The Chronicles of Bael

The Chronicles of Bael Part 3

Waterday, Death Week, Storm Season, 1599

It has been two long weeks, but finally I was able to slip away from the Temple for half a day to swing my sword at the Storm Bull temple. The Temple's Rune Lord Gorath Khan seemed pleased to see me, and even more pleased when I told him that I had had been initiated. Gorath is gruff, bombastic and unlearned and our Temples are not natural friends, though we both have a common enemy in Chaos. Nevertheless, I love him dearly. Unlike so many of his brethren, he is not completely unbearable and anti-social, which may explain his surviving long enough to become a Rune Lord. He is also rare among the unsophisticated Storm Bull, in that he is both a master of the blade and a master of the forms of physical training for strength and endurance. Gorath always reminds me of my father when he extols upon the need for both great strength and great endurance when one chooses to wield a great sword.  There is great truth in this.

As we spared, he warned me that if my absences grew longer, I would become soft like the other sages of my temple, and proceeded to prove his point by providing me with a few bruises. I know he is proud of my strength and skill for he is constantly suggesting that I set aside my allegiances and become a follower of the Storm Bull. Though he must know full well that such a course would never be open to my nature.

Truly I am the best of his students, a source of great distress among the Storm Bull initiates of Gorath's small temple. I believe he derives no small pride from my abilities, so many of which he has taught to me, and his fondness for me is a result of more than just my Master's gold.

Once more Gorath delighted me with tales of his homeland. Gorath claims that he was once a great man of his tribe, a people from the barren plains of Prax known as the Bison people. The Bison people are so named because they ride a creature of the same name, a large, powerful and very hairy creature. It seems to me that Gorath is describing himself whenever he talks of these Bison. Prax seems like a terrible place filled with a myriad of warring and primitive people, an arid and inhospitable land upon which civilization cannot encroach. His many stories are made more colorful by his wayward and creative use of Tradetalk, a language that he seems to have no interest in mastering. He has taught me some of his native Praxian tongue, but his desire to do so does not match my lust to learn.

My Master once visited the land of Prax, many years before I became his apprentice, but I never have. He did so to undertake a pilgrimage to our God's most holy place known as the Block, a portion of the exploding Spike that slew the Devil. All members of the cult of Lhankor Mhy are encouraged to make the pilgrimage to the Block at some time in their lives, and so shall I one day. My master has spoken often of his trip as a young man, but his stories have focused more on his visit to the nearby Devil's Marsh, rather than on details of Prax or the Block. I believe that it was on this trip that my Master chose his field of study. The Devil's Marsh is as much a holy place to creatures of Chaos as is the Block to my faith, for beneath the swamp lies the body of the Devil. Many creatures of Chaos are drawn to this foul swamp or are spawned from it. If my Master's stories are representative of all, it is a very dangerous place indeed.

It was on this pilgrimage to the Block that my Master acquired the rare piece of Truestone, a tiny sliver of the Block, within which he stores all his worldly knowledge. No earthly journal would suffice for such a Sage as my Master; indeed, it would be a weighty tome indeed that could record the knowledge my master has unearthed during his life. A Truestone is the perfect vessel for my Master's purpose, not just because it can hold vast quantities of knowledge, but because it would require another Priest of Lhankor Mhy to extract the stones secrets.