Dec 18, 2021 8:22 am
Chapter 1. Heroes at the gates
Targos - 16 Uktar 10:00The razorwind blows from the north as if punishing you for daring to brave the road to Targos.
It's like there's no sound - there's no room for it amongst the relentless white roar. Sight, sound, touch, smell, taste - all are useless. The only sense you have left is a ragged sense of habit as you battle blindly forward. Wrestling. Auril. For. Each. Contested. Step.
Any clerics who say hell is hot have never walked the lonely Icewind trails.
The wind abates long enough for you to open your slitted eyes. It's as if the Frostmaiden Herself is proudly presenting a gore-strewn scene.
Behold their fine offering! And yet the sun rises not.
The blood of Auril's toll stains the crossroad's frost; a human sacrifice decided by lottery, tied to a broken mast, to be dismembered by yeti, crag cats, ice trolls and the other of the Frostmaiden's night-children.
Down the road beyond the sacrifice, guilty Targos lies on Maer Dualdon. High palisades surround the town, yet her wooden gates lie open, guarded only by a snow-covered table.
Failure to hold token punishable by DEATH
Beneath the official pokerwork sign, half-buried on the snow-laden table, is a bowl containing numbered wooden discs - Targos's grim lottery tickets.
The town beyond the gates seems almost abandoned. The only signs of life are thin candlelight strained through shuttered windows and two bundled figures in the street.
The mood in Targos is as dark as Icewind's neverlight skies. Karl's number had come up last night. He wasn't a good man, Targos has few of those, but he was a man all the same and a good sailor.
The Lottery isn't any more dangerous than fishing the icy Maer; the one-in-a-thousand odds of being chosen are long compared to the chance of being dragged into the lake by a Knucklehead - but that's not the point. It's that it's your maties who string you up to die alone in the cold; that's the cruelty. The town wasn't really mourning Karl but their lost humanity.
This morning, Anders and Okto found the Trip's atmosphere was as taught as a mainsheet a'tempest and as likely to snap. Of course, it was always tense the day after a sailor's death, so it was usually like that now. They decamp from the sailors' taven; perhaps The Flags will be less oppressive.
As they brave the windblown streets they see three figures, bundled in furs, approach the gate from the 'Shander road. Their thick clothing hides their forms, but a faint ringing of bells accompanies their approach.
The Ten Towns are dying. Unhappy is the land without heroes and woe unto the land that needs them.
You stand at the gates.
Targos - 16 Uktar 10:00
OOC:
Bells, Ilenos, and Rayne approach the town.It's like there's no sound - there's no room for it amongst the relentless white roar. Sight, sound, touch, smell, taste - all are useless. The only sense you have left is a ragged sense of habit as you battle blindly forward. Wrestling. Auril. For. Each. Contested. Step.
Any clerics who say hell is hot have never walked the lonely Icewind trails.
The wind abates long enough for you to open your slitted eyes. It's as if the Frostmaiden Herself is proudly presenting a gore-strewn scene.
Behold their fine offering! And yet the sun rises not.
The blood of Auril's toll stains the crossroad's frost; a human sacrifice decided by lottery, tied to a broken mast, to be dismembered by yeti, crag cats, ice trolls and the other of the Frostmaiden's night-children.
Down the road beyond the sacrifice, guilty Targos lies on Maer Dualdon. High palisades surround the town, yet her wooden gates lie open, guarded only by a snow-covered table.
Failure to hold token punishable by DEATH
Beneath the official pokerwork sign, half-buried on the snow-laden table, is a bowl containing numbered wooden discs - Targos's grim lottery tickets.
The town beyond the gates seems almost abandoned. The only signs of life are thin candlelight strained through shuttered windows and two bundled figures in the street.
OOC:
Anders and Okto are already in the town.The Lottery isn't any more dangerous than fishing the icy Maer; the one-in-a-thousand odds of being chosen are long compared to the chance of being dragged into the lake by a Knucklehead - but that's not the point. It's that it's your maties who string you up to die alone in the cold; that's the cruelty. The town wasn't really mourning Karl but their lost humanity.
This morning, Anders and Okto found the Trip's atmosphere was as taught as a mainsheet a'tempest and as likely to snap. Of course, it was always tense the day after a sailor's death, so it was usually like that now. They decamp from the sailors' taven; perhaps The Flags will be less oppressive.
As they brave the windblown streets they see three figures, bundled in furs, approach the gate from the 'Shander road. Their thick clothing hides their forms, but a faint ringing of bells accompanies their approach.
The Ten Towns are dying. Unhappy is the land without heroes and woe unto the land that needs them.
You stand at the gates.
OOC:
Anders and Okto are the green token. Bells, Ilenos, and Rayne are the yellow token. It's time to introduce your characters to the world.Targos
