Stone Pass Keep - Working Title

Prologue - Orphan - Unfinished

Prologue

Orphan

It was with some foreboding that the traveller noticed the smoke coming from the valley below.  He had been travelling for many days to reach this place, hoping to arrive before the raiders.  It appeared that he had come too late to warn the inhabitants of this valley.  As he got closer to the outskirts he noticed that his arrival had been late by only a few hours.  Some buildings still burnt, while others, their timbers all but charred, still smouldered and all around there was the pervading smell of death.  As yet the carrion had not come to collect the dead, soon the wolves would come, and then later, perhaps vultures.  Before he left he hoped to rob both of a quick meal and give the dead a proper burial.

His horse skirted sideways as it shied at the smell of death, it was obviously as disturbed as he was about the slaughter that had occurred here.  Deciding that his horse would be more trouble than help in the work he was about to undertake, he let her loose to graze near a shed that had survived the torch.  Quickly he searched the shed and the surrounding charred rubble searching for tools to dig a mass grave.  He soon found a serviceable shovel and began his task in earnest.  It was now mid afternoon and if he were to head off the scavengers he would have to work hard.  He decided that the best thing to do would be to dig where one of the villages many gardens had been.  Here the soil was soft from many years of being turned over and was easy to dig, later, once the dirty job was done, he would then cover the mound with rocks to prevent the possibility of desecration.

This was the fifth town that he had passed through that the raiders had done their dirty work, each time he repeated the same process, assess the damage, look for survivors and then bury the dead.  This time he did not look for survivors.  He knew that there would be none.  There were none in the other towns.  The Utarvian civil war had claimed many deaths but these peasants were the most sorrowful of all, especially since they had nothing to do with the conflict.  Twelve days ago the raiders had broken through Kaldrack's defence lines and began their sweep of terror, their intentions entirely obvious.  To cause as much destruction and damage as possible, in the hope of diverting Kaldrack's forces.  Faced with a difficult decision Kaldrack was forced to hold his position, to divert forces in a wild and potentially fruitless chase could spell doom for his campaign.  Instead he sent his most trusted Ranger to forewarn those in danger and, if possible, motivate the peasants to defend themselves.  With luck this annoyance would be eliminated quickly.

So far Kaldrack's Ranger had been out of luck, if he had sacrificed his high sense of morals perhaps he could have caught up earlier, but something inside prevented him from moving on without taking care of the dead first.  This town gave him the impression that he was catching up, after the first few days he worked out the raider's pattern.  Ever since he had been trying to get to the next town before they did.  However the quicker paths he knew still got him here later than he would have hoped.

It was a long and hard job digging in the evening sun and by the time he began dragging the bodies into the mass grave the sun was beginning to dip into the western horizon.  He lost count of how many he had buried in the past days, so much so he didn't even bother the count the dead this time.  Tears began to flow unbidden as he beheld the carnage left behind.  Twisted bodies that had been brutally murdered some bristling with arrow shafts while others had been hacked to death.  All were stiff with rigger-mortice that made the task of moving them even more loathsome.  Women still clutching their children, a look of horror on their faces, menfolk dying at their sides clasping broken picks and rakes that had been useless against the steel of the raiders.  Those were the ones that had perished in the streets, they were the lucky ones.  A quick death had been theirs.  Those that had been trapped in the burning building had met a far worse fate, their blackened and charred bodies were a testimony to the agony they had suffered.