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New Argonauts, Session 7: The Underworld


    Back at the palace, the guards summoned Hippolyon to speak to the heroes. The noble's eyes grew large when he saw the grisly cyclopes heads the Argonauts brought back as proof of their success, and even more so at the glowing thunderbolts Xanthos carried at his side. He ushered them back to their guest rooms in the palace and ran off to notify King Goran. The king invited the Argonauts to the evening feast, and when they arrived they could tell he wasn't exactly happy about their progress, but made a reasonable attempt to hide it.
    Goran congratulated them on finishing their second task, but warned them that their third task was the most heroic and dangerous of them all. In the eastern part of Colchis is a mountain range, and within that range is a cave that leads deep under the earth and eventually to the underworld. For their third task, the heroes were to go to the underworld and bring back it's gate-guardian, Cerberus, and bring him back alive. After all, in the ancient days Heracles performed this very task without any help, so in this modern day it is reasonable to expect that six great heroes working together could do what mighty Heracles had done alone. Of course this caused the feasting nobles to immediately fall into gossip and odds-making. The Argonauts promised to set out the very next day.
    Back in Xanthos' room, the heroes shared what they knew of the underworld and Cerberus. Like the first hydra, he was said to be offspring of the mother-monster Echidna. He had three great heads with slavering jaws, and his tail was a venomous snake. Cerberus guarded the gates to Hades' realm in order to keep the dead from escaping, though in many tales he was happy to prevent mortal heroes from entering while they were still alive. The Argonauts made plans to subdue the beast. The heroes retired, as the journey to the mountains would take a week.
   That night, Thyrsos again awoke to find princess Meledria in his room. She warned him that her father was furious at their second victory, and though other heroes had agreed to this quest, none of them ever returns. She feared for his life and urged him to be careful. Once again, Thyrsos asked her to join him in his bed, and this time she agreed, leaving before dawn so her father's spies would not see her.
    The next morning, the heroes went shopping in the capital city. They found an apothecary who could provide them with nonlethal poison and antitoxin to counteract any venom, and from a blacksmith they bought lengths of stout chain to bind their prey once they had subdued it. The Argonauts then set out eastward according to the directions the king gave them. After several days of travelling the villages became less frequent, and just outside the foothills of the mountains they found a small village filled with people quite surprised to see armed Greek heroes. The villagers told them the way to the dangerous cave, and the heroes lit torches and entered.
    The tunnel angled strongly downward, twisting back and forth until they were disoriented. Eventually they reached a cavern with a large black river running through it. One each side of the river was a bronze bell. Anaxis rang the bell, and in a few minutes a strange figure on a small skiff poled his way toward them from upstream. The figure was old and gaunt, and wore a skull-faced mask. He extended an emaciated hand, and once he was paid he carried them across the river, never speaking a word. Unnerved, the heroes elected to not converse with Charon, ferryman of the Styx.
    The heroes cautiously approached the tunnel on the far side of the river. Arcturus anointed his spear with the apothecary's poison, and Zale and Thyrsos drank their poison-fighting remedies. Further along, the tunnel opened into another small cavern. Huge iron gates stood partly ajar, restricting access to a narrower tunnel. Three great canine skulls were mounted above and to each side of the gate, each as large as a horse's head. No sign of Cerberus--or any other guardians--could be found.
    Zale cautiously approached the gate, but before he reached it, six ghostly figures appeared in front of the gate--the six false oracle guards the Argonauts had killed at Delphi! This gave the heroes pause, but the spirits only stared at them with hollow eyes. Moments later, two monstrously huge dogs charged through the opening in the gate, passing through the spirits as if they were but mist.
    The hounds were larger than any the heroes had seen, easily as large as a horse, though their heads were not as large as the great skulls mounted around the gate. Each was a dull gray, tipped with gray-white, and their tails were green and slick with slime. Almost in unison, the hounds opened their mouths and howled, releasing a bitter chill as cold as the underworld itself. Thyrsos, Arcturus, Xanthos, and Zale found themselves covered in frost and hurt by the intense cold of the creatures' breath. Enraged, Arcturus called on Ares' power, and the hero's eyes turned red with the fury of the god of war. Zale shrouded himself in Poseidon's mists. Xanthos and Thyrsos picked one hound and began to stab at it. The dogs retaliated with bites and lashes of their poison-drenched tails. Clearly Cerberus was not here, but these things were related to him somehow.
    At first the heroes were cautious, as they did not wish to upset Hades by destroying the guardians to his realm, and they had to bring back one of these creatures alive. The hounds didn't hesitate to strike with lethal intent, and their bites and frozen breath caused great wounds. The Argonauts were forced to choose survival over expediency, and fought hard against the underworld monsters. Arcturus' spear bit deep into one hound and it reacted to the poison with an angry growl. Xanthos called upon the power of Zeus and struck the other with his sword, charging his blow with lightning and thunder. The other four rained down blows on the two creatures, and all the while the six dead men watched silently. Eventually the heroes wounded one hound so greatly that it fled back into Hades' realm, and with the flat of their blades they pounded the remaining one into submission. As the second hound fell, the spirits of the dead retreated through the bars of the gate. Quickly the heroes bound the Cerberean hound with their chains, quickly tended to their wounds, and pulled their captive to the banks of the Styx. Charon seemed unfazed by his monstrous cargo, and after the heroes paid him he brought them all back across the deadly water.
    The climb back to the surface was difficult with eight hundred pounds of furry anger dragging behind them, but the heroes saw that the creature was unharmed by this casual abuse and decided to drag, rather than carry, it down the mountainside to the village, where they purchased a cart and oxen to make the return trip easier. For the entire week it took them to get back they carefully watched the hound to make sure it did not escape, but the apothecary's poison was potent and the blacksmith's chains were strong. Eventually they reached the capital of Colchis (causing a minor panic as the people recognized what they carried in the cart), made their way to the palace, and demanded to see the king.

    To be continued....