Melenthe goes to investigate the statue, "What was our wizard doing with this thing?"
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There are no magical auras within this large room. The elves also don't find anything lying amongst the rubble and debris in this chamber.
Closer inspection of the statue reveals that it is an ancient looking iron maiden that haa been fastened shut. Along the edge of the casket are red stains which at first appear to be rust but are most likely long dried blood.
Drifting over to the statue, Tanssi looks over the casket and iron maden. Then, for what seems like the first time, those around here its voice. It's voice is low but ethereal- as if a soft whisper in the darkness.
"This appears to be blood, unless I am mistaken. What creature (or creatures) might it have been extracted from?"
Suizal looks around cautiously. "Who said that?". She raises her arms, ready to fight, then realizing it was Tanssi. "I forgot you can talk," Suizal looks disappointed.
"Do you think we can open it up?" She eyes up Sir Falcon.
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Falcon looks around.
He pokes the bones with his sword. Is there anything magic in this pile?
He then walks away from it, after he is satisfied its not about to reassemble and strike him and, provided theres nothing interesting in that pile of bones, he approaches the steel door and sees if it can open.
Suizal will inspect the bones. "Hmmm. Wonder who that was and why they were imprisoned."
Melenthe grimaces, "Creepy to go with the crawlies." Then she turns her attention to the beds, "Who slept here? Is this a cellar?"
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Falcon looks around the chambers and finds a pile of broken weapons and dusted scraps of armor in the southwest corner of the the room but nothing that seems worth keeping. Then he pokes the bones that were inside the iron maiden with his sword but he doesn't find anything interesting.
Suizal scans the area for magical auras but does not find anything.
As Melenthe wonders who once lived here Falcon tries out the iron door in the southern wall and finds that it is locked.
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"Fine. I'll take care of it", Andwise groans, making is way over to the door. He spends his time looking over the lock and any mechanisms in place.
"give me just a second" he mumbles. A soft chanting fills the room, and his hand glows a soft purple. Drawing his tools, the halfling sets to work on the door.
"Lookie here!" Suizal pulls out a rusty iron key. "This may help, Andwise.". She walks over to the door and puts the key into the lock.
"I wonder how long that door has been closed?"
Melenthe stands a little way back from the door as Suzail fits the key. The elf has an arrow to the bowstring and her dancing lights hover expectantly beside the door.
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Sir Falcon grabs the key and pushes his way in front of Andwise to unlock the door. The key fits perfectly and the heavy iron door swings open. Beyond the door is a corridor lined with numerous jail cells. Each of the solid iron cell doors hangs ajar. They each include a peephole at eye level that is covered with a piece of sliding metal and a smaller slot for food and water at floor level.
The hallways are completely silent and the floors are covered in a thick layer of dust, indicating that no one has passed this way in years.
A curious semicircular stone ridge runs along the ceiling of the hallway.
Suizal looks through one of the peepholes. "A jail. Or a dungeon. I wonder who was imprisoned here."
Beyond dust, she's on the look out for any old inhabitants - dusty skeletons, old books or trinkets, anything interesting. She'll wait for someone (i.e. Sir Falcon) to be nearby and try to open one of the cells and walk in.
Melenthe nods, "I don't think so. The floor is thick with dust so nothing here could have had an effect."
She peers back into the previous room, "Maybe there's nothing to be found down here? Maybe the kobolds had another way in?"
She looks upward, "Maybe we should leave, check out the wizard's house and let the collapse settle a bit?"
The elf shrugs, "Mind you, we're here now." and casts detect magic again to see if any auras can be found in the corridor or coming from the cells.
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Melenthe takes one last look into the big room and she thinks she sees a glint of something shiny in the pile of broken weapons and armor in the southwest corner.
On closer inspection, there are two short, wide daggers wrapped in rags. The knives are made of glittering mithril with gold handles. There are unusual indentations along both the edge of the blade and inside the fuller of the blade. The indentations on both daggers appear to be identical.
The cells are all open and luckily they are empty. No shambling undead come crawling out of the cells and there aren't even any bones lying in the cells.
Ilvaria does not find any magic auras, but she does discover a secret door. The walls have been clearly damaged by the collapse and the door is much easier to find than it would have been normally.
Melenthe turns the weapons over in her hands, ”What are they? Not just tools. Maybe they’re for some kind of ritual? Or status symbols?”
When Ilvaria finds the secret door, Melenthe smiles, ”I don’t know if this has any link to the collapse but, c’mon, it’s a secret door. We’ve got to look.”
As the elf draws closer to the door, she puts a hand on Ilvaria’s arm for a moment, ”Keen eyes, us elves.”
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The party finds an identical secret door on the other side of these halls. The hidden doors reveal another hallway filled with similar iron doors, but all the doors in this corridor have been shut tightly and locked rather than being left ajar. Each of these doors also have had their peep holes and the doors for delivering food sealed shut.
There is only one exception;, the door in the middle of the southern hallway is shut tight, but the peephole has been left opened.
"This place is so strange." Suizal whistles under her breath. She pushes the closest person to her (), Melenthe, towards the door with the peephole.
Melenthe looks over her shoulder at Suzail, eyebrow raised, "Okay, but you're up for the next peephole."
She heads over to the window, stands opposite the opening and lets two of her dancing lights bob through the spy hole.
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As Andwise walks through this hidden cell block, he notices that the iron doors appear to be of the same design as the other iron doors, including the one that lead to prison cells. It is likely that the iron key Falcon is holding onto is meant to be used on all these doors. The peepholes and the hatches for food are latched from the outside and can easily be opened in order to peek into any of the rooms.
Melenthe looks inside the peep hole slot. A creeping sense of dread fills her as she senses that there is something in the dark room. Suddenly a face appears in front of the slit. It is a gaunt faced human with blue eyes and a scraggly beard. He looks the elf right in the eyes and begins to speak rapidly. His raspy voice sounds like it causes him pain to speak but he does so anyways out of desperation.
“Oh, gods, kind faces! Aroden bless you, noble souls! I ain’t seen the jailers in ages, I think they forgot about us! We ain’t eaten in days and the water’s all but gone—my cousins’re both sick. I swear we’d give back the boar if we could, but we ate it, starvin’ as we was. We didn’t even know it was the baron’s lands, didn’t know we was poachin’! I beg you, we’re all gonna die in here! Kindness, noble souls, we’ve suffered awful! Good Baron Sarvo wills it!”
Suizal is a bit wary of the man.
"We need to give them water and food." She searches her bag for her waterskin and some food, then handing it over to Melenthe to give to the man.
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Suizal hands some of his food to Melenthe. Andwise notices that the man appears to be slightly translucent. One may say, kind of ghostly even.
The man in the cell pleads, "surely kind sir, you jest. You can see that I am locked behind this door of iron. Please, if you have no food to spare, can you give me just a little water! Good Baron Sarvo wills it!"
Melenthe raises an eyebrow, Aroden?
The elf gives a sad smile, ”You poor thing. You’ve been in there too long.”
She slides the water bottle through the food slot, followed by a piece of bread.
Melenthe is very careful to put the food within reach without putting herself within reach.
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Melenthe slides the food and water towards the slot in the bottom of the door and an emaciated hand reaches out and drags it into the cell. The man stands back up and says, "Oh, bless your kind hearts. Good Baron Sarvo wills it! Thank you so much for your charity." The man takes the food and shuffles off into a corner of the cell where he cannot be seen from the peephole.
After giving the prisoner disappears with his food, silence falls over the dungeon.
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"I believe that you had it last.... Sir", the ending almost an afterthought.
He turns to Melenthe inquisitively. "Who is this Baron Sarvo? Do any of you know what he is talking about? Regardless, I think he is something at least a little unnatural. Do we leave him? Was the gift enough to settle him for now? These are not areas where I am well versed."
Melenthe speaks quietly to her halfling ally, "I think he has died down here rather a long time ago. He speaks Aroden's name as though the lost god still lived."
The elf shakes her head sadly, "We will learn more later from the locals, I imagine."
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The row of cells the party is currently in is a U shaped hallway, with a secret door on either end of the loop. In this wing all the cell doors are still sealed shut and locked tight. Even the peepholes and the food ports were all shut. The only exception is that the peephole on the cell door with the hungry prisoner was open. This is in contrast to the first wing of the prison, where all the doors were wide open, allowing the party to easily see that they were all empty.
In the first wing, there is a hallway that leads north. It seems like this passage might lead to another room that has so far been unexplored.
Sir Falcon inquires if anyone has the key and is reminded that he was the last one to have it. He finds it resting in one of his pockets. Andwise and Melenthe briefly talk about what the prisoner said. The summoner urges the group to continue exploring and the magus makes a note to talk to some of the locals about the history of this town.