Into the Depths: Investigating the Shimmering Shore Tunnels (Group 3)

Save yourself first. Gilgamesh's gruff response was good advice. Fable had never had the best self-preservation instincts, and she was always trying to please others. With her cooking, with her hunting. She was a giver. It was in her nature to be selfless. And yet, when that thing erupted from the ground beneath them and turned a single, bulbous eye on the group before it, she felt herself all of a sudden wanting to be particularly selfish. Her mouth dried out all at once, and even if she tried to speak, she had a feeling that she wouldn't be able to squeak a single word out.

It looked upon them like a wolf might look upon - well, that injured deer that traveled with them, she supposed. The look about it was all predator, not prey. Fable wished it looked more like an oversized earthworm than what it did. That single eye was haunting. She gulped and swayed from side to side, feeling light headed at the sight of it. Noor, where is Noor... Her stomach felt like it might turn upside down. How were they going to get out of this mess? She paled beneath the gaze of that big, big eye. Save yourself. Save yourself. But there was a child with them... and a useless, hooved creature... Ah! The deer! She'd already bandaged her back leg with something out of that pack.

Without waiting for permission, Fable slowly (if she moved quickly, would it startle the beast?) edged toward the deer and winnowed a slip of ribbon out of her pouch. Out of her own travelling bag, she grabbed flint and worked quickly by wrapping the ribbon around a thick dead root that had fallen from the ceiling. If this creature spent so much time underground, there was no telling how it would react to the flare of a torch. Maybe it could buy them some time! If nothing else, she was comfortable with fire. She knew fire, intimately. "If this buys us some time, go, and if you see a white and grey wolf named Noor... tell her I'm coming," she sputtered, fidgeting with the flint rock until finally an errant spark erupted into flames on the ribbon-wrapped root. Fable held it aloft and approach the worm slowly, her lips curled in a snarl, the torch nearly bright as sun in the dark tunnel. The worm was disgusting - not even fit enough to eat. She'd learned her lesson harvesting rare ingredients the last time the world had turned upside down.

"Speech"