A scroll radiating magic. Alais identifies it as a scroll of animate dead.
A beaker holder containing four 6-inch long tubes filled with different-colored liquids. The glass tubes are sealed at the top with a rubber sheath, and look like they are meant to be slotted into some other device. All the tubes radiate magic. Every so often, something within the beakers seems to move slightly, but it might just be a trick of the eye. A hand-written label on the beaker holder says "Necroturgons". One is milky-white, and Alais is unable to identify it on first glance. Kata identifies it as a potion of gentle repose. The others (deep red, sallow yellow, white with black streaks) remain unexamined.
Also on the desk, Alais finds a hand-written note in an entirely different hand from the clumsy scrawl found elsewhere.
The disgusting contents of the glasswork don’t hold Alaïs’ attention for very long, at least at first. Her first guess is that they must by for some weird humoural experiments? She also has no idea what “Necroturgons” are, and doubts she wants to gain better acquaintance. After Kata identifies that at least one of the tubes contains a complete potion, Alaïs gives the others another look-over with the appropriate cantrip brightening her vision.
While she concentrates on sorting out the various auras, she waves the most promising papers in one hand. “I’ll keep searching for something that could be used against the undead, Broccan, but I think we’ve found how he arranged our friends downstairs. At least, he’s got a scroll for it here.”
Snatching that up knocks some of the other documents further into disarray, and as the elf instinctively reaches down to make sure the piles don’t slump together, a note in another hand catches her eye, and she pulls that sheet out too. After getting what reading she can from the other fluids, she takes a look for a hint as to who Filge’s been in contact with apart from the unlucky thugs in town.
Alaïs’ eyebrows lift in alarm, surprise, and doubt, and she quickly explains, “There’s a note here just signed ‘-S.’ Apparently there’s a necromantic cult holed up in one of the mines? Mucking about with worms and ‘unkillable zombies.’ If this ‘S.’ was hoping for help against this cult, they hired the wrong wizard, I’d guess.”
She shakes her head, unsure if she can believe what she’s reading, and wondering what sort of town she’s managed to land herself in. Spelunking to put a stop to weirdo cults is really not her thing, but it looks like she might have to step up – er, down, to it. When Alaïs looks up again, resolution has settled over her features, though it doesn’t last long.
“We should take these things with us. What have you found there, Briar? Is that … what I think it is? I’d like to take a look, if you don’t mind,” Alaïs says, making doe-eyes without even realizing it.
Edrukk just grunts. He's more interested in the threat of an insane wizard or their minions, so he's looking for entrances into the room, especially any of a secret variety that might be used to surprise his friends.
Broccan eyes the stairs up. "s'pose 'e's up there?" he says, nodding his head towards them. He moves over to the steps, preparing to ascend with the assent of the rest of the party.
The elven aristocrat looks up from the spellbook somewhat abstractedly at the miner’s request, glancing about the room at what there’s still to poke and prod at. “Oh, um, yes. When you put it like that. Part of me wishes I could hope that he’s been scared off, if he heard us coming, but on the other hand, that would be very inconvenient. We can come back.”
She tucks the necromantic scroll inside the cover, and the book into the pack under her baldric, before readying her weapons again and moving to support Broccan’s advance.
“Aim for the serpent’s head, I take it?” she asks, ready to charge if the opportunity presents itself, in the event of a response in the affirmative.
”Yer more mobile, elf lassie. Lemme get ‘n th’ face o’ what we be findin’, the ye can be circlin’ ’n takin’ advantage, aye?”
Edrukk finds nothing off on this floor--just some closets containing Filge's wardrobe. His 'wardrobe' consists of six sets of nearly identical sleeveless long coats worn over a shirt and breeches.
It is 7:28 in the morning. The party has been on this level for about a minute. But as Edrukk is closing the second closet door, and Alais is setting the red necroturgon back down, everyone hears footsteps coming down from above. Everyone's eyes shoot to the stairs.
A man who looks only very vaguely like the statue stands there holding a white mug, staring blankly at the party.
Filge blinks.
Venelle stares up at Filge for a split-second, then raises her bow and nocks an arrow, firing two half-panicked shots.
Filge's mug shatters as the arrows smash straight through it and hit him in the shoulder. The necromancer's mug seems to have taken most of their impact, but he still shrieks in pain, and blood stains his coat.
"S&@$!"
Filge turns and bolts upstairs, his arms flailing for balance as he rounds the corner. Everyone hears him hiss in discomfort as he wrenches the arrows out and vanishes from view.
"GO ON, THEN!" everyone hears him roar. "GET UP! GET OUT! DEFEND ME, YOU SLACKERS!"
Edrukk roars, mostly to put a little fear in the man than out of true rage, and charges up the stairs as quickly as his dwarven stature allows.
Tucked in fairly close to the stairs as she is, swinging by the mysterious vials of whatever again on her way to follow Edrukk, Alaïs really mostly sees the legs of the person coming down the stairs. Given Venelle’s reaction and the response it evokes in turn, it looks like they’ve found their necromancer, and she hurries to round Filge’s desk and get after him.
She slides past the priest deftly, bearing his suggestion in mind – she’ll make sure she leaves the direct route open for him, once they get onto less treacherous footing than stairs. Maybe you should be the snake, she tells herself. Twist in from the side, and strike fast.
Broccan draws his axe and hurries up the stairs after Filge.
A single chamber dominates the observatory's entire upper floor. Light filters through the wide slit in the roof, bathing the center of the room in illumination. Four large mirrors set along the outside wall reflect bright beams into the direct center of the room, a recessed operating theater accessible via two short sets of stairs.
The beams specifically target a hulking bugbear corpse splayed out upon an operating table, its chest completely opened and pinned back against the table with long metal needles. Two long selves cluttered with piles of papers, organs in various stages of preservation, and instruments comprise the east and west extent of the operating theater, and are only a few inches lower than the chamber's outer floor.
Four metal-and-glass tanks, each longer than it is tall and easily large enough to hold a cow, flank the short stairs leading to the operating theater. Each tank is full of red liquid streaked with pus-yellow. Indistinct, vaguely canine silhouettes bob silently in the soupy fluid.
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thud
Alais sees those four glass cases tremble.
thud
She sees cracks spiderwebbing across the glass.
With a tremendous crash, the cases shatter, and horrible beings bound out, great skeletal hounds with black pits of darkness in their eye sockets lit by tiny flickering yellow flames. Their filthy bones drip with blood and pus and gore, forming a slick congealed layer between white bone and open air. They turn to her, snarling. Meanwhile, a small skeleton dressed in tattered clothes similarly to Filge clatters after him, sword upraised to defend its creator.
"Brace yourselves!" Alaïs calls out, as she takes her own advice, raising her shield. "Hounds of war!"
Dead ones, she adds silently to herself, giving her sword a slight, experimental flick. I really ought to acquire something more conveniently blunt,oughtn't I? But that's so frightfully boring. Maybe a morningstar?
Raising her longspear, Kata runs/stumbles up the stairs, blood and adrenaline pumping through her body. Slipping around Alaïs, Kata peers at the hounds, her mind struggling with comprehension, even while bile rises in her throat. The elegist wretches, her mind races to make sense of what the things are.
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Briar follows to the stairs to see what’s the matter. ”Hounds of war? I swear, Alaïs, you talk so much like a poem sometimes that—“ She glances up and sees the skeletal hounds, then turns back to Alaïs. ”Alright, you can have this one.”
She then taps Alaïs on the shoulder. ”Lady give ya good.”
Briar follows to the stairs to see what’s the matter. ”Hounds of war? I swear, Alaïs, you talk so much like a poem sometimes that—“
“Yes?” she says sweetly. The worst part is, she’s almost all innocence when she does – not absolutely entirely, but more than enough.
I mean, what else should a poet sound like? And it beats thinking about the odds of getting mauled by a pack of undead mongrels in a moment…
(Elves tend to get good at not thinking about unpleasant things even in the heat of. Something about how enough heartache and near misses accumulate over centuries. Either that, or they are just that frivolous.)
She glances up and sees the skeletal hounds, then turns back to Alaïs. ”Alright, you can have this one.”
She then taps Alaïs on the shoulder. ”Lady give ya good.”
“And you too,” Alaïs adds thankfully as Briar offers her a spark of inspiration, before refocusing on the monsters sure to lope their way in a second – and the other monster pulling their invisible strings.
Venelle lowers her bow with a hissed, "Shoot!" and races up the stairs.
Filge raises a hand around himself, and tiny motes of yellow energy pulse into existence around his form, swimming through the air like parasites in stagnant water.
Meanwhile, everyone hears a loud clicking and clacking. Alais is the only one close enough to see what it is.
The metal instruments holding the bugbear's stomach open are, one-by-one, falling away. The zombie bugbear rises slowly to its feet, staring at Alais with a film of mindless malice.
"Beg'n yer pard'n, ladies," Broccan says apologetically as he pushes past his companions to the top of the stairs. Seeing the foul hound creature to his immediate left, he turns and swings his axe down upon it.
Broccan's axe slices into the bloody wolf skeleton, but only succeeds in shaving away some lingering unimportant flesh and fur.
The dwarf grumbles, "'ow can Ah be th' shield wall if'n ye all run up th' stairs 'fore me?" He reaches back to touch the greatsword hilt, "Gorum, grant yer servant a clear mind 'n Ah'll be sheddin' some blood 'n yer honor."
"Lass, 'e's up 'ere castin' spells! Give 'im somethin' else t' think 'bout wit' yer bow, aye?"
Alaïs doesn’t like the idea of what she’s about to do very much, but she likes the idea of leaving Filge to his own devices even less. One step at a time, though – in this case, almost literally.
First, she centres herself and makes sure her frantic worry about the bloody necromancer won’t affect her voice, producing a solemn tone at the low end of her natural range into which she pours a spark of magic.
Next, she squeaks between Broccan and Edrukk and along the near edge of the operating theatre to get into a better position, baiting the undead canine into lashing out at her as she goes. She trusts in her armour and, especially, her reflexes, honed by many years of slipping through the press of very crowded parties. (Making sure not to spill her wine, of course.)
Alais nimbly evades the wolf's slavering jaws. Congealed blood and pus spatter her cloak.
Filge raises his hand toward Alais and makes a clawing motion. The world around Alais seems to go dark, her vision briefly contorting into a liminal space of wrongness and terror.
The bugbear zombie reaches next to the table and procures a vicious bloody cleaver.
For a split second, under the assault of Filge’s magic, an unreasoning darkness closes in around Alaïs, full of shadowy visions of being surrounded by the undead dogs, and then that bloody zombie, and more, closing in…
She shakes it off, still uneasy, but refusing to let this upstart human apprentice make her quail.
Following the others up the stairs, a chill crawls over Kata's skin, as if a cold breeze had slipped through the room. "We can knock them down, but they'll heal given enough time. A bless or hallow spell, a sprinkling of holy water, a healing spell - that's the only way to put them to rest."
Pointing her spear in the direction of filge, Kata begins an old - and among those that study elegies - a funerary classic:
"Warm summer sun,
Shine kindly here,
Warm southern wind,
Blow softly here."
Briar moves up to the middle of the pack and pass another bit of divine guidance to Kata, saving her more powerful magic for when she is in range.
Venelle raises her bow, but doesn't fire. She trains an arrow on Filge's form, waiting.
After a brief delay, the hideous skeletons leap into the fray. They strike mindlessly, not even exerting the infamous wolf instinct to yank a target's leg out from under them. But when one of them gets ahold of someone, it rips and tears with a viciousness that speaks to evil beyond intellect.
Broccan tries once again to smash the skeletal hound with his axe.
Edrukk attempts to trade blows with the skelewolf that snapped at him.
Broccan swings his axe in a decapitating blow, but the splintering bones reform. There is no sinew holding these bones together, after all--only pure magic. Merely cutting the bones into smaller bones does little to hamper that magic. Still, it does seem to be having some trouble locking the bones back into place with the collarbone partially crushed.
Edrukk brutally smashes his shield into the wolf skeleton, smashing apart its spine. But its hideous animation persists, and it manages to reform enough to keep tracking his movement.
Alaïs flatters herself that one of these brutes wouldn’t be much of a challenge – Hell, that even two of them wouldn’t be too much of a problem – but, it seems, also trying not to accidentally back into one of those menacing the gentlemen while fending off two more is more than she can handle. Worse, the skeleton that gets through lands an especially lucky blow, tearing into her leg with frightful enthusiasm.
Even without the gush of blood the pain would be enough to scream that she should look after that, but though she’s pale with anguish, the elf refuses to fall just yet. She’ll do her best to take Filge with her, if it comes to that. What’s the likeliest way of getting under his skin?
“Ha!” she manages a choked laugh. “Give some whelp of a nobody a taste of necromancy, and he thinks he knows magic. Enough!”
Alaïs’ grin is unhinged as she finds breath somewhere to release a ululating cry that doesn’t sound much like her at all, low resonances sounding under her own clear tones.
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Filge cringes back as much from the slight as from the spell. His arrow wounds bleed profusely, and his eyes bulge. "You f$$&in' trollop--"
He grabs a syringe from his bag and injects it into himself. The party notices the syringe is attached to a tube not dissimilar to the 'necroturgons' they found earlier. A slightly oversaturated color blossoms across his pale face, and he seems suddenly a little healthier.
Venelle hisses in frustration and keeps her arrow nocked. "Come on, cast already," she mutters. "You know you wanna..."
The bugbear zombie, slow and unwieldy, lumbers up the stairs to confront Edrukk, raising its cleaver high.
Briar flinches as Alaïs takes a powerful blow. She steps up with a quick heal to keep her standing.
Safely ensconced behind her comrades, Kata takes a hand from her spear and mouths another wordless scream, sending all of her rage and disgust into Filge. The scream stretches between them, shaking the air, but only Filge hears.
Placing her hand back on her spear, Kata keeps reciting the elegy, her attention firmly upon the necromancer.
"Green sod above,
Lie light, lie light.
Good night, dear heart,
Good night, good night."
Filge clutches his ears, his mouth opening in a horrible scream. The flush to his cheeks melts away in an instant, but Kata's silent song keeps hammering in time with the one she sings aloud, relentless, inescapable.
He collapses in a heap.
Her target dispatched without a single additional spell cast, Venelle looses her frustration into one of the bloody wolves harassing Alais. Her arrow chips its skull, but doesn't seem to damage it much.
The skeleton next to Filge simply readies its sword.
Meanwhile, the two wolves attacking Alais pursue her. This time, forewarned, she's able to fend them off easily.
Broccan and Edrukk's attackers press the assault to no avail.
Edrukk attempts to slam the skelewolf again.
Growling at the loss, Edrukk steps back to form a line with Broccan, his chance at a flank gone.
Broccan hammers down on his foe, smashing it to pieces with his bare fists. His fists are left dripping with blood--but not his own.
Alaïs indulges in a quick breath of relief as Filge goes down, and with Briar's spell putting her back together again. It's a momentary respite, and she quickly turns her attention back to the skeletal dogs snapping at her, trying to make use of the construction of the operating theatre to her advantage.
Unfortunately, with her best bet being to batter away with her shield, that makes it a more difficult prospect than just lunging down with the point of her blade. She frowns in self-reproach. Wait for it - try to catch it when it jumps at you.
The zombie hefts its cleaver and slashes down at Edrukk in a brutal blow. The dwarf, occupied with the wolf skeleton, is caught off-balance and unable to block in time.
”Broccan, lad, Ah need ye t’ ‘andle me light work, aye? Th’ big’un is impatient!”
"No," Kata murmurs, and then casts a quick prayer of thanks that Edrukk still stands, if barely. The elegist's poem lingers in the air as Kata turns to the more immediate need - providing some space for the warriors to do their work. She stabs at the skeletal wolf closest to Broccan, trying to hook it a bit with her spear and give the brawler an opening, and then slips backwards. "Briar, Edrukk's hurt!"
Briar steps towards the heavily-wounded Edrukk and charges up another heal.
”I can keep this up a bit, so just keep pushing!”