Duardo de Palanza de Fallucci de Trantio was to be considered on most accounts, although still one of the wealthiest men in Tilea, as a pretty broken sort of man; his fortunes had failed him in the last few years, he had become a reclusive shell of the man he had once been - locking up and hiding himself away from the world in his stronghold of stone - and now he was beginning to hear voices in the night and warnings of untimely deaths before they came to pass. Many said he was mad, and more sympathetic figures would sagely nod their heads and claim that he had a right to be after all that he had suffered, to which the opposite would sneer and go on about their business as usual.

Once upon a time he had been a jovial man, a rotund figure with three sons and a beautiful wife to call his own, his family home - the castle of Guilamuero, a central keep surrounded by a curtain wall and a deep moat, the serfs of his vineyards and estates living in settlements outside the walls - passed down to him on the death of his enterprising father, along with the old mans considerable fortune; it was a fortune he had used to fund the ill-fated expedition to Albion, the hiring of a mercenary army and the passage across the waves that would end in the deaths of all his sons, the decimation and desertion of his army, and the taking of his wife by another man into his bed. Oh, she [I]claimed[/I] to have thought him dead...but he knew better.

Gaining passage back to his native Tilea from an Imperial skipper, with the very last of his coin, the now gaunt and ragged nobleman returned to an estate in ruins and a castle where only his faithful family servant Alfredo awaited him - yet Alfredo was old even when his father lived, and could not be expected to do much in the way of upkeep. He heard from this trusted man how his wife had spent all the money she could, never knowing about that which he had secreted away from all but himself, before taking the serfs and herself to a rivals estate somewhere to the south in the Republic of Remas.

All was lost, and the only artefact he had gained from Albion was a small golden talisman, a roughly hewn thing carved into the likeness of a Lizardman's skull, which over time he had began to think was driving him mad - even when he tried to rid himself of it, throwing it into the moat, it returned not moments later to lay neatly on his dusty desk,  form where he liked to look out across his hilly and empty domain of a sunlit day.

Eventually, with anger and revenge burning a hole in his chest, he sent Alfredo and the swiftest mount that his wife had not taken to every inn, brothel and crossroad across the Principality of Trantio which read;

"Duardo de Trantio, Lord of Guilmuero and man of expansive wealth, seeks daring adventurers and sell-swords in need of employment to attend him at his castle in the foothills of the Apuccini mountains east of the city of Trantio; for those that attend there shall be food and a payment of coin extended to them simply for their presence. 

The afeared of death and weak-hearted need not apply.

Make yourself known at the drawbridge, where a servant shall be waiting."

This [B]was[/B] Tilea after all, so all one need do was wait and they would come...or would they?

Guilmuero had a black reputation since his return, many saying that it was cursed by the spirits of his slain sons, mercenaries of his former expeditionary force claiming that Duardo himself had partaken of eating human flesh when they had become trapped in a bog land near some odd structures, before being ambushed by a Druchii raiding party that is. 

Yes, only the foolish or the desperate would find their way to that place, so they claimed.




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Sometimes fate is known to tap you on the shoulder, offering you a helping or not-so-helping hand or direction, and other times...other times it simply slaps you across the face!

It was in the latter way that Jan was awoken from a rather pleasant sleep, if you discount the leering Goblin faces and the blood-curdling screams of his family being butchered, when a scrap of paper fluttered by, driven by the soft breeze coming down from the Apuccini Mountain range to try and smother him in his sleep - the impact was so sudden that he almost rolled off of the lightning-split tree trunk on which he was sleeping, straight into the dying embers of the fire he had lit the night before and allowed to turn to ashes.

"By all the Gods," he muttered, wrenching the paper away and glaring at the scrawled writing, unconciously plucking the long-stemmed pipe of clay from his pocket and clenching it between his teeth, "money...adventure..." [I]food![/I] His hand now scrabbled for some pipe weed and, satisfied it was enough for his morning smoke, pressed it into the bowl of the pipe and looked for something to act as some tinder, that was until his eyes fell once more to the paper before him.

Memorising the name of the castle, the location, and the name and title of this Tilean potente, he tore the blasted paper apart and sprinkled it liberally with his weed, using the last and largest piece to dip into the embers and alight his pipe.

"Aaaah!"

He could feel every worry draining away with the first inhilation, his toes curling and then relaxing, his mind becoming both clearer and more focused, and there was only one thing now on his mind...breakfast.

Sitting now as he was at a crossroads in the Apuccini foothills, the coarse and rugged yet rather beautiful terrain so far from his Mootland home as to make him weep, it was a good thing he had stocked up in Remus when he had the chance! His pack bulged with all manner of ingredients, the all-important cooking pot and frying pan hanging from the pack that was almost as large as himself, and it was as he recalled how he had got them that he cackled into the open air.

"Aye, they all be wanting a taste of the Halflin' sausage."

Oh how he wish others could have seen the look on the face of the Butcher when he discovered his wife and the stunted Mootlander, one atop the other and seemingly rather happy, the poor lady resembling a sausage herself - all tight in her flesh, as if her innards strained against it, eager to escape - and probably having had no attention from her husband for many years before Jan arrived; how he laughed to himself as he set about preparing his earliest morning meal, plucking fat sausages, thick bacon and even an unbroken egg from the depths of his pack. 

It was known by all races that Halflings were considered able to make something from nigh on nothing, and Jan, as broken and deranged as he was, possessed that innate knowledge as much as any other.

"Well, Jan me lad," he yawned after having devoured his fried meal, feeling only half full but a little more tired than he had some time before, "time for yer second nap says I..."

Listing off the important details of the contract he had smoked away, he lay back down on the log, his bedroll beneath his head to act as a pillow, and was soon asleep once more, safe in the knowledge that no one would slit the throat of a sleeping Halfling. After all, what would be the point? They were much more useful alive, anyway.


[@POOHEAD189][@Austronaut][@HopelesRomantis][@Culluket][@Kingfisher]