Chapter 19

Faelar seated himself at the back of cave, removing his bracers and pulling off his sopping leather shirt in the process. He wiped the dripping water out of his eyes, wringing out his clothes afterward. Saeola entered the small space soon after, her dark bangs sticking to her forehead. The ranger spat water out of her mouth, unclasping her cloak in the same movement. She squeezed the excess water out of her cloak, sighing as she did so. Saeola looked up to notice that her thief companion had removed his boots and pants, squeezing and shaking them free of as much water as he possibly could.

The older half-elf felt warm blood rush into her cheeks. "What in the hells are you doing!" She screeched. Faelar looked up at her, blinking.

"Whot? 'Ey, you're not da only one 'oo doesn't wanna catch hypothermia." The rogue stressed his point with a slight shiver, shaking his clothes out again.

"Well… don't you have some sort of spell to dry them off or something?" Saeola asked in both irritation and mild dread. The other wild half-elf always seemed to have a spell on hand for virtually anything, though he claimed to hardly be adept at it. She wasn't thrilled of the prospect of stripping down with the pervert around. True, she still had a change of clothes in her pack that should still be dry – she thanked the gods for waterproof enchantments on the bag – but she would still have to change out of her current attire first.

He blinked his chocolate eyes at her once more, "No, no I don't. If I did, doncha think I woulda used it by now, before I took off my clothes?"

Saeola sighed again, ending in a shiver. He had a point, as much as she hated to admit. "Please tell me you have something dry to change into."

"Well, 'o course I do. I'm not an idiot." Faelar grinned. "Granted, it ain't my nice leather armor, but it'll do. You should change too, dove. Ain't a good idea ta keep standin' around in dose wet clothes."

His companion narrowed her eyes, "Not unless you turn around, you pervert. And no funny business, either."

The teenaged thief clutched his chest, mocking a blow from one of her arrows, "I'm 'urt, dove. Would I really peek at ya changing?"

"…Yes."

"…True enough." He grinned widely, but turned around and faced the back of the cave wall nonetheless. "Go 'head. I give ya full permission ta beat me senseless if I even twitch my 'ead in da wrong direction, all righ'?"

Saeola snorted, pulling her green shirt over her head, "Fair enough, I'll keep you to that." Somehow managing to keep her eyes trained on the thief's back the next few minutes, the ranger pulled off her wet outfit and changed into her only set of dry garments – her spare underwear and under-tunic. As she pulled the white shirt back on, she sighed yet again, hoping she wouldn't have to go out in the water again any time soon. "I'm finished, you can go now."

Not bothering to ask the other half-elf to turn around – he was already in his loincloth, after all – Faelar pulled on an old brown tunic. Saeola eyed his choice in clothing.

"Do you own anything that isn't brown?" she snorted.

"Do ya own anythin' dat isn't green?" he retorted.

"Touché."

Chuckling, Faelar squatted down and extended his – for once – bare hands while muttering lowly in some language Saeola didn't recognize. Magical red flames shot from his fingers and onto the cavern ground, the Weave allowing the warm fire to sustain itself without wood or other fuel. Whistling casually, the rogue browsed through his backpack before pulling out a few long wooden poles – far too long to have fit inside his pack naturally.

Saeola seated herself on the opposite side of the fire, raising one leg up to bend at the knee. She rested her elbow on said knee, and her chin in her now-supported palm, her slender fingers lying against her dark cheek. "Let me guess," she smirked, "a Bag of Holding, huh?"

"No good thief leave 'ome witout it." Faelar laughed in answer, setting up the poles into a stand to hang their clothes over the fire. "Best I can do to dry them faster fer now."

"Hey, what works, works." She shrugged, helping him hang clothes onto the stand. Their work completed, Saeola looked through her own belongings for food. "Damn." She pulled out a small loaf of half-stale bread, a half-empty flask of water, and day old meat wrapped in paper. "It's not much, but oh well. If we make it out of here, remind me to restock." She ripped off a piece of bread and handed it to Faelar, who thanked her and instantly began munching on his food.

"Don' worry," he commented between bites, "I'm used ta scraps."

Carefully holding the meat above the flames in an attempt to cook it, Saeola glanced up at the thief with a frown. "You really are a typical rogue, aren't you? Living in poverty while in Waterdeep or something?"

Faelar shrugged. "Sort of, I guess. Afta me mum moved us from da Chondalwood an' inta Waterdeep, we didun 'ave a lot o' money left – well, neva had much ta begin wit – but it was enough to keep us livin' somewhere between poverty an' lower middle class. Many were betta off dan us, but many were also worse. Mum made a moderate livin' on tailoring clothes; spent most of 'er profits ta send me ta sorcerer's school. Got expensive afta a few years, though, so she started buying an' eatin' less food fer 'erself – gave most of it ta me. I started nicking da pockets offa da richer folk dat wandered around so she could afford ta feed 'erself as well."

"Did she know where you got this spare money from?" Saeola raised an eyebrow. Faelar smirked, though it lacked the usual mirth behind it.

"Nah. I told 'er I got a job at da academy ta work at afta classes. I con't say I wos ashamed o' my thieving – 'onestly, neva was, since I only stole from dose dat could afford to lose some extra change – but I know my mum wouldn't buy anythin' wit money she knew was stolen, 'ence why she never found out it wos."

Saeola snorted. "Always the little sneaky bastard, I see. Didn't you ever try to get a real job?"

"Now, where's the fun in dat?" He grinned, stroking his drying goatee. "But seriously… eventually, yeah. I 'elped out at da school like I wos tellin' me mum, but dey didun pay much, so I continued pickpocketin' in my free time."

"So, where's you mom now?" The ranger asked, though she felt she already knew the answer.

"Eh, whereva we go when we die, I 'spose." Faelar shrugged, unperturbed. "She's betta off, I think. Neva wos da same after me Da died." He stretched, "Nothin' can really be done abou' either of 'em now, anyway. Whot 'bout your parents, dove?"

"Same as yours." She sighed, still resting her head in one hand, waving the other off in the air, still clutching to the meat. "I wouldn't be surprised if half the adventurers you see are orphans, or might as well be. It seems to be a common trend or something among our kind."

"Funny thin dat is, huh?" Faelar chuckled, finishing off his bread. "Maybe dose wit a family are less willing ta risk dere lives out in Faerûn, eh? Guess dose of us wit a strong wanderlust an' nothin' ta come back to 'ave nothin' ta lose, or at least we believe we got nothin'."

"I suppose." Saeola sighed, poking to see if her meat was finished. It wasn't. "Still, what about those that travel in groups like we do? Don't friends count for something?"

"Ah, so the sarcastic, cranky ranger admits ta 'aving friends?" His teeth showed fully through his smartass smile.

"Oh, shut-up." Rolling her eyes, Saeola leaned against the stone wall, taking a bite out of her half-cooked meat. "The others aren't so bad, though I'm still wondering why I put up with you." She sent the other half-elf a steely glare.

Faelar brushed off the leer effortlessly, long ago accustomed to such looks from the other half-breed adventurer. Pulling his blanket from his pack, he wrapped the cloth around himself and also leaned back. "Aw, c'mon, dove. Ya know I'm irresistible."

"Whatever." Saeola ripped a piece of meat off and tossed it to him, which he caught with ease. "You just like to annoy me to no end all year round."

"Life would be boring otherwise."

Pulling out her own blanket, Saeola resisted the urge to smack him. At least he hasn't pulled anything since you got into this waterfall cave. "You're just lucky I'm too tired at the moment to kill you."

"Oh, I'm so flattered." He sniggered.

Saeola's eye twitched as she covered herself, but she resisted the temptation a second time. "So, are we going to keep watch at all?"

"I doubt anythin' will find us 'ere," Faelar shrugged, "but in case the others come by, it'd be a good idea. I'll go ferst. You look more tired den I do."

"You're so kind." Saeola grumbled sarcastically, curling up into a ball and soon allowing herself to drift off into a weary slumber.

- - - - -

The four had remained silent since their incident with the last pack of striges, though the two humans sent icy glares at one another on occasion. Serosa'ruth sighed, rubbing his forehead as he always did when agitated. Reaching the bottom of the steps, the male elf walked out towards the center of the new cavern they'd reached. The short party leader observed the two obvious exits from the area, then noticed the small stream leading into yet another, but tighter, passage. Resting his gauntleted hands on the back of his hips, Serosa'ruth paced about the large room, keeping his keen ears and eyes trained for any important signs of danger or safe passage.

After a few minutes of more silence, the druid finished his examination and settled for the exit in the southeast corner of the cave. He hopped over the flowing water, followed soon after by his companions, all of them keeping their weapons close at hand and their muscles tensed. The quartet moved through another slim passage, though it left enough space to let them walk two by two.

The narrow walkway soon emptied out into yet another large cavern, this one much larger than the previous one. It stretched out some two-hundred feet in length, its ceiling reaching fifty or more feet in some places. Strange, yet beautiful flows and structures of delicate stone graced the chamber. The western area of the great cave where the four stood was separated from the rest of the cavern by a steep drop-off that Serosa'ruth estimated to be about twenty feet high. The ceiling directly above their heads was half the height of the rest of the chamber.

The adventurers looked around their immediate surroundings and noted that a couple dozen large stone sepulchers lined the cavern walls, each painstakingly carved with intricate reliefs and designs, all marked with Dwarven runes.

"Tombs of the dwarves that once lived here, I'd bet." Ky'itae noted, breaking the silence.

"There's only twenty-three here." Celdern added after counting, "so I'll bet this is only a small handful of the survivors against the orc raid before they perished."

"Should we search the coffins?" Miri queried, knowing there was at least a moderate chance of items of value within some of the tombs, yet unsure as to whether they really should rob the dead dwarves in their own sanctuary.

"I can't read Dwarven runes, so I'm unsure if there are any curses placed upon these tombs or not." Serosa'ruth sighed. "I wouldn't risk it, and I don't know if I'd want to rob Dwarven tombs, regardless." Mentally, he found this last sediment somewhat ironic, as he and his party had picked fallen foes clean before with no remorse. Morality worked in strange ways, indeed.

The three others mumbled in agreement.

"So, what now?" Celdern asked, looking down the bluff past the last row of tombs.

Pulling out a long piece of rope from his small, enchanted pocket pack, Serosa'ruth began tying one end to a tomb. "We'll attempt to scale the drop. It's too far to just jump the whole way, but we should be fine with this rope. It'll get us most of the way down, after which we can just jump."

"I'll go first." Ky'itae offered, "I may be the smallest in the bunch, but I'll bet I can take a hard impact better than the rest of you in case it doesn't work, plus I also react fairly quick and can probably lessen the force of the landing should my decent quicken suddenly."

"Good idea." Serosa'ruth nodded. "Then maybe I should go last, so I can untie the rope. I can just levitate down, anyway."

Miri crossed her arms. "Why not levitate all of us down?" She asked.

"Because I can't carry all of you at once, and Faelar's not here to carry the extra people down." The elven man answered, finishing his knots.

"Speaking of that thief, I hope he and the ranger are all right." Celdern sighed, scratching the back of his head. Biting back a snide remark, Miri sighed and walked towards the edge, watching Ky'itae as the elf scaled down the small cliff.

"I'm sure they're fine." She commented, though unsure of the truth herself, "And I suppose I'll go next after Ky'itae. Ladies first and all that crap."

"Who's a lady?" Celdern snorted. Serosa'ruth sent him a warning glare while Miri scowled.

"Oh, shut-up, Tethyrian." The Calishite growled, almost missing Ky'itae's safe landing at the bottom.

"You'll have to jump the last three feet, but it's not that bad! C'mon!" The elven fighter shouted up.

"Right, right." Miri muttered, taking a deep breath and gripping the rope tightly before gingerly scaling down it.

Celdern watched the other human slowly descended, already gripping the rope by the time she jumped into Ky'itae's ready arms and rebalanced herself. Just as paranoid as the cleric, if not more so, the bard muttered, "I hate all heights," and carefully scaled down the rope, allowing Ky'itae to slow his landing after his jump.

"All right, Sero, c'mon down!" Celdern called to their leader once his feet were on solid ground again.

"In a moment." Serosa'ruth replied, untying the rope. "Catch." He tossed down the rope, his three teammates seizing hold of it as he levitated himself to the ground below. Ky'itae handed him his rope, which the druid quickly wrapped up and placed back inside his magical pack. They looked about the larger section of the cavern, noting that patches of strange fungi dotted the floor, including capped stalks standing as tall as Celdern and glowing puffballs almost a yard wide.

"We should stay away from those fungi, huh?" Miri scrunched up her face, "They don't look too friendly."

Serosa'ruth shook his head, not even needing to inspect the fungus closely to know it was all harmless. "No, they're not deadly at all, trust me. The stalks are editable, and the puffballs can be distilled into a greenish liquor that packs quite a wallop."

Ky'itae's face brightened at the end of his explanation. "Really?"

Serosa'ruth frowned through his cloth mask, "No. The last thing you need is alcohol on hand." His best friend crossed her arms and pouted in only a half-mocking manner.

"Meanie."

"So, where to, then?" Miri asked, looking throughout the cavern. Even with the magic-granted infrared vision, the young woman couldn't clearly see the other end of the cavern.

Her male elf companion seemed not to be hindered as such, however. "Well, considering I can see a grick's nest near that iron door, I'd say we keep away from them. I'd like to avoid fighting with anything like them."

"How about that flight of stone stairs, then?" Ky'itae offered, pointing to the south of them. "It seems to be the only other exit, anyway."

"Hmm… Yes, it should be too far away for the gricks to see or reach us. Still, let's proceed with caution." Serosa'ruth began creeping towards the safer exit.

"Don't we always?" Miri chuckled, following his lead with the others.

The flight of stairs proved fairly short, and it wasn't long before the adventurers reached a smaller cavern, the thunder of water filling the chamber. A fast running stream ran along the opposite end of the cavern, disappearing into a dark shaft at the eastern end. A rough, winding path followed the stream towards the east.

"Stay clear of the stream, the ground's too slippery near it." Serosa'ruth warned after noting the stone near the water was covered in a thin, mossy slime. "You'd go sliding right into the stream, and I'd doubt you'd free yourself from the current before falling down what sounds like a waterfall."

"And who knows how big and bad a drop that is, huh?" Celdern chuckled grimly. "What about that path by the stream?"

"If we stay close to the wall here, we should be safe of the slippery ground. Hopefully the path leads somewhere safe." Serosa'ruth began trekking across the room, keeping his back to the stone wall. His companions followed suite, Miri yawning as she did so.

"I hope we find a safe spot soon, because I'm getting tired."

"As am I." Ky'itae agreed. "Sero, maybe we should call it quits for the day soon."

"If the chamber after this next flight of stairs is safe, we'll camp for the night." The druid agreed, "If not… well, I suppose we'll have to clear that challenge before finding another safe spot."

"Let's hope it's the former." The red-headed bard sighed. "The Darkvision scrolls I used won't last for more than another hour, and I'm out of them. I have torches, but I'd rather reserve them for as long as is possible."

"That's understandable." Serosa'ruth reached the next flight of steps. "Onward, then."

Though longer than the stairs that led into the slippery floored cave, the steps did not take long for the four to walk, and they soon found themselves in one more fairly large cavern, this one decorated by a loud waterfall spilling into a deep pool in the northwest wall and arrays of colorful minerals and lichens. After a brief, but careful inspection of the area, Serosa'ruth noted blind cavefish and white crayfish in the pool's waters, but nothing else of danger in the area.

"Well, looks like we camp here tonight, guys."

- - - - -

Faelar's ears perked up at what sounded like voices. Trusting his hearing – after all, his already admirable listening was amplified by his enchanted spike earrings – the thief grabbed his dagger and sword before cautiously walking towards the waterfall. Muttering a spell, Faelar caused the water to spread apart and away from him; something he hadn't bothered with before since he was already wet then, but preferred to stay dry now.

His Darkvision working full force, the rogue broke into a wide grin at the sight before him.

"Oi! OI! Ova 'ere!" He waved, grabbing his party's attention.

"Well, I'll be damned." Serosa'ruth laughed, spotting the young thief, as did the others by him, "Looks like the crafty bastard managed to make it this far as well."

"Damn straight dis 'crafty bastard' survived so far!" Faelar retorted, "'Aven't you learned not ta underestimate me yet?"

Only mildly surprised the rogue had heard his comment, the druid chuckled. "So I have. So I have."

Aw, damn. Two months without an update. Yes, I've been busy with school and other things (like getting the story and background for a new comic plotted out), but I DID have time here and there to work on this, I was just being lazy… I have no true excuse nor reason this time, and for that, I apologize. At least this chapter's longer than the last, eh? Also, we're getting closer to closing the "gap" SL and I had that I have to fill, so in about one or two more chapters, it should be filled in completely and I can get the next few chapters up much faster, as they're already written. Thanks for reading, and for your patience (if you're one of the older readers and have been waiting months for me to get my butt moving on this). Here's hoping I get the next installment up sooner.

As always, comments and constructive criticisms are appreciated, and help keep us motivated… Hint, hint.