Part IX:The Wall of Shields
16th of Obsidian, 370Suwu had made up her mind.
It was night and she was paying her respects to Edu in the catacombs. Cañar was behind her, standing calm and as straight as he could in the cramped dirt tunnels. Ova the mandrill man was there too. They were prepared to venture forth from Waterlures, but where, was still a somewhat open question.
Things hadn't felt right for some time now for Suwu. She had been lonely for a long time. While happy for how things had turned out for her friends -- especially Edu -- she herself felt left out and as an outside observer. The same was with Cañar, which surprised Suwu after discussing with the elephant man in the Fruit of Letters.
Suwu had had many plans on where she would go, what she would do, during the last decade. She had wanted to find Baroness Kasat more unicorns, yet she never did and now it was too late. Well, the elves
had eventually brought another unicorn, but it was after Kasat's death. Suwu had wished to head north to the elf lands of Múya Loré with Yawo, but the grumpy witch-doctor was dead now, too. And Cañar. Cañar had a mission. One that he wanted to strive for with Shebi the badger woman: to bring peace to these lands. But, alas, even Shebi had passed away.
Time was running out. She was old. Cañar was old. Things had been postponed for far too long.
But not anymore.
Plan or no plan, they had to go. They had to do
something before their time was due.
“Rin, you coming along?”, Suwu said, knowing the goblin was nearby.
“Just a moment, will you! I'm trying to get this blasted mail fastened properly,” the goblin replied from the dark, “Stupid miserable piece of shoddy craftscapyship... 'Avo' would've never produce anything of this bad quality.”
The first stop of the four companions would be Morningwilt: Edu's eldest son Lòr was residing there after he was sent away from Waterlures. None had informed him of his father's death and it would only be proper for Suwu to be the one to tell the bad news.
They set up camp at the shores of the Lakes of Saturninity. The voyage proper would begin in the morning.
However their rest was interrupted when sounds were heard in the dark. Suwu drew her bow and had an arrow ready as she yelled, “Who goes there? Identify yourself!”
But the only answer was snarls as a group of cougar men and women charged from the snowy woods, heading for Erib, one of the war grizzlies the companions had with them.
Ova shot an arrow as Suwu replaced her bow with a short sword she had grabbed from the barracks.
A swift and decisive blow to the neck decapitated one of the cougar men.
Suwu did not stop there and whirled around missing one of the cougar men only to continue the graceful sword dance to the next one. It was a powerful blow from the keen short sword, cutting through flesh and bone like butter, cleaving the foe in half.
She then turned back to the one she had missed to see Rin hack off one of the enemy's hands, Cañar punch her leg into pulp and an arrow from Ova's bow strike her in the upper arm.
Suwu's blade swung and finished their work by severing the head.
“Hah! I laugh and spit in the face of death!”, Rin barked out, waving his sword triumphantly in the air as their foes lay in pieces on the snow, their blood coloring it crimson.
The battle was over.
The companions began to near Morningwilt when the sun was directly above them, yet the uniform, dark gray clouds covered much of the light as a heavy rain fell down. A thin mist enveloped the slopes forested thickly with bamboo and highwood.
Their journey had taken them through the Dune of Vising where a pack of rabid giant coyotes had attacked them. It was something that brought painful memories into the mind of Suwu. How she had been separated from Edu for a time, seeing her friends Esala, Id, Mame, Tuxum and Ceru fall. Though of Ceru's fate she was uncertain even to this day, but there was nary a hope the drunk capybara man would've survived the encounter -- and even if he had survived, surely old age would've taken him by now.
In any case, this time Suwu was prepared and experienced in fighting -- as were her companions. The coyotes proved to be no match for them, yet the coyotes did manage to kill one of the grizzlies, Ber, who they cunningly separated from the otherwise tightly packed group.
Soon they arrived at the forest retreat in the Perplexing Jungles.
“I've heard that it was the Sprayed Councils who reclaimed Morningwilt,” Ova the mandrill man said as they walked through the pristine forest searching for Lòr.
“Uh-huh. Well, I don't really know anything about it,” Suwu replied, continuing, “I really don't know much about the history of the elf lands... All I know comes from you and Yawo. And Fayoba, I guess.”
Suwu was awed by what she saw in the forest retreat: an incredibly gigantic ginkgo tree reaching into the skies with branches that had walkways and platforms. Not built, but grown with elven magic. Something she had thought was only the product of Yawo's wild imagination! Maybe the old monkey wasn't a compulsive liar, after all? Maybe even Yawo's 'angry spirits' were real?
They searched and searched for a long time for anyone in Morningwilt, but found none.
Just as they were about to give up, Suwu noticed a capybara man walk to them from between the dense bamboo: it was Lòr!
Suwu breathed deeply, sighed, and prepared to tell the news to Lòr.
Lòr was silent. He took the news in, rubbing his chin as he was deep in thought.
“I was afraid you did not come for a casual visit,” he said raising his gaze to meet Suwu's. “But father's death does not surprise me, nor am I overwhelmed by grief.”
“Look, it is alright to be sad. Or... Or not to be sad,” Suwu said, not really knowing what she should say in the moment. She wasn't used to this kind of things. She noticed that Lòr looked slightly confused, and continued, “Uh, I just... We just felt like it would be best to let you know. That's it.”
“I would very much like to visit my father's tomb,” Lòr said, “If such a thing is possible.”
Rin stepped up, rolling his eyes, “Of course it is possible, silly boy! Nobody needs to know you came along. We can go when nobody is watching.”
The others looked at the goblin.
“What? It's not like you lot don't have your
own secrets,” he lashed out, crossing his arms in front of him. “Besides, it's quite some time before the next full moon. You'll easily make it there and back again before it.”
And so the companions, now numbering four, began to make their way back to Waterlures, traveling through the Perplexing Jungles once more. This time they went around the Dune of Vising, heading through the less savage Hill of Fells in hopes of avoiding more encounters with giant coyotes.
For they were unsure if they could keep Lòr safe if a pack of feral beasts attacked them.
It was hard to tell the time of the day when they reached the outskirts of Waterlures. It had to be close to nightfall.
They arrived from the north and headed south through the snow and mist, their breath visible in the cold winter air. They wrapped their cloaks tighter around themselves: Morningwilt was not far from Waterlures, but still the weather there was warmer and fairer -- possibly due to some elf magic of old.
Lòr looked at his fathers grave silently, head bowed down. But there were no tears, there was no sadness in him. He felt... Empty.
He turned to look at the rutile statue of his father surrounded by his friends: it depicted the moment when Edu had jokingly proclaimed himself 'Lord of Lonecanyons', the outpost he had built halfway between Waterlures and Inkedwhims. It reminded him very much of how his father, like him, treasured and loved leisure time. But he also remembered his father's words when he was coming of age,
'Son, I too wish we could spend all our time in leisure, but that is not how the world operates. Someone has to catch the fish. Someone has to clean the fish, and then someone has to cook it. Hard work is a necessary part of life, whether we like it or not.'“Father was right,” Lòr said, his words not directed at anyone in particular. He turned around to face the others, looking at them one by one. He didn't like speaking to large groups, and well, during his time in Morningwilt
four people were to be considered a large group. He shrugged off his shyness.
“I want to make this right. I may not be able to avenge father -- nor do I desire to,” he said and paused. How could he ask the others? What should he tell them? Would they believe that he had seen this in his dreams? He gathered his courage as he noticed the others expecting him to continue.
“I-I... I can not ask this from you... But I need your help,” he managed to blurt out.
Suwu looked confused. As did Ova and Cañar (Rin, however, wasn't paying attention).
“Mestthos spoke to me,” Lòr began, “I saw a dream, a vision: the curse of the gods spread and spread, like a plague. The crops withered, the earth -- the very lifeblood of Ôsed -- became barren, the trees bore rotten fruit. There was hunger, there was pain. Suffering. What little scraps were left, were fought over. War was everywhere. Death was all around us...”
“Sounds like the words of a prophet,” Suwu said, “I don't know what to make of all that. It's beyond my brain.”
“Please do continue, young one,” Cañar stepped in, “I would very much hear the rest of these troubling omens.”
And so Lòr continued to recount the dream where on one hand everything led to destruction, chaos and the End of All, but on the other, the dream offered a small spark of hope...
“...But there were those who through sacrifice and perseverance stood their ground, raised a wall of shields to fend off the waves of Darkness and the Night, keeping those behind them safe. And those who were safe had families and were merry. There was no curse, no pain, no death behind the shield-wall. There all was good... And even those who had fallen under the sway of the Night were made whole and good once they were under the protection of the guardians,” Lòr concluded describing his vision.
The others were silent, not knowing what to say. Lòr blushed and looked down.
“I... I believe this curse can be lifted,” he said in a hushed tone.
“Indeed. And you may have discovered a way... And I will help you,” Cañar spoke, walking next to the young capybara man and put his large hand on his shoulder. The elephant man looked back at the others, expecting them to say something.
Suwu and Ova nodded.
“Well... Guess we'll be going for a vision quest then,” Rin sighed, checked that his mail was fastened properly, before asking an important question:
“So... Where do we head first?”
=====
After a long time we're going adventuring!
Trying to find Lòr from the forest retreat (or anyone) proved to be quite difficult. Nobody in the tree houses and apparently the group who has "reclaimed" it is a bandit gang (can't remember if it's come up and I just forgot about it). So, I presumed they could be pretty much anywhere in Morningwilt, which is I believe a 16x16 map. Therefore, I retired the adventurers there and unretired them with Lòr among them (blessed be DFHack's 'time-skip-duration -ticks 0').
Much (or most) of the discussions are made up by me, but I tried to fit it into the lore of the world and personalities of the characters. Made that dream thing description on the fly and uh, yeah, that's what we're now going with (Lòr worships Mestthos the god of fortresses and Likot the god of jewels or sumthin').
Not much happenings there and could've continued longer, but thought that's a good spot to stop and see if you guys have ideas on where to go.
I'm currently thinking they'd first head south to the hillocks that are linked to Waterlures and do goody-good-good business to help out the locals.
I wasn't planning to take Ova along, but he was in Suwu's squad and appeared as a companion. Forgot that she was a militia captain. It's actually quite fun that he came along. Gives us a chance to possible find out some stuff mentioned previously behind spoilers.
So yeah, all ideas where to go from here are welcome (even silly ones!).
I have no idea what the hell happened. We're part of a dwarf entity, which doesn't have [ABUSE_BODIES], so um, what? Haven't seen this happen before (except with goblins and so on)...
Author
Topic: Waterlures - A Capybara Man Fortress & Adventure [DF 0.47.05] (Read 69881 times)