The Lost Moon of Eberron, Chapter 6 - Flight of the Aetherwing

The Lost Moon of Eberron, Chapter 6 - Flight of the Aetherwing

“We’re off-course.”
“That’s not possible,” replied N’ffrond, approaching the bow of the aerial vessel and the warforged glowing in the light of the fiery elemental wheel.
Staring into the predawn darkness obscured by the drifting mists of the high altitude clouds, Hinge murmured a chant in a strange and resonant timbre and swept his obsidian and composite plate arms through the air before him.
“I sense that we have drifted far to the east,” the warforged surmised, completing the divination. “Our destination lies to the north.”
“You’re certain it’s not some residual effect from the Mournland, Hinge? The Mourning seems to play havoc with you warforged,” N’ffrond said with thinly veiled contempt.
The druid turned, his twin red eyes blazing in the gloom and mist, while the elf took one cautious step backward.
“You’re suggesting ... what?” Hinge menaced.
“Only that the Windwrights are quite capable and Captain Siraeven bears the Mark of Storm of House Lyrandar. We couldn’t possibly be adrift,” was the elf’s sharp retort.
“Conversely, you warforged were constructed for battle, not for navigation,” N’ffrond continued.
“What would a slave-hunter know of the forge-borne?”
“That’s enough, elf,” hissed a shadow springing between the two. The feral shape rose from the deck, baring its sharp canine teeth.
“What is it, Hinge?” growled the ermine shifter, glaring at N’ffrond through the dim light of the burning wheel.
“Something isn’t right, Niai. The Aetherwing is sailing toward the east. Look here,” the warforged explained, directing his gaze toward the starboard prow of the airship.
A faint glow danced off the edges of the cloud cover, a shimmer of rosy fingers tracing through the dark sky.
“The Great Orb?” Niai questioned. “Shouldn’t that be further aft?”
“It should.”
“We must speak with Captain Siraeven. Immediately,” Niai said impulsively, turning toward the helm rising above the upperdeck, just beyond the ring of the bound fire-elemental.
N’ffrond stepped toward the shifter, waving his hands before him in protest. “I really don’t see any point ...”
Niai pushed past the haughty elf and trotted across the deck of the airship. Regaining his balance, N’ffrond sneered at the warforged and pivoted to pursue the vaulting movements of the frenetic shifter.
Hinge placed his heavy, forked hands on the ornately carved soarwood railings of the airship and peered over the port side edge of the Aetherwing into the airy depths below. The faint illumination of the burning wheel of fire played on the ephemeral clouds beneath the craft, hindering his attempts to view the land presumably thousands of feet below. The high altitude winds swept a light mist across his plated form and drove the billowing clouds across the starlit sky. The motion of the vapors trailing through the air drew the warforged thoughts back to the passage above the Mournland one day prior.
Absorbed in his musings, Hinge did not hear the changeling stalk beside him until she had placed her own hands on the soarwood beside him.
“See there. More of those birds I saw last night above Cyre ... I mean, the Mournland,” Lok said, pointing toward several dark winged shapes flittering through the cloud cover.
Recovering from his initial surprise, Hinge followed the changeling’s slender, grey fingers and strained to see the movement in the waning darkness.
“I don't think that those are birds,” came the druid’s halting response. “They move more like the bats I’ve watched over the Towering Wood.”
“And most birds do not take wing in the night,” HInge added , suspicion seeping into his discordant tone.
“Something amiss?” Lok asked, drawing her darkweave cloak about her shoulders to fend off the driving mists.
“Niai’s off to question the captain. We’ve drifted much too far to the east and I can’t make out what’s below us.”
“Perhaps I should awaken Araelethe. He’d want to know if there’d been a change in our itinerary,” Lok suggested with a slight smile, knowing that the loremaster would already be meditating over his ancient tomes and reciting strange verse in forgotten tongues.
“Perhaps you should. And rouse the gnome.”
As Lok slipped through the archway leading to the lower decks, Hinge turned his attention back to the flittering shapes off the port side of the flying vessel. They were nowhere to be seen.
Strange, the warforged thought, his vision shifting from the skies to the curving hull of the ship beneath him. He seemed to see a spidery shape creeping along the exterior of the craft in the half-light of the stars and the fiery elemental ring. The shape crept across the airship along the portals which marked the lowerdeck, pausing by the bulbous windows closest to the bow. Peering into the windows, its head craned about and up at the warforged leaning over the railing above, light flickering on its pale face. Clawing its way along, the spindly humanoid raced horizontally along the soarwood and vanished over the starboard side of the vessel.
Alarmed, Hinge turned to follow the creature’s movement in time to witness two more pale humanoids dressed in dark raiment clambering over the Aetherwing’s edge. Drawing his Valenar scimitar, the warforged stepped forward to intercept the two stealthy creatures, white fangs gleaming between their thin, dark lips, clawed fingers outstretched.
The curved blade of Hinge’s weapon sliced through the first creature’s garments, burying itself deep into the upper arm. Pulling the hooked scimitar free, Hinge was astonished to find the wound absent of any fluid and a grotesque smile forming on the creature’s winedark lips. The warforged hesitated for a moment and the two creatures closed the distance between themselves and their intended victim. Their gaunt white faces showed signs of advanced decomposition and traces of disturbing disfigurement, yet they moved with a swiftness that betrayed any malignancy or ailment.
The bats? Undead? the living construct questioned, pulling his weapon and body into a defensive posture at the bow of the ship. The wounded, but seemingly unfazed, creature slashed at Hinge’s composite plating, carving deep lines into his moss and lichen covered chestplate, while the second attempted to flank their opponent by slipping behind the warforged.
Stepping back to the railing, Hinge swung the ineffectual scimitar in a wide arc, trying to maintain a slight distance from his assailants. The second undead caught the blade in the chest as it tried to grapple with the warforged and pitched backward from the blow. The other clutched at Hinge’s metallic arm, endeavoring to secure a hold with its claws and fangs in the warforged’s living armor. Digging into the fibrous bundles linking the living construct together, it pinned Hinge’s sword arm against the furrowed railing of the vessel, while its counterpart scrambled to regain its footing.
Hinge pummeled the undead furiously with his free hand, tearing pieces of decaying flesh from the creature’s head. Stunned momentarily, the warforged released his grip on the scimitar and heaved the profane creature at its companion, sending the two crashing onto the deck beneath the wheel of fire burning above.
Holding his position against the soarwood, Hinge’s mind raced, recalling the teachings of his master, Oalian the greatpine. Gripping the soarwood to his side with one hand, the Warden of the Wood traced an abstract and arching design through the dim light and chanted in the secret language of the druids. Placing his other hand on the smooth carvings of the Aetherwing’s railing, a subtle green hue radiated from the soarwood. Warping and contorting in the pallid emerald light, the wood twisted itself free of the rails and assumed two rough, pointed shapes independent of the airship’s frame.
Armed with the wooden spikes, Hinge lunged across the deck at the two vampires crouching meters away. As the first rose to counter the warforged’s attack, Hinge slammed into the creature, plunging the crude spike into the living dead’s chest. Pinned against the starboard railing with the spike protruding from its body, the helpless creature shivered violently and slumped over, its head falling between its shoulders.
The remaining marauder leapt through the air with uncanny agility and landed atop the warforged’s back, trying desperately to sink its fangs into the druid’s neck. Grasping the voidoid with one arm, Hinge tore the vampire free and hurled it to the deck with a sickening impact. In an instant, the second stake was buried in the creature’s ribcage and it gasped as undeath slipped away.

“Gather your effects, Bispen,” the changeling prompted the gnome, hoping to inspire a sense of urgency in the nonchalant artificer.
“Why such haste, Lok?” the diminutive infuser replied, gathering an assortment of curiously shaped rods and decorative scrollcases, while an equally slight, shadowy figure collected the gnome’s traveling attire.
“Hinge believes that the Aetherwing is heading on an incorrect trajectory. He’d like us to alert Araelethe and escort the loremaster ondeck,” Lok explained, watching the gnome’s homunculus with keen interest.
“Shall we?” Bispen offered, straightening the wide collar of his glamerweave cloak and following the changeling into the narrow passageway of the airship’s lower decks.
Small everbright lanterns illuminated the corridors, lined with stained soarwood crafted with sloping and whimsical depictions of swirling winds and gossamer clouds. The vessel was silent, save for the hushed footsteps of the changeling and the gnome, while the shadowy furtive filcher moved with the surreptitious grace of a cat. Approaching the loremaster’s cabin door, Lok paused and raised a hand to caution Bispen.
The muted sound of an indistinct and unintelligible voice emanated from behind the door a moment before the portal splintered outward in a multitude of pieces, discharging the broken form of an undead vampire bathed in a scintillating wash of energy.
Crossing the remains of the portal, the changeling and the gnome could see the loremaster besieged by a pair of vampiric attackers. The voidoids were atrophied and pale with decay, and still they threatened the venerable human with brutal intensity and seething maws.
Araelethe raised his slender arms and whispered an evocation. A blinding light erupted from the loremaster’s frail hands and saturated the cabin, obscuring the vision of the changeling and the gnome for several moments.
“By the Sovereign Host!” Lok exclaimed, lowering the arm she had raised in a futile attempt to shield her eyes from the spell’s brilliance. Wisps of dust danced and drifted in the air, settling onto the floor of the cabin where the ominous undead creatures had once stood.
“Stillborn,” the sapient mage said in a lucid voice. “A vampiric cabal from the elven estates of Aerenal.”
“Then Hinge’s assessment was correct. The Aetherwing has strayed off-course!” the gnome cried despairingly.
“Strayed?” Araelethe echoed.
“Quickly, Master Araelethe! We must assemble your texts and join Hinge and the others on the upperdeck. Niai has gone to speak with the captain, though now I fear the worst,” Lok explained, striving to suppress the panic in her voice. “Vampires? The bats!” she started, realization seeping in. “Hinge is in danger!”
The gnome spoke softly and an oblique character covering his hand and wrist glowed with a warm light. Lok thought that she felt a gentle breeze waft by the grey skin of her face and the gnome nodded in affirmation.
“I’ve signaled him,” he confirmed, moving to assist the aged loremaster.
Lok stood by the portal, glancing out to survey the airship’s corridor for creeping undead. Balancing a wicked looking dagger in her hand, she feared the impotency of the meager weapon against such hideous adversaries. A wisp of vapor, similar to those she had felt on the open deck of the craft, swept past and into the empty chamber with a strange bearing of sentience. The changeling watched in horror as the gaseous cloud solidified and assumed the form of the undead creature crippled by the loremaster’s initial defense.
Before the mesmerized Lok could react, the vampire grasped one of the loremaster’s ancient tomes from the small candle -strewn reading desk in the chamber and whirled about to make its escape. Swiftly, the gnome’s shadowy and lithe homunculus clambered up the leg of the creature and snatched the mage’s book from the undead thief, retreating fleetly across the chamber to safety. The furtive filcher's creator turned as the maimed vampire threw itself onto the artificer and sank its fangs into the gnome’s unprotected neck. Bispen shrieked in anguish as the voidoid’s teeth pierced his skin and he fumbled for a rod affixed to his side. The wounded artificer directed the thin black rod adorned with a marbled gemstone over his shoulder and the item discharged with a fierce burst of radiance. The vampire dropped to the floor and the gnome clutched at the gaping, crimson mark on his neck, deep red fluid spilling onto the wide collar of his glamerweave cloak.
He waved away Lok’s efforts to aid him and shook his small head.
“It is nothing,” Bispen said faintly. Turning to his homunculus, he smiled weakly. “Well done.”

The shifter pounced up the baroque staircase and into the bridge of the Aetherwing where Captain Siraeven stood at the helm. Positioned behind the mystical wheel of wind and water, the half-elven Windwright bore the markings of House Lyrandar boldly on his azure cloak. His eyes appeared vitreous and strangely fixed on some incorporeal locality.
“Captain Siraeven...,” Niai began hesitantly, glancing about the bridge for the navigator.
A rabid hiss brought her attention toward ceiling above the helm. The decaying and blighted visage of a vampire stared back, slowly revealing its grisly fangs. The creature clung to the burnished soarwood ceiling, as if some monstrous incarnation of a spider, and rotated its body around to challenge the shifter below.
Enchanted by the vampire’s gaze and movements, Niai felt a sharp blow strike her head and the weretouched master dropped to the deck, consciousness fading. Standing over the collapsed shifter sprawled on the floor of the bridge, N’ffrond nodded in deference to the Stillborn vampire. Gripping Niai by her long, matted hair, the elf dragged the interloper from the bridge and away from the dominated Windwright.

At the bow of the airship, Bispen’s whispering wind whistled about and conveyed its message to Hinge. Leaving the pair of impaled Stillborn in his wake, the warforged retrieved his scimitar and sprinted across the deck as quickly as his ponderous gait would allow. Meters away from the staircase to the elevated bridge, Hinge halted. His erstwhile companion, N’ffrond Vaeryym of House Thuranni stood at the base of the stairs, the disoriented shifter clawing pathetically at his feet.
Confusion crystallizing into rage, the scimitar wielding warforged charged as the treacherous elf drew his own serrated longsword.

The loremaster, Araelethe, led by the changeling, Lok and the gnome, Bispen, ascended to the upperdeck to discover the inanimate forms of the vampires, bodies pierced by roughhewn wooden shafts. Beneath the flickering flames of the bound-elemental ring, the Warden of the Wood clashed furiously with the elven warrior, while steps away the shifter, Niai struggled to her feet. Perceiving their former ally engaged in mortal combat with the stalwart Hinge, Lok and Bispen stood, mouths agape. The loremaster frowned slightly and turned his attention toward the helm of the Aetherwing.
“Lok, take Niai and raise the crew,” Araelethe commanded, as a fierce wind crackled through the band of fire encircling the airship. “Bispen. With me,” the ancient human said firmly, hobbling across the deck and up the flight of stairs to the helm.

Within the lofty command center of the airship, the mage and the infuser were confronted with a dreadful and disheartening sight. The vampire had descended from the ceiling and stood behind the glassy-eyed Windwright captain, clawed hands wrapped around the half-elf’s throat. Sneering at the loremaster, the invidious Stillborn twisted its gnarled hands and Siraeven’s neck snapped with a ghastly crack.
The massive Aetherwing seemed to shudder as the dying Windwright relinquished control over the wheel of wind and water. The captain crumpled to the deck and the vampire hissed a threat, raising its hands in a perplexing gesture. A vortex of swirling darkness appeared and a flurry of leathery wings and barbed fangs screamed out of the writhing blackness, buffeting the loremaster and the gnome. Bispen shrunk under the weight of the sudden onslaught but Araelethe dismissed the winged terrors assailing him with a silent charm.
As the children of the night dissipated about the loremaster, he witnessed the Stillborn manipulate an enigmatic artifact above the wondrous wheel. An otherworldly moan arose from the device and the wheel of wind and water split with a deafening resonance.
The House Lyrandar Aetherwing trembled and pitched forward and starboard. Unbound, the elemental ring about the craft dissembled into a flaming, chaotic mass, setting the soarwood vessel ablaze in a spate of fire and roiling smoke.
“It’s released the elemental!” Bispen shouted, struggling to shield himself against the voracious bats careening about the bridge. “Without it, we’ll crash!”
Claws flailing, the Stillborn leapt over the fractured wheel at the helm of the unfettered airship, while swift moving fires blazed through the bridge. There was a terrific explosion of radiant energy and the vampire and the children of the night evanesced in a plume of dust. Assisting the gnome to his feet, Araelethe and Bispen fled the enkindled bridge moments before it was engulfed in the roaring flames of the berserk fire elemental.

Constrained against the railing of the Aetherwing, the elf parried the warforged’s thrusting scimitar and stepped gracefully to the left. As Hinge’s powerful attack drove the druid forward, N’ffrond countered quickly with an advantageous slice along the warforged’s midsection and Hinge twisted in agony.
“You mindless fool!” the traitor taunted, raising his weapon to deliver an incapacitating strike.
With a roar, the elemental band encircling the craft burst its restraints and the Aetherwing pitched violently. Cast prone by the magnitude of the elemental’s fiery release, N’ffrond strove to gain his bearings as the conflagration about him expanded. His longsword skated across the deck of the vacillating airship and far from his grasp. Through the driving flames, the elf could see the threatening form of the warforged looming over him. Focusing intently to assemble his frenzied thoughts, a serpentine character suddenly manifested itself in a soft glow on the elf’s sloping forehead. A sphere of darkness began to materialize about N’ffrond and the Warden of the Wood’s scimitar clove through the gathering obscurity.
N’ffrond screamed as the blade severed his hand from his wrist and the dismembered elf twitched and convulsed beneath the warforged. The mighty arms of the forge-borne warrior hoisted the screeching villain above his head.
The cries of the elf faded as N’ffrond Vaeryym of House Thuranni disappeared over the railing of the Aetherwing and spiraled to his doom.

Parting the rolling smoke and flames with a gust of wind from a tapering wand, Bispen led the loremaster along the precarious incline of the plummeting airship.
“The captain is dead and the helm is lost,” the gnome coughed, casting a fleeting glimpse over the edged of the seared soarwood and then back to the druid.
Hinge stared back, his faceplate and gleaming eyes revealing little emotion.
“The traitor is gone. He bore the Mark of Shadow, which he must have concealed from us through subterfuge.”
All about the warforged, the mage, and the artificer, the blistering fires swept along the descending craft and dark smoke and ash covered the length of the wavering deck. Niai and the changeling emerged from the burning wreckage, unaccompanied.
“The crew were slain where they slept by the Stillborn,” Lok choked, as they joined their companions clustered along the charred starboard rail. “Niai finished off the vampires,” she continued, with a hint of anxiety in her voice.
“She nearly mauled me, as well,” Lok remarked of the weretouched master, her darkweave cloak torn with conspicuous clawmarks.
“This vessel is equipped for disaster. However, I fear that the scrolls and infused contrivances in the aft hold are now reduced to useless ash,” Araelethe lamented. “And the Stillborn disrupted my meditations. I lack the transmutations necessary to grant us flight,” the loremaster admitted solemnly.

Ravaged by flames and consumed by dense smoke, the disabled airship tore through the cloud cover and plunged earthward. Beneath the banks of mist, the first rays of the morning sun spilled over the distant mountains now visible to the east. A vast plain, hedged in by a bleak and lifeless desert, spread out below the falling, smoldering craft, rushing closer and closer.
In the advancing light, a series of winged shapes formed undulating crescents against the coral dawn skies.
“More bats!” Lok exclaimed, pointing toward the approaching shapes.
“They are not bats, I suspect,” the loremaster replied grimly.
“...Dragons?!” the changeling whimpered.
“No, Glidewings!”