As the last of the Yule log burns away to embers, so too does the last of the Yuletide’s festivities come to an end. The darkest night of winter is behind them now, but as the days get longer the people of Avalon must still contend with brutal conditions that are the worst in any living memory. Drifts pile high enough to bury trees, to bury homes, and many are forgoing their fields in favour of the high walls, and warm hearths of places like Caiseal, Maum, Seascann, Tearman, and Camelot. Storms punctuate the landscape as the weather has only worsened since the burning of the wicker man and the False King over the solstice, unusual thunderclouds said to carry riders on beast-like mounts roam over the Gray Tops and the borders of the Hartwood, bringing with them a chill so brutal that everything the storm touches is frozen through. The passage through to Essetir has become impassable, and more and more of the secret pathways to the Otherworld have been buried or sealed. Most notable, the pathways at the Dowth.
Even across the Veil the storms are felt, where the Otherworld is subject to constant seasonal change, winter has fallen even there as well. Deserts of sand have turned to a white blanket of tundra, eternally churning seas have frozen solid, villages in the skies have crystallized as the sun itself has grown cold. No fair folk have emerged from Titania’s realm, and any who once knew the path to it have since come to lose their way as the Queen of the Fairy Realm has shut her gates.
The king also remains shut tight within his hold while Gwydre and his men linger in the countryside; hunting man and beast alike. Rumours of the prince’s practices run amuck, in the name of the king, Gwydre is looking for anyone with connections to Doyle ó Murchadha, or anyone with knowledge of his whereabouts. The druid was accused over Samhain of attempting to assassinate the king, and several other high ranking members of the court. A member of each great noble house accompanies Gwydre, a ranger, a bard, a paladin, and a berserker. With Excalibur’s blessing, they can wander freely through the druids’ wards, through the secret passages of the Otherworld, and with the king’s authority have razed whole villages in their pursuits.
ooc information below the cut:
