Chapter Seventy-two

Tales of the Plateau

After exploring Zephrah a bit, we decided we should head out to get to Talora and found the druid Headmaster Korrin had indicated to us. She led us to a large tree in the center of the marketplace square. "The spell only lasts for a few seconds, so as soon as it opens, step through."

She cast a spell opening a door into the tree leading to a tunnel similar to the one in the portal King Caylus created, but with a green color to it. We stepped through as quickly as we could.

Salty sea air immediately arrested my nose. We were definitely in a port town. It was a fairly small town, it had a dock, a small stream running through a lumber mill, several small houses dotted the area, and a few small shops were close to the dock. It looked like it at one point had been a fort, but it had been disassembled and now most walls were made of stone.

The sun was starting to set, we wouldn't have much daylight left. Melima suggested staying the night at a tavern, celebrating having gotten as far as we had. I agreed, it wasn't worth going out on the plateau to travel at night after having been up all day.

The plateau wasn't totally obvious. There was some rough grassland to the south of the town that rose up and suddenly stopped. A small forest headed towards the west.

We found a tavern and reserved some rooms. We all got a meal, and almost everyone got a drink— I still didn't want to touch the stuff. The meal was a good fare— meats, cheese, and a surprising variety of fresh fruit.

Several people came in to get a drink or a meal. Several humans, more gnomes than I was used to seeing, and an occasional half-elf. Several fishermen came in as the sun set lower on the horizon, some just came in for a meal, some were trading with the tavernkeep. Some of the men were bragging to their friends about how big of fish they had seen that day, most of which had gotten away.

Melima sat at the bar and caught the tavernkeep's eye as he was cleaning a glass. "What are your oldest, most notorious urban legends?"

"Well, there was one time somebody got lost out on the plateau, and he swears— he swears he saw a giant statue of what looked like a giant, just out in the middle of nowhere, just made of stone."

"Did it move?"

"As far as he could tell, no. But it was just this perfectly sculpted statue out in the middle of nowhere for miles and miles around."

"Did he come back?

"He did come back. He was scared out of his mind, but he did come back."

"Say we were to go check out this statue, what's out there? What are our biggest threats?"

"Well, there's lots of strange— there's lots of strange creatures out this way. But prob'ly the thing you want to look out for most—though I don't know how much they come up—there's these strange creatures that live under the ground, they travel on their feet, but burrow with their head. All shiny and armored up top, and have a nasty temper. Seem to sense sounds."

I shuddered. It sounded like something that had been in a dream I'd had, and it didn't feel good to get run over by them. A bulette. Something the centaurs had also warned us about.

"Do they have a weakness?" Melima asked.

"I've never seen one, just stories that I've heard."

"Do you know of anyone in town who'd be willing to tell this tale?"

"Well, most people who go adventuring don't usually come back. But tell you what, if I see anyone, I'll point 'em your way."

"Tell them I'll buy them a drink if they come and sit with me."

"Done!" Melima came back to our table, and not too long after I saw the tavernkeep pointing over to our group.

A burly gentleman, probably a lumberjack, came over to our table with a big flagon of mead. "So, the bartender says you want to talk to me."

"What's your name, sir?" Melima asked.

"Uh, Craig."

"Craig?"

"Yeah."

"Beautiful name."

"Thank you. I'm just glad I got a free drink out of it," he said, taking a chug.

"My name is Melima, what can you tell us of the bluff? You gotta pay with stories."

He told us of creatures he'd seen around, most in the forest where he spent most of his time, but some on the bluff as well. One sounded again like the bulette, but there was another he told us about that also sounded familiar. "I've seen them circlin' around the top of the bluff. They never come down the side, but are probably six or seven feet long. A spiky, lizard-like creature. It seems to have different coloration, each time I saw them they seemed a little bit different, maybe some sort of camouflage or something. But they looked fat and burly. They walked with it looked like six legs."

"Can they fly?" Melima asked.

"No, they weren't flyin', they were just walking around the edge of the bluff, all the way up top. They never came down the sides, they stayed up on top. But strange, six or seven-foot-long lizard-like creatures, spiky protrusions coming along its back." The description reminded me of the six-legged creatures we'd seen in the illithid city, basilisks. And remembering that Kima said they could turn you to stone made sense with the story about the statue. I was glad I'd gotten the willowshade oil, it might come in handy sooner than I'd thought.

Melima was continuing her conversation. "So, you haven't personally encountered—"

"I wouldn't dare go up on that bluff if you paid me," Craig said. "Well, maybe if you paid me. I stay to the treeline below the bluff."

"Well, thank you for the information."

"You're most welcome."

"You wouldn't know any— That's all you know. You don't know their weaknesses? We have a group of really empowered warrior women, and we want to go fight something. Which one would you recommend would be worthy of a fight?"

"Which creature?"

"Yeah!"

"You seem to be the adventuring type... If it were me, I'd stay clear of the bluff, but if you're going on the bluff, take your pick. There's a lot of strange things up there. A lot of stories from a lot of different people."

"What do you bring to protect yourself?"

He reached under the table and raised his large ax. "Well, this of course!"

Melima laughed. "Craig, come with us! Come fight monsters with us."

"I would love to, ladies, but I have a family at home, and they need their daddy."

"Ah. Lucky woman. Alrighty then."

"Well, you gals—and you gentleman—have a good evening."

We talked to a few more people as the evening went along. We were warned of duststorms that came in before any rain hit the city. There did seem to be a lot more mud than normal in the city. It sounded like there was quite the variety of creatures that had been seen on the plateau.

The tavern eventually emptied for the night. Melima decided to go on a walk and invited the rest of us to join her. When she got back, we decided to start out across the plateau that night instead. I gave Melima one of my bottles of willowshade oil. It would be pointless to have them if they were petrified with the person holding them.

While we could go along the edge of the plateau, it was going to be faster to cut across at a southwestern direction. We found out that the time it would take to go across was more like five days, not three. It made me glad we hadn't decided to go through the jungle. There was a slight trail leading southwest, but I couldn't be sure it would remain the whole way across the plateau. The moon was only a sliver, Ari'yasa and Jörgen were going to have a hard time seeing the path at all.

I took the lead, with Melima taking the rear. I asked her not to let Jörgen be on an end. The crazy wizard turned invisible. I groaned. "Jörgen, please don't do this."

He just laughed. We were going to have to deal with an invisible wizard as we traveled. At least his footprints were prominent on the barren ground. Melima had to keep pushing him away from getting behind her. Fortunately, his spell only lasted an hour.