Beyond Fort Duhrin
Kaldhur - November 8
People
Factions
Locations
Folklore
Chapters
Prologue
Ten days ago, a group of adventurers arrived in Fort Duhrin. Dr Gary was too curious to stay put fixing damaged structures because of the rain, so he decided to follow the southern face of the immense wall, and found himself in an unexpected adventure. Ayrrin used the time to hide from the heavy labour and rest. Oswin left Sigisfarne, met Artea at the Hunter’s Cabin, and, after the river waters receded, travelled north to the Fort.
However, you are not the only ones arriving in the Fort. Outsiders, people more tanned, with accents of the lords in the south, but expressions of the artists from the coast, flood the streets. They were brought to the region to an excavation camp further east, but, like you, they heard stories of treasures in Kaldhur.
Snakes and stones
Ayrrin gives away the Royal horseshoe she found to the local stableman. He explains these are from the important knights of the south, who are always busy with their own politics and never come north.
The group leaves the stable and follows the sound of a mob of southerners. They are stoning a woman, who reminds them of a snake, and has a green snake coiled in her leg. Artea squeezes herself and pulls Oswin. With the protection of the bulky man, she tries to ask the woman why she is suffering this violence.
Artea sees no woman, only the face of a snake. She slithers
I constructed the labyrinth; it holds mysteries and vermin. And the snake jumps at Artea, biting her and coiling onto her thigh.
Ayrrin holds her scaled mace and goes forward. In the confusion, the fletchwind blows all her aveva powder into the mob, who dissipates. They rescue the woman from the stable. Gary’s leech is positioned to suck the possible venom from Artea’s thigh, and dies doing so.
Cult of the Serpent Queen
The woman explains that she holds an old belief in the South. Her people have been tormented and persecuted by the Church of the Weeping Mother. The Serpent Queen followers are not illegal, but they suffer as a minority belief.
Darkest forest
The group takes the woman to the woods, away from the Fort. Once she is safe to tend her own wounds, they let her go and continue searching for Kormoran’s Wheel.
The forest eventually becomes silent. No living animal makes a sound. The presence of the Witch of Nevask is felt, and Ayrrin recognises it. If it were not for Artea’s skill in traversing woods, they would never have found the village.
Missing youth
The ramshackle village is also a market. People sell goods in stalls by the side of tents. Small clusters with a handful of these tents are scattered in openings in the woods. There are many of these clusters.
The treasure hunters meet a flute maker, Runik. The man has difficulty talking and seems to restart conversations with questions. His daughter, Elin, went missing with Heiko, the son of the tanner called Joban. The baker, Risti, is to blame.
It gets dark, and the group sets up their tent amongst the others. Next morning, Ayrrin sees the Witch of Nevask tending to wild chickens. When she approaches her, she is not the witch, but just someone from Kormoran.
Upon arriving at the baker’s stall, Joban is in a fight with Rishi, who is old and small. He has found his son’s adulthood tooth in a bread roll he bought from Risti. The tooth was, weirdly, covered in gold. The group de-escalates the situation and clarifies with Johan that Risti was not responsible for the children’s disappearance. It is more likely they got lost in the woods or drowned in the river flood.