They traveled on throughout the day and were surprised when they had no encounters with anything lurking in the deep of Undermountain. At mid day Kat brought them to a halt inside a small cavern which was an off shoot of the corridor. Everything seemed uncommonly quiet which put the entire party on edge.
"Is this normal?" Gawain finally asked breaking the silence.
The women looked at each other briefly. Kia answered. "No. We should have come across something by now. It's quite rare that we wouldn't have seen anything…"
"It just means something real bad is going to happen soon." Waverly said grimly. "We should start moving again."
In agreement the party traveled on. They hadn't gotten very far when they saw the corridor open up ahead of them. Naciel crept up quietly to the mouth of the hall and peered into the room. The passage opened into a large room at least three times the size of the room they'd slept in the night before. The only items in the room were six large stone statues of Minotaur.
Naciel ran her oh so sensitive fingertips over the edges of the doorway. She ran them along the flooring, and searched for any breaks or cracks. Everything inside of her told her the room was bad news, but there was no going back, and she couldn't find anything. Sighing unhappily she looked at the others. "I can't find anything at all, but it gives me the creepy crawlies. I know there's something wrong there."
Kat raised an eyebrow. It wasn't like Naciel to admit to something like that. The vibes the other girl was getting must be strong indeed. Finally Kat shrugged. "Only way to go is forward."
Nothing happened as the group entered the larger room. There were three doors against the far wall directly across from where they were standing. The first door on the far left was steel, the door in the middle was white marble, and the third door to the far right was thick, brown wood. Scrolled across the wall, starting from the steel door, and not finishing until the wood door, was strange writing. The words were etched deeply into the stone, but they seemed to glow faintly.
"What does it say?" Galahad murmured looking at the strange room. Dagonet and Gawain were studying the strange statues. They knew what they were supposed to be having heard tales of Minotaur as children. Naciel was also searching the statues while the other women searched the rest of the room. Melevey stood beside him, the only woman not moving about. Her amber-green eyes studied the words.
"It's Wizard Tongue." She told him. "There are three riddles. In order for the door to open we must answer the riddles correctly. If answered incorrectly there is a price to pay."
"I found something!" Kat spoke abruptly. Naciel didn't hesitate to leave the area she was crouching to move to Kat's side. The smaller girl felt around and then with a small satisfied grin flicked a small notch hidden in the stone. A panel slid into the wall and it made a heavy scratching sound.
"Lookee lookee." Naciel whispered as she pulled out a large chest which was squeezed inside of the opening.
Before she could open it everyone gathered around to study it. "Look at the craftsmanship." Dagonet seemed awed. Most of the carvings looked like they'd taken years. There was not a rough edge to it.
Tristan's eyes gleamed, "Never have I seen anything like it."
Lancelot's gaze was stuck on Kat who stood sneering down at the chest with loathing and something else he didn't quite recognize. "Spiders." The hatred burning in her eyes was fierce, and her lip curled. "The chest belonged to one who worshiped that evil bitch."
Looking at the chest more closely the party could see that the spiders were intertwined with figures of dark skinned elves. Some of the elves were mutated; their bodies part spider, part elf. Some of the elves were engaged in lurid activities of fornication with both elves, and spider like creatures. Dagonet removed his hands from the chest. Now that he could make out the scenes he found it utterly repulsive. There was even a scene depicting an extremely tall dark woman sacrificing a lighter skinned elf on an altar. Melevey had torn herself away from the writing on the wall and now muttered under her breath and spit on the floor next to the chest. Naciel searched the chest carefully. After several moments she took out a small leather bundle, untied it, and unrolled it to reveal an assortment of long, thin objects.
"What is she doing?" Galahad asked.
"Naciel is our Rogue; she searches for traps in doors, floors, chests. She listens for oncoming troubles, and she is stealthy in many ways." Kat told the man. "She can pick pockets if necessary, pick locks, and is quite good at obtaining information from other sources."
"You mean she's a thief?" The man seemed startled.
"Just another title." Kat shrugged.
All of the men gazed on the small brunette who was busy picking the lock of the chest. "Bugbear's droppings the Drow certainly use nasty locks." She muttered.
"You all knowingly associate with a thief?" Galahad whispered.
Waverly raised one pale eyebrow. "No successful party would be complete without a talented rogue. Luckily, Naciel is extremely talented." The distrust was easy to see now that they knew Naciel's occupation. Waverly approached and spoke very softly for the men's ears alone. "I trust her with my life. Do not presume to know who she is because of her abilities. Naciel would never steal from a member of her party."
A small sigh of satisfaction brought everyone's attention back to her and she looked at everyone with a radiant smile. She'd entirely missed the conversation swirling around above her head. "Got it. I managed to avoid this nasty little present too." She held up a thin, sharp needle in between two fingers. A thin green coating of something could be seen. "Poison, and not the nice sleepy kind either."
"That came off of the chest?" Galahad and Gawain dropped down to look at the needle more closely.
She nodded. "This is a needle trap. Those are quite common, but the poison on it…that's not so common."
"How do you know?" Gawain frowned. All he saw was a green tinge.
She shrugged. "The color, the smell, the way it coats the needle. I've had plenty of practice."
"Never mind all that. Let's open it up and look at what was left behind." Melevey waved impatiently.
Naciel gave a saucy grin and lifted the lid of the chest. There was a faint, musty smell that told them the chest had been closed for a long time. The top was covered by a piece of beige fabric that seemed old and worn. She moved the fabric aside quickly. On top of everything was a small, flat, onyx case. She gave the case a cursory glance and opened it to reveal a set of four wicked looking onyx daggers. Both Naciel, and Tristan drew in deep breaths of awe. She carefully, and somewhat reluctantly, set the case aside and went back to the chest. In the far left corner was a bag holding coins. Naciel handed the bag to Kia to count. Another bag sat to the side and Naciel opened it to reveal a handful of large gems. She set that bag aside as well.
A suit of dark Drow armor was folded in on itself, and under the armor was another small onyx box. That box contained three rings. One of the rings was a plain gold band, one was a plain silver band, and the last was gold and silver entwined and etched with runes. These too were set aside to reveal a pair of boots and a cloak. There were only two other items in the chest; a spellbook and what appeared to be a journal.
"Melevey, is any of it magic?" Waverly asked.
The magic-user moved forward to look at the pile lying at Naciel's feet. "Step out of the way Naciel." She commanded. Everyone moved back. The men watched in awe as she reached into a pouch, threw out some type of dust and spoke several odd sounding words. Their attention was drawn to the pile as different items began to glow faintly. In all; the daggers, the rings, the cloak, the spellbook, and the boots all glowed. "As much as I would love to be able to identify these items now, we really don't have the time."
Kat nodded once briskly. "She's right. We need to get out of here."
"Those words are music to my ears." Dagonet murmured.
"As much as the chest disgusts me….we should keep it." Naciel murmured hesitantly. "We could fetch a high price for it."
"These…dark elves, are they rare?" Gawain asked still seeing the repulsion on the women's' faces.
Naciel and Kat began to push and shove the large chest into the small, odd bag Naciel carried. Melevey regarded Gawain with steady eyes. "They are called Drow. Perhaps when we have more time we can educate you on the evils of our dark-skinned cousins, but for now just know that it is a highly rare occurrence to find one that wouldn't cut you apart given the first opportunity. They are savages. I do not say that out of hate or bias. They would just as soon slit your throat as talk to you. I know of very few that do not embrace evil." Her face was grim. "Some individuals would look at the chest as a unique object; they would see a high value in owning it."
All of the men were gaping as the bag was adjusting to let the chest fit into it. They were even more startled when the bag shrank back into its smaller shape. Naciel slid the bag back onto her back as if it weighed next to nothing. Melevey had turned back to the writing etched into the stone walls.
Melevey spoke the words for all to hear, "I am the part of the bird that is not in the sky; who can drown in the ocean and yet remain dry; A last vestige of man that refuses to die. In mourning I am tossed at your feet to lie; and feast on your body, your soul, without cry."
"What's that supposed to mean?" Naciel's face was screwed up in confusion. "Maybe it's a monster!" As soon as the words left her mouth a loud scraping noise filled the chamber. "Oops." She muttered and turned to see two of the stone Minotaur beginning to move towards the group. Naciel squealed and tumbled to the corner of the room.
"What the bloody hell!" Lancelot yelled in alarm. The men drew their swords and backed away from the stone creations.
"Stone Golems!" Kat cried; her swords were in her hands in a flash. "Melevey, work on the riddles, obviously answering them wrong is not an option!" She swung and her sword slashed into the stone sending sparks and shards of the rock flying. This seemed to enrage the creature, who then proceeded to swing his fist, just barely missing the elf.
A sense of panic invaded Melevey, but she composed herself to try to figure the riddle before one of her party was injured or killed. Her mind whirled as she thought of possible answers. The sounds of battle coming from behind her were quite distracting. It came to her suddenly. "Shadows! The answer is a shadow!" The two golems came to a halt.
She turned to look and saw her friends breathing heavily. Minor flesh wounds seemed to be the only injuries they'd suffered, but the group had managed to take one of the golems down. It looked like they'd banded together to work on one. The other one had taken some damage, but still looked relatively intact. The group looked at each other and realized this might not be as easy as it would seem.
