On Friday you did some morning shopping at the impressive, dispersed local New Arv market – lots of military goods, many warriors/guards shopping there – and bought hard leather suits, spears and daggers for your Mraloti friends. You bade farewell to sharp-tongued, gruff Captain Gulos and then rendezvoused with the Mraloti outside town. Narak again spoke for them, with renewed boldness, and said they would not go back deeper into the island (“too many bad frog men”) but would find their way to the Baronet's manor lands, for which Fraud gave them a copy of his map and checked it over with them to ensure they understood the way.
But first, Narak shrewdly demanded a contract, revealing that she was quite literate– they would get land (they seemed to want to keep somewhat separate from the Baronet's peasants), freedom, religious tolerance, and pigs to herd (they clearly hated goat, sheep and other horned beasts; the “Earthmaker” forebade them) and in return would give skills in herding, crafting and such. This was all quickly agreed, so you left to go around New Arv and delve into the Big Gunge, in search of the Giranois Cjed and/or Fort Mudlark.
The swamp was cold and wet and deeply unpleasant this winter. Soon something made it even less pleasant. You heard a rasping whisper just off the path, “It's you…” and spotted a hideous moundlike thing lurking near the swampy shore to your left– it seemed to be a mix of bones, muddy swamp, writhing worms and perhaps appendages. Ciddar was left mumbling and slack-jawed by some terrible impression it left on him (it said to give it his comrades' skins, and he even felt that maybe he should!). The Captain resisted this urge and was about to stab it with his harpoon. But first the Baronet rushed in and dealt it a blow with Menekeyil, whose death magic blazed with light, showing it was indeed undead. But the blow also knocked it into the swamp, and it quickly submerged not to be seen again. You then noticed that long, thin, pale worms were winding their way up his sword, and knocked one off then dropped the sword until it was safe. Ugh!
Some minutes later as you continued your slog into the Gunge, you spotted the Giranois man Verker hobbling toward you with a curious burden in his arms. He dropped it at your feet after he silently approached, saying “Break the cycle.” It was the boneless carcass of a young Giranois lad, his arm eaten to shreds and bored by worms. You tried querying Verker about this but he was characteristically full of riddles and nonsense, stating something about “light and dark” as perhaps a solution to the problem, muttering about “the consumed” and “the reformed”, and warning that Ciddar had “entered the cycle”, whatever that was. He turned and left, leaving you very frustrated and arguing about the hopelessness of aiding the Giranois– the Captain and even Boamund contemplated whether just wiping the island clean of them would be the best choice, whereas the Baronet seemed to have grown in compassion for the hapless natives. Ciddar brought up the argument that he should be granted Knighthood much as Boamund had been raised through the ranks, and you were amused by the thought of him bearing new heraldry of “the rampant boar.”
But soon enough you saw the promontory of Fort Mudlark rising from the swamps, and made it there well before twilight after a miserable day of mucking about. A tower guard hailed you from the foot of the steep hill, around which all vegetation had been cleared, making it a slippery, obstacle-strewn climb up to solid stone walls over 3m high and topped with bronze spikes. The gate swung open and a tall Pithdaran man stepped out to welcome you in, with a kind and jolly grin and a big slapping bear hug for Baronet Shaven. He was the big-voiced Baronet Mudlark, and was proud of his “lark in the mud” here, while you could see once inside that it was not much to be proud of– the men were as worn and battle-scarred as their gear, and the buildings were barely more than propped up old ruins. But there were dozens of veteran warriors here, a barracks, mess hall/bar, armoury and wizard's tower, with a spartan little one-roomed manor for the rather off-kilter Baronet, who seemed to have eschewed all servants or family and liked to fend for himself, as he reminded you several times. You came into his humble home and drank a sinus-clearing liquor of minty “snaps” with him well into the night, gnawing on salt beef and pork along with tales of your adventures.
Baronet Mudlark was a warm host and good listener but his obvious disconnect with the squalor here and his position “under siege” by the Giranois were disconcerting. Soon, however, you relaxed and drank deeply- especially the Baronet Shaven, who revealed his secret quest for the man Aym Alamyn, the Cjed family of Giranois (who might know him) in a grotto in the swamps, and the Unsighted One. Shaven revealed he had a coded message on a bone sent from Big Ron as a wedding gift, that had urged him on this quest. Baronet Mudlark knew this Aym and had a healthy respect (fear?) and dislike (muttering about some bad deed he had done here) for the man- he said he had been here lately and then “gone native” into the swamps. Mudlark would not speak of himself or his reasons for being here, but professed a loyalty to Big Ron and clearly took his job to bring light to the savages or burn them out of the lands quite seriously. Mad as he might be, he had strong conviction and you began to see the point that he did have some skilled soldiers, trackers, monster-hunters and other tough men here serving him; even if their morale was on the edge.
Mudlark said that the main trouble here, in addition to disease and the thin supply line from New Arv, was the Sharde clan who lived to the northeast in the swamps (where you had once passed en route to the Spider Temple). They were unlike other Giranois, he said, in their numbers and their viciousness. They bred monster toads and other horrors and could wield demons- he said he'd even heard of the fly and bone/worm demons you'd seen. You recollected that you'd fought them many times before, especially when first trying to settle the manor lands, but later earned a truce of sorts with one of their war leaders, Jzhurte, thanks to the Captain's impassioned speech at Burnt Priests' Hill after the horrific library affair and demise of the Rokari inquisitors.
As you asked more about the Giranois and Sharde and the Baron's man who went native, the Baronet grew short on answers (his job was to kill them, not love them, he confessed) but said that “Wyvernsbait” would have answers and so send you (Ciddar) off to drag him out of his tower for some drinks and questions. Meanwhile, the Baronet Shaven snored off his drink with exhaustion-lulled dreams of his nymphly wife back home. But when the sage came in to the manor house, you wondered if you might need to wake him, as he seemed to have the answers you craved and his name was familiar.
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