The Dauntless

Father Carondil nods. "Of course Brother. I look forward to working with you."

One month later, the sounds of construction can still be heard above the sub-basement of Citadel Altaerein. Alseta's Ring stands as it was before, save that the staircase has been cleared of rubble and Renali stands next to Huntergate, dusting a few puffs of chalk from it before stepping back. "Alright, it's finished. The portal should work normally now, but there is something you should know."

"It seems the damage wasn't an accident. Surprisingly it wasn't the Cinderclaws either, at least not something intentional on their part," Suki starts, glancing at the portal frame. "It would appear there's some sort of magical energy anomaly contained within the gate, which likely got triggered when we opened the Gate the first time. And it appears to be getting stronger. If something's not done about it, it may eventually become too much for even the Gate to contain, and that would be... less than ideal."

"What sort of something needs to be done?" Dorrak asks, getting immediately to the immediate practical concern, his brow furrowed.

"Also, is it, uh... Is it safe to go through, then?" Django asks, nervously stroking his newly-grown, neatly-trimmed beard.

"We're not entirely sure, on either count, though it's probably safe enough for now. The best I can tell though, the various gates here seem to be connected enough that if we can activate the others it should diffuse the energy enough to buy time. Possibly a lot of time," She replies.

"Time would afford more opportunity for a permanent solution. What would it take to activate the others?" Dorrak asks, resting his chin against his fist.

"Each portal is attuned to a different key," Renali explains. "Activating each portal would require its individual key. Huntergate, which seems to be dedicated to Ketephys, has an object associated with Ketephys as its key, so I imagine that somewhere in the world are four more objects, each dedicated to a different elven god, that would open their respective portals. How you would find them, I haven't the faintest idea."

"Well, we Cinderclaws found one. I wasn't part of that group, first I heard of it was when we were opening the Gate, but maybe Belmazog might have an idea. It might be difficult to get her to talk though," Suki suggests.

"Fear is a powerful motivator," Dorrak comments, drawing his lips into a tight smile.

"Okay, say we go over there," Django says, looking to Suki. "What would we be walking into? What's... what'd you say the name was? Belmazog? What do they have as far as firepower goes?"

Suki considers for a moment. "Well, not so much fire as lightning, being half blue dragon. She's also Godtouched herself, though not quite the same as you Django, but I have felt the bite of her magics more than a few times. And of course she's the leader of the Cinderclaws, so we would probably have to make it through most of the cult before we could approach her." She pauses for a moment as she thinks. "Thinking on it, right before she commanded me through, Belmazog was given a Starknife by Malarunk. We unfortunately can't ask him for any information as we already cut him down, he's the one we claimed this from," She says, raising her clawed gauntlet as she speaks, "but I bet you that's probably related to Desna's Gate," She finishes, indicating the North-West archway.

"Well that makes our objective quite clear then," Antoinette states. "We shall have to pay a visit to Belmazog. How prepared are we to travel the gate? What do you know about what's on the other side?"

"It has been well more than a month since I left so things might have changed of course, but last I saw we had set up camp around the Gate. Expect a lot of Boggards and Charau-Ka like you've seen, and a lot of the Elites are Dragonblooded," Suki replies.

"At least baboons and frogs we know we can deal with, dragonblooded or not," Django says, cracking a small grin to Dorrak.

Dorrak chuckles at the memory of shoving his sword into the mouth of the one attacking Nova. ”When I finished training, I did want to travel. Mwangi qualifies.”

"Well then it seems we're all in agreement," Suki says, turning to the archway. Drawing her Fauchard in one hand, she pulls out the arrowhead with the other and taps it to the Gate.

As last time, runes alight in the archway, and the stone inside dissolves into light, leaving behind nothing but a silvery-gray mist.

As you step through to the other side, the mists of the magical portal fade, revealing a twenty-foot-wide passageway stretching off to the distance. The walls of the tunnel seem to be made of hardened lava, long ago scorched and melted. Tiny cracks and fissures line the walls, within which an orange glow flickers, giving the tunnel a soft, fiery illumination. The wall of gold-and-silver mist from the portal glows from behind, while a similar faint glow beckons about a hundred feet ahead. The air is almost uncomfortably warm and smells of smoke.

The tunnel is deathly silent as you push forward, Dorrak at the lead with his shield raised high, your footsteps echoing off of the walls. You estimate the tunnel to be around a hundred feet long, and by the time you reach the halfway point the heat has steadily increased, as he cracks in the wall are larger here. As Dorrak steps over the threshold of the halfway point, the silence is suddenly pierced by a deafening hiss coming from all around, the sound of steam venting, ex except that it isn't steam. Instead, smoke pours out of the open spaces in the wall, surging out and onto the ground before moving seemingly of its own accord, drawing in in front of Dorrak. It grows into a billowing cloud that rises as it continues to increase in size, forming a shape; long, thin and rippling, with a head forming at the front end, a thin, whiplike tail at the back, and six limbs emerging from the middle-two of which expand and define themselves into wings.Within seconds it completes itself; a cloud of black smoke in the shape of a massive dragon barely large enough to fit in the tunnel, its eyes and chest both glowing with the orange-red of blazing embers.

Before anyone has time to react, the dragon flaps its wings twice, lifting into the air, and flies over the party, spewing a raging inferno from its maw that bathes the entire party in flame, Nova only barely withstanding through Dorrak's protective power. Suki, Dorrak and Antoinette land three decisive blows as it passes over, but the dragon seems to care very little about the significant damage they've done to it. Suki, realizing what it is, shouts for the party to run, and they take off as the dragon wheels around on a dime to make another strafing run. Everyone makes it through the portal, but Suki, who trailed behind to get a good look at it, and Dorrak, who remained to make sure she made it through, are both caught in a second wave of fire as they stumble through the portal.

Cloying heat and humidity hangs heavy in the atmosphere of this open-air temple. smeared black with soot. Charred branches and clumps of roots mark the shape of the garden that once stood here, but the plants and flowers have been ripped up and burned. In the middle of the ring of stone arches, in the center of a cold pit of charcoal, a half-complete wooden pillar once capped with a dragon’s visage stands near a pile of carved rocks and a small sack of cloth. Only one section of the ring of stone arches is solid—a section of wall that bears an exact duplicate of Huntergate as it appeared in the wall below Citadel Altaerein, as it seals behind Suki now that everyone, and the key, have both left. Beyond the open archways elsewhere sprawls a verdant expanse of a tropical jungle. You have very little time to appreciate the sight, though, as a different sight draws your attention; two-dozen bows, raised and drawn in your direction, each one carried by a dark-skinned elf dressed in leathers and brown cloth.

Dorrak very slowly sheathes his sword, calling out, "Easy, easy. We aren't your enemies," he speaks carefully, raising his hands in the air to show they're empty.

Suki quickly taps out the last lingering flames before taking note of the archer elves surrounding them. "You know, I was expecting to be greeted by a bunch of weapons, but was not expecting elves," She mutters. "Then again, I wasn't expecting the Cinderclaw to be in the Gate either, so I guess it's just a very surprising day."

Antoinette looks around and speaks out in Elvish. "We aren't hostile! Please don't shoot!"

The elves give each other cautious glances and begin to lower their bows at Dorrak's display of peace and Antoinette's words. However, one of the closer ones suddenly twitches when Suki mentions the word "Cinderclaw" and lets out a bark. "She speaks of Ubumnyama!" she shouts in Elven, and all of them snap their bows up in perfect sync again.

"Wait please!" Antoinette shouts. "We speak of it as our enemy! It attacked us."

"Please," Django croaks hoarsely in elven as well. "We're not with the cult, we're the ones who defeated the force they sent through the portal." Yanking the chain from around his neck, he holds aloft the butterfly pendant. "May the Song be ever in your hearts, friends. We aren't your enemies."

The elves don't back down at first, pulling back farther on their bowstrings in preparation to fire, when an order rings out. "Ekukhululekeni!" As one, the elves release the tension in their shoulders. One of the elves, a man set apart from the others by his gold jewelry and bracers, steps forward into the ruined temple, holding his palms open at his sides to show he is unarmed. The rest of the elves relax the draw of their bowstrings and put their weapons at rest, though their arrows remained nocked, ready to fire quickly.

The elf in gold jewelry stops a respectful distance away and gives a very slight bow before speaking in what sounds... almost like Elven, although it is a very distinct dialect that neither Django nor Antoinette are familiar with. Seeing the confusion and the lack of any understanding in Dorrak and Suki, he tries again in accented Taldane. “I am Jahsi, of the Leopard Clan,” he introduces himself. “My mother is of the River Clan.” He looks at the party expectantly.