The Eye of Anubis: Book Ten

[Isabella]

The door provided no resistance. It gave way as Charles pushed it, with a soft click.

The inscription on the doorway glowed bright white. There was a slight pause, then you all heard a loud scream as the disk exploded.

There were no leeches. What there was was a clear liquid that hissed as it touched the walls. The effect had been slightly larger than Charles had anticipated, covering most of the chamber in the blast. Only the very back of the tomb was spared.

The liquid began to smoke as soon as it touched your skin, hissing and burning even as you tried to claw it off. The problem with liquid was that it was ever so hard to get out of your clothing as soon as it had seeped in.

OOC: 50 Acid damage, hitting Charles, Otto, Tomas, and Lia - sorry, Rock, Andre only got to get out because of a rules foulup. Reflex save DC 20 for half.

---

"Profe- Merciful Ezra!" Harris exclaimed as Andre dodged out the door, followed closely by a spray of acid. The big guardsman reflexively stepped in front of Menetnashte, although the acid was nowhere near reaching either of them. Menetnashte, as usual, showed no sign of even noticing what had happened.

The three guards scrambled towards the door, blinking and coughing at the vapors the deadly trap had left behind. Sarari stepped carefully into the room, trying to scan to see if any further danger awaited them. "Charles?"

The door, as if to mock you, creaked open slightly. The sound of a young woman sobbing was now clearly audible.

[Rock of the Fraternity]

Lia only escapes receiving the full blast by throwing herself flat on the floor an instant before the disc erupts. Even so, the acid seeps into her back. Shrieking like a mad thing, the Wizard rises, hands clawing at the air. "Getitoffgetitoffgetitoffgetitoooooofffofmeeeeee!" she howls, hands clawing at a waterskin. Whimpering with agony, she starts to slosh the precious liquid over her back, desperately trying to flush away the acid as best she can.

(OOC: Reflex save: 24, meaning I took 25 damage - and wouldn't say no to a Cure spell. ^^; )

[Nathan of the FoS]

Charles just has enough time to jump forward, through the door, and thereby evade the worst of the effects of the trap which he has so stupidly activated. He gets a bit on his shoulders and back but is spared the worst of it.

"Never learn, never learn, never learn," he whispers to himself. "Stupid.." Then, aloud, "I'm here, ma cherie, not much damaged. Is there anyone else hurt?"

[Isabella]

As Charles was dusting himself off and checking to make sure no one was dead, something was becoming rapidly apparent to him. The room he was in was currently occupied.

He had, technically, already known that, as the inscription on the door had clearly pointed to an occupant having been interred. The sarcophagus was leaning against the wall, slightly cracked open, but otherwise undisturbed. But the room had a second occupant, one that did not seem to fit the general atmosphere of the tomb.

She was barely woman really, scarcely more than a girl - a young, dusky-skinned Akiri girl, perhaps sixteen or seventeen years of age. A gawky, long-legged colt of a girl, all knees and elbows beneath her off-white robes. A girl you had last seen waving you off as you had descended down the crumbling halls of Snefru's secret passages.

Mandisa lay sprawled in the center of the tomb. Her leg was twisted at a sickening, unnatural angle, and was covered with caked blood and burned flesh, looking for all the world like someone had driven a scimitar through it and then burned the wound shut. She barely managed to lift her head to look at Charles, pitifully trying to inch herself away from him, scarcely managing to move an inch. She said nothing, unable to speak anything through the wracking sobs of pure agony, gripping her arms to her chest in a feeble attempt at self-comfort.

[yalenusveler]

"Mandisa!" Andre didn't even stop to consider the possibility that this was likely some other horrible trap, or an illusion to play at their sympathies. Instead, he was rushing over, words for Cure Moderate Wounds leaving his lips as fast as he could humanly manage.

OOC:Cure moderate wounds on Mandisa, for 18 hp restored

[lostboy]

Sascha thunders in from outside, after Harris and the others. Unravelling ancient curses wasn't his spaciality by a long shot, so he'd given the others time and space, and from the looks of it rope to hang themselves by..

"Durch die ashen Fetzen!" The exclamation blurts form his lips as the acid cloud dissapates, leaving the burnt and singed remains of sevral expedition members. The Knight spends a moment scanning the room, and quickly decides on the most chivalrous course of action.

Sascha grasps Lia roughly by the shoulders to stop her struggling, "lie still for a moment I beg you" he hisses urgently, although with that grip there isnt much Lia can do anyway. The knight closes his eyes, "nehmen Sie mein Leiden als Entschädigung an" he whispers with a grimace, and a soft comforting glow spreads from his hands across the wizardess' body.

[OOC: utilising hair shirt of suffering to heal 26hp damage to Lia - I knwo youre plannign to do a mass heal KK but in Saschas mind its the right thing to do.]

[DocBeard]

There is really only one proper response to being in the front of the party when a wave of acid is about to fall down on you.

"Oh shi-"

Tomas falls to his knees, unable to even scream as the acid is trapped within his armor; he feels his insides separate, and Tomas's strange first priority is to cover himself up, putting his arms over the holes in his shirt that have been ripped open. There's a faint smell of rotting metal, and then steam starts to come off of the Lamordian, the stench changing, as though the acid itself were inexplicably boiling away!

(OOC: Rolled a 4. Full 50 damage. I'll spend ten of my daily lay on hands HP to represent Tomas covering something up.)

Arms and legs shaking, Eisenwald faintly hears the name of a friend of his. Andre. Calling. Tomas's eyes snap open, faint blue light sparking along his boots as he forces himself up to his feet. Lia's okay thanks to Sascha. Charlie's okay. Where's the proble-oh no. no. no no no. he promised.

"Gotterdamnerung!" Tomas thunders, no longer caring if his friends see the patchwork of scars where his sleeve used to be. He makes his way beside Andre, getting down on one knee and looking horrified. "What...what happened?!"

[Rock of the Fraternity]

Lia trembles briefly in Sascha's grip and then, as the healing power courses through her ... actually relaxes for a moment. A weary sigh issues from behind the mask, accompanied by some bitter-sounding words in a strange language: Patterna: "How many times must I tell these sons of giorgio to be careful before they stop getting me injured ...?"

When the Wizard regains her composure, she sighs again. "I thank you for your help, sir," she tells the Ashen Knight. "I can stand again. Your assistance is as appreciated as it was essential to -" And then the words of the people inside the burial chamber filter through to Lia.

"Trap!" she hisses, starting to struggle against Sascha's grip. "Trap! It's a trap! If the real Mandisa is here, the one at the manor is Cavendish! He knows we're here, we've got to get out! Get the girl and run!" Provided Sascha does let go, Lia pauses only to clap him on the shoulder - an almost soldierlike gesture of appreciation - then hurries to the doorway. "Someone with better eyesight than I, help me out here!" she pleads. "Something's coming, I'm sure of it!"

[lostboy]

"You are alive, my duty is served" Sascha intones through gritted teeth as the hair of shirt crawls across and burrows into his skin, exacting the required price for its power.

But the following outburst shakes off any reverie he was indulging in, as, if Lia is right, an imminent death of some kind was ariving post haste , and here we are with nowhere to go. Drawing his sword as he rises, he heads quickly to the entrance, "this place is a tomb, let it not become our tomb, everyone make ready to leave, help those who can't!"

Stepping out into the cold air he scans the darkness beyond "If anything is coming, it is going to have to come through me first" he mutters, the knight just hoped those werent his last words on the subject.

[OOC: spot 15, listen 26]

[Rock of the Fraternity]

Muttering curses under her breath, Lia briefly scuttles back inside the tomb. Looking around her, the Wizard makes a series of paces that look almost like one of the formal dances of Dementlieu. The temperature inside the tomb drops several degrees as she does so. Simultaneously with her pacing, Lia makes a series of arcane gestures which are fluid and encompassing, in sharp contrast to the rigid ritual paces. The gestures indicate each of the members of the Expedition in the tomb, as well as the injured girl in the next room. As if accompanying her motions, Lia mutters words of arcane power: "Facultam volati nos dono."

Moving back to the doorway, Lia calls over her shoulder: "We can fly away from here. Might I suggest we do so, perhaps under cover of Charles's spells of invisibility, if he has enough of them in his allotment for all of us? I am well and truly tired of traps for one day."

[Kaitou Kage]

"Great," Kuzan growled, "Just great. We walked right into what he wanted us to do. Again. Are we all really so stupid that we can't stay a step ahead of him?" He pulled a wand from his pack. "Come on, then. I'll heal you on the way."

[Isabella]

"Mandisa!" Andre didn't even stop to consider the possibility that this was likely some other horrible trap, or an illusion to play at their sympathies. Instead, he was rushing over, words for Cure Moderate Wounds leaving his lips as fast as he could humanly manage.

The mystic words seemed to bind around Mandisa's shattered leg, straightening it out somewhat. As the pain slowly ebbed away, the girl sat up, looking at her unexpected savior in awe.

"You are... miracle worker..." Mandisa breathed, in her thickly accented Mordentish. "A servant of the gods. Did the gods finally answer my prayers? Is that how you know my name?"

"Gotterdamnerung!" Tomas thunders, no longer caring if his friends see the patchwork of scars where his sleeve used to be. He makes his way beside Andre, getting down on one knee and looking horrified. "What...what happened?!"

"I...I... I am so sorry, sir!" she sobbed, cringing away slightly. Nonetheless, she answered, either out of fear, or the decision that her new tormentors could not be any crueler than the old.

"I-I was walking home... like the Kam-mand-dant said I could!" she added quickly, before continuing, "And I... my father came to meet me... we were walking home..."

"We were attacked by... by lion bones," she said, trying to form the unbelievable concept into the foreign Mordentish tongue. "Lion bones with great swords for teeth. They surrounded us, and my father grabbed me and put his arms around my neck. I couldn't breathe... I tried to tell him he was hurting me, but he... he..."

Mandisa abruptly changed the subject. "When I woke, I was in this place. There was a man I did not recognize. He asked me hundreds of questions about my life- he did not even wait for an answer before demanding the next. He... he cast some kind of miracle on me... but I did not see it do anything. Then the lion bones grabbed my leg and... and shook it. It hurt! It was so painful! I tried, I really- he...he said the door was unlocked, that I could just leave if I wanted, but... but it hurt so much! I tried so hard! I'm so worthless and stupid, I couldn't escape..."

The torrent of words streamed from her lips, unable to stop once they had begun, even as tears ran down her face. "He would come back, and heal me, and ask me more questions, and the lion bones would shake me again. He... he would take my face... he would cast miracles, just like Lady Snefru would, like I'd always dreamed of doing, but I n-never could... he cast them with my face and said... said... I was nothing!" The girl sobbed into her hands. "He told me I was worthless, that I was nothing special, that I would never be special... how stupid I was for believing I ever could be... he...he told me no one even knew I was gone. He... told me everyone liked the new Mandisa better! T-the new Mandisa was special. The new Mandisa could cast miracles. The new Mandisa was friends with foreigners, and spirits, and all the kitchen workers loved her now..."

The sobs were almost uncontrollable now, but Mandisa kept speaking. "He told me... when he was done he'd... he'd say horrible things to my father... he'd tell him I blamed him for mother's death... he'd make father not love me anymore and... he'd find my friends from the kitchen, and put them up on pikes... while wearing my face... and... and then... and then he'd let me go!" It was too much. The girl collapsed into sobs, crying as if her heart would break.

[Rock of the Fraternity]

Akiri: "He lies, woman!" Lia shouts from the doorway, her voice ... dark ... with anger. "He toys with people to break them! That man -- that creature is a coward without merit, who dares not act under his own appearance, and so must steal those of others! Trust that he impersonated you perfectly, for fear of revealing himself otherwise -- he is too much the craven to reveal himself."

"Let's go, everyone! Hurry and fly, all of us - Akiri: Mandisa, daughter of Muhar! Bend your thoughts and will to flight, and by my power you shall fly now! Trust me! Rise up! - hurry and fly, all of you! Let's get out of here!"

[Nathan of the FoS]

Charles shakes his head. Cavendish. No wonder he fancies himself an artist. "Genius is an infinite capacity for taking pains," he mutters. Why not shatter an innocent while doing one's reconnaissance? Just for the effect.

Standing and crossing to where Mandisa crouches, Charles lays a hand on her shoulder and begins to speak quietly but strongly. "Hush, child. There. He's done his best to destroy you by his lies, but you must not believe them yourself. Even when others do. You are innocent of what he has done wearing your face. Let that be your strength."

Giving her a brief one-armed embrace across her shoulders, Charles looks at Andre and says, "I think we had better presume we have sprung Cavendish's trap. I don't know what the sequel will be, but I think we had better get out while we can...and keep a sharp lookout for him, and for somewhere we can stand him off."

Using bardic "music" to inspire courage in Mandisa. In an off-label use of the ability.

[The Whistler]

Otto had managed to be somewhere else during the whole acid incident. Where precisely was difficult to say, as there was only so much square footage in the antechamber, but...you know. It was a thing he did.

And now...he's having a good deal of trouble thinking, let alone speaking.

Never. Again.

"You are safe with us." It's all he can get out, through gritted teeth--but he means it. And then he's hovering inches off the ground, pitched slightly forward towards the door. Ready to move.