Broneslav had no clue where he was or why he was surrounded by so many bodies, nor why his shield was glowing with a bright light. However, he was a practical soul and quickly decided that there was little reason to wonder, and no treasure to be had, so he need not worry too much about it. He was whole and the gamblers next door were obviously not interested in him. As there was no obvious way out of the room he was in, he passed through the gamblers, ignoring their cries to join in and opened the door to a room with nearly a dozen dark-robed people standing in a circle. The figures all wore masks of creatures from nightmare yet none seemed aware of his presence. He had no clue what to make of this. There was nothing to guide him, so he picked the right hand door at random and strode past the scary, still people.
Pausing briefly, he listened but all he could hear was the nightmarish murmuring and occasional screams of the people in the room with him. He pushed the door open and was greeted by the sight of people in bright costumes and colourful masks dancing in silence and many with no visible partner. Some stood to the side drinking while others chatted in the Cynidicean language that he had heard much of since getting lost in the desert. The people did not react at all to his bloodstained appearance or the naked blade in his hand. There was no exit from this room other than the door he had opened so he returned to the other door and opened it.
Stepping through the door, he had a sense of deja vu, although he was certain he had never been here before. His sharp eyes spotted an unevenness in the floor. He stalked forward carefully and hopped over the uneven lump. Past it, things looked more normal and the corridor floor was flat without that one lump. Perhaps it was a trap. Who knew but best to be careful anyway? This place was uncanny and he could easily find himself in trouble before he knew it.
He followed the corridor round to where a door in the wall stood ajar. It was clearly meant to be secret, but someone had left it open. Peering through, he saw a corridor with a door at the end. He committed the door's location to memory and followed the corridor he was in further to where it turned to the right and then ended in a door a short while later.
Pushing the door open, he found himself in a huge chapel with three statues at his end of it and rows of pews disappearing into the distance. Just in front of the dais on which the statues were standing, were two fountains, one on each side of the chapel.
Two red-headed strangers stood talking near the statues. They looked up as he entered. The light from his shield had given him away.
"Oho, a brave warrior," chuckles woman, "How delightful!"
She looked him up and down lasciviously chanted a few words, and he suddenly felt an overwhelming urge to do whatever she said, because she was clearly his best friend. This felt wrong just the same and he slammed his fists into the nearest statue. Something went pop in his head and the compulsion went away as his nose and knuckles began to bleed.
The woman cast Charm Person and Broneslav failed his saving roll so he opted to Defy Death (2 DAM) to avoid the effects.
He leapt towards the pair, recognising their duplicity. Horror dawned in their eyes as they realised he had overcome their spell. He crushed the woman's head and smashed the man hard to the ground. Blood dripped from the man's head. Even as he fell, the man's body started to twist and change. Suddenly, where the man had been there was a fox, also wounded in the head. It bounded away towards the far end of the room faster than Broneslav could follow.
The youth paused a moment to listen. Did these people or whatever they were have friends close by? He heard nothing but moved carefully towards the female. She was definitely dead. No doubt about that whatsoever. He moved pantherlike to the big corridor. The fox was not in sight.
Moving slowly up the corridor, Broneslav listened carefully but heard nothing. At the end of the corridor, he tried to use the corner as cover while he looked for the fox. The room he looked into was a large hall with vaulted roof and pillars. Huge double doors stood partially open at the far end, but completely blocked by sand. The fox could not have left that way. No other exits were visible, so it must be hiding behind one of the pillars.
Suddenly the fox appeared, as suspected, from behind the nearest pillat and sprinted towards Broneslav at full speed. It dodged around him, looking for a way out. Unfortunately, Broneslav was quick enough to make a wild smash as it passed and it collapsed to the ground, tumbling slightly because of its momentum. Even as Broneslav moved towards it, it breathed its last. When the last breath had left its body, it transformed back into the red-headed man.
He'd heard tales of werewolves who shifted between human and wolf form before, so these two must have been werefoxes. He'd never heard of that. When he got home, he reckoned this would be worth a kind word or two from his parents. And the jewellery they were carrying would earn him another kind word, he mused as he robbed the corpses of necklaces and other items that looked rather valuable.
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