IN THE SHADOW OF THE SPIRE

SESSION 11C: A WEARY TWILIGHT

November 11th, 2007
The 30th Day of Amseyl in the 790th Year of the Seyrunian Dynasty

THE RAINBOW LAKE

In the sudden stillness which pervaded the cavern, things looked bleak. Without the stress of combat the torturous nausea diminished, but their wounds were grievous. Itarek had merely been knocked unconscious, but even after the soothing of Dominic’s divine ministrations he still oozed blood from countless wounds and moved with the stiff pain of torn muscles.

Itarek looked down at the body of his warrior which lay near by and with a weary voice asked, “Can you heal him?”

Dominic looked at the body — its skull caved in and its chest mangled — and shook his head. “No. There’s nothing we can do.”

Itarek nodded. “We must leave. Tend to our wounded.”

Tee, who had been prepared to argue for precisely that, quickly agreed. But Ranthir suggested that they should take a look — a cautious look! — further down this passage. They may be in poor condition, but knowing what lay ahead might better inform their decision.

Tee nodded and, while the rest of the group quickly stripped the duskblade’s body of anything that looked remotely interesting or valuable (taking particular note of a finely crafted sword, steel shield, and chain shirt), she slipped quietly through the shadows ahead of them.

The passage almost immediately began angling downwards, although at a very slight angle. Beyond the downward angle, the air became damp and the passage soon opened into a large cave filled with a glowing pool of green and magenta liquid. Several dark spires of rock emerged from the chaotic fluid like jagged teeth, and pungent vapors wafted up from the liquid. The near walls of the cave seemed to shimmer with veins of sickly green-silver light, but on the far side of the lake the light seemed diminished — and there was a high overlook on the opposite side that seemed utterly devoid of it. Tee, peering closely at this outlook, seemed to detect some faint hints of a pinkish light deep in the cave beyond it.

Once again, Tee wanted nothing to do with the water. But when she returned and reported her findings to the rest of the group, Ranthir wanted a closer look: He would be able to confirm if the pinkish glow was, in fact, an indication of a cindershard outcropping. And he might be able to identify whatever contagion was affecting the underground lake.

Ranthir quickly identified the pinkish glow as almost certainly belonging to the expected cindershard outcropping — possibly a very large one. Then he moved closer in an attempt to study the lake.

This attempt was an utter failure. As Ranthir drew close to the lake’s surface, he was overcome by the noxious fumes which filled the lake-cavern. Tee was forced to pull him back to safety.

At that point, Tee had definitely had enough. They were all sick and getting sicker. They had to get out of these caverns as soon as possible.

But Agnarr, having now seen the lake cavern, was thinking about distances and angles and positions. He couldn’t be sure, but he felt that they might be able to get to the cindershard cavern without crossing through the cavern with the noxious lake: The large cavern they had seen beyond the underground river had seemed to curve in a direction — and in a position — that might lead to the other side of that cavern.

Although they were badly wounded, the thought that they might be able to secure cindershard crystals — and thus free themselves from the horrible nausea of the sickstone caverns — was tempting to them. But, in the end, they decided that such an expedition would have to wait for their return. (Although the chance of obtaining such crystals certainly made it seem more likely that such a return could be attempted.)

WARRIOR OF THE OOZE

The group carefully made their way back through the large cavern. With their injuries and their illness, they knew that even climbing the rope would be difficult. (Tee, in fact, fell once as she was overwhelmed by a wave of nausea.) But they eventually made their way back to the stone bridge and stumbled across it.

Tee explained to Itarek that their resources had been nearly exhausted. They would have to return to the surface and replenish them.

Itarek looked grave. “Will you return?”

Tee couldn’t give him an answer. “I don’t know.”

A heavy sigh escaped Itarek’s battered body.

When Tee translated for the rest of the group, Agnarr again objected to abandoning the goblins. “We’re leaving a spellcaster, who will soon replenish his arcane strength. They have no spellcasters of their own left. And who knows how many more of them are of the ooze.”

“Exactly,” Tee said. “We’re leaving a spellcaster — who we couldn’t face right now even if we wanted to! Who we might not be able to defeat even if we come back!”

Ranthir cautiously suggested that they might, at the very least, inspect the other goblins to see if the Torn Ears had any more traitors in their midst. “Can you do that?” he asked Dominic.

Dominic said that he could. The small, oozy tentacles were easy enough for any to spot — but Dominic suspected that there were subtler signs of lesser infection that he could identify.

Tee translated all of this for Itarek. The goblin nodded. “I cannot decide. But I will take this before the Queen. Will you wait?”

The group agreed that they would. Itarek set the two warriors who had survived them as guards upon the stone bridge and left, promising to return quickly.

The group relaxed somewhat, although the debating and the planning regarding their next course of action continued. But this proved to be a mistake, because none of them noticed that one of the goblin warriors had left the bridge and slipped quietly to Dominic’s side.

Dominic was seized in a blinding burst of pain as the goblin warrior’s sword slashed a vicious wound down his back.

Agnarr whirled and pounced, slashing with his own greatsword. The goblin warrior ignored the wound, however, and continued pursuing Dominic as the priest stumbled away from him. But Tee whipped out her dragon pistol and felled him with a single shot.

The other goblin hadn’t even had a chance to turn around before it was over. All he saw was his companion suddenly dead on the cavern floor. “What happened?”

Tee turned the pistol on him: “Your friend attacked us.”

“What?” The goblin looked completely confused.

“Get down on your knees,” Tee demanded. The goblin obeyed.

Dominic had knelt to inspect the goblin who had attacked him. He discovered the tell-tale tendrils of worm-like ooze extruding from the back of his neck. “This one’s been infected,” he told Tee.

She nodded. “Check that one out,” she said, waving the dragon pistol in the direction of the other goblin warrior.

Dominic did. “He’s fine.”

TESTING OF THE CLAN

“What happens here?” The goblin chieftess Crashekka swept into the chamber. She was accompanied by the limping Itarek and a platoon of her guards.

Tee quickly explained the situation. Itarek inspected the body of the slain warrior, and confirmed the taint of the ooze.

Crashekka had already decided to accept their offer of inspecting her clan, and this revelation made it all the more urgent. Dominic quickly checked the warriors she had brought with her, and then she dispatched them to gather and bring the rest of the clan before them.

The inspection took nearly two hours, during which time more than half a dozen warriors and a handful of maidens were discovered to be tainted. These were summarily killed by the goblins and their bodies stacked like cordwood.

The bloody necessity, the single-minded intensity, and the exhaustion they had already been suffering from left the party bone-weary by the end of it.

Itarek, meanwhile, had been assembling a strong guard to stand upon the stone bridge: With the traitors eliminated from within, and a strong guard upon the bridge, there was a chance they could hold.

When the work was done, Crashekka sought counsel: “Itarek tells me you must leave us.”

Tee confirmed it.

“Will you return?” Crashekka asked.

“I don’t know.” Tee said. “It is a long journey to our homes on the surface. And we have many worries of our own.”

“If you will not return, will you send us word?”

Tee hesitated.

“We must know.” Crashekka said. “If you will return, we will hold. But if you will not, we cannot wait.”

Tee discussed it with the others. In the end, all she could tell Crashekka was that, if they had not returned within two days, the goblins should assume that they would not or could not come back to them.

A WEARY TWILIGHT

On weary legs, the long journey back through the goblin caverns, the labyrinths of Ghul, and the tunnels leading to Greyson House seemed to never end. But, at long last, they emerged into the early twilight of the North Market and stumbled through the streets back to Midtown, Delver’s Square, and the Ghostly Minstrel.

Their bodies — coated with sweat, blood, slime, and vomit — were washed down in the troughs at the inn’s back and they were let in through the kitchens. All of them stumbled up the stairs and fell straight into bed. They had a party to attend the next day…

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