Summary 104: The Repentant Bridge (2013-12-06)
You assessed the situation before closing in with The Priest/Brother Huriste, and it was of course Ahappi that confronted him first, but the priest did not seem to recognize him. Nonetheless Huriste chided the Captain for his sinfully barbed tongue (Ahappi was claiming everything he'd done against the Rokari was holy, in effect), but was in the end left scowling speechlessly when Ahappi left with a final reminder of Huriste's failures as a priest.
The Captain proceeded to punctuate his departure from Huriste with a thunderous crossing of the Repentant Bridge, denying the might of the Rokari magics that judged the sinfulness of those crossing it over the Valley of Swords below. Ciddar then followed him, mincing across but then pausing in doubt halfway, and howling out his sins (mostly his greed and lust) in terror as visions danced before his eyes, conjured by the twisting runes of the bridge. Maugis walked easily across, even cleansing the age-old stone bridge with white footprints he left behind in his serene state. Cyroosta strutted across proudly, scoffing at the Rokari magics. Inyana crossed calmly, guided by her love of her husband, but the wheelbarrow swerved on the bumpy rune-carved surface and she had to quicken her step to cross while manuevering it more carefully. Boamund braved the bridge with his characteristic resolute determination and grit.
And so you crossed from the lands of lost dead to Rokari afterlife lands, you realized, and you beheld the distant walls of the Court of Silence ahead, where those of Rokari faith (in all its modern varieties/heresies) would go to be judged. As you negotiated your way through the swelling crowds of dead Rokari on the path to the Court, you met with seven Pithdaran men who recognized you as their famed countrymen of Giraine– these were recent deaths, from a variety of mostly mundane causes, but these fresh souls did not like their fate. They came to you pleading that, as heroes, you should be able to save them from death and return them home so they could enjoy their simple peasant lives again.
Maugis tried to turn them back toward Solace, speaking wise words of the faith, and some of them nodded in sullen agreement and began to turn away– but a stubborn young man, full of lust in his loins even here in hell, was consumed by desire to see his lover in St Thosos again, praising her “great thighs” and other attributes. He'd have none of Maugis's talk of religion- this was a man of the flesh, perhaps little of the faith left in him. But the Captain stepped forward and spoke darkly of the realities that awaited back home: that great-thighed lover probably was already bedded down with a new lover (Ciddar chuckled that he remembered this woman, actually!), and so the man was better off here in Solace. He pondered this and agreed, rejoining his fellows in the long queue for judgement.
You easily outmaneuvered the slow crowds and soon came before the gates to the Court of Silence, where the dead stood listlessly in limbo, walking through the gates as two huge armour-clad guards surveyed them. A vague figure was spotted by Inyana, slinking surreptitiously past the guards unnoticed and into the Court, but none of you got a good look at them. The guards handed the dead a slate tablet and a long, sharp metal needle as they entered the Court– writing tools for use with what little blood they had left, in the silence of the Court.
Above the gates the Seshnegi words reminded the dead that “Speak not here lest worms dine on your tongue”– the Rokari took the Court of Silence very seriously! So seriously, in fact, that when the Captain walked up to the guards to force his way in past their now-crossed spears, and spoke up in challenge to their obstacle, a magic power conjured worms in his mouth that swiftly ate his tongue, leaving him spitting blood in mute fury and disgust. Ahappi brandished his spear in a cold rage– no dead Rokari knights would oppose his aims on this quest if he could help it!
© Copyright - 2000-2024 - John Hutchinson, Tim Evans, Pete Nash, Colin Driver and Gordon Alford
