For someone who had spent the past two years onboard a ship, Adahni felt a strange sense of foreboding as she and her companions bundled themselves onto the Witchboat. She'd grown up in the presence of magic, her best childhood friend Amie had been an adept practitioner, even as a teenager, but even the powerful wizards she had met had never been able to create such a thing as this. She was quite sure that if he had summoned all of his powers, the hedge wizard Sand who had followed her so faithfully in Neverwinter, might have been able to propel a boat the size for some distance, perhaps the better part of the day, but certainly would not have been able to imbue it with the sort of power that would allow it to move on its own, with no wizard to send it on its way. Gann tried to explain the concept to her as he sat at the bow of the boat and it, inexplicably, began moving up the shore of the lake at a fair clip, but Addie didn't really understand, nor did she really care to. Rashemen was a strange land, and the sooner she could leave it, the better.
"How long are we stuck on this thing?" she asked, interrupting one the hagspawn as he went on about the power of the hathran.
"Sheva said a seven-day ride," he said.
"Seven days," Adahni said, "All right. I'm going belowdecks. Don't wake me."
And belowdecks she went. It was a fine autumn morning. She remembered a time when she would have liked nothing more than the stand on the deck, or straddle the bowsprit, and let the cool wind blow her hair this way and that. Now, she wanted nothing more than something warm to lie down under and the solitude of her own thoughts and dreams. She crawled into a bunk and pulled a wolfskin blanket over her head, and there she stayed for the best part of the journey.
There were dreams that plagued her during her time asleep, but every time she awoke, jerked into reality by her own terror, she could not remember why she had felt so panicked. And every time, the motion of the ship and the feeling of hopelessness that attended her when she was conscious pushed her eyelids down again to face whatever waited in the netherworld of her own subconscious. Once or twice, she thought she ought to get up, to do something, but every time, a voice in her head reminded her that there were so very many things she had to do, and she had no idea how to even begin.
She was in the Sunken Flagon, having a drink with her father and Sand. They were talking about the architecture of Castle Never. Daeghun insisted it was made by gnomes, while Sand claimed that it was the work of dwarves.
"But gnomes have such small hands," Daeghun said, "It must be built by gnomes."
"Nonsense," Sand countered. When he spoke Elvish he had a Luskan accent, something he had managed to conquer when he spoke Common. Adahni realized after a moment that the entire dream was occurring in Elvish, which was her first language, having grown up under Daeghun's tutelage. She hadn't learned Common properly until she was old enough to socialize with other children, and they thought it very strange that a human child would speak only the dialect of the local Wood Elves. Since she had gone to Neverwinter, she had let her mother – well, father – tongue fall into disuse, and was pleased that her brain still had the wherewithal to dream in Elvish.
And so, it was very strange when Gann sat down at the table next to them and said to her, in Common, in his harsh Rashemi accent, "Addie, you've got to wake up. We're here."
"Bullshit," Daeghun swore, "Gnomes. I tell you. Gnomes."
"Addie, wake up. We're in port, we've been waiting for you for an hour. You've been asleep for the last week with little interruption. Wake up."
"I don't want to," Addie sighed, "I'm so tired."
"Fine," Gann said, "Have it your way."
She was awakened, instead of by dream-Gann, by corporeal Gann, who dashed a bucket of icy water over her head, "Come on," he said, sounding decidedly not amused, "The others are waiting in the lodge in town. We've all been worried sick, we want you to see one of the hathran to see what's wrong with you."
"Nothing's wrong with me," Adahni insisted. She stretched, and she felt her back crack, "I'm just... cursed." She gathered her things, and walked off of the boat onto dry land. Or, rather, wet land. This far north, the snows had already started to fall. She wrapped her woolen cloak around her as she walked into the "town." It really was an outpost, she observed, a few lodges that would house a dozen or so soldiers, and a couple of places that looked as though they might be comfortable. There were barracks, and around the small 'center' area stood its denizens, burly creatures, human and half-orc and hagspawn, all six or more feet tall. She glimpsed one woman among their number, but once you hit a hundred ninety or so pounds of muscle she imagined what parts you were hiding in your trousers didn't really matter so much. The air was chill, and smelled of pine more strongly than any place she had ever had the privilege of sniffing before.
She became aware very quickly of how weak her legs were, having been barely used for nearly a week. Have I really been sleeping for this long? What if there is something wrong with me? She shivered, as much from apprehension as from the cold. It's just the damned curse. The sooner I can be rid of it...
"Oh Addie," Gann said, his voice singsong but rather apprehensive, "I believe we have company."
She looked up from the path to see what looked like an enormous mound of moss walking towards her, out of the woods further inland. It had bowled over a couple of the soldiers already, who were struggling to get out of the snow, and seemed intent on bearing down on her, personally.
"What in the everliving fuck is that?" she asked.
"What does it look like?" Safiya asked, looking down at her hands, which had begun glowing with some unearthly blue force, preparing to unleash it on their newfound foe.
"Some... shambling... mound," Adahni said.
"That would be its name," Safiya said. She loosed her bolt, and it struck the mound square between where its eyes would have been if it had had eyes. The thing fell apart, disintegrating like the moss and dirt it was, and falling in an unsightly but inanimate pile to the snow.
"What, a shambling mound?"
"That is what it's called," Safiya replied.
"Rashemi are not very creative with their names," Adahni muttered. Now that the mound was no more, she saw that it had been hiding a couple of... well they resembled nothing more than great walking trees. Not small trees, either, birches, thirty feet or more tall. She had seen a few strange things in her life. The first time she'd laid eyes on a ghast, for example, she had been sick for a few minutes before gathering herself enough to save her own life. But there was something especially eerie about the walking trees. She also imagined being killed by one would be a bit like dying of being whipped by willow wands, which was really not the way she wanted to go.
"I don't think your blade is going to cut it," Kaelyn said, "No pun intended." She sheathed her own, knelt, and began to pray.
Fucking clerics, Adahni thought, remembering how irritated she used to get with Casavir when, in the heat of battle, the best thing he could think of to do was get on his knees and say a prayer to Tyr. About one time out of ten it resulted in some almighty magic descending from the skies above to smite or otherwise hinder their enemies, but the other nine times it was irritating at best and at worst, downright dangerous. In this instance, it seemed like Kelemvor or Ilmater or whomever she was praying to chose to ignore this particular plea, and the trees stayed right on their course towards a administering very woody death indeed.
Adahni looked at the trees, and sheathed her blade. She thought about it for a moment. It was winter, and the trees were leafless and probably dry. She reared back, and summoned the blood of the dragon disciple. She took a deep breath, and roared, the flames spurting from her mouth in a torrent of fire. It blackened and curled the branches of the treants, and they shrieked and withdrew in pain, giving the remaining soldiers the opportunity to hack them to bits with their heavy axes.
"I must admit, no matter how many times I see you do that, it never fails to make my skin crawl," Gann sighed.
"Now you know how I feel whenever you show up in one of my dreams," Adahni retorted, "Who's in charge here?"
There were four soldiers remaining, three men and a woman, only distinguishable because she didn't have a beard. They pointed to a smaller woman, a masked hathran from the look of her, looking over at the bodies.
"It's too bad," she said, looking up at Adahni. Behind her mask, which was not nearly as intricate as Sheva Whitefeather's, her eyes were piercingly green, "They were good men. And it's too cold to bury them."
"Does this happen often?" she asked, "Do the trees just uproot themselves and walk into camp on a regular basis?"
"No," the hathran said, "It seems as though the woods have turned against us. This little outpost has been tolerated for generations, that the hathrans might keep their eyes on the world. But now, as of late, the spirits of the wood have revolted."
"I suppose it keeps you in firewood," Adahni said, nudging at the pile of sticks that had once been a treant with the toe of her boot.
"Who are you?" the witch asked, "You've the smell of despair on you. Not many come up the river this late in the year."
"My name is Adahni Farishta," she said, "I was sent from Mulsantir by Sheva Whitefeather. She said I might look for the Wood Man. And you are?"
"My name is Nadaj," she said. She walked up to Adahni and examined her a little more closely. She put her nose right up to Addie's neck and inhaled deeply.
"All right, I don't know what the customs are here, but that is a gross violation of personal space, back where I'm from," Adahni said, stepping back quickly.
Nadaj stepped up to her again, looked her right in the eye, their faces centimeters apart. "I know who you are," she said in a low tone so the others couldn't hear. Her voice changed then, and it was hollow and unearthly, not the voice of a human woman, but of something... beyond, "We have heard the whispers on the wind." The hathran's eyes went wide and flashed. Adahni felt the hair at the back of her neck stand on end and a prickle go up the base of her spine, and she stepped back again, this time slipping on a slick patch and winding up on her ass in the snow.
"Well aren't you clumsy!" Nadaj said, her voice returning to normal, "Come on, you'd best speak to Dalenka. She's in charge around here. She was hathran while I was still swaddled, she's three times the witch I ever will be."
Nadaj ushered the companions into one of the cabins, which was warm and dry, which was rather comforting all things considered. Dalenka was seated in front of a large and roaring fire at the end of the room, surrounded by furnishings that would have looked more in place in a fine house in Neverwinter than a tiny cabin at the ends of the earth. The older witch was smoking, a long, thin-stemmed pipe. She didn't look up as they walked in.
Nadaj cleared her throat, and the older hathran looked up. Adahni could see through her mask that the old woman's eyes were milky with cataracts, and wondered if she could hear or see at all.
"Dalenka," Nadaj said, loudly, "I have someone here to speak with you."
"Who are you?" asked the senior hathran, turning her eyes to Nadaj, and then to Adahni. Her voice was deep and powerful, but Adahni could hear her breath, whistling and wheezing around her words, and knew that the old woman was sickly. The climate couldn't be doing much for her, she thought.
"I am Adahni Farishta," she said.
"But who are you?" Dalenka insisted, looking from Adahni to Nadaj to Adahni's companions, "What are you doing here? Is it you who have made the trees go mad?"
The old hathran rose slowly from her chair, seizing a stick of blackthorn to keep herself upright as she walked right up to Adahni, "Who are you? You are not one, but two."
"I..."
"You are not one, but two!" the hathran exclaimed. She whirled and turned to look at Nadaj, raising her stick over her head, "It is you! You have made them... you have driven them mad! Get out! Get out!" She raised one gnarled hand over her head, as though to bring down wrath from the heavens upon them.
"I think we've overstayed our welcome," Okku rumbled, and turned to walk back out into the snow.
Back in the outpost center, Nadaj said, "Well, I suppose if you're going to look for the Wood Man, you know where to go." She looked out over the woods suspiciously.
"But I take it I can count on no help from the wychlaren here," Adahni said.
"Dalenka is old," Nadaj sighed, "I don't know if she knows where she is half of the time. As you know, we hathran are tied in our blood to the land and to the spirits of the land. Whatever has caused the spirits of the wood to lose themselves has affected her doubly."
"And it has not affected you?" Adahni asked.
"I am young, not yet twenty," Nadaj said, "I do not have half of the connection with the world as Dalenka. I suppose in sixty year's time I may be twisted this way and that with the whims of the spirits as well."
Adahni nodded slowly, looking to her companions for any clues that the young hathran was telling the truth. None of them challenged her assertion.
"Into the wood then?" she said.
"That is the idea, isn't it," Safiya said dryly, "Are you sure you don't need another weeklong nap first?"
"Hush," Adahni scolded, "I think I've got it in me right now."
"Oh, we all knew you did, my lemming!" Gann exclaimed, "Come now! Adventure awaits!"