Rast

Shunka Warakin's page

37 posts (511 including aliases). No reviews. No lists. No wishlists. 7 aliases.



2 people marked this as a favorite.
F Human Berserker 1, HP 28/28, 0 Armor

The coffins bore a fool and his fool son, and it gnarled Signy's heart to have to walk alongside them. It was a waste of wood and time to give the two rites in this unending winter, but at this moment more than any since she's joined the people who called themselves Berrywine, Signy knows she must be careful of how she treads.

Still, in the old days, by the old laws, the fool and his son would both have been left to lie in the valueless field by the crossroads.

The berzerkr had strained her patience to its limit; in some dark little corner of her mind she was quite proud of herself for not giving arms to her anger - but how to explain to these half-men who cowered around their fires the amount of strength it took to have kept things from becoming worse than they were?

She'd been with the clan some weeks now, and she'd mistakenly thought that the time when some might challenge her was gone. Perhaps now it would be; most of the clan hadn't seen the beast yet, but they'd seen what happened when the hólmgang was invoked.

She didn't need the beast for that.

Fiǫlvarr was the fool's name, but Signy couldn't, just now, think of the son's. Fiǫlvarr's wife was pregnant, visibly so, and had been struggling visbily, ay, and Signy had even marked it. The promise of a child was a rare enough thing in these years that surely the entire clan had marked her every stumble. When he glowered and made comment about the berzerkr eating a man's share, that was insult enough, but Signy'd hunted often enough alone in the dark woods...She'd survived alone, and she knew how far she was from being truly hungry. She let the comment pass long moments, didn't even look at him, as if she hadn't heard. She simply finished chewing the bit of fish she had, then set the bowl down and spun what was left across to rest before him. That could've been the end of it, and a peaceable end, but he'd had something to say about not being a beggar. Alright. She hadn't called him a beggar, she'd just slid her meal to another, but then he had to say "...one who'd come scrabbling like a dog to honest folk, like you." and the "you" had been Signy, and for that alone, she could've killed him, but she still wasn't looking at him, she was watching Baelgrin trying to conclude a tale, the old man hesitant and uneasy as he became aware of Fiǫlvarr's disruption.

She could yet pretend she hadn't heard the man. But when he hurled the bowl back at her, well. That was not a thing anyone could ignore. To throw down food, in these times? That was the end of Baelgrin's tale, and the end of all words around the firepit, and in that silence Signy'd stood up and told him to find a cloak he didn't mind dying on.

They'd pegged the cloak out properly, with all the rites, furrowed the frozen ground perhaps twice so wide as they should, measured from the outside of each furrow to the next, all while shooting fearful glances towards the woman (was she a woman?) who sat with the long axe balanced across her knees, still and silent beneath the ice bear's skin, with its head pulled down now over her own.

Did they think giving their companion some extra space would matter?

Did they think she didn't know what they were doing?

The shields they brought out for her were trash, but that was to be expected. She carefully didn't watch to see who offered shields to Fiǫlvarr. It might be that she could still stay, if they at least respected the hólmgang's outcome. Signy simply sat facing the field as it was prepared, lowered her head beneath the warm, white fur and, after a time, deliberately snored. She almost had dozed in truth by the time one had come and called to her from outside the great axe's reach (what the fool thought was outside the great, back-spiked axe's reach; the bryntroll would've taken him if she only leaned a little to the side as she swung).

They wouldn't permit the bryntroll within the hólmgang. Noone ever did. It would've made a mockery of a duel meant to have survivors, biting through shields and the arms and chests behind them. Someone loaned her a sword. Signy weighed it in her hand, found it was adequate. She didn't look at it closely, nor did she look into the face of the one who handed it to her. If it failed her, well, it failed her. If she lived, the last thing she wanted was another reason to leave this clan. How many times does one get a second chance?

She shed the great bear-skin as well, deliberately. No beast here, and no question of whether it protected her. And when the hólmgang was called she simply walked forward straight into the middle of the square, planted her feet on the pegged cloak which a shieldless man could not abandon, and twisted her strike in midair as Fiǫlvarr came to her, plunging the sword into his throat rather than his thigh as he dropped his shield to block where she'd seemed to first aim. A lot of effort and preparation on their part for nothing, that was the message she meant to send. An hour or so's labor so she could kill a man in a moment. The first blood that hit the cloak was the last that Fiǫlvarr would ever bleed. There were no laws against killing in the hólmgang, only that it must stop when blood touched the cloak. Signy was turning away even before he fell, the borrowed sword left behind in his throat. She had no patience for shieldbreaking and her own throat was acridly dry, tight with trying to keep the beast's roar restrained. Well, the widow had a son of man's age to help her raise her coming child. That was more than some people had.

But then the curst son ruined it all and stepped into the hazeled ring, demanding to avenge his father. There was no vengeance for what happened in the hólmgang! That was what the hólmgang was. Differences were settled. It was done. The laws had been observed, and there were plenty of older, wiser, cooler heads to restrain the boy, and if only they had restrained his tongue!

But no, and no, and she had to go fetch the borrowed sword out of his father's throat, while the mother screamed and wailed and the world got greyer and greyer as the beast tried to have its way. She gritted her teeth against its voice, grunted once when the boy finally was allowed entry to the ring, and if they thought that was the beast talking then they were more foolish than she could believe possible. She left her shields where they were, hammered the boy's off of him as quickly as she could, and when he stood on the cloak still stained with his father's blood she feinted him with the same damned move she had his sire: glance low, swing low, arch it high over the shield.

The difference this time being that she leaned and stepped back as she did so, rather than stepping forward and punching in with her weight behind the blade. She didn't even take the boy's ear, just lopped loose a tuft of hair as she glanced the flat of the sword stunningly from his scalp. Head wounds bleed a lot, and there was no question of getting more blood on the cloak as he buckled. She doubted the clan - eager to put an end to things - had even waited for the drops to fall, and she almost couldn't pass the sword away quickly enough to the poor bastard who'd worked up the stones to come and take it from her. Was it his? She had no idea.

Honor was served. If the idiots had eyes, they could see that, and they could see that she could control herself and pick and choose the deaths she gave.

And if the healers had been a whisker better, perhaps that would've been the end of it. The boy shouldn't have died from it. She hadn't cloven his skull, probably not even knicked it. She was fairly sure of the flat of the blade and she didn't think the sword had twisted in the previous fight. But even if it had been the best mercy-blow she could give him with the bear gnawing at the back of her mind, for some reason it simply wouldn't staunch. The blood wouldn't stop; the boy fevered and died in the night. And thank whatever gods still watched the foolishness of men that she'd struck the blow with another's blade, handed to her but a moment before entering the ropes, or no doubt the wife would accuse her of witchery.

Well, let them go talk to him whose blade it had been. She'd chopped the gods-own parcel of wood while burning off her anger, just far enough from the posted men that there was no question in anyone's mind how she'd spent the dark-hours, and they could warm themselves with it and not thank her if that was what they chose. It was unintended (for how could she know?) but likely just as well that she'd been watched all night being so angrily noisy while doing something that clearly wasn't laying curses or invoking spirits, all the while the boy lay dying on the far side of the camp. Her anger, disgust and frustration weren't at all feigned when they told her of his death, either.

Some days it seemed that everything she touched was doomed.

And so here she was, trying to show in earnest her honest regret for the boy's death (though it was hardly her fault) while walking with one parcel of fools to bury another. She was as far from the rest of the burial party as one could be while still being a part of it. Most of the others huddled on the far side of the coffin-bearers, clustered around the widow, but there were those who stood as if between Signy and the mourners (who she ignored), and then there were a few who walked behind and beside Signy, who she had not yet marked, unwilling to raise the bear's head enough to see if they were there as companions or guards.

Signy stops at sight of the scarlet banner that licks the air like a serpent's tongue. Her great axe, until now mostly serving as a walking staff on the treacherous ice and the deep snow, she takes in both hands and looks about as best she can between the trees and great stones.


1 person marked this as a favorite.
F Human Berserker 1, HP 28/28, 0 Armor

My apologies for being so far behind, hopefully I can catch up in good style. We had not one, but two deaths in the family in the past month, and an always unpleasant situation was made uglier by questions of inheritance.

GM Mogthrasir re: Questions about how Signy acquired the bear skin: you mean beyond what I put in the background I posted when I asked the question? Also, I like the moves that you've added so far. VERY colorful and appropriate to the setting, IMHO.

Signy is a Dominator...But once she was a Rager. She was not trained to be a warrior until well after the first time she had gone berserk. Now that a few years have passed and her initial ostracism has been replaced by some guarded acceptance in a new community, she has made up for lack of youthful training and a surfeit of desperate anger by blending into it some mixture of what she has learned from other warriors. Signy has learned that there is a time and a place for unleashing the spirit of the bear if she is to be accepted in this community, and that there are limits to how much she can lean on displays of anger or (what appears to be) lack of control without being considered a danger to those around her. Her rage is something she keeps as a constant threat, a core element of her social identity and a fallback in battle, but she chooses it now, rather than it choosing her.

A younger sister, Signy has given over being a housemaid (separated from a bondswoman only by being free, but having fairly similar duties) and taken quite solidly to the axe. It's a more manly calling, and she wears more manly garb, with even her hair cut short to her shoulders...But she dreams of when she had long, beautiful hair, and of her dead husband, and sometimes, most terrible of all, of the children they would have had. But the bear is always there, cold as the enveloping whiteness of old ice that brings all dreams to a close, to rend and destroy what she has loved.

Hotaru: I'm pretty sure that's the story I mentioned earlier, Poul Anderson's The Tale of Hauk. :)

What incredible signs have occurred that indicate the end has come? How do people know this is Ragnarok?
As Tofa has noted, the waves of the swan-road are more wild than ever, but at the same time, further to the north whence Signy has come, the ice locks more of the sea for more of the year, so that in the height of what was once summer a man may safely walk to the far side of a bay which, in living memory, was hardly ever frozen in deepest winter. The cold does not retreat. The ice does not thaw. There are fewer fish to be caught, and fewer fishermen return from the difficult journeys to catch them, as none can now cut through the ice in the bay where she was born. The light of the sun is dimmed by day, and the moon's glow is fainter by night. The great fires of the gods are burning low, and who has the strength to kindle them?

What rumors have you heard regarding the gods and the reason for the sudden silence?
Some say that the final battle is upon the gods, and they are hunted now, as men are hunted upon the earth. Men always reflect their gods, and if we are doing so poorly, then in what stead must be the gods' home? Desperation replaces honor. Communities are withered things, bound together by wretched skeins of gut and gristle that chill and crack with the cold, rather than by the golden haired-ropes of shared joy and purpose. Once, we hunted beasts, and now they hunt us. So, too, the gods must be hunted. It could be that they no longer dare to seek victory in battle, but rather only to stave off defeat as long as they may. Is it any wonder they will not show us their faces?

What taboos have long been respected by your culture, but now are beginning to wane with the end?
Once it would have been unthinkable for a man not to be buried with his axe or sword, a woman with her tools and knife. Now, other hands grasp for them, for who has such plenty that they can spare good iron? The old trades in iron, in furs, in wool, silk and amber...They have all gone, and the price of such things may now be measured in lives. So grasping hearts send the dead into the darkness, hungry and without what they need to make their way in the next life. Still worse are the tales...Never in this community but always the next community, or the next, whoever last did battle...of those who eat the flesh of the dead in the desperate hunger of the winter nights, and doom themselves to walk with the same hunger in death. Where once a man might be jealous of his neighbor's coat or sword, now it is a full belly that catches his eye, and begins the whispering of evil works among those who know. Beware any who seem well-fed without cause, while their neighbors starve.

When the Wise Women interpreted the strange visions you've been having, what did they warn you against? My dreams are my own counsel since I met the bear, but I'd dreamed of him when I was younger and foolish. The bear will be the death of me, the Volva said. Well, it was the death of me as they saw me. Perhaps it will be the death of me yet, but it's seemed content to keep me alive so far. But other wise women have since listed other undoings, so unless I die a dozen times (and I am mortal as any), some of them must be wrong. I've been told to only eat bear flesh and to never eat bear flesh; to never eat the flesh of a raven; that I must never lie with a man, for I am no longer a woman; that there is a fish in the sea that will be my death; that Thor has forged a bolt of lightning for my accursed self; and that I will die to a friend's betrayal. Some of the Volva must be false...But which? There are days I worry and chew over my dooms, and others when the cold and hunger is too busy trying to end me for me to worry about any other ends.

====================================

I've drawn a bit of inspiration for Signy along the way, some of which you probably would easily guess (the Wendol from Crichton's Eaters of the Dead, filmed as The 13th Warrior), or Bjarki from Hrolf Kraki, the Icelandic saga, who transforms into a great bear who "went before King Hrolf's men, keeping always near the king. He slew more men with his forepaws than any five of the king's champions. Blades and weapons glanced off him, and he brought down both men and horses in King Hjorvard's forces, and everything which came in his path he crushed to death with his teeth, so that panic and terror swept through King Hjorvard's army..." (Bjarki is very probably the inspiration for Tolkien's Beorn, yet another werebear/berzarkr), and others which might be more obscure, such as Heather Alexander's song "Don't Call My Name in Battle." It's an entertaining bit of music, hope you'll enjoy.

Also, I'd be remiss if I didn't point everyone at Kipling's "Song of the Red War Boat" while we're discussing honor and obligation and superstition and tabu.

P.S. You keep saying "he..."


1 person marked this as a favorite.

I am about 3/4 through with putting together my Berserker, Signy.

I had initially envisioned her as having this spiritual tie to these big monstrous polar-bear types, which was a 'stock' thing for berserkers far enough north to deal with said bears (and their spirits). Now what I'm curious about is this, the CC "Skinwalker" which is where I see her heading, has this requirement:

Quote:

When you wear the skin of an animal as an intimidation tactic

during a battle, you may take his move when you level up:

Now...Is it valid for her to have that skin up front, starting out, or is that something you feel should be acquired in-game?

Here's the backgrounding I'd been fiddling with:

Back before the Doom was clear, when there was still a hint of spring to divide the winters and there were stars rather than storms in the night sky, Signy was a young lass of the northern tribes, and perhaps she was lovely then. There is, at least, truth that one man loved her. The two were to be wed, but the day of their marriage one of the great ice bears broke into the village, stormed straight towards the wedding party as they were arming themselves, and took her husband-to-be's head with one great paw. Something inside Signy snapped, and as great as her love was, so great was the sudden fury which took her. She actually wrenched a great-axe from the hands of her lover's father, and went at the bear with it, and that's where the stories really begin, you see, because the bear wouldn't hurt her. It dealt terrible blows to the others who came near it, but it wouldn't lift its claws at Signy, nor even roar at her...The noises it made when Signy struck at it were more like a mother bear lamenting her cub. Eventually, most of the holt's better warriors were struck down, though few had been slain, and the bear continued backing slowly away from Signy, who screamed and struck, screamed and struck, until finally she found one of its knees and it went down. She killed the great bear, and wouldn't stop hacking at it until she was exhausted. The shamans who witnessed this mulled things over and came to three conclusions: the bear spirit (clearly, by its actions!) had disapproved of the marriage, and given the clearest sign possible; women were not berserkers, therefore Signy's spirit was clearly that of a man (or possibly a bear), which is why she shouldn't have married; and they wanted her out of the holt before more bears showed up. Likely, they should've taken the axe away from her before telling her this, but as it happened there were no fewer injuries. Signy bundled her few belongings, skinned most of the bear's tattered and hacked hide, including its head, and strode off into the afternoon gloom, still holding the axe none had dared demand of her. She wears a man's clothing now, hacks her hair short, and whatever beauty her face once held has been furrowed under with lines of anger and loss, but she still answers to a woman's name, when any dare call to her.


1 person marked this as a favorite.

I'm not terribly familiar with DW, as said, so any advice on classes would be welcomed and I'll look up what's been given so far.

I also haven't played Skyrim, but I've got a bunch of the old, oldschool S&S writers in my formative years...And among them are Anderson's take on Hrolf Kraki, and "The Tale of Hauk."

Nohwear raised the idea of the ship as "we would have a base of operations and an easy tie."

I kicked back with the idea that "Ships were wealth and power, and the sea was life." and I wanted to see more of that being under threat, or all but devastated.

Nohwear replied with the idea of the ship as "something designed to make the travels safe, or at least sane." and added "Thus part of our adventures could simply be acting as one of the few things keeping civilization together."

And now we've got our setting bits, and one of those setting bits is the destruction of community. One of the reason ships were wealth and power is that it took a community to make a vessel large enough to trade or raid...And it took a community to maintain such a vessel...I assume you mean a ship and not a fishing boat. o let's see, hmmm. I'd like to toss a few ideas in about the ship and its relationship to "absence of community".

Tossing this in for discussion:

In its time the ship was the heart of a community, figuratively and literally. In its time, it was a dragon-ship, figuratively and literally. Now the dragon's spirit bound into the great, carven head at the prow speaks rarely, even when she is summoned to, and she has become lost more than once, too, whether it is the lack of stars to guide her or her own vision fading with age. She is old, and the ship is old, and where once she was the core of a community, now not all of those who sail in her are crew. She can break ice where the seas are frozen, and in this fell age that is sometimes one of the only ways to know when one has reached land...And there is a price to begin each new voyage, a price which steepens over time, but community makes all things easier, and dissent makes all things hard.


1 person marked this as a favorite.

I can't help but notice that we're approaching 300 message on an interest check.

And most of the past couple of days has been character creation. Perhaps it's time to just create a Recruitment thread? With the understanding that 'game time' is still distant and unset?


1 person marked this as a favorite.

Oh, hmmmm...Languages in this setting? I presume Equestrian is 'pony common', and Griffon is one...

Probably a lot don't change. Draconic, Abyssal, Infernal and Celestial are probably all unchanged, I'd imagine.

Do the Zebras have their own tongue?


1 person marked this as a favorite.
Ellina Sensewi wrote:
All good things are worth waiting for

^ this.

Also, I think I may've accidentally built Mane-iac using all-Paizo (no 3rd party!) Pathfinder rules (Hexcrafter/White-Haired Witch).


2 people marked this as a favorite.
SilvercatMoonpaw wrote:
So long as they don't suck blood.

I'm pretty sure they don't, but they are required to hiss at the sun and wander around in pretentious capes draped over one hoof held in front of their muzzles.

James Langley wrote:

Flutterbat...

But that was fruit juice lol

Tosh, sheer fan speculation...For all we know, rainbow colored small horses have blood with assorted fruit flavors! :9

(Except for Rarity, whose blood tastes like marshmallows and dramatic posing, and Berry Punch, whose blood tastes like it should have a small paper umbrella stuck in it.)


2 people marked this as a favorite.

This post makes me marvelously happy. As has been mentioned by a variety of other people, it's inclusive in a way that deliberately permits some interpretation; it doesn't condemn Shandra's parents or make them out to be non-supporting in the end; it's inherently positivist across a very broad spectrum and that's fantastic.

People who are bothered by 'tokenism' really need to thrash their way through the frequently-repeated statements by the devs and authors that Golarion is far less bigoted and far more inclusive. In that sense, Shardra is not a token but is a representative of an extant and perceived-to-be-normal part of Golarion's population.

As she should be!

Therefore, Paizo's decision to give that population some attention shouldn't be diminished by claiming that it is in any way political. It's a part of the game's setting.


1 person marked this as a favorite.
Female Weasel Dilettante

(Since I didn't see anything about the address "Madonna" in the Ironclaw Omnibus notes on Triskellian, I assumed it was rule zero on Ultrafennec's part and it occurred to me to run with the idea, so...I ran this by him before posting it here.)

A few words about Triskellian forms of civil address*:

As Triskellian was in the past ruled by a Don and established by the Rinaldi, it has taken on a somewhat Italian flavor in many regards, particularly having to do with propriety. Rather than Sir or Madam, nobility (and only nobility) are addressed as Signore and Madonna (although sometimes Signora, an even more archaic form is used). Many titles are also changed in the local argot, such as Duc and Duchessa, Conte and Contessa, or gentilhuomo and gentildonna. One of the learned class of scholars, lawyers or notaries may go by messer, while an artisan may be maestro or maestra. A degreed scholar is a dottore or dottora, and a high clergyman may be known as a monsignore, while lesser priests are likely to be referred to by the more humble padre or don. Poveruomo (poor-man) is also a legitimate form of address, particularly among the penitents of S'Allumer, who may consider humility and vows of poverty respectable.

* Based on notes from Cohen and Vance's book, Daily Life in Renaissance Italy