Ekan hopes his friend doesn't get, well, in this place , anything could happen.
"Again with the locked door..." Nicat mutters in frustration. "Is this a horrid beast locked in by someone, or someone who's terrified and is trying to keep horrid beasts locked out?" he wonders aloud.
Raising his voice a little, he says, "Hello in there! I know you're scared, but my friends and I don't mean you any harm. I'm going to try to open the door, and we can get you out of this place safely! Don't attack me, okay?"
Eostre watches and waits...
The crying softens in response to Nicat's reassurances.
Nicat kicks the door right next to the doorknob. There's a rattling noise, and the door shakes before slowly opening a bit.
Waving his friends forward, Nicat waits until they’ve joined him, then slowly pushes the door open and sends his glowing lights inside. He puts the most reassuring grin he can muster on his face, and hopes that Conner isn’t glowering over his shoulder at whoever is crying inside.
The room beyond is cold & damp. An old armoire stands near the east wall. The ceiling slopes down to only four feet high to the northeast, leaving little room for a small window. A full-size mirror in a dark wooden frame of coiling roses leans against these bricks, angled toward the tiny window.
Crouched in a quivering ball of sorrow & self-pity across from the mirror is a deathly pale woman, dressed in a drab blue dress with a red shirt beneath it. Her shoes are filthy, caked with years of dirt & dust. The nails on her hands have grown into wicked-looking claws.
"No... please, don't look at me..." She whimpers, her face buried in her hands.
Eostre turns her head.
"Alright, not looking, you can relax...What's...um...what's your name?" she asks, trying to sound as kind as she can manage.
"Okay, okay, we're not looking at you," Nicat responds, doing his best to not look as he says it. This is creeeeeepy, he thinks to himself, but she's not attacking us with those claws of hers, so that's good.
"I'm Nicat," he continues, trying to keep his tone bright. "Can you tell me why you're crying? What's wrong?"
Conner glances in the room then steps back to the side of the door, adjusting his grip on his sword. Yup.
Uhm... you mean this crying girl with claws?
"Nicat, step back and close that door," Evelyn whispers, her voice strained by the effort to not enter panic mode.
Having a very bad gut feeling, Evelyn focuses on the divine energy within her and casts detect undead to find out if the girl is among the living.
Nicat keeps a hand on the doorknob, even pulling it closed by an inch or two, while waiting to see what Evelyn can tell him about the sad but scary girl in the lonely room.
"Can we help her?" Ekan whispers, fearing it is too late.
...
...YEP.
And she's a strong one at that.
The crying woman peeks through her claws at Nicat, her red eyes focusing on him. "Betrayal... by the man I loved..." She whispers between her sobs.
Evelyn swallows, her heart skipping a beat when she realizes what the girl is.
Her hand shaking ever so slightly, Evelyn grabs hold of Nicat's sleeve and tries to pull him out of the door opening. She tries to not look at the girl, and to close the door as good as its busted lock allows for it.
"វាមិនមានប្រាជ្ញាក្នុងការបង្ខំឱ្យទ្វារនេះបើកទ្វារទេ។" Evelyn whispers nervously. "វាមិនចាំបាច់ធ្វើបាបនាងទេ។ សូមឱ្យនាងជាហើយនាងនឹងបានសំរាកនៅពេលដែលយើងសំលាប់ឃាតកររបស់នាង។"
Eostre nods at Evelyn's words and helps shepherd the others out of the room.
"តើគាត់ធ្វើបែបនេះយូរប៉ុណ្ណាគាត់សម្លាប់មនុស្សនិងបង្កើតសត្វចម្លែក? គាត់ហាក់ដូចជាធម្មតានៅពេលយើងជួបគាត់នៅ Sandpoint!" she whispers back.
As Evelyn tugs on him, Nicat keeps his grip on the door and pulls it closed as he is himself pulled out of the room.
"I don't know what you guys are saying," he says quietly, "but this place gives me the creeps."
"That woman was apparently murdered by Foxglove and it turned her into a monster. She's gonna come back from being killed if we try to put her down every time until Foxglove himself dies or she manages to kill him..." Eostre explains. Then she blinks in surprise.
"Callous as this may sound, we could take advantage of this. She may be undead, but we're effectively on the same side. We help her find Foxglove, maybe she helps us fight him?
A sniff comes from the room the party just left.
"I can hear you, you know..." She whimpers.
Eostre grimaces.
"Sorry, miss," she replies in an embarrassed tone. "We're not too keen on fighting you, you sound like you've been through enough."
"We will try to avenge the wrongs done to you" The monk says to her Though a part of him admonishes himself I should be seeking justice, not revenge but then my focus in that area is also... blurred. as he remembers his lost home and scattered siblings.
Evelyn hears the girl speak, but has no idea what she just said. Alarmed, Evelyn looks at Eostre. "តើនាងបាននិយាយអ្វី?"
Eostre and Ekan seem to respond to the girl, and Evelyn hopes nothing bad will happen.
"នាងនិយាយថានាងអាចលឺយើងបាន" Eostre replies.
The woman's reply is marred by a continued bout of sobbing. "Why... why would you ever help... help a wretch like me?"
She peeks through her claws at the mirror she's in front of and starts crying again.
The woman's reply is marred by a continued bout of sobbing. "Why... why would you ever help... help a wretch like me?"
She peeks through her claws at the mirror she's in front of and starts crying again.
Eostre rubs the back of her neck, and then starts fiddling with one of her braids.
"Cuz...we're heroes? Helping people is what we DO. And...knowing someone hurt you and left you like this...well personally that pisses me off royally, so I'd wanna fireball the son-of-a-barghest who did this to you on principle!"
Ekan translates what Eostre and the ..lady say
Then "your name, please? I'm Ekan"
The revenant sniffs. "...Iesha Foxglove."
"Hello, Iesha. Would that we had been in time to .. meet under better circumstances"
Eostre looks between the door and the group, waiting for Iesha's reaction...
Iesha briefly pauses in her sobbing. "...the mirror. Please, do something about the mirror..."
"Sure, I got an acid spell that should do the trick," Eostre offers. "I'm comin' in now, Iesha, if you wouldn't mind stepping away from the mirror so you don't get caught in the splash?"
"Plus she'll probably freak out if I accidentally look at her reflection in the mirror.
She covers her eyes steps into the room.
Iesha curls up into an even tighter ball, shrinking away from the mirror.
Eostre tromps into the room and begins throwing acid splash after acid splash on the mirror, hoping this would work to destroy the offending object without actively shattering it and condemning herself to seven years of ill fortune. Granted, that length of time wasn't as significant to a dwarf than to a human or halfling, but she felt if she was going to continue an adventuring career, she'd need all the good fortune she could muster.
Eostre's acidic magic flies at the mirror again. And again. And again. With each casting, more and more of the mirror's shine fades. More and more of the mirror corrodes, blackens, loses what reflection it could once cast.
Iesha stares at the mirror. Her sobs stop.
Her eyes are wide.
Eostre covers her eyes.
"Um...feel better, Iesha?" she asks.
Ekan hopes that Lesha can hold onto herself until they bring justice for her. He doesn't relish the idea of fighting her
Eostre tries not to gulp and display how Nethys-damned scared she was.
For a few tense moments, Iesha says nothing. She slowly rises to her feet, her limbs trembling and her hair falling in ragged strings around her shoulders.
Her jaw clenches. Her teeth grind together. Her hands clench so tightly that were coal placed in them, they'd be crushed into diamonds.
And then comes the scream.
Her shriek of rage pierces the silence like a ballista bolt, carrying with it a wave of fear that could only come from first-hand experience with the supernatural.
Eostre immediately flinches and curls up on the floor.
"We're on the same side, we're on the same side, we're on the same side, we're on the same side," she repeats in a hushed, panicked tone.
Nicat winces at the scream, but manages to keep his head. Seeing Eostre rolling about on the floor, Nicat lays a calming hand on her and says, "Easy there, sis, she's not hurting us! I think she's just a bit...upset."
I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the soiler of breaches and pantaloons. Wait, that's not how that teaching goes... instead of the words, he focuses on the stillness needed and stays calm "We are on your side."
Conner winces slightly, but doesn't otherwise react. If this...person was so enraged she'd tear off after Aldern and rip some pieces off him, Conner wasn't about to object.
Iesha storms out of the room, her hair waving wildly in the air behind her. Her claws extend and sharpen, gleaming in the faint light of the corridors. Her howls of rage disappear into the house's lower floors.
"I think she'll know how to find her foe, we should follow" And he starts to do so.
"Makes a horrible sort of sense to me," Nicat says grimly, moving along after Iesha.
Conner nods and follows, if this "revenant" could draw the enemy's attention, the group could flank them.
Eostre gets up from the floor, mentally trying to pull herself together. She begins trundling after the others.
It's not hard to follow Iesha. Her enraged shrieking can be heard throughout the house, as can the violent sundering and tearing of wood. She storms all the way down to the first floor, finds a doorway to the north of the trophy room, and practically tears it off its hinges in her mad journey downwards.
Following her down, the party stumbles across what was once a kitchen in the manor's basement. A large oaken table, its surface covered with moldy stains and rat droppings, sits in the center of this large kitchen. Shelves line the walls, and an oversized fireplace dominates the northeast portion of t he room. The shelves in the southwest wall are in a much greater state of disarray, and two one-foot wide cracks in the wall near the floor lead south into the earth beyond the basement walls.
The sound of squeaking rats can be heard over Iesha's ranting.
"Knowing our luck the rats are gonna burst out and try to eat us, slowing down our pursuit," Eostre comments as she continues bringing up the rear of the group.