It's been almost a month since Kelemis Durn, the Veshian Home Commander, asked you to go to Hedrad to gather information about the Serpent Amphora. Since then you've travelled the 100s of miles, over land and sea. You've survived ambushes, nefarious plots, and even a shipwreck. You've bravely faced down Mormo's minions at every turn. Now you stand on the top of Mount Craigmore, amist the ruins of the fabled Sky Keep. You're here to recover the Book of Chains, which you've been told lies in the Vault of Chardun, somewhere deep in the ruins. Unfortunately, you've discovered that you are not alone. The servants of the Serpent Queen have been busy as well. You've just come upon a large band of Red Witch Ratmen, and you overhear the leader in the midst of an animated discussion with a form in a small pool of rain water..."...at all with your current progress," the voice from the pool says, the barely repressed anger making her voice quiver. "Do you understand the consequnces of failure here, you little rodent?!"
The robe-covered slithern by the pool hisses loudly, and her companions visibly tense, especially the large 7ft tall one, wearing a pair of curved swords. "I understand better than you, I think," she hisses in the siblant ratmen accent.
"I don't think you do," continues the female voice in the pool, "I've placed my position here in jeopardy to ensure that you and your stupid minions would know where they were at every step of the way. Now I learn that not only are they still alive, they're headed your way! They could be in the ruins even now! Yet you--"
"They are here," the Red Witch interupts, "And I will defeat them. And I will defeat the guardians of the SkyKeep. I will find this cursed book, and I will teleport to the agreed location. Our plan will succeed. I am Tears of Her Enemies, and not even your incompetence will make me fail!"
With that, the witch waves a claw, and the pool ripples. She turns to her giant, hulking companion, "When she is no longer useful, Spineback, we will drink her blood together."
"Good. I don't like working with humans, and I don't like this plan." They turn and stride towards the nearest intact structure, the Ratman retinue breaking the circle one by one to fall into place behind them.
As we watch the group of rat men, we see that the parts of the skykeep behind them are still partially intact. It's clear that someone has worked on these portions since it fell. Passages have been extended with primitive craftsmanship to link with passages within the mountain itself.
Weapons drawn, Telryn with crossbow, Chuck with longbow, we move towards the rat men, looking for a good bowshot. Four of the five have bows drawn. Paks sets her pack down. Miriel stays behind the rocks while the other three fire. Chuck hits with one arrow and Telryn hits. Paks drops down off the ledge.
Telryn shoots again, killing the one he hit. The one Chuck hit shoots him. One of the uninjured ones tries to hit Telryn, but misses. Another shoots at Paks, but misses wildly. The last one shoots at Paks and fumbles. Paks charges the one Chuck shot, but misses. Chuck jumps down and shoots two arrows again, grazing one. Miriel continues to hide.
Telryn shoots again, but misses. The one Paks charged drops his bow and draws a scimitar and swings at her, but he misses. The other two shoot at Chuck; one of them hits. Paks moves on in and the rat man next to her swings at her, bt misses. She swings at the stunned one, hitting it. Chuck charges the nearest one with Hoarfrost. As he draws it, he yells "Hoarfrost" and it shines with a bright blue light. It cleaves the rat in two, freezing the wounds as it goes. It's dead. Miriel continues to hide. The stunned rat man comes out of it and draws her scimitar, swinging at Paks and missing.
Telryn shoots at the grazed one, hitting it. It takes aim at him, but misses. The other one attacks Paks, but misses. Paks swings at her, hitting her and killing her. She swings on through to the unwounded one, but misses. She swings with the other sword and hits, killing it. She points her longsword at the last one. Chuck charges the last one and kills it.
Telryn tries to retrieve his crossbow bolts. Chuck searches the mage while Paks covers the entrance we saw the rat men go in. He finds five veshan gold pieces. He checks the next body and finds four more gold pieces. Telryn searches the rest and finds 9 more gold pieces.
Paks looks into the entrance; it looks like a ruined church. Chuck moves in slowly, looking for traps. As we look in, Stone sees some runes on the wall and backs out rapidly, saying he can't go in there. GP decides to stand guard with him, and Telryn leaves Chester with them as well. There are lots of carvings of Chardun, battling various forces, in different incarnations. It's rather disturbing.
Chuck tries to sneak in, checking for traps. He moves silently in and doesn't find any traps, so he gestures for us to come in. He tries to track the rat men as he goes, but it looks like they swept up their tracks as they went. We see two large double doors at the other end of the huge room. Paks suggests we split up as we move through the room to examine it. Paks takes Telryn with her. Miriel notices a shaft of light strangely concentrated on one stone in the floor. Chuck notices that the stone is loose. He checks for traps, there aren't any, so she tells Chuck to move it. He easily moves the stone and finds a chest. He checks for traps, but doesn't find any. He opens it (it's not locked), and finds seven potions labelled in Leadan. He goes over to Telryn with them.
Paks and Telryn see six big lead bolts broken and twisted in the ground where something was attached. They're dusty, it's been a while since whatever it was was moved. The corridor goes around the corner and goes maybe 50 feet down into another room. We meet back in the middle and Telryn says that four are labelled healing and three are labelled mana. Miriel drinks one and feels power flowing back into her. She drinks another. Telryn puts the others away hastily. Miriel gives a quick invocation of thanks to Madriel. We head for the closed double doors. Chuck checks for traps again. The doors are heavy, but with Chuck and Miriel's assistance Paks manages to open the doors. We see a long corridor. It's very dark.
After 80 feet, we find ourselves entering into earthworks; we've actually entered the spire. It gets humid and uncomfortably cold. 10 feet in, the passage turns to the NW. It's now just a rough-hewn passage. Chuck is holding his glowing dagger to light our way. We go NW for 70 feet, turns L, 20 feet, find branching. Telryn hands out one healing potion to each of us; Paks gives hers to Chuck. As we walk to the branching point, a small barrage of arrows comes from both corridors simultaneously. Four go at Paks, the other four at Chuck. One hits each of them.
Four more arrows come at each. All miss Paks, but two hit Chuck. Telryn casts Sleep down the right-hand corridor. We hear a lot of snores, but at least one rat man is still moving around. Chuck sends his snake down the left-hand corridor and moves down the right one until he can see. He shoots at the moving rat man and hits. Paks charges down to the left in the dark. Miriel lights a torch and moves towards the left corridor.
The rat man who Chuck shot bolts the other way. The three in front of Paks shoot at her. Two hit, grazing her. Telryn draws his dagger and follows Chuck, telling Chuck to go after Paks. Chuck tosses a torch to Telryn and goes the other way. His snake bites a rat man. Paks plows into them, hitting one and killing it. She swings on into the next one, hitting and killing that one as well. Miriel changes direction and moves after Telryn.
The rat men in front of Paks draw scimitars and swing at her, but miss. Telryn moves to the first rat man and slits its throat, killing it. Chuck shoots two arrows and hits with one, fumbling with the other and breaking his bowstring. Paks swings at the wounded one, hitting and killing it. She swings on through to the other, killing it. Telryn and Miriel hear a rat man scream from down the corridor. Miriel and Telryn coup de grace the other two. Chuck starts to restring his bow.
We regroup and move down toward the sound of screaming, with Chuck in the lead. Chuck drinks a healing potion as we go. We go 50 ft. down the corridor. Just at the edge of the light, we see a skeleton hanging in midair, slowly moving towards us.
Telryn casts Disrupt Undead. He sees no visible effect, and says he doesn't think it's undead. Paks steps in front of us, moves up to it, and swings, fighting defensively. She hits, but there's a sheen in front of her, and she slices into a gelatinous cube. The cube moves forward, trying to engulf Paks and the snake. Paks leaps backwards, but it engulfs her. The snake is engulfed as well. Miriel blesses everyone. Chuck walks up to it with Hoarfrost and swings at it, hitting it and freezing parts. His snake attempts to escape, but fails.
Telryn casts a flaming sphere behind the cube, burning it. Paks breaks free and moves back. She swings at it again and slices into it. The cube moves forward and tries to engulf Paks and Chuck. Chuck leaps back, but it grabs Paks again. The snake dies. Miriel waits. Chuck swings with sword and dagger, hitting it again. The cube loses it's coherence and slumps into a pile of slime. Chuck grabs his snake. Miriel looks at it and shakes her head sadly. Telryn sends the ball of flame down the corridor. Miriel heals Paks. A steel spear drops out of the remains of the cube. It has a sun and feather motif. Miriel picks it up. Telryn says he's heard of these, they were made during the titan's war for warriors of Madriel. As Miriel picks it up, it lights up. She's seen something like it before; once per day she can use it for a Daylight spell, but then has to be recharged in the sun. Six gold pieces also fall out. Chuck takes the snake's skeleton.
Telryn points out that the rat men obviously didn't go this way, so we go back the other way. Chuck picks up his torch. We got about 100 feet down the the other way. Paks and Telryn argue in whispers about what to do next. Paks says to go right. Chuck tries to track them and says the tracks go to the left. We head to the left, and four more arrows fly out at Chuck. One grazes him.
Telryn waits for Chuck. The rat men fire at Chuck again, and one hits. Paks charges. Miriel waits. Chuck charges the rat men and hits one with Hoarfrost, killing it. Telryn shoots the one to the left of Chuck, hitting it and killing it.
Suddenly a band of spider-eye goblins appear behind the rat men and start clawing at them. The rat men turn toward the goblins. One rat man kills a goblin. They stand back to back. Paks swings at them and kills one, cleaving through to kill the other. Miriel shouts to them that we come in the name of Madriel, let us pass! Chuck says "just give us the book and leave us alone".
The goblins move slowly towards us, and we can smell them rotting. They're zombies. Paks calls to Miriel that they're undead and evil. She swings at a zombie and kills it, cleaving through to slice another. She misses with the second attack. Miriel moves up and attempts a turn undead. She dusts the three that are still 'alive'. Chuck searches the rat men corpses quickly and takes a bow and 20 gp. Paks hands Chuck a composite longbow. Telryn asks Chuck to check tracks: clearly a large group of rat men went this way.
We continue on for 30 ft. and see another branching, with three more spider goblin zombies. Telryn and Miriel wait for Paks, who turns them and crumbles them. Chuck sees a lot of footprints going in all directions; it looks like maybe they split up. There are more goblin corpses and 3 rat man corpses; it looks like there was a big battle here. Telryn drinks the other mana potion. Paks leads us to the right. 20 feet down we get to another Y branching with four zombies. Paks turns them and dusts them. Chuck looks for tracks, but can't really tell which way. Paks leads us left.
Curves to right and come to 4-way intersection, five zombies. Telryn steps to the side and shoots at one, hitting it. Paks turns them all and dusts 'em. There's a dead rat man here. Chuck looks for tracks again, and it seems like they went in all directions. We go to the left. 30 ft down, we get to a T intersection. 4-5 dead zombies. Chuck tries to track again, and says the rat men went to the right. We head to the right.
Corridor turns more to the right, another intersection, turns to the right and left. Three more zombies. Chuck charges and hits one, chopping off its head. Paks charges and a zombie tries to bite her, but its teeth glance off her armor. She misses. Telryn watches behind us. The zombies attack Paks and Chuck. One bites Chuck's leg. The other fumbles against Paks and she hits it. Miriel waits.
Chuck swings and misses. Paks swings at the wounded one and hits, killing it, but fumbles and misses the other. Telryn starts chuckling. The zombie attacks Paks, but misses. Miriel moves down the corridor towards the fight.
Chuck swings and hits the last zombie, killing it. Telryn walks up and says "only 3? took you guys long enough." Chuck checks tracks and sees that rat men went in each direction. We go to the left. 30 feet down, another intersection with a lot of zombies hacked to pieces. Miriel pulls out some chalk and marks the walls. We take the left hand branch. 50 feet down the corridor turns to the right and goes 10 feet. There are lots of rat tracks. it curves back around to the right, 20 feet, then back to the left 150 feet and we come into a huge natural cavern.
Miriel marks the entrance. We can see a horrific battle, blood and ichor, feet stick to floor. Hairy bits of flesh and gore. Rat men and spider eye goblins. Large band of rat men and larger horde of zombies wiped each other out. Walls covered in slick translucent slime. Several doorways. Paks moves to the center, with Miriel following. Chuck looks for tracks. He notices that some of the wounds on the corpses were made by some sort of lash, and comes over to tell everyone. Suddenly, a weird creature drops from the roof. Hideous humanoid, bald and pale of skin, covered in ritual scars. "The book" it hisses in a rasping voices, "give us the book!"
Telryn pulls out a scroll and summons a wolf. It attacks the creature, but misses. Paks charges it but misses. Miriel casts Cause Fear, but it is unaffected. It steps back, and shoots out whip-like tethers from its hands and mouth at Paks, trying to entangle her. The one from its mouth hits her. The two from its hands attach to her armor. Chuck runs over with Hoarfrost and swings at the tether coming from its mouth and cuts through it. Telryn hits it with a magic missile. The wolf moves behind it and attacks it, flanking it and hitting it. Paks drinks a potion of bull's strength. Miriel casts a searing light at it and realizes it's undead. It shoots two tethers up to the ceiling and is now hanging from the ceiling. It's dropped Paks.
Chuck draws his bow and shoots at it twice, hitting once. Telryn magic missiles it and kills it. Chuck searches the body, but doesn't find anything. Chuck drinks a potion of healing. Miriel heals him as well. Chuck examines the doorways to see which way ratmen went, and finds that they probably went out to the left. It seems like a small group. Miriel and Chuck say the rat man near the door has only been dead 15-20 min. We decide to follow after quickly. We hustle 80 feet down and come to another intersection, a T, the left branch branches off to a Y. We hear sounds of combat to the right. Paks heads to the right as Chuck looks for tracks.
Corridor slopes downward. Lots of noise. 6ft high slimy creature with blood-drenched polearm. Spineback, Tears of Her Enemies and several other slytherin and fighting the devilish creature. They're very wounded. Enormous iron box, like giant casket, stands up in corner. Clearly Vault of Chardun. Rat men studying it trying to open it. Spellcaster and fighter between 'em trying to ward off guardian.
Telryn steps up and casts a Lightning Bolt, straight towards the Vault of Chardun, sweeping through everyone in the room. Four rat men die, one in each group survives, and one in each group is not hit. Tears of Her Enemies and Spineback are both hit for the full amount, but survive. The devil resists. Telryn yells "take out the witch!" Chuck moves up and shoots twice at her, but misses. The devil swings with his glaive and spears the wounded rat man, killing it. The other rat man near attacks it with his sword, but it just bounces off. The wounded one near the vault just vanishes into thin air! Spineback has a curved gleaming silver scimitar and shortsword, swings both at the devil. The scimitar hits, but the wound just closes up. Miriel moves in, holds up the magic spear, invokes Madriel, and casts the Daylight spell it holds. Paks moves towards the devil, invokes Madriel, and casts Divine Favor on herself. ToHE casts a spell and suddenly there are four more of her.
Telryn steps in again and casts a second lightning bolt. Spineback is hit again. The two images that were hit disappear. Chuck shoots two of the witch images; one disappears. The devil swings at spineback and hits; the wound keeps bleeding profusely. The rat man next to the devil steps back and shoots with his bow, but the arrow just bounces off. The other rat man next to the casket tries to open the door and disappears. Spineback swings at the devil and hits twice. Miriel blesses her allies. Paks charges the devil, flanking it, but misses. ToHE casts another spell, and now she and the image are blurry.
Telryn reads a scroll and casts a wolf behind her; it attacks one of the blurry images, but misses. Chuck attacks the devil with Hoarfrost, but misses. It attacks Paks and hits once. The last rat man flees. Spineback swings at the devil and hits with his scimitar. Miriel moves over towards Paks. Paks attempts to smite the devil and hits it with holy damage. She swings again and hits it, killing it. ToHE casts a Web at us, and Chuck is stuck in it.
Telryn throws a flash of alchemists fire at the two images of ToHE. He hits the real one and the other image disappears. The wolf bites at her, but misses. Chuck tries to break free, but fails. Spineback rushes Telryn and swings at him, but misses. Miriel tosses a potion of healing to Paks, who drinks it. Paks moves out of the webbing. ToHE casts a magic missile at the wolf. It bites at her but misses.
Telryn steps back and shoots the burning hands wand at Spineback. Chuck tries to break free of the web, but fails. Spineback attacks Telryn again, hitting once. Miriel tries to move out of the web, but fails. Paks attacks spineback, but misses. ToHE tries to cast a spell and the wolf bites at her, but misses. She pulls a bone out of her pouch and snaps it; Telryn's right leg is broken. He screams.
Telryn steps aside and drinks a potion of invisibility. The wolf attacks, but misses. Chuck tries to break free of the web, but fails. Spineback turns towards Paks and attacks, missing both times. Miriel tries to move and fails. Paks swings at Spineback and hits, killing him. She turns to ToHE and yells "you're next!" ToHE casts a magic missile at Paks, and the wolf attacks her, but misses.
Telryn moves over and the wolf attacks ToHE again, but misses. It disappears. Chuck breaks free of the web. Miriel moves towards the edge of the web. Paks lays hands on herself, then moves up to ToHE. ToHE steps back and hits Paks with another magic missile.
Telryn drinks the potion of healing. Chuck moves out of the web. Miriel tries to move and fails. Paks swings twice at the witch, hitting both times, killing her. Chuck rushes over to search the bodies. Miriel asks for help getting free of the web. She heals Paks and sets Telryn's leg.
Chuc finds 5 plat , 59 gold, black pearl, spell book, and ring on witch. 39 gold pieces, 3 crystals, great quality scimitar and shortsword on swingback.
Miriel examines the vault. Solid iron, unmarked by rust, engraved with ancient runes and symbols. Miriel recognizes that several of the symbols have no relation to Chardun. Miriel and Telryn together recognize them as an arcane trap of some sort. Telryn checks with Chester; the other half of the party was surprised by a monster but killed it, and they're making dinner. Miriel and Telryn need to rest and ask Chuck to set an alarm spell. Telryn looks at the spellbook before he rests. Chuck casts Alarm, has something to eat, and settles down to stand guard while Paks searches the room.
Spellbook contains: 0: Dancing lights, detect magic, mage hand, read magic. 1: color spray, disappear, mage armor, magic missile, sleep. 2: invisibility, web, mirror image, blur. 3: dispell magic, major image, fracture, blood storm. Paks finds a lot of dead rat men, and a chest which looks like it might have belonged to the devil. She notes it but doesn't open it. They move it inside the radius of the alarm spell before Chuck casts it. Paks goes to look in the other large room. Chuck examines the chest, and it doesn't look locked.
Paks goes into the large room, checkes the celing, 368 gold pieces, grabs a bag off rat men to hold it. 5 hours pass with no incident. Miriel heals Telryn's leg. She detects magic on everything, something magical in chest, two swords and rings are magical, glaive not magical. Moves it at telryn's suggestion to the Vault; glyphs have moderate magic aura. Paks notes that it has bolts that make it look like it was removed from the floor of the church.
We all move to the other side of the room and Telryn attempts a targeted dispell on the glyphs. The ones that don't belong disappear. Miriel does another detect magic on the vault. It's no longer magical. Chuck takes a look at it and says it's really complicated. It takes him three hours to open it. Paks heals herself while we wait. Meanwhile, Paks goes to the other side of the room to open the chest. Telryn puts on the ring; it's a ring of spell storing that can store five spell levels; currently has teleportation.
Paks opens the chest and finds 334 ledean gp, lots of chardunic relics. Beautiful jeweled medallion, ornate candelabra with lots of chardun runes, two scrolls. One scroll is divine, the other has a note on it. Telryn reads the note:
"Yes, it's only too trueTelryn looks confused for a moment and then says: "From the way it's made, I'm sure in time it will fade."
the curse is on you.
Now until the end of time
Everything you say will be in rhyme!"
Chuck chuckles: "You're in luck, it's not a duck!"
Telryn: "Of all my luck, why couldn't it have been Chuck!"
Miriel examines the divine scroll. It contains: Airwalk, Protection from Chaos, and Chardun's Torments. She starts meditating on Remove Curse and a short time later removes the curse from Telryn. Telryn thanks her, "Thank you, milady that was a horrible malady." And with that we know he's healed.
Chuck finishes with lock and opens the vault, stepping back. Loud screech of door, padded pedestal with large tome, bound in burgundy velvet, locked with iron clasp and chains. Telryn casts mage armor on himself. He lets Chester know that we're coming out. We head out of the maze. Chuck tries to track our way out, but doesn't succeed. We take the left passage back to the large room. We head out the door on the left down a long passageway, through the S-curve. We reverse the direction of the arrow. We find dead rat men and zombies at a 3-way intersection and take the right hand branching. 30 feet, 3 way intersection, find new zombies. Paks destroys them with a turn. Chuck tries to track us and finds our tracks to the right. We follow them.
Passage curves to left, 3-way passage, find 5 zombies. Paks turns 'em and kills 'em. We take left passage to 4-way intersection, zombies coming from all 4 directions, 13 of 'em. Miriel turns 'em and they start to shuffle away. Telryn casts a flaming sphere at the group straight ahead and burns one, but doesn't destroy it. Paks runs around to the left. She sees them in a t-intersection, and there are five more zombies, for a total of 9. Chuck runs around to the right and hits a zombie, killing it. Chuck also finds a t-intersection with two more zombies.
Miriel moves to the intersection and performs a greater turning, killing all 19 in range. Telryn sends his flaming sphere down his corridor and finds a five-way intersection but no more zombies. We follow the right hand passage and then go right again. 20 feet down we find a 3-way intersection with dead rat men. Chuck tracks again and we go to the left. Long corridor, chuck remembers this is where the rat men got pinned between the zombies and us. Another interesection, go to right, 3 way intersection, dead rat men, Paks goes to right. 80 feet, stonework passageway, we work our way back to the chapel. Telryn, Paks, and Chuck want to explore, but Miriel just wants to take the book back. Chuck looks and finds that rat men went thorugh the other passage. Chuck starts down this passage, even though Paks is now agreeing with Miriel. Chuck comes into a 20x20 room and is ambushed by 5 rat men. Four shoot arrows and one casts burning hands. One arrow hits him.
Telryn yells "do you want help!" Chuck: "sure!" Telryn casts sleep at the rat men. Two fall asleep. Miriel heads cautiously down the corridor. The magic user casts color spray at Chuck and stuns him. Paks heads down the corridor.
Telryn shoots a magic missile at the magic user, killing it. "Now you're on your own." Miriel waits. Two awake rat men slash at Chuck with scimitars, one hits and scratches him. Paks steps in. Chuck swings with both swords and hits with Hoarfrost, killing one.
Telryn walks back into the chapel. Miriel waits. The rat man swings at Chuck and misses. Paks attempts to disarm the rat man and it swings at her, fumbling, dropping his weapon, and stunned. Chuck swings at him and hits twice, killing it. Chuck kills a sleeping rat man. Paks asks for the other, so Chuck puts the manacles on it. Paks slaps it awake and asks it who the traitor is. Chuck wants to look for more trouble. Paks goes outside with the book. Miriel wants to rest. Chuck asks for the ring of teleport, but Telryn says he has to study it more. Paks gives Chuck a potion of cure light wounds.
Whne we go out, we see a huge dead beast. Looks like they've killed a huge monster and Stone has pieces of it roasting over a open fire. Offers us some tasty, but stringy, roast owlbear. It does not sound appetizing and his offer is declined.
Chuck finds an intersection 30 feet down. Tracks for rat men, really dusty, so probably nothing passed in a really long time. Keeps going down, going back into spire. 20 ft down the other way it dead ends. Goes down the other corridor from teh chapel. 90 feet and finds a big banquet hall, table, chairs, plates, looks like someone's been eating here. Looks like humans were being eaten. Hall is 40x80. Chuck moves towards the head of the table, searching and tracking as he goes. Dust disturbed. Double doors on NW side, burst open, spider eyed zombies burst in. There are 13. The three in the doorway try to bite him and one gets his leg.
He swings both swords at two in front of him. He hits one with Hoarfrost, killing it. They move in to surround him and he swings and kills one as it goes past. They try to grapple him. Two grab him. He tries to break free, but fails.
He tries to break free again and succeeds. He pushes through the crowd and tries to tumble free, but they swing at him as he goes. One claws him badly, but the others miss. He runs for the door. They chase after him.
Chuck shouts "Zombies!!!" but no one hears him. He moves to the corner of the room, turns and shoots his bow. They chase after him. He runs down the corridor, turns, and hurls a vial of alchemist's fire, hitting it. They shamble after him. He swings at the nearest two with two swords, hitting and killing both. More shamble after him, trying to surround him again. He kills one as it goes by. Two attack him, one fumbles and the other bites him. "Ow! Zombies!"
Miriel hears him shout this time. He swings both swords and kills one more zombie. He moves down the hallway; four of them try to grapple him and grab him.
Chuck tries to break free and succeeds. He moves down the hall again. Miriel shouts "Chuck!" and starts to run towards him. The zombies move down the hall towards chuck. He swings and hits one as it goes by.
He swings Hoarfrost and the dagger at the zombies and hits with both, killing two more zombies. The zombies grapple him again. Chuck breaks free and moves down the corridor. The zombies follow. He swings both swords and hits twice, killing one. Steps down the corridor again. They pursue and one bites at him, biting his leg.
He swings both swords and hits twice, killing two more. The last zombie pursues him. Miriel arrives and waits. Chuck swings both swords and hits twice. She tries to lead him away. She finally convinces him to come back to the camp. After a rest, she heals him. Paks asks Chuck if he found a duck.
Telryn charms the rat man, and begins to interrogate him.
"How are you doing today my friend?"
"Um...okay. Hey friend, do you think you could get rid of these manacles?"
"Possibly, but my other friends are afraid of you, so give me a minute. I need some information from you."
"Sure, anything I can do, but it would be easier if you let me go. I promise I won't eat your friends."
"What is the name of the human who is helping you?"
"Oh, I don't know, they never tell me anything You should really talk to Spineback or Tears of Her Enemies, but Spineback is really mean."
Telryn signals Paks to kill him, and Paks quickly dispatches the poor helpless ratman.