Warlock! Something is Rotten in Grim Biskerstaf...

"Lambert, you okay? Dark abyss, you scared the shit out of me! Get away from that damn hole, will you?"

After making sure Lambert is fine, Trusova listens to Banio's conjecture.

"That would make sense. If these elves tossed that fancy box down the hole back in the day, stands to reason we could still find it at the bottom, if nobody beat us to it. Maybe there's an access to bottom of the hole down there, or something."

She figured that space would have seven severed heads, an ornate strongbox, and who knows what else.

"Lambert, that box that priest hurled into the hole? That's probably where the amulet is, yeah?"

Lambert stammers out:

"F…f…f…fine."

His teeth chattering in his head gives the opposite impression.

He just nods among the shaking to share his agreement with everyone’s assessment.

"B…b…body." he manages to mumble.

There’ll be a body on top of it…

Phelbt pushes away from the wall. "Let's try the stairs, then," he suggests, in a tone of declaration. "We aren't equipped to climb down there anyway."

Banio crosses to the exit, where he turns and waits expectantly for the taller and, frankly, more robust Trusova to lead the way. He does not quite tap his little foot, but he looks as if he'd like to.

Trusova helps Lambert away from the hole and toward the door. Seeing Banio's impatience, she can't help but agree.

She gives Lambert a slap and a shake. "Snap out of it Lambert! We have a job to do, and if we're going down the stairs we should do it right quick. If any more ghosts come up those stairs while we're going down, we'll be hard pressed to avoid them."

It had been Trusova's experience that a hint of a woman's disappointment was the swiftest antidote to many a man's ailments. Although she had been curt with Lambert, she would smooth it over later. She grabs her lantern and spear, and leads the group downward into the dark.

The slap stiffens the man, and sets the blood pumping around his body again.

"Reckon… the dwarf should lead." he says, pointing a quickly-steadying finger at Banio.

"All the ideas about where we should we, without him being the one being there." Lambert says, starting to get tripped up in his own point.

"Stand over the hole, Lambert Ninefingers." he quotes dismissively.

"You have no light, Lambert Ninefingers," Banio retorts, rattling his lantern for emphasis. "You want to bring up the rear, where anything might creep out of the darkness and nibble a few more of those fingers, then be my guest. But if you'll indulge another of my 'ideas,' then maybe you should go in the middle and compose yourself for the work ahead." He lingers by the stairs, waiting for Wolke to choose his place in their order.

Stand over the hole, indeed. It would've worked, if the cursed place weren't crawling with phantoms rather than beings of flesh and blood.

Descending Deeper into the Spire
And so with Trusova leading the way, and Banio taking up the rear, the trio begin their descent. First through the lower chamber below the room with the hole in the center, and then onto the narrow, winding stairs that plunge down, down into the darkness.

Their footfalls echo in their ears, reflecting off the ancient stone walls... the light from the lanterns dances and shifts, making mockeries of the shadows each of them normally knows so well. And as they go, warily, it is into a dankness and dampness which they descend. There's a smell that grows stronger with each step, the stench of ages, and of rot and old bile. The gloom seems to press in around them, fluttering their lantern flames, and each of them become aware of the cold as they delve deeper, undoubtedly past the water line outside. There is proof of this soon enough when trickling water makes itself known on the walls... dark fluid that drips and dribbles from every side.

Phelbt isn't sure if he hears the clicking sound again or not; his ears are playing tricks and there seems no shortage of sound that comes from his two companions. Their breath, the creak of leather, the scuff of boots.

Then, after what seems an interminable descent, Trusova finds herself at the bottom. There is an inch of water on the cold stone floor, and a smooth, featureless passage that ends in a door. But this tall and broad door is stone, covered in elven engravings that look to be arcane in nature, and long ago sealed at its edges with what looks perhaps like wax or tallow.

"Does any of this meaning anything to either of you?" Trusova inquires, gesturing at the ancient elven carvings. "If not, then we'd best get at it. Perhaps we can carve the wax seal away to get purchase for a pry bar."

"Don’t make no sense to have a fancy door like this guarding the bottom of a hole in the ground. You lot set on traipsing through an elven ruin then?"

Banio doesn't know whether to be relieved or troubled that the faint noise he heard before has not recurred. Could it have been his imagination? Or might the source of that sound simply be still now, sleeping or lying in wait? He crosses to the runic door, brushes strings of hair away from one ear, and places ear to stone.

"Your amulet must be in there somewhere," the wee fellow mutters. "Either we go in or we go home."

Then Banio falls quiet, and listens through the door for any sound he might be able to discern.

Lambert gets a better look at the door as Banio moves forward to place his ear against it... and the tomb robber sees that the words suddenly shift and make sense to him. He can read elvish! It must be the ring. Just as he read the flowery script on the side of the wand, he can read the graven words now in front of him!

Banio's ruddy cheek and pink ear press on the cool, mottled and damp stone of the door... and that's when he hears it again! The now terrifying clicking sound, as it is much closer now!

Lambert reads the words aloud, standing in the soggy puddle at the bottom of the steps.

"Beware Friend, For Our Doom Lies Coiled Within The Depths… To Trespass Here Is To Risk Your Soul… Pray to the Wild Wood for Her Loving Protection… Within The Spawn of the Wyrm Sleeps… Sated By Human Flesh… Surrounded by Bone."

He looks to the other two.

"All this, for ten sodding gold coins? All that…? What was that you was saying about going home?"

"Wait, the payout for this amulet thing is just 10 gold coins? If we have to split that three ways, I made more money skimming gunk off the Vassen!"

"Well, it was twelve gold, as I remember. Then there’s my finders fee, of course. And the ten leftover were meant to split five ways. So splitting it three is that bit better.

Plus all the assorted jewels and what have you."

"Plus all the assorted jewels and what have you," Wolke is saying, when suddenly his voice breaks, changes, and utters a string of words that visibly surprise the man.

Through the door you must now go! Claim the prize that lurks below!
Worth your while this will be! So close are you to pleasing me!

While this is happening, Banio is hearing the clicking... but he's having trouble placing where it's coming from. Seemingly all around them, and when he turns to look at Lambert he sees it. A pair of pinprick eyes in the gloom, then the rest of a frightful, ancient grey face that splits to reveal rows of needle-like fangs before his eyes. There's a crevice in the inner tower wall behind his companions, five feet above their heads, and something fearsome and terrifying lurks there!

Before the portly man can call out a warning, the fiend comes partly out of its hole, reaching out with spindly, spidery limbs and filthy claws that are far too long for the thing's size...

Sudden grasped, before he can even comment on the words that came from his mouth, Lambert is in a struggle with something as yet unseen. Instinct makes him try to break free!

Well. That's where the clicking was coming from...

Strangely, the resolution of this mystery acts as a counterweight to Banio's surge of panic. Dire knowledge, but it flatters his perspicacity and keeps the little man in command of his wits.

"Wolke! Get away from the wall!" Phelbt cries, too late. He jabs a pudgy finger up and behind the thief, aimed squarely between those eyes peering from the shadows. "There's something up there!"

Something that now crouches between their motley crew and escape. Holding his lantern as steadily as he can in his off hand, Banio paws about for the hilt of his dagger and manages to draw the weapon.

Cold, strong hands find purchase on Wolke, and like that the man is being dragged backwards, towards the wall. The skin of those terribly long arms is black and waxy, wrinkled and rough. The knuckles are gnarled and knobby, the nails long, hard, and sharp as broken flint. Lambert can feel them press into him, piercing his clothes, his skin.

Breath explodes from the man's lungs and he's slammed into the stone wall -- and then his feet leave the ground and the monster begins hauling him up!