During the day, I attended the coliseum for a few hours, long enough to watch several fights between variously-matched gladiators and some stranger creatures. The most exciting match was between an otyugh – whose foul stench reached me once or twice when the breeze wafted the wrong way – and a group of three deep gnomes. The otyugh was a tremendous creature, its spiked tentacles moving with a swiftness that belied both their length and filth.
After a bit of dancing, the otyugh grabbed and ingested one of the gnomes, its legs flailing feebly from the corner of the fat beast’s mouth. One decisive crunch later, and a spurt of blood upon the still-muddy ground, and there were two. But gnomes are nothing if not resourceful, and the remaining two managed to snare the creature and tie its stump-like legs by running a rope around the thing at a distance just outside of its reach. It flailed at one and only managed to get the tentacle caught in their ropes. After this, the two charged in and got about to business with their wicket short swords. The severed eyestalk flew from the creature first, and gouts of greenish grey juice began to spill. Before long, the bets were being paid off and the cheers of a great many observers drowned out even the clatter of the gnomes’ blades.
As I was leaving, the two remaining gnomes were standing, arms raised in victory, weapons held aloft. One of them held the severed foot of their fallen comrade, and they were jumping with exultation at the battle’s outcome.
I visited the New Black Widow again, to trade a few of my cigars in exchange for a couple bottles of good wine local to the city. Fine stuff – it has a deep texture that almost feels shadowy, and its intoxicating effect lays a soft veil over one’s perception, quite different from a traditional alcohol. I spoke with the proprietor, and re-established contact with house Despana’s buyers for a future association. Unfortunately I was unable to meet with the house matron, though I desperately wished to find out how it was that she knew my name, and what I could have possibly done to have earned her distaste.
Perhaps I have not yet done it…? Of all persons on this world, I should have a looser perspective on causality than most.
I returned to the Hunter’s Rest, to find the rest of the group gathered in the main hall, looking over the supplies that the assistant innkeep had prepared for us. It all looked proper, and we carted it up to our rooms prior to returning for dinner together.
Arn looked particularly anxious to get underway. Can’t say I blame him, he’d been hiding under that cloak for the entire time we’d been here, and for a person from the Faywild, accustomed to living in wide open spaces, this place must truly be oppressive.
It also didn’t help at all that the people among whom we mingled would probably put a knife in his eye as soon as look at him.
Dex seemed interested in vacating as well, though perhaps not nearly so urgently. I could tell a coolness had never quite passed from between her and Arn, but there seemed no outright hostility.
That night, we had a calm evening to ourselves in the tavern. Even the streets were quiet outside.
The following day, we met with Thrae and described our decision to him. He reluctantly agreed, and took custody of the old man, Gal’Van. Rhogar decided to accompany them back, to make sure the old man made it to Al’Veydra alive, and they departed our company shortly thereafter and we returned to the Hunter’s Rest to gear up and set out. The albino, Bat, led us out and showed us through the city and out into a tunnel leading away. Bat wore a small miner’s headdress, with a twig extending from it on which was mounted a tiny glowing light, just enough that we could see ahead. I don’t know if that could help the full humans, but I certainly had an easier time of it. His outfit was certainly curious, and I didn’t recall him having the leather jerkin when Sered brought him home – the fellow must have equipped him once he’d put him up in the inn.
The first ‘night’ of our journey came after a surprisingly uneventful day, wherein we settled into a small side-cavern and relaxed as best we could. I didn’t look forward to this return to Cozule, but the sooner we got it done the better. I rested my head on my pack and ate some small bit of food. I already missed the city. Countryside would have been better, at least then I’d be able to smell the trees, see the stars.
As we settled in, Sered spoke with Bat away from the others. “I want you to know, Bat, that I only need you to show us the way to the outpost, and then home from there. I do not own you. You are free, and you do not even have to lead us anywhere. I would appreciate it if you did, but you are not my property.” Much more of the same vein was said, I lost track after a bit. Bat said nothing, just watched Sered with his reflective red eyes, head lowered a bit.
When Sered paused for a bit, Bat leaned forward. “Whatever master says, whatever master says.” Sered shook his head, but gave up trying to explain that night.
We went about our business, setting watches and laying out our sleeping rolls.
I woke a while later with a start, sitting up and looking around. I saw Bat crouched over Sered, face only inches from Sered’s. His arm was raised above Sered’s head, a tiny, thin knife in his hand. Impaled on the end of the knife was a twitching, wriggling spider.
“Master must be cautious,” Bat whispered. “The widowmaker, she crawls where it’s warm, thinks to make her lair there. In your collar, under your arm…between your legs. She gets most upset when her lair decides to move, and she nips at your tender bits.” He shook the spider slightly, it’s legs wobbling flaccidly. “Deep poison she gives you. Painful and rich, you clench up so tight your bones break, your balls pop, and your tongue reaches for the air to escape you. Good thing you are not bitten, master, or Bat would have to slay you for mercy. Don’t worry, though – Bat make it clean, quick. No pain. Just…” he snapped the fingers of his free hand. “And away you go, off to your next life.”
He slowly scraped the spider off onto the rocks in the center of the room. “The inky mistress there,” and he pointed the tip of the blade at Dex, “…she might find this, useful.” The knife vanished into his jerkin, and he returned to his little corner of the room, curled up beside his pack. Before long he was snoring gently.
The next day we continued further, as uneventfully as the previous, almost to the point where it became routine.
Of course, that should have been the warning to me.
Bat had vanished up ahead, up a long tunnel that had apparently been carved out by a river. The sloping sides came down to the floor, some ten to twenty feet across at our feet, and the roof vanished into the darkness. A sinkhole opened in the ground behind us, where the river had apparently washed through to somewhere deep below. Ahead, a fork in the tunnel broke off to the left while our main passage continued forward.
The ambush hit us just as we passed the fork. Up ahead, Bat’s little light – his lure – dangled from a stone up ahead.
Dex, Sered and I took the brunt of the first volley. Crossbowmen with small handheld contraptions – hard to see in the dim light – that spat several bolts each were firing at us, and I distinctly recall the painful wound as one of the bolts passed through the meat of my shoulder. The bunch of them – four or five – were on shelves above us, twenty or thirty feet above the floor upon which we walked. They fired and retreated into the shadows behind them, into small tunnels which we could just barely make out. I shouted a warning and backed up.
They were small – dwarf-sized, with slate-grey skin, white sightless eyes, wiry hair that wrapped around their heads like a crown. Their patchwork armor made little sound as they moved, and they screamed with voices reminiscent of a lamb being slaughtered. Derro. Twisted mockeries of dwarves, who delved too far into realms that should never have been uncovered. Poisoned with the insanity of the absence of creation.
I heard a bit of shouting from behind – assumed it was another part of the ambush, striking our rear. We pulled back, into the intersection, and I caught glimpses of axe-wielding dwarf-like creatures charging up behind us. Dex whispered about in a shadowy form, while Arn shifted into his panther-form, darting forward to attempt to engage the crossbowmen.
Only one axe-man could approach us at a time from the rear, and Sered stood to block their approach – and the axe-men went into a strange dance of blades, the first swinging and withdrawing as the next slipped up beside him to swing his own blade. Sered blocked as best he could, but the punishing strokes fell with the relentless constant clash of rain. The third blow drove him to his knees. As I moved toward him, pushing forward a surge of vitality to bolster his failing strength, Zenith vanished from among us, leaving only a translucent self behind. I saw a glimpse of light behind the axe-wielding creatures, and observed him materializing there, well beyond their reach on the other side of the sinkhole.
It was as Zenith popped away, Bat struck from out of the small side-tunnel. The white form leaped over me to land on Sered, his tiny blade flashing as Sered staggered to crush him against the wall. “Hello, master. Surprised to see me?” The knife flashed and Sered shouted in pain. With a swift move, I slashed withSybarron, feeling a rib crunch under the leather jerkin. Two arrows appeared, protruding from the armor, to either side of my blade as I drew a violet trail across Bat’s back. The small albino screamed in pain and leaped off of Sered, cleanly missing the axe-men as he raced away. He leaped down the sinkhole before I could further add harm to him.
Sered, meanwhile, could not withstand the rain of axe-blows that kept coming. Looking at the position – and hearing more creatures approaching from the tunnel which Bat had used – I made a snap call.
“RUN!” I shouted, and grabbed for Sered’s quickly-weakening form. I missed him, and saw the two axe-men close to us focus upon me. Before the first axe came down, I ripped open a juncture through Winter, and rolled through it to reappear next to Zenith.
The others disentangled themselves as best they could, arn throwing some form of enchantment that slowed the enemy down a bit behind us. Sered breathing hard as he brought up the rear – limping slightly, but putting good speed on his run. He was shaking his head as we ran through the tunnels, the sounds of the derro behind us slowly weakening as we opened distance on them.
Eventually we got to a point where the sounds behind us died off, and we ducked into a small chamber on the floor of which were many small bones. I was a bit worried at this – something else’s feeding or dying grounds didn’t seem a good place to catch our breath, but a cursory look around showed us that it was at least superficially clear.
Once we settled in, Arn laid down a ritual that would obscure our campsite from casual observers walking by in the tunnel. We all leaned back, our breathing slowly returning to normal.
“Well, that’s something I’d rather not repeat,” I said.
“I should have known. Should never have descended into that slave pit. Should have seen it in his name.” He kept rapping his forehead with his knuckles to emphasize his points.
“Known what? How could you have known?” Dex gazed levelly at him.
“In the translation of his name. It wasn’t Bat. It was Bait. How many times has he done that? With that sleazy flesh-trader, they probably have done this half a dozen times before.” He shook his head slowly.
Dex shrugged. “We lived. Vengeance can be handled at a later date. Better than the Crossed Swords did.”
Zenith looked up. “The who?”
Dex continued, “The Crossed Swords – an adventuring troupe that passed through Erelhei-Cinlu some time back. Did you see the wall at the Hunter’s Rest? All the ‘we have been here’ signs and postings looking for extra hands?”
I nodded. Zenith just shrugged.
“There was a note about the Crossed Swords from six months back, looking for a guide. The notice was scratched out, with an addendum ‘Bought one.'”
I nodded again. “Settles that, I suppose. We have other concerns than vengeance this day. Or, well, a bit more pressing case of vengeance, if we wish to read it that way. Don’t let it get to you, Sered. Everyone has moments such as this. Just be glad he didn’t stuff that spider down your pants.”
“Oh, gods, I trusted that thing…slept in its presence…” he moaned.
“Lesson learned. One more to add to your multitude of lives. Do not punish yourself overmuch, as we need you for the fight to come.” Eventually he nodded, resting his head back against the stone wall.
“Hey!” Arn called from the corner.
“What is it? I can only take so much cheering up.” Sered didn’t move his head, didn’t even open his eyes.
“I think I have something here.” He was poring through his ritual book.
“Hmm?” I said around a mouthful of bread.
“I have a ritual here, I think I can use it to lead us to Cozule.” He was looking over the page. “Yes, as long as we can get to within about ten miles of the place, I should be able to lead us the rest of the way.” He was nodding excitedly as he did.
Sered looked over slowly. “How long have you had this in your book?”
“I received it ages ago, part of my training to become one of the Ghog’Narak, the forest-keepers. Why?”
Sered grabbed a handful of bones from the floor and began to fling them at him. “Because if you had mentioned it before, then I wouldn’t have had to buy that little traitor, and we wouldn’t have been ambushed like that!” Every few words was emphasized by a fresh bone. They bounced off Arn, who flinched at the first one.
Zenith chimed in. “Sure would have been nice not to have been attacked there,” he said.
I looked over at Dex. “You know that bit about making those kinds of mistakes before, that I said a little while ago?” She nodded back. “Never made one like that.” She s****ed a little, went back to polishing her blade.
Arn shrugged. “You want me to use it or not?”
Sered looked down at his feet where he was sitting. “You forgetting anything else that maybe you should tell us?”
Arn was getting frustrated. “Okay, I’m sorry I forgot. I can’t go back and change it. Now, do you want me to use this and find us a way out of this forsaken tunnel?”
I held out an ale bottle to him. “Apology accepted, and yes please, do use it.” He thanked me, but shook his head. Began laying out the materials he’d need.
“Everyone, get a little rest here. Once we’ve had a little time to recuperate, I’ll do this and we can head out.”
I napped for a short while, then ate a bit more bread with ale to wash it down. I walked over to Arn and sat beside him. “Know what you need? I still have a few ritual components left here if you need them.”
“I’ve got enough here. Find the Path is pretty basic.”
I nodded. “Hey look, despite my joke, sometimes this sort of thing happens. I don’t have that one in my book, and given your ability in the wild, it’s probably been a long while since you’ve needed guidance over a span as short as ten miles. I can certainly understand forgetting it’s there.”
He nodded with appreciation. “Can I talk to you?”
His low voice expressed the need for privacy. I nodded back. “Sure.”
“This whole affair is really bothering me. I mean, it was strange enough finding Althea in the company of you all, and it took a while just to get used to you.”
“What do you mean, is it something I said?”
“No, not you specifically. What you are. Shadrim haven’t had dealings with the Fay in ages, and your kind has never been entirely welcome among us. But you aren’t really the issue here, I got used to you. You saved us often enough to show your good intentions.”
“Glad I could disprove the stereotype.” I grinned at him and made a show of checking the tips of my horns. “But what’s the problem then?”
“It’s the deep elf. It was bad enough that you all had had dealings with them and let them set up camp beneath your keep. But to travel with this one, openly? And a member of their assassin’s caste? I can’t begin to tell you how much you endanger yourselves with this thing here.” He nodded in the general direction of Dex. “I don’t know how much of our history you know.”
“I remember that your two kinds parted ways during the godswar, when their mistress betrayed your Correllon. That they were led beneath to this undeworld, and you have a long-standing feud between you.”
“That’s the gist of it, but what you’ve said is an understatement on a grand scale. Individually there have been rare cases of a deep elf surfacing with a good heart, but their kind are so thoroughly faithless that we’d slay them outright regardless. I’m confused at why she and I have not tried to kill one another yet.” He was deeply troubled by this, I could tell.
“Well, Dex came along only with the idea of avenging herself on Jhaelent and the walking dead of Cozule. I see no reason why she would continue with us afterwards.”
“It’s not just that – though it would be a good thing if she did depart. You’d all be safer. It’s that, it’s the ease with which you all accepted her presence, and it’s the absence of my own cause that is disturbing me.”
“I suppose I understand that. Your cause? Your sister?”
“Yes, now that she has gone home, I have to go to her. I spent all that time searching, and finally found her, and now she’s gone home. I would follow her.”
“I see. I suppose I can see where your point is coming from. I take it you mean to depart after we return to Al’Veydra?”
“Yes. I will finish out with this task before us, and return home after that.”
“We will be sad to see you go, ArnG’alad. But let’s live through this next bit first, hey?”
He nodded with a grin back. “I appreciate your ear. Please keep it between us until we return. And yes, it would be good not to die. ”
The others were beginning to stir. We gathered up our gear while Arn worked his ritual.
After several minutes we set out cautiously, Arn leading and quite certain of his direction now.
And yes – this time he knew his way. We still had a good road ahead of us, but in less than what I’d guess to be half a day, the tunnels began to smell of death and rot. A while later, perhaps half again as much travel, and we came upon our goal.
We came towards it along the route that we’d originally met and intercepted the slave caravan. I saw our tunnel above us as we came into the big chamber. I almost wrote “great” chamber, but after the city of Erelhei-Cinlu, I have a bit of new perspective.
On the opposite side, I could see movement in the shadows, figures skulking there. Directly across from the end of the bridge, between two large stalagmites that delineated the ‘road’, was Casava.
Or rather, what was left of him. The ghoul lord was chained to the two upthrusting rocks spread-eagled. His head lolled from left to right, mumbling. The crown of his head was missing, and its contents were gone – something in there gleamed white, and shone through his eye-sockets.
He saw us at some point, and began calling out. “Ah, Fellbane comes to finish me off, come, children, give it your best shot! Two hundred and eighty years I have waited, since the first fall of Al’Veydra, for someone to challenge me with real threat in their voice!”
“So much for stealth,” Dex said.
Sered nodded. “Let’s go.”
We charged across the bridge, the great chasm yawning to either side. It was this very chasm that spelled doom for Wynter, so long ago, turning him into the revenant that I met when I joined ranks with this fellowship.
I kept watch behind us as we charged forward, and saw a small pack of ghouls slinking in behind us, as the others called out targets ahead of us appearing out of the dark. “Ware behind!” I called.
And even as I said it, Casava threw back his head – the gleaming white thing somehow managing to stay in there, it’s glow shining off one of the pillars – and screamed out to the high roof above us.
“My king, Doresain, aid your servant and bring down your enemies!”
The ceiling erupted.
A spreading tide of white flame jetted across the ceiling, spreading out from a central point that boiled and bubbled like a live thing. Out of the tumult, a great winged creature – the same we saw when the mote was destroyed, I am sure – flew like an arrow towards us. Wreathed in blue and black flames, this darkly angelic figure wielded a longsword of bone, its wings tattered and covered with decay. Had it stood, it would have probably been nine or ten feet in height, but it had no legs we could see – it’s form dissolved into bubbling white dust where its waist would be. This was the mote – the Living Key to the White Kingdom of Doresain.
It came to rest on the ground at the foot of the bridge, between Casava and us. With a crack of lightning, the tempestuous storm upon the ceiling of the cavern snapped away as if it had never been, leaving us with just the light of Sered’s greatsword and my everburning torch. When it reached the ground, it pointed that blade at me, and I felt a sizzling scorch upon my forehead. Suffice it to say this came as a surprise – the sensation of burning is a rare one for my kind. I spat my curse into its face and sank my spiritual teeth into its soul. I felt the essence of Winter bite down into its heart, and heard it cry out in rage. My eyes cleared, just in time to see that sword beginning to arc toward me – I parried as best I could with Sybarron, but the strength of the thing was so that I could barely withstand its blow.
While the Key was attaching its attention to me, another screeching assailant appeared – Jhaelent’s new ghoulish form leaping from the top of one of Cozule’s buildings, racing forward and smiting the chains that bound Casava. The chains rattled free, and Casava’s arms lowered, snapping with dry creaks as they reached his sides.
Bingo’s bow was twanging like a lutestring, and the others each were offering their best offense against the Key. I ran for the end of the bridge, ducking beneath the sword, hoping to get clear of that gaping chasm. Though the fall would not kill me with my boots, my absence would likely kill my companions, as I was the only one capable of arcane healing during this fight. Zenith was releasing blasts of frost into the ghouls behind us, and mowed them down with little difficulty. As I cleared the end of the bridge with Dex and Arn, the Key let fly with a burst of raw, weeping death that pushed everyone around it out with its fury. Zenith only barely managed to stay standing on the bridge, and the others were pushed within inches of the edge.
My run proved futile, as the Key dissolved into fine powder which sped across the floor and reformed before me – completing the swing of its blade. What meager lights we had vanished from my view.
I came to to find Arn with an empty water-pouch over me, shouting “Get up! Get up! Get up!”
I snapped to, snatching up my fallen torch beside me, and took stock of what I could see. Sered and Casava were battling on the edge of the chasm on the far side of the bridge. Dex was finishing off several of the smaller ghouls on our side of the bridge, and the Key, looking injured and flying unsteadily, was retreating to the top of one of the outbuildings of the city, fading out of the realm of my light. I could not see Bingo, but I trusted that he had a vantage point that granted him a decent shot.
I charged towards the Key, not willing to let this enemy escape so quickly. As I did, I summoned up a deep blast of Winter and powered it with my darkest scorn, shouting a curse at the thing revealed in my torchlight. I saw the thing rock in reaction to the frost, its vaporous dust-trail becoming a glitter of crystals behind it. It lurched to one side, and I saw a flicker of motion – an arrow sank into its body from far across the cavern.
Bingo’s shot found its mark – the Key detonated in streamers of white dust and black flame.
I turned back towards where I’d seen Sered and Casava duelling on the side of the deep. As I caught sight of them, Sered’s blow drove the creature over the side, where it fell, grasping the side desperately. Another swing of his greatsword, and the glowing white coal behind Casava’s eyes fell, swirling, into the depths. It impacted, guttered, and went out. Sered turned to me, and hefted his sword.
Which is when Jhaelent struck. From the shadow to one side, a burst of black energy enveloped Sered, picking him up with its force.
Flinging him into the blackness. Like an echo of Casava’s own fall, Sered’s sword spun lazily on the way down, glowing like a tiny sliver of sun, before fading from view.
An arrow impacted Jhaelent’s leg, causing him to crouch, shouting in a papery screech. He looked around at us, seeing the remaining members of Fellbane closing in, and called out at us:
“This is not over. My king Doresain will suck the marrow from your bones when you finally are dealt with. And I will be there to watch!”
And with that, he ran and leaped over the edge himself.
We saw no more of him after that, even while retrieving Sered’s body and sword, and confirming that Casava was indeed dead.
We went through the outpost over the next few days, putting up with the smell as best we could. We found Jhaelent’s old study, his library, and a few trinkets remaining from the dunkels who had lived there before the disaster that resulted in all of this mess. We ran into the occasional pocket of remaining ghouls, but they put up little resistance. After we’d done as best we could, Arn prepared a portal for us and we returned to Al’Veydra, with the hands of Casava and a host of new stories to be told.
And so, I sit now on the terrace of the Death’s Head Inn, scribing this into my pages. I have seen some of the darkest places now that this world has to offer – and lived to tell the tale. J’Tiel – the real J’Tiel – lives, his body recovered and restored by the strange members of Acererak’s cult, but that is another story. We saw to it that Sered’s spirit was offered a renewed lease on his body here, and he is recovering now. That he didn’t immediately animate as a dead thing back in Cozule serves well enough as evidence to me that the curse of that place – if not its dark depression – has been lifted.
Arn was as good as his word – he saw us home, and then with little fanfare departed to seek his own.
Al’Veydra has seen some small changes as well. More people have come to make this their home, including a batch of northland dwarves – apparently seeking Duchan, the Innkeep, to spend time with their old comrade. They’re a rowdy bunch, but Duchan has promised to make good any damage they might do to the Inn out of his own savings. One of Casava’s hands is in a jar next to Natha’s head now, a symbol to the township that they are safe from this old danger, at least.
And now, before us, the future beckons. The tides are uncertain. As Mahar has told us, the powers of the Abyss and of Hell are staking out their respective holds on the two sides of this “Great King” competition. What their stake is, I cannot say, but I know it cannot end well, whichever side wins. Bael Turath in its glory did not survive in spite of our strong ties to the Legions. Whatever empire arises out of this cannot let itself be bound to either side. I have discussed this further with Mahar, and while he has spies in many places, he was unable or unwilling to part with any additional information regarding the developments there.
I look at this circumstance, and I think perhaps it is time we sought out the fellow we met in the Faywild, called himself Bow. If he is truly the heir to the original kingdom, and gave his life and memory in a quest to restore his lands, I feel he would be a fitting king for this land. It is perhaps this which would draw enough support to Al’Veydra in its bid for independence that may very well bring enough support across the lands that it would perhaps neuter the forces of both the camps of Gavilan and Lord Andelyn.
But for now, I have a fine meal before me, a mug of ale and more where it came from, and my old friend is coming for a chess game at sundown. It is these good times which we keep to us, which are made all the more valuable for the knowledge of the bad times we have passed through to reach them.
