Klale has been seeing to the horses. Strange the road should be open to here but not beyond.

[It seems the road goes into the courtyard. Is the locked gate set in the courtyard wall, or does the road continue into the structure? Perhaps I'm a poor reader.]

GM:  It's not really a road so much as a natural path between the mountains.  The pass leads up to the walls, then the walls have a gateway that is much more narrow than the sides of the pass.  There really isn't a road.

The gate does not appear to have any lock, latch, or other device on this side that can account for the gates being shut.  They are certainly latched or locked that way.  There are ramparts on the walls and what might be short guard towers spaced all along the top.  They aren't quite towers, but they might be a small room that could protect from arrows coming from attack from the other side.  It's difficult to see from this vantage point.

Eles suggests looking all along the wall for doors into the wall and up to the ramparts.  After much searching and even some casting of the new spells on Toben's part, a secret door system is discovered.  It's is so finely crafted that it looks like part of the design of the wall.  Counterweights and bearings allow the door to swing easily into the wall, though opening it from the inside would be impossible if not for handles to pull on.

The area inside is s small room with a stone protrusion that looks like something was meant to hang from it.  Anything perishable has long since turned to dust.  From the small room, stairs rise into darkness in either direction along the wall.  There is a staleness to the air that threatens to overwhelm you.

Phineas succumbs to the stale air and passes out.  Toben staggers against the wall and barely maintains consciousness.  Eles, Ano, and Klale cover their mouths, but only feel a twinge upon inhaling the ancient air.
This message was last edited by the GM at 23:50, Wed 22 Oct 2014.

Toben blinks away the tears welling up in his eyes. Before the dizziness over takes him, he attempts to stumble out into the open courtyard for fresh air.

Klale armored and armed, backs out leaving the door wide. After several deep breaths, he holds his breath and gets Phineas out into the open air. Rebreathing, he reenters and looks for where one might go next.

[Thanks]

Eles helps with Phineas by propping up his head and trying to wake him.  He tests for breathing and heartbeat and nods.  Then he trickles a bit of water from his water pouch into Phineas lips.

"Be careful, Klale.  There is no telling what is in there after all these centuries.  Don't go alone."

Once he finds out that Phineas is OK, Ano moves towards the door with Klale.  "I will go with Klale to check things out"

Ano moves into the room looking carefully, and steps forward to inspect the stone protrusion on the wall.

OCC: If it is too dark in the room to see properly, then Ano will pull out one of his sun rods

It takes Toben a moment to come to his senses. He grabs a fist sized rock from the ground and stands up. "Ano, here use this... save your sunrod for when absolutely necessary."

He brings the rock close to his lips and whispers the word, Illume. The rock takes on a dull glow at first, but then begins to burn bright. Almost as bright as a torch.

He hands the glowing stone to Ano. "This should last you a good 30 minutes or so." Toben smiles, "I need the practice."

Afterwards he walks back over to Phineas to see how he is doing.

Struggling back to consciousness, eyes still half-open, Phineas mumbles:

"Mommy? Where…am I? The last…thing I remember is the beautiful…horses, but with horns on their heads…running across a verdant, sunny field…and a stunning young redheaded woman with green eyes reaching out…reaching out to grab my…"

After a pregnant pause of several seconds, Phineas' eyes snap open all the way.

"Aww, just kidding. Phew, it *really* stinks in there! Worse than your feet, Klale. Thank you, by the way, for pulling me out -- I am sincerely grateful." He sketches a bow, though the effect is a bit lost because of his prone position.

Klale and Ano, who holds the light, pass up one flight of stairs.  It seems the choice between them is not much of a choice as both end up on the ramparts.  Along the way, rooms branch off of the stairs at landings.  Dim sunlight pours in through arrow slits on the rooms on the outer wall.  The arrow slits in the rooms on the inside of the castle wall are barely visible.  There is nothing but piles of dust and cobwebs anywhere.

On the top of the ramparts, the view outside is stunning.  A narrow causeway leads from the gates to a continuation of the pass.  On either side of the causeway there is a sheer drop into darkness and fog.  There is no visible bottom.  The causeway runs for a quarter mile, then the pass continues between the mountainsides which soon fall into hills and then out into open plains several miles ahead.

Below the open pass there are ruins of an ancient human city.

Exploration of the ramparts above the gates reveal another set of stairs down to either side of the gates.  These stairs lead into rooms on either side of the gate with no other visible way out.  Each room has a complex contraption that probably operates the gates.

Again, there is no sign of anything else but dust and cobwebs.  No furniture, no remains, nothing within the bare walls of note.

Toben assists Phineas to his feet. He waits a moment to make sure there are no screams of sounds of battle before he ushers him and Eles to the stairwell.

Upon reaching the top of the ramparts, he stops for a moment to take in the view. "It's amazing that with this view and the castle here that no one has taken up residency here."


"This place sure has been picked over, hasn't it?", Toben remarks as they make their way around the ramparts . From the top of the stairs, he peers down into one of the 'contraption' rooms. Leery about being assailed with noxious fumes again, he wraps his traveling cloak around his nose and mouth and heads down the stairs to investigate.

"I don't know that it has been picked over so much as time has caused all things but the stone itself to pass into dust.  Flesh, bone, metal, wood...there is no sign of any of it.  If it had been sacked, there would be remnants."  He pauses and looks around anxiously.  "I don't think anyone has ever come in here before us and I am not sure I want to find out the reason why."

Ano accepts the glowing stone from Toben with a distinct look of awe on his face "Truly you have been gifted my friend"

Ano takes some time to study the rooms that have the contraptions in them, to see if he can determine how they might work.

Klale opines Or everything has been evacuated. Metal out of moisture doesn't go away. In a "contraption room", he looks for levers or things to pull...or for evidence of missing parts such as chains or ropes. It may take simultaneous working to open the gates. Strange that nobody has passed this way in a long time. No people to the east; look slike none some way west. Had to be, sometime, lots of people to build this and the city we saw. What happened to them all? War? Disease? Famine?

Toben bows his head slightly. "Thank you Ano. Much like the fine art you practice, my new found enlightenment will need a lot of cultivation. I still don't know what I am fully capable of yet."

While in the contraption room with Klale, Toben slowly removes his traveling cloak from his face as he tests the air. Satisfied that he will not pass out, he responds to Klale. "I was thinking the same thing. I am guessing we may need a coordinated effort to open the gates with these devices."

He pokes around the room to further his investigation.

Both rooms are the same.

The gears look like the work on a series of levers and pulleys.  There are four pylons in the four corners of the room with stone reliefs carved into them.  They may have been painted at one time, but the paint has long since faded to nothing.  The pictures are of:

-a short, and a squat man full of muscle in metal armor with a long beard
-a slender man, or maybe woman with delicate features in fine clothing
-a muscular man with rough features and simple clothes
-a tree that looks vaguely human

The pylons look like they can rotate and maybe slide up and down as the levers turn.

There are four levers.  Everything is made of stone and is all the same color, the bone-white of the castle.

Klale looks to see if an oiling is indicated. Blacksmiths use oil occasionally.

Toben takes a step back. "Hmm, it's been so long since any of this stuff has been used... I wonder if it's still sound. Phin, does it look safe to you?"

The chains in the pulleys are the only major metal pieces.  They have somehow survived the passage of time or thieves or whatever else has removed all but stone from this place.  After a bit of testing, a bit of oil on the chains probably wouldn't hurt.  However, the whole system is as enduring as the mountains and looks perfectly functional.

Klale suggests each of the young men take a lever and that Eles gives the count so movements can be synchronized.

"That's a good idea. We should decide which levels to pull, and in which order."

After some initial frustration and then some historical context (mostly guessing) and trial and error, the gears whirl and a loud whoosh comes from outside.  A moment later, a sound begins from inside the castle, quiet at first, but grating on the nerves in timber.  It sends a chill up the spine.

The group wastes no time and heads back downstairs to find the gates opened inward.  By then, the sound is growing louder and more grating.  It sounds like the cross between a scream of pain and a howl of fury, though it has not relented once to take breath.  The horses are stamping in agitation and the wagons are in danger of being overturned.

Toben rushes over to the horse in an attempt to calm them down.

"I don't know what in the world that sound is, but we need to get out of here. Quickly."

With some luck, it looks like he may have calmed them down enough to exit the gates without losing their cargo.

22:05, Today: Toben Ironsprings rolled 23 using 1d20+3. Handle animal.

Klale goes up to the lead right-horse hitched to the wagon. He takes hold of the bit collar and speaks soothingly while stroking its face above the nose. We're leaving, easy now he says over and over as he attempts to lead the team out of the courtyard and away west.

Given his previous failures with the animals, Phineas decides the best thing he can do is to scout ahead a bit, making sure the appalling noise hasn't alerted anything the party might not want to come across unawares.

Ano races to the wagons with the others and begins to load up any equipment or gear already not on the wagons as the others try to calm the horses.  He gets ready to move a soon as the others are ready.