32Then: North, the Settlement
Back then, North was just a colony.
A small settlement, made of five or six small houses filled with small minded people. They were set on surviving in this strange new wilderness so far away from any city, on proving that it was possible to inhabit the rough land. Back then the forest was supposedly normal, just like any other woods, with thick, tall trees and abundant game. It helped stabalize the farmers, helped draw people to the area and give them work. If it wasn't for the nameless forest, the settlement wouldn't have been possible in the first place, and chances were that none of the hell would have followed.
Then the stone was found. No one really knew what it was - an egg? A rock? Some fossil of a long forgotten past? Some even said it was a sign from the old gods. But none guessed the truth, none even knew the danger - no one suspected this strange rock may be the cause of the unusual happenings that began taking place in the simple area of North. Fires broke out in strange places, people disappeared mysteriously, odd storms started out of nowhere in the middle of summer. Yet the man who had found the stone didn't think anything of it - he kept it on his mantel just as one would some family heirloom, and soon its presence was forgotten. Or at least, it was forgotten until his wife began hallucinating. She would wake up in the middle of the night screaming and crying about violet eyes, violet eyes that stared at her. . . and a voice that kept repeating over and over, "Jos clen desote a'hla modae." The visions grew worse as time wore on until the woman became a shivering wreck, muttering the words over and over to herself, seeking every new traveler who came to North in order to ask them what it meant. No one could answer her. Months passed, the man reduced himself to drinking, the family's name was ruined and only mentioned in whispers.
Then it was discovered that the woman was pregnant. Not just pregnant, but carrying twins. Rumors abounded, flooding the small settlement, speculating viciously on how the children of a mad woman would turn out. Who was the father? It was well known that the husband had long since given up on anything but drink. And so as the birthing day grew near, the whole of North waited with baited breath to see just what would happen. As it turned out, such guessing and gossiping was unnecessary, since everyone knew the moment the babes were born.
The night of their birth, the singular street resounded with the mad woman's screams of agony. Spectators who were watching the house claimed that they had never heard such an ungodly noise, but just past midnight the noise stopped. Silence reigned, not the blissful silence of sleep and peace, but a dark, brooding silence like the calm before a storm.
Then there had been a howl and something black, darker than the night sky, had burst from the chimney of the house. Several people claimed to have seen the body unfurl huge black wings and fly away, heading into the woods. The shape was apparently followed by a burst of light, and another figure chased after the dark one, this one floating on wings of the purest white.
That was all the viewers could claim, all they could describe, and after the short period of a week stories had grown from a simple whispered sentence to an entire epic. It had been a demon that had burst from the chimney, the demon that lived within the woman's soul, and an angel had followed the demon to destroy it. "The Lady Angel," they whispered. "It's a sign of good luck!"
Or would have been if the howling hadn't started. It had been a starry night, a silent night, when the air had been still with the end of summer and weary farmers had gone home. Then an eerie, soul shuddering howl had drifted through the colony of North, flowing like some ancient music from the woods. At first people thought it was a wolf, but that assumption was soon changed - no wolf could sound so sad, so lonely, so utterly terrifying.
"It's the Howler," they began to whisper. "The Howler. . . who lives in Howling Woods."
Soon after that, Howling Woods (as it was now called) became a forbidden place, a place where evil lurked and dark things slept. None were allowed to enter there, it was unheard of, taboo, certain death to all who dared. Those who did brave the depths never returned, and it was told that the Howler had discovered them and ate their souls, as it lacked one for itself. Yet whenever there was a good crop or fair weather, or the howling stopped for a few nights, the Lady Angel was spoke of and apparent good fortune was blessed upon the people.
As for the stone? The house it was kept in mysteriously burned to the ground the day after the twins' birth. There were no survivors.
This is the legend of Howling Woods, and where our story begins. . . .