Blood Moon - 06 "One for Silver, Two for Gold, but Feck Gorecrows!"

Journal of Fathak

Treasure! Shiny, heavy, awesome treasure!

Have I mentioned that I love treasure? It could be a bunch of useless junk, but if it's shiny and comes packed in a rickety trunk, it really makes my day.

Also, I have decided that i am not a fan of Gorecrows. You can tell them from regular crows in several ways:

One - They're twice as big as a crow, bigger than most ravens. So far, not so bad.
Two - Gorecrows have a reddish undercoat, as opposed to jet black. Creepy.
Three - Size of flock, which unlike a murder of Crows or an unkindness of Ravens, Ive decided to call large groups of gorecrows a "pain." It's apt, trust me.
Four - They're fecking Carnivores. Think dirty, stinky, flying piranhas. Shudder.

Anyhow,
We left our cave shortly after one of our guides tried to kill Kobsha. Beta, cute lil thing that she is, is evidently some kind of up & coming prodigal sorcerer, (turns out she's more of a specialist hired by the gaijen clan-less than their leader) and is seriously kind of disturbed. After beating the guy who tried to knife Kobsha so badly that his mother'd never be able to recognize him, she then proceeded to raise him as a freakin zombie. Not my cup of tea.

So anyways, we were headin out, having decided to help her find some lost bandit treasure, and around the corner comes a badger clan patrol. I dont normally like to brag, ( yes, yes I do...) but they were all dead in under half a minute, and we suddenly had plenty of horses again. Score one for the good guys! Also, the scout group's leader was wearing some nice armor, so Beta raised him as a zombie, too. I.. think we're still the good guys... It didn't seem to bother any of the other swans, not even Rowen, who seems to be pretty easily bothered.

walk walk walk, yada yada yada, ( which is an ancient art of sizing someone up by their reaction to inane chatter) and Rowen says we're headin the way we needed to go. Apparently the little creepy indian spirit kid gave her a map in her head. After we take out this Orbius fella, I'm gonna tell everyone that some huge dragon aspect gave me a map in my head, and start headin for a freakin city. There's a distinct lack of civilized services out here in the forever plains, and I could use a Concordian hot bath&rub, if ya catch my drift.

We come to a cliff-to-cliff chasm, spanned by the oldest, most frazzled rope bridge I've ever seen, and I've seen more old frazzled rope bridges than most. wanting to prove my daring, I immediately head over, on the assumption that, a) I am most likely nimble enough to swing & climb to the far side should it fall, and b) skipping across would look really badass.

So I get to the other side, and Beta starts across. ( I think she might have lost a coin toss or something.) I'm in the process off getting my bearings when everyone on the other side of the chasm start royally freaking out, and winging arrows my way. Remember how I was talkin about gorcrows? Yeah. hideous flying piranhas heading our way.

What to do? Set a bush on fire, thinking "They're wild animals, they'll be afraid of fire." Not.
So here I am waving a burning bush, shouting at this freakin huge Pain of Gorecrows, and Beta starts to slip. Being pecked at by at least a dozen birds at once, she'd lost her grip on the rope bridge. ( She was also in the process of stringing a safety rope, which turns out was a Very Good Thing. Flailing and shouting doesn't seem to dipurse the Pain, and now there's hundred of them, thousands maybe, welling up from a cave-mouth on the far side of the chasm. What's a dashing swashbuckler to do?

So I drop the bush, wrap my ankle in the near end of rope, and leap out into open air to grab her hand. Luck's on this chick's side, she was about to fall, but jumped & grabbed on at the last second, and we got off the bridge. Solid ground never felt so nice.

This is the point at which I came up with the name for a flock of Gorecrows.

I had figured my leathers, scarves, big floppy pirate~y hat & all would protect me from a bunch a freakin birds. Turns out, they have teeth. I took hit on the arm, the shoulder, the back of the leg. I thought my scarf was in my eyes, but it turns out I was being completely swarmed by the damn birds. Waylan told me later that he could almost see me through the swarm, but not quite. I guess somewhere at this point he started across the bridge. I didn't know it at the time, but I was In Big Trouble.

Finally put my back to a wall & started waving my cutlass Matilda. They were everywhere, and I was getting bitten in places I would never ever have thought to have been vulnerable. I realized I was In Big Trouble, when I parted company with most of my left ear. Not sure how many of them I killed or stunned, but the next thing I know, Beta's yelling at me & dragging me into a cave. Good thing too, because I was getting dizzy from blood loss, and nothing seemed to affect the damn birds. Must have passed out a bit at this point, cause next thing I remember is Waylan standing in the cave entrance, sun shining off various bits of weaponry, looking like one of the Gods themselves come down the mountain to rescue me.

Between Beta's magic & Waylan's bandages, I was feelin right proper, though my clothes we a shredded shamble, and my hat probably can't be saved. Oh, and they put my ear back, good as new. And right about then is when we spotted the treasure.

Mmmm treasure.

Unfortunately, there was some kind of magical circle drawn out around it. Standard thieving practice: If you see a circle, break it. From a distance, of course.
So I did, even though both Beta and Waylan looked like I'd stepped on their mother's graves. Beta waved her hands in the air & pronounced the site as "clean." She was about to make a very foolish amateur mistake & open the chest, so I grabbed hand before she got herself poisoned or heavy rocked to death. Checked the thing over thoroughly, and though I didn't find anything, made a good show of it, maybe those two'll be a tad more careful about trappity traps in the future.

Long story short, there was some decent silverware in the chest, along with some spiffy bracers & a big bag of jewels. beta said the gauntlets were tingly, so I offered to wear 'em & test em out. ( free loots!) Waylan carried the chest, & we got back to the rest of the group with pretty much no problem. Well, the bridge did collapse, but I'm sure nobody would have wanted to use it; it's practically a dinner plate for those damn gorecrows.

Later:

camped out last night, uneventful evening. more canyons, more maze. less bickering than usual, but I aint complaining. came to the town of outcasts & clanless, redtown or something like that. No bars, taverns, or wenches. I doubt we'll find help here, but the others seem certain. Beta keeps going on & on about being the clanless leader. Not sure she understands the Oroka. Not that I do, either. Kobsha just shakes her head. ( Kobsha is an Orokan priestess, something of a mid-high station in life around here.)

Of course there were badger clan out-runners in the town. ( not really a town, more a bunch of tents thrown up around a spring.) Beta & her crew went down to scope it out. I'm starting to think she might be a tad on the evil side. We'll see. Gods know I'm no saint. spent the afternoon & evening playing "hide & seek & nick" with the swans, turns out they get real touchy about their stuff. Once you've had every single wordly possession taken away, you realize that stuff is just stuff. I think. I dunno. I miss my hat. But these bracers sure are nifty. ( they DO tingle a little, sometimes.)