Role

Chapter 1

In the depths of the tunnels it half crawled and half ran. It moved at
times as a creature and at times as a humanoid, sliding its movement
between two and four legs as the terrain demanded. The claws extending
from its paws were ferocious and though it moved unseen, the scratches
left behind were like no other feline roaming Thera.

The world in which it hunted now was the world in which the thing had
been born. Cold and dark, only the strange radiation of the Underdark
gave off any sort of heat in these tunnels far down in the depths of the
world. That and the lingering breath of the travelers who had passed
this way, the heat of their life blood, and most important of all, the
strange scent of magic that drove the restless feline closer with a
hunger needing to be sated.

The meat would taste good. The warmth of wet blood would thrill. But it
was the magic it sought, the destruction and consumption of which would
drive back the madness and deafening throbbing that shot through her
skull...for a time, for a day, till the next victim came into her prowling
territory.

The feline creature came upon the camp in a space that could only be
described as a widening of the tunnels. Three companions, two warriors
and a young mage barely more than an apprentice paused in their travels
to rest. They were far from home and obviously regretting their
adventure as they huddled around a meager fire drowned by the darkness
surrounding them.