After catching up to the gobber, Brina bites into its leg. But that was the wrong gobber. The other is even further ahead.
Jewel focuses on the marble long enough to realize that the captured goblin is the wrong one, then continues chasing the other. Using her Feral Speech hex she calls out to Brina, "Brina! Wrong one. Help me catch the other. It carries the septer."
Brina looks at Tobar for confirmation, and runs after the other gobber as Tobar nods. But the gobber has quite the head start already. As Brina finally manages to catch up the gobber reaches the edge of a canyon, where a small river has washed out and cut into the ground.
It is some hundred feet across and 50 feet down. The gobber jumps to lose the cat in the river, hoping to get away alive. However slim his chances may be.
Seeing the goblin jump Jewel again consults the marble. Fairly certain that the thing's range is far beyond where they currently are she hopes it doesn't have any limits on how much she can use it. Give up the septer and we won't kill you! You only got part of it anyway! I've got the rest of it!
If she confirms that the device is ahead, in the river, she starts moving downstream with it. She glances back hoping that the others are in sight. If not she directs Chirp to find them and lead them along.
Clara helps Tarjun to 'hurry' along.
The group follows the canyon along, watching the golbin struggle in the waters below. After a quarter mile the typical noise of a waterfall is heard and it becomes louder the further one follows the river.
The gobber below soon outswims the kids above, as the river takes up speed. The littel green guy finally shoots over the endge, down the waterfall.
As the kids reach the edge, they look down into an almost circular hole with a diameter of hundreds of feet. The waterfall drops into a lake below, that for some reason doesn't seem to overflow. Even though it is not clear where the water goes to.
The steep walls down to the lake are covered with ivy. Down to the surface of the lake it might be about 50 feet. The gobber is nowhere to be seen.
Brina happily chases he goblin, at least to the point where it jumps into the water.
"Water? Water!!!!! Not going in there. No way!. Silly boy better not ask!!"
She then stops and, of course, grooms herself
"I LET him go. I MEANT to allow him to jump. Clearly"
Does the way down to the lake look climable? Can we see an easier way down there? For that matter, can we see any sign of the goblin
The vegetation has enough handholds to give climbing a try, but it is deep. And a fall would be deadly.
As you can see the sky again, as you have no trees in the way at teh edge of the 'valley' you notice the sun touching the trees.
Tobar looks down at the pool
"We can DEFINITELY get down there. Right? Sure, we can make it"
Brina, probably picking up on the fact that he is obviously very, very nervous, gives Tobar a look. Or so Tobar thinks
"But Brina doesn't want to go for a swim so lets not!. Well, the magic thingy seems to have gotten away. Any ideas?"
"Yes we can." Clara agrees and starts climbing.
"Can you decide what you want?" she complains as she hangs in the ivy.
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Tarjun joins his friends, fashionably late to the party.
"Yeah, I don't know about climbin' down there, guys. The gobbo ain't gonna make it alive. And Pa and Ma are gonna worry if we don't show up soon. Maybe we can look for 'im tomorrow -you can make that doggo come back, Clara, can't you? Maybe he can follow its trail -or whatever."
"That dog comes only a very short time. Ask Tobar if Brina can follow tracks." Clara replies. She doesn't look happy on the mentioning of having to go home. "Send Chirp to tell that we won't come." she tells pouting.
Jewel hangs her head, obviously upset. "No. Stop Clara. If somebody falls that far you're dead, and our magic can't even help then! We gotta do this smart."
She reaches to help Clara back up. "We still have the marble. We don't know what the limit is on it but it was good from the grave to here. If the gobber survives and carries it away we can follow it later. If it dropped it, we'll have to try to find wherever it ends up from the flow of the water. Right now let's just watch and see if we can spot the gobber. Then we go back home and get the key back in Dad's coat pocket."
"This is stupid. I don't see anything from here." Clara pouts.
After a while the gobber floats out of the whirling mists of the waterfall onto the lake. He lies face down in the water and doesn't move.
When Jewel finally spots the body floating in the water below she points to it. "There it must have drowned after it fell. Stupid gobber! She checks the marble again to see where it indicates.
The marble pulls down into the lake.
As most of the kids are not willing to risk being grounded, the group hurries home again. Thanks to Tobar they make it without getting lost. They are still way past fashionably late and earn themselves a stern look from their parents.
Slipping the key back is an easier task than getting it, as it takes mere seconds.
Luckily for the kids, the next day is Sunday, so there is no extra work punishment. After the usual breakfast routine, the kids are released for play.
Going in direction of the ruined shrine first and turning the other direction once out of side the kids make their way back to the lake. Jewel notices, that the pull is stronger with distance. As Tobar bragged about his skills to find tracks and not getting lost, Jewel leaves the lead to him, and only corrects when he fails.
At the end of the long walk leads to the rim of the lowered lake.
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"Jewel, is the marble at the bottom of the lake?"
Of course, they could try diving into the lake to fetch it, but the drowning of the goblin makes Tarjun distrustful. The stream could be strong enough to prevent a kid from swimming safely.
He picks up a long stick, and throws it in the middle of lake, trying to test the stream and evaluate if taking a dip could be dangerous.
Jewel walks along the shoreline holding the marble and trying to get a specific location. She offers the marble to the others so they can 'see' it too. "The marble pulls to the septer, but I don't think it would help anyone swim to it. I hope it's not too deep. I'm not comfortable swimming in strange, deep water."
The marble still pulls downward, but not directly towards the lake. More to the side of it.
The stick Tarjun threw in slowly drifts away from the position he threw it to. Really slow. The only movement in the lake is where the waterfall drops into it.
Confused at the direction the marble pulls Jewel calls the others close and leads them around the shoreline. "Might be something amphibious grabbed the septer. Find a stick to throw. If it's stupid it might run after it like a dog."
Standing on the other side of the lake, you find that the marble pulls almost straight down. If not even behind you, which would be underground.
"Are we climbing down?" Clara asks. She got the feeling, that walking around the hole is like beating around the bush.
Jewel holds the marble in the palm of her hand, stepping back and forth while focusing on the direction of the pull. "Check this out Clara. It seems to be under ground here. I wonder if there's a cave under the water?"
Clara takes the marble and confirms the direction. "I'll go down and see where it is. Do you come along or may I borrow the marble?" she asks.
Being too hasty Clara looses hold of the ivy and tumbles down into the water 40 foot below.
Seeing his sister fall into the water, floating there unconscious, Tobar decides to rapidly climb down to help her.
Swift action - he takes on the aspect of the monkey for a minute
He then scrambles down madly towards the lake (accelerated climb)
"Don't worry Clara, I'm coming!"
It isn't really hard to climb down the ivy and Tobar soon reaches the surface of the lake.
Having managed to climb most of the way down the Ivy and seeing his sister just floating there, likely dying, Tobar dives the last 10 feet into the lake
He bellyflops into the water, taking damage
He then swims toward his sister
and
manages to get her head above water. He then makes for the nearest shore
Tobar notices a slow but steady draft towards the ivy covered wall, but he manages to get to shore about 80 feet away.
Scared as she is, with Tarjun's coaxing and Clara's need Jewel carefully climbs down.
Jewel slips and almost falls but then remembers Tarjun's helping words. She is shaking slightly when she makes it to the ground. "Thanks Tarjun!"
She moves over to where Tobar has Clara and reaches out to cast a healing spell.
"Come on sis. You can make it. Wake up! Jewel, she will be ok won't she? She can't die! Please, make her well"
Clara looks better after the healing, but still doesn't wake. But at least it is clear that she is still breathing.
Tobar rubs his sisters limbs and croons softly to her, trying to wake her up
Jewel joins Tobar trying to wake Clara. "Come on Clara. You need to wake up and use your own magic to do some more healing....
Clara jerks up and starts coughing. Once done with that she tells "I'm not feeling well."
She sinks down on her back again. Putting her hand on herself she uses her magic to heal herself some more.
As she is fully restored again, she ponders if she shall play badly wounded some more to postpone the scolding for almost falling to her death.
As the shock of seeing his sister nearly dies wears off Tobar can't help himself
"You HAVE to be more careful. You could have KILLED yourself. What would I have told mum and dad? PLEASE promise me to be more careful in the future"
He tries to hold back the tears in his eyes but fails.
He grabs Clara and gives her a big bone rattling hug and whispers to her
"I'm glad you didn't die. PLEASE don't do that again. I couldn't stand it if you got seriously hurt"
In a low whisper that she hopefully can't hear
"I love you sis."
Jewel considers joining with Tobar's scolding but decides against it. "Once you are feeling capable, maybe we can figure out where the septer is and how to get it. Then we still gotta think of how to get back up there and back to the crypt..."
"Yes, I will be more careful." Clara promises, and these are no empty words. Falling 40 feet down is no experience you need twice. "Love you too." she replies sniffling.
The marble pulls towards the wall of ivy and still a little down.