Escape from Whitestone Hold

Turning Tides-Chapter 13

Sapphira's progress was slow and methodical as she gripped the wall with her bare feet, ensuring she would not easily fall. As she descended, she kept glancing below her to make sure no one had entered this large chamber, but the coast was always clear. The floor of the room was as large as the central shaft, 300 feet in diameter, and largely empty, save for some bookcases along the walls, and some more multicolored braziers lighting the center of the stone expanse of floor. This place almost seemed like the courtyard far above, or an arena of some kind, seeing as the few windows peeking into this area were reinforced with metal grating, and many of the doors that emptied into this room were formed of thick iron bars. In fact, only a couple doors did not match that description, because they were instead much MORE reinforced. Almost directly across from her, there was an absolutely massive garage-door leading into the shaft, which was about 40 feet high. She shuddered to think what gigantic creatures or machines the Magistrate wheeled through that door when it was open... Speaking of open, she certainly hoped that some of these doors would be open once she got to the bottom, or she would have to climb all the way back up.

After a couple minutes, Sapphira had climbed low enough to where she could jump to the ground without getting hurt, so she dropped off the wall and caught herself quietly on her feet. The impact stung a little, but she'd made it. Her slight grunt reverberated off the cavernous walls, making it sound far more ominous. Sapphira quickly took a look at the contents of a nearby shelf, discovering some unknown crystal-powered technology that looked almost like mining equipment. She was tempted to bring these devices with her in case they could be useful, but frankly there were so many different devices, it would have been a challenge to carry them all, let alone use them effectively in combat. So she left them in place, resolving to come back and figure out what they did if she had time.

As she slunk her way to the nearest iron-barred door, she heard voices from the other side of it, prompting her to press her back against the stone wall and stay out of sight. Moments after the voices had past, Sapphira tried the door, finding that it appeared to be locked. She cursed under her breath, wondering if she should try to attract the attention of those voices, and get them to open this door as they investigated a distraction she could cause... But it was too risky. Sapphira breathed deeply and walked over to another door of very-similar construction. It, too, was locked. Trying not to let her impatience win out, she tried several more doors in this way, only to determine that people in this area were extraordinarily particular about locking doors behind them. Sapphira tried to budge a couple of the larger doors, but they did not budge, perhaps because they were locked or perhaps because Sapphira was simply not strong enough. After almost two minutes of fruitless time-wasting, Sapphira gave up and returned to the mysterious crystal devices. She carefully grabbed what looked to be some kind of gyroscope and hoisted it off a small table, only to yelp and drop it again as she felt a sharp pain in her palm. She looked down at her hand, finding a deep cut in her hand, which immediately began to drip blood on the cobblestone floor in front of her. She grimaced and balled her hand into a tight fist to staunch the bleeding as she examined the device once more. It seemed to be a circular saw of some kind, but with extremely non-intuitive handles that required the user to put their hands within the circular cage of metal. And apparently Sapphira had lifted it by the sharp blades. Sapphira glared at the device, apprehensive to touch it again, let alone have her hands surrounded by the blades while using it. Not to mention what a horrible sound a grinding saw blade would make on a metal door... Sapphira decided to look for a different device.

This one seemed more promising. A visual inspection revealed what seemed to be a tube with a focusing lens at the end, perhaps for viewing, perhaps for destruction. Sapphira was banking on destruction. Being careful how she lifted it this time, Sapphira gently set the device on the ground, and flipped a small switch on the side of the brass body. A terrible grinding, whirring noise immediately began to emanate from the machine as the blue crystal glowed to life, filling some copper capacitors with an enchanted sheen. Without warning, a bright beam of aqua light burst out of the end of the device, forming a sustained ray of energy from the focusing lens to the cobblestone ground in front of it. Sapphira grinned as she watched the somewhat-noisy, possibly-damaged machine slowly melt the stone in front of it, releasing an awful vapor into the air.