# Doom from Below: The Illithid Ascension (Last Updated: 1-1-03)



## Phasmus (Jun 5, 2002)

Greetings and welcome to The Vitis Campaign story hour.  Here will be recounted the story of a group of adventurers forced to contend with a world plunged into turmoil...

Enjoy.

---

"Eh? What's this? If you've come here for a story, or a tale, then you can turn around and leave right now. This is a library, a place of learning...not a receptacle for fantasies and the foolish claptrap of addled youths and romantics.

Hmm? Ohhh! A history! Well that's an entirely different matter! Have a seat then and I'll tell you what I can, though what you're asking about is a dark and murky time, even now. Yes...the Dread Ascension, or Illithid Uprising...many names, but only a single, terrible time. Is it over now? An interesting question...one can only hope.

But here, sit and look at the Viewing Stone. It will show you where it began. See it now as it was then...and never will be again. There are the spiraled towers and crenellated walls of Caronalon, capital of the nation of Caron and oldest of its cities. Those sculpted walls may look just for show now...but they speak of a long and brutal history. Caron was forged from lands taken inch by bitter inch from the orcs and goblins, driving them into Ogonek of course...but I digress. Founded by the might of its armies, kept through skillful diplomacy between the haughty mages of westward Cedilla, and the dry technocrats of eastbound neighbor Macron, the Caronites forged a kingdom that would dominate the entire continent of Kaldonia. The work of ten kings in sequence, raised over centuries...

...smashed in a single night, in the Uprising.

But look now, and see the story unfold..."

--

Over the light forested plains of south central Cedilla a storm brewed uneasily. It was typical of the weather that settled over the land in the early springtime...gusting in spastic fits and starts, dying just as unpredictably. It was a storm that didn't know its own strength, but seemed to fear what it was capable of. Or perhaps it feared what it now passed over. The woods were not heavily populated even in the best of times, and no one went this far south in them. There were whispers of hauntings, of strange voices and stranger sights...those who ventured too far were never seen again. Unknown to any who still lived, there was a ring of clear ground in the heart of the forest; a ring in which nothing living save witless grass and a few dry shrubs made homes. Birds never sang in the sky above, and the earth here was devoid of burrowing moles, even worms and grubs. This was the alfheidar; the Hallowed Ground. Unbroken and flat, except for the rearing hulks of ancient stonework bleached stark white in uncounted millenea of sun and rain. Scattered without apparent design or purpose, like unmarked dice carelessly thrown from the heavens to take root in this sacred ground. Elsewhere jutted crumbling fluted pillars and remnants of still greater buildings, now mouldering to their foundations. Skeletal fingers protruding from the soil as if scrabbling desperately to regain their fallen splendor.

Into this place so long forgotten stumbles a small line of figures. The first ones are humans, shambling against the suddenly howling wind. When skeletons arise out of piles of debris around them, they fight back with eerie silence, even as some of their number fall. Behind them lurch three taller, narrower forms. When they come out of the shadows of the trees, their writhing tentacular faces and hideous, glistening mauve skin leaves no question at all as to their species...even if the slack, perpetually distracted expressions on the faces of their companions did not expose them first.

*The journey has been harder than anticipated,* spoke one, not with the nauseous flapping of oral cavities that thrall-races used, but with the erudite transmission of thought to thought.

Another one considered, and broadcast agreement. It's tentacles splayed momentarily, revealing the horribly sharp beak within. *Our resources dwindle. We must eat again, sooner than planned.*

The third brushed a fallen twig off of it's undulating flesh. *Our mission will require the use of battle-thralls. Which among them is most expendable?*

As one, the three alien heads swiveled to regard three thralls that were just then emerging behind. One, a powerfully built human who had been a priestess. Another, a halfling whose small size and relative lack of strength were causing him to suffer more from the storm than the others. And finally, a human sorceress, chosen for her magic abilities, but in reality far too inexperienced to be of much use. 

Further agreement was not necessary. The solution was clear. The three bodies were casually dumped in front of the first crypt and then forgotten. But One saw, and did not forget...

--

Shayuri, Piklum, and Shar awoke inside a dank, dark crypt. This was perhaps not especially surprising, since all of them had vivid memories of being slain and consumed by their illithid masters. They quickly noticed however that the mortal realm was wispy and insubstantial...like a construct of fog. While Shar immediately knelt in supplication to her deity, Delta, and begged to understand why she was not now in the goddess' domain, the halfling Piklum and sorceress Shayuri explored the extent of their new surroundings. They found that while stone was no bar to them, that there was something in the stone that blocked them. There seemed to be no escape. Before they could do more than register this though, a trap door in the ceiling opened.

Through the door, came an angel.

Or so it first seemed. In fact, the 'angel' was a luminous elfin creature, who despite her ethereal nature seemed perfectly capable of manipulating 'solid' objects.

"I am Shankara," she said in a voice drenched with sadness and hope, "And I need your help."

The three spirits looked at each other, then at Shankara...and all struggled to speak at once, ranging from polite requests for information, to raving demands for explanations. The ephemeral elf simply smiled her sad little smile and spoke again...her voice effortlessly cutting through the clamor.

"I apologize for this. I realize it must come as a shock to you all. You must know though that what I must ask of you would be impossible if you were in your natural forms. I have returned your souls to the material plane as ghosts, and after you do me the service I must ask, I will return you to your full lives. I am truly sorry, but there is no other option for me but to do this."

This time the sorceress spoke first, gliding forward and quickly blurting, "What 'service' are you demanding?" before anyone else could interrupt. The other two seemed content with that question, and they all waited for Shankara's reply.

The elf seemed oddly uncomfortable. "I am the guardian of this place," she said simply. "Three of those you call mind flayers invaded it earlier, with their minions. I was able to dispose of them all." She paused, then added, "All but one. That one escaped. Worse still...it has glimpsed what it is that I guard. Should it find its way back to the others, they will stop at nothing to obtain it. My powers are great, but not enough to withstand the full might of the illithid. Your task is to find the illithid that escaped and slay it before it can warn the others."

"Why," growled Shar belligerantly, "don't YOU slay it? If your 'powers' are so great, what need have you for us?"

"I am tied to this tomb," Shankara replied, taking no insult at the priestesses tone.

"Sounds good to me," the halfling Piklum said cheerfully, floating in elaborate patterns. "Heck, you can just leave me like this after we're done if you want. Wheee!"

"Wait," Shayuri protested, "How are we to find this illithid? It's a big forest, and we can barely see the material plane."

Shankara nodded and gestured for the others to be still. "The one who walks still killed one of you. There is a bond between it and the one it killed...a bond of vengeance earned. Ghosts are very sensitive to that, and that one among you can follow it like a hound." On catching a look at the wildly soaring spectral halfing, she noted as well, "Be aware that this call of vengeance is all that holds your souls here in this ghostly shell. Once the mind flayer has fallen your onuses will be expiated, and you will begin to dissolve. If you have not returned here, so that your souls are returned to your bodies, you will pass on as you normally would have without my intervention."

Piklum stopped in midair and mulled that over. "Bummer."

"You all have supernatural abilities," Shankara went on, "That will enable you to enact your retribution. Do it, and return to me here, and you will live...truly live...once more. Are there any other questions?"

"I can feel it," Shar suddenly said, her expression darkening even on a face made from glowing ectoplasm. "It's the one that killed me!" She zoomed towards the trap door. "This way!"

Shayuri sighed and shrugged. "It seems there's no more time for questions. We'll see you soon, Shankara."

The three ghosts plunged out into the increasingly stormy night...

------------------------
To be Continued


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## Orkane Khor (Jun 6, 2002)

*Hurray! The epic begins!*

Let there be more of this!
MORE!
MORE!
MORE!
*bangs blade on table*
...

Give us severed heads.


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## Cyronax (Jun 6, 2002)

This has sparked my interest! Keep it coming!

C.I.D.


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## Mana (Jun 6, 2002)

*Huzzah!*

Well done! I can't wait to see a more familiar character.  Keep it up!

-Mana


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## Phasmus (Jun 6, 2002)

Drawn ever onward by Shar's unbreakable tie to her slayer, three ghosts soared towards their quarry. As they did, a peculiar wrath began bubbling in each of them. The world was a dark mockery of its former self in their eyes, seeming twisted and wrong. Where once there had been life and flesh, now only the mind-grating coldness of negative energy percolated. Goodwill, compassion...all these things faded in the face of their new existances...for now, they existed only to destroy...

But they are not alone in these woods.

These are times of trouble, when death and slaughter are rampant in the cities of men, sending waves of negative energy outward in ever expanding ripples. The dead do not rest easily in these times...least of all in places already haunted by the unquiet spirits of creatures slain by the elven guardians, and more recently, by the mind flayers themselves...

The headlong pursuit is slowed as the three fallen catch sight of curious creatures ahead. They are composed of the same glowing white plasm they themselves are, and stand out in sharp focus against the ever-shifting waver of the material plane. But these are not human, nor anything like.

Sharp-eyed Piklum saw them first and pointed. "Look! What're those?"

Shayuri, her long hair floating around her head in an incandescent mane, as though underwater, paused as well. "They look like goblins," she ventured hesitantly. "Ghost goblins?"

Shar, for her part, merely snarled and accelerated, brandishing a spectral scythe that seemed to appear out of the substance of her form as she needed it. "Out of my way!" she bellowed.

The glowing goblins shrieked in defiance and two aimed crossbows at the descending priestess' shade. As Piklum and Shayuri realized that they too were armed with what weaponry they had possessed in life, the goblins fired! Shar's expectation of invulnerability was brutally shaken as a bolt pierced the shadowy armor she wore and punched deep into a shoulder. Heedless of the pain, she brought the wickedly curved edge of the scythe around. Even in the ethereal plane, it seemed to make a loud 'whooshing' sound as it cleaved through the space a goblin was standing in...leaving the startled creature to slide into two equal halves, both of which rapidly lost cohesion and faded into the ether. Shar cackled delightedly and turned to face another.

Now Piklum darted to one side, releasing an arrow as he did. Unfortunately the shot went wide, narrowly missing Shar as well.

Shayuri, armed only with a small dagger, decided to see if her magic would function in her present condition. Her voice seemed to swell pregnantly with arcane power as she incanted, and with a flick of her wrist released a single spark of bright magic force that deftly jinked around Shar and slammed into a goblin, staggering it, but not dropping it.

From there, the battle progressed swiftly. Shar took a shallow gash from a ghostly scimitar, but the remaining four goblins were quickly overpowered. The final one dropped in its tracks by Piklum as it tried to flee.

In the wake of combat, Piklum and Shayuri inspected Shar's wounds.

"Are you all right?" Shayuri asked delicately, brushing errant strands of hair away from her face.

Shar drew herself up proudly and scoffed. The scythe had mysteriously vanished as she stopped thinking about it. "I am better than all right. I am victorious!"

"Hey, does this hurt?" the irrepressible Piklum asked, poking at Shar's arm, where a livid gash split the ectoplasmic 'flesh.'

The cleric flinched back with a hiss, then looked at her arm, and at the arrow. "Trifling wounds," she blustered. "Delta's power will overcome them." She raised her hands in preparation.

"Hang on," Shayuri interrupted, earning an annoyed look from Shar. "We're ghosts now, right?"

"Yes. Briefly! And?"

"Well...I thought I remembered reading that healing magic hurts the undead," the sorceress mildly put forth. "So maybe instead of trying to heal yourself..."

"Hah!" Shar blurted quickly. "You think that fact was lost on me? That I am some kind of...imbecile? Delta's plague on you!" Yet, when she raised her hands again, she put them in a different position, and the beginnings of the incantation were different as well. Nevertheless, the influx of negative energy seemed to generate replacement plasm, drawing her wounds shut.

And so they continued, drawn onward by Shar's tether. It occurred to Shayuri to wonder what might have happened had the goblins 'killed' Shar. Somehow she doubted the dissolution would be permanant...but it would almost certainly allow the mind flayer time to escape them...

What was Shankara guarding anyway, that was so important?

But all such secondary thoughts were quickly swallowed whole when a shape loomed from the dim shadows of the material plane around them. None of them needed to see it clearly to know what it was. They had spent a year chained to the will of creatures like it...

As one, operating on murderous instinct, they parted the veil between worlds and fully entered the material plane as hovering translucent ghosts. Shar emitted another battle cry to Delta, and swept directly through the mind flayer, though doing no physical harm.

The illithid stopped in its tracks as something cold and awful raced through it. At first it seemed only an indistinct mist...but as it swooped back, the mind flayer recognized the face of its former thrall. Suddenly it realized the extent of the threat. It was stripped of its layers of thrall protection, and faced with an opponent that its mind-controlling powers were useless against! For the first time in a very long time, it knew fear. Tentacles writhing madly, it whirled to flee...and stopped.

Two MORE ghosts waited behind it.

Burbling wetly in panic, it splayed its facial tentacles, and the air churned with psionic power as it unleashed a telepathic screech, calculated to overwhelm the nervous system of lesser beings.

The ghosts did not flinch or waver. They approached, unholy hate burning in their eyes...their cold, dead eyes... The illithid turned about as the ghosts' hatred struck it with supernatural force, stripping its life away in chunks. It made a last, futile run for it...before stiffening under the combined assault of its spectral attackers. It released one last scream...a desperate note struck with both voice and mind echoing out...and then it crumpled to the ground, dead.

Shar whooped and brandished her scythe. "Die, vermin! Feel the wrath of Delta!!"

Suddenly there was a...relaxation within all three. A tension eased that none had been aware of before. They were done here. There was nothing left but the peace...the seductive peace of death that had been denied them.

"No!" shouted Shayuri. "Fight it! We have to get back!" Without a word, she launched herself back along the path they had come, followed closely by the other spirits.

The marathon was grueling. The material world was as indistinct as ever...but they had no bond to follow to lead them back! And all the while a white, glowing light seemed to be gently consuming them, beckoning to them with promises of rest at last. And they were tired. So tired...

It took several more minutes before they realized they were really quite hopelessly lost.

"You know?" Piklum said, watching his substance fade slowly away, "This isn't bad, really. Feels kinda nice."

"No," the sorceress repeated, though it lacked the force it had before. "I won't give up. I won't!"

Shar snorted. "I brought us here, I can bring us back. Trust in Delta's will."

"Delta's will?" Piklum chuckled teasingly. "Delta's will is all about chaos and randomness! For all you know she could will us all to die! Riiight?"

Shar fumed, but said, "Your words only demonstrate the depth of your ignorance, halfling."

"If only we had a bond to the chamber," Shayuri lamented. "We could..." She paused thoughtfully.

The halfling and armored priestess exchanged glances as Shayuri's gaze became unfocused...even for a dissolving ghost.

"Shay?" Piklum ventured. "You still there?"

"This way!" Shayuri cried, and soared off through the trees. "I can still sense my familiar! He's this way!"

Piklum shrugged and followed. Shar scowled, but also took off after them. After all, who was to say it wasn't Delta's will that the familiar link still operated in death?

What entered Shankara's tomb was less three ghosts than three foggy blobs of ectoplasm, held together by sheer will and fortune. They could not see the living world anymore. Everything was blotted out by the darkness of death on one side, and the horribly seductive brilliance of the Soul Road through the astral plane that would guide them to their eternal rest.

Shankara's voice was thick and distant, marred by their fading consciousnesses.

"quickly! ...to your bodies...i'll revive you..."

Acting on pure instinct, the ghosts of ghosts sank into the dead flesh of their bodies, where Shankara had placed them on stone slabs in preparation.

The darkness curled in on itself, forming a tunnel that led to a blaze of light. Voices echoed along the Road, welcoming, calling, as fragments of their lives played on the walls. Another voice was in the din too, incanting or somesuch...it didn't seem very important suddenly...

And then three names were spoken.

The tunnels vanished. The crypt reappeared. Blinking and groaning, the three adventurers sat up and looked around.

Shar slipped off the slab and squinted around in the gloom. "Shankara?" she called. Something wasn't right about this.

Piklum was next. He whistled shrilly and called, "Bunki! Where are you?" A ferret skittered around the corner from the outside corridor and darted into the room. Then it stopped, peering at Piklum curiously.

"Hey look," said Shayuri. "Dinner!"

"Don't you DARE," thundered Piklum vengefully. "If it wasn't for him, we'd have dissipated out in the...the..." he trailed off, staring at Shayuri in mounting horror.

Shayuri looked down at herself. "Oh wow," she said, staring at how she filled out the little thrall-blouse she was wearing.

Shar stared at both...and burst into laughter, surmising what must have happened.

And then there was another voice...a horrible grating voice, like bone on stone, grinding. What had appeared to be little more than a skeleton propped against the wall, half concealed by mouldering robes...moved. It scuttled into the center of the room and peered at Shayuri and Piklum through hollow eyesockets, each possessing a tiny spark of blue light deep inside.

"Oh dear," Shankara rasped. "That wasn't supposed to happen."

The three adventurers screamed.

----
To be Continued Again!


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## Mana (Jun 6, 2002)

*Wee!*

We endorse this product and/or service.

-Mana


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## Phasmus (Jun 6, 2002)

At this point, since our heroes are, well, alive...it may be a good time to provide some information on each of them and spare us all some expository dialogue.

Piklum is, as noted, a halfling. Possessing a certain cuteness rather than handsomeness, he wears scruffy clothing and a well-used suit of leather armor. Across one shoulder is slung a short bow (as if any other kind would do), and he carries a seemingly unending supply of daggers secreted here and there on his person. His goals and background are murky, but seem to involve revenging himself upon a crime syndicate that does 'business' all across Kaldonia. A peculiar motivation for such an otherwise happy-go-lucky person, and one wonders what more there is to the tale...

Shayuri is a young woman with the dark skin and subtly exotic features of one of the desert tribesmen that roam far off Tyjir. Despite this hint at a distant origin though, she is quite comfortable with local customs and language. Possessed of almost unearthly beauty, Shayuri's most striking feature is her eyes, which possess irises that are bright silver in color. She is uncommonly well-educated for a sorceror, having recieved magic tutelage from a wizard she refers to as Bernard. Her mind is methodical, but she must struggle with her passionate nature which sometimes overwhelms her with intuitions and violent mood swings. There are few people more pleasant to deal with than she...when she is in a good mood. Otherwise she has a biting tongue. Her goal is, at first, merely to survive in this newly hostile world.

The priestess Shar is a worshipper of Delta, a goddess of what might be considered 'chaos,' or Change in it's raw form. She is trained almost as much as a warrior as a cleric, possessing an almost amazonian physique. Her choice in weapons is as whimsical as the goddess she serves (a scythe), but Shar enjoys the intimidation value of the large curved blade atop a long pole. While Delta herself has no restrictions on the use of negative energy or the undead, Shar has decided that undead are fundamentally unchanging beings and thus antithetical to Delta's nature. Accordingly, she has chosen to draw positive energy despite her more or less amoral nature. Shar's motivation is, as always, to promote her goddess' will. Since the illithid are highly organized creatures, she has taken it upon herself to oppose them with near fanatic fervor.

And now, on with the story. Er...history.

The dual shocks of discovering that Shayuri and Piklum had inadvertantly entered the wrong bodies, and finding that Shankara looked very different to mortal eyes than to ethereal wore off over some long, tense minutes. Both Shayuri and Piklum alike were VERY interested in having the unfortunate accident reversed...but unfortunately, Shankara informed them that it wouldn't be that easy.

"Why not?" they both demanded, as Shar resumed chortling.

"I do know a spell that could do it, but I haven't cast it in...a very long time," the baelnorn replied. "I lack an essential component. A soul gem. Without it to house your souls as they pass between the bodies, you would be lost."

Shayuri slumped despairingly and looked at her freakishly small hands. Piklum said with a nonchalant smile, "So where do we get one of those?"

Shankara considered. "It is possible," she said at last, "that one of the other guardians here has something that would work." She dug into her robes with a skeletal hand as Shayuri looked up, hope returning to her halfling features. The lich produced a scrap of parchment and muttered a spell, causing words to flare into being upon it. "Take this to the custodian of the tomb you will find south and west of here. Count three doors south and turn west at the crumbled pillars that once were..." she trailed off for a moment, shook her head, and resumed, "then count two doors west from there. The third will be his. Show him this and he will provide what you need."

Shayuri leapt with halfling nimbleness off the slab she sat on and snatched the letter from Shankara. "Thank you!" she gushed. "We'll do that right now!"

Shar stretched. "I suppose I'll go too. Better than sitting around in here waiting."

Shankara raised an admonishing hand. "I would suggest being cautious. The ward that protects this place often causes the dead to become animated as lesser undead guardians. They are mindless, and will attack you as they would anything living that strays too close."

Piklum bristled and raised his (her) hands menacingly. "I'll use my magic to stop them!"

"That's MY magic!" Shayuri protested. "Here, take your stupid bow back. You can't use magic even in my body. You don't know how."

Perhaps a little bemused by the group's bickering, Shankara indicated the passage out with a wave of her bony hand. "The force walls that blocked this place are gone," she said. "You are free to leave."

Shayuri nodded from where she was transferring Piklum's weapons to him. "Thank you," she said sincerely.

"Yeah, thanks," Piklum echoed, trying to get the bow to sit right on Shayuri's unfamiliar body.

"Come on," Shar said impatiently, striding out towards the exit, "If we're to do this fool's errand, let us be quick about it."

It was something of a surprise when they emerged from the crypt into the light of day. Apparently the raising magic Shankara had performed wasn't as instant as most. At least the storm had passed though. Nervously the trio walked out across the scraggly grass that carpeted the necropolis, trying to look every direction at once. It was eerily silent there, but a persistant feeling of being watched hounded them. You are not welcome here, the shattered buildings seemed to hiss, leave or suffer the price. And yet, they continued. Southward, past three hulking crypts with solid doors, was indeed a small complex of broken pillars around what might have been a fountain, or sculpture.

"We turn west here," Shayuri said, pointing.

"Whatever," replied Shar, not particularly interested.

"Hey," Piklum said, turning around. "Do you guys hear anything?"

Now that the halfling-in-the-sorceress mentioned it...there WAS a slight noise. A peculiar clicking noise followed by a scrape. Click - scraaaaape. Click - scraaaape. Regular as...footsteps.

"Oh no," lamented Shayuri, feeling very out-of-sorts in this foreign flesh. Shar, on the other hand, grinned and shook the shaft of her scythe, causing the blade to snap into its ready position. She said nothing, but her expression clearly communicated, "It's about time!"

And around the corner from behind the crypt they'd just passed shuffled three skeletons, all of them humanoid, but not human. One in particular was larger and more vicious looking, with sharp fanglike teeth. It carried a peculiar dagger that seemed to be made of dark smoke, wavering and shifting constantly. Upon seeing the tresspassers, the undead silently charged!

The resulting melee was swift and brutal. Shayuri, taken by surprise by the things' speed, was raked by the large skeleton's dagger before she could retreat to safe spellcasting range. Piklum had trouble with the skeletons, since his only weapons were daggers and the bow. He spent most of the battle looking for a rock he could smash at them with, even as Shayuri demanded that he retreat and not put her body at risk. In the end, Shar's maniacal scythe-swinging and a hail of magic missiles brought the skeletons down. Eager to avoid any more encounters with the undead, the group quickly pressed on, not immediately investigating the dagger.

They found what they hoped was the correct tomb, and stood staring at its large black iron door apprehensively for a moment.

Shar, nursing a wound that was too minor to waste magic on, but still deep enough to hurt, seemed to be considering the idea of staying outside as Piklum checked the door out for traps. When he pushed the ominous thing open though, all three entered.

They were perhaps ten feet inside when the door slammed shut with a resounding CLANG, sealing them in near-darkness. As they looked at each other, as if daring someone else to take the next steps first, a mad cackle filled the air and a sickly greenish glow began emerging from a side passage.

Not even Shar could pretend to be brave as an ancient liche tottered out of the passage, the fitful green witchfire in its eyes being the light they saw approaching. It raised its hands on seeing them and howled in fury. "INTERLOPERS!!!"

The full force of its supernatural aura struck all three of the adventurers, and sheer panic drove all thought of Shankara and the letter from their minds. They shrieked in abject terror and fled to the vast iron door, pounding and begging for release. Meanwhile, the lich, now chuckling, advanced towards them from behind. "Now," it hissed, "What shall I do with you three? Hmm?"

Shayuri, in a fit of desperate self-survival instinct, suddenly remembered the letter she carried. She grabbed it out of the grubby little halfling belt pouch it was curled up in, and held it out. "Please!" she wailed, "Shankara sent us to give you this!"

In an instant, the lich's demeanor changed from demented amusement to caution...and perhaps disappointment. "Shankara, eh? Let me see that." It reached out and took the letter...letting one finger brush Shayuri's hand as it did. A layer of skin dried up and peeled off where it had touched her, and the sorceress swallowed, dry-mouthed.

After a moment of scanning the arcane scribble, the guardian lich sighed mustily. "I see. It seems I won't be destroying you after all. Pity. This has been the most fun I've had in centuries."

"A...and the gem?" Shayuri asked, hardly daring to breathe.

"Yes yes yes," the lich said impatiently. "She'll get what she needs, as always..." It's terrible glowing eyes surveyed the three balefully. "You three stay right here. Don't MOVE until I come back." Then it turned and shambled back the way it had come. Long moments passed. Just as the adventurers began to consider trying to find out what was taking so long, they heard the unmistakable sound of its dry shuffling footsteps echoing through the halls.

The lich returned, holding a sapphire as big as Shar's fist. "This will suffice, I think," it rasped, glancing at the party. "It would be enough to hold all three of you, in fact, unless I miss my guess." It chuckled; a sound like centuries-old paper ripping, and held the gem out. Shayuri managed to grab it a split second before Piklum did.

"No fair," he grumbled. "I'm the one who's supposed to be that fast."

"Here," the tomb lich grunted, producing another parchment. "Take this to her as well."

"Of course," Shayuri hastily agreed.

There was an awkward pause then, as the adventurers waited for the door to be opened, and the lich looked thoughtfully up at the ceiling. "Tell me," it said at last, "is Shankara as beautiful as she once was?"

Shar covered her mouth to suppress a derisive laugh, and even Piklum looked taken aback. Shayuri, remembering what the baelnorn had looked like when they were ghosts, nodded. "She is."

"Ahhh." It was impossible for the lich to grin or smile in any way other than the perpetual skull-grin it always wore...but something in its inflection suggested that it would have been, had it still a face. "You may go. Give her my letter, my gem, and...my regards." Turning swiftly, it waved a hand as it ambled back down the passage. There was a scream of iron grating on stone, and the door opened, pushing the party along with it.

Thoroughly unnerved, they wasted no time dashing back to Shankara's tomb, and their progress was not impeded this time.

Upon coming again into Shankara's presence, Shayuri did as instructed. Shankara turned the gem around in the bony claw of a hand as she read the parchment...and giggled. "That scoundrel," she said affectionately at last, secreting the letter away in her robes. "I hope he wasn't too hard on you. He's always been a show-off."

Shayuri could only open and close her mouth, speechless. Piklum slapped a knee and scoffed. "What, him? Nah! Perfect gentleman!" Shar gave Piklum a burning, hateful look, remembering all too well how her courage had failed her.

Wrapped up in her own memories, Shankara missed the interplay and indicated the slabs. "You two now...lie back down. Good. Now focus on the stone." She lifted the gem aloft, and it began to glow in fitful actinic bursts. The rhythm of the flares was somehow hypnotic...

For both Shayuri and Piklum, the universe suddenly became bright blue...and faceted. For an instant their souls touched one another, and a cascade of memories and thoughts too numerous and fast to read flooded them. Then there was a brittle crunching noise and the world became dark.

They sat up, eyes becoming adjusted to the gloom of the crypt. Shankara stood above them still, somehow regal in appearance despite her decayed form. From between her uplifted fingers a fine blue sand ran. She looked down at them. "You have stronger souls than he thought," she said. "Much stronger and the stone would not have been able to hold you both." The lich nodded. "That is good. You will need all the strength you have and more to do what I will ask of you now."

Shar snarled and leapt to her feet. "More tasks?" she raged. "We have done as you asked! The mind flayer lies dead! Now fulfill your bargain and let us go!"

Shankara's voice remained as mild as ever as she turned to look at Shar. "You have done as I asked, yes, and now you live again. I have given you this second chance. Know this, however...you are presently enmeshed very close to the illithid infestation, and if you do not leave you will be recaptured." She paused to let that sink in, then continued, "The task I ask of you now will help ensure that you remain free."

"What is it?" Shar demanded.

"I will give you a crystal, encoded with a message for the current king of the West Sh..." another pause, "...of Dieresis, I mean. The kingdom of the elves. Your task is to see that my message is receieved by the emperor of that land. He will know my name, and the message will make the situation unmistakably clear."

"Forgive me, Shankara," Shayuri pipes up hesitantly, obviously relieved to be back in her own body, "but...what IS the situation? My memories are cloudy."

Shankara sighed. "It is grim, child. I am bound to this tomb in body, but through magic my eye wanders the land with impunity. I have seen the great castles of Caron falling. The very capital itself torn asunder. Cedilla too is all but gone. Only the great towers of its capital hold fast, protected by wards the illithid have not been able to pierce. Yet. Much of the heart of Kaldonia has fallen under the yoke of the mind flayers, and when they have completed the assimilation process, they will lead an army of thralls such as that this world has never seen. If we wait that long, I fear no power under the sun will be able to stop them. My message to the emperor explains all this, and informs him of my wishes that Dieresis offer aid. So far there is still resistance to the illithid...a few isolated pockets. Furthermore, the dwarf mountains in Umlaut remain largely free of their taint. The free peoples of Kaldonia must counter this invasion, or the entire world will be blanketed by the control of these abominations."

Shayuri nods, her eyes widening as the magnitude of the task ahead becomes clear. Yet, she feels her resolve stiffen. There was little she could do to personally fight right now, but if by delivering this missive she could help to organize a counterstrike...

Piklum shrugged, again settling into his gear. "I suppose there's not much point in my going after the Syndicate if they're all thralls," he mused. "So okay."

Shar thumped the butt of her scythe on the floor and religious fervor glowed in her eyes. "So be it," she crowed. "The illithid are abominations in the eyes of Delta! Let none of the peoples of the world fail in their duty to CRUSH them!"

Shankara might have raised an eyebrow, had she any...and presented the gleaming crystal to Shayuri. "I regret to say I cannot help you more," she said. "The illithid and thralls that invaded this place had some valuables...items that may prove useful to you in your journeys. Come."

The elf lich led the party through serpentine halls to a large room that was decorated with the charred, frozen, scoured, and otherwise destroyed husks of many living beings...including two illithid. "It is fortunate that they left your bodies more or less intact," Shankara said, indicating the mess. "I could not bring any of these back. The damage I inflicted was too great."

"But the stuff?" Piklum eagerly demanded, his sharp eyes jumping from body to body seeking loot.

"There in the middle of the floor. I took the liberty of removing them from their previous owners, and of...cleaning them. The gold ring will protect the wearer's mind against reading. Oddly, it was an illithid who wore it. Perhaps it was keeping secrets from its fellows. Additionally, they had some gold and silver coins. They are yours now. I have no need of them."

Piklum fell upon the tiny hoard immediately, though he was quickly persuaded (at scythe-point) to divide the money equally. Surprisingly, Shar wasn't interested in the ring...and after some discussion, Shayuri relented and let the halfling keep it. His will was the weakest of the three, and thus his need greatest.

And so, with farewells (in some cases even fond ones) to Shankara, the three set out once more, this time not to return to the ruins of the elf city again. The elf-lich informed them as they left that they must make haste. When night fell in the aelfheim, there were far more terrible things that lurked than mere skeletons. Shayuri, at the last minute, recalled the odd dagger the large skeleton had used, and retrieved it. The blade of the dagger was indeed seemingly only partly material, though it was as solid as steel to the touch. Since Piklum had claimed the ring, Shayuri kept the dagger. As twilight broke, they could hear the unearthly wails of...things...in the woods behind them. Twisted, strange lights flickered through the towering black trunks of trees. They stumbled on into the night, trying to put enough distance between them and that haunted stretch of woods, but finally had to sleep. And sleep they did. For a time.

---
To be continued


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## Mana (Jun 7, 2002)

*Well.*

*Now* I finally understand the background information. 

Post more. Now.

-Mana


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## Shayuri (Jun 16, 2002)

*Darn Freedom Force *

Sorry for the delay in updating, those few of you who may actually be interested.   I recently got Freedom Force, and was apparently struck by some kind of Mind-Control Laser, perhaps operated by a dastardly supervillain...because the next thing I knew, it was more than a week later and I still hadn't continued the darn thing. 

Just to clarify, while Phasmus is the GM, I'm the campaign "Archiver" in some ways, since my character keeps the reasonably detailed journal of each session (which I've ALSO fallen behind on...sigh), and I've been writing the Story Hour.

Should have another update today.

Out of curiosity though, is anyone out there interested in this? 

PS - Thanks, Cyronax.


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## Mana (Jun 16, 2002)

*I am.*

I done been *hic* interested in this. I done been *hic* want to see my chara-*hic*cter.

*stumbles to the ground, his mouth foaming*

-Mana


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## Cyronax (Jun 16, 2002)

I'm still here. I like your narrative Shayuri, nice descriptions. So I'm guessing that Shankara is perhaps a baelnorn? Cool use for one I must say.

Keep it up!
C.I.D.


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## MavrickWeirdo (Jun 18, 2002)

A very origional story. Please continue.


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## Leopold (Jun 18, 2002)

what no horacio not bumping this..oh it must not be good them


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## Phasmus (Jun 19, 2002)

That night, as the others slept, Shayuri was on her watch shift when she noticed something strange. A pair of faintly luminous orbs hovering in the absolute darkness in the trees nearby. Like...eyes. Looking closer, she could faintly discern a blacker-than-black shape set against the shadows. The shape of a human being. It was then that she felt the fury rolling off of the thing in cold waves. Hastily, the sorceress roused Shar first, then Piklum, only to find that only Shayui seemed able to see it in the gloom. Shayuri cast a spell on a nearby stone that caused it to glow brightly, hoping to illuminate it more fully...but when the flash died down into steady brilliance, the thing was gone...

Before they could do much more, the intrepid party was forced to deal with monstrous animals that burst from the underbrush and fought like creatures possessed. Apparently attracted by the Light spell, the dire rats attacked viciously. To make matters worse, during the battle, the dark wraith-like form appeared again behind Shayuri as she cast her spells. Though it never attacked, the constant chill of its presence was a terrible distraction to the poor sorceress, making it hard for her to concentrate on casting.

For several rounds, things were starting to look unusually grim, as Shar's scythe was unusually ineffective in striking the unusually sized rodents and Piklum was forced to stay moving to avoid the things, and couldn't flank any. Just then an arrow flew from nearby underbrush and slew a rat outright. An oddly pale elven woman melted out of the midnight shadows there and put another arrow to nock as the others rallied around this opening. In short order, with help from the stranger, the rats were slain. The elf then nocked another arrow and watched the group warily.

Shayuri, by now almost frantic at being paced by this malicious spirit, pointed at the thing that hovered just outside the radius of her spell. "There!" she cried triumphantly. "There it is! You can see its eyes glowing."

Shar and Piklum exchanged dubious looks. "You sure one of those rats didn't bite you?" Piklum asked. The stranger shifted uneasily and looked over her shoulder. It was a strangely awkward moment, with no one sure what to say as Shayuri backed slowly away from, by all accounts, nothing at all.

The thing grew closer then, daring to edge inside the light...appearing as an utterly black silhouette of a man. Shayuri jumped back and drew the dagger she'd taken from the skeleton. It's semi-transparent blade whickered through the air in warning, but the creature's unnatural rage only seemed to intensify.

At the sight of the dagger, the elf perceptibly tensed, and the bow moved to cover Shayuri, though was still not completely raised and ready to fire.

"Hey! Calm down!" Piklum said, abruptly a little nervous. 

"Yes," Shar agreed, subtly readying her scythe, just in case. "And put the dagger down at once."

The dark-skinned sorceress glanced at Piklum and Shar, realizing what was happening. "You can't see it," she said softly and looked back at the hovering terror. Its eyes were not on her, but on the dagger.

"See what?" Shar demanded. "There's nothing there!"

"Shar...take the dagger," Shayuri said, backing up towards the cleric. She held the hilt out.

The priestess scowled and muttered something not at all polite, but grudgingly snatched the dagger away.

Shayuri jumped as an audible howl of pure anger echoed in her for a moment, and the apparition vanished. Shar's eyes widened. "What is THAT?" she yelped in shock.

Piklum darted over. "Let me try!" he demanded eagerly. "I wanna see it too!"

Shar handed the halfling the ghostly dagger, and his eyes bugged out at the sight revealed to him. "Wow...that IS creepy," he gushed. "No wonder you completely panicked."

A delicate rosy tinge came over the sorceress' cheeks. "I did not panic," she replied primly. Then after a pause added on, "Not completely." Shar and Piklum exchanged another dubious look, and Shayuri hastily went on. "Anyway, it's clear that this...manifestation is tied to the dagger. What's more, it seems to avoid light, and it didn't come at all during the day...so... Let's try this. Piklum, put the dagger down on the ground there."

Piklum shrugged and did as asked, giving a little startle at the howl only he could hear. "Okay. Now what?"

The three waited, watching the dagger apprehensively. The thing...if it was a thing...did not reappear.

"Well, that's easy enough then," Shayuri said happily. "I'll just set it down by night, and it should be all right. I was afraid I'd have to discard it entirely."

At this point the elf coughed politely and said in a melodic contralto, "Are you actors then? Is this part of your performance? If so, I'm sure I won't be the first to tell you that it needs a great deal of work."

"Wha...who?" Shayuri whirled, startled, then flushed on seeing the delicate elven woman there. "Oh gods, I'm sorry. I was so wrapped up in that..." suddenly realizing she didn't really want to get into it right then, the sorceress shook her head and waved that line of conversation off. "I'm Shayuri. Thank you for your help."

"Semaki," the elf replied in a deadpan voice. "I suggest you put out that light before you bring more trouble."

Shar thumped her scythe meaningfully. "I am Shar, priestess of Delta. And *I* suggest you put up that bow, before you find more trouble."

"I'm Piklum!" the halfling chirped sociably.

"Delighted," said Semaki, the irony clearly implied though her voice was still expressionless. She did take the arrow away from the bow, but remained tense and alert.

With a furious look at Shar, Shayuri quickly injected, "We're all really grateful for your help. None of us mean you any harm."

"Mmm," the elf replied neutrally, eying Shar out of the corner of her unusually dark eyes.

"Not even her," Shayuri said miserably.

Shar grunted. "That remains to be seen."

Semaki opened her mouth, perhaps to answer, perhaps to give vent to a heartstopping battle cry...but was interrupted by another voice from out of the foliage. A tremulous, hissing whisper. "Is it...safe?" Semaki hesitated, then said, "I think so, Quadim."

"Nooo," came the siblant whisper, "It's not...it's never safe. We should go, Semaki. We should go." There was a momentary rustling in the bushes, cut off when Shar demanded sharply, "Whoever you are, come out where we can see you now."

Semaki's hands tightened around the bow angrily, but before she could respond, a shape ambled out of the brush. It was short and thick, almost looking dwarvish, until it uncurled out of the stoop it was in. Quadim turned out to be an ordinary man, perhaps on the youngish side. He was tall and a bit skinny when not doubled over. His hair and beard were scraggly, and his eyes were too wide, jerking from point to point without cease. Hunted eyes. He was wearing simple clothing, almost peasant garb. In contrast, Semaki was wearing cured leather, reinforced in places with metal strips. He bore no weapon at all, while she carried both a longbow and sword.

"You used to be thralls," Shayuri said abruptly, the realization dawning on her. "You're fleeing the illithid, right?"

Quadim wailed and cowered behind Semaki, who threw a glowering look at the sorceress and spared a hand from her bow to pat Quadim with stilted reassurance. "Not used to be!" Quadim whimpered. "I am, master! Am! I would not betray you...please don't punish me...not again..."

Uncomfortably, Semaki replied, "He is...not well. But I assure you, neither of us are playthings of mind flayers." A brief hesitation, then, almost guiltily, "Not anymore."

"A likely story," Shar sneered.

For a moment, Semaki and Shar's eyes met, struck sparks, then parted. Semaki stepped forward, into a small ray of moonlight that slipped deftly through the leaves overhead. With some startlement, the others saw that the elf was covered in strange, arcane-looking blue tattoos. Every bit of skin that showed crawled with them. And her eyes were black, like a pair of polished obsidian orbs. "I will tell you my story," she said woodenly, "And you will tell me yours. And we will decide if we believe any of us are yet pawns of those horrors." Quadim whimpered again and sank to the ground in a fetal ball, crying. Semaki sat easily down, crosslegged, and spoke to the man in a low, comforting voice. When his sobs diminished and ceased, she looked up at the others expectantly.

Piklum and Shayuri sat as well. Shar remained standing. After another moment staring unreadably at the priestess, Semaki began her tale.

"My memories of our..." her face hardened, and she nearly spat the next word, "captivity...are not completely clear. I was captured just under two weeks ago, not long after I arrived in Cedilla. I was made part of a group of others, and led by two of them to a large natural-seeming cavern entrance. There must have been nearly two dozen of us, all combat-trained and equipped. I don't know why we were there, but I remember what happened." The graven elf paused again, reliving the moment.

"I was in the rear of the formation," she said more quietly. "It was dark even to my eyes. I'm not sure how the humans kept their step. We went into the caves, followed the...flayers...though tunnel after tunnel. I have no idea how deep we'd gone, or how long or far...when I felt something cold wash over me. Ahead I saw a wave of darkness, solid darkness, moving towards us. The torches they'd had to light at the front...they went out. People started screaming, and I suddenly felt the illithid gone from my mind. We started running, scattering...none of us remembered how to get out." Semaki stopped again, breathing more heavily. She shook her head and forced herself to meet the eyes of the others, one by one. "I don't know what was in the darkness, but it followed us...chased us through the tunnels. And one by one...it took us. I could hear them screaming...and then silence. And I knew it was coming for me. When Quadim reached me, I nearly killed him I was so afraid. But of all of us, he knew the way out. He led me out." Her black eyes rested momentarily on Quadim. "We've been running from that place ever since. And from the mind flayers."

Shar sat heavily at last and propped her scythe over her knees, eying Quadim. "And him?"

"I'm not sure, exactly," Semaki said evenly. "He's been...prisoner, for much longer. He's not well."

"Where are you two going?" Shayuri asked, as much to change the subject as anything.

The elf's eyes flicked to Shayuri, but her head hardly moved at all. She seemed to weigh the question. "Dieresis."

Shayuri caught Shar's eye with a mute question. Shar shrugged, but both were spared the need for decision-making when Piklum spurted, "Hey, that's where WE'RE going too! You could come with us."

Shar sighed, and Shayuri quickly rallied. "Yes, do Semaki," the sorceress said. "It's a long journey, and a difficult and dangerous one." She didn't add, and none of us knows the woods from a set of brown pillars, but figured an elf would assume that anyway.

Semaki's eyes rested on Shayuri, and if she heard Shar's sigh, she gave no sign of it. Her face betrayed nothing of her thoughts or emotions. Very unusual for an elf, in fact, thought Shayuri. At least from what she'd been told of them. Finally Semaki said, "Very well. If there are no objections, Quadim and I will travel with you." An unstated but clear, for now hung palpably in the air however.

The two groups bedded down then, but Semaki kept her own vigil over Quadim's fitful, nightmare-ridden sleep. When day broke again, the adventurers, now five in number, set off across the untamed wilderness of Cedilla. Westward; always to the west. Towards Dieresis...and hope.

---------------
To be Continued


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## Son_of_Thunder (Jun 19, 2002)

*You bet I'm interested*

Shayuri and Phasmus, keep it up. I'm loving this story hour. I'm ranking it up there with Wulf's, Sepulchrave's and Lazybone's. Illithids have always been one of my favorite bad guys. I love the setting you guys have done. As an author of an oft unread story hour I encourage you to keep going.

Son of Thunder


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## Leopold (Jun 19, 2002)

any thought of the children of Gith making an appearance....i would hooked on any story with Gith creatures like a kid with 10 packs of Pixie sticks on sugar.!


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## Son_of_Thunder (Jun 21, 2002)

*Just a friendly neighborhood bump!*

Bump!

To good to be on second page.


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## Phasmus (Jun 27, 2002)

The haunted forest thinned noticibly as they went, and by the early afternoon had metamorphosed into a broad grassy plain broken only occasionally by copses of trees. The rippling of the grass made the entire vista seem strangely oceanic; a great sea of green, with tree-bearing islands scattered through it. With the gentle breeze and the twitter of birds, it was easy to imagine the world was unspoiled, that the events of the past were nothing more than sordid nightmares.

Semaki was the first to see something wrong.

"What is that?" the elf asked, a small frown curving her lips. She pointed.

The others squinted and shaded their eyes...except Piklum, who had trouble seeing over the top of the grass. "It looks almost like something...moving," Shayuri said. 

Shar scowled. "Whatever it is, it will not find us unready."

Sure enough, a 'V' shaped wake was visible...something moving below the grass level. However, as the group watched apprehensively, two things became clear. There were in fact two wakes, and neither of them were headed for the party. They were crossing perpendicular to the party's path. Then, finally, the disturbances got close enough that two human figures could be seen, their heads and shoulders alone poking above the grass level. Behind them, gaining slowly, was a sharklike something that couldn't quite be seen beyond an occasional flash of reflected light from through the grass that covered it.

"Semaki..." Shayuri said, eyes narrowing. "Can you hit that thing?"

The elf was already preparing an arrow. "Yes," was all she said. The bow was lifted skyward, and Semaki's muscles bulged as she drew the arrow back...back...back. The wood arch creaked in protest.

"Ridiculous," Shar scoffed. "Let it catch up to them first. For all we know, those men may be thralls and the pursuer friendly to us."

"I don't think they're thralls," Shayuri demurred. "They look afraid. Thralls would only run if ordered to. They'd be more likely to attack whatever it is...oh dear."

The runners had passed into an area where the grass was thinner. The human beings were a young, but rough-looking warrior and an older man. As they frantically sprinted, the old man lost his footing and fell. The warrior didn't notice at first, then paused and looked back.

"No!" the man's voice could faintly be heard. "Keep going!"

From the grass behind him emerged a horrible spidery thing made of brass plates and iron joints. Puffs of white vapor issued from ports, and it made a wheezing noise that barely carried to the hill where the party stood.

"Gidi," Shayuri whispered.

The warrior cried, "No!" and drew his sword. Anyone could see though that he was too far, the machine too fast. The old man raised an arm over his face as the construct bore down on him, sharp scythe-like blades gaping wide like fangs...

It was interrupted by the *twang - zip* of Semaki releasing the arrow. Her hand, acting automatically, dropped to her quiver and neatly plucked another before the first was even halfway through its trajectory. Incredibly though, the second was not needed.  Despite the distance, concealment, and sheer speed of her target, Semaki's arrow struck true. There was a loud metallic *CLANG* as it lodged itself into one of the ports in the thing, and the device slowed...faltered...

...and exploded in a titanic blast of scalding vapor and flames!

The warrior was blown backwards off his feet and landed face down at the outskirt of a wide circle of flattened grass. The old man was concealed in the hanging cloud of soot and steam that lingered over the center of the blast. Shayuri immediately broke into a run towards the scene, followed closely by Piklum and Shar. Semaki nocked the second arrow and proceeded forward slowly, already scanning the surroundings for more wakes, Quadim at her heels.

While Shayuri hovered anxiously nearby, Shar called on Delta's power to mend the warrior's wounds. The worst of the burns did indeed congeal back into healthy skin, and a few pieces of shrapnel were ejected as the holes they made in him filled in. Coughing and wide-eyed, the man awoke blearily, then sat up, groping for his sword.

"Who are you?! Where is..." His eyes fell onto the smoking crater. "Oh no..." Before Shayuri could urge him to take it easy, he was staggering up and towards the burnt ring that marked the middle of the explosion. Crumpled there was a dark heap of what had once been a man, scoured by fire, steam and fragments.

"I'm sorry," the sorceress said. "We couldn't help him."

"You," the man said, turning abruptly and pointing at Shar, who was getting to her feet. "You're a priestess. Can't you..."

"No," Shar replied frostily. "Now I suggest you begin by telling us who you are, and why you are here. It's not too late for you to join your companion."

"Shar!"

"The cleric is correct," Semaki said lightly, emerging from the grass, arrow still at nock, "...though not polite. In this place, in this time, we must assume any stranger is a threat." Her coal black eyes fixed on the warrior. "Who are you?"

The man's face hardened. "Mark del'Sol," he replied. "Of Caron. This is...was...Pique. If any of you have the means to help him..."

Shar gave an exasperated sigh, and Shayuri shook her head. "I'm sorry, Mark." Semaki just continued watching, somehow seeming both relaxed and ready to pounce at the same time.

Mark deflated a bit and looked down at the lump of ripped charcoal. He made a reverent gesture and closed his eyes in a moment of silence. When he opened them again, he was all business. "And you all are?" he asked crisply. Introductions were made and he absorbed each name without comment. "Good to meet you all. I thank you for the assistance." His deep blue eyes surveyed the group, lingering a moment on each of Quadim, Shayuri, and Semaki. "I will be frank. My life is in danger, as you have all seen. There will be more of these things coming for me. Will you let me accompany you?"

Piklum shrugged noncomittally and edged a bit closer to the smoldering body. "I don't mind." Shar smiled grimly, "Any enemy of Gidi is a potential friend of mine. Can you handle that sword?"

Mark simply nodded, his expression not changing.

Semaki merely put her arrow back in its quiver. "The day is getting on," she said calmly, "we should get moving."

"A moment," Mark said tightly, stepping between Piklum and his erstwhile friend. Piklum scuttled back a few steps and put on an innocent, nigh-cherubic expression. Mark paid no attention, grimacing as he knelt down and pried the remains of the backpack off the body. "Sorry, old man," he said quietly, fondly. "These will do you no good now though." With a sickening *ripping* noise, the backpack came free, and Mark hastily upended it. Much of the contents were ruined, but three things were conspicuously unharmed. A set of leather bracers with metal inlays, a simple bronze ring, and a metal segmented necklace made of gold. He looked at the others, "Are any of you..." he grimaced again, as if hating the sound of the word, "...magicians? These things have some power, I think, but he never told me much about them."

Shayuri darted forward, eyes widening. "Let me see them," she said, reaching out.

The sorceress intoned strange words of Shaping, and twists of arcane energy rippled around her fingers. The mystic auras of the items bloomed into her view as she examined each of them. "Oh yes," she said, "Definitely magical. The bracers and necklace were made with transmutation, as well as abjuration...odd combination, that..." She faded into a moment of thoughtful silence, then said, "The ring is pure transmutation, and is quite powerful by the look of it."

Mark held his hand out rather pointedly, and Shayuri, after an almost imperceptible pause, returned the items. "Are they safe to use?" Mark asked.

Shayuri shrugged. "I'm afraid I can't see that much detail. Didn't your friend talk about them? Where did he get them?"

"He was involved with a group of mages," Mark grumped. "He wouldn't talk about them though. They apparently liked their privacy. Unfortunately, someone must have found out...hence the...whatever it is." He indicated the crater where the Gidian construct had been.

"And you?" Semaki inquired in that quiet voice of hers. "Who are you involved with?"

Mark was silent for a moment. "I'm not ready to say yet," he said at last. "I do appreciate your help, but...you must understand. There are many more lives than mine at stake."

"Hold," Shar abruptly interjected. "We are followed."

Semaki whirled to look back at the forest. In the distance could be seen three human-shaped figures walking slowly out of the trees. Something like surprise flickered across her impassive features for a moment, but she said nothing; only reached to take an arrow and put it to nock.

"Who are they?" Mark asked, drawing his sword. The blade of it was an odd, unreflective black metal inlaid with peculiar runes. Shayuri's eyes immediately gravitated to it, though she did not say anything at once.

"I do not know," Semaki replied, though there was a brief hesitation before the statement.

Quadim flinched. "Masters, your servants...they are dead, or serve you no longer. It wasn't my fault! Please..."

Mark fixed Quadim with a cold expression for a moment, then strode out to intercept the three. Shar, not to be outdone, hastily followed. The others watched. Mark suddenly cried, "Zombies! Undead!" and charged forward, sword upraised. Semaki loosed her arrow, which arched high and buried itself into the chest of one. Closely following it was a brilliant shard of magic force that launched itself from Shayuri. Between the two, the lurching thing fell, it's midsection hanging in tatters. Then Shar and Mark reached the remaining two, and did their grisly work. In moments, the shambling corpses were dead once more.

Semaki, looking paler than usual, went forward to look at the remains. She didn't seem surprised when she reported, "I knew these men. They were with me. When we went into the caves."

"Caves?" Mark said confusedly, "What caves?"

"It's a long story, Mark. We'll tell you tonight, when we camp," Shayuri replied uneasily, looking from the mangled rotted bodies on the ground to Semaki.

"Faugh...fine," the warrior replied, wiping gunk off his blade and sheathing it. "Let's go quickly though. Too many enemies have found us here for my liking."

"Agreed," Semaki said, and without further comment set off westward, trailing Quadim like a lost puppy.

Shayuri quickly fell into step, and Shar hustled to take the lead. Piklum grinned companionably at Mark. "Women, eh?" Then pattered after them.

Mark watched them for a moment, debating with himself. Then with long, heavy strides, he followed.

---------------
To be Continued


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## MavrickWeirdo (Jun 28, 2002)

*Very Nice*

I wonder what Mark will think about sleeping with a dagger stuck in the ground. Please continue


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## Cyronax (Jul 2, 2002)

Here's a BUMP! Keep em' coming!

C.I.D.


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## Cheiromancer (Jul 3, 2002)

And a bump!


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## Spider_Jerusalem (Jul 9, 2002)

ka-bump.

Great writing... although I have to say I want the Illithids to win - I'm just a sucker for their big, innocent eyes.

When is the next installment?


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## Shayuri (Jul 10, 2002)

*Sorry for the delay, all. *

Between the holiday week (technically just a day, I know, but...eh , getting Neverwinter Nights, and frantically preparing for rolling out a campaign of my own, the Story Hour updates fell a little behind. I really *really* appreciate the bumps and support from y'all though. I should be back on track this week, so expect another update.

As for some of the questions asked, I'm not the best person to answer I guess, but I'll take a shot.

While there's certainly room for the Gith to appear, so far there haven't been any. We're just level 6. No planewalking for us.  Not to mention the focus of the game is, so far at least, very much centered on the material plane, which is probably for the best. On the other hand, who's to say this is the ONLY plane the illithid are making their bid for domination on? >

As for the illithid winning, gee, THANKS!    (^_^)

The story hours are, in case ya haven't guessed, running WAY behind the actual game sessions. In the next update we'll learn that enchanted items can't always be trusted, that sorcerors can lose their heads when a rogue becomes sluggish, and that two wrongs don't make a wight.

Stay tuned, teen gang!

*poof*


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## Shayuri (Jul 13, 2002)

*Update!*

That night the six mismatched refugees made camp without a fire, and exchanged stories. First, as promised, Mark was regaled with the tale of Semaki and Quadim escaping from the terrors of the dark cave. He absorbed it silently, nodding in places but never commenting. Shayuri went next, telling Mark of she and Shar and Piklum's brush with death, and subsequent encounter with the haunted dagger. Mark eyed the dagger where it lay innocently on the ground, and edged away from it. Piklum then launched into an enthusiastic and wandering telling of a noble and gallant halfling, unjustly persecuted by a criminal syndicate and who was now seeking blood-spattered vengeance against the leaders of the syndicate for its terrible crimes against him. Shar added nothing to the collection of tales, and Quadim was in no condition to do more. Mark, perhaps still not quite ready, declared that he would take the first watch, and that was that.

The night passed without incident.

It wasn't until the following afternoon, when they paused to rest and eat a midday meal, that Mark grudgingly began speaking of himself, sitting stiffly and speaking with a cultured, somewhat contemptuous, air.

"The del'Sol family is," he paused and grimaced painfully, "was...a family of noble bearing, well spoken of and respected. I am the fourth of my line, and was squired to Sir Farlon, a knight of House Reichard." Another pause as he took in the others with a meaningful nod. "I was training to become a knight myself, and would have been close to completing it had it not been for this catastrophe." Somehow he managed to convey the impression that the invasion of the illithid was a personal affront to him, in denying him knighthood. That faded quickly though as he continued with genuine grief. "Sir Farlon...he did not survive the initial attacks." Mark shook his head slowly and looked down. "There was nothing I could do. The court mages, the Thirteen Magisters...they were running amok. I saw towers exploding in fire and rock, whole units swallowed in green clouds of death as they battled their brothers...it was chaos. Madness. Then something struck me from behind, and as I fell I knew death had found me..."

For a long moment Mark sat silent, collecting himself. When he continued, his voice was steady again and had a sharp crack to it as if angry at having let his demeanor slip. "I awoke underground, on a soft bed. There were many others. At first I was afraid, thinking I'd been taken prisoner. But I soon learned that I was the opposite. One of the few free men left in Caron. When I was sent north to meet Pique, I accepted the assignment gladly, despite its danger. And now he is dead...but for your aid, we might both be." His eyes, normally blue but now shrouded in the dark of night weighed each of the others. "I have heard your stories, and I do not believe you to be thralls. I will trust you, if only because I must. Pique was bearing a message to my commander, and now only I remain to deliver it. We must turn northward and east, to find the enclave of the Caron resistance."

Shar burst into derisive laughter, and Piklum just looked confused. Shayuri, eyes wide and glittering silver in the moonlight demanded in a shocked voice, "Are you mad? That will take us back into illithid-controlled territory!"

Mark's eyes narrowed. "The message is important to my cause."

"But not to ours," Shayuri returned, just as coldly. "If your message is so important, then you can deliver it without our help. We are bound for Dieresis."

"What do you hope to accomplish there?" the warrior demanded. "The elves know what's happening, but they do nothing! Only the Resistance is in a position to ACT."

Shayuri lifted her chin slightly and affected a mysterious air. "We have our reasons, Mark, and they are not subject to debate."

Mark's eyes jumped from person to person, and found no sympathy to his plight. "So be it," he growled finally. "I have little chance of making it alone, and the message must not die with me. I will go with you. Maybe when you see for yourselves how futile your goal is, you will come to your senses."

"Um," Piklum injected quickly, "You could tell us the message. You know, in case you're horribly killed or something."

Mark gave the halfling a withering look, and rose to his feet. "The day is passing us by. Let's go."

No one could argue with that, so the group once again set forth. The remainder of the day passed slowly, uncomfortably, but with no untoward events. In a way that made the tension worse. An attack would have provided some outward focus for their frustration. Instead, it simply festered. Night came none too soon, and camp was struck once more. This time the peace was broken before the intrepid adventureres even had time to begin splitting the watches.

A low burbling hiss could be heard in the distance from the direction the group had been traveling from. Like a kettle boiling over, vaguely.

Immediately everyone leaped to their feet.

"What is that?" Mark asked, drawing his black, rune-encrusted sword.

"I'm not sure," replied Shayuri as she frantically looked around. "It sounds almost like steam though. It could be another construct. Semaki, do you see anything?"

The elf shook her head calmly, having already prepared her bow. "No. But it is coming directly towards us by the sound." Quadim whimpered, but moved to Semaki's forward flank, as if to interpose himself between whatever it was and her.

Shar readied her scythe with an impressive flourish and snarled, "We've been followed by far too many things for my liking. Hasn't the elf been covering our trail?"

"There," Semaki said suddenly, pointing. She ignored Shar's outburst. "I see something."

The hideous noise grew louder, and everyone strained to see. A tall, dark figure lurched unsteadily towards them through the tall grass and twilight gloom. The strange hissing whistle unquestionably came from it. As the group stood transfixed by this apparition, the scudding clouds finally let moonlight down and revealed more detail. Pale, glistening skin. White, marbled eyes. Four tentacles waving from a terrible beak-like mouth.

The illithid had found them at last.

Horror paralyzed them all. It was too late to run, and fighting was futile, wasn't it? Then a roar of horribly mingled panic and rage erupted near Semaki...and Quadim launched himself at the hateful thing! Semaki was jolted from her numb state, and immediately fired an arrow that pierced the heart of the dread creature...and while it's hiss shifted to a keen, it did not drop. Not to be outdone, Shar reared her scythe back to a striking position, and broke into a run to reach it as well.

"Well," Piklum said with apparent nonchalance as he brought his shortbow to bear, "It's been nice knowing you, Shay."

Mark grimaced. "I won't go down without a fight!" He too charged to the fray.

"There's something strange about it," Shayuri mused. "I wonder..." She began moving her hands and incanting, summoning a spike of magical energy. There was ordinarily no way she could pierce the antimagical slime that coated these creatures, but...there was something wrong here. The bright shard of force erupted from her hands and wove a dizzying path as it zigzagged around Mark, Shar, and Quadim, then impacted the mind flayer...which recoiled and hissed in pain! In the bright flash of impact, Shayuri noticed something, and gasped.

"Don't go near it!" she yelled. "It's not an illithid! It's undead!"

Too late though. Quadim, unhearing in his madness, reached the pale, decayed form of his foe and begain lashing out at it with his bare hands. Incredibly, those hands blurred with speed, landing punch after punch with devastating force. The "illithid" reeled back again, then lashed out with one gnarled, flipper-like hand. Quadim tried to duck, but was taken by surprise by the thing's unearthly speed. There was a dark burst of power as it connected, and Quadim wailed in agony, and crumpled to the ground.

"QUADIM!" Semaki roared, and shot again. The arrow took the mind-flayer thing in the forehead and penetrated deeply. Undead or no, the undead corpse had taken too much damage for its animating forces to continue to inhabit. With a hollow gurgle, it collapsed as well.

Shayuri ran towards the two fallen bodies, though was handily outrun by Semaki. She called out, "Shar! It's the one we killed! We were ghosts at the time, and..."

The priestess needed no more than that though to realize, "...and things slain by undead often rise again as undead. Blast!"

"Quadim," Semaki said as she reached him and knelt down. "Quadim, can you hear me? Quadim!"

The sorceress swallowed thickly. "Semaki...undead can sap life force. If it did that to him, then...he may come back as another one. We have to destroy his body, quickly."

Semaki looked at Shayuri coldly. "No."

Shar readied her scythe. "It's the only way, elf. Move aside."

Semaki rose to her feet and snatched her longbow off the ground. "No!"

As the two faced off tensely, Shayuri reached Quadim and carefully felt his cold pale flesh in the crook of his throat, searching for a pulse. "Wait...let's make sure first..."

Mark watched the fray, nonplussed. His sword was still out, but he wasn't sure what to make of it all. Before he had time to decide, things were decided for him.

It all seemed to happen at once.

Shar growled and stepped forward, raising her scythe as if to attack. Semaki loosed her arrow. Shayuri gasped and yelled, "He's alive!" Chaos ensued.

Several minutes of bitter arguing and recriminations followed. Shar had ripped the arrow out of her and healed the terrible wound. Piklum, who'd readied his own bow and prepared to help, went over and sat by her. Semaki sat alone off to one side, cradling Quadim's inert, barely-living form as Shayuri desperately apologized both for her own misguided assumption, and for the behavior of Shar. Mark simply watched in befuddled amazement.

As fragile as the ties that bound the group together were, they were never more frayed than at that moment.

Finally, hoping to distract the others from the strife, Shayuri asked Mark to produce the magic items again. "The abjuration magic these have make me think they're probably protective in nature," she explained. "It's silly to have these, and not use them."

Piklum instantly materialized by her side, nodding emphatically.

Mark frowned, but couldn't argue the point. He dug around and finally brought out the goods.

"Let me try the necklace," Shayuri said, knowing that its aura was the strongest of the three.

"The ring!" Piklum shouted, hopping up and down. "I want it."

Mark rolled his eyes but gave them the requested items. "I'll not put my trust in magic, thank you."

The necklace was wide and segmented. Shayuri fit it around her neck, then set the clasp shut. There was a distinct *click*. She waited a moment and looked herself over. Nothing seemed to change. "Hmm. Well, some experimentation should prove..." She broke off as a hot sizzling sensation washed over her neck where the metal touched her. Not painful though. She swallowed nervously. "...educational."

Piklum jammed the ring on his finger. "It's not working. Why not? Do I have to say something? BIZZDANG! Nope. Um...LOORBADDY!"

Mark stared as Piklum's skin began to turn greyish and grew shiny as it exuded a slimy ooze. "Oh boy."

"All right, well, I think that's enough experimenting for one night," Shayuri said hastily. She reached back to the clasp behind her neck and undid it. There was another *click*. Suddenly Shayuri was falling! With a surprised yelp she hit the ground and stared dazedly up at Mark. "Oops...that didn't seem to work right. I need to..." She quickly realized two things. Although she could still feel her hands scrabbling at the clasp, she couldn't seem to control which way her head was pointing. No matter how she tried, it just sat and looked up at Mark. Her arms flailed, seeking the ground, but just whistled through the air!

Two, Mark was looking down at her with an expression of abject horror and screaming his head off.

Even then, it wasn't until she saw herself standing near him, waving her arms around that she realized. SHE was the one who'd lost her head. It was now lying on the ground at her feet. And the necklace wasn't coming off!

"Oh gods," she whispered.

--------------------------
To Be Continued!

Next time!: Revelations of the Spineless Order! A dragon's cry for help! Danger in an illithid lair and TWO new additions to the party, including the almighty XAG!! Plus, Quadim's Awakening...will he ever be the same?? Find out next time in DOOM from Below!


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## Spider_Jerusalem (Jul 14, 2002)

Yep. This story rules. 

Good magic item thinking aswell. I like that spectral dagger - and the necklace kinda took me by suprise. Nice to see a character slapped around so early on.

Could i ask... how many are in the gaming group, and as you said you have two new additions... does this mean you have an eight strong troupe or playing multiple characters?

Spider (Still cheering the Illithids on...)


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## Shayuri (Jul 14, 2002)

*Respies*

Bah! The Illithid will die! DIEEEE!  

 

Yeah, Phas has been rather clever with his magic items. They're usually similar to what you find in the DMG, but with subtle (often horrific ) differences. His campaign world features a sect of acrcane casters who dedicate themselves to creating perverted magic items, so that people never take enchantments for granted. Shayuri and Piklum ran afoul of two such items so far. 

The group's composition has changed a bit since then, but the only NPC in the story hour so far is Quadim, who stays with us for quite awhile as melee support (which we sorta lacked for awhile) and Semaki's boyfriend.

The other NPC who's about to be added is the inimitable XAG! He's actually still with us now even, but is sleeping. The other new player is in fact a new player. I shan't say more at this time. So in answer, we go from five live players to six in the next update, and from six characters to EIGHT.

Sigh. It's still not enough though. Not ever enough.

*looks pensive and sad*


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## Phasmus (Aug 1, 2002)

Well, as you can see, our next update has been delayed somewhat.  This will be corrected presently.  However, in the meantime, I have provided the map of the world of Vitis.  The characters are currently in Cedilla, heading west, toward the Umlaut boarder.







Yes, indeed, this map was made with the StarCraft map editor.


Regards,

Phasmus & Co.

"Diabolical laughter is the best medicine."


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## Capellan (Aug 1, 2002)

Love the concept of this story hour - PCs who used to be Illithid slaves.  Consider that idea well and truly *yoinked* for my own purposes.  

Looking forward to seeing more of this in the future.


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## Phasmus (Aug 7, 2002)

*Archivist-Shayuri has done it again!*

The moments of chaos that followed Piklum's unfortunate transformation and Shayuri's even more unfortunate, though thankfully nonlethal, decapitation must have been very satisfying indeed to Shar's divine patron. Finally, after much hooting, hollering and general pandemonium, Shayuri's head was reattached (though the necklace still refused to be removed...any attempt to do so merely unlatched her head from her neck), and things calmed down enough for rational discussion. Well...as rational as was possible.

"Mark," Shayuri demanded almost as soon as her head was back on, "why didn't you TELL us your friend got these from the Spineless Order?!"

Mark shook his head and spread his hands helplessly. "I didn't KNOW!" he returned. "He never told me the specifics. How was I supposed to know?"

"You must have suspected though," the sorceress fumed. "Or you would have tried one yourself."

"Mages may operate openly in Cedilla," he replied, "But in Macron they keep to themselves mostly. A 'secretive order of mages' could mean anything there."

Piklum stood looking himself over as they bickered. His skin had become grey and covered with a thin patina of slime. Already his clothes were dark with it. It squished in his shoes at each step. "Hang on...Spineless?" he asked, not looking away. "What's that?"

Shayuri gaped at the halfling. Mark snorted, and Shar chuckled and replied. "They're an organization of mages," she said in a low, amused voice. "At one point or another, they decided that people were taking magic and enchanted items for granted...using them without appreciating them. So they started making useful items that also carried taints or curses and spreading them around." Another laugh. "They serve the interests of chaos, even if they don't mean to."

"Even more," Shayuri threw in, not liking to be shown up, "Every mage in the Spineless Order has to have some kind of...body altering magic on them." She gave Mark a venemous look. "And they're by far the most secretive order of mages around."

Mark waved it all away. "It's hardly my fault if you barged into this without thinking," he said. "Maybe next time you'll be more careful."

Shayuri's mouth dropped open into a little 'O' of outrage, but before she could say anything, Semaki spoke up from where she sat beside Quadim's unmoving, barely breathing form. "I am tired," she said, her words cutting through the tension easily. "I will take the second watch. I suggest the rest of you sleep as well. Our journey will not be easier even if you do decide who is to blame for this misfortune."

She then lay down beside Quadim, and closed her eyes. This was, of course, a case of leading by example since elves do not sleep as humans do.

Suddenly, arguing over it seemed terribly juvenile.

Stiffly, Shayuri moved away some and bedded down, though the necklace made it hard to get comfortable, since it held her neck straight. One by one, the others followed suit, though Piklum discovered that he stuck to fibrous cloth like his blanket, and soon had to discard it. Shar took the first watch, but nothing further happened that night.

The next morning, Quadim was awake. He was staring off into space glassily, but seemed different somehow as well. He wasn't muttering under his breath, or fitfully rubbing the faint gridwork of scars that adorned his head under his thin hair. When he looked at the others, there was no longer fear in his eyes.

"I nearly died, didn't I?" he asked in a low voice. Semaki stirred from her reverie and looked at him for a long moment. No one else spoke. Finally, Semaki replied.

"Yes," she said.

Quadim nodded, not upset or surprised. In fact, oddly, he seemed suddenly happy. "I could feel it, reaching into me...pulling at me.  I felt my soul leaving me." he said in a near-whisper.  

Semaki put her hand on his arm. "But it didn't."

Suddenly he looked up at Semaki, his eyes burning with realization, "There is no way to fake that!"  Quadim smiled. "I _am_ awake. It's over.  I am free!"

The elf's face sudden broke into a smile, no, a grin. Something akin to joy was shining from it, and the difference was breathtaking. Normally she was pretty in a distant, hard way. A statue, perhaps, of a warrior queen. But when she smiled, the knife edges of her cheeks seemed to soften, and she was just a girl...a beautiful young girl.

Shayuri watched, rapt, her peculiar silver eyes a bit shinier than usual. Shar yawned and began collecting her things...perhaps a bit louder than necessary, as if to remind Semaki and Quadim that she was there. Mark snored and turned over. He was a late riser. Piklum, still grey and slimy, said to Shayuri in a hushed tone, "But he's been free for weeks."

The sorceress shrugged. "Free in his body maybe...but he didn't believe it until now." Her eyes locked onto the scars on Quadim's skull.* "I wonder what they did to him..."

Quadim glanced over at Shayuri, his smile diminishing, his eyes growing hollow and distant, "They took my mind... and played with it, like a cruel child plays with a captured insect."  His voice was bitter, more sorrowful than angry.

The air of near-celebration fled as Quadim continued, "I could never know what was truth and what was an abominable fantasy injected into my mind.  They showed me freedom, over and over... but it was never real.  I came to see any goodness, any light, as falsehood... shown to me only so it could torn away for their amusement.  Any action, any thought, that displeased them, and I would be wracked.  When, I refused to act, refused to believe what I was shown, and begged to be taken to the feeding stocks... I was wracked.  Eventually... I was broken.  And they sent me to die with the battle thralls."

Semaki's eyes hardened with anger, and her visage returned to stone, as hatred of the Illithid came to the forefront of her mind.  

Quadim smiled slightly, though, as he added, "I couldn't let myself believe I was free...  It wasn't possible.  It was..." his eyes fell on Semaki, and his voice slowed slightly, "too good to be true."

"Sounds pretty bad," the halfling noted cheerfully, and also began breaking his camp. The others soon followed suit, and with considerably higher spirits than before, resumed their course westward.

They managed to get into the afternoon before something unusual happened. Not bad, considering.

Shayuri paused in midstride as she felt something tickle at her. A peculiar sensation was creeping over her. A feeling not unlike hearing, but that had nothing to do with her ears. She looked around, tilting her head slightly with an inquisitive expression.

It was Semaki who noticed first. "What is it?" she asked without preamble.

"I'm not sure," Shayuri answered distantly, her eyes unfocused as she concentrated on other senses. "Something...is coming." She pointed to the north. "That way."

Semaki looked northward and squinted, raking the horizon with her gaze. She saw the slight quiver of grass against the wind that told of small creatures huddling in it. She saw the fine mist of pollen rising from some of the grasses that were in season, the distant speck in the sky that must be a hawk, even a faint glint of water where a pool had formed in the distance. "I don't see anything unusual," she said dubiously. Of course, to some it would be a lie. What she should have said was, "I don't see anything unusual for an elf."

"No," Shayuri said, apparently not in response to Semaki. "He's...hurting. He's frightened! We have to hurry!" She burst into a run northward.

"Shayuri!" Mark yelled. He looked vengefully at Semaki, as though it were the elf's fault. "She's going to get us all killed," he said tersely.

"Sorcerors learn to trust their intuitions," Semaki replied thoughtfully. She readied her bow and put an arrow to nock.

Mark growled, "That's fine for them, but I prefer some hard facts before I jump into action."

"Then stay," was Semaki's only reply before bounding lithely off after Shayuri. A moment later, Quadim followed her. 

Piklum started to run too, then paused and looked back. "Aren't you two coming?" he asked in a slightly burbling voice.

"Oh very WELL," Shar snapped, glaring daggers at the shrinking backs of the others. "I suppose there's a chance she's not simply insane." Grumbling, she stalked after them, making no effort to match their speed. Piklum, his gregariousness satisfied, ambled along with her, though constantly tried to see what was happening ahead.

Mark waited longer, hoping someone would regain their senses. Finally he uttered a curse his mother would have gasped...and then chased him around with soap...to hear, and broke into a jog. He quickly passed Shar and Piklum, hoping to be there at least when the uppity sorceress made a fool of herself.

His jog became a run through, when he heard the sounds of battle from ahead. Shayuri's high voice rose and shook with arcane power, and there was a flash of light. The noise of weapons meeting weapons. Oddly, though Semaki shouted something at Quadim, there was little other noise. By the time he arrived, the fight was all but over. A veritable throng of hobgoblins lay in a large, tattered ring formation. Semaki was at the outer edge, putting an arrow back in her quiver and walking towards the center, where Quadim and Shayuri were. The elf gave him a wry half-smile as he drew even with her.

"You're slow, human," she said in her mellifluous alto. "You missed the action."

"By the crown," Mark replied, not really having heard Semaki, "What IS that?"

At the center of the decimated ring of humanoids (FAR too many for the three to have dispatched in so short a time) was something that looked like a huge pile of gold coins. But, as he came nearer, he realized it was one object...a huge mass of gold. But it was moving! Then he was near enough to see over the grass better, and he froze, hand going automatically for his sword.

"Shayuri!" he hissed. "Get away! It's a dragon!"

The sorceress looked up from where she was kneeling...and Mark realized that her hands were on it, and her face was torn with sorrow. "He's almost dead...the hobgoblins were killing him."

Semaki trotted past Mark then, seemingly unconcerned about the large (the size of a pony perhaps) dragon. She watched it, not warily, but with a subdued sorrow that seemed to echo Shayuri's.

Mark decided to try reason again. "Shayuri, it's a -wounded- dragon. If it wakes up, it might attack!"

She shook her head and looked back down. "He's already awake."

Mark's reply to that was interrupted by a strange noise coming from the beast. The nearest he could equate it too would be someone trying to talk backwards through a huge brass trumpet. A badly dented one at that. It was awful. But Shayuri just nodded and answered. The language sounded unnaturally coarse and gutteral in her mouth, but he could recognize some of the same sounds.

Realization dawned. "She's TALKING to it," Mark said dumbly.

Semaki gave him another amused look, but mercifully, said nothing.

"Poison," Shayuri said, sounding aghast. "No...no, I know what to do. Just hang on." She bent over more, her head vanishing behind the bulk of the dragon's side. It's head swung around on the long, serpentine neck and regarded first Semaki and Quadim, then Mark. Its eyes were like polished steel spheres set into their sockets, though slitted in pain. Somehow, though it lacked pupils, Mark realized that it was staring at his sword...and was afraid. With effort he managed to release its hilt and let it slide back into the scabbard. The dragon whuffed, and flecks of silvery blood came out with its breath.

Only Semaki could see what Shayuri was doing. The dragon had moved his leg when she'd asked how she could help him. There, near the breast, was the ebony hilt of a dagger sticking out. Horrified, she'd bent to take the dagger out, then put her mouth to the wound and started trying to suck the poison out... She knew it was too late, she could feel the dragonet dying all around her, as if he was a second skin. Deeper, a more distant echo in her mind wondered at the intensity of her emotions...You wouldn't get this upset if it was your own father dying, it noted. Why now? She had no answers to offer though.

The first taste was bitter, and Shayuri coughed and spat it out. She immediately repeated herself, remembering well her lessons for snakebites. But the flesh of the dragonet around the wound was cold already. Too late.. It was her third repetition that she felt the warm tingle in her mouth. She'd been very careful not to swallow, but panic began rising up in her. Some poisons worked through the skin. Some...

...there was a rush of motion and color, a sensation of hurtling forward at incredible speed. Darkness formed a tube around her, leading up to an incalculably bright spot ahead. It was coming...coming fast... Then a sound like a gust of wind, and she was in the light...and the light was outside. Below her, a vast desert spread magnificently stark and barren, yet possessed of a savage beauty as well. Darker stands of rock, remnants from an age of volcanos, jutted out of the white sands like huge rotted teeth. Wind tugged and tore at her as she manueved between those dark craggy towers. Her body was different, she realized. It was...it was... Not hers. Gratified surprise suddenly flooded her from outside her mind.

_Ah, so you have come at last, daughter._

...and she spat out the mouthful of blood and venom with a strangled cry and stood up, wiping her mouth furiously. The dragonet moved one clawed foot and put it on her ankle. {My sister,} it said in its rasping, injured Draconic, {they still have her...in the hole...towards the sunset...}

Shar and Piklum arrived, and Piklum immediately gasped and ran to the dragon. Too late though...its chrome eyes were glazed in death, already dulling to a cataract white. "Shayuri!" he cried out, "You killed a dragon?!"

She looked down at him, expression unreadable. Then she said to Semaki, "His sister is still a prisoner. He told me which way."

Semaki nodded. "I understood him too." She and Shayuri, with Quadim trailing behind a bit confusedly, began jogging west.

"Wait!" Mark yelled. "What are you talking about?!"

Shayuri called back, "There's another one, west of here. I won't let them both die, Mark! Come and help us!"

"But..." he let the 'they're dragons' comment go unsaid. It was clear she already understood that.

Shar made a disgusted noise as she prodded the corpse with a foot. "No finesse at all," she complained.

"Hey...they're going again!" Piklum reported, and took off after them, this time determined not to miss the fun. Shar grunted sourly and followed...this time a bit faster though. She too was itching for some action.

"This is getting to be a habit," Mark complained to no one...and he fell in after them. "Saving a _dragon?_ From what? A monstrous virgin?"

--------------------------
To Be Continued!

Next time!: The one where we ACTUALLY meet the two new characters, because I got overzealous last time and forgot how long this would be!   Also, a horde of thralls, and a close call with the illithid. Oh, and did I mention...XAG? Muahaha.


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## Phasmus (Aug 28, 2002)

The group of adventurers hiked a good mile or more before they found what they were looking for. In a large copse of trees, hidden between several hills, was what looked like some kind of ancient ruined building. A temple perhaps, judging from what was left of its architecture. High marble pillars now crumbled with age, festooned with the rubble of arches and high ceilings. Here and there amidst the wreckage was a face, a hand, a part of some statue or bust, looking disturbingly like people trapped under the fallen stone struggling to get free.

Semaki returned to the group after having scouted ahead. She was as silent on the broken rocks as she was on soft earth and grass.

"Hobgoblins," she said in a lowered voice. "I counted ten. They're around what looks like the central foundation. There's some kind of door there, but I couldn't get close enough to see more."

"This is madness," Mark gritted through clenched teeth. "Ten hobgoblins and for what? A dragon?"

Shayuri shook her head. "Not just any dragon. A baby one. A gold one."

"I agree with Mark," Shar said. "I don't mind the chance to cut down some hobgoblins, but this entire situation is nothing more than a distraction."

Mark nodded. "Gold or no, it's still a dragon. We owe it nothing."

"Don't you ever do anything for more than just what you _owe_?" Shayuri shot at Mark angrily, her strange silver eyes slitted. "Somewhere ahead is an innocent creature, a good creature, dying in agony. We can still save her! Isn't that worth it?"

"I have a nation to worry about," Mark returned. "The trials of an infant dragon, who, even if good, would never lift a claw to help a human being don't mean a great deal to me." He looked away from Shayuri towards the milling humanoids. "Certainly not enough to risk my life for."

Shayuri nearly hissed, "So be it. Leave Semaki and me, and go on your way if that's what you want. I mean to do this." And before Mark could return, she stood and began her incantations. As her long-fingered hands looped and described impossible geometries in the air, Semaki calmly nocked an arrow. Spell and shaft were loosed as one, and two of the hobgoblins cried out and fell.

The remaining ones turned to regard the origin of the deaths with glassy, unseeing eyes. As if on an unheard signal, they charged towards the concealed knoll the group crouched behind. No war cries. No jeers or curses. Just the eerily quiet clanking of armor, and the whisper of boots through grass.

"Thralls," Shayuri said, and began another spell.

Three more hobgoblins dropped when Piklum joined the fray with his shortbow. Then the battle became a melee. At the mention of thralls, Mark and Shar added their blades to the group. Sword and scythe reaped a bitter harvest of goblinoid blood, but as the tide turned more dark-armored figures came boiling out of the doorway and charging towards the free-for-all. Shayuri managed to disengage from the melee and began raining white-hot bolts from her fingers, incanting so furiously that smoke wafted from between her lips. Semaki, having dropped her bow in favor of her shortsword, strove to flank with Piklum to allow the halfling chances to find chinks in hobgoblin armor. Meanwhile Shar laid about herself frantically, felling hob after hob like so much wheat.

Finally, the battle was won, though not without cost. Both Mark and Shar bore ragged-edged gouges from the rusty and pitted hobgoblin blades. Semaki had taken a bad stab as well. Even Shayuri had felt the sting when a single hobgoblin had managed to break through and charge her. And yet, for all that, the bodies of twenty hobgoblins littered the earth around the group.

It was with caution and trepidation that the group came to the stone pit that had once been a cellar for some grand building. Against the back wall was a stout door that had quite obviously replaced the original in recent times. As one, all heads turned to the bewitched halfling, who looked cluelessly back at them for a moment before he realized that he was expected to check out the door. A few peculiar springy-looking things emerged from well-concealed pockets as Piklum worked in silence. A metallic click. A twang. The heavy scraping of metal on stone. Everyone shuffled backwards a step.

The door opened, revealing darkness beyond it.

"This is madness," Mark whispered. "What if the mind flayer is still in there?"

Shayuri shook her head and tried to project confidence she didn't feel. "There would have been more thralls, and more powerful. No illithid would rely on a few hobgoblins as a personal guard."

"Maybe it doesn't NEED a personal guard."

For a long moment Shayuri hovered at the sharp slash of light and dark that marked the threshold of the mind flayer lair. Was this worth the risk? Capture again. Slaving for the illithid. There would be no second chance, no convenient resurrection after death. Her mouth went dry just thinking about it. And yet...that was the fate awaiting the dragon's sibling as well. And a thralled dragon would live much longer, and suffer much more than a human could imagine. "I'm going in," she replied. "I have to."

The sorceress vanished into the dark.

Semaki followed without comment, having merely been waiting for Shayuri to get out of the way. Piklum toddled afterwards, his curiosity far outweighing his caution.

Finally Shar and Mark entered as well.

The stonework of the chamber beyond the door was smooth and relatively untouched by the passage of years. The detailed carved relief that adorned each corner was somewhat blunted by lichens, and bore the trace cracks that centuries of successive summers and winters will inflict, but the festive 'leaf and vine' motif common to elven architecture was still plainly visible. It was a small room, square on the side they entered from, with the far end having three walls set like half a hexagon. Each was wide enough for one aged stone door. In the dull orange flicker of the party's makeshift torch, the shadows jumped and leered at them like things alive. Worse even than that was the peculiar odor that permeated the air. Slinking furtively beneath the mustiness of the ages was something else...a pungeance that reminded one faintly of wet cinnamon. The smell of mind flayers.

"All right," Mark growled, trying to look every direction at once with his strangely engraved black sword out, "We're here. Now what?"

Shayuri managed to suppress a nervous swallow and focused on the task at hand. "She'll be through one of these," she said. "Piklum, if you'd check to make sure they're safe, we can..."

She was interrupted by the sound of something rattling, and a low, ominous growl through the center door. And suddenly her uncertainty was gone. "That's her," she declared, and swished to the door in the middle, feeling around its surface for an opening mechanism.

The mechanism turned out to be, "Push really hard," and it took Mark and Shar's help to do it. No sooner had they stumbled in, than there was a reptilian hiss, and the torchlight suddenly exploded into a thousand smaller specks of light that hit the walls and ceiling of the room beyond, as though striking a ball covered with mirrors. Writhing on a large stone table in the center of the room was a dragon somewhat smaller than the juvenile they'd encountered out side...perhaps the size of a very large dog save for the tail and long neck. Strong steel clamps held its legs and tail in place, and another one was situated just behind its head, preventing it from seeing who entered (as well as making sure it's firey breath was pointed the wrong way). Its hide was the color of newly polished gold, the scales so fine that they were all but invisible, making it seem an exquisite sculpture come to life. It struggled more violently as the group entered, and emitted a piercing combination of a wail and a roar.

Shayuri quickly began speaking in the draconic tongue, assuring the dragonet that they weren't slaves of the illithid, and that her brother had sent them to free her. The dragonet didn't respond verbally, but her struggling calmed somewhat, though she kept trying to angle her head to see who was speaking. "Piklum," Shayuri asked, "Can you see to those locks?"

The halfling eagerly sprang forward, eliciting a flinch from the captive, and with a flourish of slimy hands, and some deft turns of curled up wires, unlocked each padlock that kept the clamps shut. "Got it!" He took an exagerrated bow. "Thank you, thank you aaaahh!"

His theatrics were interrupted when the dragonling shook free of her bonds and slid off the table, nearly crashing into him in her haste. Despite her relatively small size, the dragon had an umistakable presence as her stately head turned to weigh each of her saviours in turn. Finally, in the common tongue of Kalonia, she spoke. "Thank you. I scent my brother on you. His escape was successful?"

Shayuri sadly shook her head. "Almost. The thralls, in the end, managed to slay him with poison. We tried to help, but we arrived too late. He told us that you were here though."

The dragon's eyes became chrome slits, and her head bowed. "First my parents, now him," she whispered. "Who could have guessed the illithid would be so strong, so soon..." Before anyone else could say anything, the dragon's head snapped up and she was all business. "My parents accepted a task on the behalf of Dieresis, but I cannot finish it alone. Will you? They believed it was important...important enough to die for."

"What was the task?" Semaki asked, fluidly managing to cut off a similar, but much less polite, reply from Mark.

"There is a device we were transporting to some humans in Caron. Humans that have not yet fallen under illithid control. It must reach them."

Mark's eyes widened. "The Resistance?" he asked, astonished. "What device is it?"

The dragon's head wagged. "I do not know for certain. Only that the elves have safeguarded it for a very long time, and speak of it as if it were a weapon."

"Where is it?" the warrior demanded. "Is it a weapon against the illithid?"

His temerity was met with a glare from the dragonet that could only be described as icy, despite the thin plumes of smoke that puffed from her nostrils. "You will find it in the illithid's study. It's the door to the left of this room's. Hurry though. The illithid will return soon. It said to me that it was only going for help."

Shayuri blinked. "Help with what?"

"With me," the dragon replied with a trace of smugness. "I would not allow it into my mind."

Mark rubbed the bridge of his nose. "All right...you keep watch outside, the rest of us..." he broke off as the dragon edged past him, heading for the exit. "Hey, where do you think you're..."

"I am leaving now," the dragonet responded with a flick of her tail that caught Mark's ankle like a whipcrack. "I am going home." A note of melancholy entered her proud voice then. "To what home remains to me."

Shar spoke up then, "We saved you, dragon. I think we deserve something for that!"

Shayuri winced slightly as the dragon's head arced around to look behind her at the group. Finally the serpent's voice slid out unwillingly, "Yes...I suppose that's true." Her neck lowered to the ground, and her chest convulsed in a sharp jerk, forcing a strangled noise out of the dragon's mouth. Something dark and wet popped out from between the sharp-fanged jaws and slid a few inches over the floor. "Your reward," she said. Then, with a touch of sincerity, "Thank you again. Good fortune." And she slithered up the short flight of stairs and opened the door that led outside. Shayuri and Semaki both followed at a respectful distance, and were treated to the sight of the dragon's wings spreading wide like gold foil in the sunlight, momentarily forcing them to avert their eyes from her brilliance. When they looked again, the dragon was already dwindling into the sky, wringing a sigh from Shayuri.

Semaki gave the sorceress a questioning glance. Shayuri simply shrugged and said, "I wish I could fly like that."

Piklum's cry exploded out then, "An emerald! Look how BIG it is!"

"Give it to me, halfling." Shar.

"Aww, that's okay. I'll just hang onto it for safekeeping. Besides, I'm the one that let the dragon out."

"Piklum!"

"Both of you stop it," Mark said as Shayuri and Semaki returned. Quadim gave them both a wryly amused look as he watched the fracas. Mark indicated the door to the right of the dragon's cell. "Let's find out about this weapon, eh? Piklum...do your, er, thing."

The grey-skinned, slime coated thief caused the emerald to vanish into his pockets and scuttled over to the indicated door. He found it completely clean, but in the interests of maintaining the feeling that his services would be needed, he decided not to make things that easy. "Ooo," he breathed, fingering the crack that demarcated where the door met the wall. "Tricky..."

"What is it?" Shayuri asked, taking a discreet step back.

"Looks like they installed an Osmotic Freefib layer here...you so much as breathe on it wrong, and it sets this thing off..." he ran his finger up, as though following a line only he could see. Then he looked up. "Very nasty indeed."

Everyone else looked up as well. The ceiling looked perfectly normal.

Getting impatient, Mark said, "Can you disarm it or not?"

"Don't push me, Mark," Piklum said seriously, as he howled laughter in his head. "I can't work if I feel rushed. It makes my fingers all quivery. Unless you all want to be doused in a hail of lich-leeches, just let me think for a second."

"Lich-leeches?" Shayuri asked dubiously.

Sensing that the ruse was expiring, Piklum pressed just _so,_ and made a satisfied grunt. "There. That should hold it for awhile. Come on." He pushed the door open, and the others were greatly relieved not to be inundated by undead worms.

On the other side of the door was a short corridor that led to yet another door, this one made of iron-reinforced wood. In the corridor...was what appeared to be a large undead worm. It bellowed and lunged at the flabbergasted Piklum, knocking him backwards and onto his back. "Lich leeeeeeeeech!" he squealed in shock.

The thing was as big around as a full grown man, though considerably shorter and stubbier, with the same approximate build as a maggot, but on a far larger scale. It's flesh was pale and mottled, shot through with pulsing violet veins and little nodules that resembled nothing so much as pustules ready to pop. What passed for its head was a horrific tangle of tentacles surrounding a cruelly hooked beak that clacked open and shut. It lurched its front end out of the door after Piklum, only to be greeted by Mark and Shar. It spread its four tentacles wide and roared at them. Shar swept her scythe, but the worm's flesh was extremely tough, and the blow didn't cut through to the softer parts beneath. Its tentacles writhed forward and entangled Mark's midsection, yanking him forward towards the drooling beak. He screamed as he felt it bore through his armor and into his flesh and out of pain and desperation raised his sword above his head and drove it point down into it, cutting through its hide and innards alike. The creature shuddered and lurched, and Mark found himself thrown aside, with a deep gouge in his midsection. It reared around, seeking more prey, but no sooner did it begin waddling further out than one of Semaki's arrows lodged just over its beak. Finally, Shayuri finished her spell and sent a pair of energy bolts searing into its body, wringing still more howls from it.

Somewhere in the confusion, Piklum got up and joined Semaki in plugging it with arrowshafts. Shar changed her technique, chopping with the pointed tip of the scythe instead of the more shallow swings. When the hideous thing managed to rope Shar in as well, Mark hacked through a tentacle to make it release her. Finally it's bellows changed to a weak keening, and it began trying to back up into the corridor. Not fast enough though. More weapons lashed out, and the worm, or whatever it was, emitted a thick gurgling noise and collapsed, leaking a thick ichor onto the floor from its many wounds.

"What in the name of the GODS was that?" Mark gasped as he sheathed his sword and started tending to the gaping wound in his side.

Shayuri glanced at Piklum, who was gingerly testing his bruised backside. "You called it a lich...leech?" she ventured.

"What, that?" The gooey halfling glanced at the monster on the floor. "Nah. I was wrong," he said cheerfully. "Lich-leeches are dozens of times worse than that. I dunno what THAT was."

"Why don't you make yourself useful and check the other door while I see what I can do about these wounds," Shar suggested acidly. Piklum, catching the edge in her voice, decided, in a fit of rare wisdom, that this wouldn't be an opportune moment to indulge in a bit of fun-spirited banter.

This time there really WAS a trap, if not a very sophisticated one. Ironically, none of the others ever realized it, since when confronted with an actual trap Piklum tended to just shut up and fix it, rather than call attention to it. He knew too many people who'd died from trying it the other way round. Finally the door swung open, and Piklum stepped inside...carefully. The others followed.

The room was devoid of obvious danger though. The slightly spicy smell of illithid was strong, almost cloying, and splotches of slime were all over the floor and on the furniture. The room itself was done in simple, tasteful style, with the desk and drawers set right into the stone walls. Like the rest of what they'd seen so far, the stone was unbroken, with no sign of bricks or mortaring. Possibly shaped by magic, or simply excavated into its present shape. On the desk were several rolls of parchment, written in the language of the mind flayers; a seemingly random series of squiggles without any obvious pattern to their usage.

There were no weapons immediately apparent.

With a disgusted grunt, Mark went to the drawers and began emptying them, muttering about treacherous dragons and damnable illithid. Piklum hurried behind him, hoping to glimpse valuables. Shayuri stayed near the entrance and watched the scene bemusedly.

"We can't take too long with this," Semaki said as she inspected the slime puddles. "These are not old marks." Quadim assumed a disquieted expression and slipped out into the corridor to watch.

Meanwhile, Shar had drifted in, but wasn't really looking for anything. Just looking around. On the floor near the desk something caught her eye. The illithid's study was clearly laid out in excrutiating organization and orderliness, with the parchments here, the quills there, and so on. Shar's link with the essence of entropy and randomness quailed at the sight of it...and her eyes were drawn to the one thing that was out of place. A small pebble sitting on the ground. How peculiar.

To her untrained eyes, it looked almost like an ioun stone might, albeit one that was long exhausted. A burned out, grey color. But it wasn't like one of the highly structured mind flayers to simply let it sit on the floor like that. Her fingers closed around it... It got warm.

A little uneasy, Shar turned to Shayuri, seeking a 'professional' viewpoint. "Shayuri," she said, "What do you make of th..."

The stone suddenly jerked in her hand, hard. Before Shar got over her surprise, it jerked again, this time with enough force to squeeze out of her fist altogether and assume an orbit around her head. A rich, throaty voice blasted out of the tiny rock.

"It's about TIME someone came for me! I was starting to think the squidheads were going to hang onto me forever!"

Shar's head kept going from side to side as she tried to keep the thing in view. Everyone else in the room turned to stare.

"What is that?" Shayuri asked, leaning closer. "Some kind of ioun stone?"

The stone emitted a raucous laugh. "Me? IOUN stone? Oh, sister, if I thought you were serious and not just _woefully_ ignorant, there'd be some serious problems here. I'm XAG. Got it?"

Semaki asked, "Are you what the dragons were taking to Caron?"

"That's me!"

Mark looked stricken. "You're...a weapon?"

"Not just A weapon, monkey-boy," the rock, Xag, said gleefully. "THE weapon! Weapon Number One! And let me tell you I cannot WAIT to start scragging me some squidhead ass. In fact...hey, where's that one that was in here before?"

"Speaking of that one," Shayuri said, "Why didn't you just kill it?"

"Oh ho...smart mouth on you, lizard-lips. It's BECAUSE I need a host to do anything. And now, I have one. See?" It waggled in its orbit around Shar.

Shar made a grab for it. "I am not host to you or anything!" she bellowed. "Leave me at once!"

Xag laughed crazily and effortlessly dodged the priestesses flailing hands. "Say please and I'll think about it!" it teased.

"NEVER! GO AWAY AT ONCE!" Shar began swinging the haft of her scythe at the circling stone.

"Strike one!" Xag cried happily as the wooden haft whistled past. "Strike two! Ooo, that was a close one. Strike thr....eeeeeeee!" There was a sharp crack, and the stone sailed away from Shar's head and plunged into a stack of papers on the mind flayer's desk.

Shar grinned ferally. "Maybe next time, you'll listen," she began...but stopped as the papers rustled. A giggle drifted out from between them, followed closely by Xag itself, who came hurtling out and resumed its orbit.

"Nice try, tutz, but now it's just you and me. Hey, I could sing a song about that." It began to sing in a terrible caterwaul, "_It's just yoooouuuu and meeeeee..._"

By this time everyone but Mark and Shar were laughing helplessly.

Inflamed by the ridicule and the mocking, Shar snatched at the stone with the speed of a striking snake, and managed to catch it! Almost as fast, she clapped her hand down on the stone desk and laughed triumphantly. "Got you!" she cried. "And if you want out, you'll do exactly as I say."

The stone began to get warm.

"First, you will stop circling my head!"

Very warm, in fact.

"Then, you will stop speaking to me, or about me! I want nothing to do with you!"

Rather..._uncomfortably_ warm.

"And finally...OW!"

There was a sizzling noise, and Xag burst straight up THROUGH Shar's hand, leaving a cauterized little hole in it, and resumed his orbit around her head. "Alright, alright," it said amiably. "Fun's fun, but down to business. I'm with you, because right now you're who needs me most, even if you don't know it. Plus, you hate the squids more than anyone else in this room right now. I can relate to that. You're my kind of chick."

"But MARK'S the one who's in that Resistance!" Shar complained, almost whining now. "That's where we're taking you!"

"Eh? Well, he's a nice kid, but he's fine for now. Later...well, we'll see. But for now? _It's just yoooouuuu and meeeeee..._"

"All right, all RIGHT! Just swear you'll never sing again!"

Xag actually stopped in midair, and managed to look very dismayed for what was basically a small, featureless stone. "Ever?"

Shar sighed. "At least not until we deliver you to the Resistance. After that, you're someone else's problem."

"Deal!" Xag agreed happily, and resumed his motion.

Semaki managed to keep her smirk to manageable levels as she said, "If that's all finished, I suggest we leave now, before it's too late." She glanced at Shayuri, who was desperately covering her mouth to keep the laughter in. Piklum was still chortling, having made no such effort in the name of politeness. Mark was just looking sullen. He nodded.

"Yes. The sooner we're out of here, the better."

The group turned and made their way back to the entry chamber, but before they could leave, Quadim stopped them. "Shh," he said softly, and angled his head towards the last door.

Barely audible through the thick stone was a thin voice.

"help me....someone help me!"

--------------------------
To Be Continued!


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## Mana (Aug 29, 2002)

I really like this storyhour. Keep it up! MORE! MORE MORE MORE MORE!

-Mana


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## Son_of_Thunder (Sep 8, 2002)

*Awesome!!!*

Keep it up guys. Great Story Hour.

Son of Thunder


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## Shayuri (Sep 11, 2002)

*A question for y'all*

Sorry for the length of time between posts. My enthusiasm has been waning, as has the readership of this Story Hour by the look of it. Judging by the number of new reads each time this thread hits the front page, we have around 30-40 people who pay attention to this story hour, of which I'd estimate maybe a third are probably people who click on it out of curiosity...

Maybe I'm being unrealistic, but I feel like I'm doing something wrong here. 

So! I have an idea and I wanted to run it by the folks who read this to see if it's a good one.

My idea is that I do shorter installments, more often...rather than a week or two apart as per now. I'm estimating the length of each installment would be around half of what they tend to be right now...varying so that it finds a good "cut point" in the narrative, of course.

If nothing else, this'd keep the hour on the front page more, and it would be easier to write and so I'd tend to procrastinate less. 

Is it the concensus of those on this board that this course of action would help expand this tale's appeal and readership? Or are there any other comments/suggestions anyone would like to make? I haven't tried this kind of serial story posting before, so I fully admit there's aspects to it that I'm unaware of.

Any kind of feedback would be welcome. I should have the next update ready tomorrow.

Thanks.


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## Capellan (Sep 11, 2002)

*Re: A question for y'all*



			
				Shayuri said:
			
		

> *My idea is that I do shorter installments, more often...rather than a week or two apart as per now. I'm estimating the length of each installment would be around half of what they tend to be right now...varying so that it finds a good "cut point" in the narrative, of course.
> 
> Is it the concensus of those on this board that this course of action would help expand this tale's appeal and readership?*




I don't know whether it would lead to more readers or not, but I do personally prefer more frequent, shorter updates than less frequent, longer ones.

At the very least, it's got to be worth giving a try!


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## Imhotepthewise (Sep 11, 2002)

More...brain...eaters....NOW!


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## Horacio (Sep 13, 2002)

I had completly missed this story! What a shame...

Story Hour addict #1 ready for next update!


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## Phasmus (Oct 6, 2002)

*Bump*

The Vitis Storyhour is presently suffering from minor logistical difficulties.

We will return to our regularly scheduled doom shortly.

We apologize for any inconvenience.


Regards,

Phasmus & Co.

"Anything worth doing is worth doing ominously."


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## Nyarlathotep (Oct 21, 2002)

just a bump cause this rules.


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## Phasmus (Oct 26, 2002)

The voice cut off when the oval of stone that comprised the door began scraping noisily open. Immediately there was a puff of air from within, full of the stink of decay and excretion. The chamber was almost completely dark, save for what light streamed in through the now-open doorway. It was roughly cylindrical, with a low, claustrophobic ceiling. What use the original builders had used it for was uncertain. Storage, perhaps. Unfortunately, the use it was now being put to was all too clear.

At regular intervals around the circular wall were shackles for wrists and ankles. Each set held a person...or what had been a person. Most were in various states of decay. One, the smallest of them, moved weakly and winced at the sudden relative brilliance. "Help," it croaked weakly again. Semaki darted in, Mark hot on her heels. Quadim and Shayuri were next, the sorceress momentarily preoccupied by the unabashed squalor and filth of the room. Chains clinked, and Semaki called, "Piklum!"

Moments later, they were outside, with Mark carrying the ex-prisoner. He was a boy, a human child of perhaps sixteen. It was hard to tell specifics of his appearance. Grime caked his skin, and he wasn't much more than that and bones. But the most disturbing thing about him was his head. He'd been shaved bald, and a regular series of  linear scars crisscrossed his exposed scalp, forming a grid that conformed to the shape of his skull. On seeing that, Quadim jerked slightly and put a hand to his own thin hair...similar scars barely visible beneath. The boy flinched and cried out when the sun brushed his face, but quieted when Mark carried him into shade. "Shar," he said, "Can you help him?"

The cleric peered down at the boy and slowly shook her head. "He needs food. And time."

Shayuri kneeled down near the boy and asked gently, "What's your name?"

"Leave him be, Shayuri," Mark sighed. "He's far too..."

The boy's face scrinched in a peculiarly confused expression. "My name...I don't...I think it's Mana?"

"We need to keep moving," Semaki said, though not without a trickle of sympathy. "The illithid could be back any time."

Mana flinched at that, and weakly began trying to get to his feet. "I think I'm all right," he muttered. "I need my friends...where are they?"

"We're your friends," Shayuri assured him warmly, "But Semaki's right. It's too dangerous here."

"No!" Mana replied, then cupped his hands around his mouth and released a long ululating cry. Mark stiffened and his hand dropped to his sword hilt. He looked at Shayuri and mouthed, 'thrall.' Shayuri shook her head, but uncertainly.

Out of a copse of trees nearby sprang a pair of full grown wolves, one grey, one slightly tawny. Mana burst into tearful laughter on seeing them and stumbled forward, arms wide. The wolves bounded into his embrace before the astonished party could do more than get to their feet. 

Feeling the invisible, yet almost tangible pressure of the illithid's return, the group hastily moved onward. They turned southward though and depended on Mark's guidence. The objective, for now at least, had changed. Semaki and Shayuri committed to completing the interrupted quest of the dragons, Shar equally committed to ridding herself of the circling Xag, and Mark with his mysterious message for the Caronian Underground.

Mana was the enigma. His amnesia was nearly total, save only his name. Yet, for a moment another voice came from his mouth...deeper, powerful, resonant. In that voice he announced himself as the Grand Druid of Te'kleos, but even then seemed confused. In the end he avoided conversation, keeping with his two wolf "friends."
Once away from the mind flayer lair, things relaxed somewhat. The open expanses of Caron seemed endless, and there was no sign of hostile presence. The ragtag band made camp under an enormous tree that stood by itself in the middle of that plain...Mark called it 'The Encampment,' and referred to it as a landmark on the way to the Resistance. After setting up camp Mark dropped a goldpiece into a large hollow in the trunk of the tree. There was a distinct metallic 'clink' as it landed. 
"For good luck." Mark explained sheepishly to the questioning stares he received from the other party members.
"Sounds like that old tree might have a bit more 'good luck' than it can hold." Piklum said with a grin as he stood on his tiptoes to look into the treasure-filled hollow.
Mark shook his head seriously at Piklum, who took the hint and stepped away from the tree grumbling.
Mana dismissed the wolves tearfully, saying that it was too dangerous for them to remain with him. He spoke more candidly then of his memories among the illithid, though they were still too spotty to make much of. However he recalled one thing clearly. Being bound and immobile as an unusual illithid hovered over him, doing something to him. From the description, Shayuri and Shar alike gasped.

It could only be an Ulitharid.

The sorceress recounted what she knew of them, which was regrettably little. The ulitharid were distinguished by their six facial tentacles (as opposed to four on common illithid) and their larger size and greater power. They were the elites; the leaders and tyrants of the mind flayers, the so-called "noble" illithid. Subject only to the will of the Elder Brain....and if they were operating independently of a colony, not even that.

The idea of one of them having personally 'worked' on Mana was troubling. To say the least.

Semaki and Shayuri split off for a bit, talking amongst themselves. Quadim was close, as always, but seemed distracted by Mana's news. His hand raised slowly to trace one of the scars on his head, his dark eyes were distant and disturbed.

Finally the fire guttered low, and sleep came to most...if not all.

The next day went swiftly, and evening brought the group to a stripe of green and trees that wound verdant through the vast, dry, tree-speckled plains. A river sawed it's way through here, and in the distance another forest bloomed from it. Mark nodded on seeing it and said merely, "We're close now."

They followed the river. Mana in particular seemed to delight in the green, in the abundant life that the water carried with it. It was just after the mid-day meal that Shayuri noticed Piklum was oddly silent. When she turned to look at him, the slimy halfling was seated near the water, looking down into it and rubbing his forehead.

"Are you all right?" Shayuri asked, walking up behind him.

"Wha?" Piklum started and looked up. Shayuri's eyes widened.

Two large bumps were growing from his forehead, one over each eye. They looked soft...fleshy, nothing at all like horns. Even more disturbing was his eyes. They were beginning to...protroude, for lack of a better word. Each one bulged obscenely from the socket.

Piklum smiled, though it was forced. "I hope these guys in Mark's Resistance can help with this," he commented, "Or I may have to give up on wenching for a bit."

Shayuri opened her mouth, shocked at the continuing disfigurement, but before she could say anything, Mark's voice rang clear. "Here!"

They gathered around Mark at an embankment near a waterfall, where the river fell a good thirty feet into a broad pool before continuing on its way. He waved a hand at the cascade, beaming. "We've arrived! This is the Enclave."

As if on cue, a mental force encompassed them.

_Please do not resist._

It probed...it pried. It measured and judged. The voice came again.

_Mark, Semaki, Shar, Shayuri, and Piklum may enter. The ones known as Quadim and Mana must remain._

"Ludicrous," Semaki said. Then louder, "Unacceptable!"

Shayuri frowned. "We vouch for them both," she said. "If you trust us, you can trust them!"

_Your devotion is commendable, but perhaps misguided. We shall see. Those who remain shall be tested more extensively. Not necessarily denied entry. _

Semaki's face hardened. "Then test us, faceless one. I do not fear truth."

Banishing a shred of worry, the sorceress nodded. "I will stand with them as well."

_As you wish._

Mark led Shar and Piklum through the pool to the falls. Mark and Shar passed through. Piklum glanced back, seemed to weigh his options, then shrugged and waved. "Good luck guys! Seeya inside." Then he too was gone.

Shayuri looked worriedly at Semaki. "What do you think this...test will be?"

"I do not care," Semaki said stolidly. "It is..."

She broke off as the water in the pool bubbled, roiled...and reared up! Four shapes emerged from the water, forged FROM the water. Roughly humanoid in form. Shayuri had time to gasp, "Elementals!" Then they moved with speed and precision.

Each of the elementals grabbed one of the four testees by the neck, hard enough to block speech, and with inhuman strength hauled them forward, into the pool...through the waterfall.

The Testing began.

--------------------------
Next Time! Zoyster and the Resistance, and a dangerous diversion to save them! Also - The Mystery of Quadim revealed?? To Be Continued!


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## MavrickWeirdo (Oct 27, 2002)

*The Testing Began* 

Very Exciting. 

So, how much is cool writing by the DM, and how much is cool player ideas? 

for example:


> * thief caused the emerald to vanish into his pockets and scuttled over to the indicated door. He found it completely clean, but in the interests of maintaining the feeling that his services would be needed, he decided not to make things that easy. "Ooo," he breathed, fingering the crack that demarcated where the door met the wall. "Tricky..."
> 
> This time there really WAS a trap, if not a very sophisticated one. Ironically, none of the others ever realized it, since when confronted with an actual trap Piklum tended to just shut up and fix it, rather than call attention to it. He knew too many people who'd died from trying it the other way round. *





This was priceless


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## Phasmus (Oct 27, 2002)

Note, firstly, our story hour represents a somewhat unique (as far as I am aware) situation...
Specifically, it is written not by me, the DM, but by Shayuri's player.  I just edit, approve and post.  (I love delegating authority!)

The present events of the story hour took place many sessions ago so there is a bit of room for archivist-license, and occasionally a couple things might be enhanced or otherwise adjusted depending on their relevance to the overall story.  That having been said, Shayuri does a top-shelf job in recreating both the events and the feel of the game.

So, in answer to your question, most of this story hour is either cool writing by the players, or cool player ideas.  I just provide the environment (i.e. the unrelenting advance of all-consuming DOOM) to motivate them.   


Regards,

Phasmus & Co.

"Vitis is brought to you in part by Brains: Breakfast of Champions."


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## Phasmus (Nov 6, 2002)

It was dark. Cold. Also, wet.

Their heads swam and ached. Vague, half-felt memories swirled like a spiral of cream in a stirred cup of coffee.

Semaki groaned and sat up slowly. The dark was absolute, even to her eyes. Her skull felt...bloated somehow. As though her brain had been inflated. "Quadim?" she probed into the black. "Are you there?"

Another female groan. Shayuri's voice crawled out of the gloom. "Ooog...my head..."

Elfin hands slapped bare stone as Semaki patted around her. "Where is he? Quadim?"

_I do apologize for the necessarily rough treatment, but there are reasons; which will be explained shortly. Until then, welcome to our enclave._

A rectangle of light appeared, and swiftly expanded upward with the grating of stone on stone. Shayuri and Semaki stumbled out of the testing chamber, wincing and squinting in the sudden illumination.

Sitting at their ease in the warm, comfortable room they entered were Mark, Shar and Piklum who looked up at them quizzically.

"How'd it go?" piped Piklum as he scooped the coins he'd been counting back into his pouch.

"I feel like someone actually put their hand into my brain and wiggled it all around," Shayuri complained with a hand on her temple. "It was like being back with the illithid."

Mark shrugged. "It was your own fault, you know," he said. "You could have just come in."

"Quadim and Mana are just as much part of our group as you are," Shayuri shot angrily back. "If he distrusts any of us, he distrusts us all!"

"Where are they?" Semaki suddenly interjected. "Quadim...and the boy. Where are they?"

"Perhaps they're on their way?" Shar suggested. "It took you two over an hour after all."

As Semaki and Shayuri digested that tidbit, the stone door ground open again, admitting the adolescent druid, Mana, into the room. He looked around blearily and coughed.

The elf stepped nearer and demanded, "Where is Quadim? Was he with you? Where was he taken?"

Mana stepped back, alarmed. He raised his hands defensively. "I don't know! I was alone, I think...but it was dark. I couldn't see! And there was...something..." he winced and touched his scalp. "...something in my head. Asking things. I didn't like it."

Now furious, Semaki whirled and looked up at the ceiling. "Where are you, mage?! Where have you taken him! What is the meaning of this?!"

_Excellent questions, Semaki. And ones I will explain at once. Please come this way._

Another slab of stone, a different one this time, slid up to reveal a smallish but well-lit passageway. Standing just inside was the burbling amorphous shape of a water elemental. Shayuri immediately stepped back, a hand going to her throat. Semaki narrowed her eyes.

_It will not harm you unless provoked,_ reassured the voice. _Follow it, please. I look forward to meeting you all in person._

"Is Quadim with you?" demanded Semaki.

_He is._

Shar rolled her eyes and stepped into the passageway, following the water elemental as it trundled away, leaving a trail of wetted stone behind it. 

Mark gave Semaki a severe look, "Try to be respectful," he said. "You're about to meet a leader of the Caronian Resistance; a great man. He's saved more lives than I can count."

"Five?" Shayuri asked in a scathing tone.

Piklum burst into laughter and scuttled after Shar into the hall. Mark's eyes threw daggers at Shayuri, but he decided not to dignify it with a response, and proceeded as well. The three who were Tested followed brought up the rear.

After following the oddly winding passage for a few minutes, they were brought to another door. The elemental stood aside and gestured with a glassy pseudopod for the others to enter. No sooner than they had then Semaki cried "Quadim!" and rushed ahead.

The room beyond was largish, apparently a natural cavern that had been "dressed." The floor was smooth, but uncut; the same stone as formed the rough walls and ceiling. At the far end of it was a stone table large enough to hold a person lying down, an older man of perhaps fifty winters with a rather impressive-looking staff and red robes, and a low cut open doorway with a hallway partly visible behind it. Lying on the table, unconscious, was Quadim.

The old man didn't flinch at Semaki's maddened rush, and halfway through the room the reason became apparent. Semaki struck an invisible _something_ and rebounded, falling backwards onto the ground. Shayuri rushed to help her up, but Semaki shrugged assistance aside, darting to her feet with elven grace.

"What is this?!" Semaki raged. "Release him at once!"

The old man bowed slightly, not directly reacting to Semaki's words. "Good afternoon," he said in a deep, rich voice. "I am Zoyster. As Mark has informed you, I lead this cell of the Resistance."

"DO YOU HEAR ME!"

Face tight with anger, Shayuri stepped forward, careful not to hit the invisible wall. "I think we deserve an explanation, Zoyster," she said coldly. "This isn't exactly the welcome we were promised."

Zoyster's eyes flicked between Semaki, Shayuri and Mana for a moment, then he nodded. "Yes. Quite. Routine mental probes are usually enough to ferret out thrall infiltrators. The more..extensive...tests you were subject to are in reaction to a recent development by the mind flayers. You both have my apologies, though you chose to be examined of your own will." He walked behind the table and raised a forestalling hand. "I realize that my words will not suffice though. That is why I brought you here to see this." He began to chant hollowly in High Arcane as his hands described looping figures in the air.

And Quadim began...to melt.

Semaki rushed at the wall again and pounded futilely against it, screaming "NOOOOOO!!"

The others watched in horrified fascination as Quadim's flesh ran like wax...then began resculpting itself, knitting into an entirely different form.

Pallid grey flesh. Long arms, with long fingers. Blank white eyes that dominated an otherwise almost featureless face. 

A doppelganger. Only the gridwork of scars on its skull linked this creature with the monk that it had been.

"A trick!" Semaki bellowed, tears flowing freely. "A lie!"

Mark rounded on Semaki furiously. "An illithid spy! I _knew_ there was something wrong with him! If it hadn't been for you, I'd have left him behind long ago!"

Shar shook her head slowly. "We were fools to have trusted him." Her dark eyes raised to meet Semaki's with mute accusation.

"All of you be quiet!" Shayuri demanded. "It's not Semaki's fault! She had no one else!"

Everyone fell quiet though as Semaki suddenly roared defiantly and ripped her sword from its sheath. "Drop this wall, mage!" she howled. "Drop it and face me! If you harm him, I swear on the blood of my ancestors that I will hunt you and yours until the world BURNS! FACE ME!"

As if in response, the invisible wall suddenly became very visible indeed...and quite opaque. A featureless onyx field, utterly smooth, and impervious to any force Semaki could muster.

"Semaki, are you MAD?" Mark yelped. He lunged for her, trying to restrain her. "He decieved you! That's no reason to get angry at Zoyster. Imagine how much worse it would have been if we hadn't found out in time!"

"Stay back, human," Semaki snarled, leveling the blade at him. "Confederate of this evil. I'll have no qualms about starting with you, if you interfere."

Shayuri quickly ducked in, pulling Mark back. "How dare you?" The question was aimed at Mark and Shar. "Both of you! Quadim and Semaki have been our companions for weeks, and this is how you repay them?"

"The truth is plain, _sorceress_," Mark returned with contempt. "Open your eyes and SEE!"

"I've SEEN a wizard turn a man into a doppelganger," she retorted. "That, in itself, means nothing."

"Not a man!"

Shayuri folded her arms. "We have only his word to accept for that. And at the moment, I'm more inclined to trust my own intuitions about Quadim than this...Zoyster."

Mark bridled. "This Zoyster is one of the last court mages of Caron! He's wiser and smarter than any THREE of you!"

"Oh?" Shayuri asked archly. "I have yet to see any evidence of that. We come to him as friends, and he rewards our amity by raping our minds and subjecting Semaki to this...display."

"Are you a _complete_ fool?" Mark demanded of Shayuri. "He said it himself! This was to protect us from illithid infiltration!"

The sorceresses silver eyes flashed angrily. "A convenient excuse but it doesn't hold, Mark! You didn't see what happened after you went in. We were brutalized by elementals, our minds all but...DISSECTED with magic, and now this? How can any Resistance movement hope to endure when it seems hells-bent on making bitter enemies out of potential friends?"

"Friends that are dominated by the illithid are friends we don't need," Mark growled.

"Anyone with some power and ambition can turn a time of justified fear, into a time of tyranny," Shayuri replied sadly.

Before Mark could reply, the wall winked out. Semaki, having collapsed against it, sobbing, leapt to her feet...but Zoyster was nowhere in evidence. The table was also bare.

_It seems that I...erred in my judgment.  Quadim is not a threat to this enclave.  You all have my apologies._

"Where is he, wizard?" Semaki shouted. "Show yourself!"

_Quadim is through the doorway, in the last room on the right. You're welcome to see him, if you like._

"Don't do it, Semaki," Mark warned. "He may be dangerous."

Semaki's bloodshot eyes regarded Mark for a moment, but any response she might have been brewing was interrupted by Shayuri.

"I'll go with you."

Semaki hesitated, then nodded, and the two went through the arched doorway into the darker passage beyond.

The hall was lined with doors, but all were closed and barred except for the one at the far end, on the right. It stood open, letting an oval of light out into the corridor.

When they reached it, Semaki said in a dry whisper, "I...would like to see him alone."

Shayuri nodded. "I understand. I'll be just outside here."

"Thank you."

Semaki entered Quadim's cell alone.

--------------------------
Next Time! Illithid scouts threaten the Resistance! Can our heroes help? WILL they help? And what dark secrets lurk within the woods nearby... To Be Continued!


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## Nyarlathotep (Nov 8, 2002)

Awesome and very entertaining as always .

So when do we learn more about the indominatable XAG... (BTW consider this idea *yoinked*... An intelligent Ioun Stone? Brilliant!)


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## Phasmus (Dec 5, 2002)

The holding cell was made of the same hewn stone as the rest of Zoyster's underground hideout. Smooth, probably shaped by magic, and grey and featureless. In the center of the cubical room was a metal table. Secured to the table by 'his' wrists and ankles...was Quadim. Not the quiet monk they had come to know though. Instead he sported the alien features of a doppelganger.

Semaki paused just inside the doorway, her mind and heart raging against one another. She knew what doppelgangers were; what they did. Spies. Saboteurs. Seducers. And often...too often...agents of the mind flayers. Could it have been an act? Could it... _No!_ Resolutely, she took a step forward.

Quadim jerked and awoke...grey eyelids uncovering featureless white orbs. He squirmed on the table, not as if trying to escape his bonds, but rather shrink away from the woman who was approaching. "Semaki, no," he protested weakly. "Please...don't look at me..."

The elf narrowed her eyes and nodded. All question and doubt vanished, and she went to Quadim's side.

"This isn't me, Semaki!" Quadim pleaded. "I didn't...I don't know what happened!" His voice cracked as he spoke...had he human eyes, his tone suggested strongly that they'd be shedding tears. Then he added, in a dry whisper. "I don't know if I can go on like this. Maybe the wizard was right..."

Semaki's face hardened a bit at the mention of the whisper, but she still said nothing. Her right hand dropped to her side though, and with the whisper of steel on leather, drew her sword. A classic 'archer' sword, only three feet of blade, but done in the tasteful, elegant style that typified any elf handiwork. Its blade gleamed in the magic light that shone from the rock above them, making a silver-blue slash that hovered in the air between elf and monster. "Tell me," Semaki said in a heavy voice that was devoid of any hint of elven melody. "Tell me what you want."

"Release me," Quadim replied in a quiet voice that, despite the inhuman rasp, sounded very much like the Quadim she had known. "If I am to die, I would die free."

Semaki only barely hesitated, putting her sword down on the table and going to each limb in turn, freeing him from the shackles.

Before she could reach it again, Quadim's smooth grey hand curled around the hilt of Semaki's sword and lifted it. It glinted dangerously. Semaki paused where she stood but made no effort to step away.

"All my life I have sought order in my life and self," Quadim said in a hollow monotone as he gazed upon the sword's blade. "Perfection in body and mind...through discipline." His shoulders quivered. "And now...I see that all I thought was a lie...a deception. I don't know who I am anymore. I don't even know _what_ I am. How can I live like this?" He turned his pale white eyes to Semaki. The hand with the sword moved towards her...reversing its grip and extending the hilt. "Take it," Quadim urged. "Take it and..." he broke off and looked away.

Semaki's icy white fingers, marred only by the dancing blue sigils of her tattoos, closed around the hilt and gently eased the sword out of his hand. "Tell me," she said again, though her composure was thinner now, her eyes moistening as she became surer of what his answer would be...what it _must_ be. "What do you want me to do?"

Still looking at the door, Quadim asked in a toneless voice, "Would you  kill me if I asked?"

The elf nodded slowly. "If you asked," she answered, almost too softly to hear. Her voice mourned not one passing, but two, though how exactly she conveyed that was hard to say.

Quadim did not ask what Semaki would do after she struck him down, and she didn't volunteer that information. Even so, the knowledge of it resonated between them.

There was a long period of silence.

Then, with a peculiarly...wet...sound, Quadim's skin began to change. It lightened, roughened a bit. His head became rounder, grew thin hair that didn't quite hide the marks on his skull. After a few seconds, Quadim sat on the table before Semaki as he had been when they first knew each other. His dark eyes could shed tears now, and were shiny with them. "It won't be easy," he said softly, his voice rich and warm and human, "but given the choice between you and anything else...I must choose you."

A sword hit the hard stone floor and clanged resoundingly. It was the only sound for several minutes in that cell, save for an elf's weeping, muffled by a monk's tunic.

When they emerged from the cell, Semaki was helping support Quadim, who was still a bit stiff from his confinement. Shayuri raised a questioning eyebrow, but decided to leave well enough alone. Both Semaki and Quadim looked...content. That was enough.

They were met in the larger room by Shar, Mana, Mark and Piklum...and Zoyster, who was talking to them. They all turned around. Mark's hand dropped to his sword hilt on seeing Quadim and Shar's eyes narrowed warily. Mana smiled shyly and backed up to lean against the wall. Piklum, the irrepressible, waved jovially and called, "Hey, welcome back! Can you turn into anyone now? Turn into me!"

Semaki glared daggers at Piklum, and Quadim shook his head. "This is who I am," he said in a tone that brooked no argument. "I will be no one else." Semaki squeezed his hand gratefully.

Mark opened his mouth angrily, but was smoothly cut off by Zoyster. "I owe all of you my deepest apologies, and to Semaki and Quadim in particular. An explanation is the least I can do to try to make amends."

"Save your apologies, wizard," Semaki spat, anger again rising to the fore. "We've heard enough and want nothing more to do with you."

"Actually," Mark noted with a trace of smugness, "we've agreed to help..."

"*I* have agreed to no such thing!"

"Please...please," Zoyster again broke in. "The time is late, and there's much to hear."

Quadim tilted his head towards Semaki and whispered something to her. Semaki stiffened, but finally nodded, looking sulky.

Zoyster gestured. "Follow me, please." As he led them through the winding corridors he spoke. "As you're all surely aware, we live in constant danger from infiltration by illithid spies and thralls. However," he said quickly, raising a finger to forestall an angry comment from Shayuri, "as your sorceress is well aware, there are methods of detecting and dealing with illithid domination that do not require what some of you were subject to." Zoyster paused and gestured with his staff, causing a pair of large double doors at the end of the hallway to open before them. The room beyond was larger, with shelves of books spaced around the walls, and several tables and desks scattered across it. "Unfortunately," he went on, "it seems the illithid are well aware of this also...and have arranged to make life more difficult for us."

Shayuri's expression changed from one of sullen annoyance to one of surprise, even eagerness, as she saw the rows and rows of books. As Zoyster strode to a shelf on the far side and began digging around, the sorceress drifted to a nearby shelf and scanned titles. Mark remained respectfully silent, his posture rigid...almost standing at attention. Shar had turned to one side and was muttering something to Xag, who giggled and waggled in his orbit around her head. Mana put a hand to his head and said in a voice that echoes in the rocky chamber amplified, "It's these...lines on our heads, isn't it?"

Zoyster grunted and nodded, turning back around with a large roll of parchment in his hand. "I'm afraid so, my boy. See here, all of you."

He spread the parchment out over a desk. On it were drawings and diagrams of human heads...each with a webwork lattice of scars over them.

"What are they?" Shayuri asked, setting a book she'd picked out down and touching a fingertip to a drawing.

"We don't know," Zoyster admitted heavily. "We've learned, through hard mistakes, that ordinary methods of detection don't work. We speculate that the scars are side effects of a new method of domination that doesn't require any kind of mystical power. As such, it cannot be easily detected without an unfortunately thorough search of the subject's mind...and cannot be suppressed, dispelled, or otherwise interrupted by any means we've found so far."

This information was digested in silence by the various people in the room. Shayuri, on sudden impulse, asked, "Xag? Have you heard of this tactic before?"

The whirling grey rock immediately piped up, "Nope! It's news to me. You have to _watch_ the squids though! They're crafty. Like, uh, things that are...crafty."

Shar sighed. "Which reminds me...I think it's time to hand over Xag."

Zoyster raised a bushy white eyebrow. "Hand over?"

Mark stepped forward and eagerly broke in. "Yes. You see, we were sent here to bring Xag to the Resistance. He...it's an item of great power, made to fight the illithid."

"I see. May I?" Zoyster held out a hand.

Shar snatched at Xag, who swerved crazily out of the way. "Hey!" he cried, "Relax! I can do it!" The stone zipped away from Shar's head and performed a single orbit around Zoyster before returning to Shar.

Zoyster's eyes widened, and he placed a hand to his temple. His breath caught.

"What is it?" Mark asked. "What happened?"

"It seems Xag will be remaining with you for the time being," Zoyster finally said as he recovered his composure. "I myself have some...thinking to do. You are all free to go, of course. But I must ask something of you."

Semaki scowled. "You dare ask us a favor after what you did?"

Zoyster merely nodded. "I realize you may not be inclined to help, but do hear me out. We've recieved word that a party of scouts is approaching and will reach this spot within two days. They are thralls." He let that sink in, then continued. "We cannot kill them. Their deaths would attract even more attention, and we can't risk it. Instead, if you would see fit, you could leave here and loop through the forest widely around this site, eventually connecting with the trail you left when you came here. The scouts would follow your tracks, guiding them around this part of the forest, and onwards into the empty wilds. Once that is done, you would be welcome to return here. I'm sure a suitable reward could be arranged, if that will help your decision."

"You want us to be bait," Shayuri said flatly.

"Not exactly. Should the plan be successful, you will never see them. Here." He held out a gourd carved with mystic runes. "As you leave, pour some of the contents of this on your soles. It will prevent you from laying tracks leading to here. Then, do it again before returning here, after you've connected to your earlier tracks. They will not be able to follow you, save where you wish it."

"Why should we help you, wizard?" Semaki asked angrily.

Zoyster waved a hand at the door sadly. "It is not I you would be helping, lady. It is the hundreds of other people currently living here. Refugees from Caron, mostly. Left to my own devices, I could escape easily enough...though I've no doubt I would stay to fight. But should this sanctuary be discovered by the illithid, these poor souls who hide here would have nowhere to turn to."

Shayuri sighed and looked away.

Semaki's mouth twisted into a rictus, but finally she nodded. "Very well. For them. Not you!"

"On their behalf, I thank you. I thank you all." Zoyster gestured widely. "I'll have a room prepared for you. A night of rest would not come amiss before you begin, I think."

"We gladly accept your hospitality with thanks, Zoyster," Mark said formally.

"I think not." Semaki padded to the door of the study. "I will sleep outside." Before anyone else could say anything, the elf was gone. Quadim hastened after her.

Shayuri stood for a long moment, an agonized expression on her face. On the one side, her friends, on the other...a warm bed, and books. Finally she slumped and picked the book up off the table. She would explain to Semaki. Surely this would be all right. It was just for one night.

When Zoyster led the others to an empty room with cots set up in it, Shayuri followed. As the others tiredly set down their things and doffed their armor to sleep, Shayuri curled up on the cot, automatically tucked the little thrall-skirt around her legs, and began to read the book of elven history she'd found on Zoyster's shelf... Finally she too slept, the book lying open on the floor below her cot. A leather thong marked the last paragraph that she'd read.

_In the last days, when The People had all but left the land, and the empire that had been was as bones in the cradle of the earth, there was set aside a hallowed ground to sequester the Nine for all time. Five lords of magic, peerless in their might, were set with four of the highest and most holy priestesses within the _alfheidar_ to guard the Nine and keep their power from corrupting the world again. Their spirits accepted the shackles of the _baelnorn_ willingly, and they gave not their bodies, but their very souls to their pledge. And over the hallowed earth was placed a ward of undeath; that any who died in a vain attempt to wrest away the power would be charged in death to defend it._

Morning came, and a simple but fine breakfast served. Zoyster joined them early on, looking paternally pleased. When Shayuri asked if they had a crossbow to spare, he even threw in a quiver of bolts. He also gave them a map outlining the ideal course for them to take, to lead the scouts astray.

They met Semaki outside who looked a bit sour, but not as much so as Shayuri had feared. It occurred to the sorceress later that perhaps Semaki hadn't minded some time alone with Quadim. The thought brought an embarrassed blush to her coppery cheeks.

Just before setting out, Mark produced the gourd Zoyster had provided and applied a splash of the ointment within to his soles. Even Semaki had to admit that the magic was effective. The armored warrior left not a single disturbed blade of grass in his footsteps. A few minutes later all the party was so girded, and they set off, following the river towards a location on the map dubbed 'Ruines.' There they would scrape the ointment off, and begin to lay the false trail.

For most of the journey the party walked in silence. It was a fine spring day, with the trees shimmering radiant green and birds of all kinds twittering and calling. The river sploshed jovially alongside them at a leisurely pace, like a friendly dog tagging along. Somewhere along the way Semaki and Quadim had unobtrusively started holding hands. Mark took point; striding instead of walking, rolling his shoulders in a suitably dramatic, heroic way. Clearly he thought Zoyster might he scrying. Shayuri walked in silence, consumed in her thoughts. Bunki, her ferret, perched on her shoulder and groomed her hair. Mana was nearly as exuberant as Mark, if considerably more genuine about it. Bursting with energy and glad to be out of the underground, he surged ahead, then waited for the others, only to surge ahead again. Shar, for her part, was unusually pale and withdrawn, occasionally rubbing her temples. 

And Piklum...ahh, Piklum. He was missing.

No one noticed until the splash.

Semaki turned and looked at the others questioningly, realizing almost at once that it was too big a noise for a simple rock. Shayuri nearly bumped into her before snapping out of her thoughts. "What is it?" the sorceress asked, craning her neck to look as well.

"Piklum is missing," Semaki said. "I heard a splash."

Almost as one, the party, save Mark and Mana, spread out along the banks of the river, calling out. The current was not fast on the surface, but on entering the icy runoff water they found that it was deceptively strong. They fanned out farther, calling his name, questing for branches or other obstacles the slug-like halfling might have gotten stuck in. Finally, they had to admit defeat.

"I'm sure he'll be all right," Shayuri said uncertainly.

"We'll keep watching for him as we go," Semaki noted. "If he washed downstream, we'll see him."

Mark nodded. "Good idea," he said impatiently. "We'd best hurry. The scouts won't wait for us."

And so they journeyed on. The "ruines" were not altogether far past where Piklum had vanished in a puff of water. The river became split by a large central island, with a crossable ford at the tip. Atop this island was visible broken, crumbling stones. They scraped the remaining ointment off their shoes and boots, knowing that to the trackers it would seem as if the group had been walking in the river until this point. They crossed the ford, still scanning the area for any sign of Piklum, but without success.

The island was about the same as the bank they'd left. Intemperately overgrown shrubs and grass threading between loose clumps of broad-leaved trees and the occasional mossy boulder. The main difference was that, protected from direct viewing from shore by a large hillock, an old stone tower rose perhaps three stories before the brickwork finally had given way some time in the far past. Rubble surrounded the ruin, but the bottom section seemed reasonably intact. The door was even in place.

Mark eyed the structure with some distrust, but his voice was jocular. "All right, so where to next? Across the river to the other side, then around and..." He paused as Shar cried out in something like pain. "What is it?"

Shar shook her head. "It's not possible..."

Mana looked curiously at Shar and Shayuri asked, "What's not? Are you all right?"

Semaki peered at the door, seemingly oblivious. Something about it seemed...wrong...

"It's new," Semaki said suddenly, making heads turn towards her. "The door. It's not as old..."

The door opened with the sharp CRACK of breaking wood.

Things seemed to happen in slow motion. Semaki jumped away from the door, just as something large, spindly, and grey-green whickered out. There was an impression of jagged serrated edges, of dull highlights off of a hard carapace. Mark was grabbing his sword and running at the creature. Semaki, her eyes open in shock, was scrabbling for her own short blade. Quadim was roaring something and flashing forward with impressive speed...

Lurching out of the dark doorway was what looked like a preying mantis, but nearly seven feet tall from its triangular head to its clawed, narrow feet. Long feathery antennae twitched and it jittered with incredible speed away from Mark as his sword flashed in a broad arc towards it. The wide swing overextended the warrior, and the mantis took ruthless, instant advantage of that momentary opening. Chitinous, serrated forelimbs lashed out and pinned Mark's body between them, holding him steady for when the suddenly gaping mandibles descended and dug through armor and flesh alike. Mark howled.

Shar launched herself towards the fray, incanting a supplication to Delta as she went, and Shayuri launched a pair of scintillating magical darts at the monstrosity. Even as she did, she realized that something about the creature was...unsettling. There were the suggestions of fingers outlined in the carapace of its forelimbs. The hint of a humanoid nose in its arthropod's face. Then Quadim and Semaki attacked as one, the thick shell deflecting Semaki's blade, but doing little to help against Quadim's assault. It staggered and emitted a piercing screech that was something between a woman's scream and an insectile squeal. Distracted by Quadim, the mantis-thing released Mark...who returned the favor by releasing a loud cry of battle and swinging his large rune-encrusted blade directly at the thing's back. Chitin crunched and buckled under that massive attack; another horrible cry rent the air. The massive insect twisted, knocking Mark back with one sweep of its claws. Just as the world went grey, then black in his eyes he saw Shar hovering over him...her expression was unusual...almost gentle.

More magic bolts, and between that and the combined efforts of Semaki, who's next thrust was far more effective when it found an aspiration pore in the thing's carapace, and Quadim, the wretched thing finally collapsed in a jittering pile of spindly, armored legs and leaking abdominal fluids.

Mark managed to get back to his feet, his nearly mortal wounds all but completely healed by a generous outpouring of divine power from Shar. "What WAS that thing?" he demanded.

"I'm not sure," Shayuri replied, approaching the fallen thing carefully. "If I didn't know better, I'd think it was originally human though. But I have no idea what magic would do this...even a polymorph would leave the original mind intact."

Quadim quickly poked his head in the door and looked around. "It's clear inside," he reported, wincing when Semaki gave him a silent glare for risking his life that way.

"Maybe there's clues about what it was there," Shayuri mused, drifting into the tower.

Mark shook his head. "No...it's not important. Look, we did what we came to do...let's move on. The scouts..."

"...will be at least a day behind us," Semaki said calmly. "We have time."

"I do not like it here," Mark gritted, staring fearfully at the tower.

"Good GODS!" Shayuri shouted from inside the dark. Both Quadim and Semaki bolted inside.

The sorceress was staring at a corner that at first seemed to have a stack of bizarre objects...resembling burlap sacks perhaps. On closer perusal though, one could see that they were in fact bodies, covered in a sort of hardened goo. Worse still, the bodies were not...entirely...human. Instead, most seemed to be frozen in between human and insect states, with chitin spikes and plates protruding from agonized faces and grotesquely rupturing skin. They were all, mercifully, dead. Most of them had huge holes eaten in them, and missing limbs. A terrible miasma hung in the air though. It smelled of crushed ants and rot.

In Shayuri's hands was a tattered old book. Semaki touched Shayuri's shoulder gently, eliciting a jump from her. "Are you all right?" the elf asked sympathetically.

Shayuri nodded too quickly, then swallowed and straightened. Her second nod had more conviction. "I almost didn't notice...but I did a detection cantrip," she responded in a dry, soft voice. "There's something magical in the...pile." She swallowed.

Semaki looked at the stack of corpses with a distasteful expression. "Is it worth it?" she asked.

"I don't know. It looks fairly strong."

The elf nodded, but before she could take more than a step towards the grisely stack, Quadim was past her, and throwing the topmost...thing...off. His face was a mask of revulsion. Two more toppled to the floor, with awful brittle crunches mixed with pulpy squishes. Then Quadim asked, "Is this it?" He started to reach down, but Shayuri interrupted him, almost panicked.

"Don't touch it!"

The monk jerked back, and let Shayuri replace him. Sure enough, there it was. A sword, not much larger than Semaki's, but radiant with magic energy. It was embedded in the chest of one of the unfortunates...horribly, its own hand was on the hilt. The sorceress' luminous silver eyes squinted, searching...searching...there. Her skill was still a bit tender, but the signature of Transmutation was distinct. A very versatile school, to be sure...but she thought of the insects, and what might have caused the transformations, and shuddered. "It might not be safe. I need some cloth."

Quadim complied, providing a strip from the hem of his tunic. As he did, Semaki picked the book up off the floor from where Shayuri had dropped it.

As Semaki began to read, Shayuri incanted, making a quick but complicated gesture. The sword slowly raised out of the insects body, dislodging the thankfully not-so-tight grip it had on it. When it was hovering in midair, Shayuri took the cloth and wrapped it carefully around the hilt...only then did she gingerly take it and place it in her backpack. "We can't use this until we've had it more completely analyzed," she explained. "It could be dangerous, especially given what we've seen here."

Semaki began to read aloud.

"I'm hungry...hungry all the time. They did this to us. I don't know why! We can't get out. Lenford can't break it open...says it's barred on the outside. I've begun to change...my eyes are different. Some of the others too, but I'm farther along. Our food's nearly gone."

She paused, then started again, making it sound like a journal.

"They..." she squinted. "They are dead. I had to...I couldn't stop... I'm already hungry again... If only...there was nectar...like before... It filled me. It made me whole. I want more... I'm sorry, my friends...at least you didn't have to...change. Changing. Still. It hurts, but mostly...not as much as hunger..."

Another pause, and now Semaki's eyes were watering.

"I can barely hold the quill..." she paused, seeming to skip ahead. "I can't think. There's only the hunger left now. Gods take pity on me...let me die..."

The elf dropped the book and stumbled outside where she coughed and half-doubled over. Quadim hurried to her side, but was waved off. "I'm all right," Semaki insisted.

Shayuri picked up the book and examined the last entry. During the part Semaki had skipped, the words degenerated into mad, chaotic scribbles. The last part of the page was torn off. Or, she quickly realized on seeing the pattern of the tear, eaten off. Suddenly feeling ill, she slipped the book automatically into her pouch and exited the tower. "I suggest we all get out of here now," she said thickly. "For all we know, it may be something in the area that does it. We should go."

Mark nodded, very pleased with the idea.

Shar said in a calmer voice than any could ever remember from her, "You're right...and you're wrong. You all have to go away from here. I have to go...somewhere else."

"What?" Mark asked, shocked. Shayuri's mouth dropped open.

"I've felt the presence of Delta," Shar explained wearily. "She has made Her will known to me. The illithid are...attacking Her. She needs my help."

Shayuri's mouth opened farther, then snapped shut with a little *click* of teeth. "They're attacking a _goddess?_"

The priestess nodded. "Delta's freedom and chaos are anathema to them, even as they to Her. They are using their control over Her followers against Her."

"But what can you do to stop that?" Mark demanded.

"Whatever I can. Whatever I must." Shar sighed and shook her head. "I wish you all well. Perhaps we will meet again." She didn't seem optimistic of that though. "Xag?"

"Huh? Oh! Right. Um...eeny meeny my-knee...MARK!" The hurtling pebble suddenly altered course and whipped at Mark, causing him to recoil with a startled squawk. When he recovered, Xag was comfortably circling his head. "Heya," it said jovially.

"Uh...hello," Mark replied uncertainly. Then his native upbringing kicked in. "This...is an honor, Lord Xag. I'll do my best to..."

"Don't even start that with me, kiddo. I don't even HAVE an ass! You can't kiss it! HAW!"

Shar smiled and waved. The others said their goodbyes. And then she was gone; walking off towards the river and vanishing behind the shrubs.

Those remaining turned and walked the other way, crossing the river again and forging ahead into the deeper woods on the other side.

It was perhaps another hour or two, not long past midday, when they saw the thick, inky strands slung between trees. The webs got thicker as they progressed. It was not entirely a surprise therefore when three unusually large spiders saw fit to hurl themselves down from the trees at them. Two smaller ones, and one large one. And yet, these creatures too bore the subtle hints of humanity in their features. All three were dispatched with almost disappointing ease, with Semaki able to use her archery skills while Mark held the onslaught back. He took a pair of mild bites, which Mana treated competently. Though the wounds itched, the venom didn't have much more effect than that on him. They pressed onwards.

According to Semaki, finally they were nearing the north edge of the forest. From there they would return to the large tree they had stayed at once before, the lone tree called The Encampment that jutted alone out of the plains they had come across to reach the Resistance enclave. There they would again salve their feet, and tracelessly return to the enclave.

They did run across an unusual thing however. A clearing in the woods had a large conical hill in it. The hill was made of loose, piled dirt, and was perhaps ten feet tall. Its peak seemed flattish, but it was hard to tell. Neither Semaki nor Mana seemed to know what it was, and while curious, the group was eager to get out of the freakshow forest, and so decided to continue on by. Whatever it was, it didn't seem especially threatening.

Fifteen minutes later Semaki whispered in Shayuri's ear, "We're being followed."

With it pointed out to her, Shayuri could see. Shapes to either side, zipping from tree to bush to tree. Mark, Quadim and Mana looked around as well when notified.

"What do we do?" Mana whispered.

"There's nothing left for it. They mean to ambush us," Mark gritted. "We form a defensive line, and hope we are too much for them."

"Quickly!" Semaki hissed.

Quadim, Semaki, and Mark quickly formed a triangular formation which Mana and Shayuri ducked into. As if on cue, things burst out of the forest around them. Grey and sickly shiny, their features a blur of human and ant. Shayuri cast a defensive spell as the creatures closed with dreadful speed...and the battle began.

Very quickly it became clear that although numerous, the 'mants' were fragile things. Semaki took one down with a carefully aimed bowshot as they charged, then switched to her sword. Mark and Quadim attacked at once, slicing and crushing another pair. Shayuri dispatched one with another pair of force missiles, but a second one managed to wiggle in close enough to rake her...fortunately its talons skittered off the invisible field around her. Mana's scimitar blurred and hacked off one of its arms. The battle went quickly. Less than a minute later, the group stood unscathed amidst a small ring of dead bodies.

"That wasn't so bad," Mark noted, fingering his hair as the wind picked up in the leaves with a sighing rasping sound.

"Run," Quadim said, abruptly.

Semaki's eyes widened. "Run," she confirmed. Both wasted no time following their own advice.

The others followed, though Mark sputtered, "What? Why?"

Shayuri looked over her shoulder...and gasped.

It hadn't been the wind. The sound was the pattering of feet getting nearer. Hundreds and hundreds of feet.

As they ran, a living carpet of halfling-sized ants surfaced out of the underbrush behind them. Glassy, murderous compound eyes glared. Mandibles gnashed. Disturbingly humanlike claws reached out for them.

And slowly...ever so slowly...the ants were gaining.

Suddenly the forest was thinning, falling away. Mana whimpered, his breath wheezing in his lungs. The vast golden plains were stretching out now, and in the distance was the large solitary stalk of The Encampment. "We're not going to make it," Shayuri gasped, her breath burning like fire.

"Get to the tree," Semaki urged. "Put your backs to it. We'll have to fight."

"It's too far!" Mana cried out. "I can't...I can't..."

"You CAN!"

The pattering footfalls sounded like rain, but when they entered the tall grass, the ants collectively made a huge tempestual roar like a hurricaine might.

The tree didn't seem to be getting any bigger.

Quadim suddenly grabbed Semaki around the waist with one arm and sprinted toward the tree, rapidly leaving the others behind.  Mark began to pull ahead as well. Shayuri grabbed Mana's shoulder, wishing beyond wishes that she had just exercised a bit more, had just practiced running a bit more. So close...so close. She raised a hand to try to fight off as many as she could...a wave of dizziness, a moment of nausea...

...and she ran headlong into the Encampment tree. Mana crashed into her from behind.

"What?"

"No time!" Semaki scolded. "Backs to the tree! Weapons ready!"

"No," Mark said abruptly. "Hold your fire. Let them come." He swallowed and looked up at the tree. "Just let them come."

The hurricaine grew...grew...grew until it was a maddening howl that seemed to reside as much inside their brains as in the air around them.

The grasses at the edge of the clearing around The Encampment parted, admitting things that looked almost comically like children in grey waxy armor...if not for the terrible jaws and clawed hands. And so the Swarm descended upon the party like the wrath of every god combined.


----------



## Shayuri (Jan 1, 2003)

*Updated!*

Sorry for the huger than usual delay...holiday season and such. Excuses, excuses, I know.  On Widdit!

--------------------------

As the living ocean of twisted, ant-like people (or were they person-like ants?) descended on the adventurers, time seemed to slow. A warm springtime breeze swirled around the group as they pressed their backs into the bark of the tree known as The Encampment, as if hoping it would absorb them into itself. Somehow, impossibly, the noise of that breeze in the leaves and limbs of the tree raised over the nightmarish pounding of hundreds of chitinous feet, yet did so without being loud. It sounded almost like music, of a sort; a soft sighing refrain that reminded one hauntingly of a song you knew, but could never quite remember the name for.

And as the inhuman swarm reached the great burled trunk of The Encampment...it parted and swept around it. Not one set of hideous compound eyes set into humanlike sockets seemed to notice the group as they huddled, astounded. It took several minutes for the insectile tide to pass by. Several more minutes after that for them to decide they had lost their quarry...and another few minutes watching them all trundling back towards the woods, satisfied that the intruders had been repelled.

There was silence long after the hissing patter of their feet had faded. Reverentially, Mark put another coin in the hollow of the tree's trunk. This time, everyone else followed suit.

They rested. Semaki nimbly scaled the tree's trunk to sit on one of the lower, thicker branches. Quadim followed her with equal aplomb. Shayuri, still feeling a bit weak from the sprint, sank to sit at the tree's base. Mark paced impatiently, occasionally checking his sword.

"Mark?" Shayuri asked presently. "How did you know? How does this tree...work?"

Mark paused and gave the sorceress an unreadable look. "I don't know how exactly," he admitted, slipping off a glove and scrubbing his fingers through his short brown-blonde hair. "But the stories of The Encampment are specific. It's a place of sanctuary. The tree guards that." He shrugged.

Semaki spoke in her quiet, mellifluous voice then. "There are ways to bring trees intelligence to rival or exceed that of men. And to give them magics as well. Elven rituals that I doubt were taught widely to others, but may have been used here in ages past. The tree is older than it looks I think."

Mark patted the trunk. "The hows and whys are beside the point anyway. What's important is that it happened at all. I think Zoyster will be most interested to hear our re..."

"Again, the wizard," Semaki said dismissively. "I did not agree to this for his sake. Moreover, he failed to warn us of these dangers."

"He may not have known," Shayuri replied, trying to head off the confrontation. "The mantis and spiders...I think they're pretty recent. And if these...deformed ant-things breed at the same rate real ones do, they may be relatively recent as well."

Mark nodded fiercely. "Of course he didn't know! How would he have?"

Semaki shrugged. "You may be right. I'm just used to wizards who are a bit more competent."

The warrior's face turned a shade of reddish purple, and he sputtered. Semaki went on as if nothing were happening.

"...after all, it could just as easily have been a community of illithid or thralls in that wood, not one day's march from his stronghold. I would think he would keep a closer eye on his surroundings."

"Listen _elf_," Mark spat in a fury. "When the mind flayers came up from the ground with their armies, killing and enslaving all before them, _where were YOU?_" He began to pace under Semaki's branch, glaring up at her like a cat stalking a bird that stays maddeningly out of reach. "Zoyster, and others like him, risked and sometimes even gave their lives to save the few wretches they could, and I will NOT hear you insulting him! Say what you like, but at least he has acted; not stayed hidden away in some misbegotten forest somewhere, laughing and dancing as the world burns!"

Shayuri stood up, palms out. "Mark, calm down, please..."

Mark turned to look at her, his rage undimmed. One accusing finger jabbed in her direction. "And you...you're scarcely any better! Siding with _her_ over Zoyster! And given the chance to stay here and work with the Resistance...to make a difference!...you choose instead to go to the elves!"

The sorceresses face hardened. "I have very good reasons for that."

"Call it what you like," Mark sneered. "I know cowardice when I see it."

There was an almost silent plod as Semaki dropped to the ground, her face set in a furious mold, her eyes narrowed and her hand on the hilt of her sword. Shayuri's eyes widened and mouth twisted into a grimace. "How dare you?" she asked, almost conversationally. She began walking towards Mark, quicksilver eyes fastened tightly on his blue. And despite her being unarmed, and her slender form hardly threatening or muscular, there was something in her anger that unfurled around her like a set of dark, invisible wings, casting an almost tangible pall. Her lips peeled back to show her teeth as she spat.

"How DARE you accuse me of that?!"

To his credit, Mark did not fade back under the sorceresses wrath. "What else can I accuse someone of, who chooses to flee rather than fight?"

Shayuri stopped, mainly because to continue forward would mean plowing straight into Mark. While her voice diminished in rancor, her eyes lost none of their anger. "There are many ways to flee, Mark. And many ways to fight. My journey to Dieresis is how I mean to fight. I cannot oppose the illithid alone, and so I am going to enlist their aid. Is this too complicated to understand?"

Mark's eyes flicked to Semaki, then back. "No," he replied tightly. "But tell me if _this_ is too difficult a concept. The Resistance has tried contacting the elves before! More than once! And each time it's failed to produce any kind of aid, any kind of recognition. What makes you think you'll be any different?"

One of Shayuri's hands strayed to the pouch at her side, where the hard lump of Shankara's crystal message sat. _Do I trust him that much?_ she wondered to herself. And she shook her head. "I cannot make promises, nor assurances that I can get results where others have failed," she said smoothly. "Though I think the presence and support of Semaki will prove beneficial."

Again, Mark glanced at Semaki. "No. No, the fight is here, can't you see? It's now! Even if the elves for some reason DO decide to help, they think in years! We're struggling in the here and now, and can't wait for that! Going to the elves, pressing them...I still see it as an excuse to find safer lands. Is it a coincidence that the one place you want to be is also the one place the mind flayers have no hold over? What good can you do there?"

"What good can we do HERE?" Shayuri snarled. "Join with Zoyster? Live like a cockroach under the ground? Hiding and hoping that someone else will take care of the problem before they find us? What good does that do anyone? Don't you see, Mark? Zoyster is pinned down! He can't move, he can't act...for fear of being noticed. And it's only a matter of time before he's found. Tell me what he would have done yesterday if we hadn't conveniently been nearby to lead these scouts astray! All it will take is _one_ ill turn of fate, and he's done for!"

Mark's face went greyish at the words, and he glared at Shayuri. "A coward might flee a ship merely because it's sinking," he began, but the sorceress cut him off.

"No, Mark. A coward, by nature, is passive. Afraid to act! Courage demands action, no matter the risk. Now tell me...what is acting here? Crouching under the earth and praying for a miracle, with the mighty Zoyster? Or striking out across the hostile wilderness in the thin hope that the battle may yet be turned? Let me make myself perfectly clear." Again fury rose off of Shayuri in sheets thick enough that they seemed almost visible, like heat haze over masonry on a summer's day. "I am not fleeing this war. I mean to go into the world and bend my every effort to binding friend to friend, ally to ally. And I swear..." She paused, then went on defiantly, her eyes taking on a fierce gleam. "I swear _by my Name_ that when I return, it will be at the head of an army that will SHATTER the illithid! I will _scour_ the world of their infection and send the few that survive scrabbling so deep into the earth that they'll never again see the surface!"

"Fine words, but do you think Zoyster feels any differently?"

The fire that had filled Shayuri faded. She half-turned away from Mark. "I do not presume to know how he feels. However, if he does, then he's chosen a highly suspect course of action. Or should I say, inaction."

"He's doing more than you know," Mark insisted. "He's doing the best he can. There's a lot of people who owe more than their lives to him."

"I was a slave to the illithid for a year," Shayuri returned gently. "In the end, only death freed me. I know better than most what's at stake." When she looked at Mark again, her eyes were haunted. "Do you really think I don't want to hide?" she asked softly. "Do you think a night goes by without me wanting to pick someplace far from anywhere, craft a meager home, and try to escape notice? Mark, there is nothing that frightens me more..._nothing_...than being captured again by the illithid. I admit, it frightens me to know that the road I'm on will eventually, inevitably, lead me back to face them. And every day we spend traveling is another day for us to be discovered. Their agents are widespread by now..." Shayuri looked away from Mark again, and shivered slightly. "But I will not be ruled by that fear. I _will not_ be! Surrendering to it would be giving them control over me again, and that I will never do."

Semaki came over and put a hand on Shayuri's shoulder. The sorceress nodded gratefully, then met Mark's eyes again. "So accuse me of vanity. Accuse me of arrogance." A short, humorless laugh. "Accuse me of madness, if you like. All of those are things that I possess, in some measure. But not cowardice. Never that."

This time it was Mark who looked away. "My duty is to the Resistance," he said stalwartly.

"Then our paths divide at the enclave," Semaki returned.

There was nothing more to be said. Mana and Quadim, silent throughout, exchanged glances but didn't speak. A wind blew in the branches of The Encampment, making a soothing surssuration...but if it carried any real meaning, there were none present who could interpret it. The traceless salve was again applied to their soles, and they struck out for the enclave of the Resistance, following their old trail so that the magic of the salve would erase those earlier tracks and leave only the trail they left when first coming to The Encampment on their way to Zoyster several days ago. The circle was complete. The enclave, for now at least, was safe.

By the time they returned, the sun was setting. Standing beside the waterfall that guarded the enclave's entrance was a tall thin figure that bowed at their approach. Mark knelt. Semaki turned her back.

"Welcome back," Zoyster said in his aged voice. "Come inside, please. Tell me of your journey."

Semaki didn't say anything, nor move, nor in any way acknowledge that the wizard had spoken, or was indeed there at all. Mark got to his feet and went to Zoyster's side. Shayuri hesitated, unsure what to do.

Zoyster signed and let his arms back down to his sides. "At the very least," he said, suddenly sounding weary, "come and accept your reward for the service you have done for us."

Shayuri stepped forward, but Semaki half-turned and spat, "I want nothing of yours."

Again, the sorceress hesitated...but with an apologetic look at Semaki, she continued forward. "It'll only be a moment, Semaki," Shayuri explained uncomfortably. "We'll need all the help we can get to reach Diaresis."

The elf did not respond as Mark, Shayuri and Zoyster vanished into the enclave.

Once inside, Mark and Zoyster excused themselves, leaving Shayuri in the library. It was several minutes before Zoyster returned, alone, and carrying a sturdy, well-made but otherwise unremarkable leather backpack.

"This, and its contents, are for you," the wizard explained, holding it out. "For you all. I, and those I safeguard, owe your group a debt for your aid."

Shayuri nodded and held out the crossbow she'd recieved before. "Thanks."

Zoyster waved it away. "Keep it. Weapons like that will do us little good here." A wan smile curved beneath his large white mustache. "Should we be forced to fight, then we will have already lost. It will do you more good, I think. Keep it."

"Then...thanks again." She took the backpack.

"Don't be too quick to thank me," Zoyster added, a mysterious glint in his eye. "I am being generous, but not without an ulterior motive."

Shayuri's eyes narrowed slightly. "What do you mean?"

"Mark will be coming with you to Diaresis. The task you have set before yourself is a difficult one, and you'll need our help." His bearded head nodded as he studied Shayuri. "As, I believe, we will need yours, should you succeed." Zoyster waved a hand helplessly. "We've tried to reach the elves before. Never with any success. They have not exactly turned our requests for aid down outright, but their deliberations take a long time...time I fear we don't have. Between that and the internal politics of the court, I fear our requests may not have reached the ears that they need to." He paused, scrutinizing Shayuri anew. "What makes you think you can succeed when so many have failed?"

Again, Shayuri could feel the weight of Shankara's stone in her pouch. But anyone could deliver it. It didn't have to be her. What would happen if Zoyster learned of it, and of what message it contained? Would he entrust it to this inexperienced band? Or take it for himself, to bring before the lords of the elves...and shut the others out. She shook her head. "I think Semaki's presence will help. They are more likely to listen when an elf is among us...and Semaki is not an ordinary elf." She felt sure that was true, though wasn't entirely sure in what way Semaki was unique. The tattoos meant something...but what, she had no idea.

Zoyster nodded slowly, his grey eyes never leaving Shayuri. "Perhaps. In any event, you have the well-wishing of everyone here, including myself. I regret that what you will find in that pack is the most resources we can afford to part with, but I do hope you find them useful. Also...I recieved word from a messenger not a few hours ago that a friend of yours...the transmuted halfling...had turned up with a caravan belonging to the Spineless Order." His mouth twisted in distaste. "They reported him to be in good health, and accompanying them. As I understand it, you should be able to pick up their trail several hours to the south of here." One bushy eyebrow wiggled as he winked. "I am given to understand that they're headed for Umlaut. May the gods watch over you all."

Mark walked back in, looking stoic and determined. Shayuri looked at him for a long moment. Was he a friend? An ally, most certainly...but a friend? His first allegience was to the Resistance. He would help them as long as it was in the best interests of the Resistance. It would be wise, she decided, to remember that. She turned back to Zoyster and bowed her head to murmur thanks. Then she and Mark exited the enclave. Semaki and Quadim waited outside. The elf's nose wrinkled at the sight of the backpack, but she said nothing, preferring to pretend that no such thing existed.

To Mark she said, "I did not expect to see you again."

"I'm coming with you," the warrior replied evenly. "This affects the Resistance, and I'm to serve as embassy to the elves."

Semaki looked at Shayuri. "And you?" she asked archly.

Shayuri met her gaze. "Nothing has changed for me. I represent only myself." For some reason the words sounded terribly lonely to her as she said them.

Semaki nodded approvingly. "And Piklum?"

"He's with a caravan south of here. They're already past, but we can pick up the trail. They'll be expecting us." She hesitated, then went on. "The caravan belongs to the Spineless."

Semaki only nodded, unconcerned. Mark rubbed his finger uncomfortably, remembering Piklum's unfortunate transformation. "Is that safe?" he asked.

"Who can say?" Shayuri replied. "Not much is known about the order. I imagine if we show proper respect and don't antagonize them, we should be all right. Same with most mages."

Mark swallowed, but squared his shoulder and nodded.

Semaki waved them forward. "The light is fading," she said. "We should go before it's too dark to find the track tonight. Come."

She and Quadim jogged off into the deepening twilight. A moment later Shayuri and Mark followed suit.

They left no tracks; no signs of passage. The waterfall burbled on, unspoiled and unseen. Just another peaceful glen in an empty wood.


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## LGodamus (Jan 3, 2003)

nice work....bump


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## Phasmus (Mar 3, 2003)

*Bump*

Because of issues beyond our control, the story hour is/has-been on hiatus.  We hope to resume updates presently.  Nevertheless, we are now compelled to cry BUMP and let slip the prawns of war!


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## Capellan (Jun 25, 2003)

*bump courtesy of Rune's bump a story hour thread*

So, did the prawns of war get out of control and eat everyone?  Because it's been rather a long time since the last update


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## Shayuri (Jun 25, 2003)

That's my fault, actually. Our faithful (hah!) compiler of adventures has been subject to a variety of pressures that have made compiling and posting...difficult. I shan't bore with details. 

I am semi-back, and trying to catch up, but there's a huge backlog. You know how when you look at a tower of paperwork, it's really hard to grab the first sheet off and start...because it represents a commitment to keep going through the whole thing? That's what I'm fighting now. 

A lot has happened, but one thing hasn't changed.

DOOM still hangs heavy over our heads. 

I will try to get an update out this weekend to illustrate...perhaps with a teaser for some of what's happened in more recent sessions, to give a sense of foreshadowing. Hmm, yes...I like that idea.

Thanks for the post though. It's nice to know someone remembers us after so long.


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## Joshua Randall (Aug 2, 2005)

Calling upon the almighty, mystical power known esoterically as _Search_, I hereby resurrect this thread. *Behold*! DOOM is upon you.


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## the Jester (Aug 2, 2005)

This is a great story hour! 

I'd love to see more of it...


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## Hurog (Jul 1, 2006)

The power of *bump* compells you!


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## Perun (Jul 2, 2006)

I'll join the bumping party. It's a good story hour, and I'd like to read more.

Regards.


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## MavrickWeirdo (Jul 2, 2006)

Dudes!

I'll admit I miss this storyhour too, but the last update was *over 3 years ago* 

I suggest contacting the author directly rather than commiting Thread-Necromancy.


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## Shayuri (Jul 2, 2006)

Hee. It's my fault. I left it in my sig for some weird nostalgic reason. But I should probably dispel any unfair hopes.

Doom from Below, the game, ended quite awhile back. Chronic GM-fatigue, combined with the story sort of spiraliing out of control...not to mention some character stuff... Granted, there's a LOT of stuff left to add to the Story Hour... Suffice to say the group was just learning what the Illithid were REALLY up to, and working out how to stop it. We'd vanquished a minor illithid cyst, and caught up to an old friend who'd been turned into a sort-of-enemy...

Dang. There were some good times. In fact, it'd still be cool to keep going with it. The campaign lasted over two years. It's just hard to get the gumption going once the game's over, ya know?

It WOULD be nice to have some closure though. Of course, the GM has noted several times that once his time permits (I'm not holding my breath ) he'd like to get it going again.

Sigh.

PS - There WAS another thread started, by the way. It doesn't last long, but does include a few more updates. I don't have the link to that thread, unfortunately. Someone with access to Search might be able to dig it up. It's newer than this thread.


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## Land Outcast (Jul 3, 2006)

Search check = Natural 20!

*Vitis Chronicles: The Rise of the Illithid (Last Updated: 6-29-03)*


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## Hurog (Jul 5, 2006)

Heh, i know it ended, i just wanted to see what kind of respone i'd get if I did


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