In the Shadow of the Valley of Death

The party sat down across from the orc huntress and her dire bear companion inside the tiny hut . The bear wasted no time curling up on the floor of the hut, and the huntress sat back against the great creature’s bulk, its shaggy fur almost obscuring her entirely. Erwen couldn’t stop staring at her. Siegfried busied himself with a cornucopia of useless gnomish tinkerfications he’d picked up on the way out of Ieirithymbul, having decided that spreading goodwill in the form of hard coin would end up being a smart investment for future dealings with the small folk of the mountains. After all, he was intent on returning to pick up the phase spider contraptions from Master Milltall. He had procured four “electric blankets” that used some manner of gnomish trickery to heat up independent of flame, and two of them connected together were large enough to shroud a man. He gave two each to Alec and Bob, who set about wrapping themselves up, Alec jerking spasmodically as the blanket contraption contrived to give him a nasty shock. He also set about cooking dinner in a novelty panini press shaped like a quintessential gnomish cottage, the peaked roof serving as the hinged lid. He offered the first set of paninis to the dire bear, who gulped them down without hesitation, or mastication. “I am Haravak the Mountain Strider,” the woman introduced herself after the uncomfortable silence had gone on just long enough. “And this is my companion Grûnhawr,” she said, nodding up at the bear, who snored softly in reply. She returned her gaze to the party. “Erwen and Siegfried I have made an acquaintance with, but as for the rest of you…?” “Theryn Hellvalor,” Theryn said. “And as I was saying earlier, why weather the storm when you can storm the weather?” “I am Varien Aether,” Varien said. “The Brothers Trevelyan, Bob and Alec,” Bob said, indicating his brother. “Yeemik,” Yeemik said. “This one,” Haravak pointed at the Tiefling, “would have led you into the hunting grounds of the Great Yeti or the hallowed fields of the stone golems.” Yeemik looked pained, but said nothing. “Betrayal so soon?” Varien said. “No, but his ignorance of his surroundings would have meant your doom,” Haravak said. “Through no fault of his own.” “That presumes much,” Theryn said. “Our doom is by no means assured. And besides, we already mentioned that we were in search of stolen children and you proceeded to ask for payment before lending assistance. Why would you care if we were eaten by a yeti?” “I intervene when necessary,” Haravak said. “As I have not yet taken your full measure, it profits me nothing to see you perish.” She cast a quick glance at Erwen that Theryn picked up on. “Why are you here?” the huntress asked the group. “First of all,” Theryn said, “our perishing isn’t inevitable. As for our business, we could ask the same of you.” “I will be more specific, then,” Haravak countered. “Why did you visit Ieirithymbul, and how did you come to know of it in the first instance?” “Bob was drawn here by his ancestral connection to an invisible golden dragon, the Unseen Protector of Ieirithymbul,” Siegfried said. “Also, the Sune-worshippers among us were bid to travel into the mountains in search of a phoenix.” “Ah, a dragon, you say?” Haravak replied. Siegfried pulled out a tin windup toy dragon that breathed sparks when he wound the key and let it totter around the hut. “Like this, but bigger.” Haravak rolled her eyes, but nodded slowly. “You see many strange sights and learn of many strange legends if you spend enough time in the Sword Mountains, and an invisible golden dragon, well, the stories abound. Some say that his treasure hoard is scattered in hard-to-reach outcroppings and atop sheer cliffs. Those who seek them seldom return alive.” “What about an orcish warband?” Siegfried asked. Haravak’s expression darkened and her hand absently traced the line of the scar that cut across her face. “What do you want to know?” she replied. “Well,” Siegfried said, “I’m pretty sure they’re about to use a group of kidnapped children in some sort of unsavoury way, and that makes me uncomfortable. I would like to prevent that from happening.” He cast a glance at his companions. “And it is possible that my father is leading them.” Haravak glared at Siegfried. “Absent fathers, you know, always marching off to war and leaving unwanted sons in their wake,” Siegfried said. “But know that my objective is to save the children. If I have to commit patricide to do so then so be it. Deadbeat dads should not be allowed to murder children.” Haravak took Siegfried’s measure. “And it was your father who was…” Siegfried nodded. “My mother was raised in the royal family of Neverwinter, but was sent to the Kingdom of Many-Arrows, where my understanding is that she became a master of orc cave magic, before returning to Neverwinter before my birth. As to her activities in the interim years since, well, she’s been dead for most of them, and enraged for all of them.” “You are a half-orc as well, then?” Theryn asked Haravak, who nodded silently. Theryn turned to Siegfried. “What are the odds of the two of you being related?” he asked. Now it was Siegfried’s turn to glare. “Wow. Wow. Racist much? Are you and Varien related just because the two of you are human?” “Wait, you’re taking that question the wrong way!” Theryn said. “Racist Westerners,” Bob said under his breath to Alec in their native tongue. “Hear me plainly,” Theryn protested. “You both have a connection to this orcish warband,” he reasoned. “She clearly has had some interaction with them, or bands like them.” Haravak was stone-faced, the puckered flesh of her scar reddening against the green tint of her skin. “I shall indulge this human’s audacious query,” Siegfried said to Haravak in orcish. “Is his conjecture accurate? Is your father a member of this orcish warband?” Haravak grit her teeth and shook her head firmly, but Siegfried could see through her stony façade and knew that she was not sure of the truth. “Okay,” Siegfried said, standing up from his camp chair. “There’s someone I know who can settle this. But to do so, I shall need our cleric’s blessing. Bob, can you give me some divine guidance?” Bob shrugged and cast bless on Siegfried, Theryn and Erwen. Siegfried bowed. “Please forgive the blasphemy that follows,” He pulled out his heirloom dagger and cut into his wrist, drawing blood, and mixed it in with some ash that he conjured. He used the vile paste to smear a crown-shaped line across his forehead, and formed the rest of the bloody mixture into the shape of a circle on the ground around him. He then prestidigitated a fire in the centre of the circle. Ash began to swirl up, obscuring the view of the outside, and filled the volume of the tiny hut in concentric rings of smoke and gas that striated into fast-moving currents that swept around like a grey whirlwind. I do not approve of this , Fiendsbane rattled. “Nor I,” whispered Varien, shielding his eyes from the ashen storm. “This blood magic will plunge us into the Abyss!” Haravak hissed in Orcish. “That’s my mother’s choice, not mine,” Siegfried said absently, his eyes turning into shining black orbs. Yeemik’s smile was unsettlingly wide as he watched the ritual unfold. Within the ash, as if from the middle distance, the silhouette of a woman appeared, its features distorted and distended in a hideous caricature of a human form. The ashen shadow walked in herky-jerky stutter steps, drawing ever closing until she loomed above Siegfried. ABOMINATION , she said in a voice like crushed gravel. YOU MAY SPEAK. “Nice to see you too, Mother,” Siegfried replied. “Now, to business.” The apparition of Siegfried’s mother held out a hand with impossibly-long fingers towards her son. “First question. Haravak and I,” Siegfried said, “are we blood relations?” NO, the answer came all too swiftly. One finger curled in towards her blackened palm. “Second question. Nezznar’s hemomancy,” Siegfried asked. “Do you know that magic?” YES , the shadow answered with a crazed grin. A second finger curled inward. “Third question,” Siegfried said. “Do you truly intend to see me sit upon the throne of Neverwinter?” The grin turned into a hysterical spiral full of teeth and smoke. MAYBE , she responded with a guttural laugh like a chugging gnomish steam engine. A third finger bent into a growing fist. “Fourth question,” Siegfried said. “Did Lambrac the Damned attack Lorelei, and does he live there now?” IRRELEVANT , was his mother’s reply. Her thumb curled in, leaving only a pointing index finger. “Fifth question,” Siegfried said, steadying himself. “Does my father lead the orc warband we are chasing?” His mother’s form bent backward in a spasm as a shriek escaped her shadowed mouth. She dissolved into a pile of ash that began to spin around the hut like a dervish. NO NO NONONONONONONONONONONONONONONONONO was the earsplitting reply. Siegfried pointedly ignored his mother’s arcane tantrum. So, my father is not a party to this evil, he thought to himself. “Well,” Siegfried said, dusting off ash from his hands ineffectually. “I can only hope that our next conversation is more polite, mother, otherwise my good friend Robert Trevelyan has an opening for me in Kirkwall’s public service, far to the east of Neverwinter and away from you. Now, begone.” Siegfried’s mother reappeared as a looming shadow and for the barest instant, an expression of motherly interest clouded her ashen features. She reached out with a bony hand and stroked Siegfried’s cheek for a moment. Then she gripped Siegfried’s chin with surprising speed and strength and leaned in close until her smoky face was inches from the half-orc. TAKE THE THRONE OF NEVERWINTER…OR DIE ! Then, all around them, the ash fell to the floor of the hut in one great cloud. “So,” Siegfried said as the smoke cleared, his face streaked with grey slashes of ash. “One day I’m going to ask for your assistance in dealing with that.” With that, he pulled out a bottle of wine, broke its neck and chugged its contents. He threw the empty bottle to shatter against the wall of force that surrounded the party. “And so no, we are not related, and our dads aren’t in the warband,” he said to Theryn. “Are you happy?” “Well, that certainly was a thing,” Haravak whispered. “I need some comfort cheese,” Siegfried said, fumbling for a gnomish tin of the smelliest blue he could stomach.

Theryn pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed deeply. “As enchanting as all this is, conjuring witches from afar, making paninis, the smell of the bear, which goes really well with the reek of that cheese by the way,” he said wrinkling his nose, “If we’re going to save those gnomish children from the orcs, we really should probably be getting a move on.” Erwen nodded, standing ever closer to Haravak with bright shining eyes. “Yeah, we need to get moving,” he squeaked. “Of late, I have witnessed the orc tribes’ restlessness and the greater activity in the Sword Mountains,” Haravak said. “Raiding parties from orc tribes not usually seen in these parts, and of course the Sons of Gruumsh, marching from the North.” “Go on,” Siegfried said. “It is odd that the orcs would capture gnomes, rather than pillage and destroy the entire village, but my belief is that if they are being taken anywhere, they would be taken to Tholl Sla-Houk, the site of recent orc activity.” “Great, let’s get on that!” Theryn said. Haravak frowned. “The way is dangerous, and I’ve not yet heard a compelling reason why Grunhawr and I should risk everything to aid you.” “Because, Haravak, we have to be better than the weaker angels, than the worse devils of our nature,” Siegfried said, pouring on the persuasion. “Yes, the only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for good people to do nothing,” Theryn said. “Human, shut up!” Siegfried said firmly to the monk. “You know nothing of the shame, the rage, that folk like Haravak and I have experienced. Living with one foot in two worlds and being a whole part of neither. You weren’t cursed by Gruumsh at birth. You aren’t considered a half-made beast. You didn’t grow up in high society with highborn looking down their long noses at you because of the accident of your birth. You didn’t have to grow up with half-orc rage kindling inside you. We,” he indicated Haravak, “have to be better than what we were made to be. You,” he pointed at Haravak again, “don’t have to care but I need to do better. We need to do better. If I am going to let the devil inside out, it’s going to be for a cause, for a chance to help the innocent.” Haravak was moved by Siegfried’s oratory, just as the half-orc intended. “You seek the location of Tholl Sla-Houk,” she said in a quiet voice, as she considered Siegfried’s words.” “Funny, that’s exactly where we were told the Phoenix would be as well,” Varien said. “And don’t forget Theryn’s vision of a mountain being struck by a shooting star,” Siegfried said, holding up his drawing of the monk’s vision. Haravak shrugged. “A fair rendering,” she admitted. “Never laid eyes on it myself,” Siegfried said. “Let’s go there and add a few more details to my drawing, shall we?” Siegfried saw Haravak’s expression shift as her avarice and her anger at past mistreatments battled one another. In the end, it was her rage that won out. “The place you seek is a four-day march to the east,” Haravak said. “But I would counsel against a direct approach. Tholl Sla-Houk, located at the base of Mount Stonefang, is a forbidden citadel perpetually shrouded in a malevolent fog that consumes the unwary and thwarts those who would disturb the resting place of Uruth Ukrypt, the once mighty warlord who commanded the orcs of the North.” “Representatives of various orc tribes are converging on Tholl Sla-Houk to pay homage to a new warlord from the North,” Haravak explained. “It is a conclave the likes of which I have not seen in years.” “A gathering of the tribes,” Siegfried mused. “This warlord, what do you know of him?” “Very little,” Haravak admitted. “Only that he is almost supernaturally charismatic and wields a legendary weapon, the Hammer of Gruumsh, great maul of the northern orc kings, and that he surrounds himself with berserker champions and cave witches of renown.” “The Hammer of Gruumsh, you say?” Siegfried said, rubbing his chin. “A legendary artifact indeed, right up there with the Ettin Axe of Uruth.” He turned to his companions. “Dibs on the warhammer, by the way. That is an orc king’s weapon, and if we’re going to kill an orc king, we’ll need it.” “You know your history,” Haravak said. “I also know there’s no time to lose,” Siegfried said, “And it might surprise you to learn that we have a number of tricks at our disposal for covering great distances in speed, in safety and with discretion,” Siegfried said. He turned to Erwen. “Small man, perhaps a gas shape? A floating nest? A speedy speed cloud?” “And what do you know of the Sons of Gruumsh?” Haravak said. “Only what I learned from Sheenzen the Spiteful back in Neverwinter,” Siegfried said. “The Sons of Gruumsh are led by a leader named Rulgar, who received a vision from old One-Eye that told of a great warrior who would soon emerge and lead his people into glorious battle against the humans, sweeping their cities into the sea. This dream told Rulgar to gather warriors to his banner and wait at the ruins of the once mighty bastion for Uruth Ukrypt’s blessing.” Siegfried frowned. “So it would make sense for all these other tribes to gather to pay homage to a new warlord if he were to receive this blessing.” “Which warlord?” Varien asked. “He who was promised,” Siegfried said. “If we’re lucky, it’s me. If it’s not me, we have to kill him, or thousands will die.” “The blessing of Uruth Ukrypt will be the key, yes,” Haravak said. “But the role that these captured gnomes play in this warlord’s plans, that is so far elusive to me. But it is obviously an important one.” Her expression turned to one of resolve. “I can guide you to the outskirts of Tholl Sla-Houk, but I will not approach the shadow cast by Mount Stonefang,” Haravak said. “It is a haunted place, full of stirring bones and hidden dangers.” “Do lead on,” Siegfried said. “Small man, work your magic and set us adrift on the wind.” Erwen pulled out his new pipe and began to puff on it as he performed the ritual for wind walk. The pipe smoke enshrouded the party members until they began to dissolve into wispy clouds. In their nimbus state, Haravak led the cloud formation east at great speed, turning a four-day journey into a trip of a few hours’ length. As they passed over the mountains and valleys, a formation of wyvern riders hove into view, with powerful-looking orc sitting astride the reptilian beasts as they flew a lazy patrol through the skies. The party members kept their distance and tried to act natural until the patrol altered its course and disappeared in the other direction. More time passed, and Haravak led the party in a slow spiral towards an imposing-looking mountain shrouded in its own wreath of unnatural cloud. They slowly passed through the cloud layer, mindful of writhing shapes that appeared and disappeared at random intervals. They heard a chorus of moans and hisses from whatever malevolent beings resided within the cloud cover. Then, they penetrated the base of the cloud layer. Rain was falling in the valley, and a thick blanket of low-lying fog covered the land. The party descended beyond the roiling gray veil, Haravak leading them to a sheltered overhang on a rock face across the valley from their destination. The party members rematerialized into corporeal form. Grunhawr grumbled and growled his displeasure at Haravak extended a finger and pointed across the valley. “There is your prize. Tholl Sla-Houk.” Before them, a bleak citadel loomed out of a chiseled edifice of black rock. Haravak smiled darkly and pointed downward into the valley. “But you are not the first to arrive.” The valley floor before the citadel was home to a sprawling array of encampments, many of them with their own wooden palisades, featuring elaborate yurts, vast collections of simple tents, and impoverished lean-tos. Tholl Sla-Houk’s architecture suggested a gargantuan orcish skull set into the mountainside, with blank eye-socket battlements that would have, in an earlier era, contained massive fires to illuminate the area. Its slack-jawed entrance was also gap-toothed and bare, one of its great gates thrown down entirely while the other hung askew from its rusty iron hinges. To Theryn’s eyes it looked like the citadel had been constructed inside a large impact crater on the face of the mountain that had been smoothed out and filled in by stonecutters long ago. The entrance to Tholl Sla-Houk was flanked by a bulwark of sharpened stakes and earthen berms supplemented by piles of boulders, but interestingly, the defensive position appeared aimed towards the citadel, and not constructed in the fortress’s defence. This bristling barricade was manned by ranks of orc archers and javelin-wielding berserkers, all with their weapons trained on the entrance. A great bonfire was blazing at the centre of the v-shaped killing field. A haunting, mournful song of reverence was being sung by a shaman standing atop a shrine placed equidistant between the citadel’s entrance and the bonfire. “How curious,” whispered Siegfried. “I wonder why-” Siegfried didn’t have time to finish his question as from the yawning shadows of the gaping entrance, in ones and twos, undead orcs in varying stages of decay, some little more than walking skeletons, stumbled out, howling and gnashing their tusked teeth as they shambled towards the ranks of living. Without hesitation, but with respect, the phalanx of defenders mowed them down in a hail of black arrows. “Ah, I see,” whispered Siegfried. ““ Against the bones of the Broken Bone ,” indeed.” As the twitching corpses fell to the earth, shamans armed with long hooks approach and dragged the bodies to the fire. With each flash of sparks and plume of smoke, the song of reverence began anew, many of the orc warriors joining the shamans in a full-throated funereal hymn that venerated the long-dead, but newly-disturbed, Broken Bone horde. Varien’s expression was grim as he drew Fiendsbane from its scabbard. “Bob,” whispered Erwen from his hiding place beneath Haravak’s cloak, his eyes on the growing orc encampment. “We’re going to need another dragon.”