SKT: Session 30: Oracles and Trials of the All-Father

Session XXX — The Eye’s Reckoning

The heroes, still brimming with the ache of battle, debated their course: a frozen door barred with frost’s spite, or a stairway curling upward like a beckoning finger. Swifter seemed the climb, so up they went, steps echoing in the vast, cold silence. There they beheld a statue — a Cloud Giant caught mid-incantation — and beyond, a barracks hallway long-abandoned.   Juniper’s eyes, touched with the magic of sight beyond sight, spied what mundane gaze could not: a bag tucked away in a quiet room. From within tumbled trinkets and baubles, but also horrors — three dwarven heads, grim trophies of some long-forgotten slaughter, and a shard alive with icy magic: the Ise Rune. Perhaps, they thought, this was the key to the mist-veiled arch they had found before. Harshnag, ever the towering ally, lifted Madra high to reach the mithral-inlaid rune above the arch. Madra’s touch brought no change — the portal remained mute. So, with frost still on their minds, they turned to the frozen door.   With a grunt and a crash, Harshnag shattered it with his mighty shoulder. Beyond lay a feast hall for giants — long tables like oaken roads, pillars like trees of stone. Yet it was no banquet that greeted them, but a predator. From shadow and frost came the Remorhaz, scales shimmering with heat, hunger burning in its alien eyes.   It struck with terrible swiftness, seizing Juniper in its furnace-hot jaws. Unconscious she fell, and the beast readied to make her its meal — but Uvar’s divine grace wove life back into her. Awakened in the beast’s maw, she conjured her magic, vanishing in a shimmer before its teeth could claim her anew. From afar, Azure and his conjured ally rained down sorcerous strikes; up close, Madra and Thyme struck steel to flesh. Harshnag joined the fray, and together they drove the beast back, toppling it from a giant’s table. Madra, though clamped in its jaws, drove his pike clean through its skull, ending its hunger forever.   Their search of the hall uncovered a giant’s steel greataxe, seemingly a match for the statue of Thrym. Madra and Thyme strained to lift it, but to no avail — Harshnag, of course, bore it as easily as a woodsman bears a twig. Returning toward the main hall, Madra and Thyme found a table slick with blood and grease, the stench thick enough to choke a Troll. In what can only be described as dwarven genius (or folly), Thyme tasted a morsel. Only her dwarven resistance to poison spared her from an immediate and ugly death.   The puzzle of weapons and runes vexed them still — no arrangement seemed to stir the portal. So, turning north, they recalled the suspicious hallway. Harshnag volunteered to lead, the others following. At first, the air shimmered but brought no harm. Then Thyme stepped forward — and the trap sprang. A boulder, vast as a cottage, phased from the wall and thundered toward them, while stone barriers sealed the exits. Harshnag and Azure leapt aside; Uvar and Thyme were crushed beneath its merciless weight. With frantic hands, Harshnag and Azure pulled them back from death’s icy fingers. As they recovered, a stone statue at the hall’s end came to life, calmly rolling the boulder back to its lair before all returned to stillness.   Back in the main hall, they pieced the puzzle at last: each giant statue bore a weapon, each weapon tied to a mithral rune above the archway. Harshnag lifted the steel greataxe, touched it to the Ise Rune — and with a thunderous crack, the portal awoke.   Through they stepped into a hexagonal chamber, its walls rising high to meet at a cold-lit apex. In each corner stood a statue of a giant bearing an iron lantern, each lantern aglow with magical light. In the center lay a giant’s frost-preserved corpse, beside a morningstar frozen in rime. From the body’s chill rose a Ghost — Eigeron by name, slain by his father Blagothkus.   The spectral son told them he was no oracle, but the chamber itself would answer six questions a day if they remained within the runed circle.  

First Day’s Questions:

1. Where is the Storm King? — “Unknown.”
2. How do we solve the giant problem? — “Find a magic conch of the storm giant king, Hekaton. Use it to visit Hekaton’s court. Root out the evil therein.”
3. Do the giant leaders have possession of the conches? — “Yes.”
4. What are the positions of the giant leaders? — A trial was demanded: the heroes must retrieve lost giant relics buried beneath the Uthgardt barbarians’ mounds.
5. Who is Uvar? — The answer: prove yourself through the quest.
6. How do I stop the other voices? — Juniper was told: eradicate the other personalities, though doing so would end the Juniper they know.

  Harshnag marked a map of the Uthgardt mounds for them.

 

Second Day’s Questions:

1. Who is behind King Hekaton’s disappearance? — “His elder daughters, Mirran and Nym.”
2. Who is truly behind everything? — “No. They are pawns of a much greater evil named Iymrith — a Blue Dragon in the guise of a storm giant.”
3. Can Lycanthropy be controlled? — “Yes.”

  Their questions spent, the party prepared to leave. Harshnag vowed to stay and protect the Oracle. Farewells were said, boots turned toward the cold road.   But the road was not what came. Above, a strange ship descended — a sleigh-runnered vessel held aloft by a massive red balloon. Two fifty-foot ladders fell, and Uvar climbed first. At the top, he met eight cultists — dragon-cloaked servants of the Cult of the Dragon, foes not long past.   Yet they bore no weapons — only words. “We come on behalf of Klauth, the Great Dragon of the North!” they cried. “He offers you this vessel and our service to speed you across his realm. The Ordning is broken, the giants divided. Slay their leaders, and when your task is done, seek Klauth in his hidden vale to claim your reward.”   Thus, with wind in their hair and Klauth’s shadow upon their path, the heroes took to the skies.