Chapter 1: Awakening

"Hey. Imoen. Ims, wake up. We've got to get out of here…"

A familiar voice brought the redhead back to the edges of consciousness. She opened her eyes cautiously and found herself sprawled on a metal floor in an immaculately clean cage. The room was dim, but she could make out most of what was around. Steel bars… flagstone walls around, with flickering lights above...

And outside, peering in through the bars and fiddling with something, was Eli.

Right... She was Imoen. Imoen Winthrop, the innkeeper's daughter.

"Eli…?" Groggy, she shifted her position upwards slightly to get a better look at him. The half-elf was dirty and heavily bruised, and his black hair hung limply behind him in greasy, ratty braids. Eli offered a shy but pleased grin in response, then finished jimmying the lock. He broke it off with a click, then held it up for her to inspect.

"You taught me something after all," he said proudly, pressing it into her hands through the bars. "Let's find everyone else and get the hell out of here."

Imoen's brain was still sluggish; she was having trouble processing where she was, and what she was supposed to be doing. The half-elf must have noticed her confusion because he paused, opened her door, and then helped support the redhead out of her cell. "Come on, now," he said, supporting her as she gained her feet. "It'll be okay. We'll get out of here…"

Through the haze of confusion, she suddenly giggled. "You know… you kind of suck at giving encouragement."

Eli's face fell, but he rallied quickly. "Yeah, I know. But you're up, aren't you?"

Still holding her about the waist, he looked around and then pointed to the back of the room, to where there were more cages. "I don't know how long we have until that madman comes back, but I passed a few other cages to get to you. Let's go."

"Who? S- stop, wait." Imoen was wobbly when she tried to keep pace, her legs weak even with her companion's support – when was the last time she'd really stood for an extended period of time? Or was it due to the adrenaline rushing through her veins? Eli relinquished his grip, and she allowed herself to lag behind for a few seconds to let her limbs regain their bearings before hobbling off once more to keep pace. Eli was taller, with longer legs - it made for a challenge. "Gods, what did he do to us?"

"…I don't know. On either count."

Eli peered around the cages like a scout, looking every direction to see if they were being followed. If they hadn't just been tortured for an undetermined length of time, Imoen would've been proud of her studious companion. After all, when they'd started out together a year ago, he'd barely spent any time out of the Candlekeep library and had tripped over every rock between Candlekeep and the Friendly Arm Inn. She hadn't passed up an opportunity to tell him so, either.

"But you're – I remember - spells –"

"I know. I've never seen anything like them before in my life. Nothing Gorion or Ulraunt ever cast was like that. Here, stop."

He held up a hand, and Imoen paused, grateful for the rest. They'd come to the corner of the room; in the cage ahead of them, slumped over, was a figure who was mostly naked, bald, and covered in a variety of heavy bruises. Whoever was in there was very still. The redhead watched Eli's pale face contort into a frown, and his pale eyes narrow to get a closer look.

"Oh my Gods," Imoen said, after recognition had kicked in. "Is... is he dead?"

Eli let out a soft shush, but the pathetic creature on the floor managed to croak something unintelligible, cough, and whisper, "D-death... would feel better than… than this."

That was a voice they both knew. Imoen looked to Eli; the caged man opened his eyes into 2 dark slits and locked them with Eli's. The mage had reached in with his other hand to try and take his pulse, but withdrew out of surprise upon hearing Khalid speak.

"Khalid!" Eli had gone as white as a sheet.

"H-how did you two escape?" Khalid asked, still barely above a whisper.

"Oh my Gods," Imoen repeated, dropping to her knees to join them at their level. "Khalid! Oh, I'm so glad to see you. Where's Jaheira?"

"I don't know." The fighter sat up with some effort, wincing with pain as he did so - both Eli and Imoen cringed at the extent of what had been done to the other half-elf. Lightning scars in the shape of fractals traced their way up and down his body; bruises and cuts covered his skin nearly everywhere else.

Imoen was struck by the cuts in particular – the elf's bright pink flesh, in the process of healing over, showed that they were arranged symmetrically, in ray-like patterns from a central line in each limb. Their tormentor was remarkably precise when he traced the patterns of his nerves and veins. The scars were almost… pretty?

She shuddered, putting the thought out of her mind for the time being, and braced herself to stand.

" – if we can find her, then," Elioth was saying in a whisper to Khalid when she started to pay attention once more. "There has to be a key somewhere that could get us out, unless you can somehow break these bars..."

"I- I'm not in much a state to really try b-bursting out of this cage right now," the Calishite admitted haltingly. "I can s-shout, though, if you're about and something happens."

Eli looked contemplative at that. After a few moments, he licked his lips, braced his hands upon the cage's iron bars, and then moved to stand. "All right. We'll be back for you as soon as we can."

"Wait."

The two younger escapees paused their exit and turned back. "Before you g-go…"

Even with the swelling and bruising of his face, it was obvious Khalid had something more on his mind. He gestured for the two to come nearer. Once they'd gotten as close as the bars would allow, he whispered to them hoarsely: "If s-something h-happens… if the man keep-keeping us here comes back, f-find Jaheira and g-get out. Leave me."

"Khalid, we can't – " Imoen interjected.

"You c-can and you will." He and Eli stared at one another unblinkingly for a few long moments. Then slowly, the mage reached back in and offered him a pale hand, which Khalid took with his own. He looked to Imoen next, who swallowed hard to keep her protests but nodded her agreement.

"All right," she said softly. "We'll be as quick as we can, but please, please… take care of yourself."

The Calishite had resumed his slumped pose, though it was clear that he was very alert now from his vague frown and upturned, pointed ears. "I'll be fine. B-but be careful, you two."

They searched the other cages one by one. Most were vacant, a few recently so by the marks on the bars and dried pools and smears of blood on their floors, still red and brown in the dim light. The others were as immaculate as the one Imoen woke up in, and the two youngsters had just about given up hope in finding the rest of their teammates when they came to an odd area curtained off from the rest. A foul odor wafted out from underneath, and Imoen caught sight of a puce liquid running in thin rivulets past their feet.

Smething, or possibly multiple somethings, had died there and were busily decomposing on the other side.

Eli, who was about to pull the curtain to the side, had blanched at the smell. Imoen suddenly remembered that he'd never had a particularly strong stomach – he went queasy at the sight of the butchered animals Winthrop had put aside for dinner (and had been a staunch vegetarian ever since that initial discovery of where said dinner came from), and he'd had to step away from the aftermath of every battle, lest he lose his last meal.

"Let me," she said mercifully, gently pushing his arm to the side and away from whatever horror they were about to witness. "Might want to get your vomitskin ready."

"Thanks," he said gratefully, taking a few steps back. "It's gone, though. I wish our gracious host had let me keep it. I've got a feeling it'll come in handy."

It was funny, in a grim sort of way. Imoen could help but rasp out a chuckle. "I'll do it on three, then – don't look until I say so, and even then be ready to run and puke over in that corner." She pointed at the furthest spot from them. Despite the jest, though, Imoen felt a hole open up in the pit of her stomach. She wasn't much a fan of gore herself, and if the stench itself was any indication, the body - or bodies - in question were by no means fresh.

"One. Two." She put her other hand to her nose, trying to breathe through her mouth. Elioth was already quite green in the face and had backed up several steps in anticipation. Imoen looked back to him and he nodded weakly, then closed his eyes and gave a thumbs up.

"Three."

The redhead pulled back the curtain to reveal two cages, side by side and nearly touching. Both were occupied, but only one had a puddle of decayed remains dripping out from the bottom.

From her closer vantage point, she could see the entire grisly scene. In the dripping cage, a network of rotting flesh had been draped over a bloodied scaffold of bones. Perhaps they made up a whole skeleton - Imoen could make out the oddly familiar shapes of ribs, spine, skull, and pelvis, along with the smaller bones she couldn't name - but they weren't in the order they'd started in and had been rearranged into a mockery of the human form. Whatever it used to be, they were a veritable giant, too. Even de-fleshed, the man or woman took up a great deal of the space inside the cage.

In the second cage, a crumpled and mostly naked figure lay still on the floor. She – for this one was definitely female – was dark skinned and haired, and deathly skeletal.

Imoen was holding her breath, she realized. Again, she looked from the first cage to the second, then back to the first once more while her eyes and brain tried to process what they were seeing. And then, a memory caught up with her.

The flesh inelegantly draped over the top of the dead man had a bald head, stained purple in one sagging, eyeless area. The thief let out her breath with a whispered, Gods, then took several steps away from the lurid scene, nearly crashing into several of the other cages in the process. The noise startled Eli; even though he'd promised to keep his eyes closed, the pale spheres flew open and looked at her in alarm. "What is it?"

"Don't look," Imoen begged. "Please - please don't look."

She might have had a more solid constitution than Eli, but it took all of her willpower to hold back the nausea and force her nerves to calm. She wanted to run. She wanted to grab Elioth, and flee even if it meant leaving Khalid to rot like the figure in the cage. As it was, the little thief lacked the strength to stop her companion from looking anyway.

"Is that –" he stuttered, wide-eyed. The half-elf had taken in the entire thing, and his face was the sicky grey of sooty wax.

"I think… I think so."

"Oh." Elioth nodded then and turned, took a few lurching steps towards the corner, and vomited bile onto the metal floors.

Imoen had to go back up there, had to know whether the other half of that pair was, indeed, Dynaheir and whether the witch was still alive. While the mage wiped his mouth and worked to regain his composure, she held her breath and approached the second cage, where the dark figure lay. She could make out the bumps of her vertebrae and ribs along her naked back in the dim light, along with the sunken dimples of where her backbone met her pelvis, but it was hard to tell whether she was breathing.

"Dynaheir," she whispered. Nothing. "Dynaheir?"

"Is she dead, too?" asked Eli weakly in the distance.

"I dunno…" There was no ichor, no runny putrefaction from her cage. If she was alive, she was barely clinging on; if not, she'd passed recently. It was against her better judgment and essentially contrary to everything she'd been taught about thievery to reach inside the cage, but what other choice did she have? Tentatively, she wedged her hand into a gap between the bars and felt for Dynaheir's wrist to take her pulse.

More quickly than expected, a skeletal, dark hand clamped over her own, and sharp fingernails dug into the flesh above her knuckles. Imoen bit her lip, which kept her from crying out in pain and surprise. "Who are thee?" the wizardress hissed in a voice that was very different than the proud one Imoen remembered.

"Dyna–" the thief gritted her teeth through the pain, curling her fingers as well. "Dynaheir, it's me, Imoen—"

"Lieeees! Thou art dead. We are all dead here!" The Rashemi woman's voice was a guttural growl, which awkwardly highlighted the overformal way she'd always spoken in Chondathan.

"Uhn," Imoen grunted, watching blood bloom and run down her forearm. "Please, Dynaheir, look at me. See for yourself. Eli's here, too…"

"Eli…"

The prone woman's hand relaxed somewhat over Imoen's, and the younger woman yanked it back and cradled it against her chest. "Y-yes, Eli. You remember him, don't you? Elioth Halfelven, Gorion's Son?" She shot a look back at the other wizard, who was sitting near his pool of vomit and steadfastly looking away from the whole scene. "Eli, say something."

"Um." Imoen could hear a rustle as he stood and approached the scene. He awkwardly knelt before the dark-skinned woman, and put a hand on the edge of her platform. The other hand shielded his eyes from the sight in Minsc's former cage. "Dynaheir, it's us, Elioth and Imoen. We've come for you."

Dynaheir moved enough to turn her head towards them. She'd always been masked, Imoen remembered, part of Hathran tradition – now, without the cover, she could look upon the wizardress' high but sunken cheekbones and delicate brow as she gazed up at them with dark brown eyes. Now, though, her warm eyes looked distinctly empty. "I - I was told that ye were all gone," she said quietly in her hoarse whisper.

"Everything has been taken from me, Visions of Yore. What insanity does the mad elf try to peddle to me now?"

"Mad elf…?" Eli turned to Imoen, who shrugged – how would she know? "Dynaheir, we need to get you out of here, but we need you to hold tight. We're going to look for a key –"

"We can't just leave her here," Imoen interjected. "Not with…"

She jerked her thumb at Minsc's remains, and Eli paled once more.

"Well, we can't very well break the cage, can we?" he asked.

"'tis open."

"You picked my lock. Why not try the same with her? I understand why you're so hesitant, but –"

"Yours was damaged by whatever that disturbance that made 'the mad elf' leave so abruptly," the half-elf explained in a strained voice. "I- I suppose *you* could try picking the lock…"

"If I couldn't pick my own, what makes you think –"

"I tell ye, 'tis open," repeated Dynaheir softly from the cage floor.

"What?" Eli and Imoen asked the question at the same time.

"The lock. 'tis open," Dynaheir explained weakly. "Whether ye truly are who you say or just another tricks, the lock is... open. He knew I could not run, that my strength and spirit were dead, and so the lock… is... open."

The Hathran was not in her right mind. This was plain to see to both Imoen and Eli.

The former scooted over to her cage, cautiously avoiding the puddle that was running out of Minsc's cage, and with her non-injured hand she tested the door. Exactly as Dynaheir had said, it was open. The witch inside gave no attempt to move, but remained on her floor, crumpled and passive.

Imoen bit her lower lip, looked to the half-elven mage with a nod, and the two of them gathered Dynaheir up and left the room quickly, each holding half of her up and carrying her far from the scene of carnage. She was light, disturbingly so for such a tall woman, and still said nothing - she only lay limp, like a ragdoll.

Like someone, she later thought, who didn't care whether the release they were headed towards was freedom or death.

The two young mages decided to leave Dynaheir with Khalid for the time being, and deposited her next to the Calishite's cage. Imoen wanted to take her with them, but Eli's logic prevailed - it would be easier to escape if they were all in one place, especially given how battered Khalid was and Dynaheir's unwillingness to move. A further complication - that neither Imoen nor Eli had their spells - put Eli especially at a disadvantage. What convinced her, though, was a fact that no one in the party wanted to say aloud.

Dynaheir…

Well, she was…

"I think she might be broken," Eli whispered, once they'd finally decided to address the Rashemi elephant in the room. "Look. Look at her eyes."

Dynaheir hadn't moved or spoken since they set her down. Her dark eyes were glazed over, and she ignored even the hand that Khalid had laid upon her ankle, the closest spot of hers he could reach.

Imoen averted her eyes from the scene and bit her lip. Eli was right. They needed to find the key, and they simply couldn't do it while also supporting a woman taller than the both of them who completely refused to move.

"I hate to leave her," she whispered furiously a short time later, as they walked along the corridor on the hunt for the key. "After what was done to her… to us…"

"Ugh, I wasn't suggesting that… that's out of the question. But she's safer with Khalid than sitting next to a puddle of -" Elioth shook his head, clamming up before he could finish the end of that sentence. "I don't know what we did in a past life, Ims, but this is not the way I pictured we'd end up dying."

Imoen scoffed. "I've no intention of laying down and giving up, Elioth. Neither do you, silly, elsewise you'd never have broken me out in the first place. Let's keep walking."

Eli must have paused to think about that, because he let her get ahead by a few paces. The mage-thief turned her head and offered him a lopsided grin from over her shoulder.

"How's that for encouragement?" she asked.

"And you said I was bad at it..." His expression was wry.

"Pah. Buzzkill."

Oddly, the key to Khalid's cell wasn't hard to find once they set their mind to it. The golem in the room that contained it didn't attack them on sight, and the locks to get to it were easy for Imoen to pick. Whoever was in charge of the place - the Mad Elf or whatever - hadn't put that much effort into keeping it out of their hands. They'd also found old but serviceable armor and some weapons too – real weapons, not flimsy, iron-poisoned ones - in a lockbox. Most precious of all, however, were the three vials of cloudy blue liquid Imoen had discovered behind a trapped painting. Elioth had identified them as healing potions. They scurried back with their ill-gotten gains as quickly as they dared, and tried to make as little noise as possible.

Khalid hadn't gone back to sleep in their absence. He started when the youngsters returned, awake and alert, and nudged Dynaheir. As everyone predicted, though, she did nothing.

"You'd think he'd've put more effort into hiding this stuff," Imoen remarked, her spirits considerably risen by their small victory. "It's almost like our host wanted us to f…"

"D- don't say that…" Khalid stammered softly, watching the two wizards juggle the pile of loot. "For all y- you know, he did."

With a click of a lock, they released the Calishite from his confinement, then the group as a whole took a time to divide and dress in their spoils. It was difficult for Imoen to ignore how roomy the armor and clothes were on everyone, though. She was short but had always been a healthy eater; the soft leather jerkin she'd donned, sized for someone of about her height, hung off of her. Khalid's body was so covered in bruises and cuts that she and Elioth wondered at the amount of pain it must have took to get the battered, heavy armor onto him. Watching Eli dress Dynaheir was disturbingly like watching someone drape a corpse.

While Eli worked, Imoen took a moment to press one of their potions into Khalid's gloved hands. He looked down at it, then into her eyes quizzically.

"Take it," she urged him gently.

To her surprise, the half-elf tried to give it back. "I c-can't accept this."

"Just a sip. You're bruised all over. There's no way we can get out of here without you being whole, Khalid."

Whole. Khalid looked over at Dynaheir, who was now dressed but pressed up against the edge of his cage and staring off vacantly into space. "I'll b-be whole again once we find Jaheira."

He didn't try to give the potion back a second time, though, Imoen noted. Instead, he popped the vial's cork and tipped a mouthful of the liquid back into his mouth. The bruising that had swelled up his face receded slightly; the cuts and scars scabbed and faded as they knit in magically augmented time. Magical healing however, though, for all the benefits and boons it granted. His face scrunched into a temporary expression of anguish and he bit down hard on his lip to keep from crying out.

Ere long, the magic worked, though: he looked more like the Khalid of old soon, just balder.

The fighter gave a shudder, then stashed the potion away. "T-that's enough for now. What- what's our plan?"

Silence.

"What IS the plan?" Eli asked, looking to Imoen, who shrugged.

"How the hells should I know?"

At Imoen's expression of confusion, Eli attempted to explain. "This place is full of locked doors and trapped all over, Ims, you've seen it. None of us have spells, and Khalid doesn't have much in him, so it only makes sense that you..."

Imoen giggled nervously as he trailed off. The redhead wasn't used to being put in charge – her stomach dropped at the burden everyone had just placed on her. "Like I have any idea how to get out of here..."

After all, Eli had always taken charge when they were on the road last time, despite the odds stacked against them and his bumbling. There was something about his force of personality that suited him better to the role. So why place the mantle of leadership on her now? She continued, "I guess – um, if the democracy agrees, I guess we'll go through that door we found in the golem's room...?"

"G-golem?" Khalid looked alarmed. "N-no one mentioned a golem."

"He's... docile," Eli explained. "Or apathetic. Something like that." Then mournfully, to Imoen, he added: "Too bad the other exit's sealed shut."

Imoen nodded emphatically. "In any case, I doubt we'll get out of here without at least one of us having spells, Eli... which means we should find a safe place to hide for a few hours."

The younger of the two half-elves looked around, both at the cells around them and at what the party had become - 3 spell-less casters, including one who was barely conscious, and a fighter who looked like he could take exactly one hit. "Agreed. Whatever passes for safe here, anyway."

They gathered their gear, Khalid picked up Dynaheir, and they made their way as a group to the Golem Room door to rest for a few uncomfortable hours, prepared to bolt if needed.

Refresh: 3/26/20