Fire and Ice 11

General Summary

I apologize for how broken up these correspondences are. It's been hard finding time to write it all down, so it's taking me a little while to get through all the Pale Tower stuff. We did a lot in there. Anyway, hopefully, I can finish it off now.

13 Arodus 4713

There was only the "Mirrored Hall" left on this level for us to check out. As I mentioned previously, we purposely left it for last so that nothing could come up behind us once we used it to go face Vasilliovna and/or her apprentice. There was also the room's name. We've grown kind of suspicious of mirrors since the witches can use them to spy on people. There were a lot of mirrors in this place already and one with "mirrored" in its name seemed extra suspicious. Oh! I think I forgot to mention Bronwyn had been systematically smashing every mirror we find. Vasilliovna knew we were here, but she wasn't going to get to spy on every little movement we made. There was a red carpet on the floor of the room, which led to the teleporter in an alcove on the eastern side. There were also two ice statues of nymphs. And of course, there were mirrors on all the walls. Ten-Penny entered first, staying away from the carpet because she was suspicious of traps. (It ultimately turned out the carpet was harmless, but I understand her paranoia.) Cassy was also suspicious of the ice statues, but nothing happened when Ten-Penny approached one and waved her hand in front of its face. The room seemed safe, so we approached the teleporter. We couldn't all fit on it at the same time, so Bronwyn and I stayed back, ready to use it after the others had and had had a chance to move clear of it on the other side. Cassy said the pass phrase. It didn't work. Instead, the ice statues attacked. They just came to life and attacked, so I guess Cassy was right to be wary of them. Once we'd smashed the statues into ice shards, we tried the teleporter again. It still didn't work. We doubted Hatch had lied to us. Everything he'd said so far had worked, but he had warned us the pass codes could be changed. It seemed likely Vasilliovna or her apprentice, aware we were in the tower, had changed the code. We needed another option, so I suggested something. It's not something I've made much mention of in the past, because I don't really understand it (a lot like most of my abilities). I have a bit of a way with magical devices. I can sometimes force them to work without the appropriate command words or magical knowledge. I offered to try with the teleporter. So Cassy, Grinner, Valeria, and Ten-Penny piled on again. I bent down, touched the teleporter and concentrated as hard as a I could. There was some sort of electrical discharge, and damn, it was painful (though it didn't seem to cause me any actual harm). The others vanished and I was left alone with Bronwyn. But I knew something had gone terribly wrong. It had teleported them, but not where they were supposed to go. It turned out to be not quite as bad as I'd feared. The teleporter had sent each of them to one of the other teleporters in the tower. Valeria and Ten-Penny ended up on the two teleporters on the first floor. Cassy was sent only a short distance away to one of the teleporters in the dining room. Only Grinner ended up in any kind of danger. He ended up in the aerie, where he promptly used the teleporter to come back down to the north teleporter on the second floor. Valeria and Ten-Penny similarly came back upstairs, and we all regrouped. Grinner reported that he had seen a cage full of ravens and a woman with a spear looking after them. He couldn't be sure if she had seen him or not, but if she had, she hadn't followed him down. We now had to find a way to get up to the witch's chambers. I offered to try again, but the others decided (probably wisely) that it wasn't a good idea. I couldn't promise that it would work on another try. Indeed, the same could happen again or worse. Instead, we decided to return to the library to see if there was anything there that could help us. Unfortunately, we didn't find anything there that was even remotely helpful. After some discussion, we decided our only option was to go up to the aerie. If we could capture the woman there, maybe she could tell us how to get to the top floor. So we moved to the north teleport. We had to go up in two groups again, but this time, there were no problems. The woman in the aerie was unprepared for us, and were quickly able to subdue her, and Ten-Penny manacled her. The woman was pale-skinned and humanoid, but not human. I'm not actually sure what she was. She said her name was Jairess Sonn, and she was somewhat cooperative with us. She told us that Nazhena Vasilliovna was not in the tower, but in Whitethrone at some meeting. Jairess said she didn't know what the meeting was about, only that it had something to do with portals to other parts of the world. She said Vasilliovna's apprentice Radosek was here though. After we first invaded the tower, he probably turned the teleporter to the upper floor off, which is why it wasn't working for us. Cassy asked if there was another way up and Jairess said no. That was a lie. It was a kind of an obvious one, and a shame, as she'd been truthful with us so far. She would try lying to us one more time a little later, alas. With a little pressure from Ten-Penny, Jairess admitted her lie and said she had a key (we'd already found it in her belongings when we searched her, but we didn't know what it was) that would activate the teleporter. Apparently, Radosek had given it to her after inviting her up to his chambers. She said she'd never used it, but she'd kept it so as not to anger him. The key overrode any pass code settings on the teleporter. Anyone possessing the key just had to step onto the teleporter and it would immediately activate. Then Grinner said to Bronwyn that it was time she did her thing. "What thing?" Bronwyn asked. Grinner explained that he meant offering Jairess a chance for redemption. "Oh that." Bronwyn then asked if Jairess was willing to repent her evil ways. At first, Jairess said she didn't feel she needed to repent for anything. She didn't consider herself evil. We pointed out that she was willingly working for a child murderer. She was evil. Bronwyn offered again, and Jairess hastily said yes, she would repent and seek redemption. Bronwyn said--and I quote--"I don't fucking believe you." Then she, Cassy, and Grinner shot Jairess dead. Ten-Penny commented that she had wanted to toss her out a window. Yeah, we're getting kind of ruthless when we need to be. We then discussed what to do with the ravens. Grinner wanted to poison their feed. Ten-Penny said that was a waste of poison. We should just leave them in their cage and let them starve to death. Bronwyn said that was unnecessarily cruel and we should leave them be until we were finished in the tower and then set them free. Grinner didn't like that plan much, but that's ultimately what we decided to do. We did a quick search of this level. There were two rooms off the aerie. One was a bedroom, probably Jairess's. The other was a storeroom with crates of grain. There were also several dollhouses on shelves. At first, we thought that maybe they had something to do with the dolls Vasilliovna made, like the one she had made out of Sofia. However, they were too small for that. Searching them, we found them fully furnished and lived in. There was even treasure in them! We realised then that these were where the tiny fey lived. We took their stuff. Then we went back down and over to the Mirrored Hall, where we made a plan of attack. Grinner had the key and would take the first group up and then come back for the second. It was important that Ten-Penny and Valeria be in the first group. As mêlée combatants, they needed to get up close to Radosek to help prevent him casting spells at us. The gun users and I could then offer support in taking him down. The plan went pretty well. Ten-Penny took some heavy damage, and Grinner got distracted by Radosek's goat familiar, but otherwise we made it so he wasn't able to do a whole lot against us. Cassy managed to blind Radosek with a spell, and then we took him down. And then it was time to take stock of where we were and figure out how to shut down the portal. Unfortunately, I have to go again. The life of an adventurer, eh? I'll get through the rest next time. I promise. (Well, I'll do my best at any rate.)

All the best,
Izzy (and Frono)