A bunch of ice-creatures. They’re pretty ugly. They’re about eight feet tall and they’ve got icicles like stalactites sticking out of their bodies all over the place. It looks painful. They’ve seen the hut, but they haven’t seen me. You’ll probably hear them any min...”
There’s a loud raking sound on the east wall of the shelter. Half the party sits bolt upright, while the other half sleeps through the noise. Kibi explains the situation.
“Wake me if they start attacking with siege weapons,” says Aravis, confident that the shelter will hold. He goes back to sleep.
“Did they teleport here or walk?” asks Dranko.
“I saw them walk into my view,” says Scree, “but they may have teleported nearby and then walked. Visibility’s pretty poor out there. Oh, and they smell funny. Like they have rotten meat inside their icy bodies.”
Yeah, come to think of it, there is a faint, putrid aroma starting to seep into the hut.
“Guess it’s not a ‘secure-from-bad-smells’ shelter,” says Morningstar with a smirk. (The integrity of Aravis’s shelters has been a sore spot ever since those balls of black energy burned holes in one like a Swiss cheese)
Ernie throws some herbs in the kettle to mask the smell. The party starts to hear scraping on a second wall, and then an angry pounding on the door. Nothing’s getting in, but the smell gets worse. Scree reports there are about a dozen of the things outside.
“We can always teleport out, or wind-walk out the chimney if we have to,” says Dranko.
“Scree reports that one of them just vanished,” says Kibi.
That sets everyone on edge. They expect for a minute that one might have teleported inside, but Aravis reassures them that creatures cannot teleport to a place they’ve never seen if they don’t know what the landing area looks like. Still, everyone who has armor puts it on as a precaution.
“Three more just appeared,” says Kibi. “Scree thinks the one that vanished went to get friends.”
The pounding on the doors and walls continues. Finding a curious rhythm to all of this, Morningstar takes out her flute and tries to play along. As soon as she starts, all the noise outside stops for a minute.
“I think they’re listening,” says Scree.
“Do they like it?” asks Kibi.
“I can’t read their expressions. Maybe. Or maybe they weren’t sure anyone was in there until now.”
Sure enough, the pounding starts again, even louder than before. The smell inside the shelter is starting to become pretty rank.
“I think there are around twenty of them now,” says Scree.
Eventually the incessant pounding and scraping becomes a kind of soothing white noise. The ice-creatures don’t seem to be advancing any kind of adaptive strategy, and the Company manages to fall asleep again, long enough for the wizards to clear their minds for more spells. They all wake hours later to a truly awful stench, though the battering must have stopped while they slept.
“What’s out there?” thinks Kibi to Scree.
“There are about thirty of them now. Some are keeping watch on the shelter while the rest sleep in the snow. Ooop. They seem to have heard you moving around in there. The guards are waking up the sleepers.”
“We’re leaving soon,” says Kibi. “Come on in.”
Scree moves, xorn-like, up through the floor of the igloo.
“Hm,” says Aravis, frowning at Scree’s entrance. “I guess Leomund had a blind spot.”
With a new batch of protection spells applied, the Company wind-walks out the chimney. Oh, ye gods, the smell! Inside the shelter it was just a nasty stench. Outside, where some thirty ice-demons crowd around the igloo, it would be instantly vomit-inducing to someone with a solid stomach.
One of the creatures sees the fleeing party and points upward, shouting. Another, not quite grasping the situation, teleports upward, thinking to grab Flicker and fall with him back down to the snow. Instead, he waves his arms clownishly through Flicker’s vaporous body and then plummets, confused, to bounce off the roof of the igloo some fifty feet below. And then the Company is safely away, high into the cold Abyssal sky.
...to be continued...
