The Kinstrife

Part 59

In which our heroes opt for the civilised approach and knock on the door; are given a guided tour of Marath Seregûl; have dinner with their host and swap news of the Seven Dominions and Gondor; learn of the ‘legend of the tomb’ and begin exploring the tower that night while Ilviren distracts Seregûl.

September 20^th – evening

The ‘tower’ is 160 x 240ft and only two stories high with a tower at each corner, so more of a squat fort really. It’s the shape of a courtyard castle but a single building – perhaps a courtyard castle rebuilt? We can see guards on the battlements and a pair of serious doors of some sort of metal 20ft high. There’s probably one or more sally-ports at the sides or back. It looks formidable.

We could try sneakily climbing walls and Brand assures me he can blow a hole in them. However Aerin says Raj culture is strong on hospitality so perhaps the best play might after all be to stroll down and just knock on the doors.

Close up the doors are even more imposing, of iron and steel with a heavy knocker that tolls like the knell of doom. A butler leads us in to a cubical room with seats around the side and asks us who we are. I announce my name and ask for a tour of the tower, claiming to be a Gondorian nobleman on a sightseeing tour. The butler vanishes through wooden doors opposite those we came in by after shutting the outer doors with a metal bar operated by a lever.

Brand busies himself by communing with any magical forces and claims to detect something powerful in the basement.

After ten or fifteen minutes the butler returns with a better dressed man who introduces himself as Seregûl. He asks for news from Gondor in passable Westron and I fob him off, portraying myself as uninterested in current affairs. Seregûl instructs his butler to show us his house and leaves after inviting us to dinner.

Brand reckons the tower is probably 2^nd Age in origin or perhaps a later imitation of that period. The butler is not an edifying guide but Aerin chats him up and learns he came with Seregûl some two or three years ago.

The first thing we’re shown is the Grand Hall, 30ft high with murals and tapestries of peaceful mountain scenes. (There are no mountains in the Raj but they can be found in the Seven Dominions so presumably these are to remind Seregûl of home.) There’s not much furniture and I get the feeling the room is not used that much.

Beyond the Great Hall runs the Grand Corridor, passing the entire width of the building. The butler shows us the Dining Room, opposite the Great Hall, and then down the corridor to the right, apparently at random. He mumbles something about most of the ground floor being given over to guard rooms and servants quarters.

Brand asks the pertinent question of why his master chose to settle in this place. The butler replies that it seemed fair and had some interesting architectural features – but he doesn’t know much about all that so we’ll have to ask his master.

He leads us along another corridor round the far side of the Great Hall to the left to enter a room evidently housing a turret in the far corner, judging from the concavity. The butler says this is a guardroom (seems to be a lot of them) but unused as there are too few guards.

We enter the tower and ascend the spiral stair in the middle to the next floor and emerge in to a room with two breathtaking murals. It’s impressive and we make all the right noises. One wall has obviously been recently repainted with a depiction of the Sun and Moon but the wall opposite, though retouched, looks original and depicts a star field that Brand is sure dates from the 2^nd Age. The butler says the Sun and Moon replaced a wall from which the original plaster had fallen, thanks to damp penetrating the outer wall. It’s called the Hall of Stars, unsurprisingly.

He leads in to another huge chamber, matching the Great Hall below. There’s a few sticks of furniture but otherwise it’s bare; apparently it used to be the servants’ common room. Then through another empty room and in to a practical chamber with a desk and a chair belonging to the captain of the guard.

Beyond is another long corridor, matching the Grand Corridor below and the butler shows us in to Seregûl’s private audience chamber, long and thin and lavishly appointed with tapestries, seating and statuary.

Back to the corridor and we double back the centre axis and a smaller octagonal room near the back of the building. There are 4 alcoves with old-looking statues that the butler claims were here before Seregûl came. Brand wanders from one to the other and gives a start when he inadvertently brushes agains the north wall, which is the outer skin of the castle.

As he exclaims and he and Sern set to examining the masonry, the butler shows some agitation so I distract him with facile questions about the décor. Then Sern announces that ‘there’s nothing here’ – I have my doubts but I don’t know about the butler, who leads us down a side corridor in to a room and leaves us to freshen up before dinner.

As soon as he’s gone we double back to the octagonal room and Sern immediately starts poking about that north wall. After a few minutes he gives a grunt and points out a small level hidden behind a statue. We’ll come back later tonight and explore.

Brand, Aerin and I dress for dinner, which proves a little odd – as if a Raj chef had tried to produce Gondorian food based on word-of-mouth descriptions.

Seregûl has a Numenorean appearance, black hair and grey eyes, but a darker complexion. Tall and well-built, he clearly takes regular exercise and to all appearance is a man of action. I compliment him on his home, especially the Hall of Stars, and he seems genuinely pleased.

He presses again for news of Gondor and I give the recent headlines: princely murdurs in Morthond and Lond Ernil, the blasting of the Sealord’s Tower in Pelargir, but giving every appearance of having come abroad to get away from all that. Seregûl responds with news of the Seven Dominions, which I expect has been similarly edited for content, but then the man is an ambassador.

Returning to the tower, Seregûl claims not to know much about its history. I try to lure him in to an indiscretion but he remains tight-lipped and on-story. Aerin doesn’t make much headway either but when Ilviren bats her eyelashes at him I’m damned if he doesn’t blush. Seregûl seems genuinely smitten by Ilveren – evidently he likes it rough!

I ask if he can recommend any sights in the Raj and he mentions the Caverns of Ice – ice forms in caverns beneath Bozisha-Dar and is mined by a noble family led by ‘Led Prodivac’ – a title meaning ‘Ice Seller’ in Apysaic, who serves all the nobles of Bozisha-Dar.

Again coming back to our present location, Seregûl mentions a legend of a ‘tomb’ beneath the tower, protected by some sort of trap, according to rumour. After dinner he reluctantly leads us to a chamber accessed by a stair in the NW tower.

It leads down and northward and Seregûl warns that the seventh step is the trap. Stepping on it causes the stairs to collapse in to a smooth ramp that slides down in to an acid pit at the foot of the stair. It stays open for a short while and then closes. The acid is produced by starfish.

In the bare chamber below the stair are soap and towels for victims to wash themselves – the acid, it seems, is not too strong, but it can give nasty burns if not cleaned off quickly.

I press Seregûl on the ‘legend’ and he waffles about it being about non-specific ‘doom’ and ‘creatures’. As he leads us back up the stair Brand whispers that he feels the magical entity he detected earlier is on a level with that chamber but outside the castle walls to the NW.

We return to our rooms. Ilviren decides to capitalise on Seregûl’s interest and distract his attention, which should let us address the secret compartment Sern and Brand located in the octagonal room.

Giving Ilviren a few minutes to engage Seregûl’s full attention, we decamp up the corridor and it takes Sern just a moment to open a hatch to a compartment. I’m a little disappointed since I was expecting an intra-mural stair down to whatever magical thing Brand has detected. Instead it reveals a statue of an historical lord of Erlond (one of the Seven Dominions), which Brand reckons can receive and cast a spell), a pile of coins, a circlet and a bow. Brand confirms that the circlet bears a dweomer and aids evasion in close combat. The bow is also magical.

I’m not sure we should take all this. It’s clearly Seregûl’s personal belongings and valued enough to be hidden away. So far we’ve found nothing incriminating. If we put it all back we can always come back later if further investigations prove substantial.

I think we need to return to that ‘tomb’ and perhaps see what really happens when that seventh step is pressured?

To do list:

Investigate Marath Seregûl – the Tomb!

Take a caravan to Tûl Póac

Keep accounts for money accruing while in Raj

Visit Minas Ithil – probably not going to happen now

Talk to the survivor of the 1st Mordor expedition before entering Mordor

Survey my estates and produce a plan to improve them – consider Pimm’s offer but be cautious