"Why are we waiting in a torture chamber?" Avariel signed to Sahide. The man had taken his cat form and insisted on being called Sahide.
"He'll bring them down here eventually," the cat replied.
Avariel just shook her head helplessly and waited.
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"How do we get out of here?" Callahan asked.
Entreri and Jarlaxle looked at him and shrugged.
"A good night's rest will clear our minds," Entreri reminded his companions.
Jarlaxle and Callahan nodded. Callahan and Jarlaxle went to the bed, and Entreri lay on the floor.
When he was sure that his companions were asleep, Entreri got up and looked out the window. Obviously, locks had been installed, but where? Was it a spell that held the window closed?
"Artemis? Is that you?" a female voice asked from the doorway.
Entreri spun around; he had been so deep in thought he hadn't even noticed the slave who had come in with some water.
"Melany?" he asked quietly.
"It is you, isn't it?"
Entreri could only nod. She smiled and jumped into his arms.
"I'm so happy to see you!" she cried out excitedly. Entreri quickly silenced her.
"I don't want you to wake up my companions," he said quietly.
Melany nodded and explained everything to him.
Jarlaxle had indeed woken up to Melany's joyous scream and listened in.
According to her the only time they could get out was when the High Lord brought them to the torture chambers. She couldn't bring them out because a good 50 guards had accompanied her; the High Lord wasn't taking any chances.
Then, she left. Jarlaxle forced his breathing to steady and fell back to sleep.
When he woke up in the morning he was glad to see that Entreri was asleep. By the sounds of it they would all need to be well-rested.
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Ali sat in his private chambers wondering how to approach the situation. It was morning; did he want to wait for the evening? No, he decided. He did not want Artemis to get time to reunite with old friends. He knew that most of the people in the palace were against him.
Sighing, Ali Entreri went to collect his prisoners, his thoughts focused on the most important of them: his son.
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Jarlaxle, Callahan, and Artemis turned as the door opened, then discovered they couldn't move any further.
Ali walked up to them and allowed two burly guards to enter the room. They grabbed Callahan and Jarlaxle. Ali decided to carry Artemis himself.
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They were coming. Sahide and Avariel could feel it. The two companions had positioned themselves at the corridor that led to the torture chamber. Sure enough Ali came with two burly guards behind him. Sahide looked at Avariel and then pounced.
Ali shouldn't have stood a chance against Sahide, but the great cat bounced off of a spell shield! (It was embarrassing, too.) Sahide rolled on his back and shook his head to try and clear it.
One of the guards fell to the floor. Ali turned around, only to see Avariel standing there, longsword in hand. The second guard grabbed his saber, dropping Callahan, and swiped it towards her mid-section. The elf, however, rolled to the side, causing him to miss.
Sahide had finally cleared his head, just in time to notice Ali finish a spell. The holding spell vanished, and a creature appeared. It looked like a massive, roughly humanoid toad with arms in place of forelegs. Its wide mouth had rows of blunt teeth, and long spines ran down the length of its back. It was about seven feet tall. It was standing right in front of Sahide. In his terror, the great cat jumped along the walls and accidentally opened a secret compartment. All of their equipment was in it—everything except Artemis's gauntlet.
Avariel, Jarlaxle, Callahan, and the guard all began to gag. That thing smelled appalling. Artemis, Ali, and Sahide were able to ignore the smell.
Sahide grabbed Charon's Claw in his mouth, mentally telling the sword that if it didn't cooperate a Sharite would have it, and ran to Artemis. A blast of fire shot from Ali's hand, but Sahide easily dodged. Sahide wasn't so lucky with the Hezrou, the creature Ali had summoned. An explosion of leaping energy came from the Hezrou and hit Sahide hard. The cat fell to the ground. The last thing he did before he went unconscious was make sure that he rolled Charon's Claw to Artemis.
Artemis quickly picked the sword up; it didn't even try to take him over. Jarlaxle and the others finished gagging just in time to realize this; they also realized that they had hit the bottom of the hole and were digging, fast. They had to run.
Artemis knew that too, but they needed something to cover their backs. Anger is fire. Gather up all your anger, Artemis thought, and he willed a wall of fire between the Hezrou, his father, and everyone else. His power was nothing compared to Ali's though, and the firewall wouldn't last long. Quickly, Artemis rushed over and picked up Sahide.
None of them looked back. None of them wanted to know what was happening inside.
Ali was furious; the only good thing to say about this was that he still had most of their stuff.
When he went over to check on that fact, he found it was all gone and a black and red leather mask was in its place. Ali screamed, and fire engulfed his body. Quickly he began to cast summoning spells. He would kill them all and drag Artemis's dead body to Memnon's prison.
Author's Note: The naming is going to be very complex now. I'll try to make it easy, and yes I have my reasons.
To YoginiGal: It's not all supposed to be obvious. However, if you know that Ali is Artemis's father it should be obvious who Gareth is. As far as Sahide, I have yet to post the story that explain that here. I'll get around to it, but it's not essential. As far as the purpose of "Moonwood". It was to introduce who Aramil was, bring in Callahan (although he isn't overly major, I'm probably going to make him more important later on, and he's a nice connecting peice), and make it clear that other things are going on. Thank you for reviewing as often as you have!
