Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="BoldItalic" data-source="post: 7192102" data-attributes="member: 6777052">Snagtooth was on watch in BloodFort Keep. He liked being on watch over the big gate because it was an easy watch. All he had to do, was to make sure no-one stole the big gate. No-one had ever stolen the big gate for the hundreds of years it had been there, and no-one would as long as he was on watch. No-one had ever opened it either. Everyone used the little gate at the side because opening the big gate made no sense. It wasn't there to open, it was there to look terrifying and forbid entry to anyone who wasn't supposed to be let in. It was there to not open. That was the whole point of it.A movement caught Snagtooth's eye, down below on the snow-covered trail that ended at his gate. A very small wizard, about the size of a pixie, had emerged from between some piles of snow that, in the fading light looked a bit like snow-elves but obviously weren't because there weren't any snow-elves up here. The tiny wizard walked slowly up to the gate, five feet at a time, and raised a tiny knobbly staff.Snagtooth laughed and shouted "GO AWAY!" but then a strange thought entered his mind. After all, why should the pixie wizard go away? Pixie wizards were specifically allowed to open the big gate, weren't they? He felt sure they were. He didn't notice that one of the snow-elves had been staring at him intently. He was too busy watching the tiny wizard.The pixie wizard rapped on the gate with his staff and said something Snagtooth didn't understand. There was a loud KNOCKKKK sound and then a lot of clanking and squealing as massive bolts sprang open, chains dropped, counterweights counterweighted, and hinges protested. Slowly, very slowly, the big gate, the gate that was never meant to open, began to swing open and the pixie wizard, three snow-elves and a lobster walked through. One of the snow-elves clanked a bit but it was barely audible above the cacophony of sound that the gate itself was making. Another of the snow-elves carried a very shiny halberd and she was ... she was ... female. Snagtooth felt the stirrings of something best left unstirred. The third snow-elf wore sergeant's stripes on his arm, and if a sergeant wanted to walk through the gate escorting a bunch of other snow-elves, Snagtooth wasn't going to argue. Arguing with a sergeant was instant termination in the orc ranks. It had been drilled into him from a very early age. What is it, Private? Termination, Sergeant! Right, and don't you forget it, sunshine."So far, so good," said the snow-elf called Tippy. "Let's head through that archway. It looks like there are some steps up towards the battlements. It's nearly dusk, and the orcs will be stirring soon."Meanwhile, Albert had quietly opened a grating leading to the castle sewers and he, Inannyunot and Ha! had slipped in un-noticed. It was dank and dark down there, so Inannyunot cast Light on an apple that Albert gave him, but kept one hand over it so that the light only lit up the floor enough to see where they were walking. He conjured a map of the sewers into existence and consulted it. "We need to go down there, turn left and up some steps," he said confidently.As they went down there and turned left, the hairs on the back of Albert's neck started tingling. "We're being watched," he whispered. "Can't you feel it?"Iggy crooned. Iggy could feel it too, but Iggy couldn't see it. "Gurgle?"A pair of eyes blinked ...</blockquote>

Verification