by Eric Ugland
“You have been fooled by the brownies. They are infamous for the abilities with illusions and charms.”
“Maybe they are, but in this instance, they are telling the truth. Something I know because nearly all of them chose to leave back to Feedoheem instead of staying here. And they gave me their tree to replant.”
I held out the acorn. It felt very warm, and pulsed out a little green light.
Bixby reached out a little, and I saw a flicker of magic in between her hand and the acorn.
“It is real,” she said softly, speaking to herself. “Then they have told the truth. They are leaving the valley?”
“Bingo.”
“And you are leaving with them?”
“For now,” I said. “I don’t plan on letting the spiders keep this valley, but they’ve got the numbers right now. I’m a solid fighter, but no way I can take them alone. Once we’ve won back the valley, you can return.”
“So you’re saying we need to leave?”
“Yeah. Like, now. Or sooner. We need to be out of this valley by daylight.”
“I don’t know that I can make it over the pass—”
“I can carry you. Just get the things you need, and we’ll go, okay? Anything you need to take with you, bring to me. I’ll put it in my magic bag, and—”
“It cannot possibly carry—”
“Stop arguing, would you? Get your shit, and let’s go.”
That seemed to get through to her. She nodded a few times, and then disappeared back into the house, yelling for the others to get up. A moment later, Careena came sprinting out of the house, and headed for the other buildings to round up the girls. It was a sort of pandemonium as everyone darted around trying to get ready. The brownies and I just stood as much out of the way as we could. After maybe half an hour of chaos, a bunch of young women, the students, plus the four teachers stood in front of me. All their belongings, for the most part, got shoved in my bag.
“Okay,” I said. “Great. We are going to take a little walk, and then a longer walk. It will take be about two days. There’s a really high pass, you probably know the one,” I pointed to said pass, “but otherwise, it’s going to be mostly downhill. Then we get to go into a kobold warren and a banded worm tunnel, so, uh, I suppose an educational opportunity there.”
No one smiled at that, so we just started on our way. The witches had glowing stones attached to sticks, illuminating everything out to a certain radius. There was a lush grass all over the island that seemed to have been trimmed by someone.
We had to use all the rafts to deliver everyone in groups to shore, and even then, it took multiple trips. I caught sight of the glowing stones reflecting off various things in the darkened forest towards the north. Spiders were watching us.
I took up the front, walking towards a towering rock formation I remembered being in the general vicinity of where I’d left my compadres.
Even that mild uphill slope taxed the witches, and not just the older ones. The entire group was out of breath and fading as we closed in on the tree line. The brownies, on the other hand, just motored on. Still quiet, still reserved. Maybe they were having doubts about not going back to the Feedoheem. I mean, I didn’t exactly understand why any of them would want to stay in this world, not when they could go back to their home.
We waited at the edge of the tree line. I started wondering if the Feedoheem somehow touched Earth, if there might be a way to go through that plane and wind up back at my own home. Though that was more a thought experiment than anything else, seeing as I had nothing to go back to. And if I went back through the Feedoheem, would I be going as my old self, or would I be going as Montana of Coggeshall?
Even if I did find a way to Earth, I didn’t think I’d go. I was set in my new world. And making a life here.
We continued on, but I couldn’t sense any spiders, which worried me. They had to be somewhere, watching. But the only thing I saw was a singular goose head sticking straight up out of a giant goose body.
A soft honk echoed out, and I sped up across the open space, waving. That got me a second honk.
The group followed, sort of. Some of them walked into the field, but more of them remained in the trees. None of them seemed sure of what they should be doing. I scrambled up the boulders, then dropped into my group.
“Wake up,” I said, being purposefully loud.
I got a bunch of groans and squinty eyes as I pulled off blankets and pushed people around.
“We’ve got things to do today,” I said.
“Just walking,” Ragnar said, grabbing the nearest blanket and wrapping it tightly around him.
“Not just walking,” I said, “escorting. Running. Probably fighting. So get up.”
He did not.
The others got to their feet, and were getting something of a move on, but Ragnar continued to be recalcitrant (where the hell did that SAT word come from?). I picked him up, blanket and all, and threw him up over the rock barrier.
There was a whump as he hit the ground, and then a long string of curses in Lutra.
“I told you to get up, fleabag,” I shouted back at him.
The curses continued, but I had other things I had to do.
“So, once again, we are forced to make a trip back home,” I said.
The others looked at me like I was a fucking idiot. Which, to be fair, was pretty much how I felt about the situation too. But that was just my idiom. Fucking idiocy.
“Why?” Amber asked.
“So you know the spiders in the valley?” I asked.
“Not personally,” Amber said. She got sassy when she was tired.
“Turns out they’re giant assholes, and super violent. They like making puppets out of people, and they’ve basically genocided the brownies here in preparation for killing the witches — not hags, by the way, Wulf — and taking over the valley. So, we’re taking what’s left of the brownies and the witches, and bringing them back to Coggeshall.”
“And then we come back here?” Skeld asked, pulling a leather shirt over his fur.
“Negative ghostrider,” I said.
“Ghostrider?”
I continued as if I hadn’t heard his question. “The spiders will remain in control of this valley, for now. We’ll have to get our army to come up here and run an extermination job sometime soon. And hopefully rescue the humans, and others, they’re currently keeping as livestock.”
“Why not do it now?” Wulf asked.
“As much of a badass I believe I am,” I said, “even I have certain limits. And going up against a thousand plus spiders is one of them. One good dose of poison, and I’m toast. As are all the fools fighting with me, or those I’m trying to keep alive.”
“So you run like a coward.”
“It’s a tactical fucking retreat, dickbag. And judging by your last performance, you seriously shouldn’t accuse anyone of being a coward. But if you want to take them on,” I reached into my bag and pulled out a spear, “here. Be my fucking guest.“
That took the air out of his sails. After an awkward moment, I took the spear back and slip it in my bag.
“So, yeah. We’re heading back down the mountain, and then we’ll do this whole thing again. But different.”
“Different?” Meikeljan asked. “How?”
“We can’t go through this valley again without clearing it first. I don’t want to risk the spiders being able to track us back home. So we’ll need a different route. You know one, Wulf?”
“I will need to think about it.”
“Peachy. We’ve got a day or so’s walk back home. Ruminate away.”
Chapter Thirty-Five
The older witches were less than enthusiastic when they saw Fritz for the first time. And they were not amused when I suggested Bixby ride the goose over the pass. They even yelled at me when I picked her up and used a bit of leather to tie her on. That said, the screaming stopped once Fritz was airborne. And or she fainted. Or they got out of range. Tough to
tell, but at least she wasn’t struggling to get up the pass.
I got the rest of the group on the path, and then decided I should mosey over to the spider-home and see what they had to say. Not just because I wanted to get the quest to complete, though that was part of it, but also because I wanted to buy as much time as I could for the witches to get up to the top of the pass.
But I didn’t want to go by myself, since I didn’t trust the spiders. They would have no problems just eating me. So it was time to try out my newest hirð member.
“You have some magic capabilities, right?” I asked Bear.
She nodded at me.
“Invisibility?”
“Yes,” she said. She had a sultry voice.
“What do you have in terms of spells? Maybe something with fire?”
“I can cast several fire-based spells.”
“Cool,” I said. “Can your invisibility hold against the spiders? In their lair?”
“I have not tried it, but I would assume so.”
“Great. You’re coming with me. Uh, I guess ride on my shoulder so you don’t get stepped on or something.”
She nodded, closed her eyes and disappeared. Then I felt something climbing up my leg and torso before a slight weight settled on my shoulder.
It wasn’t hard to find my way back across the valley — just go downhill until you end up going uphill. Ignore the spiders until they came to escort me, and then let the escorts do the work.
Walking through, I noticed more spiders around than I’d seen before. Maybe because it felt like they were watching me, hungrily. Just before we got to the caves, I saw what I thought was a human corpse, but with a little, uh, movement happening under the skin. Its eyes opened, and I saw only horror there. Well, horror and pain. The poor bastard was being eaten from the inside out.
After a short walk through the tunnels, I was back in the large cavern, standing in a circle of giant mother spiders. The Grand Mother stood right in front of me, her black and shiny eyes locked on my face. A moment passed, and another pale humanoid came walking out. It knelt in front of the Grand Mother. There was no hesitation this time, and the spider just jammed her leg into the dude’s head.
Kersplush.
The humanoid, a young man with just the barest vestiges of facial hair, turned around to face me.
“You have returned,” the Grand Mother said.
“I do what I say I’m going to do.”
“I have been told that you killed several of my children.”
“I might have,” I said.
“This does not make us happy.”
“You think it made me happy? I was trying to solve your problem, and then they attacked me.”
“You must have been in the wrong place.”
“Did you tell your children to not attack me?”
“No.”
“Okay, so, they did. I defended myself, and your kids lost. I’m sorry. but, I did do as you asked.”
“You resolved the issue with the hags?”
“Yes. I got them to leave the valley.” Which was mostly true. I did get them to leave, I was just planning on making sure they’d be free to move back home at some point.
The Grand Mother stood back up to her full height, and I felt like she was chatting with the various mothers in the room. Or, who knows? Spiders doing spider things.
Then the attention came back to me. “You have done as you promised.”
Congratulations! You’ve completed a QUEST!
The DeHaggening
Get the hags out of the valley, turns out, alive.
Reward for success: Safe passage through the valley. Once.
Well that was underwhelming.
“Okay,” I said, “so I get free passage now, right?”
The puppet smiled.
“Yes,” it said.
But I didn’t believe her. There was something about the way she said it, well, the way the puppet said it, that felt like she was about to pull something over on me. And I was pretty sure I knew what she was going to do.
“Okay then,” I said, “I suppose I’ll just have to chat with y’all on a later date.”
I gave a little wave, then walked away from the spider mothers.
All around me, small spider faces turned in my direction. It continued as I walked back through the cave tunnels — I was not ignored this time. I felt like I was a candy bar being paraded through an elementary school. Everyone was careful not to touch, but it was taking all their willpower.
Outside of the cave, the spiders were just as eager. They kept a polite distance, but dozens just followed along behind.
“A little fire,” I said to Bear softly. “Just enough to let them know to hang back.”
A tiny ball of fire shot straight up, barely missing the overhanging webs.
The spiders, almost as one, flattened out and scurried away. Not away away, unfortunately, but just enough away that they weren’t in striking range.
That is, until we got to the edge of the dead-zone. The clear demarcation of where the spider’s forest began and the rest of the valley ended. As soon as I stepped across that line, as soon as my foot hit the grass, I felt a change ripple through the spiders. I glanced over my shoulder to see an eight-legged beast the size of a pony soaring through the air, with iridescent venom dripping from its fangs.
Here’s my top tip about flying attacks: make sure you’re attacking something that doesn’t have the speed, strength, or weight to push you around. Because otherwise, you wind up looking pretty stupid.
I grabbed the spider’s leg from mid-air and pulled hard.
The spider sailed over me, gained a tremendous amount of speed, and then came to a very sudden stop in the trunk of an old oak. Goo came out around the spider as I, essentially, forced the creature to kiss its ass from the inside.
GG! You’ve killed a Giant Spider (lvl 21 Hunter).
You’ve earned 330 XP! What a mighty hero you are.
Then I sprinted. I knew I couldn’t take all the spiders, and I think they knew it too. But they also had just enough of an individual survival instinct that no one was super keen to go next and wind up a goo-stain on a tree.
“Fire,” I said through deep breaths. “At the webs, if you don’t mind.”
There was a whoosh behind me. I felt a searing heat around my head and back, and then heard a second whoosh. Another glance over my shoulder, and a goodly portion of the forest was on fire.
Some of the spiders stopped the chase, made a high-pitched chittering noise, and started trying to put out the fire. Still, that left hundreds, if not thousands, of eight-legged assholes still after this two-legged asshole.
It seemed like my incendiary warning shots did more to piss them off than scare them away. They only ran faster now.
Mid-stride, I grabbed Eona’s bow from my bag, as well as some arrows. I turned and knelt at the same time, sliding through some of the grass.
“Plug your ears,” I said.
I fired an arrow at the biggest, baddest looking spider I could see, about thirty yards away.
I felt the familiar boom, and the front portion of the big bad spider disappeared in a furious spray of blood, guts, and chitin.
Between the sound and the fury (ha), the spiders slowed some.
A second shot seemed necessary, something I’d expected, so I already had another arrow nocked. I released it at the next biggest arachnid, and blew that poor bastard to bits as well.
I continued laying down the booms, causing a shower of chitin to rain down on the spiders until I’d used up all the arrows I’d grabbed.
“More fire please,” I said, getting back to my feet, and sliding the bow in the bag before running.
“I have given you all I have,” she said.
“Let’s work on that in the future,” I replied, and hurdled a fallen tree.
Chapter Thirty-Six
The spiders continued chasing us through the valley, more or less. I think they assumed I’d tire m
yself out eventually. But I could sprint all day and all night. And then another day and night. Then I’d have to sleep a bit, but I could probably push myself to three or four days. I just hadn’t seen the reason to yet.
The spiders started to lag back after twenty minutes of sprinting. Once we got going seriously up hill, we finally had some distance from our pursuers. But they didn’t give up. And from the crashing sounds behind us, some of the big boys had come out to play.
I got to the path, breaking through some bushes, and had to grab onto a tree to slow myself down enough to make the turn. I continued sprinting on the path, my knees pumping, breathing hard, but feeling good. Little Bear was still invisible, but I could feel her holding onto my hair, occasionally slipping a little and ripping at my hair as she struggled to regain her seat. It was only a few minutes on the path before I saw the pass up ahead. More concerning: quite a few of the students were standing at the boundary between warm and cold, refusing to move on further.
None of the older witches were present, and neither was Fritz, so at least there wasn’t that hurdle to jump. And yet, if one of them had been there, it probably would have been easier to get the girls to move into the cold.
“We won’t go with you,” the apparent leader said to a very angry looking Skeld. “It’s too cold—”
I sprinted through the group, right into the snow on the other side of the line before I stopped.
“You don’t have to come,” I said, wiping some of the sweat off my face and rather enjoying the fact that it looked like I was steaming in the cold. “But if you stay, you’re not going to like it.”
“I don’t understand why we have to go,” she said, and even though it wasn’t there, I imagined the vocal fry as she complained. “I’m going back to the island on the lake. It’s perfectly safe.”