"You've got him bound and now you want to do what?!" Cliona asks.
"Cut off his hand." replied Shu.
"What benefit do you think that is going to have? I really don't think that cutting off his hand is going to solve the problem" stated Cliona as the party stood there looking at their Cleric, Kalen, who was bound and passed out on the floor. The black rock that he had touched earlier, had adhered itself to his right hand and there had been no separating it from him.
"Do you have a better idea? The think is making him waste away." replied Shu. Sighing, Cliona shook her head.
Caramon sterilized his axe while Osfred cast his magic, making a tourniquet and tied it on Kalen's arm.
Caramon raises his axe over his head and brings it down severing Kalen's hand from his arm. The pain from the blow shocks Kalen back to consciousness and as Shu goes to swing and knock him back out he over calculates the blow and punches himself in the groin and then musters the strength to kick Kalen in the head knocking him out.
Osfred moves quickly grabbing Kalen's arm cauterizing the wound before leaning against the wall and sliding into a sitting position.
Shu grabs a set of tongs from the earlier discovered workshop and uses it to pick up the hand with the rock still attached. Walking out of the room he drops it down the stair well, the arm and stone clattering all the way down to the bottom.
After cleaning everything up and clearing the room of the smell of burnt flesh the settles in for the night.
Trading off watches for the night, the night progresses uneventfully until Shu comes on watch. Glancing out the window he notices a slight movement and hears a scraping noise. Shining the light out into the main room, there is nothing to be seen.
The room slowly lights up as the scene on Shu's cloak transitions from night to day.
"Everything was quiet for most of the night, though at some point I thought I saw movement and heard something scraping outside the room" Shu explained.
"It was probably Kalen's hand dragging the stone, coming back in search of it's body." joked Caramon.
Osfred turned to Caramon, "I don't know, I mean we tossed that thing down the stairwell, that's an awful lot of climbing."
Shrugging his shoulders Caramon replied "We'll it's been about 8 hours, so you never know"
Gathering up their gear the party hoists up Kalen to carry him out of the room. With a groggy look on his face he turns to his companions "I can't hear my God any more. Why can't I hear my God?"
"Maybe it had something to do with us cutting off your arm, we had to separate you from that stone and that was the only way we could do it." Shu said as he walked towards the double doors, but then paused as he heard the same scraping sound from earlier in the morning. Turning to see where the sound was coming from, showed that the room was still empty.
Caramon & Shu turn back to lift the bar that is holding the double doors closed.
"Uh guys...." Cliona said.
Kalen's eyes are wide open in awe and horror. Turning around, they notice the hand slowing pulling itself across the floor with its fingers, the rock still adhered to it's palm.
"Quick, through the doors!" Shu said as he looped a rope around the bar as they pulled the door closed, the party tugged on the rope and felt the mechanism pull the bar back into place, locking the doors tight behind them.
"You just had to mention the hand coming after us, didn't you Caramon." scowled Cliona.
