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The Yellow Bull was there, and then he was gone. The taint of chaos was in the air and Amber's familiar roared out against the smell of freshly spilled blood and ichor that seemed everywhere. We obviously were not going to get much of a greeting, at least one that we liked. Michael moved to the left to probe, Tinda took a bit of a high guard climbing into the air on his drepnir and Wolfie and Amber's familiar moved to the right to catch the wind.  Ariel's snow gryphon was a spot against the sky and I could see the strain on her face as she viewed the city through its eyes. Then there were undead all about us and the conflict was sharp and final. They would have eaten us, we were intent on destroying them and at last they were nothing more than burning shards of chaos twisted flesh. I hadn't seen such withered creatures before, though I thought we might see them again.  And we could all feel the creature behind them. Twisted bands of energy had run like cables from them to it, and more cable-like bands of chaos smoke were forming. It had more to throw at us, whatever it was that was guarding the gate. Then, with a cry of triumph, Michael let loose with a blast of light that shredded the illusion the creature was hiding behind as it called its minions and he struck, his force against the baleful glare of the bloody nimbus the dark creature shed. His force was enough, the light he walked burning through the smoke and dark fire that embraced the creature. I'd seen the like of the creature and what it summoned before, even if the withered undead it mastered were a new species to me, and that sort of nimbus is often impossible to penetrate in time to stop the waves of minions from overwhelming small numbers. Michael had struck fast and true, his light a surprise and his sword well proof against chaos. In the attack, Michael was a blur of motion as he struck, slew and vaulted clear and the thing exploded into bloody gore, poison gas and rancid flesh. I could swear he was smiling under that helmet, as if he knew it would burst the moment he broke the hold chaos had keeping its plague ridden shape in the world. The Ariel grabbed him and gave him a kiss and I found myself looking the other way. Well, at least that faction no longer controlled the gate.  If others came to aid in the relief of the city they would receive a welcome that was not so pungent.  My bull snorted.  "The yellow one could have warned us he had power only to watch and not to guard" his voice a rumble of derison. Michael stood before us, smiling. But, on the other hand, his armor was smoking ruin, his sword twisted and corroded beyond repair, bu the had taken something from the creature. Wolfie suddenly moved, even faster than fire, as Amber's familiar leaped. Under the illusion it was one of the guards we had rescued in the City in the sands. The familiar had seen only a withered crone, as if an undead puppet had survived its master's dissolution, and jumped to slay it. We almost cost our friends another scout, a brave man, tracking the gate guards with a tenacity the yellow bull lacked. Which got us an update.  There was a civil war.  It had started as a group of nobles against the Queen, but when her champion returned it quickly turned into a chaos spawned incursion. Several of the nobles fled their faction, others were consumed from within by chaos spawn and some revealed as darklings. It was a bloody war and until we had come, the gate had been blocked. But the city spirit from the City in the Sands had opened the way for us, unknowing, as its use of the gate to send us used an inner key. Not that those blocking the gate had not left guards, but we were up to the task of them as well, especially as many had chased the yellow bull as it fled after viewing us.  Which meant that there were more for us to face, though we had slain the master of this group by Michael's thrust into him before he could gather his power back or summon his minions to shield him.  "Baron Smaedshie'heigh" cursed the scout when I asked him who this one was. One of the traitors who knowingly gave himself to chaos, a Kar Manta master and one of the leaders in the rebel's council. Well, if only a few more could go down as easily as he had, I know, the lure of the blue lodge way, the sudden strike to the head, breaking the chaos bonds and freeing the masses.  In this case, the masses that had not been eaten. Which, the scout told us, were most.  The withered undead that made up the bulk of the rebel force were constrained.  They could not cross running water, could not enter into a house univited, were weakened by sunlight.  But they did not need to eat, just withered more and gained, it seemed, in power as they starved.  Hungry undead, indeed.  There were other things, but he would tell us after we found shelter. Which, it seemed needed to be quick, as the baron's brother was coming. Baron Smaedshie'heigh's brother was without any withered undead, and without much of an escort, he having pulled all of his power into himself and taken a different version of that path. So I suggested that we stand and fight rather than flee. And we did, though at the smell I began to think we should have fled. But we moved as a team.  Parakyle had already prepared the pathway it came along and it screamed as his traps took it. Thern there was Amber laying down a wall of fire that covered the pathway the thing came through, Tinda and Thalia breaking the two sorcerers who were in support, Ariel drawing in the poison and returning it with interest as Michael broke the dark light and Wolfie and I struck, my chain binding it and Wolfie going claw to fangs against it and tearing the life from it faster than it could regenerate.  Marie's arrows picked off those who attempted to reinforce the mad thing in its charge and John slew the ones who attempted to surprise us from behind. Then we took refuge for the night inside a walled house where the Queen's Guards had set up a strong point, one of the places pulling down ice, which the undead did not seem to like.  Neither did Amber, though Ariel seemed to glow as she entered the place. It was time for rest and to get together to talk and sort things out. Parkyle interrupted Michael as he was polishing the sword he had taken from creature earlier, everything else about him in ruins and discarded. "We remember the Elachi, and how they kept faith, he said." "I've had a gift for you, guess this is a good time." Then he pulled out a snakewire woven armor. Not that Michael wasn't an interesting sight waiting for some water to clean up with, dressed only in his spare pants and his liquid metal boots (everything else was ruined). He was awfully pleased by that sword, too.  "The Ankh of Life and Death" he said, "As strong against undeath as it can be fore it." The sword and his raven seemed to just catch fire from each other. But then we got word that there was some water to clean with and that some friends had come. Which is also when I got a pleasant surprise, though not after we all groaned at Tinda's choice of rations.  "Cashew Poppycock" he said "the food of the gods, at least if the gods had any sense in what they ate" he finished with a grin. Except after Starstrands, we'd all had enough cashew flavored food for a long while. Luckily Tinda had brought back more than candy and nuts. But we needed to sleep. I missed my tent and my pillow and was hoping I could just lean up against Wolfie when he handed me something. It looked like a tiny purse but when I opened it up, and shook it like he told me to, it was a pillow -- filled with feathers!  I'd never heard of such a thing, so light as if it was filled with sunbeams. So soft. I curled up next to Wolfie, but sleeping on that pillow was like sleeping in the land of soft dreams.  Got me to wondering what else I had missed in this modern world. The world might be filled with death and destruction, with the powers of hell loosed in this city, but I was going to get a good night's sleep. I had dreamed of visiting this City too. This wasn't exactly what I had planned, but I had hoped to find the last outpost of pan-hellenic speaking peoples, perhaps even some of mine among them, long lost after all these years. This wasn't what I had hoped for, blood and fire and the sort of chaos and evil that I had hoped had perished long ago. "Wolfie" "Yes?" "Those two Kar Manta sure looked like something we've seen before, didn't they?" "Male Shalgathi, in the kar manta shrine goat form, when they are still mobile, before the females eat them, yes." "But weren't the Shalgathi a natural race?" "Before they turned to Chaos and went into decline? Yes. Guess you missed that part of class, didn't you. Now they draw the life force for their young from themselves and from chaos or those seeking to be reborn. There are no more new Shalgathi souls, though those seeking to use the station of the twisted goat often become joined to them on the Kar Manta path, and, they draw life force from themselves, as I mentioned." "From themselves?" "Wolfie, answer me." "It was part of the lesson on sex you skipped to go to the Bitter King's Court for a presentation, and, well, um .." "You blush nicely under all the fur, even in the dark." "Anyway, they use a lesser kar manta focus to create males now. Sometimes a female will create multiple personalities and split some off to create children, which she will trade to other females, sometimes she will estivate chaos demons and give birth to them as Shalgathi, sometimes they will take fools looking for the path of kar manta power and give them rebirth." "Ahh, with these there was probably a Kjjtti broodmass, and they were already on the Kar Manta path, so they just used the focus for one of the stations. Wondering who was using who in this one." "Guess we will know when we see who is pulling the strings at the end. We better be quiet or we won't get any sleep and who knows what the Queen's guards will think." "Wolfie!" "You look cute when you blush too." With that I decided to ignore the boy and get some sleep. Whatever else he thought could wait till morning.  I'm glad he is warm with all that fur.

Os. The smells, even with snow and ice and wind.  I'll write more when the ink doesn't smear from the wind before it freezes. Too much chaos and not enough warm water (though we did get cold water showers).  Urgh.

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