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

Fourth Day of the Eleventh Month 293 AC

Near the Orange Shore, Summer Sea

Mournful songs filled the waters, soft and clear the voices of the children of the sea. For every joy there was sorrow below, for every finding a parting there must be. The stone flowed together under the hands of the priests, the mouth of the sacred cave sealed as though it was never there. Blood red coral they grew to mark the way, stinging sea urchins to keep away the Enemy's thralls. If the masters found, it the sanctum would be lost. This they all knew, youngest to oldest, this was the way. Though perhaps another was opening...

As they swam north towards the shore, Breath Taker let the currents wash away his sorrow and leave only the memory, as was the way of the Lord of the Waters. Mayhap in time his people would return here to reclaim the holy place and others he had helped seal, or perhaps they would delve new ones into the rock and build them towards the sky. The world was moving swift as a riptide, foaming and bloody against which none could swim, yet the calm would come again.

"Hey look, it's a shore hunt!" a young bubbling voice called out in excitement, one of the young tritons taken to be an apprentice under the priests of the Swordfish Tribe. "Have you ever seen a shore hunt, Elder One?"

"No," that I have not, Breath Taker replied gently. "There are no Great Singers in Northern waters near the lands of the Dragon. Spare me the 'elder one', please child, my bones ache enough without the reminder," he added, seeing that the boy's teacher was about to speak some rebuke to him, presumably for interrupting Breath Taker's thoughts. Truth be told, he had found over the years that those who were most troubled by the interruptions of youth did not have that much wisdom to dispense with to begin with, but it was hardly his place to say so now.

As the scent of blood grew thicker in the water and the sounds of gnashing teeth and thrashing flesh rippled through the water, Blight's Bane and his escort instinctively gripped their spears tighter, but the locals were just as much at ease as the boy, if not as exuberant. Breath Taker watched with interest as the Great Singers of the tribe raced through the shallows, hunting brown-furred beasts that came down from the shore to graze. One more hunt before they all departed back towards Sorcerer's Deep, a caravan three tribes strong. Almost as many as his own people.



Thirtieth Day of the Eleventh Month 293 AC

Narrow Sea, Approaching Sorcerer's Deep

There were fewer whales to be seen among the travelers as they made their way through waters surrounding the scattering of tiny islets that marked the southern edge of the Stepstones, and those that survived bore fresh scars of sahuagin tooth and ulat-kini spear, but both they and their masters had acquitted themselves well against the attacks and the only leviathan they had to face had been already wounded, half its inky black eyes torn from its misshapen visage before Blight's Bane, Breath Taker, and the local champions had approached it. Yet even as he gave the horror whatever peace it could find by the caress of the Last Lament, he could not help but wonder what could have wounded the monster so and where now did it swim.

"It will be good to be back home where it's safe. Even better for all the artisans who came to live in the Shallow City this moon-turn," Blight's Bane interrupted his musings.

"Even if it is only for a few days before we head back out?" the priest asked. Even if we have to cross deep water to reach the tribes that have settled near the Islands of Summer? the tone said what he would not speak aloud. Their next journey would be more dangerous by far than this one. Not so much in getting there, one of the Dragon King's sorcerers could carry them to the trader's enclave in the north of the islands, but in returning with hopefully a great host of another three tribes.

"Even then, all the more a journey that needs doing," the warrior replied firmly.

Calling Out To More Tribes Complete (Southern Coast of Essos)


OOC: Those are amphibious sloths hunted by prehistoric toothed whales. I figured I could get away with a bit more archaic bio-diversity on places we know basically nothing about from canon like the Orange Shore. Not yet edited.

Soldiers:

• 92 Triton Whale Riders [Triton Fighter 5]
• 350 Triton Dolphin Riders [Triton Fighter 2]
• 321 Triton Dolphin Scouts [Triton Ranger 2]
• 13 Priests of the Merling King [Triton Cleric 5]
• 38 Acolytes of the Merling King [Triton Cleric 2]

Camp Followers: 8,015 Tritons (2,500 can be called up as Triton Militia)