Part the Eighty-Sixth
In which: the party embarks on several projects, with varying degrees of success.
However, Eva has already made another, potentially even more exciting, discovery. Back in the corner of the side-cave farthest from the main entrance is a sloping passage, almost like a set of stairs leading down through the cliff.
“Where does it lead?” Reyu asks.
Eva raises an eyebrow so high it nearly disappears under her hair. “A tunnel. In what used to be an ogre’s lair, in the dark, by myself. I don’t think so.”
Reyu looks over at Benedic.
He picks up a torch and lights it. “After you.”
They find that the passage eventually flattens and turns, leading—they believe—under the mound with the standing stones and altar in front of the caves. They also find that as the tunnel descends, the walls, ceiling and floor are all covered with a thicker and thicker layer of noxious mold. The entire place smells of rot, and decay, with a noxious metallic, or almost sulphurous undertaste that lingers at the back of the throat.
Reyu and Benedic press on until they discover that the passage eventually opens out into an immense, domed cavern. Reyu estimates that it must be at least fifty feet across, and the ceiling rises a good thirty-feet above the floor at its highest point in the center of the cavern. The ceiling itself seems to be a mixture of rock and packed earth, with roots that have grown down from the surface hanging free in the air, or twining along the numerous stalactites. Everything in the cavern is covered in at least three inches of the strange mold… with one exception.
From the apex of the cavern ceiling, a huge stalactite descends. It is covered in the mold… all except for the very tip. It’s hard to tell in the dim light, but Reyu does not think the end of the stalactite is made of the same sort of rock as the rest of the caves. It is as though someone has cut off the end of the stalactite and replaced it with some kind of capstone, made of a black, shiny material that Reyu has never seen before. She is about to cast detect magic, wondering if this is the source of the “weird” aura Lira noticed in the stones above, when Benedic taps her on the shoulder.
“Look there, on the ground.”
Reyu does. Scattered on the floor of the cavern are nine, mold-covered mounds. “Bodies.”
“Nine of ‘em. Wasn’t that the number of hostages the goblins kidnapped?”
Reyu nods. They both still stand at the mouth of the tunnel, just before it opens up into the cavern before them.
“You want to go in?” Benedic asks her.
Reyu shakes her head. “It’s late. We should return tomorrow with the others.”
###
They return to the surface to find the caverns above reeking to new levels and everyone in the raiding party clustered outside the entrance.
“What happened?” Benedic asks Lira, who is off to one side coughing and wiping her eyes.
“Guess what smells worse than a goblin healing potion.”
“I don’t know, what?”
“A goblin healing potion that’s gone-off during brewing.”
###
A short distance away, Thatch is busy with a task of his own, with equally mixed results.
“Okay, boy. Good boy. It’s just me, Bob. Just your old friend, Thatch.”
As Thatch reaches out towards Bob, the horse whinnies and tries to bite him.
Thatch hides his pain behind determination and tries again. “Shhhhhhh,” he whispers, as soothing as he can. “It’s okay, boy. It’s just me, boy. Remember me?”
He reaches out again. This time Bob shies away, but does not try to bite him.
“That’s right. Attaboy,” Thatch says, and gently places his hand on Bob’s mane.
Bob does not react.
“Good boy,” Thatch says, as he slowly approaches his steed. “Good boy…”
Thatch takes a handful of mane. Bob allows him. Smiling, Thatch leaps up onto Bob’s back.
Bob goes insane.
He kicks, he bucks, he rears. Thatch, taken by surprise, loses his grip and falls to the ground. Seeing him down, Bob rears back and brings his hooves down towards his former master. Only a quick roll and the tether holding Bob to a tree save Thatch from being trampled.
Thatch catches his breath as Bob calms down. He stands there, waiting for Thatch’s next move.
Reyu comes over; she tries to prepare Thatch for the worst. “Sheesak made Bob one of her animal companions. He was bonded to her. This will not be undone in a day.”
“I don’t care,” Thatch replies. “I raised him since he was a foal. He’ll remember that… eventually. Besides,” he adds, “he’d do the same for me. I know it.”
###
The party makes camp that night in the woods, not far from the cave—tripling their watches in case Sheesak has allies in search of revenge. However, the night passes uneventfully, and the next morning, prepared and well-rested, the party leaves Lord Agasha and his men to sweep the woods, and descends en-mass to the mold-filled cavern.
Well, everyone except Thatch, who cannot be convinced to leave Bob’s side even for a moment.
He looks over to where Bob stands at the edge of camp, scanning the trees, waiting for Sheesak to return. Thatch’s eyes narrow, and a singularity of purpose fills his body. This is his horse, and whatever that foul she-ogre did to him, Thatch will undo it. Missions and archmages be damned.
###
As the party descends into the caves, Reyu walks near the front of the column. Although her eyes are far more sensitive than those of her human colleagues, even she is grateful for the flickering torches carried by several of her companions. She stops to cast detect magic, and suddenly the flickering firelight is dancing in harmony with a rippling aura that permeates all of the mold that coats every rock surface around her.
Another few steps brings her to the mouth of the cavern. Here, the walls are practically alive with magic. A sharp intake of breath behind her says that Lira has seen it too.
The aura in stalactite, Lira notices, is just like the one in the altar and standing stones aboveground, transmutation, tainted with… something else. Not only that, the roots, mold, even the bodies all carry a similar taint. And the source of it is the capstone on the stalactite that Reyu noticed the night before. Whatever the black, un-worked stone is, it is very powerful and very magical, but now Lira is absolutely sure that it is neither arcane nor divine. She can’t even begin to guess what sort of effect or school of magic it might be producing.
Anvil casts detect evil and detect chaos. The latter does not reveal auras of any note, but the rock, like the altar and standing stones above, pulses with an abiding evilness. Strangely enough, thought, the capstone does not.
Reyu and Anvil move forward into the cavern, Reyu going straight for the mysterious capstone, Anvil stopping to inspect the fallen bodies. As they had suspected, the one he first examines is wearing the torn but recognizable vestments of a Sovereign cleric. Benedic and Eva follow and take up positions flanking either side of the mouth of the passage back to the surface. Annika, Lira, and Kiara stay back, ready.
As she steps onto the thick carpet of mold, Eva coughs and wipes her eyes. Every movement she makes sends up clouds of spores. She looks over at Benedic, knee-deep in his own greenish haze. “Breathing this stuff cannot be a good idea,” she mutters.
Benedic just shrugs and coughs.
Reyu looks over from where she has been inspecting the capstone. “We will not linger long,” she tells Eva. “I believe this stone is the source of power in the altar and standing stones above. It would not be wise for us to leave it here.”
Anvil nods. “Agreed.”
“How are you going to get it down?” Eva asks. “We don’t have anything to hack through that much rock.”
Reyu however, has been examining the stalactite with an eye to just that question. “It is a distinct piece of stone,” she says. “I believe we may be able to, with sufficient force… dislodge it.” Reyu wraps her hands around the rock. It is quite large, and unshaped. However, there is a tiny seam between the capstone and the stalactite which she can just force the tips of her fingers into. Reyu carefully puts all of her weight onto her arms and pulls down on the capstone with all her might.
“Should someone go get Thatch?” Lira asks.
However, just at that moment, the cavern suddenly springs to life.
The roots growing down from the ceiling begin twisting, grasping like macabre tentacles. One reaches down to slap at Reyu, but it does not succeed in loosening her grip on the stone. Meanwhile, the rest of the party is distracted by the nine mold-covered bodies which have all simultaneously risen from their repose and are now coming to attack the adventurers.
