There were two small dinghies aboard the Steadfast, and these were loaded
with whatever could be salvaged as the water continued to pour into the
hold: the few undamaged biscuits; some clothing and belongings; their
hammers; and a pair of dwarven rifles that had been stashed behind the
helm. After scouring the ship for anything that might be useful upon
reaching the unfriendly shore, Perenolde at last gave the order and the two
dinghies were lowered into the icy water. Morte and Frederick rowed one
boat, and Perenolde and Lawdron the other.
They had made their way to about the halfway point between the ship and the shore when there was the loudest of cracking sounds, followed by an equally loud splash. Perenolde looked over his shoulder. The bulkhead which supported the mast had snapped, probably from the added weight of the water below the deck, and the mast itself had broken and fallen sideways into the sea. The huge weight of the mast on that part of the ship caused the Steadfast to tilt, and, as Perenolde watched, the vessel capsized and the deck fell perpendicular to the surface of the water.
The Steadfast had died. They were on their own.
They continued to row, regardless, for they had already made the choice to abandon the ship for this strange new country. As the boats came ashore, Perenolde examined the beach they had come up on. It appeared to be of white sand, but closer inspection proved it was snow. Rocks and bits of ice ringed the beach, which sloped upwards into a rocky hill. A dark cave opened into the face of the hill. Perenolde pointed to this and spoke.
"We'll camp in the cave," he said. The others grunted their acknowledgment. Everyone was too tired to argue. They climbed the hill, dragging their trunks behind them, and soon reached the mouth of the cave. Nothing visible awaited them. Not trusting the dark places shunned by the moonlight, they settled in the opening where they could see any threats that appeared, and soon fell asleep.
They did not stay that way for long. Seemingly mere moments after he had nodded off - although the position of the moon told him otherwise - Perenolde was roused from his sleep by a low howl. The sound startled him at first, but as it repeated, echoing through the night, he calmed somewhat and listened. Presently, the howl was joined by similar sounds from other creatures. Perenolde remained awake but still for near an hour, listening to the feral sounds grow louder and more distinct as the creatures making them drew closer to one another and to him.
Finally, he could remain still no longer, and the sounds were now loud enough to stop him from sleeping, so he rose and grabbed his hammer from where he had propped it against a wall of the cave. Light flashed outside the cave, drawing his attention; he looked out, and three sets of eyes shined back at him from the beach. The way their eyes shine, he supposed, they must be wolves, or perhaps cats of some sort.
He took a step out of the cave, and as his eyes acclimated themselves to the darkness, he saw that his first guess had been correct - they were wolves, though wolves of such kind as he had never seen in Lordaeron. Their coats were completely white, as white as the snow that covered the ground, and they were nearly twice the size of what one would call normal. Despite their magnitude, however, Perenolde couldn't help but note that they seemed very skinny, even starved. And I'm to be their dinner, he realized.
He took a step back, into the shadows of the cave, and the beasts began to creep towards him up the hill. He steeled himself and set the hammer back down against the cave wall, lifting instead the dwarven Blunderbuss rifle he had salvaged from the ship, and pointing the barrel in the nearest wolf's direction. The wolf in question had now nearly reached the top of the hill, its teeth bared in challenge. It sat back on its haunches, poised to leap - and as it let go and shot through the air towards the cave mouth, Perenolde pulled the trigger, and the beast fell to earth.
Perenolde immediately relocked the rifle and gunned down the second wolf, which yelped and began limping away; only its leg had been hit. The third beast, his companion wounded, saw his first meal in gods knew how long, and leapt upon the crippled wolf with ravenous tenacity. Perenolde fired two more shots at the grappling wolves, silencing them both, and turned back to the cave.
The others had risen, their sleep shattered by the first loudly echoing shot of the rifle. Morte and Lawdron had jumped to their feet, and Frederick had grabbed his hammer.
"Wolves," Perenolde said. He dropped the weapon to the floor and fell back against the wall, sliding down it to a seated position. At once, his head slumped. He was so tired. First the ship, now this, he thought. It must be five in the morning by now. I must sleep!
I must sleep.
I must...
***
Dawn came all too early, as sunlight, however dim, streamed into the cave and rousing them involuntarily from their slumber. They silently finished the remaining biscuits for breakfast, and then Perenolde went to examine the corpses; after all, they had no more food, and even the meat from the scrawny wolves would mean they would eat for another day.
His findings were discouraging. The fallen creatures had no cookable flesh - assuming they could even light a fire in the cold - and it even seemed to Perenolde, in his fatigue, that the beasts were nothing more than bone and skin. All flesh seemed to have evaporated, perhaps devoured in the early morning hours by some invisible parasite. Disgusted and discouraged, Perenolde hauled the carcasses to the beach and disposed of them in the shallows. Surprisingly, the creatures sank quickly, leaving no sign they had ever been there. Afterwards, Perenolde half believed they had disappeared even from the sea floor, for he could not see them from the beach, and only the sharp cold of the icy water prevented him from investigating.
The rest of the morning, and much of the afternoon, was spent scouting the area upon which they had landed. The terrain was hilly and rocky, which, with help from the ever-present fog, obscured from view most of the area until they were right upon it. Often, they would think they had discovered some new stretch, only to realize as they drew nearer that they had gone in circles. The hill of the cave, thankfully, seemed to be the highest point nearby, and thus they were always able to return to their camp - and therefore to where the Steadfast lay sideways in the surf. This was a comforting thought, as it suggested they would always be able to leave - assuming they found some way to repair the vessel.
It was near dusk when Frederick's voice sounded over the hills, screaming, "Come quickly! Back to the camp! Help, we're under attack!" From all sides of the area, the other three knights rushed back to the beach, weapons in hand. As Perenolde rounded the side of their hill, he came face to face with a duel. Frederick was locked in combat - and with an ogre! The great beast was repeatedly swinging a large, spiked club at the veteran paladin, who was parrying to the best of his abilities with a large, black tree branch. His warhammer lay off to the side in several pieces. It seemed the ogre had crushed it.
Perenolde jumped quickly into the fray, assaulting the enemy with his own warhammer. The creature bellowed in rage and swung its free hand in a mammoth fist, which Perenolde narrowly avoided. Frederick boldly shoved his branch into one of the ogre's faces, blinding its pair of eyes on that head, but the beast swatted the branch - and Frederick away. It took a step toward the fallen warrior to crush him as he had his warhammer, but Perenolde leapt onto its back, gripping his hammer by the neck and using it to bash one of the ogre's skulls repeatedly.
Frederick took advantage of the distraction to seize Lawdron's hammer - he had left it with their other belongings in favor of the rifles - and resume his own attack on the creature. The ogre swung Perenolde from its back and roared in anger, but from somewhere, Morte entered the fray, swinging his own hammer and knocking the ogre's blind head clean off. It rolled down the beach into the water. Now down one head and presented with two armed paladins, the ogre did the only thing it could think of - it swung its club knocked them to the ground. Roaring in defiance, the massive creature debated which of its fallen foes to trample first.
From the top of the hill, Lawdron emptied the entire chamber of his rifle into the ogre's chest, with no visible effect other than further enraging the beast. Forgetting the men at his feet, it charge up the hill towards the terrified Lawdron, who was hastily locking the second rifle. As the ogre reached his position, Lawdron raised the weapon in desperation and squeezed the trigger, covering his eyes with his other hand in fear. The creature roared, but was silenced abruptly. It slumped forward, its face falling into the snow. Lawdron uncovered his eyes and looked down. Perenolde and the other paladins looked up from the ground in amazement.
Lawdron had shot the creature straight through its remaining head, killing it. He collapsed in the snow. He was shaking.
"I think I wet myself," he murmured.
***
The battle with the ogre was both good and bad for the paladins. While it involved near-death experiences for all who participated, no one was seriously injured save the ogre itself. The ogre also supplied the paladins with much-needed meat, which they proceeded to cook and eat immediately after the creature's death. Frederick had built a fire of dried branches inside the cave, where there was no snow on the ground - which is probably what lured the creature to him in the first place - and it was as they sat around this, forcing themselves to eat the ogre's disgusting flesh, that something very disturbing happened.
It moved.
They had cut off large sections of the ogre's belly for cooking, leaving the rest of the body to the side of the cave. As they ate, the presumed carcass began to lift itself slowly from the ground. It was dark by then, and in the flickering light of the fire, they did not at once notice the movement. Presently, however, perhaps realizing parts of it had been painfully removed while it was unconscious, the bloody ogre began to moan. This naturally attracted the attention of the men. Jumping up and grabbing his hammer, Morte beat the monster over its remaining head several times. It ceased moving and making any noise.
The significance of this event was at first lost on the men, but over time they would begin to understand...
***
That night, the dream returned, although at first Perenolde believed he was awake, so like the frozen world outside the cave was the nightmare through which he trudged. In the dream, he was marching endlessly through some windswept valley. Mist and fog obscured both the path before him and the way he had come, but his footsteps were sound. Something was calling him forward, something so strong he never doubted his course, never faltered in his steps.
Come to me, a voice echoed through his mind. An image appeared to him, shining brightly through the darkness he felt more than saw. He looked at the image, and saw that it was a map. He saw the Steadfast on it, its mast repaired, moored confidently in the surf as if daring the waves to capsize it anew. He saw the cave and the hill, and beyond it, an endless chain of icy mountains.
And there, at the top of the highest mountain, was the source of the voice.
Come to me, it said. Come to me. I will save you...
***
Again, Perenolde awoke before he was due to, his heart pounding in his chest. He was getting too old for all this excitement. He wanted to sleep. He wanted to rest, to set sail for home and never look back at this place. I will save you, the voice had said to him before, I will lead you home. Perhaps if he listened to the voice, then maybe they could go home. Maybe then his debt to Uther could be paid.
His debt to Uther...
No, he said to himself. I am here for a reason, and I am not going home until it's been taken care of. He steeled himself and looked outside. The moon still shone. A cold wind blew through the entrance to the cave. Somewhere out there, he knew, was some sign, some clue about the mysterious plague and the undead it served. Somewhere, out in that vast winter, was the reason they were here.
We're here to find it, he said silently, and sitting here in this cave is getting us no closer to it. It's time we got moving again.
***
He slept again, but fitfully; images of that high mountain kept creeping into his mind; the voice, calling to him, would not fall silent. When he awoke, he resolved to begin looking for plague's source again, and when he shared this resolution with others, they reluctantly agreed. From their demeanors, he gathered that they had endured a similarly restless night, and like him, they were eager to get moving. He wondered briefly, almost jealously, if the same voice had spoken to them as well, but put the thought out of his head. He was being silly. It was just a dream, after all, incurred from spending too long in the realm of darkness and cold.
It did not occur to him until later that he had also dreamt of the voice before they had ever seen the ice or the mountains...
One other thing caught Perenolde's attention before they left the beach site, and the cave, for good. They had gathered their things, selecting only what they could carry, as they did not wish to carry or drag their trunks all across the frozen land, and they were preparing to leave the beach, when the former lord of Alterac happened to look out across the water at the Steadfast.
It appeared, from where Perenolde stood, that the ship was in full working order. It floated pleasantly on the water, right side up, rising and falling softly with the waves. Its mast, as well, seemed to be perfectly attached. By all rites, it seemed to have never fractured. Had Perenolde then imagined the terrifying splintering of the bulkhead, the awful cracking of the mast which echoed over the water? Had that, too, been part of some dream, some nightmarish vision full of voices and maddening images? Perhaps it had been. All the dreams, the visions were blending together with the real events of their quest, nights and days merging under the sinister moon and shrouded sun which already kept them so similar.
He blinked. It was so far away... perhaps his eyes were merely playing tricks on him now. After all, who could tell from so far off whether that was the mast or a wayward oar? Yes, he told himself, one of the oars has stuck out of the water, and I mistook it in the fog for the mast. It was wishful thinking, he told himself. That's all it was...
He cast one last glance over the beach. Everything was so still here, so dead. Only the decaying corpse of the ogre, cast aside at the mouth of the cave, was any proof they had ever come ashore.
Sighing to himself, Perenolde shouldered his hammer, turned, and walked away from the beach.
***
Yes, my children, a lone, far-off voice said quietly to itself. Come to me, my sons. IT is nearly time...
***
They had made their way to about the halfway point between the ship and the shore when there was the loudest of cracking sounds, followed by an equally loud splash. Perenolde looked over his shoulder. The bulkhead which supported the mast had snapped, probably from the added weight of the water below the deck, and the mast itself had broken and fallen sideways into the sea. The huge weight of the mast on that part of the ship caused the Steadfast to tilt, and, as Perenolde watched, the vessel capsized and the deck fell perpendicular to the surface of the water.
The Steadfast had died. They were on their own.
They continued to row, regardless, for they had already made the choice to abandon the ship for this strange new country. As the boats came ashore, Perenolde examined the beach they had come up on. It appeared to be of white sand, but closer inspection proved it was snow. Rocks and bits of ice ringed the beach, which sloped upwards into a rocky hill. A dark cave opened into the face of the hill. Perenolde pointed to this and spoke.
"We'll camp in the cave," he said. The others grunted their acknowledgment. Everyone was too tired to argue. They climbed the hill, dragging their trunks behind them, and soon reached the mouth of the cave. Nothing visible awaited them. Not trusting the dark places shunned by the moonlight, they settled in the opening where they could see any threats that appeared, and soon fell asleep.
They did not stay that way for long. Seemingly mere moments after he had nodded off - although the position of the moon told him otherwise - Perenolde was roused from his sleep by a low howl. The sound startled him at first, but as it repeated, echoing through the night, he calmed somewhat and listened. Presently, the howl was joined by similar sounds from other creatures. Perenolde remained awake but still for near an hour, listening to the feral sounds grow louder and more distinct as the creatures making them drew closer to one another and to him.
Finally, he could remain still no longer, and the sounds were now loud enough to stop him from sleeping, so he rose and grabbed his hammer from where he had propped it against a wall of the cave. Light flashed outside the cave, drawing his attention; he looked out, and three sets of eyes shined back at him from the beach. The way their eyes shine, he supposed, they must be wolves, or perhaps cats of some sort.
He took a step out of the cave, and as his eyes acclimated themselves to the darkness, he saw that his first guess had been correct - they were wolves, though wolves of such kind as he had never seen in Lordaeron. Their coats were completely white, as white as the snow that covered the ground, and they were nearly twice the size of what one would call normal. Despite their magnitude, however, Perenolde couldn't help but note that they seemed very skinny, even starved. And I'm to be their dinner, he realized.
He took a step back, into the shadows of the cave, and the beasts began to creep towards him up the hill. He steeled himself and set the hammer back down against the cave wall, lifting instead the dwarven Blunderbuss rifle he had salvaged from the ship, and pointing the barrel in the nearest wolf's direction. The wolf in question had now nearly reached the top of the hill, its teeth bared in challenge. It sat back on its haunches, poised to leap - and as it let go and shot through the air towards the cave mouth, Perenolde pulled the trigger, and the beast fell to earth.
Perenolde immediately relocked the rifle and gunned down the second wolf, which yelped and began limping away; only its leg had been hit. The third beast, his companion wounded, saw his first meal in gods knew how long, and leapt upon the crippled wolf with ravenous tenacity. Perenolde fired two more shots at the grappling wolves, silencing them both, and turned back to the cave.
The others had risen, their sleep shattered by the first loudly echoing shot of the rifle. Morte and Lawdron had jumped to their feet, and Frederick had grabbed his hammer.
"Wolves," Perenolde said. He dropped the weapon to the floor and fell back against the wall, sliding down it to a seated position. At once, his head slumped. He was so tired. First the ship, now this, he thought. It must be five in the morning by now. I must sleep!
I must sleep.
I must...
***
Dawn came all too early, as sunlight, however dim, streamed into the cave and rousing them involuntarily from their slumber. They silently finished the remaining biscuits for breakfast, and then Perenolde went to examine the corpses; after all, they had no more food, and even the meat from the scrawny wolves would mean they would eat for another day.
His findings were discouraging. The fallen creatures had no cookable flesh - assuming they could even light a fire in the cold - and it even seemed to Perenolde, in his fatigue, that the beasts were nothing more than bone and skin. All flesh seemed to have evaporated, perhaps devoured in the early morning hours by some invisible parasite. Disgusted and discouraged, Perenolde hauled the carcasses to the beach and disposed of them in the shallows. Surprisingly, the creatures sank quickly, leaving no sign they had ever been there. Afterwards, Perenolde half believed they had disappeared even from the sea floor, for he could not see them from the beach, and only the sharp cold of the icy water prevented him from investigating.
The rest of the morning, and much of the afternoon, was spent scouting the area upon which they had landed. The terrain was hilly and rocky, which, with help from the ever-present fog, obscured from view most of the area until they were right upon it. Often, they would think they had discovered some new stretch, only to realize as they drew nearer that they had gone in circles. The hill of the cave, thankfully, seemed to be the highest point nearby, and thus they were always able to return to their camp - and therefore to where the Steadfast lay sideways in the surf. This was a comforting thought, as it suggested they would always be able to leave - assuming they found some way to repair the vessel.
It was near dusk when Frederick's voice sounded over the hills, screaming, "Come quickly! Back to the camp! Help, we're under attack!" From all sides of the area, the other three knights rushed back to the beach, weapons in hand. As Perenolde rounded the side of their hill, he came face to face with a duel. Frederick was locked in combat - and with an ogre! The great beast was repeatedly swinging a large, spiked club at the veteran paladin, who was parrying to the best of his abilities with a large, black tree branch. His warhammer lay off to the side in several pieces. It seemed the ogre had crushed it.
Perenolde jumped quickly into the fray, assaulting the enemy with his own warhammer. The creature bellowed in rage and swung its free hand in a mammoth fist, which Perenolde narrowly avoided. Frederick boldly shoved his branch into one of the ogre's faces, blinding its pair of eyes on that head, but the beast swatted the branch - and Frederick away. It took a step toward the fallen warrior to crush him as he had his warhammer, but Perenolde leapt onto its back, gripping his hammer by the neck and using it to bash one of the ogre's skulls repeatedly.
Frederick took advantage of the distraction to seize Lawdron's hammer - he had left it with their other belongings in favor of the rifles - and resume his own attack on the creature. The ogre swung Perenolde from its back and roared in anger, but from somewhere, Morte entered the fray, swinging his own hammer and knocking the ogre's blind head clean off. It rolled down the beach into the water. Now down one head and presented with two armed paladins, the ogre did the only thing it could think of - it swung its club knocked them to the ground. Roaring in defiance, the massive creature debated which of its fallen foes to trample first.
From the top of the hill, Lawdron emptied the entire chamber of his rifle into the ogre's chest, with no visible effect other than further enraging the beast. Forgetting the men at his feet, it charge up the hill towards the terrified Lawdron, who was hastily locking the second rifle. As the ogre reached his position, Lawdron raised the weapon in desperation and squeezed the trigger, covering his eyes with his other hand in fear. The creature roared, but was silenced abruptly. It slumped forward, its face falling into the snow. Lawdron uncovered his eyes and looked down. Perenolde and the other paladins looked up from the ground in amazement.
Lawdron had shot the creature straight through its remaining head, killing it. He collapsed in the snow. He was shaking.
"I think I wet myself," he murmured.
***
The battle with the ogre was both good and bad for the paladins. While it involved near-death experiences for all who participated, no one was seriously injured save the ogre itself. The ogre also supplied the paladins with much-needed meat, which they proceeded to cook and eat immediately after the creature's death. Frederick had built a fire of dried branches inside the cave, where there was no snow on the ground - which is probably what lured the creature to him in the first place - and it was as they sat around this, forcing themselves to eat the ogre's disgusting flesh, that something very disturbing happened.
It moved.
They had cut off large sections of the ogre's belly for cooking, leaving the rest of the body to the side of the cave. As they ate, the presumed carcass began to lift itself slowly from the ground. It was dark by then, and in the flickering light of the fire, they did not at once notice the movement. Presently, however, perhaps realizing parts of it had been painfully removed while it was unconscious, the bloody ogre began to moan. This naturally attracted the attention of the men. Jumping up and grabbing his hammer, Morte beat the monster over its remaining head several times. It ceased moving and making any noise.
The significance of this event was at first lost on the men, but over time they would begin to understand...
***
That night, the dream returned, although at first Perenolde believed he was awake, so like the frozen world outside the cave was the nightmare through which he trudged. In the dream, he was marching endlessly through some windswept valley. Mist and fog obscured both the path before him and the way he had come, but his footsteps were sound. Something was calling him forward, something so strong he never doubted his course, never faltered in his steps.
Come to me, a voice echoed through his mind. An image appeared to him, shining brightly through the darkness he felt more than saw. He looked at the image, and saw that it was a map. He saw the Steadfast on it, its mast repaired, moored confidently in the surf as if daring the waves to capsize it anew. He saw the cave and the hill, and beyond it, an endless chain of icy mountains.
And there, at the top of the highest mountain, was the source of the voice.
Come to me, it said. Come to me. I will save you...
***
Again, Perenolde awoke before he was due to, his heart pounding in his chest. He was getting too old for all this excitement. He wanted to sleep. He wanted to rest, to set sail for home and never look back at this place. I will save you, the voice had said to him before, I will lead you home. Perhaps if he listened to the voice, then maybe they could go home. Maybe then his debt to Uther could be paid.
His debt to Uther...
No, he said to himself. I am here for a reason, and I am not going home until it's been taken care of. He steeled himself and looked outside. The moon still shone. A cold wind blew through the entrance to the cave. Somewhere out there, he knew, was some sign, some clue about the mysterious plague and the undead it served. Somewhere, out in that vast winter, was the reason they were here.
We're here to find it, he said silently, and sitting here in this cave is getting us no closer to it. It's time we got moving again.
***
He slept again, but fitfully; images of that high mountain kept creeping into his mind; the voice, calling to him, would not fall silent. When he awoke, he resolved to begin looking for plague's source again, and when he shared this resolution with others, they reluctantly agreed. From their demeanors, he gathered that they had endured a similarly restless night, and like him, they were eager to get moving. He wondered briefly, almost jealously, if the same voice had spoken to them as well, but put the thought out of his head. He was being silly. It was just a dream, after all, incurred from spending too long in the realm of darkness and cold.
It did not occur to him until later that he had also dreamt of the voice before they had ever seen the ice or the mountains...
One other thing caught Perenolde's attention before they left the beach site, and the cave, for good. They had gathered their things, selecting only what they could carry, as they did not wish to carry or drag their trunks all across the frozen land, and they were preparing to leave the beach, when the former lord of Alterac happened to look out across the water at the Steadfast.
It appeared, from where Perenolde stood, that the ship was in full working order. It floated pleasantly on the water, right side up, rising and falling softly with the waves. Its mast, as well, seemed to be perfectly attached. By all rites, it seemed to have never fractured. Had Perenolde then imagined the terrifying splintering of the bulkhead, the awful cracking of the mast which echoed over the water? Had that, too, been part of some dream, some nightmarish vision full of voices and maddening images? Perhaps it had been. All the dreams, the visions were blending together with the real events of their quest, nights and days merging under the sinister moon and shrouded sun which already kept them so similar.
He blinked. It was so far away... perhaps his eyes were merely playing tricks on him now. After all, who could tell from so far off whether that was the mast or a wayward oar? Yes, he told himself, one of the oars has stuck out of the water, and I mistook it in the fog for the mast. It was wishful thinking, he told himself. That's all it was...
He cast one last glance over the beach. Everything was so still here, so dead. Only the decaying corpse of the ogre, cast aside at the mouth of the cave, was any proof they had ever come ashore.
Sighing to himself, Perenolde shouldered his hammer, turned, and walked away from the beach.
***
Yes, my children, a lone, far-off voice said quietly to itself. Come to me, my sons. IT is nearly time...
***