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Stories from the Verse
Re Verse All
Chapter 76: Hastings 211
Table of Contents
Previous chapter: Beam 80
There was a somewhat lengthy discussion of whether they should flee, and who should flee. One proposal was that Lauren would take a group of about half the people to a safe point behind them, including Lurt and Serona, with perhaps Malacon’s leadership so that Sheegoka and Gojo could negotiate. Serona said, though, that the nobles are bound to want retribution, and if they can’t have the actual killer they will probably insist on whatever members of the team are still present. Malacon would have preferred to make a stand, to fight against the drow, but Tiras observed both that starting a war against the entire drow nation was not a wise choice and that it would be a bit foolish for them to have risked their lives to bring the queen home only to risk them again to defeat the queen. The final decision was that they would leave a message stating that given the present situation they would return at a future time to discuss trade relations, and the entire crew would then exit from the front hall to some point in their past travels, so as to avoid losing anyone immediately.
The next problem was where, and Lauren realized that she had a problem she had not considered: everywhere they went they had carried their own lights, and so all those places would be, at least to her eyes, utter darkness. She had thought about the place where they had met, where she had cast her light spell, but as she attempted to find this all she found was darkness. Similarly the cave where they encountered the orcs, and the dragon lair, and the top ledge, and the cave at the bottom, everywhere now was dark.
The one place where there was a smattering of light was the entrance to the drow city where they had come out of the tunnel to face the spider elves. That wasn’t far, but it would get them out of the city and give them a head start. Closing her eyes, she focused her clairvoyance on it, and tried to give herself as complete a picture as she could. Mercifully the guards were not moving.
She made sure Tiras was ready, and then said, “All right, everyone, walk with me.” Then she extended her hand and pronounced the words, creating the mist and moving into it.
She walked forward several yards, enough that she realized they were beyond the doors of the palace, and then she formed the image of her target in the mist, pronounced the words again, and in a few more steps they were out of the mist.
And they were surrounded by the spider elf guards.
There is a behind-the-writings look at the thoughts, influences, and ideas of this chapter, along with five other sequential chapters of this novel, in mark Joseph "young" web log entry #381: World Complications. Given a moment, this link should take you directly to the section relevant to this chapter. It may contain spoilers of upcoming chapters.
As to the old stories that have long been here:
