Chapter 39
A Sacred Site
Pieron and Fabian rushed to Dyson's side and lifted him to his feet, all three slick with wreaking ichor they did their best to wipe it from their eyes and examine each other up and down. They'd survived, worse for wear, but nothing that wouldn't heal with some rest. They looked out over the darkness of eastern trees beneath the faint silouette of the foothills of Mount Ghakis and felt they had no strength left to chase after their wayward friend. If he did not return in the early morning they'd have to deal with that then. Presently they used the last of the fading rain from the unnatural storm to wash Wintersplinter's goo from their cuts, made to cross the stone circle in search of Kavan's final resting place which Fabian somehow felt was on the western slope of the hill, and as they passed the bubbling pool of decay they saw from beneath it's surface the glimmer of a fading green light. Pieron reached down into the tar like substance and pulled from it the green gem of the Ladies Three. It pulsed in her hand, unnaturally spotless, and she felt for that instant an intense awareness of her natural surroundings. The movement of the birds and knight-time insects, the sounds and smells that the wind carried past her face. She noticed this close that the stone wasn't a stone at all, but some sort of petrified wood, translucent and slowly dimming to a soft emerald hue. Pieron felt the stone dormat now but all three of them could appreciate the stores of power it had recently displayed, and they knew wether or not they could in good faith give this back to the Martikov's would be a conversation for after a good night's rest.
Fabian asked Dyson for his owl-goggles and led them into the night in search of Kavan's resting place. With torch in hand they followed, and all arrived without a moment of search at the largest cairn they'd yet seen, each smooth stone scrawled with swirls of wind, just like the symbol they'd seen etched on the obelisk outside the winery. Out from the stones thrust a muscled hand, carved exquisitely from the granite, clutched in a fist about the shaft of a hefty spear stained brown with blood. Fabian reached out her hand to touch it, and at the slightest contact the granite hand burst into a cloud of dust, and when it settled she was clutching the staff and a presence in her mind subsided in peace. They had the spear and Yaedrag awaited, but they threw it metaphorically onto the growing pile of threads that required their attention and made camp atop the hill, rotating watch and much needed sleep.
Erros awoke to the sound of birds flitting past his upturned face in the pine branch canopy overhead. The ground was hard and smooth beneath his back, the right side of his face was hot, as if baking in the morning rays he knew couldn't penetrate Barovia's misty roof. He sat up. It was fire, the hut he lay near was a blackened pile of rubble, smoldering like a furnace. There were six other huts still standing scattered about a packed earth clearing in the wood, a village he'd never before seen. Hello? he called out. Noone seemed to be there, though something must have started the fire. He checked his body for wounds: perfectly unspoiled, save for the back of his tunic now covered in dust. Damn, he whispered. Erros high stepped over the bodies of two villagers clutching each other, careful not to step into the strange puddle that surrounded their forms. He walked across the square, past three more he somehow managed not to count, and pulled aside the curtain of an untouched hut. Inside he found drying sausage and acorn paste which he ate ravenously, before wiping his mouth and checking the next door over. Bodies and blood. Small ones. At first he saw, four or five, but then he realized he hadn't. I'm lucky nobody's here, he thought aloud, and began the morning stroll back to Yesterhill. Another circle of forms, forest folk this time bearing weapons. He started to count, but figured better not, and the rest of the ninety minute walk he didn't pass any more, except the occasional corpse every few thousand feet.
Pieron spied him first emerging from the forest as they finished their breakfast and struck camp. He walked at an even pace up the steep slope of the hill and saw Pieron waiting for him arms crossed, Fabian striding up, having just finished the work of gathering their slain foe in respectful rows across the grounds.
What happened, are you okay?
I'm fine, didn't make it that far.
What of the forest folk you hounded?
Didn't see them.
Fabian exhaled with relief and pulled Erros in tenderly by the shoulder as Pieron scowled, certain he wasn't telling the truth. But they turned their attention to the next order of buisness without a moments celebration for what they'd accomplished in retrieving one of the gems. Pieron picked up the spongy black staff the antlered leader had wielded and sensed it's ancient arcance power. It was a certainty this staff could create and control blights to some degree, and she asked the group if they thought it safe enough for her to study the staff more closely, an act sometimes frought with the perils of awakening evils and taking on curses. They trusted Pieron's intellect and judgement and stated as much, but agreed together that investigating the southern grove could provide answers more easily, and set off to do so before returning to the winery.
It was a short walk to the grove from the stone circle atop the hill, which they made in the immense shadow of the mist wall just a few leagues west. Fabian and Erros searched the mountains beyond for another glimpse of their home, felt the strange pull of the mists from this vantage point atop the hill, and pondered that perhaps the forest folk could feel the same and chose this hill for their burial site accordingly. The grove ahead, which looked so vibrant from a distance, was in fact half dead, patches of yellow-green leaves clinging to dry trees choked by weeds and parasitic ivy. They passed into the center of the grove and found a much smaller ceremonial clearing. In it's middle a stone altar, a square pedestal thigh high and engraved with carvings of wind that matched Kavan's cairn. Behind it, a thick gnarled oak tree, bare petriefied branches upturned to the sky, every inch of the wood dyed a deep, consuming, black. The tree matched the staff in color, though lacked the dripping red liquid, but Pieron spied several breaks in the branches overhead that implied several large sticks had at one point been removed. Erros touched the staff, smelled the red stain it left on his hand, pungent tree-sap musk with a biting metallic edge. Like blood and sap in one. Dyson felt convinced this was the tree they'd seen in their vision at Jeny's hut, the tree that turned black when Strahd spilled his blood at it's base. He walked to the place that strange figure had stood, felt the unmoving roots that emerged from the dirt, and surprisingly saw a large gap in their folds where the aught not to be. Stairs led down there, woven of roots themselves, a subtly concealed passage way into the heart of the tree.
Dyson turned to his friends and with their encouragement he removed his heavy pack and toolbelt and wriggled underground and into the trunk. From under there he could tell the passage was made for someone of dimunutive height, barely standing upright himself, he shuffled along eight feet or so until a turn into the center of the tree revealed…a dead end. But surrounded by wood and earth, the end of this short tunnel was capped with a shear stone slab. He pushed against it and nothing moved, but saw deep carvings recessed into the stone. He scrapped away the dirt of centuries of exposure and as best he could he sidled back to take the entire image in.
The stone slab bore a border of three icons repeated, an open eye, a wolf's head, and most prominently the wind symbol. In the center, standing 5 feet tall was a woman with long hair and a flowing sleeveless dress, arms upraised in front of them. Behind her stood two other woman nearly identical, the one on the right clasping their hands in an open circle in front of their chest, the one on the left holding a dead rabbit by the ears in one hand and an ornate dagger of apparent significance in the other. Dyson climbed out to report what he'd found, and together they experimented with several things. First they touched blood-sap from the staff to the stone and it surprisingly sloughed off, where water did not. Then they brought the gem, and it illuminated faintly in close contact, as if something on the other side were resonating with it. It seemed as though this was a long disused ceremonial site for worshipers of the ladies three, and whatever rested behind the door which was the engraved stone slab would likely be revealed at the completion of whatever ritual the engraving described, a ritual they didn't seem to have the equipment nor instructions for. But a friend in their midst was a fearsome werewolf, and that was most pressing of all.
