Huddled against the hill atop which the Jarl’s manor lorded over the village of Hirot was a small, ramshackle hut. A straw roof stretched over walls made of mossy and uneven planks of wood. It sat away from the other structures within the palisades wall and, because of its location, existed in perpetual shadow.

Hilda approached the old hut, stepping carefully through the untended brambles and shrubs. Exhaling and smoothing her robes, she straightened, cleared her throat, and rapped on the door.

Something within shuffled, moving slowly, and then the door opened a crack. A stooped and ancient woman peered up at Hilda from the opening. What little hair remained on her liver-spotted skull was bone white and wispy. Her face sagged like melted wax, and one eye opened much wider than the other when she spoke.

“Well, you’re not from Hirot. Didn’t know the fool of a Jarl would let in outsiders. Drop the hood, my dear, and let me get a look at you.

Hilda hesitated, then reached up and pulled her hood off, revealing a pleasant face with the black rectangle tattoo upon her forehead. The old woman seemed startled for a moment, then grinned a toothless grin.

“Are you Ymae?” Hilda asked.

“The same. Come in, come in,” she opened the door wider, which creaked loudly on rusted hinges. Ymae craned her neck to look past Hilda. “Just you, then?”

“I have companions,” Hilda offered. “But I’m obliged to talk just the two of us, about the Hound. If that’s alright?”

“Yes, yes,” Ymae stepped aside. “Perhaps for the best. What do I call you, demon-bride?”

The robed mage faltered. “What? My– my name is Hilda.”

“Ah. And new to your patron, eh? Come in, and we’ll chat. Tea?” the old woman shuffled deeper into the hut, her feet scuffling along the dirt floor as she moved.

The interior seemed somehow larger than the outside, though Hilda still felt a need to duck under the low, thatched roof. There were no other rooms; it was simply a wide, round hut with a large fire pit in its center, a rickety chair next to a loom, a wash basin, a mat of fresh straw, and, built into perhaps one third of the walls, countless shelves filled with jars and curios. As Hilda took in the darkened surroundings, she noticed a mottled cat yawn and stretch from one of the topmost shelves, regarding her with eyes that shone in the darkness.

Ymae plucked a bundle of dry sticks from the floor and began to carefully assemble them within the fire pit, using knobby and bent fingers. She spoke as she worked.

“So, how’d your patron come to you?”

“I, ah…” Hilda considered how to answer the question, then the words came out in a rush. “I found a glowing orb, beneath a blue star we called the Empty Star. I took the orb home, and… after months, a figure appeared within it.” Her cheeks colored at telling someone else about the shadowy man within the orb.

The old woman, nonplussed, grunted. “Hilda of the Empty Star, hm? And what did this figure offer you for the power you now possess?”

Hilda’s first instinct was to answer “Nothing” reflexively, but she paused. “I… don’t understand it, really. I don’t even know what powers I possess. I just know that I can open a doorway to him, and that he can send magic through me into the world. I have a vague memory of him speaking at times, but I… can’t remember it.”

Ymae was using a flint and steel to light the fire. She grunted as she struck them together once, twice, and a spark leapt to the leaves beneath the twigs. Painfully and slowly, she bent down to gently blow at the embers. When she finished, she looked up over the smoking sticks.

“Well, there’ll be a price, my dear. There always is. This isn’t like a cleric, where the demons and angels they call gods grant them boons because they align with their aims. What you’ve done is make a bargain, and the contract of it’s written plainly on your skin. At some point he’ll ask for something in return, perhaps something terrible. And when he asks, you’ll do it.”

“Or… what?” Hilda asked.

Ymae cackled softly, the sound dry and harsh. “There’s no ‘or,’ dearie. You’ve already agreed by using his power. And the more you use it, the more he can–and will–ask of you. It’s the way of these things.”

“You called me ‘demon-bride.’ Does that mean he’s a… demon?” Hilda asked haltingly. Somehow this conversation made her want to pull her hood up and hide her forehead, which she did.

“Do you know his name, this man in the orb?”

Hilda shook her head.

Ymae sprinkled dry leaves into a small pot, which she laboriously hung on an iron hook over the burgeoning fire. She produced a ladle from a basin on the floor, and spooned water into the pot. The growing flames danced in her one large eye, with the other hidden beneath hanging folds of skin.

“An angel wouldn’t have such a symbol, I think,” she shrugged. “A black door? No, no, surely not. Call it an educated guess, then. Unless he’s older than either the beings of Law or Chaos, one of the truly old ones. In that case, well… hope it’s a demon, Hilda of the Empty Star.” She chuckled grimly, poking at the small fire with a black rod. “But you said you came to discuss the Hound, mm?”

Flustered, Hilda said. “Oh! Yes. I ah… we’ve killed it, but the Jarl says it will return.”

“And it’ll remember who killed it, too.” Ymae continued to poke at the fire.

“What do we do? How do we keep it from returning?”

Setting the poker down, the old woman rose from her chair and smacked her lips. “Do you know, that fool of a Jarl has never once asked me that question. No one has. Hirot shrinks every turn of the moon and the people allow it because they think the fool has a plan. He doesn’t, he or his ridiculous seer.”

“The thin man who whispers in the Jarl’s ear.” Hilda said absently. She had begun sweating, the heat of the fire already warming the hut too much for her tastes on the late summer day.

“Mm. Sylle Ru is his name. Odious man. Some small gifts, I’ll admit, but clinging to power like a rat to a sinking barge. Now, where’s my cup?” Ymae turned her hunched back on Hilda and began rummaging around one of her many shelves. When she returned, she held a small, simple wooden cup. “There. Time for tea.”

Hilda stood to help the old woman lift the pot off its perch with a rag, then poured some of the discolored water into the cup while Ymae held it with trembling hands. Once Hilda had returned the pot to the hook and taken the cup from her, Ymae collapsed back upon her chair. It seemed the effort of making the tea had left her exhausted.

“Don’t you want any?” Hilda asked, looking down at her tea. Even in the warmth of the hut, the liquid steamed.

Ymae waved a knobby hand and chuckled. “Only have one cup. You drink it. While you do, I’ll tell you the nature of this Hound, and why I alone in Hirot don’t fear of it.”

Hilda blew gently on the tea’s surface. It smelled strongly of herbs and moss. The old woman watched her with one wide eye, licking her lips, as Hilda touched the cup to her mouth and sipped. The witch giggled.

“Trusting, demon-bride. Too trusting,” Ymae tsked and then grinned. “Well, you’ll learn, won’t you? For now, have a seat if you don’t mind the dirt. I’ll tell you what I know of this Hound, and how I might be of some help to you…”

---

That evening, the four Graymoor companions shared a table in the Wolf-Spear Inn. Minding the Jarl’s warnings, they insisted on paying coin for the food and ale that Broegan continued to enthusiastically bring them and promised to provide him his full rate for their rooms. When he reluctantly agreed, they suspected he quoted them prices far below the norm.

Their table was the most secluded in the crowded common room, which meant only that they could speak without shouting. It seemed half of the remaining townsfolk had gathered in the Wolf-Spear, and the sound of voices, clinking mugs, and calls for food competed with the bard Lloré’s fiddle and song. Pipe smoke hung thickly in the air, and everyone there peered through the haze, frequently stealing glances at the four outsiders at the corner table. Joane’s words had apparently reached across the whole of Hirot, and the locals’ gazes held everything from awe to curiosity to skepticism.

“Alright then,” Haffoot smiled, practically squirming in her chair. “We’re all here and pleasantries’re outta the way. What’d you learn?”

“You first,” Erin scowled, crossing arms over her white-mailed chest. She had been in a foul mood since returning in the afternoon, refusing to do much else than brood. “Were you sober long enough to speak with the bard or others?”

“Aye, we spoke to Lloré,” Umur said, wiping ale from his beard with the back of his hand.

“For a while!” Haffoot jumped in. “He was willing to go on and on about the Hound. Said that in ages past, the tribes of this land worshipped a wolf spirit, and made sacrifices to it by castin’ people into a pit in the Sunken Fens to the northeast ‘o here. Said it’s why the Jarl resorted to sacrifices, ‘cause he figures it’s the same spirit.”

“Why not use the same pit, then?” Hilda asked.

“Too far,” Haffoot shrugged. “And the Jarl thinks the Sunken Fens is where its lair is at, so it’s too dangerous. It’s comin’ to town anyway, and nobody wants’ta be outside the walls for long. Though Lloré says, as a spirit, it can walk through walls and that it’s taken people right from their beds, locked gates or no.”

“Half’a what the bard said is nonsense,” Umur added. “Rumors and such. But what Haffoot shared is what we figure’s the truth of it.”  

“How do we kill it once and for all,” Erin uncrossed her arms and leaned forward. “So we may leave this Chaos-cursed place?”

Haffoot pointed to the great spear resting above the bar, where Broegan was cleaning mugs. “Some ancient chief named… what was it, Umur?”

“Ulfheonar.”

“Him!” the halfling brightened. “Had a magical spear that Lloré said would do it.”

“The Wolf-Spear Inn,” Hilda grinned from beneath her hood. “The Jarl knows of the wolf spirit but has apparently forgotten his own town’s legends. But, ah… that spear there is wooden, a replica. Where is the actual weapon?”

Haffoot shrugged. “Nobody knows. But Ulf- Ulf,” she struggled with the name.

“Ulfheonar,” Umur said, taking another draught from his mug.

“His tomb’s somewhere north of here!”

“So,” Erin leaned back, thinking aloud. “We have the next two days to find this chieftain’s tomb and find the spear. Otherwise, we must be at the stones to dispatch it and buy ourselves another three days. This is good. This is a plan.”

“Now you,” Haffoot said to Erin. “Anything from the church visit?”

“No,” the white-mailed woman scowled. “The head priest is an awful man, and in my eyes not a true cleric. He believes the Hound is some kind of end to the world, that it will devour everyone, and that our only salvation is repenting our sins so that our purified souls make their way to Justicia. He is without hope.”

“Well, that’s cheery,” Umur grunted.

“We would have come to blows,” Erin admitted. “Except that he has an assistant, Briene, who intervened.” She pointed with her chin to a young, attractive woman in simple clothes and a cloak, laughing at a table with several others. “But I will not speak to that man again, nor visit their bleak, desperate chapel.”

“I’ve, ah…” Hilda said suddenly. “Spoken with the woman the locals call a witch, Ymae. I don’t believe she speaks in rumor and hearsay, and she adds another piece to the puzzle.” She paused, and the others looked at her expectantly.

“Well, go on then,” Haffoot encouraged.

Hilda cleared her throat. “She says the Hound must be magically bound before dealing the killing blow. It’s the only way to ensure it never returns.”

“Magically bound?” Umur frowned. “How’s that done, then?”

“Ymae can weave us a net to do the task,” Hilda offered. “But she requires the hair from a corpse.”

“Necromancy,” Erin growled. “I like that not at all.”

“I don’t think you would like her, no,” Hilda nodded. “But is it a surprise that a creature of Chaos requires such means?”

“I did not say that I would not do it,” Erin crossed her arms over her chest again. “Only that I do not like it. By Shul’s will, I will not touch a corpse’s hair for this task nor wield the net, but I would gladly thrust the spear into the befouling beast once it is bound.”

“That’s settled then,” Haffoot beamed. “Now we just hafta find a dead body.”

“We will, in fact, be searching for a tomb.” Hilda offered.

The halfling grinned. “Hey… I s’pose we are at that! A tomb’ll have corpses. Worse comes to worse, I s’pose they have graves around here too.” She made a disgusted face.

“There’s, ah… one other matter, though.” Hilda added. They turned to her, and the robed woman practically squirmed in her seat. “Ymae had two requirements for the task. One was the hair from a corpse. The other, ah…” She snapped her mouth shut, clearly uncomfortable. Her head turned to the dwarf at her side.

“Spit it out, lass,” Umur placed his mug on the table.

“Master Pearlhammer,” Hilda said delicately. “Ymae was willing to help us if one of our party agreed to, ah…” She cleared her throat.

“Yeah?” Now it was the dwarf’s turn to cross his arms.

“What is it, Hilda?” Haffoot asked, eyes wide.

“If one of us agreed to, ah… marry her.” If the wizard could sink further into her hooded robe, she would have done so. Silence filled the next several heartbeats at the table, all four of them frozen.

“WHAT!?” Umur thundered. The tavern crowd immediately paused in their conversation and camaraderie to look in their direction.

“She was, ah… quite clear,” Hilda faltered. “I agreed to her terms.”

Haffoot burst into gales of laughter, slapping Umur upon his armored shoulder with one hand and the table with the other. Even Erin grinned at the dwarf, who was red-faced and sputtering.

Doom of the Savage Kings, Chapter 5