Wrack and Ruin Read online

  Nessa lowered her gaze in shame. “Yes. I failed to detect the floor triggers. My master would be greatly disappointed in me.”

  “Your master?” Max asked.

  “I am a novice… liberator.” She paused slightly before the last word.

  “Ha! Liberator. I like that! She’s a thief.” Smitty grinned at her. “As if the gear didn’t give you away. In that outfit you had to be a thief, or a stabby stabby assassin, or both. Can you disarm traps? Cuz I’m a little tired of this place trying to kill us.”

  Nessa glared at him for a moment, offended by his blunt words. Dylan stepped in to help. “He wasn’t making an accusation. Thief is a perfectly acceptable class where we come from. We’ve got no problem with that. You know, as long as you don’t try to steal from us.”

  Dalia disagreed, her dwarven honor did not allow for stealing. But she held her tongue.

  “To answer your rather rude question, yes. I can disarm traps, up to a certain level of complexity. I missed the traps in that earlier room because my perceptions are… different in my full feline form. I depend more on scent and sound in that form, and my thought processes are more feral. I had not suspected that any traps would still be in working order after so many years.”

  Max looked up at the open ceiling. “We have concluded that someone has made use of this place more recently. You see that the roof is gone, yet there is no debris on the floors?”

  Nessa looked up, her eyes wide and mouth open in astonished realization. A second later she looked at her feet again, shaking her head. “Truly, my master would disown me, were she here to witness this. How did I not notice such an obvious incongruity?”

  “Don’t feel bad.” Smitty offered. “Max here used to work counterintel… uhhh… he got paid to notice stuff. In a past life.”

  “It be commonly known that treasure fever causes even experienced explorers to forget themselves on occasion.” Dalia smiled at the beastkin woman.

  “Tell us about this treasure.” Max said. “And what do you know about these ruins?”

  Chapter 4

  “This place was originally built by a tribe of half-ogres who’d been banished from the ogre lands in the mountain. So long ago that I was not able to find any records of its original construction. It was said that they abandoned it when their chief married an ogre chieftain’s daughter and returned his entire tribe to the mountains.” She paused to point toward the walls. “They were talented stonemasons, and chose this location because they found the sparkly stone nearby.” She looked at Dylan and shrugged. “As good a reason as any, I suppose. Pretty, shiny stone.” Dylan just chuckled at her opinion of ogre intelligence.

  “In any event, after it had been abandoned, the gnomes eventually moved in. They were led by a gnomish mechamage, who sought a secluded place to research new inventions. He brought his entire clan with him, and they turned this place into a temple dedicated to one of their gnome gods. The clan remained here for centuries, reportedly long past the mechamage’s death, until the orcs invaded and massacred the gnomes.”

  “Orcs, man… what are ya gonna do?” Smitty shook his head in mock sadness.

  Nessa looked confused by the comment from the orc for a moment, but continued. “It is rumored that selling their inventions generated mountains of wealth, and that it was hidden here below their temple.”

  “And you don’t think anyone has come and looted this place before you?” Dylan asked.

  “The place was not well known, even before the gnomes perished. And no offense to you, sir orc, but the orcs aren’t the best at finding hidden doors or rooms when they sack a town, or in this case a temple. They pretty much charge in, kill everything, take whatever isn’t nailed down, and move on.”

  “So how did you find this place?” Dylan pressed. He was thinking this was exactly the kind of situation where talking to an NPC in a game would lead to an epic quest or first-kill dungeon. Smitty caught on, and nodded with approval. He even crossed his fingers behind his back.

  Nessa gave him a wary look, then sighed. “I suppose it doesn’t matter, as you’re already here. I was given a novice quest by my master. I cannot achieve the rank of apprentice until I complete this quest, which was to locate an obscure ruin, defeat any obstacles it presents, and return with its most precious artifacts. It took me six months, and several failed expeditions to already-plundered sites, before I found this place. I only discovered its existence by accident, finding an old bill of sale for a portal pedestal that mentioned delivery from this temple.”

  “So the gnomes built portals?” Max was now very interested in whatever treasure might be found in this ruined temple.

  “Built them, repaired them, improved them, I’m really not sure. As I said, there was almost no information on this place. The delivery receipt showed that it would be delivered to the human city to the south, the one now occupied by the orc clans. It mentioned six days’ provisions charged to the client, which I took to mean that the delivery would take three days by wagon, each way. So I estimated what that distance might be, and have been exploring a wide circle approximately three days’ travel around that city. This morning, I found this place. I don’t know for sure that this is the gnome’s temple, but based on the traps I encountered, my confidence is high.”

  Dalia nodded. “Gnomes do like their traps and gadgets. Even more than dwarves.”

  Smitty shook his head. “I see a problem with your reasoning, dudette.” When she raised an eyebrow at him, he shrugged. “If I were a gnome who could build portals, and I was delivering a portal to a city, and probably installing it… why would I take the long way home? Why not just take the new portal home?”

  Nessa’s ears went flat and she growled slightly as she answered. “I considered that, orc. Once I knew the temple existed, I spent a month researching the gnomes and any references to this place I could find. As I said, the gnomes were reclusive. I gambled that they would not wish to connect their home portal with every other portal they delivered. Hence the need to travel home the long way.”

  Smitty nodded. “Okay, I see where you’re going with that. Good thinking!” He grinned at the beastkin, taking no offense at her tone.

  “I’m so glad you approve.” She looked from Smitty to Max. “Now that we’ve covered all of this, shall we proceed to finish exploring this place?” She motioned to the pyramid they were all standing upon. “This structure has short steps, easily managed by our druid here… I’m sorry, I did not ask your name?”

  “I be Dalia, and this is Max, as ye heard. The ogre is Dylan, and that’s Smitty.” She introduced everyone.

  “My pleasure, Dalia. And thank you again for the healing.” She bowed her head slightly. “As I was saying, these steps were built to gnomish dimensions, not ogre. Which leads me to believe this was an addition built by the gnomes. I suggest we begin searching here. Look for levers, hidden doors, discolored stones, that sort of thing.”

  The group split up, spreading out around the base of the pyramid, with Nessa beginning her search at the top. They peered closely at the stone, looking for signs of secret levers, trigger panels to push, or any other oddities that might indicate a hidden opening. After an hour, none of them had discovered anything promising. Finally, Max shook his head and shrugged.

  “Maybe it was just a way for their leader to elevate himself above the others.”

  “That may be, though it seems unlikely.” Nessa answered. “From what I know of gnomes, no way would they be able to resist putting a gadget or secret compartment into a structure of this size.” She looked toward the door at the rear of the room. “However, I suggest we continue to explore the rest of this building, then move on to the two smaller buildings out front. Since I have you with me to help fend off any monsters that may arise, I shall remain in this form. I’m much more capable of detecting and disarming traps this way.”

  “Sounds like a plan.” Max agreed, the others nodding their heads as well. They gathered at the rear door, and this tim
e Nessa took the lead. She spent a moment examining the door frame and the stone floor just in front of it, making sure there were no traps or trip wires before stepping through.

  The door led down another short corridor, in which Nessa identified two different flagstones on the floor that were trap triggers. Marking each with a few drops of water dyed bright red that stood out on the dusty floor, they avoided the traps and moved on.

  The next room, the last in the building, Max guessed, was even larger than the previous. All around its outer edge were a series of stalls separated by short three-foot high walls, each facing toward the center of the room. In that center was a decorative fountain that featured a ten foot tall toga-clad ogre female holding a large pitcher in both hands. The pitcher was tilted forward so that water could pour out into the basin below. Just a trickle of water ran out to splash into maybe an inch-deep pool in the basin.

  “She’s a hottie!” Dylan admired the ogress for a moment, then looked around the open space. “Some kind of market, maybe?” Dylan ventured, looking at the scores of stalls around the room.

  “Aye, or a place fer crafting.” Dalia added. “Like the apprentice area ye worked in yerself, Max.”

  Nessa agreed. “I think crafting the more likely option. The gnomes were introverts, recluses. While I’m sure there was some trade and barter between the few residents here, I doubt there was need for a marketplace so large. And the short walls must have been built by the gnomes. They’d only be knee-high for ogres, and would serve no purpose to them. Crafting stations makes more sense.”

  “Well, there’s nothing left here now.” Smitty observed. “No craft items, tools, furniture, trash, nothing. Either it all rotted away, or this place has been cleaned by someone since the gnomes were killed off, just like the rest of the building so far.”

  After a short time spent searching the room, the group agreed to return to the front temple entry and check the two smaller structures. Nessa led the way, carefully checking for undiscovered traps as they moved. When they reached the areas of known traps, she confirmed that the ones they had triggered had not reset. Max waited until they’d passed through the final door and out onto the wide stone area where they’d began before asking the question that had been nagging at him.

  “Nessa, if the traps didn’t reset after we triggered them, how old does that make them?” He paused to organize his thoughts. “I mean, if the gnomes had built those traps, you would think that random wildlife wandering into the building would have set them off centuries ago. Meaning there wouldn’t have been any live traps for us to trigger, right?”

  “I agree.” Nessa nodded. “These were likely set by whomever has occupied this place more recently.” She looked at Dalia, who just shrugged. Dwarves were nearly as good at traps as gnomes were, but they weren’t Dalia’s specialty.

  “The form and construction of these traps would suggest they spent a good deal of time here. I mean, they’d have to have redone the floors to place the triggers, opened up walls to install the mechanisms and bolts, then resealed them…” Dylan rubbed his chin as he spoke. “Even just cleaning up all the debris from the fallen roof sections would have taken a good bit of time and effort, and where did they put it all?”

  “All good points.” Max motioned toward the smaller structure on the left side. “Maybe some of the answers are in there.”

  Once again Nessa led the way, carefully examining the floor and walls as they entered and began to descend. She tested each of the stone steps, prodded gently at nicks and cracks in the walls, making their progress very slow. Max and the others didn’t complain, happy to trade the delay for the opportunity to not be skewered or blasted by traps.

  When they were maybe twenty feet below the surface, there was a groaning, grinding sound in the stone, followed by a loud crack. A second later, an entire section of the stair fell away at their feet, dropping the group into the darkness below. Max was just able to turn himself to see the ground below when he hit hard, his shoulder and hip absorbing most of the impact. He felt a couple of ribs break, and he thought his shoulder had probably dislocated.

  The sounds of cracking bones and gasps of pain around him told him that others had landed badly too. Dalia cursed quietly but impressively somewhere off to his right. Max was relieved that she had survived the fall. Instinctively looking upward, his darkvision showed him the jagged opening in the stairs maybe forty feet above them.

  Max cast a heal on himself, then turned to do the same for the others. The worst off seemed to be Dylan, who was laying on his belly, his head in a pool of blood, one arm obviously broken and trapped beneath his bulk, and jagged breaks in both shin bones protruding from his skin. It looked as if the ogre had landed atop a large chunk of the stone stairway that had fallen with them.

  After allowing his healing magic and troll regeneration to repair him for a moment, Max pushed through the pain and got to his feet. He moved to Dylan, rolling him over as gently as possible. The ogre’s forehead was dented in on one side, the wound bleeding profusely. Max cast a heal on his friend, trying to stem the bleeding, then moved to his badly broken legs.

  “This is gonna hurt, buddy.” He warned, taking hold of Dylan’s left leg at the ankle and knee. With a grunt of effort and pain from his still sore ribs, he yanked his hands apart, pulling the broken ends of the leg bones apart, then relaxed and let the leg muscles pull them back together in roughly the appropriate alignment. He quickly did the same for the other leg, worried that Dylan didn’t wake up screaming. His head injury could be more severe than Max had hoped.

  He took a moment to reset the broken arm as well, then cast another heal on Dylan. By this time, Dalia was on her feet and had already cast heals on Nessa and Smitty, neither of whom were as severely injured as Dylan. She knelt near the ogre’s head, taking it into her lap as she cast a spell that glowed a deep green as it seeped into his head.

  “His skull be broken, bits puttin’ pressure on his brain.” She bit her lip, looking up at Max. “I see’d worse, on warriors takin’ hammer hits to the noggin. I can heal it, but there be no way o’ knowin’ if he’ll be himself when he wakes.”

  “Please, do what you can.” Max asked quietly. Smitty moved up behind her to peer over her shoulder.

  Dalia placed both hands over the crushed area of the ogre’s skull, closing her eyes and pressing her lips together as her hands began to glow with a warm green light. After half a minute, the glow faded, and she gasped for breath. Leaning back against Smitty’s leg, she looked up at Max. “Best I could do. I think he’ll be alright. He’ll need to sleep for a bit.”

  With her hands removed, Max could see that Dylan’s skull appeared to have returned to its normal shape. The skin was healed, though there was some obvious bruising. They all relaxed a bit when the ogre began to snore loudly. Dalia produced a blanket from her inventory, folded it over several times, and placed it under his head as she got to her feet. She quickly checked over the others, finding no one else in need of additional heals. Moving to the nearest wall, she took a seat on the floor and leaned her back against the wall. “I could use a lil rest meself.”

  “Right. Thank you, Dalia. Everybody else, check this room, make sure it’s clear. Then we’ll all rest and eat.” It was obvious from the faint light streaming in through the gap above that it was still daylight outside. But it wouldn’t hurt for everyone to rest and replenish themselves while they waited for Dylan to wake up.

  Max took in the area around them. They’d fallen through a hole in the ceiling of a natural underground chamber. Water dripped from the edges of the hole above their heads, the drops impacting the stone floor making the only sound other than their own breathing and footsteps. The cavern was roughly round in shape, their landing zone being near one edge. The floor spread out for a hundred feet directly across, the opposite wall curving up to the twenty foot high domed ceiling.

  He spotted Smitty standing very still, his hands held out in front of him as he took tentative steps.
Once he’d left the faint circle of light from the opening above, the orc had no way to see through the deep darkness. “Hold still Smitty. Can’t have you stumbling around blind.” Max bent and picked up a handful of loose pebbles. Biting his lower lip hard enough to make it bleed, he sucked on it till he had a good mouthful of blood, which he then spat into his hand. He used his other hand to rub the rocks and sand around, covering them in blood.

  Setting the stones in a small pile on the ground, he stepped back and cast Spark. The stones flared to life, his blood burning brightly.

  Skill Level Up! Your Alchemy skill has increased by +1!

  Realizing that the flame wouldn’t last long before the blood burned away, Max asked, “Anybody got any firewood?”

  Smitty obliged, the scout having wisely been keeping a small supply in his inventory. In less then a minute they had a cheery campfire burning brightly enough to illuminate a large portion of the cavern. The still sleeping ogre grunted once upon feeling the heat from the fire, unconsciously rolling closer to the flame and curling into a fetal position.

  “If he wasn’t so big n ugly, he’d be cute.” Smitty grinned at Max. “Don’t tell him I said that.” Max mimed a zipping and locking motion in front of his lips.

  Nessa appeared from behind the orc, making him jump in surprise. “Shit! Don’t sneak up on me like that.”

  “I was not sneaking, orc.” She glared at him. “You were simply speaking too loud to hear me approach.” She motioned over her shoulder toward the darkest part of the cavern’s opposite wall. “There is a rough opening that way. It leads to a short tunnel and another chamber. Not a natural one, like this.”

  Max turned in the indicated direction, making out a deeper darkness that was the opening. A quick scan of the rest of the walls showed no others.

  Smitty, still annoyed, griped at the beastkin. “I thought you were supposed to be able to detect the traps.” He pointed upward. “Seems like you missed a pretty big one.”