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Chapter 17 - Team Bramblehold - Of Ashen, Teryn, Bolo Berrytoe and Penny Cottonrush

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 As the Frost Comes Down “The Wind Turns North” Autumn’s breath had grown brittle. The leaves no longer fluttered—they fell in sudden spirals, brittle and dry, crunching under boot and paw. The air had a sharpness to it now, a crystalline tension that smelled of bark, stone, and the long hush before snowfall. Even the animals moved differently heavier, slower, their coats thickening with instinct. The whisper-willows, once full and rustling, now stood lean and alert, their branches creaking like old joints in the wind. The season was shifting, and Peter and Lucia felt it in their bones. It was time to finalise the stocks for winter, time for the hunt. The sun had barely crested the treeline when Lucia emerged from the cottage, dressed in her frost-hued cloak and leaf-bound leather. Her breath misted before her, silver and curling. Her bow was strung tight across her shoulder, its carved limbs glittering faintly with frost. A quiver of deep-fletched arrows rested at her back, and a ...
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Chapter 16 - The Birth of Bramblehold - The story of Lucia (Elf of Starfen), and Peter Anderton

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  “When Flame Met Root” Scorchwind Year, Deep Edge of Bramblehold Forest, Deep on the Forest Way The smoke lay low and bitter in Peter’s throat, a dull blanket of heat pressing against his brow as he hacked through bramble and pine. Ash fell like snow. Behind him, the firebreak gaped open—a strip of raw earth meant to hold the flame. It wouldn’t be enough. That was when he saw her. A silhouette within the smoke, graceful but real—more dream than person. She moved through the haze like something summoned from an old grove song: tall, with soot-streaked cheeks, her long braid matted with ash, guiding panicked beasts through the gaps like a ghostly shepherd. A fox clung to her side. A hare bounded between her steps. Even the fire seemed to curl away from her presence. “Hey! You can’t go in there!” Peter shouted, waving his billhook. She looked back once. No fear in her face. Just quiet certainty. “You put your firebreaks wrong,” she called back, then vanished between the t...
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Chapter 15 - Die Alten Hofs - WHQ - The search for Kelly's Gold - Part 1

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Image - Kelly's Gold Characters:  Gwendolyn Woods - Wizard and Drugen Greyfoot - Dwarf Brewmaster,  Anilah - Albion Druid and Futhark Runemaster  (Die Alten Hofs) ,  with  Lorenzo Chiorboli D'Este - Imperial Noble (Les Ultras)  It was some weeks after the departure of Jederman from the Elvenwood, the trees still whispering his name like a ghost on the wind, that Gwendolyn found herself once again in the smoky warmth of the Lehmitz Inn , nestled near the edge of the Weeping Hills. The fire crackled with the deep red glow of pine logs, casting flickering shadows across timbered walls and worn stone. She sat beside Drugen, the sturdy dwarf with his beard plaited in the runes of h is forefathers, each braid a tale of battle or kinship. They hunched over their mugs of thick brown ale, warmed not just by the fire but by familiar company. They had learned from the innkeeper—a leathery old man with one good eye and a memory like iron—that Jederman had left so...
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