When you cross the mountains, don’t take Willard’s Pass-
That’s where the Black Mines are. They’ve been abandoned for, oh, couple hundred years now? They wouldn’t be safe even if there wasn’t the Gheist.
You’ve heard the legend, haven’t you?
Right?
The Mine
Garoth Mines were one of many small outposts sprinkled into the Begoria Mountains. Willard Garoth had gotten the land cheap from the @gol in what he thought would be a very lucrative deal-The Gol-Smitts wanted nothing to do with the land.
Perhaps that should have been his first warning.
When the mines first opened, silver flowed freely; A small town sprung up around the mines, rich with merchants and ladies of the night alike. For a couple of years, all was well.
Then the disappearances started.
Vanishing Act
A young miner who had been breaking open a seam in one of the lower parts of the mine never reported for the end of his shift. When a team went to investigate, his pick was still dug into the wall and his lunchbox was sitting at the bottom of a support beam, but the lad himself was nowhere to be seen. Further investigation found a small gap in the wall, leading to a cave system deep within the mountain. The Memoric gas Analyzers, however, detected large amounts of [gas] in the system, so a search party was postponed-the boy would be dead even if they could find him in there. The tunnel was boarded off and the mine continued in another direction.
A few days later, another miner disappeared. When the tunnel was investigated, there was a trail of blood leading to the boarded-off tunnel. A horrid wailing could be heard from within. It did not look like a single board had moved.
Rumors ran like wildfire in the town-There was a ghost in the mines, a vengeful one that had been angered by the mining operations. Why they were vengeful, and what would sate them, no one knew. Miners went on a strike and it was only the promise of added security and the re-organization of schedules so everyone worked in teams that allowed the mines to open again. Further security was added to the boarded-off tunnel.
Then the ghost started leaving sticky trails of black pitch. It appeared overnight, dripped down the lowest corridors of the mine, stopping only at the elevator shafts. Soon an entire floor of the mine was condemned as Garoth tried to dig in another direction.
Even as the miners worked, the horrid wailing could be heard from below. But now there were more voices, all male, all crying out in pain.
Ghost Town
Had the terror only been contained to the lowest floor of the mine, all would be well. And we would not have a ghost story to tell.
A young courtesan from one of the many houses of Love in the town vanished one night. One of her boots was found at the entrance to the mine. A washing woman vanished next, her starched undergarments still dripping in the morning sun. An entire carriage of people leaving town at nightfall never made it to the next station. All work in the mine had stopped. No one dared to go near the place. People sat in their homes, shaking in fear.
A desperate plan was hatched. The last remants of dynamite that remained in the quarry were piled at the entrance to the mine, early in the morning. The remainder of people in town-who weren’t many, by that point-gathered at the road leading down into Cailar. The fuse was detonated.
The explosion could be heard from miles away, and the mountains shook with its wrath. Unfortunately, the resulting explosion resulted in several landslides, killing the survivors of the Gheist. The sole survivor stumbled into a town at the foot of the mountain two days later, muttered about the Gheist of the Black Mines, and fell over dead.
No one goes near the Black Mines now. Not unless they wish to vanish themselves. Are the legends true? Is there really a Ghost in the Mines? No one really knows. But no one dares to believe otherwise.
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