“Dead!?” Umur crouched down, eyes wide and troubled. “By the gods, no.”

To her credit, Briene appeared neither panicked nor overwrought. Her pretty features were creased in concentration, her hands moving efficiently and rapidly over Erin’s bloody side. Already the novice healer’s hands were soaked in red halfway to the elbow as she pressed an end of her cloak down firmly to staunch the wound.

Erin groaned.

“She’s alive! I have something!” the dwarf stammered, fumbling at his belt. He pulled out the Horn of Kings, newly acquired from Ulfheonar’s tomb, a polished horn capped in gold with ancient script upon it. “Pull her head up, lass, cradle it while I pour the liquid.”

Briene moved to comply, supporting Erin’s sweat-damp head while Umur uncapped the horn and brought it gently to her lips, all while holding the sodden cloak to the cleric’s side.

By now the others had begun to gather round. “What is it?” Haffoot asked, craning her neck to see past them both. “Is that Erin? Is she okay?”

“Quiet,” Umur barked. Trying not to spill a drop, he tilted the horn. Clear liquid crept into Erin’s mouth, wetting her lips and briefly causing her to sputter. In a heartbeat, however, the cleric of Shul was drinking, her throat bobbing. When Umur tilted the horn away, capping it once more, Erin’s eyes opened.

“Let me up,” she said clearly, beginning to stand.

“I don’t think you should–” Briene tried, but Erin pushed her hand away.

“I’m fine. Let me up.” With a groan, she stood. Her white-scaled armor was punctured from the sword thrust, and all around it shone with Erin’s scarlet blood. But the wound beyond the rent mail was fully healed, its skin unblemished. Briene gasped.

Erin’s gray eyes, narrowed and calculating, took in the wider scene of the clearing.

“We’ve lost so many,” she said gravely. “I’m sorry, Brienne and Joane. You joined us with the hope of saving Hirot from the Hound, and instead we couldn’t protect your neighbors from the world’s other horrors. It is a cruel cost for this spear. Who were these ambushers?”

“Iraco was this one’s name,” Joane said, kicking the corpse in frustration and disdain. “The Jarl’s hunt master. And the rest are his huntsmen. Or were. Hunting us instead of the Hound.”

“But why?” Haffoot asked, confused, looking around the fallen bodies.

“Sent by the Jarl, obviously,” Joane growled. She tossed her red braid aside angrily. “He wanted credit for whatever you found, or maybe just wanted rid to be of you lot, not caring what you were doing but only that you were out of town and vulnerable. Bloody fool.”

“No, he wouldn’t do that,” Briene argued.

“Open your eyes, Bree!” the young woman spat. “He’s got no plan! The Jarl has lost all hope and doesn’t want anyone else to have it either!” And with that she collapsed to her knees, dropping her pitchfork into the grass and covering her face with both hands. Briene moved in to envelop Joane in a hug with bloodstained arms.

“The lass has the right of it,” Umur said in low tones to Erin and Haffoot. “This was a calculated moved by the Jarl, and he will be none too pleased that it failed. He’ll find some way to blame us for all this death, despite the spear.”

“Are you okay, Erin?” Haffoot asked hesitantly. The gash in her white armor was almost eye level for the halfling, and her stare flicked from it up to the cleric’s face.

“I’m tired,” she sighed. “Perhaps a little weak from blood loss. But the horn healed me fully, when I was close to meeting Shul. It’s not my time to face the moon, it seems.” She tried a grin, an expression uncharacteristic for her serious face. Her ponytail was messy and frayed, and blades of grass clung to one side of her head.

Haffoot met the grin with wide eyes. “Bloody miracle is what it is. That horn might be a better find even than the spear, yeah?”

“It’s almost empty,” Umur grunted. “Maybe one more draught is all that’s left. It’s a precious thing, but today taxed it.”

“And yet worth the cost,” Hilda said, approaching the trio. Her hooded head was fixed upon Erin. Umur and Haffoot shuddered at seeing her, suddenly remembering the shadowed whispers of her magic and the despair that had filled them because of it. “We cannot lose Erin, our acolyte of Shul.”

It was an odd prioritization of the four of them and hung awkwardly in the air. It was Erin who broke the silence, saying, “Your magic again turned the tide, Hilda. We would all be face down in the grass if not for you.”

Hilda inclined her head, expression unreadable beneath the hood.

“But,” Erin continued. “I’m troubled by the manifestation of this magic you wield.” She looked over at Iraco, whose withered skull gazed up at the clear blue sky from empty sockets. “It seems… a thing of Chaos, if I’m honest. I worry for you. For all of us.”

Hilda waved a hand dismissively while leaning on her staff. “I’m fine, though I admit more questions than answers about it all. As some truths become revealed, others wander into shadow. It is the way of magic, I think.” She sighed. “The important thing is that you’re alive, Erin, and that our quest continues. Let’s focus on the creature of Chaos terrorizing Hirot first, eh? Then we can all worry about me.”

If any of them noticed that Hilda’s hands seemed almost gaunt, or that her neck was far thinner than the former baker had possessed even that morning, none said anything. Indeed, Umur and Haffoot seemed to give the wizard a wide berth, much as the Hirot villagers had done within the tomb. It was as if some unnoticed stench permeated the air around Hilda, subtly pushing them away. Erin was the only one who seemed unaffected by robed woman’s presence.

The cleric frowned in thought. “Hirot doesn’t feel safe with the Jarl bent on ensuring we are gone. He has tried once to kill us and will not stop now. Do we camp near the standing stones and wait for the Hound there tomorrow night?”

“Hrmph. That’s a sure way to force a bad confrontation,” Umur sighed, smoothing his beard with a hand in thought. “The Jarl’ll pick another lot to sacrifice, probably Joane’s father if she’s not around. Then he’ll charge up on horseback with all his thegns. That’s not a fight we can win.”

“And we must return to the town,” Hilda intoned. “The spear is but one tool with which to kill the Hound, and Ymae will create another for us.”

“The hair from a corpse,” Umur growled. “I’d forgotten.”

“The hair from a corpse,” Hilda agreed. “She will make a net from her magic to bind the creature. Then the spear can slay it.”

“Does the mad widow know where to find it once we’ve got the net?” Haffoot asked.

“Everyone knows where,” Briene called out from nearby. The four companions turned to see her still cradling Joane. The two rocked gently, and the young healer met everyone’s eyes but Hilda. “It’s in the Sunken Fens, downriver. I don’t think anyone knows where, exactly, but its lair is there, sure enough.”

“Sunken Fens,” the dwarf groaned. “Sounds lovely.”

“It’s a cursed place,” Briene said earnestly. “Full of malevolent spirits from a bygone age, Father Beacom says. A place steeped in Chaos.”

“Excellent, Briene,” Erin nodded. “So we return to Hirot and get Ymae working on her net. When it’s ready, we cleanse these Sunken Fens of its Hound, and whatever other evil we find there. It is a fine plan, and a noble one. How do we avoid the Jarl and his madness until then?”

“And what if the net’s not ready or we can’t find the lair until after tomorrow night?” Haffoot asked. “What do we do about the bloody sacrifice?”

“Something to contemplate on the way back,” Umur said flatly. He looked up at the cloudless sky. “But we should gather the dead and Erin should do her rites. We’re already into the afternoon, and if we don’t make it back by nightfall they’ll lock the gates up tight. I don’t relish another night in the woods.”

For the next hour, they gathered the dead into a grisly pile. Though it felt vile to them all, they rifled through the huntsmen’s possessions for items of value, eventually equipping Joane with Iraco’s longsword and Briene with the best bow and fullest quiver of arrows. Haffoot found a purse upon Iraco’s belt heavy with coin; either the man had recently won at gambling or, more likely, the Jarl had paid him handsomely for today’s ambush. Once the others were done, Hilda stepped in with a dagger from a huntman’s belt to cut hair from each corpse. The others grimaced but let her do the task without comment.

The number of dead outnumbered the living almost two to one, so it was clear they could not transport the bodies back to Hirot through the dense forest. Unsurprisingly, Iraco had come on foot instead of horseback, further limiting their options. It was Briene who said that it was common in Hirot to burn the dead as a tribute to Justicia’s cleansing fire. Erin suggested that doing so may also prevent any of the corpses becoming infected with the serpents from the tomb, and that the number of discarded snakeskins within the false room within far exceeded the three creatures they’d destroyed. Shuddering at this realization, they quickly agreed to build a pyre, despite the waning afternoon sun.

As the fire blazed near the serpentine mound within the clearing, sending a column of smoke up into the open sky, Erin sang out in a haunting prayer.

“O Shul, Silver Lord of the Night,
Guide us through the veil of darkness.
As the moon fades and returns,
So too may we rise from the shadow of death.
Grant us rebirth, as your light renews the sky,
For in your eternal cycle, we find hope,
In your endless rising, we find life anew.
Shul, keeper of time and tides,
Shine upon our souls and lead us back to the light.”

It was perhaps the most reverent moment in Briene and Joane’s young lives, and they both wept openly for their losses and hugged one another long after Erin’s words had ended. For Umur and Haffoot, the hymn was a balm for the lingering malaise of Hilda’s magic, and they found themselves spiritually renewed, even if physically exhausted.

The effect of Erin’s voice upon Hilda was unclear, but she looked upon the cleric with an open, warm smile throughout the brief service. If anyone had watched her, firelight illuminating the shadows beneath her hood, it was akin to the look of an exceedingly proud parent upon a precocious child.

“That’s done, then,” Umur said simply as the pyre smoldered. “Let’s get going.”

Despite his obvious fatigue, the dwarf guided them expertly back through the forest and occasional marshes to the palisades wall of Hirot. It took all the remaining daylight, and he urged them on at every rest, seemingly motivated by the promise of a comfortable bed over a damp bedroll. By the time they arrived, everyone was sweat-soaked and bedraggled, stumbling their way to the tall gate.

“Ho! Nothan!” Joane called out.

The stern face with the long moustache appeared at the top of the palisades, looking down with some surprise.

“Joane! Where have you been all day, girl?” he barked. Umur and his companions listened carefully to determine if he perhaps knew about Iraco’s ambush and assassination plot, but it seemed the watchman was fixed on the red-haired young woman more than any of the others. Indeed, Nothan seemed not even to note that they had returned with only a fraction of the original group who’d left at dawn. There was rebuke in his words to Joane, but something uncharacteristically gentle as well.

Joane seemed to pick up on the peculiarity. “We were out in the forest. What is it? Has something happened?”

Nothan grimaced. “Come in, girl. Come in, and let’s talk. I’m afraid I do have grim tidings.”

The group exchanged confused looks and entered the village. They were not so alarmed as to have their weapons drawn, but their eyes darted everywhere looking for threat, expecting a second ambush at any moment. The place seemed once again empty, though the few eyes in town watched them with interest.

Tall and whip-thin Nothan barked orders at the two watchmen on duty to close the gate behind them all while he regarded Joane with sorrowful eyes.

“What is it?” Joane demanded. “What is the–”

“Your father’s died,” he responded abruptly. Briene gasped, covering her mouth with both hands. “I’m sorry, Joane. Damndest thing. This afternoon he… well, those present said he just clutched his head and fell over. I– I don’t think there was much pain in it. He passed in a blink.”

He had barely finished his words when the young woman with the red braid was already running for the Wolf-Spear Inn, Nothan shouting after her. The others looked at each other sadly, shaking their heads and moving to follow them both.

Hilda, in the back, pursed her lips in thought. Something about the description of Broegan Cayhurt’s death made her hands itch, and the black rectangle upon her forehead tingled with something she could only describe as amusement.

DCC Character Level 1: Joane Cayhurst