3. Wyvern Tor

Redhawk seeing the creature fall to his sword attack will look to Boggart "Will we ever get a peaceful night out here?!"

Redhawk will then mark S3

Alex, you steady your sling and send another pebble toward one of the skeletal wargs. The shot is barely enough to connect, striking bone with a dull crack.The remaining undead surge forward. Two rush toward you, two converge on Boggart, and two charge Redhawk. Another breaks away from the main pack, heading straight for Gertrude.

HP lost
Igrem: 12 of 20
Gertrude: 0

S7: 19
S8: 23

Redhawk will defend against these attacks as best he can then counter on S3 who is marked. He will then disengage and move 4 spaces north and 2 to the west to end up at L10.

Puck sees Alex fall to the savage attacks of the undead and rushes to his aid, becoming a stream of golden leaves and wind that seeps into the man's wounds and brings him back from the brink.

Boggart wards off attacks left and right, putting his battered wooden shield to task. "Wither!" He calls, and snarling shadow jaws leap from his hand into the chest cavity of [S5].

"Protect the animals!" Boggart shouts, digging in for the fight.

Igrem, you see the two skeletal wargs close on Alex leaving him nowhere to retreat. One lunges for him with enough force to end the fight—and perhaps Alex himself—but you throw yourself between them. You Interpose, moving Alex to S13Then, you seize your staff and call upon the cold magic within you. A translucent frost shield erupts around you and Alex, forming a wall of ice just as the wargs strike again. Their claws and jaws smash into the frozen barrier instead of flesh.Alex, for an instant, you have a vision. The world fades around you. You find yourself standing somewhere dark, with no ground beneath your feet and no stars overhead. The faint sound of dice rolling echoes through the darkness.

Then comes a woman's laughter.

You cannot see Her clearly, but you know somehow that She is there. She seems delighted.

Your recent wounds, your disastrous sling shots, the moments when fortune abandoned you during the owlbear fight—all of it suddenly feels like part of some private joke.



Beshaba has noticed you. The Lady of Misfortune seems almost amused by the fact that you survived the owlbear only to find yourself surrounded by undead wargs. Your improbable survival has caught her attention, and she mocks the fickleness of the luck you place your faith in.

Then the vision snaps away. You are back beneath the night sky, with the skeletal wargs closing around you and the cold remnants of Igrem's shattered shield drifting through the air.HP lost
Igrem: 12 of 20 (Bloodied, Charged)
Gertrude: 0

S3: 12
S5: 22 (Bloodied)
S7: 19 (Bloodied)
S8: 23 (Bloodied)

Alexander Simonnet Natalis de Bertier du Puy, scion of the du Puys of Amphail and environs, was petrified. His joie de vivre, his happy-go-lucky attitude, his sheer zest for life all curdled up and melted away in an instant. For a moment, a blessedly brief moment, he had felt the gaze of the Maid of Misfortune. The cold, icy fingers of The Laughing Lady of Ill Luck trailed down his back like the caress of a jilted lover intent on murder. His lady's twin sister, her evil mirror, had glanced upon him and found his straits—amusing. He was overwhelmed by visions of doom and death. The goblin ambush. The claws of the owlbear rending through his pitiful hide armor and showing him the slimy, squiggly, glistening mass of his own intestines, the violent displacement of Igrem's blessed spell, nevertheless followed by the ghastly claws of the undead warg. Not even wolves—wargs—AND SEVEN OF THEM! Boggart's healing magic paled in the face of the despair engendered by the overwhelming odds against them.

For a moment, Alex gave up. There was no way they were going to survive this. None. Black Bess had laughed in their faces and placed her cruel, but gorgeous, hands on the scale, tipping it against them. He sighed and closed his eyes. For a moment.

And then, Alexander Simonnet Natalis de Bertier du Puy got angry. Very angry. More angry than he had ever been in his young life. Even more angry than he was when his father explained the circumstances of his family's disgrace. A red vision descended across his eyes as the phrase WHO THE HELL DOES THAT BITCH THINK SHE IS! echoed through his mind like a mantra. Without realizing it, Alex repeated that outloud. WHO THE HELL DOES THAT BITCH THINK SHE IS! he whispered. Then, he said. Rising from his knees, he shouted WHO THE HELL DOES THAT BITCH THINK SHE IS! LADY DOOM, I DEFY YOU. I DEFY YOU WITH THE LAST BREATH IN MY BODY. YOU WANT MY LIFE, COME AND TAKE IT YOU MISERABLE SACK OF LEFTOVERR LEAVINGS OF TYCHE. MY BELOVED LADY LAUGHS IN YOUR FACE, AND SO. DO. I!

With that, Alex twisted around Igrem and rammed his rapier and its pommel right into the skeletal warg standing near them both [Action 1: Vicious Opportunist on S6].Still overcome with righteous rage, Alex slammed into the skeletak warg again [Action 2: Rushed Attack on S6]. As the blade slipped right in between the skeletal ribs, Alex realized he needed to focus. And in his state, focus on survival [Action 3: Anticipate Danger: Finesse].

Redhawk, Boggart, Alex, Igrem, you notice that the battle has become dangerously scattered. Rather than concentrating your attacks and bringing the undead down (even if one by one), you have been fighting whichever warg happens to be in front of you. The result is that the pack remains largely intact.

The seven remaining skeletal wargs show no fear and no instinct for self-preservation. They keep fighting despite their injuries, attacking until their bones are shattered, never retreating like living animals would. Your earlier success against the first warg makes the lesson painfully clear: thinning their numbers quickly would have been far more effective than spreading your attacks across the pack.

The undead surge forward again. Three close in on Boggart, snapping and raking from different angles. One attacks Redhawk, while another lunges at Alex. The final warg turns its attention toward Igrem, closing on the mage with its jaws wide.HP lost
Igrem: 12+?? of 20 (Bloodied, Charged)
Gertrude: 8

S3: 12
S5: 22 (Bloodied)
S6: 20 (Bloodied)
S7: 19 (Bloodied)
S8: 23 (Bloodied)

Flashing fangs and rending claws rain down from all sides onto Boggart over and over again. Valiantly he fights, bearing his teeth and howling with determination to live and see those in his care safe, but his shield can only ward against so many blows, and his armor has many gaps in it's protection from the struggle with the owlbear. His shield splinters under the ferocity of the attack and he falls. Crushing jaws close around his abdomen, and he screams.

This is it. There are too many.

Boggart feels the hand of his Lady on his shoulder, and he knows that there is no point in fear anymore. He can't heal his way through the violence of these creatures. His fate, it seems, is sealed.

He tries to take a breath, but he coughs up blood. On a whim(?), he cranes his head back and sees his friend, Alex, ablaze with zeal not far from him. His friends still fight. Maybe he can still make a difference. Boggart smiles and reaches out. Oak leaves and fireflies dance through the air, carried aloft by a gentle, golden wind towards Alex.

"Live."

Boggart, you feel the world fall away.

The snapping jaws, the scraping claws, the cries of your companions—all of it fades into silence. The pain remains for a moment, distant and strangely unimportant, before even that disappears.

You find yourself standing in a vast forest beneath a golden-green twilight. Ancient trees rise impossibly high around you, their branches forming a living cathedral overhead. Soft wind moves through the leaves, carrying the scent of pine, rain, and wildflowers.

Someone stands ahead.

A woman, tall and serene, dressed in simple green and brown, her hair flowing like leaves in a summer breeze. Animals move quietly through the forest around her—deer, foxes, birds, even a great wolf that watches you with calm amber eyes.

She looks at you with an expression that is neither pity nor disappointment. There is warmth in her eyes.



"You have given much, little one."

Her voice is gentle, yet it seems to come from the entire forest.

"You stood between danger and those in your care. You did not flee when you were afraid. You did not abandon your friends when the darkness surrounded you."

She steps closer and places a hand upon your shoulder.

"You cannot protect others by believing you must always stand alone between them and death. Even the strongest tree bends beneath the storm. Even the mightiest stag must sometimes run."

Her gaze shifts toward something beyond you, as though she can see the battlefield through the vision...