Tindor Session 2

Tindor Chapter 1

Log

I returned to Cambridge without incident and met with Lord Uhtred. He was as perplexed by the pigs' heads as Lork and I, but he speculated a magical dimension to the issue (as Lork and I had) and suggested we talk to Brida. Naturally, Brida knew nothing about pigs' heads. Apparently, there are trivial spells that require a bit of dried sow's ear, but that didn't sound like cause for secrecy and security. Certainly more than 100 pigs' heads on ice didn't fit the bill.

Although she was baffled, she knew of a non-guild mage, named Gargoon, who was something of a scholar and might have more info. Gargoon is a Loki follower and reclusive (though her house was in Arlington), and Brida cautioned me that she might be a few apples short of a bushel. Fine. I decided to take Mishmi with me, thinking she might be useful.

Before we departed, Uhtred asked me (since we were headed North, anyway) to speak with Leofric, who was organizing Aethelflaed's army. "And bring Lork with you -- Leofric may need him." So Mishmi, Lork, and I traveled North to Arlington. I decided to speak with Leofric first, but it turned out he was in an advanced position in Amesborough, guarding the mountain pass to Cnut's territory. Gargoon first, then.

Gargoon's house wasn't difficult to find -- a constable pointed us in the right direction. Gaining access was another story. A voice inside said, "Go away! I serve Sif, now! I'm a servant of Sif!"

I replied, "That doesn't concern us. We need assistance understanding a particular arcane magic."

"You cops?" she sniffed. An eye appeared at a hole in the door. "You look like cops."

Mishmi, as I surmised, was the right person to have with me. She handed me a note with a partial poem on it that I read aloud:

In this path does madness lie
Presented to the lesser mind's eye
This knowledge we do not disdain

There was a giggle inside, followed by, "Great Lord Loki, make us sane." Gargoon opened the door to us, and naturally there was a prominent shrine of Loki, complete with full sized statue... though, I later learned it wasn't a statue at all, but... Loki. At the time, I thought he was a statue -- he looked like a statue, all posed, he was perfectly still... Strange, strange god. I'm glad I serve Surt.

Gargoon didn't know anything about pig's heads, but she had a vast (albeit, disorganized) library in her home. She was intrigued and promised to find what she could while I traveled North to Amesborough. I left Mishmi with her for help, and Lork and I departed.

In Amesborough, Leofric had made the public house a temporary base. He had a small force mostly made up of scouts and light infantry. I surmised he was equipped to detect Cnut's army, and slow it, but not stop it. It would make enough time for Uhtred to march.

Leofric's concern was that he hadn't heard from his spy in Cnut's territory for more than a week and worried they had been discovered. He wanted Lork to take a path through the mountains -- not the pass -- to infiltrate Cnut's territory and take up a station in Rye. Lork would be the new spy. Leofric hoped he would be able to give him a progress update on Cnut's preparations. Surefoot, a goliath pathfinder, was assigned to help us navigate the mountains.

Surefoot's tribe lived in the mountains, so he was familiar with the territory and he led us deftly and confidently. Not far into the mountains, though, he became uneasy. "This path hasn't been maintained. My people normally keep this way clear." All at once, we were ambushed by a party of gnolls and their hyenas. We were greatly outnumbered -- and outmatched in that terrain -- and they had Lork and me down rather quickly. Surefoot, however, cut his way through, with an over-sized sword, like a hobbit through a buffet. We were all pretty badly hurt, though.

We made our way back to the goliath encampment where we were healed. "Don't go that way. Never go that way! There's GNOLLs down that path." The medicine woman explained that their tribe had stopped maintaining that path on account of a strange cult that had begun meeting among standing stones on the other side of the mountain. A tribal warrior had observed one of their midnight rituals and gone mad (and was subsequently exiled). As it happened, this warrior was Surefoot's uncle. In exchange for a promise to report on the cult situation, the tribe cleared a path for us on the following day.

We crossed the mountain with little trouble, and Lork was sent on to Rye. On the way back, Surefoot and I made camp in some cover, immediately below the treeline. In the middle of the night, I awoke to find that Surefoot was gone. I thought I saw him among the trees and went to him, but he ran away. I followed and was caught by Surefoot, who informed me I had been chasing his uncle.

The two of us followed him to the standing stones, where a wild ritual was taking place. The cultists were shaking and screaming. They did not appear to be enjoying themselves. Surefoot's uncle was among them. Amidst the chaos, I thought I saw something... unnatural... emerge from the fire and we decided to be on our way. But as soon as we turned around, our path was blocked by a wolf. It seemed spooked and threatening, but I managed to keep it from attacking, doing everything I could to demonstrate that we posed no danger.

And the next thing I remember was awakening in the morning. Surefoot had carried me a disttance during the night after I'd passed out. But I had a raging headache that didn't go away. At the goliath encampment, the medicine woman gave me something for the headache, but the cause was magical and she didn't know how to treat it. Neither did anyone in Amesborough, though it was getting worse. Even in Arlington, the brother at the temple was stymied. No cure was effective.

Gargoon, on the other hand, took one look at me and knew what was going on. (As an aside, the "statue" of Loki was gone. You can't expect a god to spend all their time in a private shrine, I guess) She put me into a trance, and in my dream her house was vacant and dark. I was alone. I exited, and the streets were still. Suddenly, I encountered the wolf. It was sickly, and some of its attacks were thwarted by coughing. When I did manage to kill it, it vomited acid that melted my sword, and an awful creature burst from its side -- the creature from the cultists' fire.

All at once, I had a glowing blade in my hand that I used to fight the creature. Both of us were nearly dead by the but I clearly had the upper hand and it fled. Behind it, my father lay in bed. It grabbed him out of his bed and the two of them were swallowed up by the Earth.

I awakened in Gargoon's house, without the headache. But I was deeply concerned for the state of my father.