Althea leaned heavily on her blood-stained spear as she attempted to draw ragged breaths. Around her, the others did the same, panting loudly. The air inside the small room was stifling and thick, tinged with the ever present stench of decay. After regaining her breath somewhat, she allowed herself to sit, trying to find a clean spot on the stone floor. The rest of her companions, a motley assembly of warriors, all had the same idea and collapsed onto the ground, their armor scraping loudly against the stone walls.
"I think…we're safe for the moment, we should rest here for a second," said one of the men, a Paladin.
Beside him, a massively framed Northman sighed and remarked, "Maybe more than a second, boyo, some of us aren't as young as you."
"I'd appreciate if you didn't call me boy, Wuglaf."
"Relax, Pavel," the Northman chuckled tiredly, "I was just saying that we should rest for a while. I need to clean the guts out of my beard anyways."
Pavel took a glance around the room at the exhausted party and reluctantly took a seat next to Wuglaf, still refusing to take off his battered helm. The room was silent, save for some quiet shuffling coming from Althea as she rummaged through her knapsack, looking for a spare cloth to wipe the demon blood from her spear.
"Ana? How about a little light?" Pavel said, looking up into the gloom.
A few seconds later, a petite, raven haired woman walked to the center of the room, a small cube in hand. Ana placed the plain looking cube on the ground and gave it several twists. The box whirred noisily and suddenly the room was enveloped in a reddish light, casting eerie shadows on the walls.
"Thanks," Pavel said as he watched the strange contraption conjure a small, continuous flame.
Ana nodded and seemingly melted back into one of the shadows in the corner.
"That's still unsettling no matter how many times I see it," Yates, the other paladin in the group remarked as he walked over to Pavel, several folded parchments in hand.
"No kidding," Pavel said, noticing the look of worry in his friend's eyes, "Something wrong?"
Yates kneeled in front of Pavel and unfolded the papers on the ground. He ran a hand through his sandy hair and shook his head in frustration. The yellowed document was a map of the catacombs and basements of the Rogue Monastery. Pavel leaned forward towards the map, his blue eyes taking in the multitude of twists and turns.
"Well, I think we're here. Or here. Or maybe here," Yates uttered, placing his finger on each possible location.
Pavel sighed and shut his eyes and racked his brain, desperately trying to remember the path they had taken, a near impossible task considering the constant running and fighting they'd done since entering the monastery.
"Pav, I think we're lost," Yates declared frankly.
Wuglaf laughed suddenly and looked up at Althea, "Maybe if someone hadn't beheaded the guide that the Rogues lent us…"
Althea stopped cleaning her spear and felt four pairs of eyes on her, "Perhaps I'll just let the next one of us that gets bitten by a zombie take a chunk out of your ass, Wuglaf. You probably won't miss it."
"Feisty one, aren't we!" Wuglaf said, a smile crossing his scarred face.
Althea shook her head, annoyed, and returned to her task, switching from cleaning her spear to furiously scrubbing her brass greaves.
"So…what now?" Yates asked.
Pavel said nothing, only removed his steel helm, revealing a thick mane of dirty brown hair. His eyes, once an attractive feature on his face, were now sunken and shadowy.
"Well, what do you think?" He asked in return.
"I don't know, it's hard to tell. The Sisters built this monastery so damn confusing and we haven't really had a chance to stop and do map checks."
"I'm sure whatever route you pick will work out, Yates," Pavel said, rising tiredly.
"Pav…" Yates began, before he felt a hand on his shoulder.
"We all trust you. Just go with your gut. I'll be checking on everyone."
Yates nodded and returned to studying the map intensely, while Pavel walked over to Ana, or rather, where he thought she was. He finally found her sitting cross legged against a pillar, thick spectacles on her face as she intensely studied a multi-colored cube.
"What does this one do? Shoot fireballs or electrocute people?" Pavel asked, leaning on the pillar.
Ana merely shook her head and turned the cube over in her small hands repeatedly, pointing to different colored, seemingly random sections of the object.
"I don't get it…" Pavel said, confused.
Suddenly, her hands became a frenzy of twisting and turning motions, the cube becoming a colorless blur and moments later, the cube transformed from an erratically colored object into a cube with all six sides perfectly aligned and organized by color.
"So it's a puzzle then…amazing," the Paladin remarked, "Did you make it yourself?"
She nodded silently and tossed the object to him. Pavel caught it lightly, half expecting the thing to explode or burst into flames. Seeing that it was safe, he pocketed the object.
"Thanks, I'll give it a try sometime. I doubt I'll be much good at it though," He said, turning to leave, "Is there anything you need? We might be here for a while."
Ana looked up at him through her thick spectacles and shook her head, again silently.
"You know, one of these days we're going to get you to talk."
Wuglaf's rough voice floated from across the room, "Not likely, boyo, her mouth's shut tighter than a --"
"Just help Yates with the map, would you?" Pavel, a hint of exasperation in his voice, cut him off.
The Paladin turned away from Ana and continued his rounds of assessing everyone's condition. He stopped next to other female in their party, Althea. The woman warrior was still attempting to clean the gore that had caked up on her greaves. Her blond hair, normally in a well-kept ponytail, was now dirty and hung disheveled around her face.
"You're going to wear a hole straight through your armor if you keep that up," He said, taking a seat next to her.
"It's been through worse days," She said, inspecting the shin armor she was working on, "I take it we're lost then?"
He scratched the stubble on his chin and looked over to Yates and Wuglaf who were hunched over the faded map, arguing in loud whispers over which way to go.
"No, not lost. We're just stopping for a quick rest and I was tired of listening to Wuglaf 's constant complaining."
"A shame we didn't leave a trail of bread crumbs behind us," She said, smiling slightly.
Pavel raised a quizzical eyebrow, "Breadcrumbs?"
"Oh, it's just from an old story I was told as a child--"
A thunderous crack suddenly filled the entire room, silencing everyone. The group scrambled for their gear and leapt to their feet, eyes scanning the entire room, looking for the source of the sound. There was only one door in the room, making only one entrance and one exit. The first crack was followed by the sound of a second impact, louder than the first. More soon followed until the room was shaking with the steady thundering noise of collapsing stone.
"Where's it coming from?" Yates asked, steel mace and shield held at the ready.
"It's not coming from the door!" Althea attempted to shout over the deafening racket.
"Where then?"
In the corner, Ana carefully wrapped and put her glasses away. Satisfied that they were secure, she placed an ear to the wall and felt the rough stone wall with her bare palm. She quickly stepped away from the wall and pulled on Wuglaf's tunic with surprising strength to get his attention.
"What, woman!" He roared, pulling on his leather gloves.
She pointed to the walls and made an exploding motion with her hands.
"What the bloody hell are you going on about?" Wuglaf shouted, "Speak!"
Exasperated, she ran up and smacked the stone wall repeatedly, mimicking a walking motion with her fingers.
"…Oh, the walls! They're coming through the walls!" The barbarian announced, finally understanding Ana's frantic game of charades.
"Backs to each other! Face the walls! Get ready!" Pavel shouted, brandishing his sword and shield.
The group of warriors all placed their backs to each other in the center of the room, forming a defensive ring that faced outwards, ready to repel an attack from any direction with a veritable wall of swords, spears and hammers. Suddenly, the noise stopped. A thick silence hung in the air as the party held their collective breath, waiting for the inevitable attack. Pavel breathed deeply and shut his eyes. A traditional battle prayer escaped his lips and helped to calm his nerves. He exhaled and opened his eyes just in time to see a section of the wall come flying straight at him.