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Post by fairies wear boots 👢 on Nov 23, 2023 1:14:20 GMT -5
ACT I.
Wilcume, brave hæleþas, to Bryten..
Your fæderas spoke Englisċ, and provided for you and your folc in an honest fashion - tilling the soil, fishing the coasts, or hunting in the wood. Your fate, however, has bade otherwise for you.
When your eldest fōrefæderas walked the earth, the days were long, the winters brief, and the dēor plentiful; Yng was lord and the cāseras fought amongst themselves in the sūþ; Bældæġ the golden lived still, and the treasure of the gods remained out of mortal hands. Ages passed, and now the treasure is long lost, and Ætla has descended upon the greatest of kingdoms, bringing with him blood and doom; chill winds from the norþ bring long winters and short summers, while the birthplaces of your ealdfæderas now lie beneath rising oceans.
So, then, you have left this world in which no bright future can be found; at the advice of kith and kin, you've taken to the whale-road - west to the island of the Brettas. They are a wealthy folc whom the Caesars have abandoned; in need of warriors willing to fight their battles for them, these Bret-wēalas have given land, refuge, and silver to those who hath sailed west before you.
Swearing oaths of fellowship together with others such as yourself, you've crewed a large scip called the Bircewyrm and landed upon the shores of the northern half of the island - what the Brettas call the Old North, separated by the river Hymbre from the rest of Bryten.
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Post by fairies wear boots 👢 on Nov 28, 2023 21:26:47 GMT -5
ᛋᚢᛗᚩᚱ
Summer
By way of the great sǣ you fourteen have come, taking the path advised by your kin, pausing at the horn of Cantland to trade supplies and words with the Eotas living upon the isle of Tanet. They tell you of their wigfruma Hengest and of the cyning of the Brettas, Wyrtgeorn. Giving you the names and descriptions of the best Englisċ-speaking ports along the expanse of the northern wetlands, they bid you good health and safe travels. You fourteen heroes continue northwards, seeking a settlement by the title of Daġeshām - north of the Hymbre, along the river Wyrne. A distant relative of one of you, Wignoþ, lives there, and presents a possible first contact in an otherwise unknown land.
After many grueling days of rowing and rowing and rowing, you have finally met a fisherman who knows of your "Daġeshām"; he points you further north, describing the rocky landmarks which dot the southern edge of the river Wyrne estuary.
Please introduce your characters and, if you desire, describe their journey or interact with the others.
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Post by Royal Joker on Dec 6, 2023 17:41:54 GMT -5
Aching hands and blisters. Not a day had gone by without it. It had gotten better with time as his callouses hardened, but Stanwulf's hands still got sore from the endless days of rowing. He was not a fisherman's son and thus not born to man a ship unlike some of his fellow companions. He had had to learn with time, patience and sheer tenacity. The first days had been awful, his hands bleeding and screaming with pain. The sea had offered no soothing, quite the opposite in fact. The lessons had been hard, but necessary.
Stanwulf was not one who liked to stand out among the fourteen. Long, blond hair and a thick moustache like any Angle, his most distinguishing feature was the ugly scar covering most of the left side of his face. When people jokingly asked if he had been mauled by a bear he merely shrugged and carried on with his business, letting the question hang in the air.
He looked up from his aching hands while some of the others talked with the fisherman, following their gazes northward. Britannia, the frontier of the mighty Romans. A land abandoned by its masters, a land where a wise man could make a name and a fortune for himself. Stanwulf smiled to himself and grabbed the oar again. The sooner they got to this Dagesham place, the better. At least they could probably find some half-decent sleeping quarters at the very least.
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Post by oznerol on Dec 18, 2023 10:10:53 GMT -5
The morning cold was getting to his bones. He came from lands more gentle to bone and flesh, where rivers and meadows held firm against the wake of winter. But such were fates, fickle, and he found himself far and beyond, beating waves in a boat that was not his, with men that were not for him to command. Aelfric had seen much on his life -he was already older than his father and grandfather both when they died. But they were fools and died a fool's death: a bad belly and a knife to the neck. None could be trusted. This he knew. Only a mother and a wife could be trusted, and the later only if she was of good spirit and uprising, unlike some wenches who he had met in times past: one, he killed, two more he loved and a third was a slave, of whomst nothing can or should be said.
He wrapped on his cloak, seeking to preserve the heat of his own flesh. The man smelled of leather, sweat, ale and iron, with a hint of something else, like grass, horse and a faint scent of a crude oil-made soap. The hands closed around the sword's scabbard, he seemed tense, and uneasy in company, but his mail of good iron and he wore jewel and embroidery around arms and on chest. It all seemed rather aged. Better times the warrior had witnessed and lived through, but now it seemed his heyday was gone. Still, looking proud, he grabbed the decorated scabbard firmly, and tried to seeks shelter among his worn furs. Looking ahead, he saw nothing, nothing worth mentioning. He had dreamed of fire and meat that night; could still taste the grease, the burned surface and the herbes.
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Post by fairies wear boots 👢 on Jan 11, 2024 0:44:00 GMT -5
An oarsman by the name of Earconbert howls with victory as the fisherman's news reaches his ears.
"So close! Row, row! We can get there 'fore eventide!"
Earconbert was loud and obnoxious, but friendly; even at the voyage's more grueling moments, he had been quite upbeat.
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