January 6th – 9th, 974
Previously in Archea…
The party’s investigation into the disappearances at Hollowmere culminated in the discovery of the ancient Orcish research complex of Mira’Thar, where two very different excavations were already underway. The Crown had uncovered the complex in its search for the Sereth, the demonic servants employed during the Righteous War five centuries earlier and long thought lost to history. At the same time, a coalition of orcs, goblins, and hobgoblins had been secretly expanding its own foothold within the complex, recovering the history, artifacts, and knowledge of their ancestors while establishing the area as a major base of operations. Those competing ambitions ultimately collided beneath the mountain. Multiple factions fought for control of the Sereth, and, confronted by overwhelming force, the party destroyed one of the creatures before fleeing into the custody of the coalition.
Honored Prisoners
For several days the party remained quartered within the encampment beneath Mira’Thar. Their accommodations were simple but comfortable, their captors unexpectedly courteous, and the constant sounds of marching feet, creaking wagons, and departing work parties made it clear that their focus, for the time being, was on war rather than the party. Within a day or two, however, the thunder of battle faded and, in its place, came the quieter rhythm of soldiers, engineers, and laborers setting about the practical work of consolidating their victory. The occasional concussion of magic still echoed through the caverns, but these grew fewer with each passing day as the coalition shifted from conquering Mira’Thar to securing it.
As they waited for Colonel Varnes, the party compared what each had witnessed during the battle and, perhaps more importantly, considered how they intended to face whatever came next. They reflected on the fall of Mira’Thar, the capture of the Sereth, and the realization that they had become entangled in events far larger than a simple investigation into missing villagers.
Escape was discussed at length. It was, after all, theoretically possible that they could slip away before meeting Varnes and avoid becoming further involved in the growing conflict. Gareth, however, pointed out that the party was already deeply entangled in the conflict whether they wished to be or not. They had reached a moment where history itself seemed to be pivoting around the decisions of a handful of individuals including themselves. While they could not hope to erase centuries of hatred or resolve every injustice, perhaps they could help Archea weather the coming crisis with a little less bloodshed than might otherwise be the case.
It was Merrythought who finally crystallized the discussion. Leaving now, she argued, would mean surrendering any influence over what happened next. If they fled, they would no longer have “a voice at the table.” They would be abandoning the fate of the captured Sereth, the changing nation, and perhaps the entire war to others. That observation struck home. Whatever they ultimately decided about Colonel Varnes and his cause, they first needed to hear what he had to say.
Soon thereafter, a guard appeared at the chamber door with the words they had been expecting.
“The Colonel will see you now.”
Colonel Varnes Cuts A Deal
The party was escorted not to a grand command chamber but to a hastily assembled conference room deep within Mira’Thar. A large table dominated the room, surrounded by an assortment of mismatched chairs gathered from the Crown encampment and the ancient complex itself. Several lanterns cast a warm glow over what had plainly become one of the coalition’s operation rooms. The walls were conspicuously bare, leaving little doubt that the maps, orders, and operational plans that normally filled the room had been removed before the party’s arrival.
Colonel Varnes rose and greeted them courteously. Although his demeanor remained calm and professional, the unnatural aura of fear surrounding him had not diminished. Every instinct urged caution in his presence, making the contrast between his reassuring manner and the terror he inspired all the more unsettling.
Varnes dispensed with formalities and instead began with a military briefing.
Mira’Thar had fallen completely into coalition hands. Lucien, Major Thorne, and nearly the entire Crown garrison had been killed during the fighting. Only a handful of soldiers had survived to be taken prisoner, and none had escaped. The Crown’s expedition to Mira’Thar had ceased to exist.
He then turned to the fate of the Sereth.
When the party first entered Mira’Thar, six Sereth remained imprisoned while two already roamed the complex. During their escape, the party had destroyed one of the loose Sereth while the second was eliminated by coalition forces during the opening stages of their return to Mira’Thar. Later, Lucien succeeded in taking control of one of the imprisoned Sereth and directing it against the attackers, forcing the coalition to destroy it as well.
That left five Sereth still imprisoned when the battle ended. Varnes personally approached their cells and succeeded in bringing four under his control. The fifth resisted, slipped his grasp, and had to be destroyed before it could escape.
Rather than employing the four captured Sereth immediately, Soulreaper had elected to study the creatures further before deciding how—or even whether—they should be used in the coming war.
Varnes went on to describe the immediate aftermath of the battle. Hollowmere had been occupied against minimal resistance, and work was already underway to convert the former Crown installation into a permanent Reclamation garrison. Professor Harrow’s collection of Orcish artifacts had likewise been recovered and placed into safekeeping for future study and preservation.
He then turned his attention to the party.
“As for the artifacts in your possession, we understand that you wished these returned to their rightful owners,” he observed. “That remains your wish, does it not?… Very good.”
There was little room for debate. The party surrendered the artifacts without protest, adding the episode to a growing collection of decisions that had somehow become theirs while never quite feeling as though they had actually made them.
Before continuing, Varnes addressed a question he suspected had been weighing on the party’s minds.
Corvin Hale, he explained, had been released. The Reclamation’s healers had quickly concluded that his experiences beneath Mira’Thar had left him emotionally exhausted and deeply traumatized. They had offered treatment and attempted to debrief him, but with no greater success than the party itself had enjoyed. Corvin wanted only to return home, and so the Reclamation had allowed him to do exactly that. Varnes expressed the hope that, away from Hollowmere, he might finally begin to recover.
Professor Harrow, on the other hand, had accepted a very different arrangement. Although not formally aligned with the Reclamation, he had agreed to act as an academic intermediary. Before sending him on to Manchester, the Reclamation had supplied him with books, notes, and as much instruction in Orcish language, history, and culture as circumstances allowed. Varnes hoped Harrow would eventually obtain a university appointment and help introduce the wider world to the civilization the Reclamation believed had been unjustly forgotten.
“A scholar who tells the truth,” Varnes observed, “is worth more than a captured fortress.”
Finally, he turned to the Blackvein Company. Serik Johnson and his mercenaries had accepted a straightforward contract to escort Professor Harrow safely to Manchester. Once that duty was complete, they would return to the work of any successful mercenary company—selling their services wherever the growing war created demand. As Varnes noted with a faint smile, war was rarely good for nations, but it generally proved quite profitable for soldiers of fortune.
Varnes then surprised the party with an unexpected question.
“Do any of you know the purpose of an Inquisitor’s jewel?”
When they admitted that they did not, Varnes explained that the orange jewel embedded within an Inquisitor’s forearm was far more than a symbol of office. It allowed nearly instantaneous communication between Inquisitors and the Crown. Lucien had enjoyed ample time before his death to compose a lengthy final report.
The implication was immediate.
The Crown already knew.
It knew that Mira’Thar had fallen. It knew the Sereth had been captured. It knew that Soulreaper’s coalition existed. Whatever secrecy had protected the coalition for years had vanished with Lucien’s final report.
For that reason, Varnes explained, the coalition had abandoned its carefully prepared timetable. Rather than waiting another month or two, the war had begun immediately.
Only then did he formally reveal the coalition’s name.
The Reclamation.
With secrecy no longer serving any purpose, Varnes turned from military events to the ideals for which the Reclamation claimed to fight. He distributed copies of the Articles of the Reclamation, explaining that every soldier received them and every officer was expected to live by them. Throughout the discussion he returned repeatedly to the same themes: that an army existed to build a civilization rather than merely win battles; that promises once given must be honored; that discipline, justice, and the preservation of history were strategic necessities rather than luxuries; and that the reputation of an army could prove as valuable as any battlefield victory.
Those same Articles, he pointed out, were also the reason the party remained free to leave. He had given them his word and the Articles bound him no less than any common soldier.
Only after laying out the Reclamation’s principles did Varnes arrive at the main purpose of the meeting.
He explained that he had not brought the party to the conference room merely to inform them of recent events. They had seen too much, learned too much, and proven too capable simply to be released without an attempt at recruitment. Nor, however, would he attempt to coerce them into service. The Articles he had just placed before them required him to honor the promise of safe passage he had already given.
Instead, he offered them four paths.
The first was to join the Reclamation outright and undergo the same transformation that he himself had accepted. Varnes spoke of the change without embellishment. It had made him “more than human in some respects and less than human in others,” he admitted, and the result could fairly be described as a form of undeath. He regretted the circumstances that had forced him to choose that path, but not the choice itself.
His second offer required far less. The party could remain exactly as they were while serving as trusted outside agents of the Reclamation. They would not enter its chain of command, could refuse future assignments without dishonor, and were not expected to agree with every decision Soulreaper might make. Their only obligation would be this: if the Reclamation entrusted them with information in confidence, they would keep that confidence even if they were to part ways in the future. A betrayal of that confidence, he took care to emphasize, would result in a fate worse than death.
The third path was simply to depart in peace while leaving open the possibility of future cooperation. The Reclamation would honor its promise of safe passage regardless of the party’s decision. They would be provided with a means of re-establishing contact should the party someday find that their interests aligned.
The fourth and final option required nothing at all. The party could leave, decline every offer, sever all communication with the Reclamation, and continue their lives as they saw fit. Varnes made no attempt to disguise his preference, but neither did he pressure them. “The choice,” he told them, “is yours.”
Before going further, Merrythought asked whether the Blackvein Company had been offered a similar arrangement.
Varnes shook his head.
No such offer had been made. Professor Harrow had required an escort to Manchester, and Serik Johnson’s company had accepted a straightforward mercenary contract to see him there safely. Once that obligation was complete, their relationship with the Reclamation would end. They had not been invited to become outside agents.
“They don’t strike us as the sort who would make particularly reliable agents,” Varnes admitted matter-of-factly. “You do.”
The distinction did not seem intended as flattery so much as explanation. Throughout their investigation at Hollowmere, the party had repeatedly demonstrated thoughtfulness, restraint, and a willingness to weigh competing moral claims rather than simply choosing the quickest or most profitable course. Whatever disagreements remained between them and the Reclamation, Varnes plainly regarded them as people capable of independent judgment—and therefore worth trusting with responsibilities he would not casually extend to hired swords.
Varnes then excused himself, leaving the party alone with perhaps the most consequential decision they had faced since arriving in Hollowmere.
The discussion wandered across strategy, ethics, and practicality. Joining the Reclamation outright found little support. Whatever admiration the party felt for the Articles or for Varnes himself, the permanent transformation remained a bridge too far. Nor did simply walking away prove as attractive as it first appeared. As Merrythought observed, leaving now would mean surrendering any “voice at the table.” They had stumbled into events that would shape the future of Archea, and choosing not to participate was itself a choice with consequences.
Gradually the debate narrowed to the second offer. Remaining independent while cooperating when their interests aligned preserved both their freedom and their ability to influence events. They would neither become Reclamation soldiers nor turn their backs on a conflict they might yet help steer toward a less bloody conclusion.
When Varnes returned, the party informed him of their decision and he accepted their decision without disappointment or triumph.
“Perhaps the wiser choice.”
Varnes then outlined their first assignment. Through their own intelligence network, he explained, the Reclamation had learned of an isolated Orc tribe living quietly within Briarfall Forest near a community of Forester Druids known as the Circle of the Second Growth. A human woman by the name of Laveleen had established peaceful contact with the tribe and, he believed, might be willing to make introductions. The tribe itself, however, had never been approached by the Reclamation. The party was to travel south, seek out Laveleen, present the Reclamation’s cause to the tribe, urge them to consider joining, and report back on results. They were not to make any binding commitments on behalf of the Restoration; that would be the role of follow-on negotiators.
The party listened without interruption. Unknown to Varnes, they had already met Laveleen, the druids, and the tribe during their earlier travels. They quietly chose not to volunteer that fact.
It was Wolfgang who suggested improving the plan.
Rather than relying upon humans to explain the Reclamation’s ideals, why not send an Orc to speak for his own people?
The obvious disguise would require presenting that volunteer as a captured “feral” Orc in chains while passing through human territory. Varnes visibly disliked the idea but, after a thoughtful pause, admitted that it was tactically sound. An articulate Orc named Mukden soon volunteered to accompany the party.
Only after the party had accepted their role as outside agents did Varnes entrust them with one final truth.
“There is one matter,” he said quietly, “that I believe you deserve to hear from me before you hear it from someone else.”
He explained that approximately one thousand members of the Cambrian Compact had launched coordinated attacks across Cambria on the opening day of the war. Their objective had never been to seize territory but to cripple the Crown’s ability to respond by destroying Army headquarters, Civil Guard stations, communications, and regional administration.
Then came the more disturbing revelation.
The members of the Compact had never known that the Reclamation existed. They believed instead that they were one part of a much larger underground movement whose allies would rise in support once their own operations began. Those allies, however, had never existed. Unknown to them, their attacks were clearing the way not for a human revolution, but for the birth of the Reclamation itself. Had they known the truth, Varnes admitted, many of them would never have marched.
The deception had been deliberate.
“It was my recommendation,” Varnes said simply. “Soulreaper agreed.”
The Compact had been assigned the most dangerous opening operations of the war. Heavy casualties had always been expected, and Varnes acknowledged that this, too, had formed part of his reasoning. The fewer who survived, the fewer who would remain to discover they had been deceived. When asked whether he regretted the decision, he answered without hesitation that he did not. He regretted mistakes, he explained, but not decisions that accomplished what they had been intended to accomplish. Had the Reclamation’s survival required the same choice again, he would have made the same recommendation.
Yet Varnes also looked beyond the war.
He expected that a handful of Compact veterans would survive and eventually learn the truth. Some, he said, would hate the Reclamation, and they would have earned that right. Others might be persuaded that the deception, however terrible, had ultimately served a greater purpose. When that day came, he hoped the party—people who stood outside both organizations—might be willing to speak with them. If reconciliation proved possible, it would almost certainly have to begin through someone they trusted.
The party found little comfort in the explanation. They expressed the hope that, if peace ever came, acknowledgment alone would not be enough. The men and women of the Compact had been used in pursuit of another nation’s birth, and some measure of restitution might someday be owed if the Reclamation truly intended to build the just society described in its Articles.
The meeting concluded with passwords, recognition signs, ciphers, and safe-conduct through Reclamation territory. The party left Mira’Thar with a mission, a new companion, and considerably more to think about than when they had entered the room.
Into the Sunlight
After several days beneath Mira’Thar, the party at last prepared to leave. Mukden, the volunteer who had agreed to accompany them, soon joined the party. Although no great warrior, he spoke Common well and possessed a thoughtful, quietly optimistic manner that made him an ideal representative of the Reclamation. His role would be to speak for his people when they reached the isolated Orc tribe in Briarfall Forest.
Before departing, Merrythought decided that Mukden should also learn something of human diplomacy.
She offered him a fist bump.
Mukden immediately understood that the gesture was intended as a friendly greeting and, with an enormous smile and obvious enthusiasm, he enthusiastically drove his clenched fist directly into Merrythought’s waiting knuckles with full force.
The resulting yelp of pain was accompanied by an equally broad smile from Mukden, who appeared delighted to have mastered yet another human custom.
The lesson, everyone agreed, would require a little more practice.
The party’s escort led them back through the captured Crown installation that now guarded the entrance to Mira’Thar. Crown banners had already disappeared, replaced by those of the Reclamation. Orcs, goblins, hobgoblins, and even disciplined undead worked side by side repairing fortifications, unloading wagons, and preparing the position for what all knew would become a lengthy war.
As they reached the surface, one of the escorts halted the party.
For several moments he regarded them silently before speaking.
“A word of advice.”
His voice remained controlled, but only just.
“Don’t take any more ears.”
The party’s habit of collecting goblin and hobgoblin ears during earlier battles had become widely known throughout the Reclamation. Many of the soldiers now passing them had lost friends whose bodies had later been found mutilated in precisely that fashion.
The escort rested one hand upon the hilt of his sword.
“If it weren’t for the hospitality oath…” he said quietly, “…we’d settle that matter right now.”
No weapon left its scabbard.
No voice was raised.
The Articles demanded discipline, and discipline prevailed.
After a long silence, the Orc lowered his hand, pointed down the road toward Hollowmere, and spoke in a voice that had become purely professional once more.
“The village lies that way.”
Without another word, the escort turned and marched back toward the fortress.
Only after the Reclamation soldiers had disappeared from sight did Hunkle finally voice what everyone had been thinking.
“They’re awfully worked up over a few ears.”
The comment was met with little enthusiasm. Whether or not the party believed the practice had been justified at the time, the encounter had driven home an uncomfortable reality. Their growing friendship with Colonel Varnes did not erase the fact that, to many ordinary Reclamation soldiers, they were yet another band of adventurers who had cut trophies from the bodies of fallen comrades. The Articles of Reclamation had prevented violence.
It had not required forgiveness.
Hollowmere Under Occupation
The road from Mira’Thar soon brought the party back to Hollowmere, though it was immediately apparent that this was no longer the rough and tumble frontier village they had left behind only days earlier.
The Crown banners had vanished. In their place flew the standard of the Reclamation from the village watchtower. Orc, goblin, hobgoblin, and undead patrols moved through the streets with quiet efficiency while wagons laden with timber, stone, and supplies passed continuously between Hollowmere and Mira’Thar. Earthworks had begun to appear around the former Crown compound, which was rapidly being transformed into a permanent military post.
The occupation, however, had proven disciplined.
Sheriff Aldren Pike and his small force of constables remained in office, much to the party’s surprise. Pike explained that the Reclamation had shown little interest in ordinary civil disputes.
“Somebody still has to settle arguments over missing chickens,” he observed with a weary shrug.
Instead, the Reclamation had confined itself largely to military matters. A curfew had been imposed after dark. Civilian weapons, other than those of the constables, had been confiscated, though Pike quietly suspected that more than a few remained hidden beneath floorboards and inside haylofts. Food had likewise been requisitioned for the army, but every sack of grain, barrel of ale, and side of bacon had been carefully recorded. Those surrendering provisions received written receipts bearing a simple promise:
“The Reclamation Remembers Its Debts.”
Whether those promises would ever be honored remained an open question.
The party witnessed one such requisition firsthand. A farmer, recently relieved of a wagonload of grain, bitterly complained that a receipt would not feed his family through the coming winter. Merrythought gently pointed out that, under the Crown, armies had often requisitioned supplies without either compensation or even the courtesy of acknowledging the loss. The farmer conceded the point with obvious reluctance. A written promise, he admitted, was preferable to no promise at all—but promises could not be baked into bread.
The occupation itself had not been entirely bloodless.
According to Pike, several townsfolk had attempted acts of sabotage during the first days after the Reclamation arrived. More serious still had been a confrontation with an adventuring company unwilling to surrender its weapons. The Reclamation had insisted that the company surrender its weapons before leaving town while the company insisted on being allowed to leave with their weapons.
Exactly what happened next depended upon who told the story but all were in agreement that the argument escalated to a fight and when it was over, the entire adventuring company lay dead alongside one or two Reclamation soldiers. Since then, no one had shown much enthusiasm for testing the occupiers’ resolve again.
The undead proved far harder for the townsfolk to accept.
Skeletons and zombies hauled timber, quarried stone, and performed the endless heavy labor required to transform the area into a fortress. They worked tirelessly, efficiently, and without complaint.
Children hid whenever they approached and even adults instinctively stepped aside to let them pass.
No one had yet become accustomed to seeing the dead employed as laborers and the party expressed their own discomfort with the practice. Rather than dismissing their concerns, Mukden acknowledged them.
Many within the Reclamation, he admitted, found the undead unsettling as well. Their use was understood to be a temporary expedient born of necessity rather than an ideal upon which the new nation should be built.
He went on to explain that, contrary to what many humans believed, the Reclamation did not possess an inexhaustible supply of undead. A body could be raised only once. When an undead servant was finally destroyed, it could not simply be animated again. Every person, therefore, could receive at most two lives, the life they had originally lived, and one final undeath.
Mukden then shared a piece of history unfamiliar to the party. During the Righteous War, the Orcs had stolen the secrets of necromancy from the Archean King and Grand Vizier and turned those same arts against the kingdom that had created them. The undead armies that eventually became synonymous with the Orcish resistance had not been an ancient tradition, but a desperate wartime innovation born from knowledge taken from their enemies.
The explanation did little to ease the party’s unease. If anything, it complicated it further. The undead were no longer merely a frightening spectacle but a finite military resource, one the Reclamation intended to spend carefully rather than waste. Whether that made the practice more acceptable remained very much an open question.
Despite the relative order the Reclamation had imposed, Hollowmere was steadily emptying.
The wealthier families had already departed, their wagons piled high with furniture, heirlooms, and whatever possessions they could carry before the roads became impassable. Those with fewer means followed more slowly, pushing handcarts, leading nervous livestock, or carrying their lives upon their backs. Many locked their doors before leaving. Few expected to return soon.
The road leading south had become a steady procession of refugees. Farmers abandoned fields that should have been prepared for the spring. Shopkeepers boarded their windows. Children rode atop overloaded wagons while anxious parents glanced constantly toward the northern horizon.
Some fled because they feared the Reclamation. Others fled because they feared the Crown’s inevitable attempt to retake the region.
Most simply wished to place as much distance as possible between themselves and an approaching war whose causes mattered far less to them than its consequences.
The party watched the procession in thoughtful silence.
Only a few days earlier, Hollowmere had been the destination toward which adventurers, scholars, treasure hunters, and soldiers eagerly traveled in search of mystery and opportunity.
Now, it had become a place that ordinary people were desperate to leave.
Southbound
Leaving Hollowmere behind, the party found the southern roads crowded with refugees. Every mile carried fresh reminders that the war had begun in earnest. Wagons groaned beneath hastily packed belongings, livestock wandered untended beside the road, and families paused only long enough to ask anxious questions of one another
The farther they traveled, the more fragmented the news became. Every traveler had heard something. No two stories agreed completely.
In Harrowden, the party paused only briefly to collect Ant’s long-awaited reply from the Crown.
The letter confirmed that the authorities had received her earlier correspondence and, at least for the moment, regarded it as genuine. Whatever consequences that exchange might ultimately have would have to wait for another day.
The village itself remained peaceful, but everyone expected that peace to prove temporary.
By the time the party reached Gallowbrook, the rumors had become considerably more alarming.
The tavern buzzed with contradictory reports from every direction. Travelers spoke of bridges destroyed, messenger riders disappearing, isolated patrols ambushed, and entire Civil Guard detachments simply vanishing. Some swore Orcs were responsible. Others insisted it was human revolutionaries. Still others blamed bandits taking advantage of the confusion.
Gradually a clearer picture emerged. On the opening day of the war, coordinated attacks had struck throughout Cambria,
- Army headquarters at the regional capital of Batinder had been wrecked.
- Civil Guard stations across the region had been attacked or abandoned.
- Communications had broken down.
- Much of the Crown’s local authority had simply ceased to function.
The party, of course, understood far more than the frightened patrons around them. They knew these attacks had been the work of the Cambrian Compact.
They alone knew who had truly been behind them.
Northbound Refugees
The following morning en route to Wolfpine brought an unexpected sight. All of the refugees they’d met so far had been headed south. Just now, however, they met a group of refugees headed north.
They looked exhausted, frightened, and profoundly relieved to discover that the approaching travelers were adventurers.
“Thank the gods…” one of them exclaimed. “You’ve got to do something about Horace Bell.”
Between overlapping accounts, the party pieced together the story.
With the Crown’s authority shattered and the regional Army headquarters destroyed, Horace Bell—an already notorious tax farmer—had transformed himself into something far more dangerous.
Claiming emergency authority in the King’s name, he had occupied the village of Wolfpine, surrounded himself with hired thugs, garrisoned the bridge crossing the fast-moving stream just south of the village, and begun collecting taxes with unprecedented enthusiasm.
Those unable to pay found their property confiscated.
Those with little property found themselves confiscated instead – prisoners were being held for forced labor until relatives paid their debts.
Travelers were stopped, wagons searched, livestock seized. Anyone who protested was reminded that the Crown needed every possible resource to defeat the Orc invasion.
The refugees estimated Bell commanded nearly twenty armed followers, including several experienced fighters and at least one wizard.
“Don’t just march in,” one old farmer warned. “You’ll only end up joining the prisoners.”
Reconnaissance at Wolfpine
Despite the sage advice of the refugees, the party’s initial plan was to stroll into the village and immediately stab everyone who looked evil. It was only with considerable difficulty that they eventually embraced strategic patience over immediate violence.
Merrythought deliberately presented herself as an unfortunate debtor and successfully allowed herself to be arrested, placing herself among the prisoners she ultimately hoped to free. From the cellar beneath the village inn she began quietly learning who was being held, how they were guarded, and what opportunities for escape might exist (principally the lockpicks she’d smuggled in).
Meanwhile, Hunkle and Wolfgang entered the village openly, posing as wandering adventurers looking for provisions. The disguise proved unexpectedly successful; far from treating them with suspicion, Horace Bell enthusiastically attempted to hire them and the ensuing conversation quickly revealed the man behind the office.
Bell wrapped every action in patriotic language, insisting that extraordinary measures were required if the Crown was to survive the Orc invasion. Yet beneath the lofty rhetoric lay something considerably less noble. Every discussion somehow returned to money. Taxes became opportunities. Refugees became contractable labor. Confiscated property became profit. Loyalty to the Crown seemed valuable primarily because it justified enriching Horace Bell.
Whenever patriotism and personal gain came into conflict, personal gain won effortlessly.
His obsession with paperwork proved equally revealing. Bell guarded his great leather tax ledger almost possessively, speaking of it with more affection than he showed the prisoners whose names filled its pages. Every confiscated wagon, every seized sack of grain, every debtor, every coin owed to the Crown—and every coin quietly diverted elsewhere—passed through its pages.
Despite Bell’s confidence, his little empire displayed unmistakable cracks.
Not everyone serving him appeared enthusiastic about their new profession. Hunkle and Wolfgang encountered several guards who seemed uncomfortable with imprisoning farmers, seizing livestock, and threatening refugees. They followed orders, accepted their wages, and performed their duties, but without the zeal displayed by Bell himself or by his number two man, “Captain” Wilkes. More than once the party caught the uncertain glance of a man who looked as though he had accepted employment because war had left him few alternatives rather than because he admired the man now paying his wages.
The discovery immediately suggested possibilities.
If fighting could be avoided—or at least shortened—those uncertain loyalties might prove every bit as valuable as swords or spells.
By the end of the interview, however, ell himself had become the easiest person in the village to understand with Wolfgang later admitting that he had found it very difficult to resist stabbing the tax collector where he stood.
Hunkle’s assessment was equally succinct. “That guy needs to be pounded down like a railroad spike.”
While events unfolded on the ground, Heka circled high above Wolfpine in owl form, quietly mapping the village, tracking patrols, identifying likely escape routes, relaying information between the separated members of the party, and taking advantage of an opportunity to poop on Wolfgang’s shoulder.
By evening, every member of the group had successfully reached their assigned position and the reconnaissance was complete.
Action—and whatever consequences it might bring—would have to wait until the next session.
How We Left the Characters
- Merrythought has successfully infiltrated Horace Bell’s operation and is manacled with the other captives in the inn’s basement.
- Hunkle and Wolfgang have been accepted as prospective recruits and presently enjoy the freedom of Wolfpine provided they maintain their cover.
- Heka continues to observe the village from above while serving as the party’s eyes and messenger.
- The remainder of the party, including Mukden, wait concealed outside Wolfpine for the signal to move.
- Horace Bell remains enthusiastic about the business opportunities created by the war.
- Laveleen, the Circle of the Second Growth, and the uncontacted tribe in Briarfall Forest await reacquaintance with the party
- Grelda, in Dolven’s Hollow, has something to show Cassyndra.
- And around them all, the first days of the war continue to reshape Archea. Whether the party can influence what that new world becomes remains to be seen. The choices the party makes in the coming months may determine not only who wins the war, but what kind of nation survives it…