The Temple of Elemental Evil

24

They descended the staircase into the depths of the temple once more, still seeking Falrinth, hoping to catch the wizard before he could destroy a third door.

Shanhaevel swallowed nervously. Ahead of him, Ahleage moved along, following the stairs, while behind the wizard, Elmo held a lantern high, helping everyone to see.

As the group, moving single file, reached the end of the stairs, Shanhaevel saw that a second opening had been blasted in the structure of the temple. He could easily imagine that a second set of doors, also sealed with magical sigils, had been placed at the foot of the stairs, but now there was only a gaping hole.

“The second door,” the elf said quietly, “or what once was.”

“We only felt two blasts,” Elmo said.

“Then the third must not be far beyond,” Govin said, motioning for Ahleage to push on.

Beyond the blasted remains of the second portal was a patch of earthen floor—what once might have been a large area. Now a large portion of the room had collapsed, and a great wall of rubble blocked their way.

“Damnation!” cursed Govin, smacking his hands together.

“So, now what?” Shirral asked. “One of those other ways down?”

Govin, his mouth twisted in a snarl of frustration, nodded and headed back up the stairs as the rest of the group followed him. He stopped at the pit he had been examining earlier. “We try this next. We must find another way down, get to the next door, and stop them. Look there, about fifteen feet down. There is a ledge and, if I’m not seeing things, a set of stairs that spirals down from it.” The knight pointed down into the shaft.

Ahleage, who had lain down on his stomach to peer over the edge of the pit, turned his head sideways and stared at Govin. “You just got through saying that you hope we never meet this ‘Nameless One’, and now you want to go straight down a gaping shaft that probably leads to one of the nine hells itself.”

“I think I can see light from the very bottom,” Shirral said, hunched over and peering down, herself. “It’s just a faint white glow, but I’m almost certain something is lit down there.”

“I could be in Hommlet right now,” Ahleage muttered, even as he uncoiled some rope and tied one end to a post of the railing. He tossed the other end over the side of the pit and continued his tirade. “Leah could be on my lap. I could be eating some of Glora’s fine roast chicken, but nooooo, I’m here, about to go down a hole with a crazy knight and you four, all insane enough to follow him.”

“Are you finished?” Elmo asked.

Ahleage pursed his lips, as if thinking. Finally, he replied, “For now. Give me a few moments though….”

“Well then,” Govin said as he sheathed his sword. “Let’s get moving.”

“Let me go first,” Ahleage suggested. “I can check to make sure the ledge is solid and safe enough to stand on. Hold tight until I get down there.”

Ahleage sat down and dangled his legs over the side. He took hold of the rope, twisted around, and lowered his body so that he was hanging freely in the shaft with only his head above the surface of the floor.

“Don’t wait too long, though. If some demon tries to grab me, I sure want the rest of you to be there, too.”

With that, Ahleage lowered himself.

Once he had determined the safety of the ledge, the rest of the group descended into the shaft. Shanhaevel swallowed nervously as he peered between his feet over the edge of the narrow ledge. The drop made him sweat. Far, far below, he could see the faint glow of light that told him how far he would fall, should he slip. Ahead, Ahleage moved along, following the ledge around to the stairs that descended lower into that shaft. Behind the wizard, Elmo held a lantern high, helping everyone to see.

As the group descended the stairs, moving single file, Shanhaevel used his staff to make sure his footing was sound. The steps spiraled downward, but fortunately, they seemed to be stout and intact. The group took a couple of turns around the perimeter of the shaft, and then the steps just ended at a small platform hanging from the side.

“Great,” Ahleage said. “Good idea, Govin. Let’s head back up and try those doors, I guess.”

It was then that Shanhaevel felt a strange, cool breeze against his cheek. “Hold a minute!” the elf said just as everyone was about to reverse direction. “I think there’s something here.”

“What? Did you find another secret passage?” Ahleage asked, having turned to face Shanhaevel as the elf examined the wall.

“Actually,” the wizard replied as he pushed a section of wall so that it suddenly slid downward, “yes.”

“Istus’ mother!” Ahleage breathed. “You give me the creeps, the way you always find those things. Elmo, shine your light down in here.”

The huge man held the lantern forward as Ahleage squeezed past Shanhaevel and moved through the portal opening. He stopped halfway through.

“What is it?” Shanhaevel asked, peering past the man into the area beyond. The floor immediately before Ahleage was covered in bones. Skulls mingled with femurs, and rib cages tumbled together with fibulas in a jumble of remains. Many of the skeletons were roughly intact, still wearing armor of some sort in several cases.

“A great battle was fought here,” Shanhaevel surmised. “Maybe when the temple fell.”

“So that’s supposed to make me feel better?” Ahleage said, still frozen in his spot. “I don’t want to go in there.”

“Wait a moment,” Shanhaevel said, then turned and looked back along the line of companions strung out on the stairs. “We’ve found a secret way into some tunnels, but it’s full of bones.”

“What’s beyond the bones?” Shirral asked.

“It looks like a hallway, but I can’t tell for sure.”

“We don’t have a choice,” Govin said. “Keep moving.”

“All right,” Shanhaevel said, then turned back and relayed the answer to Ahleage.

“Did you tell them about the bones?” Ahleage asked testily.

“Yes.”

“Lots of bones?”

“Yes.”

“Was this Sir Govin Dahna’s, Sir We-must-stop-them-at-all-cost idea?”

“Ahleage,” Shanhaevel replied, sounding each word slowly and distinctly to drive home his urgency. “Go inside the door. Now.”

Ahleage sighed and skulked into the chamber. Shanhaevel followed close behind. The area was indeed a hallway, or rather, a T-shaped junction of two hallways, each several paces wide. The covering of bones stretched beyond the lantern light in both directions. The passageway straight ahead went about that distance before it ended, a door to either side.

As the last of the members of the Alliance filed through the secret door, it abruptly slid upward, closing. Ahleage lunged at the portal, trying to stop it from completely sealing shut, but he was not quite in time. With a solid thunk, the door slammed shut.

The echo of the door had scarcely faded when there was a clattering at each end of the hallway. In horror, the companions watched as several intact skeletons arose from the heaps. Wearing armor from their days among the living and brandishing weapons in their bony fingers, a half dozen or more of the undead charged the group from both sides.

“This way!” yelled Elmo as he cut across the corridor into the central part of the intersection. The others followed him, all except Ahleage, who was clawing frantically at the door. When he realized that his friends had left him there, he turned and sprinted into the safety of the side hall.

Elmo, his axe held ready, motioned for Shanhaevel and Shirral to get behind him and the more battle-capable members of the group. Draga, Govin, and finally Ahleage took up positions across the mouth of the hall, ready for the onslaught. The first of the animated horrors turned the corner, their bony grins silently laughing as they clattered down the hall toward the waiting defenders.

It was at that moment that the door beside Shanhaevel and Govin opened. An ogre stood there, a club raised in its hand, ready to bring its weapon down upon the head of some enemy. Behind it, a second ogre waited with a feral grin on its ugly, wart-covered face.

Shanhaevel was too surprised to move when the ogre’s club came crashing down on him. The elf was only able to twist his body out of the way enough to avoid being brained. The weapon caught him across the back of the neck and shoulder and drove him straight to the ground. All of the elf’s extremities went numb, and he could scarcely breathe. He lay on the floor, his mind unable to register what had happened. The ogre stepped into the corridor where the members of the Alliance were already battling a line of skeletons. The creature raised its weapon to strike the wizard again, and behind it, the second ogre waited eagerly to get into the fray.

As Shanhaevel watched the huge wooden weapon loom over him, its face set with sharp stones, he found himself suddenly thinking of Lanithaine. His old mentor’s face seemed to hover in the elf’s field of vision, smiling down on him, and Shanhaevel wondered if Lanithaine would be proud of him, of what he had been a part of. I came and served, the wizard thought. I honored his name and helped to protect the people of Hommlet from harm… at least for a little while.

Shanhaevel smiled back at Lanithaine, hoping his teacher was proud of him, and then the vision dissolved, and it was the ogre again, about to kill him. But the beast never got the chance. Govin was suddenly there, jumping between the huge creature and the fallen wizard, warding off the intended blow with his shield and driving his sword deep into the ogre’s midsection. At the same moment, Shirral dragged Shanhaevel away, giving Govin room to fight.

Shanhaevel tried to twist his head around, to smile at the druid as she pulled him to safety, but he could not move his head the way he wanted to. He heard the scream of the ogre as the knight’s sword eviscerated it, and out of the corner of his vision, he saw Elmo bullrush a skeleton, shattering the undead with his shield while he swung his axe around to strike at another. Shanhaevel’s vision blurred as a jolt of pain shot through his neck and down his back. Agony coursed up and down his spine, so much so that he could not even scream. The searing pain faded to a dull throbbing, and he could feel his fingers and toes again.

“Shhh,” Shirral told him, trying to press her hands against the back of his neck. “Hold still!”

The liquid fire that coursed down every nerve in his body immolated him, forcing him to cry out with the little strength he could find, only a hoarse croak. Suddenly, there was blessed coolness. He felt it radiate through him like a frozen stream melting in the spring sun. Shirral’s fingertips gently caressed his skin, sending quiet ripples of healing magic through him until the pain from the ogre’s blow was reduced to a vague throbbing in his neck and shoulder muscles.

Shirral sat back, looking at Shanhaevel, who blinked and realized he could sit up.

“Thank you,” he said, not knowing what else he could say.

Without a word, she leaned forward, grabbed him roughly by the collar of his cloak, and kissed him, pulling him to her lips and holding him tightly. He blinked in surprise and then kissed her back.

Just as suddenly, Shirral pulled away from him and uttered a few words of prayer so that her flaming scimitar ignited in her hand. Raising her weapon high, she leaped in beside Draga, who was being pushed back by no less than three skeletal warriors, their spears coming dangerously close to the bowman’s flesh time and time again.

Shaking his head to clear his senses, Shanhaevel rolled to his feet, noting that there was still some stiffness where he had been struck.

Govin was locked in a battle with the second ogre, while the rest of the companions fought skeletons. Now that Shirral stood with Draga, it looked as if Ahleage was bearing the worst of the fight, with three of the skeletons surrounding him. The man danced and feinted, trying to keep from getting pinned, but he was tiring.

Shanhaevel moved up behind Ahleage and said, “Keep them busy for just a moment more!” Then, he began a spell, drawing the magical energy and directing it outward as a sheet of flame from his spread fingers. He caught two of the skeletons in his magical fire. The scorching flame crackled and licked over the bones of the skeletons, igniting them like dry wood. When the jet of fire finally dissipated a moment later, the skeletons were nothing but a heap of smoldering bones.

“Thanks, wizard,” Elmo grunted, using the broad, flat blade of his axe to smash skeletons now, shattering them with his ferocious blows.

Ahleage said nothing, but he did take the offensive again, battering the lone skeleton still facing him with the flat of his own sword. Shanhaevel assisted with his staff where he could, swinging the stout weapon about and cracking bones when he saw a clean shot. After Elmo knocked the last skeleton backward to shatter against the wall, Shanhaevel turned to see Govin, his shield arm hanging awkwardly at his side, standing over the second ogre. Blood dripped from his blade.

Shirral was already moving to the knight’s aid, preparing to use her magical healing powers to mend his arm. Despite his injury, the fire in Govin’s eyes told Shanhaevel that the holy warrior was ready for more. Leaning on his staff to catch his breath, the elf looked around at the rest of his companions. Each of them had wounds, some worse than others. Draga had a nasty gash across the side of his face that had barely missed his eye. Elmo had a gaping rent in his armor across the ribs on his left side, and he was bleeding. Even Shirral walked with a slight limp. Yet none of them seemed cowed or subdued. Instead, he sensed an eagerness about the group, despite the oppressive feel of the temple, as though they felt they were close. Even Shanhaevel felt the excitement coursing through his limbs.

When Shirral finished her healing work, the companions turned their attention to their surroundings, trying to determine which way to go. At either end of the great hallway were other passages, and, of course, there was the room from which the ogre had come. They were just beginning to debate which way to go when Ahleage held his hand up for silence, his head cocked. In the distance, Shanhaevel could make out muffled sounds, a discussion it seemed, accompanied by footsteps. Motioning for the rest of the group to follow him, Ahleage padded forward, in the direction of the sounds.

“My lord Hedrack, we are almost ready to destroy the third door,” a man in the distance was saying. It sounded as though the voice carried from just a bit beyond where they were, around a bend in the passage.

Hedrack? Shanhaevel thought the name was familiar. The name from the papers in Lareth’s lair! Was this the man in the armor I saw today?

“Very good,” another voice replied, one that was rich and deep and carried the weight of authority—Hedrack’s, Shanhaevel knew. The power that radiated from that voice left no doubt in the elf’s mind. The footsteps had stopped. “You may proceed. I shall be in the main temple, preparing for her arrival. Notify me when the last doors are sundered.”

“As you wish,” the first voice answered, then there was a commotion, as though several others were scurrying somewhere.

“Hedrack!” Govin hissed. “We take them now, before they can destroy the door!” With that, the knight dashed around the corner.

“No!” Shanhaevel called after Govin, cringing at the thought of charging recklessly into battle unprepared, but it was too late. Shaking his head, the wizard followed as the rest of the Alliance charged after the knight.

The bend in the passageway deposited them in a wide corridor that ran at an angle and ended in another wide staircase leading down. A second passage, as wide as the first, branched off in the other direction, so that the whole of the intersection was in the shape of a Y with the staircase as the vertical line at the bottom. Falrinth and a small host of men and bugbears stood near the top of the stairwell, looking down into its depths. They were turned away from the onrushing knight and other members of the Alliance, and there was no sign of anyone else.

Upon hearing Govin’s heavy footfalls, Falrinth spun, bringing his hands up instantly, and cast a spell. The wizard stepped back as the bugbears brandished weapons and stepped forward, blocking Govin’s advance. Grunting from exertion, Govin charged into the fray, raising his sword high and swiping at the mangy humanoids. Ahleage and Draga hit the wall of bugbears a moment later, and quickly, the wide corridor was a broiling sea of weapons and blood.

Falrinth was on the verge of casting a spell that Shanhaevel recognized—the flaming ball of fire the elf had used several times before. Shanhaevel opened his mouth to shout a warning, but before he could utter a word, Ahleage threw a dagger, and the blade blossomed in the other wizard’s shoulder. Crying and stumbling backward in pain, Falrinth lost his concentration, and the spell he had been about to unleash failed. Snarling in anger, Falrinth reached inside his robes and removed a small length of wood, polished dark with age, and ducked to avoid further injury.

Shanhaevel frowned when he saw the wand in the other wizard’s hand. He quickly cast a spell of his own, summoning three of the glowing green missiles and directing them unerringly toward Falrinth. As the other wizard raised his arm to use the wand, the missiles struck him in rapid succession, causing him to howl in renewed pain.

Shanhaevel followed with a new spell, launching the acidic arrow that he had used to slay Falrinth’s imp, but Falrinth had taken enough. He turned away and scampered into the darkness of the opposite corridor. The magical arrow of acid fell harmlessly to the floor where he had been only moments before.

Her flaming blade in hand, Shirral was battling a pair of grim-looking men, each of them wielding a short spear. Govin and Ahleage, meanwhile, had waded through the thickest clump of the enemy and found themselves pressing the attack against the force of temple followers from both sides, trapping them.

With practiced ease, Shanhaevel summoned his spell of sleeping and put the few remaining combatants down. As the handful of men-at-arms and bugbears slumped to the ground, Ahleage moved in to finish them with his dagger. Shanhaevel gaped at him.

“No, Ahleage!” the elf cried out, causing the man to pause.

“They would release a demon on the world!” Ahleage said. “We can’t leave them here to destroy the door after we’re gone. If there was another way, I’d take it, but there isn’t. Blood for blood, wizard.”

Shanhaevel shook his head. “They cannot get near the door to ignite the powder. Only Falrinth can do that, with his magic. Leave them to their fates.”

“I won’t risk it,” Ahleage replied “A flaming arrow, a hurled lantern or torch… You convinced me to come here, to save the world from this festering evil. Well, I’m here, now, and I’m going to make sure it gets done. Turn away if you cannot watch.”

Resigned, Shanhaevel turned away, trying hard not to listen. He concentrated instead on Shirral, who was looking at him with sorrowful eyes.

“Does the evil of the temple wash over us?” he asked her softly. “Does it win in the end, then?”

“The lesser of two…” the druid whispered, taking his face in her hands and kissing him. “Our sorrow at committing even the lesser evil is what separates us from evil.”

Shanhaevel nodded, feeling great sadness in his heart, because he realized Shirral was right. “I understand, now, why Lanithaine never talked about his experiences during the war,” the elf said quietly. “In war, the line that separates the two sides of conflict grows perilously narrow.”

Govin looked back at his companions, and his gaze fell finally on Ahleage, whose bloody dagger was still grasped in his hand. The knight frowned. “There will be too much killing before this day is over,” he said. “May Cuthbert have mercy on us all.”

“Come on,” Ahleage said, wiping the dagger on a dead bugbear’s cloak. “We still have a wizard to catch.”