Tales From Year's End (Ravenshield’s Home for Experienced Adventurers)

Wemick the Weird is the youngest retiree at Ravenshield’s Home for Experienced Adventurers and is its current Grand Poobah- a status for which he was proud. Ravenshield’s is along Trader’s Way across the street from the Market where mercenaries have taken over and have managed to organize a central command position. 

Wemick thoroughly enjoyed watching the formations of swords men practicing thrusting tactics needed to combat the dragon terror. In the days leading up to Year’s End Wemick would cheer and motivate the mercenaries from the roof of Ravenshield’s or from his bedroom window- he was their mascot; they in turn showed their appreciation with gestures and remarks that completely gratified Wemick. 

This was it, tonight was Year's End- the Mercenaries of the Marketplace needed him and he would not let them or the city down….

Wemick did not sleep the night before, so when the crash of the white dragon’s tail crashed through the front corner of Ravenshield’s it woke him from his late-day slumber tossing him from his loft. He is late he thinks, and hastily rises to action- damn his sleep apnea!

Then the world around Wemick darkened as shadows began to wax and wane in the corners and halls of Ravenshield’s. Wemick felt a cold wash over him causing some of the strength betraying his legs causing him to tumble hard down the steps. All around him was suddenly a mix of dark glimpses of a dragon, physical pain from the fall, and a sense of darkness at the end of his unfortunate spill.

When Wemick the Weird opened his eyes he was laying on his side with a large painting of Ravenshield’s founder, Matilda the White Lady shielding him from the debris caused by swipe from the dragon’s tail. Moving the bulky painting Wemick realized several things all at once- the dragon was gone, much of the first floor was now open to the street, and he was lying in a growing pool of blood.

Outside he could hear the battle against the dragons continued on, but they were far away, so Wemick took stock, examined himself and found that he was bleeding from the head. Around him the creepy darkness was still present and sent uncontrollable shivers through his legs, he needed to get out post-haste. Emerging from Ravenshield’s Home for Experienced Adventurers, Wemick hastened to the Mercenaries of the Marketplace for aid but what he found instead robbed him of any sanity his simple mind had managed to retain.

Just as the eclipsed sun disappeared beneath the western skyline, a horizon sketched with the tall masts and long shadows of the Captain’s Confederation Armada, divine-death was unexpectedly released on the city.

The Blood Wind, as folks would come to refer to it as, emanated from an area central to the Sea Ward; it was like being buffeted with cold razor sharp pins- every living creature in the city began to bleed. Some bled from exposed skin, some from their eyes, and others retched blood uncontrollably; for Wemick it only further opened his wound from falling.

Coming upon the Marketplace Wemick watched as deceased mercenaries, marketplace defenders fallen in battle, begin to rise up by the dozens and move with gruesome hungry intent. Grunting and slurping the undead fell in a swarm on the unsuspecting living. The presence of blood appeared to excite the undead further; they feasted like ghouls and when the undead finished gorging itself on a victim Wemick watched in horror as it too rose hungrily joining the macabre undead mob.