Henri, after pulling away from the zombie, tried to grab onto the wall for balance, slowly swaying back and forth "N-nah, Doc, I've got plenty of stamina, I can go f-for hours, days, ev-" - but as the final enemy collapses into a pile of gore, she lets herself fall backwards, and her hat drifts slowly to the floor. She's clearly exhausted, letting her eyes drift closed, and heavy breaths pouring from her lungs. She tries to raise her arms, but their heaviness causes them to immediately fall back to the floor. "Okay. N-nope. Nevermind. I'm done, just let me die, please." She groans heavily, letting her wounds gently ooze her bodily fluids, and trying not to think about the hike back down the mountain as every muscle in her body ached.
With the battle over, and the adrenaline subsiding, Alaina collapsed to one knee. She coughed then said, "I've had rougher times."
Dara rushed over to Alaina's side, "You can it Cuz." Turning to Silo, "Hey, Old Man, get that stick over here and heal her up!"
Silo hesitates, looking anxiously back at the Captain, then runs over to Alaina.
As he heals Alaina, he asks with dread, "Is she dead?"
Silo next glances over at Henri with concern.
"Not yet, thank Gods."
Dulae scans the room, checking to make sure that there are no enemies and that the captain is still around. She glances down at the amulet.
"Mr. Shadelock, did the amulet try to possess you when you took it? Something was whispering to me when I got too close to the pillar of darkness, and I suspect it may have come from this..."
She hustles over to where Henri is lying on the floor, pulls out her wand, and leans over so that she is in the elf's line of sight.
"Still sounding like an officer, Fireball."
Dulae then taps herself with the wand.
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Henri rolls her eyes. "Listen, I've had a bad day, can't I just be lazy for once, Retired Sergeant Sunshine? Maybe I'll order someone to carry me."
Even as Henri's wounds closed, she could still feel the exhaustion of fighting, running, being captured, and no sleep from the night before catching up to her. Even on days she had traveled without rest, this was just so much rougher - and while her body no longer hurt, her bones still ached.
"Have I mentioned I hate healing magic? If I had just stayed wounded, I coulda milked it for days, cuddled up to Sarge while she carried me down the mountain, gotten free drinks at the bar, rest up in a comfy bed..." She grunts, pulling herself to her feet and picking up her hat, brushing it off before placing it delicately on her head. "عصا غبية، كهف غبي، الكسالى غبي، يمكنك الحصول على كل وضعها على سندان برودوس حيث سيتم قصفت في بركة عميقة وموشقة من ضباب أحمر، أونريكوغنيزابل لهذا العام. إز أيضا. ويمكن وضعه في قفص من الصلب على سندان حتى يتمكن من البقاء على قيد الحياة للقرون القليلة الأولى، كما هو مضغوط في مكعب غرامة من الحديد و غور." The elf stretches and yawns deeply.
Silo releases a breath in uneasy relief.
Seeing Dulae tending to Henri, he glances back at Captain Vazquez, then moves quickly to heal Xizoh.
After he is satisfied Xizoh is healed, Silo dashes over to the captain. He uses the wand on her, but she does not wake. He cradles her head in his hands. Anyone who looks over can see his eyes are closed and his lips are moving, but cannot hear what he says.
Dulae snorts. "You know, you can do all those things without the open wounds and bruises. Well, all but the second." She rummages around in her pack until she finds her uncharged orb. "Because by Altien's grace, there is no way I am walking down this undead infested mountain, carrying you or not!"
She walks over to Silo and the Captain. She waits for him to finish whatever he is doing before addressing him. "Good that you're alive, Silo." She hands him the teleportation orb. "I don't suppose you can charge this while we secure the area, then take us all home?"
Being one of the bigger battles Cel's been in he stands there a little dumbfounded. His body is quivering visibly, and the small cyclone of wind around him is making his hair and clothes flap around. He starts checking himself, hands first, then up his arms to his shoulders. He tries to look at his back and ends up chasing his tail like a dog for a couple of turns realizing that he's pretty much okay. He states, almost like a question, "We're alive!" His chest perks out a little bit almost as if he's actually displaying some confidence for once.
Henri takes the time to reload her dragon pistol with a flare shot, and loads her blunderbuss with a dragon's breath cartridge. She starts to wander towards the necromancer, stopping only briefly to give Xizoh a light pat on the shoulder and return his ioun stone. "Thanks, Doc." She crouches down next to the necromancer and starts to rummage through his remains, looking for anything interesting. She laughs tersely, "I'm as surprised as you are, Windy Kid."
When Dulae mentions the amulet, Xizoh frowns. "Yes, it did. Luckily it didn't seem to realize it chose the wrong thing to sway me with." The half elf stares at the object in question with concern. "If holding it is enough to let that...thing into your mind, how do we take care of it?"
Feeling the abused patch of skin he called a back weave together, the doctor makes eye contact with Silo. "Thank you. Sorry about the Captain, I did the best I could to stabilize her but she needs proper care for something that isn't of a physical nature."
Henri's angry words bring a smile to Xizoh's face, and the doctor gives the exhausted elf a one armed hug in return. Taking a moment to run his thumb across the surface of his ioun stone, he muses, "Don't worry about it. I'm mostly just glad no one died." Remembering the corpse that was once a young man just a few steps away, he gives a melancholic sigh. "I wonder what drove him to this."
A small smile appears on Dulae's face at Cel's antics, but anyone paying attention can see a hint of sadness there as well. We made it, but barely anyone else that went up here did... I hate mind control.
She shakes herself from her thoughts. "Lets stay that way. I'll secure the far entrance, someone else stay here and make sure our wizard doesn't get kidnapped again." Dulae moves across the chambers, keeping an eye out for anything of interest.
As she passes Xizoh and Henri she pauses to talk with them. "I suppose we could wrap it in something?"
Dulae shrugs at Xizoh's question. "If you really want to know, check in with the Captain in a few months. Questioning the dead takes time, but she owes us a favor after this."
Henri, still sifting through the gore, shrugs at Dulae's comment. "I mean if it controls you I don't know why a piece of cloth or leather would stop it. I don't suppose simply breaking it is an option?"
Getting up, Alaina smiled at her Rabbit. She walked over to him, grabbed the front of his tunic and pulled him into a passionate kiss.
Dara gave a heavy sigh.
Silo nods appreciatively to Xizoh before dashing over to Captain Vazquez.
After Dulae addresses him, Silo says mournfully to no one in particular, “She is under a terrible curse.”
He tears his eyes away from the captain's face to look up and see the uncharged teleportation orb in Dulae’s hand. He nods with some relief. “Good, that thing is still out there." He accepts the orb from Dulae and turns it over carefully. "Yes, I can charge it, but I’ll need a quarter hour to concentrate without interruption.”
Silo prepares to concentrate by healing his own wounds with Cel's wand.
Before settling down next to the captain and thumbing through a slim spellbook, Silo surveys the room and notices the discussion of the amulet. “Be sure to not let the amulet or a spark touch your bare skin,” he warns. “Thick leather will hold for an hour or two until the sparks burn through. Most metal is useless. And please take care to keep it far away from me,” he says with a shudder that stems from experience or fear of the consequences.
After Henri’s question he says, “Ms. Marchand is correct, we must destroy it. Perhaps shatter it into fragments that can never be recombined." He pauses. "It would take a powerful spell, or a spelled weapon.” He looks toward the captain’s scabbard and frowns when he doesn’t see her sword there.
The party does not see or hear any other approaching people or monsters.
Dulae thinks the captain’s shield probably also has magical properties.
Henri sees only blood, bone, and gore-soaked shreds of clothing. The necromancer must have lived like a monk; he had no money on him.
Henri remembers Risa, the general store owner, had some magic items stolen. At one point the party suspected the necromancer was responsible, as he had also been stealing food. Presumably those are stowed away somewhere in the caves.
Cel smiles at Alaina warming at her touch, it takes a few moments for him to come back down to Earth. He frowns at the discussion of the amulet. "Um...I can try to break it, would that help?"
Henri wipes her bloody hands off as best she can on what clean spots remain on the necromancer's robes. She grunts as she stands, and starts to wander around the room, looking for anything that might be stolen treasures. "I'd guess you'd be the best at it, Windy Kid. Although our wizard friend might have some advantage, he needs to charge the orb... thingy. Wouldn't want him to overexert himself."
Xizoh starts to dig through his pack, asking, "I have some rope would could tie around it if we can not break it." The half elf pulls a coiled bundle of red rope free from his pack and sets it down. "I spent a good deal of my childhood around sailors so I could most likely get a solid knot to hold it in place."
"I have some Oil of Bless Weapon if Rabbit's wind doesn't do the job. It should let a weapon cut through its protections. Whatever is in there seems thoroughly evil. Let me know if you need it."
Dulae crosses the room to the other exit, eyeing it warily.
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Emptying one of her belt pouches, and putting the former contents in the other one, then set the pouch on the floor next the the amulet. Taking a step back, she extended her hand and focused on the pouch. It slid across the floor and scooped up the amulet. Lifting it into the air, the Dwarf closed the pouch, opened her pack and dropped the floating pouch inside. Turning to the others, "It might be safer to not destroy it here. Wouldn't want the place coming down on us, would we?"
Silo sits cross-legged next to the captain and closes his eyes. A moment later he smiles at Cel’s offer and opens one eye. “Over many thousands of years wind can cut stone, but is it the air that carves mountains, or the stone within the air?” he says. He shuts his eye and hums softly, politely ignoring or not hearing Henri’s comment.
Henri passes multiple cells without seeing anything of interest in the shadows cast by the others’ light. In the third cell, one away from the exit where Dulae is standing, Henri thinks she spots a few orbs, some sodden-looking scrolls, and some wands hurriedly stashed in a messy pile on the cell floor. There’s another small something in the pile that she can’t quite make out in the dim light. Something dark.
Something draws Xizoh to the cell he saw Silo in during his vision. The light of his ioun torch reveals the body of a woman laid out carefully on the cell floor in a traditional Abbhen funeral dress. His medical training tells him she has been dead for about six months. The humid heat of the caves has rotted her clothes and hair, and her skin has become shriveled and mottled with fungus.
Xizoh spots dead flowers laid carefully over her chest; Altiendel evergreen winter blooms not more than a week old. The remains of older dead flowers are arranged around what is left of her head.
Dulae’s shield shines into the darkness of the far door, revealing a much smaller chamber cut into the heart of the mountain. The air here feels feverishly warm and humid, emanating from the furthest wall.
From what Dulae knows of smugglers, she thinks it’s possible there might be a well hidden trap door in here leading to a narrow escape route of some kind, but there’s no way to know if it would be passable and she expects it would be difficult to carry the captain through.
Nothing happens when Dara puts the contained amulet in her pack.
Dara can feel a small thrum of energy vibrating in her pack. Every once and awhlle there is a bigger jolt, as though it is trying to free itself.
You are surprised to see Dara perform what looks like magic.
Dulae remembers that members of Abbhen's anti-cult task force are often required to learn a bit of useful magic.
Cel is completely oblivious to the rest of what is going on for a moment after seeing what Dara did, "Wooooooow, I didn't know you could do that! It was so unexpected! Where did you learn to do that?"
Upon finding the loot, Henri crouches down, lighting a tindertwig and holding it closely to her hooded lantern's wick. After a moment, it catches fire itself, illuminating the small pile of objects. If it's nothing immediately dangerous or interesting , she'll scoop up all of the items and put them carefully in her bag. The store'll probably want them back.
In the flickering light of her lantern Henri sees 3 uncharged teleportation orbs, 6 scrolls, and 4 wands in the pile. Sandwiched unceremoniously among the magic items is a fine ebony comb, well-polished and cared for. She can't put her finger on why, but she gets an evil-feeling vibe from it.
The scrolls feel damp, like they will tear easily if they rustle against other items.
"Well, that's concerning..." The elf softly mumbles as the ebony flickers in time with her lantern. She takes a moment to gingerly examine the scrolls, looking to see if they are, indeed, magical, or perhaps simply messages. She uses one of her belt pouches as a glove, and reaches for the comb... before sighing and thinking better of it. "Leave it to the professionals, girl..." she continues under her breath. "Treasure ain't worth being necromanced over." She still stores the wands in her pack, but leaves the scrolls out in case one of her compatriots had a scroll case, as well as the uncharged teleportation orbs.
"I found something back here! It's kinda making me uncomfortable," she calls out behind her.
Shaking his head, Xizoh mutters, "Is everybody a mage in disguise?" Ignoring the obvious elephant in the room of his appearance, hoping Silo was politely doing the same, the doctor suddenly felt a desire to investigate Silo's cell.
Moving into the cell he realizes the presence of a corpse. Xizoh kneels beside her, his marked hand gently brushing the petals of the fresh flowers. Someone dead lover perhaps? But she's a long ways from home, and one would think her family would want to bury her. Perhaps the necromancers?
Henri's loud call draws his attention from the dead lady. Nodding his head and murmuring a quick prayer,"May Altien guide your path through the shadows so that you reach safe harbor," Xizoh jogs to stand behind the sharpshooter elf. "What do you mean uncomfortable?" he asks inquisitively, peering over her shoulder.
Henri bites her lip. She couldn't really describe the feeling she got from the comb, but she points towards it, and glances at Xizoh. "I'm not sure, Xixi. Just something about it puts my teeth on edge. That black comb there. Maybe it's the fact that it's in the middle of a bunch of magical objects or something. It looks too nice and pretty, and too dark to be something innocent, doesn't it? It's suspicious."
Xizoh raises an eyebrow at the nickname, and coughs awkwardly at the mention of the comb being too nice and dark. She didn't mean anything by it. Come on, you know Henri well enough, that's not how she is. Shaking his head to clear his thoughts, the doctor brushes a loose strand of hair out of his eye. "Then what do you say we do like Dara just did?" Accenting his words, he holds out his hand in a claw like position, lifting the comb away from the other objects.
With a quick yell, Xizoh asks, "Is there room for one more magical nasty in your pack?"
Dara smiled at the lad, "You pick up a few things in my line of work."
Alaina smirked as she gave Cel's buttocks a little squeeze before entwining arm with his.
Before any more questions come pouring out the squeeze makes the words catch in his throat, and instead just smiles a little. "So, what do we do now? I mean, we're pretty banged up, but this one guy," pointing at the necromancer, "Didn't seem like all of this nastiness is just from him, plus there's that weired energy...thing...out there," pointing toward the exit, "Do we have a plan?"
Dulae heads into the small room, shield raised for both light and protection, and looks for anything unusual.
"No, it didn't," Dara commented. Going over to what was left of the Necromancer, she looked closely for any sign or symbol of a Cult.
Dulae becomes more certain that the damp heat is coming from the interior of the mountain itself, but she sees nothing else besides the skeletons of some small animals.
Dara sees that there's not enough skin left on the necromancer's corpse to tell if he had any tattoos and he doesn't seem to be wearing any jewerly or talismans.
If she's on the lookout for signs of the occult, she finds Henri and Xizoh's exchange to be of interest.
Dulae walks back into the main chamber. "This way appears to be a dead end. Nothing but more heat and damp."
Seeing Dara examining the deadee, she makes her way over. "Any idea where he's from?" She gestures to the necromancer's body with her boot, being careful not to touch it.
Curiosity getting the better of him, Xizoh quickly placed the comb where Dulae could see it and make a decision about. "Our favorite swearing gunslinger thought something was off about this little comb. Any of you capable of figuring out if something is?" Pausing for a moment, he shook his head at Dulae's question. "It sounded like he was from Abbhen from the way he was talking, but I could be wrong."
With that handled, the doctor moved to besides Silo. "Did you know the girl who was in your cell?" the half elf murmured quietly. After waiting for his response, Xizoh called out, "I'm going to grab the Captain. I'll be back in a second."
As Xizoh sets the ebony comb down he feels a sense of malaise that he can't place.
Silo opens his eyes just as Xizoh approaches. He blinks at the question. "No, I don't think we had anyone missing or who had passed away in Southtown at the time she died. I'd assumed he'd brought the corpse here from Abbhen." He glances back at the cell. "He called the body Jija once."
Silo tells Xizoh, "Be careful with her, please."
He places the orb in front of him and flips a page in his spellbook. Glancing at it, he mutters something unintelligible while performing a series of complicated gestures. After about half a minute, the orb emits a steady glow.
Silo picks up the charged orb, rises, and walks toward the group. "This should get us back to town. I'd prefer to get the good Captain to help as soon as you're ready."
He spots the comb in front of Dulae. "What's this?" He bends down to examine it. "Hm, this is perhaps a source of trouble for the late young man. Best not to touch it if we can help it, but we should take it for testing."
Dulae nods. "Let me take a good look at it..." She moves to get a good view. "Altien, part the shadows..." She casts Detect Magic, followed by Detect Evil.
After about 18 seconds, Dulae detects the presence of an overwhelming magical aura centered around the comb.
12 seconds after she casts her second spell, Dulae is stunned by a single evil aura that overwhelms her with its strength.
Dulae's second spell stops abruptly and she looks stunned.
Dulae stumbled back with a gasp and grabs her head in pain. She scowls.
"That comb is both very evil and very powerful. Silo?"
"It will pass," Silo says, looking at the way Dulae holds her head with sympathy.
He considers the comb again. "Yes, though I doubt it poses immediate danger."
Silo appraises those in the chamber with the eyes of someone following protocol, judging whether this is information they need to know. Then he sighs wearily, like he has just nearly died. "I suspect this is an artifact of Norah. It's likely it is meant to cause some great loss, maybe over time, then serve as a vessel for grief and hatred." He glances at the necromancer's body with pity. "This makes the target more susceptible to evil influences, you see."
Before lifting the Captain, Xizoh quickly double checks her condition. It can't hurt to be able to reassure Silo, and a lot of things can go wrong in only a few minutes.
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Henri sighs, a small amount of regret in her voice. "Two unholy artifacts that have to be destroyed? Today is just the luckiest day ever." She moves away from the artifacts and the abandoned scrolls and orbs. "Well, if someone can at least grab those... I think they belong to the store in town." She glances at Dulae as she is dazed by the magical feedback. Somedays I wish I could do magic... it would make a lotta of things easier. But there are sure as heck downsides.
"Guess we better get outta here before Norah shows up, then. And, of course, so we can get rid of those creepy, but surprisingly fashionable pieces of jewelry." She glances around at her party members. Her friends. She slowly grins to herself, directing it mostly towards the floor. "I'm ready when y'all are."
Alaina just stood by as everything was going on. She had but one thought at the forefront of her mind, getting the young man standing next to her naked and riding him to exhaustion. Which probably wouldn't take too long given the fight for their lives they just went through.
Dara made sure to keep some distance from the other discovered dark object. "Probably not a good idea to put two powerful artifacts together. Who knows what would happen."
Xizoh observes Captain Vazquez is still breathing normally; he doesn't detect a sign that her condition has changed.
As far as you know, no one has seen an artifact of Norah in hundreds of years.
Henri learned in her lessons growing up that artifacts of Norah were ancient history; all destroyed long ago.
You've never heard of an artifact of Norah before.
Silo looks mildly amused at Henri's commentary. "So it would seem."
"Prudent," Silo says to Dara. "Although they do not have the same creator, so it is unlikely they would interact. But no matter." He pulls a handkerchief from his pocket and uses it to pick up and wrap the comb before stowing it in a different pocket.