Wairith's Answer

As the group enters the cavern Tavarak whispers just loud enough for the party to hear, "We need to spread out as soon as we can, it makes for a smaller target." Carrying on in a louder voice he continues " So you must be Wairith the love of Avons life. As for where he is, well lets just say he is indisposed at the moment. I must admit that was a nice bit of magic though, yes very impressive indeed. Now about your most generous offer, well we have a counter offer. A life for a life you might say, namely yours for the life of the prince."

Tav pauses to let the impact of his words sink in "Look we know you aren't stupid or totally powerless, and could put up a good fight, but we both know that you would eventually loose. And you know I'd be willing to bet that the reward for the prince could still be collected even if he were dead. Dwarven kind can be so, well so vehement about the burial of their dead. Now as for the problem with your associates shall we call them? I know what would happen to you IF your brethren find out that you have double crossed them, but they can't kill you if they don't know where you are now can they? Don't look at it as the end of your life but as a new beginning. A chance to expand your horizons. So now what do you say? shall we forgo all the bloodshed?"

Ven looks over at Tav in awe of his fine speaking abilities, knowing that he surely would have stuttered, gotten confused and made an utter ass of himself if he were talking to a Mark's Arm assassin like that. He looks over to Sandros and whispers, "I don't know about you Sandy, but after getting another look at Myr naked, I don't think I could concentrate enough for a fine speech like that."

As tired as all the rest Andrew wakes up with the attempted defection of Avon. Agreeing wholeheartedly to have this thing over with one way or the other Andrew follows along to the meeting with the assassin. Constantly glancing over his shoulder for Dak or Avon and pondering the intelligence of leaving them alone Andrew tries to keep his mind on the important matters at hand.

Standing on his guard with his spear ready Andrew tries to look imposing to lend an air of credibility to Tavarak's strong words. Keeping the tiredness and worry from his face is a hard task and looking around Andrew can't help but wonder if the bard's words are more true than he thinks.

Sandros turns towards Ven with a blank expression on his face.  "Wha?  I'm sorry...I was still imagining that view of Myr we just got.  Did you say something?"  He grins.

Quill shoots both of them a dirty look, but said nothing.  Instead, she waits to see whether Tav's words provoke any reaction, whether good or bad.

The group waits, not moving much, maintaining the 35 yds between them and Wairith.  Daggda looks at the ground in front of Tav's feet, trying to detect if there is some trap ahead of them, but ... it's hard to tell without getting really close, and the dwarf is in the 2nd rank.

Myridian, standing on Sandros' shoulder, is in the shadows and trying to look invisible.  She reaches over and slaps the side of Sandros' ear with her tiny hand, "Hey, get serious... I'm trying to be a bird here.  One who can cast some sort of devastating spell at a moment's notice."  She goes back to thinking hard about what spell might work on this assassin/spellcaster.

[WAIRITH]
"I do hope you didn't hurt him, Arron was it?  He was kind of cute in a peacock-ish way.  Are you the new leader of your pack then?  Why dont you come down here and we can talk about all this?  I'm sorry but you'd have to come alone... I'd be just too nervous with all your friends and their ~shining~ weapons."

She moves a bit, shifting her weight.  A fold of her robe moves, and the light glints off some sort of symbol or scarab hanging from a chain around her neck. 

"A life for a life you say?   Nay... that's no offer at all.  You'd do me in the moment I let go of this edling's head." She gives the dwarf's head a sideways shake.  The dwarf offers no resistance at all.  "How about... you leave and I'll send the dwarf along tomorrow?"  Her laugh is a short bark that echos off the harness of the rock surrounding all of them.

"Besides... I could not try and run from the Arm... There is no place to run from Him."  The capital letter on "Him" is clear from her emphasis on the word.  "He sees the secrets of every heart."

Veneron gasps softly and takes a step back... then another until his back is to the cavern wall.  His blood turns to ice at hearing her last words -- and the almost chanting way she says them.  One of  his earliest memories -- perhaps he was only 7 or 8 years old -- is of watching an execution in Tirion with his father and brother.  There had been a big hunt across the countryside -- it was the white cloaks of Illuvitar who had been in charge, not the MDF [OOC: Melfan Defense Force]. 

The man was a Black Priest of Silindur who was being beheaded for having "offered" a child -- younger than Ven -- to his God.  Even the Priestess of Deltara could not help bring back the child for her heart was completely gone.  Those same words, chanted with the same inflection, were the Black Priest's last words.  Ven will never forget the smile on his face when the headman's axe fell, or the clank as his spider-shaped unholy symbol rattled to the wooden platform when his neck was parted.  The Priestess would not even touch that thing.

Andrew, Sandros and Myridian are all aware of the look of fear on Veneron's face.

Wairith relaxes her grip on the head of the dwarf who is her shield.  Strangely, the dwarf's head remains at the same uncomfortable angle. 

"No, my gallant adventurer ... You'll either deal with me or take him back as worm food."

Avon shakes his head as he hears the words from behind him.  "I'm awake. What on earth happened? The bastards, are they after her?" Avon starts pulling on the ropes to try to get loose. "And who the hell are you?"

"Me? I'm Dak.  And I dont like these guys any more than you do.  And who the hell are *YOU*?"  says Dak.
"I guess they're after her.  I don't know, to tell the truth.  They went down there -- and there's nothing that way except HER and the dwarf ... and Frick and Frack, of course.  They're the guys you probably saw with the crossbows."  He starts squirming and twisting and pulling also.... sometimes knocking Avon off balance, as the two are tied together.

Neither one seems to make much progress in getting loose in the next few minutes.

"Hey, hey. Watch it will you." Avon is getting irritated by whom ever is behind him. He can remember seeing a orc prisoner before he passed out, so he figures he is dealing with him. Of course his real irritation is caused by the fact that he is double crossed and tied up, but the poor orc will have to deal with it. "Are you really as stupid as you look", Avon asks although he cannot see the orc. "Force will get us nowhere, just stand still and I'll get us out of this mess." Avon continues to get himself untied.

"You're calling ME stupid. That's a good laugh. I did not pick these people for friends. You did. MY friends died trying to defend themselves... They died... ohhhhh.." and suddenly he collapses into a pile of dead weight, sobbing and drying. As he falls over, he takes Avon to the floor also.

The duo are back-to-back, on the floor, in the dark, tumbled over on Avon's left (Dak's right) side. But that does not bother Avon. He is working, writhing, twisting... almost dislocating his shoulder to reach the knot that is holding his hands.

Attack on Wairith

Tavarak shrugs and advances, keeping his eyes on the prince. He looks down at around his feet, looking for the telltale footprints or any marks that would confirm that the pair is really there and that what he is seeing isn't an illusion or some sort "Leader you ask, well no, we don't have a leader actually, and as for doing you in, well are all the Marks people so paranoid? No the offer is made in good faith, if you choose to accept it as such well that requires a bit of trust on your part." Tav catches her subtle movements and pauses "Don't waste your spell energy with that little trick, you do know what they say don't you, trick us once shame on you, trick us twice shame on us. We have taken precautions to ward off that spell, you may want to try something else." Tavarak gets as close as he can before halting. "The offer still stands the choice is yours, but consider this, Kill the prince and the revenge that his kin will do to you is a hundred fold worse then what the Mark will do to you. Your association would not survive a war with the dwarven kind. And nothing would unify them like the death of a noble."

"Oh shit..." laments Myr-bird, hopping uncomfortably on Sandros' shoulder. "Let's hope this works," she says, sounding unconfidently fearful.
As quietly as possible, she begins a squeaky chant:

"Thistle, gristle, sissle-do!
Moldy pocket fuzz, licorice, too.
Rickety, rockety, deep fried flies
How'd you like a missile in your eyes?"

And partway thru Tav's speech, the magic missiles fly past him.  He keeps talking, trying to distract Wairith from them for just a few seconds longer.  He is about 25 yards from the Assassin when the mm's hit her.

"AAAAHHHHHHIIIIIIEEEEEEE."  Screams the surprised Wairith.  The hit from the firey missiles knocks her back but she recovers enough to stagger back to the dwarf.  She screams again even as she plunges the stiletto into the hostage dwarf -- but not into his neck. Into his shoulder... not a mortal wound unless it is poisoned, thinks Daggda, looking from between Quill and Tavarak.

As the magic missiles scream past them, Quill, Tav and Daggda break into a charge... trying to cover the yards between them and the Prince/Assassin pair.  As they arrive in the room, they see:

Wairith staggers back from the Prince... falls heavily against the wall... mumbles a few words that no one can hear.  Her eyes roll up into her head, her last breath comes as a ragged, uneven hiss in the suddenly quiet chamber, her inert body slumped against the wall/floor.  The burn marks from the magic missiles are centered on her chest. 

1) Frick and Frack, a pair of crossbow weilding orcs.  They are standing to the side, having thrown down their weapons, with hand nervously over their heads.

2) The Dwarven Prince, with a dagger sticking out from his shoulder, still stands and an uncomfortable angle.  His head still twisted to the side in the position Wairith last left it.  He made no reaction to being stabbed.

Sandros charges ahead when he sees the front rank advance, and arrives in the room just a pace behind the others.

Myr is dislodged when Sandros leaps into a charge.  She nearly falls to the floor, but remembers to start flapping, and she achieves flight.  Ackwardly flying up near the roof to find some shadows for cover, Myr painfully bumps into rock protrusions, knocking her around.  She'd never really tried to fly close to something overhead... just to avoid trees and such.  She tries again, getting too close to the ceiling again *WHAK*.  This time she'd gone straight up, as fast as she could.  The rock overhead proved harder then her head, and the stunned Myr-bird flaps clumsily to the floor, trying to land on her feet, but failing, and landing squarely on her chest.  The wind knocked out of her, she cannot even speak for a few seconds.  Her head is spinning from that encounter with the rocks overhead.

Andrew quickly decides to stay with Veneron... still in shock.

Quill decides to leave the prince to those who may be able to heal any of his hurts, and instead heads directly toward Wairith. "I doubt she is dead..." she says. "She murmured some words before she fell, probably some spell to make us think we killed her. I've heard tales of such things before."

Placing the point of her blade directly at the base of the woman's throat, she eyes the witch warily. "What should we do with her?" She glances at the two surrendering orcs for a brief moment, but immediately returned her eyes to Wairith, as if showing them how unafraid she was that they might have a change of heart.

On closer examination, Wairith was a human woman in her late 20s. Dark hair, but light complexioned, her features make up a longish face which might have been attractive. The symbol on her neck is a large spider -- made of metal (looks like steel), hanging on a chain of plain steel links. There is a bright red stone in the middle of the spider's back..

Dragon's Claw, which had pulsed strongly during the just-finished fighting, is beating normally as Quill holds it poised over the dead/unconscious spellcaster's throat.

Worried that the prince might have been poisoned by the dagger, Andrew quickly moves to inspect the wound and the blade in an attempt to discern if there was any poison present. If the blade seems to have been poisoned Andrew will tend to the wound and IF anything bad starts to happen because of poison Andrew will cast Slow poison on the prince. While tending the wound Andrew will also do his best to identify and treat any other visible hurts.

Ven snaps out of his shock as the magic missile flies and the priest is stabbed, though he still looks quite shaken and pale. He mumbles something about priests of Silindur and follows the others toward Wairith. "Be careful with the bitch," he says. "I think she may be a dark priestess of Silindur. Their magic is unknown to me, but it is dark and sinister. I wouldn't be suprised if she has a few tricks left for us." He shudders again as the childhood memory rears its ugly head once again.

Sandros, realizing he's lost Myr, turns around to find her. "Oops," he mutters. "Sorry about that...got all riled up for a second there." Seeing her lying on the floor, he kneels down next to her. "You okay?"

Myr lifts her little bird head looking as if she's seeing even tinier birds rotating around her head. "Ohh... the colors...." she says dreamily, then shakes her head slightly to clear. "I'm all right... just a little loopy."

"Hope she wasn't possessed and looking for another body now. And what is up with my aim? Guess the bird suit isn't conducive to bulls-eye targeting."

Tavarak moves to cover the two, motioning them to turn around before searching and binding their hands. "That was just too easy, there is something that doesn't fit. I have heard of mages who had the ability to project their life force into objects, like perhaps that spider broach she is wearing, or even the prince." Tav shudders at the thought "How is he doing? is he alive? Can anyone bring him around? We really should be getting out of here as soon as we can." Tav begins to search the cavern. "It would really help if someone could ask these two where they keep anything of value."

The two orcs turn to face the wall, giving no resistance.  The one on the left says, in *VERY* heavily accented, common, "nokillnokill !.  grummmusch mhenbjlek frack.  mhenbjlek MHENBJLEK !"  The words are nearly incomprehensible and sound like the orc has a mouth full of marbles, a bad sinus condition, and is about to throw up -- but Tav has enough experience to know that Orcish ALWAYS sounds that way.  He throws his hands higher into the air and follows Tav's gestured instructions.

Tav quickly brushes his hands over the orcs, as Daggda holds her pick poised.  A pair of daggers, 2 small pouches is all the Tav finds.  Each is dressed in a patchwork of leather and metal sewn to  sturdy cloth blouse and breeches.  He looks around quickly for a rope but... the group's last remaining rope is back with Dak and Avon !  He quickly rips some strips from the blanket that covers one of the sleeping pallets and binds the orcs' hands.  "Not very effective, I'm afraid, but better than nothing." The bard mumbles to Daggda.

Tav's begins a quick search of the room, avoiding Wairith's inert form for the moment.  He finds: a lantern, a small cache of dried food, a set of very high quality boots that look like they would fit Prince Geodon's bare feet, a pot of water, a larger pot with a cover -- which turns out to be half full with excrement and other waste.  One of the sleeping pallets is set apart from the others, and Tav assumes it was probably the witch's.  He discovers a mace of reasonable quality, a purse, another dagger, and a metal-clad vial of a thick, dark blue liquid--it is about 3/4 full.  The pouches from the 2 orcs contain many colored stones... some appear semi-valuable to Tav's untutored eye, and an assortment of coins... less than 2SP in total value.  The purse from Wairith's bed is fairly heavy; he opens it to see a lot of coins.. mostly gold.  Tav tucks all the coins and stones into his pack for later examination.

Tavarak has been pushing all the things into the middle of the room as he finds them -- except the half-full chamber pot.  When done, he stands, drawing his sword once more.  "That's all of it... I think."

Daggda, guarding the orcish prisoners, had been listening as Tav announced the various things.  She speaks now, "Nothing else of the Prince's?  He would certainly have been carrying some sort of weapon.  Even in the city... He was --- er.. *IS*  ... an experienced warrior."

Andrew takes his time and really looks the prince over well. "It seems he is relatively unhurt and I don't think the blade was poisoned. However there is obviously something going on here. I can't say if he's been drugged or is under some kind of spell but I think that if we're going to move him we'll be carrying him."

That said Andrew quickly casts a spell of healing to close the dagger wound and then he's ready to go.

"It really makes me glad,
that the wound is not so bad.
But any hurt is worse than none
With this spell I'll make it gone."

Cringing at that last bit Andrew prays that his bad use of rhyme doesn't affect the quality of his spell. Figuring that Najela has probably heard worse over the years he quickly check on his handy-work then looks to see what the others have decided

Tav hands the vial to whichever healer will take it. "I have no idea what this is but we should take it with us. Who knows it may be poison or an antidote of some sort." Looking at the prince "How is he making out? Is he in any shape to travel? We really should get out of here as quickly as we can.?" Leaning down he starts to put the boots onto the dwarf Hearing Daggda 's question the bard turns to her, "No the only real weapon is that mace. Perhaps one of the mages can detect magic. And damn if we can't find a key we are going to have to get Avon to try and pick these locks."

"I think I can handle that," Myr replies, sitting down to inspect the mace. "Maybe after this we should head down to the kitty tunnel for some rest. I'm outta spells, and everyone's beat."
She hops over to the mace and sits down near the spiked head of the weapon.  She looks from one end of the mace to the other... it is about 50% larger than she is.  She is perplexed for a moment, then smacks her hand against her forehead.  "Oh yeah... I guess I can..."  And so saying she pushes back the hood of the Raven Suit, and in the span of a heartbeat, *poofs* back to normal size.  In the process, she bumps into Tav, who had bent over to place the mace on the ground, and finds a corner of a small table poking sharply into her side.

"Oops! Sorry Tav." she grins.

The bard takes a step back,  "Welcome back to the big world."

The mage picks up the mace, putting in her lap as she sits on the floor, and concentrates on it for several moments.  "Booooorrrrrrinnnggggg!" she announces eventually.  "Plain old, garden variety mace."

[Tav] "Good idea Myr, but i don't think we should stay down here. Lets make our way back up top before we rest. It will be alot easier to defend against someone scaling the cliff then fend off someone attacking while we are trapped in a cave."

Tav visible cringes at the thought of a fireball exploding in these close quarters. "Now all we need to do is to find a way to release the prince from the chains. Guess its time to search the witch."

Ven isn't too keen on being in the same room as the black priestess.
He approaches Sandros. "Sandy, what do you say we go and fetch are friend Avon. I'd go alone, but, well, he might not be too thrilled with me right now. Besides, I curious to see if the charm is lifted. If not, it may indicate that she," he points to the apparently dead woman, "isn't really dead after all." [OOC: Assuming that Sandros agrees, Ven will go with him to the place where they left Avon. Otherwise, a discussion will likely ensue.]

Sandros readily agrees to the idea. "Okay...will give me a good chance to slap the boy around a bit without the others getting all mad at me." He grins, and says, "Just kidding...don't get all bent on me, you guys..."

As he turns to follow, he suddenly stops and says, "Hang on a second. Myr, guess you can get out of that birdsuit now." He waggles his eyebrows at Ven, grinning evilly.

[Tavarak]   "I agree with you Andrew...But we can't just carry him off.  That collar and the wrist/ankle shackles are attached to the wall via chain.  And the ring in the wall looks pretty solid.  It looks like either hammer & chisel or pick the locks."

Quill, still standing over their recently defeated foe, growls "Too bad we can't trust our thief well enough to let him pick those things. Guess we'll just have to chisel them, eh?"

"Well if he's a talented thief," Myr says, tapping her chin thoughtfully. "Then he should be able to pick a lock with his hands tied, wouldn't you think? Can't be that difficult. For a thief, I mean. Chiseling is going to make a lot of noise... what if we're not alone in this cavern? Is there anywhere that hasn't been searched where we might find a key? Hey - maybe it's back in the other cave - could be that was where witchy woman stayed. I don't see her putting up with the stench in here for long!"

[Tavarak] "Well, we *could* search her. I guess we could do that before, after or instead of Quill running that super-sword thru her neck. It's not going to go well if Avon is here when you do that, Quill... That is, *IF* you're going to do that."

[Myr]
"Oh gods - by all means, stab her first! If you don't, as soon as you touch her she'll wake up and wrap her hands around your neck and squeeze, or she'll poke out your eyes with her fingernails, or she'll bite a chunk out of your cheek, or stab you in the gut with a hidden dagger..." She goes on mumbling other gory possibilities for a minute, then smiles cheerfully. "Or you could tie her up, then search her. If you're not gonna slice and dice her. I'm not saying we should or shouldn't. I mean, we don't even know if she's really dead."

Her eyes then suddenly go wide with some just-thought-of horror, and she shrieks. "OH SHIT!!!"

Myr searches frantically for Flybreath, calling out to him. "Flybreath - oh Flybreath, please tell me it's still you - tell me you haven't been possessed by a she-witch-wraith-wannabe!"

Seemingly convinced by something no one else can hear, Myr sits down on the floor, heaving a huge sigh of relief. "Sinclair was one thing. I mean, he made a cute frog. Cuter in human form, of course, even if he could have used some dental work, but that was beside the point."  Myr continues on, mumbling fairly incoherently to herself until finally, she stops talking and stares off into space, losing herself temporarily in the madness that is her mind.
It takes the mage a few seconds to remember that Flybreath must be in the pocket of her vest, which is back with her clothes, which were back with Avon, which is where Sandros and Veneron went, who she asked to bring back her clothes.  Her mind spasms at the thought of those two men just bundling up everything, and maybe crushing poor little Flybreath.

She jumps up, runs two steps toward the doorway, then stops.  She turns, takes a step back toward Quill, standing over the still-lifeless Wairith.  Her eyes are rolling around in her head, uncertain what to do... Go back.. stay here.  Run in circles, scream and shout...

Daggda, who had been standing with weapon poised behind the two surrendered orc, listens as Tav, Quill and Andrew discuss possibilities.  "Tavarak," she said, "Naturally, I have a hammer and chisel in my pack.  No dwarf would be far from such necessities.  But you may not need to get the Prince away from the chains, if you can get the chains away from the wall.  The strongest iron will be around his neck or ankles or hands... It may be easier to break at the wall fitting.  At least we could move him from here.  And no matter what you decide to do, I will not leave that vile priestess of Silindur alive.  He and the vermin he spews into the world are blood enemies of Moradin... If you won't finish her off, come and guard these beldarak ... I will do it and with pleasure at serving My Lord Moradin."

The Acolyte almost pushes Tav over behind the two orcs, and then shucks off her backpack.  Opening a small wooden box and extracts a vial, she stands next to the Ranger, saying: "Watch her close, Quill... If she's alive in any way, she'll probably have a very strong reaction to this.  Slowly she pours the entire contents of a small bottle of holy water on the black, jeweled scarab that is the holy symbol of those who follow Silindur.  The water, blessed by Moradin's priestess, bubbles and smokes and steams as it hits, and the black scarab becomes pitted as if by acid.  The dwarven Priestess shrugs, and says, "Guess she's probably already dead..."

With quick sure fingers, the dwarf runs her hands over the body on the floor, finding: a dagger hidden among the folds of her robe and a plain steel wrist band.  Without even stopping to consider, she says, "Here's a magic bracelet.  The steel fits so tightly that it  could not have been put on over the hand... and it surely could not have been forged against her skin.  Also it is *very* cold to the touch ... unnaturally cold.  If somebody wants to try, go ahead... the less I have to do with this witch, the better."   She returns to her pack taking out the hammer and chisel and going to look at the place where the chain is attached to the wall.

Andrew looks at Myr, whose mind seems to be somewhere else, and then goes over to Wairith's body and looks at the bracelet.  "It *IS* cold, but not so cold it is painful."  He tries to move the bracelet up and down on her arm.  Despite its very tight fit around the wrist, it moves easily, becoming larger/smaller to accomodate the arm's dimension as it moves.  He thinks for a minute, and decides that whatever curse may be on this thing would not likely come to him if he merely removing it.  And it might not be cursed at all -- after all, she was wearing it.  So Andrew slides the magic bracelet off her wrist, over her hand, holding it gingerly in his fingertips, he looks at it.

It seems to be a plain steel band.  As it is not being worn, it is about 2" in diameter, and there are some very tiny runes carved into the inside of the band.  He cannot read them, nor can Quill, or Daggda.  Tav ventures a guess that they might be "the old language" -- but he cannot read that either.

"As I thought," says the dwarf after a few minutes of studying the wall.  "This will be easy."  A few light taps here, a little scraping at the rock there, and pretty soon, Daggda turns with a smile of triumph -- and the entire wall-attachment assembly in her hand.  "We can go now... anytime you're ready."