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Alyra turns towards Ceri just in time to see Storm's form fading into nothingness. "Hmmm." Ceri looks to Alyra rather like she's actually seen a ghost. "Are you OK, Ceri?"
"W-what just happened?!" Ceri half shrieks, clearly not okay.
"Ummm... She woke up?"
"Woke-- oh. Oh." Ceri visibly calms down. "I, uh, keep forgetting we're in Dreaming." She gives a sheepish grin.
Alyra smiles sympathetically. "It is kind of an odd feeling," she admits. "I sometimes wake up and think I'm dreaming -- only I know it's not a dream, because I'm not here." She ponders that a moment. "I remember wondering once, when I was very small, if all my life up to then had been a dream, and what if I woke up? Now I wonder if -- oh, never mind. Look, shall we go in after all? Come on, Gl-- Oh. I guess he must have awakened, too."
"Well, if you want." Ceri looks up at the large double-doors. Which were closed. "Do you have a key?"
"No... at least, not that I know of. I never knew it to be locked before." Alyra tries the doors, which swing open easily -- almost too easily -- and meet the walls to either side with an ominous ka-dooom.
Ceri jumps.
Alyra looks up at the lintel over the door. "What are you doing up there, Ceri? The door's down here."
"Yes, and I'm up here." Ceri answers.
Alyra sighs and shakes her head. "OK, maybe it's not the best time to visit the castle. You're obviously still a bit on edge. Why don't we go for a walk instead?"
Ceri jump-- climb-- fall-- er, gets down, and is several paces towards the lift before Alyra finishes speaking. "Good idea!" the brunette says eagerly.
Alyra follows her friend, still shaking her head, but now chuckling to herself. "OK, where should we go?" Despite her question, she already has a goal in mind, and veers to the right, away from the lift and towards the path that leads to the city on the cliffs. With Ceri following her, she heads down the path and makes her way through the maze of cobbled walkways -- up, down, over, under, down, and up again (was it really this convoluted on the old island? she asks herself) -- and finally comes to a halt at the entrance to the Toasted Rodent tavern.
Ceri wrinkles her nose at the name. "I'm not all that hungry. What are we doing here?"
"Exploring." They are standing on a narrow wood dock with the ocean at their feet. Alyra looks at the door to the tavern, and then at the entrance to the lift across from it. "Well, if you're not hungry..." She summons the lift, which slowly emerges from the dark waters below.
Ceri stares wide-eyed at the slowly rising drenched lift, then turns and gives Alyra an incredulous look. "I don't really feel like swimming either," she says.
Alyra grins. "Don't worry; if it's anything like the waking world, you won't even know you're underwater."
"What?!"
"Look, if you're worried about it, I'll go first, and prove it to you." Without waiting for an answer, Alyra steps onto the lift, seats herself, and sends it into the depths.
"Wait! Where does that thing go?" Ceri calls out quickly.
Alyra does not answer; she is at that moment plunging beneath the frigid Port Luskan sea.
Ceri stares at the rippling water for a long moment, then starts digging in her belt-purse. After a moment she pulls out some parchment, a stick with a charred end wrapped in a cloth, and a stoppered glass bottle.
After scribbling down her message, Ceri stuffs it in the small but heavy bottle and stuffs the cork back in the neck. As the lift begins to rise, she moves carefully to one side and drops the message.
As the bottle falls, the lift rises from the water. Alyra sits on the bench, perfectly calm, perfectly dry. "To the Dwarven Hall," she says in answer to Ceri's question, and hands her the bottle which has fallen neatly into her lap. "Did you drop this?"
Ceri's right eye twitches as she takes the bottle back. "Thanks," she mutters. "Anyway, why are you going down there?"
"Like I said, exploring. I just wanted to show you that there's nothing to worry about. You don't get wet, and you end up in the Dwarven Hall, which is dry and actually quite comfy. They have a great tavern. Want to see?"
Ceri hesitates for a moment. "Well... I suppose." She steps forward and onto the lift. Despite the drenched appearance of the roof, it is actually quite dry. Ceri begins to relax.
Then it reaches the water -- and keeps going.
Alyra watches impassively as they slide silently downward through the open water -- which seems to have no substance whatever -- and into the lift shaft proper. They barely have time to notice the hewn rock walls before they land in a large open hall, constructed of fine dwarven stonework. Massive wooden doors to the north promise entry into the Dwarven Tavern, while to the south a large passageway leads into the darkness of the mines. To one side is an alcove with a small fountain. Alyra looks about, for the first time showing a touch of nervousness; then she relaxes. "Oh, good. No sign of the big golden kitty cat."
Ceri stands stark still for a long moment, only her eyes moving. Finally she relaxes. It actually seems rather open down here. Then she hears Alyra's comment. "What kitty?"
"The big gold one that the dwarves were so set on keeping back on the first island. They actually brought it with them, if you can believe that! when we moved to the second island. It was one of the three monsters we fought in the mine cave-in. Remember? There was the gold cat, the sandy man, the mummy..." Alyra thinks a moment. "Oscar. One of them was named Oscar."
Ceri gives her a nervous look. "And you wanted to come back down here without knowing if it would attack us?"
"It wasn't here when we left the old island. But it was when we first arrived. But it's not there now. So it's OK." Alyra pauses, then adds, with perhaps not quite as much conviction as she would like, "Really.
"But you know, that was nothing compared to what we faced here. I mean Abiorn--" Alyra stops quite suddenly and looks down the south passage. There is a very long silence, which is finally broken by Alyra. "Um," she says, eloquently. She looks back to find Ceri edging back into the lift. "Um," she says again, and then looks back at the passage, then back at her friend. "Are you going? I mean, I can kind of understand. This -- well, down there -- used to be Abiorn's territory. And it might still be, but we don't know, and we won't know unless we... Um." This said with a pronounced sense of "um."
Ceri gives her a wide-eyed Look. "I thought you said this was the Dwarven Hall!"
"It is." Alyra regards her solemnly, then gestures vaguely at the tunnel to the south. "The Hollows is down thataway -- or used to be. Or it might be down a different tunnel; they kind of branched a bit. But it's down that way somewhere, if it's here at all. So as long as we're up here, we should be OK. Unless..."
Ceri gives her a flat look. "That's not very reassuring."
"Nothing about this island is exactly reassuring," Alyra states, realizing as she speaks that this is probably one of the least reassuring things she might have said. "Um," she finishes, purely for the sake of consistency.
Ceri reaches for the lever. "Well that's nice. Going up?"
Alyra sighs. "So... does that mean you're not going to go exploring with me?"
"Let me put it this way -- this room seems nice and big, but where else do you expect me to go?"
"Well... I was thinking... I mean, when we left, the Hollows was empty. Dead. I mean, dead quiet. No one about. You could walk through there and nothing happened. No goblins with bows, no beholders... it was very boring." She grins lopsidedly. "So... want to go check it out?"
Ceri takes a firm hold of the lift's lever. "No, not particularly," she manages.
Alyra looks at her friend and sighs again. "Oh, well, it was just a thought. I suppose I can come back down later... alone..." In her voice you can almost hear the unspoken phrase, "in the dark."
By this point Ceri is frozen, and white as a sheet. But having firm control of the lever now, the lift will not be leaving without her. Although it might be leaving without Alyra, if she doesn't hurry up and get on.
"Ceri? Are you all right?" Alyra moves towards her friend, which puts her, of course, on the lift.
Which immediately begins to rise, as Ceri's arms give a great and sudden jerk on the lever.
Alyra, not yet seated, is thrown off-balance by the lift's sudden departure. She manages to regain her composure but not her feet, and ends up sitting on the stone floor as the lift rises out of sight above her. At this point Alyra's stubborn side kicks in. Determined not to be gotten the better of by a rickety piece of gnomish technology, she gets to her feet, grasps the lever and gives it a yank of her own. The lift groans to a stop at the end of its appointed course, then in obedience to the new command, reverses direction and descends once more.
Above ground again, Ceri picks herself up from the middle of the floor. The lift rises up and stops at the dock -- and immediately starts back down again. Ceri is not amused. Having made it back down to the cavern floor, she reaches out and gives the lever a yank, even as the lift is groaning to a halt. There is a small bump and with no noticeable stop the lift begins to rise again.
Alyra is caught with one foot raised to step onto the lift; as it rises it catches her heel and down she goes. Now what on earth did she do that for? the bard muses, even as she regains her feet, reaches out and gives the lever another pull.
Again, the lift reaches the dock and, with a groan of protest, immediately starts back down again. (One could almost hear its gears thinking 'make up your minds, already!') This time as the lift descends, it reveals Ceri standing frozen in the middle of the lift floor, wide eyed, dead pale, stark still -- except for a single twitching eye.
When the lift reaches her level this time, Alyra is ready. She leaps aboard and grabs hold of one of the wooden supports, hanging on for dear life in anticipation of another rapid ascent.
There is no discernible response from Ceri.
Alyra stands, gripping the wood post, and stares at her friend. "Ceri?" Silence. "Are you OK?"
There is a long pause. Then another. Then Ceri's head slowly turns towards Alyra, and she whispers, "Can we go up now? And stay there?"
Alyra looks at her friend for a long moment, the light slowly dawning. "Oh. Sure." After making certain they are both actually on the lift, she pulls the lever, much more gently this time, and the platform rises once more. They pass the tavern and arrive at the uppermost level without incident, and Alyra debarks at the fire circle next to the Edonil Warm Spring.
After a moment Ceri scrambles off. She refrains from doing something silly, like shouting "Ground!" and dropping to her knees to kiss the earth. Although she has a definite urge to fall over at this point. Having unfrozen, her knees now feel rather like jelly.
Alyra is watching Ceri carefully. As her friend wobbles over to the fire to sit down, Alyra begins to hum, then to sing. Her bardic spell is intended to soothe, heal, and inspire her friend with confidence in the wake of what has apparently been a somewhat harrowing experience -- though why, Alyra is still uncertain.
Ceri closes her eyes and concentrates on taking several deep breaths, letting the calming melody wash over her. Slowly, she relaxes. After a long couple of minutes she opens her eyes, now feeling much better. Then she remembers something and turns to Alyra. "Say," she asks, "when did you take up pole-dancing?"
Alyra stares at her blankly. "Say what?"
Ceri blinks innocently. "You had a very good grip on the pole on that last ride up. Managed a leg around it and everything." She gives her friend a bright smile.
Alyra rolls her eyes, but can't keep up that charade for long. She bursts out laughing. "Yeah, I guess I did, at that."
Ceri's fake smile relaxes into a real one. "Anyway I should apologise. I thought you were on the lift, didn't realise you'd get thrown like that. And then when I didn't have a chance to get off at the top -- and with all the up and down -- well I started to panic a bit. Sorry."
"That's OK... but Ceri, I don't understand why you were panicking. I mean, you were already heading in that direction when you got on the lift, or I miss my guess. Was it because I was talking about going to the Hollows?"
Ceri gives her a sheepish look. "Well... yes. Sort of. I mean, we were already underground, y'know, but you were pretty set on going deeper."
She sits silently for a long moment, then quietly adds. "You know I'm half wood elf, right?"
Alyra nods. Although she knows Ceri is half-elven, this is the first time she recalls being told which specific kind of elf; but with her memory, she might well have known at some point.
"Right. Well. That and half gypsy. So I've grown up roaming around, on the road and through the wilderness. That's always where I've been most comfortable, out in nature, especially the woods."
She pauses, and still not looking over at her friend continues, "So going underground has never really been fun. It's cut off from, well, open air. I'm usually fine in caves, especially if they're shallow. Nothing wrong with buildings. Used to be able to go underground as long as it wasn't too deep, or small, or for too long. And then there was that cave-in. And now it's worse."
Alyra regards her a moment, then says, "So the real problem was being underground, not the promise of wandering into dangerous territory, risking life and limb, and possibly getting Abiorn mad at us?"
Now Ceri looks at Alyra, and not a very happy look either. "Are you crazy? I don't laugh in the face of danger, I scream and run the other way!"
Alyra grins in spite of herself, but the grin is warm with affection for her friend. "I know. And sometimes that really is the best course of action. Well, maybe not so much the screaming part. That's rough on the singing voice."
Ceri tries to look indignant, but after a moment bursts into laughter.
Alyra's grin widens, but she continues with sincerity, "Ceri, not everyone is cut out for high adventure. But everyone feels fear at some point -- if they're sane. Cel told me to use the fear to keep myself alive, and he's right about that. So when I'm scared, I acknowledge the fear, but I don't let it stop me. At least, I try not to." She stops; she has a feeling this is getting a bit too philosophical for the moment.
"Anyway," she continues, standing up, "I think it's time for hot chocolate or something. Shall we?"
"Yes let's!" Ceri says brightly, and the two start back towards the bookshop, Ceri chatting amiably about the nice clearing she's set her tent up in.
Post composed from RP by Alyra and Ceri.
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