Fall of the North RPG

[Garen LiLorian]

She had only advanced a few steps down the tunnel before she felt Angóre's cold hand on her shoulder. She looked up at his disapproving face. "You may do as you wish, lady Erenor," he said quietly. "But as long as I remain your guard I would order you at least in this; let me go first! I will walk ahead some ways and remain alert for dangers. I'll wait for you at intersections."

He turned to the young man. "I am entrusting the safety of Lady Erenor to you, Faerim. See that no danger befalls her; her life is more important then mine. Or yours." Without waiting for a reply, he turned and vanished into the darkness of the tunnel."

[Nilpaurion Felagund]

Bethiril wanted to step back from the conversation. She knew little of caves, and less of exploring them. But she found no way of exiting gracefully, so she stood there awkwardly, like a peasant watching the discussion of nobles.

I’m sure nobility wouldn’t include allusions to children’s stories in their lofty discourses. She hoped no one would discover that she knew the tale. As unbelievable as it sounds, she had heard of it from an old man from Dor Lómin who somehow found his way to the mouths of Sirion. But Bethiril didn’t want her image . . . tainted.

Well, she thought, my acting was pretty good. She gazed at the stone roof above. And what will we find here? An edible cottage? She almost laughed, but then remembered, And what evil thing will we find residing in it?

[Lalwendë]

The air was acrid as though something had been burning, yet it was also chill and clear, and there was no sign of any recent fire. All was desolate, and there was no sign of life let alone the kind of life that might want the cheer of a fire. Renedwen was more unsettled than ever, even though she was not alone. Lissi at least came along with her, and though they did not talk together, her presence at least was a small comfort.

Renedwen was now troubled with her son. Since his birth he had been remarkably quiet, and this had been a blessing on this journey, but he had begun to grizzle when they left behind the daylight, and now they were deep underground, he had begun to cry. The noise echoed in the dark passageways and she saw how the others winced at the sound. If there was anything living down here, it would surely hear them now. Seeing the disquiet on the faces of her companions, she only felt worse. There was little she could do, as she dared not let go the hand of little Gilly, who now clung to her as though she were his own mother. If she did not have him to care for then she could attend to her son, comfort him, but now she had two to care for, two frightened boys.

Something in the cries of her son chilled her heart. It was more than cold or hunger, as she had made sure he was not suffering from either of those; it was terror. She knew that coming into this dark place, leaving behind the wide open skies, had awakened a dim memory of the terror that had assailed them back in the city. It was as though a curse had been placed upon them and the child was voicing what no adult dared to mention.

If she could but speak with someone, she might get some help, but she was frozen not just with foreboding but with fear of her companions. She knew she had been aloof and had made sure they could see she could cope; it was her way of withdrawing after her grief, and now that the silent tears had passed she did not know how to approach anybody. She looked at Lissi when she thought she would not be noticed doing so, wondering how to speak to this other woman who had been so helpful many weeks ago, but she could not find the words.

The company stopped in one of the passages and Renedwen, busy with the boys, walked on, not noticing that her companions had halted. Gilly tugged on her hand and eventually let go. Panicking, Renedwen spun about and looked for the boy, but stumbled backward. Her fall was halted by something soft, but instead of standing up again, she found she was unable to move, suspended with just her toes touching the ground. The more she tried to stand upright, the further she got from the floor, until she was hanging there, held by something sticky she could not see in the gloom.

Remembering a familiar childhood tale, a chill went right through her. She tried to scream for help but the words stuck in her throat. Like a nightmare she could not wake from. And then her cry for help suddenly echoed along the passageway, but the nightmare did not stop.

[Osse]

It had not been the skill of the Eldar that had led the Dunedain to the small storeroom; rather, it had been through a misunderstanding. The party had become stretched out, winding through the corridors of the city like some giant millipede, the head often having no knowledge of the whereabouts of the tail. Belegorn had delegated the organisation of the party into Carthor’s capable hands. Not wishing to rely solely on the Eldar’s prowess, Carthor organised, as suggested, the end-man to mark the route the group had taken with the chalk the Elves had found earlier. For this task Carthor had chosen a capable young man, Derigorm.

It was because of Derigorm that the party stumbled across the little room. Derigorm, white chalk in hand, had fallen back slightly, far enough behind to be unable to see the glow of his comrades’ torches in front of him, and as the group took a passage to the left, Derigorm turned into a smaller stone doorway to the right. The room on the right turned out to be a small square room, roughly hewn from the living rock, with shelves of softer, smooth stone placed along its walls. On every surface stood stone and clay jars, ranging from great round vessels to small intricately patterned pots.

Suddenly aware that Derigorm was no longer with them, Carthor, located near the rear of the column, had halted the group. Soon after, Derigorm’s husky voice came running through the corridor behind them. Now at the head of the group, Carthor strode towards the sound of the younger man’s voice, finding him standing torched raised at the entrance to the chamber.

“What is it?” Carthor’s question was short, Derigorm’s answer matched it.
“Have a look.”

Shards of pale grey stone crunched and crackled under the leather soles of Carthor’s boots, rudely disturbing the quiet of the small chamber. The torch held aloft over the man’s grey head cast long, flickering shadows around the room, glancing off the glossy stone surfaces like droplets of water.

Every vessel, every jar, was broken - as if in a fit of fury the room had tried to consume itself. There was no surface that was not covered in the crushed remains of the containers.
Evidence of their contents littered the floor; grains of barley and oats, as well as other grains indiscernible in the ruddy light, spilled around the broken pots like waves breaking on jagged shores. The smell of broken clay, stale air and slowly rotting grain wafted like plant tendrils through Carthor’s nostrils, its mustiness sitting like some great carrion-fowl at the back of his parched throat.

Carthor was aware of the fact that the remainder of the group was pressing him in from the corridor behind.


Stepping forward further into the chamber, Carthor raised his hand, signalling the rest of the group to follow him forward. In the far right corner of the square chamber, a great shelf had been up-ended, its contents falling in ruin upon the cold stone floor. On the wall where the shelf had been standing, was a small, square, cunningly crafted door. The shelf, in its original space, would have completely concealed it.
Indeed, the door was hard enough to see in the dim torchlight as it was. Were it not for the huge flakes of broken stone around its edges and rutted centre, the door would have been near-unidentifiable. Carthor had seen such marks before, as if great hands had beaten upon the rock in their fury, rock-like themselves. The marks sent a shivering quake down his crouched spine, which ran like an electric current, shimmering through his entire body. Putting the thought of those who had made such marks from his mind, Carthor beckoned to the men behind him to come closer, and using the tips of their swords attempt to pry the door open.

Carthor’s broadsword fell clattering and cold from his hand as a scream rang out through the corridors behind him, echoing and resonating like some contorted, twisted musical instrument, playing chords that shook his soul. Turning, Carthor joined those rushing towards the scream.

[Nuranar]

Lissi was learning to deal with the dark. At first, every instinct urged her to stay in the light, to dog the footsteps of the torch-holders. But their spasmodic progress was frustrating, and soon her steady pace found her a position forward of the middle. With only the flickering reflections of the torches to see by, Lissi watched the ground carefully, as much for herself as for Brander. Her eyes became so accustomed to the murk that direct torchlight pained them like the glare of the noonday sun.

Now she trailed along behind Renedwen, Brander her side as always. Sometimes she held his arm, sometimes his hand; sometimes he simply grasped her sleeve or her cloak, but it was her task to guide him safely. Her eyes noted unevenness in the floor and deep shadows in the walls, which could hide doorways, with the same ease she negotiated rough ground while riding. But even as she did so Lissi worried about the other woman. Renedwen seemed to be brooding over her husband's death; she never spoke if she could help it and seemed to ignore Lissi's existence. With the additional burden of Gilly, Lissi thought she would need help, but the lady had stayed cold and untouchable. Lissi watched with concern, aching to help. But she was afraid, afraid of the other woman's pride and disdain and grief. She imagined those brilliant blue eyes, flashing with anger and rejection, and shrank within herself. But she could not stop worrying.

Just as they turned a corner, Lissi thought she heard a low-pitched "halt" from behind. "Did you hear that?" Brander asked, stopping. "Yes," she replied. "I'm glad I caught this one." Brander's sense of hearing was far better developed than hers, a fact which had become very important. Sounds were both easier to hear and more confused in these tunnels; sometimes they echoed clear and far, sometimes the echoes made it impossible to tell the source, and occasionally those same echoes canceled each other out and nothing was heard. They made their way back to the main body. Carthor's voice was raised, but he was out of sight; apparently he was investigating some sort of chamber.

They were nearly to the opening when a shriek rang down the tunnel behind them, a cry for help, shrill with terror. Lissi tingled with horror, fear, and shame all at once. "That was Renedwen!" she gasped to Brander. "Wait here!" She spun and dashed back, the soles of her shoes slapping softly against the stone. The dark beyond the turn blinded her briefly and she slowed. Then a small glimmer appeared in a shadowed turn-off and resolved into Gilly's terrified little face. He dashed up and wound his arms around her knees as Lissi stooped to him. "It's all right, I'll take care of it!" she tried to assure him. Glancing back, she saw Brander's shadow approaching carefully but steadily. "Go to Brander!" she said firmly, untwining his arms and shoving the little boy toward the light. Drawing her sword, she turned away. "I'm coming, Renedwen!" she called. "What is it?"

"I'm caught!" The other woman's voice broke in a panicked sob. "Please help me out of it. Please - hurry, hurry!"

"I'm here, I'm here," Lissi said, slowing as she neared Renedwen's voice, straining to see. What was she caught in – a hole in the floor? A cave-in? Something was clouding the tunnel ahead, something that entirely absorbed the thrice-reflected torchlight. A spot of deeper dark seemed to move... "Renedwen?" There - the white blur of a face. "Here," she whispered. Lissi advanced carefully, sword angled in front of her. Abruptly the blade was deflected and seemed to slide on an invisible obstruction. She hesitated, then reached out her hand. Soft and sticky and slightly elastic... Lissi jerked her hand back with a sudden shuddering horror. "Renedwen, are you all right? I know you're caught, but are you and the child all right?"

The other woman's voice trembled. "I'm all right, but I think I hear them." Her voice trembled and rose hysterically. "They're crawling along the walls, they're on the ceiling and the floor, they're coming for me!"

"Stop it!" Lissi snapped, trying to banish the images from her own mind. The light had improved marginally, and she could see Renedwen's form suspended near her, caught near the edge of the web. "I'm coming for you now." Swiftly she moved in, side-on. Sword ready in one hand, with the other she reached for Renedwen and slid her arm around her waist. The web's supple cling wound about her arm and shoulder and fastened to her skirt, but she swung at the rest of the threads with her blade.

Hastily she cut away the web above and around Renedwen until she could slide down to the floor of the tunnel. Still keeping a trim grasp on the other woman, Lissi pulled and cut and worked the two of them loose. As they stumbled from the branch tunnel they met with Carthor's party, including Brander with Gilly. Lissi explained hastily; unsurprisingly, no one was inclined to investigate the turnoff further. The two women followed them back toward the safer discovery slowly. Lissi held the taller woman closely, feeling her tremble, speaking softly and reassuringly, trying to calm her down.

[Mithalwen]

The value of the elves as an advance party had perhaps been undermined by the bickering of Erenor and Angore. Noldorin ladies of high rank do not appreciate being overruled by their guards; still less to they enjoy being undermined publically and before mortals. Erenor would have had to have deferred to Berethil and maybe even to Ereglin, the longest serving elven emissary, but, despite her respect for Angore as a ranger and fighter, she felt he had overstepped the mark. And she had refused to yield.

Since Angore was determined to stay ahead and Erenor was equally determined not to be left behind , they had moved swiftly. Faerim was young and agile and well able able to keep up with their steps if not the hissed exchanges in Sindarin ( though the elvish tongue was still known and used among the Dunedain, the speed and volume of their speech made it hard to distinguish their words ). Their gist, however, was easy enough to follow.


The scream roused them from the folly of their dispute. It rang and echoed aroung the tunnel and caused the elves and the boy to turn and retrace their steps, their light footfalls obscured by the lasting resonance of that terrible cry.

As it subsided, Erenor sensed another duller sound, it seemed, from the other direction .. the one they had been heading for before the scream. It was duller, irregular but repeated frequently - like the pounding of great drums out of time. The sound was still distant but getting nearer, heavier. Looking at Angore she knew he heard it too, though it was yet beyond mortal sense.

"Faerim, if you aren't wearing that armour, I suggest you put it on very soon, but now draw your sword and run". The elves and the boy fled back towards the scream, Erenor careful to keep Faerim ahead of her, for whatever Angore had said, she felt his young life to be precious. As she ran, Erenor tried to reach the mind of Bethiril - both to discover the cause of the scream and to warn them of the danger that threatened, for the sound had not augured a friendly presence, rather about the worst thing that she could imagine finding in a cave save a dragon.

[Amanaduial the archer]

Faerim obeyed Erenor without a word. The steady way in which she had given the order came from the mind of a woman who has just worked out what they are against and does not want to panic anyone - including herself. And if an elf of thousands of years more experience of the world than he was worried, Faerim had a feeling that whatever he was imagining didn't even come close. Turning tail immediately, he ran backwards, closely followed by the other two elves, although he did not immediately draw his sword; the light in the caves was little enough as it was and with the torch in one hand, he could not risk stumbling and thereby both putting out the light and possibly stabbing himself - not, he mused, a particularly heroic death for anyone, even a seventeen year old boy who was probably thought of by half his companions as a fool already.

The pounding seemed to be getting closer and closer, louder and louder, the ominous, muffled beat becoming stronger and faster and thought growing in confidence as the elves ran from it, swelling with the victory. Was it his imagination, or was the floor even now pounding along with the beat? No, impossible, nothing could be so large as to shake these caverns - impossible.

Beneath Faerim, the floor trembled suddenly, the very pebbles leaping and, with a yelp, the boy stumbled forward, barely catching himself in time as he carried on running, the torch flickering.

Possible.

Fear suddenly caught up with Faerim and as he turned the corner he flinched away from a sudden flare of bright light. Drawing his sword, he blinked against the light, before recognising his fellow soldiers. Faerim barely even paused in his step as he continued in his headlong sprint. "Run, quickly! There is-"

Belegorn grabbed him by the scruff of his neck, pulling him back. "Faerim, what is this nonsense-"

The floor shook, and for a second, Faerim saw the impossible: through Belegorn's capable, unshakeable gaze flashed a sudden dart of fear. He swallowed, trying to catch his breath, as Belegorn stared down the tunnel as Angore and Ereglin burst into view, followed closely by Erenor, all three with sword drawn. The lieutenant didn't question the grim expressions on their faces, and neither could he question the drumming, now unmistakably real, that pounding stronger and stronger by the second. Turning to his men, he signalled them back down the tunnel. "Retreat, men! Retreat back down the tunnels!"

"Lieutenant Belegorn, wait." It was Angóre who spoke. "To take the men back that way - we are leading them directly back to your people. The unarmed Dunedain are sitting ducks for these foes."

"And what foes exactly are these?" Bethiril interjected this comment, appearing behind Belegorn, the only one in the tunnel without a weapon - a fact that Faerim immediately noted and which he doubted Angóre had dismissed either. Erenor answered her, looking directly at her companion with a steady, no-nonsense gaze. "That sound, in such a place? What would you guess, Bethiril?"

For the first time in Faerim's sight, the calm, smooth porcelain of Bethiril's face faltered and her eyes widened. "It cannot be," she whispered.

"You know it is, Lady Bethiril," Erenor almost snapped in reply. "That sound is all too familiar, and you know it as the dwarves would have."

"And what sound is that exactly?" Belegorn inquired exasperatedly. His sword was now out, ready to run or fight as he glanced repeatedly down the tunnel the way the elves had come from.

Bethiril's expression was haunted as she took a few steps down the tunnel away from the pounding. She turned wide eyes upon the lieutenant and gave a simple, unexplained answer, but one that would inspire fear into the heart of any who knew what it meant. "Trolls, Lieutenant. Trolls."

Belegorn's jaw dropped, the answer wreaking the same effect upon him as it had upon the elves. Behind him, a few of the older soldiers had stayed, unmoved by his orders as they had seen that their leader stayed, and one of them swore softly, spitting on the ground and taking to his heels unashamedly. A few stayed, themselves holding a torch, but they were as spooked as Belegorn. Faerim looked from Erenor to Belegorn, seeking some explanation as to what these things were, what Bethiril's answer implied, before he saw Erenor's grim expression and understood that now was not the time for explanations. The elven lady had her eyes fixed upon Belegorn. "What would you have us do, Lieutenant?"

A scream echoed down the corridor, then another, desperate, urgent, high pitched - female. Fear drenched Faerim as he realised what this meant: besides the elves, there were but two women in the party: his mother and Renedwen. And the realisation, along with the sound, shook him to the core. Without thinking, every nerve balanced on that scream's echoes, Faerim was within seconds sprinting full pelt down the tunnel, torch held high. As he turned the corner he came to a crossroads in the tunnels, he heard Erenor's cry, then something lunged at him out of the side tunnel, hissing viciously. With a yell, he fell sideways, tumbling head over heels; as the torch extinguished itself, Faerim's world was plunged into darkness...