Rashemen Book 2

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"Corellon Larethian is the god worshipped at the temple, he is the god of the Elves; Music and poetry he sponsors as well and thus most bards like myself worship him as well. On the whole he is a good god though of a chaotic nature. Most people that come to the temple come to see the Seers and most go away disappointed; Seers tell you what they see not necessarily what you wish to hear. If you talk to one be careful, for they will talk in riddles and the greater the destiny the more the answer is obscured is my understanding."

 

Maron steps up next to Nakia, and taps her on the shoulder.
"I shall need your help at the temple, my friend. I am no rogue, and removing this artifact without incurring the priests' wrath will be difficult, but with your help, and a few spells, there will be no problem. The temple's God is a good one, and my church has no desire to harm any of his followers."

 

Nakia nods her head. "Don't suppose you could just explain the problem and ask for the artifact?"

She sighs, adventures just never work that easily.

 

"The Church has tried, but to no avail. Theft it must be."

Maron shrugged her shoulders, theft was no big problem, if it was returning something to its rightful owner.

 

"Hokay, getting the artifact shouldn't be a problem but how to keep them from knowing it is gone? Since we all seem to be headed to the same place they're sure to notice people around. Even if you and I keep hidden I wouldn't want the others to get in trouble. Any ideas?"

 

Maron thought for a moment, before slapping her thigh and exclaiming "An illusion! That would work perfectly! No-one will look too carefully if they see it in its pedestal, so we'll have time to get away. ANyway, if we steal it just before we leave, there will be no problem."

 

"Good. Say, Del, you ready to go? Me feet are growing to the ground."

 

Delphinae would have answered, but she was already walking down the road and didn't hear the question.

 

Nakia chortles and takes after Delphinae.

 

"No problem . . . . unless they decide to come after us. Temple folk aren't always as dumb as you seem to think they are, and sometimes they can get pretty fanatical about stuff."

 

"That's for sure," Delinos said, laughing to himself about a certain caper he and Kelvados had pulled at a temple in the Underdark just before they left.

 

Harbourboy sees an interesting looking butterfly out of the corner of his eye and he follows it off the trail for a short distance to try and get a closer look at it.

 

Sepp looked at the temple for a bit, then saw a brightly colored butterfly zigzagging in an odd flight pattern. He followed it over a small hill, and saw that it was making its way towards a similar, yet slightly different colored butterfly. When the two met, their flight plans became even more intricate, twirling around eachother, ever closer, ever closer. Sepp took a few steps towards them to obsever close up, then he noticed Atten across the glen. He had on some new boots.

"Oh, hello Atten. I wondered where you were. Nice boots."

 

Ciana wandered over to the main doors of the temple and spoke to the guardian priests there to tell them who she was and to ask how they could help her. Their reply wasn't what she expected

"You have been expected Ciana, the High Priest himself Aldahrel Clouddancer will see you when you are ready. Others are to accompany you to visit him, please take Delphinae, Nakia, Maron and Sepp with you. Until you are ready you and your companions may rest and refresh yourselves in the visitor's quarters to the left"

Ciana turned to go back and tell the others to find the brothers just behind her, "We heard" Delinos remarked coldly "We'll wait here for everyone else, and then we'll see what you are about."

 

"These boots are great."

Atten danced around on the grass.

 

Jex had arrived at the temple and remained outside. The elven pantheons kind of bothered him, especially because the seemed to shun his drow heritage. He had seen the others arrive, and decided to stay on the outside. Be the wildcard in the situation.

 

Sepp was also surprised that he had been invited by name into the temple, but he was curious to see what it looked like inside, and what would happen.

"Okay, I'm ready whenever everyone else is."

 

Nakia glanced up at Maron , then stepped up near Sepp. Part of her was glad she was going where he was going but the other part was suprised and suspicious of how they where known and of the friendly greeting.

 

Ciana led the small group to the doors from the visitor’s quarters back to the front doors of the temple, after conversing with the priests there she found that they had to go to the rear of the temple and after knocking on the door and hearing a clear command to enter did so.

The oldest Elf she had ever seen was sat behind a table weighted down with scrolls a second Elf a younger woman sat next to the High Priest, they looked up as the group came in

“Please sit down all of you,” he said, “my name is Aldahrel Clouddancer and I am the High Priest in this temple and this is Alleiea one of our most powerful Seers, it is thanks to her vision that we all sit here now and I know why.

“Firstly let’s get the unpleasantness out of the way, Maron the artefact you seek is behind me on the third shelf, it is trapped but nothing that Nakia shouldn’t be able to handle. I suggest you use a Sanctuary spell to actually remove it, also after removing could you put this paperweight in its place. If Nakia then resets the trap and you cast an illusion on it everything will be fine”

At the startled looks on Maron’s and Nakia’s faces the priests started gently laughing and then he explained “Politics between our respective temples means that you can’t ask for it, and I can’t just give it to you; one of the advantages of being old is you can bypass the usual umm ‘niceties’ shall we say. It is time the pipes were in the world again according to Alleiea and this way your temple can gloat a little, mine can be outraged a little and everybody is happy and we of course can laugh at the inside joke. I’ll explain about everything else when you’ve finished”

Del was sitting nervously looking at the sorceress who’d taken her mask off, the scars were vicious and horrid to look at but Del was convinced it was an illusion just to set their minds at ease. She was ready to take any action necessary should it be needed, as she waited she looked at her companions in the room, Sepp was sat on his chair on his chair feet swinging beneath him smiling at the ‘joke’; Maron and Nakia were working on taking the pipes from the shelf, and just finishing as Del looked over at them. They came and sat down in front of the table again; the priest got up and slowly made his way round the table to stand in front of Ciana.

“Ciana I am sorry for what you went through at the hands of Torturus and it must be difficult to see the purpose in that for you, know that the purpose was to bring you here and with these people.” He placed his hands on Ciana and as Del watched through her claw the sorceress’s aura settled down and the n surprisingly took on some aspects of her own.

“I have stabilised your condition for the moment, child” he continued to Ciana “but know that I have not cured it yet; like all things of this nature you must prove yourself worthy of the cure” the priest moved on to stand in front of Del now and continued

“Thus I have placed a geas on you for the moment, you will aid and protect Delphinae even unto your death if necessary, Del will know when the conditions are completed at that point Maron will take this letter to a High Priest of a good god and all shall be resolved. If you do not accept this geas, you will be detained here at the temple until the end of your days; if you fail you will find yourself back her also for the remainder of your days. Del you cannot refuse this as much as you would like to, she is not the one that harmed you nor is she simply a sorceress she is first and foremost a Bard; it is for your own protection that I and through me my God do this.

“Now if you’d all like to return and rest, in the morning you can head east which is where you need to go next, farewell”

The group left and headed back to the visitor’s quarters to let the others know what happened; none really noticed Del hanging at the back of the group, shaking her head and whispering to herself “No, no, not east, I won’t go, I won’t”

 

Jex entered the temple after the others had gone. He kept his head low and his cowl over his face. Walking around he admired the structure. Finding his way towards the rear of the temple. Gently pushing open the door he found Aldahrel Clouddancer sitting at the desk. He quietly entered the room and sat down across from the old elf. "I need to ask you some questions that my companions couldn't help me with. It concerns the demon that nearly killed me. I'm just wondering if you could tell me something about the demons. Their names are Braxorthallit, and Iuz?"