380

Shortly after dawn the following day, you wake with a splitting headache. With bleary eyes you peer around you at the snoring dwarves who occupy the tiny bunks of the cramped cabin. The low hum of the ship only increases the pain that throbs like a demon inside your head, causing you to wince and grit your teeth at the slightest movement of your stiff and aching limbs. You lose 2 ENDURANCE points due to this monstrous hangover!

Painfully, you gather up your equipment and climb on deck to find everything in deep shadow, for the Skyrider is hovering beneath a massive outcrop of sandstone that juts from the side of a mountain. Banedon still stands at the helm, but he is no longer in a trance.

‘Kraan-riders,’ he says, pointing to a sun-bleached valley beyond the shadows. ‘They arrived with the dawn.’

You stare out across an alien landscape, a mountain valley filled with thousands of pillars formed from massive and precariously balanced boulders. The pillars reach so high into the sky that an avalanche looks inevitable. The Vassagonians call this place the Koos—‘the needles’. Perched upon two of these huge rocky columns are Kraan, their Drakkarim riders scouring the valley with telescopes. An hour passes before they take to the sky and disappear.

‘Trim the boom-sails, Bo’sun Nolrim,’ orders Banedon, his voice barely audible above the increasing hum of the Skyrider. ‘We’ve a fast run ahead.’

If you possess a Black Crystal Cube, turn to 229.

If you do not have this Special Item, turn to 247.