There are many stories about the cottage near the mountain pass.
Some say that an old hag dwells within, skulking about the grounds and glamouring herself and her hovel so that she can lure in passersby foolish enough to accept her poisonous offer of hospitality and then leave what she doesn’t use for her potions buried in her garden on the edge of the property.
The village near the eastern end of the pass would whisper that it was once the home of a local hunter who, in his blind ambition and hubris, marked a sacred beast as his quarry. After felling the ancient guardian, he was cursed by the land and driven to make his home on the outskirts of humanity, his new feral nature unfit for the civilization he had enjoyed.
Anyone drinking in the ale halls in the town at the western end of the pass would scoff at the superstition of their neighbors and maintain that it was the home of a competent, if somewhat eccentric, herbalist who could cure anything that ailed a body and offer some of the finest tobacco on the mountainside. Never mind that occasionally someone would return from their treatments just a little…different.
Still, others say that no one has ever called that strange little cottage home. That no matter what time you pass by the well-kept little plot you’ll smell fine food on the air and see smoke puffing from the chimney but no one has ever seen a living soul through the brightly lit windows or puttering around the lush little berry patch.
Only the mountain could really attest to which, if any, of these tales are true. But like all mountains, it’s notoriously good at keeping its secrets.
And silencing those that wish to reveal them.
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