Off into the World Wound!
Sometimes, late at night, when all of the wine that there is to be drunk has completed its job and yet we are still unwilling to commit to slumber - sometimes it's a fun exercise to sit back and think about ways in which the world can end.
No? Maybe it is the philosophical bent that YHN finds himself curving towards that leads him to consider endings.
Most Golarion scholars, when thinking about threats to the world, will include Rovagug, the God that slumbers at the center of the world, and Tar-Baphon, the Whispering Tyrant, who is trapped beneath Gallowspire. Some parallels between them, there - Rovagug who wishes to destroy all of creation, and Tar-Baphon, who wishes that all life become un-life; both trapped under the surface of Golarion, at great expense - and both unable to be destroyed outright, but could only be contained.
Several people might also add the Dark Tapestry and the Elder Gods who live behind it, or the dark and unknown forces of the Fae, or of the Dark Elves who live in deep tunnels, or of forces from other planets in Golarion's system.
But while most will disagree on what the most pressing, dire, and imminent threat to life on Golarion is, everyone agrees that the World Wound is in one of the two top places. A rift leading to the abyss where demons pour into? A region the size of a large nation given over to madness and evil? A place so foul the gods sent down their emissaries to help - and who were given only the power to contain, not to end? It is a bad place, and a bad thing to have on one's world.
This is where Our Heroes are to head to next. They are contacted by the Runelord Sorshen - or a person who looks talks and acts like her - and hired to accompany a small company of Paladins into the 'wound to retake a small fortress town called Drezen. Sorshen also asks that the party track down a friend of hers named Arueshalae - the last message Sorshen received from her was something about a bell, and being trapped - the World Wound is bad for magical communications.
There is some small amount of discussion regarding funds and motivation, but ultimately Our Heroes are unable to resist the call of adventure, and they are telported to Kenabres, a crusader-run city on the edge of the World Wound. There they're met by Queen Galfrey, who agrees to Raise Kendra Lorrimor from the dead as part of The Party's incentive package, and then introduces them to Irabeth Tirablade, the leader of this expedition, and their new boss.
I just want to point out at this point, Gentle Reader, that YHN snuck in all three 'there'-type homonyms in that last sentence. I DO so enjoy my little self-indulgent games! I hope you do not feel they are at your expense, Gentle Reader.
But I digress.
The next day the party meets the Command Team:
Sosiel Vaenic: human Priest of Shelyn, Command Team leader.
Anevia Tirablade: human Rogue, scout
Aravashniel: elf Wizard / Riftwarden, magic support
Aron Kir: human Rogue / Low Templar, engineer
Nurah Dendiwhar: halfing bard, specialist / worldwound scholar
They also meet the 'army' that will head to Drezen - 100 Paladins, mostly faithful to Iomedae. I mean - some are faithful to other gods - Sarenrae and Erastil, Torag and Abadar. I certainly did not mean to imply that a Paladin might be only 'mostly' faithful! Just that the Army was 'mostly' of the Iomedean faith.
It's enough as a small strike team - and since the Queen's intel is that Aponovicious (the Marilith leader of Drezen) left with the bulk of her forces for the south, now is a good time to strike, and a small fast force might have the best chance of retaking Fort Drezen.
Additionally, a group of porters, drovers, carpenters, and engineers accompany the Army, with some 28 Ox-drawn carts, full of food, spare weapons and armor, and building supplies. Along the way several support staff will be left with materials to build way-posts, so that Drezen might be supplied by Kenabres.
It's enough as a small strike team - and since the Queen's intel is that Aponovicious (the Marilith leader of Drezen) left with the bulk of her forces for the south, now is a good time to strike, and a small fast force might have the best chance of retaking Fort Drezen.
Additionally, a group of porters, drovers, carpenters, and engineers accompany the Army, with some 28 Ox-drawn carts, full of food, spare weapons and armor, and building supplies. Along the way several support staff will be left with materials to build way-posts, so that Drezen might be supplied by Kenabres.
The main charge is to find an artifact called the Sword of Valor - a banner that can protect the city it flies over. Legend has it that a former Paladin called Staunton Vhane was tempted and took it outside of Drezen, allowing the city to fall. Retaking Drezen is also of high priority, and the Queen would appreciate it if contact was made with a group of Druids said to be living in a small forest near Drezen inside the World Wound.
And so Our Heroes ride forth - after a shopping excursion!
The first day is uneventful - this close to the World Wounds things are... strange, but not unbearable. The Party has certainly seen worse - as have the army, all of whom have served tours of duty inside the 'Wound. "Don't eat or drink anything inside the Wound, greenhorn," one of the Paladins tells Torvan, "it's all full of poison and disease. We bring our own food, and use magic to create our own water." Good advice from a grizzled veteran!
The Army leaves Kenabres and follows the West Sellen river, staying on the East side of the river (so on the 'safe' side of the Ward-Stone barrier). An hour before dark camp is set up at a site called Valas' Gift - formerly a town surrounded by fertile fields, now laying fallow and ruined. Except for one building, still standing, which looks strangely familiar to Our Heroes.
Irabeth calls Our Heroes over and asks them to investigate: "When you have dinner - say, a nice steak and a bowl of good soup - for some courses you use a knife, and for others, a spoon. My army," pointing back over her shoulder, "Is like a knife. And you..." Torvan holds up a spoon and grins - and The Heroes head over to the house to investigate.
 |
| A familiar looking house! |
The house is on a ridge, right at the edge, twelve feet up from the ground near the river. The party walks around, getting their bearings, and seeing some stained-glass windows in a room which overlooks the river plain, several windows, and a main front door. The door opens into a foyer with a stuffed manticore and an old, musty odor.
"A stuffed Manticore?" asks The Party of themselves. "Have we seen something like this before?"
Doors are opened and staircases, both up and down, are discovered, and once past the foyer Our Party hears a chittering sort of sound, like rats in the walls. Down the hall is a dining room, with furniture, two fireplaces, and giant stained-glass windows of The Party.
Yes, a four-panel set of windows, portraying Antwon riding Nelson, Kand, Kendray, Torvan, and Vig. "Hmmmm..." ponders the party, starting to feel a little uncomfortable in this house.
The other rooms on this floor include: a privy room, where a figure is seen in the mirror who runs off as the door is opened, as if caught in an embarassing moment; a library, filled with books (mostly historical romances) - two of which float in front of chairs, pages turning slowly as if imaginary readers were present; a sitting room where a lone violin could be heard, keening and lonely and far-away; a second parlor with a piano, in which a rat was heard running across the wires - although no rat was seen when the piano was opened; and a locked room, painted all in black, with an altar (also in black) upon which sat a black candelabra, and black candles. In this room runes were drawn on the walls in what looked like chalk - Kand could not identify them as any comprehensible language, and the assumption is that it was the coded ravings of someone mad, not an actual attempt at communicating. Kand takes one of the black candles for further study.
Dripping water was heard in this room, but the room was bone-dry. Drip.... drip... drip....
Our Heroes head downstairs, reasoning that the scariest shit is probably attic-based and so should be encountered last. The basement contains a kitchen, store-room, pantry, prep room, some sort of bedroom (for the staff, perhaps?), and a circular staircase, with construction looking much older than the rest of the house, which ended at a door that was rusted shut. The sound of dripping was much louder here. DRIP.... Drip... Drip....
Before tackling the rusted-shut door The Party decides to head upstairs, reasoning that anything behind a rusted-shut door is probably scarier than any attic-based encounters. So upwards They head!
Well, Gentle Reader - so far this house has been tame so far. But I fear there are some things that might disturb or distress the more faint-of-heart among us; I would ask you to look inward, and ask yourself how strong your system is - ask yourself if you are the type to whom frightful things might be too much to bear? If so, perhaps the rest of today's tale is not for you.
Consider yourself warned. Drip, drip, drip. The sound, though it faded on the main floor, comes back on the second - along with the rat-skittering, and a lonely violin.
The first room is a child's bedroom - perhaps a lad or lass of ten or eleven years - not old enough for weapons or studies in advanced mathematics or inquiries into planetary motion, but too old for childish ways and toys. An in-between kind of room, which perhaps explains the sobbing heard when the door is opened, a sobbing that clearly comes from inside this room, but with no clear source, if you see what I mean.
Additionally, upon inspection the beds are hay bales, with bed-sheets stretched over them. A sort of model of a bed without actually being mattressy.
The next room explored is above the dining room - and again, containing stained-glass windows. The windows are again of the party - but this time, depicting them and tortured, and broken. Each scene is quite personal to each viewer, and while the Four members of The Party are intimate enough with each other, from battles and scars shared, to be willing to expose their broken and damaged inner selves, perhaps we should leave each to contemplate the particular way that bits of steel, wood, and colored glass have been constructed to show the deepest fears and anxieties of Our Heroes.
Yes. Drip drip skitter drip. The sobbing can be heard from down the hall.
If I mention the artist Edward Gorey, and claim to you that A is for Amy who fell down the stairs, and further to vow that B is for Basil assaulted by Bears, would you know to what I refer, O Gentle Reader? Perhaps I might direct you to here:
https://www.brainpickings.org/2011/01/19/edward-gorey-the-gashlycrumb-tinies/
The next room is a child's bedroom. Along the top of the wall, just under the Crown Moulding, runs an alphabet, of sorts.
Also on the walls are posters with two children's poems. Rock-a-bye-Baby:
The next room is a bath room. There is a tub. It is not spooky, eerie, or sinister in anyway - unless you have a fear of baths, or of tubs, I suppose.
In the penultimate room explored by Our Heroes on this floor is a summoning circle, scratched into the floor - or rather, two concentric circles, separated by a hand's-width, with runes of protection, summoning, and coercion carved into the floor. Powdered silver and onyx dust are scattered around as well. Water drips up from the circle, where it pools on the ceiling. The skittery sound is a bit louder here, as if the number of rats were slowly increasing. "The water drips UP?" asks the party of each other. "Oh."
Finally on the second floor, a central room is entered - a parlor, with a hardwood floor of the kind that is good for dancing upon. And, sure enough, from across the way the door to the Master Bedroom opens, and several well-dressed couples begin waltzing towards Our Heroes! The Violin and Piano can be heard from below - a ghostly sort of sound as it comes through the floors, and is not created by mortal hand.
Oh. The dancers are all skeletal. By that I mean that they are skeletons, dressed in formal evening wear, who are dancing to ghostly music. I perhaps might have disclosed that earlier, I now see, but our narrative moves ever forward and so I will say that the party watches the skeletons dance through the room, down the stairs, and down the stairs again to the basement, and then finally down the last set of stairs to the rusted-shut iron door, where the skeletons become translucent as they appear to pass through the door.
The dripping, while not changing in volume, becomes slightly faster now.
Drip... drip... drip... drip...
The Party considers burning the house - burning it and fleeing and forgetting, in a bottle or in a book, but the lure of adventure and the unexplored Attic are irresistible to Heroes such as ours, so back upwards they trudge.
The skittering is louder and faster, as if the walls were insulated with living rats.
Most of the rooms in the attic are unused, or storage, with sheets covering old unused furniture, and crates of porcelain dolls, rusted and dented metal kitchenware, or doilies stained and frayed from age, and from various fluids they might have been exposed to. One crate contains several jars of paint, all of which are about half-used, and all of which are various shades of blood red.
One of the rooms, however, contains a sick bed. If we consider THIS house to be some sort of translation of Foxglove Manor, the sick-bed room corresponds to the room in which Iesha Foxglove was found (as a revenant). In THIS house, however, is only a sickbed, which nearly gives The Party a horrible disease.
The next room entered is, again, painted all in black, with a black altar atop which rests a black candelabra containing black candles. In addition to the chalk runes are runes, pictograms, and other strange writings in red paint. Kand does not take a candle from this room.
Next to this room is a Very Clean Room, with the floor, ceiling, and walls all tiled in stark white rectangular tiles, held in place with white grouting. A study in contrasts - a mystery to add to the unease Our Party feels.
"Unease" might not be strong enough of a word, really, but one hesitates to describe Heroes such as Ours as 'fearful', 'freaked out', or 'wigging'.
One of the storerooms is found to have a trap door in the ceiling, perhaps leading to an upstairs crawlspace, or second attic - Torvan pulls down a set of stairs, and Vig heads up. The sound of water and the skittery noises both go still, as if the House were holding it's breath, pausing to see what would happen next...
Many things happen, all at once. Let us describe them one-by-one, for that is the nature of Narration - but remember, Oh Gentle Reader, that they all happen simultaneously.
First to Vig, who comes up the stairs just as a... thing... a monstrous... thing... - oh god or Gods why - how could a world where a... thing... such as this existed ever come to be - ever hold it's shape as a world with such... things....
Vig falls down the stairs, senseless, and is wrestled onto Nelson's back. Later he would describe the... thing... as the worst part of a centipede, a squid, and a slug, all together but far worse than any of those, and with precisely the wrong number of eyes.
The skittering suddenly increases to a deafening roar, and a rush of water flows out of the fireplace in the attic bedroom. Those are the next two things that happen at the same time as Vig was encountering the... thing... in the attic.
Torvan considers grabbing Vig and throwing him out a window, following soon after to escape the house, but as he considers the water rushes The Party down the stairs, and then again down the stairs, and then out, past the Maticore, and through the front door.
Our Party is soaked, bruised, and discomfited, and as they see to Vig and make sure they are hale and healthy they hear the shouts and see several shouting Paladins, pointing and making their way over to the blackened ground where once there was a house.
Oh.
A stone staircase down is all that remains - at the bottom of which is an iron door. Through the door is a small room - perhaps fifteen feet wide, and ten deep, with two skeletons manacled to opposite walls. The skeletons stretch out towards each other, their feet inches away from each other - each with a look, somehow, of stretching to touch, to make contact, one to the other. The walls of the room are cold iron.
Our Heroes camp some thousand feet away, and the engineers cordon off the black earth where once a haunted house stood as a necro-hazard.
Stunned and still a bit damp, Our Heroes bed down for the evening. Tomorrow they will continue their adventure - and cross the Barrier into the World Wound. What further horrors await? That, Gentle Reader, will have to wait until the Next Times.
"A stuffed Manticore?" asks The Party of themselves. "Have we seen something like this before?"
Doors are opened and staircases, both up and down, are discovered, and once past the foyer Our Party hears a chittering sort of sound, like rats in the walls. Down the hall is a dining room, with furniture, two fireplaces, and giant stained-glass windows of The Party.
Yes, a four-panel set of windows, portraying Antwon riding Nelson, Kand, Kendray, Torvan, and Vig. "Hmmmm..." ponders the party, starting to feel a little uncomfortable in this house.
The other rooms on this floor include: a privy room, where a figure is seen in the mirror who runs off as the door is opened, as if caught in an embarassing moment; a library, filled with books (mostly historical romances) - two of which float in front of chairs, pages turning slowly as if imaginary readers were present; a sitting room where a lone violin could be heard, keening and lonely and far-away; a second parlor with a piano, in which a rat was heard running across the wires - although no rat was seen when the piano was opened; and a locked room, painted all in black, with an altar (also in black) upon which sat a black candelabra, and black candles. In this room runes were drawn on the walls in what looked like chalk - Kand could not identify them as any comprehensible language, and the assumption is that it was the coded ravings of someone mad, not an actual attempt at communicating. Kand takes one of the black candles for further study.
Dripping water was heard in this room, but the room was bone-dry. Drip.... drip... drip....
Our Heroes head downstairs, reasoning that the scariest shit is probably attic-based and so should be encountered last. The basement contains a kitchen, store-room, pantry, prep room, some sort of bedroom (for the staff, perhaps?), and a circular staircase, with construction looking much older than the rest of the house, which ended at a door that was rusted shut. The sound of dripping was much louder here. DRIP.... Drip... Drip....
Before tackling the rusted-shut door The Party decides to head upstairs, reasoning that anything behind a rusted-shut door is probably scarier than any attic-based encounters. So upwards They head!
Well, Gentle Reader - so far this house has been tame so far. But I fear there are some things that might disturb or distress the more faint-of-heart among us; I would ask you to look inward, and ask yourself how strong your system is - ask yourself if you are the type to whom frightful things might be too much to bear? If so, perhaps the rest of today's tale is not for you.
Consider yourself warned. Drip, drip, drip. The sound, though it faded on the main floor, comes back on the second - along with the rat-skittering, and a lonely violin.
The first room is a child's bedroom - perhaps a lad or lass of ten or eleven years - not old enough for weapons or studies in advanced mathematics or inquiries into planetary motion, but too old for childish ways and toys. An in-between kind of room, which perhaps explains the sobbing heard when the door is opened, a sobbing that clearly comes from inside this room, but with no clear source, if you see what I mean.
Additionally, upon inspection the beds are hay bales, with bed-sheets stretched over them. A sort of model of a bed without actually being mattressy.
The next room explored is above the dining room - and again, containing stained-glass windows. The windows are again of the party - but this time, depicting them and tortured, and broken. Each scene is quite personal to each viewer, and while the Four members of The Party are intimate enough with each other, from battles and scars shared, to be willing to expose their broken and damaged inner selves, perhaps we should leave each to contemplate the particular way that bits of steel, wood, and colored glass have been constructed to show the deepest fears and anxieties of Our Heroes.
Yes. Drip drip skitter drip. The sobbing can be heard from down the hall.
If I mention the artist Edward Gorey, and claim to you that A is for Amy who fell down the stairs, and further to vow that B is for Basil assaulted by Bears, would you know to what I refer, O Gentle Reader? Perhaps I might direct you to here:
https://www.brainpickings.org/2011/01/19/edward-gorey-the-gashlycrumb-tinies/
The next room is a child's bedroom. Along the top of the wall, just under the Crown Moulding, runs an alphabet, of sorts.
Also on the walls are posters with two children's poems. Rock-a-bye-Baby:
Rock-a-bye, baby, In the tree top.
When the wind blows,The cradle will rock.
When the bough breaks,The cradle will fall,
And down will come baby, Cradle and allAnd the classic "Old Father Long-Legs", Originally from Nancy Cock’s Pretty Song Book for all little Misses and Masters:
Old father Long-Legs Can’t say his prayers:Take him by the left leg, And throw him down the stairs. And when he’s at the bottom, Before he long has lain,Take him by the right leg, And throw him up again.Ah, the classics of children's literature. It IS so important to expose them to the old tales, don't you think? The beds in here are mock-beds, as well, but on a smaller scale, for smaller bodies.
The next room is a bath room. There is a tub. It is not spooky, eerie, or sinister in anyway - unless you have a fear of baths, or of tubs, I suppose.
In the penultimate room explored by Our Heroes on this floor is a summoning circle, scratched into the floor - or rather, two concentric circles, separated by a hand's-width, with runes of protection, summoning, and coercion carved into the floor. Powdered silver and onyx dust are scattered around as well. Water drips up from the circle, where it pools on the ceiling. The skittery sound is a bit louder here, as if the number of rats were slowly increasing. "The water drips UP?" asks the party of each other. "Oh."
Finally on the second floor, a central room is entered - a parlor, with a hardwood floor of the kind that is good for dancing upon. And, sure enough, from across the way the door to the Master Bedroom opens, and several well-dressed couples begin waltzing towards Our Heroes! The Violin and Piano can be heard from below - a ghostly sort of sound as it comes through the floors, and is not created by mortal hand.
Oh. The dancers are all skeletal. By that I mean that they are skeletons, dressed in formal evening wear, who are dancing to ghostly music. I perhaps might have disclosed that earlier, I now see, but our narrative moves ever forward and so I will say that the party watches the skeletons dance through the room, down the stairs, and down the stairs again to the basement, and then finally down the last set of stairs to the rusted-shut iron door, where the skeletons become translucent as they appear to pass through the door.
The dripping, while not changing in volume, becomes slightly faster now.
Drip... drip... drip... drip...
The Party considers burning the house - burning it and fleeing and forgetting, in a bottle or in a book, but the lure of adventure and the unexplored Attic are irresistible to Heroes such as ours, so back upwards they trudge.
The skittering is louder and faster, as if the walls were insulated with living rats.
Most of the rooms in the attic are unused, or storage, with sheets covering old unused furniture, and crates of porcelain dolls, rusted and dented metal kitchenware, or doilies stained and frayed from age, and from various fluids they might have been exposed to. One crate contains several jars of paint, all of which are about half-used, and all of which are various shades of blood red.
One of the rooms, however, contains a sick bed. If we consider THIS house to be some sort of translation of Foxglove Manor, the sick-bed room corresponds to the room in which Iesha Foxglove was found (as a revenant). In THIS house, however, is only a sickbed, which nearly gives The Party a horrible disease.
The next room entered is, again, painted all in black, with a black altar atop which rests a black candelabra containing black candles. In addition to the chalk runes are runes, pictograms, and other strange writings in red paint. Kand does not take a candle from this room.
Next to this room is a Very Clean Room, with the floor, ceiling, and walls all tiled in stark white rectangular tiles, held in place with white grouting. A study in contrasts - a mystery to add to the unease Our Party feels.
"Unease" might not be strong enough of a word, really, but one hesitates to describe Heroes such as Ours as 'fearful', 'freaked out', or 'wigging'.
One of the storerooms is found to have a trap door in the ceiling, perhaps leading to an upstairs crawlspace, or second attic - Torvan pulls down a set of stairs, and Vig heads up. The sound of water and the skittery noises both go still, as if the House were holding it's breath, pausing to see what would happen next...
Many things happen, all at once. Let us describe them one-by-one, for that is the nature of Narration - but remember, Oh Gentle Reader, that they all happen simultaneously.
First to Vig, who comes up the stairs just as a... thing... a monstrous... thing... - oh god or Gods why - how could a world where a... thing... such as this existed ever come to be - ever hold it's shape as a world with such... things....
Vig falls down the stairs, senseless, and is wrestled onto Nelson's back. Later he would describe the... thing... as the worst part of a centipede, a squid, and a slug, all together but far worse than any of those, and with precisely the wrong number of eyes.
The skittering suddenly increases to a deafening roar, and a rush of water flows out of the fireplace in the attic bedroom. Those are the next two things that happen at the same time as Vig was encountering the... thing... in the attic.
Torvan considers grabbing Vig and throwing him out a window, following soon after to escape the house, but as he considers the water rushes The Party down the stairs, and then again down the stairs, and then out, past the Maticore, and through the front door.
Our Party is soaked, bruised, and discomfited, and as they see to Vig and make sure they are hale and healthy they hear the shouts and see several shouting Paladins, pointing and making their way over to the blackened ground where once there was a house.
Oh.
A stone staircase down is all that remains - at the bottom of which is an iron door. Through the door is a small room - perhaps fifteen feet wide, and ten deep, with two skeletons manacled to opposite walls. The skeletons stretch out towards each other, their feet inches away from each other - each with a look, somehow, of stretching to touch, to make contact, one to the other. The walls of the room are cold iron.
Our Heroes camp some thousand feet away, and the engineers cordon off the black earth where once a haunted house stood as a necro-hazard.
Stunned and still a bit damp, Our Heroes bed down for the evening. Tomorrow they will continue their adventure - and cross the Barrier into the World Wound. What further horrors await? That, Gentle Reader, will have to wait until the Next Times.
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