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The wolves of Mynydd Myddyn

Scribed by Theodosius in 1146AD

Along with Astrius, Madoc and myself we had Gam (Astrius' shield grog), Aledd, Arian, Dylan (the houndsmaster, but he was not allowed to bring any hounds as Allydd would not let him) and Caelwin (who was told to act as my shield grog). We set forth on a beautiful summer's day, the weather could not have been better and allowed us to travel quickly, it took us just over five days to get to Skinfrith, from there we headed along a lone valley towards Mynydd Myrddin.

Once we were in the general area we set up camp and started our investigation. That first day I talked with some of the beasts there about, a rabbit told me of the wolves that smelled of man and how they had hunted there at the last full moon. The next full moon was in two days time. I noticed that even outside of the regio the animals seemed to be much more lucid and 'awake' than they normally are, curious but almost certainly it is an aspect of the magic of having the Mynydd Merddin so close, from what I understand it is a massive regio.

For the rest of that day and the next we kept searching for tracks - finding sign of the passage of wolves, but from what I had learned from the wildlife they were almost certainly normal wolves.

During the third day there (the first of the full moon), I spoke to an aged oak and asked it if it knew of the werewolves, suffice to say it did and refused to help us in hunting the 'children of the wolf' as it called them. This was certainly no ordinary tree spirit, in fact the way it spoke put me more in mind of an awakened spirit of the whole forest. This surprised me as I had never encountered such a thing before. That night we heard wolf howls for the first time, they were hunting, but they not us. I am not certain if they were werewolves or not, but I think not.

It was that night that, for the first of many times, Arian woke us up, with warning of a dark shape near the camp - it turned out to be an otter or some other small creature. Then just to make sure we did not sleep at all well, he woke us all up again having heard some strange noises in a nearby bush, this time it was a hedgehog. I admit to finding the entire thing funny the first few times, but that soon wore off over the next few nights.

During the next day Viremos told me of tales that he had heard of werewolves, some of them speak of wolves that can control their anger and possibly even their form, somewhat like the magi of House Bjornear can. During the day we spotted a lone wolf watching us, it ran away quickly but I cast the spell that allows me to talk to beasts of the earth. During this conversation I try to negotiate with the wolves, so that our patrols can pass harmlessly to the regio. It seems that a hunting party killed one of their brothers and they decided to take their revenge out on our patrol - probably because they could not see the difference between one group and another of outsiders. Astrius stopped me from going to talk to the Grandfather wolf, and thank the gods that he did, I must remind myself of the tales that involve werewolves - none of them end well for those caught alone.

So having got over that madness, we spent a watchful night expecting to be attacked anytime, I did not count how often Arian woke us up. However nothing happened.

During the next day Aledd went off tracking, to see if he could find the tracks of the wolf from the day before. He found wolf tracks all right, along with a wolf, which proceeded to attack him. Madoc heard this and along with Arian ran to help. Both Madoc and Arian showed immense bravery in charging headlong into that wood and it was just as well they did. As Aledd had been very badly hurt, Madoc managed to lift him and carry him out of the woods, however the wolf had some friends close by and they chose this moment to attack. Astrius ran towards them to help, followed by Gam. I stayed with Caelwin at our camp, ready with a healing potion and the Beast Ward.

Astrius ran headlong towards Madoc who was being chased by four of these large black wolves, he threw fire at one which killed it; two of the others ran off when they saw this, the last one was despatched by Astrius and Gam between them. However in the fight Madoc had his leg bitten and Arian had also been badly wounded and was insensible.

When I saw what had happened, and that Aledd and Arian were obviously badly hurt I took the Beast Ward and started running up the hill towards them. However I am not very fast when it comes to sprinting and so I was only halfway towards them when many, many more werewolves burst out of the forest towards us. I had no idea how many there were, but certainly more than twenty of them. I ran a little father then re-activated the ward hoping that the others running downhill could outpace the wolves coming at them.

I spent a few heartbeats without breathing just then as I watched Astrius, Gam, and Madoc carrying Aledd and Arian between them, sprint into the circle just ahead of the lead wolf. As the wolves hit the ward there was a huge spray of sparks and they all rebounded. If Turold had been there I could have kissed him at that moment, so it was probably just as well he wasn't.

We were all safe within the ward when I saw Dylan, who had been tracking further along the valley come running towards us - he had two of the wolves on his tail. Astrius was busy attacking the wolves surrounding the circle and did not initially notice Dylan. As the wolves saw that they could not harm us but we could kill them, they started to withdraw - but two additional wolves moved to intercept Dylan. With two wolves in front and two behind, Dylan kept sprinting headlong towards the two in front, knowing that if he could reach the circle then he would be safe. Astrius threw another ball of fire at one of the two in front of Dylan. This killed it and blinded the others, including Dylan but he knew where to run to and finally managed to make it into the circle unharmed.

The other wolves were all running at this point, and Astrius tried to kill the pack leader but tragically missed. Whilst this was going on we tended the wounds of Arian and Aledd, cleansing them with fire so that the wolf spirits could not posses them. Then Madoc checked the two werewolf bodies, which had reverted to their human form, one was a grog from our missing patrol called Simeon.

We decided that with so many wounded we should leave the valley as soon as possible. As we packed up we could hear the wolves, and occasionally spotted one as we went back down the valley. We did not travel far so we set up camp for the night, the last of the full moon. We were all exhausted from carrying equipment and so some of us were easily overcome during the night by a fell magic. As I sat on watch I felt myself overcome with a great weariness and I almost fell asleep, Caelwin who was watching with me did fall asleep. I decided to try and see what I could see with my Sight, as I looked into the Otherworld I saw many large man/wolf spirits attacking us, draining our will. I knew that fire would ward such things and so using a flaming brand drove them back and woke the others up. Viremos then told me that the Grandfather wolf must be nearby directing them, so Astrius used the invisibility cloak and went hunting. He found the group of wolves guarding the Grandfather wolf but was heard approaching and they all turned tail and ran. With the Grandfather wolf gone we were safe for the rest of the night and the next day we made it out of the valley and headed on our way back to Seven Temple.

Back at the covenant over dinner we decided that as two months of the season were left we would heal Madoc's leg and head back to the valley to continue investigating what it was that could have angered the wolves.

This time we stopped in Skinfrith for two days as I asked around for any news. It seemed that Sir Gavin and his wife Edith had six children until recently, their eldest son (Kenneth) went missing last year when he went hunting with a group of friends. I suspected that Kenneth and his friends were the ones who killed the werewolf and started this all.

After this we moved onwards towards Mynydd Myrddin this time there were no problems with wolves and we went straight into the regio. The regio of Mynydd Myrddin is a very strange place but it has been described elsewhere so I will not say much, suffice to say that the lack of day and night is exceptionally disconcerting. We went to the village of the Celts and asked news from them of werewolves. Their druid Tewdric told of the wolves to the south east, he also told me that after our fight with them they could go one of two ways. They could either start a blood feud or they may let things settle down again. Tewdric then arranged for an old guide to tell us where the werewolf lair was, not that I could follow his directions at all.

It was that night when Viremos first sensed that we were being watched by a spirit, the druid said that he had not sent it and I still do not know who did, although an educated guess would be that the Grandfather wolf sent it to watch us.

The next day we went into the forest nearby so that I could talk to the awakened forest, as I talked to the forest spirit I was again surprised by it's nature. We talked for a long while and in short it told me that it was not concerned with our fight and said that we should broker a peace with the Grandfather wolf ourselves. Eventually it said that if we wanted it's help then we would have to show due reverence and respect, and not bring axe or fire to the old wood.

Whilst I was talking to the tree/forest spirit the others saw a figure made of wood standing in the tree looking down at me. Form this and other clues we realised that I had been talking to Jak'o'Green - one of the most powerful of the old gods, which was rather intimidating.

Later we discussed this and other issues and it was as we were doing this that Ruaridh arrived and told us that the end of the season was upon us already, and so we returned to the covenant for the Autumn meeting.
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