Alms for the Mad
The Never Ending Quest - Episode 18931
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Dealing with the refugees had been a frustrating experience for Lady
Rowena D'Honaire. Pirates being at heart a cowardly and superstitious lot,
it was difficult getting two stories that agreed. Many of their answers
were punctuated by rubbing of folk charms and warding gestures against the
evil eye. The monster that had at first plagued the shantytown was
variously a woman, a wolf, an entire pack of wolves, or a polar bear of
mammoth proportions. Though some maintained that this same beast had also
destroyed the settlement upon its return, others raved of giants, angels,
and sons of angels. Some even claimed the leader of the settlement had
called upon the devil to defend it. All things said, most had gone quite mad, if not from the attack, then soon afterward. Which left Rowena with little more than she had started with. Her brother wasn't with them, though at least a few raved of a "blind prophet" or a "Lord of Ruins". The presence of the wolf-beast, a beast that might have been a woman, was unsettling given the plea from her relatives. With Duke Collins proving intractable, it would seem her next destination was clear. Elaine DuChamps paced the floor of her chambers nervously, a recently received letter on her writing desk. Her cousin had obviously sensed the urgency of the problem, and had dispatched her fastest courier to send her response. Elaine dared not tell her father Leon DuChamps of this. He was a proud man, and would not ask for help from the outside, even from blood. Nor would her cousin have come at his request. It had been covered up in the courts, but there was still bad blood between the two when her father's baser impulses had resulted in advances upon her cousin. Still, Elaine thought, they needed this aid. The wolf queen was proving quite a problem, preventing herders from being able to graze their herds. It had gotten worse, as well. Elaine remembered the first day when everyone was forced to acknowledge that it was no ordinary wolf. A young girl, just in her teens, had been begging for food from one of the girls in town. When the town girl's mother had shown up, the beggar became hostile, and then a startling change had overtaken her, and she became a snarling beast, attacking the little girl. The beast fled after that. The little girl recovered alarmingly quick, but the incident had named the scourge of the countryside. The Wolf Queen, and her myth of fear, had been born. Elaine was happy to see her cousin Rowena D'Honaire again. She just wished it was under better circumstances.
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The Traveler
3/5/2002 10:50:56 PM
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