curse of innistrahd (Page 3)

Hell is real. To what extent is unclear, but the church needn’t have fables of fiends when they came unbidden all too real cackling in the night. There were holes that the Cathars knew about, gaping mouths of flame and sulphur. They dispensed the biddings of chaos and torment, crazed devils in seemingly infinite amounts and scheming demons to never truly be slain. They were portals to so much malign. And from a young age, Lady Wachter was enchanted.

It was one trip on an urgent journey that her mercantile father took her through the Needle’s Eye, her seat in the carriage barely raising her eyes above the draped windowsill. It was there she saw its activity: The Ashmouth, the maw of stygian forces glowing with an ambient menace. It lit the darkening earth in a warm and consuming radiance that felt as though it threatened to draw her off the teetering peaks. Only her father’s shouts roused her from her encompassing focus, as he bellowed at the teamster to move them faster away from the leathery sounds of wings.

She never forgot that feeling. She swore to find it again. There was so much out there. And she needed it all.
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Ireena Kolyana was surviving. She had always, and would never stop doing so. But now, today, left in this building she felt so small. She propped her cushioning better against the wood of the wall, and looked down at her book of nature lit by the flickering lantern light that managed to reach her. The words she hoped would sweep her away for now, from this subtly warmed cell and dark of the night and paranoia. She was wrong.

She didn’t hear those few words muttered from the other end of the structure, starting with “Excuse me why are you-”, before the guard’s voice vanished with a thick gurgling sigh. She didn’t smell his red black blood the color of her hair as it spilled across the planks. And she didn’t hear the approach of the tall blonde woman that walked up to the door. But she did hear when she spoke.

“Hello miss Kolyana.” she spoke, in an even and sweet tone that Ireena had not expected coming from the visage before her. “I think it’s time we get you out of that cell.”

Ireena struck to her feet to gaze across at this woman she had seen before, but who seemed so oddly elegant now standing outside her bars. “Grimhild?”

The woman smiled. “Not quite.” she said in a devilish whisper as Ireena took in more of the scene, the scent of blood and the reddening spots on this woman’s dress. She waited until the quivering gaze and stiff chin of the proud Stensian looked back up before speaking again.
“But you’ll find we have something in common. We both wish to protect you from the beasts that lurk out there. The only difference,” she paused, as if savoring the taste upon her tongue, “Is that I know the game they’re playing. And I know how to win.”
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She could feel them watching her. We see the Inquisitor, Seeta Venliss, hat off her head staring out the window. She had sealed her letters, the burning sensation of heated wax remaining on her hands reminding her of every word and failure. This town was dying. It had been for a long time, but she refused tooth and nail- Though the sentiment had come back to bite her. When she closed her eyes she could hear them, the screams, the crackling of buildings as she saw them casting harsh orange across her face and the streaks of blood and tears across the people. Her people. She awoke with a start, no time for that. No time for sleep.

The vampires had to fall. Or everything else would. His madness was contagious, and she was certain that this town would buckle under the weight of his ego. If it hadn’t already.
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It was not vampires that brought the redheaded Yulia with her endless seeming optimism to the outland valleys, but rather two things: Stories, and truth. And it was in departing from the ways of Maurer’s hunters that she endeavored toward the second. The Silver Temple, ancient and caked in ash and disuse was nestled in the mountains in the burning shadows of the Ashmouth. The only way to get there was the treacherous winding path of the Needle’s Eye, avoided by all but the mad and the dead. Yulia wasn’t sure which one she was, but she was willing to take it. There was much in there waiting for her. Speakers of knowledge trapped in its ancient walls and ancient stones.

She smiled her usual confident smile, a guise that no one saw but she felt on her face nonetheless, a reflex, as she lazily grazed her hand along the rough hewn walls of the staircases to her goal. This land had forgotten. Forgotten what it was like before the angels. The people reliant. The vampires confidant but contained. And any talk of gods… Vanished. But that was no more. Not today. Today she would find proof. Find proof that her stories lead somewhere. That life didn’t serve faith, but rather the inverse. She would take this whole temple down, demon and trap, one step at a time. She would get there. Or die trying.
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Listener, sometimes I feel at a loss. It is you and I with this bird’s eye view, seeing a story of the dark and the hopes and fears of those caught within.

We see the crying tears of a mother in Shadowgrange that doesn’t know her where in that manor her daughter is kept, wallowing in the decrepit corpse of a house. We see the inquisitor Seeta being stirred from her sleep as the sound of bells and the scent of smoke rouses her from her tenuous slumber. We see the hidden man Rem Karolus battle with fiends in the streets with flashes of steel and holy light, but fleeing at the sounds of the church he serves. We see the druids and savage folk of the hills gathering around the mountainous bones of the earth in prayer of a lord who will free them of their loss and pain. We see the caves of the burgeoning howlpack, and a strong dark skinned woman looking for something to believe in. We see the shattered remnants of soldiers praying with a conflicting but nonetheless real faith in the righteousness they hope to serve again. We see the vampire progenitor Strephan Maurer, calmly and idly contemplating his words, and the days to come as he gazes out of the shrouded window of his wagon. And we see a woman that looks remarkably like Grimhild but dressed in a red dress that cascades and flows like a river of blood as she leans in an whispers something secret, something dark to a glass and metal contraption flowing with ice white light. Though I suppose most notably, we see her smile. A true smile, not fiendish, but the confidence of someone who has made up their mind.

And yet despite seeing all these things listener, we are still caught along this story. Hoping we will see how it ends. Whether this is a story of redemption, vengeance, or just purely tragedy. Though I suppose that is for them to decide. But now plans are in motion, and there is no turning back.
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