Now in better condition, the party followed stairs leading further underground. Condensation made the stone slippery, and the torches the humans carried hissed in the damp. I saw a faint light and movement ahead. A sparrow flew out of the dark and lit on my shoulder, so quick and small most of the others seemed not to notice in the flickering torchlight.
"What is the hidden knowledge you seek?"I was so surprised to hear an animal speak in this realm that I stammered instead of answering. The sweet thing fluttered against my cheek and promised to return. Kain raised a fuss, but I ignored him and the others chalked it up to the dwarf's earlier over-indulgence in ale.
Kain split off to investigate the room with the light, and reported back that it is collapsed, although a way through may be found if we are careful. We followed more stairs down. The dwarves talked excitedly of the gold they could smell ahead, but all I sensed was mold and damp. There was a chamber at the bottom, and Slim volunteered to investigate. He took a torch (foolish human) and crept ahead. After a small amount of time he came back to tell us of an altar below. Bartimus's muttering in the back had started getting on my nerves, so I offered to accompany Slim and Paug. The wizard looks at me too often with suspicion in his gaze. I believe he knows I am not quite what I claim to be.
There is a bit of a disturbance upstairs, but it sounded like the others had it under control. Paug found a hidden chamber under the altar, and we pushed the stone aside to reveal a space full of human skulls and a cloak attached to a beer skull. Paug claimed the cloak at first, strutting as he swung the fancy thing over his shoulders, but his face became cold and odd. He took it off and refused to wear it anymore. There was some gold in there as well.
When we rejoined the others, Kain was proudly showing off the shrunken skull he boasted to have cut from one of the creatures. There was the sound of dragging, uncertain steps, and the corpse of Valatress stepped into view. The unnatural thing's head was still twisted around backwards! I attacked, seeing this can no longer be the young woman we once saved from her fellow villagers, and such a blasphemy should not be tolerated. My spear caught the back of her head, but the undead creature clawed me viciously, and I fell senseless to the ground. When I woke, Varg! was praying over me, and the rest had dispatched the foul walking corpse. While Paug gave the bearskin cloak to Kain (it suits the dwarf much better, to be honest), Moira and I investigated a corner. She swore she could practically taste the gold, but there was no hidden lever, no false front hiding a door.
We pressed on despite the dwarves' protests, and came to two large stone doors, covered in runes and flanked by two large gold braziers. There was a large depiction of a snake crushing a giant wolf over the doors, and the floor was covered with shed snake skins. We lit the braziers and Slim discovered an opening over the door. He and Moira went in while the rest of us waited below. I kept an eye on the tunnel behind us. Varg! seemed to settle into a deep trance while the others sharpened weapons and talked quietly among themselves. The sounds of a scuffle drifted back to us, but Moira is worth two of any of these others. The noise died, and Moira and Slim returned, somewhat worse for wear, with a wolf spear, silver drinking horn, and a silver wolf pelt. Varg! donned the pelt, and even I must admit he looks almost heroic in it. Slim, Moira, and Paug decided to go investigate further, taking the tunnel again as the dwarves had determined that the room would collapse if we opened the doors. There was a great disturbance before long, and all three tumbled back through the passage, covered in dirt and out of breath. They had recovered another spear, this one even more finely crafted, and managed to escape just before the room collapsed.
