DCC DotSK: Act 1-3

Dufgal wakes in the first light of the morning surprised that he wasn’t called on to take watch at all. He wouldn’t call it a good night of sleep but it was restorative and the dreams he had seemed on par with his waking life. He shrugged them off and began readying for the long jaunt to Hiroyuki and the resolution of the mystery that they were retained to sort out. His instinct told him that they would be successful, but that the pay would not be worth the trouble. He said none of this to the others. In fact, he said nothing at all to anyone. His actions were clear. It was time to push on. Although Dufgal did not feel particularly chatty, he found himself walking beside Aldric and listening to the quirky man of the cloth. He felt kinship between them growing and wondered why this person felt like more like a fellow thief than a holy man. The holy men that Dufgal had encountered were certainly less interesting than this man. The former gongfarmer smirked imperceptibly. He was somehow certain that he would kill for Aldric and likely would need to before this adventure ended.

Anora had wondered if she ought not to carry her blade quite so close to her person, given the dreams of the night before. She had watched as the thing rose and fell in wide arcs, through the fog of sleep.

When the figures came trundling through the mist, she was glad she had shaken off her morning’s superstitions, for she pulled the blade free and placed its point between herself and the approaching figures.

"Halt! You approach Anora the Blue and her companions." she challenges them, as if the name meant anything in this part of the world.

This… or any other part, as a matter of fact.

When Anora addresses the approaching figures, Dufgal slips off the path using the mist as cover. He finds a hidden position from which a sneak attack would be easy if warranted.

Aldric wakes, well-rested. He dreamt of being inside a dark womb, naked and shriveled, that was within the eye of a vast, violent storm. He gulps down his tasteless rations and straps on his squeaky armor. "Surely the last leg of the journey! Tonight, we drink!"

Once they strike out on the road, Aldric continues Dufgal's education into spiritual matters. He opines on such matters as the benefit of crippling natural disasters on the cycle of human progress, and the great and evil threat posed by the fucking moon. Although Aldric is making half this stuff up, Dufgal's audience serves as a whetstone for his rhetoric, sharpening his ideas and his delivery.

When they come upon the strangers on the road, he dons his shield and presents his oar, both marked with the Bitch Queen's sigil, and stands shoulder-to-shoulder with Anora. Though terrified (for should he die, his soul belongs Pelagia), he knows that showing weakness invites violence.

Tyravasiel-Llir dreamed of the exquisite and diabolical means of murder than his long-lived people had fashioned over the eons, with the deft hand and aesthetic sensibility of sculptors. The dark lady whose honor demands Tyravasiel's blood knows and has practiced many of them. Rituals of torment that would shatter the minds of these humans; hemmed in by their mayfly lives, they couldn't even conceive of the point of such cruelty.

The dreams have left Ty restless, and distracted to the point that Anora calls out to the figures in the fog before he realizes they are there. Hurriedly, the elf pulls down his blindfold to hide his too-green eyes. He stoops over his cane, once more the old, blind beggar with the hunch under his cloak.

Light-footed Dufgal slinks off as Anora calls out her sword-girded challenge, and as grim peasants, their dirt-lined faces drawn with fear, emerge from the gloom. All bear simple weapons -- wood axes, cudgels, pitchforks, long knives -- and cast worried looks at the woods on both sides of them, and at the travelers. The mob has been driving a gagged and partially bound raven-haired woman before them -- the source of the muffled screams. A terrified, pleading look mars what would otherwise be a pretty face, and she squirms and fights with each step she takes until a burly man behind her shoves her down face-first onto the road.

Trailing the now murmuring, hesitating mob are solemn figures astride warhorses, the telltale glint of armor flashing beneath their wolf-skin cloaks. There must be a half-dozen or more of them deeper in the mist, based on the hoofbeats that now pound the road.

"We don't want no trouble!" one of the men in the lead shouts before the riders arrive, brandishing a heavy felling axe. When the bound girl shouted into her gag and tried to get up, another man knelt and prevented her from rising, causing her to thrash in the mud.

"S-stand aside and let us pass!" the man with the axe yelled, his knuckles white on the haft of his weapon.

Anora takes in the haggard looking woman who is thrown to the floor. A witch, she was sure the village folk would argue. She’d heard tell of the same story a hundred times or more. It was luck more than anything that had saved her from a similar fate.

Perhaps they feared the arcane. Perhaps they feared it enough to send them fleeing back to their hovels. Though, perhaps they feared it just enough to kill the witch, while showing little fear of binding her. Such a stroke of luck would have Anora bound alongside the raven-haired woman before long, if she revealed her gift.

"You startled us." she says, lowering her weapon a fraction. "This one here serves the Mistqueen." she starts, motioning to water cleric and his oar. She throws her hands up to the wet air all around her, as if to show Pelagia’s water prowess in the very air.

"The Drowned One is another name you may know her by. We are here to deliver the woman to her. You may hand her over and we shall attend to her ourselves."

Aldric plays along with Anora's ploy. He advances to the raven-haired woman and helps her out of the mud.

"Ahh, she is exactly as she was in my vision, sent to me by the gods. Filthy bitch!"

He slaps her, open handed, across the face, hard enough to send her staggering. Then he turns and addresses the mob.

"Best you all pay heed, for Pelagia watches here and now, and will hold you in judgement for your actions. Woe be to the mortal that stands in the way of divine retribution!"

"You are permitted to scream your grievances into the mist before we take her. Your words will be like anchors that will drag her to the bottom of the sea."

Dufgal, laying in wait, is quite amazed and impressed by the ruse the two are creating. Yet, he knows too well how villagers love their vigilante justice. He readies his newfound spear just in case.

Anora's explanations and declarations are met with confused looks from the crowd of armed villagers. "Drowned One?" the man with the axe asks, "Do... do you mean the Hound?"

Before the enchantress can answer, forward strides Aldric, playing along as he helps the also bewildered-looking woman from the mud of the road. Stood up straight, she looks not so witch-like as she does... perhaps barmaid-like? Or some other vocation where putting a bit of flesh on display loosens coins from fingers. The girl is perhaps twenty, and well-formed. She wears a pretty but homespun skirt, a leather apron, and a blouse and cinched jerkin that rather purposefully put a good portion of the young woman's cleavage on display. She is not dressed for the weather or any kind of journey, and tries to utter thanks to her would-be savior through her gag, but then the man backhands her back into the mud, insulting the stunned girl as she hits the ground again.

The whole mob gasps, closes ranks and retreats a step at this -- they are clearly both shocked by the priest's actions, and not terribly ready for a fight.

And that's then that the horsemen arrive.

"Make way! Out of the way!" a deep and coarse voice calls out, and quickly enough the mob parts to allow the armed men on horseback to push through to the front. They look dressed for full-on war, these warriors, and they bristle with armor, helms, shields, spears, axes and swords. Seven mounted men ride to the flanks of the road as Aldric shouts of retribution and grievances, and two of them bare steel when they see Anora's drawn but lowered sword.

"What foolery is this?" a hoarse bellow comes from an eighth rider, the last to arrive, a huge man who is astride the largest and most powerful horse of the lot by a good measure. A tangled black and gray beard erupts from the man's half-helm, and with his broad shoulders and barrel chest the leader of this grim procession must weigh close to twenty stone.

"Out of the way, whoever you all are!" he bellows before turning in his saddle to the mob. As he does, there's a wince on this face that is perhaps evidence that he in some pain or discomfort. "Girl the girl on her feet, take her to the standing stones!"

Dufgal plays the wait-and-see game hoping his crew will do the same. The numbers are just not on their side at this point.

"In the name of the Gods, what is happening here?" Aldric demands. His voice is strong, but physically, he won't stand firm. He will ebb and flow with the force of the horse-riders, careful not to be in danger of trampling.

When the riders approach, Ty grits his teeth and his blindfold crumples over drawn brows.

Well here are poor odds. Of what consequence to us is the big-breasted human? I suppose some amusement might be had of her, if the yokels can be chased off...

"Is that the clop of hooves I hear?" he cries suddenly. "The jingle of bridles? Those are the sounds of substantial men!"

Ty ambles forward on his cane, coincidentally placing himself square in the lead rider's path, as if unaware in his blindness that he's impeding the column's progress.

"Noble sirs, have you alms for a poor pilgrim who hungers upon your road? Surely such generosity as you can spare would bless your business at these stones, whatever it may be."

"The Hound. Yes… Many are the names. Though this man has taken to calling her…" and she hesitates before saying the distasteful word. "… the Bitch." she lies, or rather repurposes a truth.

Fearing she can’t save the woman here on the road, Anora stands aside, and ushers Aldric and the others to do the same. The horsemen had tipped the scales against them, but they had revealed the reason they had been contracted to travel this way.

"The Mistqueen watches you. She awaits your offering." she says, putting out a hand to guide the blind elf out of the way of horses.

The girl could give them information about the men they seek, if she could only speak with her alone.

Would the villagers wait and watch to see if their offering had been accepted?

The unlikely thief sees the encounter unfolding without real answers to any of the mysteries. He follows at a safe distance. He trusts his crew to signal him if they wish to call him off.

As Anora ushers him aside, Aldric struggles to come to terms with the outcome of this event. He had told them, quite forcefully, of the will of Pelagia. And they ignored him.

A wise man might be grateful, for Aldric knew full well he was talking out of his ass when he demanded the girl. These "thegns" might have taken an ill liking to him and run him down. Or, taken the lot of them as sacrifices, to spare their own folk. But they simply ignored him.

He looked at the woman he'd slapped in an attempt to free her. Some men in his shoes would be reflecting that, rather than saving the woman, he had merely added to her injustice. But Aldric was preoccupied with his excellent theatrics, and how they had failed to illicit much of a reaction.

It dawned on him that they were very concerned about the beast. He could relate, given his relationship with Pelagia. But, this was just a beast. Sure, they had seen how it had ripped people to pieces. But, they were many men strong, with mounted fighters. Surely, with polearms and ropes, this lot was the match for any earthly animal? But they were tossing their own barmaids at it, like Pelagia herself had manifested in the forest.

He finally turned back to the raven-haired barmaid with a sigh. A barmaid was a terrible thing to waste. He quickly consults the man that explained the sacrifice to him. "What exactly is this beast that everyone is going on about? How long has it afflicted the region?"

It takes a moment after Anora coaxes her fellows out of the way for the unnerved mob to reorganize and resume their march. The black-haired girl continues to resist, so they end up practically carrying her as they veer off into the misty woods on the north side of the King's Road. Aldric gets a brief answer to his question as the man he was speaking with marches off with the other armed villagers: "A demon-wolf! A monstrous, unkillable hound! Set upon us sinners, Father Beacom says!"

The Jarl looks long and hard at the wizard in blue from behind the eye-holes in his heavy helm, then turns and follows the crowd, clearly intending to supervise the proceedings. He draws his men with him -- his thegns -- as he goes... all except one. When some distance has opened between the trio on the road and the departing rear ranks of the mob, that warrior removes his helm, revealing he is a lean-faced, older man with a white beard and little hair on his head. One eye squints as he gestures up the road, towards Hirot.

"You are not far from our village, travelers. You'll want to shelter there for the night, even if Morgan's blood sates the demon. It's unwise and unsafe to be outside the walls after sunfall."

The thegn's horse shifts sideways, seeming nervous as the other warriors leave them behind, so he clicks his tongue to calm the mare and nods at Anora, Ty, and Aldric. "I am Orioc, and I will find you tonight."

And with that, Orioc puts his helmet back on, then spurs his horse to catch up with his leader and fellow villagers.

As the grim procession filters into the woods north of the road, Tyravasiel straightens from his elderly stoop. He keeps his blindfold on, just in case.

"Well! Hard luck to her. She was quite pretty as humans go," he concludes, once he's sure that the locals are out of earshot. "On to Hirot, then?"