The Eye of Winter's Fury

by Michael J. Ward

  Pyromania!: Segg and his phoenix cause 2 damage, ignoring armour, to each drakeling at the end of every combat round.

  If you manage to defeat this monstrous swarm, turn to 520.

  42

  ‘You sound both surprised and concerned, my dear.’ Sylvie gives you a sideways glance. ‘Do you think poor Sylvie can’t look after herself – that she needs a man around her home to keep her company? Hmm? Is that what they fill your ears with these days?’

  You flounder for an apology, wondering how you might have caused offence. Sylvie’s eyes glint mischievously, her lips twitching into a playful smile. ‘Ah, you’re still such a babe. Grew up behind safe walls, I daresay. You’re not ready for the wilds quite yet, are you?’

  You find yourself confused at her manner. ‘I wasn’t given a choice,’ you reply sourly.

  ‘Hmm, that’s as maybe. Well, seeing as you’ve asked, I work for the Botany Society. Actually, I used to – before I decided to focus my efforts in other areas. I’ve had to live in some very remote places, boy, in order to conduct my studies. You learn quickly to fend for yourself when you don’t have nothing between you and the great outdoors.’

  Sylvie lifts her hand, displaying a band of silver around her wedding finger. ‘I was married once. He was a good man. Randal. We were posted here together by the society. Perhaps it was always inevitable we would fall in love.’

  ‘What happened?’ You venture. ‘If you don’t mind me . . .’

  ‘He died,’ she interjects, before you can finish. ‘It’s painful, but it happened and there’s nothing I can do about it. Sometimes, the hardest part is learning to let go, to say goodbye.’ She looks up, meeting your gaze – then smiles once again. ‘Sorry, I didn’t mean to snap. I haven’t spoken about it for a long time. That’s one downside of being alone – no one to talk to. Well, except for the plants.’ Her grin widens. ‘But they’re really not the same now, are they?’

  Return to 191 to ask another question, or turn to 207 to end the conversation.

  43

  You find yourself in a cobwebbed cave chiselled out of the black rock. One wall is lined with barrels, and another contains a rickety-looking wine rack filled with coloured bottles. Stairs at the back of the cave lead up to a trapdoor, which you assume provides access to the main taproom of the Coracle.

  If you have the word Bowfinch on your hero sheet turn to 148. Otherwise, turn to 380.

  44

  The lightning bolts lance into your transport, causing serious damage. (You must lower your transport’s toughness and stability by 2.) Thankfully, you manage to reach the far side of the island without sustaining another barrage. With an extra boost of speed, you quickly outdistance the towers’ range. Turn to 492.

  45

  Your weapon splinters the Skard’s javelin, your foot catching him in the chest and driving him back to the ground. He reaches for his belt, fingers closing around the black wand. ‘Min eld!’ he hisses, pointing it towards you.

  Then Henna’s sword comes slicing down in a brilliant arc of steel. You turn away from the blow, not wishing to see it land.

  ‘Funny,’ she pants, dropping to her knees. ‘With a face like yours, didn’t think you’d be so squeamish.’

  You grunt at the joke. ‘Is that the last of them?’

  She nods. ‘I think so. Took down the other hunter. His dogs too.’ She winces as she works her shoulders. ‘Think I may need a healer, though – and a good bath.’

  You take a moment to search what remains of the Skard. If you wish, you may now take one of the following rewards:

  Bone smile Red gutter Atataq

  (necklace) (main hand: dagger) (main hand: wand)

  +1 brawn +1 magic +1 speed +1 brawn +1 speed +1 magic

  Ability: reckless Ability: bleed Ability: sear

  When you have updated your hero sheet, turn to 108.

  46

  The einherjar are quick-footed and strong – and more used to fighting on the shifting uneven banks of snow. Despite your strength and magic, you struggle to fend off their brutal attacks. It becomes a battle of attrition, which quickly wears you down. As you fall to your knees in the deep snow, your weapons are knocked from your hands. With nothing left to defend yourself, you resort to clawing and biting, letting Nanuk’s spirit rise to the fore.

  For an instant you sight the shock on the faces of the warriors, then they back away. Aslev is the first to lower his blood-stained axe. The others look to him, muttering angrily in Skard. Aslev appears to concede to their demands.

  ‘Are you truly what you say you are?’ he asks gruffly.

  You struggle to find your voice, to find that part of you which is still human. Steadily, you push past the savage, bestial anger – kicking inwardly to reach the surface of your own thoughts, to break past Nanuk’s stifling presence.

  ‘I am,’ you gasp at last, falling forward onto your hands. ‘The ancestor spirit . . . the bear . . . he gives me his power. Sura believed . . . I can save your leader. I just need . . . the chance.’

  Aslev offers you his hand and helps you to your feet. Suspicion knits his eyebrows, but there is also admiration in his steely glare. One of the warriors speaks up, barking words in Skard.

  Aslev nods. ‘We all gave our word,’ he says slowly. ‘You cannot go back. You will shame us.’

  ‘I can,’ you reply defiantly. ‘And I will. All I ask is that I am given a chance to prove myself. I will not dishonour the Ska-inuin.’ You raise your manacled wrist, its dark magic still flickering in the half-light.

  Aslev sighs. ‘We will become cursed for this.’ He passes his hand over the rune-marked iron. A second later, there is a click as the manacle’s teeth spring open. ‘We will become nameless, lose our seat in the halls of our heroes.’

  You rub at your blackened wrist. ‘Gurt cannot judge your worth. He is not the Drokke.’

  Aslev grunts. ‘I believe it is you who should be afraid of judgement.’

  You retrieve your weapons, fists tightening around the grips. ‘Perhaps you’re right.’ You grin darkly. ‘Now, come. I have a score to settle.’ Turn to 119.

  47

  You lurch forward, eyes flipping open, hands scrambling for purchase. Your surroundings seem strange, wooden walls and shelves of guttering candles. Light creeps beneath a curtain. From the other side, you can hear a woman whistling merrily to herself. The cabin. Memory suddenly comes flooding back, and with it the unsettling realisation that you were tricked.

  You stagger to your feet, still trembling with fear – and the dread cold of that other place. It eats away at your stomach, rooting through you like some malign parasite. You swallow back a wave of nausea, the cooking smells from the main room doing nothing to settle your queasiness.

  Fresh clothes have been provided at the end of the bed. You ignore them, instead tugging your damp cloak around your shoulders. After taking a moment to regain your composure, you push back the curtain and enter the main room.

  Sylvie is busy with breakfast. You see a pan over the fire, with eggs and bread cooking in goose fat. She looks up as you enter, a smile crinkling the corners of her eyes. It is as if the events of last night had never occurred.

  ‘Did you sleep well?’ she asks, flipping over one of the pieces of bread. ‘I hope you’re hungry. If you don’t mind fetching some water from the creek, that would be wonderful. Then I’ll get some tea on the boil. There’s a bucket out the front.’

  Will you:

  Ask her why she tricked you? 295

  Ask her what she knows about the dreams? 165

  Ignore her and leave? 282

  Agree to fetch water? 78

  48

  The immensity of the mountain fills your view, its sheer slopes carpeted in the same red dust that coats the rest of this blighted land. You scan the rocks, looking for a place to set down the ship. Suddenly, there is a shout from the crow’s nest. The lookout is gesturing wildly towards the nearest rock face. You try and make out what he is saying,
but his words are snatched away by the rushing wind. Instead, you turn your attention to the area he is indicating.

  You spot a cavernous opening, previously obscured by a spur of rock. At first you assume the lookout is showing you a means of entering the mountain – but then his words finally carry to your ears. Along with his fear.

  ‘Kraken! Move away! Kraken!’

  The attack comes swiftly. You register only a few staccato images – a gigantic beaked snout pushing out of the cave, tentacles surging forward, snapping like whips. Then the ship is rocked to one side, tipping over. A suckered tentacle crashes down across the deck, knocking sailors flying over the rail. There is the crunch as the main mast splinters. More screams. Another tentacle squirms its way between the sails, smashing through anything that gets in its way.

  Skoll is struggling against the wheel, trying to haul the ship back on course. Anise rushes to the ship’s mounted gun, a malign weapon crafted from the nails of the dead. Spinning it round, she fires on the nearest appendage, peppering it with razor sharp bullets. It withdraws quickly, trailing a shower of ink-coloured blood.

  An agonised screech echoes from the cavern.

  But the reprieve is short-lived. More tentacles are thrashing through the air, slamming into the deck and crushing sailors to ash. The ship itself is being gradually dragged towards the snapping, toothless maw of the creature. You realise that unless you can free yourself from the kraken’s tentacles, you are on course to become its next meal. It is time to fight:

  Speed Brawn Armour Health

  Kraken 12 6 7 90(*)

  Tentacle 13 8 4 30

  Tentacle 13 8 4 30

  Tentacle 13 8 4 30

  Tentacle 13 8 4 30

  Special abilities

  Under pressure: If the tentacles are not defeated by the end of the fourth combat round, you are dragged into the jaws of the kraken. This inflicts 4 dice of damage, ignoring armour, and reduces the stability and toughness of your transport by 2. This cycle repeats every four combat rounds until the tentacles are defeated.

  Thrash it out: (*) The kraken cannot be harmed until the four tentacles have been defeated.

  Fire at will: You may use your nail gun ability in this combat.

  (Note: If your transport’s stability has been reduced to zero, you can no longer use its associated ability.)

  If you manage to overcome the tentacled horror, turn to 238.

  49

  The moment you step across the threshold the tremors start to subside. You find yourself in a long, vaulted chamber, circumvented by a high balcony. There are no markings or decoration save for a sculptured ceiling showing nine humanoid figures standing at the edges of a circle, arms raised together, hands linked – the pattern reminiscent of an unfurled flower. It is breath-taking in its scale, marred only by the fractures that criss-cross through the stone.

  But something else quickly draws your attention.

  Statues. Dozens of them, arranged haphazardly across the length of the hall, seemingly without order or design. Some are men and women, others goblin, troll and half-giant . . . Each crafted from the same green stone, glimmering with magic.

  As you step cautiously between them, the true nature of their invention is slowly revealed. Each body is contorted, deformed. Some are flailing with arms raised to their faces, others grasping for something, almost pleading. A few are wielding weapons, caught frozen in a swing or a desperate block, captured in a moment of frenzied battle.

  You put a hand to one of the statues. A Skard, like many of the other statues, going by his height and brawn. To your surprise you discover the material is not stone, but ice – slick and freezing cold. Worse, you can sense some glimmer of life still flickering from deep within.

  You step around the Skard, your gaze falling on the man’s face. The mouth is pulled open in a silent scream, nostrils flared, head leaning away – the ice having frozen his features in a fateful instant of death. And yet he is still alive. A single eye tracks your movement, wide and unblinking from the hollow of his frozen skull. You never thought so much pain and suffering could be writ in a man’s gaze. The other socket is empty; a pit of cauterised flesh.

  Turning, you look into the face of another statue; this one a female knight, clad in plated armour. Through her visor you can see the same agonised expression – and a single eye following you from the depths of its icy prison. The other taken, leaving only a blank hollow.

  Another soul trapped in an eternal nightmare.

  You draw back, shaking with the horrifying realisation of what has been inflicted on these people. The sentinel’s wings . . . adorned with hundreds of eyes . . .

  Do you like them?

  The woman’s voice, scratching inside your mind.

  You twist round, tracking the edge of the balcony. A hooded shape is moving there, the body slender, stepping silent as a ghost.

  ‘Melusine . . . ?’ You can barely speak, your mind still racing. Skoll had warned you about the witch and her power to turn flesh to ice.

  From beneath the folds of her cloak a slender arm emerges, pale as snow. Rings glitter on her long fingers, the red-painted nails tapping absently against the balcony rail. I wasn’t sure you would get this far, Arran.

  ‘I thought you were a prophet,’ you snap, your anger returning.

  A soft chuckle, like the tinkling of glass. Oh, you have much to learn, fledgling. Nothing is certain, only possibilities. I work to ensure my own plans come to fruition. This ending is my choice, not yours.

  ‘Why . . . ?’

  The woman ceases her pacing then turns to face you. In one swift motion, she pulls back her hood. You take an involuntary step backwards, your expression mirroring that of the tortured souls in the chamber. What had once been a face is now a bloated growth of pulpy flesh, distending into coils that curl about her slender neck. A crown sits atop a ridged brow, itself looking as if it was fashioned from skin, with bony hooks that grip like claws. A veil of shimmering light streams out behind her, surrounding her tortured visage in a gossamer halo.

  You avert your gaze, fearing to look into the pits of her eyes.

  ‘You are . . . not human.’

  Oh, dear Arran. I was beautiful once. A dancer. Every night I would perform the Red Masque at the Scourou Nave. Every night I would exit to a standing ovation, such rapturous applause! Men would shower me with their gifts, they would beg for my attentions. A dancer and a princess. No woman could match my beauty; no performance was ever as spectacular as my own.

  You hear the tap of her fingernails as she resumes pacing.

  I was traded like a piece of meat. The emperor chose me above all his other daughters to leave my homeland and marry the king of Valeron – all for a bargain, the sealing of a peace treaty; one that barely lasted past my wedding night. Father wanted me there, to spy on my husband – I was a tool, a weapon. For Mordland.

  You lift your eyes, watching her move, noticing the graceful sway of her hips, the litheness of her step – the poise of a princess, and a dancer.

  Understand this, Arran. Wars are never truly won. There is no end to it, no end to what men will do for power.

  ‘Power? Look at what you have done, Melusine.’ You scan the rows of statues, each one a cruel work of pain and suffering. ‘Look at what have you done!’

  Silence. In the distance you hear another faint rumble. For a moment the ground shivers beneath you.

  The woman grips the balcony with both hands. I bring an end to all things, Arran. I have no regret. No pity. Such emotions were beaten from me, torn away, stolen like every other precious part of me. A ruthless father, a cruel husband. You look upon me with disgust, Arran, but this is everything your world has taken from me. She pauses, letting the silence grow. Tell me, prince of Valeron. Has life treated you with any greater kindness?

  You glare back angrily. For a second, you meet her gaze – two pinpricks of light amidst the darkness of her deformity, blue and penetrating. You look away again. ‘I do
what I must – to stop this madness.’

  And what then – what next for the ghost prince? What will you do when you have saved the world, become the hero? What could possibly follow that – a throne, a kingdom, a petty act of revenge?’ Melusine fills your head with her shrill laughter. Sharp and cutting. Wars are never truly won. I told you that, Arran.

  You pool magic into your fists, preparing to strike.

  Melusine raises a hand, and snaps her fingers. Enjoy the dance, my prince.

  You hear a rustling to your right, a sharp crack, then an echoing thud of something heavy landing. Spinning on the spot, you watch in horror as the crowd of statues start to move, stumbling like zombies towards you. From the balcony you hear Melusine humming to herself, a sad and melancholy tune – in perfect timing with the swaying, erratic movements of the animated statues. It is time to fight:

  Speed Brawn Armour Health

  Ice tomb 14 7 16 30

  Ice tomb 14 7 16 30

  Ice tomb 13 8 16 25

  Ice tomb 13 8 16 25

  Ice tomb 13 8 16 25

  Special abilities

  Smash it up: If you win a combat round against an ice tomb, instead of rolling for a damage score you can choose to smash the ice, reducing your opponent’s armour score by 4 each time.

  Outnumbered: At the end of each combat round, you must take 1 damage from each surviving opponent, ignoring armour. This ability only applies while you are faced with multiple opponents.

  If you manage to defeat these tortured souls, turn to 514. (Special achievement: If you defeat the ice tombs without lowering their armour, turn to 779.)

  50

  You pick up the tile and push it into the square-shaped hole. Leaning back, you wait expectantly for something to happen. However, it appears that you have chosen the incorrect rune. As you hurriedly try and prise the tile back out of the grid, you hear a sudden crack of branches followed by another barking cry. If you don’t run now, the other fengles will find you! Frantically, you spring to your feet and sprint for the cover of the opposite treeline. Turn to 175.