RP:A Sour Kill

From HollowWiki

Part of the Eboric Unites the Tribes Arc



On The Northwest Coast of Rynvale

The ship, long and lean, all curving strakes and rowing benches, draws close to the beach, high on the northwest coast of Rynvale island. The crew has furled the single, square sail, and now dig oars into the choppy waves, pulling the ship toward the shore. The shallow keel allows it to approach closer than the heavy tubs used by the southern port city, and so the steersman holds his course without fear, intending to simply beach the vessel. In the prow, Eboric stands, watching the land as they approach, scrutinizing the landscape until he is sure there is no hidden danger.


Raidh is not watching the approach to Rynvale. She is watching the sparse remaining contents of her stomach hit the choppy waves over the side of the ship. Again. And being forced, in doing so, to once more view and thus ponder the depths below isn't helping.


Avaldi stands beside her, barely, his legs shaking and his one hand white-knuckled on the timber rail. "Land," he croaks. "Blessed land."


Raidh groans in joy, retches one more time and draws herself upright in a most unsteady way.


Eboric looks away from his vigil at the sound of renewed retching, a sound that has provided constant amusement for the crew throughout the voyage, although Eboric at least has had the grace to be kind to the two Riddarnir. He crosses the ship, making his way between the benches to where Raidh and Avaldi stand. He even brings them a skin of fresh water. "Be sure to drink as much as you can," he says. "You've given what you had to the sea, after all." The ship slides onto the sand with a lurch, and the king steadies himself with one hand on the ship's side. "I was sick on my first voyage, too."


Brother and sister nod sympathy and thanks, in unison. Both drink a few sips, before Avaldi slings the skin’s carry-strap over his shoulder and vaults off the ship, charging through the shallows and dropping to dry sand like a lost child finding its mother.


Raidh waits for Eboric, and will follow where he goes, “All that water,” her voice is faint, her features a sickly shade of white. The sea is a wonder to be sure, as had been the journey to the ship itself through Kelay, where ‘stranger’ was a not just a noun, and Cenril with its bustling streets and fish-markets. But the sea trumps all of that, and Raidh fears it as an oath-breaker must fear his gods. “How does anyone ever get used to it?” She summons a faint smile, for even the Great Deep cannot quell her spirit, “Is the den of the dragon far from here?” Raidh looks hopeful; she doesn’t favour the idea of having to hunt the creature without finding her land-legs again.


Eboric disembarks in a less hasty manner, as do the majority of the crew, who will accompany the royal party as guards, while a few remain to watch the ship. "Some find as much joy in riding the waves as your people do in riding your horses," he says, amused. "As for me, while I do not mind it, I have never felt the ocean's call the way others do." As the scouts disappear into the woods that grow some distance from the beach, the main party begins to move, many carrying heavy packs of supplies. "We will need to skirt Gamorg to reach the dragons' hunting grounds. I did not bring enough men to tangle with the ogres, this time, so it will be a few days' walk."


Raidh gives Eboric a highly dubious look when he mentions joy, as she surely has found very little of that herself during the sail over to this foreign island. Still somewhat green around the gills, she taunts Avaldi with a joke about his own sea-sickness, before addressing Eboric again, “One of your men told me all about Rynvale’s ogres during our journey. From what he said, they are rather fierce.” Her brother, still too queasy to get revenge on Raidh yet for her teasing, spends his recovering energy instead on preparing his gear for the trek through the thick forest, not too unlike the one in which he’d been attacked by that wharg years ago. Raidh sought and shouldered her own share of the supplies, her weapons with it. As the party begin to file into the woods, long legs help her easily keep pace with the King. “The men also said that dragons are many here, so it shouldn’t be too hard to find one, then?”


Eboric, dressed in his armor with his weapons ready at his belt, enters the dense forest, his eyes continually flicking back and forth, checking the trees. "The eastern part of the island is plagued with the beasts," he says as he walks, following the path set by the scouts. "Luckily, they are the kind that do not speak or change their appearance, but rather live their days as they should, little more than animals. They are still ferocious enough, and they have a taste for the flesh of men."


Raidh grits her teeth at the thought as she paces by the vigilant King’s side. She is as cautious as any man here, but as Avaldi is ranging the flanks of their company with some of Eboric’s men while others hold the rear, she feels confident that they have a good chance of spotting trouble before it finds them. “It’s the ones who do speak and change form which offer the most danger,” she observes, with not a single pang of guilt mentally bestowed in Xersom’s direction. “The bestial ones are far more easily slaughtered, as they are at least predictable. “ The woods grow foggy as the ground rises, and trees thicker. Avaldi can be heard, an owl in the light of day, calling to his sister from a slight distance, that all was well. “My brother will be enjoying this,” Raidh muses quietly. “I’m sure he’s already making the song of it in his head.”


Eboric receives constant reports from his own scouts, including a pair that have outdistanced the rest, already searching for signs of their prey, and relaying the messages back down the line. "Yes, the greater threat comes from the intelligent creatures, on that we can agree. I've overthrown them before, however, without too much difficulty." He smiles slightly as he remembers the fight, the moment of victory. As Raidh speaks of Avaldi, he says, "I would be glad to hear a song of it. Perhaps he can have it ready by the time we reach my father's steading." As they pass south of Gamorg, the forest grows quiet, foreboding, although no ogres are in evidence.


Raidh had forgotten that this island was Eboric’s homeland, and she makes a soft ‘ohh’ sound as it dawns on her. “So you grew up in a land infested with dragons?” she grins, imagining an infant Eboric, no doubt he’d had a tiny axe. “I think you’ll find the deep plains dull by comparison. All we have left to fight there are poachers and bull-men, the occasional wharg.” As though summoned by that word, Avaldi melts out of the trees like a very tall, yellow-bearded wraith, makes a swift signal to Raidh with his hand and vanishes again. The Jarl’s daughter holds her hand over her mouth to prevent herself being too loud in her mirth. Recovering herself she explains, “He made the sign for danger, then no, then sad. I think he was expecting a platoon of ogres mounted on dragons.” She’s speaking barely above a whisper, for the quiet of the forest has not escaped her. As she continues to walk, the longbow she carries is unshouldered and lightly nocked, “Is it always this gloomy out here? And how far are we from your father’s house?” Another thing dawns on her then, “Your son! He’ll be there, right?”


Eboric shakes his head. "The ogres were between my folk and the dragons' nests, although they sometimes flew by in search of food. Not often, and those that did rarely flew home again. The minotaurs could make for some interesting hunting, though. We don't have them up here." His gaze flicks to Avaldi as the man appears, and he grins as the signal is translated. "We are fortunate that the ogres and the dragons are at odds." As the party continues on, leaving Gamorg behind, he says, "The ogres hunt the forest, so wise creatures stay clear. As for my father's house, it is north of Gamorg, but not too far. We should be able to make it before nightfall, so long as we can catch a dragon quickly." Indeed, the reports from the scouts seem to bode well, and Eboric picks up the pace a little, his excitement for the hunt beginning to show. "And yes, Aethelric will be there. We will be bringing him with us when we return home."


Raidh’s breath comes a little harder, both with the exertion of keeping up with Eboric on their long walk through this wooded terrain, and the excitement buzzing through the company. “My King,” Raidh is scanning the woods fervently, for sign of their quarry, though they are upon it yet. “Please, call your men in and let me have at the creature alone.” She is hasty to add, in case he looks at her like she’s mad, “The true test of the dragonbane comes not with swift slaying, but with slight wounds and slow death. I only have this one piece,” she grasps for her amulet, pulling its chain over her head. “Not enough to kill outright, but in a beast with not enough wit to dig the poison out, it will die sooner rather than later with my arrow in it. We can track it, and retrieve the arrow when it’s dead. I wish to see if the legends speak true, Just as you do. Avaldi will hate it, I am sure, if I spoil his song. But it remains, my wish is that you see what happens when they are merely wounded.”


Eboric gives Raidh a look, his expression a hard-to-read mix of amusement, pride, and perhaps a bit of something else. "Have no fear," he says with only the slightest of smiles. "They know well enough to leave it be. But they must ensure that there are no others in the area, because the beast's roars and death throes may well call more down upon us. As you say, we only have the one piece of the stone, and even my men cannot fend off a whole flock of the creatures."


Raidh’s cheeks drain of the color they’ve only just regained after her bout of sickness, but her voice betrays none of her dread. The amulet is separated from its chain, and fitted with a soft click over the head of her arrow. “Avaldi had one, too,” she shows Eboric how firmly the metallic hollowpoint fit over the arrow. “Amma gave us each one, as the eldest of the Jarl’s children, so we wouldn’t forget. And in case we ever did find a dragon, and it ate us,” she smiles wanly, “Our Amma had a funny sense of humor, but I think she was only half-joking when she said, if one ate us and flew away, at least it would die of a rotten gut and we’d be avenged.” Her weapons and shield are at her back now, leaving her room to shoot cleanly, and the bowstring is drawn a little further back as they walk on. “Avaldi gave his to his wife,” blue eyes shift toward the King momentarily, “We must never mention her in his presence.” Her look said this was a thing to be discussed at another time, “Anyway, his is lost now, so this is the only piece left outside that which the Jarl keeps in a chest, spear-heads and arrow-tips, ancient as the tales which speak of the old wars. And there’s the map…” But here come the men, cutting off her speech, and Raidh looks to Eboric for this is his homeland, and his hunt.


Eboric listens to Raidh's story in silence, his ears already straining for any sound of a dragon's heated breath, the snap of leathery wings. It has been long since the werebear has hunted such prey, but the routine comes back to him easily enough, and as the scouts come in to report the nest of an adult red, just up ahead in the ruins, he takes a long spear from one of the men, long-bladed and crossed under the head like a boar spear, only stouter. His voice dropping low, he says, "You will be given the first shot, while the beast is unaware of us. You should be able to place the arrow somewhere vital. Just as soon as you take your shot, though, you will fall back behind me. If it chooses to attack rather than run, we will have to finish the job quickly, and I will not have you in the front line for that fight."


Raidh rather wisely shuts up now, and though her mind continues racing her hands hold her weapon steady.


Avaldi has made his way to them in similar silence, his stump firmly jammed in the special leather sleeve that keeps his shield in place, a spear similar to Eboric’s gripped in his one hand, and his glance to Eboric made it plain he’d be front and center of any trouble that followed his sister, right alongside the King.


Raidh looks to Avaldi then the King, and with her jaw setting in firm resolve she steps as soundlessly as she can through the trees. Just up ahead indeed! The ruins are some ways distant yet, but that arrow is held ready all the way there so that her arm is aching by the time she glimpses the lichen-greyed turret of its one remaining tower over the treeline. Hardly breathing, she creeps forward, telling herself this is just like hunting bison, really. Yes, just like that, except bison don’t snap heads off or breathe fire, but the analogy holds otherwise, and – shut up, Raidh! - she scolds herself, it is time to focus! The air reeks now, with the stink of saurian and scorched meat, the creature must have fed only recently. That’s good, right? It might mean the beast is more sluggish, which could only be.. Raidh frowns and hushes her mind one more time, for ahead she can see, coiled among the rubble of long-fallen stone, the deep red of the dragon’s flesh, the sinuous motion as it shifts in its nest. Out of the denser forest hasn’t much cover left but the stink of the dragon’s recent meal will at least mask her own scent as she creeps toward it, making a fleet dash to hide behind a section of wall not yet crumbled with neglect and time. Peeking around this now, her arrow aims but she can’t see a vulnerable spot; the dragon has its back to her, all hard scale and leather wing. There is nothing for it but for the maiden to creep closer still. Closer, and she is making a berth around her quarry, hoping to find a better target. The creature seems very busy with its feast, but as Raidh inadvertently steps on a dry twig which cracks like lightning, to her dismayed ears anyway, the dragon’s head whips around on its long neck, its maw opens to roar a warning or threat, and that is the moment her arrow flies!


Avaldi growls a blue curse as the sharp arrowhead plummets into an eye, what a shot! She’ll be boasting about that for years!


Raidh will of course never tell anyone she’d really been aiming for its throat.. But never mind all that! There’s a dragon screeching and thrashing, pawing at its injured face, blood flying everywhere and its tail lashing – Raidh leaps from its path, the tail swooshes under her feet and when she lands she’s already running, not fast enough that she escapes the first gout of flame blown in agony and rage. There’ll be burns to tend to later, but now is the time for doing as she was told, and retreating behind husband and brother. Half blind, furious, poisoned and agonised, the dragon is definitely on the warpath, and headed their way.


Eboric keeps pace with Raidh as she moves toward the dragon, moving as silently as only a hunter can. He takes a position beside a pile of fallen stones, eyes locked on the dragon and Raidh. As she pelts past him, he sidesteps to close the gap and block the dragon's diminished line of sight, planting the butt of his spear in the dirt, and leveling the blade toward the incoming dragon, so that if it continues its path it will gore itself. Eboric's men materialize from the trees behind and to either side, hemming the dragon in and approaching it with yet more spears, while those with bows wait at a distance, ready to lend what aid they can.


Raidh glances back as the men move forward, the tip of one braid faintly smoldering and her face smudged with char where her burned tunic-sleeve has swiped at the flames.


Avaldi is still cursing, for he knows his sister wishes the thing to remain alive as long as possible, despite the threat it poses them all. His spear does not join Eboric’s, the lithe Rider skirting the infuriated reptile to gain its flank on the blinded side, the tip of the weapon ready to rip into the dragon’s gut. But the path of the beast is not so predictable as if it was wounded by any ordinary arrow, for the dragonbane is even now working its way deeper into the socket with every swipe of scaled paw, and its poison is working directly on the dragon’s primitive brain. Madness ensues, and the beast doesn’t care if it’s speared, it’s smashing its own head into the ground, charging the men, stopping to thrash its head again, entirely blind with sheer pain. The edges of its socket begin to blacken, though its probable no-one’s looking closely at it, while wings flail in a failed attempt at flight. Once more, it smashes its burning brain-pan into the stony ground of the ruins, blowing only smoke for it cannot raise a fiery breath. Only its claws and teeth, and the sheer weight of its body and tail are a danger, perhaps moreso for its utter lack of control as its bucks and thrashes into that line of spears.


Raidh has her own weapon in that line, now – behind the King, be damned!


Eboric , the immediate threat of a charging dragon stolen by the workings of the dragonbane, cannot help but grin, exhilarated, as he tosses the spear aside. Together with three of his men, he steps in, braving the dragon's thrashing limbs and approaching only with coils of heavy chain. Two of the men spring for the tail, looping the chains around and around deftly, then sprinting to secure the other end around the trunk of an especially thick tree. Eboric and his companion, however, dart toward the creature's head, dodging it as best they can on the way in. The werebear leaps for the dragon's neck, takes hold for a moment, and is thrown to the earth with a thud. Springing up, he leaps again and, holding tight with his legs, begins to secure the chain, while his companion runs with the other end toward another tree, in hopes of trapping the beast and stilling its throes.


Raidh and her brother spare a second to gape at this process in utter amazement, though Avaldi keeps his spear in hand, still ready to gut the dragon at the first sign of any of the company being in immediate and mortal peril. One chain snaps, so powerful is the dragon’s struggle against its own impending death, and the freed limb lashes to rake at the nearest soldier. The creature begins gasping and twitching all over, though, as its nervous system suffers the effect of that toxic metal.


“It’s not supposed to be like this,” Raidh mutters; even though her people despise this species, the dragon is still a living thing and in abject torment. No clean death is this! “Avaldi!” she raises her voice, having decided the issue. “Kill it, quickly.” But she hardly need tell him this, for the dragon’s head hangs low, and more than blood is dripping from the hole where once was housed a brilliant, lucid eye.


Eboric , who had been expecting a bit more fight from the dragon, finishes chaining a its weakened head, stretching out its scaly neck. He slides from his perch, looking at the beast in something close to wonder, and the potency of the stone is made apparent. He glances over at Raidh as she speaks, then again to the poisoned dragon, his face kept expressionless. All the while, his men work to chain the rest of the body, throwing the heavy links over the torso and pulling them taut, staking them down. "Through the eye," the warlord says to Avaldi. "Use a long spear, and pierce its brain."


Raidh forces herself to watch the slaughter, as surprised to see the distaste for it on Avaldi's face as she is to feel it in her own heart. "I don't understand," she is muttering again, mostly to herself, though loud enough for the King to hear if he is close.


There's a sickening thud, and the Half-Arm's spear finds it mark, the dragon rattles the chains with one last fatal throe and lies still. Disgusting matter of some pale sort slowly seeps from the eye shot with the arrow, while Avaldi plants his foot on the dragon's head to help with leverage as he tugs his spear free. He steps back then, staring at corpse, as confounded as his sister; this is surely not as the songs have it, the epic struggles and days of trailing a wounded dragon across the plains. This was something else, and it is leaving a bad taste in the Rider's mouth.


Raidh is at Eboric's side, checking him over, for he'd taken a spill , but doing so discreetly as the King is as proud as any of the Riddarnir. "Perhaps it was so quick because it's only a small one," she suggests, her voice still low in tone. "The ones in the songs were large enough to raze a whole village, this one is hardly big enough to take on just a handful of men." She's staring at that mucky eye socket now, realizing somebody had to get in that head and fetch the amulet out.


Eboric 's men are already in motion, stepping forward as the life leaves their prey. Their blades skillfully cut the hide free, taking scales and all as they bare the flesh beneath. The flesh around the head is corrupted, with tendrils of rot creeping down the neck. Eboric, though slightly battered, is otherwise unhurt, and he watches the process in fascination, still surprised at the strength of the weapon. As his men begin to cut the flesh away to free the bones, the werebear finally looks away, inspecting Raidh's burns critically. "Perhaps," he says in reply. "The beasts are seldom as big as their greater kin, and this one was young. Are you hurt?"


Raidh shakes her head, though there’s deep redness and a blisters forming on the few places where her skin was bare to the air and dragon’s flame both. “I’ll live.” She’s frowning, “It cannot be size alone, the poor thing’s brain is all but liquid. Perhaps the shamans back home will know.”


Her brother is wiping the gore from his spear-head on the trunk of a tree, suddenly too grim to make jokes about his sister’s aim, or dragon’s willingly dying rather than listen to her blather. Perhaps the amulet has him thinking about loved ones lost, who knows, but he’s quick to make himself busy rather than talk.


Looks like Raidh’s the one who’s going to have to dig into that necrotic head. She wrinkles her nose, and reaches behind her shoulder for her axe.


Eboric lays a hand on Raidh's arm, meaning to prevent her from doing the deed herself. "They will get it," he says. "You'll need a salve, and maybe some bandages." He motions to one of his men, who approaches with a small kit of healing supplies. Another warrior moves to the skull, his own axe biting into the bone to spill the foul remains of what used to be a brain. The odor is appalling, and the king takes a step back to avoid the growing puddle. The amulet appears amidst the waste, with the arrowhead still within, though the shaft and fletching of the arrow are gone, disintegrated in the beast's fiery blood.


Raidh knows well how to treat burns with the mashed pulp of certain plants which grow everywhere on the plains. But here and now, she’ll graciously allow the King’s man to ply her with a pleasant-smelling ointment and a clean bandage on the back of her hand and wrist, where skin had broken. At least the salve is alleviating the stink of that rotten dragon-brain somewhat. The unfortunate warrior tasked with that unpleasant job rinses the object off with a dash of hard liquor he keeps in a little flask for ‘emergencies’, and hands it to the King’s wife. Raidh cradles the amulet, still locked around the arrow-head, in her palm. The metal of it is dull like lead, but harder than iron and sharper of edge than honed obsidian. Aside from its twin which Avaldi once owned, she has never seen another of its like, even among the ones Jorgun keeps like treasure in that chest. The amulets are somehow different, is as far as that train of thought takes her.


Avaldi quits being grim and turns toward Raidh and the King with a grin, “Are ogres harder to kill than your island’s piss-poor dragons, brother?” The question is not random. In the distance, guttural voices speaking a harsh-tongued language sound, muffled through the thick belt of trees.


Eboric turns toward the sound, and a frown crosses his face. As one, his men cease butchering the dragon, and bundle up what bones they have collected in the scaly hide. "We move," he says quietly, wondering what happened to his scouts. "North and west, swiftly. Oswine, Aelfred, do what you can to disguise our tracks." The king's face is blank and hard, his jaw set as he strides purposefully away from the kill site.


“That’ll be a ‘yes’,” says Avaldi to his sister before he follows, and while he seems to have regained his good spirits, the Half-Arm glances back almost mournfully to the forest and those grunting voices. Will he never get a clean fight, this whole journey? But Avaldi is no fool, and Eboric no coward. If these ogre-things are enough to worry the King, then Avaldi must trust there is wisdom in retreat.


Raidh grins and shakes her head at her brother before she too moves after Eboric and his men. Minus two, she notes with concern, as Oswine and Aelfred use leafy branches to obscure footprints behind her.