aelfgyth

Gyth ain't returned ter Combe. We'em parted a bit cross ... a bit too much ale. She had ter start on about her burnt man. ruined the party, she did.

Everythin' is going ter ruin and misery. I aint got no friends, an' Gyth says Wine is her protector now. She wants everythin', she does. She'm already got Bawde, an her Burnt Man... an' now she got Aefenwine too... it aint bloody fair.

Tavern - voices rumble up through the floorboards. The indistinct muffle pierced again and again by a bellowing laugh, some snatches of a merry fiddle-tune, friendly cat-calls.

heh.

That went better than i could have hoped for.

Duresen't start out well, though. Master Oldgrove brings me ter the Bridgetown... an' up pops more of them grim northerners ... and then... that old bastard hisself, the helm-giffer. I realises master Oldgrove is an even better liar than me.

'You be safe with me lass' he says.

Curse it all!

I swear, I'd give my right hand to the fire had I the foresight to stay out of this whole affair. Thinking back to it now, I see the folly of my acceptance to their "quest". What was I thinking? What was I expecting? It was clear from the beggining there was more at work here than I suspected. Or later feared.

Wherever I go on this island, them big grim lads is watchin'. iffen it aint master oldgrove its some other lad, starin' with them grey eyes, like wolves watchin' a new born foal. Aint much ter do at this lake-hold iffen they'm all watchin yer. So there aint much point stayin', and Oldgrove he'em keen ter be off back ter Brig bewiccan. I got ter find Gyth, and bawde... an' we got ter get into the dead town.

Summat important must be in this fornost place. Now yer would expect that a dead city - full of bone-men, corpse-walkers and shadow-men wouldn't be full of live 'uns like me an' Gyth an' Bawde. But ...

Me an' Gyth an' Bawde, we come up ter  Bryg Bewiccan - that dead-city, Fornost. That bloody wealas, Araenion, guides us up in ter the dead fields almost ter the gates, further than I bin on my own, to an old tumble down fortress – an' then … he leaves us. Without a by-yer-leave or nothin'... just goes out in ter the mist an' he's gone. Well, I'm buggered if I'm going a-chasin' after him again.

I'm all fer a good tale. But this aeranion goes on an' on ... I dursent understand a third o' what he says. Gyth's eyes are as bright as the sun ... i aint able ter keep mine open. He's spinnin' some nonsense about this fornost. Taint what Gyth heard from her burnt man. I dursen't know what ter think about him and this araenion now.

Makin' me mind up though. Iffen I aint trusted, an' he is being paid by the burnt man... then feh.. iffen I going ter be hung fer a lie then I may as well be hung fer a truth. Iffen the burnt man dursent trust me, then i shant bother being honest.

so he aint dead. i'm thinkin' we might wish he were. He turns up back at the bridge town, just as I finish collectin' some coins from the local folk... Gyth being his 'pore ol' young widdow' an' all. Heh, well it were worth a try. Stupid Bawde made me give all the coins back once that Araenion showed his face again though. Gyth made a good widdow... she'm was proper cryin' and she'm very pretty when she does it too. I jus' goes all red and blotchy.