As the warm sun rose, the hunter returned to its cave in the hills after a night of devouring sleeping deer and large game of all variety. Its long, red feathers required a slow pruning before it could earn a rest.
It slowly slid into its nest where its babies chirped and greeted it. Begging for food and their own pruning. With a simple huff of resignation, the hunter began to regurgitate its kills. Providing some food for its little hatchlings.
It did not understand why it and its mate created eggs that birthed black chicks, nor why the eggs sprouted black veins one day. The hunter had been concerned, but once the eggs hatched and the birds seemed healthy, she forgot what concerns she had.
Their black, swirling eyes filled her with comfort and maternal love, even if the chicks did not give off heat, she could provide for them. Even if the beginnings of feathers looked more like scales, she did not worry or doubt the chicks.
All was well for the hunter and her chicks, even if she was beginning to lose more feathers than before. Even if she weighed less than before. The chicks were happy, healthy, and would require more food. She had no time to worry. For that night, she would find new prey, and feed her chicks again.
***
When the sun fully broke the horizon, beginning its journey in full for the day, the duo of younglings broke their camp and set out on their third day of travel. They would be approaching the main area of the owlbear, or where they assumed the nest to be.
The lad guessed the owlbear had first attacked the group when they entered its territory, most likely seeing it as herd migrating through. And when it stopped, was when they left its territory. Assuming it to live roughly in the middle of that distance.
With some quick math, the wizard guessed the group of nearly 1,500 people traveled ten to fifteen miles a day, probably more once they began to be attacked. Making the area they were looking for to be around thirty-five miles across. With about twenty miles of green hills between the river and desert.
“Even with limiting our search to the central area of its estimated range, it is still nearly a hundred square miles.” The lad grumbled as the pair walked. “We will have around half a day before it discovers us in its territory and tries to start hunting us.”
“If it finds us. Ain’t much trail we can leave until we get to the small forest or wherever its nest is.” The lass shrugged, her eyes constantly scanning their surroundings. “Around noon, we’ll get to that Green Nipple Mounds, and we’ll get a better idea of where we can focus on searchin’ first.”
“It- It isn’t the Green Nipple!” The wizard groaned in exasperation, and the fighter smirked.
“Ya said that’s what the Orcish name meant.” She taunted back. “It’s suppose’ to be where an orc tribe tried to build a statue of Madra from the earth and sand. It ain’t my fault they decided to try and build a pair of twin hills to look like she was sun bathin’ by the Veins.”
“The accepted translation is, Emerald Tipped Mounds. They are a testament to the faith and might of the artistic orc tribes love of their version of Madra.”
“Sounds like they tried to build Madra’s ‘Mounds’ and the tips are nips.” She shrugs, her grin growing wider as the wizard throws back his head and hood to stare into the blue sky. “Their tribe was destroyed before they could build more than the chest, right? So, they are her mounds, they are quite literally just a monument of Madra’s breasts. It ain’t my fault they didn’t finish.”
“That- That is not, that- Fuck! Technically that is correct-” The gnome tried to retaliate before being interrupted.
“The best kind of correct.”
“BUT! But, it is still two mounds, and that is its name.” He opened his cloak and grabbed at his note and spell book, glaring a challenge at his sister. He was prepared to go to war with knowledge and resources on her butt. “While yes, Green nipples is... a crude, slang way of reading the title.” His glare stopped his sister from gloating. “The Mission of Madra has it officially recorded as the Incomplete Monument of Emerald Tipped Mounds, with direct approval of Madra’s speakers. The goddess Herself says that is its name, so that it is.”
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The gnome felt a fair bit of satisfaction as he wiped the smirk of his sister’s face bringing up her patron goddess’s own words to smack her argument down. Only for a cold sweat to form on his back when she started to grin again.
“When She was addressing the realm after the god of wizards and spells attempted to invade the island, she called him and his followers, if the quote is correct, ‘Those stick twirling twinks too obsessed with the smell of ink, parchment and their own asses to attempt a successful invasion.’ Are ya a twink wizard then?”
The tears of laughter welling up in her eyes nearly caused her to miss the ball of mud lifted from the earth and thrown at her while she dashed away. Howling like a hyena as the small wizard tried to keep up and deliver retribution for such a reminder of his profession's most recent divine insult.
***
As the hours went on, the pair would reach the artificial mounds, built thousands of years ago, and looked out on the green lands and hills beyond. Consulting the most updated maps they had copied, the lad crossed off and marked likely locations. They stood nearly five miles from what they guessed was the center cross section of the owlbear’s range.
“I think we have three options.” The wizard grumbled as his sister searched the oddly round and bulging peak of the mound with a satisfied smirk. “The forest that borders the river, the furthest away. The grove in the center of the oases that connects to that stream that cuts into the desert, about the same distance inland as that forest is to us. Or the only grove with trees large enough for an owl bear to roost in nearly two miles northeast of us.”
Preparing to say start with the nearest one, his sister spoke up and said in a serious tone.
“The oasis. It's there.”
The lad frowned and looked to his sister, and he saw it as well. Above the oases that marked the least likely point to find the creature, was a small flock of ravens, vultures and a number of scavenger birds.
They flew in a circle, but slowly, once every minute or so, a few of them would drop from the sky, trailing a black miasma.
“Well... That is not promising.”
***
As the sun began to fall, the once thin, nearly invisible string of miasma that rose from the center of the green oasis grew darker and thicker. The stench of rot, decay and death was clear for nearly a mile in every direction of it. Pieces of dead birds, insects, and prey animal corpses of bone and blood litter the immediate surroundings and central area of the oasis. Casting a clear warning for all that might attempt to find repast in the heat of the desert.
Much of the stench was carried south, away from the green hills and land travel routes near by. And within the shadows of dunes, the pair watched the oasis. Seeking to confirm and see the owlbear leave.
Their hope was to investigate the creature’s appearance and actions, then scouting out its home. If it was suitable for an ambush, they would dig in and wait for it to return before dawn. If not, they would try and leave to make a better plan.
As they waited, and the moon fully beat back the sun, the teens watched as a thin, red feathered owlbear leaped from the tree line and glided down the path of the stream that broke off from the main river so many miles away.
They waited and watched for another hour, taking shifts and taking small naps until the creature returned, soaring after leaping from the top of a nearby dune. Where it dropped its clutched prey, a deer or gazelle of some kind from nearly forty feet up. And its corpse collapsed and crunched on impact. The monster flew into the tree tops and then turned around once again. Heading out to find and bring back more prey.
“That explains why there are so many corpses scattered around...” The halfling sighed, grimacing as she could see the creature twitching before finally dying.
“There are nearly a dozen corpses that look to be a day or two old at the most... Why is it catching so many? Nothing else has left, so maybe chicks?” The gnome proposed. “But that amount of food could feed four normal owlbears. Let alone chicks or even cubs.”
“Only one way to find out.”
The two waited until they could no longer see the shadow of the bird flying in the distance before approaching the small land of green.
The smell and miasma grew thicker and worse as they approached. Getting to be almost unbearable to them both, they stopped speaking entirely and resorted to hand gestures.
Entering the thick greens, they stepped through brush and around small trees to approach a small burrow in the center of a clearing. Within a hollowed space of a rock, the two found a large nest of tree limbs and plant fibers.
But within it, were not owlbear chicks. The stench from them were distinctly that of a being of necrotic rot, a being of undead, or so full of necrotic energy, it would be better off undead.
Within the nest were four small hatchlings. Wyrm or even dragon hatchlings. Each of which was dripping rotting flesh covered in barely formed scales that clung to a visible skeletal form.
The owlbear was rearing under dragon spawn.