#76
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The next key step lied in being able to find their hole. Yeah, it would probably be frozen over by the time they got back, but it should at least be thinner than any other spot in the ice. Sev pulled out his longest length of rope and his supply of sunrods. He tied one to the end of the rope and tossed it in the lake, and another one at about it's midpoint. Securing the rope to one of the larger pieces of recovered firewood, Sev was as ready as one could for a swim through a cold that could ice over the realms of hell. To help lead them back, Sev ignited and dropped his other sunrods along the way. Although deep under the water, the small cavern was almost a sauna compared to the icy cold water. Jumping out of the water, Sev immediately started with trying to warm himself. With the lack of dry warm clothing, Sev stripped down to his underclothes and laid his garments out on the stone floor. He did the same with the contents of his bag. Upon noticing the looks he was getting, Sev responded, “I'd rather be embarrassed and dry, than frozen to death with my modesty intact.” While his things dried off, he searched the room. The room looked to have been touched up by stone carvers, but seemed mostly natural... other than the obvious iron door. With the cursory search of the room not turning up anything interesting, Sev turned to focus on the door. “First, we gotta figure out which way you open...” Sev pulled out his tools of the trade and began poking around the edges of the door. If there were hinges, or it was suppose to slide, he'd figure it out. As he poked around, Tolle asked about the bladders. "I suppose if you don't know any better, anything could be magical. They were a gift to us from a frost giant friend back in town. Olaf. Name mean anything to you?"
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Oct 28th, UPDATE: Things appear to be settling down. Returning to normally scheduled posting |
#77
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"Olaf?" Tolle answers, his voice a bit distracted as he continues to give some of his attention to the underground grotto and the imposing pair of doors. The hotlanders shiver and chatter their teeth against the cold, causing him some concern - but if they have no way to warm themselves, he has no way to help. "Zis name ... hrrrmm. It is common, zis name, and often given by children to zere toys or zere snowmen they make in the spring. The wolkjin of my people would know more zan I can claim. But I am thinking it means heritage, or ancestor memory." He pauses, then nods soberly. "Yes, zat is the meaning."
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#78
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For a long time, Muriel Favreaux sat huddled beside the fire in dead-eyed silence. She entered the water last, preferring to give the flying woman -- Jenna was the name the others had used for her -- an opportunity to drown or freeze to death and float to the surface in warning to the others.
Even then she did not trust either of the men to follow her through the frigid waters. Generally speaking, Muriel was not a trusting woman, but to accomplish her goals she needed these explorers and that meant taking some risks. The savage, Tolle of Clan Something-or-Other -- Honestly, can I be expected to remember the full proper title of every new person I meet? -- seemed to possess information the group required. The other three were obviously close-knit and trusted one another implicitly. Muriel felt inclined to trust the woman with the silver tongue. Kiriel. The entertainer was her entry point to the group, but first Muriel would need to prove her value -- a simple enough task considering the immense power she possessed, particularly the level of control she could leverage against weaker minds. One after another, all four dove into the freezing waters. "Clearly they haven't been down there before," she said to the empty air. Muriel had been, and that was why she hesitated. Gripping the strange bladder, she stared down into the frigid waters, her face contorted with a sour expression. Maybe this... thing... will protect me from the cold? She shuffled forward a quarter-step, cursed, took a deep breath, stuck the bladder in her mouth and dove in head-first. She gasped as the water shocked her with its biting chill and was pleased to find that at least the strange device did, in fact, allow her to breathe underwater. That didn't change the fact that she would die of hyperthermia in a matter of seconds without finding a proper heat source. She swam with all her might and flopped out onto the dry land, a fish thrashing on the end of a hook. Scrambling to her feet and hugging herself around the waist, she shivered, teeth chattering, and shot a glare at Jenna as cold as the lake itself. "I only just got warm. Now look at my clothes! Soaked. And my hands are blue. BLUE!" Scowling, she stripped off her sopping wet outer wear, then stood rubbing her hands together. "Any other brilliant ideas?" A short while later, still in a foul mood, but determined to fulfill her purpose, she approached the door and examined it closely. She appraised the door in silence long enough for her teeth to stop clicking together, then reached out and knocked. Last edited by moozuba; Jan 13th, 2015 at 02:09 AM. |
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