The next task the Lydians asked of Grettir and his companions was to help them bind and banish Apep. This done, they might close the Gate securely for the first time since the Breaking. They would then be free to assist in any way they could Grettir’s quest to seek the aid of Ptah. Having met and defeated Apep once already, Grettir was confident that the deed was well within the compass of the adventurers as long the Knights of the Shattered Sun knew their end of the business. However, there were preparations to be made to give them their best chance.
Preparations
The lifting of the Siege meant that the adventurers could teleport back and forth to Sequarl and Chittagong at will. Grettir, Ubaron and Wilf all returned to their respective Temples for advice and any assistance they could offer. Grettir returned with a gallon of Osiran holy water which he had made up into pots that could thrown, and some advice from Rendip Rim about not falling into the water. Ubaron returned with more holy water and a scroll from High Priestess Cassandra seeking a meeting with the Kights of the Shattered Sun, once it was all over. Wilf returned from his meeting with the ever-pragmatic Mitrans with a holy artefact – spiritual anchor in the form of a candelabrum.
It was perhaps intended as a means to allow crewmembers to secure themselves against falling overboard and spinning away into the Void to be lost forever. However, Paradoxides immediately identified its potential as something to which Apep might be bound. The wizard was making twine from the hair of the devout. The skinhead look was much in vogue in Lydius in those days (though there were those – Jason and Kolgrim in particular – who stuck with their customary hirsute look). The purpose of the twine was to catch and bind Apep. The Mitran Candelabrum would be ideal as an anchor to which the threads might be tied.
Meanwhile, Jason had been working in the forges, making harpoons. These would be inscribed with the same glyphs as the ineffective javelins from the last encounter with Apep, but propelled by the muscular warriors of Grettir’s party they would have a far better chance to pierce the beast’s thick hide. Each harpoon was barbed and wrought with a ring, through which the wizard’s twine might be threaded and secured to the candelabrum.
Finally Paradoxides and Ubaron flew up into the mountains and captured a powerful air elemental, which Paradoxides intended to use to wrap more of his twine around Apep.
First Contact
On the appointed night, the ceremony took place once more in the Temple of the Shattered Sun. The chamber in the Prime Plane faded from sight, and the Ship of the Dead set sail into the Void, the Dusk behind them, the helm pointed in hope towards the Dawn. The crew was the same as before, with addition of the archer Trevillion, who had happened to be in Sequarl when Grettir visited Rendip Rim.
It was not long before they made contact with five powerful flying demons. Three were slain and two fled, one trailing smoke having been caught by one of Grettir’s pots of holy water, that burnt it terribly. The worst casualty upon their side was Wilf who bore the brunt when Jason accidently dropped on of his alchemical incendiaries. Fortunately Paradoxides was able to prevent any serious damage to the ship with his sorcery. Wilf was healed by the priests.
A Diversion
Trevillion thought he could hear distant screaming and a tower manifested upon the starboard bow. It was standing upon a bare rock. He and Samuel went to investigate and returned with the news that they had spied inside and seen a woman, who Trevillion thought was probably a Kosian, being tortured by a fiery demon held in a pentacle.
There was some disagreement about whether they should divert from their mission. Esther in particular thought they should not be diverted from their core mission. However, the adventurers were adamant that they should rescue her. Samuel sided with them and so an away party of Grettir, Paradoxides, Trev, Ubaron and Kolgrim flew to the tower and smashed their way in courtesy of Paradoxides’ conjured vorpal blade. Paradoxides dispelled a web of illusions intended to thwart their progress and discovered the secret door that led to the lower levels. There they slew the giant spiders that infested the place and rescued the fair damsel.
Zilzana of Jad was a priestess from Kos. She had been kidnapped by Tyrosian pirates and brought here to be held and tortured – possibly at the orders of one of The Seven – the pirate rulers of Tyros. She was very beautiful. They in turn briefly explained their mission and apologised that they could not return her to Kos until they were done. Thus she had a ring-side seat when they encountered Apep.
Apep
The battle with Apep went as well as it might, with all the careful preparations paying off. Several harpoons hurled by Grettir, Wilf, Ubaron and Jason found their mark and some pierced deep into its body and held there. Paradoxides manoeuvred his bound elemental to cast more lines around the body of the serpent and Grettir leapt into the water using his Water-walking ring to secure the serpent with yet more cables to the side of the boat (it only occurred to him afterwards that there been no guarantee that it would operate on the largely illusory sea of the Void). The serpent was not idle while all this was going on. Esther narrowly escaped disappearing into its maw, and her steed, the troll-like being, perished. Apep’s black magic seemed particularly aimed at the Knights and all were injured. However, at the end the Serpent was securely bound. Despite their wounds, the Knights of the Shattered Sun managed to complete their ritual. As they did so, all those with sufficiently potent magical weapons thrust them into the serpent. Apep turned to smoke and disappeared, banished forever from this place and time.
The ship sailed on towards the Dawn and they reappeared in the Great Hall of the Temple of the Shattered Sun, to much rejoicing. Grettir was left reflecting on the long years in which the Knights of the Shattered Sun had been unable to to pull off the feat that they had just completed. Certainly on this occasion they had benefitted from the martial skills and powerful sorcery that the adventurers had brought to the endeavour. However, he thought that the critical factor was that they had developed a sound plan and made detailed preparations. The Mitran Candelabrum, the wizard’s cunning thread and the air elemental, were perhaps beyond them, although with thought they might have come up with equivalent analogues. They certainly should not, to Grettir’s mind, have taken 700 years to work out that their javelins were ineffective and they needed heavier spears. He suspected that they trusted too much to personal valour and ancient ritual and had not spent enough time thinking about the capture of Apep as a practical problem to be solved. In his opinion Lydius needed a bit of a shake-up in its thinking.
Heroes of Kos
While Lydius partied, they returned Zilzanah to Kos, via Grettir’s agents in Telnus. It became apparent that Zilzana was quite the celebrity in Kos and that her kidnap had caused much consternation. They were delighted to have her returned and Grettir’s stock rose considerably on the island as a consequence. They were rewarded with Zilzana’s weight in gold. Kolgrim was heard to complain that, though she was beautiful and well-formed, he preferred a woman with a bit more meat on her – particularly under the circumstances. Nevertheless, at 140lb she netted them the equivalent of over 45 Chittagong talents of gold, which they shared with the whole ship’s crew – even those who would have left Zilzana to her fate.
The Essence of Ptah
While the adventurers had been busy in Kos, the Knights, and in particular Samuel, had been reconnoitering those parts of the Void near the Lydius Gate, that had been obscured from their view since the years of the Siege. He returned with news of a step pyramid, the existence of which was not recorded in any records the Temple held. He had watched a while and noted that there seemed to be regular shipments of something leaving the pyramid. Intrigued, he suggested a reconaissance in more strength. The adventurers readily agreed. Once more the Ship of the Dead was prepared. Miriam and Esther joined them, but Ellia stayed behind this time. Samuel guided the ship to a cove that he said was the nearest approach to the pyramid. They left Miriam and Esther with boat and Samuel led them overland to where the Pyramid lay.
It was a rocky, dusty, arid landscape, shrouded in darkness and shadows cast by the moon – there had been no moon prior to the Banishing. They made camp in some ruins close to where Samuel said that the shipments passed. Sure enough, after a substantial wait (it was hard to judge the passing of time here), they saw a group of figures heading slowly away from the pyramid. There seemed to be one large and six lesser demons and a band of eight bearers carrrying a large urn carried shoulder high upon a litter. From their progress it seemed very heavy. There were many stoppages despite much merciless whipping of the bearers by the demons.
When they drew level with their position, the adventurers struck. The demons, especially the largest, were no pushovers but they were all slain. The bearers seemed to be lost souls – of the sort that had made up the Soul Chain that they had burst through with the Black Swan. Grettir spoke words over each. Their bodies crumbled to dust as he sent their souls to rejoin the great Cycle of Life over which Osiris presided. The wizards reported that the urn seemed to be carved from pumice – so that was not where the weight resided. Whatever was inside was alchemically sealed. It was very powerful but not, it appeared, evil. They did not stop to examine it further but took it back to the ship and thence to the Temple to be investigated.
Inside the urn was discovered a metal cylinder and inside that, a blue flask that Rebecca determined to be the Pure Essence of Ptah himself. This would require some futher investigation and a return to the pyramid itself.
G-18
OE Date: April 695
Characters: Grettir, Paradoxides, Ubaron, Jason, Wilf, Trevillion NPCs: Kolgrim, Samuel, Ellia, Miriam, Esther
Real World: April 2010; Where: Surbiton
See also Ubaron’s Diaries