Blood, Plunder and D&D

It all started in a bar Ricmo set his empty beer mug down, leaned back in his chair, and put his bare, hairy, halfling feet up on the rugged wooden table. He heaved a contented sigh and resumed picking his nails with his long dagger. Good beer, good times.  The Salty Seafarer  was one of his favorite dives in Valoria, and Ricmo was something of a connoisseur of dive bars. The city had a lot of drinking establishments, and he’d seen the inside of most of them, so he felt he had an informed opinion on the subject. For one thing, Old Salty not only had pretty good beer on tap, at a very reasonable price, but there was a smattering of halfling sized furniture scattered around the joint, beaten up, but rugged and serviceable. The room was dimly lit by the sputtering torches, dimly lit enough to offer a modicum of privacy, but not so dimly lit as to prevent him from noticing anyone thinking to sneak up on him. It was big enough you could usually get a table.  And most important...

"There is a dragon approaching us." Merus announced matter-of-factly.  "A large one. Flying down the road, close to the earth, moving at a great speed. It is relatively close." She lowered the hand that she had been using to shield her eyes from the tropical sun and unlimbered her great bow. "It means to attack" she continued coolly. "Prepare yourself." As an afterthought, almost as an apology she added "It must have hid itself in the rainclouds as it approached, allowing it to come upon us unawares." For a moment the party was gape mouthed, stunned at the news. Dragons were passing rare in The Thousand Isles, and also back in Valoria for that matter. The stuff of legend. None of them had ever actually laid eyes on one. Wyverns sure, Wyverns were common in the higher peaks of the Isles as well as in the Erinthor Mountains east of Valoria. But a real dragon.... "Are you sure it's an actual dragon?" Dakhir questioned. The El...

Prologue Red Alice Alice pressed against the wall so she could see the door. Through the door was only blackness and cold. Behind her she could not only hear, but feel the bass beat of the pounding rhythm, throbbing through her bones. Feel the heat of the pressed bodies of the crowd. The never-ending drug and magic infused music, her bacchanalia carrying on without her, shadowy forms writhing to the beat. Behind her, her beautiful people danced, wreathed in smoke and strobing lights.  She wasn't sure why she had pulled away, exited the rhythm. Behind her was music, warmth, and life, the sweet smell of perfume and cloves mingled with sweat. In front of her, through the door was only darkness. And potential. "Perhaps the party was getting stale?" she mused to herself. It had been going on for what, ten years, twenty? A hundred? She really didn't know. She wasn’t good at time, under the best of circumstances, and it was even harder to keep track in this place, this bubbl...

Excerpts from " Tales of Alice" by Rufus the Well Travelled Death and Black Alice It came to pass one day (on Black Alice’s 100th birthday as a matter of fact) that Death arrived on her cottage doorstep. Since even Death had heard of Black Alice, he made special effort to present himself well, taking the form of a distinguished older gentleman with greying hair and wearing somber but expensive clothes in an impeccable style. He was armed with a suitably exotic accent. And a cane. It was made of some expensive black wood and had a silver knob on it. He knocked on the door politely, because while he could freely enter any building he liked, he valued etiquette. Black Alice answered the door. Because she was Black Alice she knew immediately who was standing there, of course. “Well, hmph. Fancy seeing you here. Didn’t plan on company today. I suppose you should come in and have a cup of tea” she grumbled, ushering him inside. She already had a pot brewing on the fireplace, so ...

Two hundred and fifty years ago, there lived a powerful witch who gave birth to three daughters, one fair, one dark, and one ginger. This came as something of a surprise to her as she had only been anticipating one baby. And she was never wrong about these things. Still, their father was probably a god, so a surprise or two was to be expected. Because she had only been expecting one daughter, she had only picked out one name, "Alice". Still it was a good name, and she reckoned it could stretch a bit, so she proceeded to give it to them all. She was a bit on the single minded side, that witch, and not one to change her mind easily once it was set. And so the Alice sisters came into the world. Very quickly the siblings found that sharing the same name, while convenient in some ways, was more than a tad irritating in others. After some internal discussions, they agreed upon a plan, and thus when they finally burst upon the World, the World came to know them as Red Alice, White ...