Introduction: Portal Under the Stars Playthrough

Portal Under the Stars, Chapter 1

Portal Under the Stars, Chapter 2

Portal Under the Stars, Chapter 3

Portal Under the Stars, Chapter 4

“The moon is barren,” Erin Wywood sang with a mournful, strong voice as she clutched the charm around her neck fervently, head bowed and eyes closed. Her companions, now only Ethys Haffoot, Hilda Breadon, and Umur Pearlhammer, stood around her in silence. All of them were caked in dried mud and blood.

“The moon is old.

“The moon is knowing.

“The moon is cold.

“Its light’s a mirror,

“And moves our souls.” The minstrel opened her eyes as this last word lingered, and they were brimming with tears. She looked around at the bodies arrayed before their small gathering. They had worked together to drag them here, at the foot of the giant throne.

“Leda Astford. Bern Erswood. Veric Cayfield. May these souls find you in the heavens, Shul, God of the Moon, Dancer of the Half-light Path, Husband of the Three. May you also shepherd Giliam Haffoot,” at this Ethys choked a sob. “Gyles Teahill, Finasaer Doladris, Mythey Wyebury, and Egerth Mayhurst.”

The halfling snarled. “No! Not him. Let Egerth burn in an undying hell.”

Erin sighed and nodded sadly at Ethys, which seemed to mollify her. “May these souls find rest in your domain among the stars, and may you find good use for them in your celestial domain. May your light banish the Chaos in darkness and remind us of a brighter day. May it be so.”

“May it be so,” the others repeated.

Erin released the pendant in her grip, a simple silver crescent moon. “Alright,” she said wearily. “Thank you all. Now, do we explore the door that Umur found behind the throne, or do we simply leave? There are only four of us now. I’d like it to be a group decision.”

As the others cleared their throats, Erin looked around the vast chamber. Shattered clay pieces and slabs of mud were everywhere, littering the throne, floor, and shallow water of the pit below them. Only hints at the vast army of soldiers remained; clay arms, hands, broken spears, and half-heads were scattered around the floor. In the pit was only brown, thick water and chunks of the ceiling above.

“You said you thought it was treasure, didn’t you Umur?” Hilda asked. She had dropped her rolling pin and held in both hands the glowing orb from atop the throne, big as a small watermelon and seemingly made of pure crystal. This close, the pulsating light was harsh and cast deep shadows on Hilda’s face and arms.

“It’s me best guess,” the dwarf sighed. “Whoever built this place would hide the vault behind the throne. But, mind, it could be trapped as well. The door was not easy to find.”

“I suspect it is trapped,” Ethys frowned. “Everythin’ in this cursed place is trapped, eh?”

“I agree,” Erin conceded. “We have jewels from this place we’ve salvaged, silver figurines, and a magical orb,” she nodded at Hilda. “Plus armor and spears nicer than anything we could forge. It’s enough, isn’t it? I don’t think that I can bear any more of us dying here.”

Hilda frowned, clearly the dissenter. She looked at the others in turn, then eventually puffed out her breath in a mighty heave.

“Alright, alright. We leave it. I’m sure you’re right that it’s trapped, and we’ve seen enough death to last our lifetimes. Imagine what this place could be hiding…” emotions warred on the baker’s face. “But okay. Alright. We leave it.”

Erin nodded. “And we do not explore the rooms on either side of the giant statue, either, not the one Councilwoman Leda and Bern opened, nor the one Egerth disappeared into. We are retracing our steps as best we can and getting out of here. Yes?”

“Okay, but how are we getting past that giant statue without getting burned alive?” Ethys asked, tamping the end of a black spear on the stone.

“I’ve been thinkin’ on it,” Umur said. “May have an idea there.”

The dwarf had strapped Leda’s ancestral longsword to his belt on the opposite hip from Mythey’s shortsword. He, Hilda, and Erin all wore the black scalemail from the spear-throwing statues. Ethys declined to peel the armor from Leda’s corpse, but she was happy to take Bern’s spear and have two of the weapons. Erin, meanwhile, had taken Veric’s iron scissors, not as a weapon or tool but as something to bury when they returned to Graymoor. They had all agreed that they couldn’t realistically bring the bodies of the other residents with them.

“Let’s go then,” Erin announced.

Slowly, painfully, the four companions made their way from the large throne around the pit and out the way they’d come. Hilda glanced back at the throne, where a door lay open behind it, and sighed heavily. Then she followed.

The pulsing orb banished the darkness in the long, wide room containing the miniature clay soldiers on its ledges. As they passed through it, Ethys wondered aloud.

“Who built this place, then? That guy from the statues… seems a wizard, yeah? But also a warlord. Where is he now, d’ya think?”

“I don’t suppose we’ll ever know,” sighed Erin. “Some knowledge is not meant for mortals.”

Hilda harrumphed at that, disagreeing but choosing not to say so explicitly.

“Quiet now,” Umur growled. “We don’ know if the room with the pool is still there, or what effect it’s had on those crystal people.”

They climbed the spiral staircase to the closed door at its top, which Umur opened hesitantly. The room was indeed still there, but no longer lit by shimmering gemstones beneath rippling water. Instead, Hilda’s orb showed that the long, rectangular pool had fallen away below, but the rest of the floor was intact. Stone walkways interspersed with tall, floor-to-ceiling pillars, allowed them to stay wide of the now-gaping hole where the pool had been.

The crystal figures remained, and they shambled their way towards the companions once they’d arrived. Erin hoped they could bring the strange creatures with them to Graymoor, but once they moved towards the door to the giant statue, the crystalline humans edged away like frightened animals. They would not step closer than five strides from the exit, and nothing the companions tried could convince them otherwise.

“Do we force them, then?” Hilda asked.

“No,” Erin sighed. “I suppose we leave them here, in their home. Like everything else in this place, I have no idea if that’s the noble decision or not.”

“I’m still wonderin’ how we aren’t gonna be cooked by the statue,” Ethys muttered.

“Calm yerself, lass,” Umur grumped. He was wheezing in pain from his shoulder wound and a mosaic of smaller hurts. Mud caked his broad beard and armor. “I’ll go first. This is all based on it not cookin’ me when I first open the door. If it acts like it did when we first arrived, though, I’ll try me idea.”

The dwarf placed a bloodied, dirty hand on the latch and pulled. The door opened.

There was the enormous stone statue, fully thirty feet high and dominating the square room. Its outstretched finger pointed directly at the doorway in which Umur stood.

He winced and waited, then, after several heartbeats, exhaled. “Alright, good. Let’s go then.”

Ethys hobbled in on her club foot and made her way to the burned lump that was once her brother. She sank to her knees, dropping the two black spears in her hands, and wept. Erin lay a hand on Umur’s uninjured shoulder.

“I’ll go be with her,” she said in a low voice. “What’s your plan, Master Pearlhammer?”

“I need to look at the base,” he said. “And I need one’a those spears.”

Erin nodded, leaving him to examine the base of the enormous statue. Hilda followed Umur, providing light with her glowing orb. Their footfalls and Ethys’ sobs were the only sounds in an otherwise silent space.

Without saying a word, Erin plucked the spear that was briefly Giliam Haffoot’s from the floor and brought it to Umur. Then she returned to Ethys and crouched down at her side. Erin had prayers to her Moon God at the ready but chose to reflect on them them silently. She closed her eyes and lay a hand on the middle of the halfling’s small back as it shuddered with grief.

A long while later, the light from Hilda’s strange orb grew closer. Erin looked up to see the baker and stonemason standing a respectful distance from she and Ethys.

“I’ve done it, then,” the dwarf said, clearing his throat. “We can go now, or at least try.”

Ethys sniffled and nodded. As she rose stiffly, she hugged Erin tightly for several heartbeats. When she let go, Ethys looked up gratefully.

“Thank you,” she whispered. Erin nodded, a warm, sad smile on her face. A memory flashed of Leda comforting Ethys immediately after her brother’s death, and a pang for all they had lost today ran through her. How long ago had that been? She suddenly felt very small and fragile.

“So,” Ethys said shakily. “What’s the plan, then?”

Hilda answered for him. “He’s hammered one of the spears in the place where the statue rotates,” the baker said proudly, as if she’d done the work herself.

Erin blinked, impressed. “Do you think it will keep it from turning?”

Umur shrugged, then winced in pain at the motion. “Hard to say. But it should at least give us time to leave. The exit is the opposite of where he’s pointin’, so even if it just slows the thing we can make it.”

They all wandered over to inspect the dwarf’s handiwork. Indeed, one of the black spears now jammed into the crease between the statue and its base. The stone around the shaft had been chipped away to give the spearhead better access to the mechanisms within.

“Are we sure we don’t want to explore the side doors, then?” Hilda asked, then started at the dark looks the other three immediately shot her. “Alright, alright. Let’s go home.”

They assembled around the southern door, with the statue’s broad back looming above them from the center of the room.

“When I place me hand on the door, crowd forward. I don’ know how much time I bought us.”

They all nodded. Sweat had broken out on Erin’s forehead and she wiped it away. The back of her hand came away mud-smeared.

“On one,” the dwarf rumbled. “Three. Two. Go!”

He threw the door open as the statue began to turn. A sound like a mallet striking a large iron rod echoed in the hall, then again, then a mighty CRACK! that set everyone’s teeth on edge. Erin and the others pushed through the doorway and, as Umur and Erin slammed it closed, they heard the telltale hiss of the flame from its fingertip. The door grew hot, and they all stepped away, panting.

Erin had never seen the dwarf whoop in joy, but he did so now. The relief of surviving the warlord’s death trap was palpable, and for awhile they all hugged and cheered and, eventually, cried again.

“That’s it, then,” Hilda beamed, cradling her orb with both hands. “We can go home now.”

“If the portal’s still open, ya,” the dwarf chuckled.

At that statement they all grew immediately silent.

“Wait, what?” Ethys stammered. “Do you think it may have closed?”

“I… uh,” the dwarf said delicately, pulling at his beard with one hand. “It only opened with the star directly overhead, so I don’ know.”

“There is only one way to find out,” Erin said soberly. “And I believe it will be open. We’ve done all of this under Shul’s watchful gaze. It won’t have been for naught.”

The others clearly did not share the minstrel’s faith, but they hustled to the door facing them. Lining the wall behind were statues with arms cocked back, now armor-less and without weapons.

Umur did not pause for ceremony. As soon as he’d reached the door he unlatched and threw it open.

A long hallway greeted them, and at the corridor’s end was a blue-limned, shimmering doorway with night sky beyond.

The air felt cooler and crisper than Erin had remembered. The others laughed and hugged again as they made their way outside, then grew more sober as they saw the bloody body of Little Gyles and the burned, stripped corpse of Mythey.

For her part, Erin Wywood looked up at the blue star, what Old Bert Teahill had called the Empty Star. It twinkled and gleamed overhead. Then her gaze shifted to the full moon, bathing the old stone mound with pale light. Indeed, for the first time she realized that the orb Hilda held was like its own miniature moon and would banish shadows wherever she brought it. In that moment, the full divinity of their harrowing, miraculous experience flooded her. She felt without a doubt the divine guidance of Shul steering her and her companions’ movements, from agreeing to join Leda’s expedition earlier in the day to now. With newfound appreciation, she looked from the sky to Umur, Hilda, and Ethys, all smiling and tear-streaked and inviting her to join them.

Under the light of the full moon and Hilda’s orb, Empty Star twinkling blue overhead, she joined them.

Reflections: Portal Under the Stars Playthrough