“That beastie was hidin’ in a chimney,” Haffoot explained, nodding to the sloughed bag of gray skin and the black spatter that was once the serpent within. “We musta passed right below it in that crawlspace. Anyway, it pushed through the sticks and stuff to go after the folks here. Smart little fucker, yeah?”

“So when we all came back through the crawlspace…” Umur muttered, rubbing at his beard, and glancing up at the gap in the stone.

“There was the pile ‘o sticks and stuff, yeah. I shimmied up there easy-like, and there was the real tomb.” She gestured to the silver wolf pelt on the floor, wrapped around the wicked spear.

Erin leaned down and pulled the weapon free. Even with its butt planted firmly in the hard-packed earth, the spear’s broad head stood well taller than the cleric. Its length made it a decidedly human weapon, and would be too unwieldy for Umur or Haffoot. Crossbars mounted near the spearhead could pin a creature, if the wielder had the strength to keep it pinned.

“Ulfheonar’s wolf-spear,” Joane breathed reverently. The other Hirot villagers too seemed in awe of the weapon. “I knew you all would succeed, but…” she swallowed. “I– I don’t know that I ever really believed it was real.”

“The Hound,” the rough-faced man of the group, Anthol, said decisively. He spat to the side without taking his eyes from the spear. “You all can kill it now and keep it dead. The cost of coming here was awful, but it’s done. We’ve saved the town.”

Erin’s steel-eyed gaze fell on Haffoot, who was basking in Anthol’s words. “Perhaps,” she said. “If the bard’s tale is true. But that was reckless, Haffoot. What if, instead of the true tomb, you had stumbled upon a nest of those Chaos-kissed creatures? You would be dead, and your death would draw us into their midst looking for you.”

The halfling scoffed and grinned back at the white-mailed young woman. “You worry too much, Erin. If it’d been dangerous I woulda hopped away.”

“And you worry too little,” she frowned. “There is enough danger here without you taking unnecessary risks.”

“It’s done now,” Umur inserted himself between them, forcing Erin’s stare onto him. “We have the spear.”

“And this!” Haffoot chirped. She brandished a polished drinking horn, capped in gold and held by a leather strap.

Umur took the horn and peered at it. “Don’ recognize the writin’ here. Not dwarven, nor the common tongue. You know it?” he held it up for Erin to see. The cleric shook her head. “Hrmph. And what’s this?” he muttered, freeing the ornate cap from the widest end of the horn and sniffing. “It’s got liquid in it. Not spoiled. Smells clean and clear.”

“Magical,” Hilda said ominously from behind them.

“Go on. Take a drink, yeah?” Haffoot grinned.

“Absolutely do not,” Erin warned.

Umur sniffed the horn again, scowling mistrustfully. He looked from Erin to Haffoot, then quickly tossed back a gulp of the item’s contents.

Vitality seemed to infuse the dwarf immediately. He blinked in surprise and peered down at the horn in wonder.

“By the gods…” Umur gasped, and immediately replaced the cap. “’Tis an item of great power. I’ve no doubts about your claim, Haffoot. That spear Erin’s holdin’ there was Ulfheonar’s, I’d bet my beard on it. As the man there says, we’ve got we came to claim.”

“I have Shul’s rights to offer our dead,” Erin said. “Unless you would care to offer Justicia’s blessings instead, Briene?”

The comely young woman seemed startled by the offer. She pulled her gaze from the legendary spear and met Erin’s steely stare. “Oh! I– I’m not a priest, ma’am. You should do it. But maybe outside, in fresher air?”

“Aye, let’s get the bodies and ourselves out of here,” Umur nodded.

“Unless we think there are more treasures to be had?” Hilda offered, peering down the hallway to the areas they had not yet explored.

“We have what we came for!” Joane spoke up angrily. The other Hirot villagers nodded in agreement. “The treasures were in Ulfheonar’s true resting place. Only death lies in the other passages! You have what you need to kill the Hound.”

“I’m inclined to agree,” Erin said. “The horn is an unexpected boon, and I cannot help but feel the silvery wolf hide, so much like the moon itself, is a direct message from Shul about our victory here. It is enough. We are not here as graverobbers.”

Umur looked around and saw steely resolve in the others’ faces. Haffoot, he figured, would probably be up for anything, but the others clearly wished to leave this place.

“We go,” he grunted. “Let’s get the dead outside for Erin’s rites, and then let’s get to our beds before nightfall.”

Hilda, inscrutable behind the hood that only revealed the bottom half of her face, said nothing. She replaced the glowing orb in her satchel carefully and drifted towards the rear of the group, keeping her distance but following their lead.

Umur hoisted the body of his fellow dwarf, Tor Goldfinger, with a grunt. It was an enormous burden with his armor and the shield strapped to his back, but he said not a word of complaint as he slowly ascended the three wide stairs to the main hallway, then through the narrow corridor from which they’d entered. Erin cradled small Avel Wayton, the halfling merchant, like a sleeping child and followed. The remaining corpse, the beggar Umulf, had been torn to shreds by the tomb’s denizen. It was Anthol who, face set grimly, gathered what he could into his arms, covering himself in gore. Joane, Maly, and Briene huddled around the man, their presence meant to bolster his bravery and offer support.

Without conversation, the group found their way to the partially collapsed room, where shafts of sunlight slanted from the far side. Those not carrying bodies helped those who were to navigate the piles of rubble and ascend the slabs of stone to the narrow gap outside. Only Hilda stayed back, hands folded within her sleeves, following like a silent wraith.

As they pulled their way into the late summer afternoon, squinting from the bright light, it was as if they were being birthed into a new world. Birds chirped from the nearby trees and tall grass swayed in a gentle breeze. Overhead, the sky was a bold, blue dome.

“Where is Riffin?” Briene said worriedly. “He said he would wait and keep watch.”

It was then that the hail of arrows began.

Two arrow shafts embedded in the soft ground near their feet before they knew what was happening. Then a sharp clink! echoed as an arrowhead glanced off Umur’s black, scaled armor just as Haffoot cried out in pain. More arrows whistled through the air.

“We’re under attack!” the dwarf bellowed, unceremoniously dropping the corpse he had been carrying. “Close the distance! Quickly!”

Like an anthill kicked over, the group scrambled forward. Haffoot, in her loping gait, drew both of her blades as she ran across the grassy field, and soon villagers had joined her, eyes wide and panting.

They charged a small cluster of human men in travel cloaks, three within the clearing and two farther back near the tree line. All five had short, curved bows, and they drew arrows from quivers on their backs and let loose with trained precision. None of the heroes from Graymoor nor the villagers from Hirot dropped under the deadly rain, but many took glancing hits.

As Umur and his gang neared, an ugly man with a mashed face dropped his bow and drew a long blade. The two huntsmen flanking him followed his lead, though their swords were considerably less impressive. With a shout, the three of them dipped their shoulders and moved to meet the charge.

The ugly man was clearly the best fighter among the group, and likely the leader. He sneered as Anthol, still covered in his neighbor’s blood, ran forward. The man spun and cleaved down with his blade, and Anthol fell dead into the grass.

“Broder! Bina! Go! Cut the traitors down!” he yelled.

The next several moments were a dizzying dance of chaos and death. The two hunstmen near the tree line continued launching arrows again and again at the party while the mash-faced man and his two companions deftly swung their swords. Though they and the Hirot villagers seemed to know one another, these cloaked figures had clearly come to kill them all.

Haffoot leapt with both of her blades, meeting the huntsman the ugly man had called Broder. He was a hulking human with a shaved head, strong and skilled. The ring of steel echoed across the clearing as neither found an opening in the other’s defenses. Umur, freeing his ancestral sword from its scabbard, roared to help his halfling friend and stomped across the clearing.

The ugly man, meanwhile, felled Maly Peabrook and her mismatched armor as easily as he’d killed Anthol. The young woman’s oversized helmet rolled into the grass as she died. Joane, eyes blurred by tears, stabbed ineffectually at the man with her pitchfork as he shook his head at her.

“You shoulda died two nights ago at the sacrifice, girl,” he jeered. “And you never shoulda joined this lot.”

“Don’t do this, Iraco!” Joane cried. “They’re going to save us all!”

Nearby, eyes glowing a luminous white, Erin charged in with Ulfheonar’s spear. The broad spearhead burst from the cloaked woman named Bina’s back as the cleric attacked with a righteous frenzy.

Hilda had been standing back from the battle, chanting in a language she did not understand. She could feel the orb within the satchel at her hip pulsing like a thing alive, communicating with her in ways she could not describe. When Erin thrust the legendary weapon through her opponent, the orb grew icy cold against her and drew Hilda’s eyes to the scene. It was as if the cleric in white armor was a beacon upon the battlefield, like a star in the endless dark of space. The black rectangle upon Hilda’s forehead shone a brilliant blue, and her eyes took on the same hue.

“I understand!” the wizard cackled as, across the clearing, the light seemed to dim. “We are both your vessels! She is of the moon, one of your acolytes’ acolytes, and you are of all celestial creation! Shul is your child and so I must protect her, this child of Shul, above all others! I see! I see it now! I SEE IT ALL!”

None of the others heard Hilda’s rantings. Instead, they became aware of the air growing warm and full of flecks of blue light, even as the sunlight dimmed. Monstrous shadows prowled that dimness, and though none of them would be able to recall exactly what those shadows said, they whispered awful truths. Dark susurrations filled the combatants’ minds, and they stumbled and were filled with despair.

All except the acolyte of Shul, upon whom Hilda’s blue gaze was fixed. How had she not seen it before? It was so obvious now. Erin was the first celestial body in the galaxy of Hilda’s expanded consciousness. Then and there she vowed that no harm would come to Erin Wywood while the wizard drew breath. Hilda would guard the cleric as her own child, just as–she was now certain–the shadowy man within the orb would guard Erin’s god Shul. They were inextricably linked by their time beneath the Empty Star, two mortals now under the protection of immortal forces. No one else mattered. It was only those offered to the open sky who would survive the coming void. A thousand insights rushed into Hilda’s mind at once, and she could not help but cackle with the glee of it.

To Hilda’s companions, the overwhelming feelings of helplessness and despair were familiar from her magic within the tomb. Yet this time they would each have nightmares for many nights to come, of shadowed creatures prowling at the edge of their vision and whispering their darkest secrets. Umur and Haffoot had been spared before, but not this time. They swayed and moaned on their feet with the others, utterly overwhelmed.

If anyone had been able to shrug off their anguish enough to see it, one of the archers near the tree line shrieked as what appeared to be black lightning sparked around his eyes and mouth. The man fell dead at the feet of his companion, who shuddered under the magic’s effects.

Iraco, the ugly leader of the ambushers, shook his head with a shout to free it of the shadowy visions. As his vision cleared, Erin was there, leaning forward with the legendary wolf-spear and piercing his side. The cloaked man snarled with pain and brought his sword up to attack.

The hunt master and the acolyte of Shul engaged in battle. Erin’s wolf-spear was the superior weapon, but Iraco was the superior fighter. Once, twice, they made feints, and then Erin moved to thrust her spear forward. The mash-faced man stepped deftly sideways and then up, impaling Erin on his long sword. Ulfheonar’s spear dropped to the grass, and Erin’s limp body slumped to follow it.

“Erin, no!” Umur shouted, his stocky legs churning across the clearing with sword and shield raised.

Before he could get there, however, Hilda arrived. Her hood thrown back, hands glowing the same bright blue as the black doorway on her forehead, she grabbed Iraco’s head from behind like a child capturing a skittish frog.

The man shrieked, a keening sound full of anguish and sorrow as much as pain, and his eyes rolled up and into his head. In moments, his hair turned wispy and white, and those eyes sunk and disappeared. Flesh grayed and tightened across bone. When Hilda released him, everything above Iraco’s shoulders was a skeleton that appeared as ancient as Ulfheonar’s tomb. The wizard looked down on what she’d done with something akin to contempt before returning her hood to shield her face.

Umur, for his part, wheeled with sword raised to survey the battlefield. Haffoot had dispatched the man named Broder and looked unharmed. Joane, the red-haired young woman who had rallied these villagers from Hirot to their side, was stabbing down on the last archer with her pitchfork, yelling defiance and crying. Which meant that all five of their ambushers had been defeated, though it had cost them dearly.

As if reading his thoughts, the healer Briene cried out from behind him. He turned to see Erin face down in the grass, her white, scaled mail stained by bright red blood. Kneeling beside her was the young woman, whose hands were searching for the wound that felled her.

“It’s bad, sir!” she cried. “I think she may be dead!”

Doom of the Savage Kings, Chapter 9

Haffoot’s bravado proved warranted. The halfling sheathed her two blades, handed her tricorn hat to Erin, and scurried up the stone wall easily to the gap above.

“Sure enough,” she called down in a loud whisper. “It’s carved into the stone and goes for a while. Not big, but enough to crawl. I’m gonna toss a rope down. It’s tight for you bigguns. Leave your backpacks there.”

Soon the knotted end of a hemp rope slapped the floor, scattering the dried snakeskins around its impact.   

“I don’t like leaving our belongings unattended,” Erin frowned up at the dark gap.

“I don’ like tryin’ to navigate a crawlspace with this large a group,” Umur agreed. He turned to the Hirot villagers. “Alright, listen: We’re going to see if that gap leads to the real tomb. You can come if you want or stay here to watch the gear.”

“Do we… all have to go up there?” Hilda asked, pursing her lips.

“The four of us, yeah,” Umur sighed. “Don’ know what sorta monsters or traps might be guardin’ the spear if we find it. Your magic might be needed, lass.”

At that statement, the villagers all decided to stay. Erin, Umur, and Hilda removed their packs, though the wizard kept one bulging satchel close. Umur, with the help from others, strapped his shield to his back. Hilda reluctantly left her staff with Joane, who was equally reluctant to receive it. Then, one by one, the companions gripped the rope and scaled the rough stone to the gap above.

Umur was the last to perform the task. As he placed his black boot against the wall, he looked back at the six villagers–Joane, Briene, the dwarf Tor, the girl with the oversized helmet, and two rough-looking human men whose names he couldn’t remember–and nodded reassuringly.

“Those gray things were nasty business, but we haven’t heard or seen anythin’ else in here. You should be safe.” He cleared his throat, and then added. “Just, uh… don’t go wanderin’ and keep your eyes sharp.”

“May the gods light your way,” Briene nodded to him.

With that, Umur grunted and pulled himself up. Thanks to his scaled armor and broad frame, it took some work. Eventually, however, his legs disappeared into the crawlspace and the villagers were left alone and wide-eyed, listening to the echoed, murmuring voices above and standing in a room littered with discarded skin.

“All I can see is Hilda’s feet,” Umur complained. The passage, stone but with a ceiling of branches and roots, fit each of them and allowed them to move single file, but it was cramped going. There would be no drawing weapons or casting spells in this narrow passage, something they all realized warily. “What’s ahead, Haffoot?”

“Continues for a ways and bends to the right,” the halfling whispered back. “Let’s go.”

Haffoot led the way, followed by Erin, Hilda, and Umur. For the wizard it was a terrifying journey, not only for the feeling of stone and earth pressing down on her from all directions, but also because she was the only one of the four unable to see in darkness. Hilda pushed forward on hands and knees, sweating and frequently bumping into Erin’s boots for fear of being left behind.

The crawlspace indeed continued to the right. Shortly thereafter, it opened to a room beyond.

“It’s here!” Haffoot called. “The tomb!”

Thankfully, the passage ended at floor level to the tomb, which made exiting head-first considerably easier than if there had been a drop. Haffoot, Erin, and Hilda emerged one by one upon their hands, rolling free and standing. The room before them was modestly sized and square, with a high-vaulted ceiling. A large stone column rose from the center, decorated by numerous carvings of wolves dying in numerous ways–by arrows, spear, fire, and sword.

“Look there,” Haffoot pointed for Erin once she’ stood. Well off the ground, perhaps halfway up the column, a long spear and bronze shield hung from leather straps.

Umur rolled free of the crawlspace clumsily, cursing. Hilda, holding the glowing orb they had taken from the portal beneath the Empty Star, helped the dwarf rise. She pointed out the spear and shield above as he took in their surroundings.

“Always with the false tombs,” he grunted, but with a note of satisfaction. “Well, we’ve found it, then. How do we get them down from there?”

“I climb again, yeah?” Haffoot grinned. Without waiting for confirmation, she rubbed her hands together and approached the column, studying its surface for hand- and footholds. With the stone carvings across its entire surface, there appeared to be no wrong choice.

This time, the halfling’s bravado may have been ill-placed. The way up was cunningly treacherous, and several times a hand or foot would slip and make those below catch their breath. Tongue protruding from her lips in concentration, Haffoot said nothing as she focused on the task and, increasingly slowly, she made her way to the leather strap and dangling weapons.

“Spear first, yeah? I’m dropping it,” she called down with a voice strained by exertion. With a grunt, Haffoot pulled the spear free…

…and the entire chamber immediately began to rumble.

“Get out!” Haffoot called. She could feel the column swaying and beginning to topple. With a deftness borne of desperation, she launched herself from the collapsing stone at the chamber’s nearest wall. Down she fell, and as she hit the stone surface she pushed with one leg, aiming at an angle towards the floor. All in one motion, she struck the floor, rolling, and then disappeared into the crawlspace faster than any of them would have thought possible.

The halfling’s agile descent distracted the others from reacting as quickly. Sections of the stone column cascaded on them, and a fist-sized rock struck Erin’s armored shoulder, throwing her to the ground.

“Look out!” Hilda yelled, and dodged to the side just as an enormous slab of stone thudded into the floor where she had been standing. Cradling the glowing orb protectively, Hilda pushed her way into the gap after Haffoot.

“I don’t… what?” Erin shook her head, dazed, as rocks continued to fall.

“Go, lass, go!” Umur yelled into her ear and pushed her towards the crawlspace. Dumbly, the white-mailed cleric followed Hilda’s disappearing feet.

Rocks battered Umur’s helmet and armor, and he spared a glance up. The top half of the stone column was gone, and with it the ceiling was collapsing. Wide-eyed, he dropped to his knees and pushed Erin forward.

“GO!” he bellowed, and with a roar threw himself into the open space ahead.

Just as the dwarf’s boots pulled into the gap there was a deafening crash as the chamber beyond filled with debris.

Thanks to the cacophony of destruction, none of them heard the Hirot villagers screaming in pain and terror.

---

“When will they return?” Maly Peabrook asked in her squeaky voice. She was the apprentice to Hale the Crane, Hirot’s armorer, though the man often complained about the arrangement. It was well known within the village walls that Maly was a terrible smith, ruining as many pieces as she helped create. Her prized creation was a misshapen, battered iron cap, too large for her head, that she wore proudly, along with mismatched pieces such as a single shoulder pauldron, shin guard, and bracer. Each piece displayed her shoddy craftsmanship, yet these, at least, had survived the forge.

“Either there’ll be the chief’s tomb at the end of that crawl or death,” the dwarven carpenter, Tor, growled at her. He was a proud member of the Hirot crafts guild and had no love for the human he considered a blight to his fellow guildmembers. “So either soon or we leave.”

“They won’t die,” Joane admonished, frowning at Tor and then flashing a grin at the armorer’s apprentice. The two were peers in age, but Joane was by far the more confident and, thus, seemed like an older sibling. “Which means soon, Maly.”

As if her words had summoned the heroes, there was a rustling from the darkened gap above. The villagers’ eyes all followed the noise expectantly.

A gray-skinned humanoid figure in rags leapt, snarling, from the opening, its wide mouth open to reveal sharp teeth and a forked tongue. Claws outstretched on overlong fingers, it landed atop one of the human men. Omulf had lost his entire family to the Hound of Hirot, and with it his will to live. He had been a vagrant in the village the past few months, until the Graymoor residents had given him a spark of hope. That spark, it seemed, had led him to die screaming beneath an earthen mound far from his home. The creature spit and grunted and it rended Omulf apart in a matter of blood-soaked moments.

“What is this devilry?!” the dwarf Tor roared as he swung the dagger in his fist at the creature. It tore through the sagging flesh at its neck, spraying blood that was thick and black. The grotesque thing reared back in pain, its bulging eyes wild. With a backwards slash of its claws it tore out the dwarf’s throat, and Tor toppled, grabbing at his ruined neck, next to Omulf’s tattered corpse.

“No!” Joane shouted. She pushed her pitchfork forward, pinning the creature through its shoulder to the dirt floor below. It snarled and bit at her, distracted, allowing Briene Byley to approach and swing her club. The healer’s attack was wild and borne of horrified fear, but it caved in the creature’s head, killing it instantly.

A monstrous snake began tearing its way free of the sagging skin, but it seemed hampered somehow. Perhaps it was the pitchfork impaling a part of its serpentine body within, or perhaps it was less ready to be “born” than the other two who had emerged earlier. Whatever the case, as the human-like head with bulging eyes thrashed and chomped blindly with its shark mouth, the remaining villagers had time to attack.

Shouting incoherently, Joane pulled her pitchfork out of the sagging gray skin and stabbed down on the serpent. It squealed and hissed in response, wounded and even more aggressive because of it.

Maly Peebrook, near paralyzed by fear and wielding a smithy’s hammer, swung at the squirming creature. Her blow caved in the chest of the humanoid thing, allowing the snake within to burst free. She yelled in shock as it launched itself at her, then again in pain as its sharp teeth sunk into the flesh where her neck met her unarmored shoulder.

“No! No!” she screamed, battering at the scaled body with her hammer. Her efforts caused the creature to release its grip and fall, writhing to the floor. Maly rained hammer blows down until it was a black-blooded pulp. She kept striking until Briene firmly but gently pulled her away. The armorer’s apprentice dropped her hammer and collapsed into the healer’s arms, sobbing.

It was then that echoing sounds of a crashing avalanche reached them from the passage above.

---

“Back, back!” Umur yelled, though whether he could be heard above the ceiling’s collapse, or his companions needed the encouragement were both in doubt. The sound and vibrations from the rockfall shook their bones and rained twigs down over their heads as they crawled frantically away. The four of them moved through the passage as it jogged left, and then each bumped into the person ahead.

“Why are we stopping?” Erin said, speaking loudly and through teeth gritted in pain.

“I’ve, uh…” Haffoot said from the front. “There’s something here. And… oh! One of the villagers is crying! You all go. I’ll meet you soon, yeah?”

“Meet us?” Umur growled. “What does that mean? We’re in the same bloody crawlspace!”

“I’ll explain later,” Hilda said. “Follow me.”

The light of the orb pulsing a soft white, Hilda continued forward. Erin, still half dazed, followed. The two women pulled away as Umur shook his helmeted head, cursing in his native dwarven tongue. He followed as well, and soon found himself being aided by a number of outstretched hands to lower him from the opening to the false tomb’s floor. The dry snakeskin crackled underfoot.

“So where’s Haffoot?” the dwarf demanded, then blinked in surprise as he took in the scene. The dwarf, Tor, lay dead next to the body of one of the human villagers, both in a wide pool of blood. Nearby was the sloughed, gray skin of one of the creatures they’d fought before. Spattered gore was everywhere. Briene held the human girl with the large helmet, who was weeping inconsolably and covered in a mix of black, sticky blood and her own.

“What happened here?” he gaped.

“One of those gray fuckers attacked,” Joane Cayhurst spat, planting the butt of her pitchfork into the hardpacked earth. “Jumped straight out of the hole up there. How did it get past you and to us?” the red-haired young woman challenged Umur, but her eyes darted mistrustingly towards Hilda’s impassive, hooded form.

“I– I don’ know, lass,” the dwarf sputtered. He removed his black, horned helm and wiped sweat from his brow. His craggy face was lined with weariness and confusion. “It was but a single passage to the real tomb. We couldn’ta passed the creature without seein’ it. And somehow we’ve lost Haffoot through the same mystery, and ‘twas she who had the spear.”

“The wrong spear!” a jovial voice called out from above. They all jumped and grabbed at weapons, heads snapping to gape as Haffoot’s smiling face peered down. “A second false tomb, Umur! Can ya believe it?”

“Haffoot!” Erin strode forward. Miraculously, she looked untouched by the ordeal from the column. Her white armor was again pristine, and the pale skin of her face and neck lacked any bruises or obvious wounds. “What are you saying?”

“I found the real tomb,” the halfling’s echoing voice chuckled. “Look out below!”

 A bundle thumped onto the ground from the opening, which the others gathered around to inspect. There, laying atop the dried snakeskin, was a bundle of silver fur, wrapped around a long, flat-bladed spear.

Doom of the Savage Kings, Chapter 8

It was a bloodcurdling scream from the back of the group that alerted them to something wrong. The halfling merchant, whose name was Avel, shrieked a second time, and immediately others from the back began yelling in alarm. Erin and Umur exchanged a quick nod, and the two began pushing through the Hirot villagers fleeing from the screams.

Erin outdistanced the dwarf and arrived first. Her eyes, limned by white moonlight, widened as she took in the two pale figures in dirty rags. They looked like humans, but gray and with sagging flesh over their bony limbs, assessing Avel with overlarge eyes. One crouched on the hard-packed dirt floor like a wild animal, sharp teeth gnashing. The other hung from the stone ceiling like a spider by clawed fingers that were too long to be human. Directly in front of the first creature, the halfling held her face with both hands and squealed while her fellow villagers scrambled away.

“Begone, creatures of Chaos!” Erin bellowed, one hand gripping the crescent moon hanging on a silver chain at her neck, the other hand on the hilt of the dagger at her waist. “By Shul’s light, begone!”

Snarling, the gray-skinned man-thing on the floor swiped up and grabbed a halfling leg. Almost simultaneously, its companion reached down and grabbed one of the merchant’s arms. Avel screamed even more hysterically as the creatures pulled her taut, muscles straining. With a howl from the creatures, her arm tore completely from her body. Gore and viscera sprayed the stone walls, splashing across Erin’s white, scaled armor and astonished face.

Umur bellowed as he arrived, shield in front like a battering ram. As he collided with the creature still gripping Avel’s leg, he slashed up with his longsword. The misshapen figure released the dying halfling and tumbled backwards in a heap, skidding on the floor and leaving a trail of thick, black blood. Umur snarled incoherently, spinning to raise his shield against the thing clinging to the ceiling, a small and bloody arm hanging from its grip.

Chanting filled the hallway, making everyone’s ears itch and causing them to wince. Hilda approached, hood thrown back and black rectangle upon her forehead glowing blue in the darkness.

For Joane Cayhurst and the three Graymoor companions, they witnessed Hilda’s miracle a second time. For the other five remaining Hirot villagers, they were awestruck by the sight of the Empty Star’s magic in action.

 As before, many events happened simultaneously and almost too quickly for minds to comprehend. Weeds and vines burst from the ceiling and floor. Cracks spidered through the heavy stone walls. Despite being indoors, snow filled the hallway, piling suddenly at their feet and upon their shoulders. And, above all, lightning flashed directly in front of Umur, blinding them all momentarily as it incinerated the gray-skinned creature that had rolled away from the dwarf’s shield blow.

When they blinked away the light from their eyes, the burned husk of the creature had collapsed like an empty bag. What had emerged from the husk was a large snake with a human-like head, eyes bulging and hinged mouth opening wide to reveal sharp, jagged teeth. It was as if the death of the first creature’s body had released this serpent that had been nesting within. The snake creature rose, hissing malevolently.

Charging through the blizzard with swords out, Haffoot spun and slashed. Her normally clumsy gait disappeared in combat, it seemed, and the halfling fought with a graceful savagery that was made even more dizzying in the snowfall. With a leap, she drew a black, bloody line across the humanoid creature’s ribs and it fell, snarling, from the ceiling.

“I said begone!” Erin yelled, suddenly appearing out of the storm to loom over the fallen creature. She had drawn her long, crescent dagger and it glowed pale white like a shard of the moon itself. The cleric stabbed down, and the blade sunk into gray, sagging flesh. The creature arched its back with wide and terrified eyes, seemingly unable to move.

“It’s frozen!” Haffoot whooped. “Well done, Er– aarrgh!” The halfling had taken her eyes off the large, human-headed serpent that emerged from the burned corpse. It snapped with a shark-like mouth full of teeth at her. Haffoot reflexively brought the thin blade of her rapier up to parry, but the creature still tore into her shoulder.

A breeze suddenly filled the hallway that could only be described as evil. Cold, sickly air scattered the snowflakes still drifting aimlessly, and with it a wan blue light that seemed to emanate from everywhere. The remaining villagers collapsed, most crying or doubling over, as waves of shame and guilt washed over them with the wind. Only the Graymoor adventurers seemed immune to its ill effects, and there could be no doubt as to its origin. Staff held aloft, Hilda continued to chant, the doorway on her forehead pulsing with light.

“Go!” Hilda paused in her chanting to yell at the others. “While the creatures are distracted, finish them!”

Haffoot spun, thrusting with her rapier and slashing with her short, flat-bladed sword. The first pierced the body of the unnatural serpent, and its thrash of pain sent it directly into the second blade. Two pieces of the serpent fell to the snow at their feet, each writhing and spewing black blood.

Teeth clenched, Erin twisted her glowing dagger in the chest of the creature at her feet. Doing so created a hole from which burst a second human-headed serpent, its shark mouth open wide. Erin reared back but would have been too slow if not for a lateral slash from Umur’s longsword, the ancestral blade from Councilwoman Leda Astford of Graymoor. Dark liquid from the serpent joined red blood from the halfling across Erin’s white armor, and the second serpent died as soon as it had been born from its gray-skinned carcass.

“It’s done!” the dwarf bellowed. “These foul creatures are dead. Villagers of Hirot, gather round.”

There was something in Umur’s voice that rallied the group. Wiping tear-filled eyes and running noses, the words pulled them from the despair of Hilda’s ill wind. Shakily, they stood and staggered closer. The dwarf, Haffoot, and Erin stepped to meet them, shielding most from the view of the dead, dismembered halfling and gray-skinned corpses.

“Is, is that Avel?” Briene asked, sniffling and hiccupping from her despair. “Oh, no.”

“She didn’t even want to be here,” another woman, wearing patchwork armor and an overlarge iron cap, said from Briene’s side. “Was in the back because of it. Poor thing.”

“It’s done,” Umur repeated commandingly, drawing eyes to him. “From now on, one of us will travel in the rear as well as front.” His eyes scanned the gathered villagers. “Wait, why are there only six of ye?”

“Riffin stayed outside,” Briene offered. “To keep watch.”

“Fine then,” the dwarf nodded, frowning and inwardly berating himself for not realizing the absence sooner. “I can’t promise that was the last o’ the danger. Keep your eyes open, and don’t bloody touch anythin’.”

They readily agreed, and Umur said they would carry Avel’s body outside once they’d found the spear and were leaving the tomb. In the frightened, skittish minutes that everyone regrouped, breath steaming in the sudden cold, every villager from Hirot gave Hilda a wide berth, either looking away or with narrowed, untrusting eyes. Even Joane, who had been telling everyone of Hilda’s astounding feats of magic for the past day, seemed unsure how to make sense of the wind the wizard had summoned that robbed her of all hope. Hilda, for her part, said nothing. She returned her hood to cover the top half of her face and stood stoically leaning on her staff.

“Excuse me, Haffoot, is it?” Briene approached the halfling. With slender fingers she touched the torn, bloody sleeve delicately. “You’ve been hurt! I– I’m a healer. Not a cleric, mind you, but I provide aid to the clerics in our church. May I… take a look?”

“Ah, sure thing,” Haffoot grinned. “Much obliged.” She turned to offer the shoulder towards the striking young woman. Briene asked for someone to bring a torch so she could see, then rummaged around in her pack for bandages and salves.

“It’s not a bad wound,” she said, lips pursed as she worked. “But already looks angry and red. I’ll clean it and give you a bandage. That pretty blouse will need some mending, though.”

“I’ll sew the blouse tonight,” Haffoot smiled, craning her neck to view the gash on her shoulder. “And appreciate the tendin’.”

By the time that Briene had washed the injury and applied a cloth to it, the others were ready to go. Half-melted snow littered the ground, and as it vanished it revealed the weeds that had thrust up from the hard-packed earth. It was all an unnerving reminder of Hilda’s power.

The halfling agreed to take up the rear and watch for more threats with her keen darkvision while Umur and Erin continued to lead the way. Hilda followed behind her two companions, and the five Hirot villagers held back from getting overly close to her. If Hilda noticed, the wizard of the Empty Star did not remark on their apprehension.

Erin and Umur led the group to the large chamber at the end of the hallway, ignoring the cramped, branching corridors except to be vigilant against additional threats. They neither heard nor saw movement. It seemed that, once again, they were alone within Ulfheonar’s tomb.

Three long steps descended from the hallway into the high-ceilinged chamber. Across from them stood a towering stone door twice the height of a human, flanked by ancient braziers of hammered bronze. Hundreds of carved, spiraling runes decorated the door, as well as the clear image of an enormous wolf being crushed by an even larger snake. The square room, which could fit their gathered group several times over, was bare except for thousands of what seemed to be thin, translucent strips of vellum covering the earthen floor.

“What’s that on the floor?” Umur frowned and squinted.

The acolyte of Shul, her white armor speckled red and black, descended the stone steps cautiously. When she reached the bottom step, Erin knelt and examined the objects on the floor with her luminous eyes. After several heartbeats, she reached out with a hand and snatched one, the sound like picking up a dry leaf in autumn.

“Snake skins,” she said simply, frowning and scanning the room. “Discarded snake skins.”

Carefully, she stepped onto the floor, dried skins crackling under her boot. Erin unsheathed her dagger, softly glowing eyes looking up and around. Grumbling, Umur followed her, his sword in one hand and shield in the other. The dwarf peered through his black, horned helm, ready to be attacked.

“Well, will you look at that?” Umur gasped, slightly lowering his guard as he approached the enormous door. “That’s dwarven make, that is.”

“Can it be opened?” Hilda asked, gingerly stepping onto the skin-riddled floor.

“Not by mortal hands,” Umur grunted. “That’s set into the ground, a seal more’n a door.”

“Is Ulfheonar’s tomb beyond?” the wizard asked. “Are we thwarted from reaching the spear? Perhaps my magic could…”

“No,” the dwarf cut her off. “Doesn’t smell right. That’s not his tomb.”

“Master Dwarf?” Briene Byley asked softly. The villagers had assembled on the bottom step at the chamber’s entrance, and only Joane and she had stepped forward onto the desiccated snake skins. Haffoot, taking her rearguard role seriously, stayed at the topmost step, back turned on the others as she watched the hallway.

“Mm?” Umur grunted. “What is it, lass?”

“It’s only,” the young healer said. “Look there, at the smoke from the torches. It’s being drawn up, above the stairs. What do you think that means?”

“What are you,” he began, and then squinted. Sure enough, smoke from the two torches the Hirot residents held seemed to be pulled up, to disappear into a horizontal gap near the ceiling he would not have noticed otherwise. “Step aside, let me see.”

The dwarf tromped over in his black-scaled mail, studying the wall below the gap, adjacent to the stairs.

“What is it?” Hilda asked. Villagers parted as she approached.

“By the gods,” he said, and when he looked up at the robed wizard, he was smiling. “She’s right. There’s a chamber above this one. See these holes here? And here? I’d bet my favorite hammer that was to anchor a ladder. Haffoot, lass, look at this.”

“Sure thing,” Haffoot sauntered over in her peculiar gait. “You, with the torch, hold it up and keep an eye behind us, yeah? What is it, Umur?”

“See that gap up there? Think you could climb it?”

The halfling crunched across dried skins, peering up beneath her tricorn hat. With a lopsided grin, she crossed her arms before her.

“Absolutely.”

Doom of the Savage Kings, Chapter 7

“So… she’s human, and old,” Umur asked, pulling at his beard. “How old?”

“Let’s talk of something else, please,” Hilda said, pulling her robe free from a bramble that had snagged it as she stepped over a fallen log.

“She’s so old!” Joane Cayhurst cackled. “And hideous!” She picked her way through the forest beside the dwarf, on the other shoulder as Hilda. “I can’t believe you’re going to marry the mad widow!” Behind the red-haired young woman, two other Hirot residents snickered.

“Hilda agreed, not me!” Umur growled. “I haven’t said I’ll do it. She can marry her.”

“Can we change subjects, please,” Hilda begged, and her tone made Joane and the others laugh all the more.

The group made their way slowly through the tangle of the forest, following a trail so forgotten and overgrown that they were forced to frequently pause and argue where it was. Umur, Hilda, Erin, and Haffoot were joined by Joane and seven other villagers from Hirot who had volunteered to help the brave adventurers on their quest to find the tomb of Ulfheonar.

Each of the Hirot villagers had his or her own reasons for being there, most of which were unknown to the four outsiders from Graymoor. Some had been inspired by Joane’s tales of heroism. Some were concerned citizens prepared to do anything, no matter how fantastical, to help Hirot. Still others were searching for something to bring a spark of hope into their wallowing seas of despair. Six of the eight were human men and women of varying ages and trades, and they were joined by a halfling merchant woman and dwarven carpenter. None seemed particularly capable foresters, yet they were certainly brave enough to accompany what many–surely including the Jarl and his thegns–would call a fool’s errand.

It was Briene Byley, Father Beacom’s assistant at the church to Justicia, who had first mentioned the existence of the trail to Ulfheonar’s tomb. Her late father had been a hunter in Hirot his entire life, and he’d long suspected that the earthen mound at the end of the trail was the fabled chief’s burial site. Yet Briene’s father could never convince others to explore the mound, and the man had no desire to do so alone. Instead, he’d long ago marked the trail just in case and had taught those markers to his daughter. Thus it was that the girl had led their ragtag dozen at dawn’s light through the trees and moors north of Hirot. It was now nearing midday, but they had made decent time despite the sparse trail and large group.

“Briene,” Erin asked, casting an annoyed look at the snickering villagers. “How much further to the mound? If this is not the tomb, I fear we have wasted a precious day.”

“I haven’t been here in years,” the young woman admitted in conciliatory tones. “But I believe it– ah! Yes! Right here!” She pushed forward through a thicket, revealing the forest breaking on a ledge, with a narrow vale below. Set in the center of the valley was a long, earthen mound topped with tall grass. As the others gathered at the forest’s edge to see, Briene pointed excitedly. “You see? The mound there… my father said it always looked like a serpent to him.”

Sure enough, from above the mound wound in a snake-like line, flanked on either side by slender, silvery streams that glistened in the midday sun. It was the first time they had been free of the dense forest since leaving the clearing around Hirot, and stray puffs of cloud crawled overhead upon a blue field of sky.

“What do you say, Master Pearlhammer?” Erin asked, fingering the pendant at her neck. “Could that be the tomb?”

“I s’pose it could at that,” the dwarf said, rubbing at his mouth. He raised his voice. “Haffoot and I will take the lead, then our cleric and wizard behind. The rest of you follow but keep yer eyes open for threats.”

“What sorta threats we watchin’ fer?” one of the humans, a rough-looking fellow of middle years with a scowling face and a dagger, asked.

“Dunno,” Umur grunted. “But I don’ trust open spaces. Watch the skies. Watch the trees. Watch the grass. Just keep your eyes peeled.”

The group made their own serpentine line, winding their way down the grassy slope into the vale. It was not a precarious way down, nor a deep valley. Soon they gathered on the vale’s floor, facing a shallow stream and the broad “head” of the mound, though this close nothing about the place seemed particularly snake-like.

“Look there,” Briene added enthusiastically, pointing with a slender finger. “Set into the hillock there! That’s the door, my father said.”

They approached, eyes casting up and around everywhere upon Umur’s warning. Yet by all accounts it was simply a picturesque location on a pleasant, mild day, with no danger about. Sunlight glittered off the shallow pool between them and the mound, and a slight breeze ruffled the tall grass all around.

The round stone was large, perhaps as tall as either dwarven man, and from this distance they could make out faint spirals carved into its flat surface, worn by time to be almost indiscernible.

“It’ll take some work to move that stone,” Umur grunted and looked around at the rest of their ragtag gathering, none of whom looked particularly strong. He opened his mouth to say something but thought better and snapped it shut. Instead, he simply muttered, “A good deal of work.”

“Shall we examine it, then?” Haffoot asked brightly, and then without waiting for a response splashed into the pool.

“Wait! Dammit, halfling,” Umur complained, and splashed after her. Erin was at their heels, while the rest, including Hilda, waited apprehensively at the stream’s edge.

The pool was not deep, only reaching Haffoot’s knees. A white sand bed stirred as the three adventurers moved, clouding the water.

“Oh, what’s this, then?” Haffoot paused and reached down to pull something from the pool. It was an old–perhaps very old–animal hide wrapped around something bulkier, secured with rotting leather straps.

“There’s more here. Come, lass,” Umur said, moving his foot experimentally. “Bring it back to the group. Let’s see what these are, laying in the water.”

The bundle was indeed ancient, and the leather and hide sloughed away as they unwrapped it. Inside was a nicked and pitted bronze sword, a handful of tin and bronze coins, and a cracked, humanoid skull. All were badly treated by time and the elements.

“What do you make of that?” asked Hilda, peering over the others’ shoulders with the Hirot villagers. “A sacrifice of some kind, for some sort of ritual?”

“No,” Erin announced, a fierce grin of satisfaction on her lips. “It’s a burial ground. Ulfheonar’s tribe buried their warriors at the foot of his tomb in honor of their chieftain. This is blessed news. It means you have led us, by Shul’s will, to the correct spot, Briene.”

“Oh,” the comely young woman blushed. “I’m glad.”

“Let’s go, Master Pearlhammer,” Erin splashed back into the water. “Any of you with strength, come help us roll the stone aside.”

It was a task easier spoken than accomplished. Five people could fit around the circular stone, and after some discussion the strongest of the group seemed to be Erin, Umur, the girl Joane, the dwarven chest-maker Tor, and a human gongfarmer. Yet even with their muscles straining, the group could not move the heavy slab even a hair’s breadth. It was Umur, sweating and near collapse in his black armor, who eventually suggested they use a lever of some kind. The others went in search of one within the vale while the group at the stone recovered.

While Hilda and the other villagers scattered, Haffoot made a slow perimeter around the mound itself. She walked in the clumsy saunter brought on by her club foot, scratching at her chin and allowing her instinct to guide her. As she scrutinized the mound, she absently whistled a tune her brother used to sing.

“Now, what’s this?” she grinned, stepping through the shallow stream to examine something pale caught in what appeared to be a cleft in a stone. Haffoot bent down to tug out a shred of homespun cloth. Pulling it free caused the stone to shift somewhat. She bent down and, tongue protruding as she squinted, peered closely.

“Oy!” she called out to where she could hear Umur cursing and complaining about how bloody hard it could be to find a bloody tree in a bloody forest. “Umur! Come see this, yeah?”

Hilda was the nearest to the halfling. “What is it?” she called from up the hill towards the forest’s edge.

“Go get the dwarf and Erin! I found somethin’!”

---

Amazingly, the halfling had stumbled upon a collapsed section of the structure beneath the earthen mound, and seemingly a way to enter the tomb without moving the impossibly heavy stone door. Umur argued that using a tree trunk as a lever would have worked, but he could see his own fatigue mirrored on the others’ faces and gave up the protest with a grumbled murmur about “halfling luck.” Everyone else was more than happy to clear away the more manageable pieces of rock, clearing a gap large enough for any of them to squeeze inside.

“We dwarves, Erin, and Haffoot can see in the dark,” he grumbled to the humans. “Best light a torch or two for the rest o’ you. Now let’s go… we’ve lost enough daylight with that fool door. If we waste much more time, we’ll be sleepin’ in the forest tonight instead of a warm bed.”

One by one, they began to get on their hands and knees to push themselves feet first into the gap in the earth. First the four Graymoor residents disappeared, then Joane, then, with murmured nervousness, the others. The last two were Briene and an older man with a pinched face and white beard.

“What is it, Riffin?” the woman asked him. “You seem reluctant.”

“Fools, all of them,” the man spat. “Did you not see the cloth? Not one mention of who or what it belonged to. I don’t expect an empty tomb, waiting to be plundered, girl, and neither should you.”

“Oh!” she gasped. “Let’s go talk to them, then.”

“They won’t listen,” Riffin shook his head, disgust woven into every word. “They’re desperate, Briene. If the tomb is already plundered or the spear is not there or the witch cannot make good on her promise… well, they have no other options. They’ll leave us and escape the Jarl’s justice and Hound’s jaws.”

“No! Riffin, they’re heroes!”

“Don’t be ridiculous, child. They’re travelers who surprised the Hound and were lucky to beat it once. They’ve no loyalty to Hirot. Stay with me here. Don’t follow foolishness.”

Briene straightened and set her chin. “I will follow them, but if you won’t, I understand. Are you heading back, then?”

Riffin made a face and spit into the water. “Nine hells, girl. I’m only here for you. Go then, and I’ll stay here as lookout. If you don’t return, I’ll tell the Jarl of this foolish expedition and wait for the Hound to come for me.”

“Oh, Riffin,” she lay a hand on his shoulder. He looked down on her slender fingers, the pain of longing in his eyes. “You’re always so dire. We’ll all be back, with the spear. You’ll see. We have Justicia and Shul watching us!”

“Go on, then.”

She flashed him a bright smile and shimmied into the cleft. Riffin, frowning and eyes glittering with frustration, watched the darkness for several heartbeats. Then, with a curse, he wandered a few paces from the stream to sit in the grass and wait.

---

On the other side of the gap was what had once been a square catacomb of some kind, its ceiling canted towards the opening and piles of rubble littering the hard-packed earth of the floor. The walls still stood and were simply immense stone slabs set into the ground. Contrasting with the bright sunshine outside, the place felt damp, huddled, and dark, even by torchlight.

“Truly, Shul smiles down from his moonlit throne today,” Erin whispered once they had all gathered, her voice echoing even using hushed tones. “Well done, Haffoot.”

“Are you sure it’s Ulfheonar’s tomb?” Briene whispered fervently, eyes darting everywhere. She had been the last to arrive, but the other villagers were more than happy for her to move closer to the front with the four outsiders.

“It’s a tomb, alright,” Umur answered. “Let’s find where the chief might be buried.”

The room led to a long, narrow hallway with the same stone-slab walls and packed-earth floors. Given the collapse, several people eyed the ceiling warily. It was a cramped experience, and the sounds of their feet, armor, leather straps, and shuffling cloth crowded out any opportunity to listen to ensure they were alone.

Thankfully, the narrow corridor met a larger hallway with a slightly raised ceiling. Umur and Erin, in the lead, scanned both directions and sighed. To the left, the hallway appeared to open to a much larger, lower-ceilinged chamber, while to the right was an even larger, higher-ceilinged chamber. Two smaller corridors, like the one they’d just exited, branched off as well.

“Lotta options,” Umur grumbled. “Stands to reason the left is where we woulda come in through the stone door.”

“Yes,” Erin nodded. With a whisper she added, “We can look there last, to see if perhaps there is a way to open it from the inside. In the meantime, shall we check the side corridors?”

“Maybe later. If we’re looking for the chief’s tomb, it’s gonna be somewhere grand.”

“To the north, then,” Erin announced, slightly louder so the others could hear.

They could walk two abreast here, so Umur and Erin took the lead, with Haffoot and Hilda close behind. Joane and Briene followed most closely, with the others paired off after that.

None of them sensed the gray-skinned figures in dull rags that crawled, spider-like along the ceiling behind them. Their overlarge eyes reflected in the torchlight, and forked tongues ran along too-wide mouths filled with sharp teeth.

Doom of the Savage Kings, Chapter 6

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

The great hall in the Jarl’s manor was its largest room by far, taking up over half of the structure. It appeared that it had been used as a sleeping quarters for the man, his warrior thegns, and perhaps their retainers as well. Blankets, mats, weapons, shields, and scraps of armor littered the floor haphazardly. It was if the Jarl had assumed that one day soon the Hound would come for him, and he had closed ranks to be prepared.

Upon each wall hung banners of a yellow wolf on a green background, presumably the Jarl’s standard. On one end of the long room, where the Graymoor companions entered with Nothan and Joane, was a large oaken dining table piled high with half-eaten breakfast. On the other end was a raised dais, upon which sat an ornately carved chair that could only be described as a throne. The Jarl lounged on the chair seemingly casually, an immense sword with a blade a full hand’s width laying across his lap. He still wore his wolfskin cloak across his broad shoulders. Flanking him were his seven thegns, battle-scarred men and women standing with arms crossed or fingering the hilts of weapons. It appeared as if the Jarl’s warriors had hurried to assemble, and many wore only pieces of armor, with crumbs of food still in beards. Skulking to the side and behind the Jarl’s throne, was thin, robed man of middle years with jet black hair.

“Bring them here, Nothan,” the Jarl bellowed, his voice echoing. “I would speak with these travelers who have neither ears nor brains.”

Erin began to say something in response, but Umur laid a cautioning hand on her arm and, defiance written across her face, she snapped her jaw shut. Nothan led them around the table, and they wove their way through the mess of bedrolls and items to stand at the foot of the raised dais. The Jarl glared down at them, frowning, as the warriors on either side studied each of the four outsiders. The thin man behind the throne smiled mockingly, his beady eyes darting over them and back like birds fluttering within cages. This close, there was something weaseling about the thin, sharp-featured fellow, and his black hair was limp and oily.

“We’ve done you a service–” Erin began, but the Jarl cut her off with a sharp wave of his hand. His gaze fell on the young woman, Joane.

“First you, girl. At the standing stones. What happened?”

Joane cleared her throat and, with earnestness in every word, relayed the brief battle with the Hound. The Jarl’s expression remained a stoic frown, but the thegns shifted in astonishment at Joane’s description, their eyes upon the Graymoor companions moving through a variety of conflicting emotions. The robed man’s eyes fixed on Hilda, sparkling with something like avarice.

When Joane had finished, she curtsied once and stepped back, leaving the four companions alone to face the Jarl.

“Well?” he growled. “Do you dispute any of the girl’s tale?”

“That’s pretty much it,” Haffoot smiled, then bowed. “You’re welcome.”

“Idiot fools!” the Jarl shouted at her. Hands from the companions and thegns simultaneously reached for weapons, and the robed man ducked for cover behind the throne. Thankfully, none drew blades from scabbards even as the Jarl continued his tirade. “Do you think we’ve never tried to kill the beast? To trap it? You think us mewling cubs? You think you are better, more fearsome warriors than my thegns?”

“Yet we killed it. It died,” Erin said with pride.

The Jarl laughed mockingly at the follower of Shul. “Oh, it died! Turned to oily mist, did it? Explain to me why, then, in three nights’ time the beast will be back and tearing through my village, seeking retribution? Pompous fools!”

“Then we’ll kill it again,” Umur said.

“Will you now, dwarf? You took no injuries, which I’ll admit makes you either skilled or lucky. But how do you fancy a rematch when it knows what you’re about? Tear out that wizard’s throat first, is my guess.” The weaseling man giggled at that, a high-pitched and childish sound.

The Jarl’s eyes bored into them like glittering coals. “Then it will see to the rest of you. And if you do defeat it, how about three nights after that? And then again? Are you moving to Hirot permanently? Will you keep killing it for the rest of your and your children’s and their children’s BLOODY LIVES?!” He worked himself up as he spoke, and by the end the Jarl was spitting and shouting, red-faced, at the Graymoor companions.

The thin man bent down to whisper in the Jarl’s ear, and the burly ruler settled back onto his throne, breathing hard. After several heartbeats of listening to the whispers, he nodded once, sharply.

“I told you to leave this place and you stayed. Well, now you’re here, so I’ll give you a choice, and this time you will heed my words: Leave immediately, unharmed, or, if you’d prefer, one of you can volunteer to replace Joane in three nights at the standing stones.”

“What?” the girl trumpeted from behind Hilda. “You’d still send me to the stones?!”

“Your father drew the lot, girl!” the Jarl bellowed, half standing, gripping the hilt of his enormous sword. “Do your duty or let others do it for you!”

“Ay, fine, fine,” Umur said in his low, gravelly voice, holding up both hands placatingly. “You say we have three days until the Hound returns. Let’s see what we can do in that time, ya? It costs you nothing.”

“Master Pearlhammer,” Erin warned.

“Enough, lass, enough,” Umur growled. “We can make no demands of this suffering place.”

The rat-like man at his shoulder bent down to whisper. The Jarl listened as he regarded the dwarf, frowning.

“You break no laws while here,” the Jarl said loudly. “You use no magic or draw weapons within our walls. You pay full price for any goods or services. My thegns will not aid you in whatever fool-brained scheme you attempt. In other words: You will cost the people of Hirot nothing, for they have already lost too much. Disregard my words and I’ll strap you the standing stones myself.”

“Fair ask,” Umur nodded. “Agreed.”

“Fine. Welcome to Hirot,” he said, his voice heavy with sarcasm. “Now leave me.” He rubbed his face with a hand, and, as they all turned to go, added, “Joane, girl, think on my words. If it’s not you, we will take your father.”

“Let’s go then,” The tall, gaunt Nothan said in the uncomfortable silence, guiding them out of the hall. The others followed, all frowning except Joane. The red-haired young woman looked lost, her eyes brimming with tears.

As they reached the far end of the room, Haffoot lingered and glanced back. The Jarl had his face buried in his large hands, beginning to weep while the robed man pat his shoulder awkwardly.

---

“Another round of ale for my new friends!” the innkeeper, whose name they learned was Broegan Cayfield, bellowed. The dozen or so patrons of The Wolf-Spear cheered and raised their mugs.

Broegan was a large, round-bellied man, and Joane’s father who was so despondent the night before. He had been dumbstruck upon seeing his red-haired daughter appear in the doorway, then fell to his knees, weeping with joy and relief. Joane endured a long embrace from her father, then proceeded to chastise him loudly for allowing her to be taken in the first place. She’d stomped upstairs briefly to change her clothes and wash the night’s events away. Now she was back and moving around the room, doing everything she could to both ignore her father and fan the flames of the Graymoor residents’ legendary powers.

“These outsiders,” she said to a well-dressed halfling woman, making sure her voice carried to the rest of the common room. “Will kill the Hound once and for all! You should have seen it! Dispatched it like a stray pup!”

A meal and three detailed tellings of the battle had passed, and now Umur and Haffoot’s cheeks were rosy with drink. Hilda still nursed her first mug, watching Joane work the room with a bemused grin beneath her hood. Erin, in contrast, pursed her lips disapprovingly and remained drinking water.

“It is almost midday,” the cleric said to her companions. “We are fed. I do not see how lingering here helps us solve the mystery of the agent of Chaos plaguing this village. We must act. You’ve bought us time, Master Pearlhammer, but Shul knows that time is already running out.”

Umur sighed and smacked his lips, pushing his plate aside. “Aye, lass. Ye have the truth of it. Broegan, do ye have a Hirot bard? Someone who can relay the legends of this Hound? Give some clue as to its origins?”

“We do, we do, Master Dwarf,” the man bobbed his head enthusiastically. “Lloré is his name, and he comes to the Wolf-Spear every night. Asleep now, to be sure, but should be here sometime before sundown.”

“Fine, fine,” Umur nodded, slightly slurring his words. “Anyone else ye’d suggest we speak to?”

“Oh, ah…” the innkeeper faltered, looking around the common room for help.

A man from a nearby table offered. “The mad widow may know somefin’?”

Broegan visibly grimaced at the suggestion. “I suppose, if you’re brave enough to take on the Hound you’re brave enough to face her. Good idea, Anthol. Ymae is her name, and she’s as mysterious and mean as they come, but she does have magic about her.”

“Who leads the church to Justicia here? I would speak to them,” Erin said.

“That would be Father Beacom,” the innkeeper offered. “He’ll be out in the village square by now, ma’am, easy to find.”

“Fine,” the woman pushed away from the table and stood in her white armor. “Hilda, perhaps you’ll join me?”

The hooded woman rose. “I believe I’ll pay the ‘mad widow’ a visit, actually,” she smiled. “From one witch to another, mm?”

Erin nodded, seeing the benefit of dividing their attention to make better time. “Excellent. You two,” she frowned down at Umur and Haffoot. “Sober up. See what you can find out from others. We meet back before sundown, yes?” Without waiting for an answer, she turned on her heel and exited the inn.

The cleric burst from The Wolf-Spear’s doors directly into the village square. The mangy, stray dogs had been replaced by mangy, stray villagers. Only a small handful wandered this way and that across the square, each looking down and huddled as if it were midwinter instead of late summer. Various peddler carts sat forlornly abandoned. Crows and smoke still circled in the air above, and Erin squinted up, frowning. There could be no doubt that Chaos had its oily grasp upon Hirot. The village practically reeked of it.

Father Beacom was, as the innkeeper had promised, easy to find. A thin man of middle years with the cruel face of a hawk stood outside the open doors of the Justicia church, shouting at each passerby. As Erin began striding towards him across the square, his head snapped to regard her with narrowed eyes. He momentarily ceased his shouting until she was well within earshot.

“An outsider,” he said, making the word sound like an insult. “Here to bear witness to the end of the world for all sinners. Are you here to repent, child of the Highest Magistress? Are you ready for the Restoring Flame of Mercy and Justice to pass judgment upon you?” The father’s face was slicked with sweat, out in the square and wearing his heavy robes, and his eyes shone with something close to madness. Erin touched the pale crescent moon around her neck.

“I am Erin Wywood, father,” Erin bowed her head subtly, then straightened. “An acolyte of Shul, the Watcher in the Sky. I would ask what you know of this Hound that plagues Hirot. Ways one might defeat this beast of Chaos the Jarl has failed to see.”

“Shul,” Father Beacom scowled, examining her head to foot. “Well, a disciple of Law at least, though that’s all the good I can say. Your goddess invites the Hound, child, for it only appears under her watchful gaze. You should leave the darkness of your god to come into Justicia’s light, for it is only the repentant who will be left after she cleanses the world.”

Erin stiffened. “You are suggesting Shul is complicit in this Hound’s attack? You, a cleric of Law?”

“I am not suggesting it, child, I am asserting it as so,” Father Beacom pounded a fist into an open hand, emphasizing his words.

“Then you are no true cleric of Justicia and do not serve the forces of Law,” Erin sneered. “As such, you are of no use to me. Stand here and rant to villagers who have no interest in your doomsaying, while I go find a solution to your people’s woes, old man.”

“What did you say!?” he sputtered, face turning purple. “I will bring down Justicia’s wrath upon your head for blasphemy!”

Doom of the Savage Kings, Chapter 4

Doom of the Savage Kings, Chapter 1

At first, it seemed a wolf or shaggy dog had emerged from the evening shadows. Yet when it approached the standing stones, head low, the companions realized that the creature was the size of a small horse. It stalked carefully, black fur bristling, growling in a sound so deep that it was felt as much as heard. Feet tipped by oversized, wicked claws, each a hand’s length, dug into the soft ground as it stepped forward. As it sniffed the air, they saw the thing’s face was as bat-like as it was dog-like, the nose smashed close on its short muzzle. Its ears, too, had a bat-like quality, and the longer the group watched the creature, the less canine it seemed.

“Chaos is here,” Erin breathed, she gripped her curved, silver dagger.

“We must leave this place, now,” the red-haired girl whimpered, eyes wide.

“You stay hidden, lass,” Umur murmured, eyes shining. “Haffoot?”

“If you think we can take it, I’m ready,” the halfling said in a small whisper, breathing shallowly. She held two short blades in her hands, one thin for piercing and one wide for slashing.

“On my charge,” Umur nodded. “Hilda, keep the girl safe.”

As Umur, Haffoot, and Erin broke from the woods, Hilda stood.

“What– what are you doing?” the girl stammered.

“‘Hilda, keep the girl safe’,” the robed woman scoffed. “Let them witness what I can do.”

Hilda threw back her hood. On her forehead was a tattooed marking of a black rectangle, like an empty doorway above her eyes. As she began chanting, the rectangle became outlined in a bright blue light. It was as if a miniature portal beneath the Empty Star from three months earlier had opened upon Hilda Breadon’s forehead. She swept her robed arms wide.

Everything in the darkened clearing changed. The earth dried in an instant. Trees and bushes grew, as if reaching towards the shaggy beast. Weeds erupted from the stones themselves, wending through cracks and bored holes. Just as suddenly, fat snowflakes filled the area as if it were a blizzard instead of late Summer. The black hound was suddenly a smudge of darkness in a white storm.

The others staggered and glanced back, stupefied, at Hilda. Lightning crackled at her forehead and around each hand. Then a flash of searing blue filled the clearing as a bolt of jagged lightning struck the creature at the stone, leaving behind a seared image in everyone’s vision. The creature staggered, then turned to peer malevolently at Hilda, its body smoking. It rumbled a low, dangerous growl.

Erin Wywood, Acolyte of Shul and sworn enemy of Chaos, was the only person not stunned by the display of otherworldly magic. Instead, she smiled savagely. “Ha!” she yelled into the storm, and then charged at the beast.

The white-armored woman, almost invisible in the blizzard, spun and slashed a line across the creature’s cheek. It reared and snarled at her, ready to pounce.

Instead, with a whoop, Haffoot soared past Erin with her thin blade outstretched, impaling the creature’s snout in a spray of black blood. The beast howled in pain, a sound that shook their bones. The howl grew shrill and louder as the creature’s back immediately arched in agony, its bloody nose to the sky, and then it was dissolving into oily black mist. One moment the enormous dog-bat-beast was there, and the next it was snaking tendrils of smoke, quickly dissipating, the pained howl echoing across the clearing.

Where the beast’s legs had once been, Umur completed the chop that felled the creature. The dwarf blinked in surprise at his success and its disappearance, then smiled fiercely at Erin and Haffoot through the falling snow.

It seemed that, with the creature’s death, the storm ceased. Fat, white flakes floated gracefully in the air in rapidly decreasing amounts, then stopped altogether. It had been mere moments, and yet the companions stood in almost a foot of fresh snow, their breath misting in the unexpected cold.

Hilda, stepping with high knees, crunched through the snowy clearing to them. She’d redrawn her hood, and heavy puffs of air were visible from her panting.

“Hilda, I…” Umur began, then lost words as he looked around. Though everything was blanketed in white, they all remembered the sudden growth of vegetation. She had utterly transformed the clearing with power none of them knew she possessed.

“Yes, well,” Hilda chuckled. “I… may not have expected that, exactly.”

“Bloody brilliant, is what it was!” Haffoot whooped. “And Erin, chargin’ that creature through the snow!”

The woman nodded, face stoic. “Your thrust to its head and Umur’s slash to its back seemed to have killed the abomination before it knew we were even there. Well done, all around. Shul’s will be done.”

“We’re bloody heroes, is what we are!” Haffoot pirouetted in the snow and waved a sword overhead. “We’ve saved the village! That girl over there and anyone else who they would’a sacrificed, yeah?”

At that, the four of them turned to the edge of the forest. There, snow on her shoulders and shivering, wide-eyed, the red-haired young woman watched them with dumbfounded awe.

“Come, lass!” Umur called out to her. “Let’s get you back home. The beast is dead.”

After the group had gathered and tromped to the edge of the fresh snowfall, already melting in the late summer evening, they were once more struck by the enormity of Hilda’s magic. Stepping from the snow into the path beyond felt somewhat like stepping through another world, as they’d done a season ago at the old stone mound. Though none of the four Graymoor residents voiced it, they all felt the echoes of that evening leaving the remnants of Hilda’s spell into the seemingly mundane forest path outside of Hirot.

It was entirely dark when they approached the palisades surrounding the village, which stretched a full fifteen feet high. The stout, double gates were closed tight. The five of them walked across the wide clearing towards the gates, and a voice called out from somewhere at the top of the wall.

“Joane? Is that you? Who is that with you?”

The red-haired girl stopped and placed hands on hips, peering up into the darkness. “Nothan, it’s me. Open the gate!”

Thanks to their respective ancestries, both Umur and Haffoot could see perfectly well in the darkness, though the images lacked color. Eyes limned in soft white light, Erin saw just as clearly. Thus it was only Hilda, squinting up into the shadows, who did not see the hawkish, gaunt man who peered over the palisade wall from some sort of platform. He had a simple steel helm atop his head and a long, drooping moustache.

“It can’t be done, Joane,” Nothan shook his head. “Only a direct command from the Jarl can open it after nightfall.”

“So go get him!” the girl stomped her foot.

“Ah, no,” the man said simply, peering down. “Now who are these folks with you, then, and how is it you’re…?”

“Not dead and eaten?” Joane hurled back at him. Nothan visibly flinched. “These outsiders saved me. Killed the Hound dead without even trying, with magic and blades. Go get the Jarl, Nothan! They might be what we need!”

Umur scowled and looked at Haffoot questioningly. The halfling shrugged.

“Magic and blades?” Nothan repeated, rubbing at his mouth. “And hardly trying, you say? That’s quite a tale. Well, you can tell the Jarl yourself in the morning, girl. Sounds like you have good protection through these dark hours. The gate stays closed.”

“Nothan!” Joane shouted, stomping her foot again. Haffoot calmed her with a hand to her arm and some whispered words.

“You have a peculiar way of giving thanks,” Erin called up, crossing arms over her armored chest. “We will wait until the morning and camp here.”

“That’s fine then,” Nothan responded. “I’ll tell the other Night Watch to not shoot you. Just don’t creep around in the dark or you’ll find yourself full of arrows.”

“A peculiar way indeed,” Erin growled, turning to her companions. “Shall we make camp, then?”

Umur sighed. “S’not a warm bed, but ya, fine.”

The group made a fire and ate the last of Hilda’s now-stale baked goods within a stone’s throw of the palisades. After the Night Watch captain’s words, it was unnerving to have the towering wall next to them, where bowman could be lurking at the top between sharpened tree trunks. Still, they made camp and ate. Eventually, bellies more or less full, it was Umur who asked, “So, lass, tell us about this Hound.”

Joane had stayed silent since the interaction with Nothan, seemingly both petulant and in awe of the Graymoor residents. She blinked with large eyes, glancing around at the others before clearing her throat.

“Not much to tell, Master Dwarf. Some months ago, soon as the sun went down, the Hound started appearing, killing people. Lots of people died. Eventually the Jarl decided to start sacrificing one person every three nights to keep it satisfied.”

“Sacrificing? Do say more,” Hilda asked mildly. A fingertip traced the runic writing atop her staff, seemingly studying it in the firelight.

“Yes, ma’am,” Joane’s head bobbed. She seemed, understandably, most in awe of Hilda. The outspoken, foot-stomping girl at the gate had been replaced by a polite, shy companion. “Every third day, the Jarl draws a lot from a box in the village square. That family has to send someone to the standing stones. Today my pa got the lot, and my mum and brother’s already gone.”

“Madness,” Erin scoffed. “What was the Jarl going to do when he ran out of villagers? Fool. Why not fight the creature?”

“Oh,” Joane said. “They’ve fought it a lot, ma’am, and just more people die. Nobody likes drawing lots, but losing one every third day’s kept it out of village, at least. People say the Jarl is working on a plan to defeat it, but I don’t know.”

“Well, that’s all done!” Haffoot piped up, smiling face lit by the fire. “No more sacrifices, yeah? We did the Jarl’s work for him. I wonder if there’ll be a reward?”

Strangely, Joane said nothing, and instead abruptly stood to begin cleaning up after the meal. She was a strong young woman, and clearly used to hard labor. But then with half her family dead, she would have to be. Her actions spurred the others to stand as well, and soon they were settled onto thin blankets and bedrolls to sleep for the night.

The group woke at dawn and had broken camp by the time the heavy wooden doors of the gate swung slowly open. There was Nothan, who, it turned out, was quite tall and older than they’d guessed, with gray streaked in his moustache. He was flanked by a man and woman in green livery, each carrying a spear, and both Watch members eyed the Graymoor residents suspiciously.

“Come in,” Nothan announced, his face serious. “I’ll take you to the Jarl. You stay with them, Joane. He’ll want to hear your tale.”

“Still no word of thanks?” Erin arched an eyebrow. “And no expression of joy for seeing your neighbor returned unharmed?”

“Come on,” was all Nothan said, grim-faced, and turned with the Watch members to escort them. The companions shared a confused, offended look and followed.

Nothan led them past several houses and shops and into a largely empty village square. A few scruffy mongrels picked their way through abandoned shop stalls while ravens circled and cawed overhead. Dark smoke hung forlornly over the village as well, as if it somehow wanted to stay within the protective circle of the wall. Ahead of them, past a large church, a path snaked up a low hill, with the Jarl’s manor atop it. The Night Watch members did not pause to interact with the few, disparate residents who busied themselves in the morning hours, nor did they bother to say a word when those residents paused to gawk at Joane and the outsiders with her.

As they passed a strongbox with a heavy padlock, bolted to a chest-high post, Erin scowled. “Is this used for the lots?” she asked Joane, every word dripping with disdain. The young woman simply bobbed her head, staring at the box with eyes wide. The white-armored woman grunted in disgust and her chin rose imperiously to glare at the manor above them.

The sole structure made entirely of stone was the chapel, and this early in the morning its iron-banded, heavy doors were closed. Above them, carved into the stone, was the symbol of a balanced scale, the sign for the goddess Justicia. Those scales, devotees claimed, must always balance between justice and mercy in equal amounts. As with most gods and goddesses, Graymoor residents found reasons to pray to Justicia, but none of the companions had seen a structure dedicated entirely in her honor, much less one so large. The church was fully twice the size of any other structure in Hirot, even larger than the Jarl’s manor. Umur examined the stonework as they passed and immediately recognized it as the most defensible building were Hirot under siege.

The last four days, the group had trudged through moors and forest, so it was a relief to be on simple, dirt roads. Their boots kicked up dust as they followed Nothan up the winding path to the manor atop the hill. As they crested the rise, a great, squat hall built from enormous timbers, thatched with golden straw, greeted them. Standing in front were more humans in green livery and spears. Nothan raised a hand in greeting and left the companions to speak in low, urgent voices with the manor’s guards.

“They sure aren’t happy we’re here,” Haffoot commented with some bewilderment.

“This entire village feels as if Chaos hangs over it,” Erin grumbled. “It is steeped in despair.”

“They’re in mourning,” said Hilda from beneath her low hood. “Did you see how few people still reside here? Every family must have experienced loss. But still, news of this Hound’s death does not seem to be spreading. It’s… odd.”

One of the guards speaking with Nothan left at a trot, pushing through the front doors of the manor. The Night Watch captain returned, his hatchet face still grim and serious.

“Let’s go,” he said, jerking his chin forward.

“I’m eager to speak with the Jarl,” Umur growled. “Find out what the bloody hells is going on.”

Beside him, Joane bit her bottom lip, looking at the open manor door with something like fear. Reluctantly, she followed the group into the Jarl’s great hall, guardsmen flanking with spears on either side.

Doom of the Savage Kings, Chapter 3

Introduction: Doom of the Savage Kings playthrough

Erin Wywood adjusted the strap on the backpack and allowed herself one glance back at her family’s darkened home. Her brown hair was tied back in a simple ponytail, exposing her pale, freckled face. Erin bit her lip absently, wondering if the note she’d left her parents would be sufficient. With a prayer to her god and a touch to the silver crescent moon hanging at her neck, she decided it would have to be.

Turning, eyes set forward, she picked her way through the sleeping village. Erin made for a ghostly figure in the darkness, dressed in scaled armor painted meticulously, painstakingly in white. Nightbirds, insects, and the crunching of her boots were her journey’s only sounds.

The late-summer sky had turned the same light gray as her eyes by the time she’d reached the outskirts of Graymoor. Waiting for her, leaning against a tree, was a halfling in leathers and flouncy blouse, a tricorn cap atop her head, with a sheathed sword hanging at her hip, another hilt peeking over one shoulder.

“Ethys,” Erin nodded. “I apologize for being late.”

The halfling smiled. “You’re right on time. But please, Erin, I’m leaving that name behind today. Ethys died with Giliam. Just call me Haffoot.”

If the armored young woman had an opinion or retort, she held it back. Instead, she said simply. “Are you ready, then?”

“Yes, but I have a surprise for you,” she grinned, and with that, Haffoot pushed off from the tree and stepped aside.

Another figure moved out from the woods, clad in nearly identical scaled armor as Erin. His had been modified to fit the short, squat frame of a dwarf, and where Erin’s was a brilliant white, Umur Pearlhammer’s was a matte, ominous black. A horned helmet hung from one hip, a sheathed sword from the other.

 “Mornin’ lass,” the dwarf rumbled, scratching at his full beard. “I’ve, been trainin’ ah… Haffoot here and got wind of yer plans. Thought you could use another sword. Hope you don’t mind.”

Erin blinked. “You’d leave your life here, Master Pearlhammer? For places unknown?”

“I’ve been in Graymoor as long as anyone can remember,” Umur shrugged. “Think it’s about time I do somethin’ else. Besides, I’m tired of tellin’ the story of that Spring night over and over.”

A half-grin touched the woman in white’s mouth and a finger strayed the pendant at her neck. “On that we agree. In truth, I’d welcome your sword, and your company.”

Haffoot yelped and did a little dance. “Yes! The three heroes of Graymoor!”

“There were four of us, if I recall,” a voice said from the shadows, and the darkness coalesced into a robed, hooded shape. The others startled, hands moving to weapons.

“H-Hilda?” Haffoot gasped. “Is that you?”

The woman before them bore little resemblance to the baker from their memories. She had lost a good deal of weight, for one. Gone were the simple, flour-stained clothes, replaced by a dark blue cloak over a gray robe and belt laden with pouches. When they had entered the portal that night, Hilda had brought her rolling pin as a weapon. Now she held a sturdy walking staff topped by a wooden sphere carved with symbols.

“By the gods, lass!” Umur sputtered. “No one has seen you in months! They say you went mad in yer home.”

“They would,” Hilda scoffed. “I know you each came calling during that time, though I did not answer my door. For that I thank you.”

“What are you doin’ here?” Haffoot stammered.

“Coming with you, of course. There were four survivors that night, and all of us forever transformed by our time beneath the Empty Star. Where you go, so I follow. Graymoor holds nothing for me.”

“But– but how did you–?”

Hilda waved a hand dismissively. “I simply knew. So. Will you have a hermit of a baker? I brought pastries.” Her mouth, visible beneath the hood, grinned wryly.

“I say yes,” Erin stated decisively. “It is the completion of a full circle, us being together once more. A good omen from Shul for our travels.”

The halfling shrugged, grinning. “As long as I’m away from here and seeing the world. A week ago, I thought I’d be travelin’ alone. This is better. And pastries!”

The three turned to the dwarf.

“I’m happy for the company, Hilda, and ye were always a friend,” Umur said hesitantly. “But can ye defend yerself? We’re headed to the Trollteeth, and the way will be treacherous. This won’t be easy.”

Hilda laughed, though the sound held no joy. “I emerged from the portal untouched, which cannot be said for you, if I recall. But I hear your warning, Master Pearlhammer, and don’t worry. Despite the rumors, I haven’t been sitting idly, going mad in my home. I think you’ll find that I am more than capable of defending myself. You as well, if the need arises.”

The way she said it made the others pause for one quizzical, uncomfortable moment. It was Haffoot who broke the silence.

“It’s settled then. I’m happy to have you all here on my wanderin’. Let’s head to the mountains and away from here before anyone wakes and sees us, yeah? Imagine the stir all four of us being gone will cause! The tales they’ll tell!” She laughed, and then clapped two hands over her giggling smile.

They headed east, through the wooded moors beyond the old stone mound and away from the Teawood River. It was slow going, through marshy ground and tangles of low-hanging, dense forest, though the weather was mild and pleasant for late summer. The four spoke little beyond helping one another navigate the way through the wild country, but it was a companionable silence, each focused on the effort of moving ahead.

It wasn’t until late in the afternoon–sitting in a small glade upon a fallen log and munching gratefully on Hilda’s pastries and fruit from Haffoot–that the question of their destination arose for the first time.

“Why the Trolltooth Mountains, then?” Hilda asked, her face still mysteriously hooded.

Haffoot shrugged and answered around a mouthful of apple. “There’s a stretch on the Teawood when, on a clear day, you can see ‘em in the distance. For years I went back and forth on the skiff, passin’ that place. The mountains became a, I don’t know, dream, I guess? Giliam and I used to talk of it as a place we’d go someday. When I decided to leave Graymoor and give up tea-haulin’, well… it seemed like where I’d start.”

“I was born in the Trollteeth, deep beneath the mountains,” Umur said, swallowing his food. The rest of them gaped, and he chuckled at their reaction. “Ya, I haven’t spoken of it, and I’ve not been back in a long, long while. But if we make it that far, I’ll introduce you to Arenor. It’s a grand city, at least in my memory.”

“That sounds amazing,” Haffoot smiled widely. “What’s between here and there, then?”

Umur grunted. “Mostly this. Forest, rivers, moors, then foothills. But there are human villages and towns, too.”

Erin hummed, thinking. “My grampa has talked about a village named Hirot, a few days from Graymoor towards the mountains and along another river. Perhaps we can find it.”

“For a bed and warm meal, t’would be worth a search,” Umur agreed. “You’ll see tonight that sleeping in a marsh leaves little to recommend it.”

The ensuing days of travel passed as a mosaic of shallow bogs, tangled brush, clouds of insects, and moss-covered trees. It was clear why Graymoor had no contact with the villages to its east, Hirot or otherwise. The group encountered no footpaths or roads, and it was only glimpses of the Trolltooth peaks through the canopy that kept them moving in hopeless circles. As Umur warned, they all slept poorly, thanks to the wet, soft ground, biting pests, and especially the eerie, unfamiliar night sounds.

Despite the hardships, the four of them discovered that they were compatible travel companions. Haffoot remained positive and upbeat, seemingly happy to be anywhere as long as it was unusual and unfamiliar. Umur, despite so many decades in Graymoor, proved to be a competent survivalist and guide. Erin grated on everyone with her constant prayers and earnest lack of joy, yet her singing voice was a balm to weary minds, and she seemed determined to work harder than the other three combined no matter what obstacle confronted them.

Finally, Hilda remained an enigma, but not an unpleasant one. She complained not at all, and indeed her stamina rivaled them all. Like Haffoot, she seemed to be content wherever they found themselves, and sporadically surprised them with her gentle kindness and generosity. If the others had a complaint, it was that Hilda revealed little of her thoughts even in evening downtime, and always she kept her hood drawn and face shrouded. When asked about the hood directly, she deflected with a mysterious grin.  

 After three days, they reached a river, which they surmised was where the village Hirot lay, either upriver or down. Umur directed them downriver for nearly half a day before declaring it the wrong direction, and so they backtracked. Even this waste of a day seemed to only amuse Haffoot, and both Erin and Hilda bore the distance stoically.

Such it was that, late in the afternoon on their fourth day, they began to discover worn footpaths and signs of civilization. A simple dock like the one in Graymoor sat unoccupied except for a single raft, around it a collection of oars and wooden buckets. The forest had been cleared on their side of the riverbank, and as the group rounded a bend they saw, in the distance, a tall wall made of sturdy tree trunks, sharpened at their tops. Smoke from several chimneys rose from beyond the wall, as did a low hill with a large manor atop it. Ravens circled overhead in lazy circles.

Village sounds drifted to them in the heavy summer air: the clink of hammers, a sharp whinny of a horse, and human voices calling out indecipherably.

“There we go,” Umur smiled, stroking his beard. “I do believe we’ve found Hirot.”

Before they were halfway to the large gate, the heavy, wooden doors swung open before them. The companions stopped and watched as a line of human villagers emerged, dour-faced and bearing a variety of wood axes, knives, staves, and pitchforks. Immediately following the line were five armored men and women astride horses, the last of which was a giant of a man in a fur cloak despite the season. Neither the villagers nor horses were in a hurry; it seemed they almost walked against their will, an invisible rope compelling them forward despite half-hearted resistance.

As they approached, one of the armored men, a patch over one eye, called to his party and pointed at the group from Graymoor. The villagers gripped their shoddy weapons fearfully and stepped back in a disorganized cluster, while those on horseback trotted forward.

The bear of a man from the back rode to the front. He was in his later years, bald atop his head with gray strings dangling over his ears and neck. Scars crisscrossed the slab of his face above a bushy gray beard. Hands as big as hams, calloused and scarred, pulled on his reigns to stop. This close, the furred cloak over his worn armor was clearly a wolf pelt, its head adorning one shoulder. The man’s horse whickered and danced as he towered over them, looking down imperiously. His four armored companions flared out to either side, creating a semi-circle around Umur and the others.

“Who are you?” the man said a deep, gravely voice. “What business have you here?”

“Is this Hirot?” Erin said, straightening.

“It is,” the man growled. “And I am its Jarl. Now answer my questions.”

“We’re travelers,” Umur said, holding both hands up in a sign of peace. “Simply lookin’ for a warm bed to stay the night and chance to restock food supplies. Then we’d be on our way.”

“Travelers?” the Jarl scoffed. “Here? Begone, dwarf. We have no need for whatever trouble you bring.”

“You’d deny travelers hospitality?” Erin gasped.

“I’d deny armed troublemakers in my town,” he snarled back. “Now out of the way. We have grave business before us.” He jerked his head, and he and the other horse riders wheeled around, returning to the line of nervous villagers.

Erin, Umur, and the others stepped aside to give a wide berth to the procession. The villagers trudged past them, glancing anxiously at the Graymoor group but mostly keeping their eyes down. They appeared bedraggled and worn, some underfed and all despairing. Only as they passed was it clear that the group carried a red-haired young woman, gagged and bound with thick rope. When the woman saw the outsiders, she squirmed and thrashed, yelling incoherently through her gag. Two peasants moved to help those holding her, while an older man shushed and pat her, openly weeping.

“What is the meaning of this?” Erin demanded of the closest figure on horseback, a hardened woman of middle years with a strong jaw and corded muscle.

“Don’t you mind,” she shook her head, warning. “Just leave it be.”

“You see,” the Jarl bellowed as he passed. “We have enough trouble in Hirot. We do not need yours.”

The procession did not proceed to the river, but instead followed a cleared path through the woods parallel and away from the walled village. The Jarl and his lieutenants peered suspiciously at the Graymoor companions with every clop of their horse’s hooves, radiating an aura of promised violence. Umur, for his part, scowled and stared with crossed arms over his broad chest. Erin said a fervent prayer, clutching at her pale crescent pendant. Hilda simply held her staff unmoving, face hidden behind her hood.

“What do we do?” Haffoot said, wringing her hands. “We can’t let them do… Whatever it is they’re doin’ to that girl. Can we?”

“Of course not,” Erin said. “Chaos is afoot. It is good that Shul led us here to deal with it under his watchful gaze.”

“We’ll follow,” Umur agreed. “But not be seen, ya? We don’ know yet what’s happenin’.”

“Yes. Let them go. I will seek Shul’s guidance.”

Haffoot danced anxiously, watching the group of Hirot slowly, arduously disappear beyond a bend. The Jarl’s lieutenant with the eye patch lingered in the back of the procession and turned in his saddle to spy the Graymoor group until his group was fully out of sight. Then he too was gone.

“It is good we are in a clearing, with an unencumbered view,” Erin announced in the uncomfortable silence that followed. Without preamble, she sat cross-legged in the soft earth. “It would be better were it night, but here we are. Now, please, quiet.”

The other three looked to each other quizzically as the white-armored woman began to hum, her gaze skyward.

Haffoot gasped as Erin’s open, unblinking eyes began to glow white, visible even in the afternoon sunlight. It was, they would all agree later, like a full moon shone from behind her gaze. At the same time, the white-armored woman’s hum increased to a haunting, enigmatic melody that none would be able to describe or repeat.

After less than a minute, Erin blinked repeatedly. When she’d gained her bearings, the glow from her eyes was gone. Hilda helped her stand, and Erin thanked her with a grateful nod.

“We should not interfere with the Jarl,” she proclaimed. “Until after he’s gone. Then it will be safe.”

“I coulda told you not to interfere,” Umur grumbled. “I don’ relish fightin’ armored men on horseback, and make no doubt they would draw swords if we tried anythin’.”

“But that was plumb amazin’, Erin!” Haffoot clapped. “You truly do have a connection with Shul, yeah?”

“Of course,” the woman said, somewhat defensively. “I am an acolyte to my god, his vessel and weapon.”

“Well, it’s somethin’ to watch, that’s for sure,” Haffoot smiled. “C’mon. Let’s go.”

They moved into the forest, walking always with the path in sight. It was slow going as they aimed to move quietly, and every crash of bramble made them collectively wince.

Thankfully, the procession from Hirot had not traveled far. To the east from the walled village, atop a clearing on a low headland, were large stones set in a squat block. It reminded the four of them of the old stone mound near Graymoor, yet whereas those boulders were eerily untouched by the nature around them, these standing stones were draped in moss. There were fewer stones as well, only four rounded, verdant boulders leaning against one another.

In the clearing, around the stones, Hirot villagers and warriors atop horseback watched as several men wrestled with the bound woman and attempted to secure her with thick rope to the stones.

“Are they goin’ to kill her, then?” Haffoot whispered, crouching low with the others. “Like a sacrifice or somethin’?”

“If they attempt it, we will stop them,” Erin whispered back with conviction, and one hand gripped the dagger’s hilt at her side.

“Hush now,” Umur cautioned.

The Jarl, grim-faced, watched as the men managed to attach the rope at the young woman’s wrists overhead to the central standing stone. He said something in his low, gruff voice, but it was difficult to hear from distance. As they loosened her gag, however, the woman’s response carried clearly to them through the early evening air.

“Please! Don’t leave me! Father, father!”

The weeping man who had been shushing her before fell to his knees, face buried in hands and sobbing uncontrollably. Several villagers pulled him to stand, muttering words fervently to him. The Jarl allowed the scene to continue for several heartbeats, but eventually barked a command. The horses and their riders turned to retrace their way back to Hirot. Reluctantly, many crying and pulling the girl’s father with them, the villagers followed.

The Graymoor companions waited a long while to make sure the Jarl and his procession had left. It was dusk when they padded out of the brush and towards the mossy boulders. As they did so, they saw that the central stone had holes bored into it, through which the woman’s rope had been threaded. The woman herself had collapsed against her crude shackles, sniffling and eyes closed. When she heard the snap of a twig underfoot, her eyes flew wide and terrified, heading swiveling everywhere. Then she saw the companions and whispered urgently.

“Please! Please help me!”

“Ay, lass, be still. We’ll get ye down,” Umur said reassuringly. He drew the longsword from his hip in one fluid motion and, with a single chop, severed the rope above the woman’s wrists. She collapsed to the ground, immediately pulling at the ropes around her ankles.

“Hold,” Erin said imperiously. She had drawn the crescent-shaped blade from its scabbard and leveled it at the girl. “What madness is this? What crime have you committed that your own father brings you here? Explain.”

“C-crime? What?” the woman stammered, her tear-streaked face wide-eyed and swiveling amongst the four of them. “I’m not being punished! My family drew the lot. I’m to be sacrificed!”

“To what?” Haffoot cocked her head.

“Please,” she gasped. “I’ll explain everything, but we must get away. It’s already dusk, so it will be here soon. Please hurry!”

“Let’s return to the forest,” Hilda offered calmly. “And see what arrives.”

Haffoot and Hilda led the way back to the brush. Erin followed, pulling the girl, stumbling, with her. Umur secured the shield to his arm, then backed away with sword raised.

Moments after they had returned to the woods, the creature arrived.

Doom of the Savage Kings, Chapter 2

• Level 1: Umur Pearlhammer
• Level 1: Ethys Haffoot
• Level 1: Erin Wywood
• Level 1: Hilda Breadon

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Here we goooo! My surviving Portal characters have leveled up (links above) and so it is time for their first story as true adventurers. Which also means that it’s time for me to play the full breadth of Dungeon Crawl Classics’ excellent rules. I’m super excited, which you can probably tell by the frequency with which these posts have been coming. Don’t expect this same pace forever, but for now I’m still, shall we say, gung-ho about this project.

Before I jump into the narrative, though, there are a number of topics I want to cover, namely: a) why I chose Doom of the Savage Kings as my Level-1 adventure, b) a modification to the leveling and experience system from the core rulebook that I’m using for my solo-play stories, and c) my addition of Level 0 retainers to the party to serve as backup characters (and possible fodder), and finally d) when and where this adventure will take place relative to The Portal Under the Stars, and  one veeerrrrrry significant event that will have occurred between stories.

Doom of the Savage Kings

One of the joys of discovering DCC a dozen years after its original release is that there are literally hundreds of published adventures, plus a metric ton of supplemental materials (some of which I’ve linked to in the character level-up posts). I admit that choosing a single module as my jumping off point was difficult.

Eventually, I decided on either The People of the Pit or Doom of the Savage Kings. Why these two? Primarily because both are in the Tome of Adventure, Volume 1, a collection of the first seven adventures published for DCC by Goodman Games that I own. I admit that I don’t really understand their numbering conventions… Why is Doom #66.5? But whatever. They are written by two of DCC’s most revered progenitors, Joseph Goodman and Harley Stroh, respectively, so I felt like I would be in good hands with either. I sat down to read both in their entirety to decide.

Not surprisingly, both are great and sound epic. I chose Doom for two reasons. First, it was easier to envision the group of 4 PCs (plus retainers!) moving into the events of Doom over People given that I wanted the PCs to leave Graymoor behind. Second, The People of the Pit seems… complex, and I read some forum posts that suggested that a Judge would need to modify it, possibly heavily, before running it successfully. Given that I’ll be struggling through the full complement of rules for the first time, I thought it wise to stick to something simpler. Which is not to say that Doom is a simple, linear module. Quite the contrary; Doom of the Savage Kings is a sandbox with a lot of options for the PCs to explore.

Experience and Leveling

Something that bothers me about every level-based TTRPG is the idea that PCs can make a sudden jump in abilities with a snap of the fingers. Wizards learn new spells, Warriors become significantly tougher and learn new moves, Thieves understand more complex locks, all in an instant, usually the second that a random monster dies. It breaks all immersion for me. In my mind, new abilities should be earned by taking the experience of the adventure and applying it to dedicated training or some other event. My fiction blurbs for each level-up post demonstrate the sort of story that makes sense to me.

Leveling up in Dungeon Crawl Classics is based on experience points (XP), calculated from encounters that the party survives. Moreover, each level requires subsequently more XP, so the gap between leveling up gets longer. The system is straightforward, and I haven’t heard a single DCC player complain about it. On one hand, then, I feel squeamish about fiddling with the standard leveling system before I’ve even tried it. On the other hand, I’ve played a ton of games using similar systems and it’s my solo game, so screw it… I’m fiddling.

One of the many, many things that charms me about DCC is the adventure design. Gone are long, epic campaigns in massive, published tomes. Almost every adventure in DCC is self-contained and around 30 pages or less (sometimes half as much), including backmatter, maps, items, and monsters. It is incumbent upon the Judge and players to weave these adventures together into a larger narrative, exploring individual quests and emergent threads as they come. There is a good video by Matthew Colville describing why I prefer this approach.

Since I started playing Pathfinder 2E, I’ve become a fan of milestone leveling over XP-based leveling. It doesn’t solve the “Voila! You now have a bunch of new powers!” issue, but it at least allows for characters reaching levels at good story points versus immediately after, say, killing the fourth giant centipede in a tunnel. The primary downsides of milestone leveling are a) the absence of rewards for players who take side quests or who want to fully explore the setting, and b) a potential for uneven progression from level to level if a party takes a shortcut (or doesn’t). I’ve been lucky to GM and play in groups who fully embrace roleplaying and character development, and all have leaned heavily towards a milestone system without these downsides getting in the way.

Combining ideas from those previous two paragraphs, the system I want to try is leveling based on adventure completion. It was the core rulebook that first planted this idea in my head, because it says, “As an optional rule, consider allowing any 0-level characters that survive their first adventure to automatically advance to 1st-level and 10 XP.” I’m planning to stick to published adventures for this first DCC foray, and since all of them are relatively consistent on length, they provide their own story milestones. Moreover, there is built-in downtime between modules so that I don’t have to make up some goofy reason why they gain new abilities. The idea I’m considering is one published adventure to reach Level 2, two to reach Level 3, and possibly three or more for higher levels. Knowing my own proclivities, I suspect that I’ll have individual quests and narratives for each PC between adventures, and these will be included in the level-up process somehow.

Just in case, I’m going to track XP in the background as I play to see how well my system matches the published advancement table. If I’m wildly off in either direction, I’ll adjust.

Level-0 Retainers

Something that surprised and concerned me when reading possible Level-1 adventures for my party was that every single one of them suggested more than four PCs. Indeed, Doom of the Savage Kings states “this adventure is designed for 6 to 12 1st-level characters.” Yikes. Once again, I wish that I’d included more peasants in Portal.

Thankfully, DCC comes built with the idea of retainers or henchmen, extra characters traveling with the PCs with the promise of steady pay and a share of the treasure. It hadn’t really bothered me that most games treat adventuring parties as the full group of travelers until I considered retainers. Now I’m slightly incredulous at the idea that four lone villagers would consider moving from dangerous locale to dangerous locale with no help and no hangers-ons. Of course people would join the PCs, either hired or because of the party’s growing celebrity.

I’m going to hopefully learn from my Portal mistake and not skimp on the Level-0 characters joining the party. I’ll make 8 total peasants, and these will both provide the PCs some extra help during Doom and possible Level-1 back-up characters if Umur, Ethys, Erin, or Hilda die. Unlike Portal, I’m not going to work too hard to flesh out all 8 of them in the narrative. Instead, they will be very much in the background unless called upon to be more. In addition, they will not be from Graymoor, but instead from the village of Doom of the Savage Kings’ setting: Hirot.

Here are the 8 redshirts accompanying the party:

Will any of these Hirot peasants survive to Level 1, much less become the hero of future tales? I can’t wait to find out!

Story Timeline & Events

Finally, I want to take a breath to consider what’s happened between the end of The Portal Under the Stars and the beginning of Doom of the Savage Kings. As outlined in each level-up post, in the two months after returning from that night beneath the Empty Star, each of our PCs in some way reshaped their identities. Master Umur succumbed to the pull of adventure, revealing some sort of mysterious past that sullied the Pearlhammer name in his dwarven homeland. Ethys abandoned the tea-hauling life she had with her now-deceased brother and vowed to leave Graymoor, calling herself Haffoot the Wanderer. Erin, Acolyte of Shul, sequestered herself within her room (to the distress of her family), and meticulously painted one of the suits of scale mail white while communing with her god of the moon. Finally, poor Hilda continued with her life as a baker, spending late nights staring into the magical orb she took from the portal. Unfortunately for her, one night a being stared back, breaking Hilda’s mind and sending her on the path of wizard. All of that took two months, and presumably over that time the four also attended many funerals for their companions, answered three thousand questions, and found themselves celebrities within gossipy Graymoor.

Portal began in early Spring, whatever this world’s equivalent is to March. I’ll say that three more months passed before Doom kicks off, taking them to the end of Summer, the equivalent of late August. In that time, Umur would have fully succumbed to the sword, and tells himself it’s okay because he’s training Haffoot (who shows a remarkable skill with two blades, one of which is Mythey’s shortsword). Erin would eventually emerge from her room, serene and aloof to her family, and rarely singing of anything except hymns to the moon. Over the summertime, our acolyte of Shul would realize that Graymoor has no place for her anymore, and that the portal beneath the full moon was a calling to a different place. When Haffoot proclaims that it’s time to wander, Erin volunteers to accompany the halfling.

In that last month before leaving, Hilda will attempt to cast her Patron Bond spell, perhaps the first time she’s cast anything except Read Magic. She has abandoned her bakery, and now spends all her time with the orb. This spell is a chance to more fully commit herself to Ptah-Ungurath, Opener of the Way, though she doesn’t know her patron’s identity or nature.

It’s a little weird to have my first DCC spellcasting occur “off camera,” but it’s a spell that a) takes a week to cast, b) will provide me a good handhold to Hilda’s state of mind and body as she undertakes the adventure, and c) as I say below, if successful will make her spells more useful. So here goes…

Casting a spell as a Wizard requires a spellcheck, which is d20 + 1 (Hilda’s level, she has no other bonuses or penalties from her Intelligence). She can also “spellburn,” which temporarily reduces one of her physical stats (Strength, Agility, or Stamina) to enhance the spell. Spellburn will be great for Hilda later on because of her high Stamina, however, for this casting she won’t understand the importance of sacrificing her body for her magic. She’ll go into this spell proverbially blind.

Patron Bond’s purpose is for the Wizard to commit herself to the service of her Patron, forming a pact for its service. If successful, she replaces Patron Bond with the spell Invoke Patron, which only takes 1 round to cast and does all sorts of useful things. If unsuccessful, well… that will suck for Hilda, both because she won’t be able to try again for a month and because she will begin to be tainted in horrific ways.

For the spell to work, she needs to roll an 11 or better on d20, literally a 50/50 shot. I’m emotionally ready for either outcome. Here we go…

Hilda rolls… a [17 +1] 18! That’s amazing, and here is the core rulebook text of what happens: “The caster makes contact with their patron and is granted a mark of favor. They receive a prominent mark of the patron on their face. The caster learns the spell Invoke Patron as it related to their patron and may cast it once per day at a +1 bonus to the spell check. Each time they cast Invoke Patron, the caster is indebted to their patron, who will call in the debt as some point.”

Woo! Amazing. Per her Mercurial Magic roll, she will also get +4 to spell checks for her first 3 (rolled on d4) spell checks in the adventure. Whenever she casts Invoke Patron, this bonus will be for d4 rounds (not checks).

That’s about as good as I could have hoped for, and now I must think about her facial, Post Malone-like mark from Ptah-Ungurath. I’ll reveal whatever I come up with in the first Doom write-up.

And with that auspicious beginning… I’m ready to start the next adventure!

Doom of the Savage Kings, Chapter 1

Level 1: Umur Pearlhammer

Level 1: Ethys Haffoot

Level 1: Erin Wywood

It’s time for the fourth and final member of our surviving Funnel party for my Dungeon Crawl Classics storytelling (the other three are linked above). If you’ve been reading along to this point, there is absolutely no surprise what class I’m choosing for Graymoor’s village baker, Hilda Breadon. Yep, she’s the Wizard. On paper, Ethys or Erin look like better fits, but the story with Hilda as the Wizard makes too much sense to ignore.

Here was Hilda’s Level-0 character sheet:

Hilda Breadon. Level 0 Baker. STR 9, AGL 11, STA 18, PER 9, INT 11, LCK 11. Init +0; Atk rolling pin +0 melee (1d4); AC 10; HP 7; MV 30′; Act 1d20; SV Fort +3, Ref +0, Will +0; LNG Common; AL Lawful; Equipment: chain, flour, 26cp.

Hilda was my first and only 18 on any single ability score. She is as tough as they come, with a +3 Stamina and whopping 7 hit points. Unfortunately, everything else about her is utterly average. Until the very end of her adventures, she wielded a rolling pin for goodness’ sake! Once I’d started playing and writing Portal, you may notice that I gave Hilda almost no airtime in the narrative until the end.

One I realized she may very well survive to be Level 1, I assumed her toughness would translate into a mediocre Warrior. But then her greedy nature started to emerge from the story, and I became more and more comfortable with Hilda as a Wizard. As I heard in an interview with one of the DCC designers, Wizards are the junkies in the game, interested in acquiring power at the expense of themselves and those around them. That fit my understanding of Hilda perfectly. Then the party found a magic orb, which was my excuse for granting her spells and a patron.

As I’ve said before, many people believe the bonkers magic system is the best thing about DCC, and Wizard spellcasting is really what they’re talking about. There’s a lot to cover, so let’s dive right in…

Hit Points: As the Wizards of almost any old school game, Hilda only gets d4 hit points per level. Thankfully, she has a good base, will min out at half, and will get that sweet +3 bonus. The roll is… 4! Ha! Hilda will start her adventures as the hardiest mage in the land, flexing with 14 hit points, the most of any party member!

Magic: Alright, here is what we came to see. Magic in DCC is unpredictable, dangerous, and inhuman… great powers granted from otherworldly patrons that, over time, fundamentally transform the caster. At first level, Hilda will have learned 4 spells from the whisperings of her patron through the mysterious orb. As with Erin, she will need to make a spell check to cast these spells, which will be d20 + 1 (her level). Here are the spells she received, rolled randomly on a table from the core rulebook:

Spell 1: Read Magic, which is boring but makes sense as a first step towards being a Wizard, especially for a villager who may not have even been able to read at all. I suspect this was her first spell. Next we roll on the very-fun Mercurial Magic table to see how this spell expresses itself. The idea here is that spells vary based on several factors, including how it was gained, who’s casting it, etc. For Read Magic, Hilda will transform into a man for 1 hour after casting the spell (unless she fails to cast it, in which case it will last a full day). Ha! That will be interesting.

Spell 2: Feather Fall, which allows her (or someone of her choosing) to avoid falling damage. Unfortunately, the spell is also a vermin attractor, bringing a cloud of bothersome insects at Hilda for 1d4 rounds after she’s completed the spell, biting and distracting her during that time. Ouch.

Spell 3: Patron Bond, which is amazing. It takes a full week to cast, but doing so puts her in direct contact with her patron (which we’ll get to below), forming a permanent pact with it. This is not a spell to cast lightly but is just filled to the brim with story consequences. Even cooler, after casting it the Mercurial Magic table tells me that she gains a psychic focus, clearing her mind and granting her a +4 bonus to 1d4 spell checks afterwards (it’s technically 1d4 rounds by the table, but that makes less sense for a casting time of 1 week). This overall spell result makes me giddily happy.

Spell 4: Chill Touch, which allows Hilda to give a necromantic touch of the dead, damaging opponents. And… on my goodness… I rolled a 01 on percentile dice for Mercurial Magic, which means every time she casts it, someone she knows dies! Holy crap. That is horrifying all around, and I suspect she won’t immediately figure out this cost until later.

What an interesting assortment of spells and side effects. There’s a little utility, a little offense (at great cost), and Patron Bond for pure craziness. Hilda is going to be fascinating.

Supernatural Patron: Who is speaking to Hilda through the veil of the magical crystal orb, granting her these dread powers? The core rulebook provides a handful of detailed options, and not surprisingly the DCC community has increased the list exponentially (check out here and here and here for great free resources). I’m going to rely on this delightful book, because there is a Patron there that fits The Portal Under the Stars, perfectly: Ptah-Ungurath, Opener of the Way. I won’t say much about him now, but I will say that he is terrifying, cosmically vast, and someone that Hilda should want to avoid. But it’s the key to her powers, and she wants more power, so we’ll explore that conundrum as the adventures unfold. I may tweak the “insects” effect on Feather Fall above with this Patron in mind, keeping the effect but changing how it manifests. Anyway, when her Level 1 adventure kicks off, she will not know the name of her Patron, much less his ineffable nature. Will she have cast Patron Bond yet when the adventure kicks off? This is something I’ll ponder.

Other Abilities: As a Wizard, Hilda can’t really wear armor, so yay for piles of hit points. There are circumstances under which she could obtain a familiar and learn extra languages, but those haven’t happened yet. Finally, she gets a +1 to her Reflex and Will saves, which means she’ll have bonuses to all three.

Title: None of the suggested titles for Wizards work for the image I have of Hilda in my mind. She is not part of an order and is not self-taught, nor does she even understand schools or types of magic. Instead, it is the simple act of spending time with an orb that gives her access to speak with an otherworldly entity that is the reason for any magic she possesses. She’s a vessel, not a scholar, akin to a Sorcerer, Warlock, or Witch in D&D/Pathfinder terms more than a Wizard. The portal she entered to get this orb opened under the light of the Empty Star, so I think this will be Hilda’s inspiration. As she embraces this new path before her, she’ll stop referring to her family name (yes, a baker named Breadon maybe was a little too spot on, but I do crack myself up) and instead call herself Hilda of the Empty Star. This title fits the Patron perfectly, so Ptah-Ungurath will be pleased.

Here she is, in all her soon-to-be-corrupted glory:

My choices over these four level-ups will drive any min-max power-gamers insane. I made a dwarf with bonuses only in non-combat stats my frontline fighter. The closest thing to a thief has 6 Agility, and my cleric is the only PC with a negative Personality modifier. To top it all off, I took the only character of the four without an Intelligence bonus and made her my mage. Do I want them all to die or fail miserably? On the contrary, I am pulling for my party of four, desperately hoping they survive their first big adventure. But you don’t play DCC to win, you play to tell a great story. These four PCs, I am confident, have terrific stories on the horizon (assuming they don’t die horribly in the first encounter). I can’t wait to get started!

But first, a look at Hilda’s early corrup–, er transformation…

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Hilda closed the shutters of her home with practiced ease. She’d already given her unbought items to Redor from the Beggar’s Alehouse, cleaned her kitchen, and prepped ingredients for tomorrow. Thanks to farmer Beeford, she still had an abundance of peaches, so tomorrow she’d decided to bake peach cobblers in addition to her usual items. Hilda knew several people who would be delighted.

She wiped her hands on her stained apron before removing it. Hilda wrinkled her nose. There was washing to do, but not tonight. She’d do it tomorrow. Tossing the apron aside, she turned to her bedroom with anticipation in her tired eyes.

Without cleaning face or hands from the day, Hilda removed her clothes and donned her nightgown. Everything she’d done today had been rote, like an ox pulling its cart. She baked her wares, smiled when it was required, made small talk with her neighbors and patrons, and performed her necessary chores. To anyone paying close attention, however, the shadows beneath her eyes had grown darker each day, a yawn always barely contained behind her lips. She’d lost weight, too, giving more unsold items to the Alehouse and rarely eating them. If anyone had noticed, none had brought it to her attention. They must have thought she was still recovering from her ordeal from the night in the portal. They could not be more mistaken.

Hilda sat cross-legged on her bed and carefully uncovered the item beneath her blankets. Shimmering light filled the room. There, in the center of her mattress, sat a crystal orb the size of a small watermelon, its pale light casting dancing shadows around the room. Her eyes sparkled at seeing it, the smile on her face genuine and wide for the first time today.

“Hello,” she whispered, caressing the orb lovingly. “Will you visit me tonight, then?”

She did not know how long she stared at its depths, yearning and wishing it to change. It had been days since the last visitation. And ho! Was that a flicker of blue amidst the white tonight? Hilda rubbed her eyes and then the orb, looking again. Yes, most assuredly a small square of blue, and growing. Her smile widened.

With an almost sensual sigh, Hilda waited. Soon the orb’s light was a pale blue, like the portal beneath the Empty Star into which she and the others had entered. Embracing the sensation, she felt herself pulled into a great vastness within the small sphere, beyond anything her mind could grasp. Hilda Breadon had never left the outskirts of the village of Graymoor, never considered that her home sat on a continent of land, surrounded by vast oceans upon a wider world. How, then, could she hope to comprehend an entire universe, full of countless planets living and dead, floating within a sea of stars and empty void? Her utter insignificance, her soul infinitely less meaningful than a mote of dust landing upon the Teawood River… Hilda had no words nor frame of reference as she lost herself to the orb’s cosmic scope. But lose herself she did, for hours on end, until the dead of night. Something unlocked within Hilda on these nights, though she could not explain to herself how or what.

Hilda stared vacantly at the blue orb, all sense of individuality gone, as she had done a handful of nights in the past two months. Tonight, however, was the first that a figure moved into view. A slender, hairless man, his body not so much black as the absence of anything, stared back at her from the orb’s interior. For long moments he considered her, as Hilda sat on her bed, staring, drooling, moaning, and expelling her bowels without care.

Then he spoke, and Hilda Breadon’s unprepared mind shattered into fragments as numerous as stars in the sky.

Introduction: Doom of the Savage Kings playthrough