Narration 21
Friday 10 April, 1571 P.C.E
Vespers

he party dismounts before the main doors of the ruined keep.  Shardis and Lugnut quickly gather the reins of the riding horses, while Giles detaches the draft horses from the merchant wagon.  Then as they lead the animals across the mist-filled courtyard to the stables, Castus turns to the rest of you, drizzling rain running down his face and through his beard.  "We've got to move everything from the wagon inside.  This is generally a safe place to stop...but why take chances, eh?"

    Groaning and fumbling, you move through the sheeting rain and begin to carry things into the small entry hall of the keep.  After a few minutes of seemingly back-breaking labor, all lies on the rough stone floor of the hall and Castus pulls the heavy doors of the keep closed.  For a few moments, you mutter and stumble about in the darkness until the portly monk lights a lantern with a spark from his flint and steel.

    Covering your eyes from the sudden burst of light, it takes a moment for you to accustom your eyes enough to look about the small room.  The stone is old and worn, with covered burn marks and nicks from old violence.  Here and there, small bits of graffiti from past travelers dot the walls.  The place smells rusty and unused, and outside the circle of lantern light, seems rather foreboding.

    The portly monk takes up the lantern and then shoulders the heaviest pack one-handed.  Raising an eyebrow, he looks to the rest of you, "Well, unless ye want to sleep by this drafty door, take up a load and follow me."

    The monk moves off, holding the lantern high, and the rest of you are forced to grab what you can and hurry to catch up.  The rest of the keep seems just as empty and scarred.  The walls and dusty floors show similar signs of a long-ago battle, mixed in with newer markings of bored wanderers.  Up the main hallway, Castus stops before an ornate, heavy double door.  The portly monk crosses himself and mutters, "Bloody scary room, lads.  I won't go in there without a bloody damned good reason.  The walls are covered with crucifixes and marked with prayers to the AllFather.  The only other thing is a sealed door in the north wall.... 'Tis covered with crosses as well.  All that holiness, you'd think it would be fine...bloody place gives me the chills."

    Folly arches an eyebrow, "Oh really?"

    Before any can stop him, the young mage opens the door and slides in with Brisbee.  A few moments pass, then you hear a great deal of chattering, followed by a scream.  A brown streak shoots out the door, up Doran's leg, and stops upon the startled bard's shoulder.  Brisbee's fur stands out on end, making him look like a skinny hedgehog.  Excitedly he chatters and hisses in the direction of the room.  After a few moments, he settles warily around the bard's neck.

    Folly comes out, his face pale as the new-fallen snow.  A thin scratch mars his left cheek, where the scared ferret obviously scratched him in its flight.  Wiping at the thin trickle of blood, the mage leans heavily on the door, closing it.  With his free hand, he pulls out a vial and begins to liberally scatter salt about on the floor while muttering his half-remembered prayers.  Looking chagrined, he looks at the monk, "Umm...I guess you were right;" then, shifting his eyes to Martin, "Could you spare a blessing right now, father?"

    Martin gives him a rather disapproving look.  "Maybe later."

    Castus shrugs despairingly and rolls his eyes before moving down the hall to the left.  As you follow, you can hear him muttering softly, "Why me?"

    After a few steps, you come to a fairly large room that seems dry and sheltered from the elements.  Across the room, a large hearth and fireplace dominate the west wall.  Coming to the center of the room, the heavy-set monk looks about, grunts approvingly, and sets his pack down.  The rest of you do likewise and then quickly join your burdens on the floor.

    As the rest of you sit, Castus moves about, setting up and lighting more lanterns.  Soon, the grey stone of the room seems friendlier under the flickering lantern light.  As the others come in, Castus moves to his pack and begins pulling dry clothing out, "I suggest we get out of these wet rags or it'll be the death of us."

    The monk drops his soaked cloak and half unlaces his jerkin before he notices the sparkling sapphire eyes of the young bard. A fiery blush runs through the older man's face as he stops his undressing.  "Doran, lass, I think we passed a door back down the hall a wee bit.  For modesty's sake, I think you better go change down there."

    The bard nods and gives the monk a small smile before rising and taking up her pack.  As she goes down the hall, Lugnut rises, motions with his recently captured crossbow, and hisses at everyone while extending his prodigious warty tongue.  Satisfied with his display, he shoulders his weapon and scurries after the winsome bard.

    After a time, when everyone is together again, Shardis rises and stretches out, "I think I'll take a look around."  Without further words, he takes up a lantern and stalks down a nearby hall.

    As his light fades from sight, Castus shouts after the ranger, "See if you can find some wood for a fire."  The ranger does not respond, and the monk can only guess if he heard him.

    A half-hour passes spent in rest and nibbling upon Folly's offered fare.  Shardis strides back into the room with an armload of firewood.  The mages claps his hands and rubs them together before taking the proffered wood to the hearth.  As he sets about making the fire, the ranger gives you a general layout of the keep. (OOC:  Had to do this rather than spend 87 narrations going from room to room.)

    As the taciturn ranger speaks, Folly soon has a cheery fire going and the reluctant Lugnut running to fetch him some water. As you all relax, absorbing the warmth of the fire into your tired bones, Folly has a rich bean and ham soup bubbling over the fire.  The smell quickly has your stomachs, weary of the past day's cold rations, rumbling in anticipation.

    When he serves the meal, all conversation ceases as everyone's attention focuses on more personal matters.  After the food is gone, everyone sits near the hearth, taking in its warmth.  Castus sits propped against the wall, a worn pipe clenched between his teeth.  The smoking pipeweed sending out the smell of cinnamon and cloves.  Doran sits nearby strumming and fiddling with her gittern, stopping every so often to mutter something about rain and stringed instruments.  Only Martin seems preoccupied.  He sits alone, his face a mask of faith, as he clutches the recently found crucifix.

    After awhile, Folly stands and stalks over to where the group's treasures are.  With a dramatic showing, the mage grabs the cloak and wraps it around his shoulders.  Almost immediately a change comes over him, his face becomes lined and his hair turns a silvery gray and thins.  He becomes skinnier and his height drops as he begins to stoop.  Castus jumps to his feet.  "Folly, take that damned thing off before..."

    The mage doesn't let him finish.  He drops the cloak and immediately becomes himself again.  The monk's face becomes even more shocked, "How in the bloody hell!?!"

    Folly scratches his head.  "Hmm, guess I better study this thing a bit more."

s all of this has gone on, outside the weather has grown fouler.  The rain comes down in heavy sheets, pounding against the worn stone of the fort.  The dark night sky is often lit by cataclysmic flashes of lightning and the heavy, rumbling peals of thunder that follow can be heard even in the bowels of the keep, making the night a maelstrom.  Most odd for the season, ragged chunks of hail slam down, pummeling the ground and tearing through the trees of the nearby forest.

    Finally as the evening passes, Castus yawns and pulls himself to his feet.  "Well, I forced us into this bloody long march, so I'll take the first watch.  I suggest ye can get what sleep ye can with this banshee of a storm wailing outside.  Besides, this place gives me the willies."

    As you move to your scattered bedrolls, the heavy monk stokes the fire and then oddly puts on his heavier armour and takes up his footman's mace.  You pass it off as his nervousness about the place as you snuggle down into your resting-place.  Even with the howling storm, sleep finds your agonized forms very quickly.

t nigh the same instant, you all awake with a start.  It takes you a moment to realize what has woken you.  All is silent.  The storm is gone.

    Looking about, you see Castus stalking back and forth, his heavy gauntleted hands clenched about his heavy mace.  Under the wide nasal of his helm, his face is twisted into a grim concerned scowl.  "Up with ye.  That bloody storm stopped suddenly with the coming of the witching hour.  One minute it sounded like the damned in hell, then nothing.  This is making me bloody..."

    A deep hollow booming noise deep from the roots of the barrows interrupts the monk.  The sound fades, but then is followed by another, then another, and yet another, continuing its steady cadence indefinitely.

    You rise and listen to the horrid hollow sound.  It continues for several minutes, and then is replaced by a long, thundering rumbling noise somewhere beneath.  As the last of the heavy vibrations fade, a relieved look comes to Castus' face.  "I guess that was the end of whatever it was.  Probably some old tunnel under the Barrows giving way."

    After your long hours in the saddle, you are more than inclined to agree.  You all begin to settle back into your beds, while Castus sits by the fire, removes his helm, and lights up his pipe.  This time, sleep does not come as quickly.  Many minutes pass, and just as you are about to drift off, the booming, hammering noise begins again.  Except this time, it is nearer and the very walls of the room vibrate from the blows.

    Castus lunges to his feet and drops his pipe.  With a quick swipe of his big hands, he scoops up his mace and helm.  As you struggle to your feet, he stalks about angrily.  "Grab your weapons... that pounding is coming from that bloody room."  Without waiting, he takes up a lantern and stalks down the hall with Lugnut in tow.   Hurriedly, you throw on what clothes you can and grab your weapons.  Several of you notice Calimar remove a scabbarded sword that wasn't there a moment before from the saddle of his new black war-horse.

    Down the hall, you find Castus standing before the open door, his hand covering his nose and mouth.  In a moment, you know why.  A sickening miasma of filth, dung and gore spreads out from the open door into the hallway.  With Castus' lantern lighting the room, you see the painted prayers and silver crosses defiled with some foul black, congealed ichor that is seeping from the very stones of the wall.  As you watch horrified, you see the corrupting filth reverse some crosses while knocking others to the floor where they land with a dull thud.  Across the room, you can see the brick sealed doorway resound with a hammering blow.  Each strike makes the mortar flake a little more, until it explodes in a spray of brick chips, bits of mortar and rotten wood.

    As the dust settles, man-shaped forms stumble from the black hole that lies behind the ruined door.  Yet sight quickly tells you that these are no living men.  They move towards you sluggishly with unseeing eyes.  Many of them are mangled and maimed with great gaping wounds, dripping with sickening black and green tinged fluids.  Behind the rotting undead come skeletons shining in white and bearing arms and armour.  Their empty eyes and permanently grinning mouths seem to laugh at you and your destruction.  All move silently, except for their footfalls.

    Castus shouts, "Fall back for your armour.  I'll hold them here at the door.  Get a move on... I don't have all night!"

    As the monk sets himself to meet the charge, Lugnut fires his crossbow at one of the approaching dead.  It hits with a sickening thud and more of the sickening green-black puss seeps from the new wound.  The thing does not seem to notice and keeps coming forward.

    You quickly move down the hall and begin donning your armours.  Back at the doorway, you can hear Castus alternately cussing or calling on PaterOmni.  All the while, you hear the sickening smacking of his mace as it hits dead flesh.  As most of you finish donning your armour, the wall in the northeast corner of the room collapses.  Through the dust-filled ragged opening, the grinning dead move out to attack you.  In the lead, a magically warped skeleton comes forward, clacking its abnormally elongated finger bones.  It takes a moment to notice that those bones are sharpened to a fine edge.