Clean Cup

[Rakeleer]

Rakeleer cursed and cursed again.

After rummaging through the rest of the equipment in his belt, desperately searching for something to save the day, or inspire him to save the day, Rakeleer came up with:

A shuriken of some strange ghostly metal

Two otterhide belts

A half eaten meat pie

A spool of yarn

and several other odds and ends.

Panicking now, Rakeleer tied one end of the yarn to the beasts corpse, and tore down the caves.

In moments he was in near darkness, running with one hand on the wall and one loosley holding the spool.

He ran until his breath was ragged and his muscles burning, and it only got darker.

    Then he stopped, arms flailing.  Something suspiciously like spider web were binding his arms and legs.  Looping the yarn into his belt, and acutely aware of the sklittering screeching coming from somehwere in the darkness, Rakeleer drew his rapier and gave the command word to activate it\'s enchantment.

 \"Redeemed!\"

   The metal began to crawl with wispy blue flames.

    \"Odd.  What happened to the red glow?\"

    But no matter.  He could now see the giant spider\'s web, or what he thought were spider webs that were entangling him.

   From the darkness, Rakeleer watched as the strange green creatures that he supposed might be the web spinners crawled back into the shadows.

    \"Yes...\"  He examined the webbing.  It was quite thick.  And he only managed to free himself with the edge of his blade.

  After gathering as much of the subtsance as he could, he race dback along the yarns path, one hand on the wall.

 \"Hold on, lady.  Hold on!\"

    He cut a small length of the webbing and set it aside.  The rest he quickly (over the course of the next half hour) braided into a very crude rope.

 That done, he threw one end around a jutting stalagtite, and the other he cinched around the end of the beast that pointed toward the water.

    Several running starts and an extremely tired rogue later, the beast was moved, and Valfaran\'s unmoving body was revealed.

   He checked her form for obvious injury, and found little that would cause her condition.

    \"Head wound\" he guessed.  Perhaps from the fall.

  But she was alive.

  He gathered some of the water in his skin and trickled some on her feline lips.

 \"Well if help won\'t come to us, we\'ll go to help.\"

  Taking the length of webbing he had set aside, and two of the now-rigid dismembered legs of the beast, Rakeleer crafted a rough gurney.

 It took almost as long to get Valfaran\'s body onto the gurney as it did to move the monster\'s.

    Moments later, Rakeleer started down the passage, back toward the civilization he had met the Enkidukai near, but this time dragging his guide behind him.

[Valfaran]

As she was pulled along in the crude vessel, Valfaran continued to have more of what seemed to be flashbacks. Sometimes the Enkidukai would shiver, wracked with sobs; other times she would cry out and convulse with anger. Very seldom, however, did the sounds of laughter or contentment pass her parched lips.

The space between these relived memories was often filled with low whimpering, like some small creature in pain. However, it was soon apparent that this condition was not a creation of her mental state; a thin trail of blood stained the grey-blue passage floor.

In a sudden fit of what seemed like panic, Valfaran grasped at the open air, searching for something. Her eyes were open, but looked to something much more distant than the cave walls or the passage in front of them. \"Kith\'nek! Kith\'nao!\" she cried out, and rolled to one side, nearly off the gurney.

On her now-exposed back, a blood stain began to spread across the rough leather vest that was her simple garb, as well as the tattered white shirt she wore beneath it.

In a blind fit, the Enkidukai reached backwards to grasp the hilt of her once-missing blade, previously unnoticable, half-wedged and half-sliced into the leather. As her paw clutched the hilt, she cried out and drew her arm away from it. The keen blade cut into her flesh at an angle just to the side of her shoulder blade.

[Rakeleer]

\"Well, no wonder.\"

Had turned at the Enkidukai\'s fit.

\"How did I miss that?  Sorry, Valfaran... hush a minute, let me see that.\"

Rakeleer knelt and examined the wound.  She had lost some blood, but the cut was clean, and what bleeding there was now was from the wound being disurbed.

\"I think you\'ll live.\"

He was smiling, but he felt abashed.  How had he missed a sword sticking out the cat person\'s back?

He put one hand on the short sword as gently and deftly as only a master pickpocket could - he hoped this wouldn\'t hurt for long.

\"Alright...  I\'m going to count to three.\"  It was an old trick.  Maybe it would help.

\"One....\"  He wrested the sword out of the wound, dodged several potenetially deadly swipes of claw, and immedietly applied pressure with the remainder of his salve-treated bandages.

When Valfaran\'s form grew still, and Rakeleer was fairly certain mortal danger was abated (until she woke up) he bound the bloodied bandages around her chest and across the wound on her back.

And then he sat down, back against the wall, in almost the same position Valfarn had found him in, and quietly went to sleep with one eye open.

[Valfaran]

When Valfaran woke clear-headed for the first time, she grasped instinctively for her twin short swords. The same as when she was delirious, Valfaran sat up and spoke, \"Kith\'nek, Kith\'nao!\"

Wincing at the sharp pain at her back, she seemed to be aware of her injuries for the first time. Glancing around frantically at the drastically different surroundings, the Enkidukai\'s gaze fell on her new friend. As if he would understand, she queried, \"Kith\'nek, Kith\'neo?\"

Patting at the worn spots near the tops of her boots, Valfaran looked, obviously distressed, to the empty blade sheaths stitched cleverly at their sides. The Enkidukai leaned sideways and clutched at the floor, spotting the blade stained with her own blood.

Hilt firmly in her grasp, Valfaran kissed the golden pommel of her short sword, wiping it clean on a corner of her tattered shirt. Sheathing her blade at her right paw, the Enkidukai heaved a shuddering sigh of exhaustion at these seemingly vital actions, then collapsed backwards once again.

It was at this time she finally found herself able to speak, and her words were blunt. \"How long?\"

[Rakeleer]

After some quick mental arithmetic, \"perhaps 5 hours\" Rakeleer said.

\"Would have been less, but your sword was cleverly disguised as part of your shoulder.\"

Rakeleer opened his other eye.

\"And I needed my beauty sleep.\"

He stopped smirking long enough to look concerned.

\"I wasn\'t sure...  How bad is it?\"

[Valfaran]

Valfaran mustered her strength and sat up once again, smiling an odd smile, as if the expression were unfamiliar to her. \"I see. Disguised, eh? Must\'ve been the charm that was put on it. Didn\'t think it would still work. I suppose you didn\'t see it right off?\"

Rolling her shoulders a bit, the Enkidukai tested her strength. \"I should be all right,\" she murmured, standing up, \"and you needn\'t carry me in this thing anymore.\" With a chuckle, she motioned to the crude but cleverly built gurney. \"My legs are a bit stiff, but I think I can walk it off.\"

Crouching down slowly, Valfaran touched one of the creature\'s legs that part of the craft had been built from. \"This stuff is quite useful, usually. The chitin, I mean. It has medicinal value, though I don\'t believe I\'ve seen one of those types of critters in a long while. Could\'ve sworn they were driven out of the near passages years ago.\"

Taking a length of te spider\'s web, she wrapped a leg tightly, covering the more spiney portions of it and then leaving a loop of the crude rope to sling over her shoulder.

\"If you\'re quite rested, we should get a-moving by now. Believe me, we haven\'t seen the worst of the creatures here. They only come out during certain times.\" As steadily as she could manage, Valfaran began to hobble down the passage.

[Rakeleer]

Rakeleer sighed in relief.  The Enkidukai seemed to be doing well enough.

\"We should find someone that can do a better job of patching you up.\"

Despite the cat\'s wounds, Rakeleer was pressed to keep up with her.

Oh sure, he thought, she\'s had a nice lie-down.

\"And I\'m somewhere to rest.\"

\"How do you tell time down here, anyway?  I\'ve been trying to gauge by the blue light, but it\'s patterns are recognizable to me.\"

Rakeleer felt, for the first time since leaving his adopted homeland, like he was in a truly alien place.

He had visited the homeworlds of gods, and not felt the same sense of.... otherness that this place brought him.

Maybe it would grow on him.

His grin reappeared, and his pace picked up.

[Valfaran]

As she walked, Valfaran seemed to debate mentally on where they should be headed. A familiar azure glow began to grow up ahead, and faint noises bounced gently down the stone corridor to reach their ears.

\"Usually time is told by the changes in the Azure Sun\'s brightness, as it can still be seen in the more shallow reigons of the Stone Labyrinth. When you get deeper,\" she grinned, \"I suppose the best way to tell is by your stomach.\"

The Enkidukai\'s grin turned to something more of a wry smile. \"Though it\'s not as if my meals are at any specific time of day anymore.\"

Valfaran continued on in silence as they approached the Bronze Gate, blinking as the light grew ever stronger.

[Sharaz]

Resting in the shadows beside the Bronze Gate, Sharaz was seriously considering his options. Though it seemed like a good idea at the time, facing the unknown dangers of the Stone Labyrinth all by himself to prove his bravery, seemed more like the dumbest thing he\'d ever thought of.....

It wasn\'t as if he hadn\'t faced the dangers of the labyrinth before, and with success! He\'d always been a welcome edition to any questing party, because of his skill in the martial arts and his slowly growing knowledge of shaman medicine and magic. But today he got the distinct feeling that all this had gone to his head. Better to go back and forget this foolish idea, instead of being gloriously killed by one of the many monsters in the labyrinth.

Just as he\'d decided to return home, he heard two beings approach. One was clearly a fellow Enkidukai, the gracefull movements left no chance for mistake, but the other being was wholly unknown to him. Should he approach them or keep hidden?

Remaining in the shadows, Sharaz decided to leave the decision to the two strangers. The Enkidukai would surely notice his presence, so it would be up to her to decide wether to approach him or simply ignore him and let him go home by himself.

[Runesoul]

\"30...40...50 Tria!,\" thought Runesoul the Master Magician as he counted yesterdays profit inside of the Stone Labyrinth.  He made a living by preying of off the warriors and adventurers that attempted to explore the Labyrinth and find the supposed path to the Surface.  Some might call him a thief, but he prefered to think of himself as redistrubting the resources to more worthy pursuits.  These bumbling fools that entered the Labyrinth only to be overwhelmed by monsters that they can not even begin to match up to dont deserve to have money.  Runesoul knew every nook and cranny of the Labyrinth up to the Golden Door.  He supposed this door led to the Surface, but he was never bothered by these things.  Runesoul was a business man, out for money and money alone.  He waited, hidden in the shadows for an unsuspecting party or adventurer to emerge into the Stone Labyrinth

[Valfaran]

Valfaran\'s pointed ears twitched as she sensed the presence of others close by in the tunnel. Although the Labyrinth was like a second home to her, she longed to return to her village once more, despite what foul memories were held there.

Besides, the Enkidukai thought as she hobbled along painfully, there are healers there who could do better for my wounds than I ever could. As she drew nearer to the other creatures hidden then in shadow, Valfaran paused to draw her one blade from its sheath at her boot.

A feeling of sickliness, one that could not be cured by a healer, crep into her stomach. She was obligated to return and retrieve her other blade, the sooner, the better.