ragath7

The party returned to the Ragath mines minus their dwarven companions. Dagmar told the miners of their valiant fight against the face of evil and they nodded in appreciation. After healing their wounds the party got some sleep if not rest. Their dreams were troubled.

Xendra had strange visions during her meditation of crossing the gray bridge of elven lore which foretold the death of someone near. In Jacen's nightmare a dark elf in black robes was standing over him as he slept. He couldn't move, and then he realize his left arm was being lifted so that he could see his hand. The drow took out a black blade and slowly started to cut off his hand at the wrist. He screamed and suddenly awoke. Dagmar's nightmare was of a beating heart getting louder and louder and until it pounded in her head.

Suddenly, the heart stopped and Dagmar realized she was being shaken awake by a grim-looking dwarven woman, Agmer.

"Neygrim Roshtel, carrier of the Shield of Ragath, son of Grimmar Roshtel the Red, heir of Telormar Roshtel, is dead. As defender of the Clan of Ragath and a paladin of Moradin, you are requested to officiate at his entombment and the coronation of Varmer Telormar."

Something in her manner made it clear that the invitation was for Dagmar only.

At the entombment deep in the mines in a room she had not been taken to previously, Dagmar spoke prayers to Moradin the Soul Forger and struck the ceremonial anvil four times. Neygrim was placed in his tomb. His greataxe and the Shield of Ragath were carried to a sturdy gray-haired woman.

"With the heavy axe of Neygrim and the Shield of Ragath, I will defend our clan," the woman said stoically.

With that, the dwarves filed out and closed the great stone door behind them.

Dagmar rejoined the rest of the party near the boats and told them that Neygrim had died.

"How?" asked Jacen.

"His heart was cut from his chest," said Dagmar, lowering her eyes.

None of the party said anything for a long while as they remembered their actions in the reliquary.

"Can't someone raise him?" asked Triblet.

"No, they cannot raise him without his heart. Stronger divine powers than they possess would be needed. Whoever did this knew what they were doing," answered Dagmar quietly.

"We can't let them get away with this, we need to got back and get that drow guy with the wands," said Jacen.

"I agree. But first we have a few things we need to take care of. First, that unholy water must go. Second, while I can see you aren't evil of heart, I worry that your flirtations with the cloaks and relics are corrupting you. We should destroy the hand and eye."

"I'm a little worried too," said Xendra, "but I'm not sure we should destroy them. We might need them and I'm not sure what kind of evil they might release if we tried to destroy them."

Reminded of the heart in the glass case, Dagmar compromised. "Why not let Triblet carry the hand and eye. The unholy water needs to be destroyed, however."

"Alright, alright," conceded Jacen, "I'm pouring out the holy water!" and he poured three vials out into the river.

Triblet took out a vial as well, which surprised Dagmar, and poured it into the river as well.

"Triblet was giving me weird looks back in the reliquary and was trying to steal one of my vials, so I gave him one," said Jacen.

"No I wasn't!" said Triblet indignantly, "I have no idea why he gave me one!"

They gave the hand and eye to Triblet and then took their boat back to Rugoth's lair. They found their way back to the cloak room and everyone who didn't have one grabbed a cloak and put it on. Again, they all felt warmer except for Jacen (whose ring already gave him warmth). Again, they found the doors before them unlocked and entered the reliquary.

In front of them, a one-armed skeleton was busily polishing the black marble floor to a high gloss, oblivious to their presence. A lone bonebat sat motionlessly on a rafter above. Cautiously, they examined the pedestals (and avoided the pressure plates) to find that the broken iron box was still in its case beneath a cloth. They also found that the heart was once agalin in a glass case and slowly beating. Examining it closely, Dagmar could see the scars that must have been from her axe. Dagmar shuddered at the evil aura around the heart, but stayed her axe this time.

Dagmar walked over to where the skeleton was polishing the floor and smashed it to bits of bone. Above, the bonebat didn't move.

The party got in their normal marching order and proceeded down the spiral staircase at the "wrist" of the room. As they descended, it became increasingly cold. Jacen put his cloak back on as they reached the bottom of the stairs.

The room was dark except for an eerie green glow coming from the walls and ceiling. There were several barrels in the room which they went to investigate. Dagmar could tell immediately that the barrels contained more unholy water and, as they went to tip them over, a large cat-like monster leapt out and struck Tribet with two tentacles, knocking him to the ground. Dagmar fired her crossbow, but the bolt was wide of the mark. Jacen leapt with his long sword in hand and swung down on the creature's head but found he struck only the stone floor.

The blue-black cat moved quickly and gracefully on its six legs around the barrels and its tentacles again struck out and hit Dagmar. Triblet, back on his feet, ran up to the beast with his shortsword and dagger and swung, but he too missed the shimmering beast. Xendra cast a Flame Sphere and rolled it toward the beast. The cat cried in pain as its fur burned, but ran around the barrels again as Dagmar swung down her greataxe and struck the beast.

The air shimmered around the beast and it leapt again. This time its tentacles battered Dagmar with their horny ridges. The Flaming Sphere caught up to the cat, filling the air with the stench of burning flesh and fur. Jacen swung his blade true, yet struck only air. Dagmar, bleeding from the cat's blows, brought down her axe on the cat's head and felt it connect. The cat twitched and sunk to the floor.

The party finished dumping the barrels and Jacen skinned the cat and put its pelt in his pack. They also found a potion, a small hematite, and six platinum coins.

They went down a short corridor in the west of the room and entered a room with two black stone coffins. Dagmar and Jacen lift the lid of one of them and found the body of an orc in brown robes submerged in unholy water. Xendra looked at a book on a stand near the coffin.

"It looks like some sort of experiment to create undead involving unholy water and drow poison," said Xendra.

They dumped the bodies onto the ground and severed their heads. Xendra grabbed the notebook and put it in her pack.

They explored two more connected rooms, each containing exactly the same contents. In the last, they found the body of the female drow that had been missing from the upper level of the complex. As with the other bodies, they decapitated the body and dumped it on the floor.

Finally they came to an unoccupied laboratory. Around the room there were several bookcases and a desk in the southwestern wall. On the desk sat a beautiful darkwood harp with ivory inlay and pearls. Along the west wall a sleeping troll with curiously braided hair was shackled with heavy chains. Further north on the same wall a body wrapped in spider web lay on the floor. In the center along the north wall, a large pentagram was etched in the floor with scorch marks and blood stains around it. High above on the ceiling along the northern wall they could see a mass of webs with several different kinds of spiders crawling about. On the east end of the northern wall, a black cloak like the ones the party wore except with a golden rather than silver clasp hung on a hook. Looking further south on the eastern wall, they saw an electric blue field about twenty feet across suspended between two eight foot tall obelisks giving the room a faint smell of ozone. A block of ice with a seven-foot tall orc in blue robes frozen inside dominated the southeastern corner of the laboratory.

Searching the room, Xendra found more books on the shelves related to the undead experiments and also some involving the creation of half-fiends. They also found a box of flasks, all labeled in Draconic. Eight appeared to be flasks of acid, two alchemist's fire, and two antitoxin. In a glass case on the desk was a scroll that Xendra identified as Control Undead. Triblet investigated the desk drawers and found a leather bag containing twenty platinum coins and three gems that he believed to be quite valuable.

Triblet went to examine the orc in the block of ice when suddenly and silently a gray pseudodragon with rotting flesh flew down and stung him with a barbed tail. The gnome immediately fell to the floor and stopped moving. The noise alerted the others in time to see a pseudodragon flying silently up to the ceiling and disappear into the shadows.

Jacen snatched up his bow and sent an arrow into the darkness, but it missed its mark and the pseudodragon descended for Dagmar. The undead creature sank its teeth into Dagmar's forehead and its tail whipping around, but missing the paladin. Dagmar screamed and swung with her greataxe, but missed. Xendra shot a Magic Missile, but this one dissipated into shimmering metallic light before striking home.

This time Jacen's arrow hit the pseudodragon and buried itself into the decomposing flesh of its tail. The undead beast released Dagmar and quickly flew straight for Jacen, stinging him with its tail as it once again rose to the ceiling. Dagmar ran over to Triblet while keeping an eye toward the ceiling and tried to revive him without success. Xendra let loose a Magic Missile that struck the creature as it hovered behind the cover of a ceiling beam.

Jacen fired, but his arrow struck the beam above and the creature again descended like a bolt toward Dagmar. The undead pseudodragon whipped its tail at Dagmar's face and struck. Dagmar fell to her knees clutching her bloody face and the creature flew past into the shimmering electric field between the obelisks. With an intense blue flash and the sound of a thunderclap, the creature was gone.

Dagmar crawled over to Triblet and again tried to revive the gnome, who awoke, but still felt rather groggy.

After a round of healing the party decided to leave the laboratory and explore the rest of the complex. They quickly realized there were three more rooms, each similar to the others they had found earlier. They dumped the bodies in the coffins, decapitated them, and Xendra took the lab books from their stands. After determining that there were no other rooms in the complex, they returned to the laboratory.

By this time the troll had awakened and struggled at its chains. "Brog Gor Mor Gah," it yelled at the party.

Xendra cast Comprehend Languages and translated for the party. "Let me go! Albereth will be back and hurt me soon!"

"Who is Albereth?" asked Xendra.

"What you say? Azbrayd not talk that way. Speak Troll, pointy eared one. Come closer, maybe I understand you better."

Xendra took a step closer and the troll lashed out, but was restrained by the chains.

"Uh, me just trying to, uh, point at thing. Me don't hurt tasty, uh, nice elf. Me help nice peoples. Know special tunnel to run away."

"I saw we torch him and see if he changes his attitude," said Jacen picking up a torch and lighting it.

"No! No fire! Nooo!" cried the Troll which started to eat through its own arm to free itself from the chains.

"He's escaping!" cried Xendra, taking a step back.

Jacen grabbed his blade with his free hand and hacked off troll's head which fell to the stone floor with a meaty thud. He hacked the troll to bits of gore.

They then turned to the orc encased in ice. Xendra found a brazier and set it near the orc and they lit it. As the ice melted they investigated the spider web-wrapped body. Tearing away the webbing from its head, they found the visage of Roguth. Jacen immediately took a torch to the desiccated body and it burst into flames. He then noticed the limbs of the troll were slowly creeping toward each other and torched them as well. The severed limbs writhed in the flames and then stopped.

After about an hour the frozen orc was completely thawed, but also completely dead. After Dagmar laid on hands with no effect, they lit the orc as well. Its body burned slowly at first, but after a flask of oil, it was consumed in flames.

As the flames died down from the orc, troll, and Rugoth, the party turned their attention to the two obelisks. Xendra looked carefully at each of them and cast Comprehend Languages to read the runes on the surfaces of the black stone columns. They seemed unremarkable except for a dial with three numbers in Draconic and an "off" setting. The dial was set to one.

Xendra nodded to the rest of the company and they lined up to cross the field into the beyond after the pseudodragon. Readying their weapons, they counted, "one...two...three...jump!"

The thunderclap was deafening and the flash temporarily blinded them. Dagmar's vision returned just in time to see a greataxe coming down on her head. Dagmar's head burst like a Gallagher prop. The rest of the party was stunned. Grikk, the half-orc fighter from the four in black they had been following, stood in front of them, his greataxe dripping with the gore from Dagmar's head. Jacen swung and Grikk parried and Xendra's Magic Missile failed to phase him. Triblet grabbed up Dagmar's body and jumped back through the teleporter field behind them. The rest quickly followed and Xendra turned the knob on the teleporter to off.

The field between the pillars disappeared and the room was suddenly silent. After waiting for a few minutes in the laboratory for Grikk with weapons ready, they realized he wasn't going to follow. They gathered their loot and Dagmar's body and once again retreated to the boats and the safety of the mines.

* * *

Varmer and Harran Telormar listened as Xendra and Triblet described their encounters in Rugoth's complex. Jacen did not attend. Triblet pleaded with Varmer to do what they could for Dagmar and offered the mine the gems they found in the laboratory.

"Treasure is all well and good," Varmer said, "but what we need are defenders of the mines. Our numbers have dwindled through the latest adventures. Will you swear an oath to defend the clan when called to do so?"

"I do," said Triblet solemnly.

"As do I," added Xendra.

Harran looked over Dagmar's body and shook her head.

"Leave me with the body. I will do what I can. Come back in the morning," she said.

Triblet and Xendra left quietly and rejoined Jacen in their rooms. They slept soundly and were surprised to be awakened before the dawn by Dagmar.

"Dagmar! You're alive!" said Triblet.

"Welcome back," Jacen joined in.

"Thank the Old Ones," said Xendra. "How do you feel?"

"Okay except for a terrible headache," answered Dagmar with a smirk.

The rest of the party filled Dagmar in on the few details that she missed and they agreed that they needed to return as quickly as possible. Dagmar decided to see if she could recruit any volunteers from the dwarves and went to speak to Queen Varmer. The queen decided that she would not request any of the clan to join them, but would give Dagmar an audience and allow the party to take any volunteers that wished to join them.

"Friends, fellow followers of Moradin the forger of our race. A great evil threatens the Clan of Ragath. While we must surely defend the mines from this evil, our party must go to its heart to rescue our friend Grelj, son of Fjan, the leader of the barbarians of the Sable Woods. In our mission we hope to strike down this threat to the mines and the clan. We know that many have joined us before and fallen."

The eyes of their audience lowered and the mention of their fallen family.

"Their sacrifice has been great and honorable. But the evil is still strong. Who among you will join us to end it once and forever?"

A three fingered hand was raised immediately. A dwarf rescued by the party from Roguth's prison.

"Aye, I'll join you," said Redbeard.

There was a little laughter from the others.

"You! You can't swing a cleaver in the kitchens without losing a finger!" said one of the audience.

Redbeard lowered his hand. "True, but it is a noble cause I cannot refuse," he blushed.

"Then Redbeard shall join us. Are there others?" asked Dagmar.

No more hands were raised.

"We will leave at noon from the river," Dagmar finished and the audience was dismissed.

"Ooh, nice speech," said Jacen.

"Shut up," replied Dagmar.

Later, as they readied the boats Redbeard arrived with a pot on his head and a kitchen knife.

"I think we can do a little better than that," said Dagmar who went back to their quarters. She returned with chainmail and her old warhammer. "There, that's a little better."

Redbeard took a few swings with the warhammer and managed not to brain himself. They took two boats up the river and after a few hours arrived once again at Roguth's lair. Redbeard vomitted over the side of the boat.

"Yeah, I'm not one for the water either," said Dagmar.

The party went back down to the laboratory. Redbeard was a little taken aback by the burned and decapitated bodies along the way. Once at the twin pillars, the party arranged itself to strike.

"Wait here, Redbeard. If we don't return in ten minutes, turn off the teleporter and let the clan know what happened," instructed Dagmar.

On the count of three they jumped and swung.

Grikk was caught off guard and Dagmar's greataxe caught him square in the chest. Jacen's sword caught Grikk in the throat as the half-orc was reaching for his weapon. Finally, Triblet pressed his blade into Grikk and gave it a twist. "This is for Dagmar" he whispered to the half-orc. Grikk's eyes opened wide.

"May the right hand of Norda cut you down," and he died.

They looked around the room. It was a bedroom. The air was warmer here than the rest of the complex. At the foot of the bed was a chest and on the wall opposite where they entered was another set of teleportation pillars, shimmering blue and waiting. They examined the chest and found twenty-four bottles of elven wine from the west of Dirole. They also found a velvet bag. Opening the bag, Triblet found a lump of iron in the shape of a dwarven heart. He handed it over to Dagmar who looked at it carefully and put it in her pack.