Beastborne- Mark of the Founder

by James T Callum

  “An ancient city, Mornheim is its name. Long lost and thought destroyed, it exists still as a memory of itself. Touch your hand to our prison and we will give you the knowledge of its location and how to gain entry.”

  “What’d they say?” Elora asked, her eyes wide with hope at seeing Hal’s expression.

  “They say there’s a Manaseed we could get,” Hal answered as he walked over to a shadow-filled emerald. “We might actually be able to make a Sanctum.”

  Just as Ashera was about to ask what Hal was doing, he pressed his palm to the cold emerald. A shadowy hand pressed against the other side.

  It was over in an instant. Hal’s body went rigid and then sagged. He nearly stumbled but his DEX, at over twice that of a normal human’s, compensated and he managed to keep his feet under him.

  He knew where to go. It was a bit hazy and indistinct but it was to the west far into strange purple and blue crystalline lands. He saw the cliff he would need to reach and he knew too how to pass beyond its protections.

  “Hal…?” Ashera asked, her mace in one hand. “Are you well?”

  Straightening, he turned to her and smiled. “Better than ever. I know where we can find a Manaseed.”

  “We did as you asked,” they prompted.

  Hal nodded. “Tell me where I can find the Manatree and fix Rinbast’s mess and I will see you and your children are returned to your home.”

  Shadow Sage Reputation: +2,000 (Enemy of my Enemy).

  While the Shadow Sages do not fully trust you, they recognize the value in what you seek to do. That you are the enemy of Rinbast, their captor, they are all the more willing to aid you as much as they can.

  “Wait,” Noth said. Hal was surprised when Ashera didn’t react to Noth’s voice. She could always hear her before. “I would ask you a question.”

  “So the Dark Sister finally sees the truth. Very well, ask the question that burns your tongue,” said one of the Shadow Sages.

  “Ever since I came to this plane, I… noticed something was off. With Hal. I feel a similar echo in the air distant and yet familiar. Your own words echo my concerns. You said you mistook him for another. Why?”

  Noth gave Hal a curious look, as if he was a puzzle she was hoping to figure out.

  “You speak of the Founder’s Grand Plan. An army of selves, failures one and all. This one, we thought, was just another of his minions,” a Shadow Sage explained.

  “How is that possible?” Noth asked before Hal could. His mouth still hung open, agape at the implications.

  “Many worlds exist, as you well know, Dark Sister. With deific aid, Rinbast sought to pervert the natural order. He stole versions of himself from different realms. To the common observer, they would appear as an army of selves.

  “A hope that was summarily dashed when Rinbast overextended himself. And ultimately put an end to by this one’s benefactor murdering the god Rinbast had been using. Our children lack the higher functions we possess and could not tell the difference between Hal and another of Rinbast’s ‘brothers’,” explained another Shadow Sage.

  Noth turned to Hal with an uncharacteristic look of sympathy stamped on her features. “Hal… I’m sorry.”

  The blood drained from his face as he stared at one of the Shadow Sages.

  “Perhaps the timeline you and Rinbast share is more alike than others, perhaps it is not. It matters little,” said one Shadow Sage. “That which we have seen shows us a man apart. You and Rinbast may share an origin but it is clear you possess a nobler heart. Your origins do not define you. Only your actions.”

  With those words of wisdom, the Shadow Sages fell quiet again to let Hal process what he just heard.

  “Hal?” Mira asked, placing a hand on his shoulder. He jumped at the touch, so deep in thought already and Mira started. “You look pale as a ghost, is the location of the Manaseed that bad?”

  Right, they didn’t hear Noth. Hal glanced at Ashera, who looked concerned but no more aware of what was just said than any of the others. He breathed a sigh of relief. He looked to Noth, and the Reaper gave a subtle shake of her head to the silent question. She would not expose him.

  He explained where the Manaseed was but left out the rest. He wasn’t sure they could handle it. The truth of Rinbast somehow made sense to Hal. Looking back he saw the various hints, the doors that only opened because of him.

  When somebody tells you that you’re an alternate timeline of a tyrannical ruler, you would expect to feel pretty lost. But Hal didn’t. He knew who he was. And even if Rinbast and he shared a past and DNA, he was no more Rinbast than Hal was his twelve-year-old self.

  Decades of experiences differentiated them, most of which Rinbast had upon Aldim, stacking the deck in his favor. Which seemed ridiculous at first, but if he could pull versions of himself from different timelines, then would it be that odd that Rinbast took Hal from a different point in time?

  His head hurt as he tried to keep it all straight.

  It wasn’t that he doubted his friends cared for him but some truths were too big. No matter how dedicated or altruistic they were, this was a truth he painfully realized he could never reveal. How could they ever look at him the same again if he revealed to them that he was the very agent of their oppression and misery?

  They hated Rinbast with every fiber of their being. How could they not hate him as well?

  Each of them – himself included – would find it hard not to wonder what path took Rinbast from Hal’s current one to that of a tyrannical killer. Was Hal walking that same path? There was no way to know without asking the man himself and Hal, more than ever before, wanted to be as far away as he could from him.

  His soul felt weighted and dark. Noth’s golden eyes watched him but she said nothing. But then he remembered something. And he couldn’t help himself. If Rinbast brought Hal over, why did he want to kill him?

  “Is Rinbast just killing every potential Founder?” Hal asked. There was something seriously wrong with Rinbast if he kept killing versions of himself.

  But he kept that to himself.

  “No, that’s ridiculous. Killing every potential Founder would be outside any single Founder’s reach,” Elora said. “Rinbast rules Fallmark, the region we’re in now. The world is a big place and many other Founders exist outside of Fallmark. The Broken Lands, where I found you? That borders between the Fallmark and the Direlands, ruled by Founder Tristal. And there are many more beside her.”

  “But everybody uses ‘Founder’ as if he’s the only one,” Hal pointed out.

  Mira chuckled. “It’s just a title, dude. Like King or Queen. People often just use the title because there’s only one in their area. It’s… what’s the word...”

  Her eyes went dull and listless for a second before they sparked back to life. She snapped her fingers sharply and pointed at Hal. “Ubiquitous! Anyway, everybody knows who the King is so you don’t need to keep saying King John, you just say ‘the King’ and everybody groks you.”

  The more Mira talked, the more Hal had trouble seeing her as a native of this realm. He highly doubted the words “dude” and “grok” were common vernacular in Aldim. Then again, there were orcs here, and “grok” was definitely an orc-sounding word. But he doubted it had the same meaning.

  Was she letting her guard down, or was he reading too much into things?

  “If I were a Founder,” Mira continued, “I’d have a special group of warriors tasked with finding and bringing such a person to me. That way I could meet them and help them out. Get them set up somewhere else instead of all this killing and fighting business. The world is so much nicer with friends,” Mira said with a shrug of her narrow shoulders. Her hair still stood ridiculously on end and as Hal’s eyes crept up to it, she scowled and frantically tried to smooth the hair back down.

  76

  “Rinbast is methodical,” Ashera said, “I would not be surprised to learn that he had a system in place specifically to deal with appearances of….” She motioned t
o Hal.

  Hal shook his head and turned to the nearest emerald. “Where is the Manatree and how can I get to it?”

  “Just because you possess the answer does not mean you have the means to act upon it,” warned the gentler sage. “Walk this path carefully, for it is narrow and there is no room upon it for your companions.”

  “Seek out the lowest levels of this place. Where even the Founder feared to tread. Therein you will find a Vault, that which houses the most valuable and dangerous of all things the Founder discovered here. The reason he first erected this place, though its purpose was soon replaced with dreams of conquest.

  “Dreams which were not his own,” snickered another. “Powerful are the suggestions of the Elders.”

  “Your answer lies behind the Vault. Within you will find the same answers your predecessor did. We hope you will fare better than he.”

  Guild Contract Updated: The Coffin Contract.

  You have discovered more than enough to cause riots in the streets. If the Shadow Sages are to be trusted, all the answers will be found within the Vault. Proceed to the Vault with all haste.

  Objectives

  Gain entry to the Coffin District (Complete).

  Clear all monsters from within the district itself.

  Additional objectives available.

  Discover the cause for the shadow creatures.

  Gain entry into the Vault.

  Rewards

  Guild Rank Increase (Variable).

  District Ownership Rights.

  20,000 Sparks (Per party member).

  Additional rewards available.

  Experience Points (Variable).

  Murkmire Reputation (Variable).

  +1 Guild Rank.

  For a brief moment, Hal looked around the room and was shocked at what he saw. The shadows within the emeralds shifted about, six-fingered hands pressed against the faceted towering gems. But it wasn’t the shadows that drew his attention.

  It was his friends.

  Mira was still trying to coax her hair down. Ashera watched Hal with the same level of concern that Noth did, and Elora was giving Vorax a curious look-over.

  Hal smiled at Elora and Vorax.

  There hadn’t been much time to explain Vorax, and he had been glad beyond belief that nobody was hurt by a misunderstanding upon their first meeting. He could only imagine that Ashera did the explaining for him while he was under the thrall of Besal.

  After they camped for that night, Hal fielded more than a few questions about the curious monster. Thankfully, none of them seemed overly bothered by his inclusion. In a short time, the adorable little mimic endeared himself to the entire group.

  “I know where to go,” Hal said.

  As he explained where they had to go, Elora’s face predictably darkened when he reached the warning that only he would be able to walk that path.

  She turned around to the nearest emerald. “That’s unacceptable. I’m not splitting up again. Tell him another way.” Elora turned back to Hal, her blue-gray eyes bright and angry. “Are they telling you?”

  Hal shook his head.

  The Ranger turned to each of the emeralds, a pleading look in her eyes. “We stand stronger as one,” she explained. “There has to be another way.”

  “Her heart is good but our answer remains,” came the unexpected rasping voice.

  “There is no other way,” answered another.

  “I’m sorry, Elora,” Hal said. “There is no other way.”

  “You will uphold your end of the bargain?” one of the Shadow Sages reminded him. Its voice was almost pleading.

  After everything they gave him, Hal wasn’t about to double-cross them. But he was still wary. Everything they said would be hard - almost impossible, really - to confirm without leaving this place.

  “We have everything we need though, yes?” Ashera asked.

  “We do,” Hal confirmed.

  She looked at the rest of them and nodded. “Then leave the room, please.”

  “What, why?”

  “I will destroy the warding,” Ashera said, lifting up her mace. “It should be more than up for the task. I do not need to break through the stones, only deface the glyphs, correct?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Then leave and I will see it done,” she said. “If these creatures suddenly come out, I would not see you risking yourself unduly. If, as I hope, they are telling the truth… then we waste only a few minutes.”

  Hal looked around and found the rest of his friends nodding along in agreement.

  “She is a canny one,” one of the Shadow Sages said with a hint of laughter.

  “Trust, but verify,” snickered another.

  “You will see the veracity of our words. We thank you for setting our children free.”

  Everybody left the room, piling back into the “elevator” room to wait for Ashera. It was a tense few minutes as everybody held their breath, waiting for something to go wrong.

  Hal had Dominate at the ready. If anything other than Ashera came out of there, he was going to be ready.

  There were quiet rumbling noises that made it through the doors to the room but for the most part, it was eerily silent.

  As the notification rolled across Hal’s view, he knew Ashera had done it and that the Shadow Sages had been true to their word.

  Shadow Sage Reputation: +3,000 (Shadow-Friend).

  You have honored your word. With Ashera’s help, you have utterly destroyed the warding that would have prevented the Manatree from destroying the Shadow Sages, preventing them from returning to their realm of Shadesholm.

  Few creatures interact with the shadowy beings, fewer still manage to aid them in a way that places them in debt. While you may think that the exchange was even, the Shadow Sages view things differently. Your actions have indebted the Shadow Sages to you and your lack of desire to take advantage of this has altered their view of you for the better.

  As a Shadow-Friend, the Shadow Sages will do what they can to aid and assist you as they would one of their own. The creatures from Shadesholm have long memories. Your acts have earned you allies beyond your comprehension.

  Ashera walked through the door, clearly drained from the efforts. Behind her, Hal could make out the marred and heavily damaged stone. The sensation of mana-rich air was so strong it was almost suffocating.

  Whatever magic had been kept in those glyphs was flooding out of them at an alarming rate. Before Hal could suggest they get going, Elora stepped up and with one smooth motion took out her bow and nocked it.

  With an arrow pointing right at Ashera’s heart, she said something in a lilting tongue that Hal didn’t know. Tired and sweaty, Ashera hardly seemed surprised by the turn.

  In fact, she sported a small smirk and calmly replied in turn. Elora relaxed the draw on her bow and in an instant had it put back over her shoulder. She charged at the larger lamora and wrapped her arms tightly around the woman.

  Ashera smiled wearily and returned Elora’s tight embrace. Even going so far as to lift the smaller woman off the ground slightly.

  “Everything okay?” Hal asked.

  Ashera nodded. “We have a code phrase, to make sure in situations such as these that we are who we say we are. In fact, it would be a good idea for each of us to have one.”

  “Mine is Apple Butts,” Mira said. “I’m calling dibs right now.”

  “You act as if anybody else would want ‘Apple Butts,’” Hal said.

  “You’re just mad you didn’t come up with it first,” Mira said, sticking out her chin.

  “How about we go and discuss our code words on the way down,” Hal offered. “We’re going all the way to the bottom.”

  77

  “This seems like a trap,” Mira said halfway down the worked tunnel, its many glyphs glittered maliciously in the light of their Guild badges. The very air felt hostile, hot and humid instead of cool and dry. Hal looked over his shoulder at her. She put up her hands in surrender. “I�
�m not saying we turn back. Just felt like somebody should say it.”

  Hal couldn’t help but chuckle. The mounting tension they all felt eased at the Dragoon’s easygoing attitude.

  They came to a blind turn in the hall and stopped. None of them knew what to make of the new development that lay ahead. Gone was the vaguely ominous air.

  In its place was an oppressive sense of dread.

  Like a cancerous tumor, the stone bulged and rolled over the worked segments in a way that should have been impossible. Even without Shadesight, without their Guild badges, or Darkvision, the crystals that erupted from the bulbous stone would have provided a steady – if unnerving – blood-red light down the long winding tunnel.

  The tunnel was filled with dozens of mummified remains. Half of them wore armor, the other half looked to be simple miners. And all of them seemed to have been down here a long, long time.

  Several of the corpses were half-covered in stone. Many sported growths of the red crystal.

  Tentatively, they tested the stone. Making sure it wasn’t alive or somehow amorphous. When it seemed safe, Hal stepped out in front. Intent on leading them down the ominous tunnel.

  Not wanting to let the opportunity pass him by, Hal tried to loot the nearest corpse. As soon as he drew near, the crystal growing on the thing’s chest shimmered and he received a nasty shock that would have taken off more than a tenth of his HP.

  Luckily, Barkskin absorbed just under half of the damage. It still hurt though.

  The stone visibly grew, reclaiming more of the corpse. It bulged and rolled forward, up and over the corpse forcing Hal to take two steps back.

  Seeing Hal loot a body, Vorax took it upon himself to help his friend and did the same. But where Hal was repelled by the crystalline growths, the Mimic was free to feast to his heart’s content.

  “They’re all yours, Vorax,” Hal said to the mimic, not keen on repeating his shock.