"Alright, spellcaster, do your thing," Cath says. "I'll stand here and, uh… protect everyone?" he adds, somewhat sheepishly at the thought of being useless.
"I know the feeling. I'm down two arrows and with nothing to show for it..." Sparks says. She moves out of the way near Cath and after a moment asks, "Have you eaten. You probably should. I could sell you one of my rations for... oh... 6 silver..."
"Uh, no, I haven't. Seems in our hurry I, uh, forgot to pack rations." Being in the middle of a cave in the middle of the forest, without much leverage to barter with, Sparks' offer seems more than fair. "Six seems right, since they only cost five back in town. And I'll shoot the next couple of arrows, too."
"All right. I have three types. One is jam, creamed peanuts, and bread with baked thin ridged potato slices. The second is a hearty roll with some delicious butter I made myself. The butter alone is like a meal in itself. The third is round flattened bread covered with a blanket of cheese and tomato sauces with little slices of red beef and pork on top. Taste best with a fire to heat it but it is ok cold as well." Sparks says, outlining Cath's choices
The fighter's mouth is noticeably agape as Sparks lists the ridiculously extensive menu. Cath is still thinking about the jam and peanuts when she finishes, so he just says, "That first one sounded pretty good. Thanks!"
Money and food exchange hands, then Sparks takes her bag then sits leaning back against the nearby wall. After a moment she looks up to the sconce above her head and listens to the gentle roar of the lit flame. Another moment passes, then she abruptly scoots along the wall until moves into in the gentle shadow that exists between each pair of flames... Alert and awake, Sparks merely gets comfortable and out of the way so she can watch as the magically inclined of their impromptu party do what they do.
Umros is about to offer some his supply of food to Cath, but keeps quiet when the enterprising ranger reaches an agreement with the warrior. He is quiet for a moment longer, expecting someone else to continue shooting at the plates. But for now, a proper break for lunch seems to be underway, and the gnome’s small belly is already full from the roll of bread he scarfed down moments ago.
“Well, I’m curious what is on the other sides of the other plates...” Umros Whippoorwill says as he unshoulders his shortbow. He takes aim at the plate displaying the acid.
As the arrow snaps from the string, the wanderer has a good feeling about his aim. Before he hears it hit the target, he decides to test his speed and tries to quickly nock another arrow into place and fire again. His fingers pinch at the air once before they find fletching in the quiver at his belt, and he fumbles the arrow for a second before he raises the arcing bow to the top of the pillars, this time at the fire plate.
Not quite so quick as I used to be, I suppose… He grins sheepishly to himself as he peers up at the two plates.
As an afterthought, he says to Tainesh. “This could be good target practice for that repeating contraption you’ve got… if you’re inclined.”
In, relativly, quick succesion Umros sends two arrows speeding towards their targets. The first strikes the acid-marked plate with such force that the missile splinters beyond recovery, causing the plate to spin on its axis revealing a simple target of three concentric circles.
Though slower to leave the bow, the second arrow nonetheless flies true and hits the farthest right plate. It spins to show a side bearing what appears to be a free floating eighth-note. As if from musical notation.
The fighter sees the target and can't help himself. Before anyone else can even move, Cath lifts his bow and looses an arrow in one swift motion, smooth as silk.
He tilts his head to the side to admire his handiwork before sitting down to finish his elaborate lunch.
"An archery competition?!" Sparks asks joyfully. She stands and pantomimes looking about the room. "Where is the sheriff hiding? Which of you is in disguise and steals from the corrupt and donates to the needy poor?"
Tainesh stares with envy at the feast that Sparks brought for rations. Baked potato slices? Ridged baked potato slices that must have surely been cut with a special knife, salted for preservation and sealed against moisture and rough handling? Was that what adventurers eat? Vaddock's Manual had sworn by oatcakes pressed into shape by a trip-hammer. And a loaf of Dwarven bread as an absolute last resort.
"I suppose they would be," she replies to Umros. A smile slowly spreads across her face as she gets her repeating crossbow and takes aim.
The crossbow gives off a truly spectacular series of clicks and pings as she cranks the handle and lines up another shot. Her follow-up shot isn't as fast as Umros's, but it's fast for a crossbow.
And again, she cranks the handle. Forward, back, check the follower to make sure it is properly tensioned, aim, fire.
"You could be the hood in hiding, Tainesh says to Sparks. "Or are you the maid in waiting?"
"Maybe a combination of the two? I would not want to live in a castle, but having the means to patrol the woods on the lookout for those who need help? That would be enjoyable," Sparks says with a thoughtful smile.
Caths arrow flies straight and true, hitting dead-center of the three circles on the plate, striking the small retaining-bolt and ricocheting away! It flies in a haphazard pattern back and forth across the hall, seemingly never running out of energy as it strikes each consecutive hard-surface. The group has to dodge and weave lest they feel the wrath of the errant missile. With one last "ptang!" the projectile soars back at the pillar, this time headed straight for the opening beneath the swiveling plate.
It strikes something solid and resistant inside the recessed hollow before falling to the floor of the room. A very noticeable "clunk" issues forth from the darkened hole.
As the proverbial, and literal, dust settles, Tainesh lines up her shots. All three arrows fly true towards their marks, each striking the swivel-plates in succession. First the far right plate spins back to the image of fire. Second the center plate swings round to show the greasy, goopy liquid. And quick on it's heels the final arrow heads towards the concentric-circle target. It's a solid hit and the arrow sticks in the wood, however the plate doesn't budge and stays firmly displaying the arrow target face.
"What kind of arrow was that?!" Sparks demands of Cath. But even as she says it a solid mechanical sound echoes about the normally whisper quiet room.
"...and what was that?" she asks. Following her instincts, Sparks transverses the room all but ignoring Tainesh's on target shots from her unwieldily contraption. "There's a door here now," she tells the others.
“Cath! Nice shot!” says the gnome, when the hidden door makes itself known to the others.
He watches Tainesh’s operation of the repeater with great interest. “Looks like we all have some skill with the bow, or crossbow…” he beams. His smile falters for a moment when his eyes fall on Langblade, whom he noticed a diminished demeanor since her loud and proud ways at the dingy tavern. The wanderer can see a bundle of arrows and a shortbow among her pack. Perhaps she feels left out? “Thank you for lighting the torches, Langblade,” he adds.
Umros retrieves his arrow, checking its straightness before returning it to the quiver. He puzzles over the plates, and recites the poem read by the young wizard in hopes of it jogging an idea from his mind.
"The sound so sweet as if from dream,
Calls for to meet, the dark, obscene.
So with this, we leave anew,
Our woe, and now woe for you,
Interred, beneath, this place so deep,
Interred, bequeath, does it sleep?"
His curious, silvery eyes again study the mural of Men, Elves, Dwarves, and Goblins kneeling to the Shining Lady. Umros thought it odd that there are goblins included among the others, especially when other small folk like hobbits and gnomes are left out. Cath’s lucky arrow might have been the right answer to the pillar bearing the image of a target, but the gnome realizes that none of the imagery in the poem matches that of the icons on the pillars. Except one…
The sound so sweet as if from dream… He pulls an arrow back against the bowstring, and releases it at the fire plate, hoping to turn it back to the eighth-note symbol.
The entertainer whistles a brief, cheerful melody, before singing the poem to the same tune. He raises his rich tenor voice to echo off the walls, unsure, but hoping, that the hole below the musical notation can detect the song that fills the large room.
"Mmmhu, whu?" Langblade asks around a mouthful of dry bread. Seeing Umros gesturing to the lit torches, the fighter quickly swallows the half-chewed wad and responds, "No sweat, more for my benefit." she cocks a sideways smirk "I can't see in the dark half so well."
Once more the far right plate swivels on its axis locking in place with the musical notation clear to see. As the gnomic wanderer begins to whistle, the sharp-eared think they can detect a soft echo of his first note. It fills the room with its not-quite-there presence before being crushed beneath the loud scrapping sound of stone on stone, emanating from the far wall and newly-revealed door. A second later and the harsh sound is gone. Though the stone slab appears to not have moved at all.
Startled, Sparks gives a sharp, elvish eep and is about to move away when the scraping sound stops just as abruptly as it began.
"Something happened over here... when you sang..." she calls out to Umros.
"I wonder..." she thinks to herself before reaching out and giving the door a solid nudge. Just in case something less apparent changed.
The stone outline of a door has a little give to it when the hunter pushes against it, as if the construction wants to move. But something still blocks the door from opening.
"Huh... I think maybe the singing did work," Sparks reports. "I can move the door a little now."
Tainesh locks up her crossbow with an embarrassed grin.
"Thanks," she says to Umros. "It's not nearly as impressive as an arrow that can ricochet and hit everything, but it works."
'How did that happen?' Tainesh wonders as she retrieves the arrow. Careful, exacting analysis that left her oblivious to Umros's recitation of the poem revealed that the arrow was, aside from slight blunting of the tip, unharmed by the multiple impacts against stone and wood.
'It's... not magical. Cath wouldn't throw away something as precious as a magical arrow on an easy shot like that. It's just very durable and very, very improbable,' she concludes as Umros shoots the fire plate. 'A pity that it didn't fly like that when we were in a real fight... but what if it could?'
Umros's song goes unnoticed as a wild idea courses through her mind. 'Could I replicate that with magic? Could I enchant my bolts to do that? Could I enchant my crossbow to enchant my bolts to do that? It would be just like when Halungalom crafted that tumbler! Arnhem's Sequence would make it tricky, but if I replaced the brass fittings with silver I could... Sparks is a bowmaker! Magic runs in her family! She might know!'
"Door." She says. Blushing, she quickly adds, "I'm sorry, I was lost in thought. Did that door open when Cath shot the target?"
"It became less hidden. I think perhaps it has some sort of three stage lock and we have disengaged two of them with the arrow and song," Sparks says.
'Whether we want to go in or not given the poem mentions meeting something dark and obscene interned below...'
The Desnan worshipper thanks his lucky stars when his guess seems to help unlock the puzzle. Still, the gnome is unsure of what the image of the thick sludge means. Does it have something to do with ‘...the dark, obscene.’? The picture reminds Umros of molasses, though the sweet, viscous goop was certainly dark, he never really considered it obscene…
Recalling the obscured side of the plate, the gnome thinks aloud. “The snowflake… I bet a well-tossed snowball would do something...” he lifts an expectant look up at the stone ceiling, raising an upturned palm. “But I don’t think we’ll be getting snow here for quite awhile...” he assesses dryly.
"A snowball won't be necessary," Tainesh says as she takes aim at the target with the flame icon.
She mutters something in frustration and cranks the forward assist.
As the last arrow leaves the crossbow, a bent piece of sheet metal pops out of the magazine and lands somewhere behind her with a sharp ping. Heedless of the design feature that's going to put someone's eye out one of these days, Tainish points a finger at the newly revealed snowflake and summons a cantrip to mind, the plumose construct of a Ray of Frost spell. With a little bit of will...
"Kurdi"
Magic incantations and arrows fly through the air in quick succession. The plate with the image of snowfall shows it's face and almost seems to glow as the cantrip seeks out the hollow forms of the pillars insides. With one final clunk the ancient construction starts to work once more!
The recessed stone-door begins to rumble as the now familiar sound of rock scraping against rock fills the chamber once more. Earthen floor shaking beneath their feet the group sees the heretofore hidden portal open as the heavy stone plug lowers slowly into the ground. Flickering torchlight reaches a short distance into the darkened depths and from where you stand it appears that the tunnel continues, though any details of the passage remain obscured without closer examination.
The dust settles and the torches continue to burn, aside from the newly opened tunnel, the chamber seems content to continue as it has for untold eons.
"Man I could go for some curds about now." Langblade mutters to herself as the wizard speaks her magic phrase. But as the ground begins to shake and the old heavy door opens the fighter jumps to her feet, haphazardly shoving the remains of her meal into her pack.
Scooping up the still lit torch from where she'd set it on the ground, the raven-haired woman approaches the darkened entrance, but doesn't enter.
"Well, that sure got 'em." She calls over her shoulder to Tainesh. Sticking her head into the blackness she takes a quick glance around the new area.
"Well folks, I don't think anyone has used this door in a loooooong time..."
Sparks steps back as Langblade's torch passes near her face.
"Are we sure we are in the right place then?" the elf responds to the warrior's comment. "If no one has used the door and there are no other exits to this room... She pauses a moment in thought. "If anything, that dwarf is to blame. He must have known this was here but said nothing and so we have wasted a day going down the wrong path. I'd much rather go give him a talking to than proceed down a tunnel that has not been used."
Finished with her miniature rant, Sparks now pokes her head around the opening left by the lowered door so as to see the tunnel for herself.
The tunnel itself is roughly thirty meters long, both ten meters tall and ten meters wide. A raised walkway, about three meters wide, occupies the center of the hallway. It is on this walkway the group finds themselves now. To the left and right are two long pools of dark water that run the length of the hall, about a meter deep they are empty save for ten strange sculptures, five in each pool. Cylindrical in form they bear no small resemblance to the odd-barrel shaped images from the mural in the puzzle chamber. Each barrel is topped with a star-shaped flower, closed up in a pointed bud. In a ring around the barrels midsection are five roots that run down it’s length and into the water. The sculptures stand about two meters tall and are apparently made of a darker stone than the rest of the tunnel around them.
The ornate carvings cover the floors, walls, and ceiling of the chamber in a frighteningly beautiful mosaic of esoteric and unknown symbols and shapes. To the uninitiated it looks like a long line of flowing magical script. To those who have studied the arcane arts, it looks pretty much the same. Whatever the images may mean, it’s easy to see that any real translation will take years, or even decades, of study by top scholars and archaeologists.
There are no recognizable light sources in the tunnel, though the water seems to reflect the group’s own lights in an odd manner. At the end of the walkway is an eleventh statue, stood in the center of the path. Identical to the others, it nonetheless seems to occupy a space all it’s own separate and away from the other ten barrels carvings.
The rangers sharp eyes scan the area around the door and just inside. By her reckoning this tunnel hasn't been used in an age. At the least no one has used it since before she was born...
"Not me, if you want to deal with Captain Fussy-Britches again, be my guest." The armor clad fighter draws her sword and holds the torch higher. Its light glints off the sense of adventure borne in her eyes. "But old places almost always have one thing in common, treasure. Besides, it's not like we saw another passage way into the realm of underground on our way down here..." Her voice trails off as she takes a few tentative steps into the dark below.
"Heh, treasure?" Sparks scoffs good-naturedly, "Nobody actually leaves... wow..." she says, trailing off as her feet carry her into the passage. The elf slowly turns, her eyes tracking along one set of symbols then jumping to another and another, as she drifts up onto the raised platform.
"Tainesh, Umros... you will want to see this," she calls.
Umros’ silvery, curious gaze watches Tainesh’s hands deftly switch from mechanism to magic. When the line of cold hits home, and the stone scrapes on stone once more, the gnome leaps unexpectedly up that the tall, willowy bookworm with an upraised hand for a high-five. “You did it!”
But the excitable small wanderer forgets the weight of his oversized pack, and instead of leaping up, accidentally sits down.
Pushing himself back onto his feet with a titter, he flashes a smile up at the young wizard with a congratulatory nod. With his pack securely strapped to his shoulders, the old gnome leans forward and trundles to the new opening. He gasps when he pokes his head inside, his eyes irresistibly fastened to the fine detail of the carvings over the ceiling, walls and floor. Then, when he takes in the pools and sculptures, he utters a prayer for magical sight, suspecting hidden energies in the etched stone.
Taking a few steps inside, he scans the corridor, his wandering mind is curious about the water in the pools. The torchlight does seem… a little strange...
He sniffs the air, searching for scents of fungus, sulfur, moisture, or any other oddity invisible to the eye.
With no small amount of curiosity he pads by the barrel sculptures, finally stopping at the eleventh one that stands at the center of the raised walkway.
Based on the way the light plays over the still waters, Umros would guess that they have some sort of "light-enhancing" aspect to whatever spell infuses them. As for the script running the length of the halls, it would take ages for their full meaning to be deciphered. But one thing Umros notices is that some of the feel of the power is like that of various warding spells he's dealt with in the past. Though this is unlike any spell of warding the Gnome knows.
The last distinct aura comes from the "barrels." It is no one particular magic energy, in fact each sculpture seemingly has it's own aura to it. No, what sets these apart is that the magic exuding from them seems most similar to that of auras given off by living creatures. But that couldn't be right, could it?
Never to waste an opportunity to scavenge, Umros pulls an empty phial from his pack. Down on his hands and knees, he carefully reaches out to collect an ounce or two of the strange water.
“This water is enchanted… to be extra shiny?” he says as his small hand disturbs the surface.
He holds the full vial up to the torchlight for a few moments of consideration. The Desnan worshipper then points along the flowing script that covers the stone. “Most interesting! A ward I have never seen before!”
His finger counts the stone flower buds. “And… huh… each one different, and yet… alive?” A wide, laughing grin spreads over the old gnome’s face. The readings made no sense, which gave him such joy. The life-energy of the stone sculptures reminded him of a stories he’s heard of magical creatures whose very gaze could turn someone into stone. Do the victims need to have eyes?
Umros has heard of dreaded creatures in the wide world that are known to cause petrification in those foolish enough to seek to oppose them. Cockatrice and Gorgons both are capable of the fantastic act, but based on what the wanderer has heard over the years these, things, don't seem to be suffering from that particular malady.
After Umros's stumble, Tainesh is right behind him into the passage. Unlike the Gnome, she stops right at the entrance. Stops and stares.
"They look like eggs," the wizard murmers. "Are they sculptures or something else?"
"I do not think I will be much use in here. I like exploring caves well enough but... I am afraid I'm a bit too simple minded for whatever all this is..." Sparks says as the passage begins to fill. "I will stay out of the way until the rest of you are ready to leave."
The elven huntress maneuvers around the others as she heads back to the larger room where she wanders slowly just sort of taking it all in.
Cath, who had been quietly wandering onto the pathway, snaps his head to the side when Tainesh mentions ‘eggs.’ ”I’ve got a bad feeling about this…,” he mutters, mostly to himself, nocking a new arrow to his bow string. His keen eyes scan the room, wary of any potential trouble.
The long white eyebrows of Umros furrow slightly when Sparks calls herself simple-minded, but he decides to let it be.
“Fear not, mighty Cath,” grins the little gnome, “This cave system is more afraid of us than we are of it.”
Without any explanation, he skips around the eleventh barrel, emptying the mundane water back into the pool as he bounces along the edge of the walkway.
'Eggs,' Tainesh wonders. 'What good has ever comes of eggs?'
Not much good, really. A lot of truly terrible things came from large eggs, and most manuals advised setting the nest on fire the moment you encounter them, and then collapsing the cave on top of them (Giant eggs are rarely laid in nice places like fields or meadows, and the nastiest of them are invariably found in dank, forgotten caves). The best manuals cautioned that fire would actually cause some eggs to hatch (Namely, dragons) and a whole new world of suffering would befall anyone stupid enough to attack a dragon's nest.
Fortunately, this doesn't seem to be a dragon's nest. A distinct lack of captured maidens and shelled plate armor aside, she couldn't see how a dragon could fit down here. Or why it would place its eggs on pedestals. In fact, odds were that the eggs were harmless sculptures that-
"Wait, they're alive?" Tainesh says as she watches Umros work. "And that water's magical? Do you have any idea what it does?"
”Who said anything about ‘afraid’?” Cath asks, eyes watching the corridor.
Despite his protestations, Cath is definitely a little uneasy with their situation.
As the group mills about the intricately-carved hall they begin to take in more and more detail regarding their new surroundings.
In fact the only reason Tainesh remembered the drawing at all was the fact that it was surrounded by the inane ramblings of a madman. Of the several paragraphs of text jotted next to the sketch, the one thing that seemed to make any sense was the fact that the drawing was supposed to be of something the writer called an "aberration." It wasn't quite the same as the statues in the chamber with them, but the two bear a notable similarity in general composition and structure.
When she gets close enough, she is momentarily repulsed by the sight of a skeleton almost fully submerged in the pool. Only the barest of rags still cling to it's barren form, it's bones shining white with the reflected light from the party. Closer examination of where the body must have been resting shows an oddity nowhere replicated in the hall. There are scratch marks on the floor and wall near where the skeleton now rests. Unlike the fine workmanship of the carven script flowing through the hall, these scratches are crude and inconsistent. They seem like they might have been clawed out of the stone by bare fingertip.
Furthermore, it is just one symbol; A five-pointed star, irritatingly asymmetrical in design, with a small series of lines inside...
"Place just keeps going doesn't it?" She asks quietly of Umros. If he didn't know better, the gnome might think the warrior might be starting to despair. But before he can say anything she continues, calling out over her shoulder.
"That's the spirit, Champ! Now help me see where this goes. James isn't going to find himself!" She beckons for Cath to follow as she starts picking her way a short distance into the far shaft.
"I do not think I will be much use in here. I like exploring caves well enough but... I am afraid I'm a bit too simple minded for whatever all this is..." Sparks says as the passage begins to fill. "I will stay out of the way until..." the elven huntress goes suddenly silent as her mind makes the connection between the subtle unmoving while lines beneath the surface of the pool and the shapes of bones belonging to a person's arms, legs, torso, and head!
'Ok... there is no need to panic anyone. We have likely all seen a skeleton before, even if only in a book of anatomy, Sparks thinks to herself in the space of a heartbeat. Her memory of her first time seeing such a ghastly sight immediately springs to mind... bones and still decomposing flesh half emerging from soft soaked soil... but she quickly works at repressing it as the others speak among themselves.
"Wait a moment," Sparks says firmly, in reply to Langblade's suggestion that they move on. "Two things," she says, while doing her best to keep her voice from shaking. "First, if you look closely to the bottom of the right hand pool you can just make out the shape of someone's long perished remains beneath the surface shimmer. Someone died here or died elsewhere and was disposed of here," she says, speaking a little slower than normal as she at the same time works out for herself what may have happened.
"Second, look closely here and here," she says indicating the floor and wall. "Someone took a lot of time and effort to make the artistry of this room then someone else... maybe... scratched this symbol here. It is the same as on these sculptures, and the mural outside, and... and on the half digested hand we found from the bears that attacked us!" she says, once again making a connection she had previously missed.
"Despite how this tunnel looks, I do not think this site is completely unattended... or at least it was not until a few days before..." she says, an ominous tone now creeping into her voice.
Sparks attempts to get a better look at the remains but the unnaturally reflective water greatly hinders her efforts.
“What it does? Not really, Tainesh. It reflects light much brighter than normal water, that we can both see. When I took a couple ounces from the pool, and magic in the phial faded.”
Umros is careful not to draw attention to himself as he turns and gives Cath a knowing look. With shrug that says “we are in this together”, his silvery eyes lift up to the torch-bearer beside him. A smile grows on his face to see her spirits high.
Did she just say, “perished remains”?! the gnome whirls around and hurries to where Sparks points below the surface. He wished his own reflection would stop getting in the way. As the ranger connects the clues, the Desnan worshipper brightens. “By the stars, you’re right! Perhaps not-so-simple-minded after all, hmm?”
He looks again down at the bones, first to check if it had both hands, and then for any oddities considered “not normal” for finding a submerged skeleton in a hallway humming with vague magic and covered with beautifully indecipherable script.
"Thank you, but no need to help me feel better," Sparks replies. "I simply meant I know my own limits and magic this complex is not something I will be helpful with. Not even if I were to have an entire season to stand here and study it." She grins then turns her head a bit, in a sort of glance to the uniquely angular one of a kind bow stung across her back, and says, "Magic may not be my strongest point, but there are some things I feel confident I could instruct even you in. Er gwaethaf eich mil o enwau."
The cavern echos with the sounds of the party.
Langblade squints back into the cavern from the far tunnel, trying to see what the hub-bub is about. Spotting the skeleton she calls back. "What? Some dead guy? Guy who's been dead for at least a hundred years?" The raven-haired woman chuckles. "I'll be scouting ahead if you actually need me for something."
You can barely see the fighter rolling her eyes as she turns back to the darkened tunnel.
Even the elven huntress' eyes have trouble adjusting so quickly to the dark tunnel after staring into the unnaturally bright pool, so she misses the fighter's eye roll, but she hurries after the torch wielding woman all the same.
"Have you never laid to rest someone important to you? A friend or family member? If so, would you rather they be lost down here forgotten in some pool no one has seen in decades?" Sparks asks.