29th Day of Garmensis - Part I

Hogar’s Journal (Translated from Giant)

Year 781 of the founding of the City

29^th Day of Garmensis – Part I

Silverkin Estate Outskirts

The tracks led us over rolling hills populated with sickly oak trees, their gnarled branches and roots jutted into our patch and slowed progress.  Eventually the trees thinned to reveal acres of neglected pasture.  In the distance we could see a grand white building nestled between two low rises.  Between us and it there was an unkempt orchard, its straight and once well tended rows of trees now uncontrollably tangled together.  From this orchards four undead riders trotted out to meet us.  From a hiding place in the trees I could see that three of them were entirely skeletal, their bones held together and animated by vile magical forces in the absence of tendon and sinew.  The fourth looked as though he had been disturbed from his grave-rest just as he was getting comfortable.  Pallid flesh hung slack from his cheeks as those cold red eyes seemed to find my hiding place and pierce to my very soul. His presence tugged at my vitality, draining my energy and making the long sleep of death seem almost appealing.  This wight was mounted on the monstrous undead corpse of a dire wolf whose presence set Diefenbaker’s hackles to standing.

Old Vic stepped forth and attempted to converse with the undead creature, I fear that his mind may be wandering in his old age for him to continuously do and say such ridiculous things.  The wight contemptuously ignored him and instructed the others to dispose of us, muttering something about “having enough already” and then rode off in the direction of the Manor.

The skeletons were customarily dull witted and I managed to manoeuvre into a more advantageous position before they reacted to their master’s instruction.  I heard an instruction from Vic behind me telling everyone to focus on the mounts to pin the archers down and overwhelm them.  A lucid moment from an otherwise addled mind.  It did him little good though as the rest of the party moved forward through the trees towards the enemy, leaving Vic exposed.  The arrogant mage Rodney charged ahead of everyone and sent an errant magic projectile towards the horsemen, earning for himself a hail of arrows in response.  Luckily for him the majority didn’t seem to find their mark.

One of the horsemen took advantage of the bumbling charge to circle around behind us and attack Vicrael.  The veteran warlock managed to knock one of them off balance with a well placed bolt of energy but he was quickly overwhelmed and visibly hurt.

I could spare no more time and attention on the efforts of those behind me and got to work peppering our skeletal foes with arrows.  As usual contact with iron served to weaken the dire magics that had raised the peaceful dead and we quickly began to turn the tide against our attackers.  In particular Glen and Eligos were of great help to me whilst dispatching the riders.  Glen very nearly took the head off a horse in one blow and Eligos, faced with the oncoming charge of a skeletal horse and rider , morphed before my eyes into a gigantic humanoid ram.  She then charged headlong into her undead foes and shattered them into a pile of bones.  A feat as impressive as anything I saw in my years serving the Imperium.

Minron had marshalled the others to dispatch the remaining rider and helped Rodney and Vic to overcome their wounds.  Interestingly Minron cannot get his mouth round the name ‘Rodney’ and has instead taken to calling the mage Dave.

A quick search of the area allowed me to replenish my arrows and turned up three gemstones.  The dwarf was quite pathetically excited by the discovery of the stones and refused to share them amongst the group.  Impressive though his battle prowess may be, we shall have words about that later if his attitude does not change.