By the time the astral traveler had returned his body, the deep rumbling noise had become much louder, and small bits of sand were shaking free from the walls. Caduceus took Chic aside, explaining what he had found. "I skried a large, dark form in the clouds," he whispered. "I believe it to be an Aleraran airship, or something like it."

"Why would Alerar have sent an airship all the way out here?" asked the older adept. "You don't think..."

"No." The Qaballist said it with finality. "They couldn't have found out about the book. And why would they send an airship after an old journal? No, I think this is just a coincidence. Probably using the area for some sort of test of a new design." He looked over at the rest of his party. "Still, it would probably be best if we picked up the pace. We need to get out of the range of any destruction, should they test any new cannons or other weapons." I can only hope Torgun can hold out if that passage collapses. He should know better than anyone what to do.

Returning to the group, Caduceus announced that they needed to get going. "Let's pick up the pace, guys! We've got a lot of ground to cover."

~~~~~

Before long, the team came upon a large room, lit by braziers filled with everburning flame. Like the illuminating flames of the dolls, these fires did nothing to provide heat -- only light. Across the entire room spread a large depiction of a strange alphabet, each tile having a letter upon it. "Tabatha? Can you tell us what this is?" Caduceus asked of the barbarian woman.

"Each of these squares is marked with a rune from my people's language," she explained. "I think we need to spell a word to get across. When I was young, I remember we would learn the letters, and how to spell, with a game like that. This should be the same."

"A word? Maybe 'aurochs,'" Logan suggested in his rough voice. "How do you spell that, Mistress Cicero?"

Stepping over to the edge of the lettertable, the raven-haired warrior looked over the blocks nearest her. She picked up a small rock, tossing it onto a space at random. Nothing happened at first, but then a click rang out and a large spike fell from the darkness above, spearing through the rune with a great crash. "No mistakes..."

Once again, she gazed upon those letters nearest to her, picking out one that resembled a reversed 4. "Ahsa," she said as she placed her weight on it.

CLICK.

She backpedaled as hard as she could, tumbling back onto the plain floor before a spear burst through from beneath the tile, shattering it. "Wrong. How was it spelled again?"

It was then that Caduceus spoke up again. "Perhaps the spellings have changed over time. My own Hebrew language has two dialects that are still spoken, with subtle differences between their spellings and pronunciations," he pointed out. "Think hard, how would the queen have spelled it?"

"That's right!" she exclaimed, flashing an understanding smile at the magician. "Ahsa is a rune we learned from foreigners after the Auroch Queen's death. She would have spelled it beginning with..." She stepped on a block resembling an arch. "Uruz."

She waited for the click, but none came, and she sighed her relief. "Raida, othal, kusma, sauil," she chanted, leaping onto a new block with each word. In this way, she crossed the table, and found a lever on the far side. Flipping it, she waved the others over.

They hesitated at first, not sure what that lever might have done, but the kender dolls ran headlong over to the warrior, not a care in the world for what happened to their stuffed bodies. And nothing happened.

"Keep going," Caduceus ordered when they had all crossed. "Who knows what other surprises we might find before we reach the helm?"