Rancid Chronicles: part 5

[Lo Ki]

The wind howled and a flurry of snow swirled into the room before Rancid could shut the door behind him. The halfling did not seem to notice. He settled into the chair by the fire with his magical bottle as the snow clinging to his clothes melted away. He took a swig from his bottle and gazed into the flames.

“We were talking about paladins,” he said as though far less than a day had passed since his last tale. “Let me tell you about Jerome. We had found some ruins in the desert which promised to yield some riches if we could but defeat its unnatural guardians. Specially crafted suits of armor had been animated by spirits magically trapped within them. After several encounters with them, we had retreated to the closest city to cash in the trinkets we had found and recuperate before returning for more. Jerome knew more about the ruins than he was telling the rest of us; but, we did not care as long as we returned with treasure to spend.
While we were in town a little guy attached himself to our party. It seems he was part halfling and part kobold. His name was Gurbirt and he had a way of getting into things. He was a likable fellow, but he enjoyed pestering Jerome. When we returned to the ruins, he tagged along.

We had found an underground complex and were exploring one room with a large statue in the center. Six large columns surrounded the statue.

Gurbirt had been especially irritating to Jerome that day. He had been arguing with the paladin’s every decision and was occasionally bouncing a pebble off the big guy’s helmet.

Well in this room Jerome led most of our group down to check out this statue. Normally I would have been in the lead but I had a bad feeling about this place. Gurbirt and I volunteered to watch the door. Sure enough, when Jerome started messing with the statue, concealed doors in the columns opened and released six of those armored guardians to attack our companions. We prevailed but would have to retreat and recuperate before exploring further.

As we were leaving Gurbirt trotted up behind Jerome and said ‘Hey, big guy! Way to go in finding that trap!’ Jerome just whirled around and backhanded Gurbirt full force with his steel gauntleted hand. Gurbirt’s head cracked open like an egg. The paladin seemed properly mortified but he had no problem with taking a split of Gurbirt’s share of what little treasure we had found on that trip. He claims to have donated that money and more to the church and done penance but I didn’t see him lose any sleep over it. I split soon after that. I later heard that the brave paladin led to others to their deaths in those ruins. Pity.” Rancid watched the dancing flames silently for a few minutes.

Then he roused himself. “To old friends!” he said and took a long pull on the bottle. Then he corked the bottle and put it away as he headed for the door.