Dakgu always felt, through his life, that he benefited from underestimation. Myrmith Tinuviel certainly underestimated his cunning. An experienced, sorcerous elven ranger with an incredible god complex, the elf fell for it and that's when Dakgu became the Elf-Scalper. To be fair, the mad ranger had a huge price on his head and was burning villages, a real menace. But the lordling that put up the bounty was grudging to pay and then had Dakgu banned from his realm after he did it. He was used to that brand of thanks from the bunnies. By that time, Nar Mat Kordh-Ishi, specifically the warlord of the company, Old Radush One-Eye, heard of him and brought him on as the warg-keeper and lead scout. The rest was a terrifying reputation for prowess in battle that included a cutthroat corps of orcs that ran side by side with wargs and slit throats in the knights, felling sentries and enemy leaders ahead of the marching, chanting, skull-bedecked, black-iron-disciplined ranks of the Orcish Free Company, who were noted for their strength and brutality in the open fight. They'd conquered a kingdom for a Queen, a rumored witch, that way, brutally chopping down opposition, a legion of heavy orcish infantry marching in ferocious discipline while old One-Eye watched and directed this fell orchestra. Dakgu's skills came from his mother, taken from him by human bandits, and a human that took him in with his wargs, when he was orphaned in the world. Always half a warg himself, Dakgu did not socialize or trust easily, but Brand tried, and perhaps he even succeeded a little in that the strange orcish youth was had decent interactions with Bosfyrd with Brand's sponsorship, even if his experience with human employers, including as a member of one of the most feared mercenary companies on the continent, was shit. It did not help that he had a cleft palate and a speech impediment that caused humans to mock him. Well, only really stupid ones these days. Dakgu was a master of the cold glare, promising the retribution for such things. He led such humans to their death when trying to capture or kill (well, kill period) Myrmith Tinuviel. They mocked his speech right up until they died terribly in the face of blood-magic, arrows and horribly possessed animals perverted to the purpose of the ranger's vengeance on civilization. He slipped into Bloody Harold's realm by completely bypassing the patrols of the border, mercenaries hungry to loot the roads for their wealth, unpaid and antsy. Dakgu, ever the superlative pair of eyes, was able to identify some of the banners; the Bear Men, l'Oriflamme, the Red Fangs, the Tempest. Others, he identified by region of origin based on equipment. By all accounts, these were the forces that helped murder Brand, and their time would come. But for now, one orc, even with a terror of a warg for mount and companion, really a full partner as was the way of Nar Mat Kordh-Ishi, he avoided the battles, even if there was a part of him that called for blood. But the greater, and more dangerous part of Dakgu, as he slunk in the green and the mud, as the spring rain fell, counseled to measure twice and cut once, to fight coldly and to win. That voice had carried him through everything. The landmarks became more familiar, part of the last few years of his childhood, even as the skies went gray and the elements pissed down on him -- and he ignored the elements. He was long of limb, but hunched over, gray-green muscle exposed, and the orc himself wearing a mix of fur and leather and spikes. Like all of Brand's Brood, he knew the way to move through this broken terrain quickly, the tricks of a woodland strider. In a way, he'd been one of Brand's best students, despite the fact that he was an Orc and considered by so many to be deficient. His grasp of the natural, and link with his wargs, was a formidable phenomenon that even a druid looked at in askance. But as an orc, he was in tune with the savage, merciless ways of nature. Not for him the gentleness of elven and human rangers, he relished the challenge of life as an Orc; the adversity made you stronger. And Brand taught that in a sense. But as he came closer to the runes that marked the perimeter of the Barrows, he knew he'd have to deal with the 'family.' Some would grasp the necessity to fight Bloody Harold with the uncaring ferocity of a storm, to crack rock with the relentless patience of water, and to burn like a forest fire. They'd bring too much of their cultural morals to the fight. Dakgu knew differently. But as the first one there, he had time to consider how he'd say it, not that he was ever very good at saying it. But Dakgu's wisdom was the raw kind, the dangerous cunning of a low thing that would not be trespassed with impunity. The body of one of the few good things in his life was on display in the village, left there by a man in samite robes, with rouged cheeks and a greedy eye for gold. Dakgu had no respect for kings or thrones, the laws of that world never held much bond on him. Gold never impressed him. He made his camp among the graves of other rangers, where Brand's body should lay. There were runes all around and a glow in the air; things grew here as they never did outside its perimeter, a splash of color and beauty. It was a place of private wonderment, but the beauty seemed to Dakgu to pall. This was Brand's place, not his. The trees and undergrowth, however, were like walls, keeping the rest of the world out. It would due as a place of refuge and a place to meet unseen, so they could begin a campaign of the likes that Harold would not believe that a mere handful could carry out. He was a creature of blood, and this was a war of blood.