Brazen Wolfe Tabletop

Homecoming

207WeHoCo

Milly looked around the Broken Tankard dazed as if she had just woken up from a night of drinking their private reserve of Mountain bear stout – named because a single mug could cause a mountain bear to regret i’ts decision to drink the dark ale for a week. Looking from face to face she could tell that everyone felt the same, dazed, confused and as if waking from a dream. Well almost everyone, Carline just looked plain furious. As she began to wonder why Carline shrieked out a long painful cry – a long mournful shriek that was filled with loss, regret and most of all rage. “Hunter!!”

Immediately everyone in the room broke out from their daze, even as Carline dropped the lute that she was strumming but a few minutes ago and drew a long bladed sword people were standing up screaming out the same mournful, rage-filled cry of anguish and Milly knew why as she felt the same. Hunter had betrayed them all, had somehow affected all of their minds to think that he was the father of Katya, and that his fellow conspirators, Katya’s families trusted cooks and hirelings, were her real family. How could this have happened, everyone knew and loved Katya’s parents and Katya was the heart of the village, she had personally helped everyone in the village and was on her way to complete her parents wishes – to become a priestess of Chauntea.

As the village mobilised, an unspeakable agreement now that they had all had their mind cleared form what ever had put heavy fog around their memories, Milly instructed her brothers to stay behind and prepare for any wounded, they after all inherited their fathers battle lust that made them more as much as danger to the villagers as they were to Hunter and the traitors.

The march was harsh as the snow had deepened as they had moved on and the villagers were on edge. Despite their wish for vengeance and justice they had never been in a real fight before and there were rumours amongst those who marched that glittering eyes and razor sharp teeth could be seen just outside of torchlight.

It was about an hour until they passed the first toppled stone that looked like it could have been the grand gated entrance to the manor which was on the families estate, everyone remembered these gates being tall and splendid but what they passed looks like they had been destroyed a century ago. The metal bars rusted and brittle and the stone green with moss and crumbling in places. As they marched onwards they took a collective gasp as the same level of ruin could be seen on the once near-majestic manor that now appeared to be a decrepit pile of ruins and rocks. Four tall, impossibly thin figures could be seen at the windows watching the villagers approach and in the time it took Milly to blink the figures had gone – disappeared from eyesight and drifted off to the unknown. Others had seen it too by the nervous chatter and jittery movements from the villagers.

“Milly, Carline, there’s movement to the east!” A spooked logger shouted as the villagers backed up into a tight little ball, their makeshift weapons pointing outwards towards the dark. A nervous tune broke out, the same one from the previous nights around monsters on the hill. Carline lent her voice to the chorus and soon the song was being sung with bravado with all trace of nerves washed away by the bards energetic display of disgust towards those on the hill. A loud blood curdling shriek was their reward that seemed to resonate down from the old building as half a dozen or so figures approached from the east, their forms cloaked on th snow and wind.