Cards Reshuffled

Being buried alive has to be one of the most uncomfortable demises imaginable. Given that I feel that, it should come as no big surprise that I always seem to wind up down dark tunnels, narrow sewers, or other assorted monster-infested holes in the ground. Let’s face it – most of the gods seem to hate me. That’s the only plausible reason for it.

Excerpt from ‘Ruminations Of A Master Bard’

As the party moved deeper into the graveyard, Zaerini pondered her new acquaintance. She hadn’t known all that many dwarves. There had been old Reevor back in Candlekeep of course, who had been so very fond of employing her as a rat killer down in the stables. Fitting, I suppose, for somebody able to change into a cat at will. Though I wish I could see his face if he found out about the kind of things I kill these days. And then there had been her friend Yeslick, the kindly old dwarven cleric of Clangeddin, whom she had found imprisoned deep within the Cloakwood Mines, held captive by the Iron Throne.

At first glance, the good-natured and orderly Yeslick seemed as different from the ill-tempered and seemingly slovenly Korgan as the day to the night. And yet, somehow she got the impression that there was more to Korgan than first met the eye. For one thing, even though he looked scruffy, he certainly took good care of his equipment, something that hinted that he was indeed the experienced mercenary he claimed to be. And cranky as he was, there was something about him that she couldn’t help liking. Perhaps it was the way he always said exactly whatever came into his head. Idly she wondered what Yeslick would have thought. Her old friend had left the group after Sarevok’s death, returning to his distant kin. He was lucky to do so. That spared him the tender attentions of Irenicus.

It was at this moment that the bard’s musings were interrupted by a horrific gurgling moan, seemingly rising from within the very ground. Wild-eyed, she looked about, seeing that her friends were readying their weapons. Clearly they were as startled as she was. Then there was another moan, and another one, rising from a heap of newly dug dirt. No. A grave.

“What evil is this?” Minsc cried out. “The dead won’t rest, but make loud noises, kicking their blankets off? That will not do! Lullaby and goodnight, Evil, Minsc and Boo come to tuck you in!”

“Stand clear, my lady!” Anomen said, stepping in front of her, shield raised. “The might of Helm shall protect you!”

“Move aside, lackey!” Edwin scoffed, shoving the squire in the side, then wincing slightly as he rubbed his aching knuckles. “She is powerful enough that she needn’t hide behind the whining prayers of a man with the intellectual capacity of a common tape-worm, and the brains and personality to match.”

“Quiet, both of you!” Jaheira ordered, approaching the grave. “I sense no unnatural taint here, as I would if there were undead about. There is a living creature down there. I suggest we start digging.”

A few minutes later, a very dirty young man crawled out of the grave, his eyes frantic with fear. He had been shut inside a coffin, tightly bound and gagged. “Oh…bless you my lady, bless you!” he coughed. “The air would not have lasted much longer…”

“Who are you?” Rini asked. “And what happened to you?”

“I…I was kidnapped!” the young man said. “Abducted by strange men, and when my family had paid the ransom they buried me alive, to get rid of me!”

“All men must go in the ground,” Minsc said, “but putting them there while they are alive is very wrong! Please, little Rini, say that we will find the evil ones who did this and put them in graves instead!”

“It is a horrible thing to do to anybody,” the bard said, “but there are other things we must do. Won’t the City Guard be able to handle this?”

The young man shook his head. “Oh no…I can’t report this! These men…they know where I live! They will take vengeance on me and my family if I report this, terrible vengeance! Please…if you find them and take them to justice, I will make certain you are richly rewarded!”

“Now, this is starting to sound more like it,” Edwin said. “We will require exactly the same as the kidnappers got, is that clear? (And it had better be worth it, or this fool may take another dirtnap.)”

The young man nodded eagerly. “Yes, of course!” he said. “When you have the evidence of these men’s deaths, come see me in the Government District. My name is Tirdir, Tirdir Darman.”

“Fine,” Rini said. “We will see to it when we have the time. What can you tell us about these kidnappers?”

“There were three of them. I only saw one, the youngest, the one who set me up. He was wearing bright red clothes, the reddest I have ever seen.” He gave Edwin a worried glance. “Begging your pardon, sir.” Then he held up a small bit of red cloth. “I found this clutched in my hand, I think I must have torn it off of him. It may help you, perhaps.”

“Aye, it should be simple enough,” Anomen said. “We need only examine the wizard’s clothing, no doubt he is the exact villain we seek.”

“Unimaginative dullard,” Edwin sneered. “I do not need to resort to such crude methods of killing. Incinerating a human body is much faster and leaves less traces than burying somebody alive. (And I am starting to feel very much in the mood to experiment…)”

“Och,” Korgan said. “Let’s be savin’ such for after we find yon book. Then ye two laddies may kill each other to yer little hearts’ content, and I be happy to watch ye go about it, as long as I have somethin’ to snack on in the meantime. Such as yer little hearts. Har!”

The mage and the cleric glared quietly at one another, and though they said no more, it was clear that they did not consider the subject closed by any means.

Korgan led the party to one particular tomb, one with a rather odd, triangular roof, and statues outside depicting strange gods that Rini didn’t recognize. At least she presumed they were gods. The animal heads made hear a little unsure, but gods could wear whatever they pleased, she supposed. At least they look better than Dear Old Daddy. Once Jan had picked the lock, the adventurers soon descended into the murky depths below.

It soon became apparent that the tomb was only the beginning, a gate into a veritable maze of dark and winding tunnels, deep below the graveyard. The air was heavy and oppressive, and only the mage lights that Zaerini, Edwin and Jan had conjured provided even the faintest light. Jan’s light proved rather erratic though. It had a pretty way of shimmering in all the colors of the rainbow, but it tended to suddenly start spinning in circles around the gnome’s head, or to shoot off down some unexplored passage, looking for fun. Jan himself was currently kept very busy disarming a nasty trap, one that he claimed would cause a large slab of stone to crush everybody in the vicinity if it went off.

“That is actually one very cheap way of getting slimmer,” he remarked. “Very permanent too. My cousin Osbert would have been very interested in trying it out. He was the fattest gnome you ever saw, ate twenty turnip pies before breakfast and kept yelling for more. He tried everything to lose weight. Dieting and eating only nineteen turnip pies, exercising by letting the City Guards chase him around the block…nothing worked. Eventually he chanced upon this elderly vampire who specialized in fat suction. “

“Fat…suction?” Jaheira said.

“Sure! You know how most vampires suck blood? This one sucked fat. Far more lucrative, people would pay him to gorge himself on them, you know. And that’s what cousin Osbert tried. The vampire tied him to a table, there was a brief sting and a terrible slurping sound…”

“And then he died, I suppose,” the druid said.

“No, no. It worked beautifully. Only problem was, he wound up with so much loose skin hanging in folds all over him that he couldn’t see, and he was run over by a cart the moment he left the clinic. He might have done that to begin with. Same result, and he would have left his poor grieving relatives a greater inheritance than a bonus clip card granting a free nosejob, which was the vampire’s second specialty.”

“I can see why that might be useful,” Edwin said, glancing at the gnome’s large and fleshy proboscis.

“That’s what I thought too,” Jan said, “but sadly enough the vampire was unable to make my nose any bigger. Oh well, the Jansen charm will have to be enough…”

As the adventurers progressed deeper into the tunnel, Rini suddenly felt a light tug at her sleeve, and as she turned her head she found Edwin walking next to her, looking very excited about something. “Hear me,” he whispered. “The time has come to tell you something of great importance, something that you and only you are worthy of knowing beforehand. (It is not as if I trust any of these chimps not to use the precious thing to blow their runny noses in.)”

“Yes, Edwin? What is it?”

The mage lowered his voice even more, so that even the half-elf’s keen ears had to make an effort to hear him, and there was a hungry gleam in his eyes. “I remember something of this place... there are soothsayers and conjurers that whisper in hushed tones about an artifact lost to antiquity... (but not so lost to a perceptive mage.) I've heard rumors, and done a little reading on the subject... Many have muttered the name in frustration... the Nether Scroll.”

“The Nether Scroll, is it?” The bard gave her companion a curious look. “I believe I’ve heard of that, yes. A magical artifact of immense power. You truly believe you have found it?”

“Yes, and yes. Of course, no artifact is too powerful for my unmatched magical prowess and my razor-sharp intellect. (And it will get me just what I want too. Phenomenal cosmic powers, and life and youth eternal – to enable me to forever remain my current flawless self, all the better for her to enjoy, and vice versa of course.)”

“Yeah…but are you sure you know how to deal with it? It’s just that I keep remembering that statue of Kozah you filched from that other tomb, the one that summoned some kind of nasty ghost that tried to kill us all.” ¨

“Of course I know how to deal with it! I have studied it extensively, pouring over many a thick volume of forgotten lore.” The wizard smirked a little, clearly aiming for a sinister look. “Also, I had an 'intense' chat with a diviner that swore it was in Athkatla, buried among the nobles. If I... If we found it we would be formidable indeed. The lower tombs, perhaps?”

“Intense.”

“Yes, well…”

“Just how ‘intense’ are we talking about here?”

Edwin squirmed a little, looking uncomfortable. “Oh, all right. If you must know, I threatened to let the Cowled Wizards know all about his secret passion of dressing up in mundane clothing and pretending to be a non-magical person, running about in the streets with likeminded idiots pretending to be ordinary. Why any wizard would wish to participate in that sort of game I really don’t know. (Of course, I have no need for any such ‘role-playing’ seeing that I am already perfect in every way. Other, lesser beings might well benefit from trying to emulate my magnificence though.)” He gave her a hopeful look. “I might well add that he found me extremely intimidating.”

“Oh,” Rini said, smiling broadly. “I’m sure that he did. And so do I. Very…intimidating.”

Edwin preened a little, looking extremely pleased with himself. “Yes, just you remember it. There is no terror of these dark depths more fearsome than Edwin Odesseiron, and I will obliterate them all rather than let them…” He suddenly broke off. “What was that noise?”

The half-elf turned her head towards the sound, listening. A whispery, chittering noise, as of many legs coming towards them. Many, many, many legs. Then her mage light flared up, and she saw what was heading down the corridor at full speed directly towards them, in a churning black mass of bristly backs, clicking mandibles dripping poison and hairy legs. There seemed to be several dozen of them, and some of them were very large, as large as big dogs. “Spiders…” she said. “I’m pretty sure it was spiders.” Now let’s just hope Tirdir will be the only one to be buried alive this day. Or buried dead, come to think of it.