"The Grapes of Wrath" (Session 1)

Fimgon, Nicodemus and Bargrimm made haste to put the town of Liebstedt behind them. They left behind one dead troll, the corpse of a vengeful bounty hunter, and a rueful tavern owner now short 20 Gold Crowns – good reasons to be gone when a contingent of Road Wardens passed through the town several days later.

Continuing north along the Old Forest Road, they made good time in Fimgon’s horse-drawn cart, only to find progress interrupted for several weeks by outbreaks of the Bloody Flux in many of the nearby towns and villages. The adventurers holed up in the Talabecland town of Uckrofurt till the stomach disease ran its course and the roads once again opened up.

Shortly out of Uckrofurt, the group was flagged down by the very Tilean merchants they’d gambled with over a month ago, notably the boisterous Giovanni. Giovanni was still enthused over the drinking and merrymaking of Sigmar-Tide, the celebration of the summer solstice celebrated throughout the Empire some weeks ago (but missed by the adventurers as they were putting distance between themselves and Liebstedt). Giovanni remarked on Liebstedt’s watered-down alcohol, a common practice for many Imperial towns saving their best booze for Sigmar-Tide. Giovanni invited the trio to stay at an inn with he and his fellow merchants to recoup their gambling losses of several weeks ago, and even offered to foot the bill for their room. True to his word, he still tried to take their money in a game of Reik’s Crossing that lasted late into the night, but after hours of intense play, it was Nicodemus who walked away with the pot of 25 Gold Crowns. Bargrimm did his best to imbibe all the inn’s liquor during the course of the evening, but succeeded only in losing control of most of his motor skills.

That night, somewhat distrustful of the Tileans, Bargrimm suggested posting a guard and even managed to stay awake for his shift. Fimgon’s shift came, and as Bargrimm slept, he began skulking across the room with plans to water down Bargrimm’s private stash of booze. Fate was with Bargrimm, however, as Fimgon tripped over the sprawled, twitching form of Nicodemus, deep in a dream state from which he would not awaken. Bargrimm tried to slap him awake to no avail, but it was Fimgon’s notion of using a pinch of snuff from Lars' snuff box that finally startled Nicodemus awake, sneezing violently. He looked like death warmed over, and confided the portentous subject matter of his dreams to Fimgon while Bargrimm slept off the day’s excess. The dream saw Nicodemus standing high atop a mountain circled by white wolves, all of them overrun by a tide of Beastmen and other creatures of Chaos.

The next morning, while Fimgon and Bargrimm ate breakfast, Nicodemus exchanged a few final words with Giovanni, who advised his friend to look to the gods for peace of mind. He presented Nicodemus with the card for his merchant house in Tilea, then took his leave. His advice proved invaluable in the days to come when Nicodemus’ visions returned with such vehemence that he began to see echoes of the dreams even by day and his body began to exhibit debilitating effects. The trio managed to find a shrine to Manann along the Talabec River, where Nicodemus offered up his fishing pole and began an hour of intense prayer. Fimgon took the time to clean up in the river, and was the first to spot three rowdy charcoal burners approaching. They were passing around a wineskin, and one in particular began verbally accosting Nicodemus. He accused Nicodemus of worshipping Stromfels, a more violent aspect of Manann paid tribute to by pirates along the Empire’s northern coast and outlawed in the Empire.

A fist-fight ensued, which turned more deadly when a fed-up Nicodemus drew his dagger. During the chaos of the fight, one of the charcoal-burners chanced to notice a terrifying sight: a large warherd of Beastmen stealthily fording the river and only a few dozen yards off. Most had goat-like faces, some had horns, others beaks, but all seemed seized by a fierce bloodlust to purge all humans from existence. Everyone broke for Fimgon’s horse-drawn cart at once. Fimgon pushed one of the charcoal burners to the ground as he made his way to the cart and spurred his horse into motion. Bargrimm leapt into the cart even as one of the charcoal burners misgauged the same jump and bounced hard off the side. Meanwhile, the Beastmen were emerging from the bank, several of their number bolting with preternatural speed at the cart on their hideous retrograde legs. Nicodemus’ former opponent fell beneath their fury, hacked by axes and gored by horns. Nicodemus himself just made it into the cart, almost overbalancing as Fimgon wheeled the cart onto the road, but Bargrimm's iron grip kept him steady. Fimgon noticed that one of the cart’s wheels had begun to crack when it hit a sharp rock, but there was no stopping for repairs at this point.

Dragging the cart down slightly was the charcoal burner who’d previously bounced off the side, now clinging to the back of it with his legs scrapping on the ground. Bargrimm tried to dislodge him as Nicodemus readied his short bow, but the hapless man managed to keep his grip and quickly became a secondary concern as Beastmen runners raced ever closer. Nicodemus’ bow shots went wide, disrupted by the cart’s violent shaking, but Bargrimm scored a lucky crossbow shot that embedded deep in one of the Beastmen’s arms. It still managed to leap into the cart, but Bargrimm body checked it with his full weight, sending it flying to an awkward landing on its neck. A loud crack indicated it had gone to Morr’s embrace, or wherever Chaos abominations go when they die. Meanwhile, the hapless charcoal burner had hauled himself onboard, where he was given a spare crossbow to help defend the cart.

As more and more Beastmen spilled onto the road in chase, Fimgon happened upon a clever idea and threw Lars’ snuffbox behind him. It clattered on the road, spilled open, and sent the lead Beastmen runners into fits of coughing and sneezing. Still, they persevered with bloodlust, and one, sporting a huge, jagged beak in place of a mouth, leapt onto the back of the cart where it was taken by surprise when Nicodemus flung Lars’ confiscated net at it. The net coiled around it and it flopped off the cart and tumbled to the ground.

Just then, tragedy struck as Fimgon’s horse reared up violently to avoid a tree that had fallen across the road. Everyone but Nicodemus was thrown to the ground, and with the Beastmen mere seconds from reaching the cart, it was the charcoal burner who leapt onto the horse and spurred it back into motion around the tree. Bargrimm made it onboard, but Fimgon had to run for it as the netted Beastman snapped out of his confinement and sprang at him. Fimgon struggled to haul himself onto the cart, but Nicodemus managed to get him onboard even as Bargrimm dispatched the unwary charcoal burner with a firm shove. The charcoal burner was shortly set upon by the Beastmen horde and sent to a bloody end, but with Fimgon back in the driver’s seat, the horde was rapidly falling behind. The beaked one was a persistent bastard, though. He vaulted aboard for one last assault, bringing his beak down with near bone-breaking force on Nicodemus’ arm. Reeling with pain and fury, Nicodemus crashed his mace down on the creature’s shoulder as payback. This gave Bargrimm time to heft his mighty pick, and he followed up Nicodemus’ attack by planting the full length of the pick through the Beastman’s shoulder and into its heart. It coughed a spray of blood, then fell to the ground for the last time.

Only minutes later, the exhausted crew pulled up to the bridge that crossed the Talabec River, joining Talabecland and the military-minded province of Middenland. A crowd was lined at the bridge, waiting for the rigorous inspection of the knights who manned a fortified tollhouse on the Middenland side. Fimgon let slip that Beastmen were nearby, panicking the crowd, gathering the attention of the knights, and earning the trio an armed escort past the throng. They were led to a tough-looking sergeant who believed their story (and the blood covering them) enough to dispatch a team of the famed Knights Panther into the woods to investigate. Meanwhile, he allowed the adventurers to clean up, and even provided food and the services of a battlefield medic to address Nicodemus’ badly swollen arm. Nicodemus had quaffed a nasty healing brew given him by the grateful Heidi Handler at the Strutting Cock several months past, and it had stopped his arm’s bleeding, but the healer kept it from getting infected and set him on the road to recovery. The three warriors spent the night in a dingy room, battered but safe.

The next morning, the sergeant interviewed them, taking down names, religious affiliations, and destination (for which he provided directions). He also provided a bit of history on Middenland, and it was Fimgon who caught the connection between the land’s favored symbol – the white wolf of Ulric – and the white wolves of Nicodemus’ dream. Fimgon related this dream, crediting it to a fictional old fortune teller to avoid accusations of occult visions. The sergeant felt that the mountain of the dream seemed surely to be Ulricsberg, upon which the fortress city of Middenheim sits, but he scoffed at the notion that it could be taken by Beastmen or anyone else. Still, he promised to inform his superiors just in case. He went on to take the standard toll, then hinted at a few more Gold Crowns for the upkeep of the clergy, the Order of the Howling Wolf. Nicodemus, still sitting on a number of Gold Crowns from his recent gambling winnings, paid the extra money.

Shortly north of the tollhouse, the adventurers were approached by an expensive coach whose driver, Hedric, had seen the respect given them at the bridge. He offered to pay them a few Gold Crowns to ride at their side as protection, as he was escorting the daughters of a wealthy merchant to Middenheim and wanted a little extra insurance to ward off potential bandits. The adventurers agreed and rapidly became friendly with both Hedric and the two lovely young blonds in his charge. After Fimgon talked up himself and his compatriots, the girls even spoke of their father hiring them in Middenheim.

The next day, however, their plans took a turn for the strange. A few hours before sunset, Nicodemus felt the twinge of his sixth sense even as the horrific sight of a flying skull terrified the horses pulling the girls’ coach. Fimgon wheeled to avoid the runaway coach, but the cart spilled into a ditch and its already cracked wheel splintered in the crash. The girls’ coach tumbled over even harder, releasing two of its horses, badly hobbling a third, and leaving one badly shaken. The skull itself flew off, but not before a good look at it chilled both Bargrimm and especially Fimgon to the bone. Hedric was a mess, too, though Bargrimm eventually managed to calm him down. Bargrimm also sent the girls away while he dispatched the doomed horse. The girls’ bodyguard, Gunder, was of no use, his neck broken when a trunk full of gowns had crashed down on his head.

Hedric pointed out that the nearest coaching inn was over 20 miles distant, but the girls remembered that they had only just passed the road to Grubentreich, a village where their aunt and uncle lived. It was only 10 miles distant, and so the group set out for it, the girls given leather armor in case the skull or any other dangers threatened along the way. They arrived shortly after sunset and were put up at the Black Sheep tavern, run by the girls’ aunt and uncle. Dinner was, of course, on the house, but inquiries about the skull were met with skeptical looks by patrons somewhat suspicious of outsiders. Eduard Jung, the girls’ uncle showed more interest. He’d heard a wine merchant describe similar sights in the nearby village of Pritzstock. Allegedly the village was cursed, the results of an uncovered tomb that supposedly housed great treasure. The adventurers floated the rumor past other patrons and heard a story that generally corroborated it. They also inquired about a wainwright to fix their broken cart, only to learn that the local wainwright was apparently off on one of his periodic alcohol-fueled forays to the woods. He’d be back, but not for a few days.

Perhaps time enough to pay Pritzstock a visit?