A Sword Without a Hilt: A Song of Ice and Fire/D&D 3.5 Crossover

Twenty-Ninth Day of the Eighth Month 293 AC

Soft Strider is more than glad to join you in speaking to Wyl after hearing what you had gleaned of the man's tale for all she knows more of Redcaps than most. "He is strong of will, stronger perhaps then he knows to have held to his vows after such a changing of his very soul," the Singer sighs. "A warrior is not whom I would have chosen for the first to come among us and join his voice to the Song, but I see the same chance you do, Dragon King. This man who fears death and yet who refuses to wear the bloody shroud of his new form in full, he might find more contentment between the brief span of mortal years and cruel eternity bound to an unchanging tale."

"If he does not seem fitting to you then you may of course refuse him," you assure her.

"The first of any new thing always seems unfitting, for it has not yet had the time to wear smooth its place in the order of things," she replies. "Better that his begin with kindness than cold reasoning of one thing against another."

Following directions whispered by passing unseen false ravens you find Wyl in an armorer's shop. Haryl and Sons clearly shows its Tyroshi origins in the fanciful helms peering from the windows, some like the heads of eagles, others hounds, even one modeled after the face of a serpent-man trailing green silk like a cobra's hood. Yet the steel is all wrought at Everfire Dale and hardened by sorcery. So is the glass for that matter or this Haryl would not have dared to have such tall windows to display his craft.

Though Soft Strider is clearly impressed, perhaps even a touch curious, she chooses to stay outside, ill at ease in a place of iron-craft.

Inside suits of chain clink faintly in an errant breeze and breastplates gleam by mage-fire, likely the work of some phoenix trading in his or her services. Even the kindly firebirds are not without some need for coin after all.

It is there, looking up at a locked display containing an enchanted axe, that you find what looks at first glance to be just a man in a red cap, stooped by age yet still broad of shoulder, his chain shirt hanging to his knees. Yet to your eyes it is clear that what weighs upon him is not the passing of mortal years, but something darker, crueler, and far more implacable—the cap, the weight of blood upon it, the expectation of a tale half-told.

"Wyl of Bear Island?" you ask softly.

Shadows of steel race across his features as fingers twitch upon the hilt of his axe, eager for battle, but he does not draw it forth. "Who wants to know?" he asks in a faintly quarrelsome voice.

Seeing no reason to be coy, you introduce yourself in full and invite him to step out for a moment.

Though clearly daunted Wyl does his best not to show it, mumbling something about how you should probably be talking to Walter, seeing as he's the highborn and the one who knows how to talk to kings.

"A poor king I would be were I insulted by plain-speaking good man," you answer with a smile.

Out in the light and open air, away from the sight of edged steel and workings of war and bloodshed, Wyl seems more at ease with himself, if not precisely the circumstances he finds himself. The company of a king leaves him tongue-tied enough, but upon seeing Soft Strider he is left truly speechless... though on the balance it might have been her offer. It is one thing to see the stuff of children's tales come to life and quite another to be offered the chance to become one.

"I... uh... I've got family up in Bear Island, and I was hoping to send them a bit of silver from here and there. If I become a... er... Singer, would I still be able to do that? Odd says the Children didn't much care for gold and silver, so..."

"We did not trade in gold and silver because we did not mine," Soft Strider corrects him. "Yet we still saw the worth of trade, in lore, in food and beasts. Though our lives may seem slow and strange to mortal men we love and sorrow even as you do." She pauses a long moment, staring into his eyes. "Do not fear that you will forget your kindred."

That is when you discover that Redcaps weep tears of blood. Wyl can only nod mutely, grasping for the offer as a drowning man does a rope.

What do you do next?

[] Wait until Wyl's transformation before approaching the others

[] Seek out one of the other visitors from Bear Island
-[] Write in approach

[] Write in

OOC: Remember, you can also send Companions to do the talking if you want. Also, a question—do you guys think you can write up Team Bear's Character sheets today, or should I run Snake vs Arcanum as I do them myself?