Another level (31 July 2018) – Taffeta
Aug 5, 2018 16:45:50 GMT
mattwilkin, Tugark (Retired), and 2 more like this
Post by Malri 'Taffeta' Thistletop on Aug 5, 2018 16:45:50 GMT
1495 DR, 1 Elesias
‘Ma!’ calls Aila from the other room. ‘We’re out of fresh water! Can I have some from your water-skin?’
Taffeta, still bleary after the Midsummer festivities the night before, takes a while to absorb the question. But as soon as she does, she leaps out of bed and rushes to the door.
‘No! Don’t drink that!’
After assuring herself that Aila hasn’t tasted any of the skin’s contents or even unstoppered it, and after Nerry has taken Idari off to fill some buckets at the nearest well, Taffeta sits outside the house in the shade with Aila.
‘So what was that all about, Ma? What’s in that waterskin?’
‘I… honestly don’t know… But you wouldn’t enjoy it!’ she laughs. ‘You remember a few days ago when I made that trip to Port Ffirst?’
‘To look at the restaurant, right?’
‘That’s right, love. Another Level, it’s called. The owner asked some of us to go and collect some very rare and expensive wine he’d bought.’
‘Ma! Don’t tell me you filched some of it!’
‘No, love – not exactly, anyway. We went and collected the wine from a trader in Greenleaf and took it back to Another Level, and the owner – Claus, he was called – suggested we drink some as a reward. Said it was supposed to be good for you, magical or something.’
‘And was it?’ Aila, sitting on the doorstep, leans forward with interest.
‘Well it was magic, sure enough. He poured us a cup each, and the stuff was bright purple.’
‘That doesn’t sound… normal…’
‘It surely was not! And when he poured out Daisy’s cup, there was a dead green worm in it – glowing!’
‘Eugh! Did she drink it?’
‘Now, you know Daisy, she wouldn’t glug down something like that without checking first. She took the worm out and put it in a jar, and then she used her clever ways to make sure the drink wasn’t poisonous. But then that fancy-pants grung, G’Lorth, got fed up waiting and downed his drink all at once.’
‘What happened?’
‘He said he felt good on it, so sure enough Barden knocks his back, and then Crow, then all the others. Daisy said it tasted sweet but also like metal somehow. The only one who didn’t drink, apart from me, was the new druid, Igg. I somehow didn’t feel too keen, and anyhow I reckoned if it did have useful magic then I’d be better saving it for when I need it.’
A flash of understanding crosses Aila’s face. ‘So you emptied out your water-skin and put the wine in it!’
‘You’ve got it!’ Taffeta chuckles. ‘I’d completely forgotten it was there until just now when you were about to take a swig. That would not have been a good idea!’
‘Why, though? What does it do? Were the others okay?’
‘Well, things got pretty strange after that. Some of them started looking at their hands and arms, and then shaking or slapping them, shouting about worms; and the others, except me and Igg, looked like they were trying to help them take things off their arms and bodies, except I couldn’t see anything on them at all. Then I noticed they were all breathing out a sort of purple mist, all except me and Igg. It smelled sweet and made me feel a bit strange when I breathed it in. Then, next thing we know, it seemed like the floor of the room was opening up, like a mouth or something, and we all fell down into it.’
‘Everything went dark, and I was in some kind of sticky, stretchy sack. When I managed to get out, I found the others getting out of other sacks too. We were in some kind of room or cave, and there were two… I don’t know, they were like living things on the wall, like holes opening and closing.’
Taffeta hesitates for a moment, remembering the other sacks hanging from the ceiling. Igg’s part-orcish voice from somewhere in the gloom saying, ‘Person in sack. He dead.’ Daisy, in another part of the cavern, saying, ‘Taffeta, you’d better come and look at this.’ The naked halfling lying on the ground beneath a cut-open sack. The body without Taffeta’s scars, but the lifeless face identical to her own. Turning the body over, seeing the mark of Cyric on the back, just like hers… Aila doesn’t need to know about any of that. After all, none of it was real anyway. Probably.
‘Well, while the rest of us were… looking around, Crow and Barden went through one of those openings and suddenly there was a lot of ruckus. They’d gone into some kind of fleshy tunnel and there were strange beasts attacking them, like tadpoles the size of pigs. We fought them off, and Daisy – she’d turned herself into a big, tusky cat of some kind – dashed off down the tunnel. At the other end she found a flower and went up to it. I think she was sort of talking to it. Suddenly the flower grew much bigger and changed shape, until it looked – well, to be honest, love, it looked like Leocanto’s face! And it spoke, and said, “Narcissism is poison”, then it shrivelled up.’
‘Ma, you’re pulling my leg.’
‘Honestly, love, it all happened! Or, at least, it seemed like it was happening. In hindsight… I don’t know what was going on. Anyway, under the plant was another tunnel that ended in a big pool of pink liquid. Daisy did something so we could all walk across it, but as we did, something started moving under the surface. Most of us ran to the other side but Barden, daft fellow, he just stopped in the middle of the pool and started attacking whatever was in the water. Huge eel things started coming out and biting at him and Daisy. She got away but they bit Barden and he froze up, didn’t seem to be able to move. I had to go back and help him get out.’ Taffeta decides not to mention that, in the course of rescuing Barden, she herself was bitten so badly by the eels that she almost lost consciousness before Igg partially healed her wounds.
‘Well, the other side were a couple of portals. I could tell one led to another plane and the other didn’t – but not before G’Lorth decided he was going to hope through the second one! Well, we all had to go after him, didn’t we? It’s best to stick together when you’re in strange places. And that sure was a strange place. We ended up in a room where jelly people came out of the walls and started saying a lot of nonsense like “you are in” and “you have to go in to go out”. So we went back the way we came and Crow was all set to dive into the other portal, the planar one, which was a kind of hole in the floor. But out of the hole came a nasty-looking creature, like a person all draped in rags, with glowing eyes. It stared hard at Code – she’s new in town, a tiefling like Nowhere but very pale. Then it lashed out at Barden so a fight started. We didn’t notice at first that whenever we hurt this creature, it seemed to be harming Code as well. Pretty quickly she was out like a light, and Igg had to pull her out of the fight to heal her. Then G’Lorth went down too, and I helped bring him round. Crow decided he’d had enough and just jumped right into the portal. Then G’Lorth took a shot at the creature with his bow and I don’t know what happened, but it seemed to turn into mist and vanish.’
‘The others all started jumping into the portal after that, except Igg. He really didn’t want to go. I wasn’t wild about it either, but there didn’t seem to be much alternative. But Igg was having none of it. Eventually we agreed that I’d tie his rope around my waist and go through, and he’d hold the other end. Then if it was safe, I could tug the rope to tell him to come. So in I went.’
‘And where did it take you?’
‘Back to the restaurant. Well, the alley behind the restaurant. The others were all there too, even Igg, but he was asleep. It was like none of it had ever happened, except we still had the aches and pains from the fight we’d just been in. I tried to find the portal but there didn’t seem to be one. I don’t know if I dreamt it or it closed after we came through or what. The best Daisy could figure was that maybe the wine had caused a sort of hallucination that somehow became real. I don’t know. But whatever it was,’ Taffeta says to Aila sternly, but unable to suppress a bit of a smile, ‘I do not recommend it!’
Aila grins. ‘Don’t worry, Ma. I don’t want any of that!’
They fall quiet for a moment.
‘What happened to Igg? Did he wake up?’
‘I don’t know,’ says Taffeta seriously. ‘None of us could wake him up that day, anyway. I think Daisy was going to see what she could do for him. I should ask. We all got so busy with Midsummer… I’ll go and see him tomorrow.’
Another silence.
‘And what’re you going to do with that wine?’
‘Ha! Good question. I might hang on to it… you never know, it might come in handy.’
‘Ma!’ calls Aila from the other room. ‘We’re out of fresh water! Can I have some from your water-skin?’
Taffeta, still bleary after the Midsummer festivities the night before, takes a while to absorb the question. But as soon as she does, she leaps out of bed and rushes to the door.
‘No! Don’t drink that!’
After assuring herself that Aila hasn’t tasted any of the skin’s contents or even unstoppered it, and after Nerry has taken Idari off to fill some buckets at the nearest well, Taffeta sits outside the house in the shade with Aila.
‘So what was that all about, Ma? What’s in that waterskin?’
‘I… honestly don’t know… But you wouldn’t enjoy it!’ she laughs. ‘You remember a few days ago when I made that trip to Port Ffirst?’
‘To look at the restaurant, right?’
‘That’s right, love. Another Level, it’s called. The owner asked some of us to go and collect some very rare and expensive wine he’d bought.’
‘Ma! Don’t tell me you filched some of it!’
‘No, love – not exactly, anyway. We went and collected the wine from a trader in Greenleaf and took it back to Another Level, and the owner – Claus, he was called – suggested we drink some as a reward. Said it was supposed to be good for you, magical or something.’
‘And was it?’ Aila, sitting on the doorstep, leans forward with interest.
‘Well it was magic, sure enough. He poured us a cup each, and the stuff was bright purple.’
‘That doesn’t sound… normal…’
‘It surely was not! And when he poured out Daisy’s cup, there was a dead green worm in it – glowing!’
‘Eugh! Did she drink it?’
‘Now, you know Daisy, she wouldn’t glug down something like that without checking first. She took the worm out and put it in a jar, and then she used her clever ways to make sure the drink wasn’t poisonous. But then that fancy-pants grung, G’Lorth, got fed up waiting and downed his drink all at once.’
‘What happened?’
‘He said he felt good on it, so sure enough Barden knocks his back, and then Crow, then all the others. Daisy said it tasted sweet but also like metal somehow. The only one who didn’t drink, apart from me, was the new druid, Igg. I somehow didn’t feel too keen, and anyhow I reckoned if it did have useful magic then I’d be better saving it for when I need it.’
A flash of understanding crosses Aila’s face. ‘So you emptied out your water-skin and put the wine in it!’
‘You’ve got it!’ Taffeta chuckles. ‘I’d completely forgotten it was there until just now when you were about to take a swig. That would not have been a good idea!’
‘Why, though? What does it do? Were the others okay?’
‘Well, things got pretty strange after that. Some of them started looking at their hands and arms, and then shaking or slapping them, shouting about worms; and the others, except me and Igg, looked like they were trying to help them take things off their arms and bodies, except I couldn’t see anything on them at all. Then I noticed they were all breathing out a sort of purple mist, all except me and Igg. It smelled sweet and made me feel a bit strange when I breathed it in. Then, next thing we know, it seemed like the floor of the room was opening up, like a mouth or something, and we all fell down into it.’
‘Everything went dark, and I was in some kind of sticky, stretchy sack. When I managed to get out, I found the others getting out of other sacks too. We were in some kind of room or cave, and there were two… I don’t know, they were like living things on the wall, like holes opening and closing.’
Taffeta hesitates for a moment, remembering the other sacks hanging from the ceiling. Igg’s part-orcish voice from somewhere in the gloom saying, ‘Person in sack. He dead.’ Daisy, in another part of the cavern, saying, ‘Taffeta, you’d better come and look at this.’ The naked halfling lying on the ground beneath a cut-open sack. The body without Taffeta’s scars, but the lifeless face identical to her own. Turning the body over, seeing the mark of Cyric on the back, just like hers… Aila doesn’t need to know about any of that. After all, none of it was real anyway. Probably.
‘Well, while the rest of us were… looking around, Crow and Barden went through one of those openings and suddenly there was a lot of ruckus. They’d gone into some kind of fleshy tunnel and there were strange beasts attacking them, like tadpoles the size of pigs. We fought them off, and Daisy – she’d turned herself into a big, tusky cat of some kind – dashed off down the tunnel. At the other end she found a flower and went up to it. I think she was sort of talking to it. Suddenly the flower grew much bigger and changed shape, until it looked – well, to be honest, love, it looked like Leocanto’s face! And it spoke, and said, “Narcissism is poison”, then it shrivelled up.’
‘Ma, you’re pulling my leg.’
‘Honestly, love, it all happened! Or, at least, it seemed like it was happening. In hindsight… I don’t know what was going on. Anyway, under the plant was another tunnel that ended in a big pool of pink liquid. Daisy did something so we could all walk across it, but as we did, something started moving under the surface. Most of us ran to the other side but Barden, daft fellow, he just stopped in the middle of the pool and started attacking whatever was in the water. Huge eel things started coming out and biting at him and Daisy. She got away but they bit Barden and he froze up, didn’t seem to be able to move. I had to go back and help him get out.’ Taffeta decides not to mention that, in the course of rescuing Barden, she herself was bitten so badly by the eels that she almost lost consciousness before Igg partially healed her wounds.
‘Well, the other side were a couple of portals. I could tell one led to another plane and the other didn’t – but not before G’Lorth decided he was going to hope through the second one! Well, we all had to go after him, didn’t we? It’s best to stick together when you’re in strange places. And that sure was a strange place. We ended up in a room where jelly people came out of the walls and started saying a lot of nonsense like “you are in” and “you have to go in to go out”. So we went back the way we came and Crow was all set to dive into the other portal, the planar one, which was a kind of hole in the floor. But out of the hole came a nasty-looking creature, like a person all draped in rags, with glowing eyes. It stared hard at Code – she’s new in town, a tiefling like Nowhere but very pale. Then it lashed out at Barden so a fight started. We didn’t notice at first that whenever we hurt this creature, it seemed to be harming Code as well. Pretty quickly she was out like a light, and Igg had to pull her out of the fight to heal her. Then G’Lorth went down too, and I helped bring him round. Crow decided he’d had enough and just jumped right into the portal. Then G’Lorth took a shot at the creature with his bow and I don’t know what happened, but it seemed to turn into mist and vanish.’
‘The others all started jumping into the portal after that, except Igg. He really didn’t want to go. I wasn’t wild about it either, but there didn’t seem to be much alternative. But Igg was having none of it. Eventually we agreed that I’d tie his rope around my waist and go through, and he’d hold the other end. Then if it was safe, I could tug the rope to tell him to come. So in I went.’
‘And where did it take you?’
‘Back to the restaurant. Well, the alley behind the restaurant. The others were all there too, even Igg, but he was asleep. It was like none of it had ever happened, except we still had the aches and pains from the fight we’d just been in. I tried to find the portal but there didn’t seem to be one. I don’t know if I dreamt it or it closed after we came through or what. The best Daisy could figure was that maybe the wine had caused a sort of hallucination that somehow became real. I don’t know. But whatever it was,’ Taffeta says to Aila sternly, but unable to suppress a bit of a smile, ‘I do not recommend it!’
Aila grins. ‘Don’t worry, Ma. I don’t want any of that!’
They fall quiet for a moment.
‘What happened to Igg? Did he wake up?’
‘I don’t know,’ says Taffeta seriously. ‘None of us could wake him up that day, anyway. I think Daisy was going to see what she could do for him. I should ask. We all got so busy with Midsummer… I’ll go and see him tomorrow.’
Another silence.
‘And what’re you going to do with that wine?’
‘Ha! Good question. I might hang on to it… you never know, it might come in handy.’
