The Plane of Slavery

The respite was for but a moment. A few minutes later, the portal opened again, and two Githmorein knights stepped through and into the whirling agony of the Blade Barrier. Evidently by prior arrangement, one continued walking forwards, while the other stepped back as soon as he was able, disappearing through the gate.

The remaining knight, pouring blood from the injuries he'd suffered coming through the Barrier, drew his greatsword and advanced. Surya attempted to parlay, calling to him in the common Erlyid tongue

He tried to reason with the warrior, indicating the bodies strewing the floor and suggesting that the Mind Flayers and their allies were overmatched. The Githmorein was scornful and dismissive. Hildraft then joined in, speaking the warrior's own language, and demanding the immediate return of the dwarves of Nisur and closure of the Gate as the price for not being slaughtered by the Wyrmslayers.

The arrogant responses returned by the Githmorein were uncompromising, and it gradually began to appear almost as if he was playing for time. 

Battle erupted, and the knight attacked savagely, but he was alone, Surya's swords were drawn, and Sack had plenty of arrows; he stood no chance. His task was done, however. Mere moments after he had hit the ground, the portal opened again and three more figures emerged. Two Githmorein knights, flanking a single Mind Flayer, emerged and started to walk through the Blade Barrier.

The Mind Flayer had one clawed mauve hand on each Githmorein's shoulder. As they walked through the whirling nightmare of flying edges, the startled heroes could see that, while the Githmorein knights were taking the expected wounds - more, in fact - the Mind Flayer was untouched by the spell's effects. The three stepped out of the Barrier, and the Mind Flayer lifted its' hands from the Githmorein shoulders. The two knights reeled away and collapsed, clearly dying from the damage they had absorbed on behalf of their master. With a flourish, the Mind Flayer brought its' hands up to begin a spell, aimed at the Barrier rather than the heroes.

Once again the warriors attacked. Surya smote with his swords and Sack hammered arrows into the monster, but both noted with dismay that the damage it suffered was nowhere near what it should have been; a shimmer of energy around its' form betrayed some form of psionic armouring.

Hildraft used one of the Hand spells to force the creature back into the Blade Barrier. The effects of this were two-fold; first, it took the damage it had escaped before, and second, it derailled its' concentration, causing the Dispelling it had been attempting to fail.

A moment later it had its' feet settled and drove forwards again, pushing back the Hand, but the blades had hurt it badly, and a few more blows were enough to kill it.

Standing over the body, the companions realized that this cycle could go on indefinitely. Something had to be done. It seemed sensible to call on the experts at fighting Mind Flayers; and that meant Githyanki. Which meant Kazoth.

Kazoth was the Githyanki knight who had sided briefly with the group out of the shared bond of the Ta'nara gift that he and Hildraft both possessed. Facing exile and condemnation by his people for this, he redeemed himself by returning with the Silver Swords lost by his comrades, plus the exceptional one he and his group had been sent to Vorsand to retrieve. He had Surya to thank for this, another fact likely to ally him with the companions.

Hildraft cast a Sending and transmitted the following succinct message to their Astral ally; "Mind Flayers. Hunting time. Bring friends. Nisur.". The response was instant: "Stay. We come."

Slightly more than an hour later, twelve humanoid shapes faded into existence within the council hall. Ten were Githyanki knights; one was Kazoth himself. The twelfth was humanoid in shape, but coal-black in skin colour with eyes of dancing flames. To Surya's vision, enhanced by the Robe of Eyes, a shadow of a much larger creature seemed to hang around this person.

Fortune seemed to have treated Kazoth well; his equipment was even more baroque and lavish than before, and he had more marks of what were possibly status and rank on them. The Githyanki knights, clearly Kazoth's elite guard, who didn't have his reasons to approve of the Wyrmslayers, gazed at the human, dwarf and half-orc with flat, unfriendly expressions.

Kazoth greeted the three cordially, especially Hildraft. He examined the Portal carefully, nodding to himself, and grinned ferally as Hildraft held up a shattered Mind Flayer head for him to examine (this altered his knights' expressions slightly too; obviously people - even humans - who slew Mind Flayers were worthy of a bit more respect). His composure was lost, however, when he heard the heroes' account of their adventures in Nisur.

He at first refused to believe that Mind Flayers referring to those on the material planes as "Lost Ones" could exist. Such phrasing would indicate the Flayers in question considered themselves of the Empire; the vanished, lost multiplanar dominion of the Ithilids smashed and broken when Gith herself led her people to freedom. He was reduced to apoplexy, however, by the claim that people like his, calling themselves Githmorein, were serving these Flayers.

Such a name was heresy in itself; it meant literally "Gith-that-stayed". Gith by definition was the leader who led her people to freedom; it was an insult to her memory that her name was used to name a people who chose the Flayer yoke.

He insisted on viewing Hildraft's memories to confirm this, and laid a long, gnarled finger against the dwarf's temple. Sack and Surya both winced, expecting the worst, but Hildraft merely blinked at the rather odd feeling of having thoughts and memories occur to him at another's behest.

"Obscenity! It is so!" cried Kazoth. "This is truly serious. Word must go back to our people immediately." He didn't gesture or speak to his knights, but one suddenly disappeared without warning, Plane Shifting to the Astral to return to the great fortresses homes of the Githyanki race. A few moments later, a Githyanki wizard appeared in his place, summoned by Kazoth to break the portal to Heppetah.

While he did so, Surya addressed the black individual, who had said nothing so far, asking who he was. He answered that his name was Morodric, before switching to Krultac (which Surya knew) and adding that he was Kazoth's mount. Surya's brows went up; he knew what that meant. 

This done, the unlikely allies discussed the next move. Hildraft and Kazoth both pushed for a move onto the plane Heppetah; the Hand of Kord wanted to pursue the posibilities for rescuing his fellow dwarves; Kazoth wished to scout the Mind Flayer infestation before reporting back to his Lich-Queen and asking her for the troops to destroy it. In the end it was agreed, and the heroes moved closer to the Githyanki, allowing them to establish touch contact. All then Plane Shifted to Heppetah, coming down on the portal island, the only place Surya had been able to describe accurately.

As soon as they arrived, the ten knights drew their swords and engaged the four Githmorein soldiers who'd been left guarding the Gate. This was so swift that the heroes nearly missed it altogether. Then Morodric stepped casually off the island into space, and transformed into a red dragon of vast dimensions. Kazoth stepped onto his back and settled between two of the huge neck ridges, and Morodric swooped around the island in dizzying curves as his rider surveyed the strange place the True Mind Flayers had chosen for their structure. 

Hildraft was unaware of most of this. From the instant he appeared in Heppetah, he had been struggling to retain his sanity. Washing against his mind, he could feel the projected agony of dwarves. Thousands of dwarves. Ten thousand dwarves. In mortal agony, their minds shrieked a dreadful siren song of pain and suffering, perceptible even to the non-psionic Hildraft.

His people were here, all right. Here, and in need.