Caell carried some things that once had value. Weapons, armor, tools and warm clothes had once been everything that stood between him and the cold death of the tundra. Now, he did not need any of them, other than what modesty required. The only great sacrifice he could make, was the silver crown on his forehead. At this time, he was not willing to give it up. It remained a last measure to save his friends.

Cora reached into her belt pouch, drawing out her bone dice. She poured them into her hand, sifting through the little shapes until she drew a old and warped octahedron, numbers chipped and faded

"This die was carved by an orc man, and given freely to a human woman, who passed it on to their daughter. By the end it was her only possession. There are many like it in the daughter's possession, but this one the daughter did not craft, this one she was given."

Putting the rest back in her pouch she held the die up, pinched between her thumb and forefinger

The priest extended toward Cora the hand that had first beckoned the party to the shrine. Their robes shifted as they did so, revealing a satiny sheen that caught the light of the fire much as the polished ceiling above the steaming pool had.

The priest's body, which had until now been shifting and indeterminate, began to resolve in size, coalescing into the shape of a short, stout humanoid. The hood of robe slipped back an inch, revealing a bearded face, though if this was indeed a dwarf, a beard did nothing to resolve the priest's gender.

The hand did not attempt to take the die from Cora. "You show me something of yourself." The priest's voice sounded pleased. It lost its ethereal, booming quality and grew more soft. "I shall do the same." Her hood slipped further back, revealing an old and definitively feminine and dwarven face. She laughed.

"A die is a fitting gift." Still, she did not take it. "Go on, cast it." The priest indicated the open stone floor between herself and Forza's flame. The other worshipers had stopped their work and now looked on eagerly. They whispered amongst themselves, placing bets on what the die would show.

Cora, if you wish to roll the die, then go ahead and give us a roll. You can choose how many sides it has.

Arvid heaved a sigh of relief as Opalia's affliction was lifted, and was caught by surprise moments later when he was scooped into the air. Rather than protest though he returned the giantess's embrace. He'd been more frightened than he'd allowed himself to acknowledge. Now he had other concerns to fret over - Sikuaq's transformation for starters. But at least Opalia was safe.

Cora let go of the die, giving it a twist as she loosed it, the eight-sided piece of bone toppling and tumbling, bouncing for a moment before coming to rest showing the orcish number djor, the sixth number of their number system.

The fire-worshipers held their breaths, crowding around to see the results of the roll. There were gasps and cries of jubilation when it settled into place with six pips pointing up. The priest gave a thin smile, seeming no more or less pleased by this result than she would have been by any other. "Six," she noted dispassionately. Her eyes met Cora's, and she smiled as if the two shared a secret. "Or do you prefer djor?

It is an inauspicious number among the dwarves. The mark of Hrom, He-Who-Thunders. Yet the orcs favor it, perhaps for the same reason."

The die burst into flames, though it had landed far from Forza's fire. The flames vanished as quickly as they had appeared, leaving only a small pile of ash in their wake.

"You have cast away a part of yourself, as we agreed. Let us see what Hrom has been up to."

She indicated the great fire in the back of the temple. Staring into its leaping flames, the party soon recognized a familiar sight. The Resting Place, the eternal home of the elves, which the party had previously defended from the combined forces of Hrom and Forza, still stood and appeared no longer to be under attack. The forest around it was decimated and many of its grand spires reduced to smoking rubble, but it still stood. Elves moved through the charred streets, some digging through rubble, some tending to the wounded, some already working to rebuild.

There was much to lament, however. In addition to the ruin of the city, Hrom's forces had apparently withdrawn largely intact. Dark clouds gathered in the distant sky, and the scene in the flames shifted towards them. Thunder rolled and lightning crackled over towering peaks, where in a cave many dark spirits had marshaled. They were gathered near a crackling black sphere, the beginnings of what would be a portal to the realm of the living. Through the portal could be seen the form of an orcish shaman bearing a skull-headed staff, much like the one Stormbringer had carried.

Then the scene faded, and the fire was fire once more.

Fergus watched proudly as his niece sacrificed something of herself for the benefit of her companions. His attention then fixed on the vision in the flames, first with relief at the understanding that the Resting Place they defended earlier was still standing, then with dismay as he observed the army of shadows standing by a portal and the staff carrying orc on the other side.

"Garduk, I presume. With a staff like the one Stormbringer carried." He turned to Sikuaq, uncertain how much to reveal with the eerie priest still with them. "And the one from Guthluthic. I wonder if there is a fourth.

"Regardless of that, we're running out of time. If he's using that thing to open a portal, we need to find him and stop him."

"Here, or in the Resting Place?" Arvid asked. "Sikuaq, can you bring us back there again?"

"Or Cora, as Brigha suggests?" Arvid said, motioning towards the blade at her side.

Seized with sudden inspiration, Arvid reached into his pouch and withdrew a scroll case - one that he'd held tight to for sometime for fear of damaging its contents. (I actually don't recall who was holding this but for the sake of expediency, Arvid is)

He looked to the Forzite priest. "If you have the power to restore Opalia's form, do you also have the ability to remake what is broken? I fear this will come apart in my hands if I disturb it."

Cora watched the fire consume her father's die, saying a little prayer to . . . Gruumsh? Kann? She wasn't really sure. To her father, moreover, reaching out to find Fergus or Caell and touch her hand to them to feel grounded.

Cora drew the Starbound Blade, running a hand across the flat as she turned it slowly in the firelight

"Like . . . now? We're opening this portal now?"

"The sword is the way," Sikuaq confirmed to both Arvid and Cora, her flaming tresses swaying slightly as she nodded.  "But now is not yet the time, Cora.  We are pressed, but have some latitude yet.  We must find the ancient battleground left from the orcish invasion so long ago.  There we might gather the strength of spirit to fashion the gateway."

"But first Arvid must hear the answer to his question," she noted, one of her lava tentacles gesturing toward the northman and his scroll case.

Cora made a sacrifice to the fire priest, who showed them a vision within the flames, which Opalia found very impressive.  She struggled to understand what the flames conveyed, recognizing the so-called Resting Place looking very fought-in, then it moved onward to towering mountains shadowed by thunderheads, and through a spooky portal... "GARDUK!  That is him, that I saw before!  He still has the BAD-STAFF, and doing with it BAD deeds."  The giantess squinted into the fiery imagery, then added, "We did know that already, but now we see it!  Can we find this place, so we can go there and SQUISH Bad-GARDUK?"

It seemed that there would be a number of complicated steps before the squishing could happen, as always seemed to be the case, much to Opalia's chagrin.  Sikuaq mentioned they must go to an ancient battleground deep in the earth, to which the giantess nodded and cracked her knuckles.  "OPALIA does not know magics, but she does know what to do on a BATTLE field.  When do we go to there?"

"I do not have any power," the priest explained. "Forza merely works her will through me. A thing can be made whole, if Forza wishes it made whole. But that is rarely Forza's wish. Fire prefers to consume and destroy." The flames flared dramatically behind her.

Fergus patted Cora's hand as her die succumbed to the flames. She had sacrificed much for the well being of the group. This simple ornament, he knew, was a part of her. He gave her hand a squeeze to tell her he loved her for the way she put her friends before herself. Darna would be proud.

Things quickly turned to the scroll Arvid had revealed, and discussion on how to possibly remove it from its container. "We need to work together, then," Fergus concluded. "To carefully remove and read this scroll." He looked at Sikuaq, who normally he would entrust with such a fragile request. Her wild transformation, however, gave him concern. "She's more likely to burn the parchment to ashes than remove it in one piece. Who then? Arvid? Cora?" Finally he looked to Caell. Even though memories of him stumbling through Jawbreaker's still flashed through his memory, Fergus surmised the fair faced elf was their best chance. "Caell, you're the most qualified for this. With Kann's blessing, you might fish it out without destroying it. What do you say?"

Will cast Guidance if Caell agrees to fish it out now... fish it out - no offense, Opalia!
This message was last edited by the player at 03:32, Thu 10 Feb 2022.

Caell stood in his own thoughts. The others had aired the possibility of opening a portal and face their enemies. While there was nothing he wanted less, it had to be  done. He believed it was the reason he had been led along this path in the first place.

When Fergus said his name, Caell turned. "What?"

He looked at the scroll and between Arvid, Fergus and the others, then down at his own long and thin fingers. He didn't know if he was more qualified at this operation than the others, but he was willing to try. While he wouldn't want to disappoint his friends by failure, the prospect of doing this did not fill him with gut-wrenching fear.

He gave a nod and accepted the task, listening when the others offered advice, but ultimately doing this at the best of his own ability. Fergus' blessing gave him a calm and dissipated what nervousness he had. Moving as slow as the snow leopard approaching its prey, Caell carefully proceeded to open the scroll. Unlike the hunter, however, there would be no sudden pounce. Slowly. Steadily. Meticulously.

That's Sleight of Hand 18.

Caell's hands, much as he willed them not to, trembled as they opened the scroll case. The smell of parchment, ancient even by elven standards, rushed forth to greet him. Whatever was inside had defied tremendous odds, to still exist intact so many centuries after it was written. So little remained of that bygone era.

The elf tried to quiet his mind, but he could not help thinking of the monumental effort that must have gone into preserving it this long. It must have passed through so many hands that could have lost or destroyed or simply neglected it but chose to treasure it instead. Improbably, two of those hands belonged to the orcish shaman known as Stormbringer. More improbably still, two of them now belonged to the disgraced Quinichiat known as Caell.

He would have only one chance at this. Failure - as little as a twitch of the finger or an ill-timed breath - would undo the careful work of all those hands that had come before his.

Caell knew about failure. His unsteady hands had once before cost him something incalculably precious. She was less important to the world, perhaps, but far more important to him.

What a joke, that he of all people should be entrusted with this. His own tribe would not trust him to hunt with them.

Put that down immediately, you fool, the voice of doubt instructed him.

At least have a drink first, to steady your nerves, suggested an equally unhelpful voice.

Cora's touch cut through the noise in his head, as did Fergus's. They trusted him, even if he did not trust himself. And that was something, because the dwarf had long made clear his disapproval of the drunken elf.

But then, he was not a drunken elf, not any longer. It had been a few days, anyway. That was all it took. A drunken elf without the drink was just... an elf. No better or worse than any other. At least he was not inhabited by the tentacles of some ancient fire-demon.

He heard a new voice laugh in his head. It was a familiar laugh that had once lit up his life like no other, a laugh he thought he would never hear again. There was no anger in that laugh, no bitterness or resentment. No forgiveness, even, for forgiveness, the laugh said, was not necessary. There was nothing to be forgiven.

They are no better than you. All you can do is try. That is all any of them are doing. That is all they ask of you.

Caell's hand stilled. Two tentative fingers pinched the parchment, which was so desiccated he could feel it sapping the moisture from his skin. It was brittle. It would not endure much longer, no matter what anyone did. If they did not look upon it now, it might never be seen again by anyone anyway. All things crumbled to dust, there was no better reminder of that than the temple in which he stood, where even now the pious masons were destroying one scene written upon the stone walls to chisel a new one.

Inch by inch, Caell's steady hand lifted the rolled parchment, moving so slowly it was almost imperceptible to his companions. There was no rush. It wanted to be free. He had only to guide it.

Then it was free, the scroll entirely clear of the case and in his hand. For a brief, terrifying moment he could have sworn he felt it coming apart, but it was simply unrolling, he was unrolling it, his hands now so attuned to what the parchment wanted, how it needed to move, that his mind had not even grasped what they were doing.

Caell did not possess the gift of letters, but he knew enough to recognize the arcane symbols on the page. They were written not in the flowing script of elves but in the runic symbology he had seen used by the druids of his tribe.

Having held his breath throughotu the end of the procedure, Caell exhaled slowly. It seemed they had succeeded. He gave a faint smile, but then looked at the parchment again; eyes narrowing. "I can't read. Not this. Symbols, not letters, I think. Magic runes."

He glanced around at the others, although there were several with more knowledge than himself (all of them, he suspected), his eyes lingered on the other quinichiate, in spite of her current condition. "You read runes, anatka?"

Sikuaq watched as closely and full of anticipation as any of them, her blazing eyes fixed on the ancient parchment and her breath held with each gentle unfurling as Caell progressed.  In the end her fellow Quinichiat demonstrated his deft touch and the whole of the scroll was exposed, where the anatka could discern faded Druidic runes across its surface although not the specific words written there.  The parchment was simply too far away to be sure of the message recorded there.

With the scroll safely open Sikuaq finally let out a big breath; as she exhaled small orange sparks whirled away a few inches before winking out.  One of the lava tentacles stroked up and down her staff, almost an unconscious motion while in thought.  Finally she answered Call.

"Yes, I can read the runes of the Druids.  But the scroll is too far away, I can't make out the words in detail.  You will have to bring it closer." Sikuaq gestured with a free hand, her fingers summoning Caell to approach.

Opalia wrung her hands in second-hand worriment as Caell carefully withdrew a scroll that looked fit to crumble if a breeze should touch it.  She wasn't sure of the significance of this scroll, but wondered if it would be wise to allow a FIRE-ANATKA to touch such a fragile item, when even her breathing made burning sparks?  The giantess reckoned that it would be wiser not to refuse one so strong in spirit-of-flame!

As the tense moment of scholarship happened, Opalia whispered not very quietly to Cora and Arvid, "It must be a much-oldest story on crumbly parchment!  OPALIA hopes it is good tale of mountains, and maybe bears."  She looked on, waiting sort of patiently find out what would be discovered.

Caell approached, holding the scroll for Sikuaq to read.

The fiery tentacles sprouting from Sikuaq's abdomen writhed and twitched as if controlled by a will beyond her own, growing more agitated as her eyes took in the contents of the scroll.

Caell was a little worried by the fiery tentacles. He was ready to pull the brittle parchment away should the heat potentially harm it.

"Careful..." Fergus pleaded to Caell, placing a reassuring hand on his side. "I don't think the anatka's in complete control of herself right now." Fergus didn't like where this was going and muttered another prayer to Kann.

OOC: Cast Guidance on Caell, just in case he needs a slight of hand to save the scroll or an insight to judge what the @#$% is going on with Sikuaq... by the way, what the @#$% is going on with Sikuaq?!?!?

Sikuaq was fixated on the runes, so much so that she never even flinched at Fergus' comment, if she even heard it.  As she struggled through the ancient writing, similar to but not exactly the same as she had been taught, the meaning began to grow clearer and her agitation began to manifest.  Her eyes dimmed from their cheery yellow-orange to ruddy red flickers, and her flaming hair began to waft about her head a little, as though stirred by an unseen breeze.  The lava tentacles holding her staff were even more apparent, moving restlessly and with increasingly sharp and aggressive motions.  Even the curl of her lip hinted that something in the message committed to the scroll was distasteful to her.

When she finished the text she straightened up in a huff, eyes dangerously ablaze and more sparks cascading from her nostrils.  One of the tentacles shot out toward the parchment, unable or unwilling to remain with the staff, but pulled up just short when Sikuaq barked "No!", before Caell or anyone else could intervene.  The tentacle hovered there a moment, illuminating the parchment in its molten orange glow, and then slunk back and wrapped about the staff again like a chastened pet.

"I can't believe it," the anatka added with a shake of her head, before motioning with a wave of her hand for Caell to store the parchment back in its case.  After a few more moments of contemplation she looked about at her companions with a certain sadness in her eyes, which had subsided so far as to almost be blue, like the banked flicker of flames along the edge of charcoal.

"Finish your questions with the priestess if you have any," he suggested to her friends.  "Once we leave this place, I will explain the contents of the scroll.  It will interest you, but does not immediately affect our next steps."

"Then let's get out of here," Fergus suggested, realizing at the same time that there was no obvious exit on this side of the boiling lake.

"Uh, how exactly do we get out of here?"