Framsburg - Free RP

[Dungeon Delver]

Framsburg and the Surrounding Countryside

Original Artwork by Romain Jouandeau

Framsburg, situated in the Vale of the Anduin with a backdrop of the Ered Wethrin, was the original city of the Éothéod. It thrived for nearly five hundred years, staving off attacks from Angmar in the west and dragons from the north. The Éothéod grew into a hardy people here, intractable and brave as the founder of the city: Fram, the bane of Scatha the Worm. The hillfort was largely abandoned by Eorl the Young when he led his people south and became the Rohirrim, but there were still some that remained, intermingling with several of the other tribes of Northman like the Beornings, refugees from Rhudaur and Cardolan, the Daen, even some Dunlendings. As the people dwindled, the threats increased from the outside. Wights, goblins, Easterling raiders, the problems were myriad and constant, but the people of Framsburg are used to doing things the hard way. There are large portions of the town that have fallen into disrepair simply because there are not enough people living there, but still, they refuse to abandon their homes, entrenching themselves deeper and deeper into the land and the soil. By the time of the War of the Ring, they had not recovered their former glory nor their former strength, but nonetheless sent what aid they could to the Woodland Realm and Erebor.

The city is large but ghostly, owing to a lack of inhabitants over the centuries and the countryside is wild and untamed. There are many patchwork farms, but woodsmanship and mining are considered the more profitable (if not more dangerous) professions. There are hamlets here and there nestled in the sides of hills or on riverbanks, but all of these places owe allegiance to Framsburg and the remnant of the famed horse-riders that still sally forth from time to time.

Artwork by Gianna Michèle Kaye

There is little in the way of governance or centralization. While the hinterland people look to Framsburg for guidance, the city itself does little to maintain order unless the larger peace is threatened. There is a mayor within the walls of Framsburg, but their authority does not extend beyond the walls and has very little to do with the day to day lives of the people. Scattered about are goði, men and women chosen to oversee local trials and pass minor judgements on crimes and disputes, but again their authority has a very limited range. By and large, the people within site of Framsburg are free to do as they please.

A superstitious lot, the people of Framsburg believe the land is home to dozens of kinds of spirts who walk the earth, sky, and riverbeds and thusly pay tribute to these mysterious, enigmatic figures throughout the year in ceremonial blóts. It is believed that seeing one of these many spirits is an omen of good fortune but attempting to capture one is to invite doom upon one’s entire family. Whitethorn bushes are considered especially sacred, and it is taboo to harm the trees, the locals believe that the Silvan elves of Mirkwood also live within the brambles.

Incomplete List of Possible Locations:
Framsburg – Within the town there are several inns and taverns, blacksmiths, silver smiths, coopers, fletchers, merchants, horse-traders, bakers, butchers, brothels, potters, barber-surgeons, artists, carpenters, guildhalls, and warehouses. While much of the town is in a state of perpetual decay, the people are lively and cantankerous.
The Bogs of Aughiska – Before the Anduin becomes the Anduin, most of the small rivers and streams pass through a cold, marshy land with a sinister reputation. Rumors persist of orcs and goblin encampments within the vast marsh, but no adventure has been able to see if this true or not. (Frost Original)
Gladden Fields – An infamous marsh where King Isildur met his end, but also home to a sizeable community of Stoor hobbits
Nôr-Dûm – A dwarven colony town and trading center within the Ered Witherin, the dwarves prove to be fickle allies of the Northman but both Nôr-Dûm and Framsburg require some niceties for trade, which they both depend on. (MERP)

Note: This a far from complete list of cities, regions, and places, please feel free to add or own (and if you like I will add them to OP)


Rules and Guidelines:
1. Read and enjoy other people’s hard work but respect their privacy (go to the RP Request Form if you would like to join an existing story or start a new story)
2. All races are welcome! Timeline is whatever you like, from the beginning of Arda through the fourth age
3. Keep any OOC comments to the The Golden Hall III (Meduseld OOC)
4. Refrain from using overly bright colors or potentially incur the wrath of the TR (Frost)
5. Icons and small images are welcome, but please no moving gifs
6. Anyone can use any canon characters in their stories, there is no ownership in this thread
7. We are all adults here and can decide for ourselves the stories we want to read so rather than dictate what can and cannot be written in this thread, we will ask that any CW (at the discretion of the writer) be placed at the top of the post

[Winddancer]

Framsburg Bathhouse




"JAOOOooOOOooWWW!!" The gruff scream broke the silence of the night, though no one reacted to it. Not when it came from the direction of the city's bathhouse.

"Are you trying to burn my skin off, woman!?" Einar jerked up to standing so fast that water splashed over the edges of the large wooden tub.

"Oi! Don't you woman me, Einar!" She sent the back of the large long handled sudsy brush smacking down on his bare arse with a sharp crack and eliciting yet another howl of pain. "Sit your smelly rump back down right now before I shove you back under myself!" The firm stare she sent his way was enough to wither flowers and reluctantly Einar sat back down, wincing all the way as the hot water bit into parts best not mentioned.

"By the Valar! Are you trying to cook me alive!? This is like taking a bath in Mount Doom!"

"Don't be such a baby, it is not that hot. And you need it at this heat, it's the only way to get that rancid smell off of you! What did you do, roll around in rotting carcasses!?"

Wrinkling her nose Aldith applied more suds to her brush and got to work. Strong as a man, she gave him a scrubbing of his life ignoring all his howls of protestations and at times even pulling him back in to continue. From top to bottom she scrubbed him within an inch of his life, though the biggest fight came when she reached his feet. With one firm hand she held his ankle and ignored his yelps, yells and laughter as she scrubbed his dirty feet clean.

By the end of it she was about as wet as he was, feeling like she had just wrestled one of the mythical watchers of the deep. Wiping away a loose strand from her forehead with the back of her hand she grabbed a large bucket of water and dumped it unceremoniously on his head to get the soap out.

"WWWWHHHHAaahahha! What the everloving damnation, woman! That is freezing cold!!"

Again he was ignored, she had heard it all before. "Get out and let me rinse the rest off and don't be such a babe."

Grumbling Einar reluctantly conceded, mostly because he could not stay in the tub forever and tried to brace himself for the next onslaught. "Ssshhheeeeeesh! you could have heated it just a little!" He squealed as he bounced around while she slowly poured the next bucket over his body and rinsed the suds away.

She made sure the entire bucket was used, her strong forearms not once shaking with the weight of the heavy bucket. Once done, she tossed him a large towel and left him to dry himself off as she moved on to clean the massive mess left behind. At least the floor got a washing too she thought as she set to work emptying the tub of grimey water.

Einar cursed the whole time under his breath as he gently toweled himself dry. At least the towel was soft, his skin still tingling from the 'torture'. He had not paid for the massage she offered as well. He had tried that once before and while his back had never felt as good as it had after, the process itself was nothing less than terrifying. Nor did he have the time, he needed to drop off his latest hoard of skins and meat.

"You look almost half decent now, Einar" Aldith said as she shot him a grin. "Almost shining!" Chuckling to herself as his face grew slightly more flushed than it was before, she knelt down and began scrubbing the floor. "See you a year's time!" Another chuckle followed him as he left muttering about how it had not been a year.

[Dungeon Delver]

A Crown of Violets, Roses, and Crocuses
The Framsburg Library
(Private)

Many crowns of violets,
roses and crocuses
…together you set before more
- Sappho

The hour was late, or at least she assumed it was late. There were no windows where she’d sat down to read the scrolls. It was a big room, musty and cavernous, and lit with a single, long candle at the far end of her table. That she’d lost track of time in here was more an inevitability than a surprise. Any library, every library, all over the world and under it, she would get lost in. Dusty shelves and endless rows were more natural to her than sunlight and fields. She’d had adventures, many of them, but they all led her back to one library or another. One could only learn so much on an adventure, they must, must be supplemented by research and study. At the very least, her adventures needed to be catalogued so that she could be a part of the research. That’s what had led her to Framsburg.

It was not a hidden city, but it was a forgotten one. Supposedly its foundations were laid by the Rohirrim before they were the Rohirrim and, judging by the age and decay and general rundownedness of the city, it was at least a thousand years old, older than her by a good three hundred years. Odd that places made by humans could be older than an elf, but they happened. She was young, but not that young. The world was an onion, layers and layers and layers of things to find and explore and discover. Framsburg was forgotten because people mistakenly believed it had little to offer the big, wide world. She knew that wasn’t true. No place in the world had “little to offer”, that sort of phrase was a slur, a curse, an obscenity in anthropological circles. She’d come to the city with little knowledge of its size or it’s make up. She was shocked at both. The city was large, larger than Edoras has been. It was founded on a much more gently slowly sloping hill and was not quite so rugged. Half the city seemed to be ruins though. A half dead, half alive city. That was something she could understand, most of the great elven cities were growing more and more like that, Lothlórien, Mithlond, Imladris.

There was no central authority here either, no mayor or lord or council that she could ask questions of. It was an imposition to be sure. But Patsimiel Yoshiyo was not one to be turned aside so quickly. Her time studying anthropology had given her one thing, and her elven senses had only sharpened and honed it: patience. There was no council she could talk to? She would ask the people on the streets. She’d picked up enough Rohirric lately that communicating was no problem. Well, not too many. She’d talked with a cooper and kept confusing an offer from him to come inside and meet his wife for tea, for an offer that was not about tea. Thank the stars, most of the people spoke a dialect of Westron she could speak and understand. The cooper and his wife pointed the young elleth to the library. It wasn’t much a of a library, the people of Framsburg were an oral people more than a written, but they interacted with enough people, Northmen, Silvan elves, Ered Wethrin dwarves, that a library was more or less expected, even if it wasn’t well maintained or catalogued. There was a librarian, a wizened old man with a very short gait and a very sturdy cane, he was a delightful little man and was so enamored with her that she assumed she was the first elf he’d ever seen. His smile was as bright as the waxing gibbous moon. He led her to a private chamber where she could read and study and write in peace.

She yawned. She wasn’t tired, but she felt like she should be. The yawn was more an attempt to trick her body into telling her its secrets. Her mind had begun to wander. The candlelight was growing fuzzy, and the light was getting dimmer and dimmer. The words on the page drooped and dipped on the page, they played and teased her. She would read a sentence, then read it again and find words that had been coy and hid. Her stomach gurgled. She might not be physically tired, but she was hungry. When was the last time she’d eaten? Had she stopped at an inn before she made a beeline to the library? She couldn’t remember if she’d had the tea with the cooper and his wife. Some tea would be very pleasant right now. Tea was the whetstone on which she sharpened her mind. Ever since she’d learned to brew it herself, Yoshiyo had used it to stay up at all hours. She would hide under blankets with a lantern and read anything and everything she could. Once, she’d nicked a cookbook from her neighbor and read the entire thing in a single night. If only she could use that knowledge to make more than tea. She was certain that a tea and biscuit combo would make her at least a fraction more popular, at the very least not the one mocked and teased endlessly.

She yawned again, this time it was genuine. It must be late. She read one more line from the scroll, blinked hard, then read it again. Neither time she read it did it make sense. The words could have scribbles for all she understood them. She squinted and leaned in close to try a third time. Still no luck, the words dripped and slipped out of her line of sight like a waterfall. She sat back and sighed. She was done for the day. She’d learned her lesson. Reflexively, she looked at the candle, making sure it was not too close. She would not forgive herself another library fire. She sighed again, rubbing her face. Comparing languages and tracing certain stories back to their origins was fun work, but it was mind numbing too. She’d read eight different renditions of “How the Fox Stole the Farmer’s Wife”. All of them only slightly different. There was something wrong about the order in which the library said they were written and recorded. But all of that was going to have to wait until tomorrow, or at least until she’d had some tea and a bowl of soup. Her stomach mumbled in agreement. Soup would be very nice.

She packed up her things, scrolls and scrolls and more scrolls with pens and wax tablets and sketch pads. Her pack was an unorganized bramble of chaos. She wouldn’t have in any other way. Her apartments were always orderly and organized, but her pack, like her mind, was wild and carefree.

The sun was still out, but it was dipping behind the mountains, exploding in pink and orange. She inhaled the smell of Framsburg and closed her eyes.

She took a step and felt herself bump into someone rushing by.

She opened her eyes, catching just the barest glimpse.

The woman turned to look back. Her eyes were soft and round with irises of violet so dark they could have been a reflection of the primordial, starless sky. Her skin was silvery porcelain, her feathery, raven tresses was styled in an ancient elven style, one she’d not seen in…

Suddenly she was not in Framsburg anymore. She was in another city, one far older with towers of ivory that stretched up into the sky and disappeared. There were singing voices all around her instead of the murmur of a crowd. There was so much light here: golden and silver. There was music in the very air. She reached out to touch it. Her fingers moved slowly, through honey. She could see the light wisp around her fingers, almost tangible. And she was there. The same woman, raven black hair and violet eyes. She was looking at her again, but on her lips was a gossamer smile, so sweet and silky it made Yoshiyo’s knees weak. The woman, so familiar that her name was on the tip of Yoshiyo’s tongue, said something and touched her cheek. It felt like she’d been kissed by a cloud. It was dizzying. The air smelled of roses. She said something, but her words were wisped away a sweet wind…

“I’m sorry, I wasn’t paying attention…” the woman said, her eyes and hair the same as it had in Yoshiyo’s vision. She smiled. There was a twinkle in her eyes, a reflection of ancient light. Did she know Yoshiyo? Did Yoshiyo know her?

Before Yoshiyo had a chance to say anything, the woman rounded the corner and disappeared. She touched her face where she’d been touched in the vision. She felt dizzy again.

Who was she?

[Dungeon Delver]

A Crown of Violets, Roses, and Crocuses
Elsewhere in Framsburg
(Private)

Many crowns of violets,
roses and crocuses
…together you set before more
- Sappho

The evening was quiet, the air was cool, the fire was comforting; on any other night, this would have been magical, but tonight everything felt like it was being observed behind glass. She couldn’t focus, couldn’t keep her mind from wandering, couldn’t stop thinking about… Odohe dropped her chopsticks for the third time and gave up trying to eat. She wasn’t hungry but the ritual of cooking and eating was perfunctory, a requirement for her state of mind. She was a creature of routine, an elf of prosaic ceremony. Everything in her small house had its place and every ritual in her life gave had purpose. It was the only way she knew how to live. Odohe had lived on her own for so long now; at the start, the routines and the rituals helped ground her, keep her from focusing on the losses, but as time went on (and went on, and went on was it does for elves) she grew to depend on the rituals until they were structure of the world in which she lived rather than the foundation.

Tonight was the first night in a decade things had gone amiss. She’d spend nigh on two decades in Framsburg now, not quite enough for her to consider it a home, but it was more than a temporary hideaway. She’d come here to escape, to break free, to discover herself. The forests of Lothlórien, after the losses she’d suffered, no longer felt like home. It was an alien world filled with alien people. Or perhaps she was the alien, the child out of the outyards. They all looked at her with pity, she hated the pity in their eyes, it made her feel so weak, so out of control. She came to Framsburg on a whim. Most people south of the city didn’t even know it existed still. It was a shell of itself, the people that lived there said, but the embers of the city still burned hot against the gathering cold. Odohe stayed there. She endured looks of suspicion and distrust, bearing them easier than looks of pity and sorrow. In time, the people of Framsburg wore down and accepted her. She was an outlier, but she was welcomed. “Every city should have an elf,” they said, “a being of living history and countless tales.” She wasn’t really one for storytelling and saga sharing though. While she did her part to participate in annual events, blóts, and ceremonies, her talents were in gardening and cultivation. History was something she’d rather forget than be eternally called upon to recount tales of glory and woe.

She had been doing fine, living a life of quiet fulfillment, disconnected yet connected, boundless but organized. She had found a spot, both consciously and unconsciously, where all her mannerisms and proclivities existed in a state of equilibrium. It was not happiness, per se, but it was something near that, closer to contentment. Then she heard that there was another elf in the city. It was strange, looking back on it now, but initially when she heard the news (and what news it would be that there was not just one elf in Framsburg, but two) she felt jealousy. Framsburg was her home, her sanctuary, her ship on the astral sea. What right did another elf have to come in and take that from her? She was no longer special, no longer a fixture.

However, as the days went, the excitement died down, and with it her jealousy, the elf, whoever they were, cloistered themselves in the remnants of the library, a place Odohe had only passed by. In those following days, she avoided the streets that lead to the library, staying as far from this interloper as she could. Until today.

She’d been so busy, so caught up in her routine that she forgot to take a new route. She’d awakened before the sun, performed a few ashtanga movements to help awaken her mind and body, then began work in her garden. Her house was small, but it was one of the few places in the city with a yard large enough for growing more than a few flowers pots. It had taken years of trust and hard work to make it the way it was now, something Odohe was very proud of. It was time to harvest her leeks, she done so and delivered them to Léofrid, her grocer friend in the marketplace and closest thing she had to a real confidant. Without thinking, Odohe took her old route, the one that took her near the library. She was so distracted that she didn’t even notice until she bumped into her, into the other elf. She’d taken such pains to avoid this person, refusing to see her, refusing to even know her name or gender. But now she knew. They only locked eyes for a brief moment, and in that brief moment, Odohe had learned far more than she’d ever wanted to know about anything.

The look in the elf’s eyes took her back, back further than the sun and the moon, back to a time before she’d been born. Memories of a time she’d never seen, dreams of a place she never imagined. There were so many lights and sounds, they grew to a crescendo and for a moment Odohe thought they’d overwhelm her, but then everything vanished. Everything except a small lawn overlooking a deep verdant forest, the ur-forest that belonged to Oromë and his kin. She was not alone. She could not see her face, but she knew, knew beyond a shadow of doubt. She was weaving flowers into her hair: scabiosa, camellia, and dahlia, pristine white flowers, emmeshed within tresses of scarlet, crimson, and ruby. There was an intimacy here, an intense intimacy Odohe had never felt before. They were so close to one another, clad in naught but their skin and hair. She could feel the warmth of the one she was with, a warmth inviting and alluring. The light was silver, Telperion was casting his dim evening rays across the land. That moment, simple as it was, held more emotion in it than Odohe had felt her entire life. What was this? What was this place? She didn’t want to leave it. She didn’t know this woman she was with, but she didn’t want to leave her. The woman turned, soft brown eyes framed by hair a million shades of red. Their eyes locked and kisses as sweet as cherries followed.

It was only for a moment, a moment shorter than a breath or a heartbeat, but it had so much more weight. She was confused though. Who was she? She’d never seen this elf her entire life. Yet the dream, or memory, or whatever it was, felt so vivid that had to have been real. To her shame, she ran. She heard the woman speak, but the words were lost as she darted back home, scampering like a frightened deer.

Now, she was home. Or was she? Home suddenly didn’t feel like it. This building, this place, it had held her together as much as she’d held it, but now it felt cavernous and empty, and Odohe felt alone, unmoored, and drifting. She felt the overwhelming curiosity to find the elf, to see her again, to confess the vision she’d had when they ran into each other. That slow moment of perfect time when their eyes locked and she saw a vision of something past, unburied by a single soft smile and the scent of cherry blossoms.

She went to her garden. It was dark out and naught but the stars held any light in the city. Still, she saw the flowers as if they glowed with an inner light: scabiosa, camellia, and dahlia. She gathered up enough to make bouquet. Before she knew what she was doing, in the darkness of the coming nights of summer, Odohe began her search.

[Aikári Salmarinian]

Old Framsburg, Mathleisburg and lands of Ronen-in-Anduin.
(New RP with Fenrir)

Utchuk in town (1)

He came from the northern fells long ago. He wore a good mask that made him look human, but he would never be near one. In his time so far he had travelled through most lands, where humans lived and remained this far inconspicuous. He travelled around in selfmade clothing, in what he had developed a good hand and a warm skin from a bear as cloak. His belt supported an once stolen human sword, a Morgul knife and a dagger. He got a pouch with a few important possessions as money and papers. He had a necklace of animal bones to complement the wild men of Palisor. With his six feet he was pretty tall and thus not easy to hide his stature, but the shadows did a lot. In pure daylight he wore a cap over his head, the greyness of his skin was hidden under clothes and in handshoes. He couldn’t deny his real nature, but humans were excellent meat eaters, so he was no exception in an inn. In desolated lands, like old Arthedain, he was a lone traveller nobody really bothered. And if he met people who had questions, he spoke in the common tongue a bit grunting and brusque, but never out of hatred.

The lands across the mountains were barren. Framsburg was an old town sitting like a duck along the river Anthiel, that plunged at the crosspoint from the west into the Anduin coming from the north. There was order within the walls of stone, just like the sistertown Mathleisburg, a stone throw away at the river junction with the Sirros. The lands here were different than the other side of the Hithaeglir. Utchuk was in town. He was at a tavern near the northern exit into town, enjoying a warm beer. He had learned to drink it. It was warm and full of protein. Law and order were loose here, so it was important to keep a dagger loose in the scabbard. The humans were superstitious with reason, there was a great bog to the north, named Aughiska. There was no record where the name came from. The boggy lands were invested by a smaller kind of Orc, limited of intelligence and only roamed when the clouds hung low during daylight. He stayed rather inside these walls than out in the marshes.

He knew of the sulphur ghosts in Mordor. A pulsating mist hung there that hungry surrounded victims, sucking them empty from emotions, exhausting them, a desire came to fall asleep. The surrender was the moment where the victim would become part of the mist. The victim was reborn as pulsating flard of mist. Nobody could escape it. Utchuk wouldn’t try it at night. He was well-versed to travel through the lands, but wouldn’t risk the hide if he could not. His home were the tundra in the northwest of Middle Earth, the Forochel lands. Free Uruk tribes lived side by side with human tribe and almost ate the same kind of food, that mostly came from sea. Mindless battles and skirmishes were not for him. He was a traveller.


Bogs of Aughiska.

Grasgnur was the kind of mountain orc, small of statue and evil throughout. There was no problem to digest a weaker orc than yourself. In small camps they sat around the fires, as it would keep the roaming ghosts of the bogs away. Battles had been fought long ago, their dead buried beneath their feet. Little knew these orcs about this and if they knew, they wouldn’t care at all. A word as care was strange vocabulary to them. He was part of the force, but not in command. That was a more ferocious brother with more scars than anyone else. A long travel it was to the south, where the town was, named Framsburg. Reported was that were here the fabled horseriders of old, but none had seen them in years so far north. So the Orcs of the Ered Mithrin were bolder than before. It was a good time for a raid, a pillage and if possible good murder. They would not consider the hidden kingdom in the southeast, where the borders of the forest began.


The woods & the garrison of Mathleisburg

Elven eyes kept an eye on the growing numbers and reported this back to court in Aradhrynd. The fiercest warriors of the north lived there, unconquered, led by the last true elvenking of Middle Earth and his successor. It was seldom that the golden force rode out and waged battles. Unless there was a serious threat from either Gundabad or the Ered Duir. Even the lands around Esgaroth, Erebor and Nan Annen could give problems. There was little love with either the humans or the Dwarves, but they could come to aid, if the orc numbers were too numerous to handle. The forests of the north were greatly feared by the orcs of the Ered Mithrin and the Hithaeglir.

The garrison of the bigger town to the south of Framsburg did have a contingent of the fabled Eotheod, the horse riders of Rohan. King Eomer sat on the throne, and had established a good garrison for the remnants of their people who had remained behind hundreds of years ago. They were about twohundred strong, with equal horse. The Beornings and the woodsmen of Rhovanion were also part of the same people. It was established because the strength of Lothlorien was not what it once was. It was rather silent these days, and nobody really knew if the elves still lived there. Everyone knew of their leaving Middle Earth. The elvenking however had no ears for these messages. The garrison did have an ablebodied commander, who had a good record on his name. He had a several adjudants who commanded different divisions of horse riders. Framsburg fell under their protection. But even within sight, it was still a ride to reach it, if ever came an attack on the small town.

[Fenrir]

Thump.

Thump.

It was the dull sound of axes cutting sharp wedges on tree trunks. This was an area they preferred more. It was near to their outback settlement and supplied them with all the wood they could even need. Besides, there was a nice stream nearby carrying fresh water from the hills yonder, and thus they didn't have to worry about not bringing water from home. Yes, it was a nice place. They rarely came upon any maneaters there, and when they did, their numbers scared the beasts off. Their own settlement was far away from Framburg in the middle of the woods and hills. Sure, they had a few scares now and then, but no one was ever lost to the woods. They weren't the only settlement beyond the town's walls either. There were many backwoods settlements where people loved to live with comparatively more freedom.

There were three woodcutters there that day, including his Adyun, and himself, Elmer.

Wiping the sweat off his brow, he let down the axe slowly and proceeded to rest a while.

"Whassamatter, Elmer? You ill?" sneered Adyun as Elmer sat down.
"Nay!"
"Then put you back into it, lad, or shall we be callin' you lassie now, eh?"
The woods rang with their merry laughter. The sullen Elmer laughed too. "Oh fudge it Adyun. Let a man rest."
"We need to take firewood and logs back before dark, and that isn't far away."
Another man said, "Aye, the sun's settin' already. We best get back. I don't like these woods in the dark."
An old woodcutter, the oldest of the lot said, "None of us do."
"Oh aaaaallll righty!" interjected Elmer. "Let's hurry and go back to the village. Sooner we make it the better."

Indeed, they picked up the pace, cut some more wood, gathered them up, and tied them into bundles. Then came the long trudge back home through the dark woods, where shadows lengthened as the sunlight receded. The trees seemed more menacing, the branches above them seemed like webs of a gigantic spider, and the smallest sound almost made them look back, only to discover it was just the sound of streams, falling twigs, or something else.

But sometimes, the dangers are real.

Crack!

"What the...?"
One of the woodcutters behind Elmer said, "That sounded loud and heavy, and nearby."
"Aye, it was. Sounded like a wolf," quipped Elmer. Unlike the rest, he was quick to drop this bundle of wood and grabbed his axe.

The next few moments were a nightmare. Some wolves fell on them from all sides and tore them to shreds. The largest of them was big enough to rival a boulder. And yet, there was something different about this one. Not only was he larger than the other wolves, he could speak in in the Common Tongue as well.

"Your axes won't help you, not your swords, nor bucklers nor homes of wood. I, Fenrir, leader of the wolf pack have spoken. And we are coming for Framburg."

With that, the werewolf fell on Elmer and tore him into shreds.

@Aikári Salmarinian
OOC: Hey Aiks! Let's have Fenrir and your orcs meet in the next post where we can plan on the attack on Framburg. Alternately, we can attack more villages near the forests and draw out the town's cavalry. What do you think?

[Aikári Salmarinian]

OOC: Hi Fenrir, both plans sound good to me. We work it out along the route of writing.

______________________________
Old Framsburg, Mathleisburg and lands of Ronen-in-Anduin.
(RP with Fenrir)

Bogs of Aughiska.

Routing was not an easy thing for Grasgnur. Balhur, a fellow orc, was around. The rags on the body had to be clothes, adorned by the skulls from rodents that had been captured and eaten. The spoils were eaten in secret and not shared with others. The witchking was a frightening presence, but luck was on their side, he and the other Nazgul were not in the north. Balhur had a sense of wanting to stay alive. He was further equipped with constant mortal fright, envy, jealousy and malice. Grasgnur knew enough that this orc was a kind that stabbed a knife in the back, when you were not alert. Fear was a good weapon, and out here in these accursed lands, they were not the only thing to fear. The mountains were better and friendlier than these bogs. When the morning came the fog had thickened and dulled all sounds, from animal screams to the dead rustling leaves in half crooked trees. It was mealtime, and these orcs had no idea of it. Grasgnur was intelligent enough not to be in the bogs, but on the border. Most of the orcs jumped up and ran into the fields. But unfortunate Balhur was not that quick. The hungry fog surrounded the orc and began to feed on his lively essence. Balhur had no sense of what was happening that feeling to becoming dull of mind. There was no plan to engage the legs and run to safety. He was frozen in place, dissolving slowly in the mists, where no time existed. Just the eternal hunger. There were many names in this fog, trapped and had become just a bit stronger again.

Grasgnur and his troop of nineteen orcs out of thirty stood on the open plains. To their east lay the town of Framsburg. It was mostly grassland, ideal for horses to gallop across. But also wolves could roam here, and other deer sorts. But the last kind lasted in the woods better. There were a few pockets of forests along the west side of Anduin, where the Anneithel streamed from the Hithaeglir eastbound. The start was the Gundalok plains and other minor tributaries. The Men Rúnen was the road in the northern side of it. From the south came the Men Leimuin, that connected Dungirith nearby Carrock to the small settlements at one of the starting arms of the Anduin. There were barks not that far off, and Grasgnur looked around. They made it to the nearby wood, where they found ripped up corpses from Framsburg probably. Bundles of woods lay everywhere. “Work of wolves,” he concluded. They were around somewhere. “Keep your weapons on sharp,” was the instructions. Wolves could be allies in certain cases. But also an enemy if there was not a mutual ground.


Utchuk in town Framsburg (2)

The joy of a fresh morning was palpable when some rays of sunshine broke through the clouds and chased the rain and fog of earlier away. Utchuk was on the walls of the town, eyeing over the grasslands, the nearby woods and the water of the Anthiel flowing into the Anduin from the north. It was a calm, but still quite swift water, clear to drink straight. He appreciated this wild human society. It was like up in the deep north, where the passage of Den Lóke was a gateway. West lay feared Gundabad. But a quick traveller had no fear of the mountain. The lands of Forovirkain and Gondladwen lay beyond the Ered Mithrin. Rich uncharted and wild free lands, former from the baddest guy in Middle Earth. But after his capture it had been left alone. A world of ice and tundra, of icedragons and trolls, but also deadly whales of the sea. Utchuk was a traveller and adventurer. He was not aware of any plans, but there was something foul in the air he didn’t like. It had the stink of darkness he was not used to. And perhaps it was time to leave? He could travel to Mathleisburg and check out the town there.