The Karanas

They call these plains "The Karanas," which struck me as a little offensive at first.  See, there is only one Karana, the Rainkeeper, father of storms.  But the plains named for Him, with a corner carved off of the rest by the Serpent River, are so vast and so differing in the creatures that wander their various reaches that people generally have to specify whether they mean Northern or Southern or Eastern or Western Plains of Karana, and so you have to use the plural when you're speaking of the whole thing.

It's Western Karana where I've been staying, with a farmer family called the Millers.  I was told to expect that humans are peculiar, but these two are surely peculiar even to their own kind.  They've got a single son of their own blood, but also working the farm are a gnoll and an ogre that they have adopted as their own children.  Frankly, "Tiny" and "Furball" seem better suited to the farming life than their natural-born son, but that's another story.

Why am I at the Millers' farm?  Because I'm told that the hay that's cut here is blessed by Karana himself, and we need it to put some life back into an old protector of Tagglefoot Farm in Rivervale: one Shakey the Scarecrow.  There are some other steps to the process of re-stuffing that old guy that concern me to think about, but right now I'm focusing on convincing the Millers to part with some of that hay at a price I can afford (which is to say, next to nothing).

They weren't impressed with any of the items I offered in trade, but when I informed them that I was an adventurer who knew all manner of lethal spells they told me I might be of service to them instead.  They said that some friends of theirs had tried to start up a farm in South Karana and had ended up slaughtered by something called aviaks.  Some kind of bird-men who have built a village down there. 

It seems the bird-men just showed up one day out of nowhere and started stealing the crops the humans had spent all season toiling in the fields over, food that they needed to survive.  One of the kids out in the field, furious, went after the nearest bird-man with a stick and poked its eye out, and then all Zek broke loose.  In the end every man woman and child that had been living at that farming village was dead and what was left of the aviaks took all the food and ran.

Mr. and Mrs. Miller told me that I would be worthy of Karana's blessing if I'd avenge the death of this farming community by traveling south and wiping out the aviaks in the village.  Not exactly what I came out here to do, but I have to admit that the story the Millers told me made my blood run cold, and I won't lose any sleep over watching some feathers fly.

Because you see, there is more than one Karana, in truth.  There's the steady rain, blessing the fields and bringing life, and then there's the storm in all its fury, blowing roofs of houses and splitting trees down the middle.  Karana blessed those fields with His rain, and through me, He can curse the thieves that plundered His fruits and murdered His people.

And that's the nice thing about being a halfling, sometimes.  Bad guys figure us for easy prey, happy-go-lucky followers of Bristlebane one and all, good for a laugh or a prank and nothing else.  And so they never see the storm coming until it's way, way too late.