The Eekers' Lament
Part III: Theroscade
In the gaming room of the Alabaster Brow, they encountered the group of Pilts. Their apparent leader was named Teucer Orm. He seemed to know their intended quest, having suggested blandly that despite being in the high hills far from the sea, it was likely a kraulschwimmen, a sea monster, which they hunted. When asked for further elucidation, he told the old legend of High King Tascifarnias and the slaying of the Lampedusa. He added however that before its death, it was said that the Lampedusa would travel upon the land to lay its eggs in the gravide mud. These spawn were called the Ravenusi and, fortunately for mankind, would lay dormant for ages before coming to life.
"I think maybe your eekers have inadvertently awaken a Ravenusa."
He wished them luck in the hunting of it but warned that legend held that such terrible creatures could be slain only through the self-sacrifice of a Piltking and since there had been no King in centuries, the party was headed to their doom.
They scoffed at this superstition and began debating jokingly about who they could make king to so sacrifice. Throgmorton suggested that if they proclaimed Teucer king would that suffice. At this, Teucer flew into a rage, "Do not call me such! Your Tutin Emperor has declared death for any Pilt who claims that title! I have no wish to end my life hoisted on a Catharine Wheel! I am a simple farm hand."
The matter might have come to blows had not Teucer's wife, a woman with some pretension at being a seeress, looked oddly at Lord Danny and said to her husband in Piltish, "Icu thu me favin nir Haraman."
Teucer stared at Danny for a time before finally saying, "You have a strange friend, my Burgund lord."
Upon hearing that he was of the family Figge, Teucer observed that this was a Piltish name and that many of the nobles of Lillian of the Faye were of the Oldest Blood.
"We may not be so distant from each other," Teucer said wryly
"I certainly hope that's not the case," returned Danny amiably.
The exchange seemed to soothe things somewhat. Teucer proved willing to give them direction to settlement of the eekers. It was in a place known as the Deixerat in Piltish, meaning simply The Dale.
"Take a care, it is a place of ill omen and few have ventured there before. These eekers may have thought such a place one of safety but I fear they have found it to be just the opposite."
After this, Brandywine went in search of Roman. She found him settled in a dark corner of the inn's basement as was his eccentric want. She confronted him about her suspicion that he was dabbling in black habilistics and warned him not to trifle with the party. Taking this as a threat, he referred her to his metal staves and warned that should she desire to test him, he was well able to defend himself. The encounter ended in an uncomfortable stalemate. In the end, Brandywine, much troubled, retreated from the basement.
The next morning they set off in the lentum. Following Teucer's instructions, they travelled for several hours down the main road heading north. About midday, they reached a small track turning northwest off the road. Another hour or so brought them to a clearing, The Dale.
As they approached, they could see some small farmed fields, the ripe crops lying uncollected in them. There was a small thorp at the end of track, containing several humble buildings surrounded by a rough stockade. A small stone cottage stood a short distance before the stockade.
They halted at this first habitation. The small stone cottage had but one door and windows shuttered from within. No smoke was coming from the chimney. Roman and Throgmorton approached. While Throgmorton held a loomblaze at the ready, Roman rushed at the door. Only to find it locked. The frail fulgar merely bounced off the stout wood.
The pair decided to climb onto the roof and perhaps claw their way through the thatching. Throgmorton opined that a potive such as bothersalts, dropped down the chimney first might be the best first step in investigating the cottage.
Not trusting to the novice scourge's abilities, Roman hastily descended from roof and clung to the stone walls of the cottage. The rest of the party had remained in the lentum which Flossie drove forward to a safe distance. Lord Danny and Sister Brandywine readied their firearms for whatever might come from the cottage.
Throgmorton managed to drop his potive down the chimney. When it burst within, explosively filling the cottage with repugnant fumes, two figures burst forth from the door to the cottage. They had all the appearance of revermen, man-made walking corpses.
Almost instantaneously, Flossie sent a hunting arrow into the skull of the first while Danny's long rifle shot shattered the head of the second.
Brandywine approached the now motionless bodies with care, her bayoneted musket at her shoulder. She saw where wounds had been made that a host of yellowish worms from rapidly emerging from these walking dead. She recognized them as larger specimens of the one that had come off the mad boy Amery back in Brandenbrass. As aimed her musket down at them, she was horrified to see one crawling up the bayonet of her musket. She quickly flung the gun away. They observed that the worm crawled into the trigger guard and molded itself into the curve of the guard. Danny hurled his dagger at the worm, killing it but also firing the musket. The shot ricocheted off a stone of the cottage wall, nearly striking Roman who had returned there seeking cover.
At this point, Throgmorton flung a loomblaze onto the heap of sqirming worms emerging from the corpses. They were soon engulfed.
Just to be sure, he hurled another onto the already burning corpses.
To be even more certain, he cast one onto the roof of the cottage, which was soon fully ablaze.
As they approached the stockaded village, they saw a body of a dead cow lying near the road. Roman rushed to the dead bovine and began to cut at its distended belly with his surgeon's knife. As soon as the blade cut through the hide, the gases that had accumulated with during the beast's decomposition burst forth, propelling a wriggling mass of the yellow worms across the road and into a fenced field.
Throgmorton confidently approached the mass of worms, a loomblaze in his hands. However, when he raised it over his head to throw, he discovered that he had failed to properly seal the cork of the potive. The chemicals, upon coming in contact with the air, burst into flames as they poured down on Throgmorton's head.
The now flaming scourge began to run in panic across the fields. Brandywine and Roman rushing after him, attempting to put out the fire. Danny and Flossie remained in the carriage, placing bets of the chances of Throgmorton surviving his first monster-hunting expedition. Danny bet that the novice scourge would survive, albeit mutilated while Flossie believed his chances of surviving the day were remote.
As the pair discussed their bets, they suddenly heard high pitched giggling coming from behind them. When they turned, they saw eight glamgorns prancing about a nearby hill, singing of the feast they would have on these human fools.
Four of the creatures charged the carriage while the other four called out to something further back in the woods.
Flossie used one of her war arrows to bring down the first attacker. A second attempted to fling open the door to the carriage which Danny was holding shut. This tug of war ended when Danny suddenly thrust the door forward, knocking the glamgorn onto its back. Danny then snatched up his long rigle and shot the glamgorn through the head.
The remaining two threw themselves onto the roof of the carriage, and slashed at Flossie with wicked rustying daggers. Using her saber, she parried and drove them back.
There was a fearsome rustling and snapping amongst the trees as an enormous ettin strode onto the hill.
Brandywine aimed carefully with her salinumbus and placed a well aimed shot, well dosed with poties into the creature's eye, partially blinding it. The creature cried in rage and charged the carriage.
Picking the carriage up, the enraged ettin hurled it into the fields. Flossie sprang free and easily regained her feet. Lord Danny, still within the carriage was knocked about, he crawled out of one of the broken doors only to face the mass of worms writhing toward him.
"Buckfus! I need help!" he cried. Flossie made a quick evaluation and believing Danny capable of fending for himself, fired an arrow at the ettin.
In the meantime, Throgmortom hurled a combustive at the foursome of glamgorns who were preparing to support the ettin. They were all knocked from their feet.
The ettin turned toward Throgmorton. The rest of the party fired shot after shot into the giant.
As the glamgorns struggled to their feet, Roman charged them and began laying about with his stave.
Throgmorton hurled a cast of Frazzard's powder at the ettin. The blast and repugnant fumes forced the creature to retreat and it stumbled back up the hill.
As it retreated, Brandywine fired shot after shot from her pistols into its vast back.
Sorely wounded, the creature turned and piteously called to Roman for help, calling out, "Click Click, the yellow flood! Help me!" Distracted by the creature's piteously cries, Roman was swarmed by the glamgorns who slashed into the fulgar with malice.
Flossie carefully aimed her bow and let fly. Her large monster-slaying arrow, double-barbed and laced with monster-killing potives, drove into the creatures ear, killing it finally. For a moment it swayed upon its feet before collapsing directly onto Roman and the glamgorns.
Hoping to gain some protection from being crushed by the massive bulk of the dead ettin, Roman dropped to the ground and held up his stave as a brace. The metal drove directly into the ettings skull. A vast mass of yellow worms flooded out of the wound, all around Roman.
To be continued...
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