[WFRP] The Bloody Crown III

[LCP]

The Bloody Crown - Continued

In that dread desert, beneath the moon’s pale gaze, dead men walk.

They haunt the shifting dunes of the breathless, windless night, brandishing weapons of bronze in mocking challenge and bitter resentment of the life they no longer possess.

And sometimes, in ghastly dry voices, like the rustling of sun-baked reeds, they whisper the one word they remember from life. The name of the one who cursed them to their existence of more than death but less than life.

They whisper the name, Nagash.

OOC (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?309514-WFRP-The-Bloody-Crown-OOC-II)


“So.. we are, ah, staying here?” said Orfeo, in halting Reikspiel. Neither he nor Cesar looked too happy at the prospect.

“We should set the watches,” said the taller of the two Tileans. He looked towards the less ruinous of the two towers still standing. “Up there, no? Can see... all around.”

[LeSwordfish]

"I could take a watch." Ludo suggested. "I'm not sure i'll sleep well anyway."

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

<"Good thinking."> Adelbert replied in Tilean, squinting at the tower. He turned and glanced at Sieghard in case the experienced mercenary had any objections. "I'll take the watch after Ludo then."

Unlike the others the scribe seems pretty assured sleeping in the ruins. His academic fascination had gripped him, turning the ruins from something to be creeped out about to a intriguing enigma to be studied.

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

"Last watch is mine then," Sieghard said. He didn't care for the ruins any more than the Tileans did, but after falling in the marsh once, he was in no rush to try crossing it again.

[LCP]

Orfeo nodded, glad to see that Lady Hildebrand's travelling companions were willing to pull their weight.

"I watch with the little man," said Cesar, indicating Ludo. "Orfeo, you take over for third watch." He looked over to Sieghard. "Two guards, better than one, no?"

It seemed neither of the Tileans were particularly keen on taking chances tonight.

Pitching their camp in the shadow of the one of the tumbled walls, the party watched as dusk stole over the sky from the east. The stars came out one by one, gleaming in silver pin-pricks through the streaks of cloud that were sailing in from the north.

Entering the tower, Ludo found the stairs broken down in ruin. Jumping the gaps in the steps, he scrambled up to the highest level, keeping his eyes peeled for forgotten treasure. Cesar followed him at a significantly slower pace, cursing and mumbling to himself every time he had to pull himself up over a section of broken stairway.

Finding a good perch for a sentry, he waved down at the others in the courtyard. You could see for miles up here - it was just a shame that all you could see was swamp. Still, the view would have been beautiful at sunrise...

Down below, the others ate and drank, keeping careful track of their rations. Even if they had wanted a fire, there was no dry fuel to be found in this place. Elsa found herself missing hot meals rather more than she'd expected. Her hungry stomach making the most of what they had, she settled down to get some sleep.


~

Ludo

Ludo did his best to make friendly conversation with Cesar, but the Tilean seemed too on edge to maintain it. Contenting himself with thoughts of treasure tomorrow, he settled down to watch the moons rise over the Mere.

After a short while, Cesar descended the stairs to take a leak, leaving Ludo alone at the top of the tower. No sooner had the mercenary vanished from view than the stripe of cloud that had been cloaking Morrslieb drew aside, bathing the marsh in the Chaos Moon's greenish light.

Ludo had to stifle a gasp at what he saw then. Rushing to the edge of the parapet, he gazed down at the points of light he saw glittering under the water. Thoughts of sunken gold leapt to the forefront of his mind - he could see it down there, reflecting the moonlight.

Something was wrong, though. Frowning, he looked up at the sky, and saw the ragged veil of cloud had passed back in front of Mannslieb's sickly cousin. When he looked back to the marsh, however, the points of greenish light still shone under the water.

Some of them were moving.

Moving in pairs.


~

Elsa Only

Though Elsa was tired from the journey, the whispering from the marsh kept her awake, creeping into her mind without the consent of her ears. It was fainter than during the crossing, but present nonetheless. Meaningless words rustled in her ears, alternating with the faded echoes of clashing swords.

After what seemed like hours, she was still awake, though the others were sleeping soundly. The marsh outside the walls had fallen utterly silent - no birds, no frogs, no insects chirping in the reeds. The only sound was the whispering, which seemed to change as she listened. It became the words of one voice - a man's voice - hoarse and purposeful, no longer lost. Though the words were still strange to her, she could feel the power in them. The sound of them alone sent an icy thrill down her spine.

The amethyst shadows that haunted the ruins were stirring - but something else stirred with them, moulding and breaking them to its will. Before her eyes, the ancient walls began to weep. Liquid darkness ran down from between the cracks in the bricks, staining them. It puddled and ran like oil, and Elsa could taste the sour, cold stench of grave mould at the back of her throat.

One of the spreading puddles reached the spot where Sieghard lay, flowing around his exposed hand. Elsa watched in horror as the skin of the sleeping mercenary's fingers began to blacken and rot, sloughing away to reveal the white bones beneath...

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

Adelbert said his evening prayers in private (to Sigmar and Verena) before returning to join the others. "A fascinating day." He said cheerfully. "I'm sorry I didn't bring more parchment."

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

"I'm sorry we didn't bring kindling," Sieghard muttered, not sharing Adelbert's high spirits. To him, there had been nothing fascinating about nearly drowning and coming face to face with a long-dead orc. His clothes were still damp and being unable to dry or warm himself made him all the more irritable. Eventually he settled into a restless sleep.

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

Adelbert too eventually drifted off to sleep. No matter how enthused he was, he was also tired.

[-Sentinel-]

"I'm sorry I didn't bring more parchment."

"I'm sorry we didn't bring kindling."

"And I'm sorry I didn't bring more booze," said Elsa, grabbing her half-empty bottle of brandy from her backpack, "but we should get at least a few gulps each." She took a large swallow of brandy and passed the bottle to Sieghard, to her right. "Pass it along. Might as well finish it."

Elsa only

Elsa stared in shock at the black liquid that seeped from the walls and ate away Sieghard's hand. At the back of her mind, her reason told her this might be only a vision brought by the Aethyr. This did nothing to reassure her; when her witch-sight saw horror, the real horror was never too far, be it in terms of distance or time. Dread mounted within her. Wolf-riding goblins, would-be ambushers, overzealous enforcers, even witch-hunters, she could deal with; they all burned equally well. If dark magic was at work, though, there was no fireball hot enough to save her.

The whisper. What is that whisper?

She rolled over to Sieghard. Her hand closed like a vise around his to make sure it was still made of flesh.

OOC
She's grabbing him tightly enough to wake him up, provided his hand didn't actually turn skeletal, but I'll let you include him in the next spoiler tag.

[LeSwordfish]

Ludo
Panic starting to rise in his chest, Ludo leaned over the parapet and squinted at the lights, trying to get some sense of distance and speed.

OOC
Perception [roll0] vs 48

Like i said, connection may be spotty/i may be busy until thursday: if so, regardless of the test outcome, Ludo will run down the tower and try and wake the others, Sieghard and Elsa first.

[LCP]

Elsa & Sieghard

Elsa
Sieghard's hand felt rotten under her touch. She could feel the liquescent rot oozing between her fingers, carrying chunks of flesh with it. It made her want to gag - but when she snatched her hand back, Sieghard's hand looked whole.

Sieghard woke to Elsa squeezing his hand.



Ludo

The field of marsh-lights stretched away for a mile or more. They were densest near the walls, glimmering softly under the water - except for the few that were moving. Those seemed to wander without direction, tracing slow, erratic paths through the marsh.

Mannslieb broke through the fast-running clouds, and by its light Ludo saw a huge, hunchbacked silhouette pulling itself out of the water. Twice the height of a man, its gangly arms reached all the way to the ground. They seemed thin and wasted compared to its size; Ludo thought he caught a gleam of bone in the moonlight. Two of the greenish witch-lights burned like lantern flames in its shadowed face.

For a while, it remained still - then it joined the smaller figures stumbling at random through the marsh.

[Northern Lad]

Viggo Hirtzel

Viggo nodded when told which watch duty would be his and after he had eaten and drank he folded himself up beneath his worn cloak and did his best to get some sleep. He knew they were likely to start digging around in that ominous doorway tomorrow and he knew that they had to also.

Doesn't mean I want to write a song about it! he thought to himself glumly. It felt to Viggo that sleep was a long time coming.

[-Sentinel-]

Elsa and Sieghard

Elsa's look of panic and bewilderment quickly turned to one of embarrassment when Sieghard woke up with her sweaty hand clamped around his.

So what do I tell him now? Will he think I was just having a nightmare? Was I?

She took a deep breath. "I... um... there was, um..." she mumbled, her heart still pounding in her chest from terror. Her sleepy mind raced for a way to explain why she had woken him up. A way that would not make her sound like a raving lunatic or a frightened child.

The best idea she came up with was to lean forward and glue her lips to Sieghard's.

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard and Elsa

For a moment, Sieghard was too dumbstruck to react. He tried to gather his thoughts... What if one of the others woke up? What about her guards?

He didn't care.

He wrapped an arm around her and pulled her closer.

[LeSwordfish]

Ludo
Something in the back of Ludo's mind was very calm, even as sheer terror twanged his muscles, and what it thought to itself was This is absolutely fascinating!. However, if you don't mind, i'm going to scream now.

Ludo screamed, and ran down the tower as fast as his legs could carry him, sprinting straight towards where the others were sleeping.

[LCP]

The quiet of the night was rudely shattered as Ludo burst from the tower and ran screaming through the camp.

Orfeo woke instantly, sitting bolt upright with his hand on the pommel of his sword. Over in the shadow of the tower, the dim shape of Cesar hurried into sight, looking to see the source of the noise.

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

Awoken from dreams of Aisha by Ludo's screams Adelbert groggily reached for his sword and his chainmail.

"What is it? What is it?" the scribe called out, trying to force himself into proper wakefulness to confront whatever danger was facing them.

[-Sentinel-]

Elsabeth Holt

As Ludo ran into the camp, he could hardly miss the fact that Elsa and Sieghard were kissing hungrily on the ground, the pyromancer on top of the mercenary with a fistful of his hair in her hand. Elsa broke off the kiss with a snarl of annoyance and sprang to her feet.

"What now?" she growled, removing a lock of hair from her face.

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

Sieghard scrambled to his feet.

"There had better be an army of greenskins out there, halfling," he grumbled, glaring murderously at Ludo the entire time.

[Northern Lad]

Viggo Hirtzel

Viggo sat bolt upright, What woke me? then he heard Ludo screaming at the top of his lungs. Rubbing at his sleep filled eyes he cast about the the camp worriedly searching for signs of what had raised the alarm. That's when he saw Elsa and Sieghard locked in an embrace, a passionate one at that. No wonder he's bloody screaming!

As the pair guilty scrambled to their feet he forgot about the screams and laughed out aloud. "Ha! I'd heard that it was possible to kiss a drowned man back to life, but I'm not sure that's how it works Elsa!"

Staggering sluggishly to his feet he grinned at them, chuckling once more at the gruffness in Sieghard's voice. "He probably thinks she was trying to kill you! Ludo? Ludo! Calm down, what is it?!"

[LeSwordfish]

"There's something coming!" Ludo yelped, scrabbling on the ground for a stone for his sling. "Some things, man-size, with glowing eyes, coming out of the - kissing? - out of the swamp! And there's something with them, something bigger! They were kissing?"

OOC
Apologies for slowness. Ludo is taking a Ready and Load action on his slingshot.

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

Sieghard started putting on his armor.

"What things? And how many?" he asked, still scowling but grateful for a change of subject.

A few questions. Does this tower have a door, or (if there ever was one) has time caused it to rot away? Is there anything else we in the tower we could use to barricade the entrance?

How are the two Tilean soldiers armed?

[LeSwordfish]

"Lots of them! Lots and lots and lots of them, moving in the swamp!"

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

A frantic looking Adelbert had joined them, sword drawn and chainmail on. "Quick - where do we make our stand?"

He may - or may not have seen the kissing - but he's more concerned with attack at the moment.

[-Sentinel-]

Elsabeth Holt

Elsa shot Viggo and Ludo a withering glare. If I have to eliminate any witnesses, she thought, hurriedly putting on her boots, it can wait after the battle.

"Are we surrounded, as far as you could see?" she asked the halfling.

[LeSwordfish]

"I think so!" Ludo said urgently. "The whole swamp was swarming with them! Go up the tower, see for yourself."

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

Sieghard nodded and turned towards Adelbert and the pikemen

"I'm going up top, yell for me if you need me down here," he said, grabbing his bow.

[-Sentinel-]

Elsabeth Holt

"Coming as well," said Elsa, following Sieghard.

If Viggo made a snide remark, she would fry him where he stood.

OOC:
While Sieghard looks with his eyes, Elsa looks with her witch-sight.

Target 48: [roll0]

[LCP]

"No," said Cesar, catching Elsa by the wrist before she could enter the tower. He pointed to the crumbling doorway. "Inside, one way in, one way out. You will be caught like the rats in a trap,"

Orfeo nodded, buckling on his breastplate. "A dead man could have heard this shouting," he said. "If they are coming, they are coming now."

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

<"Did you see a way out from the tower top or are we surrounded?"> Adelbert asked Orfeo and Cesar.

[-Sentinel-]

Elsa paused. "Good thinking, Cesar." Her eyes darted about for a staircase, a half-collapsed wall or some other place where she could stand higher than the entrance, raining down spells on the melee, without making herself a target to those outside the fortress.

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

Sieghard had already had his foot on the first stair when Cesar spoke up.

"Where else is there to go?" he asked. "If there are as many as the halfling says, we're already trapped."

[LCP]

Cesar gave Adelbert a dark look. He seemed embarassed about something.

<I didn't see what the halfling saw,> he muttered in reply. <I was taking a piss.>

"If there are too many for us to fight," said Orfeo, looking to Ludo for confirmation, "then... then we run, or we hide, si?"

Cesar shook his head, looking back to the tower. "There is nowhere to hide in there."

Orfeo nodded, his eyes darting around each of the openings in the ruined walls. There were rather too many for him to keep track of them all at the same time... but at the last, his gaze seemed to linger on the dark doorway into the cliffside.

<Oh no,> said Cesar in Tilean, seeing where his comrade in arms was looking. <No. No way.>

Somewhere close by, there came a clinking sound - like a piece of rubble being dislodged.

OOC: I put a map up a few posts back; people may wish to refer to it.

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

Sieghard exited the tower as the pikemen spoke.

"You've lost your mind." He said when he saw where Orfeo was looking. "For all we know, there could be more of them in there. At least out here we can see what we're up against and die on our feet." There was a sort of grim acceptance in his voice.

His mind changed quickly when he heard the shifting rubble. A slim chance of survival in the dark unknown was better than a certain death.

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

Still unsure what they were facing Adelbert turned to Ludo and exasperation said: "What did you see out there halfling? Goblins, orcs... something else?"

[LeSwordfish]

"I didn't see!" Ludo insisted. "Lights, like marshlight, in the swamp, but they were eyes! And you could just about see human-sized shapes with them."

Ludo looked at the doorway too. "There are lots of them. If they're trying to fight us, it doesn't matter if there are more inside. It might be the only place we wont be surrounded."

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

"Fine!" Sieghard grumbled. "If we're going in, then start moving. The more time we waste talking, the closer they get!"

[LCP]

Cesar shook his head like a stubborn horse.

"I'm not going in there," he said. "Maybe the little man just panicked, si? I will see for myself."

Setting his helmet on his head, he strode off towards the gap in the walls that bordered the ruined gatehouse. What he saw made him stop dead before he reached its edge.

A hand gripped the edge of the ruined wall. Ir was attached to a huge, gangling arm, and as they watched the limb's owner levered itself into view. Mannslieb chose that moment to break from behind the scudding clouds, casting the whole scene into pale moonlight.

It was the skeleton of a troll - or what was left of one. Its bones were stained brown from centuries steeping in the waters of the marsh, and clumps of earth and knots of rotting weeds adhered to its ribs and backbone, giving it the appearance of a deformed hunchback.

One side of its thick skull had been broken open long ago, but an eerie green light still burned in the ruined eyesocket. Marsh water dripping from its ancient bones, it knuckled forwards into the courtyard. Scanning left and right, its attention focused dimly on Cesar...

OOC: Fear checks please! As a house rule, I will accept running in blind panic (i.e. not a coordinated retreat - no exchange of useful information with the others as you do so) as a substitute for standing paralysed with fear for those who fail the check.

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

Sieghard paled at the sight of the undead troll (which was made all the more noticeable by how flushed he had been not long before). A living troll would've been worrying enough, but the bones of one moving on their own filled him with horror.

"Run, fool!" he shouted to Cesar before taking his own advice.

[Northern Lad]

Viggo Hirtzel

"Sigmar preserve us!" It was more a moan of abject terror than a prayer of salvation. "Sleep here they said! It's fine, what could possibly go wrong?!"


"Run, fool!"

Viggo didn't need telling twice, he span on his heel, stopping only to snatch up his belongings as he dashed after the fleeing Sieghard. Upon realising their destination he moaned in fear once more. Better in there than out here with that thing though!

[LeSwordfish]

Ludo tripped as he stumbled away from the monster, grabbing Stoutheart around the ribs and hauling the little dog along as he scrabbled to his feet and started sprinting away, desperately heading for the dark of the doorway.

OOC
Carrying his dog and maintaining his loaded sling takes up both Ludo's hands, so i'd suggest that someone else grab a few logs from the fire. Did we have a fire?

Full move towards the doorway in a straight line. Kite like a man.

[-Sentinel-]

Elsa briefly considered making a stand, until she saw from the looks on her guards' faces that, right now, they would be of precious little use in a fight. Besides, even if she survived, getting her guards killed on a routine mapping trip would do little to earn her respect from her superiors in Mirino.

Muttering under her breath, she slung her backpack over one shoulder and hurried after her friends towards the doorway, quickly catching up with them.



Carrying his dog and maintaining his loaded sling takes up both Ludo's hands, so i'd suggest that someone else grab a few logs from the fire.
Elsa won't be the one to do it. She has her Light spell, so these things don't occur to her.

Doesn't Ludo's dog have, y'know, legs? :smalltongue:

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

Adelbert's eyes widened... in fascination. He'd once read Dr. Ebersbacher's Liber Mortui Viventes (a fanciful account of a supposed necromancer conspiracy during the reign of Emperor Maximilian) that had alluded to a troll corpse reanimated through magic but had privately never believed such nonsense to be possible. To see one in real life was incredible...

Abruptly the scribe realised the others were fleeing. Deciding academic curiousity was a poor second to staying alive he turned on his heel and joined them in their scramble for the doorway.

[LCP]

Orfeo and Cesar fled with the party, leaving the tents behind. The massive skeleton watched them run with empty, senseless eye-sockets - then, silently, it lumbered after them.

Casting a glance over his shoulder as he ran, Sieghard saw points of light rising up over the breach in the ruined wall on his left. Stumbling and staggering, more dead things were spilling into the courtyard, eyes burning like faint stars in the night. Some were wizened bog mummies, others little more than bundles of dripping bones. Orcs and men alike, their lifeless faces turned in unison to track the flight of the living among them.

None of them seemed able to follow at more than a walk - hardly a match for Elsa's pace as she sprinted into the lead. Fastest was the troll, its loping gait eating up the ground with surprising speed - but still even Ludo, dog under one arm, managed to outrun it. One by one, the seven of them dashed through the darkness of the door.

Inside, it was almost pitch black. Lingering at the threshold, Sieghard could see the massive skeleton of the troll stalking steadily towards them. They had perhaps thirty seconds' grace before it would be at the doors...

Sieghard & Ludo, Night Vision Buddies
By the tiny share of moonlight that spilled through the empty archway, it was possible to make out a little of their surroundings. They were in some kind of grand entrance hall, high-ceilinged and long enough that its far end was lost in the dark even to Ludo's sensitive eyes.

Two ranks of tall pillars marched down the length of the hall to either side, framing an open space in the centre directly in front of the door. There were shadowed suggestions of corridors leading off to either side behind these colonnades. What might wait at the back was anyone's guess.

OOC: Having reached the entrance, you all have one half action and two full actions before Mr Troll reaches the entrance too.

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

Sieghard gazed into the darkness and shook his head. He could make out a bit of what beyond the archway, but not nearly enough. "Elsa, light," he said bluntly, turning and drawing an arrow.

Atleast the bastard is slow. He had no intention of trying to fight the thing, but until they had a source of light, he didn't want to go any further. If he could get a good shot off while Elsa worked her magic, all the better.

Quick draw the bow and rapid reload an arrow. Standard ranged attack against the troll.

[roll0] vs 49 BS (Not sure how far the troll is at this point, so I dunno if this is normal or long range. Edit: Not that it mattered)
[roll1]

Again, I fully intend to keep running as soon as we have enough light to see where we're going (or sooner if we fail spectacularly at getting that light). I'm just taking a shot while Sieghard is unable to contribute anything else.

[-Sentinel-]

Elsa/Beatrix

"Elsa, light."

Elsa winced in the dark at the use of the wrong name. She nearly protested, but that would only draw her guards' attention to Sieghard's mistake.

First half-action: Light spell, target 3+. [roll0] You had one job, Elsa.

If this fails, Elsa will take time to channel. Target 58: [roll1]
Light spell, target 3+. [roll2]

Okay, so she succeeds only on the second try, and she's last in initiative order. You guys don't hesitate to keep going blindly; she'll catch up soon enough.

She muttered a string of arcane words interspersed with vile curses in Reikspiel, to which Aqshy adamantly refused to respond. With a deep breath, she forced herself to calm down and concentrate. On her second try, cold blue flames wreathed the tip of her spear.

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

Not for the first time Adelbert cursed himself for not brining along a misslie weapon. Without a bow he had little recourse other than to draw his sword and wait for the others to bring up light. In the meantime he checked the doorway, trying to calculate how much time they had.

[LCP]

Elsa's spell threw their surroundings into stark relief. They were standing inside an enormous hall, bigger than any room in Sforza's palace. Four rows of soaring pillars - two on each side - ran down its echoing length, the gap between them closed by another two rows that ran parallel to the rear wall. They were carved with close-set columns of the same pictograms that Adelbert had observed outside. In here the symbols were much better preserved; the light of Elsa's spear picked out their graven lines in deep, flickering shadows.


http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v700/LordChilipepa/hypostyle_zps4c068423.jpg

The space immediately in front of them was the only part of the floor the pillars did not cross. The floor itself was thick with a solid layer of dust, but there was some more weighty debris scattered about close to the door. Traces of wooden struts and bars, some snapped in two, lay rotting there, along with one particularly large chunk of timber that looked like it might once have been a battering ram. From the way the dust had built up around them, it was clear they had been there for a long time.

Adelbert thought he could make out hints of designs on the walls and ceiling - but the light of Elsa's spell was too faint by the time it reached that far, and the pigments too cracked and faded. What he could see were two dark corridors leading off to the left and right, and a huge pair of bronze gates closing off the rear of the hall. Blue-green with corrosion, they bore the unmistakeable design of the sun-falcon. They looked solid enough to keep out an army of trolls - that was, if they would open at all.

Looking back over his shoulder, he saw the skeletal troll was now only twenty yards or so from the gate. It would reach them in a matter of seconds.

OOC: Map of the entrance hall:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v700/LordChilipepa/Inside_zps67c1495f.png

See guys? It's not creepy at all in here.

Troll arrives in one round.

[LeSwordfish]

Timesplit: Before Light

"We can't fight them!" Ludo urged. "Run! Hide! Maybe we can lose them in here, but look how many there are."

Regardless of what his friends said, Ludo let fly a stone from his sling at the troll's ruined head, and stooped for another, not really expecting it to help much.

OOC
SA at troll, half action reload, same again, bringing Ludo to the same level as everyone else, T-One Round. The T stands for Troll.

[roll0] to hit. BS 49 +20 range? +10 size?
[roll1]+3 damage.
*plink*

[roll2] to hit. BS 49 +20 range? +10 size?
[roll3]+3 damage.

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

Adelbert ran for the falcon gates. As he reached them he cried aloud: "I don't know which god you are or where but I swear we will not pollute your sanctum - but that dead thing will if we can't keep it out!"

He tried the gates.

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

With a curse, Sieghard ran after Adelbert and helped him try to pry open the bronze gate.

[Northern Lad]

Viggo Hirtzel

Viggo gasped in awe as the light from the end of Elsa's spear illuminated their surroundings. The awe was only momentary though, quickly replaced with dread and horror as he regarded the shambling mass of bones and rotten flesh that bore down upon them.

Taking in a large gulp of air he dashed further into the hall after Adelbert and Sieghard, desperate to find sanctuary behind the large bronze gates.

"Everybody run! It's still coming!" Viggo's voice sounded shrill even in his own ears.

[-Sentinel-]

Elsabeth Holt

As soon as the tip of her spear burst into flames, Elsa followed Sieghard and Adelbert and quickly caught up with them, only barely noticing when she lost her wide-brimmed hat in her haste to reach the bronze gates.

OOC
I now regret giving Elsa a hat in the first place, so now I'm getting rid of it. :smalltongue:

[LCP]

One of Sieghard's arrows and both of Ludo's sling-stones found their mark before they turned tail, the second stone cracking a chip of bone from the monster's skull. The thing didn't seem to notice at all - it kept coming at the same steady pace.

It reached the gate while Adelbert was still running through the pillars of he hall. Stooping to fit through the narrow space, its shoulder collided with the lintel. Ludo felt the tremor that ran through the ancient structure through the soles of his feet, a drizzle of dust falling from the high ceiling.

Squeezing its dead bulk through, the troll straightened up once again. Its expressionless skull sweeping left and right, its glowing eye-sockets fixed on the brighter light of Elsa's spear.

Flying as fast as his feet would carry him, Adelbert finally reached the inner gates. Throwing his weight against them, he felt his heart sink as they refused to move.

Sieghard and Viggo piled on beside him, pushing for all they were worth. To the scribe's amazement, something gave - with a lurch and a scream of unused hinges, the bronze gates swung inwards. They had been barricaded from the other side, and now the ancient baulks of timber that had been propping them shut were crumbling to dust under the sudden stress.

Pushing them open as far as they would go, the party scrambled through the collapsing struts. The skeletal troll was already lumbering after them, no more than eighteen yards from the doors when the last of them slipped through. The doors had a bracket for a bar - but the rotten beam that had been there already had given way under the strength of three men pushing. It seemed unlikely that any of the remnants of the barricade would do a better job.

Their surroundings seemed unlikely to yield up anything sturdier. They were in another pillared hall, not as long but just as wide. On the other side from where they stood, another archway led deeper into the rock. The light of Elsa's spear did not reach beyond its threshold. To the left and right, at the far ends of the hall, pairs of huge, strange statues flanked narrow staircases that ascended into darkness.


http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v700/LordChilipepa/Statues_zps588f9c53.png

At that moment, the wail of a horn pierced the air. It had come from somewhere far-off in the rock-labyrinth, but its echoes went on and on, rebounding endlessly from stone walls and pillars. The skeletal beast hesitated, looking around to find the source of the sound.

The echoes died away at last, only to be replaced by another sound - the rhythmic stamp of marching feet.

OOC: The Skeletroll suffers 8 wounds.

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

Adelbert pointed at the left handed staircase. "Perhaps... perhaps it leads to the roof?"

He sounded less than optimistic but clearly did not want to stick around here.

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

"Anywhere is better than here right now."

[LeSwordfish]

Forcing down the rising wave of panic in his throat, Ludo began scrabbling amongst the rotting wood for something sturdy enough to hold the door at least a little. "I've got rope! If we need to, we can tie it."

Perception vs 48: [roll0] Which direction are the footsteps coming from?

[Northern Lad]

Viggo Hirtzel

As the wail of the horn faded and the sound of marching followed, Viggo let forth with yet another pitiful moan. "What's that?! What's that?!" He answered his own question as he scuttled towards the back of the room, moving towards the steps that Adelbert had pointed out. "It's not good whatever it is!"


"Anywhere is better than here right now."

"But where is here?! What is this place?! If we go running up these steps are we likely to run straight into whoever is marching about like that?" Viggo's head shook, clearly not relishing the prospect. He drew his sword, desperately hoping that he wouldn't have call to use it. "Forget the door Ludo, we've got to keep moving!" He called out to the Halfling.

[LCP]

The Tileans needed no more prompting to run for the stairs. Abandoning the defence of the door, the seven of them took off as fast as their feet would carry them.

The steps wound up through two right-angled, clockwise turns, steep enough to put even the fleet-footed Elsa out of breath before long. At each turn the stairwell grew narrower, its ceiling lower. By the time they had passed the second Sieghard was convinced the troll could not follow them this way.

Reaching the top of the stairs, Orfeo and Cesar collapsed against the wall, panting for breath. Adelbert almost called out for them not to: the walls here were painted with murals, far better-preserved than anything in the vicinity of the door. Unfortunately, he too was bent double, wheezing for air.

<'I just need to make my magical map'> said Orfeo to Cesar, babbling between breaths in rapid-fire Tilean. <'My magical map of invisible things. We can leave as soon we've stayed the night at this haunted castle'>

Taking a deep gulp of air, he regained a little of his composure. <I'm telling you, Cesar,> he said, dropping his Elsa impression, <this is a punishment detail.>

<It's not my fault if you made the Captain hate you,> replied Cesar, his own breath mostly regained. <You should stop trying to look up the lady Irene's skirts.>

Seeing Elsa looking at them, the two stopped bickering with a suspicious abruptness, returning her gaze with big, plastered-on smiles.

The light of Elsa's spear revealed surroundings that were significantly less grand than the hall of pillars. They were in a corridor that was just wide enough for two men to pass each other, its ceiling just six inches or so above Viggo's head. The ceiling was rough, unpolished rock, but the walls and floor were dressed stone. Each wall was painted with marching rows of stylised reeds.

The air was stale, and Adelbert could see motes of dust drifting thick in the glow of Elsa's spell. He couldn't see to the end of the corridor - it stretched on straight into darkness, well beyond the pool of light shed by the spear. Already though he could see a shadowed side-door leading off to the left - and who knew how many more there might be in the darkness ahead.

Echoing faintly now up the stairway behind them, a distant clamour was audible. There was the ringing of blades, and a dreadful, dry hissing. It might have been the troll - or it might have been something else entirely.

[-Sentinel-]

Elsatrix

Elsa did not need to speak Tilean to be able to tell that Cesar and Orfeo were complaining. She could hardly blame them, but her pride would not let her admit her mistake in front of them. "Good thing we found out about this threat so close to Mirino," she said, determined not to let her mask of confidence slip. "Now... wherever the dead walk, there's a necromancer around. We only need to find it."

She cocked her head to one side at what sounded like the sounds of battle, downstairs. "I think somebody's already fighting those abominations..." Of course, the enemy of their enemy was not necessarily their friend.

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

Motioning for the others to shut up Adelbert tried to distingush the sounds coming up the stairway, hoping against hope it was simply a trick of the echo.

OOC:
Perception check vs. 66 (Intelligence+Acute Hearing talent)

Roll: [roll0]
Fortune Point Re-Roll if needed: [roll1]

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard


"Good thing we found out about this threat so close to Mirino, [. . .] Now... wherever the dead walk, there's a necromancer around. We only need to find it."

"Why would we do that?" Sieghard asked, ignoring Adelbert's request for silence entirely. "Lets say we do find this necromancer and kill him. There won't be any reward in it for us. No one will believe us if we say we saved Mirino from an army of the walking dead. They'd think we were charlatans or suffering from some madness."

[LeSwordfish]

"Oh, good." Ludo was panting as much as the rest of them. "When the army of the night comes marching into town, we can shrug and say "Well, there wasn't any money in it."

He recovered his breath and began looking up and down the corridor. "I think we're safe here for a moment, at least. We can defend that staircase and all the noise is coming from the other direction to the rest of the corridor."

He began to pace, looking at the walls, and for the first time dropped Stoutheart- the terrier shook himself, and began sniffing around at the top of the staircase. "If they're fighting, then we've got two factions - attackers, and defenders. Why would a necromancer make them fight? Unless there are two?"

He turned abruptly to the rest of the group. "I want to go back down and have a look."

[Northern Lad]

Viggo Hirtzel


"I want to go back down and have a look."

Forgetting where they were, Viggo attempted to throw his free arm up in disgust. He looked down at Ludo in astonishment before looking back to Sieghard. "They'd be bloody right too! We must be mad! First of all we decide to sleep here and now he wants to go take a peek at whatever new horror that monstrosity is fighting with!"

He paced back and forth as much as the cramped corridor would allow. "El...Beatrix wants to go looking for some dark lord of magic and invite herself for tea no doubt!" He waggled a finger accusingly in Elsa's direction. "We should stay put here and wait for everything to slink back off to their graves is what we should do, not go poking about seeing if there's anything else we can wake up!"

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

"If all of you could shut up for half a minute I might be able to hear just what is going on." Adelbert hissed at the others.

[LeSwordfish]

"If we stay here, how do we know when it's over? Or when it's dawn? Or who's won?" Ludo pointed out, not looking at Viggo. "I can sneak down and wait in the staircase until the fighting's stopped."

[Northern Lad]

Viggo Hirtzel

Finding a little backbone Viggo snapped back at Adelbert. "We can all hear what's bloody going on Adelbert! Something down there, and knowing our luck it's probably something meaner and nastier than that, sodding... whatever it was... is bloody fighting it."

He couldn't believe what Ludo was suggesting. "Look if you want to go sneaking down there then do it, but I think you're bloody crazy! If we all just stay put here, quite as a family of dormice, we might just get out of this with more skin on our bones than that... that...thing!"

Viggo didn't quite believe his own words. Whatever is down there is probably going to come looking for whoever dragged a giant dead... thing.. into its house. He shuddered at the thought.

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

Temper fraying Adelbert moved over to Viggo and hissed. "Yes we can all hear them you idiot but some of us want advance warning if they are coming up here. And some of us might be able to tell how many sets of footsteps are involved. So to repeat myself: shut up you idiot, shut up, shut up, shut up."

[LCP]

The sounds from the stairwell certainly weren't moving away. Adelbert was becoming increasingly convinced that the dry, rasping noises came from more than one source - but his speculation was cut short as an echoing crash rang over it all. A faint tremor ran through the floor, even here.

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

'The troll?' Adelbert wondered to himself silently. He took a few hesitant footsteps away from the staircase, trying to remain as silent as possible. In desperation even glanced at the wall pictograms just in case some unknown ancient had carved a handy map on the walls.

[LeSwordfish]

Ludo moved to sit on the top step of the stairwell, absent-mindedly scruffing stoutheart between the ears.

"One way or another, we're here for a while."

[-Sentinel-]

Elsabeth/Beatrix

Elsa shrugged. She wasn't too keen to go after the necromancer, if there was one. "So I guess we just wait it out..."

This was going to be a long night.

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

"We could have a look around. We were planning on searching the place anyways and I doubt any of us will be getting much sleep in here."

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

"I suppose we probably should if only to make sure we don't have anything to worry about in that direction." Adelbert said unhappily.

[Northern Lad]

Viggo Hirtzel

Viggo huffed off, as far as he could in this place. He didn't want to venture any further than the circle of light cast from the tip of Elsa's spear. "I'm not the idiot who wanted to sleep in the middle of bloody graveyard." he grumbled sourly.

His heart skipped a beat when he heard the crash ring out through the darkness. "It's us next." He muttered darkly.

He looked back over his shoulder at Adelbert and Sieghard, after Adelbert's outburst he made sure to keep his voice down, "If I remember rightly, we were planning on searching the place before we discovered huge monsters and an army of corpses stumbling about eh? That's still the plan is it?" His voice took on a very sarcastic tone. "Oh excuse me giant rotting skeleton sir, I didn't mean to disturb your sleep sir. Could you please point us in the direction of anything interesting?!" His left eye rolled away at the sheer ridiculousness of the idea.

"If there were any Gods' here, they've certainly forsaken it now. Anything we take away from here would be cursed." he added ominously.

[-Sentinel-]

Elsa/Beatrix

Elsa cleared her throat. "Um... This light spell I cast on my spear, it won't last forever. It's not a hard spell to cast, but I'd rather not play with the Winds without cause when there's so much dark magic around. If you need light for anything, now's the time, because we might be here for a while."

[LeSwordfish]

"I've got a lantern." Ludo said, rummaging in his pack. He pulled the lantern out and set it behind him, in the rest of the group. "I don't know how long that will last either."

He continued to frown down the staircase. "Sooner or later one side will lose, and the others will come looking for us."

[-Sentinel-]

Elsa/Beatrix

"Then it might be best not to have any light at all letting them know we're here," Elsa pointed out. "If they get close anyway, we light up again and we fight." She looked at the others for support.

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

"We can keep the light dim, but no light at all sounds like a bad idea," Sieghard replied. "The troll and the rest of those things didn't start moving until night. I wouldn't be surprised if they can see in the dark. Whatever blew the horn was already in here. It certainly doesn't need light to find us."

[LeSwordfish]

Ludo stood sharply. "Lets look around. Our situation can hardly become any worse, and there might be an exit somewhere."

[Northern Lad]

Viggo Hirtzel

Viggo quickly sheathed his sword before falling to one knee and then frantically began searching through his backpack. He most definitely did not want to be trapped in the dark in this place.

"Hang on, hang on! I have some torches here somewhere!" There was a touch of panic in his voice. Viggo pulled out two torches and a tinderbox from his pack, holding them up for the others to see.


"Lets look around. Our situation can hardly become any worse, and there might be an exit somewhere."

"Really? You think we might be able to find another way out of here?" Viggo felt a faint sense of hope blossom within him. Maybe they could get out of here alive after all. He looked up at the others. "Should I light these?"

[LCP]

Producing flint and tinder, Orfeo managed to light one of Viggo's torches in short order. Lifting the burning brand ahead of them, the minstrel nervously led the way.

The sounds of struggle from down below were still audible, but growing fainter, as if further away. Adelbert remembered the stumbling shapes that had followed in the wake of the skeletal troll, and wondered how many more might have followed in its wake from out of the dripping marsh. However many had, it sounded like they weren't making much headway.

Pausing at the open doorway on the left, Viggo held up the torch. Its flickering light illuminated a small room, little more than a furnished cell. There was a lacquered water jug on a wooden stand, both darkened and discoloured with age, and the collapsed remains of what had once been a low pallet bed. Moving on and leaving the sounds from the staircase behind, they passed two or three similar rooms before they came to something different.

At the end of the corridor, a larger doorway stood - this time closed by an actual door. The ancient timbers had cracked and fissured as age had dried them out, leaking only flaking crumbs of the beautiful designs that had once been painted onto their surface. Holding the torch flame close, Viggo thought he could make out traces of a snake.

There were what looked like old axe-marks around the latch, and the doors hung slightly ajar. Meanwhile on the right, another set of stone steps led steeply down into the dark.

[Northern Lad]

Viggo Hirtzel

Viggo waved the torch at the door and motioned with his head for those behind to step forward. He wasn't quite sure how he'd managed to end up taking the lead, but he'd be dammed if he was going to carry the torch and be the first through the sodding door.

"Somebody give this door a push... Oh, and do it quietly eh?" He hissed in a hushed whisper. By Ranald's Black Cat, I hope this leads towards an exit and not whoever blew that bloody horn!

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

Adelbert pushed the door carefully, trying his best not to disturb the ancient looking panneling. If it looked like the door would actually fall apart at the first touch he would take a rapid step back!

[LCP]

The door swung gently open with a faint but persistent creak. Adelbert got the sense that if he'd pushed it any harder it might have dropped off its hinges. Inside was a much larger room than the dormitory cells they had passed - though still nowhere near the size of the halls below.

The room was full of mouldering furniture, some of it half-collapsed and all in various states of decay. A carved stone table, set low to the ground so that one would have had to sit on the floor, sat centre stage and closest to the door. It was flanked by free-standing bronze incense bowls, mounted on tall wooden stands in the shapes of women with serpents' heads. Riddled with rot, one had collapsed many years ago, leaving the blue-green bowl lying upturned among its fragments.

Behind the table was a deep rectangular pit that might once have been filled with water. What had probably been a pristine pool had long since dried up, leaving a chalky layer of sediment at the bottom. There were shapes in the accreted dust - the outlines of dead lily-pads that had long since rotted away, but left their imprints behind.

Beyond the water-pit was a rail, from which ragged cobwebs of drapery still hung. This had once been a division which bisected the room, but the silken curtains had not survived the ravages of time. Adelbert could see straight through to the section beyond. There was a slanted bed with an extremely uncomfortable-looking wooden headrest, and supports carved in the shape of slender, standing oxen. Around it were cabinets and folding chairs in the same exotic style, all in various states of collapse - and at its foot was a heavy wooden chest. Its corners were bound in bronze, and it looked like it could withstand all the centuries that had been thrown at it again.

Slumped over the chest was a human body. A man dressed in the Arabyan manner, he had a high turban and a flamboyant silk cloak. His clothes had not perished in the same manner as the drapes, although their colours had began to fade. Withered flesh still clung to his bones, and they could smell the dry stench of decay on him from the doorway. Thankfully, he didn't seem about to get up and walk around.

[LeSwordfish]

"This was a living space." Ludo said, slightly obviously. "Someone's home. Stuck here underground. What a horrible place to live."

Slowly he began to creep forward across the floor, headed for the chest, eyes on the body all the time.

OOC
Silent Move [roll0] vs 49, because I don't believe that last sentence at all.

[LCP]

Creeping up to the dead man with exaggerated care, Ludo waited with bated breath for the corpse to jump up and strangle him.

...

It didn't.

There was a dark wound in the man's back, where old blood had stained the fine silks black. He looked like he had been stabbed from behind while his eyes were on the chest. A short, curved sword was still in its scabbard at his belt.

There was something glinting on the floor. Looking down, Ludo saw what it was - a fine brass lockpick. It looked as if it had fallen from the dead man's fingers.

[Northern Lad]

Viggo Hirtzel

Viggo followed Ludo into the room, torch held high. He groaned when he saw the body and his nose wrinkled in protest at the smell. There's no exit in here, I hope.. .ooh whats that?

Once he was sure that it was safe he joined Ludo by the chest, his natural curiosity taking over. "Well it looks like he never got it open", he surmised, "and whoever did for him didn't finish trying to open it either." He tried not to breathe in too deeply as he continued, keeping his voice low. "Someone get this body off eh?" He waved his torch again, hoping it was all the excuse he would need to not have to manhandle the corpse.

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

As they entered the room, Sieghard's eyes lingered on the stands. Serpent-headed women... Even if the brothel had been named something different, the comparison to Filomena was all too obvious and he couldn't help but be amused by the thought. It wasn't until Ludo started inching forward that he noticed the chest.

"I wonder whats inside. Something worth dying for, or atleast he seemed to think so," Sieghard said, his eyes on the dead Arabyan.

He walked forward and pushed the body aside.

"I could try to force it."

Northen Lad, this friggin' body better be dead-dead and not undead :smallannoyed: :smalltongue:

We'll call trying to break open the chest by brute force it plan B for if we fail to pick it.

[LeSwordfish]

"I think this is the master thief they were talking about" Ludo said, picking up the pick and holding it up so the others could see.

Trying not to be too disgusted by the body, Ludo began searching the corpse, taking the curved sword and hooking it onto his belt. He felt like he should say some kind of prayer for the thief as he took his possessions, but ended up muttering "Thank you" without being able to look the man in the eye.

OOC
Lockpick!

[roll0] to search the body, vs Int 47(?)

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

Adelbert hesitated, then walked past the chest to take a closer look at the serpent headed women. He was finding this ancient civilisation fascinating and was privately somewhat embarassed Ludo and Sieghard seemed interested only in materials rewards.

[LCP]

Rolling the body off the chest so he could lie it flat on the floor, Ludo found it wasn't quite as well-preserved as all that when he was left holding a mouldy forearm that had just parted company with its elbow. Hastily dropping it and wiping his hands, he began picking more carefully through the corpse's clothes.

The sword was good steel, though it looked rather flashy and impractical to Sieghard's eye. In addition to the sword, the dead man had a money pouch with seven gold crowns inside. Surprisingly, they were Imperial coinage - minted in Nuln, by the crossed cannons on the reverse. Further searching revealed a cracked water-flask, a small leather-bound notebook, and a roll of finely-crafted tools not unlike the brass pick.

The chest itself was still shut. Its surface was carved with all sorts of intricate designs - human figures in profile, and more of the strange picture-writing. The lock itself was very corroded, and Ludo wondered if it had needed picking at all - it certainly seemed a shame to damage such a finely made thing.

Adelbert meanwhile was staring down one of the surviving incense-stands. It was a sculptural style he had never seen before encountering these ruins - although now that he thought about it, he supposed the jackal idol at Turnpike might once have been much the same. All smooth surfaces and stiff lines, the figures were nevertheless exquisitely made. The clothes they wore were quite unlike the northern fashions of the Empire, with flowing gowns and light shawls over bare arms.

[RossN]

Adelbert Screiber

Protective spirits? Minor goddesses? Adelbert wondered to himself as he carefully touched one of incense-stands. If only I could read those pictograms...

Unfortunately without a common frame of reference he didn't see how he could begin to translate them. It was frustrating beyond believe. With a sigh he turned to investigate the cabinets.

[Northern Lad]

Viggo Hirtzel

Viggo gagged and dry retched a little when the arm came off in Ludo's arm, but brightened somewhat when the Halfling found a pouch with some gold coins clinking about inside. "Well at the very least we might all get a coin or two out of this. If we can find a way out of here that is."

"What does it say in the book Ludo? Any maps of this place in it? Maybe some instructions on how to not wake up dead bodies?" Viggo had a quick scratch of his nose. "Not that it did him any good mind."

OOC

The Summoner. I'd have had Viggo do it but he's carrying a torch see! :smallwink:

[LeSwordfish]

Slipping the roll of tools into his pocket and handing the money to Viggo, Ludo began to look through the book. A fellow collector's notes were always interesting, after all.

[LCP]

The first page of the little book was written in a large, shaky hand that did not look like the work of any professional scribe. It read:


The Journalle Of
Lammert Lugenschmitt
Gentleman of Fortune
and
Mastur of Disgyse
and
also known as Ali Al-Kadar
and
the Theyfe of Al Haikk

Each "and" appeared to have been added at a later date - sometimes scrawled at a different angle or size of lettering.

Past the title page, the journal was filled with a densely-written scrawl. Ludo started at the first page.

Beying sound of minde and bodie, I have decided to keep this journalle of my advantures south of the Blacke Mountaines. I am a man of letters nowe and there are men who will paye a fine price for such tales.

My name is Lammert Lugenschmitt, layte of the Wissenland, and may Ranald's curse be on who-ever steyles this booke...

The tale that unfolded in the poorly-spelt pages that followed was a chronicle of this Lammert's travels south through the Border Princes, from Black Fire Pass to the Broken Reaches. Ludo saw references to place names he had only heard on the lips of passing merchants during his youth in Sermena - Morrschatten, the Varenka Hills, the great city of Barak Varr. In each place, the 'enterprising' Lammert soon found a way to make himself unwelcome - whether it was trying to sell a local prince a horse he'd stolen from his own stables, or trying to pay a dwarfish harbourmaster with false coins.

Flicking forwards, the journal soon reached the Reaches. Lugenschmitt had come down the Alvarran road, but had not lingered long in that town. After a brief delay with a too-trusting milkmaid in the Downlands, he had quickly found his way to Savonne...

The following spoilered segments are what you find if you choose to keep digging through the journal. Tell me how many you read, and that will determine how long you linger here while reading. No lying! :smalltongue:

...Thys town is not like the towns north of heyre, and coulde almost be called a citie. The old town is very old, and I thinke the Bretow Breyta frog-eaters did not builde it, though they have naymed it.

...the people here are of straynge blood, not Arabyans but not proper Old Worlders eyther. At first I thought them lyke the Strigany, but they holde the travelling folk in low regarde as much as we do back home. As a northerner, I am treated muche the same. The naytives all assume I am symple, or an easie marke. With so much bryberie beinge needed from daye to daye, this is proving expensif.

...at market today, I was strucke by an exelent sceme. My mother always said I had a swarthy complexion, and a little red dirt makes it darkere. Having purchased some suitable clothes, I have decided to re-invent myself as an Arabyan. This has the added advantayge of throwing Hr. Theudis and his tediyus accusaytions off my trayle!

...the preyste of Verena has been very generous in letting me learn from his bookes. This Arabyan gabble is childe's play! I thinke I have learned enough to convynse those who do not speake the language themselves, such as calling all men "offendy," and offering salami insted of saying hello. I have the sounde of it too, so that I can make up my own wordes in a pynche.

While I do not thinke the old preyst is so pleased with my learning as I am, he knowes much of the citie. I have asked him and he sayes that according to the local legends, Savonne had two sister cities in aynchent times. This exited me grately, for if the ruins of these cities are still standynge they much contain much gold and treasure!

Beying very pleased to talk of his reserch, I have convinsed him to make for me a map. The one citie he places in a very unplesent desert to the west, whych I think to try only as a last resort. The other he puts in a very great swamp to the south of here, which is at leest closer.

The closest place to where the preyste marked the ruins on my map is the domain of Laste Water, which is ruled by a mercenary of ruthlesse reputaytion. Nevertheless, I have resolved to get there as quickly as I may.

...My passage through the Thorn Woode has been peaceful, although I mett some travellers from a place called "River Mouth" whoes manner made me very un-easy. I told them I was an envoy of Prince Belehir, sent to speake to the sorceress who lyves in these woodes, and they let me be...

...Lammert's Note: goblins do not care if you are the envoy of Prince Belehir...

I have reeched the village of Carefort, which has a very Brettt Brit foren feel to it. I relyse now that I should not come into Laste Water by the roade that goes through the passe... it would be better to be seen to come direct from 'Araby'.

...I left the road todaye and struck off into the hills around the basin. Theye are very steepe!

The pesantes here are very unimaginative. I have not been able to fynde a single assistante to carry my thynges on the journeye to this ruin, even if I promiss one in ten of the treasure!

It is a pitie they are so dull, for I thinke there are enough secrits in this Tilean's court to make a bold man very rich - or very dead. Without an accomplis to take the blame, I thinke it is too dangerous to try.

...I have found owt that there are Arabyans among the Tilean captain's men. I should leave soon, before I am found owt myself. I also fear I have importyuned the very fearsome harlot who owns the brothel here, and it would be best to leave town before she does anythinge about it.

This blasted marsh has ruined my good boots. It lookes to be rayning soon - I will take shelter inside, and begin my serching tonight. To think I have found the old preyste's ruins after all!

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

"Still got that crowbar, Ludo?" Sieghard asked.

You would've had Viggo do it, but Viggo's a dirty coward. That said, I'm sure when Sieghard gets some horrible disease from touching dead bodies and other unpleasant things, Viggo's cowardice will start to look a lot more like wisdom.

Leswordfish, Sieghard wants to see whats in that chest and I don't recall Ludo's lockpicking skills having come up IC. If you want to give it a try, feel free to stop Sieghard (It'd probably be a much quieter way of getting the thing open anyways). If not (or if Ludo tries and fails), I'll roll to try to break it open it in my next post.

[LeSwordfish]

Ludo snapped the book shut, almost guiltily, and slipped it into his pocket. "He wasn't Arabyan at all. Sorry, crowbar..."

Ludo was about to start rifling in his pack for his crowbar, when he remembered the lockpick. "I have a better idea. When I was young and foolish, my friend Roderick and I would pick the back door to the bar, and steal bottles of... looking back on it, I have no idea what they were bottles of."

Presuming that Al-Kader- it seemed polite to use his alias- had chosen the pick well, Ludo inserted it in the lock and began turning it speculatively.

OOC
Just the first extract, but Ludo is definitely keeping the book.

(I'm putting a gold crown on the last extract being a variant of "There are drums, drums in the deep... we cannot get out")

Lets try a Pick Lock roll: [roll0] vs 49 (? It is agility-based, right?)

Fate re-roll because this is the first time i've used this skill and i want to splash out: [roll1]

[LCP]

The lock turned out to be almost trivially easy to pick. Half the pins had rusted through.

Hearing the scrape of metal, Ludo gently pushed back the lid. His face was illuminated by a golden glow as the contents of the chest reflected the light of Viggo's torch.

They were coins. Gold coins, real gold, hundreds of them. Crudely stamped and with thin, irregular edges, they bore the face of a strange king, rendered in the same style as the sculptures and murals of the ruin. On the reverse were other symbols - hawks, snakes, solar discs. The designs varied from coin to coin, but what remained constant was that they were all solid gold.

[-Sentinel-]

Elsa was about to protest to Ludo that she wanted a look at the book, but her objection died in her throat when the halfling opened the chest. Her jaw dropped.

"Wha........"

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

Sieghard watched Ludo pick the lock in silence, pleasantly surprised at the halfling's skill. When the chest opened, Sieghard stared at its contents greedily.

"Take as many as you can carry, we'll count them out when we're free of this death trap." he said, before burying his hands in the coins. "And someone watch the door," he added. "No sense in ending up like the 'Arabyan.' "

[LeSwordfish]

Ludo's breath caught in his throat, but h still reached out to stop Sieghard's hand.

"I think before we touch them Elsa should give them a proper look" he said reverently.

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

Sieghard glared at Ludo. For a moment, it seemed like he was going to push him aside and dig through the chest regardless, but Sieghard pulled his hand back.

"Fine," he grumbled, his eyes fixed on the coins.

[-Sentinel-]

BEATRIX, DAMMIT

Elsa, who was already reaching for the coins just to rake her fingers through them, interrupted her gesture.

"That couldn't hurt, actually."

Her gaze became distant as she stared at the gold.



((Magical Sense 58: [roll0]))

[LCP]

"Beatrix"

As far as Elsa could tell, no active enchantment had been worked on the coins. The wind of Chamon clung tightly to them, proving their authenticity. The Gold Wind wasn't the only presence, though - like everything else here, the chest was steeped in Amethyst energies. It probably shouldn't have surprised her - everyone who had handled those coins had likely been dead for thousands of years.

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

Even Adelbert had gone pale at the sight of the gold, his eyes wide.

"We... we should wait until morning and those things are gone before touching this. For all we know those dead things are attracted to gold."

Drawing a shuddering breath he walks over to Ludo. "Can I look at that book Ludo?"

[LeSwordfish]

Ludo seemed a little hesitant about handing the book over. "Okay, but I want it back."

[-Sentinel-]

Beatrix

"I'm not seeing any enchantment or curse," said Elsa confidently. "The Yellow Wind is strong; I'm pretty sure it's real, solid gold, not just gilded lead."

"For all we know those dead things are attracted to gold."

Elsa threw the scribe a puzzled look. "Yet none of them are here, where the gold actually is. What would they even do with gold? You ever hear the joke about the skeleton who walks into a tavern?"

[LeSwordfish]

"He had no body to go with?" Ludo replied absent-mindedly. With Elsa's verdict in, he believed in the gold a little more. Carefully, with the air of someone touching a kettle to feel if it was boiling, he reached out and took a handful of gold pieces.

[LCP]

The gold felt real enough. When Ludo let a few pieces slip through his fingers, they fell back into the chest with a satisfying clinking sound.

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

A little reassured, but still nursing a paranoid streak Adelbert found somewhere to sit down and start reading the diary.

[-Sentinel-]

"He had no body to go with?"

"He asks for an ale and a mop," said Elsa somewhat vacantly, as if hypnotized by the gold. "There's no way we can carry all of this, but we can take as much as we can... so the other good news, Cesar and Orfeo, is that I'm shortening our little trip. I'm thinking we split the loot equally between the seven of us?"

[LCP]

Their fear of the things below forgotten, the two Tileans were staring at the chest as if hypnotised. Crouching down beside it, Orfeo ran his fingers across the surface of the gold.

"We should bring it to the Captain," said Cesar, at last. Orfeo looked round with a jolt of surprise.

<Cesar,> he said. <This is a fortune. We could live like princes.>

"The Captain will reward us," said Cesar, stubbornly. "We can't move it all ourselves. We tell the Captain, he will send the army." He glanced over his shoulder and suppressed a shudder. "Clear out these... things."

Orfeo made a face, but didn't contradict his comrade. Looking up at Elsa from under his eyebrows, he looked around the chamber.

"Fine," he said. "Yes. But he won't miss a few things, si?" He raised his eyebrows at Cesar. "A few coins for me, a few coins for you. These people were rich, no? I bet there are some pretty baubles somewhere here..."

OOC: I think I missed earlier where Adelbert said he was examining the cabinets - but if he or anyone else wants to check them for valuables, give me a Search check at +20 please.

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

While the others were speaking adelbert examined the cabinets.

OOC:
Search vs. 43
Roll: [roll0]

[LCP]

Orfeo was right. While there was no golden hoard to rival the contents of the chest, the cabinets were far from empty.

A necklace/collar made from gold and coloured glass beads. The ends are made to resemble the coiled heads and necks of snakes.
A pair of lapis lazuli earrings, shaped to mirror the solar disc motif that Adelbert has noticed throughout the ruins.
A long, thin wooden game board, with a sliding drawer full of carved pieces. It looks like backgammon, but the board is three squares wide by ten deep, and some of the squares are marked with the peculiar pictograms.
A silver hand mirror, tarnished to black.

[-Sentinel-]

Elsa was thoughtful. "If you want to take some of the gold here and now, you'd better hide it well and be a good liar, because the Captain will suspect we took our share already. And if you start spending strange gold coins around town, word will get out."

[RossN]

Adelbert Screiber

Adelbert took the earrings and necklace before finally turning his attention to the gold - or rather the discussions about gold.

<"Beatrix is right my friends."> Adelbert told Orfeo and Cesar in Tilean. <"We must be clever.">

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

Sieghard had already started scooping coins into his pack. He looked up at Cesar.

"If we tell the captain," he began, with heavy emphasis on the if, "We do it on our terms. There's enough gold here that even split between us, it would make us quite rich. Sforza didn't find it, unless he gives us something good in return, why should he get any of it?"

He turned his attention back to the coins. "For now, take what you can carry without it slowing you down. The dead things are still out there and the gold won't do you any good if they catch you. We can decide if we tell the captain and how on the way back to Mirino."

[LeSwordfish]

Ludo pulled a sack out of his bag. "How much of it do you think we can carry in here?"

[Northern Lad]

Viggo Hirtzel

Viggo's right eye had goggled as the chest had been opened, he had stood there speechless as the others carried on their conversation, mouth agape seemingly hypnotised by the horde of coins. He placed the purse that Ludo had passed to him absentmindedly into one of his pockets.

"We're rich." He mumbled. "We're all rich." He turned to the two soldiers, a frown creasing his forehead. "This isn't the bloody Captains coin! It's not on his land and I don't remember him sleeping down here or trudging through that sodding corpse filled swamp do you?!"

He set the torch down carefully, before joining Sieghard and Ludo at the chest. He pulled the pouch out of his pack emptying it's contents onto the floor before starting to fill it, his pockets and his pack with coins as quickly as he could.


"How much of it do you think we can carry in here?"

"Enough that we'll never have to sleep on the floor of the Chalice again that's for sure!" Viggo's voice was excited, it seemed that in the presence of so much gold he'd quite forgotten where they were.

[LCP]

"We're rich." He mumbled. "We're all rich." He turned to the two soldiers, a frown creasing his forehead. "This isn't the bloody Captains coin! It's not on his land and I don't remember him sleeping down here or trudging through that sodding corpse filled swamp do you?!"

Viggo became aware that Cesar was glaring at him. The tall Tilean was quite intimidating when he wasn't running for his life.

"We bring it to the Captain because we are the Captain's men," he said, doggedly. He looked Viggo up and down with a little flick of his chin. "You take it for yourself, how long you think you will keep it, hey?" He held the minstrel's stare. "There are men in the Reaches who would cut your throat for one of these coins, boy." Pausing, he looked away with a shake of his head. "We bring it to the Captain. He will reward us."

Adelbert and Elsa's words, meanwhile, seemed to have given Orfeo pause. "Perhaps... Cesar is right," he said, nerves tinging his voice. "Trying to trick Captain Sforza... it is not a clever thing..."

His reservations didn't stop him joining in the free-for-all as they began to empty out the chest. Sieghard was speaking sense, and even Cesar joined in the effort to lighten the ancient box's load.

They were all still crowded round when Ludo heard something from the corridor. It was a faint sound, just a soft, rhythmic scrape - but it sounded like footsteps.

OOC: For those who are specifically filling their packs with gold, I'd like an Int test at +30 - a full pack can contain around 150kg of coins, which is a different matter from being able to hold it...

[LeSwordfish]

Ludo waved his hands frantically in assorted "shut up!" gestures, trying to prevent the clink of coin in his half-filled pack. Perhaps whatever it was didn't know they were here.

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

"You are the captain's men," Sieghard replied, still greedily digging through the coins. "And you are his men because he pays you. Does he pay you this much?" he asked, scooping up as many coins as he could in both hands and letting them drop back into the chest. "If you served him until you were old men, too weak to get up from your beds, would all the coin he gave you be worth half of this?"

He let his words sink in for a moment before speaking again. "If we tell the captain, he'll clear out the dead, but how much will be left for us after? If he'd give us our share for finding it, then I've no objections to telling him, but if he'd keep the bulk for himself, we'd be better off hiring men with what we can carry now and dealing with the dead ourselves."

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

Adelbert took little part in the conversation, filling his back to the point where he could still carry it.

[Northern Lad]

Viggo Hirtzel

Doing his best to keep Sieghard between himself and Cesar, Viggo nodded along with the mercenary. "It's not like the Captain sent us here or anything and most of us here aren't in service to him. He can't ask for a share of something we found by chance can he? If I found a load of owl droppings would he want a share of that too?"

As he spoke Viggo pulled the tent out of his pack making even more room for coins. Once he was satisfied that he had as much as he could carry, he bent down to retrieve the torch. His shoulders already ached and the sound of coins clinking in his pockets almost distracted him from Ludo's frantic gestures.

The feeling of elation at finding this hoard were suddenly replaced by the more usual sense of dread. "Shhh everybody!" He hissed. "What is it Ludo?"

[-Sentinel-]

Elsa, who had been hurriedly filling her backpack with as much gold as she could carry, paused at Ludo's urging. Would it be better if she put out her magical torch? Probably not; they would need light to fight.

[LeSwordfish]

"Something's coming." Ludo hissed. "Out in the corridor."

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

Sieghard nodded and silently reached for his bow.

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

Adelbert paled and drew his sword.

[LeSwordfish]

Gently, moving on silent feet, Ludo crept a little deeper into the shadows, drawing Lammenbert's sword.

comcealment [roll0] vs 49, readying the new sword and Ludo's dagger.

[Northern Lad]

Viggo Hirtzel

Following their example, Viggo drew his short sword as quietly as he could. He held the torch overhead in a trembling hand.

"Oh no, oh no, oh please no." Viggo whispered to himself, almost like a prayer. He didn't hold out much hope that it would be answered.

[LCP]

The sound only grew louder, until all in the chamber could hear it. It was, without a doubt, the rhythmic crunch of marching feet - and more than two.

Drawn by the solitary lights of Viggo's torch and Elsa's spear, the footsteps came closer. Their pace did not slow, and Viggo shrank back in horror as paired points of greenish light began to approach through the darkness outside the doorway.

They were the eyes of dead men, pale witchfires burning in empty sockets. They marched in lockstep, filing into the chamber like soldiers on parade. Fleshless bones gleamed in the torchlight as they surveyed the scene before them, skulls grinning blankly at mortals they had caught red-handed in their tomb.


http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v700/LordChilipepa/Skellies3_zps65272fa3.png

There were eight of them, and they were armed. Each carried a short spear and a wooden tower shield with a rounded top. Rotted scraps of linen armour clung to their bones, and their bronze spearheads were green and pitted with corrosion - but they still looked sharp enough to pierce flesh.

With a jangling stamp, the shields came up and the spears swung down. The door was the only way out, and they had it blocked.

OOC: Fear checks please - and a Perception check too.

[roll0]
[roll1]

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

Adelbert stared at the nightmarish figures. His face had got very pale, his mouth agape as if about to say something but no sound emerged. The scribe was quite simply frightened out of his wits, unable to move, fight or do anything but stare in horror.

[-Sentinel-]

Oh, right. Just taking the gold and waltzing out of here would have been entirely too easy, would it?

Well aware that her magical torch made her the obvious target, Elsa quickly took position to Sieghard's right, facing the skeletons. "Protect my sides," she snapped at her companions, oblivious to how they seemed in no state to be thinking about tactics. "If I drop that torch, it goes out. You don't want that."

As she spoke, she began gathering the Winds to herself.

Moving to the square just west of Sieghard. Channelling 58: [roll0]

[LCP]

With a rattling thump of shields, the undead formation split in half. Four skeletons peeled off to the left and four to the right, the two groups marching in unison up either side of the empty pool.

Elsa Only

As the walking dead came closer, Elsa could see - almost taste - the dark magic that gave them life. It dripped from their bones like the black oil she had seen creeping over Sieghard's hand, trapping the Amethyst wind like a caged beast and breaking it to its purpose. At the edge of hearing, she almost thought she could hear voices again - rustling whispers like the wind in the reeds...

[Northern Lad]

Viggo Hirtzel

Viggo's eyes nearly popped at the horror of seeing the dead soldiers baring down on them so remorselessly. He shook so violently in fear that it was all he could do to not drop his sword or torch.

"We're trapped! We're trapped!" He screamed in terror. "Oh Gods! Please no!" he futilely begged the nearest walking corpse.

[-Sentinel-]

"One of these days, Viggo," Elsa growled, "I'd like you to actually do something useful."

The Winds still grasped in her mind (a concept that was hard to explain to non-spellcasters), the pyromancer released them in a small, concentrated blast of fire at the skeleton that was threatening Ludo.

Target Number 5 (thanks to last round's successful Channelling): [roll0]
Damage: [roll1] :smallyuk:

Channelling again: [roll2]

Her spell began fizzling out as soon as it left her outstretched hand; by the time it hit its target, most of its heat had dissipated.

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

They shouldn't be moving, Sieghard thought, watching the skeletons advance. Somehow these were worse than the troll. Perhaps it was that they were once men or maybe just that they were closer, but something about them unnerved him.

"Protect my sides. If I drop that torch, it goes out. You don't want that."

"Right," Sieghard muttered, pulling himself to his senses. Can dead men be killed? he wondered.

Swift attack against the same skeleton Elsa attacked.

49 BS +20 (close range) -10 (shields) = 59 to hit

Messed up attack rolls and redid them OOC. Rolled 69.
[roll0]

Rolled 20.
[roll1]

Quickdraw shield

Comeon Sieghard, don't suck this turn.

[LCP]

Sieghard's arrows and Elsa's damp squib of a spell did nothing to stop the dead men's relentless march. Spears stabbed forwards as the first rank made contact, and it became clear as glass that they had no intention of letting these intruders leave alive.

The Tileans both took blows to the head, their steel helmets saving them from worse injury. Falling back in terror, Ludo avoided the verdigrised spearhead that thrust down towards him, while Stoutheart set up a furious barking. More spears came stabbing for Elsa and Adelbert, the scribe taking a spear to the shoulder that his mail shirt mercifully turned aside.

They weren't fast, or skilled, but they fought methodically and they fought together. With the ranks of the undead bearing down on him, Cesar raised his weapons to defend himself.

"Give them the gold!" he screamed, stepping out of the path of another spear-thrust. "Give them the gold!"

OOC: Map:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v700/LordChilipepa/Chamber_zps6c8f081c.png (http://smg.photobucket.com/user/LordChilipepa/media/Chamber_zps6c8f081c.png.html)

[LeSwordfish]

You're going to die here.

That was all that was in Ludo's head as he backed away from the advancing undead. You're going to die here in the dark with a handful of gold and a dead man's sword.

Ludo dodged the spear-thrust by inches and instinct, nearly tripping over his bag of coins. You're going to die here. Besides him, Elsa's spell fizzled out. You're going to die here, and your father will have been right all along.

That got him moving. Holding his dagger to block another spear-thrust, Ludo swung his purloined scimitar towards the skeleton approaching on him. It did nothing, but the thought was there.

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

"Give them the gold!"

"Oh, that's going to stop them!" Sieghard shouted back, trying in vain to get his sword around the skeleton's shield. "Maybe we should've emptied our pouches and given our money to the troll as well. There's as many of us as there are of them. Are the men of the Iron Company such poor soldiers that dead men can outfight them?"

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

Adelbert seemed scarcely aware of the world around him, having gone catatonic with fear. He glanced dazedly at the skeleton who had attacked him but otherwise seemed lost.

[Northern Lad]

Viggo Hirtzel

The light cast from the torch he carried seemed to cast the skeletal warriors in an even more grusome aspect as they began stabbing at Adelbert. The scribe seemed rooted to the spot as they attacked.

Taking a deep breath and trying to remember Sieghards lessons, he strengthend his resolve and came to his friends aid. High, low, High.. Thrust!

OOC

Half Action: Aim
Half Action: Attack Skelly Welly VI!

Weapon Skill: 37 + 10 - [roll0]
Damage - [roll1]

[-Sentinel-]

When Sieghard spoke, Elsa absent-mindedly nodded in assent. Sweat trickled down her temples as she concentrated to shape another fireball to hurl at the skeleton right in front of her.

Channelling 58: [roll0]

Magic Dart 6+: [roll1]
Damage: [roll2]

This time the Winds answered her command better than last time; flame poured forth from her fingers, eating at the skeleton's bones.

[LCP]

"Are the men of the Iron Company such poor soldiers that dead men can outfight them?"

Cesar cursed in Tilean, too busy fending off his attacker for a retort. Striking aside the skeleton's spearhead, he shouted over his shoulder to Orfeo.

<Orfeo! Orfeo, get up, damn you! Orfeo, do your job!> Another clang as he struck aside the stabbing spear. <Protect the lady!>

The skeletons didn't shout. The skeletons fought in silence, the stamp of their feet and the rattle of their ancient wargear the only sounds they made. As Orfeo cowered with his hands over his head, whimpering pleas to the gods, the line of dead men pressed inexorably forwards.

A spearhead gouged Elsa's cheek, wrenching her head to the left. More spears stabbed into the cringing Orfeo, and another bit into Viggo's leg even as the minstrel scored a hit that cracked bone.

OOC: Map:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v700/LordChilipepa/Chamber_zpsc5678954.png (http://smg.photobucket.com/user/LordChilipepa/media/Chamber_zpsc5678954.png.html)

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

The sound of breaking bone next to him finally snapped Adelbert out of his shock and fear. He still trembled slightly and his skin was still very pale but the scribe was in control of himself again.

Taking a moment to calculate the blow he thrust his sword at the skeleton Viggo had already 'wounded' if one could truly do that to the dead.

OOC:
Adelbert is going to aim and make a Standard Attack on Skeleton VI.

To hit: [roll0] vs. 46
To damage: [roll1]

[-Sentinel-]

A spearhead gouged Elsa's cheek, wrenching her head to the left.
That's gonna leave a mark, thought Elsa, more angry than anything else. Even the satisfaction of revenge would be denied her, since the skeleton had no understanding of justice. She wished they were still fighting goblins.

Channelling 58: [roll0]

Magic Dart 6+: [roll1] - Argh. WP test in the OOC thread.
Damage: [roll2]

Red-hot pain seared through her mind as she tried and failed to call up another fireball. The necromantic magic around here was messing with her concentration.

[Northern Lad]

Viggo Hirtzel

Viggo cried out as the red hot pain shot through his thigh, he instinctively grasped at the fresh gash, dropping the torch as he did so. He steadied himself, swearing profusely.

Confronted now by two attackers, he snatched the long dagger that hung on his hip into his free hand before launching himself forwards on his left leg. He yelled out incoherently, lashing out with his sword, desperately trying to find a way past the wall presented by the shield of his attacker.

OOC


Hoping dropping torch doesn't put it out!

Quick Draw: Ready Dagger
Half Action: Aim
Half Action: Attack Skeleton VI

Weaponskill: 37 + 10 - [roll0]
Damage: [roll1]

[LCP]

Sieghard had never used shields this big when they were training. Viggo's sword bit into the shield's rim and stuck for a moment too long - before he could retrieve it, the undead soldier had smashed its shield forwards, throwing him reeling backwards. Stepping into the space it had created, it stabbed overarm with its spear, catching Viggo before he could duck. Sharp pain lanced through his head, and he felt blood dripping down through his hair.

Over on the right, the others weren't faring much better - their attacks were rebounding from the wall of ancient shields, and Ludo was bleeding from a head wound of his own. Orfeo was still cowering, crawling away from his skeletal attackers on hands and knees as they tried to find a way through his mail.

Up ahead, there was a tremendous crash as Cesar managed to get inside the guard of his enemy's shield. Hacking and chopping with a desperate fury, the Tilean broke the deathless thing apart, sending its bones cascading into the empty pit with a sound like a sack of xylophones falling down a well. It had come to pieces surprisingly easily.

OOC: Map:http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v700/LordChilipepa/Chamber_zpsbdae10c3.png (http://smg.photobucket.com/user/LordChilipepa/media/Chamber_zpsbdae10c3.png.html)

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

Adelbert nearly cheered as Cesar finally brought down one of the deathless legion but the sounds of celebration died on his lips as Viggo took more damage beside him. He calculated his next strike, then thrust at their common opponent, hoping to turn into a pile of crumbling bones.

OOC
Adelbert is going to Aim and make a Standard Attack on Skeleton VI.

To hit: [roll1d100[/roll] vs. 46
To damage: [roll0]

[LeSwordfish]

Putting aside the blood pouring into his eyes for a second, Ludo hurled himself at the skeleton between himself and Sieghard, swinging Lammenbert's blade like a dervish. As far as he could tell, he got at least one hit in, although he had no idea how much good it was doing.

[-Sentinel-]

Blood streaming down her face, her head pounding with pain from the backlash of her failed spell, Elsa staggered backwards. She needed to focus if they were to survive this battle, and for this she needed to be more than a spear-length away from the enemy.


OOC:
Disengage one square north.

[LCP]

As Elsa broke free, her attacker tried to press forwards after her. Sieghard blocked its path, but as the line of shields advanced Orfeo found himself trapped against the bed. With nowhere left to crawl, the Tilean seemed to find his courage at last.

Pushing himself to his feet, he struck aside a thrusting spear and threw his whole weight forwards against the skeletal warrior's broad shield. Dry bones were no match for the armoured mercenary's weight, and the dead thing pitched back into the pit with a clattering crash.

On the other flank, Cesar put his sword through the ribs of one of the skeletons attacking Viggo. It looked at him as if he had only tapped it politely on the shoulder, then turned on its new enemy. Behind it, its two brothers kept up the pressure on Viggo and Adelbert. Viggo barely avoided being skewered by a pitted spearhead, striking the weapon aside the way Sieghard had taught him.

OOC: I heard you like maps.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v700/LordChilipepa/Chamber_zpsd87533fc.png (http://smg.photobucket.com/user/LordChilipepa/media/Chamber_zpsd87533fc.png.html)

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

With a cry of frustration and an appeal to any listening deities Adelbert through caution to the winds and lashed out at the grinning undead before him.

OOC:
Adelbert is going to make an All Out Attack on Skeleton VI.

To hit: [roll0] vs. 56
To damage: [roll1]

[Northern Lad]

Viggo Hirtzel

Viggo could feel his right leg beginning to give way beneath him, trembling as the pain lashing through his wounded thigh intensified. To make matters worse blood was now streaming down into his eyes, obscuring his vision. It's just like the Caerfort road all over again!, he thought grimly. He'd been wounded across the scalp that time too.

The terror and horror he'd been experiencing was slowly being replaced by something else. A grim sense of determination. A will to live. Anger, at these twisted nightmares that saw fit to attack perfectly innocent minstrels who had done no wrong and meant no harm to anybody.

Focusing his anger on the back of the skeleton which had turned to attack Cesar, Viggo flung himself at his opponent. Slashing at it ferociously, trying to drive it back towards the edge of the pit.

OOC


Half Action: Attack Skeleton #8
Half Action: Manoeuvre #8 1 Square South towards the pit. Viggo will follow up if successful.

Attack: WS 37 - [roll0] - Miss!
Damage: [roll1]

Manoeuvre: Viggo - [roll2] vs #8 - [roll3] - Failed!

[-Sentinel-]

Now with some welcome breathing room, Elsa ran a gloved hand on her face to wipe the blood (only succeeding in spreading it more evenly) and called up another fireball to hurl at the skeleton directly facing her.

Channelling 58: [roll0]

Magic Dart 6+: [roll1]
Damage: [roll2]

[LCP]

Elsa's spell burst her target's skull in a splash of sooty flames. Falling apart by pieces, its age-worn bones pattered to the floor, letting its shield and spear fall one after the other.

Redoubling his efforts, Orfeo pitched into the melee, trying to stop any more skeletons from stepping up to take the fallen one's place. He scored a couple of telling hits, cracking ancient bones with the edge of his sword. Raising its shield to cover itself, the undead thing retreated - and Elsa saw the gleam of the bronze trumpet at its hip.

Before Orfeo could press the advantage, the skeleton beside it had stepped across to block the Tilean's pursuit. Its spear grazed Orfeo's helmet, but the blow failed to draw blood. Over on the other right, there came another hollow crash as Adelbert smashed another of their undead attackers to pieces.

With three of their number destroyed and one scratching fruitlessly at the walls of the pit, the skeletons were being forced onto the defensive. Still they fought on like automatons, their empty eye-sockets devoid of fear or human feeling.

OOC: Map:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v700/LordChilipepa/Chamber_zpsb10b536f.png (http://smg.photobucket.com/user/LordChilipepa/media/Chamber_zpsb10b536f.png.html)

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

"Someone stop the trumpeter!" Adelbert yelled desperately. Far too far away to stop it himself he concentrated on the oppenent closest to hand, trying to hack his way through it without subtlety or finnese.

OOC:
Adelbert makes an All Out Attack on Skeleton #8. I'm assuming at least a two to one bonus and possibly a three to one if Cesar is helping so the target is either 66 or 76.

Roll to Hit: [roll0]
Roll to Damage: [roll1]

Messed up damage roll - see OOC.

[Northern Lad]

Viggo Hirtzel

He was vaguely aware of Adelbert shouting about trumpets but Viggo refused to let himself dwell upon the scribe's musical leanings. He nearly succumbed to a brief spark of panic as he felt himself wobble on his wounded leg once again. Any second now my leg is going to give out and then I'm going to end up dead and skewered!

With a wordless cry of frustration and anger he redoubled his efforts to push back at the skeleton before him, desperate to return it to the embrace of Morr.

OOC


Half Action: Attack #8
Half Action: Manoeuvre #8 1 Square South towards the pit. Viggo will not follow and stay put where he is if successful!

Attack: WS 37 - [roll0] - Miss!
Damage: [roll1]

Manoeuvre: Viggo - [roll2] vs #8 - [roll3] - Failed!

[LeSwordfish]

As the skeleton next to him was cut down, Ludo changed tack, hurling himself against the other's shield, hoping with bodyweight and force to drive it back. He really only bounced off, but it was a sterling effort.

[-Sentinel-]

Elsa's next spell, directed at the skeleton straight ahead, failed to muster enough heat to do more than slightly singe her target's bones.

Channelling 58: [roll0]

Magic Dart 6+: [roll1]
Damage: [roll2]

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

"Someone stop the trumpeter!"

"Trumpeter?" Sieghard muttered. His eyes shot from skeleton to skeleton until he noticed the cracked instrument on the belt of one that was moving away. Sidestepping Orfeo, he reached for his bow and sent an arrow flying towards it.

[LCP]

Sieghard's arrow struck its target in the chest, passing between two ribs and through the space where a man's heart would have been. Glancing off the inside of the skeleton's spine, it hardly seemed to inconvenience the dead soldier.

Passing its spear into its shield hand, the skeleton drew the long bronze horn from the rotted belt that hung over its pelvis. It raised the trumpet to its lipless jaws, and impossibly, it blew - a wailing martial note that echoed deafeningly in the stone-walled confines of the chamber.

It was a good five seconds before the echoes died away - but when they had, its call was answered. Back beyond the darkness of the corridor, their echoes carrying and mingling through the crumbling hallways, other trumpeters were sounding the alarm.

The party were holding their own, keeping the stabbing spears of the three skeletons still fighting at bay - but now it seemed reinforcements were on their way.

OOC: You're in trouble now! (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RvX-EotU-Ss#t=02m03s)

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v700/LordChilipepa/Chamber_zps3360f0a4.png (http://smg.photobucket.com/user/LordChilipepa/media/Chamber_zps3360f0a4.png.html)

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

Adelbert felt his stomach drop at the sounds of that trumpet. Then the scribe gritted his teeth and once again hacked at the nearest skeleton. He was not going to go down without a fight!

OOC:
Adelbert makes an All Out Attack on Skeleton #8.

To Hit: [roll0]
Damage: [roll1]

[-Sentinel-]

Grim resignation took hold of Elsa. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath.

Oh, for the love of...

"Been a pleasure knowing you all," she said with uncharacteristic gravity, readying another blast of fire.

Channelling 58: [roll0]

Magic Dart 6+: [roll1] - Passed thanks to channelling
Damage: [roll2] - :smallmad:

Her spell petered out halfway to its target. This gods-forsaken place was messing with the Aethyr.

[LeSwordfish]

His bodyslam stymied, Ludo lashed out again with his sword.

"This is becoming bad. This is becoming really bad."

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

Sieghard stared dumbfounded at the skeleton. That shot would've killed any living foe, but the abomination didn't even seem to have noticed it had been hit. He broke free of his stupor when the trumpet sounded.

"We need to run. We need to get out of here, now!" he shouted. There was an edge of panic in his voice.

Lets see... Maths... #3 should be at 5 wounds because of Orfeo's attack last round. Elsa hit for 1, Ludo for 3... 8 wounds...

Sieghard fires an arrow at a skeleton (#3 if Orfeo fails to finish it before Sieghard's turn comes; #8 if 3 is dead and Viggo/Cesar doesn't kill #8; and #4 if 3 and 8 are both dead.) and moves towards the door. If we get really lucky and 3, 4, and 8 are all dead, Sieghard moves 3 spaces southwest and one space south (grabbing the trumpet along the way), otherwise he moves one space east and 3 spaces southeast.

A bit convoluted, but I'm trying to account for as many possibilities as I can.

[roll0] vs 39/59 (Point blank on all 3 and I didn't forget the shields this time :smallbiggrin:. Shooting into melee penalty against #3 or #8 if theyr'e still standing.)
[roll1]

[Northern Lad]

Viggo Hirtzel

Desperate to keep the spear from jabbing into him again, Viggo kept moving despite the increasingly worrying throb in his thigh. Upon hearing the trumpet and its brothers wailing response, he groaned mournfully and yelled out even as he redoubled his efforts to see off his attacker. "Oh Gods, if we weren't before, we're bloody dead now! We have to get out of this cursed bloody tomb before any more of these things turn up!"

OOC


Half Action: Aim
Half Action: Attack

Attack WS 37 + 10Aim -[roll0] - Miss!
Damage - [roll1]

[LCP]

Nocking another arrow to his bow, Sieghard let fly at the skeleton fighting Orfeo. This time, his shot hit the undead soldier squarely in the forehead, shattering the front of its skull. The eerie corpse-lights dying in its fractured eye-sockets, the skeleton collapsed to the floor in a rain of bones.

Quite unfazed, the trumpeter stepped up to take its place. Sieghard wasn't hanging around to try another shot at that one - darting left, he dodged under the stabbing spear of the skeleton that had Viggo pinned in the corner, and in one glorious second he was free.

For the others, still trapped behind the broad shields and stabbing spears of the skeleton warriors, escape might not be so easy. As if to drive home the point, Adelbert's opponent took advantage of the scribe's overextending himself. Its spearhead gouged his cheek and nicked his ear - any further to the right and it would have pierced his skull.

OOC: http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v700/LordChilipepa/Chamber_zps94177b3a.png (http://smg.photobucket.com/user/LordChilipepa/media/Chamber_zps94177b3a.png.html)

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

Adelbert nearly wept in pain and fear. He wanted nothing more than to take to his heels and follow Sieghard... but he knew he could not abandon Viggo. gritting his teeth he sliced at the wretched skeleton confronting Cesar.

OOC:
Aim & Standard Attack on Skeleton #8

To Hit: [roll0] vs. 46
To Damage: [roll1]

[Northern Lad]

Viggo Hirtzel

"Sieghard! Sieghard! Wait for me!" Viggo called out as he saw the mercenary weaving between his attacker and Cesar. "Don't go without me!"

He gritted his teeth against the pain once more, his swings were becoming wilder now as he tried to find away around his attackers defenses. "Adelbert, we have got to kill these things, now!"

OOC


Half Action: Aim
Half Action: Attack

Attack: WS 37 + 10Aim - [roll0] - Miss!
Damage: [roll]1d10+2[roll]

Edit: Literally as bad as it could get! :smallfrown:

[-Sentinel-]

"Out of the way, you!" Elsa snarled at the skeleton ahead of her, once more trying to shape a spell out of the Chamon- and Dhar-saturated Winds of this place.

Channelling: [roll0]

Magic Dart 6+: [roll1]
Damage: [roll2]


AUGH. :furious:

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

Sieghard glanced back, disappointed to see that the others hadn't followed.

"Hurry or we're all going to die!" he called out, aiming another arrow at the skeleton still threatening his companions.

When his shot missed, he considered continuing his retreat, but something stopped him. Perhaps it was the fact that the others didn't seem to have the good sense to escape while they still could, or maybe it was the fact that in his haste to get closer to the door, Sieghard had left his pack and gold behind. Probably the latter... Something about leaving the riches behind made escape seem less appealing.

Reluctantly, he reached for his sword and shield again.

[LCP]

While the others struggled ineffectually against the skeletal soldiers, Elsa's guards were proving their worth. Orfeo drove the point of his sword up through the empty jaws of the skeleton confronting him and Ludo, piercing its skull and sending it clattering to the stone floor. That was the last of them on the right - only a jumbled pile of bones and the one damaged creature scratching at the bottom of the pit remained.

Over on the left, things were not looking as good. Cesar failed to get past the first skeleton's shield, and Adelber's attacker wounded him in the arm. His mail shirt saved him from the worst of it, but he could feel his own warm blood running down inside the cold metal links.

OOC: http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v700/LordChilipepa/Chamber_zpsa2489784.png (http://smg.photobucket.com/user/LordChilipepa/media/Chamber_zpsa2489784.png.html)

[Northern Lad]

Viggo Hirtzel

Viggo's breath was now coming out in short quick rasps. Blood and sweat mingled together, flattening his blond hair flat to his scalp, running down his face and doing their best to blind him.

His strength was leaving him now, his shoulders ached damnably and every time he moved, the weight of his pack nearly threw him off balance. He swung once more at the skeleton before him, acutely aware that the blow lacked the force of his earlier blows. "Why won't you just die?!" He screamed as he swung, unaware of the irony of the question.

OOC


You know the script! :smallbiggrin:

Half Action: Aim
Half Action: Attack

Attack: WS 37 + 10Aim - [roll0]
Damage: [roll1]

Edit: I... I.. Don't even...! Arghhhhh! :smallfurious:

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

Unable to believe how poorly they were faring against the skeletal men Adelbert sliced again at the one he and Viggo were fighting, and losing against.

OOC:
Aim & Standard Attack on Skeleton #8

To Hit: [roll0] vs. 46
To Damage: [roll1]

:smallsigh:

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

Sieghard clenched his teeth in frustration. The skeletons were annoyingly difficult to bring down and their time was limited before more arrived. He knew the best chance to survive was to run while there was still time.

"Dammit, you two..." he grumbled before charging.

Quickdraw sword and charge attack against #8 (if alive) or #7. End the charge south of whichever one so I'm only in contact with one of them.

[roll0] vs 41 +10 (charging) +10 (Outnumbering 2:1)
[roll1]

[-Sentinel-]

Right. We're done here.

Elsa hurried over to where she had left her gold-filled backpack and shouldered it. At least they wouldn't be getting out of here empty-handed.


OOC
Movement to wherever I left the backpack (near the chest, I presume) + Ready action to grab it.

[LCP]

Crashing into the skeleton from behind, Sieghard put it down with a hard chop to the back of the neck. Its skull bounced and rolled across the stone floor, and Orfeo and Cesar spared the mercenary a nod of acknowledgement before charging into the last of the things left attacking Adelbert. Their blades cracked its ancient bones, but it remained standing.

Ludo meanwhile had grabbed his sack of gold - and found it heavier than he expected. His efforts to lift it instead only succeeded in dragging it along the floor. He'd never dealt with so much filthy lucre before, but it seemed to him that a world in which you could overfill a sack of gold could only be the work of cruel and mocking gods.

At the bottom of the pit, the skeleton that Orfeo had knocked over the edge was still scratching and scrabbling. If it kept up its efforts it would surely wear its finger-bones to stubs... but that didn't seem to bother it.

OOC: http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v700/LordChilipepa/Chamber_zpsf25703f3.png (http://smg.photobucket.com/user/LordChilipepa/media/Chamber_zpsf25703f3.png.html)

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

I thought have time for this! Adelbert thought in desperation, his minds eye filled with advancing undead legions. With one last defiant swipe of his sword he moved towards the stairs as fast as his gold filled backpack would let him.

[LeSwordfish]

"Let's go let's go lets go!" Ludo said, shaking handfuls of coin out of his bag and onto the floor. He refused to get nothing out of this trip.

Ludo is going to keep trying to lighten his bag enough to carry it, shaking out some gold and trying to lift it. Intelligence test: [roll0] vs 48. If this takes only a half action, Ludo will move towards the door with the rest of his turn.

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

Sieghard grabbed his pack and made for the doorway.

"Which way? Back the way we came or down?"

[-Sentinel-]

"The way we came, I say," said Elsa, heading out of the room with barely a look over her shoulder to see if the others were following. "Not getting stuck in another dead-end."

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

"Might run into more of them coming for us if we go that way." Sieghard replied. "Same could be said for going down, though... Just don't let your guard down til we've gotten out of here."

[LeSwordfish]

"At least we know how to get out that way." Ludo pointed out, ignoring for now the second army.

[Northern Lad]

Viggo Hirtzel

Viggo almost whimpered in relief as Sieghard finally dispatched his rictus faced attacker. "Thank you Sieghard, thank you! Sigmar Bless you!" He called out as the mercenary moved off to collect his pack.

Sheathing his long dagger he quickly stooped to pick up the torch, almost singeing his fingers in the process. Limping past the backs of Cesar and Orfeo and following in Adelberts' footsteps he called out once more as they made their way to the exit. "Elsa's right, lets just get out of this hell hole the same way we came in!" Sparing a glance over his shoulder at the embattled soldiers, he urged them on. "Orfeo! Cesar! Kill the motherless son of a goat! Hurry!"

OOC


Quick Draw: Pick up Torch
Half Action:Move
Half Action Move

Viggo will move into an adjacent (either beside or behind) square to wherever Adelbert ended up.

[LCP]

Orfeo obliged with a back-handed blow of his sword's pommel, shattering the skeleton's skull against the wall. As it collapsed to the floor in a heap of bones, Cesar looked round for Elsa.

"Signora!" he shouted. "We go!"

On the other side of the pit, Sieghard had run into a little trouble. Feeling the weight of his pack as he made to pick it up, he heaved it up off the floor anyway - he wasn't some puny halfling, to be crippled by a heavy bag. There was an ominous rrrrrip as he did - and the bottom of his pack gave way, spilling its contents onto the floor in a cascade of golden coins.

At the bottom of the pit, the surviving skeleton scratched and scrabbled. It seemed to have found a handhold.

[LeSwordfish]

"Leave it!" Ludo urged. "We'll come back!"

Ludo darted a little way down the corridor to the intersection, peering into each darkened passageway. "Let's go lets go!"

Can Ludo lift his bag yet? If not, consider him to keep trying that. [roll0] vs 48. Otherwise, he's going to the intersection of the corridor to see if he can see/hear anything from the darkness: [roll1] vs 48. Ludo has Night Vision.

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

"Come on my friend!" Adelbert urged Sieghard, moving to the intersection and trying to get a bearing on the right way to flee.

OOC:
Perception Test: [roll0] vs. 66 (Int 46+20 for Acute Hearing)

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

Sieghard stared at the spilled coins. Somehow the sight filled him with as much dread as the dead men had.

"Go, I'll catch up. If you have another torch, light it and leave it for me." He knew it was madness the moment he said it, but he didn't care. More gold had spilled out of his bag than he had ever seen in one place anywhere else in his life. He couldn't get it all back, but surely he could grab some of it while there was still time.

If any of you want to try to stop Sieghard from being stupid, he can be persuaded depending on how you go about it. If Adelbert or Ludo hear or see anything that suggests the skeleton's reinforcements are closer than we'd like and say as much, that'd to it. Even if not lying would probably work. Other ideas might do it too, if you have them.

[LCP]

Frantically scooping handfuls of coins into his leather cap, Sieghard hesitated as he heard a different noise from below. The skeleton's futile scrabbling had stopped. It had found purchase on the smooth walls and was halfway out of the pit. Clutching the meagre amount he had managed to save to his chest, he dashed after the others.

Adelbert was finding the weight of his own pack rather more than he'd anticipated. The gold shifted as he walked, jingling like the bells on a jester's cap. Much as he hated to admit it, it was definitely slowing him down.

Standing at the junction of the stairs and the corridor, he lingered for a moment, straining his ears for any sign of enemies. Just there, he thought he could hear - the rapid tramp of marching feet, approaching the way they had come.

The sound was rapidly replaced by Sieghard calling a warning as the skeleton behind them levered itself over the edge of the empty pool.

OOC: TheSummoner, feel free to roll yourself for recovered coins.

Adelbert is encumbered, -1 movement with his current pack weight.

[Northern Lad]

Viggo Hirtzel

Viggo had come sliding to halt besides Adelbert and Ludo at the intersection, but he was not very happy at the delay. "Sod that lads! Keep moving!" He set off at a lurching run down the corridor, his torch held high. He looked over his shoulder as he ran, hoping the others would keep up.

His leg was still threatening to give way beneath him, but Viggo's fear lent him the strength to carry on in his flight from this dreadful place. For now."Sieghard don't worry about the bloody coins! Get us out of here alive and there's enough gold in my pack to keep us both like kings!"

OOC

Full Action: Run! He'll flee down the corridor in the direction of the stairs they came up. If Viggo see any skeletons approaching from that direction he'll skid to a halt and immediately turn and start running back towards the others!

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

"Come on, down the stairs!" Adelbert hissed, moving down the near set of stairs. He was bitterly aware his gold was slowing him down but given how badly wounded he was he was unwilling to give it up until he absolutely had to - he'd earned that gold the hard way.

[LCP]

Yards ahead of Adelbert, Viggo hardly heard the scribe's call to go the other way. What stopped him faster was the hint of movement in the corridor up ahead - and then as he slowed, the pinpricks of greenish light that began to appear through the shadows. The gold in his pack rattled and clinked as he turned and fled back towards the others, leaving the stumbling skeleton that had clawed its way out of the pit in his dust.

The stairs were steep, and their rapid footfalls filled the echoing stairwell with their sound as the seven of them fled down into the depths. Somewhere behind them, a horn wailed again - but it seemed their skeletal pursuers were no more capable of sudden turns of speed than the lumbering beast that had pursued them in. Soon they were alone in the dark, the blue flame of Elsa's spear and the fitful crackle of Viggo's torch casting different shades of shadow over the stone steps.

They reached the bottom, and found themselves faced with a blank stone wall. A bronze dish with a cracked residue of what might once have been lamp oil at the bottom stood next to it, while an open arch to the left led into a little cubby-hole or vestry. Part of the ceiling inside it had collapsed, littering the floor with rocky rubble. What sparse furnishings it might have had had clearly been destroyed in the collapse, leaving only a few pieces of rotting wood scattered over the floor.

On examination, the wall was not so blank. Under the light of Elsa's spell, a thin seam in the masonry showed the outline of a door - carefully crafted to sit flush with the wall, and at the very least faced with stone.

As Viggo brought up the rear and the clinking of coins that accompanied their movements stopped, Ludo strained his ears to listen. Sure enough,there were steady footsteps on the stairs behind them...

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

"Ludo you're the archaeologist... what do you make of this as an exit?" Adelbert asks, the scribes voice strained with barely supressed fear.

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

"Of course." He set his coins on the ground. Even trapped as they were, he took care not to let any more of them spill.

He turned to Cesar. "Help me hold them off. We'll take as many with us as we can before we die."

[LeSwordfish]

Ludo froze, his heart pounding, before he started to move again. "I need light." He reached out sharply and took Viggo's torch, and began to use it to inspect the wall, the bowl, the ruined furniture- anything that could possibly help them.

"It's big. I bet it's heavy. Is there a handle? I doubt you can just push it. Can you?"

Behind him, Stoutheart growled up into the darkness.

OOC
Okay, a horrifying dead end puzzle!

Firstly, unless Viggo stops him, Ludo will take his torch and use it to look more closely.

Search test! Anything that's not been mentioned so far. [roll0] vs 48.

Additionally, Perception/Intelligence test: Can Ludo tell what the furniture in the annexe was? [roll1] vs 48.

Next, Ludo will follow the crack around the door around the edge, to see if there's anything that looks like a hinge, lock, handle, or even a damaged area that he could fit his crowbar in.

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

At Ludo's mention of a handle Adelbert glanced over the door more closely. He had no illusions he'd find anything but if there was any chance at all...

OOC:
(Untrained) Search Test

[roll0] versus 23

[LCP]

Neither Ludo nor Adelbert could see any sign of a handle. With only the moisture and stale air in this place to act on it, the seam had not suffered much erosion either - its edges were still reasonably intact. There were a few places where perhaps the point of a crowbar would fit.

The footsteps on the stairs were coming closer. They stamped in time like a regiment on parade.

OOC: The remains in the annexe room look like they might once have been some kind of wardrobe or dresser. They're just bits now.

From the corrosion and dust, the bowl looks as old as everything else in this place - which is really, really old.

[LeSwordfish]

Ludo drew his crowbar out, and rammed it into the gap. "Does this move at all?"

[roll0] vs 21 Strength. Even if Ludo fails, he's going to see if the leverage makes the door move even the slightest bit.

[LCP]

To Ludo's amazement, the door offered almost no resistance. Its hidden bearings were a little stiff, but for a solid slab of stone it swung back with remarkable ease - to reveal another wall.

At least, that was how it looked at first glance. In fact, Ludo realised, he was looking at the back of a free-standing obelisk. Stepping over the threshold and raising Viggo's torch over his head, he found himself looking at the high walls and deep shadows of another pillared hall.

Crafted to blend into the wall and placed behind the obelisk, their door had clearly been designed for subtle entrances. The hall, by contrast, was a work of deliberately imposing architecture. Though not quite as high or long as the atrium the troll had chased them through, Ludo immediately got the sense that this place had served a far more important function.

Ranged along either side of the hall, stone stelae like the one behind which they were standing towered as tall as giants. On the face of each monument, enormous humanoid figures had been carved in sunken relief. Always depicted in profile, it was difficult to make out details past the pool of light cast by the torch - but there was something about their strangely varying shapes that suggested something monstrous through the shadows.

In the centre of the room, two empty pools like the ones in the treasure chamber - but much larger and deeper - stood to either side of a broad flight of stone steps. The steps led up to a dais, the collapsed remains of rotted banner-poles still adorning its corners. At the back of the dais, a walled sanctuary stood - a room within a room. Its square entrance was empty and dark. It backed onto rear wall - perhaps a dead end, perhaps a passage deeper into the rock.

At the opposite end of the hall, on their right, a square archway opened into darkness. If Ludo's sense of direction still held true, that was the way back to the hall of pillars - and whatever might still be waiting there...

Elsa Only
As soon as she stepped into the new hall, Elsa felt a chill inside her chest. Everywhere she turned, she could see the black oil she had seen in the courtyard - oozing from the cracks in the masonry, running like tears from the eyes of the shadowed idols. Darkness had saturated this place, and never relinquished its grip.

Doing her best not to reel from the strength of the impression, she caught a glimmer of reflected torchlight from the sanctum on the raised dais - and knew immediately that it was the centrepoint from which the darkness came. It pulled at her like a lodestone, the rustling whispers of the marsh rising again in her ears until she could hardly hear the others speak...

OOC: Most of the hall is in darkness - what is described are the gross features you can make out at the limits of the torch's light. If you want to look for other details, feel free to roll Perception. Then again, you may just want to leg it as fast as you can!

[LeSwordfish]

Ludo nearly fell over as the door opened. He was no engineer, but bearings that were smooth after this long must be very impressive indeed.

As was this room. Passing Viggo's torch back and slipping his crowbar in with the bag of gold, Ludo fought down a strong compulsion to ascend the stairs and look into the anteroom.

"Let's get out of here. We can look at the architecture later. We will look at the architecture later." He was determined to come back, with an army if necessary. He couldn't resist inspecting the wall drawings as the torchlight passed them, though.

OOC
Perception test for Ludo: [roll0] vs 48. Ludo has Night Vision, but he's no longer carrying a source of light.

In addition, what can Ludo hear from the doorway towards the exit?

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

"Let's jam the door behind us." Adelbert said, hurrying after Ludo. "Might buy us a few moments at least. Can we do anything?"

He turned and looked at the door he'd just come through, trying to tell if he could jam it with anything.

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

Sieghard watched in amazement as Ludo pried opened what had appeared to be a solid stone wall. Deciding better than to question it, he picked up his cap full of coins and hurried through.

"Maybe there's something we can block the passage with."

[roll0] vs 36 Perception. Sieghard also has Night Vision.

Edit: Rolling as well as ever I see, Sieghard. Well, maybe if we just shut the thing, they won't know about the passage. Or maybe someone else will succeed where Sieghard failed.

[-Sentinel-]

Elsa's face was very pale in the flickering flame on her spear.

"This room," she said, out of breath from the running, no longer trying to conceal her fear. "It's the source of this place's darkness. It comes from over there." She pointed at the sanctuary.

Elsa has no problem taking the time to roll Perception, as she's now hesitating. She won't be the first into the sanctuary.

Int 45: [roll0] - narrowly failed.

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

"What do you mean?" Sieghard asked, unnerved by the tone of Elsa's voice. He had thought a woman like her would be too stubborn to know fear.

[-Sentinel-]

Elsa gesticulated impatiently. "I mean that whatever magic makes the dead walk, it comes from over there. No idea what we'll find there; not sure I want to know." She bit her lip. "We're running out of options, though."

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

"Is it something that can be killed... Or destroyed? Would our chances be better against the dead men?"

He had no understanding of this sort of thing and that more than anything else made him uncomfortable. All he could do was trust the judgement of someone who did.

[LeSwordfish]

Ludo paused. "We might have to fight our way out of the main entrance- it's worth a look."

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

Adelbert looked exhausted and frightened and only barely keeping himself on his feet. "Let's... let's see if we can destroy whatever is causing this. It might be our only chance."

He moved hesitatingly towards the sanctuary.

[LCP]

Orfeo and Cesar looked to Elsa. They weren't going anywhere she wasn't.

[-Sentinel-]

"Is it something that can be killed... Or destroyed? Would our chances be better against the dead men?" asked Sieghard.

Elsa shrugged. How could she possibly know?

"Let's... let's see if we can destroy whatever is causing this. It might be our only chance," Adelbert suggested.

Elsabeth's hesitation dissipated, and a somewhat maniacal grin spread over her face. Destroying things was what she was born to do. "I like the way you're thinking, Adelbert. Let's do this."

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

"May as well," Sieghard replied. "Whatever it is, it can't be any worse than trying to get through all of the dead."

[LeSwordfish]

"Can you two try and hold that door?" Ludo asked the two soldiers, "Or defend the bottom of the stairs? It's the best way to keep El-Beatrix safe."

With a bag of gold in his hand and the undead out of sight, Ludo was almost recovering his composure.

[LCP]

Orfeo snorted. "You mean best way to save your hide," he said. "I'm not dying for you, little man."

Cesar nodded. "Where she goes, we go."

Leaving the stairway at a trot, the party hurried out into the broad expanse of the hall. Sparing a glance backwards at the nearest of the giant stelae as they passed, Ludo could just make out its face, the limits of the torchlight casting long, black shadows from every line of the carving.

From the neck down, it had the body of a bare-chested, well-proportioned man... but the head that stood on its shoulders was the head of a vulture. Such an abomination could surely only be touched by Chaos... and yet the way it stood seemed more regal than savage.

There was something else too - a discreet, unornamented balcony that he could just make out running around the back of the carved obelisks, high off the ground. Unfortunately, Ludo didn't have time to linger. The sounds of pursuit had already reached the hidden door.

Bony feet falling in unison, skeletal soldiers began to file out into the hall, two by two. Emerging from behind the carving of the vulture god, they did not give chase. Instead they spread out, forming a broad line of shields and spears. Ludo counted seventeen, including one limping, battered specimen that looked like the one Orfeo had pitched into the pit.

Raising a trumpet to its grinning teeth, one skeleton sounded a mournful blast. When the endless echoes had at last died away, another sound answered them. Corroded hinges screamed, and the verdigrised bronze gates at the far end of the hall ground inwards as four skeletons pushed them slowly open, yellowed vertebrae standing out from their bent backs.

Through the archway, a column of the dead came marching. Twenty or more, some carried spears and tall shields like the ones before. Others held long axes with strange, crescent-shaped blades, the ancient metal dull and mottled with corrosion. More than one had sustained some kind of battle damage, split shields and broken ribs being much in evidence. It looked like the troll had not gone quietly.

At their head marched a skeleton in scale armour. Though bronze had lost its shine, and the cloak that hung from its shoulders was now little more than a rotted cobweb of linen strands, its attire clearly marked it as a leader. Viggo fancied the lights in its empty eye-sockets flared a little brighter when it caught sight of them.

Reaching to its hip, it drew a curved sword that flashed blue in the reflected light from Elsa's spear. Ludo recognised the blade at once - it was the same design as the strange sword in the chapel at Alvarran. Levelling the point towards the intruders, it made a dry, hissing sound, somewhere between a command and a death-rattle. The skeletons' spears swung down.

They didn't seem any faster than their brothers - indeed, the light was leaving them behind as Viggo and Elsa ran for the steps. Adelbert's heavy pack was making him lag behind, but even so there was a healthy space of floor between the seven fleeing mortals and both groups of skeletons. Unfortunately that didn't seem to discourage them. More bronze horns blared, and both regiments began to march inexorably forwards, as if to the beat of an invisible drum.

First up the stairs, Elsa darted through the darkened archway with her spear lighting the way - and saw to her relief that it had gates. Bronze-plated and quite substantial-looking, they hung open, but could hopefully be closed.

What she saw inside was less reassuring. The interior of the chapel, or shrine, or whatever it was, was a single room. Intricate reliefs marched clockwise around the walls, seeming to depict some sort of narrative. Incense bowls lay tumbled in the corners of the room, their stands knocked over or rotted to dust. At the back, a raised stone platform held three intact objects - an ornate wooden chair, an empty lectern, and a deep, thin chest, almost as long as a man. All had once been highly ornamented with gold and lapis lazuli, but the gilt was now cracked and peeling like the bark of a dead tree.

There was no other way in, and no other way out.

Elsa Only
Inside these walls, the Dhar was so thick it was hard to breathe. This was a wound in the world - a place that had transgressed against the laws of nature. The Amethyst wind had been broken and chained, forced to work against its nature - and those chains still held.

The rustling voices were all around, saturating the air. Elsa could no longer hear the sounds of the battle, nor could she understand the language they were speaking. There was only one word she could make out, from the frequency of its repetition alone - the word Nagash.

The voices were thickest around the lectern. To her second sight, the black oil seemed to be bleeding from its worm-eaten wood, bubbling up from the crevices between the flagstones beneath it. Just looking at it made her eyes ache.

OOC: Casting in this location comes with an extra Chaos die.

[Northern Lad]

Viggo Hirtzel

Viggo had been unusually silent, he'd been focusing on catching his breath at first and then the astonishment of finding a way out what had appeared to be a dead end had stolen his words also.

As the neat ranks of skeletons poured into the chamber though he soon found his tongue again. "Morr's Balls!" he cursed roughly. "It's a bloody army of them!" He quickly sped up the steps after Elsa. "Oh that's right, of course.. another sodding dead end!" He held the torch up trying to cast as much light around their would be tomb as he could.

He was beginging to feel a little dizzy, almost light headed. It was not a pleasant feeling. "What is this place? A throne room or something?" He asked waving the torch in the direction of the ancient chair. "I wonder what's in that?" He asked once more, this time indicating the slim chest. It almost seemed as if he'd forgotten their pursuers, except for the ghastly paleness of his face and the wild look in his eyes.

[-Sentinel-]

"I wonder what's in that?" He asked once more, this time indicating the slim chest.
"How could we possibly find out?" snapped Elsa irritably.

For some reason, she seemed more interested in the empty lectern. She ran her gaze over it and under it, took a hold of it and tried to lift it.

There's something right here. I want to know what.

No point in facing the skeletons with steel and fire; it might make a glorious last stand, but no one would live to tell the tale. If anything could save them, it was in this room. Of course it might just as well destroy them, but they had nothing to lose.

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

"That's what you're thinking about!?" Sieghard spat incredulously as he darted up the stairs. Setting his coins on the floor inside the shrine, he went for the doors. "Help me with these, we'll figure out what to do after we've got something between us and them!"

[LeSwordfish]

Ludo moved over to the chest and attempted to open the lid. If there was anything helpful in there, he really really wanted to know.

OOC
If needed, Pick Lock roll of [roll0] vs 49.

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

Adelbert moved to help Sieghard with the doors, though he glanced at Elsa wondering silently if the wizardess had some sort of plan to get them out of this.

[Northern Lad]

Viggo Hirtzel


"How could we possibly find out?" snapped Elsa irritably.

Viggo glared briefly at Elsa and for the first time he noticed the nasty slash across her cheek. He tapped his own cheek with a finger. "You're going to need a new tattoo."

"So this is the plan is it?" His voice had taken on the high pitched quality of somebody close to the edge of panic. "We're to sit in here and hope they starve to death?!" He laughed manically at his own wit. "Because, I'm going to be honest, by the looks of these chaps hunger isn't their number one priority!" He moved over to Ludo to see if he could help with the chest.

[LCP]

The ancient doors squealed like pigs being butchered as Adelbert and Sieghard tried to push them shut. Centuries of corrosion had made shapeless lumps of their bronze hinges, flakes of green-crusted metal falling as they turned. Still, slowly, they turned.

Orfeo and Cesar lent their weight to push, and swiftly the resistance gave. The gates slammed shut with a sound like the striking of a giant gong.

Breathing out, the two mercenaries glanced at each other. They did not have long to rest - without some means to hold them shut, the doors could easily be pushed back open by weight of numbers from outside. They had metal handles on the inside that would perhaps accept an improvised bar - but where to find one?

Behind them, Elsa took hold of the lectern and tried to lift it. It was surprisingly light - and surprisingly fragile. The upper plate came away in her hands, part of the stand disintegrating into rot and sawdust where she had accidentally wrenched it free. Rocking on its narrow base, the stand teetered for a moment before toppling slowly over, breaking into several pieces on the stone floor. It seemed the peeling gilt ornamentation had been the only thing holding its rotten wood together.

Elsa Only The disintegration of the lectern had done nothing to affect the darkening of the Aethyr in this place. The wound in the world still hung in the air where the lectern had stood, bleeding corruption. It was thickest at about chest height, where a book might have rested on the lectern while it still stood - but there was no book to be seen. The voices moaned and whispered in Elsa's ears, dry as the rustling of cracked pages.

Standing this close to the centre was enough to make her senses spin. She felt nauseous, dizzy - but with the dizziness came an edge of exhilaration. Though little more than a shadow, this was power beyond anything she had felt at the Bright College. The very stones of this place were soaked in it.

It felt like standing at the very edge of a mighty waterfall, and looking down. Somewhere in the untamed recesses of her mind, there was the treacherous urge to jump.

At the back of the room, Ludo and Viggo had levered over the chest. Inside, there was no hoard of golden coins - just a single, long object, lying on a bed of rotted silk.

It was a spear. The shaft, though straight and smooth, looked to be in little better shape than the lectern. The spearhead was a different matter. Heavy and broad-bladed, it was made from steel or polished iron, and expertly gilded.

Its edge was still sharp as a razor, untouched by time. In the centre of its flat head, the familiar winged sunburst had been engraved in angular lines - and in the centre of that was a symbol that Ludo was almost certain was a Dwarfish rune.

The flickering light of Viggo's torch cast long shadows from the figures engraved into the encircling mural. A man in the headdress of an important person was stood directly over the chest, a sickle-sword like the one carried by the skeletons' commander upraised in the act of smiting some tiny, fleeing orcs. Somehow the shadows made his expression look disapproving of the looters crouching at his feet.

OOC: Ludo may test SL:Khazalid at +20 to recognise what rune (I do remember rightly that he speaks Khazalid and has Read/Write?).

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

Adelbert did not comment on the spear, at least not yet. He was too preoccupied searching for some sort of bar for the door to really register it.

OOC:
Untrained Search Roll

[roll0] vs. 23

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

"Does anyone have any any rope?" Sieghard asked. He didn't know if it would be enough to hold the door on its own, but if nothing else it would buy some time to find something sturdier.

Ludo has rope. Assuming he's fine with us using it, Sieghard will use it to tie the handles... Probably won't hold forever, but it should stall the skeletons for a while. After that, two search rolls vs 36.

[roll0] to find something better to bar the door.
[roll1] to look for any sort of hidden doorways like the one that was in the passage before.

[Northern Lad]

Viggo Hirtzel


"Does anyone have any any rope?"

Viggo's head whipped from side to side as he frantically looked about the small enclosed room, before spotting something right under his nose. Sticking out of Ludo's pack was the end of a rope. "Ludo, can we use this?" He asked even as he he began to relieve Ludo of the rope. He took the Halfling's walking stick for good measure and dashed over to where Sieghard was stood, handing them over to the mercenary.

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

Unconcerned where the rope and stick had come from, Sieghard fed the rope through the handles and began tying it as tight as he could. Once he finished, he shoved Ludo's walking stick through as well. He had his doubts as to how long it would hold with the mass of undead on the other side, but hopefully it would last until they could find something stronger. If they could find something stronger.

[LCP]

Sieghard had hardly finished driving the stick between the handles when the sound of marching feet came to a halt on the dais outside. The gates shook violently as something tried to push them open from outside - then fell still.

Muffled through the bronze-plated doors, a ghastly dry voice reached their ears. It spoke in a tongue that even Adelbert had never heard - but what it said sounded like a demand.

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

Sieghard's response sounded like an obscene suggestion.

Relieved that (at least for now) they were safe, he started checking the walls for a hidden door. They had already stumbled across one, perhaps there was another. Impatience and frustration soon got the better of him and his attention turned to the spear Ludo and Viggo had discovered.

"Looks like someone wanted to keep this safe. I wonder how much it's worth."

[LCP]

The sunken reliefs covered the walls of the shrine from floor to ceiling, covering what space wasn't taken up by engraved figures with columns and columns of the incomprehensible picture-script. Doubly sheltered, they were still almost as sharp as the day they had been carved. They seemed to tell a story, running clockwise from the wall behind the chest. Sieghard had to hold the torch close to make out the detail of what they showed.

Back Wall
A bare-chested, male figure with the trappings of a ruler strikes down fleeing orcs, portrayed much smaller than he is.

A trio of humans stand on a riverbank of tall, regularly-spaced reeds. Opposite them are three others - squat figures with square beards that greatly resemble dwarfs. They have been portrayed in the same strange clothes as the humans. The poses of both sides suggest negotiation or peaceful greeting.

Elegant buildings rise beside the river. Their architectural style is quite unlike anything in the Old World today, but bears a striking resemblance to the crumbling fortifications outside.

A winged sun shines down over all three scenes.

Right Wall
A huge figure on a throne holds up his arm, pointing left to right. This carving has been vandalised, its face deliberately chiselled away - but the hand that points is skeletally gaunt. A sense of the sculptor's terror pervades every line.

A smaller figure, still large enough to dominate its section of wall, rides a chariot in the direction of the pointing finger. He wears a jackal mask, or has the head of a jackal - it is impossible to tell which. Tiny human figures flee from his horses, or lie dead in mounds under the wheels of the chariot. Files of equally tiny skeletal soldiers march above and below him, in the same direction.

The jackal-headed man sits upon a throne of his own, looking back the way he has come. In one hand he holds a book, in the other a staff like a shepherd's crook. Supplicants grovel at his feet, pressing their foreheads to the floor, while two women wearing flowing robes and serpent headdresses are presented to him in chains. A slight but abrupt change in the colour of the stone suggests the following scenes are later additions.

Lines of tiny figures labour in chains to build what appears to be a great stone pyramid. A charioteer in scale armour, much larger, leads a file of horsemen against a line of skeletal spearmen that separate him from the slaves. The dwarfs from the first wall march behind him.

Front Wall (containing the gates)
On the left side of the gates: three men and one dwarf stand to either side of the completed pyramid. Beneath the pyramid, the jackal-headed figure writhes in a stiff-limbed pose, pierced by arrows and pushed down by a long spear wielded by one of the men. The winged sun looks down over the scene.

On the right side of the gates: the pyramid stands alone, surrounded by fields of drooping, withered stalks - wheat or reeds, it's hard to tell. Seen through the earth beneath it, the bones of a jackal lie curled up as if in sleep, fully animal. The two moons look down over the scene.

Left Wall
A man sits on the empty throne, a spear in his right hand. On his left, two robed priests - one man and one woman - bow low. On his right, two dwarfs turn their backs.

A troop of chariots ride out against a sea of tiny orcs. It seems the sculptor never finished this scene - the rest of the wall is left blank...

After a surprisingly long silence, the voice outside seemed to decide to stop waiting for an answer it could understand. The doors began to thud and shudder with the repeated blows of heavy axes...

[LeSwordfish]

Ludo flinched as the hammering started again, distracting him from his fingertip perusal of the walls. "If only there was some way to... wait!"

He didn't speak much Khazalid- there had been very few dwarves in the Sermena mines in his youth, and they were long gone now, but he had enough to get by. Perhaps, if these people had fought dwarves...

<"Stop!"> he shouted, the first khazalid word that came into his head, his conjugation failing him. <"What want you?">

OOC
Search, on the back wall: [roll0] vs 48

Speak Language (Khazalid) [roll1] vs 48 again. How many of these rolls do I need? Any? None?

http://i.imgur.com/5pOdc.gif

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

Adelbert followed Sighard around studying the reliefs, hoping they would stir something in his memory. Perhaps they would...

He had known dwarves in Averland and he knew history, so maybe he had heard some obscure tale somewhere of strange southern dwarves, a human kingdom and dead men.

OOC:
Academic Knowlege - History check.

[roll0] vs. 46

[LCP]

The hammering axe-blows stopped abruptly when Ludo called out. There was a tense silence - then, as at some unseen signal, the axes began again.

Feeling his heart sink, Ludo slumped back against the carving of the meeting by the river. With the softest of clicks, the hand of one of the dwarfs sunk into the wall - and a square doorway just wide enough for one man swung open beneath the winged sun.

[LeSwordfish]

"Oh." Ludo said, looking back and forth between the wall and the doorway. "Oh, well, this works too."

He peered into the darkness hopefully.

OOC
[roll0] vs 48 Perception. What can Ludo see down the tunnel, with the help of Night Vision?

[LCP]

A short stone corridor led back into shadow. Its walls were unadorned, its ceiling low. After about six yards, it broadened out into some wider space. Through the darkness, Ludo could just make out the suggestion of an ascending set of steps.

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

Adelbert had grown frustrated at his lack of attempts to decipher the gylphs but he was awoken from dark thoughts by Ludo's voice. Turning he hurried towards the Halfling. A moment later he stood, looking down into the corridor.

"Ludo..." Adelbert began voice strained with emotion as he realised they might have a chance. "... do you think it could be trapped?"

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

"There weren't any around the gold," Sieghard interrupted. There was still a bit of bitterness in his voice from losing most of his. "And even if the way is trapped, it can't be any worse than what the dead men will do to us if we aren't gone by the time they make it through the door."

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

Adelbert nodded. "True... let's go. I'm thinking the worst injured in the middle."

[LeSwordfish]

Ludo was all too happy to leave, taking a moment to poke around for some manner of closing the door from the other side.

OOC
Another search test: [roll0]

[LCP]

The door was a solid stone slab, its motion surprisingly smooth after all these years. It looked as if it simply swung to - but once it was closed, Ludo was far from sure about how to get it open again.

There came a rending crunch from the gates, and a part of the bronze sheeting on their side bent inwards. They didn't have long to decide.

[-Sentinel-]

Elsa blew out a breath. "Come on." She was the one with the torch, and she knew for a fact that she ran faster than the others. Holding her flaming spear high, she headed up the stairs at a swift pace.

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

Adelbert followed, painfully aware his gold was slowing him down but not willing to part with a schilling unless he had to - not after what they'd been through.

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

Sieghard shot a look at the doorway when he heard the crunch. Well, no time left to think about it.

He grabbed his things and took the spear that they had uncovered and followed Elsa into the tunnel. "Last one through pull the door shut behind you."

[Northern Lad]

Viggo Hirtzel

Viggo's sigh of relief was audible, at least, it was until drowned out by the sound of the gates giving way. He still felt very light headed and his dizziness was beginning to make him feel a little queasy. I'll be dammed if I throw up in front of Elsa again! I'd never here the end of it! He thought to himself as he dashed through the doorway.

Making sure that he wasn't trapping anybody inside, he set to closing the door behind them. Desperate to have it closed before any of their attackers made it into the room. "Do we know where these stairs go? Mind you, anywhere away from here is good eh?!"

[LeSwordfish]

Ludo frowned. "I don't know. We didn't find anywhere they could lead to. This might just be a dead end."

[LCP]

The door shut tight behind them, sealing them in darkness. With Elsa at the front and Viggo at the back, each one of them was a black silhouette against the light from both directions, the bare stone walls of the passageway pressing in close to either side.

Dim splintering sounds reached them through the closed door, but the sound was so muffled through the thick stone that it was almost inaudible. Raising her luminous spear as high as she could under the low ceiling, Elsa led the way.

They had hardly gone ten paces when they reached the steps. Only a fraction wider than the passageway, they rose steeply up - and ended flush against the stone ceiling.

Or at least, that was the way it was supposed to appear. Someone, it seemed, had been here before them. The section of ceiling directly above the steps was supported by two wooden slats, and had been partially pushed back into a hidden recess in the rock. The timbers were rotten with age and half-crushed by the weight they bore, and so the ceiling slab had only been forced back far enough for a slim man to wriggle through.

Night-blinded by the closeness of her illuminated spear, Elsa could make out little through the narrow gap - but she got the sense that it opened out into a larger space than the claustrophobic passageway.

[LeSwordfish]

"I wonder if this is how the thief got in?" Ludo asked, peering around Elsa up at the gap. "I bet we can seal this off from the other side though. Would my crowbar help?"

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

"Let's try it." Adelbert suggested. "El- Beatrix, hand me your pack and spear and see if you can wiggle through."

[-Sentinel-]

"Right. Take it." Elsa also handed Adelbert her gold-filled backpack.

[LCP]

The spear's light winked out as it left Elsa's hand. Squeezing through the narrow gap with barely a scrape, she clambered up into the chamber above.

The room was dark - too dark for her to see. Nevertheless, she got a sense of space, far more space than they were afforded in the narrow tunnel below. By touch, she could tell she was standing in some kind of oblong stone basin, its rim coming up a little below her waist on either side.

Somewhere ahead of her, a noise like a death-rattle whispered through the darkness. Two glints in the darkness swelled into greenish-blue witchlights, staring right at her.

A dust-dry voice rustled words she couldn't understand. It had the same sound as the creatures outside the shrine, the unnatural noise of breath without lungs - but it sounded somehow choked, like a man trying to speak without the use of his tongue.

[RossN]

Adelbert Schreiber

Adelbert reluctantly removed his pack and (more reluctantly still) his chainmail, handing them to the next in line. Then he attempted to squeeze through the gap to join Elsa.

OOC:
Roll (if needed): [roll0]