Chapter 2 - The Fortress

Acting on pure instinct Ütés starts to take a swing at the man's hand as it approaches but she quickly holds herself in check. While appreciating the man's attempt to console her she ignores his statement, knowing in her mind that she failed in her task. With the man's hand extended Ütés slowly rises to her feet under her own power.

All business and not in the mood for any surprises she responds, "I am Ütés Arc. What do you know of this place?"

Aelar stumbles back into the room. Now that the battle is over all of his energy and adrenaline are gone. We walks over to Talia's body and closes her eyes, ignoring everything but her still form.

He leans down and places a tender kiss on her forehead, knowing that he'd never get the chance to tell her how he felt. He stands quietly for a moment, staring at the still form before him before he hands the key he found to Ramas and steps into the hallway. He finds a spot just a bit down the hallway and begins sobbing, unable to stop himself any longer. There he stays until someone comes to get him.

Ah, this place? Not sure, he seemed to have a thing for gothic castles. Never truly understood it. Too much time in...well...a different time I guess, the man says. He moves slowly but with some purpose as he turns to see Aelar leave the room. He leaves Ütés where she is and strides out to the hall where Aelar is.

Dude, I'm sorry about your lady. Do you by chance have an axe...er...lute. I forget here they're called lutes, he asks, seeming to have a fairly bad time of mourning and loss.

After a few moments of contemplation Ramas takes the key and unlocks Alanna from the shackles. She staggers forward on legs of a sleepwalker, barely holding her up. He quickly clubs her in the back of the head with the hilt of a sword and she crumpled, unconscious. He catches her as she falls and lays her down gently.

There, that should buy us some time with her. We may need to find a healer, I'm not even sure what this is. I've never seen this before. I had heard what happened to all of you and could hardly believe it.

As he says that the building shakes a bit more as you see the north east tower collapse. A good portion of the keep roof has caved in too. This tower may not stand much longer.

Aelar looks at the odd man before handing over his lute.

He plucks a few strings and tweaks the tuning pins a bit until he seems satisfied. "Righteous. So, dude. Your going to want to check this out...", he starts to say as suddenly the ground shakes and you hear what sounds like the third of the four towers collapsing. The old man looks around. "Oh, this timing is most heinous. Aelar, if you want to see your love again you need to go get her and we must away, and stuff." he slings the lute over his shoulder and, moving a little quicker this time, returns to the main tower room.

"We need to get everyone out quite soonly", the old man commands.

Aelar barely hears the words at first, caught up in grief as he is. Suddenly the words register and he leaps to his feet and rushes back to the room, "We have to go, now!" he says, picks up Talia's body gently and prepares to leave.

The old man remembers the lute and pulls it forward. He closes his eyes and trills out a small tune, the last note of which is punctuated by the collective clatterings of all of the cage locks opening in the room. The survivors inside, and the other members of Aelar's troupe are among those set free. The rest, unlike the sisters, seem relatively unharmed, if a little gaunt from lack of food.

Ramas hefts the other, now limp, sister over his shoulder and prepares to follow Aelar and the rest.

Feeling the ground shake beneath her feet Ütés braces herself against the wall as Aelar runs back into the room. "Go where?" she blurts but quickly realizes it's not the 'where' that's important right now. She quickly retrieves her shield as the bard takes Talia's body into his arms. "I'll lead! You take care of her..." she pauses as she realizes there are still prisoners in the room.

Aelar follows the others out of the collapsing tower.

"Move! Move! Move!!"

Ramas does his best to dodge the falling ceiling pieces when they reach the bottom of the tower and must cross through the main keep.

"Ahhhh! My neck!" my hands immediately go to my neck where poor Fawkes had been ripped apart. Wordlessly, I drag my feet and follow the others outside.

The now large group of adventurers, Aelar's troupe, and captives round the bottom of the stairs to the last standing tower in this keep you see large chunks of stone are now collapsing from the roof of the keep into the space below. A mad-dash ensues, the more nimble in the group try and find a path to lead others through to avoid the collapsing building, but the group as a whole sustains some damage, and a few of the captives get crushed by falling debris. Ramas leads the group up to the main wooden doors to the keep, shoulders the door open and leads the group outside. You find that the chaos started by the barrel explosion has absolutely devestated the keep and the gates outside. Mostly all that is left is various goblins trying to get out across the bridge leading in to the keep.

Outside you find a cart left behind, a stabbed goblin sits in the front seat, he seems to have been wounded by a sword. The horses look skittish and nervous, ready to run. A clear path to the front gate is seen. You can see the stables you had previously been in are open and the covered cart that was in there before is now gone, the prisoners must have made off in the chaos.

What do you do?

"To the gate!!!" Ütés yells and dashes off in that direction.

"Oh yes, of course!" I wait for the others to go ahead of me first, then I follow.

Aelar readjusts Talia in his grip and follows after the girls.