She. Broccan processes the small, but important word, then looks over toward Kata, to see if she caught it as well.
He takes the rope from Roselle and loops it around his body, securing it with a bowline. He makes his way toward the cesspit, sunrod in hand.
”Pull me’up’f I star’scream’n r’f sum’n grabs me,” he says in a calm tone.
He hands off the other end of the rope to Edrukk and Rosie, confident that the two of them can pull him out, if needed.
Edrukk peers down into the pit with his darkvision, noting the apparent side tunnels. "Know ye 'is, lad. Ah c'n feel th' stone 'neath m' feet, y'know. 'ere be a tunnel. Mebbe washt out by water o'er th' years, mebbe dug out by 'ntent, but 'ere be room fer company down 'ere. 'r ye sure yer goin' 'lone 's best?"
”If y’wan’eh foll’eh’me down, I’ll no’tobject,” Broccan replies to Edrukk. ”Bu’ somebody’s got’teh go firs’. May’z well be me.”
Artophanx, meanwhile, seems disturbed when this subject is brought to his attention. "I cannot slide through fed rock, and I cannot leave Cairn. Anyone below our feet is outside."
That does sound more reasonable, in retrospect. It’s not a place ‘in’ the cairn that anyone would need access to, Alaïs muses.
<“Right, of course. I’m sorry to have bothered you, Artophanx. We’re still trying to see if we’ve missed any clue down here, but we’ll find a way to set you free, I’m sure,”> the bard does her best to reassure the elemental, before turning back to convey the bad news to Edrukk and the others.
She readies her shield and makes sure she can easily draw her sword or grab onto the rope if something goes wrong, whichever might be the best way to help.
Rosella hangs onto the rope, face grim. "I'm staying up here. I can't draw my bow while hanging onto a rope, and you need someone capable of pulling you up if needed. But be careful. Especially if there's a tunnel."
She preemptively braces herself as much as she can. Whatever had dragged that person (woman?) down the hole could still be nearby.
"Ah'll anchor yer tug-o-war, but if'n ye need 'elp, Ah'll come runnin'."
Edrukk takes up the rope with Rosella and braces himself, planning to use his stout frame to support his friends.
Kata's voice quivers, as if weighing two equally bad thoughts. "I can follow B. My spear can reach over his shoulder if need be." Gathering a pebble, the elegist casts her light-bauble upon it, and casts the stone into the hole, hoping for a better view of what lies below...
The stone falls to the bottom some fifteen feet down with a dull thump, illuminating a deep pit filled with ancient, fossilized refuse.
Seeker hops about unsteadily. "Did you hear that?"
"There is something down there. Not sure what, but the look of it reminds me of a creepy doll Ava had growing up. One of those fancy porcelain things that break if you look at 'em funny."
Rosella doesn't take her eyes off the rope as Seeker speaks. Her muscles are tensed, ready to pull back on the rope at the slightest hint of trouble. "I didn't hear anything. What did you hear?"
"Th' shine 'n th' pit - looks t' be fragile. If'n ye wanna gather 't, mind ye don' break 't."
Broccan nods in acknowledgement, and climbs into the pit, pausing at the lip long enough for Edrukk and Rosella to brace and receive his weight on the rope.
He stows his sunrod in his bandolier, freeing up his hands, and hangs on as they lower him down.
Briar nods to Seeker, then calls down below. ”Some sort of rattle sound down there, like a snake. Started right after the light struck the bottom. Keep your eyes keen!” Time like would be great to have a crossbow or something she could use to keep the others covered.
"Any o' ye c'n 'old th' rope 'n free 'p 'r archer? Let 'sella cover wit' her bow?"
“Here,” Alaïs nods, moving over to grab onto the rope and free up Rosella to cover the others with her bow. It’s a bit of an odd sight, the fine lady latched on to haul cordage, but she’s braced herself properly and her expression is determined.
Edrukk nods approvingly, ”Attagirl. Ah knows ‘ere was more t’ ye ‘an just a pretty face.”
The words are as gruffly spoken as anything else he says, but a quick glance at his eyes reveals a twinkle that makes it obvious that he’s teasing.
I hope'eh don'die'n here. I can'eh thin'kov'eh more humiliatin' way t' go, Broccan thinks to himself as he dangles from a rope over centuries of ancient offal.
As Broccan descends into the musty, fetid darkness, followed by Kata, everyone else watches silently, waiting for something to go wrong. Edrukk and Rosella strain at the rope--neither Broccan nor Kata are particularly lightweight. Seeker perches up atop the door and preens nervously.
The shaft is narrow enough for Broccan and Kata to be able to reach the sides, and climbing down isn't difficult, even though it feels like it takes months. Hopefully climbing up will be equally easy.
The ceramic thing rests half-submerged in the dried... remains... at Broccan's feet. It appears to be some sort of delicate bowl, inscribed with designs of beautiful women made of fire, earth, water and wind.
Trying not get in the way, Alaïs stands by where, hopefully, she can quickly pick up some of the slack with a quick stomp on the end, just in case Edrukk and Rosella let the rope slip, or maybe loose an arrow, if needed. It’s not that she can’t imagine why that might happen, exactly, but she’d really rather not, as she tries to keep images of a fountain of flickering shadows or worse bursting out of the shaft from around Kata and Broccan out of her mind.
Broccan descends a bit more, trying to get low enough to lean sideways and grab the bowl without having to stand in the ancient offal.
Rosella grunts as she clutches onto the rope. Edrukk is a solid presence beside her, and Alaïs' arms have proven stronger than they look, but she's not going to let go unless things go truly salted. In which case at least the bottom isn't too far down.
"Seeker, you didn't answer me. What did you hear?"
"It. Them. The thing knows we're here." Seeker flutters and makes a funny choking sound in her throat. "It's in there. I don't know where. Between, somehow. In the walls. In the floor. This is a mistake!"
A human fingerbone.
Broccan scoops up the bowl and pulls himself back up to an upright position.
"Huh," he says, looking at the rattling contents. "There'sa bone'n'it. Looks like'eh finger."
He gives a tug on the rope. "Can'ye pull me'yup? M'hands'r full," he calls up to the others.
"Mebbe 'sella c'n clim 'n 'p, s' we be only liftin' one o' ye."
Briar moves to help the others with the rope. She may not be particularly strong, but another pair of hands certainly can’t hurt. Might speed up the assent, and she has a bad vibe about this situation still. That rattling and Seeker’s rambling have her on edge.
Seeker's warning combined with Broccan's request puts Rosella on edge. "Right, I'm pulling you both up now. Hold on tight." Leaning back against the weight, she tries to get both Broccan and Kata back up as quickly as possible.
As Rosella begins to pull on the rope, Edrukk wordlessly begins to take the slack, making sure to keep the tension on the rope to aid the fighter, but his grip on rope isn't what is should be.
Kata's feet land on the ground and she gasps, as if the wind has been knocked from her. "Can you feel it?", Kata asks, her gasping louder than her voice. "Like wearing a veil. The air - its less down here..."
While Broccan attends to the bowl, Kata looks around, the hands gripping her spear shaking.
A blur of movement briefly obscures the group's view of Broccan and Kata. Just five feet down, a hand emerges from the side, grasps the rope, and gives a vicious tug.
Rosella is yanked right over the edge and sent tumbling into the shaft.
A second later, everyone hears a gnashing sound, and Broccan's and Kata's end of the rope falls to the ground at their feet. The rope looks like it's been chewed right in half.
"There's someth'n'in'ere wi'thus!" Broccan calls up the shaft.
He stuffs the bowl and finger into his pouch, and draws his shortsword, holding the sunrod in his left.
He stands ready to strike anything that lunges at him or Kata.
Rosella gets just a little bit too close to the edge as she tries to pull up Broccan and Kata. Already slightly off balance, the unexpected tug is more than enough to send her tumbling forward into the hole. If she'd had a second to think she would have released the rope rather than risk dragging the others down with her. Instead she clutches it tighter even as her shoulder slams hard into the rocky wall.
She doesn't get any time to think before she's falling again. It isn't until she hears Broccan's warning and sees the now-useless rope fall to the ground that she fully registers what's happening. Something is in the walls. In the floor. Multiple somethings? Whatever it is, it has teeth sharp enough to gnaw through a thick rope in seconds.
Wincing as she flexes her shoulder, she grabs her bow and aims an arrow towards the hole the hand had come from. If it shows itself, she plans to be ready.
Briar let go of the rope reflexively as soon as she felt the sharp tug, then cursed herself for that reflex. She draws her crossbow—remembering that she does in fact have a crossbow—and cocks it before moving over to the edge to peer down.
Alaïs utters a sharp sound of distress and stomps with her foot to try to snag the trailing end of the rope, as something else pulls on the other end, beyond Broccan and Kata, but she’s no redcap, with the sort of nasty spike-nailed boots that might make her first impulse work better.
Or not even, she has just time to think, as whatever it is is strong enough to pull Rosella over, and then the rope goes slack and drops, torn apart.
Something like an echo rises up from her mouth again as she steps up to see if she can help, peering down the shaft, except the sound is both shorter and more resonant, reverberating more briskly than it ought to.
“Come on out of there,” she commands, more assuredly than she actually feels, given that they have no idea yet what the thing is, other than something that can spook even a critter as creepy as Seeker. Alaïs’ words would be almost perfectly ridiculous, on the edge of self-parody as an unrealistically demanding aristocrat, except her previous tone still lingers impossibly under her statement.
Edrukk is still muttering under his breath and trying to regain his grip when the rope goes slack.
He catches himself before he falls, however. In a moment of indecision, he sees Briar take up her crossbow and realized the wisdom of that choice and readies his own.
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The words flow quickly to Kata, a hymnal about dark times, and necessary fortitude. The elegist grimaces as Rosella lands beside her and the severed rope, casting a silent thanks when the archer starts scrambling for her bow.
“When I am weak, she gives me strength.
When I am lonely, she comforts me.
When I am tired of the load that I am bearing,
She gives me courage, courage, courage to bear my share.”
A tense standoff begins, as the thing in the floors and the party both seem to wait for an opening. Kata's hymn is a glad interruption to the dishonest silence that has settled over the cairn.
Specifically, straight towards Rosella.
Her crossbow finally ready, she aims down, ready to shoot at anything that jumps out.
"We shou' ge'tout'eh 'ere while th' get'ns good," Broccan suggests, still keeping his guard up, ready to strike at anything that attacks . "If one'eh ye climbs up on m'shoulders, one o' th' others up there cn' pull ye up."
"We should get out of here while the getting is good. If one of you climbs up on my shoulders, one of the others up there can pull you up."
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Alaïs strains to hear or spot the sinister something moving below to harry the others, but there’s too much going on down the crowded shaft for her to catch it. She keeps her eyes open, but settles for now on adding her own voice in counterpoint to Kata’s to encourage the others’ ascent to where Alaïs and Edrukk can form a defensive line, a strange resonance still lingering behind her recitative.
“You light-armed folk, come shelter beneath
our shields on either side, then let fly your
solid sling-stones and smooth darts,
making your stand beside those in full armour!”
It must be said that as she leans over the shaft, she leaves herself a bit more open to attack herself.
Hearing Broccan's suggestion, Edrukk says, "Aye, gimme yer 'and!" He gets down on the floor, setting his crossbow on the ground beside him, and reaches into the hole to aid someone's exit.
Quickly setting her bow back in its place on her back, Rosella crouches down next to Kata and interlaces her fingers. "Step on my hands. I'll boost you up onto Broccan's shoulders."
Kata quirks her head to the side, listening, listening, and shakes her head, her voice choked with fear. "No, no. You go up Rosella! It's coming for you."
She lifts her spear and points it into the darkness, waiting and wanting to put the tip of it between whatever comes and her friend.
Even as Kata chokes out her warning, she sees two gleaming algae-green eyes blink into existence in the narrow tunnel behind Rosella--and two long, sinuous tentacle-like arms come shooting out towards Rosella's neck. At their ends are long, spindly hands, with long, delicate, many-jointed fingers--as dainty and fine as those of a child.
Rosella is caught off-guard in this moment, and long fingers move to clench around her neck.
Briar's bolt thuds into the ground, barely missing a swift-moving tendril, and Broccan's frantic swing is foiled by the narrowness of the waste shaft. Kata's spear has better luck, piercing its rubbery gray flesh. A gut-curdling shrieking rattle echoes through the cave, the sound wet and visceral.
But the delicate hands are too quick. With a brutal squeeze, and a horrible gurgle, Rosella goes limp.
The hands retreat back into the burrow--and begin to pull her unconscious body after.
Rosella has enough time to look up at Kata from her crouched position. "For-" is all she says before the hands shoot out from the walls and choke her into unconsciousness.
As she's being dragged away her body tries instinctively, desperately, to get any air it can. It fails.
Broccan lunges forward and grabs for the arm trying to drag Rosella away, dropping the sunrod as he does, but keeping in sword in the other hand.
Alaïs stifles a horrified gasp at the flicker of movement she sees, unsure what she even is seeing, exactly, before Rosella gets pulled down and off to one side.
She spares a second from trying to spot what’s grabbed the archer to glance at Seeker, her free hand and her feet almost instinctively, frustratedly maintaining the rhythm of her recitation as she asks the eerie bird, “Seeker, how many … whatevers are down there?”
Despite her necessary vagueness, her voice is stern, and she looks all but set to vault down the shaft any moment.
The creature has a disturbing strength, but Broccan manages to yank Rosella back away from the creature. It gives a rattling laugh, eyes glowing a fell green in the darkness.
"Only one, I think." Seeker flutters uneasily. "It's hard to be sure, though. There are so many tunnels beneath your feet. And it's quick."
Briar reloads her crossbow as she tries to figure out what best to do from here. She does not want to get in the way of the others, but she also needs to help Rosella. ”S@~$eshiteshite!” With the inspiration of Alaïs’s song, Briar decides to chance an offensive spell, hopefully keep the thing pinned down for a few seconds.
There is a hiss like falling hail, and the creature's own shadow seems to wrap around it, binding it to the spot.
With a snarl, Kata and Broccan see the creature twist, writhe, and rip free of the spell. It seems poised to retreat back into the burrow.