DreamLyrics™ Play-by-Post Forums Fun & Games ETD: Escape the Dream Episode I: The Dreamthief's Tavern

Try 1,4,3,2,2
"won"
"for"
"three"
"too" "too"

The melody pinged out with the 1-4-3-2-2 notes is different than the song, but still pleasant.

After tapping the second fastener the second time, you hear a subtle click behind the frame.

Pressing the loose fastener allows the frame to fold out from the wall on a hinge, revealing a carved wooden flute with six holes in it.

Excellent Weez! And nice to have another brain helping!

Take the flute and play the same sequence on it.

The notes on the flute sound quite discordant. Perhaps it's the wrong tune to play.

You pause to consider where you are... earlier you identified earth, air, fire, and water puzzles and you seem to have all the needed objects. Perhaps playing the flute is meant to be part of a larger puzzle?

Play the whole 'The Lay of the Four Winds'

As the final note of The Lay of the Four Winds fades, the sound does not vanish.

It lingers... not as music, but as pressure. The air in the tavern tightens, drawing inward toward the ancient stone archway by the door.

Then, with a low, resonant grind, the floor before the arch begins to shift. Stone separates along hairline seams. From beneath the tavern floor, a pedestal of ancient grey stone rises slowly into place.

Its surface is smooth and worn, shaped by hands long gone. At its center is a shallow circular depression — sized perfectly for a single stone.

So did we do anything with all lines in the original poem? Maybe not "the earth bears no weight"? Could it be that we need to put the Hearth stone on the pedestal, since it's the lightest, but I don't know if that relates to earth. I don't think we've figured out Young Tom's water or what to do with the stones. Is that correct?

The fire gives no warmth.
The water has no taste.
The earth bears no weight.
The air carries no song.
Balance them, and wake.

Tom's water - think Miales solved that one. The stones are on the scales and they balance. Somehow I think we need to bring all four elements together but no idea how

OOC: oops. I tweaked the puzzle but not my notes. Replace "sized perfectly for a single stone." with "sized perfectly for the base of the balance scale."

Place the balance scale in the depression of the pedestal.

Place the Moon and Mug stones on one side, and Bed, Key, & Hearth stones on the other side

As the balance scale settles onto the pedestal, there is a deep, grinding resonance that rolls through the tavern floor. The mountain symbol carved into the arch flares with a steady, golden glow.

The remaining symbols do not glow... yet... but something in the room has changed.

The air feels tighter, as though it’s waiting to be shaped.

The carved flute grows subtly warm in your hands. The etched wind-motifs along its length seem to pull your breath toward them.

Play the whole tune.

[OOC Thanks for the correction!]

You play the whole tune.

It’s a very pretty melody, and as the first few verses drift by, nothing else seems to change. The notes echo softly through the tavern, pleasant but not really changing anything.

You begin to wonder if it really matters.

Then you reach the East Wind passage... the section with the six notes with the raised dots you noted earlier.

As the first of those notes sounds, the pedestal gives off a faint hum. By the second and third, the vibration deepens, settling into harmony with the melody.

When the sixth marked note fades, the hum resolves... and with a quiet click, a narrow opening appears at the base of the pedestal, just beside the balance scale. Inside is a small compartment, and within it rests a short, pale candle.

For completeness, you finish the tune anyway. It really is a lovely song, the sort that lingers, an earworm you might find yourself humming as you press on, never quite ready to give it up, or let anyone down.

But yes.

That candle definitely seems important.

Light it.. maybe at the fireplace

The candle catches immediately from the hearth’s strange green flame, burning with a steady, smokeless light.

At first, nothing else seems to happen but as you turn back toward the pedestal, the reaction is instant.

The low hum within the stone pedestal deepens, resonating in your chest rather than your ears. The seams that revealed the hidden compartment begin to glow faintly, as though remembering the warmth that once lay within them. When the lit candle is brought near the pedestal, the flame leans forward... not flickering, but reaching.

The moment the candle is set into the narrow channel beside the balance scale, the flame does not spread wildly. Instead, it is drawn inward.

A thin line of fire traces the pedestal’s carved seams.

Then another.

And another.

Within seconds, the entire pedestal is webbed in a quiet, contained blaze, glowing emerald and gold. It's burning without smoke, without heat strong enough to harm, yet clearly alive. The flame does not consume the stone. It clings to it, as though the pedestal itself has begun to burn.

The flame symbol on the arch flares brilliantly, joining the steady glow of the mountain and the soft swirl of the wind.

For a brief moment, the pedestal burns brightly.

And then, with a low grinding sound, the fire changes.

The stone at the pedestal’s center softens and sinks inward, reshaping into a shallow basin as the flames withdraw from the outer part of the pedestal to that basin, circling it in a perfect ring.

The fire continues to burn along the stone basin's edges...

I still think we need to take care of Young Tom and maybe this is the "basin round" we need. I can't figure out how to use the jugs (III and VII) to get the 2 measures so I'm going back to the first part of Alduin's solution for Old Tom.

1. Fill the 5 bottle from the pail.
2. Fill the 3 bottle from the 5 bottle.
3. Pour the remaining 2 that are in the 5 bottle into the stone basin