Oathenor

The group explores the central square of Mrid, and Tao slowly follows traces of faint footsteps from house to house. She finds some odd clues. In addition to the very orderly looting of valuables, there are other signs of the cleanly ghouls; for instance, she finds a carrion-scented porcelain bowl that was shattered and then magically mended. She also finds newer tracks, roughly dwarven, that probably belonged to something or someone making a rigorous search of every home. Another ghoul? Nolin decides to use his goggles of hindsight to find out.

Focusing on one of the marketplace stands, he lets his gaze fall backwards in time. Faster and faster the image speeds into the past, and Nolin watches earthquake dust rise up from the floor and air pressure from the waterfall stir the faint mist. Then something else flashes across his vision, and he scans forward again until he sees a dwarf examining the remaining items on the marketplace stall's counter.

To his time-distorted vision, it's almost an iconic dwarf. Rosy-cheeked, big-bellied, with a plaited beard and twinkling eyes. His shield is battered, his horned helmet cocked on his head, his axe sharp. Nolin blinks. "I've seen someone about four or five days ago, right here," he reports. "It's a dwarf, but it's almost too dwarfy. It looks like what you'd get if someone sat you down and told you to draw the quintessential dwarf. I don't like it."

"Someone polymorphed?" asks Agar.

"Maybe," muses Nolin. "He's got a sack or treasure, and looks like he's hunting for any valuables that the ghouls missed. Maybe he's a refugee." No one believes it. "I'll go back farther." He does, and within ten more minutes he views a handful of kobold and goblin ghouls cleaning the area. They are sweeping, scrubbing, and straightening. "Bizarre," mumbles the bard, and hunts back farther to try and find more images of ghouls. He quickly reaches the limit of the goggles' time-stretched vision, but he's seen enough to confirm some of their suspicions. "Yup. Ghouls ransacked this place, stealing and smashing, and then later came back and cleaned everything up. I don't like it one bit."

Nervously, the group makes their way through the tunneled byways of the city towards the royal palace. The going becomes rougher, largely due to huge chunks of stone that have dropped from the ceiling. They also need to traverse deep crevices that have opened up in the wide, paved street. Velendo and Priggle stare around at the devastation and independently reach the same conclusion. "What you're looking at," opines Velendo, "is the result of a number of small earth tremors. Maybe only one or two of them were big, but there's been close to ten total unless I miss my guess. They're highly localized, and we're moving towards their source. Could be an earthquake spell, but I don't know for sure. What I do know is avoid loud noises and area effect spells. This ceiling isn't entirely stable." They continue towards the palace, picking their way slowly through the rubble. As they enter the grand cavern that should frame the palace's architecture, it's quickly clear that the earthquakes have been worse here. Very little of the magnificent architecture and statues remain. Faint ghostly shadows flicker on walls from buried torches of eternal flame, and darkvision limits line of sight to a mere sixty feet. Thus, it is the keen-eyed svirfneblin guide Priggle who is the first to see the dwarf sitting up by the palace stairs, impatiently swinging his iron-shod boots back and forth as he drums on the shattered remains of a pillar.

"Hssst!" cautions Priggle in a whisper. "There's a dwarf up there. Might be that one Nolin saw." His habitual frown deepens across his rubbery face. "I wouldn't trust him if I were you."

"Duh." Tao rolls her eyes and casts true seeing and Agar tries to focus his arcane sight on the stranger. As he does so, the dwarf lifts his head in apparent surprise at hearing strange noises out in the darkness.

"Hello?" the dwarf calls in a rich, deep, dwarven voice. "Is someone there?" He jumps to his feet with a hint of clumsiness, drawing his dwarven axe and gazing out into the wreckage. "Who is it?" His voice is filled with the rising lilt of unexpected hope, and he speaks in unaccented dwarven.

"Why, yes!" calls Nolin in return. "Greetings! May we approach?"

"Upworlders?" The dwarf grins widely with unanticipated pleasure, his full beard waggling as he does so. He laughs in delight. "And some of my own folk! Of course! Please, join me!" He studies the group as they approach, just as Agar and Tao are studying him.

"He's magical, all right," reports Agar over the mindlink. "Both high and low magic, both arcane and clerical. I think the clerical magic is more powerful. Something's trying to foil my detection, too, but I think I have it beat." He squints as the magical vision tries to squirm out of focus.

Tao gulps as her true sight comes within range of the dwarf. Suddenly, his squat dwarven form is superimposed with that of a massive, powerful dragon. Tao sees black faceted gems for eyes, huge rocklike scales on a serpentine body, claws like scythe blades, and an insolent sneer on the draconic face. She tries to suppress an involuntary quiver. "He's more than magical. Crap. We're talking to a dragon."

"A WHAT?" asks Nolin mentally. He tries desperately to keep a smile on his face. To his eyes, the dwarf is just a dwarf, albeit one that should be modeling for portraits somewhere. Out loud, he greets the stranger. "You're the first survivor we've found! Are you all right?" The dwarf nods in assent, apparently oblivious that the group has divined his true nature.

"My name is Oathenor." The dwarf thumps his chest. "I'm a lone hunter and explorer; I spend a lot of time by myself out in the tunnels and caverns. When I heard a rumor that the ghouls were attacking Mrid, I hurried here, but I was too late." He shakes his head sadly. "Too late. I'll have to leave before the ghouls return. Why are your folk here? It's good to see dwarven soldiers again." He looks over the group placidly, stroking his beard. Tao, seeing his real form, feels a trill of fear run across her.

"A dragon. A big, brown one with scales the color of rock. Nolin, keep him distracted while we figure out what to do. Maybe he's an ally or at least not our enemy."

Malachite's mental voice intrudes. "And he's evil. Very, very evil."

Nolin looks sick, but rises to the challenge. In a horrible parody of small talk, he introduces the group, providing a brief summary of the group's battle against the ghouls. In return, Oathenor delivers an honest-sounding story of how he explored the city in vain, looking for at least one survivor. "I think the ghouls tried to get into the Royal Vaults and failed. They've doubtlessly gone for assistance, and I'm sure they'll be back. My duty is clear: rescue what we can and bring it to the Prince."

"That's my job," announces Glibstone. Everyone mentally smacks themselves in the head, because none of the dwarves are on the mind link – and as a result, none of them know that Oathenor isn't what he appears to be.

Nolin interrupts smoothly. "That's assuming that we can get the vault door open, and that's no certainty," he lies. "If we can, you know that your job is to accompany the goods back."

"But -" Glibstone barely sputters before he catches on that something is amiss, and he recovers nicely. "Well, I suppose." Oathenor examines him with glittering eyes, and then turns his gaze back to Nolin.

"Thank goodness someone is responsible for it.. someone who isn't me!" He laughs deeply in apparent relief, sounding just like a dwarf. "Well, no time like the present, eh? I'll show you where it is. I'll sleep much better when I know you have it safe." He leads the Defenders through a tangled maze of fallen stone masonry. The palace has been almost completely destroyed by multiple earth tremors, and Glibstone has trouble holding back tears at the devastation. Subtlely, Priggle and a few of the dwarven troops peel off to go and search the palace's remains. Oathenor, up near the front, doesn't give any indication of noticing.

After more than five minutes of crawling and clambering along a makeshift path, the disguised dragon-dwarf leads them through a collapsed temple to Moradin and to a shattered wall that once held a secret door. "There it is," he gestures to an unmarked wall. The vault door would normally be secret, but the stone wall around it is horribly scarred – clawed, acid-pocked. Only a huge section of wall is untouched. The Defenders exchange glances as Oathenor idly sits down on a hunk of statue that turns out to be the remains of Moradin's head, broken in half by earthquakes. The supposed dwarf doesn't seem to notice or care about the sacrilegious act. "Look at those claws; they must have had some horrible monster with them, but whatever it was it couldn't claw the door open. Hard to believe, but good for our people." His gaze seems to burn as it falls across the group. "How do you suppose you open it?"

Velendo opens his mouth to lie to the dragon. He can't help but think that it could go horribly wrong.