The elf turned and strode toward the entrance, the band forming up behind her. As she passed Lily she slung the strings on her dimensional bag wide and a dozen teddy bears leapt forth including the red scarf and the eyepatch bear.
Darkness swallowed them as they made their way inside, the sunny brightness of the outside world becoming only a memory in the pitch black. That is until fire flared to life, a dozen fist sized orbs glowed and flickered around Ellaria, lighting the large chamber they had arrived in.
"Lily. Normally we would make use of Flora's ability to trip dungeon traps. However I would like to see how your golem bears do. Send them ahead, impress me."
Lily swallowed, suddenly feeling the pressure. She gestured and the bears ran forward, disappearing over a stone lip at the end of the chamber.
Fey trotted toward the stone lip, her stomach doing flips. It wasn't that she was afraid of dungeons, she had been in a number of them, just that her last experience with one had left her with an animalistic wariness, an instinctive fear. Could this be the same as that dungeon? An irrational question but still one that hung over her.
She blinked as Ellaria stepped out beside her, the elf confidently making her way down the stairs. What was she doing?! She couldn't let her just go ahead on her own, she needed to protect the elf, to heal her from any injury, to keep her safe.
The clopping of hooves joined the elf's near silent steps on the vast staircase. Behind them came the others.
The stairs were monolithic in scale, thirty foot wide and with large steps. Fortunate as it allowed the more pregnant of the band to easily descend. The stair alighted on a small square landing before another stair to the left took them down further, then another, a vast spiral descending deep deep into the earth, monumental blocky stonework creating a passage through millions of tons of earth and stone.
After nearly twenty minutes of descending the great staircase they, at last, stepped free from the last step and emerged into a vast cavernous hall. An underground stream had broken through the wall of the hall and flowed across it, water falling down another stair on the other side. The echoing space was filled with the sound of rushing water, the light from Ellaria's flames causing wet stone to gleam in the oppressive dark.
"Care, the floor is slippery with moss and dew."
A spot of colour caught Fey's eye and she turned to see a blue gemstone floating in the air. The gem turned over and over as though the owner was furiously studying it.
"Erm, Kayla, is everything okay?"
The gemstone froze up. Then lowered slightly as though the person holding its shoulders had slumped.
"Y-yes…" came a sad voice, "I just… I just don't want to be useless anymore, I, I want to help the band, I want to help like Lily, but I don't have anything Fey. I can't fight, I can't do magic, I'm stuck being invisible and extremely preggers. I can't even move on my own anymore without Flo."
The centaur paused at that suddenly feeling a bit guilty. It was fair to say that the otterkin was being overlooked due to her invisibility and new found shyness, she hadn't even considered that she might want to do more than be an observing apprentice adventurer in the dungeon. She promised herself that she would do something to help her if they made it out alive from this place.
"Don't fret Kayla," said Ellaria, "An apprentice first timing a dungeon is only expected to learn, just keep back and watch us."
The gem shifted as though Kayla was nodding.
They made their way onward, crossing the stream, then making their way down wide corridors. At one point they passed by a chasm in the ground, part of the corridor collapsed into the pit, its walls stretching up and down into the darkness, vast cliffs hidden underground. Fortunately they could once more rely on Flora to get by as trying to squeeze around what little remained of the floor poking from the wall was risky, and terrifying, the stone looked ready to fall into the bottomless pit at any moment.
As the last of them levitated over Lily made an exclamation of surprise and stepped forward to where Ellaria stood, her light illuminating something on the ground. It was a teddy bear, partially torn apart.
"Care. It's a trap."
The elf sent several fireballs forward illuminating the shadowy walls with flickering light. A stuck spike trap was revealed. The bronze had clearly become worn with the years, muck and stones falling into the mechanism causing it to get stuck when it had been triggered by the bear.
They carefully passed by the bronze spikes and continued on, Lily scooping up the ragged teddy bear as she passed.
Deeper, then deeper, corridor after corridor until suddenly the red scarfed teddy bear came running from the dark, darting up to Lily and leaping onto her breasts.
"Whats is it? Tell me." said Ellaria.
Lily cradled the bear who seemed quite pleased with his position in her cleavage.
"He says there's someone ahead, a human. Uhm, they sound like they are in trouble."
Vivi unsheathed her long sword and several more flames spun to life around the elf.
"We go slow. Cautious."
They crept down the corridor until a voice could be heard.
"H-help!"