The traveler stepped off the docks of Greyhook Harbor just as the last light of day slipped behind the sea.
Salt wind rolled through the harbor streets, carrying the smell of tar, rope, and fish. Lanterns flickered to life along the boardwalk as fishermen hauled in their final nets.
Far beyond the harbor, the peaks of the Blue Mountains rose into the darkening sky.
Even from here, faint blue veins glowed along their ridges.
The traveler pulled his cloak tighter and walked toward town.
He had come a long way.
And every road along the coast had led him to the same place.
The Mud Crabb.
The tavern stood crooked beside the harbor road, its wooden sign creaking in the wind. A painted blue crab holding a mug of ale swung above the door.
Inside was warmth, smoke, and the roar of a room that had already been drinking for hours.
Sailors crowded the tables.
A fiddler tore through a wild tune while a man with a drum pounded along beside him.
Several patrons were already singing.
Loudly.
Badly.
But happily.
The traveler stepped up to the bar.
Behind it stood a broad man with a thick beard and sleeves rolled to the elbow, polishing a mug with a rag that had likely seen better days.
The traveler set a few coins on the counter.
“Food,” he said.
“And ale.”
The bartender nodded.
“Name’s JC,” he said, sliding a mug down the bar.
“Welcome to the Mud Crabb.”
The music in the back of the tavern surged louder.
The fiddler quickened, and a handful of sailors slammed their mugs as they sang.
Oh Thalen the Black, Thalen the Great,
Hammer of fire, breaker of fate!
From mountain stone to star-born flame,
The sky itself once spoke his name!
Oh Thalen the Black, raise your hammer high,
He chained a falling star from the sky!
Steel and thunder, sparks that roar,
Fallen Star forevermore!
The room erupted in cheers and laughter.
Someone nearly fell off a chair.
The traveler frowned slightly and glanced toward the singers.
“Who’s Thalen?”
JC paused.
The rag stopped moving.
He reached for a bottle behind the bar and poured something stronger than ale into a small glass.
Then he slid it toward the traveler.
The tavern noise seemed to dim as JC leaned on the counter.
“You hear that song a lot around here,” he said.
“Been sung in this tavern for near a hundred years.”
The traveler lifted the glass but didn’t drink.
“So who was he?”
JC gave a small, knowing smile.
The kind a man gives when a story is about to get interesting.
“You want the tavern tale...”
He nodded toward the singing sailors.
“...or do you want the real story of who Thalen the Black really was?”
The traveler met his eyes.
“The real one.”
JC poured himself a drink this time.
Then he looked toward the distant mountains beyond the harbor.
“The world’s been different,” he said quietly,
“ever since the night Fallen Star was forged.”
And with that...
the real story began.