Mitnal's tale

Mitnal blushed furiously and then steeled himself.

“I am Mitnal the basketweaver,” he said, then paused expecting laughter. “I am Mitnal the basketweaver, son of the Shriikirri-Quah. The tale I tell you is not my own. I am not an adventurer like Ameiko Kaijitsu and have few tales to tell. The tale I tell is not my own but one that was told to me and I believe to be true.”

“In Galduria on Ember Lake I worked upon the docks loading the bargecraft that ferry freight and men from Ravenmoor on Lampblack River to magnificent Magnimar. I can carry twice what some dockworkers carry but am not used to ships. One dull, drizzling afternoon, I slipped while loading a southbound boat and dropped a crate of clay pots.”

“A crate tipped over in my arms and a dozen pots rolled out and smashed upon the dock. With each bang I heard a whimper or a cry. The cry became a scream by the time the last pot had smashed and I turned to see what woman I had distressed. But there, huddled against a load of Auroch furs, was a Chelaxian man – truly, the largest of his kind I had ever seen, larger than any man I knew from any of the seven tribes – and he was covering his face and weeping. That I had caused him to weep both shamed and surprised me. I turned and left so as to cause him no more distress.”

Mitnal clears his throat uncomfortably knowing that his story had not caught the interest of the Rusty Dragon’s guests.

“After being warned by my employer that I would work that day for free to pay for the pots I had destroyed, I returned with another crate. The man saw me and bid me to come and sit. I sat upon the bundle of Auroch furs and began to apologize for my mistake but he waved me away with his mighty paw and began to speak. ‘You wonder why a man my size would cry out at a harmless noise. You are Shoanti of the hawk clan—I can see by your dress and tattoos—perhaps you can listen to my tale and tell me if you know of any legend or song that can fill in the gaps for me. My name is Kish Berrent,’ he said.

“I shook his hand. My hand was as small in his as Amei …

Mitnal glances quickly at Ameiko and then continues.

“My hand was as small in his as a young woman’s would be in mine,” Mitnal says blushing, though few in the audience had caught his slip. “I agreed to listen to his tale and tell him anything I could. He continued ‘I was guiding, as I often do, some travellers from Magnimar. This priest … or rather this man who claimed to be a priest of Abadar tasked to bring the law to the savage Shoanti (these were his words for your people, not mine) paid me a good sum of gold to guide him up the Lampblack river, for one week’s service once past the Storval Steps and then back again. I agreed with too few questions.’”

Mitnal coughs a bit, uncomfortable with having repeated in front of a room full of Chelaxians this insult to his people by one of their people.

“Kish Berrent continued ‘Once past the Storval Steps the strangeness began. He insisted we ride northeast within the shadow of the Iron Peaks and in the first day of our journey waved off warnings from shepherds and farmers in every small cluster of houses that calls itself Hamlet This or Homestead That. By the second day, we’d seen and avoided a hill giant and two bands of ogres and I was glad that he had the good sense to give them wide berth because I began to doubt his mind was his own. My fear was confirmed on the third day when with a start he took two leather gauntlets from his pocket and put one on each wrist. Holding them up as if to block the sun he stared at the mountains for a disconcerting amount of time. As I came to see if perhaps the sun and wind had disturbed his mind, I saw what he was doing. Pressing the gauntlets together, he was matching the patterns in the leather so that the two gauntlets formed one pattern … the very image of the peaks before us. He took the gauntlets off and felt inside for something and then stuck a small iron nail straight through the gauntlet so that it was poking out and away from his wrist. Putting them on again, he matched the lines once more and now even I, as dumb as I was, could see what he was doing. The nail he had poked through the leather corresponded to a spot, a dark patch just shy of one of the peaks, that could have been an opening. For the first time that day my quite mad and certainly quite false priest spoke: “There! It is there!! We must ascend.”’

“‘Ascend we did but only after I had pried a dagger out of his hand. He had announced at the foot of the mountain that he would kill our horses and bury them so they alerted no one to our presence. When reason failed I disarmed him and threatened to abandon him here, gold or not, in the shadow of these ogre infested hills.’”

Mitnal interupts himself at this point: “These are the words of the mighty Chelaxian Kish Berrent remember … I would never leave a man to die if a promise had been made especially one who walked between worlds as this false priest he speaks of surely did.

Resuming the voice and accent he had been using for Kish Berrent, Mitnal continued the tale.

“‘We climbed the mountain, sometimes hand over hand scaling rockface for which he had come prepared but I had not, and sometimes we walked on paths that seemed uncannily like ancient steps hewn into the reddish rock. Three times, my mad companion almost fell in his singular dedication to his goal but finally, thanks to my strength and skill, we stood before the opening. Triumphant, he walked into a dark and narrow path and promptly fell. I heard a scream, a scuff of boots, a thud, and a crack. At this point, I surprised myself by being loyal to the man who had lied to me, tried to kill my horse, and led me on some mad journey into these forsaken lands … or perhaps it was curiousity not loyalty that urged me to cautiously follow down a crevice in the rock through which a man of my size or even yours could barely squeeze. Testing each step, I soon found a patch of ground – in the light of my torch no different in appearance from the too straight and smooth path around it – that gave way when I pressed upon it with one careful foot. With great care, I pushed down upon what was clearly a well-crafted trap door and called out to my client below. Hearing no answer, I shone a torch and saw his body broken, legs twisted around his shoulders but still upon his face the same look of glee he had had since we found the opening’.”

“I am sorry,” says Mitnal “The tale is longer in the telling than in my memory. When it was told to me in Galduria, I was frozen where I sat. This man, Kish Berent told it better than I … his eyes burned with fear and awe. Allow me to finish quickly.

“‘I had no choice,’ said Kish Berrent ‘My curiousity was stronger than my fear. What strange race had carved a perfectly straight but treacherous path through these hills. Neither ogres nor giants could fit in such a narrow tunnel and dwarves were not known to live in this part of The Iron Hills. I slipped past the trap and continued now, deeper into the mountain. I crept cautiously for what seemed like miles in a slowly descending spiral. My journey came to an abrupt halt when the narrow tunnel ended in a pile of rubble … but not, it seemed like the rubble caused by a cave-in; there was no disturbance in the stone walls around it. The piled stones were shaped and seemed to be of two dozen or more different statues that had been smashed upon this spot.’”

“ ‘Curiousity will kill me,’ Kish Berrent said and then asked me my name ‘Curiousity will kill me, Mitnal, for what I did next may surprise you … it surprised me … I began to dig. I tore away at the pile of broken arms and torsos trying to clear enough room to crawl through. Even in my fading torchlight I could see enough of the form of these stones to know that they were not all statues of humans … some seemed to be of scaled women … some of men whose hands were clawed … Finally, I had enough room to crawl over the pile, throwing a new torch ahead of me, through a shattered stone door and into an enormous chamber. The torch was not needed for the walls shone with thousands of enchanted gemstones, each giving off its own light and reflecting the light of others. The size of this room shocked me. Between the spiralling tunnel I had come down and this chamber, there seemed to be hardly anything left of the mountain. Either I was much further underground or this mountain was completely hollow.’

Mitnal realizes his audience is listening attentively and begins to play it up a bit too much, acting out some of the parts.

“Kish Berrent said ‘I walked down what were either corridors or streets of what seemed to be a long forgotten city of some unknown race. Each squat stone building’s openings were blocked by stones engraved with some writing of a like that I have never seen before. Every bit of the building’s walls depicted a monstrous race of snakeheaded men fighting against an army of humans and giants. Always, the snakeheads won and burned the villages of these frightened humans. Each and every building proclaimed the glorious victory of a loathsome race. I wandered, Mitnal, for I know not how long until I came to a set of stairs that led me up to a central dias. From here, I had an idea of the size of this place and I was now clearly at the centre. In all directions from the dias extended roads between these squat, stone, sealed houses. Barely the height of a man, there must have been a thousand of this stone dwellings but I saw not one door ajar, could detect not one window, and could hear not one sound.’”

“‘In the centre of this stone dias was what seemed to be a pool of water without a ripple on its surface. Gazing into the pool, Mitnal, I felt compelled to drink … my thirst was clawing at my throat. By the light of those thousands of shining gemstones, I saw my own reflection. My visage was that of a man quite mad. As I was about to lap at the pool I … I … I paused. In my reflection I think I recognized the look … the look I had seen earlier that day … if it indeed was the same day … of the obsessed false priest who led me here. It took all of my will to pull myself upright and away from the pool but something in the pool was drawing me back. I had to fight against myself as if my arms and legs were not my own. I flung myself towards the steps and stumbled down them off of the dias. My leg hurt and my ankle twisted I began to stumble toward the entrance I had come in through, for the spell (if that is what it was) was now broken and my mind was my own again and I knew that I had committed an act of lunacy in coming here and standing exposed at the highest point of this forgotten city.’”

“‘Then I heard a voice,’ said Kish Berrent with terror in his voice. ‘A voice with an accent that seemed both unearthly and yet strangely familiar. This sibilant voice whispered ‘Sslave. Sslave. Yours is a sstrange race. The ssun has circled our world 12,000 timess ssince you pushed uss back into our mountain home and what have you done with our world. 12,000 yearss have I sslept hear dreaming … waiting for ssomeone to wake me. In my dreams, I have sseen your kingdomss rise and fall … I have watched mighty Thasssilonia crumble … I have sseen the ssavage nomads rise and rule and be beaten back by those who now call themsselvess Chelaxianss. Wake me now, sslave, and I will show you how a world is ruled. I will make you an emperor and together we shall find a way to revive the army of a race, of the only race, worthy of the legacy your kind have sstolen from uss.’

“‘I ran, Shoanti. I ran. I stumbled and ran, my ankle killing me and I was not halfway to the door when I heard the noise; the noise that those crashing pots reminded me of. I turned back to see the doors of the stone houses … what I had thought were houses … crashing to the ground. And out of each one came a slithering ghoulish figure, both snakelike and skeletal. What I had thought to be an ancient city carved by some snake worshipping cult was the graveyard of an evil race, each ‘house’ in fact a tomb. I ran and stumbled and crawled and as I escaped through the narrow gap I had carved I felt a skeletal hand upon my leg. I hacked back at this skeletal half-snake creature with my sword and pulled myself over and down the mound of broken statues. On the other side of the mound, in the narrow tunnel, I threw the pieces of these statues at every bony clawing hand or skeletal snake head that appeared in the opening. For what must have been an hour I beat them back and sealed the opening with these stones until they seemed to stop coming. It would take a man three days to get back to the Storval Steps normally but I had two mounts to ride and did not mind when my favourite one died of exhaustion. I rode the other while into the night and bought a third from one of your people who charged me every single piece of gold I had been paid for guiding the false priest there. I was glad for the mount and did not mind paying thirty times it’s rightful price.’”

“‘That’s my story Shoanti’, said Kish Berrent the Chelaxian guide “Doubt me if you will but they are in the mountains. Sleeping. Waiting for some fool to wake them again so they can rise and rule. Or, perhaps I woke them already. Perhaps, I was that fool. I go now to Magnimar to my home and to return these leatherbound journals that I took from the saddlebags of the false priest. Perhaps this ‘Pathfinder Society’ mentioned in the journals can help make some sense of them, for they are written in some kind of code and of no use to me. If I ever leave Magnimar again, it will be further south. The further away from The Storval Steps, the safer in my mind’. With that Kish Berrent stood and walked away from me without even waiting to see if I knew of any Shoanti legends that would help him. I would not have been able to help him anyhow. He stood at the edge of the barge looking Northeast and began to cry in relief and fear. I left him then and continued my work and have not seen him since.”

“I am Mitnal the basketweaver, son of the Shriikirri-Quah. The tale I told you is not my own or at least not entirely my own. I am not an adventurer like Ameiko Kaijitsu and have few tales to tell. The tale I told is one that was told to me and that I believe to be true.”

Mitnal nods his head and rejoins his party.