Chapter 38 - Yarozersk's Blessings and Curses
General Summary
The following morning, the bulk of the party heads to Yarozersk by following the lakeshore. Only Vasilisa remains behind, concerned that the villagers will have a problem with her wolf, but also wanting to investigate the trails leading to the Bobchinskii domain.
Within a couple of hours, the companions begin to see small households set in the woods along the lakefront. The village forms a whole, but the households are quite dispersed - no less than a third of a verst distant from one another. There appear to be at least 20 such households that can be seen from the lakefront. Most of these have docks on the lake. Small fishing craft, presumably belonging to the villagers, float out a ways on Lake Saiga. There seem to be no large structures in the village, and to all appearances, no church. The houses have no obvious signs that mark them as Norik or Kuz'.
A large group of children on the first dock they see hail the Yokels. They tell them that this is indeed the village of Yarozersk, and take them to their parents' house. Boris Rodionovich and his wife Galina Gostoslavovna turn out to be very hospitable. They invite them in, to sit, ply them with mead, and ask them about their journey and their aims. Boris then goes off the heat up the bathhouse, while Galina prepares pies and soup. Before he gets tipsy, Plamen goes off to meet the family goat in the barn. He quickly determines that she is old, and has a degenerative disease that have made her unable to produce milk. True to his calling, Plamen cures her.
When everything is ready, and the guests have had a chance to wash off the road's grim, everyone sits down for a meal. Boris tells his guests that Plamen's ministration to the goat is just one more sign of how blessed the village is. Not everything is ideal - in fact, most of the village's small crop has actually been destroyed by some beast that trampled it, and the coming harvest time looks rather grim. However, recently, a boy named Filipok, who was lost in the woods over a year ago, and feared dead, returned, carrying a part of an old hoard buried somewhere in the woods, and with this newfound wealth, the village was able to buy food for the coming winter, and even had enough left over to begin some long-needed repairs to their houses - new planks on the walls and roof of Boris and Galina's house bears witness to this. The companions pledge to add to the village's wellbeing by saying they will catch whatever has been abusing their crops. The villagers happily accept, though they can offer no useful information about what sort of creature it might have been.
Chonkorchuk - himself a hermit - expresses surprise that such a young boy was able to survive such an ordeal, and expresses a desire to meet Filipok and his family. Soon, neighbors arrive to take a look at the visitors. Among them is Ruslan Anatolievich - Filipok's father, and Boris and Galina's neighbor. After dinner is over, the villagers and the guests head over to the neighboring compound. Ruslan explains that his son, having lived alone for such a long time, still spends a lot of time by himself, in the barn, and goes to fetch him. Filipok is a blond boy of eight to ten years old. He wears a wide-brimmed straw hat that he seems to have taken a liking to after his return, and keeps his head down when he talks. In response to the Yokels' questions, he explains that he simply got lost while picking mushrooms in the woods, and then he survived because the Lord provided for him, and ultimately, brought him home with wealth to share. Another peculiarity is that the boy speaks more like a learned man than a peasant boy. When he is pressed about details, he asks his father to bring him back to the barn.
Afterwards, the Yokels ask the locals to show them the damaged fields. The fields in small clearings in the woods, and seem to belong to individual compounds. They have in fact been trampled, and as she examines the damage, Sasha finds the outlines of a giant foot - 2-3 feet long - shod in some sort of felt or hide boot. Near it, there are also the signs of small humanoid feet, no more than 5 inches long. Sasha points this out to her companions and to the locals, and asks if her group can camp out in the field to see if the culprit will return. Chonkorchuk believes that the giant foot may have something to do with a vision he saw on the road.
Once the locals are gone, Chonkorchuk and Sasha also share their feelings about the boy with their companions. The hermit alleges that there was nothing magical about him, though he did seem peculiar. Sasha adds that though there was nothing the boy said that she can point to that was untrue, she did notice that despite his seeming shyness, he seemed to speak with an air of disdain to the party, and also, when addressing the villagers. She also noted a similarity between certain mannerisms - holding his head at a certain angle, rubbing his fingers together - that were similar to those of the boy Aleksei, whom they met the previous day.
Soon it begins to rain, so Sasha summons a dome to keep her companions safe and warm. It ends in a few hours, and then the Yokels build a fire, to make sure if something comes here, it finds them easily. Then they turn in once again. In the middle of the night, the sounds of a large creature stomping about nearby and crashing through the underbrush. Plamen, who is on watch, awakens his companions, and soon, they see a huge man, perhaps 15 feet tall, stumble into the clearing, He is carrying a tree, which he just tore out of the ground, and slapping it against his hand as he approaches the dome.
Chonkorchuk ducks out, and succeeds in hypnotizing the giant, who stands as if his feet have been fastened to the ground. Notably, his shoes are felt, of the kind Sasha thought he would be wearing. Unfortunately, no one can find a language the creature understands, though after Plamen says a few phrases in the language of the volkhvy, the creature mindlessly mimics them. Now that they are out from under the dome, a confrontation seems inevitable. Sasha bathes the creature in light, to make it easier to see and hit; Chonkorchuk blasts it, as usual, before it has a chance to react; Plamen summons a flaming sphere next to it, while Drazhan transforms and conceals his transformation, and then advances toward the giant, and tries to intimidate it into leaving. The maneuver is unsuccessful, as the huge man reaches for him, grabs him, and tosses him into the sphere. Only his toughness allows the ghazi to survive the assault. He runs out of the fire, and begins to poke at the creature with his spear. Meanwhile, Sasha calls up magic that frightens the giant, and he flees across the field, and back into the woods. Drazhan adds some speed and gives chase, while Chonkorchuk knocks it down with magical energy. Unable to resist, the apparently human Drazhan leaps onto the giant's chest, and begins tearing out its throat with his teeth.
Once Drazhan comes to his senses, the companions search the dead creature. In the folds of his skins, they find some gnawed upon bones (probably animal), some feathers and down, and a sword-length stone knife. Seeing as it is the middle of the night, they decide not to track it, but to wait until morning.
Rewards Granted
- A large stone knife
- Some bones and feathers
- A good meal, mead, and a bath
Missions/Quests Completed
- Arrival in Yarozersk
- Slaying of a giant who had apparently trampled the villagers' fields
Character(s) interacted with
- Other villagers of Yarozersk
Report Date
20 Oct 2019
Primary Location
Comments