"I have only one healing spell left for today. We could camp in here tonight, ambush anyone who arrives and question them. I can prepare three spells of healing in the morning. I could also magically trap the hidden door."
Xune can determine that the holes are related to some sort of trap, likely triggered along with the catch.
Alyna mutters in elven:
"Let's put the string to the lever, camp outside, then tomorrow morning pull the string. Then go."
She notoriously doesn't compliment the others on their perceptive finds
Xune plugs the holes and finds herself second-guessing her initial assumption somewhat. The holes are indeed part of the trap system, however the air flow is too weak to suit the needs of a high intensity fire.
The group posts up on the hilltop for the evening, allowing time in the morning for study, prayer, and to double check the effectiveness of the mud and stone plugs which have cemented up to her satisfaction overnight.
With some trial and error, Alyna's idea of using a rope to remotely open the catch works. There are a pair of loud twangs and dirt and a few pebbles are knocked loose from the plugs. Then the back of the cave wall shifts to reveal it is actually an elaborate door.
A rough passageway waits behind the false wall. It is about ten feet wide, but the ceiling is a little short at about five and a half feet. A soft blue light beckons from just beyond.
Alyna lets Xune take the lead, expectantly looking at her, sword drawn.
Xune creeps around the corner and discovers a massive chamber. Seventy feet wide and constructed in a circle, the room is lit by three large globes set into the ceiling which glow with a blue light. The ceiling here is quite high, stretching up to twenty five feet. Numerous arches and buttresses give the entire chamber a very gothic feel.
There are several exits from this large room. Across from the entrance is a passageway flanked by ancient dwarven statues. Another passage has carved pillars, and another is blocked by double doors. The other two passages have no special markings or doors.
In the center of the room is a heavy metal hatch set into the floor. It is currently open.
Davin follows well behind the others, knowing that the noise his armor makes is a liability.
Sid hangs back to let Xune ghost ahead, sword ready to assist if anything jumped out at them.
Xune's elven eyes show a mostly cold, stone passage. It returns to the shorter height of the entrance tunnel and moves steadily south. At the end is a room about fifteen feet in diameter with two narrow windows concealed into the rock: the arrow slits Beau observed outside.
Not only do they provide excellent coverage of the approach to the small mountain structure, but offer a very clear view of the entire Tesh River Valley from Daggerfalls to the surrounding farms. In the clear warm daylight things seem peaceful except for the Zhents performing drills and mustering for patrols.
Beau grunts and then looks about after they view the left path somewhat. He lights up his pipe, and after a few puffs notes he just felt something off about this place. The open metal hatch seemed odd, but more so the stone guardians. Those weren't always just block of stone, and he felt they had missed something important. It was just to easy if this was a dwarven outpost.
Talking with his pipe in mouth still he says " Something just ain't clicking ere. We not faced the first trap really."
Sid looks curiously at Xune. "What do you mean by 'pass'? Did I miss a patrol going by?" He gestures at the arrow slits. "The closest ones I saw were all the way down by Daggerfall. Which, incidentally, makes this a great watchpost even if we don't decide to make this our base."
Both elves find their observations correct. The patrols are a significant distance away at the moment, however they are just getting started and at least one is bound to pass by the Eyrie eventually so securing the cave entrance might be a good idea.
Beau leans in to look at the statues more closely. They are carved into the stone in an older art style from many generations ago and represent the god Moradin. The room beyond the statues looks from here to be a forge room. The combination of statues and anvil immediately make Beau think of the traditional phrase a devout dwarf would utter upon entering such a divine sanctum: "Moradin guide my hand."
Alyna actually is interested in looking down the hatch at least once, and walks up to it to steal a glance, with every intention of following the rest of the party elsewhere if the hatch proves uninteresting.
Alyna looks down the shaft to find a rusty, but sturdy, metal ladder bolted to the wall. It goes straight down for maybe fifty feet before ending at a platform in a chamber below. Natural light spills in from one side of the cavern, diffused at times in a manner that reminds Alyna of sunlight peeking through the rustling leaves of the forest canopy. On the wall opposite the light is another ladder and a deeper, darker shaft that it descends into.
The hatch itself appears to be rusted open and incredibly solid. A casual push does not budge it.
Sid looks over, then at Beau. "I'm no expert, but it looks rusted shut to me. Do you think you can get it closed, Beau?"
"That hatch is a direction like a hallway, with a door that's rusting open. Would you want to force to close a door if you encounter one? Why do we need to close the hatch? We go in or we move on, just like hallways."
As the others examine the hatch, Xune slips down the other long passage. At the end is another pair of arrow slit windows providing an even wider view of the surrounding region.
Xenotime does his best to squeeeeze in. Since he's about pony-sized he is able to make it, behind the others.
The dragon's white scaly head swings this way and that as he peers about in the dark confines.
"This place is kind of a dump."
Alyna calmly waits in a squat, confident that Xune is the better scout where it doesn't concern forests. She remains silent, trying to listen for danger.
Beau puzzles over the hatch, as it shouldn't have been left open in the first place unless the previous inhabitants had to leave in a hurry. This led him to wonder out loud " We may be treading on ghost aye? These halls have no reason to sit empty yet do."
The elven rogue does not detect any traps, however the rusted doors are locked.
Rusted tumblers and broken springs keep Xune from bypassing the lock. It would probably take a feat of strength or some tools to get through. Xune can hear some scratching sounds behind the door when she tries to pick the lock.
The effort creates a fair amount of noise and before long a small insect antenna pushes out from a gap in the chipped door frame by the floor. Roughly the size of a smallish dog, it looks like a beetle with a glowing orange abdomen. Several more of the insects are pushing through, quite irate at the disturbance to their nest!
Alyna blows her signal whistle and shouts "Alarm!“
She draws her sword and attacks, going fully on the offensive (so AC 1 with her new banded mail)
Beau grumbles under his breath " Ah s+*%, here we go again."
Drawing his sword forth, Beau seems to be upset from his musing over this lost outpost.
Davin hurries over to Xune, raises his mace and brings it down on one of the bugs.
Sid had been standing by while Xune did her thing, and burst into action when the bugs emerged from the door.
Xune immediately rolls away from the danger to provide space for the others as Sid deftly stabs a quick thrust at one of the big bugs, impaling it in one stroke.
The other beetle tries to bite Sid with it's dagger-like mandibles.
But it comes up short of the nimble elf. Another small insect creeps out of the sealed room, only to be sliced in two a moment later from Alyna's blade.
Continuing her dance more confidently, Alyna starts to experience this combat more as a way to compete with Sid, than as mortal danger. She attempts to kill some more bugs.
+5 = 20 for the second hit.
"These things are a lot faster than they look."
He then tries to smash the bug again.
Swinging at the bugs, Beau tries to take them out hard.
" Damn pest! Begon ye!