Hello, Everyone!
Last time, after a looong and tiresome trudge through the Swamp of Agony, our heroes finally got to their final destination - the Dragon's prison. At first, it looked like a dark and endless chasm under the eye of the storm, but then it turned out to be just an illusion (Hallucinatory Terrain, anyone?).
Also, Mary cast a spell over the group, so that they would look like a Order elves taking a tabaxi to be sacrificed to feed the Prison.
“Sooo, do we wait for the elves?” Aurum said.
They had walked around the stone building and found out that the only way in was from a large metal gate.
“I fear that they may already be inside,” Tesaya said.
“But the gate is closed…” Mary said.
Tesaya looked at her and Mary felt foolish. Of course they must have closed it behind themselves. Why make it easy for whoever would follow them?
“But maybe they're still on their way,” Mary tried again. “If we went in first, and there were traps, we'd have to disarm them. I can't see how that’ll be good in the long run. It could break our cover as another Order group, or worse, allow the real Order members to enter without any trouble.”
“Do you think they don’t have any way of disarming these traps themselves?” Tesaya said. “For what we know, they might already be inside, releasing the dragon.”
“Just in case, let me send my familiars off to scout a little,” Mary said.
She started weaving her spell but it… didn't work. She looked around, frowning. Was it the dragon's prison that was interfering with her magic? It would prove very bad if she wasn’t able to do magic inside!
“Let me get on the door, then,” Aurum said, kneeling in front of the lock with Lanurey’s thieves tools in hand. “It can't be that har– Ouch!"
He dropped the tools and pulled his hand out. A small needle retracted back into the lock.
“Stupid thing is trapped,” the bard said, holding his wrist.
“Probably poisoned, too,” Tesaya said. “Good thing we drank that wine of yours. It makes us immune.”
Knowing about the trap, Agatha used her own thieves tools (way more carefully than the bard), and promptly disarmed the lock. The gate opened into a long empty hallway ending at a rune-engraved door. The moment Tesaya made a step through the entrance, however, the rune started glowing and a blast of wind slammed at the group, instantly sweeping Bruno, Aurum and Agatha off of their feet. Mary managed to hold on to Tesaya's back for a few seconds, but was eventually hurled back, too, and tumbled onto the ground with the rest of her friends.
Straining against the wind, Tesaya made another step, the same time as Agatha stood up from the pile of people. The tabaxi drew her claws with a guttural growl and crouched to the ground, crawling her way forward. She kept going, first on the floor and then on the wall itself, and she reached the door right as Tesaya was making her third step.
“Throw us a rope!” Bruno called.
Wind was still blowing in their faces but once they had support to hold on to, all of them were able to reach the door. Agatha was trying to unlock it but it was going poorly.
“The stupid thing slips off from my tools!” she cursed. “It twisted the picklock.”
“Here, let me try and fix it,” Bruno said and leaned forward.
Holding on to the rope and pinning Agatha to the door so that she wouldn’t be blown off, the group managed to support her enough to do her work.
With one final click, the wind stopped and the door slammed open. Mary felt the momentum pull her forward and the group tumbled under their combined weight. It was going to be almost comical, if the next room had a floor.
But it didn’t.
They screamed and plunged into darkness.
“I told you… I had a… thingie,” Aurum said breathlessly.
They were dangling above a dark pit, scattered down their rope like a string of beads. Thanks to the bard’s timely spell, their initial fall had slowed down and they had managed to hold on to the rope just as the door had shut behind them. Now, there was a narrow hallway before them, with a new door at the end, but there was no ground to walk on.
Or, Mary thought, there was ground, only it was about a hundred feet down.
“I don’t know if I can scale the walls of this one,” Agatha said.
“We could go down?” Bruno suggested. “Then walk on the bottom and find a way to climb the wall on the other side.”
Mary pursed her lips. It would take such a long time to execute this plan, and there could be traps below. While she was thinking of a better way to get to the door, a snap sounded and the rope below them suddenly lost its weight.
In a puff of smoke, Tesaya appeared on the other end of the corridor and scrambled to hold on to the door with her one and only arm. Her eyes widened as her fingers slipped, and she began to fall backwards.
“No, you don’t!” Aurum shouted and his spell cracked through the air, slowing down her descend enough so she could grab the door again.
“A rope, please?” she called out.
As they were securing their way across the pit--Bruno tossed the end of a rope, Tesaya somehow managed to loop it onto the door handle, and Agatha ran across to unlock the next door--Mary let out the trembling breath she had been holding. She realised that her whole body had tensed up, almost painfully so. What was Tesaya thinking?! It was a hundred-foot drop! She had only one arm! Why would she Misty Step alone, and risk her life, when someone else could do it instead of her?!
Tesaya is being reckless. But who could blame her? If you knew that there was a Dragon who was going to be released soon, wouldn't you become a bit reckless trying to get to it, too?
I just hope they're not too late! See you next time for more challenges and traps!
Take care and be well!
(Also, here's a link to the Chapter Guide, the Glossary and the Map for the series. You're welcome!)
An important disclaimer: Mary Windfiddle's story is my notes from a D&D game turned into a narrative. All the worldbuilding and NPC encounters belong to our DM, and all the actions of the other main characters (Aurum, Bruno and Agatha) belong to my co-players. My contribution to the story is only everything Mary-related (actions, reactions, inner thoughts), as well as the writing itself.