Shadows of the Past

[ebatalis]

......1593 HC , Sarimier....Giantdowns.....Lemnjohen

.....in the dead of winter and with his only companions the sound of the baying wolves and the flickering of the flame, he stood alone in his longhouse, the scent of steel and wood were toying in his nostrils and the taste of wine still bitter in his mouth.He tosed his cloak aside and stood tall near the fire, his head bowed and heavy with burdens of time old. He clutched awkwardly the flask of whine in his hands and hastily brought it to his mouth, with eagerness he took a sip, spilling whine all over and yanking the flask aside rather disturbed. "Nysnidrae", the name pierced his mind as he stared the shadows move over the dancing flame. Despite his age his physic was still that of a bolstered bull and a flask of wine was not enough to bring him down, not this man at least. He shook his head trying to shake the memories away, but alas...it's their night and he cannot run nor hide from them.

The sound of the anvil made him grasp his head and cow in fear, the hammering on the forge again and again made his mind explode and filled it with images. He knew this was not real , this was just a dream and Einar was a part of it, he stood at the side of the forge where his father used to work and hold tight the scraps to be hammered. He could smell now the flint and feel the heat in his body from the burning forge, he reached with his hands but to no avail...he knew it all along, this images where only his cloudy mind....

Using his hands he stood again on his feet , the yank did actually brought him back to his senses or at least he though so. His eyes grew heavy and his feet crumbled at the weight of his mass, and with a large noise he landed on his knees, tired and heavy, his head hunged from his neck heavily and his eyes were now surely blured. His mind recalls the time he battled the giants unarmed and the feeling of the kill, the rush, the excitment the burn in his body and the exhaustion he felt afterwards, but now this is worse.

"You could have come with me, you could have skipped this bitter end of your existence" his voice sounded soft and warm, but his words sharp and cunning.

" I belong here, I was born amongst these people and I will depart when I choose to do so", he knew he had to be accute , he knew he had no choice now. "Show yourself! Aren't you tired of hiding in the shadows? Aren't you......" with the reflex of a young man he yanked a torch from the flames, and violently shook it over his head, revealing the emptyness of the room. He stood frozen for a split second and then he jumped on his feet. Where are you, he though but the very though faded in his mind, noone was there, he was alone. Finnaly he collapsed, his nostrils met the floor in a rather unpleasent way and at that point he knew he had to let go and succumb to slumber. He shut his lids and in an instant he was dead asleep.
From the nearby shadows the figure comes out moving lightly upon the heavy wood and closes up on him, with a swift move the figure removes his cloak and tosses it over the large shoulders of Storm, bending one knee over him he touches his head and whispers amidst the dark of the night ".....sleep tight father, I will be here till the world tears us apart...." and with that he dissapears swiftly into the shadows.

[ebatalis]

Back at 1998 we thought that it would be an awsome idea stop the nonsense efforts to play regent campaigns and start something that will lead us into knowing Cerilia from within. Thus with a weird combination of players we made a council and decide that the best course of action was not to get involved in the struggles of the Anuirean Lords but rather to seek further detail and fantasy in the Northern Rjuven Lands. Storm, Stilgar, Einar and Brodric got involved in several stories in the unhospitable northern steppes. Later on and with several occurrences the group grew and Bolvgaim Oredelver ( the sole dwarven character in my 15 years of Birthright Gming ) joined to raise and foster a young orphan Conrad who later became a King. At the peak of our gaming Edrand joined and several adventures took Storm who had the leading role to the seas of the East for exotic campaigning ( he had a think for Conan , thought he was tall blond ) , nevertheless Storm returned older, wiser and with a lot of experience to the Rjuven lands and found his home at the Giantdowns and his place as a hero of the land.

To good old days then...

[Magian]

At this point while reading,

"Despite his age his physic was still that of a bolstered bull and a flask of wine was not enough to bring him down, not this man at least."

what came to my mind was he must have a high Str and Con score. :)

Then,

"...a young orphan Conrad who later became a King..."

I was like oh hey a Conan type character arch as you confirmed shortly after. :)

I like the idea of exploring the campaign through adventure not just ruling realms. What I call the common rut of playing Birthright in the realms race to the Iron Throne seems to limit possibilities of game play for this setting. Not that its not fun or cool to explore Anuire its just that after many years of being in and out of the game the things that come to my mind are what I've dealt with more and that is Anuire.

I read one of my earlier posts about a topic on the article of the Pages from the Mages from Dragon Magazine and what character would represent the Birthright campaign and I had totally forgotten the Silver Servant and the possibilities of just that one character let alone all the others in Cerillia that I've forgotten. I guess I could say they are forgotten realms. (pun) In a way I've let my head get out of the game as many years have passed since I've done much with the game. Now I get to rediscover the old as if it were new. Hooray!

On a sad note, I had my Birthright books stored in the basement that flooded for the first time ever this year and am drying them out. The other sad note is I had bought many back up books on the chance that any would get damaged and they all got soaked. The good news is those who are sellers to collectors the price just went up a few increments since fewer mint conditions exist in the world. The other good news is I don't need the books since I have the .pdf collection. Whew what a life saver.

[ebatalis]

Storm was "Eternal Champion" if we can use Moorcocks point of view of Conan in Cerilia in my point of view and at the point of view of his player as obvious, maybe my specification was not clear but Conrad was later adopted by the young dwarf Oredelver and made after 2 decades the king of Halksapa in which time Storm had already had most of its adventures.

Our Rjuven campaign was far away from politics, intrigue and all of those things that would characterize an Anuirean campaign to the exception of Edrand whose story I will let you have later on since its very interesting to the continium of our campaigning and the history of Anuire since he firstly "liberated" Talinie from the hands of the followers of Fitzalan the Northern Imperial Temple only to find it impossible to rule it and without remorse surrender it to the hands of Boeruine making an addition to the Archdukes sovereignty.