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

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Lazybones" data-source="post: 130280" data-attributes="member: 143">Hey readers--Was going to do an April Fools Post, but since I just killed a MAJOR CHARACTER (well, semi-major) I decided to restrain myself.  D'oh!  Besides, our mods are yukking it up enough for all of us, I think!  Anyway, here's post 32, and I'll have 33 (the FINAL post of Book III) up in a few days.LB* * * * * Book III, Part 32The companions gathered in grim silence around the body of their fallen companion.  Dana and Delem had been restored by healing magic, but none of them felt fully whole in the face of the death that had once again taken one of them.  Two, really, as Varrus’s body had been claimed by the mud, but none of them had truly felt a sense of connection to the abrasive and selfish sailor.  Ruath had also been standoffish, even curt, but somehow her taciturn nature had not been able to keep her from truly becoming one of them.  Cal seemed particularly hard hit, as he had made repeated efforts to break through the halfling woman’s tough shell and find out what sort of person she was inside.  They could all remember times when her spells had dragged one of them back from the brink of death, and how, despite her cynicism, she was always at the forefront of any confrontation, not shying from foes many times her size.  They thought of the summoned badgers she’d often call to their aid, and the jokes Benzan had made about those otherworldly but very welcome allies.   And now, she was gone.  Rather than remain exposed on the flat shelf of stone out in the middle of the cavern, they’d hastily healed Dana and Delem using Dana’s wand, and then retreated to one of the terraced ledges that Benzan identified along the far wall of the place.  There were three such terraces that they could see, one to the west, one to the north, and one to the south.  They’d gone west, in part because Benzan thought he could see a dark opening in the cavern wall at the back of the topmost ledge.  They’d brought Ruath’s body with them and made their way up to that opening.  They were alert for any more signs of additional kopru, but apparently there had only been the pair dwelling in the place, for there were no other attacks or attempts at mental domination.  They reached the western terrace safely, and found a natural passage that twisted back into the stone.  They traveled only far enough in to find a sheltered alcove just off the main passage, and set up camp there.  They had spent a wary and uneasy time resting there, recovering their magic and resting from the ordeal that they had just been through.  And now, as they gathered again over the body of their fallen companion, they faced more questions—and more choices.“Well, it seems that we have at least one answer to the many questions we had about Ruath,” Cal said grimly to his friends.  The light of their lamp—a crude device fashioned from a metal cup and some of the oil left in Lok’s bag of holding—cast a flickering pall of his features and those of his companions.  They had studied additional light spells, but wanted to save those for when they inevitably had to set out once again.  Cal held out a fist, which opened to reveal a small silver pin.  Even in the bad light the ensign that the pin was shaped into was obvious and instantly recognizable to the companions.  A silver harp was set inside a slivered moon, with four stars forming a diamond around it.  “Ruath was a Harper?” Delem said with amazement.  As they thought back to what they knew of the woman, though, it seemed to make sense in retrospect.  “Apparently so,” Cal said.  “She told me, once, a little bit about her mission.  She was sent to meet with some powerful individuals that she didn’t name, down in Chult.  Whatever the purpose of that meeting, she felt it was very important.  “Important enough to die for?” Benzan asked.“Apparently so,” Cal said.  “In any case, we can’t judge her, or her motives, since we know little of them.”“What should we do… I mean, with her body?” Lok asked. “I suggest we bring her back with us,” Cal said.  “Perhaps, if we can return to Faerûn in time…  Dana has prayed for a spell that will preserve her, at least for a few days.”  He didn’t have to explain further; they had used a similar spell to preserve Cal’s body when he’d been killed by the cleric of Cyric in Elturel.  Elly sat a short distance away from them, her head bowed.  She had been disconsolate ever since the end of the battle, when a healing spell from the wand had restored her to consciousness.  In their retreat and during their rest she’d hardly spoken, and now seemed consumed by a deep depression that hung over her like a cloud.“Elly,” Benzan said.  The young woman didn’t stir. “Elly,” Benzan repeated, more forcefully.  She looked up, and saw that all of them—all of her companions—had gathered, behind the tiefling.  “I don’t want to talk about it,” she said.  “Well, we need to talk about it,” he said.  “It’s not your fault she died, Elly.  You were controlled by those things—just like Lok, and Varrus.”  His face darkened slightly at the memory, and although his friends had not laid any blame for his actions on him, Benzan had discovered during their rest that what had happened between him and Varrus could not be put aside so easily.  In particular, two pain-filled eyes and a single desperate plea hovered at the edges of his mind, and he suspected they would not fade soon.  “But…” she started to say.“No, Elly,” Benzan interrupted her.  “We all cared about Ruath—for all she tried to keep us at arm’s length, she was a friend and an important member of our company.  But she’s dead, and the rest of us are still living.  If we’re going to get out of here, we need to bind closer together, fight together to get free of this damned place.”She met his eyes, and then lowered her head.  She nodded, and the tears flowed freely down her cheeks as Benzan wrapped her up in a supportive embrace.  * * * * * They remained a little longer in the alcove, before setting out again.  Benzan wanted to go back briefly to the cavern, to scout out the terraces that they had bypassed.  They were reluctant to return to that place, but Benzan seemed strangely insistent.  For a moment they even feared that he was being influenced again by other kopru, but a test by Dana revealed no evil presences about him.  Even Benzan couldn’t give a clear reason why he wanted to return, but he said that he had a “feeling” that there was something important that they were missing.  If any of the others noticed that his hand clutched on the hilt of his sword when he said it, none of them said anything.  They returned to the site of their confrontation with the kopru.  The cavern seemed unchanged from before, with the same roiling mud and geysering water amidst the stone pathways and massive pillars.  They passed the spot where the kopru had slain.  Benzan cast a single wistful glance where the second creature had died.  His magical scimitar was gone, lost somewhere under the mass of boiling mud.  They first examined the southern terrace, but found only a pool of boiling water with edges encrusted with calcium deposits.  As they made their way up to the northern terrace, however, Benzan suddenly took on a focused look.  “There’s something up there,” he said quietly.  “What?  An enemy?” Cal asked.  “No, not a foe,” the tiefling replied.  “Something metal.”The gnome looked at him cryptically, but didn’t challenge him.  They pressed on up the tiered ledges, until they reached the top level high up along the wall of the cavern.  The view was quite impressive, but they’d already lost whatever sense of wonder had initially accompanied their arrival into this place.  The ledge was dominated by a large rock formation that vaguely resembled a throne, situated directly under a long dangling stalactite that thrust down like a dagger from the ceiling high above.  As they drew closer, however, they saw that the stone object was a throne, a massive stone chair hewn out of solid blocks of granite.  And sitting in the throne…“It’s a skeleton!” Dana exclaimed in surprise.  The others approached cautiously, and saw that Dana’s observation was accurate.  Seated in the throne, facing out into the cavern behind them, was the heavily encrusted form of what had once been a man.  At least the collection of bones looked human, although whatever details might be gleaned from the skeleton were masked by untold ages of accumulated minerals that had dripped down from the stalactite above.  “I wonder who he was,” Cal said to no one in particular, his eyes seeing the lost tales of ancient glories that might reside in the ancient figure left here to face the silent passage of the ages.  “What are you doing, Benzan?” he asked, as the tiefling moved to the front of the throne.  “There’s something here,” he said.  “I can sense it.”The others gathered closer—keeping one wary eye on the skeleton as they did so—and saw what the tiefling had identified, a long straight object that was propped up against the front of the throne and was completely hidden in a thick white layer of calcium deposits.  “Careful, there might be a trap,” Cal cautioned, but by the time his statement was completed, Benzan had already grabbed the object and tugged it free from the clinging deterius that coated the throne and the area around it.  Cal shrugged and threw up his hands—Benzan was Benzan.  At least nothing seemed to happen when he finally was able to wrench his prize free.  He held it up and examined it, then struck it against one stone arm of the throne.  The blow resulted in a solid metallic clang, and as a large chunk of encrusted minerals came away they could all see that the item was another bronze sword, similar to the pair they already carried with them, marked with arcane runes down its length and carrying with it a sense of great age and latent power.  “How did you know it was there?” Delem asked him.“I could sense it there, somehow,” Benzan said.  “I think…” he paused, and glanced down at the blade at his hip.  “I think the sword detected it, somehow.”“Interesting,” Cal said.  “Your weapon has a few surprises left in it, it would seem.”  “Maybe the weapons are linked, somehow,” Dana suggested.  “Well, we didn’t sense anything about the one that the chief of the tribesmen was using,” Delem said.  Lok carried that weapon now, secure in his bag of holding.  “Clearly there’s more to these swords that is evident at first glance.  Perhaps we should be cautious with them, until we can identify them more thoroughly.”The others nodded, but Benzan, who continued to examine the new sword, acted as though he hadn’t heard the comment.  Finally, as the others watched him, he let the sword drop to his side.  “All right,” he said, “We’ll take it with us, then, and check it out later.”  Cal, meanwhile, had cast a minor cantrip, and he continued to regard the sword with a look of concentration on his face.  “It is magical,” he said, “though that’s hardly surprising I suppose, given that it’s so well preserved.”  He gestured for Benzan to lift the weapon again, and the tiefling did so, holding it out before him.  “Strange,” Cal finally added.  “I can sense the typical aura of a magical weapon, but there’s something else as well… a potent abjuration.”“Abjuration?” Elly asked.“A school of magic that deals with various forms of protection,” Delem told her.  Although his own use of magic was less scholarly than Cal’s—or even Benzan’s—he’d been learning, and his own spellcraft was rapidly advancing with each step of his own power in arcane magic.  “What sort of protection magic does the sword carry?” Lok asked.  “I don’t know,” Cal said.  “As Delem said, we’ll have to wait until we can identify it more thoroughly.  Until then, however, it might be better to keep it stored, rather than risk using it.”  He nodded to Benzan, and the tiefling handed the sword over to Lok so that he could wrap it up for secure storage in the bag of holding.  While they were doing that, however, Cal’s attention had turned back to the skeleton, which had not reacted in any way to their retrieval of the sword.  Delem, however, noted the gnome’s interest.  “What is it?” he asked.“I can sense another magical aura here,” he said.  “It’s…” he paused, and closed his eyes briefly in concentration, “right there,” he finally said, pointing to one arm of the throne where one of the skeleton’s hands rested under a layer of white deposits.  “Well, let’s just see what it I then,” Benzan said.  He reached up and started working at the spot with his dagger.“So much for not being grave robbers,” Dana said dryly as the skeleton’s hand snapped free of its body.  “It’s a ring,” Benzan said, working it free of the skeleton’s hand and holding it up for them to see.  It was a simple band of unmarked bronze, but they already knew it to be natural.  “What kind of magic does it possess, Cal?” Delem asked.  “Transmutation, I think,” the gnome reported after a few moments.  “It could be many things—some of which could be quite dangerous.  Perhaps we should store it safely away as well, until we get a chance to examine it more fully.”“Here, Delem, I’ve already got a magic ring,” Benzan said, tossing it lightly to the surprised sorcerer.  Delem barely managed to catch it before it fell to the slick ground, and he held it cupped in his hands as if it might try to bite him.“Just keep it safe until we have a chance to test its power,” Cal said.  After a quick follow-up search of the area around the throne, which turned up nothing more of note, the companions retraced their steps and headed back down the corridor to the west, the light of one of Cal’s spells guiding their steps.</blockquote>

Verification