Exton

When the sorcerer approached me with what I regarded as a near-impossible task - to force-grow a hawthorn hedge to a height of six feet or more, in an area glutted with Cold Iron, all within the space of three days - I very nearly laughed in his face. Fortunately for my continued good health, I managed to stifle the impulse. I did manage, I think, to convey a sense of how difficult such an undertaking would be, whereupon the mage assured me that he was counting on just those factors to come into play when the Drow stepped into our trap. The presence of so much iron would weaken and destabilize their Gate; the hawthorne - a notoriously difficult plant to work with - would inhibit if not actually negate their magic. He listened to me very patiently and then nodded once. "Do your best." That was all he said.

Thus began three days in Hell, three days during which I battled the debilitating effects of Cold Iron to force an unnaturally rapid growth of a plant whose very nature disrupts and warps magic. I began at dawn and wended my way home at dusk, too exhausted to do more than snatch a quick meal and reel to bed.

By the end of the third day, I looked like I had been on a week-long hunger strike; but by the gods, the hedge was ready, and you have read already of the yeoman's service it gave us in our fight against the Dark Ones.

Ah, but I crave your pardon. I forget that not all are familiar with the ways of magic. Know, then, that hawthorn has for centuries been known as a spellbreaker, a protection against dark magic. A hawthorn flower carried on one's person renders that person proof against all but the most potent curses - and even these are apt to go strangely and subtly awry in the immediate neighborhood of hawthorn. Fashion a wax doll - a poppet, as we call them - in the likeness of your enemy and pierce it with a thorn from the hawthorn and your enemy will suffer injury or pain where the poppet has been pierced.

But I digress. The hedge protected our folk from the Drow's magic and the iron shot provided by Sieur Jack was more than they could withstand. (Mem. - Strive to stay on Jack's good side.)

A very little more remains to be said. In recompense for the three nights that I was incapable of even self-gratification, each of my lovers chose one night and pleasured me into near-unconsciousness - and when I recovered, they began again. Thus it is that once again I am exhausted... but in a much more pleasurable fashion.