Fordim,
Here is my "Dark Stones" post. I think it will coordinate with yours and so I would ask you kindly to place it at the end of your "Stones" post, just before you lead our little band into the midst of orcs once again.
I hope my next post I can place myself--that is, if you don't move on to a new adventure over the weekend.
Bethberry
>>>
** EDIT: PLACED ON THE RPG THREAD - Post #126 ~*~ Pio ** 
Bethberry's post
Something had deranged the various members of the group. Darash could feel muscles hardening in the air, tendons snapping into tightness, rates of breathing either slow or quicken. The odour of fear exuded from bodies as they moved towards these carvings which Grash had called the Dark Lord's Stones. But who was this Dark Lord? She looked over at Grash and would have asked, but she saw that he was in no mood to converse, wrapped up in some strange dream of his own, his hand reaching out and touching her arm. She could not understand what this power was, but she did not repulse the touch of the former slave. Instead, she watched all the others as they went into dream raptures as they confronted these pillars. She did not understand who or what this Dark Lord was, but she sensed abject fear and horror in those around her. Their bodies were almost becoming grass before the wind. She could feel herself melting into passivity.
Then she faced the Stones herself, hearing her called by the name of "Darash" in a sonorous voice, low and melodious but she caught a vague sense of sneering in its patronising plea. She shook from her head the sound and spoke to herself a name none had ever heard her mention,
Kashtia Ma'at-Ka-Re, Kashia Ma'at-Ka-Re. Kashtia Ma'at-Ka-Re. Grash looked at her for a moment, but she did not think he heard. Especially did He who knew every way to appeal to those whose servitude he wanted not hear, but she did, savouring the click of the consonants. Then she raised her eyes against this man-god who called to her in the name of her pain,
Kwenye darasha. She felt a soft cooing go through her, as if an arm were placed around her shoulders relieving her of her responsibility so she could rest.
Come to me and I will show you the way home, I will bring you back to your tribe, I will give them the strength to resist their enemies. In me you will find the weapon to fulfil yourself as warrior.
Kashtia remained silent, listening to his words.
Your silence already shows you have decided for me, the voice continued.
Join me and I will raise your people high. I will call upon them to join me here in my victory.
Words teetored on the tip of her tongue, and her cracked lips she held still. He knew not the words of her people but spoke in this tongue that the slaves did here, not the foul speech of the orcs but that of the northern men. She fought against the dream he was placing in her head, for she realised he was trying to grab her story, to write her into his story and bend her to his way, to twist her into a mere handmaiden to power. Kashtia would not relinquish her voice; she refused to speak to this man-god who perverted people's stories to his own narrative. For the first time she began to understand the depravity of these northern men who were slaves even in the open air, and she began to feel compassion for them rather than hauteur or disgust. She understood as she had not previously what were the chains which held Grash even as he was free of the prison. They were not and had never been agents of their own lives.
Aloud she spoke one word,
Kontu!, that is to say, "Story". "Herstory", with its warning not to speak to the Trickster man-god. Then, to herself, in her head so none could hear, particularly this Dark Lord, she repeated the old stories of courage and cooperation.
Unaenda wapi, nyumbo yetu. Kurro. "Run," she translated, "Run," she said to all near her and began to move her springing feet forward, beyond the stones.
To her side, she suddenly heard Grash call out. He grasped her arm tighter and then rushed with her through the stones. He stumbled, almost falling at her feet, but she grabbed his arm this time and steadied him so he would not fall upon the black earth and bruise himself upon the cruel edges of its rocks. She saw in his eyes he had seen a dream of his own, a frightening dream, but a hope he had never known before in his life. Then she looked away at the road which lay before them