Curse of the Gnome Lich

[Machiavelli]

Part One

Luskan; A different version of 1372 where the Mage known as Malaclypse lived on.

It was a clear winters night, the stars overhead so brilliant and perfect that they seemed almost within arms reach. An icy gale blew from the west, carrying the ocean's subtle scent of decay. Its passage through the city gave rise to a great symphony of howling, as if it were a conductor and the buildings of Luskan some bizarre and discordant orchestra.

The Elf strode quickly through the streets, a cloak wrapped tightly around him, and a hood concealing his face. Not that there was anyone to see. Not on a night like this. It wasn't as if he cared anyway. This had to be done, and by morning he would be gone. He smiled beneath the hood as the wind’s strange and primal music soothed his mind and sharpened his thoughts. Magic coursed through him imparting clarity, energy, and power; a set of sensations more euphoric and compelling than any drug. Enhancing this even further was the anticipation. He had worked for months toward finding the individual whose house was now only minutes away. The information he expected to gain would bring him closer to the hated adversary than ever before, perhaps, though he dared not hope as much, even reveal where they might be found. He turned a corner on to a street lined with elegant and well maintained houses, and spotted his destination. Looking around, he saw nobody, and heard nothing but the wind. The grin on his face spread until it was virtually a rictus, and his hand dropped to rest on a sword hilt. This was going to be interesting.

Eldo Nertwiss regarded himself in the mirror, and felt that he was as handsome a Gnome as ever he had been in spite of his advancing years. Certainly he was far richer, and the thought brought a smile to his face. Trafficking in his own kin had proven to be extremely lucrative, especially as the client would still buy any of the cargo killed en-route, albeit at a slightly reduced price. The income dwarfed the earnings from his all his legitimate enterprises combined. Even knowing, if only in the vaguest terms, that unnatural experimentations were being conducted upon them, Eldo found that he really didn’t care so long as the money kept coming in. A thump came from downstairs, barely audible over the wind outside, and then another. He swore quietly, no doubt those half-orc guards had knocked over yet another piece of furniture. Going to his door he called downstairs.
“Kruk, Vugar! What are you idiots playing at?” There was no response. “Damn this wind!” he exclaimed, and made for the stairs to assess the latest damage.

Feeling irritated, Eldo emerged into the hallway. “You damned fools, you’ll cover the cost of…” then he stopped, momentarily stunned at the scene before him.

Kruk and Vugar lay still on the floor with dark blood spreading slowly from their fallen bodies. A Moon Elf stood over them, a dripping sword in his hand, and an insane grin on his face. His features and body movements seemed too fast, somehow not right.

“What…who are you? Do you have any idea whose house you’ve broken into?” Said Eldo, beginning to recover his composure as ideas for buying off this thief with the promise of wealth started to form in his mind.

“You, my little friend, can call me Discord, and yes I am entirely aware of who you are.”

“Well listen, I’m sure we can sort some…”

The Elf suddenly sprang into motion with preternatural speed. Before Eldo was able to react, he found himself pinned against a wall face to face with the Elf, a sword pressed to his throat. Eldo found himself staring directly into eyes that shone with all the intensity of madness. The sword at his throat seemed to be drawing energy from the flesh where it touched, and beneath the blood on it he saw runes so black that they gave the appearance of sucking in light.

“I have money! You can take it, and I can get you more later!”

“Now now my little friend, I am no thief, and I did not come here to rob you. We are simply going to have a chat.There are things I need to know, and you are going to tell them to me.” The Elf then giggled manically for a moment before starting to whisper in some arcane language.

Eldo felt as if he were being drained, his strength sapped out of him as the elf continued to whisper in some harsh tongue. The Elf released him, and unable to hold his own weight Eldo fell to the floor. He felt sick, as if he were half dead. Looking at his hand he saw that it was dessicated, the flesh shrunken. The Elf leaned over him, looking somehow vital, and glowing with unnatural health.

“ Eldo Nertwiss,” The Elf made a tutting noise and waggled his finger in admonishment, “You have been an extremely naughty Gnome! Don't attempt to play the innocent, I know you have been selling other Gnomes to a certain individual in the Spine of the World. I need to know all the details of these fiendishly nefarious business dealings, and everything you can tell me about that particular customer…”

[Machiavelli]

Part Two

Part Two
Near a remote valley in the High Forest; one month before the events in Luskan documented above

The mare whinnied nervously, and then started to rear as Malaclypse gently tried to urge her forward. It was apparent that she was scared, and would go no further. Dismounting, he stroked her head and murmured soothingly, “I don’t blame you one bit my equine friend, I only wish I had the luxury of turning back myself.” He though for a second and then exclaimed, “I’ll tell you what! How about you wait here and eat some of this grass while I attend to a little bit of business hmmm?” The horse did not deign to provide any response that Malaclypse could understand, but he guessed that her skittishness was answer enough. “I really must teach you to speak elvish, or at the very least common. That would make these little exchanges so much easier don’t you think?” Malaclypse said as he led the horse back down the narrow and overgrown path that ran between the densely packed trees. Once she had calmed a little, he tethered her reins to a branch. “I do hate to tie you up like this my friend, but it will do no good for either of us should you decide to run off at this point.” The horse regarded him dolefully with her large brown eyes, seeming rather unimpressed by this rationale. “Oh, it’s alright, I absolutely positively promise to return very soon and extricate you from this horribly degrading situation of being ‘tethered’ all alone in the forest.” said Malaclypse. The horse levelled a gaze at him which suggested she was unconvinced of this promise. Feeling guilty, Malaclypse rummaged around in a saddlebag and extracted a sugar cube. He offered it to the horse, who regarded it for a moment as if indignant at this attempted bribery, then scooped it out of his hand with a dry and papery tongue. Malaclypse chuckled to himself at this petulant display of surliness. “On second thoughts, I’m actually rather glad that you don’t speak.” he muttered, before striding briskly off down the path.

As he travelled further along the path, the forest thinned out around him and the canopy was replaced by the stark blue sky of an autumn day. The trees became short, twisted, and blighted with disease. By the time he reached the edge of a shallow valley, Malaclypse was no longer surrounded by forest; only the occasional stump or leafless skeleton protruded from dry cracked earth. The sounds that had been so pervasive in the forest had ceased some time before, there were no animals here. Peering downward he saw that the only vegetation in the valley was a sparse covering of sickly yellow grass. Over ten years had passed, but it was all too obvious that a terrible taint still remained in this place. In this miniature desert located in the middle of a forest stood the ruined remains of a tower; his former master’s abode. It was utterly wrecked; the little still standing looked in danger of collapse. What remained bore great scorch marks, and numerous holes left over from the fierce battle of a decade ago. Memories came flooding back unbidden and unwelcome, making him shiver despite the mildness of the day.

He had spent twenty three years in this place, with no company but the lich Animus Morte and that foul creature’s creations. He had been an ‘apprentice’ in name, but a prisoner and slave in practice. In hindsight, he ought never to have agreed apprenticeship to the strange old man. But no, it was ridiculous to think that way, how could he possibly have known that Animus planned a transformation to undeath, let alone that the old man intended to compel him to assist in necromantickal research. Luckily he had been able to survive when the Tormites had come to cleanse this place of Animus’ presence. Malaclypse had been imprisoned by them afterward, but the time spent as their captive was almost like a pleasant holiday compared to the horrors of ‘apprenticeship’. Trying to clear his head for the task ahead, Malaclypse thought back on the chain of events, stretching far into the past, that had shaped so much of his own life, not to mention all the lives of others that had been cut short, and had now brought him back to this place…

The role of the being he now hunted was central to the tale. Dominus Brevis Populus it called itself, Master of the Little People in the common tongue. It was an ancient creature of profound evil and diabolical malevolence; the great Gnome Lich of the World’s Spine Mountains. His former master Animus had been a protege of this abomination, learning the darkest secrets of the necromantickal arts under its tutelage before moving here to work at the creature’s bidding. The experimentations of Animus, in which he Malaclypse had been an unwilling assistant, had been conducted at the behest of Dominus, with the intention that any knowledge so created would be passed back to it for the enhancement of its own studies. Malaclypse knew that the power of this creature must be immense given that it had managed to inspire enough fear in his master Animus, a necromancer of great potency in his own right, that he felt compelled to continue work for his former teacher even after his own transformation. He remembered the horrors inflicted on the many Gnomes that had passed through the tower during his tenancy, the fear and pain on their faces, and he remembered the culmination of all these atrocities; the creation of the book. Shortly after it was finished, the Tormites had come.

Dominus Brevis Populus had been in the back of Malaclypse’s thoughts ever since. It was only four months ago that the creature had been brought once again to their front. A message reached him in the valley of the Sunderer, sent by a shady merchant in Neverwinter he had cultivated as a contact and paid regularly for information. The payments to this individual had been worthwhile after all, the message contained information regarding a Gnome smuggling ring; precisely what Malaclypse had been waiting for. Taking ship immediately for Neverwinter, he met with his contact and then spent the next three months searching for the one coordinating the shipments. After numerous bribes, selectively placed threats, and much travelling, Malaclypse traced the shipments back to one Eldo Nertwiss, a Gnomish merchant residing in Luskan. This was the link he needed to track down the Lich. Acting against this Nertwiss character would make Dominus aware of him, and set events in motion that could lead only to a confrontation, or his own death at the hands of some servant of the creature. Before that happened, Malaclypse required the means to act against it. That was why he had returned to this place, there was something still here, something sinister and powerful that he intended to use.

His thoughts collected, Malaclypse descended a slope into the valley. He ignored the tower; nothing remained there, and instead made for a rocky outcrop nearby. Reaching his destination, Malaclypse stretched out a hand and ran it over the weather smoothed surface of a boulder. The wards were still intact; nobody had tried to interfere with them. It was lucky they had not; any attempt to bypass them would have destroyed the contents of the vault beyond and also the one who made the attempt. Most likely nobody even knew they were here. Below was the library of Animus, the place any books not in use had been stored. Only two people had known how to access this vault, and after the destruction of Animus, Malaclypse alone possessed the secret of entry. Steeling himself, he muttered the harsh and gutteral words “Klathu, Verata, Nichto.” The boulder took on the appearance of a ball of grey liquid, then flowed back into the surrounding rock like quicksilver, revealing a set of stairs leading down into darkness. Holding out a cupped hand, Malaclypse murmured an incantation and a globe of light appeared in his palm. He proceeded down into the darkness.

The vault was lined with bookshelves. The air down here was still, musty, and dead. There were dusty tomes on history, alchemy, and many arcane topics, but he knew from experience that the most common subject by far was the necromantickal arts. One day he would find a safe place for these, but as yet he had met no person or group that he would wish to entrust with so much dangerous knowledge. But this concern was for another time; Malaclypse had come for one book in particular, the only existing copy of the first and only great work of his former master Animus. Proceeding to the back of the vault he came to the alcove where it stood alone on a granite stand, a wooden stand would not have done as the presence of the book would have warped and twisted it, possibly even given it some new and unnatural life. Malaclypse had no fear of the power of most of the books here; he was accustomed to such things. This one however inspired fear in him on some deep and primal level. He regarded the binding, it could easily have been mistaken for some light coloured leather, but Malaclypse knew for a fact it was not; he remembered the terrified face of the Gnome from which that covering had been made. Reluctantly he stepped forward, picking up the book. Even though he was accustomed to handling necromantickal tomes, a wave of nausea ran through him followed by a sense of temptation as if the book were trying to entice him into learning its secrets. Malaclypse read the runes written in blood on the cover; Necrognomicon. The book of dead Gnomes…

[Machiavelli]

Part Three

Part Three
Luskan; Just prior to the events in Part One, Malaclypse contemplates the Necrognomicon.

An excerpt from the introduction

Deep beneath the mountain he sits, a King atop a platinum throne. In this place his court surrounds him, a motley congregation comprised of his own twisted creations. From the great cavern of this throne room extend the far reaching tendrils of his influence. The great master’s agents are spread throughout the sword coast and even into lands beyond, exerting subtle pressures to shape events to his ends, and observing what transpires so that he remains always informed of happenings in the world. Under his sway are spies, merchants, politicians, and numerous practitioners of the necromantickal arts. All these people are kept in his service by dual means; the fear of retribution for failure, and the promise of power to be shared if their actions should please him. So it has been for almost half a millennium at the time of this writing, and there is no sign that his power is waning.

Malaclypse shut the book reluctantly, one of his hands lingering on its spine in a covetous caress. It was a month since he had acquired it, and most of this time had been spent on intensive study of its contents. Its pages contained a strange mixture of history, philosophy, and arcane science which he found fascinating, compelling, and intoxicating. Many secrets were contained within the book, and Malaclypse was now confident that he had discovered a fatal weakness of the lich. The amount of power it possessed did not come without inherent risks, and Malaclypse’s former master Animus had perceived and documented several vulnerabilities.

Smiling to himself, he ran a finger over the book’s front cover, appreciating the fine texture of gnome skin inscribed with blood. Suddenly realising what he was doing, Malaclypse snatched his hand away from the book. He stood and walked away from it, his mind clearing more with each step. This unnatural tome was tainting him, there could be no doubt of that. The more he studied it, the greater its influence over him became, and the stronger his sense of attachment to it grew. Unfortunately, this could not be avoided. Books of such power could only be used if one was willing to permit their intrusions upon mind and spirit; this was something Malaclypse understood. He had accepted the risk when he retrieved it, and was confident that the process had not advanced so far that he would be unable to free himself. Now in possession of his thoughts, he considered dispassionately his behaviour over the last few minutes, the behaviour of an addict. He had learned enough for his purposes, and now was the time to act before matters became worse.

Malaclypse buckled on his swords, tucked the book into a pouch in his robe, and donned a cloak. He murmured arcane incantations, feeling the flow of energy through his body intensify with the completion of each spell. Once prepared, he left the rented room, descended the inn’s stairs, and stepped out the front door into the teeth of wintry gale. It was time to pay a visit to Eldo Nertwiss and gather a little information.

[Machiavelli]

Part Four
Luskan; Several hours after the events in part One.

Malaclypse stood over the dessicated body of Eldo Nertwiss, watching with gleaming eyes and a rictus grin as the last spark of life left the Gnomish slaver. Now, just a simple incantation and Eldo would rise to serve him in death. Comprehension suddenly filled Malaclypses mind, followed immediately by a wave of revulsion and nausea at his own actions. He backed away from the Gnome's corpse, horrified by the thought of the act that he had been so close to commiting and shocked by the necromantic methods he had employed in the interrogation. It was the book that led him to this. Regarding the drained corpse before him, and considering what he had been about to do, he realised that the whole scenario was directly taken from the pages of that tome; a ritual of the darkest kind. He suddenly realised that far more time had passed than he had planned upon. The first light of dawn was starting to filter into the house. Attempting to calm the guilt and fear rising in his mind, he quickly turned and fled through the front door.

Stepping out into the street, he strode off immediately at a brisk pace in order to put distance between himself and the scene of the three murders. There was no time to contemplate what had transpired, he had to get out of Luskan as quickly as possible. He made his way with great haste back to the Inn, and after slipping the proprietor a goodly sized bag of gold in exchange for the favour of forgetting that he had ever been a guest, Malaclypse retrieved his horse from the stables.

Sitting atop his steed, he focused all his energies on suppressing the urge to spur the horse into a gallop and make a mad dash for the gates. The next quarter hour was a nightmare of tension; with every guard he saw a potential disaster, with every movement in the corner of his eye he felt an imminent attempt at arrest. But nothing befell him, and he exited the city without incident. By the time he was outside the walls, he was shaking with nervous tension, his mind filled with fear and uncertainty. This was not like him; Malaclypse was known as virtually impeturbable, as someone who responded to crises with a combination of humour and vicious determination. Nobody who knew him would recognise this nervous wreck, barely resisting the urge to flee screaming in the direction of least resistance.

This would not do... There was work to be done. His solemn oath to make use of his necromantic knowledge only to oppose those who dabbled in the creation of undead was still unbroken, and he was free of the city. Eldo Nertwiss had deserved death, even though the method had been unneccesarily unpleasant. Before his death the Gnome had told Malaclypse of a shipment of his kin that had left Luskan only two days previously, bound for Mirabar. The only thing that mattered now was following the trail before it grew cold...