Kendall’s party tore through the halls of the dungeon, escaping narrowly from the grasping spectral hands of the pedestal room. Eventually, they slowed to a stop at the entrance to the next room of the dungeon. 

Kendall turned to look at his fellow party members, making sure all of them had followed and were safe.

“Everyone alright?” He asked. Evangeline, Katarzyna, and Tuesday all nodded, looking between one another and Kendall. Kendall nodded back at them, and the group rested in the hall for a moment, catching their breaths. 

“Alright,” Kendall said to the group after they’d rested sufficiently. “We carry on, then.” 

The group got up, shook out their manes, and stepped into the next room.

It appeared to have once been some kind of castle courtyard, lit dimly by the mysterious light emanating from the beautiful ornate fountain in its center. Tuesday thought the whole place must’ve been quite lovely in its day - there were grand statues of Coursers and humans, and the pathways were lined with swirling mosaic patterns. There were patches of earth where gardens once must have been, now growing thick with soul vines, flowering yellow in the dim light. 

And as the Diamond Hound party wandered through the courtyard, they saw the spirits brought forth by these vines - humanoids, not in armor, but in fine flowing coats and gowns, brightly colored in stark contrast to their bleak surroundings. They stood in groups and pairs, chattering to one another as if they were all still alive, seemingly attending some sort of party held in this courtyard. Around the edges of the room stood the spirits of armored bodyguards, holding bannered halberds, stoic and stiff. 

While all in attendance were humanoid, not all of them seemed to be human. Some attendees were elven in appearance, wearing necklaces and tabards marked with an insignia of a delicate doe. The dwarven guests wore heralds of a maned goat, and the orc spirits, looking rather out of place and uncomfortable in a setting such as this, bore the insignia of a magnificent boar. And the humans, of course, wore a rather familiar insignia - that of two Coursers, each biting the other in the neck. Kendall recognized the symbol from his own experiences traversing the Moor of Sleep, but the symbol was new to Katarzyna. 

“...Is that some kind of coat of arms?” She asked the group, looking at the symbol on the armor on one of the guards. 

“We believe so,” Tuesday answered. “It seems to represent the humans’ kingdom.”

“A little bit gruesome for a heraldic insignia, don’t you think?” Katarzyna commented.

Tuesday shrugged. 

“Humans were mysterious creatures.” 

Meanwhile, Kendall and Evangeline approached the fountain in the center of the courtyard. What was causing it to glow so strangely, casting dappled patterns of watery light about the room? As the pair stared into the water, which seemed deeper than the fountain itself, it began to swirl inexplicably, defying the stillness of the surrounding room. Kendall narrowed his eyes with interest, watching the vortex as it steadily grew, expecting it to stop at any moment, as quickly as it had begun.

But it never did. The vortex only grew wider and fiercer, beginning to frighten the watching pair - what was going on? They reared back away from it, but the ferocity of the vortex was beginning to cause the fountain to crumble. Tuesday and Katarzyna looked over at the commotion.

“What’s happening?” Katarzyna asked, as the ground around the fountain began to crack from the force of the water. 

“We need to leave!” Kendall called out as the fountain crumbled and the deep water flowed out around his hooves. The vortex continued to grow, threatening to consume the whole room. The ghosts continued to stand and talk to one another as though nothing was happening. Kendall and Evangeline tried to step backwards away from the whirlpool, but as the water grew deeper and swirled more fiercely around them, it became more difficult to move away. 

“Kendall? Evangeline? Are you alright?” Tuesday called out, beginning to wade towards them, but stopping, thinking better of it. “Try to get to us, we’ll help pull you out!” 

Kendall and Evangeline nodded at each other, then at Tuesday.

“Alright, we’ll try to move around to you!” Perhaps wading sideways with the current would be easier than trying to move directly backwards away from it? It was worth a try - in fact, it seemed like their only option at the moment. Hopefully it would work.