Elen uses a scroll of Mage Armor on herself, then takes a position next to Droviz on the teleporter. She briefly seeks out the dark elf's hand and gives it a comforting squeeze, then drops it.
Droviz' hands are full, but when he notices Elen's hand seeking his, he puts his shield arm around her and pulls her close without saying a word.
Ragnar steps onto the portal, and says the key words, "A gathering within the hall, take one, take us all." Ice then forms all over his body, until his body is completely enveloped in ice crystals. He then disappears. The rest of you do the same and arrive in the dining hall.
A crescent-shaped dining table occupies this Y-shaped chamber, while two large mirrors on the north and south walls create the illusion of an even larger space. Twenty feet overhead, an immense chandelier of ice crystals hangs from the ceiling. To the east, rounded steps access a short hallway, flanked by twin ice sculptures of dryads holding ice-carved tree limbs, creating an elaborate archway. Translucent, glasslike double doors are set in the hall’s north and south walls. To the west, two alcoves stand between three windows providing an amazing view of the wintry landscape outside the tower.
You see two atomies playing cards at one of the tables. When Ragnar appears, they take note of him and immediately disappear.
"Man, is there a game on?" Droviz exclaims as soon as he spots the cards. "Gin, rak, cribbage, poker? I haven't had a good game in days! I'm ready to bet some serious money!"
"Indeed? For some reason, I pictured you more inclined to playing strip poker with young ladies...and cheating at it."
"Shh..." Droviz says, winking exaggeratedly at Havelock. "Don't cast doubt into my lady's mind. At least let me teach her how to cheat first and play a few games with her."
To Krystae's words, Droviz just laughs. "Relax, Stormcrow. I know you've no interest in poker... Don't I?"
Elen just blushes in response to Havelock's comment, and returns to looking for the Atomies in the room.
Ragnar was on his guard. He didn't like not being able to see things that might be dangerous. "What those? he rumbled.
The atomies reappear. One of them says, "Sorry there folks, didn't recognize you. Pull up a chair! We're always ready to lighten your wallet for you. Would hate you see you overburdened with all that coin..." Both atomies begin laughing uncontrollably.
Droviz grins widely and saunters towards the table.
"So what's the name of the game, fellas? Like to know that for when I boast about how I won the shirt off someone's back!"
Elen whispers into Ragnar's ear, in Skald. "Those are atomies. No doubt servants of the queen, but Droviz has them interested in a game."
Elen glances around the room, looking for any points of interest. She will wander around slowly, pretending to be bored.
Ragnar was often confused by the world he found himslef in, but one thing he knew without question is that it was a bad idea to play games of any kind with the Fey.
"What we do, keeper?" Ragnar whispered back to Elen.
"Play along with Droviz's story. Look for openings, and threats." Elen replies.
Droviz keeps them distracted with the game long enough until Ragnar finds an opening, which he takes. He grabs both atomies by the neck, and smashes their heads together, leaving them in a bloody pile where their faces used to be.
On one of them you find a key to operate the portal (ostensibly to take it to a different destination).
Havelock cups his beak in one hand and chuckles.
"Certainly one way of doing things..."
Ragnar dropped the little corpses with a look somewhere between satisfaction and disgust.
"Now where?"
"Thanks for the game, gents," Droviz tells the atomies as he hurriedly scoops up the pot and the deck of cards. "Hate to cash in and run. Well; we're here to, heh, 'ice' a spellcaster, yeah? Those always go for the highest room, don't they? And once the snake's head is cut off, we can sweep down. Some of the troops might just cut and run if we kill the boss. 'Course, they might run for help instead of just running, but that's a worry for later."
"While I approve of saving the quips, witticisms, puns and mockery until it is safe, does it not seem a little counter productive to waste such sweet words on a dead audience?
Or are you holding court to an audience only you can see? I think I have a tonic for that..."
"No idea how long the soul lingers, Old Doc Crow. No harm in being polite."
"Politeness equate making verbal puns then? Amazing how they never taught that at the collage etiquette classes.
They would no doubt have paid you a handsome tuition fee there."
Droviz grins and winks.
"I'm sure the kids would've learned some interesting and useful lessons from me, true enough."
"By "kids" I assume you mean your own, and I assume you are referring to them in terms of the children you would no doubt produce by using your "charm" on your poor innocent students who cannot yet tell what a scoundrel their oh-so-handsome-and-dashing new teacher is."
"Not at all. I prefer ladies my own age. By 'kids' I mean the students, unto whom I would impart the same survival skills as I would younger recruits in the same units I served in or, in time, my own sons and such daughters as cared to listen to me. A teacher has a certain duty to the next generation, after all."
Havelock snorts at that.
"Bah! The "next generation" indeed.
Bah and humbug to them, ungrateful louts and scatterbrains.
Half the time they do not listen and make me wish I had brought a stick to class, the other time they come to me for tinctures to rid them of a "social disease" or somesuch!"
Elen chuckles at Droviz's joke once the fey are down, and rolls her eyes at the back and forth between him and Havelock.
"Boys, we have stuff to do. A portal to close, and probably a witch to stop."
"Well, it depends what you're teaching. In my case, they needed my lessons for immediate survival," Droviz says to Havelock.
To Elen, Droviz nods. Once again, he readies his greatsword and shield...
Ragnar was having trouble following the rapid fire conversation between Watcher Havelock and sort-of-Keeper Droviz. He was far too polite to ask them what they were talking about, but he understood most of it and couldn't hide the fact that he disproved. Witticisms and boastings were for the feasting hall once the battles were finished.
He looked around for where to head next and started moving, following Krystae to the door and waiting for the signal to open it. If the others wanted their share of glory they could stop talking and follow.
"Yer makin' the big guy cranky, fellas." Tulo said as he landed next to the bodies of the smashed Atomies to pick out the choice bits like eyes and livers.
"So. To the top floor, then?"
Krystae hears nothing at the door. The key you found doesn't seem to work on the portals in this room. Krystae opens the south door, revealing an empty hall that curves around past two unoccupied cells. Opening a second door at the end reveals a larger chamber.
A long red carpet extends from the western doorway of this mirrored hall between ice sculptures of twin nymphs, ending at an open alcove to the east. Passageways continue north and south, following the contours of the tower’s outer wall, where windows look out over the open courtyard below.
The key you have activates the portal in this room, which takes you to the top level.
A translucent image of a globe hangs suspended in midair, slowly rotating in place, above a summoning circle in the blue-tiled oor of this large chamber. Lines of arcane energy glow across the globe’s surface, faintly humming with power as they connect multiple endpoints in a radiant glow bright enough to illuminate the domed ceiling overhead. Many tables and shelves covered in books, maps, and large scrolls line the room’s circular walls, and a large ornate mirror hangs between two open windows to the west. Twin ice sculptures of demonic fiends flank a bubbling cauldron in an archway leading into a deep alcove in the southern wall.
There is one man in this room, tending the cauldron. "We have been expecting you for some time. You have proved... somewhat difficult for my men to take care of... but some things are best handled personally, wouldn't you say? Nazhena will certainly be happy I have solved her little problem..."
There is a goat in the laboratory alcove.
"You'll be Radosek, then, Nezhana's boy-toy," Droviz says as he raises his greatsword in a defensive position. "Queen Elvanna is not impressed with your feeble security and your attempts to cover up your failure to restrain the Black Rider, boy-toy. Your stewardship of the Pale Tower was clearly given in error."
Cauldrons. Mirrors. Strange magics. This was a Witch of the blackest sort. The same kind as those who had destroyed his people and imprisoned their souls for millennia.
Ragnar hated witches.
"No talk. J͇u͍̫͍̙̣̱͜s̠̻̝͓͙t̺ ̰͚͎̜̳̦̗͟d̵̙͈̩i̴̺̪̲̪͇̗e͍̟͖." the big man rumbled, the spirits around him swirling and echoing his voice into something otherworldly. He started to move forward like a charging bull.
Radosek begins reaching into the cauldron and casting some kind of spell.
He is casting Summon Monster III.
"Ohh, skyxofyx, we're about to have company!" says Elen, swearing in draconic as she recognizes the spell being cast.
Hoping to disrupt the spellcaster, she casts her own spell.
"Hit him with everything you've got!"
Droviz bursts into action, charging the aged spellcaster with blade and shield in hand! ... Unfortunately, he misses miserably. =_=
Havelock quickly reaches into his warm fur-coat, withdrawing his most cherished alchemical accomplishment.
Steeling himself for the chemical taste and the mind numbing effect of his mutagen, he quickly ingest it.
Immediately his body becomes more bulky, his posture more hunched and aggressive, and his otherwise so clear and intelligent eyes dim as his mental capacity decreases.
"Time to DIE!!!" He roars as he moves to engage the enemy.
Ragnar rushed passed the strange circle on the floor and drove forward with his heavy spear.
"It's a great tragedy, then, that the Black Rider killed you and all your friends before you were able to report back..." He seems quite focused on Droviz. Just as he covers his ears with his hands.
Blood leaks from his ears between his fingers and he screams in agony. Krystae's arrow goes through Radosek's robe but misses the warlock himself.
Ragnar's powerful charge ends with his spear running through the back of Radosek and all the way through the other side. As Ragnar pulls his spear free, Radosek's liver remains on the spearpoint. Radosek stumbles a bit, and the cauldron lies untended, looking more and more unstable.
As he stumbles to the ground, he lifts his hand to point at his savage attacker. Ragnar's vision begins to blur around the edges and fade to black, but he is able to fully resist the spell and avoid being permanently blinded.His sight fully returns immediately thereafter.
Droviz growls with anger at the Witch's attempt to blind Ragnar. He slashes at the man, but Radosek's staggering moves him out of the blade's way - and fortunately into Droviz' shield's way. The heavy steel rebounds off Radosek's skull with a resounding Clang.