Session #5: The Den
Baptized in Meat
The information Ambrose and Karl received from the alley attacker is unfortunately rather scant. Karl leads the pair to the Loom district, a more affluent part of Illivan, with white stone buildings gleaming in the sunlight; a stark contrast to the poor and downtrodden Low-Town just behind the two and beyond the city wall. At the gate, Karl and Ambrose turn to each other, unsure of where to start. However, a chance glimpse of another olive-skinned, robed figure leads the two to a quiet, modest home on the street. From a distance, Karl and Ambrose watch as the man checks his surroundings and then carefully slips into the building.
After some time, it seems clear that the man is not re-emerging. After waiting for what seems like the opportune moment, the two slink to the front door. As Ambrose peers around the side of the house, Karl tests the front door, finding it unlocked. The two quietly slide in and shut the heavy door behind them.
As their eyes get used to the darkness, Ambrose and Karl discover a squalid, unpleasant hovel before them. Dust stirs beneath their feet as the two walk through the front room, littered with overturned crates and broken furniture. In the back, a damp, untouched kitchen reeks of mold and rot. But the two men are immediately drawn towards a set of stairs leading down, unreasonably deep into the living stone. The old wood stairs creak under their careful footsteps, and at the bottom, a curtain, ornate but bereft of any style natural to Illivan, hides the next room.
Pulling it aside, the two find themselves in an airy stone room. Brass braziers hang from the damp ceiling, fires kindling and illuminating the gray floor and walls. The scent of incense is heavy, and the two catch their breath to keep from letting loose a betraying cough. Strewn across the floor are several cushions and rugs, beautifully decorated in the same style as the cloth in the doorway and at a stark contrast to the otherwise miserable room. The chamber hooks around both sides to behind the staircase, revealing a roughly carved hole in the stone floor nearly six feet across, and a ladder leading deeper into the earth. However, the two are not alone in this room. Laying across the cushions are two men clothed in fine silks with black, curly hair. Too concerned with their pipes and conversation to notice Ambrose peeking into the room, the loungers continue to debate an apparently heated topic in a foreign tongue. Wordlessly, Ambrose motions Karl to move further up the stairs as his hands begin to glow. After a moment a crashing noise comes from the far side of the room opposite of the hole. The two loungers abruptly halt their conversation to investigate the sudden noise. They pass mere feet from Ambrose and Karl and disappear hidden behind the wall of the staircase. Exchanging concerned glances, the two hurriedly creep into the room and descend the ladder unnoticed.
At the base of the ladder, the party finds themselves in a low, damp tunnel carved straight through the stone itself. Picking a direction, the two walk down a moldy, sordid corridor. As the tunnel twists and turns upon itself like a horrid knot, the two see the flicker of a flame ahead, and can almost make out the sound of some mechanical whirring. Before them, torches light some yet unseen room.
The two emerge from the cramped tunnel into a wretched, foul chamber. Piled haphazardly in heaps are mountains of rotting meat. The vile smell of the horrendous, stinking flesh sends both men's heads swimming, and Ambrose takes a knee before the intense scene. The whirring sound is louder now too, and to the pair, it seems as if, in addition to what they now realize is the scrape of metal upon metal, they also discern a careful muttering. Carefully, the two steal into the next room.
Before them is another abominable sight. A man, if he could described as such, sits upon the bare floor, sharpening a wicked and diseased jagged knife upon a whetstone wheel. The man is a mangled mess of hair, as wild as a rabid dog, with a snarl upon his face and seedy, yellow bestial eyes. Around him lie more rotting piles of flesh and meat, along with hunks of some unfortunate and unrecognizable prey hanging from hooks in the ceiling. He immediately locks eyes with the two adventurers, and a horrible, toothy snarl slides across his face, as he stands, brandishing the now razor-sharp weapon. A ghastly, meaty ooze drips from his blade as he laughs a terrible, coughing bark.
"Fresh meat," he cackles, "and I didn't even need to hunt it."
Wasting no time, Karl and Ambrose steel themselves for a brawl. The man, however, is as animalistic in melee as he appears, and his aggression and ferocity shock the party. A particularly nasty swipe of his corrupt, toothed blade catches Ambrose across the collar, and he collapses in an unmoving heap. Karl, in a desperate fury, pummels the man, and his eyes widen in shock as, over and over, Karl's fists catch him in vulnerable places. His face turns from cocky, animal aggression, to concern, to terror, and as he realizes his fate and begins another barking cough, this time not of laughter but of desperation, Karl crushes his face in with a powerful, well-placed fist. The horrible man gurgles and then falls silent.
Before even catching his breath, Karl runs over to the still unmoving Ambrose. He slaps his partner's face and begins to dig through his pack for smelling salts or medicinal herbs, but a sound from deeper within the cavern causes him to freeze. Holding his breath, he listens intently as he discovers the sound of several other voices, indiscernible, coming from further into the earth. Wasting no time, Karl decides he must act. He drags Ambrose back into the room of stinking meat and places his unmoving form behind a particularly tall pile.
"Sorry Ambrose," Karl whispers while covering Ambrose with a few of the fetid chunks. "I'll be back for you soon, but I need to keep you hidden." Karl begins to slip off until he notices a bin next to a metal cutting table. Curiosity takes control of Karl and he peeks in at the sight of the skin of a woman's face staring back at him. His gaze darts back to Ambrose under the pile of meat, "Better keep this from Ambrose." Lurching, Karl continues deeper into the terrifying tunnels following the indistinct voices.
Deep within the darkening cave, Karl finds himself just outside a large, circular chamber, with a vaulted, echoing ceiling. The chamber barely lit, Karl is unable to make out the precise number of attendees of this secret meeting, but is able to make out the voices of over a dozen men. Holding his breath and only occasionally daring to glance furtively, he listens as the men speak.
"We should be expecting another five men arriving within a day," one of the men says in a gruff voice. "We'll have them stay through the moon, and then they can continue north with Fakhrul's group."
"Splendid. This month should be a particularly fruitful one." The man speaking has an air of grace and power behind his voice, and Karl steals another careful peek out of a terrible charming curiosity. This man's silhouette is tall and powerful, his long straight hair clearly visible in front of the dim candle light. It is clear the other men hang on his every word, as does Karl now. His allure is irresistible.
"For too long we have had to arrange our pilgrimage in this way, sneaking and creeping in the bowels of the earth like common rats. This time, things will be different. The tunnels are finally completed, and with them, we have complete reign over this pathetic city. No longer will we be confined to caves and hovels. No longer will we be forced to eat the filthy rats and cats and pigs. From this moon onwards, Illivan will belong to us!"
The room erupts in a horrible, screeching sound, which rings in Karl's ears for far too long before he realizes it is cheering. The men have the same appalling coughing, barking laugh as the butcher from before, and Karl's blood runs cold at the sound of it. A horrible feeling of despair clouds over Karl, and, taking several stumbling steps backwards, he finally turns and runs from the terrible men.
Before he realizes where his feet have taken him, Karl finds himself in the rotting meat chamber. A quiet shuffling comes from one of the piles, and with a wretched gasp of air Ambrose pulls himself up from under the pile of sickly wet flesh. Visibly shaken but steadier every moment, Ambrose turns to Karl and gives him a weak look.
"Why was I in all this?", motioning at the meat.
"We have to get out of here immediately," interjects Karl, ignoring the question.
Retracing their footsteps is relatively easy, as though the cave is dark and winding, the journey back to the ladder is direct, with seldom any branches. Ambrose, under Karl's arm, manages to hustle relatively quickly given his condition, only needing to rest himself once. As the two approach the familiar ladder, with brazier light shining from above, they immediately catch themselves with a start. Voices carry from the basement, idly chatting. The two share a knowing look, and Karl places Ambrose down to rest against the damp cavern wall, where he sits, breathing quietly. Karl clambers gently up the ladder and peers carefully into the room, where the two visible men sit among the rugs.
"I'm not sure we can go out this way," Karl whispers down to Ambrose. "How much further can you go? There may beanother way out of here."
At that moment, Ambrose's eyes widen in fear. From no more than a bend or two within the cave, several men's voices carry. "It sounds as if they may be coming this way."
Thinking quickly, Karl palms a loose rock and hurls it at a brazier. With a loud clank, the brazier swings violently on its chain, spilling ashen coals all across the linens beneath it. The men in the basement cry out as a flame begins to spread across the room.
"Now! Hurry!"
Karl scrambles up the ladder, dragging Ambrose behind him. The two men, olive-skinned and with the faint look of bestial savageness, call out as Karl half carries Ambrose past them towards the stairs, but their attention is diverted by the fire now rapidly spreading towards the other flammable linens in the room. Ripping aside the curtain, Karl climbs the stairs, crashes through the dilapidated room, and bursts out the front door, only collapsing in a gasping heap, several streets away, when he can literally run no more.
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