The First Vow
Red Crag - Chapter 1:3 After her brother's failure to protect the village, Tamsin Stonebreaker makes a difficult decision
Red Crag is a serialized story that I am creating by playing a solo role-playing game. The main character, Tamsin Stonebreaker, is an iron miner from a small village who is compelled to restore her family’s honor. I have no idea where her story will go. I just create the characters, set the scene, think about what Tamsin will try to do, and roll the dice. Click here if you want to start at the beginning. If not, read on.
The First Vow
Billy seemed unconvinced by Tamsin’s words of encouragement. It wasn’t surprising. He looked tired and defeated. Tamsin stood and gestured toward the lodge. “Let’s get you cleaned up and something to eat.”
The lodge is the heart of just about every town and village in Storm’s End. Red Crag is no different. It’s where communal meals are shared, important matters are discussed, decisions are made, joys are celebrated, and losses are mourned. Visitors, invited or not, are always offered a meal and a place to sleep in the lodge. When a village child enters their seventeenth year, they leave their family home and become a lodger. Lodgers sleep in the long hall at the back of the lodge each bringing their own modest bed and chest.
When Tamsin and Billy entered, the mood was muted. Denric had his arm around Callin Joy as the boy sobbed. He was barely a lodger, just a few months had passed since he left his father’s house. Now his father was dead.
“Callin got hit pretty hard when he tried to shield Phin,” said Billy.
Tamsin looked around the room. Fair Nan winced as Binnie Delver wrapped a poultice on her knee with a strong cloth. Yael groused as Old Rede tried to bandage the nasty gash on her forehead.
Soup simmered in the kettle over the fire. Tamsin poured a bowl for Billy and cut him a hunk of bread. She waved over to one of the other scrapers. “Paddy, come sit with Billy. Make sure he eats it slow, but eats it all. Ya?”
Paddy jumped up immediately. “Sure, Tam.” With a smile and an arm around Billy’s shoulder, Paddy led him to a bench and settled him down. “Today’s a day you can eat as much sweet butter as you like and nobody’ll kick you for it.”
Tamsin prepared a bowl of soup for Fair Nan and walked it over. Fair Nan took it with a nod of thanks.
“Young Rede said it happened pretty fast. Did they get everything?” Tamsin asked.
“Ya, the carts were full. Food. Supplies. Seed. Leather for the new bellows Moll wants. We did well at the market. Good prices for the wrought iron itself. Even better for the Winter’s Work. There was heft to the bag of coin they took. I suppose we’re lucky they left us with a cart and two mules. So, we could ‘carry home our dead.’” Fair Nan’s shoulders slumped.
“He said they were rough crew. Not much any of you could’ve done,” Tamsin offered.
“Pah!” snorted Yael from across the room, “At least some of us tried.”
A murmur rumbled through the room as several villagers looked to Tamsin to respond. Tamsin looked at Yael sharply, but held her tongue.
“Responsibility rests on my shoulders.” Fair Nan spoke loudly so everyone in the lodge could hear. “I am the Voice of Red Crag. I decided how many sentinels we would bring and which ones. Several lodgers offered to escort us on our journey, but I decided they were needed here. I could have hired sentinels in Green Meadows for our return, but I decided to save our coin.”
Fair Nan stared straight at Yael. Yael shifted her eyes and jutted her square chin in Tamsin’s direction. “Ya, that may be true, but if Coryn Stonebreaker hadn’t run—“
“He’d be dying, too.” Alyce Lichenfinder’s high-pitched voice cracked the tension.
Tamsin had not seen the old healer enter the lodge. Even in her bright reds and yellows, tiny, hunched Alyce was so gentle-footed and unassuming that she was rarely noticed until she spoke.
Alyce approached Yael and sat next to her. “I’m sorry, Yael. There’s nothing I can do. I’ve closed her wounds and applied the herbs I know. But, Gilli’s deep feverish and slipping away.”
Tamsin felt a knot form in her throat. She’d known Gilli Turnstone her whole life. They had been children and scrapers together; inseparable friends. It was Gilli who took Tamsin by the hand and led her away from Meadowsweet Cavern the day Gwynne Stonebreaker died. Nowadays, their Work was different, Gilli was a wood cutter like her mother while Tamsin worked the mines and furnaces, so their time together as lodgers was less than it had been when they were younger. But, their lodge beds rested next to each other and, more often than not, Gilli’s was the last face Tamsin saw before she fell asleep.
Fair Nan spoke first, “Alyce, surely there’s something. It’s not like you to give up.”
The folds of time deepened on Alyce’s face as she considered. “I think the blade that cut her must have been coated in some noxious stuff. Not one I know. Her wounds are edged in a strange blueish green. Sort of the color of a rael’s egg. But, deeper blue. I checked Phin’s wound, too, and it was the same. Was anyone else cut by the same blade?”
Fair Nan thought a moment and then shook her head. “No, Gilli and Phin were both cut down by the large woman. The rest of us were attacked by the others.”
“That’s some solace,” said Alyce.
Tamsin finally spoke, “Alyce, there must be something or somebody that can help. All respect, but maybe it’s beyond your learning. Maybe someone in Green Meadows?”
“Maybe. Not in Green Meadows.” Alyce tapped her gnarled fingers on the table. “But, the Fenn, perhaps. Their learning of poisons and healing is well beyond mine.”
Alyce stared soft for a moment as she scraped her memory. Her eyes focused again on Tamsin.
“There’s a Fenn healer. Near Owl’s Rage. Do you remember, Tamsin? Fell, Felled, Felt! Felt Foot! He was clever. He might know of a cure.”
Tamsin was not even a scraper when she accompanied her mother and Alyce to visit the Fenn settlement of Owl’s Rage. It was the closest Fenn settlement to Red Crag. But, even so, it was at least three days away and well into the Fenn Wilds. Tamsin tried to remember the route. If she didn’t stop. Didn’t rest. Maybe she could get there and back in time.
“I’ll go.”
Silence fell over the lodge. Tamsin looked from Alyce to Fair Nan. “I’ll go,” she said again.
A journey to the Fenn Wilds at this time of year would be difficult but not impossible. And, she’d been to Owl’s Rage before. Sure, it had been twelve, thirteen years ago. But, she could remember the way, couldn’t she? She was the only one who could go, the only one, besides old Alyce, who’d ever been.
“If Gilli can hold on, Alyce, if you can help her, to… to just hold on, for a few days, I could get there. I could find this Felt Foot. I could get a cure.”
“No!” Yael’s fists slammed into the plank table. She stood, glaring at Tamsin. “No. Not you. If anyone goes, it’ll be me.”
Tamsin started to speak, but Denric held her back with a raised hand. “Yael, be sensible,” he said, “it’s a difficult journey and you’re not exactly… well, you’re not as fast as you used to be. Neither of us is.”
“And, you’ve been injured,” Fair Nan added.
“Gilli’s going to need you by her side. She’ll need your strength.” Alyce patted Yael gently on the arm. “Besides, Tamsin knows the way.”
Tamsin locked eyes with Yael. Slowly, she drew her dagger from the sheath at her waist. Firelight flickered off the bone handle and polished dark red blade. Gripped in her fist, Tamsin pressed it flat over her heart. “I will go to Owl’s Rage, I will find this healer, and I will bring back a cure, or I will not return. I swear this on my name. I swear this on my Faith.”
Yael glared back at her, shaking her head. “We are not putting my daughter’s life into the hands of a Stonebreaker.”
Tamsin’s nostrils flared and her eyes hardened.
Fair Nan rose, hands raised to both of them. “Tamsin is not her mother, or her father, or her brother. She has kept Peace and Faith with us, and we will keep Peace and Faith with her.”
Yael started to speak, but was cut short first by Denric, then Sore Tom, then Binnie Delver and each of the other villagers in the lodge, “The Voice has spoken.”
Fair Nan nodded curtly to Tamsin who sheathed her dagger. “Take what you need and prepare to go.”
Tamsin nodded earnestly, “I will. Thank you.”
She turned to go but Fair Nan grasped her by the elbow and pulled her close. In a low voice and with an even gaze, she said, “We will hold you to your oath.”
Tamsin stood tall and met Fair Nan’s stare, “I know.”
Don’t stop here, keep reading!! Here’s the next episode: Leaving the Lodge
The Game Behind the Story #3
[For those of you who are interested, keep reading for a peek into how I play the game and then turn it into the fiction you are reading. Each episode, I will try to highlight a particular mechanic or important moment in the game.]
As I’m playing the game I keep detailed notes of what happens mechanically. I record the questions and the results when I consult the oracle and which moves I’m making and the results of the rolls. (I’ll explain how moves work a little more next time.) I also take notes of the narrative fiction that occurs while I play. That’s the “roleplay” part of the solo experience; imagining the main character engaging with the situation, having conversations, and taking action. I use those notes when I write this serial. Of course, when I’m writing, I flesh things out, expand the scenes, and add in lots of little details.
From the game perspective, three important things happened during this scene. First, I decided that Fair Nan would be Tamsin’s third starting bond. As the Voice of Red Crag, Fair Nan is essentially the leader of the community. As I was developing the ideas that keeping Faith with one’s community is an important value in the setting, that Tamsin was honor-bound, and that her honor was connected to her family’s, and her own, standing in in the village, it seemed obvious that her relationship with The Voice would an important one in the story. I decided that Fair Nan would be a fair, even-tempered person, but that she and Tamsin are not particularly close.
The second important mechanical aspect of this scene was my use of the oracle. I used the oracle a couple of times to decide things like if Alyce knew how to cure Gilli (“No”) and if she knew of someone who might know the cure (“Yes”). But, I also used the oracle to make a choice for Tamsin. As I was imagining the narrative, it became clear that Tamsin’s brother, Coryn, had failed in his duties as a sentinel and broken Faith with their community. To Tamsin, this is a further blow to her family’s already damaged honor. I imagined she would feel compelled to go find him and drag him back to face the consequences of his cowardice. But, it was also becoming clear that there was the possibility that Gilli could be saved but that someone would need to go find the cure. So, I asked the 50/50 question: “Does Tamsin go for the cure or to bring Coryn back?” The oracle decided she would go for the cure.
As I was reflecting at the end of this session, I decided that, going forward, I would not use the oracle to decide what Tamsin would do. In solo or GM-less games, the oracle takes the place of the GM. In a traditional multi-player RPG with a GM, the GM does not decide what the player’s character will do, the player does. Here, I am Tamsin’s player. Going forward, I decided that I would be solely responsible for making Tamsin’s choices. (Spoiler alert: Tamsin makes some very poor choices.)
The third important mechanic from this session was the vow. Player characters in Ironsworn (as the name might suggest) are driven by vows. On character creation, one can choose an over-arching background vow. For me this vow represents a long-term motivating goal that underlies Tamsin’s story. As one plays, the main character takes on new vows by making the Swear an Iron Vow move. These moves are triggered by the narrative and, once the move is made, compel the main character on a quest.
Here, having decided that Tamsin would try to help Gilli, I decided she would swear a vow to do so. I set the rank for the vow as dangerous (meaning it is difficult, but doable, and failure carries a significant consequence). I decided the consequence of failure would be Tamsin’s promise not to return to Red Crag. Having articulated the vow, I needed to roll the dice to make the move.
I rolled the two d10 challenge dice. Whew, I would only need to beat a 1 and a 2! I rolled my d6 action die (the six-sided die), added +2 for Tamsin’s Heart stat and +1 for her bond with Red Crag, and scored a 9! Yes! Tamsin’s path is clear and she will set off with +2 momentum. (I’ll explain all of those move mechanics in my next The Game Behind the Story.)
If you are enjoying Red Crag, I would love to hear from you!
I was drawn in by Tamsin's internal struggle - the painful, guilty burden's she is carrying from her family's history, her drive to redeem her family's honor, and to save her best friend. The healer and the prospect of healing her family, her friend, and her clan through her quest are really engaging. I love the story because it draws me into a fantasy world of limitless possibilities.
Just as much, I love your explanation of the game and how the "moves" are made. You are really good at simplifying complex concepts and explaining them in understandable terms for us lay folk.
Completely on the edge of my seat and mesmerized by Tamlin's dark red blade! Hard to wait for the next installment...