From TES issue 67 (January 2011)
Series 3
Quest: The Shield of Liberty.
dungeoneer: Christopher Reed.Advisors: James, Alex and Tim.

Home town: Bristol.
Team score: 5½ out of 10.

Perhaps this quest does feel a bit flat after Martin’s thrilling run through level three, but I think these four affable Bristolians do a pretty good job of making the last episode-and-a-bit of series 3 suitably entertaining.

Level One: After the giant die has opened up for the last time ever, Chris meets Hordriss on a rocky ledge. Behaving for the first time pretty much as he will during the next couple of series (including his first uses of the pronoun “One” instead of “I”) Hordriss quickly dismisses Chris as being too insignificant for one of such great importance to bother about, but changes his mind when Chris apologies for disturbing him and addresses him as “Your Grace” thus appeasing his ruffled dignity. Hordriss charges Chris with retrieving an hourglass for him (foreshadowing the longer drawn out pacts he will go on to make throughout series 4) and gifts the team a SPEED spell as a reward: ”My gift to you is called SPEED.” – Hordriss. Watch out, Chris, he’s a dealer!
An obvious piece of filler follows, as Chris is coaxed into placing a sheaf of herbs into what used to be Mildread’s cauldron, thus summoning a couple of skull ghosts. (”I think it might be time to leave.” – Treguard.) Brangwen’s clue room follows, where the boys remember just enough from their nursery days to score two out of three, earning them the first step – the archer. Chris picks up Hordriss’s hourglass from the clue table, as well as – after some discussion – a bone. The advisors then take a very long time to get to grips with the Bricked-Off Window Puzzle, and have to rely on Treguard’s help to spell out SHIELD, the object of their quest – well, it’s obvious once you know! Later, the SPEED spell is used to outrun Mr Grimwold in a dwarf tunnel.
Chris then arrives in the Vale of Vanburn (not seen for quite some weeks before this) and has to beat a hasty and unexpected retreat through the cave halfway along the path as he is hemmed in by goblins coming at him from both directions. Two of the goblins chase Chris across the Corridor of the Catacombs, where he stops briefly to grab a sprig of energy. Chris then re-emerges at the end of the Vale of Vanburn, where Hordriss is waiting for him. The hourglass is duly handed over (”One is gratified to discover that in these modern times there are still some young people who know how to honour a bargain.” – Hordriss) and Hordriss reveals the second step – the swimmer – before scaring off the two pursuing goblins with a haunted sword.

Chris meets Mrs. Grimwold in the wellway room, and Festus is with her as usual. Mrs Grimwold is pleased to see that Chris has brought a bone for Festus, and gives him an item of food along with the third step – the thrower – in return. As Chris climbs into the well, Mrs Grimwold wanders off and starts being attacked by Festus – whether she survived the experience (and so was included as one of the unseen yet often mentioned Grimwold Family during series 6) is up to the individual Knightmare devotee to decide.
Level Two: A quick trip across the Mills of Doom (where Chris demonstrates some impressive leaping skills) leads to Merlin’s throne room, where Chris performs three impressive sporty actions to summon the three steps. Merlin appears and poses his two questions as usual, and with both answered correctly (just about) he rewards them with a FLIGHT spell. However, there is no time to discover what this would have been used for (a similar situation to the one Karen discovered at the Bridged Vale, perhaps) as Chris enters the clue room and the questing season draws to a (not understated) close.
Summary: They seemed pretty sharp most of the time, although probably not sharp enough to win the notoriously tough series 3, but we were never going to know for sure because they were always destined to leave undefeated.

[Previous team: Team 11 of Series 3
Next team: Team 1 of Series 4]

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