"Stop for an hour? Outrageous! If there's buildings down here, then there must be some way to the city proper. The longer we stay down here the more we risk having the whole place fall on our heads!"
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Astra and Luna yank the door open to find Gwerm crouched alongside the water basin in the entry hall in the dark. "What're you playing at?!" he scolds, standing up. "Taking all the light with you and shutting the door like that?" Sense Motive DC 15: Gwerm's anger is masking his fear; he's obviously been quite shaken by his brief experience in the dark.
Gwerm widens his eyes in exasperation at the elf and shakes his head. "Why don't you let the professionals handle this?"
"We all survived, then?" he asks gruffly.
Gwerm scowls. "Have it then," he mutters, handing the scale to the halfling.
"You trust me?" Gwerm exclaims, indignant. "Fine talk coming from one who holds all our resources. I don't know anything about that scale save what you've told us. I happened to find a similar scale underneath me in the rubble - but it certainly doesn't impart any mystic knowledge." He reaches into his coat and pulls out another scale. With raised chin and hoarse voice (whether due to emotion or residual grit, you cannot tell) he declares "I'm keeping it to remember the mighty Tarandalar's courage and sacrifice in the face of the Storm King today; by her valor do I yet live."
"Now that we're all introduced, can we please keep moving?" Gwerm asks impatiently. "We can ill afford to waste time if we're to travel with a blind elf and a cripple." He sighs inwardly, then spreads his hands out in a gesture of supplication. "My ladies and sirs," he says, obviously addressing the Desnan companions, "I have pressing concerns in the city, you see, more pressing than the mere worries for family and friends of common citizens. If you will see me to my manse directly from these caves, I will reward you handsomely - the sum of one thousand gold coins." "You'll be helping not only me and all of Mendev, but yourselves!"
"Help her along? Perhaps we should move on without her; she can rest here and we can move much more quickly - the faster to send back help for her once we find a way out."
"Yes, good idea Sir Lightmane," Gwerm says, glancing back at the others. "Best to keep making progress."
"Well done, well done!" The portly man exclaims. "Now let's see about getting out of this hole before more over-sized pests, or worse - demons - find their way to us." He walks up to the batch of vermin corpses and extends his hand to Auric. He is dressed in finely made clothes, worth a hundred gold if they're worth a copper, though they're now somewhat worse for wear. "Gwerm Horgus, sir." He then addresses the party as a whole. "Good job with these lights; any way we can move them ahead of us?" |