You remember the dragon attacking. The moon behind its outstretched, gossamer wings. The impact of its landing.
The horrifying revelation that the black sand wafting across its wasted frame was in fact millions of spiders skittering beneath its translucent scales. You remember its spider eyes locking with yours, and then its jaw unhinging and the black motes of its breath weapon billowing over you, and then burrowing, tunnelling, and cavorting under your skin.
Then blinding pain as the motes erupted from your pores as a spider swarm, and skittered back to the dragon with your life energy. You remember fear, falling, and screams muted by your own heartbeat. Then blackness.
You awoke days ago, paralysed atop the dragon’s stockpile of tangled bodies, where you still lie with humans, goblins, and reptilian beasts in a tangled mass of limbs and wide-eyed faces. Most are conscious. All are paralysed. Each horror-stricken face breathes with a slow asthmatic gasp, sucking air past spiders crawling from its throat. Each day, the dragon’s slave, a gnome with fiery orange hair, force feeds you water and a slurry of horse flesh and dragon bile. Each day, spiders crawl in and out of your open mouth, delivering your lifeblood to the dragon, as you stare helpless.
But something has changed. The dragon has been absent for over a day, and as the sun rose, the spiders climbed out and soon turned to dust. You’ve since shaken off your paralysis. Looking around, you see a great vulture nudging a paralysed goblin and ripping flesh from other victims. Wind whistles through the large single opening of this massive wooden shack. Sand covers a hard, pink, mucous floor, and two large columns of the same material provide support. Seeing you move, the gnome slave fumbles for a horn you’ve heard summon the dragon before.
...Gods help me, how have I come to this horror... This nightmare is not what Thule had imagined when he set out from his home, but as the grip of paralysis relents he is determined to free himself or die trying. Blinking to clear his eyes from days of dust and filth, he begins working his hands and limbs to further free them from their torpor. It is then he sees the slave reaching for the horn. ...I will not be enslaved again!... With a painfully raised fist he shouts, "By Thor's Might!" and an infinitesimal fraction of Thor's power flies toward the gnome.
The jolt Thule gave the gearforged near him as he gestured at the gnome was followed by a soft click, and slowly, the light of burning coals returned to the huge thing's eyes. The barely audible clicking was replaced by barely audible whirring, and the minotaur-shaped gearforged whuffed out a breath full of the dust of dead spiders. The dust settled onto the runes carved into its hide.
Seeing the gnome about to warn the dragon, the massive gearforged held out a thick-fingered hand, rising to its feet from beneath the pile of paralyzed prisoners. In a basso rumble with a strange, echoing quality, it said, "Hold, little one. Why serve, when you can be free?" It approached the gnome cautiously, or at least as cautiously as was possible for the hulking beast. "Surely you can see there is no other way to escape... than with help. Help I can provide."
Huh. I guess it is madly in love with the dragon. :P
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This was not a good month for Brintak, kobold explorer extraordinaire. First, he wasn't able to join in on an expedition to study some recently-found ruins that could have possibly been a site dedicated to one of the dead gods. Then, unwilling to face his brood with this failure without a bit of courage in liquid form, he ended up getting unwillingly involved in a bar fight and locked up for the night. And then, when he was finally able to make his way back home, through some bizarre circumstances he was unable to really remember, something about a round table and a wizard maybe, he found himself being reduced to a meal in a dragon's larder! Admittedly, while the food wasn't exactly the worst he's ever ingested, he had too much he wanted to do in his life!
Slowly, as the paralysis in his body wore off, Brintak gently started flexing each muscle he had, his toes and fingers curling, before he could make his way into a sitting position. It looked pike he could finally make his escape! Well, if it wasn't for that gnome about to ruin everything. Fortunately, it seemed a dwarf and a GEARFORGED?! had things in hand, leaving him to search for his missing gear.
Dot.
Something was different. Einarr had just blinked. Hadn't blinked for days, hadn't moved, had barely breathed. His fingers twitched and the spiders, those ever-present invasive spiders, crumbled to dust. Pain flooded him, muscles aching from days of disuse, and he moaned.
Raising his head showed him the full extent of the dragon's lair: the piles of bodies, the attendant vultures, and that wind-struck, soon-to-be-torn-to-pieces gnome. Einarr let out a growl that the spider dust turned into a cough and lunged forward, only to trip and fall as his legs cramped up.
Crea-Asp opened one slitted eye. The memories... had he died and this was the great beyond. He had seen the Dragon... the magnificent beast, then the spiders... I hate spiders. It was so confusing, what was real, and what was not. But, this time it seemed different. He didn't just drift off into la-la land again, but seemed to experience growing awareness. And distant voices... no not distant, but faint and growing louder. With a start he sit up, or tried to. The fur on his armor seemed to be matted to whatever surface he was on. With a groan he rose to a sitting position, and noticed that others seemed to be moving around as well. But so many were not. Then he noticed the gnome and for some reason he hadn't figured out yet he was filled with rage, and sprang painfully to his feet.
He reached for his weapon, for his shield... where were they. It didn't matter his rage led him forward, he had never tasted Gnome anyway, but he had an overwhelming urge to remedy that.
At Baerloth's words the gnome pulls back, startled. "You would help? Help Nabbit escape?" he says.
At least unleashing Thor's might on the gnome was what Thule had intended, but when he sees the gnome pause at the gearkwork man's words, Thule also pauses, waiting to see what would happen. He keeps his his fist held as a hammer, ready to strike if the gnome moves again for the horn.
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With his target in sight, Brintak lept for his precious bag, hoping that he still had all of his items in stock. Trying to keep from stepping on any of the still paralyzed people, he grabbed his backpack and started going through it, trying to determine if his possessions were still in his...possession.
Struggling to stand, Einarr can only cough violently and glare daggers at the gnome in response.
Gears clicked, grinding a bit from the spider-dust, as the horned gearforged nodded once. "I do not care to be food for a dragon. I know not how you came to be its slave, but I would free you, if you would in turn allow me - us - to escape. I am Baerloth Ammon. Will you give me your word, Nabbit?"
Baerloth felt the seconds ticking - when might the dragon return, even without being summoned? But he filed the passing time away under Time/Events/Necessities, and waited patiently for the gnome's answer, even as he took a step closer.
Crea-Asp was lurching drunkenly towards the Gnome when what was being said hit home. He stopped momentarily, and begin to cast around for a weapon... just in case this was a trick of some kind.
Sense motive: on the gnome
Perception: Looking for useful stuff
The gnome looks up at Baeloth. "Nabbit will help," he says. "Nabbit will come with you. Leave the skincrawler. Before Nabbit ends up with the others on the body pile."
He drops the horn, apparently discarding the idea of summoning his master.
"But first we wake this thing." He aims a bitter kick at a goblin in the body pile. It's the goblin that was being nudged by the vulture, which now you notice isn't in fact strictly a bird. Its feathers, at least, seem to be made of worms of some kind. Flatworms, constantly writhing and moving.
The target of Nabbit's kick is evidently not dead, but is still paralysed. The goblin blinks furiously but doesn't otherwise move, probably because it can't.
"Goblin knows where Brinx is," Nabbit half explains.
The rest of the body pile includes a quite beautiful female human; a large griffon, stuck on its side, but with sizeable wings that hang over the edge of the platform; another creature, a large blue reptile with curled horns and eight legs; and a giant spider. None of them seem to be in great shape, but you can tell that they're still alive. The reptile seems to have been muzzled for some reason. At the bottom of the pile, clearly dead, are the remains of four more goblins and a what seems to be a camel.
Nabbit notices Brintak going through the packs. "Nabbit threw ropes down to desert. Was going to do weapons next. Sorry."
Thule slowly lowers his arm and unclenches his fist, as it appears the immediate threat to his freedom appears to be gone. He slowly makes his way around the shack casting about for his hammer ...the gnome said he had not yet disposed of any weapons..., and anything that looks like it might be edible or drinkable.
As he gets close to the pile of bodies he ignores the beasts and goblins, and kneels beside the female, checking for injury and signs of life.
Realizing she still may be immobilized by the foul enchantment, he shakes her briskly, in an attempt to get a response, "Missus, if you can move, you should do it now. We are leaving this pit of evil!"
Baerloth nodded once to Nabbit, then turned away. "It is well you did not dispose of our weapons yet, Nabbit. Tools and weapons will be welcome," he rumbled as quietly as he was able, joining Brintak. He searched about for what was his, and what else the dead had that might be useful.
Once he had gathered what seemed useful, he asked the gnome, "What delays the dragon's return? Is it this Brinx you speak of?"
The woman starts into life, screaming helplessly and writhing to escape from the body pile.
The fire-haired gnome looks up at Baerloth: "The skincrawler comes when called. With horn. Otherwise, it hunts: more bodies for body pile. And Brinx is Nabbit's sister. Goblin vermin knows where she is."
He kicks the goblin again. "Wake it please!"
The woman is still screaming and struggling, though Nabbit ignores her.
Muttering some very unkind words and ignoring the kobold for the moment, Einaar lumbers over and grabs his gear. Once his axe is back on his hip and his shield on his back he lumbers back over to the goblin, picks it up by the shoulders, and shakes it roughly while screaming in its face.
Baerloth hefted his heavy sword and asked Nabbit, "Why was Brinx not in the pile with the rest of us?"
In an effort to get the woman to stop screaming, Baerloth aided her efforts to crawl free, lifting bodies aside. Then he effortlessly raised her to her feet. "If the dragon is near, it is inadvisable to continue to emit loud noises," Baerloth explained slowly, one large hand on her shoulder. "Can you fight?"
Baerloth eyed the flatworm-bird-thing near the goblin.
The goblin's eyes look scared, but it doesn't otherwise react.
Nabbit glares at Einarr. "That's not how to fix goblin. Need to heal him, unfortunately."
The woman screams even louder as if in some kind of competition with Einarr, when the latter tries to wake the goblin. When Einarr stops, she also goes silent, but only briefly. She turns and stares at Baerloth, backs away in apparent fear, coughs a couple of times, staggers and throws up. Then starts screaming again.
Nabbit turns to Baerloth and shrugs, barely making himself heard over the racket. "No idea where they put Brinx. We need to ask goblin."
Away in the distance, a black shadow wheels in turns in the air. Nabbit points. "Skinwalker," he says. "Hunting. More bodies for pile."
The realization that the dragon hadn't gone that far spurred Baerloth to action. He bent down to look the screaming woman in the eye. "If you don't stop screaming, the dragon will return and fill you with spiders once more," he asserted. His mind sorted options with mechanical precision: killing the woman was counterproductive, since it would likely damage relations with the rest of the prisoners and remove a resource, should she prove to be one. At the very least, the more of them there were, the better their chances of killing the dragon, or escaping while it subdued the others, would be. However, a sharp blow to the head might prove adequate to silence her; he could always carry her to wherever the gnome's sister was.
Once he was satisfied that the woman understood, whether she stopped screaming or not, Baerloth shook his head and looked over the others. "I do not possess the power to repair a flesh-creature. Perhaps one of the others can do so. In the meantime, let's take the goblin with us while we leave this den. If the dragon returns, at least it won't find us simply waiting for it," he prompted.
Spotting the horn where Nabbit had dropped it, Baerloth gathered it up and clenched it between his thick fingers, mashing it into uselessness. There was no point in tempting the gnome to rescind his offer.
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"Why so much noise?" Brintak yelled as he shook his head. "You want dragon to eat you? Be quiet!" Grabbing bis favorite crossbow laying nearby, he checked to make sure that it was in working order before gripping it tightly. Moving over to the goblin, he kneeled down and gave it a look. "Not healer, more explorer, but think goblin dead.
"No, I cannot heal. It has no wounds for me to bind; whatever this dragon did is beyond my skill - but I know it isn't dead. Leaving is a good idea."
...this female's mind looks far beyond saving, and there is need for haste... Leaving the woman Thule locates his gear, then strides quickly to the goblin who seems to be the key to their escape. "Its wounds may not be visible, so I will try something else." Grimacing with distaste, Thule places a hand upon the goblin's brow, and speaks an incantation of healing in a low voice.
As he waits for sign of any effect on the Goblin, Thule stands straight, and introduces himself, "I am named Thule, of Thunder Mountain in the Northlands."
The goblin - infused with a white-green glow at Thule's touch - wakes with a start, looks around and starts to pull himself from the body pile. He coughs, then grins at his saviour. "Ach, ach, ach! I thought I was food, with the others. Many thanks, gentles."
He stands and bows. Now that he's clear of the pile of corpses, you can see that he has a curious glass baton grafted to his forearm. "I am Felkin, at your service. And this ..." - he pats the strange vulture-like creature - "... this is my friend Iqua'tha."
Nabbit marches up to the goblin and kicks him, squarely and quite hard, in the shin. "You can thank me now, foul one. I had them wake you." He slaps the goblin a couple of times, while pushing the vulture thing - which flaps its wormy wings in a perturbed manner - away with a stick. "Where's Brinx? And what ..." - he pokes at the glass contraption - "... is this?"
The woman, alternately screaming, coughing, sobbing and gagging, moves to put as many as possible of the others between herself and Baerloth, keeping him in her wide-eyed gaze. She gasps when he crushes the gnome's horn. As the shards of the horn hit the ground, they reform, so that the horn, remade and renewed by some kind of strange magic, now lies once more, complete, on the deck of the platform.
Nabbit looks briefly at the reconstituted horn, and shrugs aimlessly. "Deep magic," he says, by way of explanation.
"May Rava smile upon you, Thule... and Felkin," Baerloth said politely, then introduced himself again, this time to the group at large. It was hard to do without booming, or his words getting lost in the woman's screaming.
Realizing that something more than a mere beast filling its larder was afoot here, Baerloth picked up the horn again and glanced at the open air nearby. Would it simply return if he threw it?
Deciding not to bother finding out with time being a factor, the gearforged minotaur instead tucked it into his belt pouch with his tools. If it was able to escape that, there was probably nothing to do about it.
To answer Baldek's question, he ventured closer to the edge of the platform, looking around. Where were they, indeed?
A vast desert lies two hundred feet below, and dunes stretch endlessly in every direction. You stand, not on a mountain, but atop a massive creature. Your wooden room sits between the eyestalks of a colossal slug frozen in time. Its pink mucous skin is cracked like a parched desert floor and peels away in great sunburned sheets. About a hundred feet down, the slug’s intestine-like tentacles grapple the leg of its larger rival, a skinless humanoid with a forest of leechlike heads, also frozen in time. The rival’s hand holds a hundred-foot-long, fluted-bone pin with lines of backward-curving hooks down its length. Between the creatures and the pin extracted gore hangs from the puncture wound like floating islands of flesh and blood.
Lesser creatures have lashed ramshackle structures upon the abominations. Most appear smashed. A wooden tunnel stretching between the abominations has collapsed in the middle, where a pair of dead goblins’ bodies landed on it. Bridges formerly leading to islands of flesh dangle from ropes. No structures lead down from your perch. In fact, this exit overhangs the slug’s face, providing a view straight down to the desert floor.
Over the following 100 years, the surviving archmages were able to save Midgard from consumption by the Great Old Ones. Unable to dismiss the creatures, the wizards instead sought to halt time around them. Known as the Great Slumber, this effort condemned the creatures to a time-slowed gait along twisting paths that still carve terrible new summoning glyphs upon the parched lands of the destroyed magocracies.
Further, you'll be aware that the monstrosities normally exude an aura of uncontrollable bloodlust not currently evident.
The woman has stopped screaming, and sits, curled up almost into a ball, with her arms wrapped round her knees, sobbing uncontrollably. Nabbit and Felkin both simply ignore her.
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"This is...not somewhere I've heard of," Brintak said in awe as he gazed across the landscape. "Brintak, by the way, kobold explorer," he added in an introduction. "I am really intrigued by how those two...creatures have been frozen like that. Has anybody heard of anything like this before?" Truely, he was really glad that the woman had finally shut up. Really, was that really necessary? Moving over to the woman, he clumsily patted her on the shoulder and said, "Uh, there there? We'll...um..try to get you out."
Looking down at the woman and putting down the goblin, "Screaming is not helping." As he walks over to the edge, he introduces himself: "I am Einaar, son of Alfa, and I have..." he trails off, struck dumb by the sight before him. "...um...no. There is nothing like this up north. What, in the name of Thor's thunderstruck ballsack, is this place?".
Stepping shakily away from the edge, he turns and scuttles to the back of the room to look for another exit, but mostly just to get away from the long fall.
Crea-Asp broods silently. He does not know who any of these people are. That one is loud though... but just before he decides to throw her off the platform, she makes the wise decision to become silent.
He then walks over to gather his belongings, eyeing each of the other moving beings suspiciously to make sure they don't touch his things. After gearing up he observes the situation.
I neither trust nor particularly like any of the others moving about, but for now perhaps I can use them to win myself free. Unless I can wake that Griffon, and somehow talk it into flying me out of here, that might be my only choice.
He then walks towards the others, and merely croaks out his name in a rasping voice. "Crea-Asp".
He then lumbers over the the Griffon to see what the situation looks like there.
Perception
Baerloth considered what he saw, and took a careful step back from the edge of the platform. Deep magic, indeed! Was the dragon somehow connected to these giant frozen... things? And who had actually had the nerve to build structures on them?!
He didn't approach the woman, in case it set her off screaming again, but he said, "We had best be departing this place quickly. Nabbit, how do we leave?" He peered at the contraption on the goblin's arm. Magic? A wand of some kind, perhaps?
The griffon lies with eyes open and moving, but apparently otherwise paralysed like the others. The reptile, like the goblins and the camel, has its eyes closed and isn't breathing.
Felkin, completely and pointedly ignoring Nabbit's attack and questions, notices Crea-Asp eyeing the griffon. "Ah, my new-found draconic friend. The griffon! An intelligent and noble creature. This one is paralysed, as we were. Good luck persuading it to fly you out of here, though. And this reptile is my hunting prize. We can trade the corpse for good money in the Lower Downs. We should take it with us!"
The woman starts as Brintak touches her, stares at him with wild eyes, makes as if to scream again while attempting to back away with him on all fours, fails to move (or scream), gags once more and finally throws up at his feet.
Nabbit looks daggers at Felkin. "Remember," he says, "Everything it says is a lie. How would a goblin kill a behir? Maybe with that glass thing?"
He pauses. "Skincrawler will return soon, horn or no horn."
Baerloth glanced at the woman. If she was unable to control herself, perhaps she would serve to distract the dragon when it returned, so that it didn't immediately go looking for its escaped larder.
Certainly, to him, the most important thing was to get away now, while they still could. Questions could come later. He moved to check the other exit, careful not to get too close to the edge.
Thule scowls at the goblin, "Look you, we will be hard pressed to leave this place with those who are more or less alive, much less a monstrous corpse. If you want it out of here I suggest you start pushing it over the edge, how about you check that opening over there to see where it will land." Thule points at a gap in the wall where there are several boards missing.
Thule looks around at the detritus strewn about the shack...maybe there are things we could lash together to lower ourselves...or perhaps I can convince this flying beast to save us as well
Not immediately finding anything to use as a makeshift rope, Thule positions himself in front of the Griffon, and speaks directly to the beast, while checking it for injury, "Great creature of storm and wind,one of Thor's favored, I ask that you grant us the boon of your strength. I ask that you break free of this enchantment and assist us in our escape."
Thule's healing has no effect ; as a result it's difficult to discern whether his wild emphathy skill had any effect either.
Felkin looks at Thule. "I think, my friend and saviour, you may be using the wrong approach here. These creatures are magically paralysed. They'll need magical healing to overcome it. And as for my behir, it's not just a case of getting out of here. We'll need to get through the Downs. Unless you have something else worth trading, and I can't see anything from where I'm standing. Look down at this desert; think again how much this meat might be worth. I'm happy to share it, in return for your good deeds."
The woman briefly stops either screaming or being ill. She stares glumly ahead. "My name is Meira Yellete. I am the daughter of Count Tremvar Yellete of Bourgund, Master of the Order of the Rose Knights. I have been betrayed. Please do not leave me here to die."
Nabbit stamps his feet. "Nabbit is still here! Where. Is. Brinx. And. What. Is. Glass. Thing? Liar!"
"If you wish to come with us, you must not begin screaming again," Baerloth told Meira matter-of-factly. "You can tell us who betrayed you, and why, while we leave."
Distracted by Meira, Baerloth doesn't pay close attention to what he intended to do.
Seeing no obvious success with his appeal to the beast, Thule slumps in frustration. But at Brintak's words, he takes some hope, realizing there may be a chance. "Keep that goblin quiet. I will beseech the Gods for their favor. If I am heard, we may be granted what we need. This will take a little time, someone should investigate that opening to see if it offers a less deadly path out of here.".
Peering through the crack, Einaar furrows his brow. "This looks dangerous, but survivable. I will go first; I can save myself if I fall." He begins to unstrap his armor, lightening himself. "We are not going to leave you here to die, Meira, but to live you must save yourself. Get ready to climb. And you," he fixes his eyes on the goblin, "even if we had ropes I do not think we could carry that much weight down. If the others consent to help you, butcher it now and stow the good cuts in their packs. And answer the gnome's questions, before his voice gets any shriller. Who, and what, is Brinx and what is that strange glass contraption?"
Stripped of his armor and with his weapons securely tied, he squeezes through the crack and begins to slide carefully down the slope.
Shutters in Baerloth's eyes clicked shut and open again, cleaning his optical apertures. "Where are you going? I see no path." Looking around, it seemed clear that if escape was possible, he would have to take his chances on the slug's head.
Thinking how useful spiked feet would be at this juncture, an idle remnant of the minotaur soul locked inside his polished and rune-engraved carapace, Baerloth forced himself through the crack, holding onto whatever was available to avoid falling to the desert floor.
He kept an eye on Einarr, trying to determine the path the (seeming) human took.
Shutters clicked again as Einarr seemed to vanish down the slope. Had he slid off the slug's head and into the air?!
Checking himself before he called out, Baerloth rumbled to the others, "I do not see a way. Nabbit, if you intend to find your Brinx, show us the way now! She will not be found if the dragon recaptures us!"
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Meira rocks back and forth as she speaks:
"My father's servant hired some thugs to kidnap me. They took me through a door that led here. A kind of gateway or portal. I think they were expecting it to lead somewhere else, because this side of it kind of fizzled, as if it wasn't working properly. And there were lots of bodies here, I don't think this was the first time. A strange sight. Many scraps of black cloth, scattered amongst the bodies. Like small scarves, the ones shared as favours at tournaments. Carried as trophies, it would seem, by the dead. Then the dragon came, the thing they call the skincrawler. The ruffians were killed, but one of them cursed the name of Daiquianas Exeltor - my father's servant, Master of the Armor Bonded. And so I was betrayed. As is my father, still."
She stares ahead, deep in misery.