The song is necessary as part of the backstory. Work with the other players—at least one character needs a strong reason to seek out the lost castle. They might catch snippets of the song first, words like “lost gold”, “Illustrators” and “Astronomers”.
A pair of dark-haired twins sing a bawdy tale of two armies back in the days of scholarly combat. Their accent is the unmistakable lisp of Great Bend. CHARACTER recognizes one of the orders: it must be about the legendary lost castle of the Astronomers.
The singers are two rogues from Great Bend. They are twins, and their song is the adventure hook. The player with the sorceror, or whichever player is the scholar who knows about the Order of the Astronomers, will recognize that, if true, the song includes instructions on how to find the lost castle of the Astronomers! Unlike the oft-visited “Haunted Illustrious Castle” to the north, Kristagna is likely to never have been visited by any human since its presumed demise.
When the singers finish, they receive a few farthings in their caps, but most of the people at Hightown Market are not here for entertainment, nor to give their money away.
If the characters are friendly with the singers, the singers will be friendly also. They don’t know anything more about the song, although they will claim to have heard it from a survivor of the battle, a nigh-impossibility unless they’re a lot older than they look or the survivor was Elvish.
“Or perhaps it was a survivor’s daughter.”
The singers speak in a vaguely French accent, the strong nasal accent of Great Bend. They will (if asked) claim to be here because of a run-in with a Southern Duke over the Duke’s daughter, and can go on about their escapades with her for as long as interest (or beer, should their suggestion to retire to the nearby tavern be successful) holds out. Their stories may or may not be true; but they will certainly be sensational.
If you wish, the twins can be avatars (or a single avatar halved) of Artemis and Apollo, Janus, Gemini, or the Yoruba gods, or any twin god of your campaign. If so, the twin singers will become permanent fixtures in the adventurers’ lives, managing to get them into major trouble with whatever heavenly power struggle is currently going on.
…so passed the Mist through Biblyon.
“South!” he cried, and south he led
his hundred men down past the road,
into the deepest forest led
a hundred men to quarrel bold
at Kristagna’s starry hold.
They marched beneath a waning moon.
Three days they marched and many a troll
fell to his army and his sword.
And many creatures long unnamed
were stirred, and fled, Mistole’s horde.
Things that fly and things that creep
with leather wings and slimy hoof,
feared, and fled, in the forest deep
before the Mist’s well-armored horde.
The third night out the moon was gone
Beneath the stars they made their camp.
One by one the stars went dull,
A mist rose up, so cold and damp.
“Mist for Mistoles? An omen good,”
So cried Mistoles’ aide-de-camp.
They built a fire, tall and hot,
and heeded not the omen,
to drive the mist that chilled their hearts
to dry the damp ‘til morning.
The fire crackled to the sky,
sent fiery coals a-borning,
when from the mist they heard a cry,
a scream, and then a warning.
Groping! Groping in the dark!
The camp was in a turmoil.
Groping! Groping in the wood
But only for a moment.
The warnings died, the screaming waned,
and when they counted up their men,
A hundred men were ninety.
At morning when the sun arose
cradled in Elijah’s breasts,
It burned the mist away.
And ninety men turned east and left
the thing that gropes the wood.
They bore due east upon the breasts,
to remote Kristagna rode.
And many songs describe the war,
and many tales are told.
In some they die in forest deep,
In some they win the suit.
But no song knows the fate of those
lost to the thing that gropes the wood.
