"I don't know 'bout that. My folks always said to stay clear o' the dead. At least the wailing kind. But if you're all set to see what's on the other side o' this door...I guess I can give it a whirl."
Feeling her pick jam somewhat uncomfortably as she works, the Halfling gives an audible groan. "Twenty silver says we're key hunting next..."
As Jaer starts trying to pick the lock, the wailing suddenly stops. It's silent now on the other side of the door. The door itself doesn't respond to her attentions, but her failure in this instance doesn't damage the lock.
Taking a moment to swap out one tool for another, Jaer's fingers come to a stop over the lock.
"...You guys hear that?" she whispers to the rest of the party before taking a slow inhale and, this time much more carefully, pressing on with the door.
The door unlocks, but doesn't open. Something seems to be blocking it on the other side. The silence continues.
"...Eh? That's...weird. Door's jammed." She looks back to the party with a nervous laugh. "Uhm...Little help, guys?"
"One of you tough guys up front want to give that a push...I am in the back or I would..."
Lemme see.
Keshy will try to move to the front for the str check.
And gives it one of these apparently.
Harken is impressed by the show of force, but since he is in the back no one sees his facial expression...
Keshy slams into the door, with some effect. The door's barricaded from the inside, apparently, but the door moves a little way open.
At this point, a crossbow bolt flies through the new crack between door and the wall, catching Keshy with a glancing blow. The originator of the shot is still bathed in the darkness of the room, and can't be made out, but suddenly becomes half-coherent, between sobs, in the same half-frantic, high-pitched voice which had previously produced the long, despairing wail:
"Get away! Get away! ... I'm not going down like the others! ... You won't come in! You'll find out like the rest of them ... Get back, I say!"
Open the door or i swear i will blow it open and shove it's remains down your throat She yells angrily her hand glowing, a cold blue aura around her hand.
Irgal mutters, "...Not particularly auspicious, if you ask me..."
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"...and people back in town said I had a temper..."
"Oh Hells." Jaer curses, digging her foot against the floor. She's got no hope of a shot; so her instinct's on making way for an even playing field.
Jaer pushes past Keshy and at the door, forcing it about half open. The light from the party's torches partly illuminates the room, so that its occupant is now revealed, at least to those nearest the door: a pale, wide-eyed human male, shaking while holding a loaded crossbow.
He fires again, this time at Jaer, but the bolt flies harmlessly past her head and into the corridor wall. He can't see Illya, but shouts back, still sobbing with real fear: "You're not real ... you're just more dead things ... bone-walkers, death-speakers ... I'm not going the same way as Shelyn and Krayl, I'll fight to the end ... go away, damn you! ... damn you forever!"
"Shelyn? Krayl? Oh, oh no... Roldare? The skeletons are gone. They could not stand the light of Erastil. We're friends. We're real. Please, listen to our prayers. Erastil, grant some comfort to your poor servant."
Irgal prays to Erastil to fill the are with his presence.
Roldare? Wait, stop shooting! We're really from Kassen! Well, not me, specifically, but I'm still not here to hurt you! Remember when I went into your store? I had to pay you extra for weird shaped shoes?
Keshik will try to open the door again, but with less, uh, zeal.
The door slams open, the makeshift barrier behind it collapsing. Roldare starts to reload his crossbow, a look of evident panic on his face. "I don't believe you ... I can't ... more magic from the death-talker ... Deadeye, Deadeye guide my bow ..."
Okay listen to me idiot, I've had about enough of your whimpering and wailing. DO we look like undead, He has scales for gods sake! She points to Keshik before continuing Stop this nonsense, Now! Tell me who exactly is missing?
Ka'narg holds back for the time being, not wanting to overcrowd the clearly frightened man.
Standing in the back Harken is still unsure of what is going on...
Roldare stares at Illya. "Get back!", he says, "I warn you, I'll fire! Get out or I'll fire!"
But he does not fire, and seems finally hesitant. He clings on to the loaded crossbow, aiming it wildly from one of the group to another in an attempt to fend off the newcomers.
Having the chance to look around the room, it seems to be set up as some sort of temporary camp. There are a few bedrolls, a couple of bullseye lanterns and a few sacks.
She takes a deep breathe closing her eyes, talking to herself for a brief moment Calm yourself, Illya control yourself She opens her eyes looking at the man in the eyes, a calmer look Put the crossbow down, We can help you, there is nothing to fear anymore. Just tell me what happened.
"She's a bit tense, too, Roldare. We all are. Things are going wrong. Let's regroup and just make sure we all get out safely, all right?"
From the back Harken yells at the man "Let us into the room! We can barricade the door after we enter to help you feel safe. This arguing out in the hallway is dangerous."
"Agreed. The hallway is not safe, and I will soon as take my chances with a frothing madman from Kassen as with any undead. 'Sides, we can always knock the poor bastard out if he tries to kill us." Ka'narg grips the haft of the double axe tightly, and moves himself to just past the doorway, keeping a watchful eye on the corridor as he lets Harken make his way into the room.
Keshy will head into the room, placing his blade off to the side.
Easy, Roldare. We're all friends here. Lets take it slowly. How did you end up here? Take your time if you need to.
Edit:
"They've got a point, mate," Jaer adds, her blades still drawn but duly lowered as she slips aside their scaled member of the team. "Take it easy, yeah?"
Roldare drops his crossbow and collapses in a heap to the floor, where he sits and gives out several enormous sobs.
"I ... I didn't think anyone would come.". He looks up. "Gerol and Vark made it, then? They made it back and brought help? They said ... they said they'd be able to fight their way out. Told me to wait here. Told me to wait and they'd bring help, and we'd get Dimira back. And maybe Krayl, if we could only kill him again."
"Ummm yeah... we are here to help..." Harken says waiting for the more silver tongued party members to break the bad news to the man...
I- they- Keshik can't seem to get his words out, before something catches his attention.
Wait, whos Dimira? And what do you mean by "killing"?
Roldare ignores the questions, and looks straight ahead, not at anyone in particular.
"We came to prepare the crypt, as it's always been done. So the children, when they came to run the test, wouldn't be harmed. Plenty of old stuff here that can hurt people - ancient tests and traps, pits and holes, bad choices with consequences. So we make it easier, because nobody has ever been really hurt, and that's a tradition we don't want to break. Pillows in the pits, bindings on the traps, blunt arrows."
He sobs and strains to get out the words.
"But someone has been here and something's been woken. Something that should have stayed asleep. And the bones came from below. First the death walkers, then the grave talker. The bones just wanted to kill and kill and kill again. I don't think they know themselves, but they just want death. This crypt is full of bones, there must be more ... he's been making more, I'll wager ... I don't know how many I've sent back, from here ... They slew Shelyn and Krayl, threw them on the fire to burn. Krayl's still annoyed about it, I think. And the dark one, the grave talker in his clanky armour - he took ... he took ... Dimira."
"So Gerol and Vark told me to stay here, and went for help. They took the lantern, kept it safe. Thank Erastil! Here you are, and the town guard, and the Lastwall garrison, must be downstairs now, sorting them out. Like Gerol said they would. Thank the gods they didn't send the children. Ohhhh Dimira! I can't think for thinking about her. What's to become of us now?"
And he sits on the floor, the crossbow completely discarded now. He simply stares ahead, rocking back and forth and crying.
As the last of the group enter the room, Ka'narg slips in and closes the door behind him. He'd been listening to the conversation between his companions and Roldare, grimacing at the descriptions given by the distraught man. "I think that we should consider the town's test well and truly over at this point, and take everything we see and hear and what cuts us as being very real," Ka'narg states matter-of-factly. "With the gate locked behind us, it might be risky taking him with us, broken as he is. Perhaps we re-establish the barricade for him and look for another way out?"
"For once I agree with you Ka'narg. It seems this test became one of life or death now. I hate to see innocents being ill treated and will work towards freeing the girl if any of you decide to leave now and head back towards town."
None of us are leaving yet. Upon hearing the words the half-mad man let out, Keshik looks down, speaking in a grave voice.
We're going down there and finding that grave talker. And Dimira. Ka'Narg, Harken, you're both right. We should rebarricade this room for Roldare for now, but I will not leave.
He picks up his scythe finally.
What would Svarozic say about abandoning someone after all?
"Don't recall saying anything about leaving before we find Dimira - but we are going to need to leave, and get them both out of here eventually," Ka'narg says, motioning to Roldare with a nod. "Otherwise we will end up just as dead as the skeletons we've destroyed, and then it will be Bardan who was smartest of us all for getting out before things got bad," he says pointedly in Harken's and Illya's direction. "Here is to hoping he makes it back home and can raise the alarm."
Once the innocents are out of the way we can come back and put these undead back down i'm not about to runaway from a fight. Whatever undead is down there we can put it back down A cocky smirk on her face
Oh, yeah, I didn't mean. I, uh, sorry. I didn't mean to insinuate or something like that Ka'Narg. Keshik sheepishly responds.
Illya, how long do you think we have before Dimira gets sacrificed to a dark cult lord or something?
That depends on a lot of things, honestly. My dad was the type to perform rituals like this immediately, but some people prefer to wait. Either way we have anywhere from an hour to tommorow before i'd called time of death
Jaer gives a roll of the wrist, her finely-sharpened short sword singing through the air. "Kidnappings, Undead, some 'Grave Talker' prick..."
The Halfling sighs to no one in particular. "Really, J.J.? This is totes not what I signed up for..."
Despite her words, Jaer doesn't seem all that upset by the revelations. Blind fearlessness and a penchant for adventure has a thick, toothy grin plastered to her cheeks, and she candidly slips back her gear from Ka'narg's grip, the gentle clink of glass and tools echoing as she lugs the pack onto a shoulder.
"Well your pops sounds like a laugh, Ms; mine just had a thing for stories," Jaer notes to the sorceress, sheathing her dagger and replacing it with her pole. "Now I love a good tragedy as anyone...but I think this one might fare better with a good ol' fashioned heroic rescue. Plus interest."
She looks back to Roldare, frightened and beaten as he is, and all but the faintest hint of amusement vanishes from her features. "A lot of interest."
Roldare - perhaps fortunately - hasn't paid attention to the adventurers' conversation. But, suddenly, he does come back into focus. He points to the silver lantern attached to the back of Jaer's pack.
"Whu ... whu ... where did you get that?", he stammers.
"Ah?" Jaer wonders for a moment what in the Hells the man is on about, but (upon following his gaze) quickly catches on. "Aaaah, right. This thing."
The Halfling momentarily unclips it from her backpack, giving the surface a spit-shine before holding it against a light. "Near enough. I take it there's more to this than a fancy lamp?"
Her sentence might as well be accented with a shrug as she mutters, "...Usually is with these things, s'all I'm sayin'..."
Roldare's eyes, widening, don't move from the lantern. His hand edges towards the crossbow. He is, suddenly, almost lucid.
"No ... it's just a lantern. It has no powers, that I know of. It's just used in the tests, to carry the flame back at the end. But the last time I saw it, it was in the hands of my friend Gerol ..."
Harken observes the newcomer little female and wonders if she is daft...such strange mannerisms...
Irgal bites his lip and shuffles his feet. "Um, well..."
Looking around to the group, he turns back to Roldare. "Er, well, that is to say... We are the children."
"Oh by the wind and the waves," Ka'narg exclaims under his breath. He crouches by the distraught man, placing the double axe to the ground beside them and looking him in the eye. "There is no kind way to say this, so out it comes. Unfortunately Gerol and Vark did not make it to Kassen to alert the guard, and the test has already begun. We found the lantern Near to the entrance, and I am sorry to say that I do not think your friends have made it.
"We are the only ones here, and I think I speak for everyone when I say that we will avenge those from Kassen who have fallen by the grave talkers hand, and get you and Dimira out of here as safely as we can manage."
Ka'narg braces himself for the man's reactions.
"HA!HA!HA! smooth Ka'narg, real smooth" chuckles Harken behind the half orcs back so that only the ranger can hear him...
You should probably leave talking to Keshik or I from now on Ka'narg Illya Says giggling