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Message: <blockquote data-quote="hewligan" data-source="post: 5064227" data-attributes="member: 19688">OOC: Frostrune - EXCELLENT post!The men sleep, then talk. Jokad drinks, then sleeps, then talks. Jovik ... not quite so much drink as he had initially planned (the hangover from the day before still lingered enough to make the beer taste 'wrong'). Danth rested with the three men, checking their wounds, and planning what magic to call upon the next day. Kael enjoyed a beer or two with Jovik, before hunger and then weariness, got the better of him too.When morning came, the men, all seven of them, crowded round a large table in a private room. The table was laden with warm bread, its yeasty smell competing with the soft yet sharp cheddar smell. Warm ham, fried in butter, was brought in on plates, the melted fat and butter mopped up by the bread. And then, a real treat, fresh duck eggs, boiled but runny.The men ate ravenously, speaking at intervals, sharing their story.Jakardos, the leader of these men, turned out to also be the leader of the fort - the new commander. Jovik knew exactly what that meant, but he bit his tongue...Jakardos spoke the most. He told of the troubles. There had been ogre activity unlike any seen in living memory. The Kreegs, a powerful clan of ogres, appear to have won supremacy over a large region of land around the fort and up towards the mountains. They started making raids, taking supply caravans due for the fort, snatching one or two men from patrols at night, even one full-scale pitched battle against a patrol of 12 black arrows and 6 ogres. The black arrows had fled that one, down 4 men.The fort had doubled its watch, retreated a little behind the walls, and started to triple the guard on the caravans of supplies. Jakardos, feeling that things were getting critical, took a patrol of 11 other men out for a scouting mission through the Kreegwood (to the south west of the fort) and then along the wooded banks of Lake Coal (to the west) and then towards the depths of the Kreeg holdings. They were a scouting party - camoflaged, silent, all rangers ... they had been gone just over a day when they came upon many, many tracks in the forest. Fresh tracks, as if dozens of ogres were marching, and it was pointing in a straight line towards Fort Rannick.At that point they had turned and followed the tracks at a half-run all the way back to Fort Rannick, catching a few hours sleep every twelve hours, and then setting off again. They were too late. The fort had fallen and was occupied by the Kreegs.Jakardos did not know what to do. At first he wanted to head south and alert the town, and then on to Magnimar, but they met up with a survivor who told them about the horrors that were unfolding inside, and they decided, enraged by the stories of butchery and worse, to try and retake the fort, or die trying.About half of them died trying. The rest were pursued south for many hours, before the ogres grew bored of the chase. But then they fell straight into the hands of the Grauls. Too tired and battle-scared to put up a proper fight, they were captured, and then over the course of many days, tortured for fun, and eaten, often while still alive.Only Kibb had escaped, and he had brought help, and now there was hope again.</blockquote>

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