Journey to the Unknown

by Jaclyn Cadell

  He took a step in the deepest part of the pool and the bottom collapsed about 2 feet. He sank to the bottom of the new hole and felt his foot strike something unusual. It felt like a box about 6-inches on a side. He ducked under the water to retrieve whatever it was before continuing his trip across the pool. Emett handed the box to Alison to hold while he climbed out of the pool. Alison said, "You know, this looks like an oversize ring box. I wonder what's inside."

  Emett warned, "You had better not open it until it has been examined by Hat. Set it on your head and put on your hat."

  Alison said, "You just want to make me look ridiculous with this box sitting on my head!"

  "No, no. I was talking with Hat this morning and it told me to do that so that it could identify anything strange that we came across before it could harm us. Give the box to me, and I'll do it."

  Alison used a spell to dry them off and another to clean their clothes before they got dressed. After dressing, Alison got out the food while Emett put the box on his head and covered it with his hat. They ate their snack, and Emett admitted to himself that he felt kind of silly with the box on his head, covered by his hat.

  Just before they finished eating, they both heard Emett's hat announce: You have made a very lucky find, Lord Darius! I have never seen the likes of the two items in this box; one is a ring and the other is an armband.

  Lady Amabel, the ring is for you. It is a link to the energy stored in your staff. As long as you wear the ring, you can draw energy from your staff without touching it, no matter the distance separating you. I recommend that you don the ring and cast a spell to keep it from ever coming off your finger. Wear it on any finger you choose and it will adjust to the proper size.

  Something absolutely amazing happened when Alison heard this news: she squealed in delight! As far as either one knew, this was the first time Alison had ever squealed.

  Lord Darius, the armband is for you. It, too, should never be taken off. It is a shield against elemental damage. As long as you wear the armband, you cannot be harmed by fire, lightning, or cold. I suggest that Lady Amabel cast a spell to make sure that it never comes off.

  This time, Emett grunted in pleasure, something he had never done before, either.

  "Thank you, hat."

  You are welcome. Normally, it won't take me so long to identify an item, but these two were completely new to me, and I had to work out a lot of details before I could be sure what they were.

  Emett took out the ring and slipped it on the little finger of Alison's left hand. It immediately shrank to fit. Alison tried it out by casting the locking-in-place spell without touching her staff. "Emett, try to pull the ring off, and let's see what happens."

  Emett grasped the ring between the thumb and first finger of his right hand and tried to pull it off Alison's finger. He felt a sharp jolt resembling an electrical shock, and his fingers slipped off the ring as if it were covered with the slipperiest possible lubricant. He jumped back and said, "WOW! I never want to feel that, again!"

  He now slipped the armband on to his left arm and pushed it up until it rested on his biceps. The armband expanded to fit, and Emett said, "I sure hope that thing will expand with my muscles as I use my arm; otherwise, it's going to be very uncomfortable ... Ah! Yes, it does. That's a relief! Alison, please do your magic thing for me, now."

  Alison cast her spell and neither one was able to pull the armband off, so they were satisfied that the spell had worked as intended. Alison got the shock when she tried to pull off Emett's armband, but the armband appeared to shield Emett when he pulled on Alison's ring. They both hoped to be so lucky from then on! Alison commented as they walked back to the road, "All you need now is a charm against poison, and you'll be virtually invulnerable against anything but simple physical damage or a subtle magical attack."

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  They walked along for a while, each thinking his own thoughts. Alison said, "Emett, This is kind of sexy going around with no underwear, but my tits and back are getting kind of tired with no bra. I'm just too big to go around with no support ... I've just had a brainstorm. I'll wrap a piece of cloth around my bust and see if I can get some support that way. If it works, I'll use a size-adjusting spell to keep a perfect fit."

  Emett said, "Darn it, here I was just getting used to you walking around with nothing on under that dress, and now you want to spoil my daydreams. Oh, well, go ahead, if you must."

  Alison stuck out her tongue again, but stopped long enough to rig up a bra from a spare piece of cloth. "Ah, now that feels much better. But, if you insist, I can leave off the panties for now."

  The weather had been very dry the last few days, so that they kicked up a small cloud of dust as they walked. Alison mused, "Hat, can I cast a spell which will keep the dust from settling on us?"

  Yes, you can, but be very careful how you phrase the spell so that you don't generate some unexpected side effects.

  Alison commanded, "Dust of this road, do not settle on either one of us." That seemed safe enough, and it should keep them a little bit cleaner.

  They walked about 3 more miles, and Alison noticed that they were surrounded by a cloud of some sort. "Uh-Oh, it looks like I screwed up the spell!" Instead of settling on them, the dust was hanging in the air around them. Alison canceled the old dust spell and cast a new one, "Dust of this road, do not settle on either one of us, but fall back to the road out of our way." This seemed to work, so Alison decided to quit while she was ahead!

  That evening, they found themselves approaching an inn just as the sun was setting. They walked into the main dining room and found a seat. They had hardly sat down when an employee ran around barring the doors and shutters. Emett waved a waitress over and ordered supper. He also asked what was the reason for the bars on the doors and windows.

  The answer was that this was Friday, and the zombies and skeletons always came out to roam the road after dark on Fridays. They were now trapped in the inn unless they wanted to fight an endless stream of the undead. Emett sent her off to get their food, but extracted a promise from the waitress to answer more questions while they ate.

  The substance of the story was that there was a graveyard at an abandoned church about half a mile farther along the road. The graveyard had become cursed about 10 years ago, and the undead came from there. She had no idea who or what had cursed the church and graveyard, but your life was not worth a penny if you were out after dark on Friday nights.

  The dinner was amazingly good, consisting of succulent roast pork slices and plenty of vegetables, with bread and gravy. There was a pudding for desert, which they ate, but it was yellow in color, so they were a little afraid to ask for any details about it. After dinner, they went to their room and got into bed for their usual evening exercise regimen.

  While they were cuddling afterward, they discussed the undead problem and whether or not to investigate. They hemmed and hawed about the thing for a few minutes, and then they both laughed. Alison said, "What's so hard to decide? We both want to investigate so let's go look the situation over, tomorrow."

  The next morning, they got dressed and Emett asked, "Hat, is there anything that we should know about the undead before we visit the church and graveyard?"

  Not really. You both know to be careful. The undead are most susceptible to fire, so Lady Amabel should plan on using mostly fire balls. The skeletons shatter if they are hit hard and are most easily broken up by a club or mace. The zombies also respond to the club, so you should acquire one or two before you enter their domain.

  "Thank you, Hat. I think I'll ask the innkeeper about a suitable club before we leave this morning."

  They went down to breakfast, and Emett told the innkeeper their plans for the day. Emett asked about obtaining a suitable club, and the innkeeper offered his personal weapon. It was a rather large and heavy mace with many points mounted on the striking head. Emett hefted it and found it to be well balanced. He took it along with the shi
eld that made up the pair. He left his two bardiches behind, since he didn't think that he would need them, and they might get in his way. They said that they hoped to return by lunch, but, surely, would be back by supper.

  Everybody at the inn wished them well, but shook their heads as the two heroes went out the door. It only took a few minutes to reach the churchyard, and they stopped to look the place over. Alison's hat was sure that whatever was controlling the undead must lie in the cellars beneath the church, so they went inside to look for the stairs going down.

  They found the stairs in the vestry and went down to the first cellar. It was almost impenetrably dark, so Alison cast a spell to give them vision even without adequate light. The cellar below the church was much larger in area than the size of the church above would lead one to think. There were a number of rooms leading off from the room at the base of the stairs. There was no logical option but to look around and see what they could find.

  There were several sarcophagi scattered about, so Emett decided to look in them to get an idea of what to expect from the contents. They walked over to the nearest one, but its lid was pushed aside, and it was empty. The next one had a closed lid, but Emett was able to push it open. As soon as the lid was pushed back far enough, the body inside jumped out and tried to grab Alison. Emett reacted without hesitation and hit the apparent zombie in the head with his mace. The head splattered into mush and blood; scratch one zombie!

  Alison grimaced, but recovered quickly and thanked Emett for his prompt action. He nodded modestly, and the two peered into the coffin to see what else was there. There were two gold pieces, which Alison took and put into her purse. There was also a shirt of chain mail. Alison declined it, so Emett slipped it over his head, taking the attitude that one could never have too much protection when dealing with the undead.

  There was another closed tomb, so they opened that, ready to jump to each other's defense. However, there was no body in this one, nor anything else. There did not appear to be anything else of interest in the current room, so they picked a door at random and went through it. This was a smaller room than the one they had just left, and there were 4 goat-men gathered in a far corner. They turned to advance on the two heroes, but Alison blasted them with ice balls and fire balls to see which worked better. There was no obvious difference—it took two shots to kill with either ice or fire.

  They looked around after the 4 goat-men were dead and found some gold pieces lying about. There were also two small containers of blue liquid which they examined. Neither one could identify the liquid, so Alison put one on her head under her hat.

  Lady Amabel, this liquid is very valuable. The locals call it manna. It is the liquid needed to recharge your staff when its power runs low. I will tell you when you need to recharge your staff. At that time, you should drink a bottle of the blue potion. That is all that is required for the recharge. As you gain experience and have access to more powerful spells, the staff will need to be refilled more often. I recommend that you keep on your person as much manna as you can carry, until you have some idea of how often you will need to recharge your staff. The staff also draws manna from the air very slowly, but that is why you have not had to recharge it. However, under the current circumstances, you can safely assume that you will be consuming energy at a fairly rapid rate.

  Alison clipped the two flasks of manna to her belt and they returned to the first room. They entered the next room in line, but there were no monsters there, so they tried the third room. This raised a cry of "SHIT!" from both of them. The room was filled with demons similar to the ones they had seen on the road to Peron. There were even two overseers in the room. Alison started firing ice balls at the demons as fast as she could identify a target. Meanwhile, Emett jumped over the intervening demons to strike at the leaders. They fired fire balls at him, but he was able to ignore them, though the force of the impact did jar him a little.

  Emett's first swing of the mace hit a shield and split it as it knocked down the overseer bearing it, but he was not killed. Emett swung at the other overseer and hit him between the shoulder blades. He was thrown across the room and fell lifeless to the floor. Meanwhile, the first overseer was now back on his feet and firing fire balls at Emett as fast as he could release them. Emett forced his way through the storm of fire and swung at the demon overseer's head. He made contact with a splat such as one would hear from a dropped watermelon as it hit the ground.

  This time, the demons did not disappear with the death of the overseers. Why not? Who knows? They found some more gold and 3 flasks of manna. Alison's hat recommended that she drink one just to be sure that her staff was up to energy capacity, so she did. She fastened the other two flasks to her belt.

  They returned to the central room and chose another room to investigate. This room was empty of monsters, but had a small chest in one corner. They opened the chest, but it was empty. There was nothing else in this room, so they decided to try another one.

  They entered that room and found two sarcophagi and steps leading down. They opened the sarcophagi and had to fight two zombies who climbed out, but they did not find anything else in the coffins. Emett and Alison discussed their next move and decided to see what was in the next cellar, down. It was a good thing that they had brought their pack of food along, since, at the rate they were going, visiting many more cellars would keep them from returning to the inn that night.

  They went down to the next level and immediately noticed the smell of rotting human flesh. The stench was terrific, but they felt that they had to find the source and eliminate it. It could only be a particularly loathsome monster that would create and live in a stench of this magnitude. Whatever it was, there was no question that it had to be destroyed.

  Chapter four

  This cellar didn't look any different from the previous one in general characteristics, though it did differ considerably in detail. The floor, walls, and ceiling were all of smoothed stone, but not remarkable beyond that. There were 6 sarcophagi in a 3 by 2 arrangement, and all of the lids were closed. Emett had walked toward one of the sarcophagi and had gotten close when he was hit in the middle of his back by a fire ball. He twisted around to see what had shot at him and saw a new kind of undead monster.

  This monster was one of four, all of whom were skeletons with glowing hands of different colors. The one who had thrown the fire ball at him had orange hands. One with blue hands was throwing ice balls. One with white hands was throwing balls of electricity. The final one was throwing green balls which seemed to be poison, since they were the only ones having an effect. He certainly felt nauseated and had a headache. Furthermore, his chest began to hurt. Emett shouted to Alison, "ALISON, I'VE BEEN POISONED! PLEASE CURE ME!"

  Alison paused in her bombardment of the skeletons with her fire balls long enough to cast a healing spell at Emett. As soon as he felt the effect, Emett ran to the skeleton with the green hands and hit him a mighty blow with the mace. Bones went flying everywhere, so Emett was able to concentrate on the other skeletons. Between the mace and the fire balls, the other 3 skeletons were quickly eliminated. "I've got to watch out for poison users. That poison really hurt!"

  "I'll bet it did! You had a green aura all about your body, and I was really worried about you. The poison must have been a slow acting one, but we'll have to be very careful if we run into one which acts quickly. I'll need to discuss with Hat about working out some protection for you from poison and for me from all four of the dangers we just faced."

  "Yeah, I think that we better take a break, now, while you do that. It would be stupid to get caught by a blast just because we were too impatient to take the necessary time to protect ourselves. You talk to Hat while I look in these sarcophagi ... Don't worry, I'll be careful."

  Emett left Alison mumbling to Hat and went to the nearest sarcophagus. He pushed the lid off and was almost disappointed when there was no body to leap at him. He chuckled to himself and went to the next one. Emett pushed the lid open and w
as not disappointed this time. A zombie jumped at him, but it was not strong enough to do any real damage to Emett without a substantial weapon. Emett clipped it with his mace and that was the end of the discussion.

  He looked in the remainder of the sarcophagi, killed a few more zombies, found a little more gold, and found a small shield which he offered to Alison. She took it on the off chance it might help her avoid a blow, but she complained that she really didn't know how to use it. Emett promised to teach her, the first chance he got.

  Alison had worked with Hat to concoct some spells to protect them both from poison and her from the elemental forces. The problem was that the spells would only last a few minutes before they had to be renewed, so she had to be on her guard and act quickly when the need arose. It looked like there was more to the hero business than either one of them had envisioned.

  They wandered around the cellar, killing more zombies and skeletons, and finding gold. By this time, they had 19 gold pieces and were starting to feel rich. They finally came to an area that appeared to be a separate chamber within a much larger room. There were three sarcophagi, two so close together that there was barely room for the two of them between the tombs.

  The third sarcophagus was in a corner of the room. There did not seem to be anything special about this coffin until they opened it. This time, a skeleton jumped out and attacked them with a scythe. The time was long past for them to be caught by surprise, and they both fought the creature with skill and vigor. This was an unusually sturdy opponent, and it took several blows from Emett's mace before it even showed any sign of damage. The only spell that Alison had to affect the skeleton was one of poison that she and Hat cooked up in a hurry. None of them, Hat, Alison, nor Emett, would have picked poison to be effective against a skeleton, but it worked, so they stayed with it. Alison made a point of keeping the skeleton with a green aura while Emett pounded on it with his mace.