A dwarven bard's tale

[Twin Axes]

A blinding flash and a sudden gust of wind, that shoved him with the force of a thousand battering rams. Strangely, Golinar felt like he didn’t move at all, but sat for an eternity with his hands on the neck of the bottle they had just uncovered from the dirt, watching with fascination how the wire that was attached to the cork was yanked by the motion, and how the small spark burst forth. When that eternity had passed though, he was flat on his back, somewhere else.All he could see was darkness, and stars swimming crazily in it. He could feel nothing. For a while. The everything was on fire.

He could hear. Distant voices were clamoring and he had a sense of being borne by something. He could hear his own voice too, roaring with pain. The darkness was gone from his eyes, everything was bathed in a red glow now. The stars were still there. Faces he thought he should know flitted in and out of his vision. Then it went dark again.

He opened his eyes. Dark brown wood grain. He was floating over a floor of heavy wooden beams. A sudden vertigo contorted his guts. No, he was looking up, at a ceiling. He gazed at the wood for a while, without moving. His skin was crawling, itching, painful. He closed his eyes.

When he came to, Golinar found that he was in the chirurgeon’s ward in Rivermoot’s Tyrrian temple. Yes, he had been here before, when they had all just arrived, sore and in need of care after the long journey. Some had festering wounds on their ankles that had to be treated with the priestly magic. More recent memories seeped back into his mind. The freshly dug heap of earth. The strange bundle of bottle, wire and canvas under it. Once again, he realized, his penchant for digging up buried treasure had got the better of him. Ah, but those grubby fingers of his just couldn’t contain themselves, even as Cas had shouted a warning over his shoulder. That roguish girl would prove her value to the group, it would seem. Most of the time, she spoke too much and out of turn. This time she couldn’t have spoken soon enough. Well, Golinar thought to himself, the value of having associates is that you don’t have to do everything yourself. Now that Moradin had seen fit to let him live to learn, he would try to put that lesson to good use. Delegate, delegate. Yes. Cassima would deal with all suchlike contraptions from now on. Speaking of which. She had stood right next to him when the blast occurred. He wondered if she had been caught in it. That would have been poor payment for warning him. He looked around. The other beds were empty, except for a leprous stranger who lay coughing across the room. He wondered again, and a sense of worry gripped him. She had stood too close to avoid the blast, for sure. So where was she now if not here? It was not likely she had gotten off any lighter than he, wisp of a girl as she was. Good Moradin, he murmured. Sure, Dugmaren extolled his followers to always strive to uncover knowledge, but not at all costs. Golinar’s position as leader of the group meant that he had a certain responsibility for his associates’ safety. He prayed that the girl had lived.

[johnlewismcleod]

Very well done...more, please.

[darrenhfx]

I was hoping that you'd pick up your pen again.