The Doomed Bastards: Reckoning (story complete)

[Lazybones]

This is just... wonderful. Can't wait for the next.

Thanks, Goonalan! This sequence was fun to write.

In other news, TDB has passed Travels through the Wild West in word count. I don't think it'll surpass The Shackled City's 733k words, but you never know!

* * * * *

Chapter 258

REFLECTION


The soft chanting from Nelan sounded unnaturally loud in the stillness of the temple of Orcus. The oddly-shaped chamber created unusual acoustics, and a footfall in one place could come back amplified tenfold by echoes, a feature that led to some tense moments for those on watch. Even Mehlaraine eschewed her usual walking pattern while on her watch, instead taking a seat on the dais near the altar, scanning the darkness for any signs of threats.

The quarters for the priests that had formerly served this temple were in a room just off the central chamber, and contained sufficient beds for all of them. That room had no exits, but Dar did not want any of them out of sight of the cleric, no matter how secure the area appeared. So they dragged the beds out into the temple, to give those not on watch a chance to sleep.

Not that any of them felt much like sleeping. Allera came over to Shay, who sat on one of the beds, her head lying against the wall at her back. The scout’s hand idly rubbed the hilt of Beatus Incendia, which she’d recovered from the blood pool through the assistance of a detect magic spell from Elegion Alderis. She had crafted a temporary scabbard for the weapon from some leather straps and a blanket taken from the priest quarters.

“You should try to get some sleep,” Allera told her. She sat down next to Shay on the bed. For a long moment, the scout did not respond.

“Would you be able to sleep?”

“Part of the training to become a healer involves acknowledging the needs of the body, even when they conflict with the demands of the mind.”

“A nice trick, that.”

“Your body will not be able to function, without rest. I could give you an infusion, something to help you rest.”

Shay shook her head. “If we’re attacked, I can’t be in a drugged stupor.”

“I wouldn’t give you something that strong. And it would be better than being in a fog because of exhaustion.”

“I’ll sleep, I promise. I... I just need some time.”

“There wasn’t anything you could have done, Shay.”

There was another long silence. Allera, alert to the feelings of others, waited it out. “I could have not given Talen my ring,” she said, finally. “I thought I was protecting him, but instead I only caused his death.” She looked over at the healer. “Yes, I know he’s dead. Just because I didn’t want to admit it doesn’t mean I couldn’t see it in your eyes.”

“Shay.” Allera put her hand on Shay’s. “It wasn’t your fault. You would have done the same, if Talen had been in danger, and you could have come to his aid.”

“Yes, but I couldn’t. Because I got myself into trouble, and I was helpless to do anything to stop it.” She leaned back against the wall. “If I’d kept my ring, that ghast wouldn’t have been able to touch me, and Talen wouldn’t have needed to rescue me.”

“And the warlock would have just let you destroy him? Shay, we were almost overwhelmed in that battle. It was a miracle that more of us weren’t killed. Talen did what he had to do, and his sacrifice probably saved the lives of several others. If the warlock had been able to hit the rest of the group with a few more of those blasts...”

“Thank you, Allera. I appreciate what you’re trying to do. If you’ll excuse me, I think I’ll get that sleep now.”

The healer rose as Shay laid out on the bed, and closed her eyes.

Allera looked down at her, biting her lip in frustration. Finally, she turned and walked quietly away.

They were ready for an attack at any moment, but the hours passed without event, the only noise the constant drone of Nelan’s chanting, and the quiet movements as those on watch were relieved.

They were all awake and together for the end. Nelan’s voice rasped as he focused the power of the Father upon this dread place, sundering the link between the temple and the demon lord. There was a faint flicker of blackness around the edges of their lights that was gone before it could be fully perceived. That was followed by a loud crack that echoed through the temple, as the huge altar stone was sundered into a dozen pieces.

Nelan slumped back. “It is finished,” he said.

Shay stepped forward. “Let’s get moving.”

The others had already prepared their gear. Allera helped Nelan gather his things, using her wand of lesser restoration to ease his exhaustion. Nodding gratefully to her, the cleric carefully folded his ceremonial vestments and placed them in his pack. Shay waited impatiently for him to finish.

“A few more minutes is not going to matter,” Dar told her.

She fixed him with a cold stare. “I seem to remember being a few minutes late, the last time we came to this temple. Ask Allera how important those minutes were.”

The fighter’s jaw tightened, but he did not reply. Seeing that Nelan had put on his pack, Shay turned and headed toward the temple exit.

“All right, let’s move out,” Dar said, following the scout as she led them out of the sundered temple of Orcus.

 

[Richard Rawen]

“A few more minutes is not going to matter,” Dar told her.

She fixed him with a cold stare. “I seem to remember being a few minutes late, the last time we came to this temple. Ask Allera how important those minutes were.”

Heh, she knows how to hit low!

I smell a confrontation with the Armored Wight* formerly-known-as-Talen and some serious butt kickin... and of course a cliffhanger to make the weekend go that much more pleasantly

*With fighter levels? We know he's not going to be a zombie... and I'm pretty sure they'd not want to waste his combat prowess on an incorporeal undead. . . makes me wonder

 

[Lazybones]

...makes me wonder

No need to wonder long.

* * * * *

Chapter 259

A RITE OF BLOOD


Hesperix reveled as raw, pure power flowed through his body. The flows of energy that permeated the main temple of the Talon of Orcus were visible to his altered sight as pulsating flows of black and red. The flows passed through the walls all around him, but tended to focus on the statue of Orcus against the back wall. The headiest part of the sensations that rushed through him was the realization that he, a mere man, controlled such power through his mastery of the rite of blood.

The ritual sharpened his awareness of his surroundings. He could taste the blood in the air, both from the font behind him, and the stale tracings on the body of the man before him. He imagined he could even smell the fear of the slain warrior, an afterimage of his emotions when he had died.

The dead warrior—and he was clearly that; the scars of dozens of battles were evident on his pale skin—was bound to an X-shaped framework of wooden beams that stood upright directly in front of the altar and statue of Orcus. From where Hesperix stood, the dark form of the statue loomed over the man, its hollow eyes staring down as if in contempt of this latest victim to the demon’s ambitions. The red light that diffused down from the ceiling above the statue cast the man’s features in garish relief, and gave his naked flesh an obscene tint reminiscent of blood.

The Seer had not made an appearance. The arcanist could not have failed to detect what Hesperix was doing here, and the cleric regretted that the enigmatic figure had not stirred from his lair. He would have enjoyed confronting the man with his new power behind him. The cleric nearly laughed. Plenty of time to attend to the settling of old scores. He had learned of the death of Theron and his entourage from his new ally; a pity, that. But there had also been a warning of other powerful enemies of the Master, former companions of the corpse here. They would be coming, no doubt, to recover their slain comrade.

Hesperix’s mouth twisted into a grim mockery of a smile.

The dark cleric’s attention occasionally shifted to the side. He did not have to turn to know that the revenant was there; he could feel the presence of the other. The undead being was favored by Orcus, clearly; Hesperix could still remember the stark surprise he’d felt when he’d realized the nature of the rod that the revenant carried. The thing had a strong power of its own, as well, a raw potency that Hesperix could sense even without the augmented perception granted by the ritual. The cleric coveted that rod, but knew that it had been freely given, and was as far beyond his reach as if it were located on the surface of the moon.

Still, if something were to happen to the revenant...

A sharp, stabbing pain in his gut drew Hesperix’s full attention back to the ritual. They were getting close, he knew. He still did not fully understand the Master’s will in bringing this dead man here, but with his hand and his mind fully restored, he was not going to pause at meaningless questions. The spell he was casting was one that had been beyond his abilities until just a few short hours ago, and the ritual was both amplifying and changing it. The cleric had to focus his full will upon the flows of power, drawing more and more of the negative energy through his spell into the temple, directing them into the body of the man.

And then, finally, it was done. The flows winked out so suddenly that Hesperix felt disoriented for a moment, as his perceptions were reduced to what they had been before. He felt keenly the absence of the greater commune with the power of the Master, but he focused more upon his subject, the limp form crucified upon the wooden frame.

“The Master calls you to his service,” the cleric said to the body.

The dead man stirred.

Talen Karedes lifted his head and opened his eyes. He stared at Hesperix and Navev. There was no life in his eyes, but nevertheless something burned in those cold orbs.

The former knight’s limbs clenched; the ropes holding his arms and legs strained, and the wooden frame tensed against the pressure. Hesperix and Navev just watched as the wood groaned, and then with a loud crack gave way. Talen leaned forward, scraps of timber still clinging to his wrists, and tore away the bonds still holding his feet.

He stepped forward, awkwardly at first, shrugging out of the remains of his bindings. Navev shifted slightly, a faint nimbus appearing around his left hand. Hesperix did not move at all, until Talen was only two steps in front of him. Then he lifted his hand, which bore his silver sigil; the horned skull of Orcus.

“Kneel, slave,” the cleric said.

Talen froze. For a moment, he trembled with the enormity of his effort. One leg shifted slightly, as he took a half-step forward; at that movement Navev’s hand came up, just a bit.

But finally, Talen slumped forward, falling to his knees.

Hesperix walked around him. “You are strong,” he said. “So full of anger... and hate. You will use that, to serve the Master. Now, you are His... His down to the depths of your soul.”

The cleric laughed, and he stopped as he came around to the back of the submissive Talen.

“This is a dangerous move,” Navev said. “He will resist you... especially when his friends come to reclaim him.”

“It is the Master’s will,” Hesperix said. He made a subtle gesture of command.

The figure that shambled forward had been a man, once. Now, the priest Calexes was just an echo of vitality. The robes he wore could not conceal the emaciated state of his body. The priest was silent; his tongue had been removed by Theron’s servants, and his arms were kept huddled against his body, concealing the fact that all ten of his fingers had been amputated. More had been taken as well, and it was the promise of the restoration of those missing pieces that had bound Calexes anew to Hesperix’s service.

Now the ruined man came forward, to stand before the new High Priest of Orcus. The former priest paid no attention to Talen or Navev. Hesperix drew out a knife from his belt, but he kept his eyes on Talen.

“You feel the need, I know. The hunger. Do not try to deny it; it is a part of you, now.”

Hesperix turned and reached for Calexes. The man did not flinch as Hesperix grabbed a fold of his robe and hacked it away with his knife. The man’s hide was tight around the bones of his shoulder, and his neck was pale, almost white. The high priest then drew the knife along the edge of his neck, opening a shallow gash that spurted a thin stream of bright red down his chest. Calexes closed his eyes and uttered a quiet sound, but did not otherwise protest.

Talen stared at the red flow.

“Drink,” Hesperix commanded. “Taste the bounty of your Master, and revel in it.”

Talen trembled; he could not look away.

“Take it! I command you!”

Hesperix’s shout echoed through the temple, and Talen stood, slowly. He did not move for several long seconds. Hesperix came to him. He wiped the bloody knife across Talen’s cheek, leaving a red trail across his face.

“You can smell it, I know. It is as good as you think, a thousand times better. You need only take it.”

A low moan rose from Talen’s chest as he moved forward in small, hesitant steps. The wounded man was starting to waver a bit, now, his breath rattling in his throat, standing there like a wounded animal frozen before a predator.

With a final sound of release, Talen leapt forward and seized the man. He sank his fangs into the mans’ throat, opening a fresh geyser of blood that he swallowed eagerly.

Hesperix and Navev watched him feed. “His will, his intelligence, his awareness of what he is, and what he has lost... it will give him strength,” Hesperix said.

Navev did not respond. He too, knew what he had lost.

 

[Vurt]

Lazybones, you are a bad, bad man. Take a bow.

 

[Lazybones]

Lazybones, you are a bad, bad man. Take a bow.

Heh, it gets worse.

* * * * *

Chapter 260

MISSION OF REDEMPTION


“Father, are you all right? Father?”

Alderis stirred out his reverie, and turned to see his daughter standing next to him, a concerned look on her face. Selanthas stood a short distance removed, respecting their privacy but close enough to provide support. “I am sorry, dear. I was... pondering matters.”

They stood on a rocky outcrop, a cold wind tugging at their cloaks and causing them to flare up around their bodies as it shifted direction. It was midday, or some time close to it; it was impossible to tell for sure, with the sky an uninterrupted expanse of deep gray above them. The colors around them were muted, dominated by the gray stones and the mixed browns of the dead winter brush that choked the hillside around them. Other than the members of their party, there were no living things in view as far as they could see around them. To the east, one could just see the faint blue of the sea between a gap in the hills. In every other direction, the rough hills continued unabated in every direction. And to the south, although they could no longer see it, lay Rappan Athuk.

Alderis had to force himself to tear his gaze from that unseen locale. Despite it being out of view, he knew that he could close his eyes and point to its exact direction. He glanced over at where Dar, Allera, Nelan, and Honoratius were engaged in quiet conversation on the far side of the crest. Shaylara was not visible; likely she was out scouting the approach to the hidden tunnel. Dar apparently was no longer worried about her going off on her own; she needed Nelan’s find the path spell to guide her.

“Father,” Mehlaraine said, her voice quiet but earnest. “Father, we do not need to stay here. Now that you have regained the use of your teleportation magic, we can return home. You have done enough for the humans... you helped them to destroy the temples, to defeat the followers of the Demon. Let us return to Aelvanmarr, live our lives in peace.”

Alderis turned back to her. Despite the love that he felt for his daughter, he felt cold inside. Ever since they had returned here, to this accursed place, he had felt the emotion draining from him like a punctured wineskin. Even now, with the presence of that dark place lingering on the edges of his awareness, he could not muster any anger or sadness, only a deep hollow within his soul. Against that, even Mehlaraine’s warmth was only a flickering candle’s flame.

“No, daughter,” he said. “My fate is bound to that of those men.” There is only one way I can find peace, he thought, but did not say aloud. Instead he said, “You and Selanthas should return home, however. I can empower you both with flight... you can be back amidst the bowers of the deep wood by the next dawn.”

She shook her head. She did not speak, but her intent was clear in her eyes. He reached out, and touched her cheek briefly. He looked up as Allera drew near them, hesitating to avoid interrupting them. He gestured for her to approach.

“We are moving out,” the healer said. “Dar and Honoratius agree that we need to make haste, to reach our destination before Nelan’s spell, and Honoratius’s time with us, both expire.”

“How far is it?” Selanthas asked.

“They are not sure,” Allera said.

“All the more reason to make haste,” Alderis said. Trying to hide the weariness that clung to him like a cloak, he walked over to where the other humans waited. Mehlaraine, not fooled in the least, shadowed him, with her consort following behind. Her expression might have seemed placid to the humans, but in her eyes the depths of her concern were clear.

The last hour had passed incredibly swiftly. Honoratius had rejoined them shortly after they’d left the temple of Orcus. He had brought the news that had set them upon this path, to stand together beneath the open sky on the cusp of another deadly incursion into Rappan Athuk.

Alderis thought back over that conversation, which had taken place in the river cavern not far from the second temple. By now they had all learned to recognize the signs of the archmage’s appearance, and were ready when Letellia’s tremors had ceased, and she lifted her eyes, subtly different, to face them.

“Talen Karedes is located in the Talon of Orcus, on the third sublevel of the tenth dungeon level of Rappan Athuk,” Honoratius said.

“Is he alive?” Shay asked.

“I do not know. I attempted to scry both him and Zafir Navev, but the spell failed to provide any result. The former attempt could have failed because Talen is dead, but the failure of the second suggests that both are in a shielded location.”

“What is this, ‘Talon’?” Selanthas asked.

“I do not know. It could be another temple, shielded like the others.”

“But Varo’s notes only referred to three temples,” Allera said.

“This could be an ancillary site, or of newer construction. Or of another purpose entirely; it is impossible to be certain given our current information.”

“Can you teleport us there?” Shay asked.

“No. Not without more specific coordinates... and even if I had such, if it is protected against scrying, it is likely shielded against magical transportation as well.”

“Will you be able to enter that place? In Letellia’s body, I mean,” Nelan asked.

“I do not know.”

Alderis watched as Nelan knelt in a clear space on the edge of the bluff, partially protected from the wind by several large boulders. The priest drew out his divine focus, and began praying.

After the conversation in the dungeon, they’d had a destination, but not a means to get there. Honoratius’s research had given them information, but not enough to act upon. Nelan had his find the path spell, but the spell was of limited duration, and if they did not reach the Talon in that time, they would be compelled to wait to rest and recover spells, a delay of another day in all likelihood.

Nelan had not had a commune memorized, but he’d had a divination ready, and he’d cast it there, on the banks of the underground river, to request guidance from his patron. The message granted in his reverie had been surprisingly clear. The fastest route to the Talon would take them back up to the surface world, and back underground using the hidden goblin entrance near Grezneck.

“That is a long ways off,” Dar had said. “It will take hours, at least, to cover that ground.”

Alderis had spoken up at that point. His words replayed themselves in his thoughts now. He wondered why he’d spoken them; his own mission was focused on the master of this place, and by Dar’s own admission, the recovery of Talen—or his body—was likely to take them off that course.

“Perhaps not,” he had said. “I have mastered the art of magical transportation myself. Between Honoratius and myself, I believe that we can take the entire group directly to the goblin entrance, and from there Nelan can guide us with his spell.”

Alderis mused on the painful history that had lurked behind his statement. The opening of the seventh valence had technically been a “rediscovery” of spells he had counted in his repertoire before his descent into madness. His friend Sultheros had been able to recover only one of his books, one that contained just a few higher-order spells. Since then he had spent hundreds of hours studying the book. It was incredibly frustrating to read the fine text, in his own hand, over and over and yet fail to grasp the meaning there, just beyond his reach. It had only been after the battle in the second temple of Orcus, while they had waited for the priest of the Father to complete his ritual to hallow the place, that he had finally broken through, and recovered some pieces of his magic. But there were still more spells, the majority, that still escaped him. For now, he would have to be satisfied with just a handful of new spells, and continue to draw the bulk of his daily memorizations from the books of the madman Banth.

Well, if nothing else, the elf thought wryly, I am becoming a quite passable transmuter.

Alderis drew his cloak close around himself, a mostly futile gesture against the swirling and persistent wind. Nelan had finished his spell, and walked with a purpose that Alderis recognized as guided by an outside force. The cleric led them down the slope on the far side of the ridge. They had picked this spot to begin, as they’d lingered here a bit on their last visit to the goblin city, on their way back to Rappan Athuk. Alderis and the other elves had not been with them at the time, but Shay had been able to describe the area in sufficient precision for the elf’s greater teleport to deliver them on target within six paces of the archmage’s group. Now they were headed back underground, to yet another stronghold of their foe. Alderis had no doubt that the enemy knew they were coming, and would have another ambush prepared in anticipation of their arrival.

The elf paused at the edge of the trail and looked around one last time. It was a harsh country, one that bore the touch of the Demon heavily upon it. It reminded him too well of his dreams, and the visions of a scoured world that were contained within.

He shuddered, and followed the others down the slope toward the concealed cave.

 

[Lazybones]

Chapter 261

DESCENT


The stairs seemed to go on for longer this time, perhaps because each step drew them closer to a confrontation that they were not looking forward to.

Not for most of them, at least.

“I am going to cut that freaking wizard’s head off,” Dar muttered, his fist tight around the hilt of Valor. “When I get done with him, there’s no freaking way he’s coming back again.”

The darkness of the shaft remained close around them, despite the multiple magical lights that they carried. Nelan had not had the opportunity to recover his daylight spell, so they had to accept the gloom, which seemed to intensify as they penetrated deeper under the ground.

They passed the warding galleries near the bottom of the shaft. There was no sign of the goblin defenders, but that did not mean that they were not there, watching.

When they reached the bottom, however, they quickly found the reason for the quiet in the shaft.

“Damn... it looks like the gobbos have given up on the outside world altogether,” Dar said.

The eight of them stood facing a wall of rubble, a complete collapse of the tunnel that led in the direction of Grezneck. It was impossible to know how far the collapse extended, but from what they’d encountered of the mining talents of the goblins of Rappan Athuk, it was likely that they’d been as thorough with this as with all of their endeavors.

“This way,” Nelan said, drawing their attention to the tunnel that was still intact, heading in the opposite direction of the collapse.

“Did the goblins ever say what lay down this way?” Allera asked.

“No,” Shay said, moving ahead to the lead. She drew Beatus Incendia, the light of the holy sword flaring out around her. The tunnel ahead was a rough but straight passage that extended without break or interruption as far as they could see ahead. “Let’s go.”

“It would appear that the scout has decided to eschew stealth, at least for the moment,” Selanthas observed quietly.

“She knows that they know that we are coming,” Alderis said, feeling something tug at him as he witnessed the passion of the woman, all of her loss and fear and anger poured into a single-minded intensity to recover her lover.

Honoratius leaned against the wall of the passage. “Are you all right, archmage?” Allera asked.

“Yes. Yes, I am fine. It is just... the strain... it is not easy.”

“Just hold on a little bit longer, magus,” Dar said, his voice almost gentle. Adjusting the straps of his pack, he started down the tunnel after Shay.

They walked onward for a goodly time, the minutes blending together without count in the dark eternity of the tunnel. Other than slight variations in the walls of the passage, their route remained unchanged. With each step they took their lights revealed more corridor ahead, and the darkness behind swallowed up an equal amount behind them. They were focused not on counting steps, but on the ambush that could come at any moment. The walls were sufficiently uneven that secret doors could have been concealed almost anywhere, and their pace did not leave even the elves time to give even a cursory search along their route. So they watched, and they waited.

Finally, a pair of doors materialized out of the darkness ahead. They were of plain, unadorned stone, their hinges recessed into the thick lintels. As they drew closer, they could see markings upon the door, sigils marked in what looked like dried blood.

“It looks like this is the place,” Nelan said. “The spell indicates that the way is forward.”

Shay moved forward and bent her ear to the narrow crack where the two doors met. After a few long seconds, she drew back. “I hear creaking metal, like chains,” she said.

“We need a minute to ready spells,” Allera said.

“Go ahead,” Dar said.

The healer began moving among the companions, laying death wards upon each of them. Nelan had not had the opportunity to recover his spells, and without his reservoir to draw upon, she could not protect all of them. Selanthas had his amulet, which offered similar protection, and they had agreed earlier that Honoratius and Alderis would rely on their own arcane magic to protect them. The two mages quietly completed their protections, and waited for Allera to finish.

“It is done,” she said finally. Dar nodded, and took up position opposite Shay at one of the doors. “Be ready,” he told them. There was no need to give further instructions; they had already made their plans on how best to strike.

As the pair thrust the doors open, their light spilled into a long hallway, maybe sixty feet long and twenty feet wide. The sound of clanking chains greeted them, accompanied by a low moaning sound that drew their attention upward.

The ceiling of the hall was a good twenty feet above them. Dangling from dozens of hooks set into the stone were lengths of barbed chain, some just long enough to brush the head of a man making his way forward. Linked and interlinked, sometimes tangled together in a jumbled mess, the chains formed a thick web that stretched down the entire length of the hall.

And hanging from those chains was the source of the noise.

They were recognizable as goblins by their size, although all of the bodies had experienced decay. There were at least a dozen of them. The creatures, clearly zombies of some sort, had been snared on the chains, which in some cases passed through their bodies, holding them pinned.

As Dar and Shay pushed the doors wide open, the goblin zombies intensified their struggles. One, hanging almost directly above the door, yanked out a length of chain and swung it down at Shay. The scout shifted slightly, and the hooked end clanged off the wall. Several of the other zombies began dragging themselves down, their bodies tearing as the hook on the chains bit away pieces of their rotten flesh.

Nelan stepped forward, and presented his divine focus. “Perish before the light of the Father!” he cried. White light flared from the device, but it flickered, flaring out against the dread power of this place. Even so, three of the zombies came apart, their bodies crumbling into ash as holy fire consumed them.

Ten feet down the passage, a zombie landed on the ground. It started toward the companions, armed with an six-foot length of chain that had come free with it. Behind it, two more tore free and fell to the ground, rapidly rising to join their companion in attacking.

Dar didn’t wait; he lifted Valor and stepped forward to meet them.

“Careful, Dar!” Nelan warned. “They are not normal zombies!”

That much was obvious, as the creatures that shambled forward to attack the fighter were neither slow nor hesitant. The one with the chain lashed out at Dar, but the improvised weapon merely glanced off the greave covering the fighter’s left arm. The blow did not slow him in the least as he slashed down with Valor, cutting the zombie in two from shoulder to hip.

But the zombie’s companions were quick to press their attack. One smashed a length of chain across Dar’s gut, but again it failed to inflict damage through the fighter’s armor. Dar lifted his sword to strike again, but a length of chain slashed down from above, twirling around his right wrist. Dar looked up to see a zombie, its body pinioned by at least three chains, dangling above him, pulling on the chain hooked around his arm.

Another zombie leapt at Dar’s leg, intent on exploiting the fighter’s distraction. But Shay sprang forward and cut down with Beatus Incendia, dashing the creature’s head from its shoulders. Even as the goblin fell, two more dropped down from the chains near her, and quickly leapt to the attack.

A fireball shot past the pair and exploded further down the corridor, immolating several more zombies before they could work free from the chains and attack. Dar and Shay’s cloaks were blown back by the force of the blast, but Alderis had placed the spell precisely, and neither were actually harmed.

Nelan and Mehlaraine rushed forward to join Dar and Shay, but the battle was already winding down. Dar had yanked the chain holding him hard enough to rip the zombie off its chains. The creature’s weapon now became a hindrance to it, as Dar snapped it up into a cut from Valor that took its entire arm off its body. Shay destroyed the other one that had been attacking Dar, and Selanthas finished off one last straggler still stuck on the chains with a volley of arrows.

Dar tore off a hook that had dug into one of the straps of his bracer, tossing the chain aside. “That wasn’t much of a welcoming committee,” he said.

“I expect these guards were placed here simply to delay us, and provide warning to the defenders of the Talon,” Honoratius said. The archmage had withheld his spell power during the brief battle, recognizing that the goblin zombies, even enhanced as they were, offered little threat to the group’s fighters. None of them had suffered any injuries during the encounter.

“We should press on, while our enchantments are still effective,” Nelan said.

“Fine with me,” Dar said. He nodded to Shay, and the pair continued to the end of the passage, where another pair of doors waited. These, unlike the first set, were decorated, graven with unwholesome images of the sort that the Doomed Bastards were all too acquainted with from their time in Rappan Athuk.

“So much evil,” Allera said, growing pale as her eyes fell on a particularly disquieting scene carved into the doors.

“Where the Light penetrates, the Dark cannot abide,” Nelan said, his hand clutched tightly around his divine focus.

“Let’s get this over with,” Dar said, taking up position at one of the doors. They opened outward, so he and Shay took hold of them, and with a shared nod pulled hard.

The stone doors swung open with surprising ease. The companions had just enough time to register a large chamber, the presence of enemies.

And then a column of fire came crashing down upon them.

 

[Nightbreeze]

By the way, it just occurred me that now "poor bastards" has a different meaning than the one at the beginning of this story hour.

At the begginning, Dar, Varo and Tiros were struggling to escape the damned dungeon and they were always against overwhelming forces. But at least there was some hope to escape and never come back, and no one in the dungeon really cared about another group of soon-goners.

Now they are forced to go deeper and deeper, and face the opposition of the entire dungeon, and it can spawn endless monsters, each worse than the previous.

Well, they are insanely brave (or just insane, like Varo and Dar )

 

[Lazybones]

A quick notice, readers: I am going to Hawaii in early October. This one's a pleasure trip and I won't be taking my flash drive, or making any effort to connect to the Internet for a week. So no updates the week of Oct 8-12. I think we'll be approaching the end of Book 4 around then; I'll see if I can leave you with a juicy cliffhanger.

* * * * *

Chapter 262

FIRST STRIKE


The companions had been expecting an attack, so the flame strike did not catch them entirely off-guard.

Even so, almost all of them took damage from the spell. Shay sprang forward as the column blasted into the end of the hall, avoiding injury, while the elves, with their superior agility, sprang back to the edge of the strike and suffered only superficial wounds. Honoratius had protected himself against fire, but the divine energies inherent in the magic still wracked his borrowed body.

But the archmage maintained his equilibrium, and as the unholy flames cleared he fired off his own readied spell.

The room was clearly the inner sanctum of a temple to Orcus. The far side of the chamber was dominated by a large stone statue of the demon lord, lit by an eerie red light that shone down from somewhere above. A broad stone altar, all edges and spikes, stood in front of the statue, while the space between it and the door they had just opened was occupied by another great stone font, a pool of roiling gelatinous fluid easily ten feet across, from which a terrible sucking and slurping sound emitted as the red substance sloshed about its container.

And standing between the pool and the altar, in the center of the room, the forces of evil stood arrayed against them. As the archmage looked upon them, he mentally catalogued and classified them, marking the greatest threats.

The enemy cleric dominated the chamber. At first glance the armored figure, twelve feet tall, looked like a fire giant, but Honoratius recognized the effects of a righteous might spell, which suggested that the man was a priest of considerable power. The creature standing next to him likewise first appeared to be a summoned lion, but the archmage sucked in a breath as he gauged the being’s true identity.

A jarilith. That indicated a planar ally, which boosted his estimation of the cleric’s potency up another notch.

There were four of the black skeletons warding the priest, forming a line before him, and an armored fighter standing off to the side. Honoratius’s gaze flicked over him, noting the almost certainly magical banded armor he wore, the blocky helm of black metal covering his face, and the greataxe that burned with magical flame in his hands. Several spells warded him, although Honoratius could not immediately identify them at this distance.

All of this the archmage assimilated in the course of a heartbeat, as he unleashed his chain lightning spell. But rather than the twisting bolt of electrical energy, the power that erupted from the arcanist’s fingertips was a concentrated pulse of sonic vibrations, which distorted the air as it shot across the chamber.

The sonic blast struck the evil high priest in the chest, overcoming his own protections and savaging his body. It then split and hit both the demon and the armored fighter, damaging both of them before it ran through the ranks of the skeletons, vaporizing all four of them.

Alderis attempted to dismiss the demon, but the jarilith resisted the spell.

Selanthas lifted his bow, an arrow at the ready. But he held his shot for an instant while Nelan imparted a spell upon the shaft of the missile. As soon as the silence settled upon the arrow the elf fired, sinking his shot into the meaty part of the high priest’s left thigh. The cleric’s face twisted and he opened his mouth to shout in pain, the sound lost within the radius of Nelan’s spell.

Thus far the Doomed Bastards had given better than they’d gotten, but they were all aware that the enemy likely held more surprises in store.

One of those surprises appeared just a moment later, as Shay, landing in a crouch as she evaded the flame strike, lifted Beatus Incendia and charged the enemy cleric. She ran around the stone pool, and had almost cleared it when the substance within rose up and split, revealing one of the creatures that had been concealed within the pool underneath. The thing looked almost like a water elemental, taking on a rough humanoid form as it emerged from its lair, but its color and substance were the bright acid crimson of fresh blood.

Shay twisted out of its path as the blood golem struck, but one of its tendrils smacked her in the shoulder, knocking her back. The scout cried out as the brief contact revealed the fell power of the creature; its touch sucked blood from her body, leaving her weakened. She gave ground as it emerged fully from the pool, looming over her as its full size became apparent.

Dar had been only a step behind Shay, but he’d gone around the other side of the pool. He started to come back toward the scout, but Shay stopped him with a shout. “No! Get the cleric!” she yelled, holding back the golem’s second attack with a swing of Beatus Incendia that merely grazed its unwholesome form. The sword hissed as it struck the construct, a terrible stench rising from its body as the holy flames seared it. But the weak attack did not seem to hinder it in the least, and it surged forward to envelop the scout as its long pseudopods of arms lashed around her arms and slapped hard into her back.

Shay screamed as her blood was torn from her body, absorbed by the creature.

As if that wasn’t enough, a second blood golem was rising from the dregs of the pool, facing the casters.

Honoratius stepped forward, and began casting again. But even as he lifted his hands, the slender fingers forming the complex gestures of a high-level evocation, the defenders unleashed another surprise. Something flickered in the shadows to the left, along the edge of the chamber, and Zafir Navev became visible as a black eldritch blast erupted from its fingertips, streaking with deadly precision at the archmage and the casters flanking him in the doorway.

 

[Richard Rawen]

A quick notice, readers: I am going to Hawaii in early October. This one's a pleasure trip and I won't be taking my flash drive, or making any effort to connect to the Internet for a week. So no updates the week of Oct 8-12. I think we'll be approaching the end of Book 4 around then; I'll see if I can leave you with a juicy cliffhanger.

Have a Great trip, you deserve it!
As to the cliffhanger... you'll see if you can leave us hanging for a week while you bask in the Hawaiian sun . . . heh heh yeah, I'm sure you're really giving that consideration

 

[Nightbreeze]

A week-long cliffhanger? That's....evil.
Ah, well, enjoy your trip