the grotto

[cellio]

December 14 (Saturday)

Kyle is definitely not quite back to his old self. This is unfortunate.

Turok used Skullcreeper in combat and we're all still alive, so that's a good sign.

Today we followed the club, so to speak. It was sure that there was a repository of ancient knowledge near the temple of Dorl Tavyani. We found a repository of ancient something, but knowledge eludes us.

We journeyed through the edge of the mountain range and, toward the end of the day, came to a small cave opening. Before we could investigate, we were attacked by some very large, sickly, dire wolves. They attacked Turok and bit into him pretty badly. We eventually overcame them with fire, Turok's sword, and Kyle's dagger-throwing.

Disturbingly, Prolix sat out most of this fight. A wolf bit into Turok and Prolix just stood there and did nothing! Eventually he joined the fight, but it was very little and very late. And he then sat out the fight with the occupants of the cave. What has gotten into him?

There was a glow coming from the cave; eventually we found it to be a grotto with sparkly rock all around (looks like this could be mined, maybe) and illumination from an eternal torch. There was a pool of foul-smelling water in the middle, and there were two creatures, a water creature that stayed in the pool and a huge gelatinous ooze like the one back under Shepford.

Liandra somehow froze the water creature; the ice crystals in its "body" were very pretty (and effective). Meanwhile, the ooze came after us, and it gobbled up and nearly swallowed Kyle! Turok pulled him out just in time (and that was a sound I'm not eager to hear again soon). I threw flame balls at it, which seemed to work well. Weapons caused it to split, even sling bullets, which surprised me. Kyle, Turok, and Liandra all hit it at about the same time, and then there were four oozes. I threw a fireball at them and ended that. We could have had the information that crossbow bolts would split it earlier if Prolix had shot when he had the chance.

It also occurs to me that it would have been very handy if I could have somehow made the floor under the ooze slippery. The floor was sloped down toward the water; I wonder if I could have slid the thing back into that water. I've been thinking lately about how to make things magically sticky (inspired by Prolix's walk-on-walls spell); I should also think about making them slippery. I think the same magical principles would apply to both cases. Yes, I'm sure of it. Just reverse one invocation and... well, never mind.

Meanwhile, the water creature was still moving (it wasn't a complete freeze), and it lunged at us from the pool. It swatted at my flame balls and dismissd them. Hmpf! Most of our weapons were ineffective, and Skullcreeper was egging Turok on and urging him to use the club instead of his sword. He did, and that seemed to work. I helped with some magic missiles, but Turok is the one who really saved the day there. (And, to my relief, Turok did not then come after me with that club.)

As the creature was dying I saw that its "eyes" were really two huge pearls. I reached out with a mage hand and snatched one of them out of the air as the creature dissolved into the pool. Neat! We weren't sure what was in the pool (water? acid? something else?), so we didn't immediately go wading for the other. Instead, we pulled it -- and the eternal torch -- out magically.

There was also a mostly-submerged chest. It contained some water-logged scrolls; what an unfortunate loss. Unfortunately, when we pulled the chest out of the water the bottom fell out, dumping most of the contents into the pool. Tomorrow we will deal with this.

This room is very pretty, aside from the stink of the pool. The glittery purple rock is lovely. I wonder if magic missiles would help me pry out a few pieces. Probably not, but I'll give it a try.

Tonight I am going to go out flying with Hrolf. I owe it to him. We won't stray too far from here.

December 15 (Sunday)

Liandra determined that the pond is diseased the way the one under Shepford was. So she cured it magically, which was neat to watch. Prolix then grew some gills and went swimming for the stuff that spilled into the pond from the chest.

The two pearls are very nice. They would certainly be good enough for the anti-disease charms that Liandra and I want to make. If we can find one more pearl, we can go ahead and make them. Well, assuming she's right that she can find a friendly unicorn in Oakhame! I wouldn't have thought so, but I'm not from around here. If Liandra says this is possible, I'll believe her.

After we cleaned up the pool and retrieved the stuff that had fallen into it, we headed back toward the road. We want to find the road (roads are safer than mountains), follow it to the provincial capital (even though taverns are more dangerous than roads), and then go from there to Oakhame, Liandra's home.

I noticed something when out with Hrolf last night, and I saw it again tonight so I don't think it was just a fluke. Both times, we passed near other birds (not owls). It almost looked as if Hrolf was communicating with them, in a way I haven't seen before except with owls. (The most notable case of that was outside Covanion, when he called in "consultants" to critique my flying. He had some amount of communication with them, but the ravens nearby ignored us completely.)

I asked Hrolf about it tonight and he said that it's strange; he can almost interact effectively with the other birds we've seen, but not quite. This is new for him, and it's puzzling him. He finally admitted that the other night, when he came back with that rabbit, he had been racing another, much larger, bird for it (maybe a hawk), and that something unnatural "told" him that bird was there in time for him to get out of the way. I wish he would be more careful; he could have gotten himself killed!