Chapter 79: Sophisticated prison cells

[12th – 13th of Evening Star 4E 202]

The situation was getting critical down here deep in the Ayleid ruin under the city of Kvatch – we had some of the enemies and the gas one on side and the archers on the other. What to do?

I quickly asked Damien if he could conjure something dangerous, and he nodded, saying that he could conjure a storm atronach. One of the city guards also had some magic skills and could conjure a flame atronach; together with Pammy, that might do. We stepped as close to the large room as possible and they summoned their atronachs right into the room. While the archers focused on them, I gave a hand signal to Pammy requesting her to attack, and with a couple of big leaps she jumped onto the gallery, right next to the group of archers. The archers were not quick enough to react, and two of them were dead before the remaining ones even thought about changing their targets. Pammy caught a few arrows now, but with the archers being distracted, the flame atronach blasted at them, and I stepped into the room as well, adding fireballs of my own. I soon caught an arrow on my chest, but the dragonscale armor I wore easily stopped it. Finally I got my crossbow out, and as the archers neglected their cover while fighting Pammy and the atronachs, I got two of them with bolts, while Pammy finished off the last one; for now, the gallery seemed to be clear.

Damien called the others into the room; it was about the time, as some of the group already started to cough from the gas. Pammy came down to me, gravely injured. For now, I simply released her and focused my healing efforts on the team mates who had received wounds from the dark welkynd stone and the gas. Some of them also swallowed potions, and within a few minutes we were ready for action again.

With some effort we managed to climb onto the gallery overlooking the room, and just in time, too. Just a few minutes after we had taken our new position, a group of bandits came storming out of the passage where the gas now had mostly dissipated, and they probably expected us to be all coughing and out of action. We had a choice of either hiding or showing ourselves, and Hadvar and Selina instructed us to do the former. Once the bandits had left the room again, via the passage, we moved on and hid in a side room we found. Hadvar explained:

"I hope that the bandits are going to return this way. With some luck, they will pass outside and maybe lead us to their headquarters."

"Why not directly follow Pammy՚s nose to get us to my wife and cousin, Captain Hadvar?" I asked him.

"Because I don't want to have a group of enemies ahead of me and another one in my back" he explained, and he had a point.

That seemed to make sense, and indeed, about twenty minutes later we heard the bandits outside of our hiding place. A few minutes after they had passed, we cautiously opened the door and made sure that none of them were around any longer. Pammy sniffed the air and guided us in the proper direction, which was helpful.

After navigating multiple rooms, passages and stairs I heard voices again. I was leading the troop together with Hadvar, and he held up my hand to make the others stop. When I carefully looked around the next corner, I could see the passage splitting into two, so that Hadvar decided to split our group as well. Selina lead half of us to the right and I went with Hadvar and the rest of us to the left. We encountered another turn, and after this one the passage opened up into a larger hall. It had at least three different exits and a balcony or gallery overlooking it, and it was obvious that we would not easily be able to cover all potential exits. We retreated a little bit, and I suggested:

"Hadvar, we do not know how to get to the gallery, and maybe it is only accessible from the passage across the room. What about one or two of us sneaking ahead, with invisibility potions, and at least blocking the exit across from us? Ideally we can even get up to the gallery."

Hadvar liked the idea, and Damien, the Breton battlemage, and I would do this. I dismissed Pammy and got two potions out of my pack. They'd last for a few minutes, more than enough. Damien and I swallowed and moved ahead; we followed the walls and slowly crept towards the exit which was located opposite from where we had come from. Just before we got there a man stepped out and joined the others, and we were able to get in. Like we had assumed, the passage led to a set of stairs, and soon we got to the gallery overlooking the room. It had another exit, but we could check this later on. There were two guards on the gallery; Damien and I both did not want to kill unless we absolutely had to, and so we just grabbed them from behind around the throat, so that we could bind and gag them. I summoned Pammy again, and she'd watch our back while we turned out attention towards the room again.

The group of people down in the big room were mostly grouped around a campfire close to the exit where Selina and her team were hiding behind, and while I could not understand the entire conversation, Selina probably would be able to do do, and she would be best suited to decide when it was time to show ourselves. The group which had attacked us earlier had just finished reporting to what looked to be the local boss, an impressive looking male Orc, when Selina՚s voice could be heard:

"This is Selina Matius, deputy guard captain of Kvatch. Drop your weapons and raise your hands – you are surrounded!"

Immediately Hadvar also shouted from the next exit:

"This is Captain Hadvar of the Imperial Legion. Do as she says!"

The big Orc cursed, and rather than doing as demanded, he ran through a forth exit we had not seen before, followed by a female Imperial. The others, though, surrendered once they saw that they were indeed closed in by our two teams, specifically when Damien and I also showed ourselves on the gallery. Once he was sure that the situation was under control, Hadvar and two of his soldiers stepped into the passage the Orc had used, but came back a few minutes later. He waved Damien and me down, and we joined them, not without posting guards on the gallery as well.

While most of the group stayed with the captives, Hadvar beckoned Selina, Damien and me into the passage. After only a few steps it opened up into another room, and the room had rows of rock doors on one side and iron gates on the other one. Two of the rock doors had a shimmering aura around it, which looked magical. The center of the room was dominated by some kind of control panel with a series of buttons and levers. There was some shouting from behind one of the iron gates, and I saw three teenage girls behind them. We got closer to them, and when I noticed that the smallest and probably youngest of the girls looked like half Bosmer and half Imperial I had a suspicion:

"Is one of you called Aloria?"

The young girl nodded and asked:

"How do you know?"

"I was at your parents' home in Kvatch, and they told me that they were worried about you. The two young ladies next to you are your friends from Skingrad, right?"

She nodded again, and I asked next:

"Have you seen two female Khajiit by chance?"

Another nod:

"Yes, they are trapped here as well, behind one of the rock doors, but I do not know how to open the doors. They always use the control panel, though."

Neither the iron gates nor the rock doors had any keyholes, and the control panel seemed to be important. Of course, the buttons and levers were not labeled, and Damien said:

"I have seen a few of those panels in other ruins, though on a smaller scale. It is likely that some trap is triggered when the wrong button is pressed. It is also possible that a sequence of buttons and levers needs to be used."

"What about the magical aura around two of the rock doors?" I asked.

"That is probably a magical shield around the rock walls and door, as additional protection; it seems to be more for keeping someone or something in one of the cells."

We had a closer look at the panel again, and Damien mused:

"Look, the order of the eight buttons seems to resemble the four iron gates on the left and the four stone doors on the right. I'd guess that each button opens one of them, but probably only once the switches are all properly set."

"If that is correct," I asked, "how do we know how to set the switches properly?"

"Not sure" the battlemage replied. "However, let's keep in mind that the system is controlled by bandits, and I cannot imagine it to be overly complicated; otherwise one of the bandits might mess up when transferring a prisoner from or to a cell."

"But maybe it was only operated by one of the bosses?" Selina suggested.

"Possible" Damien admitted.

After a little more discussion we decided to experiment with the switches, and I moved the top left one to the other position. For a moment nothing happened, but then we heard a scratching noise from somewhere. We waited, and one of the guards came in from the other room, telling us that some stone ornament had just moved. We went there and found a group of eight small stone ornaments, resembling human heads; the guards said that two of those heads had just rotated by 90 degrees.

We had wondered about those small heads earlier, as they were positioned oddly, with one of them upside down and others sideways. According to the guard, one has just rotated from upside down to looking left, and other one from upside down to upright. Hadvar pointed out:

"Maybe we have to operate the switches in a way to have all heads being properly upright?"

"That's a possibility" the battlemage admitted, "but just one of several."

Nevertheless we tried, and after some experimenting and multiple attempts we managed to get all ornamental heads being upright.

This being done, I pushed one of the buttons, which should open the door to the cell where the three girls were in, but that gate did not open. Rather, a scary noise sounded, one of the magical barriers dimmed out, and the corresponding rock doors sank into the ground. From inside, a dangerous looking lich came out.

"Trap! Fall back!" Hadvar shouted.

We quickly ran to the other room and formed a defensive barrier. Pammy was in front, and while we prepared ourselves, Damien shouted some advice:

"Liches resist most magic and are immune to frost and poison. Fire enchanted weapons work best."

I got my greatsword ready, which happened to have a strong fire enchantment, and when the lich appeared, soldiers and guards behind me shot arrows while I attacked with my sword; Pammy jumped at the lich from the side to distract the monster. Prior to the fight I had cast ironflesh on me, which helped me to last longer, but the lich was very powerful.

On my own I would not have been able to defeat if for sure, but I did have some capable fighters around, and our combined efforts eventually allowed us to kill the dangerous enemy, not without having some of us getting injured, though.

"So, what have we done wrong?" I asked.

"Maybe the heads need to be all upside down?" Selina suggested.

In lack of a better idea we operated the switches again until we eventually succeeded to get this result, and when I looked at the switches, I said:

"Look, the order of switches has a system now – both rows alternate between left and right, so this should be easy to remember."

When I pressed the button I assumed to be related to the proper cell now, the iron gate at the girls' cell opened indeed, and the three girls came out. It looked like we had beaten the system. With the complicated setup and the guarding lich it was sure good enough to deter the occasional adventurer and more.

While the other took care of the girls, I was of course eager to find my wife, and the other three cells with iron gates were all empty. With her 'FEIM' shout, the gates would not have been an issue for her anyway. Actually, that shout could probably get her though solid rock, too, so that the other cell with a magical barrier was the likely one to hold her. I told the others, and while they stood guard, just in case there was another lich or so, I pushed the lower right button.

The magical light flickered and went out, and as with the other cell before, the thick stone door slowly moved into the ground. I peered into the cell, and before I had fully adapted my eyes to the darkness in there, a whirlwind rushed forward and crashed into me. At the last moment I recognized T'mara, dropped my sword and opened my arms wide for her, and I barely managed to keep standing when she wrapped her arms and legs around me.

Another Khajiit came out, much slower, and I recognized a somewhat battered and unhappy looking M'lissa; for now, though, I had to take care of my wife, and she was unlikely to leave my arms anytime soon.

T'mara needed some time to calm down, and while she still sobbed, M'lissa gave us an overview of what had happened to them:

"When we were together with Selina and Iona, we saw some odd pattern on the wall and stopped for a few moments. I must have touched a hidden button by accident, as a hidden door opened. We stepped through it, just for a quick look, when it closed again, and we could not find a way to get it open again. Thus we looked around and found ourselves in an Ayleid ruin, probably this one here. We saw some signs of inhabitation and followed the passage which looked most promising, and eventually we got in this room here. One of the cells held a few people clothed in rags, and they begged us to get the cell keys which were in a chest in an adjacent room. They urged us to hurry before the bandits came back, and we hurried in there. Of course, there were no keys, but the massive door closed."

T'mara had recovered a little bit and added: "We really should have been smarter than that. We wanted to help the poor captives and did not pay enough attention. The walls and the door were too thick to be affected by one of my shouts, and even when I tried 'FEIM', I could not get out."

"They had a magical barrier around your cell, my love" I explained. "But I do not know how they could have known that they might need that."

Aloria knew about that: "I heard them talking about the Dragonborn and putting her in the special cell."

"So they prepared a trap just for you? Scary."

Meanwhile all of the guards and soldiers had joined us as soon as they had learned that we had found the prisoners. Hadvar noticed that and asked around:

"Who is standing watch out there and on the gallery?"

Before somebody could answer that, there was a commotion and some fighting noise, and when some of us wanted to check out what was happening, a thick stone barrier lowered itself between our room and the next one, cutting us off from comrades out there and the exit. Not enough, but there was also a magical barrier around the passage.

"Damn!" Hadvar shouted. "I should have made sure that we have enough guards posted outside!"

"The two archers on the gallery are not with us, and they are probably still there."

"Maybe so, but they won't be able to get us out easily, against an overwhelming number of enemies. This look like a large scale operation more and more."

One of Aloria՚s friends offered: "I am not sure if this helps, but just before you arrived there was this big Orc coming into this room in a hurry, and he went into this niche over there and vanished."

This got us curious, and we looked over to the nice the girl pointed to. It did not look different from other niches which were places in a regular pattern between the prison cells, except that it was located at the long and narrow end of the room, between two other and smaller niches.

T'mara looked at me: "Do you think the same I am thinking?"

I nodded and stated: "Secret door, once again."

Pammy was the first to examine the walls in the niche, and with her assistance we could identity the barely discernible outlines of a door. That, though, did not tell us how it could be opened, but the other one of Aloria՚s friends had a hint:

"The big orc lifted his hands to both sides of the niche and did something there, just before he left."

The interior of the nice was not completely visible from inside the cells, and this was already more information than what we could have hoped for. I had judged the orc as about as tall as I was, and tentatively I stretched out my arms and reached around. After about ten minutes I noticed that two buttons in a small ornament seemed to be a bit lose, but I failed to push them in. Only when I tried to push them at the same time, something clicked, and the secret door opened. While we started into the darkness behind, we heard some hissing noise, and we saw gas coming through a couple of small vents in the wall.

"Poison gas!" Damien warned.

As quickly as we could we all went into the passage which had been revealed by the secret door and closed the door behind us. We did not know how it could be opened from this side, but we did not want to risk the gas coming behind us. This side was fully dark, and Damien summoned a magelight.

We proceeded through the passage, encountered a few sets of stairs and turns, and finally ended up at another dead end. Naturally, we suspected yet another secret door, and this one was much easier to open via a handle at the wall. We turned the handle and stepped into the Ayleid ruin again.

"Wait a second" Damien said. "Somehow this looks familiar, and I believe that we are in Trumbe now."

"Trumbe?" one of the city guards asked. "This Ayleid ruin does not have a connection to others. I know, as I have been in there a few times."

Damien closed the door behind us and asked back: "Do you see a door from here?"

"No, I do not" the guard had to admit. "Whoever constructed those doors, did a real good job."

The rest was easy. Damien and the guard knew their way around in Trumbe, and half an hour later we had reached the exit. Outside darkness had already settled in, and we hurried to get back to the city. While we walked, Aloria confirmed that she and her friends had indeed been captured by that bandits off road when returning, and when they had been walked along the passage close to the hole, she had dropped her ribbon hoping that somebody might see it from above.

Just before midnight we reached the castle and reported back, and right when were were about to admit that he had lost two guards, those two showed up. They had realized that they were cut off from us and decided that there was not much they could do, so that they had retraced the way back to the main entrance and back to the castle via the underground mansion.

For now, we were all very tired and needed to rest first. We agreed to reconvene around noon in the next day, and T'mara and I guided Aloria and her two friends home.

T'mara has almost not slept at all in the night before, and she almost fell asleep in my arms when I carried her up to our room.

Our two girls jumping around us in our room woke us up. Usually we did not sleep that long, but we had been very late on the day before, and Yumi and Lucia were eager to get us up for breakfast. Naturally, with two girls being wide awake and behaving like that, we had to get up, and when we ate a few minutes later, we provided a shortened and family friendly version of our tour-

The exploration teams met again for lunch at the castle, and once we had eaten, Hadvar summarized the events of the two days before. Finally he asked:

"T'mara, M'lissa, is there anything you have to add from your side?"

M'lissa took that one:

"I got a chance to talk to one of Aloria՚s friends yesterday when we walked back. She overheard the bandits talking about an upcoming meeting. Apparently, all three of the grey leaders plan to meet with their section bosses or so, somewhere around the Imperial City."

"Did she also hear when?"

"No, sorry, that's as much as she heard."

Selina now offered: "One of my guards picked up a note down in the ruin. It says: '22 ES – 3G'. We suspect that it might just be a reminder to one of the leaders, and in some kind of code."

"Or just abbreviations" Hadvar replied. "3G could be 'the three Greys'."

"And '22 ES' can be the date – twenty second of Evening Star" I suggested.

"So," Hadvar continued, "something is going to happen on 22nd of Evening Star, related to the three Greys. If we are lucky, this is somewhere in the Imperial City, but we don't know exactly where."

M'lissa snorted: "If an event like this is actually going to take place there, the Cyrodiil Thieves Guild there will sure know about it, even if they are not included; I do have my contacts there, and I will be able to find out."

"So, I guess, some of us will have to be there in time, either to just observe and listen, or maybe to catch some of the bad guys."

[Author's Notes: Pursuing the 3G becomes more and more dangerous. Let's see what else comes up, and please let me know what you think about the adventure down in the Ayleid ruin.]