Adventure of Udt 1

Mist coils over the moor crossroads as Udt arrives. Beside the muddy road, a half-built gallows leans between black stones, its fresh beams slick with rain.

A gaunt middle-aged man works beneath it, a deserter's dented iron armor dark with sweat. His gray face is pinched, and each breath catches as though poison tightens his lungs.

A bound figure waits beneath the crossbeam, an adult woman in a torn brown cloak, wrists lashed behind her. Wet black hair hides most of her face, but one bright amber eye watches Udt.

His hammer slips from trembling fingers. The unfinished scaffold groans in the wind, while a small clay vial rolls from his belt and stops near Udt's foot.

Udt stoops, closes his huge hand around the wet hammer, and hurls it at the deserter soldier. The throw cuts through the mist with brutal force.

It misses the deserter soldier by a handspan and smashes into the gallows upright. The beam jolts, and the hanging rope slips halfway through its crude knot.

The deserter soldier staggers beneath the shuddering crossbeam, grabbing for the rope instead of his fallen weapon. His poisoned breathing turns sharp and panicked.

The hammer lies wedged in the upright, splitting fresh wood. The impact has exposed a second rope running from the scaffold to the bound woman's restraints.

Udt grips the loose line beside the bound woman and hauls downward. The rope jerks taut, biting across his palm as the crude restraint knot tears apart.

The woman drops hard onto the wet stones, but her wrists come free. The rope whips back and leaves a red welt across Udt's hand.

The crossbeam lurches sideways. The deserter soldier throws himself clear as the half-built gallows collapses into the mud with a splintering crash.

Mist swallows the fallen beams. The deserter soldier crawls toward the clay vial, wheezing, while the freed woman rises unsteadily and watches Udt.

Udt runs through the mist and mud, reaching the deserter before the fallen beams can shift again. He drops heavily beside him and examines the deserter soldier's strained breathing.

The deserter soldier's pulse flutters beneath Udt's fingers. His skin is clammy, his lips faintly blue, and dark veins creep upward from his throat.

Udt finds no wound beneath the dented armor, only a bitter medicinal smell on the deserter soldier's breath and a swollen puncture at his neck.

The clay vial rests within the deserter soldier's reach, while a narrow leather case hangs beneath his armor flap. His trembling hand closes over empty air.

Udt searches the deserter soldier's armor with broad, careful hands, lifting the leather case free and checking each pouch beneath the damp plates.

He finds a small purse of silver coins, a black iron signet bearing a split crown, a bone-handled eating knife, and a sealed green glass phial.

The case also holds a folded road map marked with red crosses, a brass key, and a blood-darkened scrap naming three villages along the northern moor.

Udt gathers the valuables into his possession. The silver clinks softly, while the sealed antidote remains steady in his palm beside the stolen-looking key.

Udt closes his broad hand around the deserter soldier’s head and pats him once, gently despite the armor and rain. The sick man flinches, then goes still.

Udt turns his back and walks into the mist, carrying the sealed green phial, the key, the map, the signet, and the other recovered valuables.

Behind him, the deserter coughs against the mud. The freed woman steps over a fallen beam and follows, her bound-rope ends dragging through the wet grass.

Her amber eye fixes on Udt’s retreating back as the mist thins ahead, revealing three distant watchfires along the northern moor.