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The next day I was ready to see where Annah had found my body. As we moved through Ragpicker's Square, I thought of my promise to tell Sharegrave where Pharod's bodies came from. But he would no doubt continue exactly where Pharod had left off. Even if I didn't tell Sharegrave, some berk would soon take control of the Buried Village, and organize more expeditions into the catacombs, looting the dead.
I considered this as we walked through the Hive, and came up with a solution. I stopped at the Gathering Dust bar, a Dustman hangout, and talked to several inside. The Dustmen evidently already suspected where Pharod must be getting his bodies, and I described to one individual what he had been doing, and where his bodies were coming from. I felt better, since now Hargrimm's and Stale Mary's charges would be protected.
As we walked through the Hive I saw coming towards us a githzerai inhabitant of Sigil. I moved to intercept him. The gith turned to face me as I approached. Like Dak'kon, he had a yellow cast to his skin and a gaunt frame. His clothing was a curious blend of sharp colors and dull, mud-stained browns. The gith's dead-black eyes flickered over Dak'kon, then me. I had learned something of polite githzerai talk from Dak'kon, and knew a proper greeting.
"Hail, sword-ringer." The githzerai ignored me and turned to Dak'kon instead. He spoke several clipped words in a strange, low tongue -- I thought I understood the inflections correctly, so I could translate what he had said.
"All beholden, *zerth.*" Dak'kon replied in the same tongue. The sentence structure was odd, but I thought I understood what Dak'kon said.
"This one is numbered among the faithful." I asked Dak'kon what he was saying, to try and confirm my translation. The githzerai turned to me as I spoke, then turned back to Dak'kon and spoke again, this time at great length. I still had some difficulty, but thought it was getting easier.
"There is one by Dak'kon's name who is not one of the People. It is said that his mind is divided. It is said that he is a *zerth* that does not *know* the words of Zerthimon." Dak'kon made the same reply as before; the tone had changed slightly, but the meaning seemed to be intact.
"This one is numbered among the faithful." Dak'kon fell silent, as if to give the words time to sink in. "The one beside me speaks. Will you hear him?" The gith's response was so quick it almost had the force of an attack behind it. I was not certain if I got the entire meaning, but it seemed as if the gith just issued some sort of challenge to Dak'kon in the form of a question.
"*Zerth,* do you *obey* the words of this human?"
I was tempted to defend Dak'kon, but wasn't sure I wanted this gith to know how much I understood of what he said. Besides, Dak'kon was capable of defending himself. Dak'kon's reply was a short one, but his speech was slowed, as if he had to drag the words from his throat.
"T'cha's choice has become mine." The gith fell silent for a time before continuing.
"This matter carries the stink of the illithid about it." His eyes flickered across Dak'kon's face. "I see no chains upon you. You speak your mind. How did this blasphemy come to be?"
"The chains are my own." His skin seemed to take on an ashen shade as he spoke... it sounded like every word was slowly killing him. "Anarch of a hundred years, there is no hourglass that can measure the tale. The matter is as twisted as Fri'hi's roots. Its resolution is one of impossibility and may never come." Dak'kon frowned, then his voice strengthened. "The one beside me speaks. Will you hear him?"
The gith did not look at me. His attention was focused on Dak'kon. "He may speak. I will hear him."
"He will hear you," Dak'kon said as he turned to me.
"Very well. I had some questions…" The gith replied with a metaphor.
"Ach'ali-Drowning. "
I struggled to remember what this particular metaphor meant. Ach'ali-Drowning: Essentially, "A question whose answer would serve no purpose." This was usually a request to the speaker to make a vague or 'useless' question more specific.
I recalled the story Dak'kon had told. The githzerai make their home on the Outer Plane of Limbo, a plane of chaos. Stability can only be achieved by shaping the chaotic matter of the plane with the mind; focus and discipline are necessary for this to occur. "Ach'ali" was a foolish githzerai of myth who was lost on Limbo, and she was barely able to form an island around herself. While adrift in the chaos matter, she met a planewalker who offered to help. Ach'ali asked so many useless and unfocused questions on how to return home, however, that the isle of matter dissolved around her, and she drowned in Limbo. I was more specific with my next question.
"Can you tell me about Dak'kon? "
"He walks with you." His forehead creased. "How is it he is not *known* to you?"
"I was hoping you could tell me something about him." Actually, I was hoping to gain more insight into what other githzerai thought of Dak'kon.
"He is not speechless. If you would *know* him, put the questions to him. Do not insult us both by treating one as a statue."
The gith would not answer any other questions about Dak'kon or the githzerai, and I learned nothing new about the city from his clipped answers.
I resolved, again, to somehow free Dak'kon of his vow. Failing that, I could at least try to learn more about the githzerai.
Annah led us to what appeared to be an abandoned tenement. We approached an entry in the side of the building, a door framed by an arch. What I first took to be a door in the archway was actually a painting. The artist had made use of the shadows of the overhanging arch and some subtle texturing effects to give the door the illusion of substance.
"Are you sure this is the door, Annah?" I asked.
"Aye... it's been smeared with barmy paints from the Starved Dogs, it has - it's a real door until yeh look at it, then it turns into a painting."
"How did they do that?" Annah shrugged.
"There's stranger things in th' Planes." She suddenly frowned. "You might as well ask how yeh got yerself out of the dead book after I was SURE yeh were dead."
"So, this door... I just don't look at it? And *then* open it?" Annah glanced at the door, then nodded.
"That's the dark of it, if chant be true."
"All right, then... I'll do what you say. You just -"
"Houl' on!" Annah stopped me before I reached for the door. "This is the only path I know ta reach the place I found yer corpse, but it's not the safest road, aye? Yeh sure you're ready? I'm not here to play yer minder, no matter what ol' stutter-crutch said."
"What's beyond this door that's so dangerous?"
"Chaosmen," Annah whispered. "Barmy as they come. Barking wild into th' day and night, ready to either paint yeh with colors or crack yer brain-box yeh with a chamber pot. Dangerous bloods, they are."
"If they're so dangerous, then how did you get through?"
"I crept in nice and quiet-like. Can't paint yeh or kill yeh when they can't SEE yeh." She looked me up and down with a frown. "Doubt I can pull that twice with yeh around. Yeh look right clumsy, yeh do."
I closed my eyes, reached for the door and fumbled around... to my surprise, I found a handle. With a slight tug, the door opened. A narrow passage led into the building, and from within, I could hear distant howling.
We entered a small room. I saw a slender tiefling girl standing with her back to me. I noticed that both her hands and the upended table in front of her were smeared with a fresh coat of what appeared to be pink paint. She seemed oblivious to my approach.
I greeted her. At the sound of my voice, the girl turned her head to regard me. Her face, though somewhat dirty and spattered with drops of pink, was strikingly beautiful. She flashed me a wide, mischievous smile, then returned her attention to the makeshift canvas.
I tried to talk to her, but the tiefling girl seemed totally immersed in her artwork. She ignored me entirely.
From this room a short hall opened, with doors on both sides. There was another inhabitant in the hall, and I figured his reaction was likely to prove more typical, as he attacked. He was quickly dispatched, being so foolish as to face four to one odds.
Taking the left hand door, we ended up in another hallway which stretched across most of the tenement. Glancing in a room off the right side of the hallway, I heard a whispered voice, apparently trying to get my attention. Looking around, I saw a figure hidden amid the shadows in the corner of the room. As I drew near, a young woman stepped out to reveal herself. She was dressed in a loose-fitting tunic, which, together with her short-cropped hair and slender frame, gave her a rather boyish appearance.
"I wouldn't go in there if I were you." She nodded in the direction of the door in the opposite wall. When I asked why, she winced at the sound of my voice, putting a finger to her lips to indicate silence. She paused for a moment, then answered in a hushed voice. "A whole mess of them howling lunatics, that's what. Looks like they're having some sort of gathering. Won't be able to get through to the alley until they clear out."
I asked who she was. "My name's Sybil." She whispered quietly, then spat into her palm and reached out to clasp my hand. I then asked what she was doing there.
"What does it look like I'm doing? I'm hiding. I came in here looking for... food." I noticed that as she spoke, her right hand moved instinctively to the pouch at her waist. "Only the barking idiots in the next room showed up and decided to throw a party on the front doorstep. Now I'm trapped in here and can't get out."
Getting back to the matter at hand, I asked how many were in the next room.
"I counted about a dozen of them. Of course, I was peeking through a crack in the door, so I could be off by a handful or so." I pondered for a moment, then asked another question.
"Is there another way to get through to the alley? "
"There may be another way to get past those animals without a fight. There is another door that leads in there. From what I was able to see, there are stacks of wooden crates along the same wall as the other door. It may be possible to sneak from *that* door to the exit on the other side of the room. There's only one problem..."
"The door's locked... I tried it. My guess is that key is on one of the thugs upstairs. I'm not addle-coved enough to go up there looking for it, though." She folded her arms across her chest and stared at me expectantly.
"If the key is up there… I'll find it. Farewell. "
Before I left, she added, "If you do manage to live long enough to find the key, the door is in a room to the southeast. I'll be watching from the shadows. If you can unlock the door and make it out to the Alley in one piece, I'll be right behind you."
I asked Annah to lead the way, since she had been here before. We went back to the hallway, and continued down it. It ended in a door which led to another room, and steps leading upward. Annah motioned us to stop. She had found a trap, and proceeded to disarm it. Morte floated up to her to stare at what she was doing. I could tell from the tightness of her shoulders as she worked on the trap that she didn't like the audience. When she was done, she turned to Morte.
"If yeh keep bobbin' about, skull, I'm goin' ta mount yeh on the end of a pike!" Morte quickly floated back to me, but his exaggerated bobbing as he did so contained its own message.
We went up the steps, ending in another hallway. On this floor we were forced to kill two more of the chaos thugs, but found nothing of interest. The other end of the hallway led to more steps, which we followed upwards.
This proved to be the top floor. We encountered a small group of the chaosmen, including a mageling. The mageling proved no match for me in magical ability, as the chaosmen proved no match in fighting ability. At the end of the fight I found a key on the mageling.
We went back down to the bottom floor, exiting through another door of the room at the base of the steps. We were actually on another side of the room the main group of thugs occupied, and a little searching revealed the secret panel Sybil had mentioned.
I doubted whether all of us could sneak past the group in the next room, besides we might need to come back this way. I wasn't sure how well we would do fighting against a large group, either. But I had a solution. I gave Annah a magical artifact we had found in the catacombs, a pipe that could call forth a poisonous cloud. I carefully explained to her how it worked, and what cautions to take to see she did not inhale any of the gas. Then I sent her to sneak into the next room and unleash the gas on the occupants. I was apprehensive for her safety, but felt I must show that I trusted her abilities.
I need not have worried. She was able to sneak in, and without anyone noticing her she unleashed the gas, killing them all. It was unfortunate they all died, but likely it would have come to that any way if we tried to all enter the room. We passed through another door, which led outside, into an alley. As we stood outside, trying to get our bearings, Sybil came through the same door.
"I must say, cutter... I'm impressed. I thought for sure
those animals would chew you up good. Well, I guess I should
thank you." She paused for a moment, then reached into her
pouch and pulled forth a small, green gem. "Here... this
one's on the Dogs. See you around, cutter."
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