The characters in this session were:
- Alabastor Quan, a gnome rogue-turned-illusionist and failed circus ringmaster; wielder of a cursed dagger and member of the Ravenswing Thieves’ Guild.
- Caulis, a homunculus warlock liberated from its master; has made a pact with certain Faerie Powers.
- Garvin Otherwise, a human rogue and burglar of the Ravenswing Thieves’ Guild, with a very, very peculiar past and a zoog pet, Lenore.
- An ancient and enigmatic Lengian cleric of the Mother of Spiders, name unknown. She wears bulky ecclesiastical garments covering an uncertain number of limbs and goes by “Sister.”
- Yam, an eccentric gnome illusionist and local graduate student at Umbral University. Yam cares little for money. Yam is curious. Yam is Yam.
XP Awarded: 900 XP
The party had returned to the city of Hex using the Portal Chalk, a group of rescued thralls in tow – spared from a short life of labour and misuse by the vicious Bonegrinders, a tribe of brutish trolls and rivals of the somewhat more reasonable (if, perhaps, no less ruthless) Goretooth trolls.
The motley group emerged into the Hive of the Thirteenth Queen; after some confusion and discussion with the waspkin hierophants, the group was given temporary shelter. Armand agreed to search for a more fitting habitation for the rescued thralls.
Before the pallid sorcerer ushered the group from the Hive, Garvin made sure to gather as much information as he could. He took aside one of the thralls, an aged woman, apparently human, who identified herself as Jenny, a borderlander who had been kidnapped by the Bonegrinders – or so they thought.
“Weren’t Bonegrinders took us,” Jenny told Garvin. “Skintakers – wrapped themselves in the hides of their foes. They took us, sold us to the Bonegrinders as thralls.”
“Hmm, I see,” Garvin mused. “How do you… living in the borderland, how do you feel about trollbloods?”
Jenny chuckled, and pushed some of her long, grey hair aside to reveal two small horns. “Why, I’ve got troll blood myself,” she said. “It’s not the blood that’s bad, it’s life out in Troll Country. Some of the troll tribes aren’t half bad, but others, well, they’re angry, and desperate.”
“Which tribes should we watch out for?”
“The Twocrowns are obsessed with purity. They kill or exile those with human bloods, and have a hierarchy based on the number of heads a troll possesses. I’d stay away from Ettin Island if I were you.” She pointed it out on the map.
“Then there are the Stoneclaws. Reclusive and unfriendly, but not raiders and slaughterers like the Twocrowns; they occasionally sail south to trade furs. There are few Blackhorns left; most of them died in the plague that created the Sickened Land. Those few that remain have warded their village against pestilence, but are always near starvation, as little game remains in their woods. The Skintakers fled west into the abandoned mine-tunnels beneath the mountains, after Hex burned their villages to the ground with acid storms.”
“How about the Goretooth tribe?”
“They’re the friendliest to Hex, certainly, but they can be ruthless as well.”
“So, do you happen to speak Giant?” he asked.
“A bit,” she says. “Learned from my grandmother.”
“Did you happen to overhear anything these Skintakers said?”
“Hmm. They kept mentioning something or someone called the Griefbringer – especially their leader. Jarna they called her, the Iron Witch. I’ll never forget her – even clad in stolen skins I could see the burn-scars beneath. I only saw her for a moment, but a terrible chill came over me when her eyes fell on me. A cold fury.” She shivered.
“Thank you,” Garvin said. “That was very helpful.”
Conferring with the others, he learned from Sister of the Griefbringer: one of the Troll Gods, She-Who-Brings-Sorrow, the Brood-Mother, and one of the eldest of the pantheon. It seemed she was a deity of vengeance and fecundity, creation and destruction all at once.
While the party rested, Caulis made its way back to its tower in the district of Caulchurch, hoping to consult some of its creator’s books in hopes of learning more about troll magic in hopes of gleaning some clue as to the cause of the fell winter gripping Hex in its icy grasp.
Caulis began its researches by looking into the runic magic of the Trolls. It learned that certain runestones were arrayed by the Trolls into circles known as Heargs, reputedly consecrated to certain of the Troll Gods, and functioning as conduits, allowing Trolls to speak to their ancestors, for, as the homunculus learned Trolls believed that their dead did not pass to any afterlife but rather returned to the land, the elemental earth from which all Trolls were born. Even one with a drop of Troll blood in their veins would merge with the land upon death. It seemed that these runestone circles, when blessed with certain rites, permitted communication between living Trolls and the spirits of their dead.
Intrigued, Caulis prepared to read on, noting several rituals recorded in the text. As it stowed the book, it noticed something strange in its musty tower room. A small rose with vivid purple petals poked through a crack in Caulis’ floorboards. Tied around its stem was a small note, upon which is written – in Sylvan – the words “WATER ME.”
With the deathly winter gripping Hex, the sight of a flower was, to be sure, strange – never mind the note. Perplexed but intrigued, Caulis fetched water for the plant and splashed a few drops atop it.
Moments later, the flower rapidly grew, blooming, sprouting, blossoming, budding, becoming a massive rose-bush arch. A wild but beautiful-looking garden could be glimpsed through the arch.
“A portal…” Caulis mused, and, intrigued more than alarmed, stepped through. It found itself in an eerie glade at twilight, though no sun was directly visible through the thick masses of thorny vines and tall oak trees that rose on all sides of the garden like walls. Flowers of a bewildering array of sizes, colours, and species filled the garden with a profusion of scents and hues. A placid pool scattered with water lilies lay at the centre, a boat tied up on the bank. In the centre of the pond, half-obscured by the mist and gloaming, Caulis could glimpse a small island with a gazebo. It sent Eleyin ahead, who reported that a figure could be seen in the gazebo.
More curious than cautious, Caulis got in the boat and paddled over to the island. Getting out, it approached the gazebo.
The gazebo was fashioned of pale wood, but seemed to have actually been grown rather than built. Flowers and vines were intertwined in its trellises, forming a resplendent bower. Seated here, wearing a dress fashioned entirely from more flowers, was an ethereal woman of regal bearing; she was obviously of the Fair Folk, with slightly greenish skin and hair the colour of summer.
“Ah, you received our little note,” Titania said, looking Caulis up and down. “There is a matter we wish to discuss.”
“It is an honour, your grace!” Caulis exclaimed, awed before its patron. “Your garden is lovely.”
“We are, of course, aware of the perversion of the natural order currently visited upon the Inkstained City – the winter which grips the streets even as spring should be filling the air with the scent of flowers, with summer’s richness close behind. As the Monarch of All Growing Things, we are, as you might imagine, greatly concerned.”
“My companions and I have been trying to fix that,” Caulis said.
“We know. We approve of your decision to seek out the source of the Fell Winter. We wish to aid you. The Giants have long been foes of the Seelie Court, and of fairy-kind in general, being, as a rule, of a brutish temperament, and much given to the trammeling of flowers and the destruction of fragile but beautiful things. In ages past, the great forest which the people of your world call the Tangle stretched through the vastness of Giant-Land. But the Giants came with cruel axes, and hewed down many trees, and drove the forest back; and then, in their warring with Hex, the wizards of that city smote the land further with caustic liquids and sicknesses, so that nothing could grow. Giant-Land, which was once a part of the fairy-realm, has become a cold, withered place, bleak and infertile. Only pockets of the once-great Forest remain. We would have you begin to remedy this state of affairs.”
She snapped her fingers, and a sprite – previously invisible – revealed itself. It held out in its hand three glimmering acorns. Caulis took them carefully.
“These acorns are both precious and powerful,” Titania said. “The are taken from only the most majestic of oaks in the Royal Forest at the heart of my realm in the innermost parts of Faerie. Where such an acorn in planted, the earth itself will be transformed. Even if the soil be ere so vile, a great woodland shall burst forth, growing with tremendous speed. We would ask that you plant these acorns to re-grow the woodland that has been destroyed. The winter itself must, of course, still be ended, or even these hardy trees will die.
“But we have another gift for you, as well.” She smiled, and another sprite appeared, this one carrying a delicate glass phial. Caulis took this also. “This vessel contains one of the Anemoi, the spirit Favonius – an elemental of the West Wind, which tokens spring. If you release Favonius, he shall aid you in combating any creature of the North Wind. Choose your moment wisely, for he is fickle, and once freed, he shall not linger for long.”
“Thank you!” Caulis said, stowing both acorns and phial carefully. “I wonder… your grace, what do you know of the runestones that the trolls call ‘Heargs’?”
“Such places are in fact convergences of ley lines – natural concentrations of Faerie magic. Like the land itself, the Giants have stolen such power for themselves, exploiting the ley lines by erecting their crude monuments atop them.”
“I see…” Caulis said. “Could they be causing this winter?”
“They may be involved,” Titania said, a frown creasing her smooth brow. “Perhaps seeking out such places of power might be a good place to begin.”
“Thank you,” Caulis said. “I shall return to Hex now, and seek to restore the woodland in your name.”
Returning whence it had came, Caulis admired the flowers in the garden as it passed.
“Your grace… could I take one of these flowers?” Caulis asked. Instantly, one grew from the wood of the boat. The homunculus added the precious bloom to the other objects Titania had given it.
Some time later, after resting, the party reconvened at the portal. Caulis relayed what it knew of the Heargs, while keeping to itself its brief visit to Faerie – and the acorns given it. Once again, debate erupted over whether to slay the Bonegrinder chieftain Vornir, or whether to turn their investigations elsewhere – perhaps to another village, such as that of the Blackhorns, or the abandoned Skintaker settlement near the Caustic Wastes. Eventually, the party resolved to first investigate the nearest Hearg, reasoning that Gyrd would think their efforts to assassinate Vornir had simply failed. Thus decided, the party stepped back through the portal they had made, and into Troll Country, near the outskirts of the Bonegrinder village.
A chill blast met the party as they staggered out into the endless snow. They made their way west and south, heading towards the Bleakwater River. Several hours later, the party entered a small forest, heavy with snow. It was almost peaceful in beneath the boughs of the dour firs.
“The Skintaker village is nearby,” Sister said. “The one that got abandoned, after Hex conjured the acid storms here.”
They pressed on southwards, and, after another half hour’s hike, emerged from the forest.
Nearly subsumed by the surrounding woods, an overgrown village covered in snow lay in shambles before them, ruinous and desolate. The remains of a palisade had rotted down to a few lone timbers, while the huts had roofs long caved in and ruinous walls on the verge of collapsing. There seemed, however, to be little sign of actual violence – no smashed doors, no bullet-holes or arrow-shafts, no bones or burn-marks.
There were, however, statues. Dozens of them, clad now in snow: troll-shapes, adults and children both. All of them were running, fleeing from something unseen but obviously terrifying, faces frozen in expressions of stony horror.
“Gorgongas,” Garvin said. “I’ve seen this before. They must have bombed the village by dirigible, petrified everyone before they unleashed the acid storm.”
Vanessa Greyleaf, the Stormguard Evoker from the Citadel of the Perpetual Storm, was silent, but her expression was strained.
“It’s like a sick joke,” Alabastor said. “There’s a myth that trolls turn to stone in daylight… but they made it real.”
Yam said nothing, but they found the gnome later. The illusionist had found an old workshop where the troll villagers built boats, but had left it be. Instead of looting Yam packed snow into the acid-holes burned into the stony flesh of the petrified trolls – parents sheltering their children from the gas, and the advancing storm.
Yam, packing snow into the acid-wounds of the petrified villagers. Illustration by Caulis’ player, Bronwyn McIvor.
Sobered by the sight of the decimated village, the party debated what to do next when Eleyin spotted a plume of smoke to the south.
“Looks like there was some sort of battle or something,” Caulis said, relaying its familiar’s report.
“Might as well investigate,” Garvin said.
They hastened south, towards the smoke. The trees thinned, replaced by stumps and leafless husks, and then the wasteland appeared before them – an etiolated expanse, pockmarked with craters. An image of burned skin springs to the mind, scalded and mutilated. The trees and the very earth were mottled with white, bleached and melted. They had come to the Caustic Wastes.
Alabastor blanched in disgust.
“I don’t believe Hex did this,” Vanessa finally sputtered, incredulous and appalled. “I mean, of course I’d heard the stories, back in the Citadel, but I never pictured devastation this… complete.”
They pressed on grimly, passing a great heap of acid-eaten troll-bones piled within a rough pit here – obviously a mass grave. A stone marker, also splashed with acid and with a single rune, served as a tombstone for the undifferentiated dead.
Eventually, they approached the source of the smoke. The ground was scorched, the trees blackened husks. Ash was strewn everywhere and the snow was streaked with old bloodstains, but there were other, less mundane signs of devastation, as well. In a nearby rock, a trollblood corpse was half-embedded in stone, hands protruding, still clutching a spear in a death-grip, her face twisted into an expression of surprise and agony. There was a small crater smouldering with an eldritch effulgence, remnant of some terrible spell.
Scattered about the battlefield were a dozen men and women in the purple and grey uniforms of the Stormguard, elite Evokers of the Citadel of the Perpetual Storm, as well as several Warders, Hex’s magical defenders. They were riddled with arrows and broken javelins, though some had been hacked to pieces by swords or axes. Several appeared to have had their skin removed.
“Gods above and below,” Vanessa swore, tears freezing on her cheeks. “The Stromguard expedition…”
“I’m guessing this is the work of the Skintakers,” Garvin said, gesturing to a flayed corpse.
A soft moan was audible amidst the carnage. Searching for it, the party found a gnome man, still alive, but skewered through the torso with a javelin, pinned to a dead tree, his long mustaches streaked with blood. A wand lay near his feet, abandoned. He seemed to be flickering in and out of consciousness.
“Phineas!” Vanessa yelled, bolting towards him. She fell to her knees, examining the wound. “Quick, Sister, come here! We can still save him!”
Sister hurried forwards, spells at the ready. While Alabastor carefully removed the javelin, Sister wove her spell, and blessed spiders sprung from her fingertips, rapidly stitching shut the suddenly-seeping wound with magical cobwebs, sealing it. Phineas coughed and groaned, eyes rolling.
“Water!” he croaked. Yam obliged.
“This is Sergeant Phineas Hookwood,” Vanessa explained. “Leader of this squad… and an old friend. Thank the Magistra we got here in time.”
The party introduced themselves and moved Phineas to the best shelter they could find – a low crag, dead trees drooping over it. Garvin made sure to retrieve the wand, and a scroll was found as well amidst the slaughter.
“What happened?” Caulis asked, after Phineas had recovered some modicum of his strength, his wounds continuing to heal. Vanessa stayed close, bending low over the aging wizard.
“Skintakers,” the old gnome said, still coughing. “They fell on us like wolves. Could be that scouts let them know our location, but I’d wager they knew we were coming, somehow.”
“Hmm…” Garvin said, rubbing his jaw.
“Did you see their leader?” Sister asked.
“Aye. I’ll never forget her face, or what was left of it. All scarred she was, like something burned her flesh. She wore a suit of human skins, all sewn together.”
“Jarna,” Alabastor said.
“What were you guys doing out here?” Yam asked.
“We were heading for one of those runestone circles – the one in Bleackwater Lake. Got ambushed on the way.”
“We were thinking of heading the same way,” Garvin said. “What do you think was happening there?”
“We got wind of some sort of ritual. Figured the trolls might be harnessing the runes’ power somehow.”
Vanessa looked around at the bodies of her fallen comrades. “That Portal Chalk you used before,” she said. “Can we use it again? I’d like to transport these bodies back to Hex, if we can, and get Phineas to safety.
Sister nodded, and the group went about transporting the charred remains of the Stormguard to Hex, along with Sergeant Phineas Hookwood. As they did so, something seethed across the landscape in the distance – a furiously writhing mass of greenish protoplasm which steamed and hissed as it slithered across the ground, leaving a burnt furrow in the earth. Although amorphous and oozing, the thing had a worm-like, serpentine form and sprouts a mass of tendrils from its bulk to pull itself up crags. As they watched, it plowed into a small sapling, a single blotch of green protruding from the scabrous earth. Instantly the tree is dissolved, digested by the entity’s churning innards. Yam used an illusion to distract the elemental and the group gave it the slip, heading for a small pool – now turned entirely to acid – to regroup.
As the party discussed their plans, Caulis slipped away. The sight of so much devastation had pained it greatly. Carefully, it removed one of the Royal Acorns from its pouch, and buried it carefully in the ground, adding a drizzle of water from its water skin.
At first, nothing.
Then the ground began to quake. Several party-members were thrown off their feet as a great tremor wracked Troll County, the ground beneath their feet quickening.
Up from below, spreading outwards from the acorn, came green shoots, rapidly growing into shrubs and saplings, and then, with a great tearing, yawning, stretching sound, shooting upwards, the saplings became at first young trees, then sturdier ones. In moments, the party stood amidst a forest of towering, ancient oaks, bushes and ferns and tangled banks of vegetation thriving round their trunks. The acid water had turned pure, and as they watched the scarred, pockmarked earth healed before their eyes.
There were chirrups and chitters; there were beasts and birds in the trees, and the distant whisper of Sylvan voices.
“What was that?” Alabastor said, marveling.
“I did this,” Caulis said. “It’s, ah… something I can do now.”
“How?!” Garvin asked, incredulous. Sister also looked at Caulis wonderingly, knowing this to be magic far more powerful than the homunculus could normally accomplish.
“It’s a, ah, power my patron gave me recently,” Caulis said, neither lying nor telling the whole truth.
“It’s actually warmer,” Vanessa noted. “How far does this forest extend?”
“I’ll check!” Yam declared, and began rapidly climbing one of the trees. Yam reached the top and surveyed the land. A vast, green forest now stretched across what used to be the Caustic Wastes. Yam could distantly see the acid elemental still thrashing through the woods, but otherwise the forest seemed undisturbed. The Bleakwater looked to be thawing where it touched the wood, as if the forest brought with it some hint of spring.
“It’s huge,” the gnome reported, sketching the forest’s rough boundaries on the group’s map.
“This should give us cover if we want to approach a Hearg,” Garvin said. “Come on, there’s not too much daylight left.”
With that, the party made their way back through what was now forest, towards the abandoned Skintaker village – itself now overgrown with plant-life. Taking boats from the boathouse Yam had discovered, they set out across the Bleakwater and rowed to the island on which the Hearg was located.
The island was eerily quiet. The group disembarked carefully and made their way up the slopes of a small hill, towards the runestone circle.
As they drew closer, they saw that the ground was scorched in numerous places, and that several trees near the circle had been reduced to blackened husks; another battle had taken place here. Strewn stone across the hillside and in-between the blood-spattered, rune-graven stones were corpses – those of trollspawn, their limbs scarred with intricate glyphs, their bodies riddled with arrows and hurled spears. Many wore armour formed from tanned humanoid skins.
Closer inspection revealed that several of the bodies appeared to have been poisoned, eyes bulging from their heads, faces blackened, wounds stained, swollen tongues protruding from their mouths. There were signs that some bodies had been moved.
At the centre of the runic circle, a heap of additional bodies was found. Unlike the corpses littering the slopes, these bodies looked to have been very precisely executed, their throats cut, and the blood then smeared on the runestones in a ritualistic fashion. These bodies were all of near-human trollbloods – men and women with blood so diluted they might pass as human were it not for the odd horn, yellow eyes, or slightly chalky greyish-green skin.
“Another battle… but not with the Stromguard,” Garvin noted.
“Looks like troll weapons,” Alabastor observed. “Trolls fighting trolls?”
“These marks are dedicated to the troll thunder-god, Rann,” Sister said, examining the blood-smeared marks. “There’s power in them, that’s for sure.” She also noted a smaller stone – an orb, set with a single mark. She took this carefully.
“I think I can use the runestones to communicate with the spirits here,” Caulis said, taking out the book it had found in its creator’s library. “Does that sound like a good idea?”
“Might tell us more…” Yam said, shrugging and shivering in the cold.
Caulis prepared the rites, reading from the book. It seemed there was enough residual energy left from the blood spilled on the hilltop that an additional sacrifice proved unnecessary.
The sky rumbled and seemed to darken, clouds gathering overhead. The shadows cast by the runestones deepened, and suddenly figures were evident within them. They stepped forwards, into the Hearg. They were troll-shaped, but obviously mutilated, their skin scarred with acid, horribly burned. Some, however, were obviously fallen in battle – indeed, they matched the bodies strewn across the slopes.
“Who disturbs our rest?” the shades demanded. There were hundreds of them now, perhaps thousands, gathered on the island about the Hearg, watching. Vanessa translated their spectral, Giant speech.
“We’re trying to heal this land,” Caulis said, boldly. “Who are you? What is happening here?”
“We are the spirits of the slain,” the shades answered. “We thrist for vengeance. The blood-price must be paid.”
“Blood price?” Sister asked.
“The foul magicians of Hex destroyed us, slew us with acid and with sickness, with spells of wicked power. They drove us from our lands, stained the land with the blood of our children. We will have vengeance for this atrocity!”
“Vengeance… are you responsible for the storm?” Garvin asked. “The winter?”
“Yes! We yearn to rejoin the Harrowgast!” the spirits proclaimed. “The Reckoning of Hex! Free us! Let us join our brethren and rain down our fury upon the troll-killers!”
“Harrowgast?”
“A great storm, formed from the souls of the dead, bound to this land.”
“That’s it!” Sister said. “The Skintakers have been using sacrifices to power these heargs, channeling the dead, making them into the storm.”
“That’s why it’s impossible to fight,” Vanessa nodded. “It’s intelligent – it’s controlled by the souls of thousands of trolls.”
“But, but look…” Caulis said, gesturing to the green forest on the eastern banks of the lake. “The land is healed! We have come to return it to health. Will this not suffice? Is this not a better way?”
The troll shades turned, looking towards the forest, suddenly silent. Then, one of them, the shade of a young troll, shouted.
“Look!” she said, holding up one ghostly, acid-burned limb. “The land! It’s healed!” As they watched, the burns and scars covering her body began to mend, healing, scabbing over, then disappearing entirely. She was whole once more.
“What magic is this?” another of the troll-shades exclaimed, as he too began to heal. Suddenly dozens, hundreds of the gathered began murmuring in joy and wonder as their wounds healed.
“They were bound to the earth after death!” Sister said. “So when you fixed the earth, Caulis…”
“I fixed them too.”
Several of the spirits, however, were not restored: those slain in battle at the Hearg, the shades of Skintakers recently killed.
“This is no recompense!” one of them screamed. “The blood price has not been paid! Only blood will answer blood!”
“Why?” Alabastor said, Vanessa translating. “That will only lead to more violence.” He looked to Caulis. “Could you… do that again? Grow another forest, I mean?”
“Yes, twice more,” Caulis said, still evasive.
“We can cure the land,” Alabastor said. “Heal it. Isn’t that paying a price? Your winter will destroy the forest we just grew!”
“He is right,” another shade said, this one healed. “The Harrowgast must cease, or this will be undone, and our suffering will resume!”
The Skintaker leader who had spoken before snarled and snatched a spectral axe from his belt. The other shade grabbed a spear. The troll-shades gathered round to watch the duel, the party observing in quiet awe at this strange, ghostly battle, shouting encouragements to the healed ghost. The battle was quick and brutal, the two shades circling one another, the axe-thrower hacking madly, only to be skewered by his opponent’s spear.
“It’s is done,” the spear-wielding troll-shade declared. “We are joined with your cause. The blood price is paid. The Harrowgast must disband.”
“So, is that it?” Yam asked.
“No. There are other heargs,” the troll-shade said. “We merely supplied the Harrowgast with thunder. The others supply other elements: fire, water, wind, lightning, frost. But it requires these elements in combination to function.”
“Elemental orgy,” Yam whispered.
“If you were to stop the rituals at two of the other Heargs, the Harrowgast would dissipate.”
“That sounds like our best chance of stopping this,” Alabastor said. “Look, on the map – there’s another Hearg not far from here. We should hurry there, before nightfall, and see if we can put a stop to one of these rituals.”
The party agreed, and, releasing the troll-shades from the ritual, set off to the west. A short distance from the next Hearg, this one atop a small hill surrounded by deadened trees, Garvin called a halt.
“I have an idea for reconnaissance,” he said, eyeing a nearby raven. He brought forth the small bird-skull talisman he’d found at the keep of the Order of the Goat, allowing him to speak with birds.
“You there,” he said to the raven. “Can you do us a favour?”
“Hmm? You can talk to birds?” the raven said. “Well, what’s in it for me?” Garvin relayed its request.
“How about some griffin lard?” Sister said, taking some from her pack.
“Mmmm!” the raven fluttered excitedly. “Alright, what’s the favour?”
“We need you to fly up high and check out the hill with the weird rocks on it, tell us how many trolls are there, if you can.”
“Trolls?”
“Yeah, you know, trolls? You live in Troll Country.”
“That’s not what we call it. This is Raven-Land. All you groundwalkers look the same to me.”
“Okay. Well, tell us how many groundwalkers there are, okay?”
The raven flapped its wings. “Sounds fair. For the rest of that griffin lard.” Garvin translated.
Sister shrugged. “Fine.”
“You got a name?” Garvin asked.
“Mugi,” the raven replied, taking to the air. “Back in a minute!”
The party waited, shivering in the cold.
“Stupid thing’s not coming back,” Vanessa muttered, but then Mugi reappeared.
“Okay, where’s my snack?” it demanded. Sister surrendered the griffin lard. After it had eaten its fill, Mugi described the situation. There were two “big groundwalkers” – presumably full-blooded trolls – and seven “small groundwalkers,” presumably trollbloods. It also described a great column of air – the Hearg must be generating wind for the Harrowgast. But another group of six were headed north from the mountains to the south, with what sounded like a group of slaves in tow.
“Probably sacrifices,” Alabastor reasoned.
“We could set an ambush,” Garvin suggested. “Lie in wait, spring the trap, then take those at the Hearg later.”
So agreed, the party took up position on the route to the Hearg, concealing themselves with magic.
“I’ve got an idea,” Sister said, and had her companions tie her to a tree, while she readied a cylinder of iridescent metal – an object taken from the Librarian Asylum beneath Mainspring, later identified as a Rod of Mind-Swap.
They lay in wait, till a group of five trollbloods and a single towering full-blooded troll lumbered into view, escorting a line of thralls bound together with rope – many of them trollbloods themselves, several prominently horned. All of the armed trollbloods wore the gruesome leather armour of the Skintakers.
Uttering an Aklo incantation, Sister activated the Rod of Mind-Swap, hitting the lead troll. He blinked, confused, as Sister’s consciousness entered his brain, while his own was plucked from his skull and sent to Sister’s brain. Tied up, Sister’s body struggled weakly against the bonds securing it to a tree.
Sister, meanwhile, now controlling the body of the troll, smiled grimly and hefted the creature’s huge sword.
Mind-Swapped Troll. Illustration by Caulis’ player, Bronwyn McIvor.
The battle was brief and bloody. Spells flared from either side of the path as Yam, Alabastor, Caulis, and Vanessa sprung the trap. One trollblood was knocked backwards into the line of thralls, who grappled him viciously, one seizing his head and twisting it with a brutal wrenching motion, snapping his neck. Garvin shot with his crossbow, killing another, while Sister – in control of the full troll – split a troll down the middle with her gigantic sword, leaving his remains steaming on the snow.
The thralls were freed, several agreeing to join the party in their assault on the Hearg. These included a powerfully muscled Twocrown troll from Ettin Island, who had broken his captor’s neck. Before heading north, Yam took one of the plums picked from Faerie and fed it to the troll inhabiting Sister’s body. Instantly, the troll became enchanted, falling desperately in love with Yam. It would now be obedient, pliable.
Sister went on ahead, still inhabiting the troll body. She approached the Hearg; trollbloods and two hulking trolls stood guard, while a group of shamans in the middle of the runestone circle conducted a ritual, sending troll-shades streaming skywards in a swirling column of gale-force wind. The runes must be dedicated to the Troll God of wind, Hraesvelgr, the Corpse-Swallower. Dead bodies were piled nearby – sacrifices, their throats cut.
“Where’re the thralls?” one of the tattooed shamans demanded. “We need more blood to continue conjuring the Harrowgast.” Sister realized she could speak Giant in this form.
“There’s been some trouble,” she lied. “A few of the thralls escaped. Come, we require assistance.”
Seeing no reason to doubt their comrade, two warriors and one of the trolls returned with Sister, only to fall into another ambush. Spells and crossbow quarrels made short work of them, Sister cleaving the head off the other troll, to his surprise. She took his sword, carrying now one in each hand.
The party now prepared for a final assault on the Hearg. As they approached, the column of wind, like a miniature tornado, dwindled to a weak breeze; the shamans had run out of sacrifices. Sister approached once more, claiming to need more warriors, but the trolls were now suspicious. Seeing that the jig was up, Sister charged the remaining full-blooded troll, swinging both swords and carving huge chunks of flesh from his body. He screamed, even as a cloud of conjured daggers and a swarm of magic missiles fell upon the remaining warriors. The shamans tried to conjure a gust of wind to protect themselves against missile weapons, but a shatter spell cracked the runestones and broke their concentration. The remaining Skintaker warriors fled, but were cut down by the fearsome Sister.
The ritual had been halted. If the party could stop a second rite from occurring, the fell winter of Hex would come to an end.
