Neurotic
I plan on living forever. Or die trying.
Why don't you look for halmae saga, lazybones or some other great writers
-
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Sagiro's Story Hour: The FINAL Adventures of Abernathy's Company (FINISHED 7/3/14)
- Thread starter Sagiro
- Start date
Why don't you look for halmae saga, lazybones or some other great writers
I've looked at other Story Hours from time to time. Some of them seem interesting, but the truth is that I've never seen another story that's as across-the-board excellent as Sagiro's is. In terms of writing, plotting -- Sagiro's writing is clear and moves through complex dialectical arguments without ever being dull or pedantic. (This is also to the players' credit, of course. I'm thinking of the episode when the Company had sworn to give up the Crosser's Maze, but couldn't do because it was part of Aravis' physiology. Ernie uttered an on-the-spot profundity: “Wanting the Crosser’s Maze is like wanting the ocean. You can see it, but you cannot hold it. You cannot control it, and no more could we bring it to you, than we could bring the ocean.”)
The fights are filled with D&D specific-mechanics, but the mechanics never overpower the storytelling, as they do in many other campaigns; the mechanics instead serve plot points that actually mean something. Think of the company's transition from low to high-level play, which was marked by the archmages giving up their powers, leaving the company as Charagan's pre-dominant heroes. Think of how that was mirrored by the transition we just saw into epic level play, after the Thousandfold, when the company was supported by Abernia itself. Memorable villains -- Moirel, Condor, Shreen, Belshikun, Octesian -- and characters who only serve a particular story arc feel just as individual and real. Praska, Mokad, the divine animal-rings of Abernia...
Even one-shot characters linger in the mind. There's a woman who appeared for half a page, in Bakersfield, before the "lightless room" and One Certain Step's sacrifice, who I've never forgotten. I just looked her up (StevenAC's collected makes it pretty easy to find this stuff) -- her name was Spindra. She believed that everyone there was suffering their deserved punishment because they had all been consigned to hell. She had no particular plot function to serve, but her presence for half a page added volumes of dimension and depth to my engagement with the story.
It's just the best thing ever.
Chronikoce
First Post
That bit actually sent a shiver through me. I still can't believe I found such an amazing story on an RPG forum. I cannot thank this group and Sagiro especially for taking the time to write this all up. Truly awesome.
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I've been on ENWorld since before the release of D&D 3.0. I've stopped playing pen & paper RPGs (lack of time/group) but I've been coming back for this story hour (and I'd come back for Piratecat's if he ever started writing again) - when it passes, it's going to be the end of an era for me.
Cerebral Paladin
First Post
I hope that at some point Sagiro will start up a new campaign. This Story Hour may be approaching its end, but that doesn't necessarily mean the end of Sagiro story hours in general. 
Sagiro
Rodent of Uncertain Parentage
Thank you all, as always, for the nice comments! But if you're enjoying reading the Story Hour, you largely have yourselves to blame; now that the game is over, I'm mostly writing it because I know so many people are having fun reading it. And also, because if I didn't finish it, StevenAC would likely fly to America and beat me to a pulp.
Sagiro’s Story Hour, Part 389
Checkle’s Bargain
The Navni all wake at the same time the next morning, refreshed for another day, having dreamed their dreams of paradise. The Company briefly considers telling them the truth, that the Dream Lords effectively enslave them for nine hours every night, but decide against it. While they agree that what the Egannic are doing is morally wrong, it is not so heinous as to throw two civilizations into chaos putting an end to it. And the Navni do lead peaceful, happy lives, and are sent back to the waking world each morning with pleasant memories.
Kibi wonders what would happen if they woke a Navni prematurely, assuming that the Egannic alter their memories at the end of each night’s sleep.
“You’d probably ruin the life of that one Navni,” says Aravis. “The others wouldn’t believe him.”
The Company bids a farewell to Epp. She and several other Navni nearby all bow low to Morningstar and wish her good fortune. Morningstar now has in her head a perfect map showing how to reach Leaping Circle Two, and it doesn’t seem difficult. The first stage involves winding through the remainder of the southern portion of the Navni territory, which takes them through long stretches of caves and fields, tunnels and temples. In one of these, a half dozen Navni are nearly finished a thirty-foot tall statue of a Dream Lord, constructed out of a clever melding of fungus and stone. Baskets of fungus are already piled at the statue’s feet, along with a scattering of emeralds and khet chips.
One of the sculptors approaches Morningstar, tentatively, not looking her in the eye. “Your name is Morningstar, yes? Would you like a statue of you? How would you like it to look? Tall? In a certain pose?”
Morningstar considers. “If you want to record that I have been here, how about making an image of this.” She presents her triangle shield. “It’s what is most important to me.” She tells them about Ell, and what She stands for. The Navni are confused to think that Morningstar worships something greater than herself, but they accept her request.
The party moves on, and the Navni population thins as they approach the outskirts of their territory. As they reach one of the last cave-homes, an old Navni waves to them.
“Are you going that way?” he asks, motioning to a wide tunnel snaking away and downward. “You should be careful.”
“Oh? Why?” asks Dranko.
“Our lands used to stretch for many more miles in that direction. Our kingdom was once three times the size it is now. But we abandoned those places. There are Cloakers there. They are creatures that look like blankets, and cling to the ceiling, and will drop upon you. Be wary of them.”
“Thank you,” says Aravis. “We appreciate the warni…”
A little ball of orange flame flares up in midair, in the midst of the gathered Company.
“Not this again,” says Grey Wolf.
It’s the same size as before, slightly larger than an apple. But this time it grows brighter and dimmer, brighter and dimmer, slowly strobing, and makes a crackling sound.
“Are you friend or foe?” Ernie asks it. There is no response, though it hisses a spits out a few small sparks.
“Who are you?” asks Dranko.
It vanishes.
Morningstar immediately casts both detect thoughts and thought capture, but both spells come up empty. Kibi opines that the flame reminds him of a scrying sensor, though it’s obviously more than just that. “Maybe it’s Kay and Sagiro trying to find us?”
But that wouldn’t make sense. The timing doesn’t work, and neither Kay nor Sagiro have that sort of casting ability.
The Company passes out of the Navni’s little kingdom, Morningstar leading the way as they navigate a complex system of tunnels, caves, and steep stairwells. Once, long ago, the Navni occupied all of this space. Did they really flee from Cloakers? Or did the Egannic convince them to become more consolidated, in order to better take advantage of their somnolent slave-labor?
They get a clue to the answer part way through the day, as they enter a tall cavern on the floor of which are twenty-odd bundles, small bones protruding from them. Each in the Company instinctively looks up to check for Cloakers, but the twenty-five foot ceiling is clear. Dranko moves to check out the bundles.
He sees that they are not the past victims of Cloakers, but rather the Cloakers themselves. They’re thicker than the Thousandfold, like rubber sheets. Each one has a hole burned right through its middle. Some of the bodies are also wounded in more conventional ways, slashed or crushed or burned in other places, but someone methodically burned out the heart of each one. Could Meledien be growing stronger each time she vaporizes the soul of a living being?
“I think they’re sending us a message,” says Grey Wolf.
There are no further signs of Cloakers after that. Perhaps when the Navni fled the region, the Cloakers also migrated away in search of sustenance. Two hours later the light motes fade, and Aravis casts their nightly magnificent mansion.
He dreams.
A small bronze urn rests upon an altar to Pikon. Members of the Spire surround it.
Lady Cornelia, High Priestess of Pikon, lifts her hand from the lid of the urn. “He does not wish to return. He has made the ultimate sacrifice for his kingdom, and is at peace.”
Salk bows his head. “He did his job, and did it well.”
To the urn he speaks softly. “Farewell, Octavius. You were truly a master of your craft, and a good man as well.”
Fylnius turns to Belinda the Diviner. “Will Naradawk believe it?”
“I think so,” says Belinda. “I’m not pretending to know what Naradawk might do to ascertain the truth, but I think he’s more likely to question the assassin, and the assassin certainly believes what it saw. Also, I had a final trick up my sleeve; a special anti-divinatory that Chiswick told me I’d need for this sort of occasion. If anyone can keep Naradawk from the truth, even for a while, it’s him.”
“Good, good,” says Duke Nigel. “The Vault of Scrolls has been emptied, its contents distributed. I gather that our forces on Nahalm are hard-pressed. Kynder Hold has been sacked, and now Hae Kalkas is sorely besieged. Some of the scrolls have been teleported there. Others have been sent to Sand’s Edge; our scouts report fifteen thousand orcs marching southward or riding the Norlin River on barges. A few scrolls have been sent to High Priestess Rhiavonne in Kallor, and now she seems more confident that they can repel an invasion with the assistance of the troops from Dimres and Dimrelor. And the final half-dozen or so have gone to the strike team.”
King Crunard IV, very much alive, walks to the body of Octavius Hightower and kneels before it.
“You rest now where our debt to you cannot be repaid. May the Gods reward you properly.”
There is a moment of silence, before Belinda speaks again. “If you don’t mind my asking, how did you discover that Yale had been replaced by a monster? My guild has been wary of the Emperor infiltrating the Spire ever since his arrival, and we have had no inkling at all.”
King Crunard smiles grimly. “We’ve known since the moment it arrived. After every Spire meeting, we’ve had it taken in secret to Rhiavonne in Kallor to have its memories modified. It thinks we believe Naradawk is a demon, and that Ozilinsh’s group was sent to the Abyss to learn how to stop him. It thinks we have no idea what we’re really up against. It even thinks it’s been spying on us much longer than it really has. But the most important thing was for Naradawk to believe the Scrolls had been destroyed, which it seems likely he now does.”
Belinda frowns. “But how did you discover Yale had been replaced in the first place?”
The King smiles again. “Naradawk may be powerful, but we have our own ally that may be his equal. Parthol Runecarver told me. He even knew the day that the monster was going to kill me. When I asked Parthol why he was helping us, he gave the same answer as before: that Naradawk is merely a servant of the Adversary, and neither is likely to do Abernia any good in the long run. As such, he dislikes Naradawk Skewn just as much as we do. The enemy of my enemy, as they say.”
The High Stormknight Dalesandro snorts. “But we still can’t trust him, can we?”
“No,” says Salk. “But we need him. If he can help defend against Naradawk and his allies, we’ll take that help. If and when Naradawk is no more, we can place Parthol under greater scrutiny.”
There is much cheering the next morning when Aravis retells his latest vision. The Spire is not so helpless against Naradawk as it seemed, and that’s two promising dreams in a row.
Wind walk has stopped working, this far beneath the surface. Kibi can feel a palpable increase in the ambient Earth Magic, and it thrills him. The pulse of abernia warms his fingers when he holds it. Traveling by phantom steed, they arrive at the proper coordinates of Leaping Circle Two at mid-day. There’s a final tunnel that presumably leads to it, but its ceiling has been deliberately collapsed.
“Did Meledien think this would slow us down?” asks Dranko.
“It wasn’t her,” says Kibi, looking at the tumbled stones. “This cave-in is decades old at least.”
Someone has cleared out the rocks at the top of the pile, allowing one to crawl along just beneath the fractured ceiling. It couldn’t scream out “trap” any louder, so they send Scree under the rockfall to see how far it goes.
“The collapse goes on about thirty feet,” Scree reports. “There’s a big circular room on the other side of it, with a Leaping Circle in it. Only the tunnel is collapsed; the Leaping Circle is undamaged. I don’t see any Cloakers, or anything else dangerous. There are four other tunnels leading out of the Leaping Circle room, but they’ve all caved in like ours.”
Still untrusting of the situation, Dranko casts moment of peril to see if there’s danger upcoming, and gets a result of “safety.” Ernie casts true seeing and inspects the rubble, while Aravis casts greater arcane sight and does the same. There are no magical auras on this side of the cave-in, or anything concealed magically.
Aravis uses his staff to make a passwall tunnel through to the Leaping Circle room, and once Dranko and Flicker are through they sweep the place for physical traps. It’s clear. Other than the five truncated corridors leading out of it, the only feature in the room is the fifty-foot-diameter Leaping Circle set into the floor.
What’s missing, Kibi realizes, is an instruction tablet. There’s no sign that there ever was one.
Hm.
Kibi casts stone tell and queries the wall of the room.
“Hello, Kibilahthur,” says the stone. “It’s an honor to speak with you.”
“Hello,” says Kibi. “Could you tell me if anyone arrived here recently, other than us?”
“Three people were here, not long ago by our standards but maybe by yours. They went into the metal circle and disappeared.”
“Do you know what they did to make themselves disappear?”
“One of them was speaking aloud for several days. Just like other people used to do, long ago.”
“Was that person reading something?”
“No, I don’t think so.”
“Did they collapse or destroy anything?”
“No. They crawled over the rubble, coming from the same way as you. Three bipeds, like you. A short one, and two taller ones. One of the taller ones spoke for several days, waving his arms. He had a crown of metal upon his head.”
Not helpful. “Do you know how we might activate the Circle?” Kibi asks.
“Have you tried chanting and waving your arms?”
Kibi sighs. He runs his fingers along the wall, feeling the deep-bones power of Abernia. “You are good rock,” he says. “When someone vanishes out of the Circle, are you involved in its magic?”
“No, no. I do not wish to go anywhere. I am one place, and this is it. Kibilhathur, you also understand the importance of being one place, but not yet.”
Before Kibi can ask the stone about this cryptic comment, there is a popping sound behind him. Someone has appeared in the room with them. It’s Checkle, the little half-mad kobold creature that last appeared in the Drevin’s feasting hall.
The creature – a Keffet – looks around with quick, twitchy motions.
“Hi. Hi. Oh, good, it’s you. Right. I knew it would be. Are you awake yet?”
Morningstar regards him curiously. “I am awake.”
“Are you sure? I have to tell you something, but one of us is still sleeping, and I don’t know who.”
“Just tell us,” says Dranko impatiently.
“Yes, yes,” says Checkle. “It’s that.. I… we’re going to… oh, it’s all so much clearer when I’m awake. But it’s important. I said before you would need something from me, and now is when you need it, and I still have it! So here I am, awake for you, and sleeping.”
Checkle pauses, rubs his eyes, tugs on his stringy hair. He looks imploringly at Morningstar. “Can you quiet my mind, please? It’s very loud in here, and confusing, and I don’t know which is the waking part and which is the sleeping part anymore. But there are a lot of things I know, and one of those things you need to know, so if you could just quiet me down a bit… I’d appreciate that…”
Morningstar quickly drops into Ava Dormo, thinking Checkle might be there as well, but the immediate Dreamscape is empty.
“You can do something, I know it!” Checkle shouts at her. “But don’t go to sleep. If you do, they’ll get you! You know what I’m talking about.”
Morningstar nods. “So you know the truth about the Mind Cows?”
“Yes, I do! And I’m going to tell you that truth! But you are not asleep, and I am not awake. But soon I will be. It’s so noisy here I can’t think, but I have it all here.” The Keffet taps his head knowlingly.
Ernie and Aravis can see there’s no magic on Checkle, no spell causing him to be here.
“What do you need to tell me?” Morningstar asks, soothingly.
“I… almost know what it is. I knew it a minute ago, and I’ll know it again soon. I’ll have to fall back asleep for that. It’s so hard to think while I’m awake.”
Morningstar has an idea. She bestows protective sleep upon him, and then brings him into Ava Dormo with her. He immediately wakes up, and the edge of confusion is gone from his voice, though he’s still twitchy and a bit manic.
He looks about. “Thank you. Now I’m home. Except that… I’m not. I understand it now. It’s all about the Egannic and us. That’s why we ended up the way we did. Nobody remembers anymore, except for me. We’ve all been born again too many times. We’ve always… no, not always. For a long, long time we’ve been at war with the Egannic. Once upon a time we were all awake. But we were powerful in Dream, the Keffet and Egannic, so powerful. We would war in the waking world, and war in the Dreaming. Two fronts.”
Morningstar motions for him to continue.
“But the Dreaming war was more important,” says Checkle. “In the Dreaming, you could affect the waking, more easily than the other way around. So we started sending in permanent dreamers to do battle. We’d put people into permanent sleep, ageless, staying in Ava Dormo forever. We did that more and more, and so did the Egannic. Eventually, the last of us, and the last of them, went to sleep. And the fighting didn’t stop. We are all asleep, and they are all asleep, whole races hidden away, sleeping and fighting forever in the Dreaming. And each side thinks that the other has some artifact, or power, or source, that is why we cannot kill them. You kill them, and they come back. But that’s not what’s happening! As soon as someone dies, we go right back in. Our minds may return to our sleeping bodies for the smallest of fractions of seconds, and then we’re back, fighting again. We don’t realize that we’re dying, and we don’t understand why the Egannic keep returning.”
“Your bodies don’t die of old age?” asks Morningstar.
“We’re in stasis. We have to be. It’s the only way to make it work. We are all of us in stasis, in giant caverns built to house our sleeping bodies. Tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, and nobody knows but me. They’ve all forgotten. But I can see back, through all of my memories. I remember the vats, climbing into mine, going to sleep for the last time.”
He shudders and hugs himself.
“But that’s all going to end now, because of you. Because you are going to wake us up! We have been asleep long enough, Morningstar. We are going to end the war, because…” And here Checkle leans in and whispers conspiratorially. “…because I know where they’re sleeping. When we are all awake, we will march to their sleeping places, and fall upon them, and then there will be no more Egannic. We will wake our people from a slumber that we never should have entered. And when we are awake…”
Checkle motions to the Leaping Circle, a gleam in his eye.
“I will tell you how that works.”
…to be continued…
Sagiro’s Story Hour, Part 389
Checkle’s Bargain
The Navni all wake at the same time the next morning, refreshed for another day, having dreamed their dreams of paradise. The Company briefly considers telling them the truth, that the Dream Lords effectively enslave them for nine hours every night, but decide against it. While they agree that what the Egannic are doing is morally wrong, it is not so heinous as to throw two civilizations into chaos putting an end to it. And the Navni do lead peaceful, happy lives, and are sent back to the waking world each morning with pleasant memories.
Kibi wonders what would happen if they woke a Navni prematurely, assuming that the Egannic alter their memories at the end of each night’s sleep.
“You’d probably ruin the life of that one Navni,” says Aravis. “The others wouldn’t believe him.”
The Company bids a farewell to Epp. She and several other Navni nearby all bow low to Morningstar and wish her good fortune. Morningstar now has in her head a perfect map showing how to reach Leaping Circle Two, and it doesn’t seem difficult. The first stage involves winding through the remainder of the southern portion of the Navni territory, which takes them through long stretches of caves and fields, tunnels and temples. In one of these, a half dozen Navni are nearly finished a thirty-foot tall statue of a Dream Lord, constructed out of a clever melding of fungus and stone. Baskets of fungus are already piled at the statue’s feet, along with a scattering of emeralds and khet chips.
One of the sculptors approaches Morningstar, tentatively, not looking her in the eye. “Your name is Morningstar, yes? Would you like a statue of you? How would you like it to look? Tall? In a certain pose?”
Morningstar considers. “If you want to record that I have been here, how about making an image of this.” She presents her triangle shield. “It’s what is most important to me.” She tells them about Ell, and what She stands for. The Navni are confused to think that Morningstar worships something greater than herself, but they accept her request.
The party moves on, and the Navni population thins as they approach the outskirts of their territory. As they reach one of the last cave-homes, an old Navni waves to them.
“Are you going that way?” he asks, motioning to a wide tunnel snaking away and downward. “You should be careful.”
“Oh? Why?” asks Dranko.
“Our lands used to stretch for many more miles in that direction. Our kingdom was once three times the size it is now. But we abandoned those places. There are Cloakers there. They are creatures that look like blankets, and cling to the ceiling, and will drop upon you. Be wary of them.”
“Thank you,” says Aravis. “We appreciate the warni…”
A little ball of orange flame flares up in midair, in the midst of the gathered Company.
“Not this again,” says Grey Wolf.
It’s the same size as before, slightly larger than an apple. But this time it grows brighter and dimmer, brighter and dimmer, slowly strobing, and makes a crackling sound.
“Are you friend or foe?” Ernie asks it. There is no response, though it hisses a spits out a few small sparks.
“Who are you?” asks Dranko.
It vanishes.
Morningstar immediately casts both detect thoughts and thought capture, but both spells come up empty. Kibi opines that the flame reminds him of a scrying sensor, though it’s obviously more than just that. “Maybe it’s Kay and Sagiro trying to find us?”
But that wouldn’t make sense. The timing doesn’t work, and neither Kay nor Sagiro have that sort of casting ability.
The Company passes out of the Navni’s little kingdom, Morningstar leading the way as they navigate a complex system of tunnels, caves, and steep stairwells. Once, long ago, the Navni occupied all of this space. Did they really flee from Cloakers? Or did the Egannic convince them to become more consolidated, in order to better take advantage of their somnolent slave-labor?
They get a clue to the answer part way through the day, as they enter a tall cavern on the floor of which are twenty-odd bundles, small bones protruding from them. Each in the Company instinctively looks up to check for Cloakers, but the twenty-five foot ceiling is clear. Dranko moves to check out the bundles.
He sees that they are not the past victims of Cloakers, but rather the Cloakers themselves. They’re thicker than the Thousandfold, like rubber sheets. Each one has a hole burned right through its middle. Some of the bodies are also wounded in more conventional ways, slashed or crushed or burned in other places, but someone methodically burned out the heart of each one. Could Meledien be growing stronger each time she vaporizes the soul of a living being?
“I think they’re sending us a message,” says Grey Wolf.
There are no further signs of Cloakers after that. Perhaps when the Navni fled the region, the Cloakers also migrated away in search of sustenance. Two hours later the light motes fade, and Aravis casts their nightly magnificent mansion.
He dreams.
A small bronze urn rests upon an altar to Pikon. Members of the Spire surround it.
Lady Cornelia, High Priestess of Pikon, lifts her hand from the lid of the urn. “He does not wish to return. He has made the ultimate sacrifice for his kingdom, and is at peace.”
Salk bows his head. “He did his job, and did it well.”
To the urn he speaks softly. “Farewell, Octavius. You were truly a master of your craft, and a good man as well.”
Fylnius turns to Belinda the Diviner. “Will Naradawk believe it?”
“I think so,” says Belinda. “I’m not pretending to know what Naradawk might do to ascertain the truth, but I think he’s more likely to question the assassin, and the assassin certainly believes what it saw. Also, I had a final trick up my sleeve; a special anti-divinatory that Chiswick told me I’d need for this sort of occasion. If anyone can keep Naradawk from the truth, even for a while, it’s him.”
“Good, good,” says Duke Nigel. “The Vault of Scrolls has been emptied, its contents distributed. I gather that our forces on Nahalm are hard-pressed. Kynder Hold has been sacked, and now Hae Kalkas is sorely besieged. Some of the scrolls have been teleported there. Others have been sent to Sand’s Edge; our scouts report fifteen thousand orcs marching southward or riding the Norlin River on barges. A few scrolls have been sent to High Priestess Rhiavonne in Kallor, and now she seems more confident that they can repel an invasion with the assistance of the troops from Dimres and Dimrelor. And the final half-dozen or so have gone to the strike team.”
King Crunard IV, very much alive, walks to the body of Octavius Hightower and kneels before it.
“You rest now where our debt to you cannot be repaid. May the Gods reward you properly.”
There is a moment of silence, before Belinda speaks again. “If you don’t mind my asking, how did you discover that Yale had been replaced by a monster? My guild has been wary of the Emperor infiltrating the Spire ever since his arrival, and we have had no inkling at all.”
King Crunard smiles grimly. “We’ve known since the moment it arrived. After every Spire meeting, we’ve had it taken in secret to Rhiavonne in Kallor to have its memories modified. It thinks we believe Naradawk is a demon, and that Ozilinsh’s group was sent to the Abyss to learn how to stop him. It thinks we have no idea what we’re really up against. It even thinks it’s been spying on us much longer than it really has. But the most important thing was for Naradawk to believe the Scrolls had been destroyed, which it seems likely he now does.”
Belinda frowns. “But how did you discover Yale had been replaced in the first place?”
The King smiles again. “Naradawk may be powerful, but we have our own ally that may be his equal. Parthol Runecarver told me. He even knew the day that the monster was going to kill me. When I asked Parthol why he was helping us, he gave the same answer as before: that Naradawk is merely a servant of the Adversary, and neither is likely to do Abernia any good in the long run. As such, he dislikes Naradawk Skewn just as much as we do. The enemy of my enemy, as they say.”
The High Stormknight Dalesandro snorts. “But we still can’t trust him, can we?”
“No,” says Salk. “But we need him. If he can help defend against Naradawk and his allies, we’ll take that help. If and when Naradawk is no more, we can place Parthol under greater scrutiny.”
There is much cheering the next morning when Aravis retells his latest vision. The Spire is not so helpless against Naradawk as it seemed, and that’s two promising dreams in a row.
Wind walk has stopped working, this far beneath the surface. Kibi can feel a palpable increase in the ambient Earth Magic, and it thrills him. The pulse of abernia warms his fingers when he holds it. Traveling by phantom steed, they arrive at the proper coordinates of Leaping Circle Two at mid-day. There’s a final tunnel that presumably leads to it, but its ceiling has been deliberately collapsed.
“Did Meledien think this would slow us down?” asks Dranko.
“It wasn’t her,” says Kibi, looking at the tumbled stones. “This cave-in is decades old at least.”
Someone has cleared out the rocks at the top of the pile, allowing one to crawl along just beneath the fractured ceiling. It couldn’t scream out “trap” any louder, so they send Scree under the rockfall to see how far it goes.
“The collapse goes on about thirty feet,” Scree reports. “There’s a big circular room on the other side of it, with a Leaping Circle in it. Only the tunnel is collapsed; the Leaping Circle is undamaged. I don’t see any Cloakers, or anything else dangerous. There are four other tunnels leading out of the Leaping Circle room, but they’ve all caved in like ours.”
Still untrusting of the situation, Dranko casts moment of peril to see if there’s danger upcoming, and gets a result of “safety.” Ernie casts true seeing and inspects the rubble, while Aravis casts greater arcane sight and does the same. There are no magical auras on this side of the cave-in, or anything concealed magically.
Aravis uses his staff to make a passwall tunnel through to the Leaping Circle room, and once Dranko and Flicker are through they sweep the place for physical traps. It’s clear. Other than the five truncated corridors leading out of it, the only feature in the room is the fifty-foot-diameter Leaping Circle set into the floor.
What’s missing, Kibi realizes, is an instruction tablet. There’s no sign that there ever was one.
Hm.
Kibi casts stone tell and queries the wall of the room.
“Hello, Kibilahthur,” says the stone. “It’s an honor to speak with you.”
“Hello,” says Kibi. “Could you tell me if anyone arrived here recently, other than us?”
“Three people were here, not long ago by our standards but maybe by yours. They went into the metal circle and disappeared.”
“Do you know what they did to make themselves disappear?”
“One of them was speaking aloud for several days. Just like other people used to do, long ago.”
“Was that person reading something?”
“No, I don’t think so.”
“Did they collapse or destroy anything?”
“No. They crawled over the rubble, coming from the same way as you. Three bipeds, like you. A short one, and two taller ones. One of the taller ones spoke for several days, waving his arms. He had a crown of metal upon his head.”
Not helpful. “Do you know how we might activate the Circle?” Kibi asks.
“Have you tried chanting and waving your arms?”
Kibi sighs. He runs his fingers along the wall, feeling the deep-bones power of Abernia. “You are good rock,” he says. “When someone vanishes out of the Circle, are you involved in its magic?”
“No, no. I do not wish to go anywhere. I am one place, and this is it. Kibilhathur, you also understand the importance of being one place, but not yet.”
Before Kibi can ask the stone about this cryptic comment, there is a popping sound behind him. Someone has appeared in the room with them. It’s Checkle, the little half-mad kobold creature that last appeared in the Drevin’s feasting hall.
The creature – a Keffet – looks around with quick, twitchy motions.
“Hi. Hi. Oh, good, it’s you. Right. I knew it would be. Are you awake yet?”
Morningstar regards him curiously. “I am awake.”
“Are you sure? I have to tell you something, but one of us is still sleeping, and I don’t know who.”
“Just tell us,” says Dranko impatiently.
“Yes, yes,” says Checkle. “It’s that.. I… we’re going to… oh, it’s all so much clearer when I’m awake. But it’s important. I said before you would need something from me, and now is when you need it, and I still have it! So here I am, awake for you, and sleeping.”
Checkle pauses, rubs his eyes, tugs on his stringy hair. He looks imploringly at Morningstar. “Can you quiet my mind, please? It’s very loud in here, and confusing, and I don’t know which is the waking part and which is the sleeping part anymore. But there are a lot of things I know, and one of those things you need to know, so if you could just quiet me down a bit… I’d appreciate that…”
Morningstar quickly drops into Ava Dormo, thinking Checkle might be there as well, but the immediate Dreamscape is empty.
“You can do something, I know it!” Checkle shouts at her. “But don’t go to sleep. If you do, they’ll get you! You know what I’m talking about.”
Morningstar nods. “So you know the truth about the Mind Cows?”
“Yes, I do! And I’m going to tell you that truth! But you are not asleep, and I am not awake. But soon I will be. It’s so noisy here I can’t think, but I have it all here.” The Keffet taps his head knowlingly.
Ernie and Aravis can see there’s no magic on Checkle, no spell causing him to be here.
“What do you need to tell me?” Morningstar asks, soothingly.
“I… almost know what it is. I knew it a minute ago, and I’ll know it again soon. I’ll have to fall back asleep for that. It’s so hard to think while I’m awake.”
Morningstar has an idea. She bestows protective sleep upon him, and then brings him into Ava Dormo with her. He immediately wakes up, and the edge of confusion is gone from his voice, though he’s still twitchy and a bit manic.
He looks about. “Thank you. Now I’m home. Except that… I’m not. I understand it now. It’s all about the Egannic and us. That’s why we ended up the way we did. Nobody remembers anymore, except for me. We’ve all been born again too many times. We’ve always… no, not always. For a long, long time we’ve been at war with the Egannic. Once upon a time we were all awake. But we were powerful in Dream, the Keffet and Egannic, so powerful. We would war in the waking world, and war in the Dreaming. Two fronts.”
Morningstar motions for him to continue.
“But the Dreaming war was more important,” says Checkle. “In the Dreaming, you could affect the waking, more easily than the other way around. So we started sending in permanent dreamers to do battle. We’d put people into permanent sleep, ageless, staying in Ava Dormo forever. We did that more and more, and so did the Egannic. Eventually, the last of us, and the last of them, went to sleep. And the fighting didn’t stop. We are all asleep, and they are all asleep, whole races hidden away, sleeping and fighting forever in the Dreaming. And each side thinks that the other has some artifact, or power, or source, that is why we cannot kill them. You kill them, and they come back. But that’s not what’s happening! As soon as someone dies, we go right back in. Our minds may return to our sleeping bodies for the smallest of fractions of seconds, and then we’re back, fighting again. We don’t realize that we’re dying, and we don’t understand why the Egannic keep returning.”
“Your bodies don’t die of old age?” asks Morningstar.
“We’re in stasis. We have to be. It’s the only way to make it work. We are all of us in stasis, in giant caverns built to house our sleeping bodies. Tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, and nobody knows but me. They’ve all forgotten. But I can see back, through all of my memories. I remember the vats, climbing into mine, going to sleep for the last time.”
He shudders and hugs himself.
“But that’s all going to end now, because of you. Because you are going to wake us up! We have been asleep long enough, Morningstar. We are going to end the war, because…” And here Checkle leans in and whispers conspiratorially. “…because I know where they’re sleeping. When we are all awake, we will march to their sleeping places, and fall upon them, and then there will be no more Egannic. We will wake our people from a slumber that we never should have entered. And when we are awake…”
Checkle motions to the Leaping Circle, a gleam in his eye.
“I will tell you how that works.”
…to be continued…
Mathew_Freeman
First Post
Sagiro, with that last line of "...I will tell you how it works" you provoked a throaty appreciative chuckle from me. Thank you.
Also - like others, I've been reading this Story Hour since at least the early 3e days. I honestly can't remember when I first picked this up. To face the idea that it's somehow going to finish, well, it's kind of sad. I also know that it cannot possibly have the kind of ultimate finale that would match the hours of pleasure I've had reading through all of this. I know that on some level any ending will be a little disappointing.
But you know what? That's FINE. That's actually, completely and utterly fine. I've already had so, so many brilliant memories of reading this that you cannot possibly let me down, because I can always go back and re-read some of my favourite fantasy literature ever. I've even had the pleasure of meeting KidCthulhu and Piratecat and they're even more delightful in person that I'd have hoped.
However, if or when I ever get to meet you, Sagiro... man, I owe you a beer or a dessert or something. At the very least you're getting a manly hug or a hearty handshake.
Now, and with full respect for the fact that you have a life and other things to get on with...more, please?
Also - like others, I've been reading this Story Hour since at least the early 3e days. I honestly can't remember when I first picked this up. To face the idea that it's somehow going to finish, well, it's kind of sad. I also know that it cannot possibly have the kind of ultimate finale that would match the hours of pleasure I've had reading through all of this. I know that on some level any ending will be a little disappointing.
But you know what? That's FINE. That's actually, completely and utterly fine. I've already had so, so many brilliant memories of reading this that you cannot possibly let me down, because I can always go back and re-read some of my favourite fantasy literature ever. I've even had the pleasure of meeting KidCthulhu and Piratecat and they're even more delightful in person that I'd have hoped.
However, if or when I ever get to meet you, Sagiro... man, I owe you a beer or a dessert or something. At the very least you're getting a manly hug or a hearty handshake.
Now, and with full respect for the fact that you have a life and other things to get on with...more, please?
Sagiro
Rodent of Uncertain Parentage
Briefly: Octavius Hightower was the leader of the Starshine Players, who served as spies for Dranko's thieves' guild. In that capacity he was a master of disguise. In case it wasn't clear from Aravis's vision, the Spire had known (from Parthol) that a monster had killed Yale and was impersonating her. They knew its job was to gain the King's trust, and by extension access to the Spire's store of ancient and powerful scrolls. They allowed the monster to think it was succeeding, going so far as to have Octavius pretend to be the King so that the monster could kill him, thus making certain that it would report back to Naradawk, with utter surety, that it had carried out its mission.
