Session 31

We continue our exploration and come to a larger chamber containing another blood lake. In the middle of it grows a tumorous, intestine-colored tree with fleshy tendrils spreading up into the stone and across the ceiling. To the west we can see worked stone and torchlight. There is movement in the lake, and after some discussion about how dangerous the paralysis from these creatures could be, we decide to lure them out rather than go into the water after them.

Titania and Alphesus hold the front while the rest of us hang back. The first abomination surges from the blood and is cut down quickly. The second comes out just after and lands a freakishly effective flurry of blows on Titania, badly wounding and paralyzing her. Mim cures the paralysis before she can be dragged down, and Valorian heals some of the damage. We kill the second creature and take a moment to recover.

As we regroup, two armored men bearing the symbol of Saqqara approach down the worked stone corridor. They are carrying maces, plate, shields, and holy symbols. We rush them before they can do much of anything. After a short fight they are both dead.

284 XP for the 2 abominations and the 2 armored men.

We search the bodies and press on into the torchlit room ahead. It is a shrine or fane with a red-striped marble altar in the center and black marble statues of dragon-winged women with swollen bellies in the north and south apses. More armored cultists are waiting inside. Aurelia gets behind one of them and drives a blade into him before he can finish casting a spell, ruining it. The rest of us finish the pair off before they can turn the fight.

On the bodies and in the room we find

• Mace of Zaharan make with a bronze flanged head and double-serpent pommel
• 35PP
• 50GP
• Plate armor, shields, maces, and holy symbols of Saqqara

We debate smashing the altar, but before we can do that we hear movement behind us. Out of the passage come six zombies, another armored priest, and behind them a woman of exceptional beauty in black lacquered plate carrying a strange great axe of dark ancient metal. This is clearly the Lady Below.

Titania drinks the potion of speed and moves up to hold the line. Valorian blesses the front rank. Mim rebukes the undead and sends most of the zombies fleeing or cowering, which saves us from being overwhelmed. Uthman then tears through the remaining zombies with a series of brutal cleaving strikes, and for a moment it looks like we may still take the room.

Then everything collapses. The Lady Below lands a devastating blow on Titania and drops her outright. In the chaos Uthman reveals himself, hails Saqqara in Ancient Zaharan, and turns on the party. He cuts down Valorian, then fights beside the cult of Zahar instead of beside us. Aurelia hesitates and backs away, trying to judge who is actually going to survive. Alphesus stands his ground, kills the enemy priest, and even discovers that Death Drinker can heal him when it strikes, but the Lady Below cuts him down as well. Mim attacks Uthman for the betrayal, but Uthman kills him too.

With Titania, Valorian, Alphesus, and Mim all fallen, Aurelia chooses survival over loyalty. She lowers her blade rather than die with the others. Uthman speaks for her and the Lady Below spares her on the condition that she swear herself to the chthonic gods and watch the sacrifice of her companions.

Uthman and Aurelia are taken to the heart of the temple: a bone altar grown through with veins and fleshy roots, set beneath a blood-red stone slightly larger than a man's heart and carved through with strange runes. There the fallen are sacrificed. The Lady Below gives her name as Zakiti. She recognizes Uthman as a pure-blooded Zaharan and a Ruin Guard, and reveals her ambition to rebuild the empire of Zahar, take revenge on Aura, and topple the Gorn Empire.