Giving up on turning their companion's heart away from his new-found bride, the group set out across the snow again. The day's travel was boring. That evening, the gremlins that had been following the group stole Zacarius' healing wand.
Around midday during the next day's travel, the group spotted a weird cloud ahead. Approaching, they found the cloud was actually circular, risen around a verdant grassland in the middle of the snowy wasteland. In the grassland they saw a single great elk happily munching on the grasses. Ash also spotted a pair of winter wargs attempting to hunt, hindered by their white coats in the tall green grasses. Ash alerted the group and they engaged the wolves. Ash charged in while Zacarius shifted Pavo to the rear of the wargs. Though the wargs were able to damage Ash heavily with magically cold breath and ripping fang, they were both bested pretty quickly, one blinded and the other pierced several times by Pavo's blades.
As they were recovering from the fight, the elk came trotting over to defend its territory. After charging towards the group, the megaloceros engaged in stomping and bellowing to get the group to leave. Ash realized that not only were they not really needing to fight the elk, but that an elk of that size could do a lot of damage, moved the group out of the greensward, keeping weapons down and eyes averted. The elk, satisfied, romped elsewhere, no doubt hoping to attract his females.
Nadya and the group spent the next hour or so calming the sled dogs and sorting their leads, during which a stranger came up to the camp, telling of a vision from the lights before the stars that led him to this land. He was an Erutaki, called Inuksuk, a spirit talker for his people. He was also trained as a kineticist, able to manipulate the stone. Though not exactly welcomed with open arms, his open nature and ease of spirit earned him a space to travel with the group.
That evening, as the rest of the group set up camp in a convenient dell, Nadya sent her son Orm into a nearby copse for firewood. Pavo decided to investigate the dell as well, spotting a trio of hungry wolves looking for easy prey. Pavo called out for assistance immediately. The wolves started at the sound of alarm and decided it would be prudent to be elsewhere and slunk off.
After camp was set, the gremlins visited again, stealing Zacarius' color spray wand and all the spacing wedges for Ash's axe, including the one currently holding the axe head in place. Inuksuk spotted the gremlins before they could approach the camp for a third time that evening, calling on the earth to force them to flee. The gremlins decided they were bored of this group now and went to find someone more interesting to play with. Inuksuk had served as blacksmith for his tribe before following his vision, so knew at least the basics of setting an axe and went to the copse to find good wood to make more spacing wedges, returning with replacements before camp was fully struck.
On the afternoon of the next day's travel, a ruined village came in to sight. Though most of the village was reduced to no more than crumbled remnants of forgotten walls, the church in the center of town still had enough of a roof to make a decent shelter; with a storm threatening on the horizon, the group decided to check it out. Set over the entry arch of the church was the symbol of Desna, and standing within its decrepit walls was a pair of priests. Even as Pavo warned the group, he heard the sound of children screaming. The group was overcome by a wave of crushing despair though it found home only in Ash's heart. The two priests shed their illusionary skins, growing jagged teeth and rough claws while their vestments appeared to rot in moments.
Zacarius called on holy energy to strike them down while Ash and Pavo engaged them. The two huecuva struck at the faithful of Desna, one charging Zacarius and the other going for Inuksuk, only to be intercepted by Ash. With holy energy and bolts of stone, axe and dagger, the blasphemous priests were finally laid to rest.
Pavo found a hidden cache of treasures the priests had stashed before their deaths so long ago, extracting a couple scrolls, a feather-falling ring and a bladed belt for the group's use. A little poking around led the group to surmise that the priests had turned from Desna when the rest of the town fled Baba Yaga's army of giants during the first winter war, the prelude to the founding of Irrisen.
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