Dwarven Outpost.

"Can we trust it?" One of the dwarves asked as they all gathered and stared at the assortment of odds, ends, and quite literal trash deposited on the ground by the dreaded Haunter.

"Think it might be a trick?" Another asked warily as he nudged a bottle with his boot like it was a blasting charge.

"What'd be tha point?" Another asked.

"Has ta be a trick."

"But what kind?"

Forgrim pushed the voices of his kin to the background as he stared down at the pile of trash. Take a bottle, a bit of hair, some bits, and bury it, Forgrim thought as he recalled the instructions. He was wary. They all were. Surely that creature hadn't just simply offered them reprieve for nothing. Did it?

He reached down and plucked a thick Mason jar off the cold snowy ground and examined it. Barring the lesser quality that came from human craft, he couldn't see anything obviously sinister or malevolent. No runes nor sigils. No spellwork or glyphs. Nothing as far as his dwarven sight could tell. Just a simple plain jar. The other materials were much the same. The nails were in various degrees of rusted and bent. The twine and rope frayed and worn. But other than that, nothing.

Which made them all the more suspicious. Good things never just happen. Especially to them of late. Yet here was their visceral terror offering them a rather simple method to remove the curse placed upon them. It stunk. Reeked of trickery. Of plots and schemes.

Yet despite all that, Forgrim and some of the others took the chance. The chance that perhaps it really was that simple. The hope that things could return to a sense of normalcy. As normal as anything could get in this strange world.

He took out his knife and cut a tuft of hair from his head and placed it into the jar along with a handful of nails, rocks, and some pine needles from the nearby trees. He fastened a cloth cover over the opening with some frayed twine. He gave it a shake for good measure. Despite himself, he actually felt a bit calm, even hopeful.

"Bury it at tha furthest part of tha property." Forgrim mumbled as he looked around. About the furthest part of the outpost would be where the patch of ground was cleared, mostly, of snow and brush.

He shrugged and made his way over to a nearby bush, dug a hole as deep as his wrist, placed the jar within, and covered it with dirt and snow. He stood and waited. He could feel the eyes of the others upon him as they took waited for something to happen. Some sort of spectacle. A cry of anguish. Something. Anything, to show it worked. That their hopes, as tempered and flickering as they were, weren't in vain.

That was when he felt it. That something. A feeling he couldn't really describe as anything other than a tingle. A fizzle. Like a fuse. Except it was in his chest. He placed a hand over his chest with worry. Yet it ceased as he did so. Gone almost as soon as he realized it was there.

He felt... little better. Try as he might he just couldn't pinpoint to what that feeling had done, or if it was even real at all and not just his mind playing tricks upon him. Part of him wanted to dig up the jar. Just to see if perhaps it really worked. But a something in the back of his mind told him not to. Reminded him of the Haunter's words.

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"Keep it buried. Don't break it."

Forgrim might be many a thing, but a fool wasn't one, he hoped. He had heard plenty of horror tales among the humans of curse and hex dispelling that went horribly wrong because the cursed got too impatient. So he'll let this "cure" play out. So far, nothing bad has happened. At least he doesn't feel MORE cursed.

He turned his head as some of the others followed suit. Some of them did as he, a tuft of hair and whats-its before burying them at the edges of the outpost. A couple, however, decided to do something different. They urinated in the jars and threw in a couple of thick globs of phlegm for good measure. Threw the bits and bobs in. Sealed the jars with some of the metal lids. Then tossed them into the mud by the river.

Then they all stood stock still.

The air was tense as, like him, they all waited. Waited for something. Anything. Yet like him, few if any of them seemed to notice a change if there even was one. One of them scoffed before returning to work.

"Waste of time."

"Least it was somethin'." Another said.

Forgrim sighed himself before turning back to work. A small vague hope that all this needed was time to work it's magicks. Not like it could make it any worse, he thought.

-----

Daelish River Settlement.

Just as things started to look up, it started to snow, Murphy thought as he looked over his people. The handful of fires they started was doing a plenty enough job keeping the snow off their construction enough, and offered a temporary barrier to anything that might attack them during the night.

He and the others grouped around the center of the burgeoning settlement and ate together the bounty of the river. The muddy taste of the fish took some getting used too, but they were bothered. Sailors and seafolk. It'd take more than mucky tasting fish to take the wind from their sails.

Eoin, their sea priest, took fish bones and muck and threw them into a pot of river water, shook it, and tossed it out. He then peered into the dredgings remaining.

"What do the portents say, sea priest?"

The weathered old man mumbled and muttered to himself for a long moment. Leaving the rest of them to chew on their food and scraps of bone anxiously. He shook the pot once more and peered within.

"Change. Great change."

"Tell us somethin' we don't know." One of the settlers muttered before spitting a small fish bone into the fish to crackle and snap upon the flame.

"Do they say how? Or when?" Murphy asked.

"Blackness. Cold. Change. Survival." The sea priest muttered cryptically before staring up into the cold cloudy sky.

"Need a new sea priest. This one's too addled by salt and spray." One of the settlers grumbled before biting down on a fish head.

Murphy paid them no mind. Faith had faltered among the folk of Daele. Ever since the orcish invasion. Since coming to this world. He was sure some among them were even doubting the awesome power of the sea. But not he. He couldn't. If he didn't have faith in the very thing that provided for him and his kin since time began, then what else could he have faith in?

Eoin took a shuddering breath as his cloudy eyes went wide. Faint gasping could be heard from him as if he struggled to breathe. Then he sucked in gasping lungfuls and toppled to the side. Some of them rushed to assist but the weathered old sea priest waved them away.

"Change. Change."

Before anyone could ask him his meaning, he reached out to the pot and pulled out a clump of viscous black mud and fish bone.

"Blackness. Cold. Change. Survival."

Then he drew the mud upon himself. Caked himself in it. When he ran out of the stuff in the pot he ran to the river as if his life depended upon it. From the couple of nearby fires along the river, they saw him heaping veritable armfuls of muck and even throwing himself into the dark muddy bank. Anyway to cover himself.

Mutterings sounded around the folk as the sea priest slowly got up and returned to them. Mud and muck dripping and trailing behind him as he returned to the fire. Little could be seen underneath the mud save for his cloudy eyes.

"The mud. Protect us from the cold. Change us. Survive."

Then the sea priest took a seat and ate his meal, uncaring for the mud being caked upon it as he ate it down. Many stared at the muddy priest for a long moment. Then many of them got up, went to the river, and did the same as he. Murphy included. Wouldn't be the craziest thing they've done, he thought as he rubbed the cold black mud upon his tanned flesh.

But all seafolk were a touch superstitious. Each and every vessel had their own rituals and customs. Some so different that it was almost like stepping into another culture when boarding. Some shaved their heads clean. Others ate fish innards before casting off. Some threw coins into the depths before boarding.

So getting a little dirty? Aye, Murphy could do that easy enough. The only ones that seemed to find genuine enjoyment in this strange ritual were the smattering of children among them that took the calling with vigor, launching themselves into the thick mud and doing their best to decorate themselves in all matter of flotsam and debris. Cattails, reeds, fishbone and shellfish shells. Whatever they could find and making the most of the occasion. By the time they all returned to the fires, they looked like washed up dead. Yet it bothered none of them.

What's one more superstition, Murphy thought as he finished his meal and joined the others in returning to their work. He watched as Eoin threw shellfish claws onto a flat rock and continued his divinations. Muttering as he did so. But none of them paid him no mind. If the portents were clear and the will of the sea absolute, he would let them all know.

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