Journey Into Shadow

Blackmere City, the great capital of the kingdom, was under siege. An army of goblins, hobgoblins, and devils spawned from the Nine Pits of Hell, after traveling a thousand miles through the underdark, had boiled up out of the Great Mere and taken the city by surprise.

The walls yet stood, though for how long no one could guess. With the army of Blackmere still weeks distant—guarding the Goblin Frontier for the long-awaited incursion of foes from the Shard Mountains—the city’s defenses were but a pale shadow of their normal formidable strength.

But the defenders had an ace up their sleeves: a powerful artifact left over from the Infernal Years capable of blocking all interplanar travel within many miles of its location. With the devils’ teleportation and summoning abilities useless, the evil forces were incapable of fully pressing their advantage.

Even this, the defenders knew, was only a temporary respite. They were still far outnumbered, and with most of the city’s spellcasters busy powering the artifact with their arcane and divine might, they couldn’t mount any kind of counter-offensive.

Enter the heroes of Helmsport.

Knowing they could not sit quietly while the armies of Hell threatened their kingdom, the heroes searched for a way to turn the tide. Adarrial, Duran, and Stannis worked the information angle, combing through dusty tomes and querying local sages. Eandrynn tried futilely to sway opinion in Brithonen; for their part, the elves refused to get involved in “human affairs.”

The half-elf ranger Beran chose to seek out information first-hand. Along with Alarion, Caedrus, and Thorgrimm, the ranger traveled east to probe the army’s defenses. They soon found evidence of the goblins’ passing, and followed this trail to a town overrun by the evil forces. Among the invaders were a number of humanoid creatures unfamiliar to the heroes—hulking, hairy goblinoids with surprising ferocity and powers of scent. After a struggle with these hellspawn goblins and their devil masters, the heroes liberated the town, shepherding the survivors back to safe territory near Helmsport.

By this point, the research had turned up a promising lead. Though the lore was limited, some old tales spoke of a parallel dimension to reality—a shadowy, twisted reflection of the real world—that might provide an alternative method of travel. Transit to and from, as well as within, this “Shadow Realm” didn’t behave as with other planes, suggesting that Blackmere City’s defenses might not block travelers from approaching.

But how to enter this Shadow Realm? Traditional methods of planar travel wouldn’t work, and any spells that might have worked were long since lost to the ages. Several more days of research revealed a possibility, hidden in an ancient tale of a terrible man named Sallust.

This man, according to legend, was one of the first self-styled lords of the region now known as the Western Province. A noble warrior, he helped clear the land of evil, then built a stronghold overlooking the rocky coast just south of the current village of Great Rock. Settlers followed, and soon Sallust had a small fiefdom.

Sadly, this idyllic time did not last. As the tales relate, Sallust dabbled in foul secrets and soon turned from kind ruler to terrible despot. He subjected the locals to horrible atrocities, but none could flee his ferocious guards. At the height of his evil, Sallust murdered his own three daughters, sacrificing them to the dark gods for great power.

Eventually, even the elves of Brithonen—for Sallust’s fiefdom lay near the borders of what was then a much larger kingdom of elves—could no longer ignore the threat. A powerful elven druid wrought a dire curse upon Sallust, banishing the dark lord and his entire stronghold from the world of light, forever imprisoning it within a world of shadow.

However, as a reminder of what he had lost, Sallust would be allowed occasional glimpses of the material world, when the border between shadow and light grew especially thin. Thus, as the days grew to their longest near the summer solstice, if you knew where to look, you might catch a glimpse of Sallust’s fortress, now known only as Shadowhold.

As luck would have it, the solstice lay mere days away. Adarrial, Jarvis, Thorgrimm, Caedrus, and Stannis hurried to Great Rock, leaving word for the rest of their friends as to their plans. Once there, they spread out along the coastline to watch for the appearance of Shadowhold.

Their research paid off. On the 20th of June, a small rocky island appeared in the fading light of sunset, a crumbling fortress atop it. As the heroes rowed across the hundred yards separating the shore from Shadowhold, they were attacked by a dark, crustacean-like creature, but managed to drive it off.

After pulling up on the island, the heroes investigated the dark structure. Within, they encountered several shadowy guardians. While they caught their breath after one of the struggles, they were surprised to see a trio of their companions enter the stronghold. Though less than an hour had passed inside, a full night and day had passed outside. The new arrivals (Alarion, Beran, and Duran) had followed their friends’ trail to Great Rock, then found entry to the stronghold as the sun set on the 21st.

Furthermore, Duran had learned more about Sallust, the lord of Shadowhold. Apparently, he had been a paladin before falling. Honor insisted that the faithful of Altius try to redeem their fallen brother, or failing that, end his foul existence. Realizing that they could not waste time if they were to use the Shadow Realm to reach Blackmere City in time to assist its defenders, the heroes quickly moved to explore deeper into Shadowhold.

Eventually, the heroes reached the cracked and ruined great hall of Sallust himself. To their amazement, the dark lord of Shadowhold still sat upon his throne, long centuries after a mortal man would have passed away. Promising that, “like all the others,” the heroes would “become mere shadow,” Sallust and his minions threw themselves into battle.

After a pitched combat, the bold heroes triumphed over Sallust and his forces of shadow. As he lay dying, Sallust thanked the heroes for their arrival, whispering“I had rather face the fires of Hell for all eternity than this gloom for another day.”

Though a dark cave beckoned from behind Sallust’s throne, the heroes seemed wary of exploring this evil place any further. Just then, an ephemeral voice interrupted their debate, and a shadowy claw appeared over the edge of a rift running through the hall. As the heroes watched in terror, a large dragon, its body the color of charcoal and its eyes a blazing red, crawled into the room, accompanied by four dark, feral humanoids—the undead forms of Sallust’s wife and daughters!

The shadowy dragon Duskwing scattered the heroes before it, cursing them for destroying its “pet,” Sallust. As they fought, it related how its mother Deathgloom, a dragon born in the Abyss itself, had lured the paladin away from light, promising him great power in exchange for the sacrifice of his family. In the countless centuries since then, first Deathgloom and now Duskwing have whispered evil into the ear of Sallust, telling him of how he had damned himself to eternity in shadow.

The heroes ended the evil of Duskwing that day, their swords dripping with shadowy blood as the battle finished. After ascertaining that no other creatures of evil lurked within the stronghold, they returned to the surface. They soon found that travel across the shadowy landscape moved at blinding speed, allowing them to cover miles in mere strides. The shadowscape made the lands around seem subtly different, yet still familiar enough for the well-traveled among them (such as Adarrial and Beran) to navigate with little difficulty.

Crossing back to shore, the heroes walked north to Great Rock to get their bearings. Though they viewed the town through the distorted lens of shadow, the town seemed strangely quiet. This was not the bustling village they had left only a short while earlier—where were all the celebrations normally marking the solstice? And who were the black-armored warriors who stood guard before several buildings? How many days had actually passed since the heroes entered the Shadow Realm?

Then the heroes came into view of the town’s church, a humble stone structure dedicated to the Highfather. But the structure there was unfamiliar. Instead of a white stone building, a tall black spire rose from the ground. topped by a wicked spike. Something was carved upon the spire as well, and the heroes approached, they made out two symbols.

One was the wavy-bladed dagger symbolic of the Dark God Seth, the cast-out son of Altius Highfather, suggesting that this spire was a temple of evil.

The other was the image of a face. Though it bore a crueler twist than they had seen before, Beran, Duran, and Jarvis couldn't help but recognize it. After all, it was a face they had seen innumerable times in their young lives.

Seth McCullin, the former hero of Helmsport, had come home to Great Rock.

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