The Ratmen Attack

Although they can hear the rat swarm coming, it is only when they are within a few yards of the alcoves that the party members can see the hundreds and hundreds of beady red eyes swarming towards the wall.

"Ummm ...." Dax whispers to Milly, glancing at the caltrop field filling the area before the wall, "not that there's anything that can be done about it now, but ..."

"How's anyone going to get through that caltrop field either going out to help those further down the tunnel or to retreat back behind the wall?"

"Well," he sighs resignedly, "maybe neither of those things'll be necessary."

"Maybe."

"Rats, why did it have to be rats," mutters the voice of Candy that comes from behind the four that are manning the wall.

"Uh, Fae?" she whispers, though she's sure her whisper won't matter a damn to the rats as it is barely audible over the squeaking coming from the rats.

"Um, I can't do much against rats."

Faewen'il does not respond to Candy, but keeps her eyes fixed to the oncoming rat swarm as she pulls a piece of cobweb from her pouch.

If anyone could see her, they would see that Milly's face is covered in sweat, although her expression has gone blank.

Reaching out to where she assumes the illusionist is, she grabs him by the shoulder. Leaning close and whispering to him she says:

"I don't imagine you could conjure up an illusion of a whole buncha' cats?"

"N-n-n-not one that's likely to fool then," Emanuel replies, stuttering. "I-I-I can only do visuals with what I have at my disposal today, so I can't do the sounds or scents; I don't think the rats would fall for it."

"It would be such an unlikely thing to find as well that I think their handlers would be tipped off that something is amiss as well."

Taking a tighter grip, she pulls the illusionist with her to the side of the tunnel up against the wall. Placing herself between him and the oncoming hoard, she says quietly:

"Stay still."

"I-I-I'll try," he says weakly, obviously petrified.

Meanwhile, in the northern alcove, Porter says to Winnacer:

"Hear those whips? They're being driven forward. We can't stop them from up here, but hopefully the others can stem the tide. We're going to have to take out their handlers, and hopefully they'll break then. As soon as their handlers get underneath us, let's drop the door on them."

Winnacer, already looking pretty poor from being stuffed into the alcove, gives Porter a weak look:

"There is no way they can stop the tide without wasting our powerful magicks and our chance to surprise them. It may be best if the group at the wall holds still and lets the swarm pass unmolested. We can always import some cats into Opava later. Hopefully Faewen'il will hold off, or if they decide to toss forth their fire vials, that they make Candy do all the work so they can remain invisible."

"This is already looking bad."

Winnacer readies a candle and a match in case they quickly need to light either their oil vials or their calivers.

"Let's see if the handlers come this way and what the others do. It may be a bit premature to leap out on the handlers if they are leading the way. Fae's a smart one, let's see what she does before committing to an action."

Back at the wall ...

"Damn!" Dax curses in a whisper as he too sees the oncoming approach. "Somehow I don't think Winnacer anticipated this..."

"Those vermin're going to make it tough to concentrate on casting the lightning bolt we're counting on so much, I'd guess, if they get over the wall before the bigger targets we want the magick for get in range," he says. "Maybe we should set some oil on the top of the wall we can light to slow them down? Got some lamp oil we could use ... "

Faewen'il doesn't take her eyes off the fast approaching rats as Dax speaks to her:

"Aye," she says with surprising calm, "now would be a good time ta be usin tha fire. Throw all o the Greek fire an oil that ye be havin ta form a pool. An' be getting a torch ready ta be lightin it an all."

As the rat swarm comes closer, Dax has second thoughts:

"On second thought," he murmurs, "maybe if we just try to stay out of the way and let them pass by, they will -- since they can't see us anyway?"

He moves to the left hand corner of the wall, where it meets the wall of the tunnel and waits, hoping for the swarm to stream past.

Faewen'il responds to him angrily:

"Use ye head, man," she snarls at him. "They can smell us. Our invisibility will nae be worth a damn if'n tha rats be swarmin all over us."

"Right," Dax hisses through his teeth, obviously not thrilled at the tone Faewen'il takes with him.

Neither Milly nor Dax are terribly keen on the idea of having the swarm running all over them and do what the magess suggests. Milly hurls her vial of Greek fire to the far end of the caltrop field and Dax adds his two vials as well before adding all of his lamp oil to create a good pool of the fluid. In the process, the pair of them becomes visible.

Dax then reaches behind himself to grab a torch. For a split second, he hesitates, knowing that the light will alert the ratmen to the fact that something is wrong. However, as the screeching of the rat swarm gets closer and closer, he realizes that he has little choice and so lights the torch.

As the torch sheds light upon the vicinity, he lights up the area and all at the wall can see the black tide of rats swarming towards them, the torch lighting up the rats' evil glowing red eyes. They can all see that the rats are frothing at the mouth. They look riddled with disease and hungry with it.

Fae realizes that the rats will spell doom to those behind the wall unless they can be stopped. With the cobweb still in her hands, she starts to chant while gesticulating towards the oncoming horde.

As she finishes with one final gesture, a gigantic web appears from nowhere, filling the passageway ahead of the wall and trapping the entire rat swarm and the three packmasters in its many-layered mass of strong, sticky strands. In the process, she too becomes visible.

The rats struggle to get out of the web, but they are stuck fast with no hope of getting past the barrier.

The magess then turns to Dax and simply says:

"Now."

Dax knows exactly what to do and hurls the flaming torch towards the web:

"WWWWWOOOOOOOOFFFFFFFFF"

The highly inflammable strands of the web immediately explode into flame, which connects with the oil on the ground that flares up in an even bigger conflagration.

Immediately the whole of the tunnel is lit up as bright as day. The party members can all see that the entire rat swarm is caught in the blaze. The rats skitter around in agony for a few seconds, trying to escape the blaze, but there is nowhere for them to run to and within seconds they are all dead from their horrific burns. The stench of burning fur and rat meat sickens all of the party members to their stomachs as it fills the narrow confines of the tunnel totally.

The three packmasters that were goading the rats forwards with their whips were also caught in the web, but were stopped by its strands before they got to the pool of oil on the ground before them. The flame from the webs catches their fur and burns them badly. One of the three falls to the ground from its wounds, while the other two stop, utterly confused by the situation. As they do so, a sling bullet appears from nowhere at the side of those by the wall and smashes into the shoulder of one of them, adding to its already serious wounds.

In the alcoves, Winnacer and Porter, Rowan and Damene are also able to finally see what is happening by the light of the burning vermin. Just as they see the packmasters looking around in confusion, they realize that more ratmen forces are on their way. They see that a pack of some twenty ratmen is heading towards the bonfire ahead of them. They notice that the ratmen are particularly puny specimens compared to all of the other ratmen that they have seen, dressed in little more than tattered rags and carrying clubs and rusted bits of scrap metal. They seem to be petrified out of their minds. From behind them, the party members can hear more whips being cracked as more packmasters urge the unwilling cannon-fodder forwards past the alcoves.

Porter hisses to Winnacer:

"Those at the wall can handle these schmucks. Let's drop this door on the handlers as they come by."

"Hold on man, not yet," Winnacer replies. "These are not the rats where the money is. Peek for yourself. They are also getting whipped forward, they must be the slaves that Thrisk told us about. Fae will be able to fry them all. We'll hold until their bosses show themselves, and then hack them to bits. The others will be alright, you and I need to be patient, we are hunting the bigger game that will be at the end of this vermin procession. We've only blown half of our surprise."

Winn keeps a sharp eye out, looking through the viewing slit to check upon the unfolding battle.

"OK," the bounty hunter agrees.

It doesn't take much to hold the manhunter back for the moment. Porter has had much experience waiting for days if necessary to flush out his quarry. Then again, he generally didn't have to sit and wait during a frenzied battle, but he would hold off for now.

In the opposite alcove, Damene leans close to Rowan to whisper to him:

"These don't look like much of a threat. Should we hold until whatever they're afraid of gets here?"

Rowan nods, forgetting the fact that they can't see each other in the darkness of the hole:

"I concur, milady," he agrees. "These seem fairly puny individuals compared to the ones that we combated before. Hopefully those on the wall should have little problem in bringing them down."

Back at the wall ...

"Well, there went the element of surprise..." sighs Milly as she readies her bow to meet the rest of the oncoming horde.

"Aye," Dax nods grimly, while also readying his bow, nocking an arrow and watching the three packmasters struggle with the web and flames. "But I don't really see how it could've been helped."

"Guess these ratmen aren't too keen on cooperating with our brilliant plans," he chuckles.

Candy emits a sound not unlike a low, albeit high-pitched, growl:

"They're going to try and use us up with these low-lifes."

She carefully describes the situation to all those behind the "wall":

"We don't want to use the big guns on these guys. Damn, this sucks."

"If I fire, I can give us all away."

"Any ideas?"

For the first time since Faewen'il met Candy, she responds to her:

"Aye," she replies, with a bitter tone in her voice, "ye be absolutely right. These be nothing more than trapfinders for tha ratmen. I only be havin two lightning bolts and so it'd be a shame ta be wastin them when tha caltrops alone might take out a lot o them."

She looks to Milly and Dax:

"I be thinking that we can take them without usin up all ma best spells."

"Let's just wait an see what they be doin first."

The ratmen seem to be in disarray following the incineration of the rat swarm. The two surviving packmasters fall to the ground in order to beat off the last flames that are burning their fur and look ahead to try and see what caused the disaster. They see nothing, however, as nothing is visible through the illusory terrain.

The packmasters of the group of ratslaves coming up behind them chitter to the slaves as they see the tunnel burning ahead of them and stop cracking their whips, bringing the company to a halt.

The fire burning the flesh of the rat swarm starts to burn itself out now as the oil is all burned up and the rats' fur is totally consumed by the blaze. As it does so, the light level falls with it and it is getting difficult to make out what is going on with the ratmen. The swarm's two remaining packmasters scamper backwards, pushing through the ranks of the slaves in order to get to the three other packmasters behind them. The five packmasters start to chitter with each other in an animated fashion. The party waits to see what their next move will be.

It becomes apparent that the packmasters were simply waiting for the fire to burn itself out before continuing down the tunnel. Once the majority of the fire is out, the five packmasters crack their whips once again and urge the ratslaves onwards. The ratslaves make their way forwards once more, slowly now, as the packmasters are obviously being very cautious. They start to walk over the burned carpet formed by blackened and charred bodies of the rats, each footstep that the ratmen take emitting a disgusting crunching sound as they crush the bodies of the burned rats underfoot.

Those at the wall hear Candy's voice whispering to them once again:

"They're coming forwards now," she whispers. "Whatever you were planning to do, now is the time to do it."

They wait until the ratmen are just 20' away and then Milly, Dax and Faewen'il pop their heads above the wall. Milly and Dax both loosen their bowstrings, sending arrows towards the throng. Dax's shot flies between the ranks, hitting only the stone floor. Milly's luck with the bow that she demonstrated with the bow during training continues as she nails one in the gut with a well-aimed shot. The ratslave groans, but does not fall.

At the same time, Faewen'il stands up and thrusts her hand forwards towards the oncoming ratmen. Three bolts of pure magickal energy fly towards the three ratslaves in the front rank that were not hit by the archers. Two of the ratslaves drop to the ground from the wounds while the other one continues onwards.

Above her, another slingstone appears out of nowhere and smacks into another of the packmasters, injuring it quite badly.

As the ratslaves are met by the hail of missiles, the packmasters crack their whips furiously, driving the ratslaves forwards. As they leap towards those at the wall, they cross the caltrop field screened by the illusory terrain. For the weak ratslaves, the caltrop field has fairly devastating results. Five of the ratslaves are killed instantly from the iron spikes beneath their feet while all of the others are badly injured.

The unexpected injuries from the caltrops cause chaos amongst the ratslaves and slows down their advance. They are urged onwards by the packmasters, however, as they crack their whips over the slaves on towards the wall. The packmasters themselves look forwards, trying to figure out what is happening.

As the ratslaves continue forwards, Dax and Milly realize that they have one more shot left before the ratmen are upon them. Dax, once more, just manages to avoid hitting one of the ratslaves as his shot flies overhead. Milly's shot flies true, however, felling the lone surviving ratslave in the front rank.

Milly and Dax then shoulder their bows and draw their longswords, ready to take on the ratslaves in hand to hand combat. Faewen'il reaches for her belt and pulls forth her rarely used magickal dagger.

The ratslaves continue to urge forwards, only to be stopped by the wall hidden by the illusion. This takes the ratslaves by surprise, giving the wall defenders a chance to attack them before they realize what's going on.

Dax lashes out at the first one through and catches it with a glancing blow. The ratslave is a big one, however, and does not fall immediately. One more mighty blow from Dax sends it tumbling to the ground, however.

Milly lashes out at the next to ratslaves to reach the wall like a woman possessed. The first two ratslaves to get within range of her sword, both already badly injured by the caltrops, easily fall to her blade.

Faewen'il tries to strike at another of them, but she is no expert in weapons and her blow is deflected. The ratslave strikes back in terror, but the magess' massive amount of magickal protection easily saves her from any damage.

Another four ratslaves manage to cross the caltrop field and start to lash out at Milly and Dax fighting from across the wall. None of them get anywhere close to landing blows on the warriors, however.

Nearly half of the twenty ratslaves are dead already. The five packmasters slowly figure out what has happened and chitter excitedly amongst themselves. Two of them break off from the fight and start to run back down the tunnel at the alarmingly fast rate that the party members have come to expect from the fleet-footed vermin. As she sees them heading off, Candy sends a sling bullet hurtling towards one of them, but her shot falls short.

Back in the alcoves, the ambushers see why the packmasters are running, as they see that ratmen reinforcements have just arrived. There are four of them in total, advancing in a line across the tunnel dressed in green robes. The ambushers see that each of the four is wearing a large brass helmet on their heads that cover their faces totally. Pipes run from the helmets to a leather sack tied to their backs. In their hands, they are each holding fist-sized glass spheres that contain some form of greenish-yellow vapor inside.

The two escaped packmasters are chittering excitedly to the reinforcements, pointing towards the wall.

Winnacer sees the poison globardiers lining up and grimaces. Letting them get close may spell disaster for those behind the wall, he realizes, but getting out of the alcoves would ruin any chance of surprise. The LawBringer looks torn for a second, before an idea comes to him:

"Porter, get that grenade ready. I'm going to raise the stone cover and you are going to toss that grenade into their ranks. Then I'm going to lower it again to protect us from the blast and hopefully maintain some semblance of surprise. Remember, we only have three seconds. And hold your breath."

"Ready?"

Porter pulls the grenade out, readying it and saying:

"Yeah, no shit. If that gas gets to us, you won't have to worry about holding your breath, 'cause I'll be choking the shit out of ya."

The bounty hunter nonetheless stands ready to light and toss the grenade into the middle of the rat bastards.

Back at the wall, Milly, Dax and Faewen'il are unaware of the globardiers moving forwards as they concentrate upon finishing off the remaining ratslaves heading towards them. More of the ratslaves flood forwards until their progress is barred by the wall.

Milly easily manages to cut one down, but the one that Dax was aiming for manages to jink out of the way of his sword and the fighter hits the wall. Faewen'il is similarly unsuccessful at trying to take out the one that she is fighting.

The ratmen swarm forwards, homing in on the fighters. Two of them lash out at Milly, but her 'Fabio' armor easily manages to protect her from any harm. Dax sees another of the ratslaves coming for him and brings his borrowed shield up to parry the attack. As he does so, another of the slaves sees and opening and hacks his rusty blade into Dax's thigh with all of its might. Dax cries out in agony as the rusty blade hacks through his cartilage and sends him crashing to the ground. The ratslaves chitter with delight and flood over the wall in the space that he vacated at the wall.

Next to him, two more of the ratmen lash out at Faewen'il, but once again they cannot find a way of getting past her magickal defenses.

From her spot on the wall, Candy sees Dax's fall with alarm and sees that trying to take out the packmasters that are standing at the edge of the caltrops field cracking their whips over the heads of the slaves is the best chance the party has of getting rid of the ratslaves quickly. Still invisible, she whips her sling in the air above her before sending it flying towards the packmasters. Unfortunately she is a little too vigorous in her slinging and the bullet flies harmlessly over the packmasters' heads.

Back in the alcove containing Winnacer and Porter, they look through the viewing slit and see the two packmasters have finished their chat with the globardiers and are running back down the tunnel. As the conversation finishes, the globardiers start to head off down the tunnel towards the wall once again.

"Now," whispers Winnacer as he grasps the slit between his hands and gets ready to lift the cover. Porter immediately lights the fuse on the grenade and then Winnacer pushes the cover open.

In one fluid movement, Porter lobs the grenade towards the globardiers in the split-second that Winnacer has the cover of the alcove open before he pulls it back in to seal themselves back in once more.

Porter's aim was good, but not great, and didn't quite land in the center of the globardiers' position, being a few feet to the left.

The ratpriests look at the small, fizzling pouch with curiosity as it lands among them. Exactly one second later ...

"BBBOOOOOMMMMMMMM"

The grenade explodes, lighting up the passageway once again. Three of the ratmen are immediately blown to kingdom come, as the grenade produces a reasonably-sized crater in the ground and hurls up a cloud of dirt and ratmen limbs together with a small cloud of greenish-yellowish vapor. The vapors disperse slowly. All those in the alcoves cover their faces in case the vapors might head in their direction, but the vapors seem to disperse quickly.

As the dust cloud lifts, they see that the ratman on the far side was thrown against the wall, but was not badly injured by the blast. The ratman looks around itself to try and see the source of the explosion, but sees nothing. It brushes itself down and carries on advancing towards the wall. Silhouetted against the burning remains of the other globardiers, Candy can see its approach, although the others at the wall are more concerned with trying to fend off the attacking ratslaves that are clambering over the wall in the space vacated by the downed Dax.

Winnacer, breath held intently and eyes peeled to the slits, watches as one lone globardier meanders down the mineshaft.

The young Lord whispers to Porter:

"Nice shot. Unfortunately, one of them survived the blast, albeit a bit shaken up. It had no clue where the attack came from."

"Those rat slaves should be all slain by now. I'm sure that those at the wall can pick off one lone globardier with missile fire. Let's hang tight for the next wave."

Another idea runs through Winnacer's adrenalin soaked mind:

"Porter, in my right pouch there is another bomb. It's an anti-personnel bomb with a three-minute fuse. Grab it."

"It may be worth lighting and hiding around this spot once we have sprung our trap. If they are coming in one or two minute intervals, we should be able to time it right so one of their entire group gets caught up in the explosion. Another option if things start to get tight."

Winnacer continues his vigil at the slit.

"I can see why the Priests of Ohen are so dedicated to their art," Winnacer continues. "You and I need to get a steady supply of this stuff."

Porter nods vigorously:

"Oh yeah, this shit is like literally DA BOMB."

The bounty hunter gives the second grenade the once over, examining it, then again takes up vigil on the tunnel.

Little do those at the alcoves realize, but the battle at the wall is progressing not quite as easily as could be hoped for, with Dax down on the ground and frantically trying to stop the ratslaves from over-running the position.

Milly growls in frustration as the ratmen continue to surge forwards, being urged forwards by the cracking whips of their handlers.

In a quiet voice she says:

"Dinosh, where are you when I need you?"

"'Exurum'"

Fingers of flame gather around Milly's hand clinched around the hilt of her sword. Traveling up the blade, they proceed to engulf the entire sword. Her face is a mask of determination in the firelight.

Attempting to move closer to the center of the wall and closer to Dax, she proceeds to swing her blade wildly about to try to stem to ratmen tide.

The ratmen squeak in alarm as the flames lick the blade of Milly's sword, lighting up the darkness. It is obvious that they would run were it not for the whips of the packmasters behind them.

With the flaming sword in hand, Milly cleaves the arm off one of the ratslaves, felling it with one blow. She tries to take out another of them, but the nimble verman ducks away from her swing. Two of the remaining slaves lash out at her in retaliation, but her 'Fabio' armor proves to be an impenetrable barrier for them.

Next to her, Faewen'il thrusts forwards with her magickal dagger as the last of the slaves climb the wall. This time her dagger finds its mark and the verman, already badly injured from the caltrops, tumbles off the wall, back onto the field of spikes. Two more of the ratmen lash out at her, but her stoneskin means that nothing gets through. She realizes that the protection from the CornerStone's spell is fast diminishing, however.

Realizing that he is a sitting duck on the ground, Dax uses his one good leg to push himself back into the corner between the wall and the side of the tunnel, in order that the ratslaves not be able to get him from behind. No sooner than he is in position than two of the ratslaves hurl themselves towards him, seeing his disadvantageous position. Fighting off the pain from his leg, he brings his longsword up to try and strike at the first of the rats, but the slave pulls back before lashing out at Dax in retaliation. Dax tries to pull his shield up to protect himself, but the ratman finds a way round it. The wound he causes, however, is little more than a scratch. As the second of the rats comes for him, Dax lifts his longsword once again and deftly runs the slave through.

There are now just five ratslaves remaining and those holding the wall see that, despite Dax's injury, the battle is now going in their favor.

Behind the ratslaves, two of the packmasters continue to whip the ratslaves on. The other one is starting to sweep the area before the wall clear of the caltrops.

Yet there is a bigger threat heading towards those at the wall, as the lone remaining globardier continues to advance at an alarming speed.

From her position atop the wall, Candy sees its approach and starts to whirl her sling before letting loose a bullet at the fast approaching vermin. The bullet hits the globardier in the gut, injuring it quite badly, but the bullet does not fell him. Furious now because of the injury, the globardier runs forwards with the glass globe in his hands until he reaches the packmasters at the edge of the caltrops field. As he gets there, he lets loose with the glass globe, throwing it in a high underarm arc.

Fortunately for those at the wall, in its haste to lob the globe, the ratman's aim was off by a wide margin and it lands far short of the wall, landing next to the packmaster trying to clear the caltrop field. As the globe shatters amidst the caltrops, it releases a small cloud of greenish-yellow vapors right next to the packmaster. The ratman immediately drops its whip, bringing its paws up to its throat as it begins to heave violently. The ratman then falls to the ground, poisoned by the fumes.

The globardier gives a 'shit happens' type of shrug and hurriedly produces another globe from its pouch.

Further down the tunnel, those in the alcoves patiently wait for more reinforcements to come forward, oblivious to the events unfolding at the wall.

The battle for the wall continues. Milly lashes out at the last two remaining rats before her in order to try and assist Dax and easily hacks another of them to pieces. The other one thrusts at Milly once more, but there is still no way for him to get through the 'Fabio' armor. Likewise Faewen'il, emboldened by her success in taking down one of the ratslaves, lashes out with the dagger once more. However, as if to prove that her last successful lunge was more of a fluke than anything, the ratslave ducks out of the way of her blade. The ratslaves' counter response is negated once again by the magess' stoneskin, but she knows that it is not going to last much longer.

On the floor, Dax has just one ratslave to contend with as Milly and Faewen'il are keeping the bulk of them back. He thrusts forwards with his longsword at the slave and runs it through before the slave has a chance to strike at him. Just three ratslaves are remaining now.

The packmasters are obviously quite annoyed at the death of their comrade at the hands of the globardier and see that they will have to wait for the vapors to disperse before joining the fight alongside their wards.

Seeing that the globardier is about to throw another of the globes, Candy tries to finish it off with another of her sling bullets. She manages to hit it once again and the globardier screams out in pain. Although it is bleeding profusely from its wounds, it does not fall, however, and tries to lob another globe over the wall. This time, its aim is true and the globe falls just behind the wall, right in the middle of where the defenders are fighting off the last of the ratslaves.

As the glass shatters, another cloud of poisonous vapors is released right amongst the group. All three of the remaining ratslaves fall from the gas in seconds, something that does not seem to bother either the globardier or the packmasters in the slightest.

The party members, however, have a lot more sense than the ratslaves, enough sense to hurl themselves away from the glass globe as it lands in their midst. Milly and Faewen'il both throw themselves to the side of the tunnel to avoid the worst of the vapors. Dax, still laying in the corner is already there.

However, there is the rather worrying sound of someone gagging and then slumping to the ground behind you, right around where Emanuel was standing invisibly. Dax, Milly and Faewen'il are still gagging badly from the thick vapors that pour from the smashed globe even though they avoid the worst of it. Faewen'il seems to be the worst effected, barely able to stand now as a result of the poisonous vapors that she has swallowed. Candy, from her position on the wall, was only very slightly effected by the vapors, although they still make her cough and she realizes that the vapors have caused her some damage.

All that remains of the ratslave units are the two remaining handlers and the badly injured globardier who is getting ready to finish off the wall defenders with another poison globe.

Faewen'il, however, in an even bitchier mood than normal after coming close to getting poisoned to death, has other ideas. Immediately that she stops coughing from the vapors, she points her hands towards the remaining vermin and utters a quick incantation. As she does so, three bolts of magickal energy fly towards the three rats. The globardier, already badly injured from Candy's slingstones, immediately drops to the ground. Unfortunately, it doesn't drop the globe it is holding as it does so. The magickal missiles have little effect upon the two remaining packmasters, however.

Milly immediately takes her shortbow from her shoulder and nocks an arrow, aiming at one of the packmasters who are unwilling to move forwards because of the caltrop field and the remaining vapors that are slowly wafting away. Milly sends an arrow towards one of the packmasters, but it is stopped by the ratman's mail. Candy sends another sling bullet aimed at one of them and, once again, finds her mark, felling the ratman with a well-aimed bullet to the head.

Milly quickly nocks another arrow and aims at the last remaining packmaster before them. Sadly, she cannot recapture her earlier form and she misses the packmaster by a wide margin.

The sole remaining packmaster comes to the realization that it is going to have little chance against the remaining wall defenders and so decides to make a rapid retreat from the wall. As it starts to scamper away at alarming speed, Milly takes another arrow and aims at the ratman's back. Once again, however, her arrow does not come close to hitting the ratman. Candy is similarly unsuccessful at taking it down with her sling. As the ratman hurtles away through into the half-light coming from the still burning rat husks, Milly has one more chance to hit the ratman with a final arrow. This time she is more successful, hitting the ratman in its leg. Unfortunately, however, this one arrow is not sufficient to bring it down and it disappears into the darkness.

From their position in the alcoves, the others see the lone ratman's retreat and are all relieved.

Winnacer whispers to Porter:

"It looks as if they have managed to send them packing."

Just then, they hear a strange sound from further down the tunnel in the direct of the ratman's lair. They hear the gushing of a large quantity of water, which is shortly followed by some annoyed ratman chittering. The sounds are coming from a short way down the tunnel and none of those in the alcoves or those at the wall are able to see quite what caused the commotion.

There are no enemies in sight currently and those at the walls check their wounds and stop coughing as the vapor cloud finally dissipates totally.

Milly looks down at Dax. He seems to be OK, but it is obvious that his leg is causing him a great deal of pain. Faewen'il seems to be very badly effected from the poison vapors. Her face has gone an interesting shade of green and she is breathing heavily as her lungs feel full of gunk. Neither Milly nor Candy is feeling 100% any longer, but they definitely suffered the least from the ratslaves' assault.

Milly then remembers the illusionist. She looks around in the dim light and see a small form lying still on the ground, his body wracked in pain. She sees that it is Emanuel, killed by the poison globe. Upon death, the illusionist has reverted to his real form. It comes as no surprise to any of them that the 'dwarf' is really a gnome who has been disguising himself in order to avoid being sent to the Nyemetz work camps.

Nothing seems to be happening at the moment. There are no sounds at all coming from the tunnel.

Dax takes advantage of the temporary hiatus. He grunts and grimaces in pain as he tries to use the tunnel wall and his sword to push himself up far enough to 'stand' and see down the tunnel. By the time he speaks, the pain and effort have him fairly gasping out the words:

Without taking her eyes off the tunnel, Milly reaches down with her off hand and offers to help Dax to his feet.

"I don't ... think ... that ... we can ... hold them ... back again," Dax spits out. "That was just ... the advance guard. Worse is surely coming."

Dax slumps slightly against the wall, dog-tired and his leg throbbing. He tries to tear a strip from his cloak to use to slow the bleeding, wincing as he wraps the makeshift bandage over the wound.

"Aggh," he grunts softly, in spite of himself. "This leg's ... not gettin' ... better any time soon."

Stepping up to the wall, Milly squints her eyes trying to see any approaching foes. She sees none, however. All seems to be eerily quiet ahead.

"So whatever happened to that druid?" she asks. "What was his name? Yast? He was supposed to be our healing wasn't he?"

Shaking her head in annoyance, she says:

"Miss Fae, if you would be so kind as to check on our illusionist friend. If he's beyond help, maybe he's got somethin' on him that we could use."

Never one to pass up the opportunity of availing herself of anyone's magickal items, Faewen'il crouches down at the side of the illusionist, whose face she can see is contorted in agony. She sees that he has got nothing on him apart from a pouch. She takes a look through it and then shakes her head:

"He nae be havin nothin but spell components," she replies.

She takes the pouch anyway, knowing that the items within will be useful for replenishing her now dwindling supply of components, particularly eyelashes encased in gum Arabic that she has been using in great quantity over the previous week.

"Candy," Dax says through clenched teeth, "maybe ye should ... go tell the others wha ... What's happened? 'Cause I think ... either they come join us ... or we have to fall back?"

Dax grunts again, but this time in abject frustration.

"OK, Candy agrees, "but let me have a quick look as to what they're doing further back in the tunnel first of all. I'll be back in a bit."

They hear nothing more from Candy, but see the poison globe that is still in the globardier's hand disappearing into nothingness.

For another couple of minutes, there is still nothing but silence coming from the tunnel ahead of you all. Those at the wall, and those still stuck in the claustrophobic alcoves, wonder to themselves what the ratmen are planning. Their imaginations start working overtime as they wonder what fiendish plans the ratmen are getting ready to unleash upon them all.

The sound is broken momentarily by the sound of glass breaking coming from further down the tunnel, which is followed by some coughing and more annoyed chittering.

Winnacer turns to Porter, looking quite pissed. He whispers shrilly:

"That's Yaz, the idiot. I bet he's tossing those poisoned globes at the rats. He'll screw everything."

"We need to get out of here and go and see what he's up to before the idiot can mess up things even more."

"Are you coming with me?"

"You bet I am," Porter whispers in reply. "I've been in this damned thing too long already."

Not wanting to alert whatever might be further down the tunnel by pushing the heavy stone slab to the ground, the LawBringer and the bounty hunter carefully lift off the cover and, as quietly as they can, which is not very quietly in Winnacer's case due to the platemail he is wearing, drop down onto the ground.

There is still no sign of the ratmen coming, but more sounds emanate from further down the tunnel. This time, they can make out the sound of something metallic creaking, which is followed immediately after by even more annoyed chittering.

Winnacer looks down the tunnel in alarm as he hears this, now more sure than ever that he needs to find out what's going on. He quickly heads across the tunnel to the opposite alcove containing Rowan and Damene, with Porter shadowing him.

As he gets to the other alcove, he whispers urgently to Rowan and Damene:

"Something's going on further up the tunnel," he says. "I think that Yaz is getting himself into trouble. Porter and I are going to investigate."

"I think it's best if you two went and checked out what's been going on at the wall."

While Winnacer is speaking to Rowan and Damene, Porter pulls out Booker T, his onyx dog, telling him:

"Yo dog, we're in the middle of fighting off an attack by those rat bastards. I can't see for shit in this tunnel, so I'm gonna rely on you to watch out for anything waiting to bushwhack our asses. You got my back?"

"Sho' thang, my man," Booker replies, wagging his tail as he is released from his stony prison once more. "Booker gonna work it out, bro'."

With that, Winnacer and Porter cautiously make their way up the tunnel to investigate what has been going on up there, with Booker running at Porter's side.

Damene seems hesitant to let the two men head off into the darkness alone. But she gives a quick nod and says:

"Alright. We'll see what's going on at the wall and meet up with you."

She throws a quick glance at Rowan to make sure he is in agreement and the swashbuckler nods in response:

"That sounds OK to me," he whispers to her. "Anything rather than staying any longer in this dark hole."

The pair of them carefully take the lid off the alcove and silently drop to the ground before starting to head back to the wall.