"Och, weel, ye cannae be tae carefu," says Gildrim unapologetically. His shoulders twitch as the spell takes hold, but he manages not to fight against it.
"I'll try to be brief," Gildrim continues. "The four of - Grendath's eyes!"
A dull purple flush rises on the back of Gildrim's neck and quickly suffuses his cheeks above his scrubby beard. He grinds his teeth and continues, staring at the floor.
"We met with bandits on the way to the swamp, and killed two of them. When we reached Cragger's Rest, the villagers weren't happy to learn that we were going into the swamp. They've had trouble with lizardfolk, or the other way around. The priestess living outside the village found us a lizardfolk guide. Deep in the swamp, we came to a hill with a standing stone atop it. While we rested there, two hungry dead men found us. Cyian... Cyian touched the stone in the confusion, and vanished in an instant. We killed the ghouls, but Cyian... we never found him."
Gildrim pauses to take a deep breath.
"But we found your house soon enough, the three of us left. It's still standing, not too badly decayed. All the wriggling, biting things from miles around seem to have made their homes there to keep out of the water. There were centipedes and a snake and spiders, one as big as a horse, but they're not the worst thing there."
"But I get ahead of myself. We met a nixie in the walled garden. She had the other two charmed - but not me! - and made them walk back out of the swamp. I had to follow. No harm would have been done, beyond the delay, except that someone drove a crocodile after us with arrows. Well, we killed it, and when the other two returned to their senses, we came back to confront the little green girl. But instead we met three grasshopper men, who I think had goaded the crocodile. They were small, but very persistent, and would have killed us if they could, but we stuffed them in a pack and kept them from further mischief. And it turned out these grasshoppers had been tricking and tormenting the nixie, so after that she was friendly enough."
"Too friendly, maybe, because she and Erf set off together and left us! I hope they're happy together! But that was after we were nearly pecked to pieces by crows, so maybe he'd lost heart in the venture."
"And now, it's time to cut my tale short. While we camped that last night with Erf, a human came tramping through the marsh toward our firelight. He too had touched a standing stone and found himself elsewhere, which gives me some hope for Cyian, though not much. When Erf left, we invited him to join with us. If we had not, he would perhaps have lived. His name was Karm."
"Together we fought the hellish giant spider, and the strangest creature I've ever seen, some demon of slime. There was nothing else at the top of the house. We went down into the stone cellar. We fell in a pit where the floor gave way and flapping choking tentacle monsters tried to eat us. Karm was nearly killed."
"And after that, it all went wrong. We put a table in the pit, and opened the stone doors that stood beyond it. There were dead things waiting for us on the other side, skeletons of wolves, and the bones of a giant with sharp teeth and ripping claws on the ends of great reaching arms. The wolves harried us and we could not strike the giant across the pit, though it could reach us."
Gildrim stops again for a few seconds.
"There was... there was nothing I could do. I saw Ter-raen fall and Karm helpless. Only I could get past the wolf. I ran for my life, with bony jaws tearing at my legs. The others are dead, beyond doubt."
Gildrim lifts his head slowly and looks Thorne in the face.
"Your urn may be there still. I've done my best, but I could not gain it. The seeking of it killed two and left another lost. I am done, with the seeking, and with my account."
With that dramatic closing, he takes a step backwards.
"Oh, and I brought from the house a portrait of a woman who looks a bit like you."