To My Fellow Harpers! Please view!

[jalahon]

Just take it.

Halaster was staring at him intently, with his arm stretched out before him. Staring at him the way a mentor considers hhis student's actions. Or maybe it was they way a cat watches a mouse, waiting for the right oppurtunity to strike. It was the crossroads of his magical study, again.

For decades, he had toiled under the tutelage of the Dark Master, and everyday had been a testament to his will to survive and his determination to master the Shadow Weave. Some days, Jalahon would accompany his teacher on walks through caverns of polished crystal, and they would discuss the semantics and possible variations of already known spells. It was as if Halaster already had clear access to Jalahon's mind, for every idea that Jala offered, Halaster expounded upon it with his ageless wisdom to craft it into something much greater. He truly was a Master of the Art. He was also truly insane.

It was on these other days that Halaster would run him through a deadly gauntlet to test not only what he had learned, but also how quickly he could adapt to any situation. Jalahon had faced all manners of twisted creations be them alive, undead or mechanical. These tests of wit and resourcefulness were merely the beginning for those who wished to study this particular school of magic. To be honest, many of the few select individuals Halaster decided to teach either ended up dead in a particularly nasty fashion, or roaming the corridors of Undermountain, gibbering and semi-comatose (These also eventually ended up dead in a particularly nasty fashion.)

Those who wielded the most powerful magics faced much stricter consequences.

He had seen his master deal with the result of a fallen Shadow Arch-Mage. The Shade, Halaster had later named it, had managed to breach the Demi-plane of Shade abd had entered Undermountain through one of it's many Teleport gates. The being had no form at all, it's blotchy pitch-black mass shifting continuously. Jalahon still remembered the crimson-red hate filled eyes as his master forced it back through a rift of his own making into the barren wastelands of Shade. He fought down his nausea as wave after wave of concentrated evil and power radiated out of the gaping vortex until his mentor forced it closed, the edges slamming together with the sound of a thunderclap.

The feeling of pure, undilluted power was never forgotten.

Shortly after, Jalahon decided he did not have the will power to make the final ascent to magical mastery. This was not a decision made lightly, as Halaster would surely try to kill him if he was caught trying to escape.

Many days later, Jalahon was found, battered, bloody and scarcely breathing by a group of adventurers who put out from the Yawning Portal Inn, seeking glory and wealth. He was carried the remaining few leagues into the light of Waterdeep, where he recovered slowly under the care of the leader of the expidition and his wife. Weeks later, he decided to join a local mages guild for, at the very least, some mental exercise. He quickly found that his abilities far surpassed his wizarding peers. For a while, life was interesting; there was much to explore in this grand city. Inevitably, thought, the luster of the new atmosphere began to fade. His mind, since it could no longer stretch against its limits down new venues of magic, began to stagnate.

He would have probably ended his own life after his first year of surface life if not for Mikar Darkraven and Ferdelon Tol' Kirin. The unlikely pair, a human priest and an elven blade master respectively, approached him with an intriguing job offer. As enemies of the Shadow's more insidious elements, they needed the insight of one who had been on the inside, one who knew the intracacies of the foe.

He accepted.

Now, he was staring into the face of his old mentor.

Where had he come from?

"You think I am here to kill you." Halaster said, without even the faintest hint of emotion.

Jalahon, try as might, could not speak.

"I should kill you. You are WEAK", he sneered in rage. "You don't have to be weak, though. You don't have to scrounge out a living next to these pitiful Excidium Umbra fools." His voice slowly settled back to a silky smooth whisper.

"Not when you could complete your transition to immortality by simply reaching out your hand and accepting my gift. I am offering you a second chance at greatness."

Jalahon was finally able to break eye contact, as he slowly looked down at Halaster's wizened hand. An obsidian ring hovered inches above his former master's leathery, creased palm.

An obsidian ring stained with blood.

Absolute power was his for the taking. All he had to do was reach out and claim it for his own. Something was screaming a warning in the back of his mind. He looked up to find Halater's face replaced with the snarling visage of a Red Wizard.

"You want the Ring, illusionist?", he thundered. "Wear it with pride!", he said as he forced the ring onto Jalahon's strangely immobile hand.

The world erupted into a white inferno of agony.

He awoke and immediately fell into a fit of coughing. The dream had been occuring so regularly now that he could play the whole thing back in his mind while awake. He had one last thought before drifting back into slumber.

Absolute Power

[Nitania]

“The time of misery is at hand, when all creatures will seek to find a balance. Many souls have been lost. Trapped. Yet the battle has not even begun. Fear races across the land, planting seeds small enough to go unnoticed until the blackened roots of fate bind us all, one by one. All flesh is anchored by their power.” The cloaked figure crouching in front of the small gathering seemed to loom, even though age had taken what little height he had once possessed. All self-assurance and reeking of knowledge, this little giant of a man, mighty in his wisdom spoke words nobody wanted to hear. “You heed my summons to this meeting with gloom in your hearts. You gather yourselves together without being unified” The soft voice seemed to fill the air as he peered out from under his hooded cloak. “One by one you fall. One by one you each find your own destiny, yet there are those among you who fritter away what small bit of knowledge I impart by letting your naïve ways control your lives.” Each person in the small assembly felt the weight of those words. A few glanced about the room, feeling uneasy.

It was a very mismatched group, to say the least. Six races represented their people that night. All remained silent and watchful. “We have a great need to put our bigotry and hatred aside. The time has come at last for all to band together.” As the old man spoke, the uneasiness in the room grew. “You have been chosen. There will be others who are chosen and because of that, each of you must decide here and now that you will do what must be done. We fight to destroy the threatening Shadow.”

After what seemed like hours, finally his words ceased. Mumblings began as a few of the chosen representatives started either talking to themselves or to another nearby. Grunts and snorts of displeasure circled through the small crowd coming mostly from the less intelligent of the chosen as they began speaking of their displeasure at having to ‘bond’ with those they whom would rather eat. Nitania looked on as the tiny speaker hobbled his way out of the room, eyes never looking away from him. She rose from the plain wooden chair she had been seated in since the meeting began and left the room silently, so as not to be noticed.

The door had not yet closed behind the mysterious old man before Nitania had reached it, but even so, he was nowhere to be seen. Just as she started to walk down the long windowless hallway, she could hear footsteps behind her. She waited for a few moments, to make sure her mind was not playing a trick. The sounds of footfalls continued. As she spun smoothly to see who was following her, the room flickered and she saw nothing. There was nothing. There was nobody behind her, there was no length of hallway she had walked, no doorway she had passed through. The world had ceased to exist once she exited the gathering room. Breath caught in her throat, she turned again, very slowly. When she came full around, her blood ran chilled. Standing less than three paces in front of her, the cloaked speaker had his hood thrown back to show his face. She recognized that face.

The all too familiar feeling of horror consumed Nitania as the old man’s persona changed. He was no longer the hunched and gnarled calm-voiced speaker; he had somehow morphed into a twisted shape of the same man, with a gaunt drawn-out face seemingly too angular and bony to be human any longer. He didn’t visibly change, he just was one, then the other. She knew him. A lich. His now lank, oily hair hung to disproportionately large shoulders, his once black cloak now the color of freshly spilled blood. His lips curved upward in a snarl resembling a grin, spittle sliding out of his mouth as he began to laugh. A sound like rusted steel slicing through rotted wood. She knew the bargain she had made would haunt her, but this hardly seemed possible. Reaching instinctively for one of the many daggers she kept about her body, Nitania froze. Her daggers were gone… all of them were gone! She was no longer wearing her favorite velvet cloak. She was no longer wearing anything at all.

The wretched man-creature reached out toward Nitania, fingers writhing in anticipation of touching her flesh. His wicked grin growing so wide it nearly split his face in two. There was no movement on his part, but he was sliding closer to her. Sliding nearer her bare body, cackling with that nasty laughter. There was no period of time between the realization of being naked and feeling him drawing nearer, knowing he needed to touch her, than she began to run. There was nowhere to run, nowhere to hide inside this gray-nothing place, but she ran anyway. She knew if he managed to touch her, she would go mad.

Pumping her legs as fast as she could manage, Nitania could feel her lungs burning with the effort of sucking in enough air to keep up her flight. The effort of just moving seemed to be more than she could handle. Blood rushing through unconstricted veins made her heartbeat sound like drums hammering in her ears. Finally, when she could run no more, she stumbled and fell, landing with a painful jolt onto a cold marbled floor. Blinking to clear the sweat pouring into her eyes, Nitania was able to see where she was. It was night now and it was cold. Sweat beaded along her naked body, running down her spine and between her breasts. As she rose to unsteady feet, she heard a noise from behind her. She spun around as quickly as she could manage, expecting to find her pursuer but instead she saw an extremely familiar scene. She was in her own bedroom. Her husband was asleep in their bed, tossing and turning as usual.

On legs as wobbly as a badly made wheel, she approached the slumbering man. She halted mid-step as the other side of the bed began to move. Forcing herself not to stumble over her own feet took the last bit of strength she had left. She could only see a vague form underneath the thin silk sheets, but she needed to know who it was, sleeping in her stead. Padding quietly and cautiously around the corner of the bed, she gently grasped the sheet in one hand while the other was poised to lock onto the throat of this usurper. Just as she flung the fabric aside, she caught sight of herself in the ornately carved stand mirror next to the bed. A vaguely familiar face, slack with age peered back at her. Skin sagging, hair graying, muscles atrophied, on a body too thin to be healthy. She ripped her eyes away from the mirror, too horrified at the sight to do anything but breathe in and out. Another slight motion from the bed brought her back from despair. She looked down at the woman lying in her bed beside her loving husband and new shock overwhelmed her. Nitania peered into her own face, youthful and beautiful.

She staggered backwards, shock hitting her like a punch to the chest. Already feeble legs, exhausted from the effort of running, collapsed and the ground rushed up to meet her. Cold hard marble met her head with blinding agony, bringing flashes of white lights stealing away vision. Just before blackness consumed her, she heard the dry sound of mad laughter, laughter of the Thayvian lich who had bound her. Unconsciousness swept over her in a rush.

Gasping for breath, Nitania screamed herself awake, sitting bolt upright, panting. More falling than getting out of bed, she tried to run over to the mirror, but ended up knocking it off kilter after a pair of matching vases shattered on the floor. Catching a toe in the knotted golden fringe of a rug she too went down. She fell on the tiny pieces of porcelain splayed out in front of the mirror and stayed there, touching her reflection while weeping softly to herself. It was her own image she saw. Her own beautiful image. Tears washed down Nitania’s face, wetting her cheeks. Moaning out loud, she continued to sit there and cry. It had all been a dream. A nightmare. Another bad nightmare. They were getting worse, and they were getting more frequent.

***************************************

Gantoris lay very still in the bed he shared with his wife, eyes wide with worry. She had broken a set of vases and did not seem to realize she was bleeding. He watched concernedly on as she sat naked in front of the mirror, trembling and sweating while she patted her reflection. Tears streaming down her face betrayed only part of a remorse that had to run bone-deep inside her. He knew what she had gotten herself into… part of it anyway, but he could never let on that he knew. So, alone and quiet he lay, pretending not to see her but unable to look away. Unshed tears glistened in his eyes, as he shook with the effort of not rushing to her side.


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[Clan Blindhammer]

Artikerus lifted his hammer, a much smaller one than his usual weapon of choice, and slammed it home. He lifted it again, and with a grunt, slammed it home again. He stood back and wiped his brow. He looked around at his fellow clansmen, each toiling under the overcast sun, building what was to soon be Castle Blindhammer. Much had been done, and much more needed to be.

Each Duergar that passed the surly king looked away uneasily, wondering what had driven the usually lazy dark dwarf to manual labor. Artikerus knew what they were thinking, knew what the looks meant, and whenever he could, he raised the small ring that hung from a leather cord around his neck, so they could see.

They were still loyal, as Duergar go. And this was what the dark dwarves of Clan Blindhammer had yearned for ever since being driven from Mithril Hall. It was their home, their surface home, where for some, their true gods could be worshipped. Artikerus did not so much worship as any other Duergar did, any more. He had been wholly faithful to the dragon Shimmergloom, an evil shadow dragon, who had routed the dwarves of Mithril Hall in the beginning. When Shimmergloom was slain, and the Duergar were forced from the Halls, Artikerus lost his faith, moreso in himself than in the shadow dragon, and so to fell his clerical abilities. They were returning, as he spent more and more time on the surface. His Clan, also, noticed a returning of strength. Many did not worship the normal Duergar gods,such as Laduguer, but worshipped Dwarven dieties of the surface races, such as Moradin and Clangeddin. Even as the ruling clan of Gloomhaven, this was frowned on, and many hid it to within their own homes. Many of the Duergar of Clan Blindhammer blamed their absence from the surface as the reason they did not recieve the same blessing of procreation, the Thunder Blessing, that saved the surface dwarf races from extinction. With that bitter hatred in mind, the Duergar of Clan Blindhammer toiled endlessly in the surface, for their king, and their gods.

The ring, however, was the key to everything. The clansmen had seen it's power, on many a Thayan Wizard now, who had travelled down to the Underdark, to the shining gates of Gloomhaven, and been captured by Blindhammer guards. There, Artikerus had given them what they had desired, the evil ring of soul entrapment - but not in the way they had truly wanted it. By placing the ring on their finger, the wizards very soul was taken, and its body burned to a scorched husk. And with the tale that Artikerus spun, of the hordes of shadowspawn destroying the surface world, all of the clansmen knew the surface races would do well to leave the surly king to his designs if they expected help in destroying the dangerous artifacts.

Artikerus accepted the varying views of his clansmen, who as few would guess, were rarely of his own bloodline. Just as each Duergar pantheon of gods lost it's faithful to the surface dwarf pantheons, so did his clan grow from a hodgepodge of the dark dwarves of Gloomhaven. Artikerus was no different, or in fact, he was the most different of norm for the duergar. He was a dark dwarf, with more than a bit of dwarven blood in him. He had hair, albeit mostly implanted, which looked very odd for the normally bald dark dwarves. His brother Drulokerus, who unbeknownst to the rest of the clan, was nearly half surface dwarf as well, and grew a small amount of curly black locks on his dome as well. Artikerus harbored an illithid in his throne room - an evil mindflayer, a being who had been partly responsible for the duergar races' prolonged stay in the underdark. It was the illithids who had enslaved the duergar race, and, because their minds were so warped by the evil psionicists, the dwarven pantheon was not able to impart the Thunder Blessing. Illithids were hated by all Duergar, and yet SSixxizzirrill was not tortured or killed as others were. Many knew of the artifact of bonding that kept Ssixxizzirrill a slave to the Duergar King, but few appreciated the presence of their one-time captors. Artikerus also had many contacts on the surface, and had taken more than a remote liking to surface elven women. To say the least, Artikerus was the worst representative of the Duergar race...

...and the best. No other Duergar had dreamed for so much, and then taken it. No Duergar, save those of Clan Blindhammer, had ever dreamed of reaching the surface. Mithril Hall had been lost, but now, the dream was being realized in full, as Castle Blindhammer slowly came to fruition.

Artikerus banged again on the steel spike, althought it's head was already flush with the solid stone. His eyes glazed as he saw his future, of the mithril throne and the power of his Clan coming into full.

Artikerus knew what he was doing. He always knew. He just had to make sure the others believed as he believed.
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Ssixxizzirrill concentrated briefly and the area around him dimmed. He squinted down and watched as his captor, King Artikerus, toiled away on the stone foundation. The Duergar of Gloomhaven never ceased to surprise the arrogant illithid, and indeed, the groundwork for the castle, nestled deep within some dark woods in a small crag of mountains, was coming along nicely. Ssixxizzirrill waggled his tentacles in frustration. He couldn't psionically attack Artikerus while he wielded the dried tentacles of bonding, an evil artifact that Ssixxizzirrill had actually been sent by the Central Brain to study. Illithids had eons to retrieve information, and so patience was not a finite commodity, but no mindflayer willingly became a slave.

And now..a new artifact beckoned to the illithid. A ring. A ring of power, that would bring the illithids of Ixarkon out in droves, would enslave the entire world with the power of the ring.

Ssixxizzirrill waggled it's tentacles in frustration and faded away.

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King Artikerus Blindhammer
Patron of Clan Blindhammer
Fallen Priest of Shimmergloom
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Kiaransalee responds to your petition with 'I have no opinion, keeps me out of trouble.'

[Iduna]

As I sit in the park just inside the gates of WaterDeep
I think to myself I must log the happenings that has occurred over thus past weekend...

Taking a journal from my bag along with a quill..I take these notes:
_____________________________________________________________
I have come to meet Nilan standing at TP during my usual walk and although the stories I have heard sound horrid I did not feel unsafe as I stood with him. He has told me he worries of his wife Elisten and was hoping TP would be a place where he could perhaps see her even if only briefly. I had seen Elisten the night before and assured him she was well, yet tired. I have become fond of Elisten she is truly delightful someone so sweet could not marry the type of person the rumors make Nilan out to be.
Our conversation continued as many came and gathered there preparing for there journeys. He asked if I had heard of someone named Sedulos..I had not come across anyone by that name but told him if I had heard anything I would be sure to let him know. As day broke and the sun rose Nilan seemed pained by the light, he is quiet kind to still stay and talk with me.
What he told me next was quiet shocking to me.
He had said he had found the body of Aleena Paladinstar daughter of Lord Piergeiron,along with a childs body of Nilan's kin,her name I do not know. I know Arilyn Moonblade also searches for her as well I do not think he Arilyn knows of this information.
I had asked Nilan if Aleena had died by his hand. He had told me No and I write his word exactly. " I dont think that matters to most, especially the lord of WaterDeep".
He told me where he had found the bodies of these girls but I am afraid to write them here. I tend to be disorganized at time IM afraid this journal may end up in the wrong hands and I would not want any harm to come to any one who may be innocent.
I believe Nilan for some reason I do not feel threatened by him.

P.S.
On another Note my sister Eslina and
I also met King Artikerus Blindhammer
although a Drudger he had quiet a sense of humor.
He thinks of himself as quiet a Ladies man.
Maybe he should frighten me if only a little.
_____________________________________________________________

Iduna presses her journal tightly and ties it with a small strand of golden rope puts it back in her bag and begins her day.

[Clan Blindhammer]

Och! Sisters!? Indeed, I do be thinkin' I'm more'n a might lucky to be meetin ye! An' to be thinkin' o all me fantasies ye were leavin out with'in me thinkin' ye just strangers!


:)