I came to my senses into a waking nightmare. This was my nightmare curse! The Dark Rider had dragged me to my doom in the dungeons beneath Castle Ravenloft. I remember screaming my voice harsh in terror. After a few mind-numbing moments of the purest of fear, I heard Nim's reassuring voice from my side, and slowly I came back to the present. My left arm and shoulder felt like they were being pulled apart and my feet were immersed in cold water. The area was all in darkness, but my gnomish sight showed that I was in fact in a dank, water filled cell in a dungeon. Nim was chained up beside me against the wall of the cell, both of us dangling painfully by one arm.
Soon others began to come to and what encouragement as could be mustered was spread amongst the troupe. All of my friends had survived the assault of the Dark Rider and had been taken prisoner. As terrifying as the situation was I felt happy that none of my friends were killed. Where there is such luck, there is always room for hope. No matter what the dark master of this land had in store for us, surely we would prevail.
Only a couple of us could see in the dark, but we were all able to determine most of the situation at hand. The cold, dank and murky water was about five feet deep, and most were chained chest deep in water. Nim and I, supposedly because of our smaller stature, were chained much higher on the wall. The others were dispersed among the large dungeon in various barred cells. All of us were stripped down to our skivvies and severely wounded. Due to the regenerating power of my fey magic, I was able to gain access to minor healing spells throughout the next hours to fully heal myself and Nim.
In my fevered recurring nightmare, a vicious werewolf occupied the cell across from me, eventually jumping out and asking me to swear to serve him, just before I slip beneath the water and drown. In this reality, nothing could be seen in the darkness of the cell across from our cell, except for a faint glow coming from that cell, under the water. It was obviously some sort of magic and would have to be investigated when we escaped our bonds.
As the hours turned into days, try as we might to keep our spirits up, we all became despondent eventually. For five days we had no sleep, no food and barely any water to slake our thirst. The water was of the foulest nature, but catching drips from the ceiling into our parched mouths barely kept us alive. It was days of living through a haze of reality and tortured fantasy. One by one we became silent and in our own ways prepared to meet the agonizing death of starvation that awaited us. There would be no one to come and our skeletal forms would remain here, chained in our cells, for centuries to come. Only sporadically would a strained voice call out to see who was still alive, and those voices became less as time went on as there was just no strength to put forth the effort, nor enough spit to make the sounds necessary.
As we slumped there awaiting our certain fate, the creaky iron door leading into the dungeon swung slowly open and a massive jailor came lumbering in, glancing first into my cell. Nim and I pretended we were not conscious and he moved on. He soon came to Akkiir and Tetsuo's cell and noticed that Tetsuo was still conscious. He opened the mostly stuck, rusty door with a key and moved in to begin unshackling Tetsuo. Both of these beaten and broken heroes lept into action and fought with everything they had. Akkiir swung his free legs up and around the giant Jailor's neck, trying to strangle the life out of him as Tetsuo drove his powerful legs into the creature over and over again. It was a valiant effort and the Jailor seemed to have been taken by surprise and unsure how to handle it, but soon enough he escaped Akkiir's grasp and brutally pummeled both of them into un-consciousness once again.
(Uphir taunted the Jailor and blasted him with a stream of her acid dragon breath?) The Jailor soon went looking for easier prey and came back to our cell. I was desperately anxious for my beaten comrades and was past pretending I was asleep. He came forth barely giving Nim or I any serious concern for attack and unshackled me, dragging me along in the water behind him. My mind was filled with visions of torture as I desperately treaded water, spitting out the murky water when it threatened to drown me.
I was unceremoniously brought forth into a torture chamber of sorts, it too being half submerged in water. Various machines and devices lay about the room and I was left to try and determine their horrible applications on my own. Sitting upon a raised balcony, looking very severe, stood a handsome, richly appointed man with an aura of supreme authority. In a very thick Barovian accent, the devil asked "Tell me why I should not just leave you in that cell to die and rot?" I tried with all desperation to be diplomatic with him. I extolled all of the platitudes I thought were appropriate and tried to tell him that perhaps we could be of some use to him, if only he would allow me to talk to my friends. I was hoping to buy time, but he seemed to see right through me and commanded I be brought back to my cell.
Next, the Jailor came for Uphir, who was taunting him to take her next. Uphir fought against her instincts, still being severely wounded from her ordeal. She trudged through the water behind the Jailor and was brought before the Devil Strahd. The ancient Vampyr asked the same question of Uphir and she replied with as much strength and venom as she could that she would not play his games and threatened to destroy him with her bare hands. She betrayed no fear and left no doubt that she would defeat him. She was sent back to her doom in the watery cells.
Akkiir was conscious once again and begged the Jailor to take him to see Strahd, he was not afraid of him and he had a message he wanted to give him. The Jailor was not interested in him in the least. He returned Uphir, locking her tight into her manacles once again, and unlocked Janlynn. Janlynn looked like she had suffered much these past days, yet there was a certain fire in her eyes and determination in her frown. She was dragged off to meet the master of this domain.
The same question was asked of Janlynn and her message to Strahd was straightforward and filled with the certainty of her faith. She stared the monster directly in the face and swore by Lathander; the Morning Lord; the Dawnbringer, that She would be the one to destroy him and free this land. She was absolutely fearless and spoke with the steady voice of certainty and prophesy. Strahd sneered and sent her back to her cell to rot with the rest of us. We once again settled in to our fate, and hoped the Jailor would give us another opportunity to resist this oppression and possibly escape.
With the excitement over, we became somewhat subdued once again. We were still exhausted and starving and sometime later we found ourselves in a quiet gloom. The quiet was broken by the familiar squawk of our raven friend Hecate. In her talons she carried snelb and in her beak a small leather bag containing lock picks! She flew in through the bars in the door and then into our cell, dropping the bag into Nims hand.
Nim wasted no time picking the locks on all of our manacles and cell doors and soon all were assembled in the water of the dungeon. For our safety Nim and I were given support from our friends so that we would not fall beneath the water. All were desperate to escape and both Snelb and Hecate were worried about tarrying too long. Healing was needed and I gave what small amount I could and, using my magic, I created a temporary holy symbol for Janlynn to use so that she could cast a more powerful heal upon herself and her friends.
My curiosity would not allow me to leave without seeing what was glowing beneath the water of the opposing cell. Nim picked the lock and we quickly went in to investigate. What was pulled from beneath the water was a glowing short sword! The sword was somewhat sentient and chose its wielder and was claimed by Akkiir. We wasted no further time and left the dungeon with haste. Snelb and Hecate were ahead and Nim communicated with Snelb through telepathy and he guided us forward.
Even with the light from the magical sword, unfortunately we ran into some magical trap that was upon the floor of the hallway, and if you stepped upon certain spots you would be magically teleported back to a random cell. Akkiir was in the lead and had this happen to him two or three times. We could see into the torture chamber that the giant Jailor stood in there and we would need to get through him and up onto the balcony if we were to escape.
We made our way into the room to do battle. The Jailor summoned forth half a dozen zombies from beneath the foul water. For some strange reason none of these zombies attacked any of our group during the battle. I'll call that strange luck, but I'll take it. As the Jailor sloshed across the room I took it as my mission to keep blasting him back with my fey bolts. This worked fairly well as our troupe formed up in the room to fight the creature.
Nim heard the muffled cry of another prisoner behind the door to another set of cells. He went to investigate and pick the lock on the door. Meanwhile it turned out that Akkiir's last teleport brought him into the other set of dungeon cells with the other prisoner. Between the two of them, Nim and Akkiir managed to rescue the prisoner and rejoin the group.
Tetsuo rushed through the room, past the zombies and leapt up to the balcony. His mission was to dig through the gear and weapons that were up on the balcony to pass out to his fellows. Snelb had informed us that the gear was there. First Tetsuo lit some torches so that those who could not see in the dark could see to do battle with the Jailor.
Uphir noticed that the Jailor held her axe and she rushed forward as fast as she could, grabbing the magic glowing short sword as she went. As I kept blasting our enemy back, Uphir moved into position. The Jailor attacked first, hefting Uphir's mighty axe for a great chop but as he was about to swing, spiky thorns erupted from the handle and the creature dropped her axe. Uphir stepped forth and with one smooth motion pierced the giant Jailor straight through the neck. He dropped instantly dead from Uphir's precise blow.
Uphir reclaimed her prized weapon from the water and all gathered together on the balcony to dress and re-equip themselves for the escape ahead of them. All of our gear was there; except for the Book of Strahd and the queer Titanite stone we had won from the Ruins of Berez. We turned to the only door on the balcony and with our heels dragging, went forth into the strange room beyond.
Comments