THREE HUNDRED FORTY SIX
(I/C)
Giving Lannis a rap on the back of the head, Lyra said, “Let’s talk about splitting up the loot later. Those idiots out there are still looking for us and we need to get out of here.”
“Bad horsey, no apple for you,” he answered. “And where do you suggest we trot off to?”
“Move it,” Brendon muttered, pushing past Lannis to check out the fancy carved chair by the desk. “Secret door, remember?”
Giving the key hanging over the altar an introspective glance, Wyn made his way to the table to look at the treasures Lannis had found. “Nice grab at Mira’s box,” he snickered. He picked up the two halves of the mithril arrow and nodded slowly. “I’ll take dis for the big fight wit de dragon,” he said. “Elven in design. Nicely made. I’m gonna guess dat Mirabellis did not bring dis wit her. Most likely found it ‘ere or around de area.” (Add +3, x2 Dragon Slayer Arrow to Magic)
“Mira seems really scared of her dragon buddy to have all that,” Lyra crouched low by the first dead body and began to examine it. “Doesn’t seem like she’s underestimating him, neither should we.”
Lannis was thumbing through the tome on the table and glancing at the two large instruments, noting the pointers and position of each in relation to what was being written. “Why a sextant? It works once, the castle doesn’t move. I don’t get it.”
Starting his look over the wall, Kovid tossed back to Lannis, “Big Brain, keep note of the position and distance marked on those instruments. It might be part of a combination or a clue we can use.”
“Damn, Doc. That’s a stretch.”
“I thought I was Doc, Senor?” Abraxas asked from the door he was listening at.
“That’s what I call you, Doc.” Brendon said running his fingers over the chair with care.
“You don’t own the Doc name, Doc.” The magic user replied with a sniff, still flipping pages. “Let’s get the key and get moving.”
The elf shook his head no. “Hm... I wait to take de key until we find de secret room... or unless de bad guys bust down de door to de Dias room en we have to run. My guess is dat dis is one of de first keys deze idiots,” he pointed to the three dead bodies Lyra was checking over, “tried to take en dey got burned for it. I may be wrong dough.”
“I dunno, has it been an hour yet?” Lannis shrugged. “You’ve been averaging once per waking hour.”
Abraxas was listening intently through the door, (>Hear Noise, +2 sort of quiet, Blue 16) but outside of some far distant noises, nothing was close by yet.
“Stow it, Big Brain.” Kovid moved over a few paces and resumed his search of the wall. “Elf-friend, remember in the baths the Ishtari key had to be inserted into the crab mosaic wall before we unlocked to area with the rod, so we may indeed need to take this key and use it somewhere in here in order to find the secret chamber.”
“Aight. If we gotta we gotta.” The elf picked up the potion next, looking it over, “My tought in de regen potion... eidder Priestess, to make sure she live long enough to bring people back from de dead en keep healin' people, or Monsieur Dwarf, en make sure he give him a potion dat he cen den give to Priestess if she falls.”
“Why not, Doc?” Brendon asked. “He’s going to be running point on Corfard.”
“He already suggested the dwarf,” Lannis replied absently, still flipping pages and looking.
“Doc, dork,” the Scout pointed at Abraxas.
“Monsieur Salazar already be savin dat haste potion fer de dragon,” Wyn offered, “en we cen't be mixin does potions. So he can't have de regen potion.”
"Usas tu cabeza bueno, Señor Wynnington. We no should mix potions. Tu figure out who gets what,” He looked around, “Need me to looking for the secret room que Arika dice us about?”
Kovid waved his hand. “I’ve got it, Abraxas.” He thumbed over at Wyn and Brendon, “And when they’re done between the elf and the Scout, they have a pretty good chance of finding it as well. “
The Fighter nodded, “Si, no pongo, then I will listen for Grinchtoot y Los Gobs."
At this point Brendon dusted off his hands and stood up, pointing at the chair (<Wis Search, +2 thief, Red 9), “Not a bad guess, Kovid. There’s a keyhole right between where our legs go along the front part of the seat of this chair. IN addition, the back legs of the chair do NOT move and are attached to the ground on a pivot. So this chair tilts back,” he tried to move it and it didn’t, “but right now it does NOT move.” He tapped the key hole, “And I’d guess it’s because of this lock here.”
“Opens the secret door?”
Brendon nodded, “That’d be my professional guess.” He turned to the wall. “Let me give Little Man a quick help here.”
“Oui, moi as well,” Wyn walked over, the three of them filling up the western wall in a search for the secret door. “We also may want to split up de raise dead scrolls,” he continued, “in case Priestess get set on fire.”
“Hey! Thanks, I’m right here,” Lyra replied,
“If, Priestesse, If. On de odder hand, for some reason I tink dat de scrolls it take up as much room on one person then when two people hold dem... so if Lyra holds both, it is more space efficient.”
“I’ll take them both, don’t worry. Plus I have some healing scrolls I might use once we get inside the secret room,” she looked up, “that we are still waiting for you three yahoos to find.”
The elf chuckled, and then snapped his fingers. He took out one of his arrows from his quiver and handed it to Brendon ,”Speakin of efficiency, Monsieur du Lac, take dis magic arrow en give me yer magnet arrow. Dis way each of us only us one type.”
“Sounds good to me.” (Wyn remove 1 +2 arrow from Magic, Brendon add 1 +2 arrow to Magic. Brendon remove 1 Doubleshot Arrow from Magic, Wyn add 1 Doubleshot Arrow to Magic.
(Find Secret Doors: >Kovid Yellow 6, >Wyn Orange 6, >Brendon Red 4)
“Well, this book tracks a number of the moon phases as well some star and planet movement for just about 2 centuries,” Lannis commented. “And it’s pretty damned detailed. I only have a passing knowledge of astronomy, but I am a genius,” he quipped, “but whoever did it was really good at their work. I could spend a week on this and still not scratch it all.” He flipped to the front of the book though and stabbed the pages with a finger. “But here, here is something.”
“What is it, Senor?” Abraxas asked.
“I don’t know,” the Magic User replied, “It’s 4 pages, written as a long assed spell. And I don’t know what it’s supposed to do, since I didn’t write the spell and can’t read the magic as written.”
At this point the three men moved back from the wall and frowned. “Was Arik wrong?” Wyn asked.
“He’s been right for the most part about everything else so far,” Kovid said.
“If there is a secret door on that wall,” Brendon shrugged, “I can’t find it.”
“Me neidder.” “Nor I.”
Brendon walked back to the table and looked over the instruments there (<Int check, +2 thief, Red 4). “Well, they’re both pretty old. But so well made and calibrated. Fragile. Heavy as well,” he smiled as he ran his fingers across the brass and glass. “I’d say the Sextant could fetch 100 crowns and the Astrolabe could get us 150 crowns back in Specularum.”
“That’s gotta be at least 15, 20 lbs each,” Kovid noted.
“Not gonna fit in your backpack,” Lannis shrugged.
At this point Lyra picked herself off the ground after examining all three bodies (<Wis check, +2 cleric) and looked down at them. “Based upon our own experiences with touching the keys if you’re not an elf, it hurts, burns, and you back up and let go.”
“Or you get all your money sucked away AND those other things happen,” Brendon sulked.
“True dat.” She pointed to one of the hobgoblins. “But these guys have multiple burns on them, some of them really deep. See how the flesh melted in some places? Someone HELD them against the key, and kept them there until they died.”
“So…dey were murdered?”
“Yep. And then to keep the smell down, they covered the bodies with Natrium. Baking Soda. Kills the smell.”
Lannis nodded slowly, “So you are saying amidst all the wonderful people in Corfard’s employ, we have a murderer as well.”
The Cleric paused and then nodded.
“Oh, thank god. I needed “enemy murderer” to finish out my Halgafar Bingo card.”
“Stuff it, Big Brain,” Kovid pointed at the wall. “There might or not be a secret door there, we have a key hole in chair that needs that key,” he pointed at the wall over the altar, “that was used to kill those three guys lying dead near these windows that someone used those tools, “he pointed again, “to write in that book,” another point, “where something is written in it that the smartest man in his head can’t read because it’s written in magic, even though he tells us repeatedly that he is in fact, a magic user.”
“Take a breath there, drunky,” Lannis warned.
“And we have a number of angry inhabitants hunting us down and they might or might not be outside that door,” he pointed one more time and Abraxas returned a thumbs up and huge smile. “And to bring it all back home again if we take the key it will make a big wind and might attract them if they are anywhere near here. And is there anything I missed?”
“It’s lunch time?” Brendon suggested.
Time now is Day 8, 12:42 PM
(OOC)
Kovid wrapped it up. What’s the plan? Anyone taking anything else from the box? Observations? Ideas?
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