The Bloody North

" ...it was after a vicious farewell ambush from the Northmen that my companions and I finally broke free of the black mountain passes of Wolgast. The screams of the dying echoed in my ears, and our raw eyes barely rested for fear of another attack... or the black nightmares that punctuated our fitful slumberings.

The frigid winds iced our veins as we made our westerly descent, doing little to lift the already grave mood that hung over us. Of the twenty that had begun the venture, a mere six remained. I counted two dear friends amongst the dead, whose bodies will never even receive the honour of a proper burial.

Still in shock from our recent losses, none of us even thought to discuss where we were headed. There was nothing to stop us completing our task; to trade with the other thriving settlements rumoured to be living in or around the mountains of northeastern Wolgast. The men I travelled with had families depending on our success; a brutal winter had left their small settlement nearly crippled.

But our minds must've wandered in happier pastures, or relived brutal memories again and again, as our pale husks continued the march to nowhere. The cold and the hunger and the monotony were an excellent cure for the desire to consciously inhabit the present. Experience suggested nothing lived in these wastes save for cruel Northmen and bloodthirsty wolves.

Several days' travel later, we collected enough wood from the withered trees that dotted the bleak hills to make a meagre fire. The insufferable cold was taking its toll. That night, as we huddled together, the chattering of teeth and shaking of weary, freezing muscles took the place of the terse words we occasionally traded.

It was just as sleep, or the skeletal chill, was about to take me, that I spied a large figure approaching our hilltop fire. Berating myself for being careless enough to allow this announcement our whereabouts, my clumsy hand groped for a blade.

An imposing greenskin stepped into the fire. He was hooded, dressed in thick red furs. The shadows thrown by the firelight gave his grin a nightmarish appearance. Coupled with the bloodstained blade he was wielding, I nearly believed it was some demon come to claim our weary souls before he abruptly spoke in a thick, gruff voice:

"Goblin 'unt'n."

With this declaration, he bared his teeth again, sheathing his blade. After waking my comrades, the next half an hour consisted of him explaining to us, in his broken speech, and armed with a variety of hand gestures, that he was both friendly and that our presence was requested by someone else, presumably the leader of his clan.

Our numb, dumb lips had barely conversed before it was mutually agreed that no matter the outcome, dying in warm surroundings was preferable to being claimed by the chill.

Fruitless attempts at sleep interrupted, we laboured after the greenskin for hours, resting frequently as he herded us up the paths winding around a solitary mountain on the plains.

Upon arriving at the wooden-walled fort perched on a cliffside, our guide shouted out, and the gate was raised by unseen hands. Only the moonlight glistened on the buildings; there were no torches or flames to be seen, the streets entirely deserted. It was impossible to gauge the size of the town in the dark. Multiple passageways seemed to run into the oppressive black interior of the mountain itself.

Our guide pressed us for speed, and we mustered our strength to struggle on. My mind dulled by exhaustion, I barely had time to prepare myself when I saw a glow coming from around the next corner. I was utterly dazzled when I stepped out of the shadows into the pool of blazing light.

As my vision recovered, I took in the huge bonfire in the centre of a large, semi-circular earth pit, with several tiers filled with orcs sitting, standing, chanting, raving and fighting on them. It seemed like a year's worth of torches and lanterns were blazing on every side. Looking eastwards, there would've been a magnificent view of the surrounding land had sunlight graced it, and far off to the east, the jagged peaks of the very mountains we fled from only a few days ago were ominous silhouettes against the stars.

The guide enthusiastically gestured for us to proceed down the clay steps. Almost immediately, two well-armoured orcs emerged on either side of us, beating and shoving a path through the crowd. Pausing briefly, I raised my bent back to gain a glimpse of our destination. A single figure stood patiently at the centre of the chaos, the bonfire at his back leaving him in shadow. A solitary stone slab, painted dark red with old blood, lay at his feet.

As realisation finally dawned, my tired heart sank further still. I was too exhausted to even question my own stupidity.

We had retained our weapons, but taking a sluggish glance at the other five survivors, I mused it was highly unlikely that we could even strike one orc down before we collapsed of exhaustion. Escape was out of the question. Tannach, the man behind me, must've caught the look of dread in my eyes, for his thin lips drew an even grimmer line on his gaunt face, in an expression of tired resignation. We stumbled on.

Each step took a monumental effort. Pangs of hunger and nausea riddled my stomach, while the bones in my aching back jostled to find their most uncomfortable positions. I remembered thinking, in the delirium brought on by overtiredness, 'At least I can lie down when I die.'

Upon stepping into the central plateau, the shadowy figure there raised his arm. In an instant, the raucous horde of orcs fell silent, leaving the howling wind without accompaniment.

I initially believed he must be some warlock or wizard, using fel magics fuelled by sacrifices to control these creatures. As we were shoved closer to him by unfriendly hands, I realised that he was actually another orc. Though he was neither as tall nor as broad as the one who had found us, or many of the other orcs we had since seen, he was both more terrifying and magnificent.

He stood straight backed, hands clasped behind him. He wore finery that would not have been out of place at a court; a luxurious suit of blue cloth with gold and white trim, splattered with blood in places. However, his eyes were by far his most memorable feature.

There was no demonic taint or odd colouration that made them particularly unusual. Instead, it was his utterly piercing gaze, the one that lanced through my brain and instilled pure, primal terror in my heart, that lodged in my mind. The eyes in his head were not just eyes; they were a gateway to a tumultuos realm governed by fanaticism, insanity, bloodlust, hate and vengeance... He exposed his very soul through his eyes, and his soul was the foulest thing I have witnessed to this day.

He regarded each of us individually, an expression of smug delight playing on his scarred features. Despite the wind, his voice resounded like the sealing of a tomb. "Brothers and sisters..." he began. The orcs roared. "The time has come. Did I not speak of a grand ceremony to honour the Bloodborne Scourge? Before the caged slaves are released, and the beards of the dwarves are wreathed in flames, let us decide how best to... entertain these humans who have joined us."

The shockwave of noise signalled the approval of the congregation. We were shoved into a line facing him, and he began his inspection from the left. I was the last on the right.

He dealt us our 'sentences' one by one; Lanev and Tenev, two brothers, were forced to fight to the death. They refused unswervingly. Their hands were tied to blades, an orc held each of their arms and others, their hands , forcing them to act out a deadly playfight. They were far too tired to resist. Uproarious laughter came from the assembly at every clumsy strike that drew blood. The other four of us could not meet each other's eyes.

I will not detail the fates of the other three men. Each death was more sadistic and twisted than the last. Regardless of whether they cried and shook, met their end with dignity, or fought tooth and claw against it, all will be honoured, if only by my memory.

Eons seemed to pass before it was my time to die. The leader of the pack stood in front of me, his eyes wild, blood coating his arms and chest. I lifted my lolling head, to meet his gaze as best I could.

Meeting his stare was like being struck with a blow. The sheer intensity of his glare was the skin-shrivelling heat of the desert sun at noon.

But, at my wit's end, it could no longer move me to terror.

Instead, surrounded by these primitives, these disgusting, inhuman wretches who revelled in cruelty and hate, I let the weak anger boil inside my chest. My own weakness, and the grief I felt for those who had died at the hands of these cretins, and the injustice of the uncaring world fuelled the molten surge of rage that gripped my heart. I drew strength from it.

I carefully drew a small blade from within my cloak. The cold metal felt reassuringly heavy in my hand. All the while, I continued to watch those terrible eyes. As I drew the blade, he raised his arm, and I expected the world to fade as my lifeblood drained out on the floor. In my final attempt to regain some honour before my death, I twisted to the left and jammed my knife into the neck of the orc behind me.

I held it there, my rage causing me to twist the blade and pummel his chest with my free hand, announcing my fury to the world in a primal, triumphant scream.

The orc shortly collapsed to the floor, choking and gurgling. Then, silence. No arrows pierced me, no axes hacked my flesh, no swords slashed it. Nothing moved. Confused, I turned around to see their leader wearing an exultant grin on his face.

"It is as it was! The Scourge has sent us his spirit through this human! Now, all, take your blades! Raise your fists! Spill blood, and have your blood spilled! None shall live come the dawn!" he exclaimed ecstatically.

I expected to see them charge off to some village in reckless haste, eager to pillage the innocent. But, to my astonishment, they drew their blades and began hacking, clawing, stabbing each other with hands and swords and teeth. Ones who had previously been laughing and joking, sharing drinks, dancing were now engaged in mortal combat. The sight was disturbing enough, but their infernal laughter while they decimated each other was truly chilling.

It was then that I felt a brief pressure on the back of my skull, and the ground rose up to meet me.


The pain behind my eyes eventually woke me. I cast about in my groggy state, hoping that the dark memories that rushed into my consciousness were part of a nightmare. I was lying in a bed, and the warmth from the room suggested I was indoors. The sight of the leader orc leaning over me was enough to assure me that it was a nightmare I had lived.

He grinned wolfishly at seeing my eyes open. I rubbed my face, briefly shocked to feel it was spattered in coagulated blood.

"Why?" was all I could croak through my hands.

"The blood was demanded." he sighed, rather matter-of-factly. "And, I tired of this settlement. We had all but destroyed the surrounding villages, and these mountain orcs were far too stupid to be of any use against the well-trained armies we occasionally encountered. A shame, really. But there are always more willing to fight. Always more willing to die."

I was surprised by his conversational tone. "Not.. me?" I asked again.

He laughed. "No. You ensured your own survival some time ago. I knew you were coming. I could feel it. So I... helped you."

"..how?"

"You remember the Northmen who attacked you, and killed many of your party?"

I nodded, their faces returning to my mind in an instant.

"Think back, now. Remember how irritated you became with some of the locals travelling with you? Their incessant whining, their crude jokes. And the dwarf and human, your friends. How dull their company became. Their constant retelling of the same stories, their voracious appetites. How you watched them eat more and more food from the dwindling stocks while you took it upon yourself to eat barely anything."

"Well," he continued, "I saw fertile ground in your mind, and planted a small seed. When the Northmen attacked, the flower blossomed for the first time."

"What do you mean?" I snapped, sitting up in my bed. A black dread was seeping into my stomach as my mind awakened, taking heed of his words.

"Are you really so stupid?" he inquired playfully. "It was not just the Northmen whose blades were bloodied that night."

My mind swam. I stared at a wall as my vision shifted, dark memories slowly surfacing. The dark. The cold. The warmth of blood on my hands. The screams. The howls. I was the howl. I howled. Howling. Vision red. Blood. Blood. Blood. Sleep.

"The flowers will blossom again," a voice said, before I passed once more into my fitful sleep."

The hooded one finished reading the small book, closing its weathered pages with a resounding snap. It glanced around the small room of the small house, a house empty of all but the faint voice of the wind blowing through cracks in walls and windowpanes. It strode outside, sniffing the sweet summer air. A soft wind rustled the leaves of the trees at the edge of the small forest, right by the two humps in the earth.

Book in hand, it walked over to investigate them. Two crude, erected stones indicated they were graves, though the engravings had long since blown away. It remained still for a while, before curiously flicking through the journal again.

"Beloved Daria and Elys. There is nobody. I cannot speak with anybody. Dead friends always talking talk never listen. Why? why? Why?

Curse makes you wrong I can't stop the bloodlust it is always there whispering. I am sorry so sorry sorry sorry sorry. No rest cannot sleep try to end it for myself and it stops you cannot. Must try to make right North back North to the ghosts of dead friends and my bloody hands. Blood blood blood. Mogdish it whispers the one who planted the seed. He will die to end this."

The hooded one nodded to itself. A fitting end. Though his khan Mogdish was unpredictable and dangerous, the hooded one admitted, he had a fine sense of theatrics. It had been a long journey from the bloody north, but one which the khan had insisted was of the highest priority. No doubt he would be pleased to read through the thoughts of a Marked One, though it was unlikely he would find anything surprising in its pages.

"Bury him here," it shouted through the trees.