Muraisa began pulling out a couple of javelins and some rope, intending to use them to try and get up, but paused as Ysildaë started bouncing around the room to get up. Muraisa watched, momentarily entranced, at the other woman's agility.
Ysildaë leeps up the wall bounding off the small ledges of stone in the tower's construction. Finding a hand hold among the rafters, the monk dangles from the ceiling examining the trap door. With nothing of note about the trap that concerns her, Ysildaë is certain that the trap door opens upward into the next level.
Rocking back and forth on the rafters to develop momentum, she pushes the trap door open with her slippered feet so that she may tumble through the aperture on her next swing.
Impressed, Muraisa took a look at the figure. Whatever it was. It might be a statue, given it seemed neither alive nor dead. Unless it moved it wasn't why they were there, and could wait again. Instead, she waited until Ysildaë was in a good place and tossed her the rope so everyone else could get up. Muraisa was not bouncing her way up today.
Watching the elf with bewilderment, Muraisa steps up the stairs into the bedroom and feels a slight tug at her boot. Looking down she sees a thin leather cord pulled taut by her stride. An audible click alerts the barbarian to the danger, but it is too late for her cloak as a crossbow bolt from the figure streaks past her and tears a hole in the fur. She twists to her right to see the bolt careen off the stone walls. Muraisa's eyes dart back to the seated figure.
High above, Ysildaë tumbles through the trapdoor to find the clock room. Various gears and tools are randomly strewn about the room. Besides herself, the room is void of life.
Ysildaë opens herself once more seeking the evil that they feared lurked in this tower.
Swearing at the sudden bolt, Muraisa glared at the figure, seeing if they were reacting at all to the sudden noise.
In the clock room, Ysildaë finds nothing to alert her to the presence of evil. She sifts through the mechanical gears and springs that lie about the room along with an assortment of tools.
In the caaretaker's room, Muraisa stares intently at the hooded figure seated inthe chair. It remains steadfast and does not flinch at the imposing barbarian.
Dipping her head back through the trap door.
"See not cut-flower-blossoms nor stolen-children. Search again the root of this tower for ways-secret to tunnels below?"
Muraisa glared at the figure one more time. "If you know where the children are, now would be the time to say," Muraisa muttered, but turned and nodded to Ysildaë.
Ysildaë leaps through the trap door with a flip, tucking into a roll to diffuse energy the jump, coming to her feet with a smooth motion.
She goes over an examines the corpse and what lies near it for clues connected to the death cult. If she finds nothing she will return to the first floor to search for any secret entrances.
Ysildaë and Muraisa cautiously approach the hooded figure. From under the hood, no sound emits nor does it shift in the slightest. The barbarian grips he axe tightly as the elf reaches forward waiving her hand before its face. Relaxing her posture, Ysildaë pulls back the hood to reveal a shriveled and quite dead human male before drawing the cloak completely back. Lying in his lap is a crossbow. Several bolts are stacked between the corpse and the arm rest of the chair. A thin cord runs from the trigger of the crossbow to tool, hammered into the stone work on the far side of the stair case.
The pair shrug and search the corpse to find a seven silver coins and a rusty dagger. Finding nothing else in the room, they move back to the stairs. As they begin to descend, Muraisa notices the top of ladder sticking out from under the bed. She glances between the trap door and Ysildaë, then smiles.
On the first floor, the group spies a pile of broken crates and a work table turned askew. Upon the table rests a series of scrolls that detail the towers construction with diagrams showing the inner workings of the clock. Kayin begins to fiddle with the papers while the others continue their search. With a muffled sigh of excitement, the Oracle stacks the thin vellum pieces and holds them to a light. When the scribblings of notes from the upper clock room are backlit and read with the ground floor on top, it reveals the location of a secret door near the work table.
Nothing else is found other than the unopened wooden box hidden among the refuse. The pair of rusty nails still lays criss-crossed upon its top, along with a single broken, wooden slat from one of the nearby crates. The box is in fine shape with no visible markings. It is made of a knotty, dark wood and the lid is hinged. A small latch pin holds the top securely to the base. No lock or other mechanism may be seen upon the box.
Being on the tower's ground floor and waiting is a somewhat nerve-wracking experience for the oracle, and he's glad when the separated members of the group return unhurt. The opportunity to poke around and investigate without the immediate threat of undead (or not-dead) foes is actually rather pleasant for him, as it soothes his persistent need to know things. Finding--by accident, though he'll never admit as much to the others--an interesting secret about their current location brings a happy smile to Kayin's face, and he wastes no time in sharing his discovery.
Muraisa isn't especially interested in the box, but she'll start messing with the door soon if someone doesn't deal with it.
Maria examines the box, her mind categorizing all the different ways it could be trapped.
Maria examines the concealed door carefully. She points out a small hole to the left of the door in the wall. The hole is just large enough to reach into, however, she cannot see anything in the dark hole. It appears to extend at least 12 inches into the wall before darkness overwhelms it. Nothing on or around the door itself would indicate that it otherwise trapped.
Next to her, Muraisa pushes slightly against the door. It shifts slightly suggesting that it is not locked.
This was taking too long, and they'd wasted too much time with the upper floors. "Stand back," she muttered, before ripping it open.
Maria examines the box carefully using a mirror to look under it without lifting the box. She smiles and slips her hand underneath it. "A small button on the bottom of the box holds a trigger in place. It would have been set off if we picked it up or opened the lid." She opens the lid to find a metal hook about 9 inches long with a wooden handle. She looks at the others and shrugs as Muraisa begins to open the door.
Ysildaë nods to Muraisa and follows her into the dark.
Curious. Is it magical?
She will look for any inscriptions or otherwise identifying marks.
With all of the talk of traps and such, Kayin is hanging well back from the others, not eager to be caught in the mess should one be triggered. He can't help but wince as Muraisa impatiently wrenches the door open, and he's half waiting for something unpleasant to happen in response.
As Muraisa shoves open the door, she feels an increase in tension that immediately gives way with a massive crash of noise. Through the entrance she sees a bundled mess of pots, pans, tools and twine tumble down a stone staircase into the darkness. The echoing clank of metal reverberates in every direction. Muraisa cringes, shrugging her shoulders violently with every clang as the crude alarm tumbles away. After several long moments, the rate of crashes slows significantly until it finally stops.
As the metal crashes down the stairs, the oracle winces and shakes his head. "Well, if there's anyone down there, alive or otherwise, I'd say it's a guarantee that they know we're coming. We might want to keep an eye out for ambushes along with traps once we head down." The oracle's attention then shifts from the opened door to the barbarian. "I know you're in a rush to find these children, but rushing isn't going to help them at all if we end up hurt or dead because you tripped something that those with those with keen senses and deft fingers," and Kayin waves toward Ysildaë and Maria as he say this, indicating whom and what he's referring to. "Could have found and disabled with just a bit of patience. Remember that book, the one that burst into flames," the oracle then asks, reminding Muraisa of the Second Scribe and the trapped ledger only a day or so previously.
Maria looks a bit chagrined that there was yet another trap she missed. She resolves to do better as she stows the hook away and steps into the noisy dark looking for more traps as they descend below.
Ysildaë mournfully looks at the clanging pots and rings pans. Fly must we with swift feet into the darkness now.
The group heads down the stairs cautiously. After several revolutions, they come to a small room with a pile of pots and pans resting on the final steps of the stairwell. The flickering of light enters through an archway on the south wall.
Gritting her teeth in frustration at the noise, Muraisa wanted to continue after the children. But this might not be the right path either. The pile was large - perhaps larger than would be simple to do in the short time since the children had been grabbed - which might mean that this way wasn't the way they were taken. She glanced at the cloud of dust it had kicked up, to see how large the cloud was. The larger the cloud, the less likely the children had been taken this way.
Maria slips through the door shed in the light of a small candle still burning near a bedroll. Two tunnels lead out of the small chamber in either directions. Near the far south wall, a manhole is covered with rusty metal bars.
As Muraisa follows after the group, she notes that the stairs have been traveled consistently. Little dust can be seen in the center of the steps although the edges are lined with dirt. The passage is old, but used recently and frequently.
Muraisa wondered how they'd been able to pile so much behind the door, but it was a brief and moderately annoyed thought. Following behind Maria with her fingers flexing, she looked down each corridor to see if there was any trace of the right path. As an afterthought, she checked the cover with the rust covered bars. Maybe the rust was more cosmetic than it looked. This place seemed full of stupid tricks and traps.
Ysildaë watches Muraisa examine the trail. She turns to Titan, "Has children-scent still the bear?"
Muraisa takes a long look down both tunnels before surmising that both tunnels have seen recent use, but the western tunnel seems to have seen more traffic lately. This is confirmed when Bjorkus lets Titan know that the scent of the children leads west.
Before she leaves, Muraisa peers down the manhole. She can see that the rusted metal bars can be easily removed. Several spikes are stuck in the rock every few feet before the darkness obscures her vision. However, the metal is rusted and covers in green algae. She looks back along the ground and sees that water slowly runs from all directions into the manhole.
"Might be something down here," Muraisa notes to the others with a nod at the well, "But I reckon they most likely went that way," she gestured down the Western passage with one hand.
Maria and Ysildaë head down the western path. Maria is on the look out for more traps.
Maria followed by Ysildaë head down the western tunnel. No sooner had they entered the narrow passage, an arrow comes from the dark flying past the women and clattering against the far wall by Muraisa. A man darts from behind an outcropping and rushes down the tunnel away from them. Passing an unlit torch in the wall, the brigand takes the torch with him, releasing a length of chain. The slack in the chain quickly begins to be taken upwards. The clanking sound of the metal chain echoes in the passageway.
The elven noblewoman dashes forwards and closes the distance between her and the archer. Her right fist lashes out to try to strike a bundle of nerves that could stun the man. He was alive. He could answer questions.
plus disease and grab
plus disease and grab
As she chases after the man, Ysildaë runs past his hiding place in the tunnels. The outcropping conceals a large room. At the edge of the room, two zombies lurk. The first tries to slam into the monk, but only finds the wall as the elusive aasimar slipped past him. She turns her head just as a second zombie's arm crashes into her chest. The elven woman gasps for air as the zombie locks its powerful arms around her.