The fire Lila had made dried the companions' soaked clothes and gear, giving the alcove some semblance of a cosy atmosphere despite the current situation. Once they were all reasonably dry, Catalin spoke.
"So, what now?" he asked quietly, rubbing his upper arms with both hands.
No one answered, all eyes sweeping uncertainly over the group of six seated around the small blaze.
At some point, Makareth had moved to sit a little ways outside the shelter to keep watch, his spiders following him as usual. Liana got up, and walked over to him now, taking a seat beside him, and looking at him with quiet concern.
He had his knees drawn up to his chin, and his arms wrapped around them, shrouded in his cloak as he stared out at the still cavern. His spiders sat each on one of his shoulders, but he was paying no attention to them.
"The prison guard was right." He whispered as Liana lowered herself to the ground beside him, "All she had to do was speak, and I froze up." He curled further in on himself, pressing his forehead to his knees with a shuddering breath, "If Beoric hadn't grabbed me…." His sentence trailed off as Liana placed a hand on his shoulder, giving it a comforting squeeze.
"This is the first time you've encountered her since running away, right?" she asked gently, shifting closer.
He nodded without looking up, and she pulled him into a hug, his spiders moving to make room for her.
She noticed silently as her arms wrapped around him that he was trembling.
"It's going to be okay." she assured him softly, loosening her grip as he slowly turned to return her embrace with distressed ferocity, "It's perfectly understandable that it would be difficult for you." She continued, tightening her arms around him again, "It's not something you could have controlled, so don't beat yourself up about it, alright?"
Makareth huffed against her shoulder, but eventually nodded affirmatively.
"Alright." he whispered with a quiet sigh before they both fell silent again, the only sounds being the distant roar of the waterfall, and the quiet murmur of their companions a little way off.
Once Makareth had stopped shaking, and his grip on her was satisfactorily more relaxed, Liana whispered: "Are you ready to head back? We need to discuss with the others what we're going to do next."
The rogue stiffened momentarily, but nodded again, hesitantly breaking contact, and standing up. His spiders returned to their previous positions, both tucked around his neck and chittering softly.
"It's going to be okay." Liana repeated with a gentle smile, as she also rose to her feet, "We're going to get out of here."
He gave her a small smile in return, and she took his arm reassuringly, leading the way back to their companions.
0*0*0*0*0
The rest of the group looked up from the small flames as the two elves reentered the sheltered camp, nodding as they joined the circle around the fire.
Once they were seated, Lila drew everyone's attention by standing up on top of the stone she had been sitting on.
"We obviously cannot stay here much longer." she said, getting right to the issue at hand, "Otherwise, we risk the priestess catching up to us again."
"But where would we go?" Catalin asked, looking up from the fire to the halfling.
"Lila said we've been pretty far removed from where we jumped into the river." Grolim stated slowly, glancing back towards the lake they had recently swam out of, while resting his chin on his folded hands, "With how fast that water was moving, it wouldn't surprise me if that were the case. Maybe we can backtrack to the tunnel we were following before."
At that suggestion, Beoric shook his head.
"That cliff was very sheer." he rumbled, "Even if we found our way back to the exact spot we left off, we would have no hope of scaling it."
"Unaided, probably." Liana countered, joining the discussion, and sitting up straighter, drumming her fingers on her knees, "But Makareth's spiders were able to climb down after us. Could they go up first, and spin a web down that the rest of us could climb?" she glanced questioningly at Makareth, who looked up at her, then to his spiders.
"I guess they could." he responded with a nod.
"That then leads to the question of whether or not we could even get back." Kirion said, tapping one finger against his chin as he stared into the fire, "And whether or not we'll be able to continue on our own without an unknowing group of guides." He lifted his gaze to look at Makareth, "I'm sorry that we have to keep asking you all these questions," he said apologetically, "But are you familiar with this area at all?"
The rogue didn't respond immediately, cringing slightly, and hanging his head; silver hair falling into his face.
"No." he responded quietly, his shoulders going rigid with frustration, "We left the caverns I'm familiar with a long time ago. I'm sorry."
"Good to know." The wizard said with a nod, "You don't need to apologise." he continued, his voice softening, "You won't know every cavern and tunnel we encounter, and it would be unfair of us to expect you to."
The others hummed in agreement, and Makareth nodded, though he still kept his head down.
A few more moments passed in silence before Beoric stood, pacing around the circle of companions.
"So, we are lost in unfamiliar territory, and don't have tons of time to make a decision." he said, glancing quickly out into the cavern with the lake, "Does anyone, other than Grolim have any ideas?"
They all shook their heads.
"Then, does anyone have any objections to that plan?" the dragonborn continued, returning to his seat.
The companions each silently swept their gazes over the others.
"What are the chances that the priestess and her men would have come down after us?" Lila eventually put out, turning her head to look at Makareth.
The drow shrugged, lifting his gaze from the floor.
"The quaggoth would probably be able to climb down on its own, but unless they brought heavy climbing gear, the others would not be able to follow." he said, "Not without jumping into the water, which I don't think Ishrae would choose." he added, looking around at his companions, "Given that I assume she thought I would just submit to her, and she would easily bring me back, I doubt she has that much equipment with her."
"So it's safe to assume that we won't encounter her again, not right away at least, if we go that route?" Grolim asked, running a hand through his beard.
Makareth nodded.
"Reasonably so." he said, "Though, I cannot say for certain. I do know that if we get back up there, we're going to have to wait for another caravan to follow behind. If we were to try and continue on our own, we would most likely end up getting ourselves even more lost."
The dwarf hummed in understanding as he rose to his feet.
"That's good enough for me." he said with a grim smile.
The others stood as well, and Kirion summoned a dim light orb, commanding it with a gesture to hover above the three companions lacking darkvision.
"Back up-river then?" he asked, and was responded with six determined nods.
0*0*0*0*0
The hardest part so far, had been climbing back up above the waterfall. The spray from the falling water moistened the stones in a rather large radius around the source, making them slick, and difficult to climb.
In the time it took to ascend the slippery rocks, nearly all of them had lost their footing at least once, and Beoric had almost fallen when a few loose stones gave way under him. Thankfully, Grolim had been right there to help the paladin, and he did not follow the rocks in their clattering descent to the cavern floor.
Once they were all safely above the roaring falls, the going became much easier, and the ground less treacherous. They kept their eyes peeled for the ledge they had jumped from above the river as they walked, as well as for threats on the banks ahead.
A few times, they spotted monsters on the riverbank, and were forced to either hide until the creatures had gone, or fight to avoid being their next meal.
After one such encounter of the latter variety, involving a troop of hooked horrors; the group of adventurers were ready to find a spot to rest for a while, when they saw something else equally worrisome in the cavern ahead.
A humanoid shape frozen in a position of fear; torso twisted, and one leg lifted slightly from the ground as if turning to run.
An extremely life-like statue seemingly carved out of the cavern's grey stone.
Author's note: I do not like how this one turned out. I wanted to keep messing with it, but was like, "it's been almost four months since I posted anything, so WHATEVER!" Hope you enjoy!