Move 390:  Smooth Caverns, One Last Time

Smooth Caverns--Midday, Day 38 (Marpenoth 21)

Blacky picked up Arachne and headed into the caverns with her to determine if the problem was only with the first cave. They returned a couple of minutes later; Arachne was getting welts from uncontrollable scratching and looked at least as miserable as the cold wet members of the group now.

It did not seem that there was a way to get the gnomes around whatever was causing them problems. The rest of the party had to go in without them.  They also left Azrun behind, since he had volunteered earlier to stay with them.

The first cavern they passed through was C-shaped. A six foot high ledge, made of the same marble-like material as the floor and walls, skirted its edges. On the ledge was a series of pillars, uniformly eight feet tall with the appearance of smooth, elegant, fluted stone vases.
 
They walked past that through a curved tunnel that opened into a cavern that had a floor covered in the same smooth glasslike rock they had encountered before entering these caverns. In the center of the room, there was a larger pillar which had a seven tipped star at its top. It was surrounded by seven pillars about eight feet tall, elegant, smooth, fluted and vase-like, all of which had sprouted a seven tipped star at their tops.
 
After walking through the chamber with the star-topped pillars, the group reached a fork. Without pausing, those who knew where they were going took the left tunnel. About ninety feet down that tunnel, they came to another fork; this time, they went right.

The tunnel had a significant downward slope, making the footing a little hazardous. It was passable, however, and after about 120 feet, they came to a point in the tunnel where the floor was covered by standing water.

Jana looked at the water and grimaced. "Damn," she grumbled. After a sigh she said, "Okay, time to tie ourselves together again. Since Azrun's not here, anyone got something I can use to poke at the floor in front of me?"

"I don't have a staff or anything like that," Echo said.

Aloysius looked at the water and frowned. "I like not the notion of getting my books and components all wet," he said. "Most would likely be ruined. I'm also not inclined to leave them behind or remain behind myself."

"How deep is this water generally and how deep is its shallowest spot?"

"It got up to around here," Jana said, holding her hand up about four and a half feet high. She drew her sword and used it in place of Azrun's staff.

"I do have this spear we got from the grells." Blacky said.

"Great, mind if I use it?" Jana asked, leaving her sword in its sheath.

"Here ya go." Blacky said handing her the weapon.

"I could stay behind with them if you want to go see the room. It should be a quick trip in and out anyway." Blacky offered.

With some care, Aloysius would be able to keep his possessions that were likely to be damaged out of the water. Kanon, in his extremely heavy armor, did not protest going into the water. Everyone got tied together, and Jana got one grell lances from Blacky and used it to poke around in front of them.  Luckily, being submerged in water did not seem to make its electrical charge go off.

The water was frigid, and the tunnel floor beneath it was dangerously slick.  By moving slowly, everyone managed to get to the cavern that had not been completely explored. One portion of it had a floor high enough that it was not submerged. In one corner, there was a mutilated corpse that had probably been a roper. The unexplored part of the cave was soon determined to be nothing but more flooded area.

With that taken care of, the entire complex, to the best of their knowledge, had been explored.

"Done now?" soggy Jana asked hopefully.

"Isn't the tree back here somewhere?" asked Aloysius.

The soggy Kanon sighed and lifted his belts and pouches with a sigh and a low remark, "Well it was a trip well spent I'd guess." He proceeded to lay his belts over his shoulder out of the range of further soaking and waited for the next direction of travel.

"It's a little farther back," Echo said. "The statue is in this part. It'd only take a few minutes to see both, I think, but let's hurry."

Jana expressed a hopeful wish of leaving, and Aloysius asked about seeing the tree. Echo mentioned the statue, but no one else seemed interested. Since neither leaving nor seeing the tree could be accomplished by standing in freezing water, the group sloshed back out to the dry portion of the tunnel.

"We best be getting back to the others, there are too many nasty things down here tostay split up for long." Blacky said.

Kanon strapped on his belts again dripping water all over the cavern floor. He looked up as Blacky spoke and offered his own opinion, "I agree.
However, If you fellows decide to push on to see the tree then I will go back and check on them myself. I made a sound mistake trudging around in the water and I believe that I'd be done with it for the time being. He offered a smile and notched his second belt into place while he waited for their answer.

"I don't think there should be any additional splitting up," Jana said in a firm voice, made somewhat less impressive by her shivering. "We either all go see the stupid tree or we all go back. I vote for 'back,' but since the tree is a magicky sorta thing, Echo and Aloysius have the final say."

"Doubts have I that there would be sufficient time for a proper analysis," said Aloysius. "Let's go back."

About twenty minutes after they left, the group that had gone into the caverns returned. Aloysius and Kanon now looked wet and miserable too.

"No problems, I take it?" Jana asked the gnomes and Azrun as the groups merged. "So, let's find someplace to open that thing, eat something decent and dry off, okay?" Her voice became a little plaintive at the end.

Dalgaer grinned, "So the gnome haters did us a favor, they kept us dry!"

"But I _like_ swimming!" Arachne exclaimed. She glanced at Dalgaer, and then the floor. "Of course, Cynthia said that that was wrong and that I shouldn't like to swim even though we lived in a maritime town and _she_ didn't like swimming and she moved inland the first chance she got... I still don't think, though, that I want to be grateful to the magic."

Dalgaer said, "I can swim, it's a good thing to know, especially if you are short."

"You can --?" Arachne asked, looking amazed. "Oh -- well, yes..."

Azrun shook his head, "Nope. Anything else at the end of that cave? I guess we can eat rest for a bit then move back down the tunnel the way we came? Or are we resting here for the evening?"

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