Old bones.

[catch]

They would come upon Many-Fights not much further upon the road. He no longer ran, no longer waddled hither and thither like a mad-thing. Their talk of Ethics would have been something to listen to, perhaps, but his brain is not-quite formed to understand, to grasp, the subtleties of human thoughts. He could ask Cherny-beast about it. It is, likely, that the boy would tell the dog of his own accord. Many-Fights did not mind. He learned much when Cherny chatted at him.

Now, however, he waited for them. In the way of beasts, he felt eyes, eyes, a subtle wrongness ahead of them. And though he had a cold nugget of fear in his heart, his blood was the blood of warriors, and he stood, alert, upon the road, paws spaced in it's wary, fighter's stance. He turns his head a little when the horses come to him, but it is mostly his ears that moves, and his plush brows peak in confusion.

CHERNY-BEAST WRONG-WRONG, he will tell the boy, his mind-throat full of sudden worry and wary. He lowers his head to sniff at the path, and he circles around, uttering a low, low whine, falling in beside Cherny's pony for his comfort.

[Glenn]

"It started before I arrived." Over five years now. "I'm not sure who instituted the policy. It seems ghastly for Helstone (Cornelius was rather squeamish you see) but far too proactive for Bromn. You're too young to remember the Ashfiend very well, I think, but I'm sure you heard the stories. He raised the dead and sent them upon us. Ghouls, reanimated flesh of dead relatives and loved ones. We'll give credit to Cinnabar for it if anyone. That's enough of this talk, though," for Burnie had spotted what was before them and heard Many-Fights words. "We'll not walk into this barrow speaking of the dead rising." They had come to the topic so innocently, but now it seemed anything but. It seemed measured, a plot against them, and Burnie would have none of it.

Before he had asked Cherny if he wanted to turn back, to go home, said that there was no shame in it. Now, though? Now the boy had committed himself and now there would be no turning back. "We'll do this together, Many-Fights, and we'll be all the stronger for it."

[Cherny]

Oh, the boy had heard the stories. Dim memories of his father returning home agitated after a trip to one of the nearer farms, back when Cherny still clung close to his mama's skirts.

He'd gone to check on the health of their flock, to be sure there were no young lambs sick or lamed, but had found so much more - carrion, the farmer and his wife and sons and daughter and farmhands slain, butchered as they'd tried to flee.

He'd stooped over the farmer's flyblown body, peering into blank, glassy eyes - when the corpse had moved - twitched, despite bearing mortal hurts; groaned, for all that it drew no breath; sat up, thick blood oozing sluggish from grievous wounds.

His panicked flight only ended when he'd made it all the way back home again.
A deep breath as of one abruptly waking sees the boy drawn back from such thoughts, sitting up in his saddle to peer down the road, thin fingers stretching as if to offer Many-Fights a reassuring touch, for all that he can't reach from his current perch. A glance back confirms that the rusty mattock is still well-secured with the pony's pack, and nods with more conviction than he really felt at the Governor's words.

"W-what d-do, do you th-think we'll f-find, ser?"

[Glenn]

Two fingers to his collarbone.

A scar replenished by his own hand each and every night. The cost of training with the mad drowess was becoming mad yourself. Ariane's return had pulled him back from the brink there. Perhaps that's why he held so little resentment for what happened in Underdark. She'd saved him once, after all. What more could someone, even a prized, treasured student expect in good faith?

It was a tattoo now, a grisly thing that occasionally poked up from underneath a collar, black and mangled, a scar. There was a slight bump to it, texture, more so than their ought to be but it was a reassuring thing. So long as it was there, Burnie knew he was awake. If it was gone, then he was sleeping. The strange creature Valgar had taught him to protect his dreams, a year's worth of lessons as the being marched slowly towards death's door.

"Whatever we face, Cherny," the Governor spoke, focused, even reassuring, "we do so with open eyes." They would be awake for it, or aware if they were drawn into a dream, but the boy had not yet been awakened to just why they were there. There would be little coddling from here on in as Burnie continued to ride on, slowly, to their ever-nearer destination. "Cameron Holbrook, the Dreamwaker, the being who sent you that dream. I have reason to believe that he was a carpenter, hundreds of years ago, that he was hung upon that tree before us for a crime he did not commit." Perhaps his voice would soften, just a little, an attempt to coddle in execution when he had no desire to do so in theory. "I have reason to believe he was buried here. When fighting things beyond our Ken, Cherny, the only two weapons that truly matter are belief and truth. We're here to arm ourselves with the latter."

[Cherny]

Open eyes, and Cherny's are certainly wide enough to qualify as the Governor recounts the bare bones of the tale, shrugging his coat collar up higher about his ears. There are gaps, of course, empty spaces which are easy enough to fill in with guesses or speculation. Previous mention of a more powerful creator that had... what, changed, shaped the dead carpenter into something else. Something to toy with the people of Myrken Wood, to fill their dreams with fear and violence and fire.

The Governor's initial mention of digging, of bringing tools and the hound's broad paws, began to make sense.

"W-we're h-here to find b-bones." Turning his head to explain to Many-Fights, the reason for their being here. "Old b-bones of a b-bad man." Or once-man, perhaps. Who could say what he was now?

The boy does his best to sit up straighter, for all that the pony shifts and stirs uneasily beneath him, for all that there's a growing sense of being watched. Puting on a front to show that he wasn't afraid, demonstrating to both the Governor and to Many-Fights that he was fit for the task ahead.

"Sh-shall we w-walk from here, s-ser?" Faintly anxious to descend from the saddle, already leaning to see how he might best climb down. Venturing into the unknown, he'd feel safer with the ground beneath his feet and his friend close by his side.

[catch]

Cherny-beast reached, and it was comfort enough for Many-Fights, the gesture taken for the deed. He did not want to make the pony act foolishly, so that Cherny might be hurt. He paces alongside, therefore, nether running to nor fro, but sticking close, a mixing of guard and relief to find himself amidst a pack that may help protect, and for him to protect.

Bones. Strange. Many-Fights twists his head up, on his short neck, and waddles onward as he gazes at Cherny, plush brows burrowing together. WHY BAD-MAN BONES? he asks, and the folly of running about as Glenn was going over all this was lost on him. Besides, he found himself entirely ignoring Glenn Burnie, all the words running through his brain with no filter to still them. He spoke so much, and Many-Fights was not a patient dog. He was a fighter, at his very core, and though he could think for himself, he still preferred action to speech.

[Glenn]

"We're here to find truth." It was repetition of a sort, yes, and more than that a little misleading, but that was how the Governor saw this. The details didn't matter. They searched for a weapon; whether that weapon was a sword or a bow or a pointed stick did not matter much; whether it was forbidden or profane did not matter. All that mattered was that they needed it and that they would obtain it. It would, of course, be preferable to shield Cherny from the worst of it in the process. "Yes, on foot then." He started to get off of the horse, taking the pack with excavation gear. The horse and pony were left with their handler as they moved on.

"Many-Fights, under this tree are the bones. Can you find them?" As simple as that. Before he'd been mainly talking to Cherny allowing the beasts to listen if he wanted. Now, though, he spoke to the dog. If he asked again for an explanation, he'd get it. Otherwise, it was just the request. There would be one for the boy too. "Cherny, I'd like for you to keep your eyes open for anything out of the ordinary." They were defiling a grave after all, even in the middle of nowhere. It was a grave laden with magic. Best to have a lookout.

[Cherny]

It takes some assistance from Nebuchadnezzar for the boy to dismount without falling, but after a precarious descent he finds himself with solid earth beneath his feet once more.

Cherny's conversations with Many-Fights have unknowingly provided with a useful skill - that of being concise, training him to pare thoughts down to their essentials, such that they might be explained clearly enough for the hound to grasp; not that his friend is stupid, no, but that he has little interest in hearing words for their own sake. Words are tools, ways to make oneself understood, and too many words are often as unhelpful as too few. Similarly, such abstracts as truth are vague and nebulous for a beast still learning to think in terms beyond the immediately concrete.

"H-he's a b-bad man who d-died a long t-time ago. B-but he sends p-people bad dreams, even though he's d-dead. F-fire dreams."

Many-Fights would know the significance of those words; a dream of fire and pain. It had stuck with the boy, a vision of horrific loss.

"S-so we're g-going to, to d-dig up his b-bones and make h-him stop." Somehow. It made as much sense as a dead man who tormented the dreams of the living, anyway. The boy glances to the Governor for confirmation that this is the essence of the plan, or as much of it as the hound needs to understand. He nods at Burnie's instruction, only briefly craning his neck to see the gnarled branches clawing far overhead, before his attention turns to the wintery woods around them. An absent scrub of thin fingers for Many-Fights' broad skull, a moment taken to retrieve the mattock from where it'd been stowed, and he's ready. Both hands grip the haft of the heavy implement as if to wield it like a club, for all that he has to rest it over his shoulder to carry it.

As ready as he'll ever be.

[catch]

It is good to have Cherny-beast off of the hoof-beast. It is good, and he sidles his body tightly against the boy. He is not afraid, no, but he is uneasy, and as the boy would stroke his friend, he would feel the tight ridges of spiked fur that stood up, all along the dog's spine. He turns his eyes to Glenn, as he made his request, and then he twists his broad head, on it's short neck, to regard Cherny.

Fire-dreams. He had no such dreams, but Cherny had ran to him, had thrown his arms about him, had wept into his neck and told him in broken-words. He had had, then, to explain the meaning of tears, and a subtle shift in Many-Fights' mood came about, his fur smoothing, his confidence returning as twinkle of brightness in his muddy eyes, brightness that bore visible the flashes of thought that came to him.

Oh yes. To stop the Cherny-beast tears, Many-Fights would tear apart many bones. He would hurt the bones that brought such sadness and hurt to his boy.

That is how he reasons it; not in lofty ideals, or out of a desire to bring use and worth to himself in the greater scheme of Glenn-man plans. But it is to protect his boy.

At once, the hound says not another word, but puts his muzzle to the ground, his skin enveloping his face in wrinkles and folds. He is not a hunting-dog, yet even his dull nose was far sharper than most, and he snuffled and snorted his way in the icy loam and rotten last-year's needles. And he did not rely on his nose alone. He stretched his mind to it's fullest for feels.

[Kylerryth]

Nothing extraordinary happened when Many-Fights searched for the bones with his nose alone. But beneath the subtle blend of icy loam, rotting leaves and the cool moisture of the air laid something else, something older, deeper, darker. When Many-Fights reached out with senses beyond the physical, however--

There, the oak; it stood as before, but everything had changed--had been changed.

Veins of molten gold covered the trunk, pulsed in the boughs, shone like polished jewelry on the smallest branches. The bark, now an unnatural, rich black, glistened as if coated in a thick liquid substance. The dark, oleaginous stuff did not drip from the tree, nor did it seem produced by the tree. No; no--upon closer inspection, they would realize it oozed from the earth underneath the roots, that the roots themselves throbbed, and...

... and a human hand, slick with the lustrous goo, shot out of the trunk several paces above their heads; planted itself against the trunk and, with obvious strain, pushed; and then emerged a head, faceless and sexless, then neck and shoulders, and finally the other arm. The metallic veins crept into this newborn horror, creating a tracery that rivaled the most intricate of laces, until they reached where its facial features should have been. Here they solidified, shaping themselves into an angular, swept-back helmet.

Behind the creature, the tree-veins suddenly resembled a pair of wings, spread and brilliant, alive and terrible.

It straightened from the hips, arching itself back to regard them, and with a voice that sounded akin to rusted pots and pans being dragged across a dry creek bed, asked: "Why have you come to this place?"

[Glenn]

And this is what Glenn Burnie brings a child into?

Well, yes, this is exactly what Glenn Burnie brings a child into. None too soon, either. The boy was developing positively unhealthy notions about life, some of which were exactly what the Governor wanted for the youth of Myrken, but obviously, they weren't quite ready to pass over that bridge yet. Times of transition were so tough upon everyone.

The smile upon the once-mapmaker's face would be slight, constrained, controlled. "Truth, of course. You're the sort that tends to come to us. I thought we'd be forward-thinking and return the favor. Cherny, behind me, if you please; Many-Fights, between us." Protect him. It was a notion that the dog would very likely understand without further explanation.

"It's a little jejune, Cameron, don't you think? Haunting your own grave. Our dearest Agony, upon coming into her first bits of hard owned money through Janeiro, bought herself a tiny shack in town surrounded by the scent of fishmongers and filth. It's not much, but it's a step up from this. I purchased it shortly after she moved up to something better. I gave Kylerryth a gift. There's no reason I can't be fair to both sides."

[Cherny]

It's an abrupt change, a sudden and silent shifting from this to that, so the boy doesn't immediately notice the difference in the tree - dark eyes watching the barren woodlands around them, glancing to Many-Fights, then to another patch of undergrowth, and it's only when he looks back that he blinks, frowns uncertainly at a tree slicked with unknown filth and wrapped in gleaming threads and filaments. He takes a half-step towards the tree, as much to stand closer to the hound, peering at the transfigured oak.

He's close enough that the sudden emergence of a hand from the trunk above him, the struggling motions and small wet sounds, has him croaking in hoarse alarm and hopping a handful of steps back, mattock hefted in readiness to swing for all that his arms tremble with the weight of it.

He's not sure what he'd expected - some translucent haunt, perhaps, or worm-riddled bones clattering to life, or any other figment from a hundred hackneyed ghost stories. They'd never mentioned anything like this gilded apparition, and he watches with wide eyes and mouth agape as it wrenches itself from the corrupted bark.

The Governor's command is a welcome intrusion upon this fearful display, and the boy has no qualms about letting Glenn Burnie - knowledgeable, erudite, assured - stand first before the tree-thing and speak. He backs away from the tree and its inhabitant, stumbling a little on the uneven leaf-mould, and once safely in the Governor's shadow a thin hand pries away from the mattock's haft to beckon hurriedly to Many-Fights; not only for the reassurance the great dog's presence would bring, but to see him out of reach of that gold-woven creature.

[catch]

The human-horror of a thing was not that a dog, a dog bred and trained time and time over for fighting. It was so far outside his experience, this emergence, that he stood fearlessly before it, his ruff standing straight-out, and trailing a line down his spine. Gold-threaded reminded him of the Zilliah, and the hurts he and Cherny-beast had endured from gold tendrils, and that caused his lip to lift over his teeth. He will take one step back, another; he shall smell the air, smelling for the bad, and he can feel a thrill of pride at his Cherny, who lifts his man-tool as a weapon, bearing his own little fangs at this thing.

Once he is perfectly between the Glenn-Man and Cherny-beast, Many-Fights will stand, glowering, alert, and never shall his lip straighten back over his teeth. He waits, every fighter's-nerve in him ready.

[Kylerryth]

"Kylerryth. Hrm," the creature issued, rolling back its shoulders and drumming its long fingers against the trunk. The glowing, glistening boughs behind it shuddered. "This explains why you have come. More so than you might know.

"Yes, I am Cameron," it confirmed, leaning forward. "But I am not the one you seek. I am a fragment, a vestige of the man who died here some centuries past. Regardless, I will perish when you complete your task. Such is my destiny."

For a moment the golden veins pulsed brighter, a defiant contrast to the pervading black sludge.

"I know, however, what you seek. You have come for the bones. They are here," and to punctuate its words the creature pointed at the earth directly beneath itself.

"You must not destroy them," it continued, pushing itself upright again. "Destruction will not bring you succor; for remember, the Cameron you seek is an architect of dreams, himself a dreamer.

"You must not destroy them," it said--and now the trio would feel the subtle pressure they experienced earlier, the careful weighing and measurement of their constitution. "You must dig them up, and you must bear them to the dream."

[Glenn]

"Of course." The brave governor walked forward three steps, towards the being. He stood tall, ready to protect his people, ready to make whatever sacrifice needed for Myrken Wood. He would find a way to dream again, would carry those bones into the dream with him as others sleep with knives. He would keep them by his side every night, between him and his Lady so that the protective aegis of their presence could crush the dreams once and for all.

Except for he wasn't about to do that at all, was he? "Or maybe not.

"There are three possibilities here, ghoul. The first is that you are a vestige, a portion of Holbrook who was left behind. You are genuine with your desires and wish to see yourself reunited with him, which would bring the two of you to unity and peace. You might be a part of his morality that was left behind." One finger ticked up just like that.

"The second possibility is that you are a tool left behind by Kylerryth. Something to mislay us into doing his bidding. He cannot interfere directly but he could, perhaps, set you here so that we were to take the bones into the dream. Of course, if we wish to be free of Holbrook, then this might dovetail with our plans. Considering he's the one who led us here, this is rather likely." A second finger ticked up.

"And then the third possibility is that you are a tool left behind by Holbrook himself, a way to make sure people do not destroy the bones but instead bring them into the dream. For all we know that may have been his ultimate goal in the first place, to drive people to do what he could not himself." A third finger.

Now Burnie was smiling just a little. "It's funny though. Everything you say assumes something. It's an easy assumption, but one that I'm not sure he, you, nor the being that you have become should rightly assume. Can you guess what it is?"