Vorrioch
Chaotic Hungry
Karma: 38/6
406 Posts
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Whose Woods These Are [Prologue]
Faith and Fire
A sharp northerly wind blew through the Minster parade ground. A storm was gathering overhead, a tempest of clouds, grey and swollen with the promise of a heavy downpour, brewing above the waiting foothills that encircled the town. Somewhere far above, hidden in the wood-strewn heights surrounding Bridhvale the dryad Immuriel was waiting, and a bloody vengeance in the name of Pelor and for the sake of their murdered townsfolk was to be exacted upon her once she could be found.
Two squadrons of the Bishop’s templars- ten men and two women in all- stood neatly arrayed in the middle of the square as though awaiting inspection, their well-polished mail gleaming brightly in the thin flicker of overcast sunlight. The templars stood stock-still, their faces half-hidden beneath the masks of closed visored helms, betraying little sign of trepidation or anxiety at the fight ahead of them. All twelve counted themselves Pelor’s chosen warriors, veterans of his wars and honed by many years hard training, sworn to follow where his Bishop would lead them, unto the very gates of the abyss itself.
They were not alone. Sheriff Woodshall and his five sons had arrived earlier that morning, their own arms and armour concealed discretely beneath heavy, water-proofed coats and wide-brimmed hats that leant the group a vaguely inquisitorial look. The shrieve himself, a broad set man of middling years who sought unsuccessfully to conceal a ruddy face and mess of varicose veins beneath a handsome handlebar moustache, was already making the rounds, passing around a battered hip-flask and bantering with the assembled townsfolk. His sons, heavily built youths of a somewhat thuggish demeanour, clung clannishly together in a tight cluster, heavy bastard swords swinging loosely at their sides. Over the past hour an angry mob of townsfolk, many of whom appeared to be family or friends of the late Arthur Bridley- the murdered woodcutter- had been milling in small groups into the courtyard. It appeared that a good handful were also veterans of the XIXth, Sheriff Woodshall’s old regiment and that of Bishop Abner before him. Before long the air was thick with their pipe-smoke, with ruminations on old campaigns and with angry talk of the hanging to follow when the tree-witch who’d blighted their town was finally brought to justice.
Not too far away, a little to the side of the square, the Bishop himself was being helped atop an enormous brown stallion, the beast snorting indignantly at the weight of its armoured rider. The old warrior’s plate mail clung loosely about his withered shoulders and chest, he’d evidently been a somewhat larger man when the armour had been crafted for him, but Abner seemed in high spirits nonetheless. “I’ve fought demons of this sort before,” the Bishop spoke off-handedly to Iskandel, interrupted by a sudden wince of pain as he was lowered into the saddle. “But they were weak and cowardly spirits, the dregs of their kind you could say. Those with the will, the rude arrogance, to fight,” he breaks off coughing, “had long since been dispatched from this world but a handful yet clung on: spineless, vampiric things hiding in the trees or streams of the forest far from Bridhvale… content with the harvest sacrifices brought to them by ignorant farmers, with stealing the lives of those poor unfortunates who wandered a little too close into their waiting jaws. This wood-spirit, I suspect,” the Bishop’s voice is firmer now, taking on an almost steely tone, “will be stronger, perhaps one of the most powerful of its ilk: a creature of dark and terrible sorcery.” Abner reaches inside his overcoat to throw the paladin a simple pendant, tarnished with age and inscribed with the image of Pelor’s holy fire. “Here, take this. The tree-demons have a magic of their own but they’re hard-pressed to harm those so protected.”
Walking the horse easily enough into the middle of the square, Bishop Abner calls the assembled townsfolk to order. Their chatter is immediately cut short at the sound of the Bishop’s voice, and as the dozen templars neatly fall in behind him. The old priest still cuts an imposing figure in his armour, snowy white hair tousled to and fro in the sharp wind, his age-lined face framed by the scars of old battles. Abner’s expression sours slightly at the sight of Sheriff Woodshall, and the shrieve looks away, unable to meet the Bishop’s frosty gaze, though his five sons glower defiantly back. “Pelor has given us this land,” the Bishop begins, his voice hoarse with a scarcely suppressed emotion before he finds his pitch and it broadens into a deep, booming roar. “In days long past, when the Kingdom was new, your forefathers and mine claimed it in his name. With sword and fire and the blessings of the almighty the dark places were cleared: the foul demons which clung to its trees and rivers were vanquished one by one and flung back into the furthest reaches of the black pit. Brothers, Sisters, the time for brave deeds is upon us once more.” A ragged cheer erupts from the crowd, half-heartedly echoed by the Sheriff and his sons, the templars remain silent. “By means of a foul ritual I had thought long since forgotten a she-demon, a pale vampire of the woods, has been stirred from its slumber and day by day it gathers strength on the stolen blood of your kinsmen.” The townsfolk fall silent, hushed by the ominous mention of sorcery, a taint of sorts- a suspicion- has hung over the forest for longer than any of them can remember, though they have only whisperings of old, half-forgotten tales of its true cause. “Arthur Bridley, may our lord Pelor rest his soul,” the Bishop’s great voice is quieter now, in a heartfelt reverence for the dead, “has been martyred, robbed of life and blood to sate its dark and unnatural appetites. We go now to avenge him. Be bold, be vigilant and, as Pelor be my witness, let our efforts not be in vain!” The clouds above him hang grey and pregnant, a storm is brewing in the air overhead and there will be a heavy rain to fall before the day is done.
Oak and Iron
Daybreak creeps slowly across the sleeping forest, a cool breeze sending the first autumn leaves spinning- red and yellow- through the trees, dancing to some unknown tune. The wolves rouse and stir themselves from sleep, stretching like dogs and sniffing the air judiciously, as the first pale tendrils of sunlight weave through the forest canopy. A strange odour cleaves to the air- a smell of blood and steel and sweat and fear all together- it is the smell of a hunt and a greater hunt than any have yet known. A fight for merest hope of survival is upon the woods and the pack is stirred, along with the forest’s other denizens, to meet its siren call.
Aliira cannot say whether she leads or follows but soon she, along with the wolves of her pack, find themselves mounting the trail through the hills back to the old elven burial mound. Even the sounds of the forest about her as subtly altered: the woods march to a drumbeat of falling leaves and pounding feet as the forest is summoned to war.
The dryad Immuriel sits, waiting within the circle of trees, poised on the hard earth of the tomb’s entrance. She seems smaller somehow than you remembered, willow thin and with a countenance as hard and brittle as river clay. And yet, a life has been breathed into the tree spirit, no less than that of the burgeoning, swaying oak branches around her. A tint of colour, of stolen blood perhaps, cleaves to the spirit’s formerly deathly pale countenance and the once wilted flowers about her tunic are blooming into sweet-scented flowers. By the dryad’s side sits Alendar, the spectre in much the same condition as you saw him last, never-drying rivulets of red dripping from his blood-stained bandage about his ruined eyes and down the slopes of his face. The elf seems at peace, however, or at least resigned to his fate, for he looks up at Aliira and smiles as the wolf-pack approaches, setting down the pipe (or perhaps it is merely the memory of a pipe) that he had been smoking on the grass by his side.
“We are glad that you have returned,” Alendar begins simply, and his words seemed sincere enough. “I had thought that perhaps…” he shrugs, leaving the thought unfinished, “but I was wrong to have doubted you.” The ghost smiles sadly, “the trees know you have watched over this place long enough.”
“The town will be coming soon,” Immuriel interjects, the soft lilting note Ito her voice in stark contrast with the tree-spirit’s steely tone, “and we must be ready. Once, we were without number here and the land was strong. And now, so little remains.” The dryad glances apprehensively upward, at the trees about her. “They will be coming again with axe and fire, and the words of their stone god- and they must be held back or the land here will perish.”
“You’ve won us one more throw of the dice, and we thank you for that,” Alendar continues smoothly, taking up his pipe once more. “The valley folk will be coming, as they did so many years before, but you’ll soon see the forest has tricks of its own. Once her people,” he gestures with the pipe towards Immuriel, “were as gods here, and our kind were happy enough- living about the rubble of our ruined cities. So little we knew of the ways of men back then,” he favours you with a wry smile, but there is a fierce anger about the elf’s dead face. “Five hundred blighted years on this cold hillside have helped me see that much. Make no mistake, it will take more than treacherous words and cold iron to rob us of this second, golden chance.”
The bark of the ancient oak to Aliira’s right peels open like a curtain and in a heartbeat a strange figure has burst through, the bark sealing up behind him as securely as ever. A being half as tall again as the tallest man, his hide as green as the long grasses which carpet the clearing’s floor stands before the druid. His head is that of a great stag, capped with antlers that branch into a great score of points and the wolves circle apprehensively about him, sniffing the air, before sinking back down again in a sort of knowing acceptance.
“This is Helvellian,” Immuriel introduces the huge, deer-headed figure, “reawakened from the heart of a tree-feller from the valley below. He is here to help you hunt.”
Helvellian’s ivy lips curl back in what could have been the parody of a smile or merely an expression of eagerness at the chase ahead. The forest avatar reaches with once arm back inside the tree behind him, re-emerging with a huge spear: nothing more than a vast bough of still-living, still-leafy wood capped with a jagged-edged cone of obsidian. The trees overhead rustle with a sudden chorus of birdsong, almost as though heralding the unveiling of this great, primeval weapon. Even after the passage of so many years, and for all the defiant, self-confident blaze of so many fires in the town below, here -in this clearing- there is life in the old woods yet.
Posted on 2008-04-03 at 09:30:37.
Edited on 2008-04-03 at 19:12:49 by Vorrioch
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The Morphing Game
Return to Charadun - Recr
If you ask for guides among some of the local woodsmen and hunters then you’ll probably also end up being accompanied by a torch-carrying mob. 
