I close my eyes. And remember. The first time. Didier, dark elf, had finally killed Aliana the Succubus. He filled her with arrows. When her body didn’t vanish back to the Nine Hells like it should have, Didier cut her open.
A blue flash. A sonic boom way above. The others murmured in concern. What omen was this?
Didier didn’t care.
You see, Didier’s wife, Ilia, was dead. Aliana had killed her. And now that Ilia was dead Didier had nothing left. He pulled the burning rubble together to make a pyre. He dragged the desecrated corpse atop it. Called his bear companion to him. Stroked it. Leaned into its nuzzles.
And then cut its throat.
The bear fell upon the pyre without a sound. Blood poured. Iron steam streamed to the heavens. Sparks followed.
Didier knelt in his friend’s corpse. He added his howl to the smoke, steam, and sparks. He screamed to the Nameless Raven Queen, in her frozen castle. He demanded the soul of Aliana never rest. That her myriad schemes bear no fruit. Didier thrust his knife to the spark and smoke-choked darkness above, feet driven like stilts into the bloody depths of his bear, and demanded that he be heard. Now!
Silence.
Everyone looked at me.
“Well, Mr. Dungeon Master?” Jedd’s voice was soft. But unyielding. I realized I had to talk. What do you say to such a thing?
“Lightning. It comes down. Engulfs your blade. The pyre is destroyed in a roar. No bodies are ever recovered.”
A silence enveloped the eight people around the table. We ended the session.
I painted that scene. It still hangs on my wall.
Not too long after, I ran my first campaign of Burning Wheel. The first session revolved a young princess discovering her fairy godmother, a tall and black-haired beauty, had an evil twin sister, who had angered the forest gods. Slighted them. Stolen from them.
And the gods demanded recompense.
The evil twin couldn’t be found. The princess and some of her retinue searched and searched, but they couldn’t find her. She had escaped. The gods would not be mocked. They wanted blood and suffering. So the fairy godmother offered herself in her wicked sister’s stead.
What followed I can’t adequately describe to you. I will try. But forgive me, I failed before I started.
The princess begged the gods for more time. She was refused. She pleaded. And pleaded. This was more than her friend. The fairy was closer to her than her own mother! Surely something could be done! The gods said there was no more time. The princess offered herself. The gods told her she wasn’t worthy without a second thought. And so, ever so patiently, the fairy godmother talked the princess into letting her go. The princess’s voice never rose. It never broke. But the confusion. Oh, the confusion! The fairy godmother had done nothing wrong! Why should she pay for her sister’s evil? There was no answer. Eventually the princess gave in. With one last smile and a lingering squeeze of her hand, the fairy godmother walked into the dark forest. And she vanished. Without a sound. She just winked out.
I can’t tell you what that room felt like. I can tell you eyes were wiped. A few got up hurriedly for a smoke break. Two of the players were Marine infantrymen, whose feet had trod Afghanistan. And they wept louder than the rest of us. They had absolutely no issue with grieving the bravery of the princess as her innocence died.
A few years later, and I played in a game of Torchbearer. A rarity, to find me playing! I wound up playing… surprise! A paladin!
… who was on the lamb for killing his parents. He claimed they drank from some cup, and when they did their eyes… changed. Something uncanny went into them. And when they talked their voices weren’t their own. He slew them on the spot. And then ran. He had killed the king and queen, you see.
In one of the dungeons he was captured by a band of snakemen. They had never met him before. So, when they declared Sir Charlemagne was to undergo trial by combat for murdering his parents, there was a bit a shock.
Out Sir Charlemagne strode into the ring, sword in hand. He lunged. And got smacked in the face with the flat of his own sword. The snake man said if the paladin could land even one blow, he would be acquitted. Again Charlemagne lunged. This time he was pricked with the snake man’s sword. I got frustrated. Kyle kept changing the difficulties of the moves! He announced that he was!
“Why did you kill your parents, paladin?”
“They weren’t themselves! They were evil!”
“Oh? And how did they show you?” The flat of the blade almost broke Charlemagne’s nose with a SLAP.
“They… they were different!”
“So what?”
And I felt it. This moment where Charlemagne’s confusion and mine fused. I realized Kyle was trying to tell me something. Something important. Vital. This creeping feeling of gravity overcame me. The next few words would be a turning point for me, as a person. I don’t know why they were, but everything funneled into this one moment.
“Do you think you made a mistake?”
“Wouldn’t that make me evil?”
“Are you not still a paladin? Do the gods not still hold your vows? Are your prayers, even now, answered?”
I laughed. Charlemagne lunged. And this time he cut his target. The snake man gave Charlemagne his own sword as a gift and released him, a justified man. Later, Sir Charlemagne would drink the same draught his parents had. His eyes were opened. And he sacrificed himself to make Ragnorak a beginning, not just an end.
These are all the kinds of moments that become myths and fairy tales. There’s so much not said here! How Didier and Ilia had helped steal Aliana’s cambion child, and how Aliana had sworn revenge. How the princess and her soldiers found the evil twin and offered her to the gods, who gave back the good fairy godmother. How Sir Charlemagne had danced with the Eve of the new world before he died, unknowingly opening her womb so life could continue. And so much more!
These were journeys that took years. The weight of unspoken time is so thick and loud that it almost eclipses these words.
Oh, you want a story I got from Crescendo! You noticed!
There was a young man named Sorin. He was a forester, and he realized the soil was impoverished. There were trees with fruit which gave magic energy when consumed. And they were dying. So was the planet. So Sorin went on a quest to find out how to save the world.
Along the way Sorin rescued his one and true love, Andrea. She had been captured by satyrs. They couldn’t get Andrea back to her husband, Marius. Sorin knew Andrea loved him still. And he didn’t make a single move on her. They would get her home. He promised.
And then one day they watched helplessly as Marius was strapped to a rocket and launched at their home city, leveling it. Andrea swore revenge. Sorin comforted her. And didn’t make a move on her. Andrea wanted him to. But Sorin knew she grieved more than she knew. Eventually, Marius came stumbling out of the woods. One of the dark gods had rescued him off the missile. Andrea was beyond relieved! They reunited, finally! Very soon, she was pregnant.
And Sorin… Sorin tried not to think about it. He was King Sorin now, you see. He had talked a mountain elemental down from destroying the people who had killed his own city, and they made him king! King Sorin tried to bury himself in his work. To help those he could in an increasingly dark and awful world. But then things started happening. A rebellion was beginning to form around Marius, who wanted nothing to do with it! But some force was twisting his every word and gesture. If Marius so much as stubbed his toe, the people took it as a demand for revolution.
Another mountain elemental and a mysterious meteor-man attacked King Sorin’s city. He went out, axe gifted him by the shield-maiden of war in hand, and this time he slew the mountain. And the meteor man. In succession. Sorin began to return home as a hero.
Only to find his city burning. See, somehow Andrea had gotten infected. Possessed. It had gestated within her. And she had begun infecting others with her curse.They were taking over. King Sorin begged the creature he still hoped was Andrea to come back to him. To Marius! But the thing laughed at him. Andrea was gone! Marius told Sorin that thing wasn’t his wife, and if he didn’t act then all she had fought for would perish.
So King Sorin, Mountain-Fighter, slew the Dark Queen, who was piloting the meat-sack that was Andrea. His magical axe, which could make mountains bleeed, was more than sufficient. Those under the Dark Queen's spell were freed. The people rejoiced in their brave king… who stood over the corpse of the only woman he ever loved.
During the celebratory feast, Sorin saw Marius slip off. When caught up with, Marius admitted he couldn’t do it anymore. His every word was twisted into an act against his best friend. And now Andrea was gone. He wished he had died on the rocket, and he was going to go do what should have been done a while ago.
Sorin asked Marius if he was really going to destroy yet another surviving part of Andrea. He promised that they would break the curse on Marius. They would rebuild. Andrea’s memory would be honored. And with that, they sat and looked at the quiet sunset. Their rebuilt city sat behind them, celebrating the life they had been given, whether they deserved it or not.
That’s a dramatically condensed version of 38 sessions. But there. That’s King Sorin, Mountain-Fighter.
There's a Point to All This, Right?
I guess?
I don’t share these stories terribly often. Other RPGers talk about their grand goofiness, and I generally let them talk and laugh with them. Their stories are fun! I like hearing them! But I’m rarely in the mood to talk about how little Celeste, the cambion Didier and the others rescued became a vibrant and loving young woman. She’s wasaaaaay down there in my soul. She still lives. And she’s gotten me through some times! Or how, when Sorin was sitting with Marius, I could almost see the sunset the two of them were looking at. And that I saw it through Marius's eyes, in the moment. These aren't just... shared.
If you like the sound of that, I got good news: there’s a game made specifically to make these kinds of moments! Just show up moderately conscious. And you will get that and so much more. I will teach you how to run it.
So.
Um.
The text isn’t done.
But the rules are, and together we can make this game, which already means so much to me, mean something to a lot more people! Come on over to the Discord! We got regular games running, a sorta shambly-but-functional text, and a lot of passion!
Thanks for reading, either way!
