The Gate Pass Irregulars: A War of the Burning Sky Campaign

[Cafu]

It took a little time and I was just explaining the technicalities of the delicate magic of the simulacra to the priest when Drudge returned.

“Found some blood; quite a bit of it actually. I knew I got him! If we hurry, we’ll catch him before he can set up.”

So we all descended carefully; the bridges still swayed and I was still as disturbed by huge trees and looking down from them as previously. Thankfully, this time, we all managed to reach the ground without mishap.

We saw Drudge waiting for us beside a particular patch of ground and he pointed at it:

“There are the tracks! Can you see them?”

“No, not really but can you follow them?” asked Longhelim.

“Easy; just watch me,” was the reply and off we went.

It must be said I had no idea what he was following but Drudge moved with a surety and a speed that was uncanny; there were a few times when he stopped us as he looked around but then he would be off again, moving along a secret pathway only known to himself.

Finally, we stopped as we saw a clearing and a structure. The clearing was dominated by yet another enormous tree. Almost as impressive was the massive network of roots that spread around the clearing; it was among this network that we were able to discern a roof; or the remains of one rather; it was in fairly bad shape, with broken shingles and several gaps. The house obviously went quite deep underground as the roof was fairly much on the level of the surface while a pit surrounded the structure. The pit seemed to go only a short distance below ground, roughly the same level as the floor of the house.

As we approached, Victor said quietly:

“This was a forge; I can smell it.”

Now that he mentioned it, the whole area still smelt of burnt metal, albeit very faintly.

There was also a dilapidated walkway leading across the pit and down to the entrance of the building.

Drudge whispered to the rest of us:

“I lost the tracks but I’m pretty certain that either he’s in there or has been here very recently. I’m going to have a look around and when I finish, you should move in.”

With that, he moved off and disappeared into the undergrowth; within moments, we saw him jump within the root system until he positioned himself on one corner of the clearing and waited. Obviously, he hadn’t found anything of interest or danger.

John moved forward and carefully checked the walkway; again, he didn’t find anything amiss as he moved forward. He reached the walkway and after looking through one of the shattered windows, he climbed onto the roof. We saw him move carefully and peer down through one of the cracks and then he began to sign agitatedly, pointing into the house below; it looked as if he had sighted our quarry. We moved forward onto the walkway only for three ghostly figures to move through the wall and attack us and John; they were the same type as those that had attacked us previously; I was almost certain now that they were somehow connected to Rhuarc’s sword.

Several of them touched Victor, causing him to flinch and stagger but then Felix managed to drive them away by the power of his god. Moments later, Longhelim had rushed forward and kicked open the door. Inside were the tools and equipment consistent with a forge; a bellows, various tongs and hammers scattered over the floor, an anvil and a water tank. There was no sign of Rhuarc. Victor, Longhelim and Felix moved into the building; I was just outside and John was still on the roof.

Then the next thing I felt was a crash and a massive mixture of logs, earth and stone fell from above, mowing through the roof, the house and more importantly, all of us. The bridge collapsed below me and I fell down the pit. Dust rose and to add to the confusion, there was a small explosion and a large fire quickly conflagrated inside this mess. I could hear spluttering and coughing from inside. As soon as I was able to stand up, I suddenly realised that I was much deeper than I originally thought; then I saw that the “bottom” of the pit had been carefully disguised to be quite shallow. It was deeper and as a result I had fallen to a much greater depth, explaining the bumps and bruises that I sported; they were quite substantial for such a shallow pit; it also meant that getting out would be that much harder. I realised this in an instant; there were other things to worry about though; I made my way inside the forge as quickly as possible. It was difficult; there was mess, rubble and rubbish everywhere but I could see Longhelim, Felix and John.

Felix was casting spells; I was too distracted to notice what they were. I saw that Longhelim was beginning to pull at a pile of rubble.

“Victor’s underneath this lot! He’s trapped!”

I didn’t have any spells which could help this situation so I began to move stuff as quickly as I could. I wasn’t very strong but I did my best. Longhelim was doing the same thing and it quickly became obvious that Victor was at least conscious under this enormous mound of rubbish. I felt a tap on my shoulder; blinking, I realised that I had been smouldering but I hadn’t even noticed.

Felix said:

“Faden, you should put your robes out now! I know you can’t feel it anymore but a lot of your clothes have been burnt away.”

“Later! Have to get Victor out!”

Suddenly, there was a shout from outside:

“Got you, you son of a…..”

That had been Drudge’s voice and I could only assume that he had seen or shot Rhuarc again, for all the good it would do. Suddenly, there was a massive heave from below the pile of rubble; a lot of it shifted and I re-doubled my efforts to move more rubbish. Finally, after yet more logs and dirt being shifted, Victor burst through with a mighty effort. He was dirty, dusty and exhausted but at least he was moving and breathing.

Getting him out fully became much easier and we finally abandoned the burning forge. Outside in the pit, John had already readied his magical rope and with that, we managed to pull ourselves up. Surprisingly, I found it quite easy; as I moved up, I suddenly realised that all of this activity that I had suffered through after leaving Gate Pass had changed my physique; whereas previously I had been soft and weak I was now much harder; and while I would never compete with Longhelim and Victor when it came to strength, I was certainly stronger than I had been; and far more resilient. I filed that away to think about later.

As I was musing about these physical changes, Victor was still spitting out splinters of burnt wood.

“Well, we certainly walked into that one! That son of a…….I think we can safely say that he will have rigged every important location in Phorros Irrendra in the same manner. He’s had years to do it!”

Drudge returned at this point:

“Lost him! I found his tracks though. If we can get organized, we should get going. We won’t catch him but hopefully, he won’t have time to set anything up this time.”

John snorted:

“I think you’re being optimistic; whatever, he’s set up, he did it years ago; but yes, let’s go!”

So there was a lot of healing done and then we began to follow Drudge. Whatever the ranger was doing, it quickly became apparent that we were moving much slower than previously. Every so often, Drudge would come back towards us and begin to examine the ground. I could also hear him muttering to himself:

“Tricky! You’re a tricky one! You won’t get away from me though; I’ll get you yet!”

I must confess that no matter how tricky, two things struck me as odd. One was that Rhuarc had the ability to travel magically; if he used that, then we would stand absolutely no chance of catching him; he knew that and we knew that no matter how cunning he was being, he was still luring us somewhere. The other thing that was odd was why did he keep attacking us? He had made no attempt to talk or reason, his first contact with us was to attack. He obviously knew why we were here; yet, with the powers he had shown, he could have hidden himself from us and we would be none the wiser, possibly for months; or he could have just left through the caves and again, we would none the wiser, again possibly for months; yet, he was aggressively stalking us and attacking at every opportunity.

He must have known that we were not Shahalesti; they wouldn’t condescend to use non-elves for such an important mission; nor did we look like the usual Ragesian group; yet he had made it clear he wasn’t interested in knowing whom we represented or where we came from. That led to a disturbing proposition: either he already knew who we were and decided that we were to be eliminated; or he was possessed by a trillith who seemed to have no trouble in knowing who we were.

As all these thoughts were going through my head, I did not really notice where we were going; I did notice that we were moving quite slowly and unconsciously, I noticed that Drudge was still doing lot of doubling up, climbing trees every so often and often moving back on his own path, checking the ground.

Finally, we stopped next to a huge tree. Extraordinarily, it seemed to have large shards of black stone through its trunk. I remembered seeing it when we had flown over the valley but up closer, this looked even more peculiar. We looked up into its heights. There were stairs along the tree trunk this time, as opposed to swaying, dangerous rope bridges. Still, John took one look at the warriors and me, and said:

“All right, all right, I’ll go up there to take a look; just so you know, if I get into trouble, I’ll scream.”

With those words, the rogue turned into mist and flew up into the foliage.

We waited some time; finally, he flew back down and solidified and quickly explained the following:

“I’m pretty sure he’s up there! There is a flat platform up there, almost like some sort of meeting place; at one end, there’s a building; it’s not in great shape but it is recognizable. There are flat black stones up there as well, posted around that platform; I had a quick look at them; they just spout on about how great the Taranesti are and how nasty and evil the Shahalesti are. In other words, the history of the elves according to the Taranesti; the bits I read are really boring.

Anyway, that’s by the by; I also a found a big trap. Another of these log falls, this one high, high up; if we had decided to go up onto the platform in force without checking, then it could have been very nasty; but, I cut the trigger cord. It won’t work!”

He grinned at us triumphantly, obviously very pleased with himself; I couldn’t blame him. I didn’t know a great deal about it but from what I saw, I suspect it that it would have been very difficult to both find and incapacitate that trap.

Drudge said:

“But he’s got to be somewhere around to trigger it, right?”

John nodded and continued:

“I couldn’t see him though; he must be doing his hiding trick. If we go up there though, we may be able find out where he is.”

I wasn’t so sure about this idea:

“So you want us to use ourselves as bait?”

Longhelim nodded:

“Let’s go!”

Carefully and rather gingerly, especially in my case, we ascended the staircase. I wasn’t very comfortable doing so but at least it was better than those rope bridges. Thankfully, we were able to get to the platform without incident; it seemed that Rhuarc really did want us to move there. So, we obliged him and cautiously stepped onto the platform. We advanced slowly and nothing happened until, with screams and moans, four more of Rhuarc’s undead servants fell on us from high above, only to be immediately driven back by the holy power of both Felix and Longhelim. All of them fled. John immediately began to scan the surrounding area for any sign of our enemy but Rhuarc was far too canny for that.

Then Drudge found the trip wire designed to drop the logs on top of us and decided to follow it. John still kept a diligent lookout while the rest of us checked the platform and the building. I looked at the slates of black stones with a history of the city of Phorros Irrendra; as discussed it was the last refuge of the Taranesti against the Shahalesti and as such a very unhappy place. No one else found anything of interest. John was right; it was all quite dull; the Taranesti really didn’t know how to tell a story.

Drudge returned fairly quickly:

“Well, I found the place from where he was watching us; I also found tracks showing where he was going; he’s running on the tree tops; I’d probably be able to follow him but it’s unlikely you will, so I suggest I try to track his route while you follow me on the ground.”

I was rather dubious about this, especially as that would leave Drudge alone up there:

“On the tree tops? How is he doing that? More importantly, do you think you’ll be safe and that you’ll manage?”

He shrugged:

“As to the first, there are lots of ways he can do it; I can do it as well although he’s probably better at it than I am at the moment; and as for being safe, no, it’s not but we have to try.”

So we descended again and then proceeded to try to follow Drudge again. He was moving slowly and doubled back several times, then circled the area again and finally joined us on the forest floor.

“I lost him! I can’t track him on the tree tops! I’m afraid I don’t where he has gone now!”

Longhelim just nodded and looked into the forest:

“Never mind; you’ve done miracles with your tracking already; we’ll do our own sweep now. The next location we’ll check is the Fane of Fallen Hallows.”

Looking at the paladin, I said:

“In other words, the graveyard.”

He nodded and we set out again. The journey to the graveyard took a little time; we were being very cautious about any other nice surprises that Rhuarc may have left for us. We did not slow down completely but at the same time, we were all remembering log falls, pits, swinging branches, sharpened spears and whatever other nice surprises that he may have devised over the years.

 

[Cafu]

We managed to get to the graveyard without any mishaps. It was an open area, prominent as it was ringed with large statues. The area inside was covered in black and purple flowers.

We all stopped and looked at this spectacle in front of us.

Felix was looking at the statues and muttering to himself:

“So, there’s Farlaghn and there is Heironeous; over there is Olidammara with the odd looking mask and we’ve even got Carellan Larethian; what’s he doing here? Well, he is elven I suppose……”

Victor was ignoring the statues and looking more at the area in the middle:

“Salubrious, any idea what those flowers are; they look quite striking and there is a lot of them.”

The ranger looked a little startled at being addressed by his first name but then he answered:

“Good spot, Victor. That is a mixture of Keshweed and Lotus; both of which are highly toxic. I wouldn’t advise going in there if you can help it.”

Longhelim was looking at the other end of the graveyard:

“Doubly not a great idea going in there, especially as I can feel that there are no less than thirty-two sources of evil in that place; however, there is also a mausoleum at the far end and there may be something of significance inside.”

Felix had finished looking at the sculptures and added:

“Don’t worry about the poison. The special food I provided this morning makes you immune to that for the time being; unless Rhuarc has managed to dissolve the effect, of course.”

By some miracle, that was the one protection effect that seemed to have stayed on everyone.

Longhelim looked at the mausoleum a little longer and then murmured:

“So, how are we going to do this?”

John grinned and replied:

“Well, if the flowers are not going to affect me, I’ll run over to the mausoleum and see what I can wake up!”

I frowned and said:

“John, that’s possibly not the best……”

But as soon as he said it, the rogue did just that. He ran across the flowers to the structure, kicking up clouds of pollen and as he reached his goal; he even jumped up and down a bit just to create more noise. He didn’t really need to as figures began to sit up from under the cover of the flowers, almost immediately. They were obvious undead, humanoid, gaunt, feral with no body hair and pointed teeth and ears.

Felix grimaced and grunted:

“Ghouls! Ghasts as well! Disease ridden poisonous vermin! Begone to whatever hells you came from!”

As soon as he used his power, a whole group of them literally exploded into dust! It was most impressive. Drudge began his normal methodical shooting. Load, aim and release; load, aim and release but at such speed that I quickly lost track of the amount of arrows he was using. Although I could not see, I was also certain he would be hitting his targets unerringly. The two warriors stepped forward, forming a defensive rank in front of Felix; not a moment too soon either as a swarm of the ghouls and ghasts surrounded them, a couple of ranks deep.

Being slightly behind one of the large statues, I couldn’t see John but I could see this group and I cast a spell at them; lightning crackled as my main bolt hit one and blasted it into oblivion while more bolts sparkled over the rest, causing them to writhe and scream in pain. As soon as Victor saw this, he began to slash at them methodically; each slash dropped one and the warrior quickly cleared a space around himself and Longhelim; they had been weakened by the bolts and stood no chance against the warrior.

Felix summoned the power of his god again and more of them exploded while Longhelim also slashed his way through them; finally, Drudge let another volley of his arrows go, leaving only a couple of this close swarm standing. I moved forward and could see John dashing back towards us, with another pack of howling ghouls behind him. I cast another of my spells and a forest of black tentacles rose from the ground and wrapped themselves around this last group.

This allowed the grinning John to join us and shout:

“Well, that worked!”

Victor gave him an exasperated look as he cut the last ghoul in half. All the others were struggling against the tentacles but to no avail; the spell was beginning to squeeze them and to add to their problems, Drudge began to pick them off, one by one. In the end, they had no chance.

Victor and John had a couple of scratches and bites from the ghouls; one of them, on Victor’s hand, looked particularly nasty, oozing something it really shouldn’t have been. Longhelim had a look, took the warrior’s hand in his own and whispered something; slowly, the blackened edges of the wounds attained a healthier, pink hue. The wounds were still there but now they looked normal.

I dismissed my spell, the tentacles disappeared and we advanced towards the tomb. It was quite elaborate, with peculiar carvings; these looked as if they were scenes from the life of whoever was buried there. John checked the door but found nothing untoward, so he opened it. Inside was dark but empty, save for a cylindrical container and a coffin; we tensed; a coffin may well mean undead. Longhelim checked but shook his head; he couldn’t find any evil in this place. Unfortunately, that didn’t mean anything as the coffin may have been so thick that the paladin’s ability did not register.

Slowly and carefully, John approached the cylindrical container and began a careful search; a cry, a flash and a curse from John announced something. John then just opened the contained and withdrew some sort of wand or stick. Then he returned to us:

“There was a magical trap on the cylinder. I set it off but it was countered by my ring. This is the only thing that was inside the cylinder; it’s bone; a thigh bone but the looks of it.”

“Why would anyone put a thigh bone in there?” I asked.

John just looked at me and shrugged:

“No idea!”

The coffin was opened carefully but also turned out to be empty. This looked like an area designed to waste our time or more likely, had been looted long ago.

We left the mausoleum and the graveyard. As we entered into the forest again, Longhelim asked:

“So, the only other two locations we have left are the cave with the waterfall and the large house on the tree top. Where shall we go next?”

Drudge, looking around him, said:

“The big house is closer.”

“Big house it is then,” said the paladin as he led the way. We followed, Drudge ahead.

There were no tracks this time so we moved a little faster albeit very cautiously. As we approached the large house, I saw that I had been initially mistaken and that it was actually built on a hill. The confusion arose in that it looked as if the only way to reach it was from a rope bridge tied at one end to a tree top and at the other to the house itself. The whole set up reeked of traps as was becoming depressingly familiar in this whole benighted place.

We reached the lower part of the tree without any mishap; there was a set of stairs winding up the trunk as in previous locations. Drudge immediately ran up the tree trunk, to see if he could find any unpleasant surprises. He returned quite quickly:

“I couldn’t see anything up there. The rope bridge looks very, very dodgy though.”

John had obviously been thinking:

“The warriors will have a problem crossing that with their armour. How many of us can turn into mist and fly over though; I still have that spell functioning, despite Rhuarc’s best efforts.”

“I’ve still got it,” I said and Felix and Longhelim added their voices to mine.

John then said:

“So, simple; Drudge can carry Victor along the bridge; he’s going to be very secure with his magical slippers. The rest of us fly over in mist form.”

It sounded like a very simple plan; why did I have a horrible feeling that it was just too simple.

As we were getting ready to activate this plan, Longhelim took off his ring and gave it to Victor.

“In case you fall,” he just said.

I remembered that this was the ring the allowed the paladin to fall from great heights with no harm, as it made him very light magically.

So, we moved up the steps to one end of the rope bridge. We could see the house some considerable distance away as rope bridges go. It had at least three floors and a tower. There was a balcony on the first floor. It seemed to be another substantial building, in the same vein as the other large tree house we explored in the middle of the forest previously. Having said that, this one was even more imposing; positively a tree mansion.

We looked around carefully but saw no one. I knew Rhuarc was lurking around somewhere though. So, we turned into mist and flew over to the front door of the residence; our flight was uneventful. We turned solid again. Then we watched as Drudge began to walk under the bridge and upside down. When he reached a specific point, suddenly two logs swung from high above and met just at the point where Drudge was passing. The ranger must have reacted instinctively and lurched forward just as the logs met but we all winced as we saw them meet with Victor’s torso squarely between them; there was then the added complication that the bridge disintegrated and swung down and smacked into the side of the hill, causing yet more hurt to the fighter.

In an odd way, the traps were becoming predictable. In fact, as I mentioned previously, the whole of Phorros Irrendra was one big trap and we were walking into each one fairly regularly. Thankfully, we managed to pull both Victor and Drudge up on our side of the bridge and both were healed. Then, cautiously, we opened the main door into the house.

It opened into a wide hall way with several doors and a set of stairs going up running along one side. Bearing in mind the incident with the bridge, we were extremely cautious with John deliberately checking the floor as we walked in. It took a little time but it was definitely worth it. In the middle of his check, several more of Rhuarc’s undead pets turned up. John had thought up this term for them and it seemed very apt. They were dismissed by Felix and Longhelim almost casually now but it proved that Rhuarc was definitely nearby; not we had any doubt.

John continued to check the hallway. The doors led to empty rooms and as we approached the stairs, another set of undead pets turned up; these struck with a difference though; they all surrounded Drudge and tried to touch him. As he was so agile, they were finding it a little more problematic but the ranger dropped to the ground, hoping to fool them by pretence of unconsciousness. Felix drove away two of them but the other two still attacked and left the ranger badly out of sorts before Longhelim managed to drive them away with a call to his own god. What was deeply problematic was the change in tactics; it was as if they had been instructed to harm the archer.

What was it about Drudge that was different than anyone else?

Suddenly it struck me!

Quickly, I said:

“Drudge, put away your bow!”


He looked puzzled but then hit is forehead with his palm and put his bow away; he grinned at me and gave me thumbs up.

We moved up the stairs and reached another hallway. These were featureless. It was obvious that this house had been cleared a very long time ago and was completely empty. As we made our way along, more undead pets appeared but this time they stayed still, as if unsure of what to do. Felix and Longhelim drove them away again, this time with help from Victor who slashed one almost in half, for all the good that would do. Rhuarc had an inexhaustible amount of these summonings or so it seemed.

Longhelim was muttering:

“We’re taking too long. That’s what’s allowing him to summon them almost at will.”

John must have heard him as he said:

“I can’t check for traps if these undead keep turning up. There are only so many times that Felix and Longhelim can drive them away. We’ll have to move at normal speed and take the risks.”

So, Victor and Longhelim moved into the front rank with Felix and I behind, finally followed Drudge and John. As we reached the corner, a spiked slab of stone fell on top of Victor; or almost on top of him, scraping the warrior quite badly. It shattered on the ground and we turned the corner; another hallway, with windows looking out onto the balcony. There were also two doorways going outside.

As Victor and Longhelim reached the first one, there was a flash and suddenly a creature appeared. It was a gaunt humanoid with leathery skin but its most prominent feature was a large horn growing from the base of its skull. I recognized it immediately; it was a babau, a demon. His skin was covered with a slimy excretion and it grinned balefully at the warriors.

As soon as combat was joined, Longhelim and Victor tried to move in such a way as to gain tactical advantage when they suddenly realised what had fully happened. Both the warriors bumped into walls; these were magical, unbreakable unseen walls. The babau screamed triumphantly and pounced but Victor expertly swung his falchion twice almost cleaving the creature in two; not before his magical falchion began to smoke and seemed to become etched and scarred by the bodily fluids of the creature though. Victor swung his falchion immediately, dislodging most of the acid.

What was of far more concern were the magical walls.

I moved forward and examined the size of the space, the nature of the walls and did a little cantrip.

Moments later I sighed:

“It’s a hugely powerful trap. They are trapped within a small cell of magical walls. There is no way to break them; the wall is also beneath their feet so the ground is not a weakness. I know this spell. In fact, I have it in my book. The cell is not permanent, but it does last a long time. We may as well settle down. There are very specific ways to getting rid of these walls and we do not have any of the means available to us at this time.”

I motioned to the others to approach the other door leading into the balcony. My cantrip was still running and I detected magic of such magnitude that I was certain the same trap was present there.

“The same trap is there as well. Odd as it may sound, the inside of the cell is actually very secure. It would be a good place to rest. If we trigger it, it should finish at almost the same time as the one that is constraining Victor and Longhelim. We may also even be able to regain our spells while inside.”

Just before we entered into the trapped area, John cast a spell on the wall of this room, creating a small thin slit into the wall; a person could just about squeeze through it but more importantly, it allowed both cells to look at each other.

Once that was done, John, Felix and Drudge nodded and we all simultaneously stepped into the area, thus triggering the new trap and enclosing ourselves into the cell. It was quite crowded, especially when another babau demon was conjured but thankfully, Drudge’s arrows did for him very quickly.

We settled down to rest. Everything was blessedly silent as one of the effects of the cell was no noise from the outside.

 

[Cafu]

As we were waiting in the magical trap, which could turn out to be an unexpected refuge, our repose was rudely interrupted. Victor and Longhelim appeared on top of us; literally, in a flash of flame, suggesting they had access to magical transport. As I desperately tried to move my head out of the path of Longhelim’s mailed boot that was flying dangerously close to my nose, I remembered that the paladin had obtained a cloak, or a cape to be more accurate, which allowed him to perform this magic. Then my thoughts were interrupted as the paladin was explaining the situation quickly:

“Rhuarc is around; he’s the one who set these traps; he can also negate them. He dismissed our cage and then set his undead on top of us again. Victor and I coped quite well but he was shooting us at the same time; his arrows are poisoned. He was using a portcullis as protection so I used my cape to get next to him. We managed to get a few blows into him but as usual, he got away; basically, he jumped over our heads, ran along the side of the wall, shooting at us as he was doing so and went around the corner. We discovered another portcullis at the end of that corridor……..”

Victor interrupted at this point:

“I cut my way through it.”

Longhelim continued:

“Anyway, the long and short of it is that he can move and shoot faster than we can catch him. Sooner or later, one of us would have fallen; especially as all of his arrows are poisoned; and those that aren’t dissolve your spells. So, I gave my cape to Victor and told him to get us in here. At least in this cage we’re same from the arrows; but sooner or later, he will have healed again and he’ll be back.

Oh, can anyone do anything about this poison and these wounds please?”

Felix was already getting a wand out and tapping Longhelim with it. John was also using his wand of healing on both warriors. Nothing loth, I was also getting some spell components out of my pouches; from what the warriors said, it was very likely that Rhuarc would be back very soon so I put up a spell which hardened the skin, making it more resistant to weapons. These were given to Drudge and Victor.

After that, we had a quick discussion, led by Longhelim:

“This cape will work for the wearer once a day; both Victor and I have used it today. Therefore, when he appears again, again we’re going to need someone to take Victor and Drudge as close to him as possible.”

“I’ll do it!” I said. I was the obvious choice; and if Rhuarc was still around for a few moments more, maybe I would even be able to cast a spell or two at him.

Longhelim continued: “He’ll almost certainly call his undead pets again so we have to be ready for this when it happens…..”

“…..he’s watching us,” Victor interrupted quietly.

We all whirled around but the spot at which Victor pointed was now vacant.

Longhelim whispered:

“He’s preparing to make his move. Everyone get ready!”

I hurriedly swapped cloaks and then waited tensely. As predicted, drifting through the wall, four of the now familiar undead appeared, hovering around the cage. As soon as they did, Rhuarc revealed himself and he must have obviously spoken the dismissal of the trap as suddenly, we could hear the outside world again. The undead attempted to fly in but met a barrier; I remembered the spell of protection that was present on Drudge. This obviously stopped them from approaching, a welcome boon.

Many things happened at once. My concentration was on grabbing Victor and Drudge and using the cape to get us next to Rhuarc; this was achieved but it also had an unexpected result. Our target space was in the same space as Longhelim and Victor’s original trap and as we landed there, it sprang again, enclosing us in unbreakable magical walls!

There was a frustrated growl form Victor and a scream of rage from Drudge:

“What is this, Faden? What just happened?”

His cries were further interrupted but the appearance of another babau demon. However, before it could do even twitch, Drudge shot it and Victor dropped his adamantine falchion, drew another and lopped its head off.

Rhuarc smirked at us and promptly went out through the window onto the balcony.

I began to divest myself of the cape:

“What happened is that in this short period, Rhuarc’s trap has reset. No, I don’t know how he did it; he should not have been able to do it by the laws magic; no, no matter how knowledgeable or powerful I become, I will never be able to do anything like this. Yes, generally, when a trap has been set off, it should not have reset, especially a magical trap. Any other questions you can think of?”

I handed the ranger the cape as I was saying those things and put my own cloak over my shoulders. Drudge was still swearing as he was taking his own cloak off and put the cape on. As soon as that was done, Drudge activated the cape and we found ourselves next on the balcony.

There we saw Rhuarc facing off against John; not really a fair match. I managed to cast a spell on him; motes of golden dust settled in his figure, making him shine out in the gloom; it would quite difficult for him to attempt to hide from us in the near future. Victor also managed to land a solid blow but Rhuarc did his usual trick of running on the side wall and jump through the window.

We followed up as fast as we could, clambering through the window, Drudge in the lead. This window led back into the room where Longhelim and Felix were battling against the two undead. Rhuarc sped past the combat and his undead tried to block his pursuers, especially Drudge. Suddenly, we all felt a boost to our speed and there was shout from John at the back:

“My compliments!”

Rhuarc was still running for the door, now hotly pursued by Drudge; Victor delayed briefly to slash at one of the undead; as I mentioned before, as a dwarf, I’m not really built for speed but I was game and made my way out of the room and down the left branch of the corridor, towards Drudge’s shouting. As I then turned right, into another long corridor, a spiked block of stone came crashing down from the ceiling, catching me slightly. I was hurt but not out so I continued. I just managed to get a glimpse of Rhuarc running on one of the walls and turning around a corner, pursued by Drudge, who was employing the same tactic of running on the wall.

At this point, I was joined by Victor and Longhelim just behind me; John had already overtaken us and Felix took up the rear.

“He’s gone into one of the rooms around the corner,” shouted John.

Drudge was around the corner and we all trundled up to an open door. The room inside was bare with the exception of a set of stairs going up. Drudge had reached the bottom of these and was getting another arrow ready. John was rapidly moving past Drudge; at this point, there was a bright flash and a shout from Drudge:

“Aaaargh! He’s done it again! How often can he do that?”

We all clattered into the room at this point, to see the ranger with his bow still aimed at a spot on the stairs.

“He’s done his disappearing trick into the shadow. Only the gods know where he is in now.”

Victor moved up the stairs, looked further up and murmured:

“This is now getting a little annoying.”

Drudge ran past us, shouting:

“I bet he’s on the roof! To the balcony!”

He ran on the walls in the same manner as Rhuarc; we all followed up at our far more sedate pace, making sure to retrace our steps and, upon entering the room with the magical cage trap, carefully avoiding the area which set it off. We clambered quite clumsily through the window and then waited for Drudge to finish running around the roof. Judging by the amount of cursing, Rhuarc was not up there. Finally, the ranger jumped down to the balcony with a disgusted look on his face.

“No sign of him. He could be anywhere.”

All of us began to look around attentively. I was sure that he was watching us from somewhere; everyone else was convinced of the same thing. Despite our conviction, we couldn’t see or hear anything apart from the wind swishing through the trees. The whole area was incredibly quiet.

It quickly became apparent that we had to make a decision.

Longhelim began a quick discussion:

“We can either continue exploring this house or we can vacate it and try to find somewhere to rest.”

I replied:

“Neither choice is particularly good; he’ll never let us rest and the house is one big trap. We’re just stumbling from one deadly obstacle to the next. The traps with the magical cage are particularly effective; talking about that, Drudge, could you give that magical cape to Felix; he hasn’t used it today yet.”

John added:

“At the moment, I’m veering towards vacating the premises. I’m not sure how much of the house is left to explore but the undead pets that Rhuarc summons all the time are becoming problematic. Neither Felix, Longhelim or I have the ability to tell them to go away any more today. That could cause many problems.”

Victor commented:

“The undead seem to come from his sword. Thus they are always with him. Do we know how much more of this house there is to explore? Most of these rooms are completely empty, cleared out long ago.”

Drudge replied to this:

“I ran around the roof a lot and the floor above this one seems substantially smaller than any of the others.”

I pondered:

“So, there is less to explore; do we gamble? Do we hope that he has had enough of trying to kill us here in the building and that he hopes to harm us in another location such as the cave of the waterfall? Or will he attack us here again? Are we strong enough to withstand another attack by him? Personally, I still have a few spells left.”

Felix replied at this point:

“I have almost nothing. One little spell that is a good protection but it will last for a very short time and then the undead pets will be able to get through.”

Victor had obviously been weighing up all the practical aspects of the problem as usual:

“The trouble is that once we leave this house, it will be much harder to reach it again, especially now that Rhuarc has dissolved so many of our spells. The bridge has been destroyed and he’s going to do his damndest to make sure we cannot learn our spells; even if he just sends his pets against us indefinitely; it doesn’t look as if he’s under any constraints in using them. He’s going to be able to find us wherever we go.”

Reluctantly, I said:

“So, despite most of our better judgments, we should at least explore the upper floor. I don’t have any answers to our problem. We are likely to face traps galore in the rest of the house but leaving the house means that we are going to find it almost impossible to reach it again. That suggests that we should at least try to explore the upper floor while we can.

I think Drudge should receive that last spell of protection from Felix as he’s the one who is most likely to be facing Rhuarc so to speak; he’s also been the one who is being targeted by the pets.”

Felix had walked over to Drudge and cast his spell over him. Then we formed up and made out way to the stairs again. We managed to reach them without incident and then John led the group, carefully checking the floor, walls and ceiling ahead of us.

It was taking a certain amount of time but we climbed the stairs and these led to a straight corridor. Again with John in front, we moved carefully, trying to follow in John’s footsteps as much as possible. We could see a corner turning sharply to the right. We reached it and saw that it led down to another sharp turn to the right. Just as we turned the corner, John signaled us to stop and began to look very carefully at a patch of floor. I couldn’t see anything but I stayed quiet as I saw that the rogue was concentrating very hard. Finally, he seemed to trace something from the floor to the wall and then he took out a piece of chalk and made a little mark on the wall. Then he took out his delicate tools and did something I couldn’t see on the wall. Once he finished, he put them away, and, obviously far more relaxed, whispered:

“Another of those spiked portcullises; could have been nasty. I disarmed it though. It’s safe now.”

I still couldn’t see anything but I took his word for it. We reformed and then moved down the corridor again; John, a little ahead, leading, followed by Victor and Longhelim, who in turn were followed by Felix and I with Drudge taking rearguard.

As we were approaching the end of the corridor, John made a motion for us to stop again; he went through the same routine except that this time he made a mark on the floor before he retrieved his tools. Again, he made a motion upwards towards some place on the ceiling; then he made a motion to carry on as he turned the corner. We followed him up, to see the corridor ending in a wall with a side door at the end.

Wordlessly, John searched the door and then whispered to Victor, who was just at the turn of the corner:

“It’s not trapped. Come and open it.”

Victor approached and gently twisted the handle and pushed…….

 

[Cafu]

Victor approached, gently twisted the handle and pushed…….

Several things happened at once then; suddenly five of the undead flew through the walls and tried to engulf Drudge, only to be repulsed by his spell. I could also hear Victor shouting:

“One big room; large pentagram in the middle; looks very bad!”

A pentagram! Maybe we had finally found where all those demons were coming from; but we had other worries right now. The undead, finding it impossible to get a Drudge, decided to attack the rest of us. I was also protected in the same way as the ranger and so was Victor for that matter but Longhelim, Felix and John were not and it was only a matter of time before they found out.

John shouted:

“Felix, get down here; we need to find out if this room is safe! You said that you had your cantrip for magic!”

Seeing a wall of undead in front of me, I cast a spell at them; I realised this would jeopardize my protection but it couldn’t be helped. The spell, a bolt of lightning, was only partly successful, with three targets, two of which were completely unharmed by the spell. Thankfully, Victor had arrived from the doorway and stepped in front of me; he began his methodical fencing and even managed to connect with these incorporeal creatures a few times. At least he was able to stop them from surging forward. He was quickly joined by Longhelim. As Victor had actually struck at the undead, he had also lost his magical protection.

Both warriors were having great trouble with the incorporeal nature of the undead this time around.

Then, there were two simultaneous shouts from near the door. One from Felix and the other from Drudge:

The first was:

“There’s a huge area of strong magic just behind the door! Don’t go in!”

The second:

“Rhuarc’s in the room!”

I glanced from the undead, only to see an arrow hit John, who grunted. I glanced back and decided to use one of my most powerful bolts of lightning; this one would strike all of the undead. Again, it was semi successful, with several of them being unaffected while others had smoking holes through their torsos. The warriors were also managing to score some hits on them but it was all terribly slow; the only advantage we had was that Victor was using that peculiar dodging, defensive style of swordplay which was very effective against the touches of the undead; they seemed confused, as if they had never come across it before. The warrior was leading a charmed life.

“Got you!”

A cry from the doorway, in Drudge’s voice. Then, with horror, I saw that one of the undead had obviously gone through the room and was now attacking John and Drudge at the rear of the group. The warriors were still keeping the others away from me; one of them had been hit badly by Victor and dissipated; another was very badly weakened by Longhelim and I cast my last spell of force bolts at it, also dissipating it with just one bolt; the rest of the spell I directed at another one. John was fighting furiously with his wooden rapier which was particularly deadly to them. He was looking badly shaken though. Drudge was not being distracted by the undead and instead he was watching the doorway like a hawk, bow drawn.

Victor and Longhelim managed to defeat another couple of the undead, now leaving only two. Felix had moved away, using the warriors as protection. Then, suddenly, the last two undead just vanished. I knew exactly what had happened:

“The summoning is finished. Quick, are we ready to take on Rhuarc? I still have some magic left.”

Drudge shouted:

“We’re not going to get a better chance. Do what it is you plan to do now!”

So I shouted at everyone:

“Ready!”

Running forward I cast a spell on the wall, gambling that it would lead into the room. The wall disappeared, creating a new doorway, bypassing the magical trap in the obvious one; Drudge grinned ferally as he rushed in, quickly followed by Victor and Longhelim. John and Felix were still in the corridor, badly weakened by the undead.

“He’s bloody hiding again!”

This was a shout from the ranger. Then there was grunt:

“There he is!”

I stepped in myself at this point and saw that Rhuarc was very close to the doorway; three of the undead were in the pentagram; Rhuarc had obviously just shot Drudge with an arrow but had dropped his bow. The first thing I did was cast my spell on him. A cloud of golden motes and dust settled all around the area, making him shine like a beacon.

“Let’s see you hide now!” I shouted at him.

Then, with horror, I realised what he planned to do.

“He’s planning to jump into the magical trap. We won’t be able to get at him!” I shouted again.

“Nooooo,” this was a shout from behind us and with a mixture of shock and awe, I saw John running down the corridor. The new undead had gone through the wall and were attacking him as he ran through them in an extraordinary dash, flipping his way on the floor and on the walls; unfortunately, I saw that he hadn’t been completely successful as several of the undead tapped him as he sped by. It wasn’t enough to stop him though, as he ran through their midst, dove into the magical trap and let the devil take the consequences; probably literally.

It was heroic; it was magnificent; it was insane!

The trap activated and something appeared but my attention was taken by Rhuarc; for the first time his iron countenance cracked as he watched John’s extraordinary dive; his face formed a mask of rage and he drew his scimitar. He was now faced by Victor, with Longhelim following up behind; instantly, Drudge loosed a volley against him. Several arrows skewered his torso. He still had one last trick to play though; he swung his scimitar against Victor and I swear that the ugly thing actually moaned as it hit him several times; it also erupted in a sickly green light as it struck and Victor swayed badly as he was hit. It looked as if that weapon had an even more evil purpose than just summoning undead; I had a dreadful suspicion as I had read about such evil weapons of legend and I prayed that Victor proved strong enough to resist it.

Evidently he did, since although he swayed, he then steadied himself and proceeded to literally dismember Rhuarc in front of him.

Even in his last moments, Rhuarc did not make a sound.

Quickly, I turned into the cage and saw that this time the creature standing there was a devil; it was a tall humanoid, its body covered in barbs of all sizes. I recognized it immediately; it was a barbed devil. It had already dealt with John; the rogue was in one corner of the trap, a burning figure, prostrate on the floor. The devil grinned at us and then gathered John on his arms and impaled him on various barbs, relishing the contact.

Felix shouted:

“Victor, with me!”

Without hesitation, the warrior stepped next to Felix who disappeared in a flash of flame and re-appeared next to the devil in the same way. Victor was in action immediately and began to strike the outsider; I was worried; this was going to be a hard combat; we couldn’t get into the cage to support them; Victor had been badly weakened by the undead previously and I could see that as usual with an outsider, Victor’s falchion was not biting as deeply as it should have been. Victor was doing his best and the two exchanged a series of blows and counterblows of such speed and strength that I doubted that anyone else could have withstood them; although the devil was hurt, it was Victor who staggered. The devil took advantage of this momentary loss of balance to sweep Victor into a bear hug and impale him onto his barbs. The warrior struggled mightily but he was up against an infernal champion who had had centuries of training; he was also the size of a troll and weighed about twice as much as the warrior did.

Nevertheless, Victor struggled and wriggled so expertly that he was finally able to escape the deadly embrace and slash the devil one more time. The creature gave as good as it got and this time I groaned inwardly as Victor collapsed, wreathed in flames. Thankfully, Felix managed to tap Victor with his healing wand and the warrior stirred and gamely, attempted to slash at the devil from the ground; the creature jumped over the warrior contemptuously and then backhanded him contemptuously across the face, causing him to become wreathed in flames again; then he turned to Felix and hit the cleric this time; the priest had suffered from the undead even more than Victor and looked badly battered but he managed to tap the warrior yet again.

Victor stirred weakly yet again; he took his time, lined up his sword and swung, this time connecting solidly. The devil looked surprised at the falchion striking his ankle, almost severing it. He had been concentrating on the priest.

“I’ll see you again!”

He was looking at Victor as he shouted this and then he disappeared in a wreath of flame.

Victor collapsed onto the ground, small flames almost taking him; Felix quickly tapped him once with the wand to save him from unconsciousness before beginning to look after John. Several taps of the wand and the rogue was stirring; wan, pale and listless after his near-death experience but at least he was conscious. He was given the cape and Victor, Felix and he appeared outside the cage in a flash of flame.

Longhelim, John, Drudge and John then began to heal everyone. We also had to clean ourselves up a bit and check on equipment, bruises and magic. Once all that had been done, we began to take an interest in Rhuarc’s corpse. He was searched carefully by John; this was particularly necessary as we were well aware that he poisoned his arrows and we suspected that even in death he may have left some nasty traps for anyone bold enough to search his belongings. Thankfully, this was not the case and we soon had a tidy pile of what looked like well made, and in some cases bespoke equipment. His body was also covered in tattoos; these were magical and explained how he had so many different magical powers.

At this stage, we were unable to find out what was magical; no one had any of those cantrips left but there were some pieces that were obvious. One of these was quickly recognized by Drudge:

“That’s an Efficient Quiver; it stores lots of arrows; and bows and other things but mainly arrows.”

There was also a couple of wands, some empty potion bottles and of course, his scimitar lying on the floor near his corpse.

“No sign of the Torch then?” asked Longhelim.

John replied:

“No, that is most likely in his secret stash if it is even here. The only place that could be is the cave with the waterfall. It’s the only location of note we haven’t yet searched yet.”

“You mean the only trap we haven’t set off yet,” I muttered.

Suddenly, I picked up the Efficient Quiver. I remembered Drudge saying that it carried arrows; maybe there were some more of them in there; nice, magical arrows for Drudge. I took it to John; he was skilled at avoiding sharp points and poison.

“John, could you take out the arrows from here; Drudge, these could be useful for you.”

So the rogue began to pull out various types of arrows; or rather arrows with different points; there were some with tips made of cold iron; others with silver; fortunately, there were none that were poisoned. Then John said:

“Hold on a moment; there’s this last compartment…….I think there’s something else in here……let’s have you……”

He took out a long, thin bone with one end that was fire blackened and a leather handle at the other extremity.

We stared at it breathlessly. I whispered:

“Is that what I think it is?”

“Yes, Faden, I think that is the Torch of the Burning Sky.”

Felix also spoke in hushed tones, as if he was also awed at this piece of history we held in our hand; the one item which allowed Ragesia to rise above all the other nations in our land; but there was something wrong. The torch was inert, cold and lifeless.

It was Victor who summed it up:

“Shouldn’t it be burning or something…..it looks like just a burned bone.”

“I think Rhuarc has tampered with it. It seems to be snuffed out for the moment,” was the reply from Felix.

I was already thinking of the consequences of our retrieval of this thing.

“We need to get it back to the Resistance as quickly as possible. Hopefully, Simeon will be able to sort find out what’s wrong with it with his Loremaster powers but so long as we have it, we will be the world’s number one target; for everyone: the elves, the orcs, the monks, Dassenians, you name them and they’ll want it; even the gnomes will have a go if they think they can get away with it.”

Longhelim said:

“Let’s not be too hasty in our decision. I agree that we will need to move fast; the elves are coming so we have to make a decision but I think we need to get some rest and recover spells. Hopefully, Felix will be able to cast his spell that allows us to fly in the clouds. That will give us a lot of added flexibility. Let’s sleep on it and make some decisions then.”

I shrugged. We were reasonably safe; I had suspected that the elves would be on their way. That was how Longhelim managed to obtain the freedom of Liat. However, I hoped that we still had one night’s rest of grace and then we would come to a decision about the Torch; although as both Longhelim and Victor were unwilling to combat good outsiders, that was a foregone conclusion as well.

I glanced to the side and then caught sight of the scimitar on the floor. I pointed it out:

“We should probably put that somewhere as well. It summons undead so it’s probably evil and I have a dreadful suspicion that it traps souls as well. I have heard of such weapons but only in legends. I don’t think it’s safe to touch. Could someone wrap it up in a cloak and put it somewhere safe?”

As Victor was taking out a spare cloak I walked over and looked at it more closely. There was no doubt that the scimitar was highly magical. Its blade was made of adamantine, and it was embedded with several diamonds of superlative quality; in fact, I recognized them as being similar in size and shape as those present in Castle Korstull and specifically designed to trap souls.

I pointed these out to Felix, who nodded:

“Yes, souls could be trapped in those.”

Then he mused:

“I wonder if Coaltongue’s soul is trapped in there? And if that is why he cannot be resurrected?”

Closer examination showed that one of the diamonds at least had a soul in it. There was also a gap where a diamond should have been but had been prised out. The hilt had been wrapped in black velvet that had seen better days and on the pommel there was a large black pearl. I looked enquiringly at Felix, who said:

“I doubt there’s anything in the pearl but one never knows; this kind of magic is very much theoretical for me.”

“And me” I muttered.

At this point, Drudge advanced with Victor’s cloak and scooped it up without touching it; as he picked it up though, he dropped it immediately:

“It spoke to me! The sword spoke to me!”

The scimitar was sentient! Yet another legend proving to be true; there were many references to sentient swords in books I had read but they were of the lighter type of books I read for leisure, full of myths and legends; most scholars dismissed sentient weapons as wishful thinking; they must have been so rare as to be unbelievable.

“What did it say?” I asked.

“It said its name was Shaalguenyaver,” replied Drudge.

That meant Bright Shadow in elven.

“What else?” I demanded.

“It didn’t have time to say anything else before I dropped it. Let’s see if it says anything else.”

Rather gingerly, the ranger picked up the scimitar quite carefully and held it for quite some time. Then he turned to us and said:

“Apart from its name, it is offering a pact. It protects its owner from ghosts and various types of incorporeal undead. If the pact is formalized, than these beings cannot approach the owner. This is a very powerful protection; the owner is also not subject to the negative energy attacks of powerful undead. However, in return it demands the soul of its owner; once he or she is slain, the soul belongs to the Bright Shadow forever with no possibility of resurrection.

Oh, she also says that if we go back to the South with the Torch, then it will be too late to repair it. She seems to know about both the Torch and the fact that it’s defective.”

“She?” I asked.

“It’s a woman’s voice,” replied Drudge.

Longhelim was frowning:

“Oddly, despite how it looks and what we have seen it do, there’s is no aura of evil from it. However, it is also a major decision and I think we need to sleep on it.”

“Here?” asked Drudge.

I looked around:

“It’s as safe a place as any; safer than most in fact, with all those traps around. We know where they are but others don’t.”

So we settled down for the night and thankfully nothing disturbed us.

 

[Cafu]

The next morning, we prepared various spells. We were all curiously refreshed as if finally getting a night’s sleep had reinvigorated us; I felt as if I had even more energy and than normal and was able to learn even more spells than usual. It was exhilarating.

Through my magic, I was able to discover the nature of the various items we had obtained. Then, while we ate Felix’s magical breakfast, we began to discuss major decisions we had to make.

As John was chewing, he mused:

“I’m tempted to take that pact Bright Shadow is offering.”

Longhelim raised his eyebrows as he buttered a piece of fresh bread:

“Are you sure? Once you commit, there is no going back. I don’t think that the scimitar understands any game that you may be playing. If you die, your soul goes into one of those gems; that’s the deal. You won’t be able to talk your way around that one.”

The rogue swallowed:

“Well, yes, but it’s not exactly as if I get into many fights. I usually skulk in the back anyway, providing support and other functions. Let me think about it a little more.”

He went back to his chewing.

I was full so I wondered over to the window and stared out into the distance. As I did, I thought I saw some movement. Curious, I concentrated and indeed, there was someone or something out there. It was the first movement I had seen here with the exception of Rhuarc. I called to the others and everyone rushed to the windows.

Drudge had the best eyes of all of us:

“I can’t see who it is but it can only be the Ragesians or the Shahalesti; I can’t think of anyone else; it’s too many people to be the Taranesti. They’re not moving very fast though. We still have plenty of time. We need to make some decisions though.”

Looking at Longhelim, I said:

“I’m pretty certain it’s the Shahalesti.”

He looked back and replied:

“Yes, I told them what we were planning to do. That’s how I was able to get access to Liat; I said previously I would not fight the elves, especially when they had good outsiders in support. So, I made a deal; the same kind of deal as John did. Yes, they were able to track us. I gambled that we would recover the Torch before they arrived. I won and lost. We have the Torch but it’s broken. I didn’t realise you could break things like that.”

Our conversation was interrupted when Rhuarc’s corpse suddenly sat up!

Felix cursed and fumbled for his holy symbol, ready to blast it into oblivion when a sepulchruous voice emerged from it:

“What do you want of me?”

John stepped forward and said:

“How do we repair the Torch of the Burning Sky and make it whole?”

The corpse continued in the same tone:

“The Torch is powered by souls. I tore them out. To re-forge the Torch, you must go to the Temple of Echoed Souls and pass the tests. Once you succeed, you will make it whole once again.”

As soon as it said that, the corpse collapsed.

Felix turned to John and drily said:

“I take you have a new partner then?”

The rogue replied:

“With the elves on the way, we ran out of time; we either tried to fix the Torch here and now in the Haunted Forest or gave up the chance forever.”

“According to the sword anyway,” I added. “I think it’s lying because it serves its purpose to do so but it’s too late now. You entered into the Pact and we had better take advantage of that. I just hope you know what you’re doing.

We had better cast spells and fly out of here. I should think that if we go into the caves, we will emerge into the forest as before.”

Rapidly, we cast various spells, or “powered up” as we called it. Then we turned into mist and flew rapidly towards the caves. We did get closer to the group of humanoids and did indeed confirm that they were Shahalesti elves. Then we moved into the caves and turned into our solid selves. Once inside, we did not let the shadows guide us so we were shunted out quite quickly. Thankfully, nothing within attempted to stop us this time.

We emerged some way further upstream on the river. Quickly, we turned into mist again and flew above and towards the Temple, landing just below the doors.

As described previously, two separate staircases led to a balcony set into a mountain side. Carved in the mountain was an intricately carved pair of doors. However, now that we were closer, we could also see that there were four bells on each side, built along the staircases; eight bells in total. I remembered that the number eight was symbolically significant to this monastic order; something to do with the eight elements and the fact that they needed the help of eight other individuals.

We became solid again. As soon as we did so, I felt that we were being magically watched.

“’Ware! Magical watchers!” I shouted at the others.

The warriors immediately began to look around drawing weapons but I added:

“We’re being magically watched from a distance; I don’t know who or from where but it’s unlikely to be nearby otherwise they wouldn’t use this kind of magic; but lots of people know where we are now. I felt at least four separate magical watchers.”

“Better get going then,” John said.

I had cast a little cantrip and said:

“The bells and stairs are magical. The balcony is not radiating anything though. It would be better to fly up there and avoid those steps, just in case.”

We flew up to the balcony, where John cast a spell which unlocked the doors and pushed them open. These revealed a hallway, along with a mirror facing us. My cantrip also showed that everything inside the Temple was magical. So, John carefully searched the first section of the hall way but finding nothing, stepped in. As soon as he did so, eight golden rings glowed on the floor and the apparition of an aged map became visible inside the mirror.

It began to speak immediately:

“Candidates, you must be warned. The candidate called Forty One now controls this Temple and has perverted it to his will. He will try to destroy you. We will try to hold against him but he is strong. You must defeat him and thus cleanse the Temple and gain transcendence. If you succeed, you will become Echoed Souls.

There will be Three Tests, each a trial of both your character and your soul; remember, no one is alone and you must share your powers with each other; only then will you be able to triumph in the tests. You must think like yourselves but also like each other; if you will it, you can speak without talking; if you will it you can fight without knowing; if you will it, you can enchant without power; but the soul is all and your will is a part of your soul. Share your soul among everyone and let everyone share their soul with you. Only then will you triumph.

Now go, go into the meditation chambers and prepare. Meditate and prepare and practice in sharing your souls. The meditation chambers are in these corridors.”

He motioned left and right with his arms. My attention was riveted to him that I had not noticed the two side corridors.

“Once you feel ready, step into the mirror and the tests will begin. The first is the Trial of the Bell; the Second is the Trial of the Offering and the Third is the Trial of the Self. Above all, remember, be true to yourselves.”

This figure then disappeared and was replaced by another; this one was far more unpleasant; younger, muscular, bald and wearing only a loincloth but the strangest thing about him was that his arms resembled those of a bear, claws and all. In fact, he reminded me most of our fight against the mad druid, Lee Sidoneth, who also exhibited the arms of a bear when we fought him, and somehow channeled the strength of the animal at the same time. I had an awful feeling that this Forty One could do the same.

He spoke, in a deep voice and a contemptuous and arrogant tone:

“So, you’re the latest group. I will destroy you! You are the walking dead!”

After that, he disappeared.

It took us a little time to gather everything in our thoughts. I was still remembering everything else that the first monk had told us. I turned it over in my mind again and again, trying to work out exactly what he was saying and also what he was telling us to do. Forty One’s threats were meaningless. We had faced other dangers and we would either prevail or not against him. However, his words were insignificant.

Drudge snorted:

“Well, does anyone have any ideas just what is going on here? What was the old monk on about? I know what the other one was saying. He just wants to kill us! That one’s easy and he’ll just have to join the queue but the other one?”

Longhelim had actually taken out his pipe and was stuffing it with tobacco:

“Faden, you have any ideas? I think I have an inkling but I’m not sure.”

I made an effort of will and tried to project my voice into Drudge’s head, speaking:

“I’m trying to…..”

The ranger jumped:

“What was that? How did you do that? I didn’t even see you cast a spell!”

I replied:

“It is the innate magic of this place; I think it allows us to share our powers. One of these is to talk mind to mind if we will it and concentrate. I think I can only do it to you but you may want to try with someone else.”

I stopped and saw that Drudge concentrated and Felix looked startled. Then I heard John’s voice in my head:

“This is a nifty trick. Do you think we could do this all the time; it would be really handy!”

I answered him in my mind, to keep up the practice.

“Well, I know of a spell that is similar but it is quite complicated. I was thinking of trying to research it but as usual, there’s been no time.

Anyway, look, as I was saying, I think the magic of this place allows us to share our powers; so you could cast some of my more powerful spells if I grant you the power; and I could use the bow in the same manner as Drudge if he grants me the power; in the same manner, Felix could use the sword in as skillfully as Victor. What we need to do is concentrate and practice. It’s going to take a different way of thinking and quite a bit of effort before we get this going. Once we do though, it’ll be a really nifty trick, as you say.”

Then I said aloud:

“I think we should retire to these meditation chambers and see if we somehow gain more focus.”

John had already pre-empted us and had looked in the various rooms while I had been distracted, trying to work it all out:

“Those rooms are all pretty similar. There are eight of them; makes sense I suppose. Anyway, all of them have a bed, table and bowl of water with various bits and pieces. I think they’re meant to be symbolic but who knows? Anyway, the first has a candle with flint and steel, the next an empty clay flower vase, next is a golden nugget, next is folded game mat, next is a pomegranate, followed by the lower half of an hourglass but without any sand, the next is odd in that it doesn’t have anything while the last one has a recorder. Any ideas as to what they mean?”

Longhelim replied:

“A couple are obvious; the pomegranate could be life; the hourglass is likely to be time and the candle with flint and steel is likely to be fire. After that, well they will correspond to the eight elements that are so significant to these monks; anyway, we should go into the rooms and meditate.”

So, taking the paladin’s advice, we all went into various rooms. I went into the room with the candle, flint and steel. I settled myself onto the floor and then concentrated; one my previous adventures, on our future, on the Resistance; on the knowledge I had about the Order of Echoed Souls; on the Torch. Absolutely nothing happened. No reaction, no inspiration, no indication, nothing.

Disappointed, I left the room and found everyone else already out.

“Anything Faden?” asked Longhelim.

I shook my head.

Drudge muttered:

“Waste of time.”

John flicked up a nugget of gold.

“Oh, I wouldn’t say that.”

I just said:

“Well, it seems quite plain that none of us knows how to meditate. Be that as it may, we’d better go ahead with this first test then: The Trial of the Bell.”

 

[carborundum]

***Weird: I replied to your previous post via Tapatalk but it never appeared.***

First off - congratulations to your group for their patient, resolute, gung-ho, kick-ass defeat of Rhuarc! I know how annoyed I am if my DM teleports a single bad guy away. Having the numero uno annoying enemy do it repeatedly... My compliments to you all - the DM for sticking to his guns and the group for having the same frustrating fight, and those nasty shadow things, over and over again until they got to do something about it

Well done you lot!


And now a few quick metagaming type questions: how much of the in-game conversations is in-character at the table, and how much is dramatic licence and filling in the details between sessions?
Is this as tense and exciting to play as it reads? Was it hard to get used to a new world?
I'm looking to start a new campaign next year and this is on my list, inspired by you guys!

Happy Christmas to all of you!

I'm looking forward to next year's episodes already!

 

[Cafu]

Hello Carborundum; apologies for the delay in replying. I was away for the holiday and did not have internet access.

After reading your post, the answers to your questions are deceptively long so, this post is a little lengthier than I thought it would be.

Yes, Rhuarc was certainly a piece of work.

We guessed quite early on just what he was but it didn’t help really. The whole area is set up to give him the maximum advantage; of course, one rarely has the correct spells to deal with someone of that power or level; resting and learning the correct spells was also out of the question for the reasons given in the SH. This was one of the main reasons why one enemy managed to last so long against a group of 6 PCs. I’m just thanking my lucky stars we managed to work out what his plan was regarding that last forcecage trap; otherwise, we’d probably still be there trying to hunt him down.

The fight itself was frustrating and tense but ultimately exhilarating. We know our GM sticks to his guns as you put it and we’d worked hard for that victory which made the whole episode so much the sweeter when it was finally over.

As regards your other question, the whole tabletop play and its consequent record on the SH is a mixture. I’m afraid none of us are such accomplished actors or improvisers that we are able to speak in character for any length of time; there is some in character speech but not nearly as much as I imply.

The style of the SH with the dialogue is a device to break up walls of text and hopefully make it more entertaining and easier to read. There are some tricks one employs such as when one PC makes a knowledge check about something and the GM imparts the information, then I have the relevant PC quote it to the other players in the form of speech; I’m not sure how else to do it really. If the GM imparts specific information to us, then I often choose the most relevant PC who is likely to know this (so Felix if it is divine in nature or Longhelim if it is diplomatic in nature for example) and relate it using that character as a mouthpiece.

However, the dialogue, although it is often a paraphrasing, is invariably facts, information or narrative which is perceived, achieved or received during the game. It is very rarely based on details filled in between sessions. On a few rare occasions, the GM has posted some relevant pieces of information on the campaign message boards, but that is it as far as out of session details are concerned.

Play can be very tense but is also alleviated with a great deal of humour.

Finally, I don’t know what style of play your group enjoys but this AP is epic, high magic, challenging, long term and rewards groups that are in it for the duration. Certain things can happen in one adventure which can seem meaningless at the time and don’t start to make sense until events two or three books down the line. Your group also needs to be willing to immerse in and commit themselves to the world and care for the events that happen within it, otherwise motivation could be difficult.

If your group prefers grim and gritty, are difficult to motivate by altruistic reasons (whether for good or evil; there are options to play evil parties), are not keen on long games, find it difficult to immerse themselves and care for the world, then they may find it a little harder to play in this AP. Finally, please also note that there has been a little house ruling for the campaign only; this is outlined in the player’s guide but the big one is the danger in using magical transport spells. If that kind of thing is a deal breaker for your group, (and I know of groups where it would be) then I would suggest avoiding this AP.

It fits our play style so we’re having a whale of a time.

I hope this helps.

 

[Cafu]

So, we all advanced to the space in front of the mirror and then, as per our instructions, we willed ourselves into it. At this point, my reality seemed to bend, twist and warp as my body was drawn into the surface of the glass and pressed through. As this was happening, I saw a vision from the past; it took me back to Gate Pass, as we were fleeing the Poison Apple pub. I did not remember this previously, because the reality was too frightening but now I could literally see a huge red dragon flying above us, but so low that I could even see the flame scarred face of the creature. It seemed to look at me with its yellow eyes; eyes that looked into my soul forever. The whole vision lasted for the blink of an eye but that dragon’s gaze would live in my memory for eternity.

We all seemed to pass through its surface and arrived beyond it in a corridor with a door in front of us, a blank wall behind us and a large bell above our heads.

“What the…..”

John spoke but his words echoed through the corridor, dangerously; so dangerously that they hurt our ears. I clutched at them and was surprised to find blood on my fingers. My ears were bleeding! Looking around, I could see that the others were suffering in the same way. Obviously, sound in this corridor was dangerous!

John, although also clutching his ears, was still excited and he was whispering:

“I think that I have gained some powers; somehow, going through that mirror, it’s done something; acid is not as deadly to me as before and I have the same defence that Faden gives to Victor and Longhelim when he sprinkles the diamond dust on them; you know, the one against weapons. I think the nugget gave me those powers.”

Even though he was whispering, it still hurt a little so Longhelim drew the attention of the rogue and put his finger across his lips. John stopped talking. I pointed at the bell and then concentrated. I managed to establish a mental link to Felix:

“Do you have one of those magical silence spells. If that bell starts ringing, we’re in serious trouble.”

The priest looked up with dread and quickly cast a spell; immediately, the area around us went completely quiet. Suddenly, I heard John’s voice in my head:

“Great! Nice one! I’m going ahead to see about that door.”

He moved forward carefully but as he reached about half way down, he must have stepped on something because the bell’s clapper began to bang furiously. It was completely silent of course but if the magic had not been in place…….

John turned towards and grimaced as he looked at the bell. Then he shrugged and turned to the door. It took him a little time, but he managed to pick the lock. When he opened the door, it revealed a large verse carved into the wall and two mirrors set at angles, facing each other. One of these, on the left, was blue while its opposite was red. Curious, we all moved forward, making sure we took the silence magic with us; the bell clapper was still flinging itself furiously against the bell.

As we approached, I was able to read the verse as follows:

Speak your name and be divided
To Paths Sinister and Righteous
A sacrifice of blood
Is the Key to your Salvation.

Mentally, I said to Felix:

“Well, Paths Sinister and Righteous means divided left and right; and if this is the second test then that is the Trial of Offering; the rhyme suggests that we need to make an offering of blood.”

The priest replied drily:

“Well, the question is how big the offering needs to be, doesn’t it?”

“We won’t know until we do it so we better get going.”

Everyone else agreed and one by one, we stepped forward and spoke our name, wincing slightly at the noise; even doing that was a little harmful.

I was the last one to say my name. So far everyone except Drudge and Longhelim had been judged righteous, going into the red mirror. As I stepped forward and spoke my name, I felt myself being pulled towards the red mirror.

As my body traversed through the glass surface, I experienced another vision.

I am with the others and we are on a mountain farm outside of Gate Pass. I recognize the hills nearby; more importantly, I recognize the people around us; a boy, who looks very much like a young Longhelim, plays with two identical girls, obviously twins. They have red hair and squeal in glee; the young Longhelim has a stick in his hand, his mighty sword. The girls play his adversaries; every so often, the boy lets himself be distracted by one of his opponents when the other ambushes him from behind, causing all three of them to tumble into a free for all involving much shouting, squealing and laughter.

In the background, a man walks behind a plough drawn by two oxen while keeping an eye on his three children. There is no sign of their mother.

A change of scene in the vision; we see the boy Longhelim finding a cave. In the manner of all boys, he must investigate; we see him going inside, picking up a stone and collapsing. His father rushes in, picks up the boy and runs back to the farm………

Then everything changed again and four of us found ourselves in a very different environment; I could see Victor, Felix and John; there was blazing fire all around us and we were standing on a piece of rocky ground with flaming fissures; fortunately, they were not wide; there were also a series of pillars in the room; these were initially very low but the further they increased in distance from us, the taller they became. At the far end, there was a portal next to which was a shape carved into the wall; this carving resembled the shape of a sword. Above us was a red orb in which lay a silver sword, presumably a key to the portal; as well as this sword, there was a creature there; I had never seen anything like it; it looked like an amorphous crimson blob with an ever changing collection of faces, limbs and mouths. If a small child’s nightmare of the mother of all monsters had come to life, this would be it. Even more strangely, the creature was singing; its many mouths produced a strange compelling harmony. Its body reflected the fire and created its own shadows on the walls. It was quite unnerving.

On our left, we could also see a pair of shadowy figures; they seemed to be in another chamber like ours but it was impossible to see much more, except that there was some sort of liquid on the ground and it was rising. Judging by the bow on one and the armour on the other, I guessed that the shadowy figures were Longhelim and Drudge.

John immediately cast a spell which put a magical silence on top of the creature in our chamber. Obviously he liked the singing even less than I did.

Out of the corner of our eyes in the other sphere, we could see Drudge grab Longhelim and walk on air to reach the top of their sphere. There they settled and seemed to be watching something or someone out of our sight.

However, I had to stop paying attention to them at that point as the nightmare moved out of the magical silence and proceeded to utter a Word of Power so vile and malign that it could have been overwhelming. Thankfully, the Word did not have enough strength to overcome us with the exception of poor Victor, who just stood there and gaped at it in stupefaction; I could see John was trying to concentrate to do something to someone but it was impossible to tell what.

I managed to cast a spell at the nightmare but unfortunately, I was unable to penetrate its natural resistance to magic and my black ray bounced off.

Felix then cast a spell on Victor which I recognized as flying magic; at this point, the nightmare acted again, enveloping us in a sticky, black magical miasma which was so antithetical to all we stood for that it even harmed us physically; especially poor Victor, who was affected so badly that he proceeded to sink to his knees and retch violently.

I glanced at the other sphere but I couldn’t see Longhelim or Drudge any longer; the liquid was still rising though. Victor recovered and immediately flew at the nightmare, which proceeded to swing at him with all its strange extremities and mouths; I lost count as to how many times Victor was attacked but somehow the warrior managed to dodge his way through this physical maelstrom and slash the creature with his sword. The nightmare recoiled and tried to move back but Victor kept pressing it.

John cast his spell of speed and I stepped to the side and managed to cast another of my black weakening rays at the nightmare; this one did penetrate its defences and I felt it bite. My attention was wrested back to the other sphere that moment though, as I saw a multi coloured rainbow wash Longhelim and Victor in its light; this was a very difficult and complicated spell with a whole set of components and results. I had theoretical knowledge and how it worked but I had not been able to research it to its individual components; I did know that their opponent must be a very powerful.

My attention was drawn back to our sphere, where Victor was now pressing the nightmare in his archetypal manner, probing, slashing, bashing and crushing; more and more of his strokes cut into the creature, its limbs, mouths, eyes and ears; it flailed back furiously but it looked as if my weakening ray had affected it quite badly. As I was getting ready to cast another spell at it, I was distracted by a gasp from Felix who was looking at the other sphere; with horror, I saw that Longhelim had nearly collapsed with three arrows in his chest; it was very difficult for us to tell as we were seeing these figures as only shadows but the only person visible with a bow was Drudge, who was now just looking into the distance.

I had a dreadful realization:

“It’s that spell of many colours! One of the things it does is send people mad!”

Felix began to concentrate immediately; from the corner of my eye, I saw Victor still pressing his opponent. Then Felix finished and I saw Longhelim touching Drudge; the latter seemed jerk at the touch and then began to fire into the distance at some unseen opponent.

Then John shouted at me:

“Longhelim says their opponent is a ghaele and its invisible!”

A ghaele? A good outsider? Fighting with a paladin? Surely Longhelim must have made himself known to her? Maybe she was mad as well? Well, whatever the situation, that was speculation for another time; the other two were in great trouble. I knew exactly what John was getting at and began to concentrate. A moment later, I was able to grant my spell to Drudge; he could now see invisible beings in the same way I could.

Just as I finished doing this, I saw that Victor had finished his opponent. However, we were still watching the drama in the next sphere; a wall of flashing blades had materialized on top of our friends; incredibly, they both managed to jump out of the way on top of their sphere. Drudge was still firing at something out of our sight; more importantly the water was still rising to I concentrated again and gave Longhelim the power of flight.

Victor returned with the silver sword; we presumed that if we fitted into the gate by the portal, then it would take us to the Trial of the Self but we needed to wait for Longhelim and Drudge. It looked as if they had a far tougher opponent; especially if Longhelim found it difficult to fight good outsiders.

We could only watch the shadows flitting in the other sphere. It was difficult to tell what was going on except that the water was rising all the time. Moments later, another large shadow appeared, quickly followed by another; it was difficult to tell what they were but they both surged against Longhelim and Drudge; oddly, the latter did not budge or flinch.

John then called out:

“I’m in touch with Longhelim; he says that the water is rising and there is little they can do. They cannot fight the ghaele; Drudge has tried to fire at her and his arrows are not doing anything; as a paladin, Longhelim will not take any hostile actions against her. The ghaele has erected a magical invisible wall so Drudge cannot see through it anyway. She’s also summoning monsters but they cannot get through the protection Felix put on him; she’s even put a barrier of whirling blades behind them; he’s telling us to go. There is nothing we can do.”

I was very reluctant:

“I think we have to stay to the end. I don’t want to abandon them!”

John turned on me and was quite curt:

“I don’t want to watch them die; let’s at least respect Longhelim’s wishes. We have to go.”

I took that as his emotions talking to a great extent.

John continued:

“There is even a possibility that if we go, then they will also open a portal in their sphere.”

I thought that was deeply unlikely but didn’t say anything. There was no point. It would either work or it wouldn’t.

So, Victor took off with the silver sword which we had obtained; he placed it in the gap next to the mirror and the latter turned into a shimmering portal as the previous ones had done. Victor then flew back and ferried everyone else next to it. As he was doing this, I was still watching the neighbouring sphere anxiously but there was little change. Drudge and Longhelim seemed to be in one place and not doing a great deal. Nothing was happening to them either. The one factor that was changing was the level of the water.

As we were next to the portal, we continued to observe the neighbouring sphere but there was still no change. So, we looked at each other and John finally nodded. Wordlessly, we stepped through, first Victor, followed by Felix, then I with John last.

We appeared in a large empty room made of stone; as we were still recovering from our portal travel, suddenly, Longhelim and Drudge appeared, alive and well albeit wet.

We surrounded them immediately:

“What happened?” John almost shouted. “You’re alive!”

Longhelim told the story:

“Well the water rose above our heads and we had to hold our breaths. We tried chasing the ghaele around but that was pretty useless since she swam like a fish; then poor Drudge began to falter. He began to struggle for breath and it was at that point that I saw that he was in real trouble as he began to choke. Then he stopped struggling and just became still. He died. As soon as that happened, that sphere dissolved and …….

“What sphere?” interrupted Felix.

“Oh, in our trial, we had big sphere with a tree in it. There was a globule of amber on the tree; that was the key to the portal. We couldn’t get in first but as soon as Drudge died it dissolved and I was able to get the amber and stick in the aperture next to the mirror which then became a portal. I took Drudge’s body and here we are.”

I was musing:

“So, this was the Trial of Offering? Did that mean that you had to offer you life? Then how come we had to kill the monster that we encountered? Hmm, two sides of the same coin maybe? Balance? One side has to take a life that is being offered and the other side has to offer a life to be taken? So, a Soul always has to be in Balance to attain transcendence?”

Longhelim interrupted me:

“Anyway, what happened to you? What was your Trial?”

I replied:

“Ours was far more orthodox; we appeared in a place full of fissures and fire. We also had an orb but this one had a silver sword; there was also a big misshapen ugly monster that tried to kill us so Victor took care of it; as soon as he did our sphere dissolved and released the sword. After that we watched you and tried to help as much as possible. After that, we took your advice and left.

I was just thinking about the significance of the two chambers and their opposition yet symmetry…..”

As I was talking to Longhelim, I suddenly realised that somehow a window had been opened in my mind and a path of magic which I had never encountered before revealed itself to me; it was divine magic! A powerful death spell; with one touch, I could kill! It wasn’t very nice magic but it could be very powerful. I examined the peculiar structure of this spell, fascinated…..

“Faden, Faden!”

Longhelim tapped me on the chest.

“I lost you there for a moment. Where did you go?”

I explained to Longhelim about my new magical acquisition and he smiled:

“Strange you should mention that. I also seemed to have acquired a spell; but mine is the opposite. It is the most powerful of healing spells.”

Victor interrupted at this point:

“My head hurts just thinking about it but somehow I have acquired the knowledge to cast the same spell which Faden described; and I have no knowledge of spell casting. How is that possible?”

Drudge ventured next:

“I’ve got the same magic as Longhelim; and my spells are of a completely different nature.”

John then added:

“I’ve got the death magic.”

To be followed by Felix:

“And I have it as well; it is something I can request from Farlanghn but I rarely do.”

Again, I began thinking aloud:

“So, symmetry and opposition; balance; water and fire, life and death, good and evil, take a life, give a life and finally healing and death; it all makes a peculiar sense…….”

 

[Cafu]

Just then, I stopped because suddenly I was gripped by a vision, much like seeing Longhelim the boy, except that this time, I could see the entrance to the Temple; eight figures were approaching and with a shock I realised that I recognized two of them; one was Shalosha and the other was Katrina! What was she doing here?

The other six figures were very exotic and a most peculiar mixture: there were two obvious inquisitors, one a lady with an extraordinarily fine alabaster mask and snow white armour and the other a powerful figure with hunched shoulders, again masked, wielding a spear and a scimitar; he was accompanied by a huge, white bear, no doubt a very handy pet of some sort. There were also two elves, one an obvious magician and the other was one of the elven bodyguards with a great sword; the latter was walking next to Shalosha. Finally there was a half orc wearing red armour.

I realised that I could hear what they were saying. It was the woman in the alabaster mask who was doing the talking:

“……have to stop fighting each other and stop the agents of Seaquen. At least we Ragesians aren’t traitors. We have always stuck to our cause; unlike some……”

She looked at Katrina at this point.

Then she looked at the door and continued:

“Follow me! I will guide us through the illusions of this place!”

Then the vision stopped. I looked at the others in shock! It was not so much that the Ragesians and Shahalesti made common cause again; that was nothing new. It was more Katrina’s presence amongst this group. I found that difficult to believe! If she was a traitor, the repercussions of her treachery would be immense; not only in Seaquen but also in Gate Pass. She was Rantle’s sister, or so he said. What did that say about him?

Then Longhelim murmured:

“Let us all remember; the old monk told us that Forty One would try to corrupt our past with the visions in the Temple so who knows what we just saw. Let’s be ready for anything!”

As I was trying to assimilate just what was true and what was illusion, another vision assailed us; this time we were at the great lake in the marsh near Seaquen; we were dealing with Your Highness, the mother dragon whose child had been stolen by an individual who wanted to sell it for a very large amount of money indeed; he only succeeded in enraging the dragon so she assaulted refugees crossing Salt Lake Marsh into Seaquen; her message was simple: bring me back my child and the thief and I will stop.

We captured the thief and the egg, returning the first and delivering the second as instructed; the visions dealt with the thief’s punishment. The dragon was not merciful; then again, I suspect that if I related this story to any mother in the land, the thief would get very little sympathy. I must confess I had little sympathy for him myself.

Moments later, the vision changes again; this time, we are in a large, luxurious ball room. It is night. Magical light illuminates the whole space, an enormous glass window looks out over a lake, the gardens outside are exquisitely tended. Inside the ball room, beautiful ladies in gowns of shimmering silk mingle with tall, military gentlemen of many races; jewels glisten on the throats and heads of the ladies while the gentlemen wear decorations, titles and uniforms. Luxury, wealth and power are visible everywhere. This is a gathering of the elite.

A large crowd is assembled by the window and one figure dominates the scene; there is a tangible aura of power and charisma around this individual; it is a scarred half orc; I recognized him immediately; an older version of his face is in Longhelim’s magical container right now.

Discreet laughter can be heard from the crowd:

“…….and this how I managed to get these scars on my forehead; not very dignified I am afraid, but true nonetheless,” Coaltongue just finishes a humorous story.

Amongst the crowd, we could all see Shalosha, next to another elf, older but with a distinct family resemblance, making me think that this must be Shalaadel. Suddenly, another figure in a beautiful red ball dress glides gracefully into the hall; we recognize Katrina, but younger; Coaltongue speaks to her directly, indicating more than a casual acquaintance:

“Has your mistress sent you to ruin the celebration? Have Leska tell Guthwulf he can take longer if he likes. I know he enjoys it so much.”

Katrina shakes her head:

“No, Your Imperial Highness; I am here for Lord Shaaladel. He has missed an appointment.”

The elven Lord seemed to start at this statement but Coaltongue added:

“Are you two squabbling again? You’d better go Shaaladel; it would be better if Leska didn’t come here; she would be such a fish out of water in this gathering.”

Coaltongue turns and looks at us, his eyes suddenly piercing and his face stony, almost as if he could discern our presence but instead something even odder happens; an apparition walks through us; a tall, powerful figure wearing red robes and the most elaborate bear mask we have seen so far; tribal charms mark her long braids, the only indication that it is a woman. The music stops.

The inhuman mask turns to Shaaladel and a voice emanates from its depths:

“Attend to your advisor Shaaladel.”

The elf turns and hurries out, plainly obeying her command.

She then turns to Coaltongue and continues:

“Music please, my emperor. Do not deny yourself your……fun. The summer is so precious, these long years.”

After that, she turns and strides towards the door. Coaltongue stares at her for a few moments and then looks at the musicians who begin to play again.

Just as she reaches the door of the ballroom, it bursts open and the group we had seen outside rush in, led by the knight in red armour, charging through the figures. We were taken completely by surprise when they looked at us, began drinking potions and casting spells. Katrina flew up into the air and began to cast; I recognized the spell; it was one of Gabal’s secret spells, known only to students of his school and gifted ones at that. A ball of flame enveloped us and there were other magical ingredients involved, which stripped fire defensive magic. I was slightly burned from her assault but Victor looked far more hurt.

Obviously, this was no vision!

It was the half orc in red armour who drank the potion while the Inquisitor in white armour stood back, surveying the scene. Shalosha, together with her elven bodyguard just retired to a corner and watched developments; the elven mage now had a skeleton with him; he raised his hand and shot a black beam at Victor; I recognized it immediately; it was a weakening beam; I shouted this to the others although they almost certainly recognized it. Finally, the other inquisitor, the burly one with his white bear rushed forward, with the bear taking a swipe at Longhelim.

After this onslaught, we were able to react; the warriors closed with the bear and the Inquisitor; I managed to cast my spell of speed on the others. John cast a spell on Drudge without any visible effect and he cursed, shouting:

“They’ve countered invisibility magic!”

After that, Drudge ran his way past the bear and inquisitor in the usual manner and shot the Inquisitor in white armour as he did so. Several arrows sprouted in her side and the inhuman mask turned in the ranger’s direction; the others looked almost shocked that he dared to shoot her!

Suddenly a wall of flame appeared in front of us and on top of Longhelim and Victor. The heat was turned towards us and I winced, thinking how badly Victor must be burning; Felix, John and I, hidden behind the wall, were still protected by our magic and this wall did have an unintended benefit as Felix was hidden behind this wall, thus making it impossible for the masked Inquisitor to counter Felix’s powerful healing spell, which he delivered to Victor immediately. That was a relief as the warrior had been staggering after the onslaught of all the magic which had been targeted at him. The enemy seemed to be thoroughly informed about our capabilities, no doubt courtesy of Katrina. With horror, I realised she must have had access to all of my journals in Seaquen…….

Then I smiled inwardly as I wondered just how badly the Inquisitor must have been cursing Katrina for putting that wall of flame there; maybe they were not quite as co-ordinated as I thought; then I realised that it was time to put my spell dueling to the test; I had been practicing assiduously every chance I had but on my own. There was a huge difference between practice and reality; I was about to find out just how different. I stepped through the fire wall to see what was new.

The first thing I saw was that the vision had changed; no longer were we in a ball room but rather in a huge, primeval forest; the Living Forest of Innenotdar and before I began to concentrate, I saw two figures involved in a running conflict; an elven maiden wielding a wooden sword and a huge stag; Anyariel was the name of the maiden; she was a legend in the Forest; the stag was the trillith, Indomitability; I caught a glimpse of a lake and the Selah, the fey race native to that land, who were singing; then the trees burst into flames; I assumed it must have become hotter although I couldn’t tell.

The vision finished but I had the greatest shock; Drudge had disappeared but there was a pile of ash and equipment where I had seen him last!

I had a truly dreadful suspicion when I began a series of complicated maneuvers and movements designed to disguise my spell casting from the Inquisitor; I watched them all as I was doing this; the Inquisitor was watching me, completely still, following in dreadful concentration, waiting for the moment I released the spell; the elven mage was grinning at me, looking smug; a moment later, I released the spell, catching them by surprise as she was unable to counter me; a thick acidic cloud descended on that corner of the room, avoiding the Drudge’s remains but settling on Katrina, the Inquisitor and the mage and his skeleton. The redhead screamed a curse and suddenly appeared next to the half orc in a flash of flame; the Inquisitor calmly walked through the cloud without difficulty; of the elven mage and his skeleton, there was no sign.

Glancing down, I saw Victor and Longhelim had converged on the Inquisitor and his bear; there was a defensive spell visible on the Inquisitor; it was the same one I routinely cast on the warriors but it would do him little good against Victor and his adamantine falchion; it was the one material that could by pass that spell; almost casually, belying oh so many hours of practice and growing expertise, Victor sliced his sword several times across the torso of his enemy; it was done so fast that I barely realised that it happened but the Inquisitor was staggered and almost fell off the bear, covered in blood, with most of his armour hanging off him in shreds; Longhelim then stepped forward and systematically hamstrung and slaughtered the bear, which roared threateningly but ultimately in vain; the Inquisitor had to jump off as his steed collapsed under him.

The half orc in red armour ran forward at this point; Shalosha and her bodyguard still did nothing and there was no sign the elven mage and his skeleton so I assumed that they were still in the cloud while the other Inquisitor still looked at me with dreadful concentration.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw that the vision showed Anaryel pinning the stag to the ground at the bottom of the lake while the Selah still sang but then the vision changed. This time, I saw a group of elves fighting another bunch of elves; Shahalesti against Taranesti by the looks of them; one of the leaders of the former looked just like Shalosha’s bodyguard and he was accompanied by another female elf who suddenly raised her hand and a spray burst out of her hand, sending a wave of Taranesti warriors into oblivion; somehow, in this crazy place, they appeared in front of us and charged! They seemed to be real, especially as several of them cut me with their swords.

Longhelim had confronted the half orc knight while Victor took one blow to finish off the Inquisitor; I dodged the blows aimed at me by the elves as I engaged in a deadly magical dance with the surviving Inquisitor; yet again, I managed to fool her and loosed off a spell; a bolt of lightning struck Katerina and she cursed loudly again, obviously struck; another bolt hit the Inquisitor but she just shrugged it off; I wasn’t surprised; she was the secondary target as I had expected her to have defences in place. Victor would be the best person to deal with her. Surprised, I saw that Katerina had several images dancing around her true form; I prepared to do something about that.

Victor had carved his way through the elven warriors until he was next to the half orc and then proceeded to trade blows with him as well. The latter was a skilled warrior and it was fortunate that both Felix and John were nearby to heal Victor; Felix also managed to release a column of fire on the top of the elves which obliterated most of them. I tried to cast a little spell against Katrina but this time the Inquisitor did counter me and my spell was ineffective; however, this did allow Victor to almost carve the half orc into several pieces; thankfully, Longhelim then took up that work were Victor left off and the paladin felled the enemy quickly; he then made sure that the half orc stayed down as we had been noticing that for some reason the latter had mysteriously been getting better throughout the combat.

I also noticed that Shalosha moved for the first time; she left the corner and moved towards the spot where Drudge was now a pile of ash and scooped up a handful.

I tried another spell but was countered again; she was obviously getting used to my patterns; I had to change my forms somehow. The cloud still remained and there was still no sign of the elven mage and his skeleton.

Suddenly the vision changed again and this time we could see the Ragesians assaulting a Shahalesti city; the Inquisitor with his bear called a column of fire on a tower full of Shahalesti and yet again, from thin air, a squad of Ragesian orcs landed among our ranks, swinging their axes.

As we all whirled around and tried to avoid all those axes hitting us, another burst of flame struck the whole group indiscriminately, originating from Katrina; Victor and Longhelim shared a look; I had lost my defence against fire now and realised that if the sorceress was going to continue doing that, it was going to get very painful. The orcs were looking burned but they were still happily slashing at anything that moved, including me.

“Felix, a little bit of help here,” I shouted as I dodged yet another axe.

“Coming, coming,” was the answer from the priest.

Then Victor took off the ground and flew towards Katrina; he was making himself an enormous target for a powerful spell caster but at the same time, maybe he could distract her despite the many images that were flying about her form. Most of the orcs swung at him while he flew away and amazingly, they must have been badly burned as each one fell over as he swung; one moment I had about three or four intimidating soldiers threatening me with huge axes and the next moment they were all on the floor, having tried to hit Victor.

One of them did clip the warrior as he flew by, making him spin towards the sorceress; Victor had to right himself but even then, he managed to swing at her, albeit off balance; unfortunately, he missed but he did force a rather undignified scramble from Katrina as she avoided the blow. As all the orcs had fallen, Longhelim flew to join Victor. Now seeing two warriors facing her, the sorceress stepped back and a ring of fire sprang up around her, forming defensive shield; both warriors had seen this spell before and knew exactly what to expect. They were going to burn.

Suddenly, more visions appeared: as before, there were two of them, one on each side of the room. The first shows a woman in monk’s robes gliding down from the sky and landing next to the Inquisitor with his bear; she nods at him and says something, which could not be heard. The other side of the room shows a far more intimate and longer scene: a darkened room contains two women; of them is recognizable as the Inquisitor in the alabaster mask facing us right now; she is next to a sitting figure, braiding her hair; the seated figure’s face is turned away from us; despite the noise in the room, this time we can all hear the seated figure speak softly:

“Etienne, please raise my spirits tonight; I am weary.”

We realise that the seated figure must be Leska herself.

The standing Inquisitor replies:

“Mistress, Kreven reports that he has found six hundred more souls to torture; so, the Scourge will be ready in a month; we will not need the Torch.”

Leska sighs:

“Yet, she who trusts the sun can still be burned.”

After that the vision fades; I didn’t have any time to think about what we had seen but I pledged to remember it for later. Then my attention was seized by the appearance of the elven mage and the skeleton next to him; they emerged from the acidic cloud seemingly none the worse for wear and immediately the wizard hit Longhelim with a weakening ray. Despite this, Longhelim moved forward, confronting the elf and struck him several times; Etienne moved up and touched the elf, whose wounds closed completely. I tried to take a hand and began to cast a spell; unfortunately, the Inquisitor was watching for that and this time not only was she able to counter my spell, she was also able to steal it from me and put it on top of my head; and poor Felix’s as well, since he was next to me. It was the same spell that Katrina used against us: a wall of flame, a particularly strong one.

Well, it taught me that despite my attempts to learn spell dueling, I still had a very long way to go before I could hope to go toe to toe with Inquisitors. Unfortunately, this was also a very painful lesson for me and the priest.

 

[RangerWickett]

Caster fight! Good times.

Care to summarize your interactions with Katrina up to this point. Any inkling she was up to something nefarious?