by G. R. Cooper
Wulfgar dropped into a crouch, putting Tim's torso between himself and the tavern window, then launched himself forward. His forehead crunched into Tim's solar plexus and the two of them fell into the dust. The two sorcerers rolled in the dirt, struggling to gain an advantage.
A sudden fury took control of Wulfgar and he once again thrust his forehead into Tim, this time pounding into his opponent's nose. A satisfying yet sickening crunch sounded out amid the clamor of clashing blades as the rest of the combatants filled the village square with grunts and metal-on-metal clangs.
"1 point of damage!"
"Your opponent is stunned!"
Wulfgar took advantage of the momentary distraction that he had given Tim via the man's nasal cartilage, and rolled in top of him. He thrust forward and down, exulting as his blade entered the wizard's left shoulder.
"6 points of damage!"
"Congratulations! You have gained a level in Small Blade!"
"Dammit," grunted Wulfgar; not at the message he'd received, but at the message he hadn't - Shepherd's Bite gave him a coin-toss chance to inflict an ongoing poisoning effect whenever he struck with it. Apparently, this particular coin toss had come up tails.
Wulfgar rose, seating himself on Tim's chest, and raised Shepherd's Bite above his head. He held down and pressed his weight upon Tim's neck, shifting his grip on his blade until it was poised for a deadly stab downward.
"Let's see if we can toss heads this time," he muttered, gripping the blade's handle until his knuckles turned white. He smiled down at his still dazed opponent as his arm began to fall, aiming the small blade toward Tim's left eye.
Wulfgar's chest exploded in the most intense pain he'd yet felt within this world.
"You have taken 7 points of damage!"
He fell backwards, thrown off of Tim's body by the force of the arrow that punched through his upper chest. Rolling backwards into the dirt, he frantically pulled at the shaft that had suddenly emerged from his right pectoral. The arrow seemed lodged into muscle and bone and didn't yield to his struggles. The pain was doubled as another arrow thumped into his hip.
"You have taken 6 points of damage!"
Wulfgar's vision flashed yellow. He'd just dropped to below fifty percent health.
Grimacing, he rolled to his left - as much to make himself a moving target for the archer as to try to regain his feet. He looked over his right shoulder as he gained his knees and saw Tim, now standing, a few feet away - his nose still streaming blood and his body covered in dirt.
Tim was smiling, holding his hands forward, toward Wulfgar, his palms upraised and his fingers curled into something like a sphere.
The fireball hit Wulfgar just as he'd gotten, shakily, to his feet. The explosion knocked him back down, and the enveloping fire seared him with a new level of pain.
"You have taken 8 points of damage!"
Wulfgar's vision flashed red. He now saw the world as though through a crimson haze.
His health was below ten percent.
That was when the cavalry arrived.
Hooves thundered around the square as Wulfgar struggled back to his feet. He looked around to his friends; they were all as seemingly battered, bruised and bloody as himself. The fight had gone the way he'd expected. The only way that it could have been expected.
Tim's cohort moved in behind the grinning wizard as the newly arrived horsemen completed their encirclement of the town square. As a man, their lances - held high and streaming pennons as they'd ridden into the village - dropped and pointed toward the humans forming sides within the equine ring.
Tim turned to the rider with the tallest plume on his gleaming helmet. The helmet covered the face, giving no indication of the visage within. The horse snorted and stamped, but the point of the lance didn't waver.
"Can I help you?" asked Tim sweetly.
Wulfgar grimaced as he sheathed his blade. The pair of arrows sticking out of his body made every movement painful. The red blaze that covered his vision reminded him of how close he was to being spirited back to Edonis for an ignominious resurrection.
"We are tasked with keeping the King's peace," echoed a voice from the rider's helmet.
"There's no problem here," grinned Tim. "We were just training. Improving our skills."
"You are not in a training arena. Death is possible here."
"Wait," grunted Wulfgar, "we aren't training. They were trying to kill us. They're preventing us from using this town."
"My only concern is keeping the King's peace."
Tim grinned back over his shoulder toward Wulfgar, his eyes narrowing.
"We have no desire to break the King's peace. None at all. Would you and your men care to join us for a drink?"
The horsemen raised their lances skyward, couching the unsharpened end into a short stirrup that hung from each saddle. The horses circled the group, following the leader as he rode out of the town. Within a minute the squadron formed into a phalanx on top of the hill that Wulfgar and his friends had ridden down. They turned and, sitting silently, watched the players.
"I think," said Tim, "that you got very lucky. I also think that you need to leave this town. Now. Before I decide that whatever they'll do to us is worth killing you for." He waved up to the unmoving horsemen on the knoll.
Tim walked in close to Wulfgar, putting their faces inches apart.
"You still owe me a life," he whispered. "And that's a debt I'll collect on one day."
He tilted his head, smiling broadly.
"In fact, now that I think of it," he stepped back and raised one hand to Wulfgar's chest. Wulfgar felt himself freeze, unable to move. It was as though he was suddenly mired in molasses. Nothing he could do would allow him to move.
"Now that I think of it," repeated Tim, "I still have one new found professional skill that I can use."
Wulfgar's skin ran cold. He knew what Tim's new professional skill was.
"And since you're handily below ten percent health, I wonder," he hummed, "if I can make you my familiar. How would you like that? How would you like to be my slave for all eternity? I wonder if that's even possible."
"Hmm," Tim continued, "all I have between owning you forever or not seems to be one little dialog box. 'Are you sure?' it says," he chuckled. "Am I sure?" He looked up into Wulfgar's eyes.
"How about it, sport, feel like serving me for eternity? I wonder how that would work. It seems to indicate that I could control you. Would that make you some sort of zombie I could control? Would your consciousness remain as it is, trapped within a body you no longer have any say over?"
As Wulfgar watched, a blade appeared at Tim's throat, attached to the revealed arm of Rydra as he emerged from stealth behind the wizard. Tim's soldiers, milling around looking nervously at the horsemen on the hill, leapt to action, drawing their blades and advancing on Rydra.
"Now, now," said the little thief to the crowding tanks, "it wouldn't do to make me nervous. My hand might start to shake. If my hand were to shake, my Cull skill might activate and Tim's head would come off of his body before anyone knows what's happening."
"Oh no!" chuckled Tim in mock fear, "You mean I might wind up resurrecting in that little church just behind us. Oh no," he repeated, "please oh please don't cut off my head."
Tim waved his hands. Wulfgar, released from the hold, fell to his knees.
Tim looked down at him, "Why in the hell would I want a lumbering twit like you as my familiar? You're nothing."
The wizard turned, shrugging off Rydra's embrace, and swirled his hands around himself beckoning his crew to form up around him as they returned to the tavern. He turned and shouted over his shoulder.
"Get out. Now. Don't heal. Don't bind. Just get the hell out of my town before I decide that I don't care if I have to sacrifice myself just to kill you."
Wulfgar dropped out of the saddle and onto the ground. His knees buckled as new waves of pain enveloped him, but he managed to stay upright. Leaning forward, steadying himself
with his outstretched left arm on the withers of his mount, he move under the horse's neck toward an oak that shaded the top of the hill the group had scrambled to after making their escape from Tim's village.
He turned and leaned back against the bark, sighing. He continued standing, not wanting to disturb the arrows poking out of his body. He closed his eyes for a moment. Every move he'd made since leaving the town had been done as gingerly as possible.
"I've only got two hit points left," he gurgled, looking up as his friends joined him beneath the tree, "if a butterfly farts on me I'll need a res."
Lauren grinned up at him then grimaced, her hand moving to her split upper lip.
"Don't make me smile, jerk," she said lightly. "It hurts."
She reached down and grabbed the haft of the arrow that was lodged in his hip. Before he could say or do anything to stop her, she yanked it out. It was surprisingly painless. She did the same for the arrow in his chest.
"What the hell?" he muttered. "When I tried to get them out in the village, it was like they were lodged in stone."
Rydra nodded, "We were in combat mode then. It's easier to heal and repair once you're away from that."
Wulfgar nodded. That made sense. You wouldn't want people to be able to yank hostile weaponry out of themselves during a fight, but the designers didn't want to make it too much of a pain in the ass. Once they were away from combat, there was no reason to prevent easy recuperation.
The removal of the arrows lessened Wulfgar's pain, but did nothing to increase his hit points.
Lauren leaned forward and kissed his chest over the wound.
"All better?" she grinned, then grimaced through her bruised face.
"Almost," he said gently, then retreated to his mount and began pulling poultices from the saddle bags. He passed them around to the group and they began to heal in earnest. Each of them applied the unguents to their damaged areas - Bear sufficed by licking his own wounds.
Wulfgar's feeling and mood improved rapidly as the healing messages flashed through his subconscious. He sat, sighing in relief, leaning against the oak as his hit points once again maximized.
"What the living hell?" he asked, his voice again full and healthy.
"What?" asked Lauren sitting next to him.
"We're, what, no more than a couple of days ride from Edonis and this Tim asshole has simply taken over the village?"
He shook his head.
"What kind of a king allows that? I mean, Clive has squadrons of cavalry out to," Wulfgar held up air quotes, "keep the peace, but he allows a jerk like Tim to setup a de-facto dictatorship within his realm? That doesn't seem right."
"No," said Snorri, "it doesn't. But what are we going to do about it? If the cavalry hadn't come when it did, at least, we'd all be corpses running around Edonis in loin cloths."
"What are we going to do about it?" Wulfgar asked the wind.
He went within himself and thought. He began going through his options. They couldn't fight Tim's group, at least not yet. Sneaking into the village might allow them to bind, but that was really only an option for himself and Rydra - Snorri and Lauren had no Stealth skill.
Maybe he could loan the two of them his Clandestine Gauntlets and Slippers. That would allow them to each make runs into the village in turn, to bind at the church.
That seemed a bit cumbersome. It was a solution, but not a good one. If they died before they could find a place to bind elsewhere, they'd resurrect - naked and helpless - within Tim's village. That seemed, if anything, a worse solution than resurrecting back in Edonis.
Wulfgar began rooting through the world information - the game rules - in the back of his mind. He had an idea. Binding seemed tied to religion. He as of yet had chosen no religion. Was there one that could address this problem?
After a few minutes he found one.
Druidism.
It gave the ability to set a binding point almost anywhere, by creating a natural holy site.
Within the shade of a sacred tree, he read, the Druid can create a temporary holy site to which adventurers can bind their soul. Those sacred trees - Oak, Ash, Apple, Hazel, Alder, Elder, and Yew - require nothing more than the will of the supplicant to enshrine the site. That site will allow any Druid and their party to bind, but the site will only last until the end of the next lunar cycle - bindings will revert to the previous binding upon the passing of the moon. The supplicant may create new sacred binding sites within the same lunar cycle, but any and all previously created extant sites will no longer accept binding at that point - only the latest created site within the lunar cycle can be used.
Holy sites can be created outside of the shade of a sacred tree using each the following consumables; Acorn, Ash seedpod, Apple, Hazel nut, Alder twig, Elder berry, and Yew needle. Placing those items in a pile will allow the Druid to enshrine a holy site just as they would in the shade of a sacred tree. All of the items must be present for the site to become sacred. The same rules apply otherwise.
There is no quest required to accept this religion.
Becoming a follower will also grant you +2 REP with the Faerie.
Wulfgar thought. That seemed like a damn fine perk - especially as he was planning on eventually wandering the world. It would come in handy to be able to bind in the woods, for example, before entering a strange city or dungeon. Even in this supposedly civilized part of the world, he'd had trouble finding holy sites.
He paused. This was a big decision but it felt right. It seemed that many of the concerns he and his friends had worried about over the past several days revolved around finding holy sites to bind to. He remembered the fear he, and he presumed his friends, had felt when beaten down in Tim's village. The fear of death in this world seemed to center on how long and far away you'd previously bound.
He remembered Tim's sneer when Rydra's blade had appeared at his throat.
You mean I might wind up resurrecting in that little church just behind us. Oh no!
That settled it for Wulfgar.
He became a Druid.
"You are now a follower of Druidism!"
"You can now create Druid holy sites!"
"You have gained in Reputation with the Faerie! They now hold you in High Esteem!"
He willed the tree to become a holy site. It now glowed, to him, a faint sheen of green.
Wulfgar looked up to his friends, "We can bind here. I just became a Druid." He smiled at their astonished looks, then explained the choice he'd made. Each of them bound to the site.
"Pretty cool," said Lauren, "is there anything else we need to do?"
"Yeah," laughed Wulfgar, reaching into the turf around the base of the tree, "grab as many acorns as you can find."
Chapter 4
Wulfgar rolled away from Bear's belly, restful after the night's dreamless sleep. After the day they'd had, he had needed it. The group had continued riding well into evening, putting as much space between themselves and Tim's town as they could before finally, wearily, dropping off of their mounts and setting up camp.
They had spent the ride discussing the fight, noting that a rogue and a thief were of less use in a straight-forward, stand-up fight. The tanks had been in their element, and simple damage-per-second calculations had overwhelmed Wulfgar and his friends.
He made note of the lessons and resolved to learn from them. There would be no more riding blindly into towns - discretion would play a greater role in their travels. Even with his newfound ability to set their bind point, he still felt called to caution. His skill-set revolved around stealth and sneaking, and he would never again forget the edge that gave him.
Wulfgar sat, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes, as Snorri rooted through his pack of goodies and started tossing breakfast to the group. He greedily munched on the crusty loaf, washing it down with clear cold water from the skin that was passed around. Refreshed, he stood and began to gather together his bed-roll and prepare for the day's ride. After strapping the roll behind his saddle, he
turned and looked back into the camp. In the freshening daylight, he saw that they'd camped in the lee of a small hedgerow. Several were white, flowered trees.
He smiled.
Elder trees.
He moved into the grove and began pulling berries from them, stuffing them into his herb pack.
"Congratulations! You have gained a level in Herb Lore!"
"Sweet," he muttered, finishing up the harvest and returning to the group.
"Whatchoo doin'?" asked Lauren as he approached.
"Nuttin'. Whatchoo doin'?"
"Nuttin'."
It had become a ritual greeting between them. He recognized that it was puerile, but it still warmed him. His affection for Lauren continued to grow and he hoped she felt likewise.
She smiled, her teeth flashing in the morning light, then she mounted her horse, settling into the saddle comfortably. Wulfgar tried to emulate her movement but felt considerably less graceful as he plopped behind the pommel and spent several seconds adjusting in the seat until he was comfortable.
"Bear!" he called as they began to walk their mounts westward. The dog had remained asleep throughout their preparations. He now rolled off of his back, snorted, and rose before trotting along behind the group.
Wulfgar sat back in the saddle. He looked around to the rest of the group, "We should be getting to the frontier this evening. Tomorrow morning at the latest." He paused in thought, "I think we'll need to work out some little plan of attack on how we're going to approach this little village."
"I think," he continued, "that it's pretty obvious that we're not built for the bull-headed approach."
"Speak for yourself," laughed Snorri.
Wulfgar grinned, "OK. I think that it's pretty obvious that Rydra and myself," the little thief bowed in the saddle, "are not built for the bull-headed approach. When we near the outpost, I propose that he and I go on a little scouting mission. To see what's what. I'd also suggest that when we stop for lunch, Snorri and Lauren don their armor. We won't know exactly when we'll run into trouble from now on."