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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Jon Potter" data-source="post: 2640353" data-attributes="member: 2323">[PLAIN][Realms #323] The Horror[/PLAIN]"Lela, keep your distance a bit, little sprite, but you might be better at reassuring this little lady that we mean her no harm," Feln muttered to the faen and she left her perch and fluttered to the ground near the broken woman. Her iridescent wings folded neatly behind her and she crept forward slowly."Have no fear, Shamalin, daughter of Flor," the sprite said gently. "You have been very brave and we have been searching for you."Shamalin - if in fact this was she - peered out from behind her raised hands and then tried weakly to draw away from Lela, crying out in pain as she did so. Up close, now, Lela could see that the injuries that marred the woman's flesh were neither haphazard nor savage. Whoever had done these things to her had done so slowly and methodically."You are safe now, Shamalin," Lela soothed as she came closer slowly, her tiny hands empty and open. "We have come to rescue you from this evil place and carry you back to your temple." She drew close enough to reach out and gently stroke the woman's shaved and battered head. The woman shrank away from the touch, but did not cry out. Her eyes - as bright and round as polished copper commons - flicked from faen to half-ogre and back again."This is my friend, Feln," Lela said, indicating the martial artist. "I know he looks scary, but I promise you he is a teddy bear!""You're safe now, Shamalin," Feln said with a rueful nod of his head. "We will protect you." Lela nodded in agreement but Shamalin just stared at the half-ogre."He is my protector and now he is yours as well. While you are with us, we will do everything in our power to be sure no further harm comes to you," Lela said hopefully. "Do you know if there will be any enemies coming in here soon?" The woman pulled her gaze away from the half-ogre and looked earnestly at Lela."He will come," she said flatly. The words lacked even a hint of emotion but they sent a chill of dread up Lela's spine none the less."Who will come?" the faerie squeaked and Shamalin's eyes shifted suddenly to the doorway. She screamed.It was just Huzair, however, and he looked quite shocked by the greeting. "What?" he protested. He looked at Feln crossly and whispered, "You said you'd found her. You didn't say she was nuts.""Look at her, wizard! Who knows what she has endured?" the half-ogre growled disapprovingly. "Where are Morier and Karak?""Morier's still healing up and Karak won't leave Ledare's body," the mage said easing his way toward the woman while he fumbled in his bag. "By Kael's Loom! They certainly treated this one poorly. Are you Shamalin?" The battered woman just looked at Huzair's dark countenance and said nothing. "Do you speak Common?"Lela clucked her tongue. "She was talking before you showed up," she scolded. "You're scaring her.""Well I'm not trying to!" Huzair griped and produced a blanket from his Handy Haversack. He offered it to Shamalin and she looked at it as if he were offering her a dwarven beard-grooming kit. Confused disinterest showed in her eyes. The wizard shrugged and tossed it on the floor beside her before backing away."This is who we came to save?" he asked, shaking his head and touching the pale gray scar that ran across his scalp where the bird-thing had wounded him in the village below. Lela sighed and grabbed the edge of the blanket, struggling to get it up and around Shamalin's shoulders."Huzair, for all of your great intellect, you have much to learn," the faen said. "Every move we make, we have a chance to spread good or evil into the world. Be it offering a small kindness to a new friend or looting the dead. It is not always in a great battle that we can tip the balance of good in our favor. And when we respond to evil in kind, be it for revenge or 'justice', I fear we hurt our cause in the long run by putting evil into the world.""Not this again!" the wizard scoffed, shaking his head wearily. "I gave her something to cover herself with, didn't I? That's more than either you or the ogre did!" Lela nodded."The blanket shows that you understand the choices life offers but perhaps not the impact our decisions make in return," the faen told him. "Please consider your actions carefully. I do not believe you help our cause when you act out of revenge and anger.""Fine! I will try to be a good boy! Now can we move on?" Huzair asked. "Have you two gotten any useful information from her? Like how many enemies are here?" He looked expectantly at Shamalin and she held his gaze for a moment before shaking her head."I- I don't know," she mumbled vacantly. "Two dozen... perhaps less."Huzair did some quick calculations and seemed pleased with the result. "We took out that many already, counting the fight in Miller's Pond," he told Feln and Lela. "There can't be much resistance left. Not that I thought there would be with Blackheart and the Plaguebringer both dead." Shamalin continued to shake her head."The Death Knight..." she began and her words failed. "Evil such as that does not die," she said at last."Maybe not. But he laid down and stopped moving at least," Huzair told her. "That's good enough for me.""He's dead," Lela reassured her. "I saw the body myself." Shamalin looked from Lela to Feln to Huzair as if trying to sense whether they were lying to her. Seeing no guile on their faces, she let out a sigh and seemed to relax for the first time in a very long while."I would see it," she said, trying unsuccessfully to rise."Yes. We should get out of here as soon as possible. I have a really bad feeling about this place," Feln agreed. "I have been trained in some dark ways but this is beyond what my mind can comprehend. I have no stomach for this kind of thing.""Our reason for being in this hellish place is now complete and we must leave with all haste," Lela added. "Feln, break these chains for this lady so we can get her out of here." Feln started forward, but Huzair forestalled him, producing a slim velvet case from its hiding place within one of his bracers."I can do that," he said as he opened the case, revealing some lockpicks with mother-of-pearl handles. "Some old skills come in handy," he muttered as he went to work on the leg irons.Shamalin just stared at Blackheart's blackened remains, clutching Huzair's blanket tightly around her shoulders. Her face never wavered and her eyes scarcely blinked as she regarded the Death Knight, transfixed by its skeletal gaze while debate raged around her."I agree with Morier. I don't want to be stung by any more bees this day! Let us go to the temple of Flor with all haste, heal up and move on to destroy the hive!""There are still those double doors we haven't opened.""We could interrogate our sleeping prisoner. I'm sure I could make him cooperate.""We now stand in a position to sweep this castle an' rid it of chaos for once an' all. Aye, it may be dangerous, but here we be!"It was only after Morier brought his greatsword down onto Blackheart's head, smashing the burned skull to powder that Shamalin snapped back to reality. She looked at the albino and her lip quivered."We are glad that you live, priestess, but we have lost much to free you," Morier said, gesturing to Ledare's body and the burned husk that had been Hildegunna. "Two of our number gave their lives in defeating Blackheart. Can you offer us any healing so that we can find the strength to quit this place?" Shamalin shook her head mutely and stared at the Janissary's corpse.The symbol of Flor that held Ledare's cloak closed seemed to mock her."How many others are here?" Huzair asked and Shamalin twitched as if she'd been stung by his words. Her hand drifted up to a surgically-precise incision that went from the corner of her jaw up past her ear and half-way up the curve of her forehead. Then she turned quickly, her eyes going back to direction from which they'd brought her. Her eyes welled up with pain and grief and she whispered, "There were five others." Then the tears over-brimmed her eyes and silently flowed down her cheeks. "He- he took their faces... Why would he do that?"Each member of the VQS remembered the unwholesome construct they had faced before arriving at the manor and each thought they knew to what use The Speckled Band's faces had gone. Not even Huzair had the heart to tell Shamalin that awful truth just yet. Instead he asked, "Have you heard of Melengar?""Yes," she said at once and for the first time there seemed a spark of some emotion other than despair in her voice. "The Plaguebringer, Callethorn, spoke of him. He called him the Reborn Master and the First Priest of Aphyx, wielder of the Rod of Ruin. He told me again and again what Melengar would... would do to me... when they sent me on to Deathshead.""Deathshead again," Morier pondered. "Any idea what that is?"Shamalin shook her head, but her eyes held a panicked frenzy. "No. But that's where Melengar is and he's growing his power.  You've got to go there and stop him."</blockquote>

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