A Monster Life

92 - Trouble on the Horizons

The village was nothing out of the ordinary with simple cottages spread out over an area surrounded by crop fields and a low fence, mainly for decoration than any form of defence, and all that surrounded by a sparse forest. Ulric was surprised to see crops growing under the misty circumstances, but they looked like hardier versions to him. 'You can still grow things here even with less light?'

Sinjin glanced over the fields. 'These crops are tougher and smaller than the usual ones and can even grow slowly during the cold season, but they're very invigorating.'

Elzbieta noticed an occasional villager hurrying from home to home. 'Everyone's staying inside?'

'Yes. We're only going outside if we really need to now.'

Sinjin stopped at the larger common house in the middle of the village and turned to Farok. 'Can you bring our village elder?'

The man hurried away without a word, and Sinjin led the party and the rest of his men inside. There were no other patrons, and the innkeeper appeared from the back to see who had come. 'Travellers?' the bald and bearded man in his sixties asked when he saw the strangers, thinking it had been a long time since he'd seen the rare dragon or harpy in his youth and early adventuring career.

'We have some explaining to do to them, Zarek. Bring out some drinks.'

'Sure.' Zarek said, and returned to the back.

Drinks were served and Farok returned with a woman around the same age as Zarek and similar hard features in her face. She needed a moment to overcome her disbelief at the presence of some of the members of the visiting party even after Farok had told her, then went up to them with more confidence. 'I'd say welcome to Ponpotr, were it not that it's not safe here now.' she said and sat down at the table with the party. 'I'm Tameta, the village elder.'

Iphigenia introduced everyone again, and asked the obvious question. 'What is happening here?'

Tameta leaned forward on the table. 'Some time ago, one of us disappeared. We went looking all over but the only thing we found were his footsteps going everywhere in a small area and what looked like marks of digging with fingers into the ground. No other sign of him anywhere, nor even tracks of a predator that might have killed him. Then a few days later, another one of us vanished, a young woman who went out to hunt, and we only found multiple cuts on a couple of trees and her dagger planted in one of them. It had been done with a lot of force because it stuck in deep.' She looked over everyone at the table. 'Then one day one of our boys heard screaming in terror at a short distance from here, and spotted a black shadow enveloping one of our men laying on the ground. He faded into the shadow and disappeared like the others. The boy ran home in shock and told us. Since then we went outside only in groups and a few of us have spotted the shadow briefly before it vanished out of view. We thought that would discourage the shadow from attacking us for long enough and leave, but it's still here, and now even people inside the village have begun disappearing.'

Valdys checked the library for information while the woman talked, but only came up with generic malicious spirits. 'You found no prints of strange animals, or heard or even smelled anything?'

Tameta shook her head. 'We've only seen it as a shadow in the mist.'

Zarek grumbled when he placed a full jar of wine on the table. 'I still say Tatum has something to do with it.'

Tameta sat back. 'Brother, just because he's a wizard doesn't mean he's involved in anything out of the ordinary. He even tried to trap it.'

'You have a wizard in the village?' asked Valdys.

'He lives outside of it to avoid mishaps from affecting us.' Tameta said, and threw Zarek a cold glance before he could make a remark.

Valdys looked at Ulric. 'I suggest we talk to him and have a look around the area. Maybe we'll spot something no one else has.'