Changelings Part II: A Holiday In The Sun

[kintire]

The group settles into a sheltered crevice. There are plenty at the rocky crest of the ridge, and most have soft sand in them, making them almost comfortable.

The rowdy camp below is still in earshot. They are far too disorganised to notice any missing supplies. They do seem to post sentries after dark, however.

As night falls, a glow appears over the city. Peering down from the high cliffs, the group can see in the distance the palace by the dead ditch is lit with many lamps. In the dead silence of the desert the very distant sound of music can be heard. This continues until midnight, when it rather abruptly ceases.

[alhoon]

Seradon seems unsettled by the sounds of the haunted palace. "I didn't think I would ever wish for that, but I wish the Eternal Order was here to deal with the undead. Why would Rupert's men want to go into that cursed place?"
After a bit, Seradon asks the others
"What we do now? Attack the sentries while the rest sleep? Try to sneak in and capture Rupert?"
Seradon makes a small pause and the continues
"There is also the alternative of assassination although I certainly don't like the idea nor I want to partake into sneaking in the night and killing sleeping men, even if they're murderers. Another alternative that I would prefer to avoid too, that would put the fear in them is to use different tactics. I could bring in an unaturally thick mist and then ..."
Seradon looks towards Helfried "... and then summon a couple of skeletons for a few seconds to make them believe undead are coming for them. Before you make any rushed decisions against me Helfried, I don't like necromancy and I don't want to use undead to kill people. Using undead to scare people is a different matter though. You've seen first hand that the living dead can be scary."

[BigBadQDaddy]

The plan proposed by Saradon does cause Helfried discomfort. He shudders and even shies away his eye contact. Looking at his feet he places his hands on his hips. "Just get it over with, Darkonian."

[alhoon]

"OK then. That will cause a BIG distraction, I'm pretty sure. What about you two? You could sneak in the camp, steal some supplies and a couple of camels and free the rest of the camels, which would hopefully go running in the desert, stranding the murderers to the same fate they had in store for us. "

[VAN]

"Sounds like a plan."

[kintire]

Silence has settled over the ruined city as the night grows old. There are still a few hours until dawn, however. The desert is almost cold, a welcome relief after the heat of the day. Then a mist begins to rise and sweeps over the camp. The sleepy guards leap up in alarm, but can see little around them.

Then shapes begin to move in the fog. Silent shapes, human shaped and yet somehow.... wrong. Too thin...

Then the fog is filled with walking death. Grinning skulls stalk through the camp on white bone, claws lashing at everything that moves. The desert sand seethes as it gives up desiccated corpse after desiccated corpse, and the screams begin to rise as the frantic men swing at the dead things, before falling one by one under the horde of death. Camels bellow and struggle against their tethers as the unnatural scent of aeons-old death fills their nostrils from things that move...and strike.

Only Rupert himself and his three close lieutenants seem to keep their heads, but they too are fighting for their lives and trying to break free, making for camels as the horde strikes!

Seradon, meanwhile, may have a few qualms about his plan. The fog has formed as expected, but his spell to summon the undead did not go as planned. Instead of the paltry handful of skeletons he had expected, the dark energies seemed to fountain instead of flow, and he is getting a veritable horde of the things boiling from the sand. This whole area must be a carpet of corpses a few feet below the sand, and far more than expected seem to be answering his call. He seems to be able to influence their actions somewhat, they are at least not attacking him, but he is able to exert exact control over only the usual few.

His companions observe this as they approach the camp. The plan calls for them to plunge into the midst of this seething mass of blood-stained bone...

[alhoon]

Straining to keep control over more and more and more undead, arguably more bloodthirsty and powerful than expected Seradon tries to keep the horde that should have be a couple of skeletons away from the camels. He didn't even want every bandit in the camp to perish under claws of his own creation, it made him feel filthy and soiled. What would Helfried think? Could he blame the man if he turned his sword on him the first chance he got? Are his friends and allies safe from his horrendous plan? Is he safe from his own spell? Or he stirred the surface of a lake and waked the horrors beneath it?
Hastily he scribes the words "Too many! Nearly lost control! Get camels and run! Hopefully I survive. Meet at our camp." on a piece of paper and passed it to CoCo. "Run CoCo, Run! Find Lady Catherine and Helfried. Use your scent to locate them." he whispered to his familiar as CoCo bravely crossed into the mist and the sea of undead. CoCo was a part of him... undead wakened (it's too late to pretend he called them) by his foolish call shouldn't attack a part of him. However, these numbers shouldn't exist at all so Seradon was holding his breath hoping he will see his familiar again.

[VAN]

From her hiding spot Catherine watches the mist rise and the chaos to begin when the undead appear and start attacking. Seradon hasn't told them how many skeletons will be so Catherine isn't worried by their number.

"Helfierd, our friend did his part now is our turn to steal 3 camels and free the rest. Lets go."

[alhoon]

A sudden thought hit the effort-strain wizard's mind: "What happens when the duration runs out?"
Although invisible, Seradon started maneuvering through the undead sea that he could barely control as long as his magic holds, towards where his allies would be. He moved as fast as the difficulties he had put there allowed him without breaking whatever concentration he could master among the screams of the bandits dying by unatural creatures he had foolishly awaken, and praying to all Gods that his friends' screams wouldn't join the cacophony.

[VAN]

Catherine has barely started moving toward the bandits camp when she feels a something scratching her boot. Looking down she sees CoCo. Looking better she spots a small piece of paper at the rat's mouth. Getting slightly worried she unwarps the paper and reads it loudly so Helfierd can listen as well. When finishes reading her eyes dart from Helfierd to the camp and then back at the Falkovnian.

"Come on Helfierd, we need to do as Seradon said, try to get the camels and run away. I'm confident he will make it safe back to the camp."

Studying the camp Catherine moves towards where the camels are held trying to find the 3 that are closest to them and obviously away from the bandits and the undead hoping they have enough time to take them and run away.

[BigBadQDaddy]

Helfried, whos face has gone quite grim almost to the point of making him look older than his years, nods in compliance. Without saying a word he readies his sheildand heavy mace and follows Catherine.

[kintire]

The two plunge into a scene from a nightmare. The crazed undead are clawing down anything that moves, except Seradon and his familiar. There does seem to be some lingering shadow of his control, in that they seem to pick Rupert and his men as targets before anything else, but if they are not available, and they are growing increasingly few, they will turn on anything else that lives.

By the time the pair get there, the camels are gone, with Rupert and two of his lieutenants on them, fled, or dead. They do manage to secure some few supplies, but even that requires some desperate fighting. Catherine has trouble with the skeletons as her weapons seem less effective than against a creature of flesh, but Helfierd finds his sturdy mace devastatingly effective. They fell a few without trouble but as the last of the bandits fall and the horde turns its attention to them, they find it necessary to beat a hasty retreat.

They do notice an oddity in the camp. Amoung the slain lies a curious creature, dressed in the equipment of one of Rupert's followers of the better sort, perhaps his other lieutenant. But it is only remotely human: a silvery skinned creature with a blank featureless face apart from dark black eyes.

[alhoon]

As Seradon makes the hasty retreat, he notices the Doppelganger. Now it all falls into place. Watching the others retreat and safely in the side of the camp he joins the escape and lets invisibility drop.
"Dopplegangers have changed places with Ruppert and his lieutenants. Or they were Doppelgangers all along, doesn't matter a lot at the time. I should have thought of that when we left Paridon; I heard there were doppelgangers there but I never thought we will bring them all the way down to whatever cursed land we stand on.
I should have also figured that calling for undead in a cursed valley is a terrible idea. I heartily apologize for putting all of us in danger and for ... scattering our camels. While at the time our situation improved the camels are gone and with them any hope we had for a quick escape back to Pharazia and then Mordent. We can only hope that our strange employer would see fit to teleport us back to the haunted house in Paridon. "
Looking at Helfried Seradon shakes his head "I understand you probably want to run me through right now, and I'm sorry for waking up bad memories from your past. It probably wasn't easy for you. I was over-confident in my abilities."

After a moment of silence Seradon adds sadly "It was also never my intention for the bandits, those used by the doppelgangers to fall under the claws of undead I called. Yes, they deserved the gallows for what they did to the professor and what they planned for us but still it leaves a very poor taste in my mouth to have rampart undead gorge out their entrails with their unliving fingers.
As far as our situation goes I think our only chance now is... our mysterius employer. As far as we know, he, she or they are interested in weird cursed magical antiques. Perhaps if we delve in the cursed city and discover a cursed magical item that fits the tastes of our employer he she or they may see fit to teleport us back. Something keeps all those undead around and something is responsible for the curse on the city. If we find that something and... steal it, we may get back."

[VAN]

Catherine nods at Seradon's words, she wanted to say something about the use of magic in a place like this but she decides against it. The wizard seems to feel bad enough already about the situations he caused and at the end of the day he was trying to help, she shouldn't judge him for that. She has heard about dopplegangers but never believed she would actually encounter them.

"Well, I don't know about you but right now the dopplegangers are the least of ur problems. Lets hope that they haven't killed Rupert and his leautenants and just took their appearance to come to Pharazia and get whatever there is hidded in the Cursed City. Because right now I'm more than sure that there is indeed something there, a magical item cursed or no and I agree with Seradon that our only bet to return is to find it and hope our employer still is caring for our progress and teleports us back to Paridon when our task is complete."

After making a small pause to check the supplies they manage to get Catherine says:

"We don't have supplies for long so we need to save them for as longer as possible. Go back to Cursed City is indeed necessary but if I'm a bit worried about the undead there. Maybe we should stay here and rest and go back to the city later. Also for how long will remain those skeletons out there? my blades aren't very efficient against them and I prefer to avoid fighting them again."

[BigBadQDaddy]

Helfried's jaw muscles flex and pop as Saradon pleads his case. What would a backwater Falkovnian know in comparison to such enlightened company as a schooled Darkonian. As if the wizard had never heard of magic being beyond control.
He looks at Catherine as she answers in response to Saradon.
"I would prefer not to engage the undead as well. As for these dopplegangers you speak of, I assume you are referring to that bizzare corpse amidst the others down there. I assumed it was some fey devil or another witch-born."
After a breif pause, he changes the subject,"I would. prefer that we approach the city after acquiring some knowledge that may aid us within before venturing to such a place. Though what hope we had of that was hacked to bits.
"I am in the same belief as the two of you, though it troubles me to say so. I beleive our employer knows a deal more that they are willing to share."