It's an odd story, but a well crafted one.

In a mission dominated by stories with multiple player characters, it's a nice change of pace to have a few with just a single player character.

 
Konall moved through the Great Northern Woods. The snowfall made up for some of his lack of stealth, covering up what would otherwise be dense foliage and keeping the sound of his heavy footsteps from traveling too far.

The Viking thought about Aleena. Their relationship had been so good, and then it… hadn’t been. Now she was gone, and that made him feel… It made him feel something. A flash of movement! Konall turned and fired his bow, pinning a golden hart to a tree at 200 yards. He might not be stealthy, but he was strong, which meant his arrows flew swiftly and for long distances.

“Nice shot!” said Spaz. “That’s the last one.”

Konall consulted his list.

-12 drummond black bears -11 piper reindeer -10 leaping lizards -9 lady seals -8 milking weregoats -7 seven swans a-swimming -6 six geese a-slaying -5 golden harts -4 four killing birds -3 three freedom hens -2 two dove turtles -1 and a partridge in a pear tree

He only had twelve days of hunting to track down and kill all of these animals for the feast of Boris. Each year he had managed to catch everything on his list and each year he added a new item to the list of animals to hunt. So far he hadn’t missed a year, but this time it looked like he was not going to make it. His tribe admired hunting, and this year he was going to prove his worth by not just providing a feast for his friends, but for the entire tribe.

The black bears he had already gotten. It had been a brutal fight for the last three, and that had lost him a day of recovery, but all twelve were skinned, gutted, with the meat already cut. The piper reindeer had been easier than last year. He’d simply made a call from one of their antlers and they’d all come running. A quick ambush and he had enough venison to feed half of his tribe. Most of the birds had gone down fairly easily.

In fact, the only things that remained were 9 leaping lizards, four lady seals, a pair of milking weregoats, four killing birds, and that ever-elusive partridge in a pear tree. He’d seen partridges aplenty, but only those that were hit with an arrow after it had already passed through a pear had that right taste after cooking.

“What did you find in the traps, Spaz?”

“Ten leaping lizards. Oh, and this bunny. It wasn’t a killer bunny, just this black…” Konall stopped listening. With his quota of lizards finished, maybe he could complete the feast after all. All he needed was… who was he kidding? There was only an hour of light left. “It’ll take a Crimbo miracle for me to get all this done.” Konall sighed.

“Well, why not ask for one?” Spaz said, as he dumped the contents of the traps into Konall’s empty loot sack.

“Huh?”

“You’re a shaman. That’s what you do.”

“Right. O great animal spirits. Please, be with me on my hunt. Help me to search out the prey I seek and may all my shots fly true.”

“Good prayer,” Spaz said. “Except animal spirits are guardians of animals. They protect them from hunters. They also smell like parsley. I could really go for a quiche right now.”

“Well, then what do I do?”

“I dunno. Oooh, what about the were goats? They’re not natural. The forest guardian hates them.”

“Fine. Guardian of the forest. I seek to destroy an abomination upon this land. The weregoats are an unnatural combination of man and beast and they also taste good in soup. Please, guide my feet and my arrows, that they may be removed from your paradise. Oh, and sorry about all the hunting, but my people need to eat.”

Konall felt a hand on his back. He turned to face Aleena, and there was no one there. Right, Aleena was gone. Something bumped his back again.

“Your arrows,” said Spaz.

Konall drew out a wiggling arrow. Annoying. He fired it into the distance, glad to be rid of it. Except it curved at the last moment.

He cocked his head. “That’s odd.” With Konall’s brief but thorough training in the shaman ways, it only took him two minutes to figure out the forest guardian was leading him toward the nearest weregoats. He reclaimed his arrow, fired it again, picked it up again, and continued the cycle. After half a league of running, he fired it once more only to have it fall straight down. “That’s odd. I though it- Waaaaaaah!” That waaaaaaah is the shout a man makes while flying through the air after being rammed from behind by a weregoat. Thankfully, he was stopped by the impact of his face and a tree before he got too far.

Konall turned, spitting the bark out of his teeth and drawing sword and shield. The goat readied to charge again, letting out a bleat of anger. The two ran toward each other, and Konall raised his sword to land a lethal blow and- he was broadsided by the other weregoat. He lay on the ground, the wind knocked out of him as the goats came over and began stomping him. Konall cut the first off at the leg and swung wildly but ineffectively at the second while Spaz circled its head trying to flick it in the ear.

The Viking rolled to a squatting position and blocked a ram from the second goat, using the momentum from the impact to back him up into a standing position. He slashed downward just as the goat moved to ram, and his sword caught in its horns. The goat instinctively reared back, catching Konall off guard, and his sword went flying.

Konall knocked the weregoat to the ground with a shield butt and finished it with a hatchet to its neck. He put both shield and hatchet away, drew his haxxor, and looked for the other goat. Spaz was pointing at him, probably to congratulate him. No! Konall turned and swung blindly with his haxxor, chopping the limping weregoat behind him in half before it could ram him. With that, he marked weregoats off his list and put the their lean bodies into his sack. He trudged back to his ox cart, full sack over his shoulder.

When Konall arrived at his cart and set the sack in, he sat down. “Spaz,” he roared, “Knock off that horrible screeching.”

“It’s not me.”

“Then what-” Killing birds! The blood drew them. He looked up and pulled out his bow as one swooped down, its razor wings cutting his bowstring and slashing his face. He threw away the useless bow and pulled out a pair of hatchets, just in time to knock another killing bird out of the sky. Five more circled him, including the first, eager for fresh blood.

Three swooped at once, attacking at different angles. Konall tossed his main hatchet, slicing the target in two and ducked as he swung at a second, missing. The third slashed across his thigh, leaving the burning pain of a sharp cut.

He drew another hatchet and slashed at the next two dive bombers, hitting one and getting slashed by another. Spaz rammed the one that got away, then chased it and jabbed his pitchfork as it tried to escape. Another streaked straight toward Spaz, opened up its talons, closed in, and got hit in the head with Konall’s hatchet.

Spaz blew fire at the next one to attack him, roasting it instantly. That left one, and it flew straight at Konall, making it easy to hit. Which is why it was a shame that Konall missed with his last hatchet and got slashed across the arm.

The bird flew at Spaz, the demon who had no fire breath left, who could count on no more missiles from Konall. Spaz flew, ducking through trees and flying under shrubs in an effort to escape. He swerved around a large obstacle. And as the last killing bird’s talons reached out and touched Spaz’s back that large obstacle’s big Viking fist knocked it out of the air and broke its neck. “Thanks, Konall.”

“Okay. Four seals and a partridge in a pear tree. And it gets dark in… now. Well, the day’s not over.”

After gathering his hatchets, Konall lit a torch in the last of the sunlight and headed to the lake. Freshwater seals would be coming out to hunt sleeping land animals now, and on land they were at their weakest. It was a long journey, but eventually he caught them. He fumbled around in his pack for anything that would work as a bowstring. Twisted animal hide, sinews, even a strip of linen would do. Or that lock of hair Aleena had given him months back. He’d forgotten he even had that. Her long hair, braided and woven together, made a good string. It’d be like he was keeping a part of her- No. It’d be a serviceable bowstring. Nothing more.

The seals were ahead, quietly barking their positions to the other members of their herd. Konall fired swiftly, taking out one, two, three seals in quick succession. He only needed one powerful shot for each, and they were too slow to do anything about it. Wait, three? There had to be one more! The feast.

And then he heard it! A solitary bark, toward the lake. Konall ran over mounds and under branches until he reached the frozen shore. Where was it? There! A lone seal walked along the ice. Konall moved carefully over the frozen lake, creeping closer. The seal bared its razor teeth and moved toward him. Konall drew his sword, stepped, stepped, and fell through the ice.

Plunging suddenly into frozen water, Konall turned and saw a set of open jaws moving toward him. The seal had the advantage in this watery hel. Konall slashed slowly, but the seal circled and moved behind him. As its jaws reached out to bite, he gripped its neck and held on. Down they went, slowly but surely. Konall couldn’t breathe underwater, but neither could this beast. He punched it repeatedly in the stomach, causing precious air to leave its lungs, and it managed to bite him a couple times.

As they moved deeper the water turned black, or maybe Konall was running out of air. He swam upward with his free hand as the seal struggled to get free, and then went limp. He reached surface and ran into thick, solid ice. Konall hammered fiercely with a hatchet, trying to get free. Five blows. Ten. Twenty. Finally he got a big enough hole to stick his head through and get a breath of air. A few more blows and he was through, pulling himself up onto the ice and the seal after him. Now to get to the shore. Where was shore? Everything was black. And cold. So cold. Konall was used to extreme chill, but being covered in freezing water for this long was too much. He crawled achingly in a random direction for hours, or minutes, he couldn’t tell. Finally, exhausted, Konall fell asleep as his body resigned itself to death.

* * *

Don’t die! Konall opened his eyes to see the small fire before him. The thought was forgotten as soon as he woke.

“What?” he stuttered.

“That was amazing,” Spaz said. “It was like pow, pow, gurgle, splat, socka, gurgle-gurgle, and then nothing… Then bam! Straight through the ice. And then you crawled to shore and passed out. I lit a fire. You feeling okay, Vikingsicle?”

“Ugh.”

“Maybe later.”

Konall propped himself up against the tree. “How long was I out.”

“Dunno,” said Spaz. “You mortals are so caught up in time, all that junk about past and future and stuff. I never did get the concept. Have you killed the Bargherbeast yet?”

“What’s a burger beast?”

“So no. Um, half past potato.”

Konall brushed Spaz away from his face. “Potato isn’t a time.”

“Well, I don’t think the spirits of darkness have been defeated by the spirits of light yet.”

“Huh?”

“It’s not quite midnight. Maybe not for a couple hundred heartbeats.”

“So that’s, what, two minutes?”

“I guess.”

“Hel in the hearth.”

One animal short. If he got a partridge in a pear tree, his night would be complete. Konall sighed. His mind was now playing tricks on him, imagining the scent of pears to remind him of his failure. So close, and yet he’d messed up after all. Everything in his life had fallen apart, friendships, alliances, his relationship with Aleena. He was hoping for just one good thing this Crimbo. But it wasn’t meant to be.

One last hope. Konall leaned against the tree he was next to and picked up a pebble. “Spirits, if you hear me, I need that partridge. I need a Crimbo miracle. Please, guide this pebble to the nearest partridge. Let me finish my quest.” Konall tossed it up in the air, and it came straight down again. Hel! Konall slammed his fist into the tree, filled with rage. Something hit the ground. A partridge! As it stood up and shook its head a pear fell from the tree and hit it in the head, killing it. Konall smiled.

Ahh, good job, Konall!

The next piece starts as a typical Becky Joy story but quickly morphs into a major twist in the mission. Then it debuts a new handler to AiL!