Chapter Nine
"Fear"
"Never fear shadows... they simply mean there's a light somewhere nearby shining."
The four took each step down the bending stairway with more care and caution than the previous one before it. Quancy held his ebony staff over his head hardly concentrating on the globes of light revolving around him and his companions. Tryshra stood behind him holding her arm up to keep it from hitting the stone stairs on her way down while Ojas was in lock step with the warrior, his spear held out prodding the darkness. Rose followed up the rear with a weary expression etched across her face but with her sling at her side ready and loaded with another stone. She reminded herself she only had six left and given the reaction that her first shot caused, she needed to make sure she made every stone count as her eyes peered about the descending stairway and avoiding the creeping thoughts of the structure caving in on her.
Ojas motioned for the druidess to hurry down and Rose nodded then forced her bare feet to obey. The stairs turned sharply in two directions and both turned in the opposite direction after several feet and descended deeper into the ground. Rose sworn that it seemed to get much darker and more importantly much smaller after each step she took. Rose's every breath become a struggle as she stood on the platform that lead to the two opposing stairways.
Quancy glared at the girl and put a finger to his lips. Only then did Rose notice how loud she was inhaling. Rose covered her mouth while Ojas pointed for Trysh to go to the other stair way and waved the rogue with him.
Trysh grabbed the girl's arm and lead her to the stairs on their right and pointed at the top step then to the girl several times. Rose nodded understanding that she needed to remain there and keep watch as the warrior walked the dozen steps into the gloomy room beneath. Rose couldn't make out much of the room, it was so dark in most of it but anyone with any semblance of sight could notice the blue glow emanating from the human sized statue that stood in the middle of the stone room. All around the statue stood piles of debris, most of which the druidess couldn't discern but she could tell that most of it wasn't useful anymore after spotting handfuls of torn up tomes and chucks of worked stone.
Quancy stood atop the other set of stairs and watched as the shaman and the warrior moved over the debris laden floor with soft steps trying to avoid any unseen pitfalls. The rogue unveiled a shimmering dagger from a pouch that seemed far too small to fit the weapon normally while Rose tried to keep her hands from quivering.
Tryshra's eyes circled the room as she stopped on the side of an odd statue that rested just outside of the blue radiance, then rest a hand on the rough stone work as her eyes meet Quancy seeming to wonder what to do next. Quancy's lavender eyes grew twice their size and in less than a heartbeat he sent the glimmer blade careening downward toward the statue.
"Get back," Quancy yelled as he sprinted down the stairway, "It's…"
The stone lurched, its hand reaching out toward the woman. Ojas ran over to the creatures side and stab at it with his spear sending piece of the hard sod of the creature. The beast growled as he missed grasping the warrior. Trysh ducked under the hand and awkwardly rolled to the creatures side then punched at the stone beat with her abnormal arm. Rose had started to head down the stairs after seeing Ojas run across the room and then hearing the sounds of the combat only to have her path stopped by a temple guard.
"You don't belong here little girl," the guard said as he reach to grabbed the girl. Rose dodged the smirking guard whose skin looked unnaturally gray lacking any kind of true color at all.
Then Rose saw another guard with the same pigmentation skulk behind the wall toward where Ojas headed. Rose turned and stumbled up the stairs hoping that she could get some distance between her and the shadow faced guardsmen.
Ojas stepped back as the creature eyes him lividly. Then the creature that stood a head taller than the shaman clasped his hands together and swung down on Ojas. The shaman dodged to the left at the last minute but the creatures oversized fist still connected with him sending the shaman tumbling on the ground from the blow. Quancy muttered an incantation as he stared at the shadows on the ground then as the creature hit the shaman a weave of inky darkness covered the sinister object. Ojas rolled to his knee as he saw the creature covered in what to him looked like a net made of shadows. Trysh grabbed at the creatures feet and pulled it from under him sending a thunderous tremor through the room.
"So much for stealth," Quancy said as he ran forward and grabbed his dagger.
"Indeed," a deep voice spoke before emerging from the shadows with a slender sword in one hand and a thick steel shield in the other, "You should leave that to those that the Lady has blessed."
Quancy took a step back to gather his dagger in a defensive position as the gray guard rushed toward him with his sword held over his head. Trysh punched into the darkness on the ground furiously occasionally landing a punch from the deafening clang of metal hitting solid stone. Ojas stood up as he saw the druidess dash down the opposite stairs she had once stood on, her eyes filled with terror. Ojas gripped his spear and limped forward in an effort to intercept what he assumed what chasing the girl. Nothing came as the druidess circled behind him and raised her sling at the ready toward the darkness.
The rogue deflected the first slash by the guardsmen as he pleaded, "You have been duped, no here truly worships Mystra… I am here to help you."
The guard scoffed as he swung brutally at the tiefling's head, "A demonkin has come to help… and I am King Azoun himself."
Quancy ducked the attack which scraped against the wall behind the thief as he continued to plead, "Look at what they did to you… the taint of the darkness is on you as much as it is on me."
The guard paused a moment as the rogue maneuvered away from the incoming corner and toward the stairs. The black, lifeless eyes of the guard closed, "Mystra's hand touch me… she said none would understand."
Quancy shook his head, "I wouldn't… but I doubt that it was Mystra's hand that..."
"Liar," the guard screamed as he rushed toward the rogue with a furry of slashes aimed wildly.
Rose finally giving up hope that the guard she saw… or thought she saw was still coming for her she aimed her sling at the ball of shadow and let loss the stone.
The stone creature was released from the mesh of inkiness and rested in crumbles on the ground as the warrior punch at it still. Rose ignore the woman and saw the rogue in trouble across the room then place another stone in her sling and let it lose. The guard moved, unintentionally out of the way of the stone trying to hit the elusive rogue. Ojas charged the guard with his spear held out in front of his mid section. The spearhead staggered of the hue-less armor of the guard with a sickening toll. Rose fired another stone then cursed her aim as it flew a few inches over the guard.
"Why continue this fight," Quancy asked as he used his staff to deflect one blow then his dagger to parry another, "You are outmanned and outmatched."
"Mystra's grace will be with me even in death," the guard said as he feigned a cross slash then brought the hilt of his blade down on the hand of the rogue sending the staff the was once in his hand and the orbs of light the danced around him to the ground.
Ojas punctured the guards back with a well placed stab between the plates of the guard but it did nothing to stop the gray swirl from attack the rogue.
Quancy kicked at the guards shin but it did nothing but leave him open for a well paced slash across his shoulder which opened up and bled out in a few heartbeats.
Rose clenched her eyes close as she released her forth stone and didn't open them until she heard the crunch of thuder fill the room. As she opened her eyes slowly she saw nothing but a black and gray and red pool twisted on the ground and for a moment she thought she had hit the rogue. Then she noticed a small horn in the pile move.
Ojas pushed the gray figure off the tiefling and tried to pull the rogue up forget about the wounds he had suffered and fell down next to the rogue.
Rose paced inside the stone tile she stood on filling her leather sling with another pebble bullet, her sandstone eyes searching from the other temple guard feverishly.
Tryshra kicked a thick piece of the creature as she stood up, "What in the name of the Abyss was that thing."
Quancy and Ojas shrugged as they gathered themselves.
"An earth elemental," Rose said quietly still ongaurd for the black eyed shade, "It wasn't a normal on though."
Tryshra looked down at the piecemeal elemental, "Why do you think it attacked us."
"Everything here smells," Rose stopped and sniffed as she thought of the right word, "Spoiled."
"Tainted," added Ojas, "The spirits here are incoherent."
Rose started to say something.
"They don't speak with their right mind," Ojas clarified.
Rose nodded as she informed, "There are more of those shadowy temple guards… well at least one."
Tryshra grabbed the blade from the guard nearest her that lay between the pile of elemental and the spinning druidess, "Let's sniff him out then. Must be afraid of us."
"Nothing of the sort," a voice circled the cavernous room, "I like the intrigue of stalking my prey, Tryshra Alvere."
The woman growled loudly running the blade along the wall of the stone room, "Tell me exactly what is going on here, now."
"Mystra reveals herself to those who are ready," the guard said deeply, "Those with the patience to wait."
"The cleric is dead there is no one here for you to defend anymore," Rose informed.
The guard laughed, "Starweaver Fembrys was just the face of the temple and although Arthas will be sorrowful for his lose, we have seen many of the less faithful fall before."
Ojas stood up completely and made his way to the center of the room slowly, "We have no quarrel… we just want to know…"
"Then you have a quarrel," the voice said agaited, "The right to know comes with time. I have been faithful since the days before the temple was even finish and just lay as a mere foundation and even I don't know all. The Lady of Mysteries shows us what we need to know."
Tryshra growled as she swung at a shadowy corner hitting nothing, "She even reveals your death, coward."
"To die for Mystra is all but gain," the voice said solemnly.
"No god or goddess worth worship would practice such… fatalism," Quancy said clenching a hand over his wound.
Ojas motioned for Rose to move back toward Quancy and whispered, "He might need a touch from your green fingers."
Rose nodded and dashed over to the rogue.
"Is there a name you wish to be known by when the dungeon delver come across your corpse," Ojas asked.
"Before I saw Mystra's glory I was known as Rythad but those days are long past, Ojas Indra Windseer."
The shaman gritted his teeth, "Why are the spirits here in such discord."
The voice didn't answer.
"I guess you are too tired to answer," Ojas said and called out to the spirits for an exchange, the power to call down lightning from above.
Rose wrapped her arms around the tiefling as the room filled with light and a huge bolt crawled through the ceiling and crashed through a figure the stood directly behind Ojas. The guard, now unveiled, stood completely still for a moment then his legs gave way as he crashed to the floor.
"This is what faith gets you," Quancy said looking at the two bodies and Rose finished her casting to seal the rogue's wounds.