Camilla slowly pushed herself to her feet, the weakness that had stolen over her since Gorn had mouthed the unholy name as not completely gone but it was abating. Now all she had to contend with was days of arctic travel with nearly no food, nearly no sleep and the after effects of the certainty that she was going to be sacrificed or worse. She supposed she had been in worse situations, though none sprung to mind. If Cydric’s Ulrician blade could only sting it there was next to no chance she could do any more than die messily. The thing reared back and smashed its front legs down, narrowly avoiding pulping one of the remaining greatswords. Camilla ducked her head to avoid the spray of gravel. The ground shook with another blow and she saw a trickle of dirt side into a finger thick crack in the stoney earth. When she looked up Dietricha was standing in front of her. The mage was bleeding from a dozen small cuts, rock spray like that Camilla had just avoided, and the whole left side of her body was an angry red that was darkening towards purple before her eyes. The woman’s hair stood almost on end her curly red locks shot through with blonde giving her a crazed harlequin look which was at odds with her sombre serious expression.

The dragon ogre bellowed and lashed out with its weapon shattering Ivan’s remaining companion to a spray of gore that spattered across a nearby boulder. Dietricha just looked expectantly at Camilla. The experience made her skin crawl even as her spine tried to tear itself out and bolt for Pavona.

“Do something damn you!” Camilla screamed, looking over the woman's shoulder to where Cydric as fighting for his life. The woman’s wizardry didn't seem to have helped much thus far but it was better than nothing. Dietricha’s eyes cut towards the crack in the ground and then back to Camilla. She glanced down at the crack in askance but the wizard still did not speak. Camilla ground her teeth in frustration.

“Yes there is a crack in the ground what does it matter!” she snarled. It as hardly wide enough to fit a sword blade through, much less offer any useful opportunity to escape. Dietricha immediately brightened.

“There is a crack in the ground?! Goodness I would never have noticed!” The wizard exclaimed in apparent shock. Camilla wondered what Morr would say if her final act in this life was to stab the infuriating woman. A sudden certainty stole of the Tilean that could have been nothing but magic.

“Cydric! Everyone to me!” she shouted, feeling a sudden and completely unjustified surge of hope.

“Bring Yantz!” Dietrica snapped and began to chant, her eyes sparkled queerly, like they were filled with tiny stars. To their credit no one hesitated. Ivan leaped over the body of his dead scout and dashed towards her. Cydric… paired was to strong a word, but deflected a blow of the things hammer, hoped back and delivered a punishing overhand cut that raised a shower of sparks and a howl of pain from the creature and then darted towards her. Skaldi obeyed the wizards instruction to bring Yantz by the simple expedient of grabbing the prostate Rieklander by the leg and hauling him bodily. He would be lucky not to have a dislocated leg at the pace the squat dwarf was moving. The all closed into a suicidally tight knot and the ogre roared in victory and raised its hammer to strike. Dietricha’s chanting grew more intense and Camilla had the sudden impression of vast currents whirling above them. With a final shouted Dietricha slapped her hands together, the slap of flesh on flesh somehow louder than the ravening thunder heads. Lightning blasted from the Dragon Ogres hammer, somehow disappointing compared to the sorceresses clap.

Camilla wasn’t sure what she expected to happen but the very earth tearing itself apart wasn’t what she imagined. A vast fissure opened beneath them and the plunged downwards with a stomach flipping lurch. The wound in the rock was perhaps thirty feet long and five feet wide. Camilla and her companions hit rock with a clatter of equipment and armor. The Dragon Ogre appeared above them, perched on the edge of the crevasse but the earth lurched again, rocks screaming as the fissure closed as suddenly as it had opened. Darkness encircled them and dirt rained down on them from above. Camilla’s dainty sneeze sounded in the dark, over the groans of battered and wounded men.

“Where are we?” someone groaned, though through her ringing ears Camilla tell who the speaker was. Above them came several shuddering booms, as the Dragon Ogre stamped in frustration on the now solid rock above them. Another shower of dirt and gravel trickled down atop the beleaguered group.

“Its an underground river,” Camilla noted looking up and down the long cavern that they found themselves in. Sand coated the bottom and it was dry as death, the water must have dried up millenia ago, smooth rock walls were marred only where the occasional nodule of mineral had been strong enough to resist the insistent flows.

“How can zou tall?” Ivan rumbled, as he pushed himself up off his back with two muscular arms.

“Blacker dan za heart of a Daemon,” the Kislivite complained. Camilla opened her mouth to point out that there was plenty of light and she could see easily but closed it before speaking. There were no visible sources of light. It should be pitch black. Yet she could see as though by a particularly strong moon.

“The sand,” she said instead, “It gathers on the bottom of rivers.”

“Aye the wee girl is right,” Skaldi boomed. Dwarves could see far better in the dark than humans and he was back in a familiar element. A light flashed and a moment later Skaldi was carrying a battered oil lamp, the glass panels had been shattered by the fall but it still functioned. Camilla saw Dietricha kneeling over Yantz whispering and gesturing. The Imperial moaned and sat up, his eyes were bloodshot but obviously worked. He blinked owlishly looking vaguely disappointed. Camilla knelt beside Cydric, checking him over for wounds.

“Are you ok?” She asked in a worried tone.
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