Beneath the skull of a great stag, Lazarus surveyed the bleak landscape that unfolded around the ferry on which he stood. Cool evening breezes swept across the marshes, blustering through the dark feathers lining the cleric's heavy cloak. Distant croaking and clicking could be heard for miles as the rivers gently guided the boat to eventual mooring at the city in the heart of the great swamp. An inordinately numerous throng of water moccasins slithered alongside them, which made the ferryman visibly agitated.
"'Preciate you a-comin' this afar, ay," the cleric's dreadlocked companion praised, breaking the uneasy silence. Indeed, the tension that hung in the air in this locale could almost be perceived as easily as the thick mists that rolled through the roots of the moss-covered mangroves. The occasional fisherman or trapper along the banks of the rivers eyed him cautiously as the ferry passed. Though his arrival and the unorthodoxy of his being had been discussed well in advance, the locals were nonetheless suspicious of the odd outsider. "Ain't a thing at all," Lazarus' gritty voice echoed beneath the bone mask. "'Tis no trifle. That's the true true," the ferryman insisted in earnest. "Words of your vexation over the Shambalah have legs, strange one," he mused in his curiously mingled and broken Common.
Lazarus' mind could not help but grasp at fleeting and unwelcoming fancies as the boat approached the city. He had been to far corners of the lands before where denizens and customs had want of isolation. These people, as he had seen so many times before, had heart…had purpose…a strong sense of self. Yet, they were all inexorably drawn to a lifestyle such as this, to havens where the forgotten and forlorn should belong. Would this be his fate, as well the last of his line…to eventually fade into nothing? Seldom did any soul care to know what transpired in these far-removed civilizations, aside from the occasional like-minded philanthropist. He found it tragic, truly, to fathom the reasons for refusing to integrate into any mainland society, to choose to be an afterthought.
Did he not do the same…?
It was places like this that always harbored the most abhorrent of legends, rituals, and creatures. Thus was he inevitably drawn like a moth to the flame. There were others that came to the Copts' aid as well. The ferryman had mentioned it, but little else was said on the matter, and he had yet to spot them midst the locals. Their immediate concern would more than likely be hunting down the reason for his own presence here - the Copts was plagued by a venomous devil of sorts. Some claimed it was a hag, that dwelt deep within the marsh. The hazy details of the creature were largely unimportant to Lazarus. Principally, it stuck out to him that these attacks had been happening within the past year or so, and progressively worsened. Men and women alike were often found dead, bundled like an infant, or with a small doll. This displayed some sort of intelligence and fixation on the demon's part. This part, he consequently surmised, was a piece of a much larger puzzle.
The dead Lazarus could tend to, if need be. It was the living he was more concerned with, however. Those that survived the monster's onslaught, only to slowly waste away from some sort of insidious toxin. Even the locals' shamans, with all their knowledge of toxicology of the flora and fauna of the area could not ascertain how to treat it.
Heavy boots finding footing upon the fastened logs of the docks, the cleric turned to pay the ferryman, to find he had somehow already gone. It seemed he would have to find his own way from here. If there was an Elder, he or she could direct him to the shaman's huts and the scene of the last attack.
