For years, people had been asked why old Matopher wasn’t dead yet. His diet consisted mainly of hard cider. He’d lost most of his teeth and his body had been wasting away. One night when it looked like his time had finally come, he gathered his brood and told them a story about the standing stones on the plain south of the trading post.
No, this had nothing to do with the White Queen. This was before he found out anything about the White Queen. This was about the night a doorway appeared beneath the central standing stone. He stared at the door for hours and then opened it into what appeared to be a treasure vault. In the dim light of his torch, everything sparkled and shone—including the spears that were hurled at him from out of the darkness. He’d often wondered, what if he had been braver, what if he had been stronger, what if he had been better armed. . .
Most of his children shook their heads and told grandpa to calm down. But Vlad and Mihir listened, especially when Matopher told them he’d been watching the stars, and they were edging closer to the same configuration that night in the spring of his youth . . .
Vlad and Mihir listened to their dying grandfather’s story and decided to seek out the adventure he described. They camped out by the standing stones for a couple nights, waiting impatiently for the proper alignment of the stars. When the portal appeared, they entered what seemed to be a tomb, rife with magical traps to ward off grave-robbers. After taking a few knocks and jabs, the cousins stopped to collect a suit of the fine, black-lacquered scale mail that Matopher had spoken of. Vlad judged it to be functionally inferior to his own plate mail, but he assisted Mihir in putting it on. Passing from chamber to another, they encountered a giant, horned snake, which first spoke to them before attacking. They fought back, but were confounded by the serpent’s tough scales, barely wounding the monsters while they were jabbed again and again by quick jabs of its long fangs. Mihir battered it with the magic staff he’d taken from Lareth. The staff shattered with an explosion, throwing the snake against the opposite wall. Though battered and stunned, when it coiled up to resume its attack, the two cousins fled for their lives. They led the snake in a chase through the tomb, and into a two-story hall dominated by a fire-shooting statue. Dollops of flaming oil slipped off Mihir’s new armor and onto the stone floor, arresting the snake. A second burst of oil hit the snake and it was consumed by the fire. After a rest, Vlad and Mihir decided that they would continue to explore the tomb.
In another, dimly glowing chamber, they encountered a half-dozen living statue, fashioned of transparent crystal. They gathered around Mihir, seemingly fascinated by the torch he was carrying. Holding the torch out from his body, Mihir led the crystal people out of the chamber, with Vlad following behind. They descended into the lower level of the tomb, and here discovered a much larger group of living statues, these made of clay, and much more martial in temperament. Their leader stood up from his throne and seemed to order an attack—the statues raised their spears and marched toward the intruders. Mihir tossed his torch toward the clay soldiers. The crystal people, chasing the light, met the brunt of the clay soldiers attack. Vlad raised his crossbow and shot a crossbow bolt at the clay king. His second shot misfired. Mihir recommended retreated. Although the crystal people’s powerful fists were capable of shattering a clay soldier with a single blow, they were being overwhelmed by numbers. Also, there was the issue of light . . .
Vlad and Mihir fumbled their way through the long passage to the stairs. As they climbed the stairs, they heard the clay soldiers marching behind them. At the top of the stairs, Vlad and Mihir paused in the dimly-glowing room where they’d met the crystal people and lit another torch. As the clay soldiers people reached the stop of the stairs, Vlad and Mihir once again took to flight, this time heading for exit from the tomb. They didn’t look back until they were once again outside, their lungs stinging with the chilly night air. The stars had changed and the portal was gone-- once again the standing stones framed only the Alyan night sky. They had recovered little treasure, only the strange suit of black armor that proved to their grandfather he hadn’t been dreaming when he first saw it fifty years before.
(Grandpa Matopher, by the way, was out of bed, and getting around as healthy as an old drunk could be.)
Tuesday, May 26, 2015
Friday, May 22, 2015
The Emperor's Atpyical Request
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That night, as usual, the Emperor entertained a party of concubines. Considering the afternoon's events and her pact with the Emperor, Beatriss watched himnot like a bashful coquette, but like a tactician. What caught her attention even more than his appetites was the uncanny intuition of one concubine: a poised, commanding woman named Biyu. She seemed to know exactly when each woman should sing, when they should dance, when to bare themselves—and when one alone should yield to the Emperor while the others withdrew.
When Biyu half-mockingly invited Beatriss to share the feast, she addressed her by name, mispronouncing it in exactly the same way Jiaohu had done that morning.
After the Emperor succumbed to sleep, one woman remained beside him while the rest arranged cushions on the floor. Beatriss did not sleep. An hour passed. Then she saw Biyu quietly rise and slip from the chamber.
Beatriss's gaze shifted to the Emperor, ears straining to read the cadence of his breath, to judge how deeply he slept.
She had little time. Moments later, another woman entered the room. She looked like Bayan—but her movements were wrong. Too smooth. Too serpentine. She moved with an unnatural grace that was almost grotesque. And in her hand was a knife. Her eyes were fixed on the Emperor.
But she paused. She had seen Beatriss.
Their eyes locked.
Beatriss did not scream. She opened her mouth and loosed a battle cry that split the silence like a spear through silk. It was the sound she would make before striking a man dead.
The assassin charged—not at the Emperor, but at Beatriss—panicking, lashing out. Beatriss never flinched. Only at the last instant did she turn her head, and the blade meant for her face sliced across her temple instead.
The guards burst in just as the Emperor, already rising, lunged from the bed, reaching for "Bayan" as she vaulted out the window. Chaos erupted. Some guards surrounded the Emperor, others issued sharp commands to lock down the palace and apprehend Bayan. Beatriss, bleeding, sat upright. The Emperor tended to her wound himself. The rest of the women were gathered and questioned. The gardens were found empty. Biyu had vanished.
Bayan, however, was discovered fast asleep in her bed.
The Emperor’s advisors urged caution. But he relented. As Beatriss pointed out, if Bayan had crept into the Emperor's bedchamber, she wouldn't be carrying a knife. Bayan was given a chance to prove her innocence—by finding the true assassin. Especially if it was Biyu, who might be hiding in the Women’s Palace—a place the Emperor’s guards could not normally enter.
Within the harem, Biyu was known as quiet and discreet. No one seemed to know which room she used. After much coaxing, an elderly lady-in-waiting led Bayan through moonlit gardens, steamy bathing halls, and shadowed corridors to a small chamber. Bayan dismissed her and stepped inside alone.
There was a figure in the bed—a girl. A young woman. She had been strangled.
Bayan knocked on the neighboring door and roused a drowsy concubine to confirm the body was Biyu. She nodded, horrified. Bayan hushed her, thanked her, and sent her back to bed.
Then she waited.
After some time, another figure entered the room. Bayan’s own face. Her own body. Her own knife.
Bayan didn’t speak. She attacked with a silent kick to the spine, followed by a flurry of blows. The false Bayan shrieked and bolted, her features warping, collapsing into the shape of a young woman. As cries echoed through the hall, Bayan warned the residents: "Stay inside. Anyone in the corridor risks death."
Locks clicked. Lights vanished.
The creature tried to strangle her. Its slender hands warped into barbed claws. Bayan drew her dagger and plunged it into the fiend’s side. It screamed, bled, and—cornered—begged for its life. It promised to surrender. To speak to the Emperor.
Bayan agreed.
The promise was false.
In the final struggle, Bayan slew the thing. It slumped, pale and grotesque—its body gray and formless, face collapsing like wet clay. She dragged it from the Women’s Palace. Guards helped carry it to the Imperial chambers, where the Emperor beheld it with his own eyes.
For the rest of the night, the Emperor slept alone.
Tuesday, May 19, 2015
The Emperor's Third Peculiar Request
Someone rubbing her face, first her cheeks and nose. And then her mouth. And then her eyes—
Beatriss blinked. Her head moved. The rest of her did not.
With sight returned the memory, the cold, bottomless gaze of basilisk.
Now, she was looking at a man kneeling over her: Cair, the wizard, his fingers smearing ointment all over her face, bringing it back to flesh
His hands moved to her chin, down over her neck, her shoulders . . .
“Stop!”
He dropped his hand. “If you say so.”
She looked down at herself. Her body ended in granite at the collarbones.
Around her was silk and light and laughter. A lavish room—pillows piled in corners, carved screens glowing with the warmth of morning sunlight. This had to be the Emperor’s palace. There, across the room, he lounged on a wide bed amid half-dressed concubines. Jiaohu sat beside him like a cat, sipping wine and watching everything.
Beatriss addressed the group. “Someone tell me what is going on?”
Jiaohu answered first, “It's too early for this! Why did you have to start with her mouth?”
The Emperor, half-laughed, but his happy surprise was obvious—he tossed aside his plate and rose from the bed. “It’s working! You must continue!”
Cair bowed. “Yes, it’s working.” He pointed to a chalk circle on the floor, “But if it pleases your imperial majesty . . .”
The Emperor frowned, but resumed his repose on the bed.
Cair spoke to Beatriss in a low whisper, warning her that once Cair's magic had taken its full effect, and Beatriss's natural flesh was restored, the Emperor intended to add her to his harem. Cair had another idea-- the same one he had proposed to Bayan-- that they should join together in escaping Khanbaliq and Zhau-Dang altogether.
"Bay-trees?" It was Jiaohu, calling from the bed. "Bay-trees, don't you want to be my sister?"
Cair stared at Beatriss. "See? We have to act quickly."
The Emperor, growing impatient, intruded on their hushed
exchange. Cair quickly straightened and held up the now-empty jar.
"Come here, wūshī."
"Yes, your Majesty." Cair approached the bed cautiously, his eyes darting for a safe place to land, without finding one. Next followed a whispered argument between Cair and the
Emperor—tense, clipped, and full of scraping bows.
“More can be made. Yes, of course, more can be made—just two days. Two days
and I will have it ready.”
The Emperor relented, and shooed Cair out of the chamber.
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Beatriss did not follow everything he said, but she did understand that the Emperor would consult his astrologers on the best time for her to conceive a son. If she cooperated, she could, after a year or so, leave Khanbaliq with the Emperor's blessings, and with his assistance in constructing her own small rural fortress. The boy would stay in Khanbaliq and be taught to be a great general. The more immediate boon, of having her body fully restored to flesh and blood, was left unsaid.
Beatriss, comparing this bargain to the never-forgotten rites of Madarua, agreed.
"Excellent!" The Emperor stood. "How shall we celebrate?"
Wednesday, May 6, 2015
The Emperor's Second Peculiar Request
Later that week, Beatriss and her companions returned
to the Monastery of the Two-Fold Path, choosing a different route of
entry. The air was thick with decay, and heavy rains had transformed
parts of the ruined compound into swampy, unstable mire. In one
collapsed chamber, half-filled with water and debris, they found deep clawed
footprints—large, reptilian, and trailing up the crumbled wall. The message
was clear: something ancient and monstrous had made this place its den.
They were not surprised to meet a dragon-like beast. They were surprised at the way it made their blood to look into its stony, languid eyes.
The creature moved slowly, almost lazily—its lizard-like
body armored in thick, stone-colored scales—but its eyes gleamed with alien
stillness, dragging dread into the hearts of the living. The party tried to
fight without looking directly at it, using peripheral glances and blind
strikes.
On the broken stone steps, Beatriss slipped. For just
a moment, her eyes met the creature’s.
She froze—a perfect statue, blade in hand, breath suspended forever.
The others fought on. Naron slashed at the beast’s
flanks while Bayan darted in and out of reach, her strikes quick and
desperate. Feng Feng, ever fearless, charged up the steps. But in the
final moments, the dying basilisk thrashed violently, its claws latching onto
Feng Feng’s robe and dragging him forward—face to face. He, too, turned
to stone.
Jumay knelt beside Beatriss’s statue, lips moving in
prayer, while Bayan stood trembling, trying to speak through clenched
teeth.
“There’s another one,” Naron said, pointing down a
corridor.
It was true. Another basilisk lurked just beyond.
They fled.
Back in the Imperial City, they delivered their grim
news. The Emperor listened, thoughtful, and then gave a single command:
“Summon Cair.”
Cair, a foreign wizard long kept in “residence” at
the palace, arrived with his companion Myrrha, a pale-robed priestess.
The Emperor instructed them to assist in recovering and restoring the petrified
warriors.
Cair accepted the task, saying little but watching Bayan
closely.
Before they left, Bayan made a request: “We need
mirrors. Polished ones.”
“To fight a basilisk,” she explained, “you don’t need to see
it. It needs to see itself.”
The Second Basilisk
This time, their approach was surgical. The second basilisk
appeared, just as expected. In perfect coordination, the group raised their
mirrors—forcing the beast to meet its own reflection.
It solidified instantly. Stone stared back at them.
But when Cair attempted to restore Beatriss, his
magic failed.
“The conditions aren’t right,” he muttered. “I need
materials. I need coin. If we could just get them to the coast—my ship—”
“No,” Bayan interrupted, her voice steel. “You said you could do it. You
lied. You won’t get another chance.”
Cair bowed his head—then began to cast again.
This time, not at the statue—but at himself.
Carrying the Fallen
Cair transformed, growing into a towering figure,
muscles and robes swelling with arcane energy. He lifted Beatriss and Feng Feng
with care, one in each arm, and carried them from the ruins. He did the same
for the others, ferrying them out one by one.
When they reached the city, the guards refused to open
the gates to a giant, no matter whose name he carried. So the party spent
the night in a tavern outside the walls, Cair shrinking back to human
form. A cart was hired at dawn.
A Statue in the Inner Palace
The Emperor ordered Feng Feng’s statue placed
in a ceremonial courtyard, where scholars and officials could admire his
“eternal watchfulness.”
Beatriss, however, was taken into the Emperor’s
private quarters—a place where only the most trusted and powerful were
allowed. She was displayed not merely as a fallen hero, but as a figure of
fascination, mystery, and perhaps unspoken desire.
And at the base of the dais where she stood, sword still in
hand, a lone warrior kept silent vigil—Bayan, dressed in
red-accented armor, eyes never straying far from her mentor’s frozen face.
She said nothing.
But everyone knew she would be the first to act—if anyone dared touch the
statue without cause.
Saturday, May 2, 2015
The Emperor's First Peculiar Request
The Emperor of Khanbaliq had grown restless, obsessed with acquiring a concubine from the lost city of Cynadicea—someone like the elusive Beatriss, but younger, rarer. (And, more to the point, willing to yield to his advances!) His latest favorite, Jiaohu, recently purchased from the Monastery of the Two-Fold Path, knew how to keep his attention. One evening, lounging at his side, she spoke with idle malice:
“They had another pale one, you know. Younger than her.
Prettier, too. Strong thighs. But the monks are keeping her for someone...
important.”
The Emperor sent gold, and messengers. But the monks
only delivered girls of vague resemblance, none matching the description. It
was clear now: they were hiding her.
So the Emperor turned back to Beatriss.
“If you can bring me this girl,” he said, “I will let you
leave. You may build your castle in the south.”
Beatriss listened, suspicious, and said nothing until she
had the full account. Jiaohu elaborated—there was a prisoner named Xing
in the monastery’s lower cells, and Ciuciu was the name the other slaves
gave to the pale girl. Xing would help, if approached with the correct
password.
Beatriss gathered her team:
- Naron,
a swordmaster who had bled beside her before
- Jumay,
priest and spell-caster of quiet but deep power
- Feng
Feng, a magician of shifting loyalties and sardonic insight
- And
lastly, Bayan—once a servant, still barely more than an apprentice
fighter, and utterly unproven, but eager to escape the confines of the place
and test herself in a milleu where the criteria of success were more
clear.
Bayan said little as they set out. She’d requested to come.
Beatriss had allowed it. Now, on the eve of action, her breath was tight in her
throat.
They entered through a crumbling postern gate on the
ruined side of the monastery. Wind rustled through rotting beams. The floor
shifted under their steps. Bayan stepped carefully, watching how the others
moved. She kept her hand near her blade—just in case, though she wasn’t
sure what she’d do with it.
They descended into a half-collapsed corridor, and there,
amid the scent of fungus and decay, came their first danger: a bloated,
tentacled compost creature, reeking and heaving as it dragged itself from a
collapsed cistern.
Before Bayan could even breathe a warning, Beatriss
charged, cutting it with swift, slashing arcs. It thrashed and struck her
across the face with a heavy, adhesive tendril. Beatriss dropped, choking.
“Do something!” Jumay shouted.
Bayan froze—then remembered a flask tucked inside her sash. She fumbled it
open, poured the acidic tincture over Beatriss’s mouth and jaw, dissolving the
syrupy film. It worked.
Beatriss stood again, unsteady, and glanced at Bayan. No
praise—just a nod. But Bayan would remember that nod.
When the battle ended, a woman peeked from a loft,
covered in straw. She was thin, bruised, but alert.
“Are you friends of Jiaohu?” she asked.
Beatriss gave the password.
The woman was Xing, and she recognized Ciuciu’s name.
She offered two paths: one through an overgrown garden, likely overrun with
venomous vines; the other, deeper, through the lair of antmen. Beatriss
chose the latter.
“Are we sure we need to go this way?” Bayan whispered,
nervously eyeing the dark descent.
“No,” said Beatriss. “But I don’t want to die in a garden.”
The antmen tunnels were cramped and damp, carved from
soft clay and overgrown with mold. Bayan trailed near Jumay, whispering
questions.
“Do they see in the dark?”
“Yes.”
“Should we be whispering?”
“No.”
Suddenly, from the gloom ahead, three antmen emerged—eight-limbed,
armored, with two shields and two blades each. One cast a net
that caught Beatriss mid-sprint. She fell hard. The antmen surged forward.
Bayan’s first instinct was to run.
Instead, she crouched behind Jumay, clutching her sword. She
watched Naron stand in the passage like a gatepost, parrying blow after blow,
while Feng Feng blasted one creature with lightning. Beatriss cut
herself free, rose, and together with Naron, finished the remaining two, and they crawled through the twisting tunnels, without direction, noticing that Xing was gone.
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“Where’s Xing?” Bayan whispered.
No one answered. From behind them came a scream—and then a wet crunch.
“Was that—?”
“Yes,” Beatriss said flatly. “Keep moving.”They pressed onward through chambers of rot—half-organic,
half-dug. One room pulsed with a humid, sour warmth. A mud chamber, slick and
bubbling. Beatriss entered first and was immediately swarmed by massive
white larvae, as thick as a man’s leg.
She shouted for retreat, slashing them away.
Bayan helped drag her out.
Wounded and weary, the party began their return. In a final
subterranean chamber, they stumbled upon two crocodiles, locked in a
lazy scuffle over a limp human shape. The beasts turned toward
them—hungry for fresh prey. The party struck fast. Bayan, trembling, landed a
single blow. It did not kill—but it felt real.
Afterward, they approached the body. It was hairless,
featureless, nearly bloodless.
“Is that Xing?” Bayan asked.
“I don’t think anyone is,” Jumay replied.
They returned to Khanbaliq bruised and empty-handed. The Emperor
was not pleased—but Beatriss’s report was thorough. Her commitment to
return was clear.
And Bayan? She slept that night still wearing her sword
belt, dreaming of tunnels, of breath she didn’t know she’d been holding, and of
the quiet nod that said: You didn’t fail.
Friday, May 1, 2015
Wolfgang and the Rattling Bones
The sought and discovered the ruined building where'd they found the statue, and descended underground by way. The halls below were quiet and empty.
And then they opened the iron door upon the chamber where the bones sprang to life. Gerrilyn raised her holy symbol. The front rank of skeletons turned away, impeding the charge of the others. Vulpio slammed the door and Mardiuw hammered a series of spikes to hold it closed.
And then, while the bones clattered against the door, the group made a plan. They hammered more spikes into the floor, a little distance from the door-- so that when the first spikes were removed, the door could be allowed to open I\just enough\I to let one skeleton at a time squeeze through.
Vulpio volunteered to stand in the breach, with Wolfgang standing behind him to destroy any skeletons that managed to force their way through. Vulpio swung his sword like a whirlwind, and the shattered bones and splintered shields piled up under his feet. He tired, and was knocked to the floor. As more skeletons pushed through trampling Vulpio underfoot, Gerrilyn once more raised her holy symbol and by the power of Raud drove them away. Mardiuw pulled Vulpio to safety, Wolfgang moved into the front rank and Chickie stood behind him. The skeletons charged again-- they were pulverized by Wolfgang's staff and laid low by Chickie's club. The pile of bones was so great that the spikes were knocked free and the door sprang open. The remnant of skeletons poured out. The party overcame them all and it was quiet, but Chickie was grievously wounded and Wolfgang exhausted to the point of delirium.
The group climbed back up the ladder, and returned to their boat. Halfway back to shore, they heard the telltale buzzing of the maverick pixies. With his last ounce of strength, Wolfgang framed their forms in purple light. Gerrilyn transfixed the pixies with a holy rebuke. Vulpio and Mardiuw shot them with arrows. They captured three living pixies and chased away the others.
The elves were heartened by the party's success in capturing the pixies. And Aemornion, after hearing the tale of their battle against two score living skeletons, expressed his confidence that they would persistently return until they discovered the lost crown.
Brief addendum: Wolfgang and Gerrilynn returned to the dungeon on the Island of Lost Dreams. They fought and destroyed a pair of gargoyles. In the process they shattered a dark mirror obsidian, breaking the curse on the pixies and revealing the entrance to the Maze of Nuromen. They returned to the surface to be feted by the grateful pixies who were no longer corrupted by evil and hatred!
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