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Going South
The first night, the group spent in Carrock, the town of Beorn at a nice inn. In the morning the weather was a little grey, and they continued they journey accompanied by the dwarves.
The day passed and when it was time to make another camp for the night, they met two men coming from the south. They asked if they could join the camp, and they were accepted, but Lomund and Gorm silently said to each other: - “We have to be on watch.”
They sat around the campfire and ate their food and talked, and one of the strangers, named Orm, asked if they came from up north, and if they had heard about an Inn named Easterly Inn. Lomund said that indeed they have, and it is a very good place. Orm kept asking about the inn, and after a while he said to his friend, with a name nobody caught: - “I need to take a leak, join me.”
Miriel was as always around, everywhere scouting and she listened and heard Orm and his companion talk. The spoke of robbing the Easterly Inn. Orm said to his companion, “Hey, it looks like a cake walk, like taking candy from kids.”
Miriel quickly skipped back to the camp and told the others what she had just heard. When the two came back to the camp saying something like: - “Ah, that felt good”.
Lomund pulled out his dagger and Gorm his sword. Lomund said in a harsh voice: - “We’ve heard you talk. You plan to rob the Easterly Inn. We decided that you rather not do that. You will leave this camp and walk south. If anything ever happens to the Easterly Inn, we will find you wherever you are hiding, and not even your mothers would recognize what will be left of you. Now go, and don’t even think of turning back.”
The man known as Orm looked startled and said: - “What are you talking about? How on earth could you … This is outrageous!”. His friend just stood there and when Gorm wiggled his sword they both knew that the group meant business, serious business. They gathered their belongings and walk away.
To be continued…
Meeting Shanker
The next day while the group travelled south to the old ford, Miriel tried to look for tracks that could show if Orm had went back north or not, but no tracks were found at all.
Well at the ford, the group stocked up with some provision at the store, food rations and some hay for the horses, you never know how arid the mountains can be.
When time was coming to look for a place to eat, they met an old, bent man with half rotten clothes that was surrounded by a cloud of flies. He looked at the group of adventurers and introduced himself as Shaker and asked if he could join in. He told the group that he had just made it through the pass, and the mountains was crawling with goblins.
When he took off his boots, the poor adventurers almost fainted from the stench. It was even worse than the half dead monster under the well, this was beyond awful, but after a few minutes they all adjusted to it.
Shaker said that he had passed a caravan on the way to the pass and it was driven by a bunch of half wit men, hobbits they called themselves, They made camp one night but he moved much faster than they did, and he wanted to use the small trails where there were less goblins.
He decided to sleep and rolled out his flee bitten bedroll, and the adventurers quickly took the space up wind, hoping for the wind not to change during the night.
In the morning, Lomund wanted to thank Shanker for the information, but he overdid it and gave him a farewell good enough for the King of Gondor. Gorm smacked his palm in his forehead muttering about the wrong place and the wrong time.
After another day’s journey closer to the mountains, they came up on the ruins of an old town.
To be continued...
Miriel's vision
Miriel says to the others that this was once a town built by humans, but it was abandoned many hundred years ago when the darkness and shadows came.
Miriel decides to sneak around, while Eirik and Lomund try to find some firewood. They find several remains of other travelers resting places. Miriel’s looks all around for dangers, she’s got a bad feeling about this place, but it’s even worse to make camp in the open.
Gorm finds a pile of firewood and chops it up and they prepare a camp. Miriel decides to listen to the stones, and this time she did get a vision. She saw Eirik, sleeping while being on watch, and there was a dark shadow passing. She went back and said she did not like the idea of making camp here, but the others convinced her, and they decided to have double guards on duty.
To be continued...
I’ve got a bad feeling about this…
Miriel and Lomund took the first watch, Miriel refused to sit with Eirik as she was convinced from her visions that he would fall asleep, and her inner voices told her this is not a nice place to fall asleep in.
Miriel sat and watched around her, feeling a little sleepy, while Lomund to stay away sat and juggled with his fine Dwarven dagger. In the early morning Gorm suddenly woke up with an urge to empty his bladder. It was dark, very dark, too dark. The fire had almost died, and there were no sign of neither Miriel, nor Lomund, except that Lomund dagger sat in the ground where he sat when Gorm fell asleep. Gorm woke up Eirik and whispered “Wake up pal, Miriel and Lomund are gone, something terrible has happened. They looked around and they see tracks of two persons that has been dragged away from the camp fire. It’s dark, and Gorm began to think. It’s too dark to track so we need a light, but I don’t want lights that turns me into a walking target saying shoot me. They lit a hooded lantern and brought some torches with them, and began to follow the trail into the compact darkness.
To be continued...
Eirik! Duck!
Eirik and Gorm searched for their missing comrades and followed the tracks that led down to what sounded like a stream coming from the mountains. Suddenly Gorm saw something behind Eirik.This was the first time Gorm really had seen anything that nobody else had carefully pointed out to him. What he saw was something like a shadow, holding a spear. Gorm screamed: - “Eirik! Duck!”, then made a mighty swing with his sword. Eirik throw himself to the ground and Gorm’s sword passed right where he had been standing just a fraction of a seconds ago. Gorm hits but it just seemed to pass through air. Small pieces of cloth fell to the ground. The shadow thing strikes with his spear that strikes right into gorms armor, and it hurt a little, it is a real spear. Gorm strikes back and this time he could feel his sword hit something. Eirik lies on the ground trying to light a torch as the shadow things seemed to be afraid of the light. The shadow thing flickers back and forth with such speed it’s almost impossible to hit it, but when Eirik finally lit his torch was waves it, the shadow thing freezes for a moment. Gorm and the shadow thing continues to fight, and the spear almost penetrated his armor, but only left a big bruise this time too.
Meanwhile, Miriel suddenly wakes up from her slumber.
To be continued...
In deep…
Miriel is slowly woken up from her slumber by the sound of battle, and panic strikes her. She is almost drowning in something greasy. She makes a quick, almost impossible jump and successfully crawl herself out of what she realizes is mud, smelly mud. In the distance she sees the a faint flicker light moving around together with the sound of metal striking metal. She tries to move in the direction of the battle.
At the same time the fight is raging. Eirik suddenly sees a swamp monster in the distance, but he decides he first needs to take out this shadow thing. He charges it and his sword strikes against the monsters armor. Now the shadow thing suddenly flies to Miriel with a speed worthy only ghosts.
To be continued...
In the nick of time
The shadow monster attacks the tired and weak Miriel and hit her. Both Eirik and Gorm charges against this not only powerful but foul playing monster will full speed and force, and both of them misses, again.
Lomund suddenly wakes up by close sounds of battle and finds himself almost drowning in mud. He tries to get up but every move he makes just makes him sink deeper, so he screams for help instead.
Eirik and Gorm finally both hit the shadow monster and with a dark explosion the armor and clothes falls to the ground in a pile. All three rushes to find Lomund and helps him up from the mud hole. Lomund, after he had caught his breath and while the others were recovering from weariness and bruises, decided to look around as they had figured out that the shadow thing must have been a knight wight, created when a powerful knight corrupted by darkness or greed is dead. By searching the stream banks around the muddy hole, Lomund found the rotten remains of a knight choker, with five large gems.
Suddenly Eirik held up Lomund knife: -"Looking for this Lomund?"
To be continued after a season break...
Into the mountains
The group decides to take a rest as the nights sleep was not very comfortable. Miriel is still a little scared so she tries to talk to the stones again, and she gets the feeling that the evil she felt before is now gone. In the late morning of the thirteenth of Gwaeron (March), the group is ready to head into the mountains. Everyone is fully rested except Miriel who still got a few bruises that hurts.
The weather is grey, with occasional rays of sun breaking through. Lomund says that Miriel should sneak ahead scouting, white the others rides the horses with Miriel’s horse tailing along at the back. They decided for the lower mountain road, the one that goes in the valley as that was the one the caravan had taken. For a few hours with Miriel a few hundred yards ahead, they kept moving, and Miriel often came out of sight as the road took many sharp bends and turns.
Suddenly when Miriel was out of sight, they all heard the whinny sound of a horse. Lomund says “She is in danger!” and Eirik replies “We should never have left her alone!”. The group readied their weapons and picked up the pace of their horses.
Meanwhile, Miriel was carefully moving, when she sees a huge rock blocking half the road. She thinks she heard a sound behind the block, and carefully, on her small elven toes, she moves along it’s side to take a peek. Suddenly she peels something wet and sticky all over her face. Startled she looks up, to see as scared pony, with an arrow sticking out of it’s left behind.
She takes a quick look around and sees a head disappear behind a rock a few hundred yards ahead, high up along the mountain side. The others arrive and Miriel takes with the scared pony and removes the arrow. Gorm and Lomund starts to discuss if they could by looking at the horseshoes find out what blacksmith did them. A hobbit, elf or goblin blacksmith.
Lomund says: - “Hey cousin, you’ve done horse shoes, maybe you can look at them to tell who done them.”
Gorm replies: -”Cousin, it was many winters since I made horse shoes, I make swords now.”
Lomund said again: - “But it can’t hurt to take a look can it?"
They did take a look, but they could not get any useful information from the horseshoe. They continue with the pony tailing Miriel’s horse. After a few hours it’s time for lunch. The make a small lunch camp and when they have finished, Miriel sees something high up on the mountain side, another head quickly hiding.
To be continued...
The Goblin scout
The group continues to to move along the small and winding road in the lower mountain pass. After a few hours, they all feel it’s time for lunch so they make a lunch camp and let the horses rest. When they have finished eating and began tightening the saddle belts again, Miriel spots another head high up on the mountainside the is gone as soon as she sees it, The group decides that they should quickly pack up and move on, while Miriel scales the mountain side to take a peek.
The slowly ride, watching Miriel climbing higher and higher. Miriel moves as silent and quickly as only an elf can do and after a while she sees a goblin sitting carving on a piece of wood in a some kind of prepared outlook position. Behind him is a small crack in the mountain wall, could be a tunnel there. Miriel, being an elf with hatred beyond understanding against Goblins and other creatures of the dark, quickly sneaks up behind the Goblin and kills it with her dagger, by first sneaking up closely behind him, then placing her dagger close t the throat to quickly cut it to prevent any screaming. She finds a small pile of hay, and a blanket in the crack, which seems to be a shelter for sleep. She breaks the bow she finds and the arrows, then she climbs down again.
They group continues to move along the road, and when evening comes, and the sun is setting, they begin looking for a place to make night camp. Gorm looks around and sees a hill some hundred yards from the road, where it looks like a fire is burning on the top. They decide to go there to have a look.
To be continued...
Nice render. However, Miriel's pose looks a bit weak. One of the "rules of thumb" when doing an action shot is show the action either at the beginning of the swing, or after the follow-though, never mid-swing. The mid-way point is the visually and dramatically weakest point in the action. Right now it simply looks like she's pointing her dagger at his neck, not thrusting it into it with all her might.
Thanks, but it's a tricky thin wire to keep Miriel's actions TOS-compliant (and she really snuck up on him, looked at him, then carefully placed her blade to the side of his neck, then quickly cut the throat to prevent any screaming. She's an awesome killer (or Patrick who plays her plays it out very well), but I agree, I first planned to add the spurt of black blood but then It wouldn't survive the forum TOS.. I'll add that to the text to we know what she really did.
Thanks, but it's a tricky thin wire to keep Miriel's actions TOS-compliant (and she really snuck up on him, looked at him, then carefully placed her blade to the side of his neck, then quickly cut the throat to prevent any screaming. She's an awesome killer (or Patrick who plays her plays it out very well), but I agree, I first planned to add the spurt of black blood but then It wouldn't survive the forum TOS.. I'll add that to the text to we know what she really did.
The trick there is to have her covering his mouth with her hand, pulling his head back, with the blade at the start of the stroke, as she's gettin ready to pull it across. Once again, the beginning of the action or the follow-through. So, if you don't want to show the blood, it's best to go with the "wind-up", so to speak.
Added a second version of it.
The campfire
Miriel moved in her stealthy way and Eirik came about thirty feet behind her. When Miriel turned her head to whisper to Eirik, she didn't see him, he was on the other side, so silent not even Miriel could hear him. They slowly moved towards the hill, which seems to be some kind of old overgrown settlement or low wall. They saw a head moving. Gorm and Lomund were still down at the road with the horses, they move as stealthy as troll in a pottery.
Suddenly they hear a voice from the hill, someone shouts in plain western speech: -”Here they come again!” and an arrow passes over Miriels head, and another one bounces off a rock near Eirik.
Now Gorm and Lomund hear the sounds of voices and arrows and start to move towards the hill with the fire. Eirik shouts: -”We want to speak to Dindy!”. A small head appears: -”Did you say Dindy?”, Eirik continues: -”We are sent by your brother Dodi to help you. Please put down your weapons.” After a few more exchanges of words, Eirik calls for Gorm and Lomund to bring the horses. The hilltop was an old ruin, and in the middle was a fire. Two roads lead to it and the wall gives good protection. Around the fire is a pile of crates.
The group is led by Eigar Longleg, and with him he has three young boys, Andy, Bill and Tom. They are all very happy to see their pony Ludde again. Dindy is mostly very frightened but Eigar gives them heroes a briefing of the current situation. They were attacked yesterday evening and the whole caravan was stolen. They lost a good man too. They fought off the Goblin attackers but lost everything. Now they know the goblins will return, in larger numbers. And they will be here any second. The boys looks very saddened and weary, not at all ready to fight.
Miriel and Lomund take positions along one of the walls each, to fight off the attackers with their bows. The boys and Eigar will defend one opening, Eirik and Gorm the other. Eirik walks around rallying the hobbit boys with mighty words about victory and together we will be victorious and the boys starts to look a little less depressed. Gorm and Eirik take position at the eastern gate, and when Gorm tightens his shield strap, a black arrow suddenly sticks out from the shield, and at the same time Miriel shouts: - “Here they come!”.
To be continued…
Ready as they could be
They all were in place, waiting for the shadows moving in the dark to come closer...
To be continued...
Under attack!
Lomund sees a Goblin and shoots it. Between 20 and 30 Goblins and Orcs are advancing from all directions on the wall that the group is defending. Eirik shouts again to the young boys and Eigar: - “Hold the line!”. Gorm and Eirik stand firm on their opening with swords ready. The Goblins are wielding small crude knives. Eirik kills one Goblin and Gorm another one. Lomund and Miriel shoot again and both hit and kill one Goblin. The boys and Eigar is holding the line, defending and firing the bow.
Eirik decapitates one with a mighty blow and Lomund hits one big Orc in the chest, but they still just keeps coming and coming. Eirik is hit by an arrow in the shoulder but he and Gorm keep the opening clean from Goblins. Lomund misses a few arrows, and suddenly the boys are having problems on their flank. Eirik tells Gotm to hold while he rushes over to the boys, singing a cheerful song telling them to fight back and be victorious. They boys seems to be inspired by Eiriks song. Lomund misses again and someone just missed his foot with a dagger and an arrow just passed over his head. The fight was far from over, but the boys took down another Goblin and Eirik shouted good job lads!
Miriel shoots one who was climbing the wall and Eirik rushes over to Miriel and attacks another one climbing the wall, but misses. Gorm cleaves one Orc with a mighty blow, Lomund misses and once again he has a dagger right beside his foot and an arrow flying past him.
To be continued...
The battle rages on
Eirik attacks more that are climbing the wall, but misses. Gorm shouts “You shall not pass!” and slashes an Orc that is still standing. Lomund shoots one Orc and Eirik attacks an Orc with his sword and wounds it and it attacks back and hits Eirik. Gorm kills the wounded Orc. Miriel is still aiming at an Orc. Lomund shoots a Goblin Archer and two Goblins chops after his feet with their crude knives. Miriel now releases her bow and hits the Orc that was attacking Eirik, between the eyes and it falls down. Gorm spots the Orc leader and taunts him. Eirik attacks another Orc at the wall and hits hit but Eirik is hit again and is seriously weary now. An Orc climbs Lomund’s wall and hits him. Eirik hit back at an Orc and kills it.
Gorm and the Orc leader are fighting, and Lomund misses the Orc that climbed the wall with an attack with his dwarven dagger. A Goblin also climbs the wall on the other side of Lomund and the Orc hits Lomund again. Miriel shoots the Goblin beside Lomund with a perfect arrow. Gorm hits the leader and the other are getting tired and keep missing, except Miriel who keeps picking off Goblins with her bow and arrow. The boys are having trouble again, Andy falls. Miriel shoots the orc beside Lomund, and Gorm carefully retreat to lure the Orc leader into a trap.
Eirik rushes over to check Andy. When the Orc leader makes an attack with his spear, Gorm gracefully parry it with his shield and runs his sword into the heart of the Orc leader.
Lomund now takes care of Andy and stops the bleeding. The rest of the Orcs and Goblins, just a few runs away. Gorm and Eirik goes to look for Dindy, but he is gone! They found a tunnel that under a crate. It leads away. They search it and find a goblin tooth necklace in the tunnel, and some blood at the entrance outside the wall. Dindy has been kidnapped!
To be continued…
Finding Dindy
The group looks at tracks and Miriel can see that Dindy was carried away into the mountains, the tracks are very easy to follow. The heroes are all very tired, and they decide they try to rest until midday as the Goblins won’t be active during daytime anyway. The boys and Eigar Longlegs decides to continue travel and Miriel says they can rest in the old ruin town as it is safe now.
After the rest, they follow the tracks into the mountains and after short while they find a cave opening. They enter the cave, carefully, and after a while it splits, and it split again and going deeper and deeper into the heart of the mountain. Darkness is compact, the only light comes from two torches, and Lomund begins to feel uneasy, dark clouds begin to cover his mind, he feels sad, sad and hopeless, deep into the darkness.
Then after a long walk, suddenly they hear a noise, the sound of someone speaking black speech.
To be continued….
Meeting Dindy
Eirik and Miriel silently sneaks ahead. They see lights from torches and two goblins drinking wine. They quickly and silently dispose the goblins, and the group can continue. Now the tunnel is lit by a distant torch light. They carry on, and after s short walk the enter what looks and smells like a kitchen, and they see Dindy sitting there peeling potatoes. He looks scared and happy when he sees the heroes, but puts his finger across his mouth to signal be silent and points at the tunnel in the other end. They look at Dindy and sees that he is firmly locked to the ground with a very good shackle, dwarven forged, no simple goblin work here. They lock looks very complex. Eirik suggests that we could just chop of the foot, then Dindy faints in fear, before Eirik could say: - “Just joking mate.”.
Suddenly two goblins hollar from down the corridor “You, cook, we hungry, we come get food.” in a crude western tongue. The goblins are instantly killed by arrows fired from Miriel and Lomund, and dragged out of the way. One of the goblins had a fork behind his ear and the other had Dindy’s hat. Dindy slowly comes back to his senses and tells the adventurers that the leader, the fat goblin, has the key.
They come up with a plan as they hear more goblins close to the kitchen. Dindy calls out, loud enough for the goblins closest to hear, but silent enough so the sound won’t travel too far that “I have some more food I need tasted.”. Two goblins arrives to the kitchen. Lomund shoots an arrow through the forehead of the first goblin while Gorm cuts down the second one. Now Gorm asks Dindy: “Where is is the dining room?” and Dindy explains that it is further ahead and down along some windling tunnels. Gorm says to the group: “Come on, no time to waste”.
To be continued...
nice story. I'm tempted to render my own 3D fantasy comic now that I have a new computer. Thanks for sharing.
Thank you, it a game log from a real table top RPG we play. Behind every hero there is a player (I play Lomund, but you probably guessed that).
Scouting a feast
Miriel, who can move silently and without being spotted starts to walk down the other entrance to the kitchen, from where there have come several hungry goblins already. The sound of laughter and talk in black speech is rather loud, which suggests that the goblins are getting drunk on Dindy’s fine wines.
After some sneaking and occasional encounters with goblins, the group have a pretty good idea how this cave system looks. There are two entrances to the great hall where the party is held. They make a very clever plan. Carefully moving some crates to one of the exists, they plan to build a choke hole, which will hold up the goblin there. To get them there, Miriel will be bait.
This is a perfect plan, what can go wrong?
To be continued...
A flawed plan, executed to perfection
Now, when everyone were in place, Miriel, not knowing Eirik had been spotted, rushed into the big room from the side tunnel, where they had built the choke hole. She fired an arrow at the King in his neck fat, and shoots another arrow. The goblins first get scared when the king is attacked and when they what they hate the most, an elf, but the King screams something in black speech and three large orcs appear from a hidden passage behind the Throne. Miriel shots a goblin and haste back to the choke hole. Eirik now fires his bow but misses. Now, when they are ready to defend the choke hole, a group of goblins arrives from one of the passages they did not fully search, causing the group to fighting on two flanks. Meanwhile Eirik need to run as the goblins and orc at the table nearest him rush in his direction, not to the choke hole. Arrows are flying and goblins and orcs are falling, and Eirik is retreating while fighting with a huge orc from the Kings guard.
Lomund and Gorm shouts that we need to retreat to the 3 way intersection outside the kitchen, we cannot defend this position anymore. This is a fierce battle, they are all slowly pulling back, Lomund and Miriel shooting arrow after arrow while Gorm and Eirik are blocking the enemies off with swords and shields, delivering deadly blows. The ranks of goblins is getting thinner, but the heroes are getting tired too. They left a trail of dead goblins and orcs during the retreat but finally they could take a defensive position at the three way tunnel intersection. They were together again, Eirik and Gorm in the front, Lomund and Miriel behind with bows. Lomund show the last of the kings orc guards right between the eyes.
Now, the King comes, wading through the dead of his own ranks with a huge sword. Miriel and Lomund hits him with arrows and Gorm kills the last orc in front of him. Gorm shouts to the King: “Your mother was an Elf and your father smelled of Dwarven ale!”
The king is furious, and both Miriel and Lomund misses their shots. Gorm hits the King and Eirik makes a full out attack, but misses, the King is still standing.
The King swings at Eirik who fights without shield but Gorm steps in and takes the attack, then Eirik sees an opening and he kills the King, who falls down, crushing two surviving goblins. Nowe Lomund and Miriels shoot one goblin each, and the remaining goblin drops their weapons and runs away into the dark tunnels.
After unlocking the chain around Dindy’s foot, they all look around and find about 40% of the goods plus some silver coins behind the Throne.
They all happily and somewhat bruised and battered spend the night loading wagons and then they rode the caravan back to the others at the old ruins.
Many days later, they finally arrived back at the Easterly inn, the the brothers, Dino and Dindy were very happy. There was a feast, or several, before the group decided it was time to go home, to Dale and Laketown again, to rest and to work a little. Miriel and Lomund spend the days training with their bows, to get even better. But the story does not end here.
To be continued...
Eirik’s little business idea
During the time at home, Lomund helped Gorm in the smithy in Dale, and Eirik was his usual self in Laketown. The friends often met and kept each other informed with tidings from far and near. One day Eirik told the others that he had a load of very fine Elven wine that he thought they could sell to Dindy and Dino back at the Easterly inn. Eirik was a little vague on how he had suddenly had a load of wine barrels in his possession, burt Eirik insisted that they had to move quick with this business opportunity. The packed and rode out with a wagon and horses, using the well travelled southern road this time again, they had used it on the way back from Easterly in last time.
The journey was uneventful and after a while they were back at the easterly in, with a load of wine. Dindy and Dino was all excited both to see them as soon again, and about the fact they brought some very fine wine with them, the very best wine.
To be continued...
Freja’s surprise
After they spent a few days at the Easterly inn, they decided to take a look at Pieters Place to say hello to Pieter, his wife and his lovely daughters Frida and Freja.
Freja was both surprised and happy to see Gorm again, and both Miriel and Eirik saw what Gorm didn’t see, and Lomund was too busy training with his bow to see, that Freja’s belly had grown radically larger during the past 4 months since they left.
They had some of the very good lamb stew and spoke with the hunters who now worked hard on fortifying the farm to withstand attacks from Goblins. They all helped with some heavy tasks too.
During supper it came to the adventurers attention that there had been some troubles with Orcs and Goblins south of the old road in the Mirkwood. The group decided to ride south, on the next morning, when they were about to leave, Freja told Gorm that she was carrying his baby.
Gorm was startled. Without knowing that Freja had told Gorm, Eirik decided to try to make Gorm understand his coming duties and responsibilities, he told Gorm that he should have a plan if something bad would happen to him. Gorm was not in the mood for this so he just said nothing bad will happen, and if it did, Lomund would take care of it. Eirik left that hanging, feeling that Gorm was not really ready for the you are about to be a responsible father talks yet.
To be continued...
Riding south
When the group rode out from Pieter's Farm in the early morning of the fourth date of the summer month Cermië, Freja really hoped that Gorm would return, but she was a little more hopeful this time.
They take the ferry over the River Anduin and the ride south to the big ford. During the night, on the second watch, Eirik hear sounds from one of the horses. He wakes Miriel and sneaks out to look, and he sees something that skulks on all for, but look fairly humanoid, but it has red glowing eyes. Miriel shoots an arrow, half on chance half on intuition, and she hears a distant sound, she might have hit something. They all start to search and Miriel finds her arrow, and it has traces of blood on it, must have been a very close miss. Lomund tries to find tracks but steps around tromping all over any steps, he badly needs his morning coffee before he can work properly.
The next day the pass through the land of Beorn. Their hearts and souls excitement, they suddenly see a gruesome scene. A boat is stranded on the river bank, in it are two men, both looks dead. They both have arrows sticking out of them, orc arrows. There seems to have been a cargo, or maybe a prisoner and there is a pile of cut rope in the boat. They carefully lift the dead men out of the boat. Gorm sees something on the other shore. Lomund quickly rows the over. It was the orcs, with a spear going through both of them. They look at each other, who could have made such a powerful throw?
They decide that they need to take these men back to Beorn, as both wear belts with a bear on the buckle.
They arrive to the land of Beorn in the afternoon, when they come closer they all feel mighty cheered up, life is wonderful, butterflies and birds in the sky, the sun is nice and the nature is so beautiful around them. The people they meet wave friendly, the fields a so beautiful.
Beorn’s house is surrounded by a thick, tall hedge.
To be continued...
The House of Beorn
There is a large gate, and through that the group saw a large building with a huge veranda and several other buildings. One the large grounds there were a lot of bee hives, and huge bees were flying around.
The dead bodies, who had tormented expressions on their faces before, now looked calm and at peace. Two dogs comes rushing towards the group, and when they see the dead men, both dogs tipped down the ears and dropped the tail, looking very sad. On the the porch sits a huge man wearing a bear pelt, carving some wood, with his thumbnail.
The man rises and walks towards the group, who decides Eirik will the their leader. Eirik introduce himself as Eirik son of Elgir, and the huge man introduce himself as Beorn, King of the beornings. Beon asks what have happened and why the come with two of his best men, dead. Eirik gives a short explaination and Beorn invites them into his hall for a dinner and more talk. They are quite suprised when the food is brought in from the kitchen by sheep, but the mead is excellent and so is the herring and all other food. When they mention the two orcs nailed with one spear, Beorn is not at all surprised, that’s the work of his dear friend.
Eirik drinks to much and goes to the privy, not feeling very well. The others eat and drink until Beorn says it’s time to go to bed, but the group can finish, no need to finish a wonderful evening just because he has to leave. When they drink the last tankards of mead, they hear some very strange sounds, from outside, and see a huge black figure head away.
To be continued...
A heavy morning, for some.
They all slept on hay beds in the large hall, and in the morning when the group woke up, the saw Beorn in a good mood. On the table lay 12 orc helmets. Beorn look at them and said, I was out last night hunting, I killed twelve of them, but I will kill a thousand to revenge my friends, for each of them.
Eirik looked terrible, and seemed to have a really bad hangover. When Gorm asked how he was he said: - “I’m fine, but you should have heard that other guy, he must have been really mead-sick, sounded like he tried all the way down from his ankles.”.
Breakfast was served, then Beorn look with a sincere face upon the our heroes and spoke: -”Those men were transporting a prisoner on that boat, and he must be found. He has taken the sword from one of my men, and purses too. They were transporting him to me from Stoneford, to stand trial at Carrock. You must travel south to Stoneford to find out more, and this man must be caught and brought to justice.”
Without further delay, the group accepted the mission given to them by Beorn and rode south.
To be continued...
Southbound
The journey goes smooth, but in the evening, when they are scouting for a place to camp for the night, Miriel spots a creature down in a small lowering. The group is stand by while Miriel quickly makes a flanking maneuver. When Miriel is in place, they all, very carefully move closer. What they see is not what they expected. An orc is laying in the grass, with his head 20 feet away, clean cut off. Gorm says something about that the prisoner had stolen a sword, must be a very good sword.
They continue a little while when Lomund spots a good place for a camp. The night passes without any trouble. The next day, around lunchtime, they pass a small village, and sees an elderly man working in the fields, and when the heroes asks if someone has passed recently, he says that a young man named Oderic, with cendré blond hair stayed here two nights ago. He was silent but polite, and he paid handsomely, a whole coin of silver, for the meat and bed. The characters says that they would love a meal and let the horses rest.
Eirik pays for the lunch with several coins of copper, far more than it was worth, but to thank the old man for the information. They ride on, and in the evening the heroes meet a group of three woodmen, heading north, looking for a night camp. They all agree to camp together as both Gorm and Eirik has a feeling that these men are trustworthy and honest. They say that they passed through Stoneford yesterday, and heard a story about a murder, a kinslayer, who killed his brother in law, Rathwick. The murderer was named Oderic, and he had been with Rathwicks wife that night. It was a good fireside chat, and they shared food and drink, and they shared watch duties during the night.
In the morning, they all had breakfast together, and then they rode in different directions. Lomund thought that this was a good meeting, a sign that not all men were evil, that there still were decent men in the world. It was about a half day ride to Stoneford, so they kept up the pace as the trail was now hot.
When they arrived to the small town of Stoneford, three people met them, a woman and two men. They asked what business the heroes had in Stoneford.
To be continued...