Ironsworn: Wolf and Cat, Log 10

  This is the 10th log of my Ironsworn solitaire campaign about Oddi Ice-Chosen. Character background and start of the narrative can be found at: Wolf and Cat, Log 1. 

Session length varies wildly. Some are multi-hour sessions in open evenings, others are 20-minute diversions over a lunch-break. 

Cast of Characters:

• Oddi Ice-Chosen, my main PC. Abducted by a Firstborn sorceress as a child, only recently returning to the world of men, motivated by a terrible prophetic vision. Wears an enchanted wolf-skin. Storyweaver and occasional ritual spellcaster.
  
• Sammutisel: Oddi's pet Cave Lion. 150 pounds, 4-inch fangs. 
• Kasju Frystgrotta: The Firstborn sorceress that abducted Oddi and taught him magic.
• Grassa Bitterloss: Oddi's mother. Recently reunited after 12 years.
  
• Emelyn Firetop: Blacksmith. Survivor of the destruction of Oddi's hometown. 
• Tern: Emelyn's younger brother. Werebear.
• Myrgun Bitterblad: Oddi's sister. Currently missing in the Shatterwood.
• Rygar Bitterblad: Oddi and Myrgun's recently deceased father. Grassa's ex-husband.

Session Log 10: (8/4/2021)

Oddi moves on from the bodies. He takes it on faith that Myrgun is not in the two graves. Even if she is, that would mean that people she led into this place continued on without her, so he would now have a responsibility to see them to safety if he can. Eitherway, he has to keep going.

Delve the Depths: Wits - Miss!

Oddi walks deeper into the Shatterwood. Bones litter the forest floor and skulls rest upon the old shattered trees. It's disturbing, and makes him think of the graves he decided not to touch. If there's any chance Myrgun is in there, maybe he should dig them up. Is it worse to disturb the rest of the recently slain, or to leave them in this horrid place. Oddi thinks back to what stories he knew of the Shatterwood before Kasju pulled him out of the lake and away to the north. As he walks, the Shatterwood grows denser around him, the trail harder to follow, choked with brambles and bones. He remembers that he and his sister weren't supposed to play in or near the Shatterwood, because there were tales of baleful ghost lights and...

That sound on the wind. Did someone just cry for help? He cocks his head and listens harder. A cry for sure, but defiant. The voice somehow familiar. Myrgun? There it is again, and she's not calling for help, she's shouting in anger. She must be battling the Broken. Oddi leaves the trail, and rushes through the underbrush in search of his sister. A sinister shadow procedes him, but he cannot see it clearly for the Gloom.

Reveal a Danger - 28 - "Denizen restores what was lost".   Denizen - 66 - Common - Gloom

Site Feature - 56 - Overgrown Path
This is my first-ever Scene Challenge. It's Dangerous, so roughly that means I'm hoping to get 5 Strong Hits before 4 Misses, using only Secure An Advantage and Face Danger.

Face Danger - Edge - Weak Hit - Progress + a minor complication

Oddi smashes through the brambles, soon losing sight of the trail. Sammutisel follows, it's ears folded back. It does not hear the illusory cries, but the great cat has a bad feeling about this.

Myrgun is barely visible in the thicket. She's shorter than Oddi had imagined. She swings their father's black blade about, cleaving brambles. Some answering force strikes back, and she parries desperately. He can't see much, but the ferocity and speed of the assault is alarming. Myrgun gives ground, falling away. He cannot see what is attacking her.  "Myrgun! Help is on the way! It's your brother, Oddi! Hold out till I'm beside you, then we'll fight back to back!"

Secure an Advantage - Edge - Weak Hit, and it's a "1", so only +1 momentum and my Wolf Pelt loses its charge!

Seeking to reach her faster, Oddi scrambles atop on of the half-trees. He sees her parries, and while he still can't tell who she fights, he sees that they wield a staff. A heavy wooden rod swings at her head, but she barely parries in time. Father's sword rattles in her hand, and flies beyond her grasp. Oddi leaps from the half-tree in the direction where her sword, his father's sword, was knocked. He clears the thorniest bramble patch, rolls, grabs the ebony blade, and springs to his feet. As soon as he clutches the Bitterblade, his pelt howls as the wolf spirit returns to the moon.

He spins around, looking for assailants. All he finds in Myrgun. She's so young, barely changed in 10 years and 2. "Have they fled? I have father's sword..."

"No!" she shouts defiantly, waving and pointing a tree branch at him. "You don't get father's sword! It's mine. I'm Myrgun Bitterblad! I'm carrying the family name, and the family sword, and I'll be defender of Forgotten Despair! Everything is mine, Oddi!"

Secure an Advantage - Heart - Miss! - Countdown goes to 2. Oddi loses 1 spirit, and learns a bitter truth

Anger flares up, and he feels his face flush. "That's not fair!" escapes his lips. He waves the sword at her like she does the branch at him. He shakes his head hard, to clear it. "Yes! Of course, I promised mother..."

"Fair doesn't matter, Oddi Lake-Chosen! It's already been decided. Dad says he knew it before we were born. It doesn't matter that you're a boy. It doesn't help that you're first. Dad promised. His first born child goes to the Thing in the Lake. You're just a sacrifice! I'm the family future!"

He waves what used to be a sword, but now it's a branch in his hand. "Wait -- what? No, I'm a, I'm the first born..." water wells up in the corner of his eye. "They wouldn't do that! You're lying!" He charges at her, swinging his stick wildly like a unskilled child imagining himself a swordsman.

Face Danger - Iron - Strong Hit! (Didn't expect that)

Their sticks crash and crack together. Oddi is two years older, and Myrgun hasn't yet had the growth spurt that often makes girls taller than boys for a few awkward years. He leverages his greater size with experience beyond his 9 years. The branches smash together again and again, and Myrgun stumbles to one knee trying to block his frantic powerful swings.

"Quit lying! Take it back! You're a liar, Myrgun! Mom and dad wouldn't sacrifice me! They love me!" His sister's stick snaps in half, bark and old lichen flying away in chips. "They loved me! Mom could never move on from what happened!" Myrgun is defenseless, cowering now with her arms up to protect her face. Oddi winds up for a massive two-handed swing.  "She felt so awful when they gave me to the thing beneath the lake!"

Secure An Advantage - Wits - Strong Hit! +2 momentum

He squeezes his eyes shut, and doesn't take the swing. Something's not right, here. Think, Oddi. You're not 9 any more. He looks about for signs of what devilry is afoot. Myrgun is nowhere. Sammutisel is watching from behind a tree trunk. He blinks and she's back, cowering.

"I'm sorry. Here, this sword is yours." He hunkers down on the ground near his sister, and grabs one of the hands she's sheltering behind. "I promised Grassa that I'd give the sword to you." He puts the stick in his sister's tiny hand, and it becomes their father's sword again.

Face Danger - Heart - Burns Momentum for a Strong Hit

"Stand up. I didn't mean to hurt you. I was just scared. What you said, it sounded like you really meant that. Did Dad really tell you that they are going to sacrifice me?"

She sniffles a few times. "On the spring moon." Her little eyes are bloodshot. "That's the cost of the sword. The Bitterblade will make him the greatest warrior in both Worlds, and he will lead the expedition to reclaim the Old World. He'll be king, and only for the small cost of his firstborn child. Rygar jumped at the chance."

Face Danger - Wits - Weak Hit - Progress, but also the third Countdown box

It stabs deep, because on some level he knows it's true. Oddi's legs go out, and he tumbles forward onto his knees. He can't stop shivering, and his wet clothes stick to his tiny body. A new linen shirt, his mother had just embroidered the cuffs and collar with fancy runes his child mind had not yet learned. His adult eyes see them now, and know them to be the signs of a gift to the gods. Could this be real? Did his parents truly give him to some monster beneath Bitter Lake? Trade him for a sword and a kingdom?

No, his father was never king. He looks around the empty shatterwood, only brambles and dead branches, and a flock of crows circling above. Come for some delicious eyeballs of a raving madman who thinks he's a child. Oddi covers his dripping face, covers the eyes that can never unsee.

The Gloom, circling as a murder,  feeds on his anguish, and tries to tease out more half-known truths and painful intuitions. This little one was meant for the lake, but somehow it survived. Could the Gloom and the Thing Beneath The Lake now come to some agreement? Surely, the Lake Monster must want to reclaim the sacrifice that was offered by Forgotten Despair.

Oddi tries to come to terms with what he's learned, and figure out what could be causing these visions. He thinks back on monsters from his childhood stories.

Face Danger - Wits - Weak Hit +Progress, + Countdown Complete,

The Glooms of the Deep Wilds.  This would fit with tales he had heard of such creatures. A sinister shadow roaming near graves and places where men go to die, feeding off their pain and misery. Oddi wracks his brain trying to remember how to break free of a Gloom's influence.

Beside him, 7-year-old Myrgun raises her night-black stick-sword in two hands above her head, like an executioner. "Father wanted you dead!"

Progress Roll - Strong Hit -

He recalled that a Gloom could fool you with illusions, but they always started somewhere potent and real. If couldn't feed you just any image, it had to be something you'd feared, or suspected, that which your conscious mind strives to deny. He remembered the tale of Harald the Helpful. In that saga, a Gloom trying to feed on the misery of a Prince's life in exile, brought to light a treachery near 30 years old. Instead of driving Jorgun Kin-Foe into despair, what it revealed lead to an injustice being redressed, and two estranged siblings finally finding peace. This could be a Gloom feeding these thoughts to me, Oddi realized. If so, I must be like Prince Harald the Helpful, and his brother Jorgun Kin-Foe.

Myrgun now stood above him, a warrior-woman of 9 and 10, ready to swing the ebon iron of the Bitterblade across his neck. Beside her stood Rygar and Grassa Bitterblad with blood on their hands.

"It's not your fault, Myrgun. You were a child. Grassa will have some explaining to do, but Myrgun you are blameless. The true fault was our father, and his ambition."

Reach a Milestone - I mark off 1 box of my "Save my family from the Bloodsick Warrior" Formidable Vow, and the first tick of my "Prophecy: I will place the mighty ruler on their pillar" Epic Vow.

I also fill in the undefined Background Bond that I had not filled in during Character Creation. Oddi has a previously unknown Bond to The Thing Beneath The Lake, whatever that is. This is probably not a healthy bond.

As the vision vanished, and the Gloom-cloud dissipated, Sammutisel skulked forward to make sure Oddi was okay. Oddi gives the loyal lion a vigorous scritch behind the ear. "You know who else isn't to blame for this mess, old friend?"

His relationship with Kasju Frystgrotta has always been fraught with complication and mixed emotion. Though his world view lacks an understanding of the phenomena we call Stockholm Syndrome, he could never be sure to what extent his feelings for her were genuine, and to what extent they were the function of some enchantment or glamour Kasju may have placed upon him. For most of his life the Firstborn Witch was his only friend that wasn't a Cave Lion. She was his instructor, his confidant, his guru, his role-model, his mistress and his master. She was also the cold-blooded bitch who'd taken him from his family, and made him her slave for 2 years and 10. When Emelyn expressed an interest in him, Oddi began to dream of what it would be to truly escape Kasju's influence. Now, he has to re-evaluate everything he knows about her. This cast all her actions in a new light... but it also raised so many more questions. What had she saved him from? What god or creature was he nearly sacrificed to? And why did she never tell him the truth about his parents? Surely the she-elf must have known that truth of their treachery would only strengthen the bond he had formed with his lone familial surrogate.