Large wet snowflakes tumble from the dark sky, landing silently on the ground and trees about you. You are in deep in the woods now, in the Night Mask lands, and winter approaches.
The Night Mask camp is empty, an eerie scene. It's as if the entire Night Mask tribe dropped all their goods, weapons and belongings and fled. Tents stand empty and abandoned. So does the corral, with a brace of stout Northerling ponies still within. But the girl you've rescued, hysterical and shrieking in Khom-Bei's arms, was witness to whatever occurred.
Thragga, axe held high, stalks off into the woods to scout the area.
Raelere, the Oathkeeper knight, has her sword drawn and takes a long moment to search the tents and sleeping rolls.
Khom-Bei quickly checks the girl for wounds as he tries to quiet her.
"No!" screams the young Northerling girl, no more than sixteen summers old. She is dusky as Khom-Bei, but her eyes are a shade of blue like Raelere's, not a trait known in the clans. She is unwounded, at least physically. Her breath is ragged, her eyes tremble, her movements are jerky with fear.
Khom-Bei touches his finger to the girl's head and utters a single word, "Quiet.'
The girl takes a deep breath, and quiets, but does not still. She tries to pull herself from the shaman's grasp.
Khom-Bei holds the girls' arms firmly and looks into her eyes. "You must be still, we will not harm you, we are here to help."
The girl relents her squirming, gasping, shaking her head.
Kane roams about the camp trying to make sense of what has happened here. He leans close over the brush, spotting horse tracks, from many riders, leading into camp by a different way than you came. And where the riders entered, something else. As if lightning or some other great force a cluster of some of the trees. They are split and cast aside as if by giant's hands.
Khom-Bei places his hand on the girls forehead and speaks softly, "Great Father, give this child peace and calm her troubled spirit." She goes limp at the imprecation to the Great Father, torpid and docile.
Kane shouts: "Khom-Bei,come here and have a look at this, horse tracks and something else..."
Khom-Bei sits the girl on the ground carefully and walks to where Kane stands."What is it, Kane?"
Raelere seats herself by the girl, sword drawn, watchful and guarding.
Kane says, "Look at the trees. They look like some giant has swatted them with his hand."
Raelere strokes the Northerling girl's hair to calm her, and sings softly to her in her lilting Ress accent.
Khom-Bei looks at the trees more closely, noting the broken trunks and branches, "What could have done this?"
Thragga emerges silently from the woods near Kane and Khom-Bei. He shakes his head. "Nothing's about. Whatever came, left, headed south, by the looks of it."
Kane says, "I have a guess, but you won't like it."
Khom-Bei turns to face Kane, "I don't like it already."
Kane says, "The Beast was here or at least his abomination was. That's the way it looks, that is."
Thragga frowns. "This place stinks."
Khom-Bei nods slowly, "And it's heading south. We need to travel quickly, don't we?"
Kane says, "We do."
Thragga asks, "Without eating first?"
Khom-Bei strides quickly to where Raelere sits with the girl, and kneels in front of them.
Raelere finishes her Ress riding song, about long journeys and coming home. The girl is pacified and appears dazed. Raelere looks at Khom-Bei, silently.
Taking the girls hands in his, Khom-bei speaks softly to her, "My name is Khom-bei. I am last of the Coldwind clan. Can you tell me your name?"
A long pause. "I am Dhar-bo, of the Night Masks..." she says finally.
Khom-Bei says, "Dhar-bo, can you tell us what happened here? Was it the Dark Ones?"
"Where are my people, Khom-Bei? What has become of them?" she asks, confused.
Khom-Bei says, "We do not know what has become of the Night Masks, Dhar-bo. Did you see anything?"
The girl is silent a long moment. Raelere takes Dhar-bo's head in her lap, maternally. After a time the Northerling girl says, "The Dark Ones came. I was gathering herbs for a poultice...my pony, he had slipped and cut himself on a stone...and when I returned, the Dark Ones were already on us..."
Khom-Bei says, "Did the Dark Ones take your clan, Dhar-bo? Was there a...creature with them? A colossal abomination?"
Kane says, "Khom-Bei, perhaps it is not wise to push the child too hard. She has been through much and I belive we can make a good guess of what happened here."
She sits bolt upright at the memory. "There were many of them. Vorghol and others. A big one...a very big one, a lord. He laughed. Said we would serve the King forever. Then one near him..on a horse...had a staff. He raised it...there was a light and a sound like a thousand screams...oh, that sound. I threw myself under a fallen tree...and still the sound came. I covered my ears and still it came. I dug in the earth with my fingers and still it came...I failed them, Khom-Bei! Oh, kinsman, lend me your dagger, I beg of you!" she pleads.
Kane says, "Easy child, there was nothing you could do."
Khom-Bei reaches forward and brushes the girls hair back from her face, "You have failed no one, Dhar-bo, and you have lived to fight another day."
"When I could see again, when i could think again, they were gone. My people...those were their screams!" she shrieks. "They are dead now, I know it."
Thragga maintains watchful guard on the camp, like a hound.
Dhar-bo wipes tears from her eyes, and wet snowflakes. "There was...something like a storm. Lightning. It flung the trees about. The very stars glowed with the lightning and energy. From the man with the staff..."
Kane says, "We must ride soon to get word south of here of the evil that is on the move."
Khom-Bei takes the girl's hands in his and holds them tightly, "Hear my words, Dhar-bo. You are last as I am last, the only Night Mask as I am the only Coldwind, and we are bound in this. You must go with Raelere to her home and carry the word of what has happened here so that Ress may rise against this threat." He faces Raelere, "Will you take her with you to your Castellan, Raelere? War is coming to us all.
Raelere nods. "Aye. Castle Eryth is due south o'here. We must ride like th'very wind t'carry news of this to them, and warn 'em."
Khom-Bei stands and pulls Dhar-bo to her feet, "Ride with us, kinswoman, avenge your clan. Do not surrender to your grief, it is not our way." He whistles softly for his pony.
Kane has already mounted his horse and looks expectantly to his companions.
Cakilgan gallops up to Khom-Bei.
Khom-Bei nods to Dhar-bo, "Girl, you are alive and you will carry your clan's name from this day forward."
Dhar-bo swallows. "Alone, as a Coldwind." She clutches a small charm in her hand, sniffing.
Khom-Bei looks to Kane and frowns, "Kane, I need a moment here, I cannot leave without paying respect to my kin."
Thragga says, "We are all of us, alone and outcasts, girl. I am Thragga. This is Kane."
Khom-Bei leans to gather a handful of the dusty soil, "Dhar-bo, will you walk the Circle of the Winds with me?"
Dhar-bo says, "I will, kinsman. It would be my honor."
Chanting the death song of his people, Khom-bei begins to walk the circle, Dhar-bo at his heels, casting soil to each of the four winds.
Raelere says quietly to Kane. "But we were told, a colossus, Kane...a very giant of undead bodies. Could th'Beast hide such a thing?"
Kane says, "I don't believe he's hiding it. But who is this other one that travels with him I wonder."
Thragga thumbs the blade of his axe. "Doesn't matter, he'll be dead soon."
Completing the Circle, Khom-bei draws a small dagger from his belt and holds its' blade to his palm. Facing Dhar-bo, he speaks so that only she can hear him and the dagger is hidden from the others, "You are last, but you are not alone. I am your kin and we are bound together forever."
At his last word, Khom-bei draws the blade sharply across his palm and he hands the dagger to Dhar-bo.
Dhar-bo says, unsteadily, "I am your kin and we are bound togther...forever..." she slices her own palm, red blood spilling down her fingers and mixing with the wet snow.
Khom-Bei places his palm to her palm, blood mingling together before dripping into the snow at their feet. He places the dagger back in its sheath and turns back to the others, "Now we must ride and ride quickly."
Raelere says, "Th'Beast must surely seek shelter nearby soon, or hide in his coffin or th'like. Th'Sun will be up soon." She mounts her own battle-trained mare, a lean hard horse of Ress.
Kane says, "Cover those wounds well, we don't need to draw any unwanted attention.
Thragga steps away and is obscured behind some tents for a moment.
Khom-Bei says, "Raelere, does this trail lead to your home or must we part ways?"
Raelere says, "Where will ye go?"
Khom-Bei says, "Kane? Do we go to Ress?"
Raelere says, "Come wi'me to Eryth, the walls are thick and these woods aren't safe."
Kane says, "I think we should travel together. Getting word to Ress is most important now."
Khom-Bei says, "Agreed." He turns in his saddle, looking for Thragga, "Thragga! Let's go!"
Thragga is busy with something, out of view. "Mmmf!" you hear.
Kane says, "What is it, my friend?"
The Urag emerges a few moments later with a sack, shaking free crumbs and greasy with foodstains. He's jammed it with food and his own mouth with a roast chicken, abandoned.
Dhar-bo opens the gate of the small corral, loosing the ponies within. "Be free," she tells them, but takes one for her own riding. She slips on its back easily, and canters up next to Khom-Bei, without a look back. Nomads travel light.
The Night Mask ponies edge forward, nervously, then flee into the woods.
Khom-Bei looks to Raelere and Kane, "Lead on."
On her horse now, Raelere says to Khom-Bei, challenge in her voice, "So, Northerling, d'ye think y'can outride a lass of Ress?"
Khom-Bei smirks, "If I knew the way, you would be choking on my dust already."
Kane says, "Easy now, we want to move fast it's true but we also want to move quietly. There is no telling what is out in the woods tonight. At daybreak, we can pick up the pace."
Raelere frowns. She wanted to ride all-out. "Verra well, Kane, lead on, then."
Kane leads the group at a brisk yet qiet pace. He says to Raelere, "When the sun rises then we can let the horses stretch their legs a bit."
Thragga trots along, sack of supplies over one shoulder, chewing noisily. "Mmmf. Mmmf mm mmm. Ff. Fff mm."
Khom-Bei allows Dhar-bo to join the group before following behind.