10 -- Delving Deeper [Story]

    As she made her way down the stone staircase, cloak wrapped tight right around her, Madeleine's heart raced.  Red eyes glared at her as the two large guard noticed her descent.  As large as a tall man, the creatures dwarfed the goblins they had seen before.  While their armor appeared just as dirty and ill-maintained, it was composed of hardy metal plates rather than leather or the chain links that their previous opponents had worn.   Behind the two guards were two more less well-armored but equally foul looking hobgoblins guarding the entrance to an adjoining chamber.  

    "Halt!" one yelled out in crude common.  Both guards moved forward, taking care to walk around a large open pit in the center of the room.

    "Shadow seeks shadow!"  

    "And life fails in the dark," Madeleine responded, her voice sounding embarassingly girlish in her estimation.  Her heart was pounding so loud she could barely hear her own voice.

    The two hobgoblins looked at one another.  "What is your business with Kalarel?  I have not seen you before."  one demanded.

    Madeleine did not answer but kept walking.  She was almost at the bottom of the stairs.

    The hobgoblin began to repeat the question when from a glowing magical bolt and a pair of arrrows launched from the darkness behind Madeleine.  The two hobgoblins guarding the next chamber began to fall, pierced.  

    As the hobgoblin guard yelled and reached for the dangerous looking ball and chain at his belt, Madeleine went into a full run and lowered her shoulder.  She crashed into one guard, giving a grunt as she felt the pain of slamming into armored flesh.  The hobgoblin guard pitched backward and fell headfirst into the pit, landing with a splash.  Out of the corner of her eye she saw the second guard also falling as Farad's immense mass shoved it into the pit.  Madeleine pitched to her knees to avoid following her opponents in.

    "Watch the door!" Madeleine yelled as she got to her feet, unsheathing her warblade.  As Bailyn moved towards the door on their left, it burst open with a crash; more hobgoblins emerged from their left as two hobgoblins ran in from the hallway on the right.  One of the hobgoblins ran to engage Bailyn; the others ran towards the room the other hobgoblins had guarded.  

    The two hobgoblins in the pit were climbing out, pulling themselves hand over hand.  One fell back into the water as Wing's blast hit him directly in the chest.  Naruel's arrow pierced another but the muscled humanoid still managed to pull itself out of the well, no small accomplishment given its armor composed of plates of crude metal.  A vicious swing of its flail bounced off of Naruel's partially raised arm, resulting in a cry of pain from the half-elf.  

    "Nary!" Madeleine yelled and leapt forward, cutting through metal armor and skewering the hobgoblin from behind, the tip of her greatsword emerging out of the front of his chest.  "Are you ok?"  Madeleine asked, leaning forward. 

    Maruel pushed her away, rose and nocked an arrow in response. 

    "Stop them, Wing!"  Naruel cried.  Madeleine noticed with a start that the room some of the hobgoblins were trying to reach contained a cage in which an unbelievably large grey and black spider was throwing itself against its bars, venom dripping down its enormous fangs.  Before either of them could reach the latch, one hobgoblin fell, an arrow lodged in its throat, joined moments later by the smoking corpse of the other. 
    
    A sole scale mail clad hobgoblin engaged Bailyn on the left while Farad fended off two hobgoblins on the right, their flail and longsword failing to find much purchase beyond his shield and plate.  Fanged mouths and sallow green skin gave them a monstrous appearance, but with Naruel and Wing attacking from a distance and Madeleine swinging around to flank the ones attacking Farad, within a minute the remaining hobgoblins were slain.

    *    *    *    *

    The group moved quickly and carefully down the torch-lit hallway.  A crude double door was to their left while an adjoining corridor opened up to their right.   The ranger peeked her head around to scan down the corridor, then gestured for them to stay back.  It was quiet, save for the clank of their armor and their breathing.

    "Some kind of meeting room -- seems empty.  There are materials on the table.  Door on the other side.  No guards that I can see or hear."  

    "Move in, watch the doors, grab the paper and then check each door one by one."  Madeleine suggested.  The others nodded their head in agreement.

    "Wait!" Naruel warned.  She pointed down -- some flagstones in the hallway seem slightly ajar.  Bailyn knelt down and looked.  "Aye, tis a trigger to ... that" 

    Bailyn pointed up and they saw, mostly hidden but still slightly visible, the points of a raised metal portcullis in the hallway.  

    "Can you disable it?"  Farad rumbled, his draconic voice almost more felt than heard at such low volume.

    Bailyn nodded.  "Aye, lets jump over it and then I'll look at some way to jam the mechanism."  They carefully picked their way across the flagstones.  As Bailyn and Wing looked at the flagstone triggers, Farad and Madeleine walked into the meeting chamber.  A massive oaken table dominated the room, along with scattered crude stools.  The table top, scarred with burns and blade cuts, was covered with parchments and mugs.  A second door was visible now that they were in the room.

    Madeleine put her greatsword on the table and picked up a parchment.  "This is a map of Winterhaven, with guard ..."
    
    Madeleine was interrupted as the two doors in the chamber slammed open.  Five hobgoblins emerged from the first set of doors they saw, one taller than the rest and wielding a black metal spear, while three scale mail clad hobgoblins emerged from the other.  "Don't kill 'em if you don't have to," roared the tall one, "we can sell them to the Bloodreavers."

    Madeleine's curse became a hiss of pain as two of the hobgoblins leapt right onto the table, scattering mugs and parchment as they lunged at her with their blades.  She grabbed her greatsword and pulled back, their longswords glancing off of her chainmail.  Bailyn, running, reached her side and with one mighty swing the maul smashed through both hobgoblins' pair of legs, sending their broken bodies crashing onto the table top.  The other two hobgoblins with the tall leader swung around the table, one falling on the way, clutching an arrow in its chest.

    Bailyn swung right to form along with Farad a living wall of flesh and steel against the scale mail clad fighters that had emerged from the other door.  A wave of bluish-red flame washed over the burly hobgoblins from Wing's hands, but to Wing's dismay two of the hobgoblins managed to shield their exposed faces with their shields.  The third, though, screamed in pain as the flames washed directly over its face.  

    "They are hardy, focus fire on the one Wing hurt!"  Madeleine called over her shoulder as she fended off another one of the hobgoblins that had emerged with the taller spear wielding fighter.  Her warblade went wide but, distracted, the hobgoblin fell from one of Naruel's arrows.

    "That's it!" Madeleine shouted in approval as Farad and Bailyn brought one of the three they were fending off down, Bailyn swinging low and Farad high at the already burned green skinned brute.

    The tall hobgoblin was alone.  Madeleine leapt onto the table and over the crumpled corpses of the hobgoblin guards and charged.  

    Though his armor appeared heavy the tall hobgoblin moved with blazing speed and sidestepped Madeleine's blade.  Madeleine roared out a rousing battlecry and mustered her strength to strike again, but the leader's heavy bladed spear parried the second attack with a crash.  "You'll have to do better than that, lass," growled the tall hobgoblin.  Seemingly effortlessly, he pushed her greatsword to the side with his spear and gave her a wicked slash in return.  Madeleine gasped at the pain in her side, though the chain mail held.  Closer to him, she could see that under his plates of armor glistened inhumanly large muscles.  

    "Nary!  Mad's in trouble!"  Wing cried out as he saw his friend fending off blow after blow from the hobgoblin leader.  Madeleine, while not mortally wounded, seemed to be slowly crumpling as her attacks were being thwarted by the obviously skilled spearman.  Farad and Bailyn were busy trying to fight the two remaining hobgoblin soldiers on their left, far more skilled and better armored than the goblins and kobolds they had fought before.

    Naruel fired a volley at the hobgoblin and he staggered slightly as arrows found their mark, two piercing through armor into flesh, but the hobgoblin merely laughed.  "Your friends can't save you.  I guess I'll have to kill you as punishment.  Pity, you would have fetched a high price.  I would have liked to try you myself."

    Wing cried out in dismay as the spearman, blocking another blow, swung his spear around and slashed it at Madeleine's head.  Madeleine put up her blade in time to avoid being decapitated, the spear's blade slamming into the greatsword with a ear-rending clang.  Still, the diverted spear slid down the warblade and ripped across her shoulder and back, opening up the metal links and leaving a bloody red welt behind in its path.  
    
    Madeleine mustered her strength and swung low, but the hobgoblin brought his spear down and sent her blow off-course, the blade sending harmless sparks on the stone floor as it skipped off the ground.   She gathered her will to prepare for the pain of the hobgoblin's counterstrike but as the spear was hurtling back towards her, it slowed for a moment; Madeleine rolled to her left and out of the path.  Leaping to her feet she saw the hobgoblin leader staggering back, his chest and face burning from the magic acid from Wing's acid arrow.   Wing, eyes blazing with a rage that Madeleine had rarely seen from the mage, gave her an urgent look even as he voiced the vocal element of another spell.  As the hobgoblin leader sought to recollect himself another magical bolt hit him square in the chest.  

    Madeleine gathered the remains of her strength and leaped at the distracted opponent.  She cleaved down at the hobgoblin with one fierce swing as she came down from her jump.  The hobgoblin leader's head, expression still showing shock, bounced into the corner of the meeting chamber as its headless torso sank to its knees.  

    To their credit, the remaining hobgoblin warriors did not flee.  Using shield and flail they had given as well as they had got against Farad and Bailyn.  But with Madeleine now free, even though wounded, and Naruel and Wing able to strike at them from afar, they soon were pierced and smash corpses pooling blood on the stone floor.   

    *    *    *    *
  
  Several minutes later, as they were still catching their collective breath and search the two rooms adjoining the chamber, there was a cry of alarm.  The double doors off the hallway they had initially entered was open.  Behind it a short hall entered into a wider torch-lit chamber.  Another hobgoblin stood there, his big pionted ears emerging from under his helmet.  "Under attack!"  he cried in crude common and ducked out of sight to the east.

    "Stop him, Wing!"  Naruel yelled.

    "Got it!"  Wing leapt up from where he had been tending to Madeleine's wounds and gave chase, preparing to fire a bolt of ice.  As he rounded the corner, he saw the hobgoblin had fled through adjoining doors into a room full of tables, rubbish and more hobgoblins.  One, quite noticeably, was not equipped with a flail or longsword, but a longbow.  Nocked.

    Wing changed his target but as his blast hit the archer, the archer's arrow sunk into his shoulder.  He screamed in agony.  Farad and the others joined him.

    Bailyn raced into the room first and caught the first hobgoblin soldier, who turned and raised his shield to defend himself.  Bailyn knocked it aside and gave him a solid blow to the midsection, but the hobgoblin was well armored and made of sturdy stuff.  The hobgoblin gave a toothy smile, saliva making his sharp fangs glisten, "Ready to play, little dwarf!" he hissed, blocking Naruel's arrows with his shield.
    
    "Watch out Nary, spell!" Wing shouted as he heard a rough voice summon arcane magic.  Naruel darted out of the way as a blue bolt whipped out from a robed hobgoblin's staff and crashed into the space the ranger had been in just a moment before.

    Wing was still in the first room, looking through the door, but the others were in the next.  A 2nd hobgoblin soldier had joined the 1st and they stood shoulder to shoulder, preventing the group from physicaly reaching the robed caster and the archer.  

    "Take down the archer before he picks us off!" cried Madeleine as she attacked the hobgoblins blocking the hall. 

    Wing fought through the pain and fired another magical missile at the archer, who answered him in kind.  The archer missed, Wing hit.  But before Wing could summon another missile, the other door to the room in which he stood burst open and more hobgoblins emerged.  Wing used his staff to partially block a longsword swipe, his wounded shoulder throbbing from the effort.

    The archer grinned and nocked another arrow, taking aim at the distracted young lightly armored human.  But his bow slipped from his fingers as one of Naruel's shafts buried itself deep in his head.  

    Naruel's moment to stop and fire cost her.  The robed hobgoblin's 2nd bolt of blue lightning hit her square in the chest, sending the half-elf spilling back into the other room near Wing, smelling of burnt cloth and flesh.  The hobgoblins who had burst in from the other door swung at her with longswords.   Nary, though still stunned, rolled, and avoided taking a direct blow from the blades, but was still struck.  

    Then Wing was astride her prone form hand spread out wide.  There was a whoosh and blue-red fire spread out and covered the side of the room facing the door the hobgoblins had emerged from.  Three hobgoblins screamed in agony and fell writhing to the ground, charred corpses.  One remained, but Wing's burning hands spell gave Naruel the time she needed.  Pushing Wing to the side, she leapt up and brandished her swords, one in each hand. 

    "Wing, help the others clear the way! I'll deal with this one," Nary commanded, even as the hobgoblin blocked her attack and countered with a glancing blow to her leg.  Though the blow hurt, the ranger used the opportunity to leap out of the way and grab her longbow.  She wheeled and fired a shot into the melee, finally bringing down one of the two scale-mailed hobgoblin soldiers.   

    "Change in plans," she cried, "Madeleine, deal with this one, I'll clear the way so you guys can get the caster!".  Madeleine wheeled and engaged the ambushing hobgoblin, who was joined moments later by another.  

    "Good shot, lass!" cheered Bailyn, not looking back at Naruel, as he fended off the remaining soldier.  "I'll get to you soon!" he jeered at the robed hobgoblin.  

    Red eyes narrowed.  "Let me help you," the robed hobgoblin replied, stepping over the body of his comrade.  Bailyn blocked the robed hobgoblin's staff with his maul, but lightning licked down the maul and arcs of lightning seemed to leap and pierce through the dwarf.  The dwarf groaned in agony and Bailyn shuddered, his eyes partially glazing from the internal damage.

   "Wing, clear these, we're being surrounded!" Madeleine called out as she fought the two hobgoblins that were behind them.  Naruel, hemmed in by the hobgoblins, could not fire her longbow for fear of exposing herself to a thrust from one of the hobgoblin's longswords.  

    "Too many women shouting out too many orders!" Wing retorted, but he swung attention away from the brutes fighting Farad and Bailyn and brought down one of the two remaining ambushing hobgoblins attacking form behind them with a spell.  , but Madeleine ran through the other, parrying its longsword and plunging her greatsword through leather armor and out the hobgoblin's back in one smooth move.

    Farad struck the remaining hobgoblin soldier, callling upon Bahamut to shield his comrade -- a bright light limning the dwarf as the warhammer solidly crunched into the hobgoblin's shoulder.  The hobgoblin soldier staggered and was felled moments later by Bailyn's maul, but the dwarf's attention on the soldier left him open to a solid blow from the robed hobgoblin's staff.

    Suddenly they were alone with the robed hobgoblin, who staggered as two arrows from Naruel, now free of the ambushers, fired at him.  

    "Surrender and we'll kill you painlessly," wheezed Bailyn, blood streaming down his brow.  

    "I think not!" the robed hobgoblin raised his arms and brought his staff down with a crash and an incantation.  A blindingly bright light of blue and white lightning arced out in a wave from the warcaster.  Bailyn, Farad and Naruel were sent slamming into the walls and left lying on the ground.  Madeleine willed herself through the painful pulse and struck the robed hobgoblin with her warblade, who finally fell.

    The stone chambers, so recently filled with the cries of battle and the clang of metal against metal, was eerily quiet save for the heavy breathing of the adventurers.  Bailyn was unconscious and badly wounded, but they were alive.

    *    *    *    *

    Madeleine and Farad sat around the massive oaken table, looking at the papers strewn on it.  The hobgoblin's meeting chamber had nothing mentioning Kalarel or a rift, but it did have plans laying out an attack on Winterhaven.  As suggested by the note found in Irontooth's lair, there was clearly a spy in Winterhaven, as the positions and shifts of the town guard appeared to be available to them written in a clean and careful hand that Farad and Madeleine highly doubted was that of a goblin and seemed different than the one to Irontooth.  Disturbingly, the note outlined an attack not just be goblins and hobgoblins but also by a large number of undead.   The rest seemed to be bills of lading and notes between the hobgoblins and a group of slavers known as the Bloodreavers.  

    Bailyn was lying on the hobgoblin's filthy bed, recuperating from the most recent battle, while Naruel was guarding the spider's cage from the rest of the group.  Bailyn and Madeleine had argued that it should be killed lest it be freed and used against them later, but Naruel had felt strongly that the spider was not to be killed while it posed no threat to them and had since spent the time hanging out in the room keeping a watchful eye on the giant spider.

    "We need to head back and warn the town," recommended Madeleine.  

    "No, we need to press on," Farad responded.  "We still have to find Kalarel and we do not know how close he is to opening the rift."

    "Here we go again." Wing muttered as he sorted through the hobgoblins' belongings.  

    Madeleine laughed.  "He's right, but I'm not giving in this time and risking my mates' lives.  Bailyn's almost dead and we're exhausted ... we've just fought a whole hobgoblin clan."  

    "Each minute we tarry ..." Farad began.  
    
    "Lord Padraig should know of the threat ..." Madeleine responded.

    "If we prevent the rift from opening, there will not be a threat," Farad explained.    

    "If we're too tired and injured to fight him, we won't be able to stop him from opening the rift anway."  Wing pointed out, standing up and walking over to the two others.  

    "Farad, we share your goals of saving the town but you need to show some care for our comrades.  It is on all of us to make sure no serious harm befall any of us."  Madeleine said, her green eyes flashing with earnest resolve.  

    Seeing Farad silent, clearly struggling with the decision, Wing continued "we don't have to leave.  We can hide for a half day or so in the store room up above.  Its right near the stairs that are apparently the only way out of here.  We'll see any one coming in or out."

    Wing grabbed Madeleine's hand, sensing her disagreement.  "Madeleine, we need to compromise.  Farad's right -- it will take half a day to get back to town -- -- if we rest here we only lose several hours or maybe half a day."  He wanted to tell her that he could sense Farad would never agree to leave the keep entirely without his quest completed or an assurance Kalarel was further off of his goal and that this was perhaps the only way to avoid a more serious confrontation.

    Madeleine looked at the young mage, his soft face grimed with dirt and dried blood.  She felt fear in her heart that her comrades, as able as they were, would find death here despite their now clearly apparent abilities unless they were fully rested, but she also knew a good commander needed to listen as well as lead.  

    "OK," she sighed.