The Clearing of the Inn

What follows is an excerpt from Valorton: An Extensive History by Erdique Boshaman featuring commentary on a portion of the Peregrine Chronicles. Originally compiled by Vederuun the Collector, the first depiction of combat in the Chronicles has been annotated by Boshaman with modern insights.

While Boshaman does not propose that the Peregrine Chronicles are a valid historic record, his book, currently available in an attractive, leather-bound edition for your library in Valorton's stores of higher character, does propose why the Chronicles deserve academic attention.

One of the earliest salvaged portions of the Chronicles describes a sortie into the so-called Dark Woods at the service of a Professor Winsome Landy.

We met her at the Stonehill, anxious and trembling. The Professor Winsome Landy claimed that she had been summoned by her colleagues to help extract a discovery from an excavation, and to use a provided purse of gold to rally and bring assistants to aid with the effort. Presumably, so excited was she to learn of the mysterious discovery only hinted at by their correspondence that she visited the site before assembling her party.

She lamented that she balked when faced by the screams of torment that emanated from the site of their discovery. A crypt, she said. A woman of learning and inaction, of dependence on cities and order, on the strength of others, she fled, leaving her associates to their own devices, but bringing a burden of guilt. I was unsurprised by her weakness.

However, her willingness to return to the site and subject of her terror earned my…

The text is devastatingly water damaged at this point, but continues, down-page.

...out of the Tempered Vale on foot with escort pay agreed at five hundred pieces of gold as negotiated between she and the Kender, Norry.

Scholars generally agree, supported by adequately convincing archaeological evidence, that a small outpost was located just outside the walls of today's Valorton, called “Tempered Vale,” during a portion of the Premedial Frontier Period of this region's history.

There is less scholastic agreement regarding the character, “Norry,” likely as fictional as Peregrine. Some Chronicle Authentists believe this to be a reference to the younger manifestation of folk legend, “Noribold the Quick,” whose horrendous demise is used to this day to scare children into appropriate behaviours. This uncertain connection is discussed in more detail, with alternative interpretations, later in this book.

Some few miles east from where we joined the main trail south of the Dark Wood, we came upon a stone inn, though its use as an inn had ended some time ago. It was partially destroyed by fire. A stable, perhaps, built off the side of the structure, had been razed to the ground. A horse carcass, slaughtered and half-eaten, lay in the tall grass near the entrance. My first instinct was that the horse fell to wolves, but the bites were too large and misshapen by my reckoning.

Here is another case for the Peregrine Chronicles being a work of fiction, since no contemporary construction or excavation has ever encountered the ruins of this inn. Not a single footing has been found. If it had existed, at least some fraction of stone remnants would sit along the Via Valor as Peregrine describes.

The Polarite, Magnanimus, and I peered through the main doors to witness the carnage inside as the others stood back. Six gruesome man-beasts, bipeds with blood-matted fur and snarling snouts reveled in the flesh of corpses strewn about the floor. Smashed and toppled furniture, scattered to the corners of the room, played quiet audience to the raucous performance.

Who could be meant in this excerpt but Magnanimus the Worthy, Apostle of Polaris? Folk fiction is made complete and relevant by invoking the names of true figures in history. In the case of the Chronicles, the name of the undisputed vanguard of Polaris, may he be eleven times blessed, is invoked here and many times more after this. This is a particularly gauche choice on the part of the Chronicles' author who surely hoped to improve his fiction's appeal by capitalising on the name of a local personality and taking the name of dread Polaris in vain.

A tingle on the back of my neck accompanied the slamming of a door along the west wall, surely the act of the Tiefling, Aramis, in a bid to distract the creatures. Instead, the noise lifted them from their carnal revery and drew their attention to their living audience. In this way, a trial of worth was gifted to me.

Three of the mongrel men leapt at the Polarite and I, though we stood ready for them. I entangled one in a net, rendering it feeble, before turning my glaive on its vicious companion. Beside me, Magnanimus hacked and stabbed at my captured prize, joined by Norry's rapier which seemed to dart out from between my legs like a serpent's tongue. The cajoling of the mangy leader could not improve their onslaught against me. The Polarite received some solid blows from the third, insatiable beast and withdrew from the fray to regain his nerve.

A moment of distraction on my part allowed me to be grazed by an arrow, cowardly shot by a blood-soaked dog-beast from deeper within the inn. My rage engulfed me as I begged my ancestors to bear witness to my glorious fury, to watch me strike terror in the hearts of these sanguinated scourges as I reaped their lives. I decapitated one of the three brave or foolish enough to approach us before advancing on the coward with the bow.

Norry, too, lept forward. Undoubtedly inspired by my righteous fury, he faced the caitiff leader alone. He bounded across the floor, amidst arrows singing and black and red eldrich energies crackling through the air from our companions outside. He thrust into the beast and it snarled ferociously before biting and hacking in return. I came to his aid and together we ended its breaths in a pitiful yelp.

I finally turned on the last curr. Moments before, it had been bathing in the blood of the weak, but now its terror was so complete that it fled my wrath. I gave chase, carving into it with my glaive as it began to make its escape through the west door. Magnanimus appeared beside me with a crossbow, and the last of the dog-men died with a bolt in its back. Laughter poured out of me as I clapped the heaving Magnanimus on the shoulder and basked in our bloody glory.

The carnage was great, but the plunder was sparse. It was in an office at the top of this stout tower that Aramis and I found, in a desk, an amulet adorned with a green gem. By Aramis' word it is a charm that will bring good health. I have since taken to wearing it.