Ben E. King

Equestria:  October 25th, Albanus 1

The party stood in the doorway, poised to attack the five demons that defiled the Shrine of the Fundati.

Titus was the first to move, charging the nearest demon.  And as he did, he discovered that the dispel magic hadn't cleared all the room's traps.  A glyph activated as the paladin passed through the doorway.  Dark, chill energy poured down upon Titus, draining virtually all of his life away.  The warrior wisely chose the path of discretion and back-peddled into the hallway.  Though not before he stuck his head through the door a second time (just to make sure there wasn't a second Harm glyph on it).

The demons then raised chittering howls, summoning their companions from the nether depths.  Only two accepted the call -- but now the band faced a full seven powerful demons.  It was shaping up to be an enormous fight, and so Severus unrolled a scroll and hastened his family.  Marius grabbed a scroll as well, one of Abbot Micarius' holy words.  The young cleric did not botch his reading of the difficult text.  In fact, Legis' dictum rang through the room with incredible power.  Six of the demons screamed and vanished back to the hells.  Only one remained, blinded and deafened.  Gaius sank several arrows into it and then Leyna rushed forward and lopped its head off.  And so, before poor Corvina could even twitch, the battle was won.

Needless to say, the captain of the guards was horrified.  Especially when he noticed that two of his men had been slain by the Word of Legis.  He quickly rattled off the names of the priests who had permission to visit the shrine.  The band wrote these names down and then urged him and his men to get out of the city as quickly as possible.  The King and the priests would kill them, now that they knew what had truly happened to the Shrine of the Fundati.  At first the soldiers scoffed at the idea that Invictus might be safer than Rostilla.  But in the end, the party persuaded them to flee.

Minda and Cassius, meanwhile, were directing a small herd of peasants down the alley.  The townspeople were also horrified by the defilement of the Fundati and helped the band begin to clean it up.  Corvina found a blocked drain under the quarter inch of sewage that filled the floor.  Once it was cleared, cleaning became much easier.  Still, it would be a monumental task to set the shrine right again.  A task they clearly did not have time for.

While they worked, Marius began the lengthy prayers necessary to contact the Fundati themselves.  The soiled mosaics on the walls flickered, and eventually shadowy figures stepped out of the walls (much to the shock and delight of the assembled masses).  At their head was a crippled girl:  Camilla, the youngest daughter of the Tyrant and the first of the Fundati.  (The Tyrant was the founder of Rostilla -- and, Viridians say, Viridia.  His daughter Camilla was the one who discovered how to perform the Fundati sacrifices.  And when the Tyrant raised Rostilla's walls she became the city's first human sacrifice.)

Apologizing for their neglect, Marius offered libations to the spirits of Rostilla's walls.  He also begged them to extend their protection over the city once more, despite its failings.  Camilla was unmoved.  "Why should we protect those who have neglected us for sixty years?" she asked.  The first of the Fundati then regaled the young cleric with complaints.  At first Marius listened patiently and tried to calm her down.  But he noticed that the more he apologized, the more surly she became.  He decided to switch tacks;  the next time Camilla demanded why they should do their duty when everyone else had failed, Marius replied, "Because you're the Fundati."  Camilla's eyes flashed with pride at that.  "It is true," she admitted.  "I am the daughter of the Tyrant.  Lesser people cannot be expected to show as much strength as I."  In the end, the Fundati agreed to shield Rostilla again -- or, at least, until the nefas priests of the city desecrated their shrine again.

The change was imperceptible to mortals.  But Marius knew that the Bad Guys would know what had happened, immediately.  The Fundati protected a city from both undead and demons;  the demonic minions of the Temples were no doubt writhing even as they spoke.  So they tried to hurry the crowd outside and vacate the scene themselves.

Alas, they didn't have time.  Just as they reached the mouth of the alley, several figures came hurrying up out of the Fundati shrine.  Eight were clerics and guards of various sorts.  Two, however, were familiar:  Archmagister Avena and their evil aunt Surilla.  Surilla spotted Marius in the crowd at once and screamed, "There!  It's that little shit What's-His-Name!"  Avena moved with terrible swiftness, intoning the words of a meteor swarm.  But Gaius moved even more quickly and sank an arrow into the wizard's shoulder.  Avena staggered, yet managed to hold her spell -- until the ranger's second arrow grazed her head.  "You sheep-witted fool!" Surilla screeched as the spell dissipated.  "Can't you channel through a couple measley arrows?"  At her words, Severus' eyes began to glow with joy.  He'd had a curse placed on the fake skull he'd left in her room:  may you truthfully say what you think.  Surilla's appalling lack of tact suggested the curse had landed!

Some of the band managed to scramble around the corner of the alley, but Surilla chanted a spell of her own before Marius and Corvina could escape.  A wave of chill energy passed over the alley, draining the moisture and life out of a score of people.  Peasants screamed and dropped like flies, sending the rest of the crowd into mad flight.  Marius withstood the horrid wilting well, however his sister was not so lucky.  Corvina shrivelled and fell.  Her younger brother grabbed her and dragged her a few steps until Leyna could dart in and scoop her up.  Then the band fled, shifting into wind-walk form as they ran.

Or, as some of them ran.  As the rest of the party fled, Titus suddenly zoomed back and dropped his wind-walk, precipitating in the middle of the evil-doers.  The paladin slashed Surilla -- though alas the blow wasn't deep enough to fell her.  Then, as the casters frantically chanted spells, he used his magical cloak to teleport away.  This escape very nearly failed, however.  One of the clerics managed to finish a dimensional anchor, a spell which prevents teleportation.  But the spell didn't quite manage to penetrate the protection of his luminous armor, and the paladin managed to flee.

The Surrexi then met up in one of Minda's safe houses to await news of the city.  Tenebrus and Brennus were able to give them a good summary of the Equestria races.  When the race began, the Aperte horse refused to run.  It simply turned around and returned to the stables, much to the crowd's amusement.  The spectators were far less pleased a few minutes later when the Tillaford and Galens horses attacked each other savagely.  Both animals fell out of the race, and eventually had to be put down.  Worse omens were to come.  As the two remaining horses passed outside the Shrine of the Fundati, the Benobles horse suddenly screamed in panic.  Maddened with fear, it charge into the crowd, killing a couple on-lookers and breaking its leg.  Only one horse remained:  Signarum's.  It dutifully completed the course and was led up to the winner's altar.  But before the priest could slit its throat (with one blow, as the sacrifice had to be done), the stallion suddenly whirled about and bit the pontifex on the face.  The nearby guards panicked and hacked the horse to pieces.  Thoroughly ruining the Bella sacrifice...

News of these dire portents spread quickly.  And as the Surrexi settled in, there were already signs of rioting spreading throughout the city.