Awaited Return

The house was dark and cold. Of course it was; no one had entered the place in over a year, and it had been still longer since anyone had actually lived there.
She sighed and dropped a small pack to the floor. All of her belongings fit in such a small space, and she wasn't sure whether that was impressive or depressing. Wood was stacked near the fireplace, very dry, easily kindled. Building the fire took her mind off other things for a few minutes. Paper from her pockets for tinder, some large shavings torn free with her knife, and the fire was crackling. Flickering light cast about the place. Some of the shadows were banished, but that only served to reveal the dust and cobwebs that filled every corner.

Tomorrow, yes tomorrow she would clean up and set the old house to rights. Tonight had been filled with enough. She was tired, both physically by the long journey, and in spirit from the sight of the place.

Too many memories were bound here, and too much old pain.

Her sleep would not be easy tonight.

Under Ancient Stone: Part III

Stealth was abandoned in favor of haste now. Cairis faced forward only long enough to see Alise raise her fist and swing it sideways into the wall of the narrow passage. Tor pressed himself flat against the wall and gestured urgently for the rest of them to pass him even as he rummaged through his bag for things to trap and slow the pursuing horde.
"No Tor, not here, just RUN!" Tala shrieked, her normally high pitched voice went down an octave or two on the last word as a pulse of magic burst from her. Lightness filled their limbs, and they sped back up the corridor. "Tala they'll be following close!"
"No they won't, not from there," Alise responded calmly, "the passage is going to collapse in a few seconds."
Cairis stared at the Sylvari over his shoulder, "by the Six! why are we not running faster then?"
"Because you bookah are too busy talking thats why!" Tala shouted as she slipped past him and shot around the corner. Cairis didn't feel a rebuttal to that statement would have been appropriate, so he just ran harder.

Back to the Deep

In the space between heartbeats, Hethir's view changed from the monster's toothy maw to gleaming armor. Struggling to haul himself upright, he saw Trace standing in front of him, shield held up as though he would fend off the massive monster with it. Strangely, it seemed to be working. Golden sparks fizzled and shot away from the shield, and Hethir realized that the knight was using the shield as a focus; blocking with magic and not mere steel. The teeth of the beast continued to grind and gnash on the barrier to no avail. Though as Hethir watched, he could see Trace shaking with exertion. The effort of holding the beast back was clearly taking its toll. "Trace, do you think you could kill that thing if I got you close enough?" Hethir regained his feet shakily, but his gaze was steady again.
"Maybe? It isn't of this world, Lumis will want it destroyed."
"Good enough, get ready."

Under Ancient Stone Part II

Slowly, so incrementally that they had had walked for almost another hundred feet before they noticed, the rough cave floor and walls gave way to ancient hewn stone and solidly placed blocks. After the initial shock had worn off, close examination of the walls began to reveal carvings. First it was just seemingly random chisel marks, but those soon gave way to runes, words, and sentences. Most of the runes were as indecipherable as those on the plinth from earlier; though Cairis was able to pick out a few here and there that bore enough similarity to hazard a guess at their meaning. The one bright spot was that neither Cairis, Alise, nor Tala's devices could detect any hints of magic in the Orrian writings. That however, changed when they found the second plinth.

A total cop-out

I was planning on releasing part 2 of Under Ancient Stone today but, well, the prep I had to do for my game tonight took far longer than I had planned. So yeah, total lame cop-out for today, but it really isn't ready yet. I promise it will be up tomorrow though.

-Matt

Under Ancient Stone

The walls of the cave glittered around them in the slight luminescence let off by Tala's armor. The diminutive Asura was several paces ahead of the rest of them, waving around a device that supposedly would detect any dangerous sections before she stepped on them, Cairis was somewhat less confident in Asuran magic after the last few mishaps with Tala's devices. She claimed to have made great progress since then, but the sections of his hair that still hadn't grown back from being singed off left him not wanting to simply take her word for it.
Behind him were the other two members of their group, Alise and Tor. The Sylvari and Norn moved with incredible silence through the rough cave, leaving Tala clinking and humming rather obviously. Alise's silence was hardly surprising. She barely weighed anything anyway--and Cairis was fairly certain that she was using some manner of air spell to silence her steps even more--Tor on the other hand was at least half again as tall as he was, and at least twice as heavy. Yet the Norn managed to move with all the grace of a dancer, avoiding every bit of loose ground or rubble that could have made any noise. Cairis himself was no slouch when it came to sneaking, but he was more than a bit awed now. He knew Tala much better than these two, having met her some years ago in Divinity's Reach. She supposedly had done work with them before, but what work that might have been was unknown to him.

From Deep Below

Hethir was barely managing to stay ahead of the tentacles and teeth that seemed to endlessly seek after him, but it seemed like he was getting better at avoiding them. It doesn't seem to be trying as hard...
Sparing a moment to glance behind him, he immediately saw why. Dozens of tentacles--and the blinded head--had become tangled up in the rigging, sails, and masts. This would be cause for celebration, except that it was now struggling to free itself, and would soon begin destroying the ship in its efforts.
Mary was casting again, though she was no longer dancing, and her spells were not having quite the obliterative effect of earlier, but the monster was clearly injured.  Garius and Michael had each grouped up a few sailors and set to keeping the tentacles away from the masts as much as possible.
Much as the man seemed like little better than a thug most of the time, Hethir had to admit that Garius had more than earned his pay on the voyage so far. Val had hidden herself in the cabin; a wise choice considering there was nothing she could do to assist in this fight. That left only Trace unaccounted for.