by Isaac Hooke
“It’s also possible she only scattered a few throughout the Midweald,” Xaxia said. “And those servants of hers back there just got lucky.”
“That’s more likely the case, I’m thinking,” Ziatrice said. “Mauritania didn’t have any more troops than the other member races of Vorgon’s army. Certainly not enough to haphazardly scatter mages throughout the region while still being able to lay siege to Tartan.” She paused, then: “Is it worth it to hunt them down? These Eldritch mages?”
Malem shook his head. “Better to press on, I think.”
The night elf picked up her halberd from where it lay against a tree and tossed its haft from hand to hand. “You’re afraid our landing awakened something? We are in the heart of monster territory, I suppose.”
“If we have disturbed the daytime rest of some beast, most likely it has already fallen back to sleep,” Malem said. “My bigger concern is time. Now that we’ve lost our rides, we can’t afford to delay. Not if we want to make it to Tartan before Rashan decides to withdraw his army. Also, it could take hours, if not days, to hunt down these Eldritch mages of yours. And very likely, they’ll be the ones to ambush us, rather than the other way around.”
“You didn’t pick up anything with your beast sense?” Gwen asked.
“No,” Malem told her. “Which is exactly why I’m worried.”
“Maybe you were too far from them,” Ziatrice suggested.
“It’s possible,” he said. “Though based on where the magic seemed to come from in the forest, I should have at least detected a faint imprint. No, I’m afraid if we were to hunt them down, it would have to be with ranger skills alone.” He glanced at Abigail and Weyanna. “Also, I’m not liking the hurt they inflicted on our Metals. If that magic had struck any of us non-dragons, I doubt we would have survived.”
“Thrawn was a dragon, and he didn’t survive either,” Xaxia said quietly.
“My point exactly,” Malem said.
“I would survive,” Ziatrice said haughtily.
Gwen ignored her, adding: “Doesn’t inspire confidence as to what we’ll face when we encounter Mauritania herself… not to mention the rest of her army.”
“Would it be better to turn back?” Xaxia asked.
“No,” Abigail said. “I’m not giving up.”
The bandit shook her head: “I mean so that we can heal you and Weyanna, and procure fresh rides. Of course I don’t want to give up.”
“By my reckoning, we’re halfway to Tartan’s Vale,” Malem said. “It’ll take us just as long to return to the front lines as to press forward. Once we leave behind monster territory, if we’re lucky, we should be able to find a healer in one of the towns along the way, either inside the Midweald our outside. If not a mage, then a herbalist at the very least.”
“I doubt a herbalist can heal this,” Abigail said, trying to pull herself to her feet.
He went to her and offered a hand. When the half dragon was on her feet, she took a tentative step while Malem held on to her. Then another. She flicked his hand away, and continued walking, her stride growing stronger with each step.
“I can do this,” she said.
“Good,” Malem said. “I’d hate to have to carry you.”
“Ha, I’d probably have to do it,” Gwen said.
“And I,” Ziatrice said.
The two half monsters were admittedly much stronger than him.
He slid down his pack and retrieved a small pouch of endurance herbs. He offered some to Abigail, and Weyanna as well, who was also now on her feet. They chewed the coca-laced plants, and instantly stood straighter.
“Well, that certainly helps,” Abigail said. “While I still can’t transform, at least I feel somewhat stronger. Well enough to use a little magic, I think.”
“I, as well,” Weyanna said. “Though it sucks we can’t transform. It’s like wearing a collar all over again.”
Malem had Rathamias lead the way into the forest. He drew Balethorn and followed close behind. He wanted to be ready in case his beast sense let him down and monsters surprised them. Wouldn’t be the first time.
The sword thankfully kept quiet—two Metals in human form didn’t interest it.
He instructed Abigail and Weyanna to follow, with Ziatrice behind them, and Gwen and Xaxia bringing up the rear.
“Why do I have to be the one on point?” Rathamias complained. “The first target for any monsters we might ambush…”
“Being on point is an honor,” Xaxia said.
“Ha,” Rathamias said. “I don’t think so. I feel like monster fodder.”
“Use your magic to protect yourself,” Gwen said. “Unless of course, your power is too weak.”
Rathamias glanced over his shoulder at her and narrowed his eyes. “You’ve already seen how ‘weak’ my power is.”
Gwen shrugged. “Next time I won’t bother to jump you. I’ll just shoot an arrow at you and be done with it.”
Rathamias smirked. “Good luck.”
The party continued in quiet for some time.
Abigail moaned suddenly, pressing a hand to her chest.
“You all right?” Malem asked.
“Fine,” she said. The spike of pain he felt from her energy bundle subsided.
He nodded at Abigail as he asked Ziatrice: “Is it the Eldritch magic that’s preventing them from transforming? The magic still embedded inside?”
“Most likely,” Ziatrice said.
He reached out, searching for birds or other animals he could use as scouts, but strangely this particular area of the forest seemed to lack such creatures.
“Do you hear that?” Gwen said. “There are no birds.”
“Yeah, I noticed,” Malem said. “Nor other animals. This place is completely dead.”
“I don’t like it,” Weyanna said.
“Welcome to monster territory,” Ziatrice said.
“We’ve been in monster territory before,” Malem said. “There were small birds and squirrels about, at least. Not like here.”
“It depends on what monsters claim this place as their hunting ground,” the night elf told him. “If birds and small squirrels make up the majority of their diet, then what you see here isn’t entirely unexpected. Myself, I actually prefer it this way. For the peace and quiet. Birds are such… irritating things.”
They had hiked for about half an hour, judging by the glimpses of the sun Malem caught through the forest canopy, and covered maybe two miles.
And then the attack came.
8
Malem sensed them only a few moments before they attacked.
“Beasts!” he hissed. “Incoming!”
Long tentacles launched from the branches of a pine ahead, and wrapped around Rathamias.
Abigail and Weyanna dropped behind the trunks of nearby trees.
A tentacle shot out from another pine overhead, directed at him. Malem sidestepped and struck it with his sword, severing the appendage. It simply withdrew, dripping green blood—there was no scream or other indication of pain.
Rathamias was dragged upward, but the tentacles that bound the mage suddenly blackened and grew flaccid. They unfurled heavily to the ground, dropping the orak.
The mage released darts of black mist into the branches and retreated behind a nearby tree to take cover.
A huge, octopus-like creature dropped from the tree. Ten tentacles connected to a saclike body, with a long, bony beak near the bottom. Its green skin had blackened where Rathamias’ dark magic struck, but otherwise no veins spidered outward from the impact sites, defying the magic’s usual effects. That meant these creatures had some magic resistance. To get the tentacles to blacken as much as they did to release Rathamias, the black mage must have spent quite a lot of vitality. Which explained why the orak wasn’t releasing any more ghostly darts for the time being. Nor paralyzing the enemy.
Three more of the creatures dropped down from adjacent trees, blocking all access forward.
“I thought yo
u said any nearby monsters that heard our landing would have already fallen asleep!” Gwen shouted accusingly.
“Guess I was wrong!” Malem told her.
He reached out, probing, trying to see if he could Break the creatures, but his will evaporated on touching their minds.
“Are these Eldritch?” Gwen asked.
“No!” Ziatrice replied. “Ghrips! Watch out for their poisonous ink!”
On cue, the ghrips lifted their tentacles and a greenish black mist erupted from the suckers. It flooded the immediate area, forcing Abigail and Weyanna to retreat from their covers, along with Rathamias. The ghrips struck out with their tentacles at the prey they’d flushed out.
Weyanna launched small shards of ice as she retreated. Abigail released weak fireballs. Their combined attacks were enough to ward off the tentacles that sought them.
Gwen meanwhile released her arrows, porcupining the tentacles, and the bodies of the creatures that released them.
Xaxia stepped forward to stand beside Malem as Weyanna, Abigail and Rathamias rushed behind him. The bandit swung Biter at the incoming tentacles. Ziatrice wielded Wither. And he, Balethorn. Together, they taught the ghrips that if they wanted to keep their tentacles intact, it was best not to steer them too close to the three figures wielding the very sharp pieces of metal.
“Now you know why there are no birds,” Ziatrice said. “Birds are their favorite food.”
“Could have fooled me!” Gwen said, nocking and releasing another arrow. “I thought their favorite food was human!”
Now that he had weakened them a bit, he tried Breaking one of them again. He was able to wrap his will around its mind, but the creature proved too slippery still, and he couldn’t get a firm hold.
Malem detected another ghrip, directly overhead.
“Above us!” he shouted, backing away as he glanced up.
But it was too late.
Tentacles were already falling toward them. He cut one of the longer ones aside, but more were beside it, as was the massive body that sourced them; there was no time to hew them all down, or to dodge the crushing mass that followed.
Dark chains erupted from Ziatrice, shoving aside those tentacles, and wrapping around the huge body of the ghrip before it could flatten them. She swung those ghostly chains to the right, smashing the ghrip against a tree, and its amorphous body momentarily compressed before rebounding. She released the chains and the creature dropped to the earth.
Meanwhile, Ziatrice slumped in exhaustion. Dark mist bled from her eyes. “Could use some vitality.”
He shared some of his and Gwen’s with her. He was careful not to touch Abigail, not in her current state.
A loud crunching emanating from behind: the sound of breaking wood. When he turned around, he realized that the trees were splintering and tearing apart. Huge tentacles thrust forth, connected to a ghrip that was four times as big as the others.
“That would be the bull,” Ziatrice said.
“All right, it’s time to make a tactical retrograde,” Malem said. He’d picked up some new terminology since joining the army. A tactical retrograde was a euphemism for “getting the fuck out.”
He ran to Abigail and scooped her up before she could protest. Meanwhile, Gwen carried Weyanna. The two might be able to walk on their own, but there was no way they’d be able to run, not for any length of time. Ziatrice and Rathamias followed just behind him, with Xaxia bringing up the rear.
Abigail shot weak fireballs over his shoulders as he ran, while Weyanna turned the grass to ice. Neither attacks had any real effect on the huge creature. The fireballs scorched its skin in places, true, and the icy surface caused a few of its suckers to slip up, but otherwise it continued to approach unhindered.
The smaller ghrips followed alongside the bigger. One got too close to the bull and it promptly scooped the smaller up in a tentacle and smashed it against a tree before continuing.
Malem and the others were the faster, however, as they could weave between the closer-spaced trees with ease, whereas the ghrips had to swerve around them. Plus, tentacle-based locomotion seemed far less efficient than two legs; it didn’t help that the ghrips apparently had to struggle to release their suckers from a surface after attaching to it. So even though the creatures were larger, the smaller humans could outrun them.
And so they did.
In moments, the ghrips were well behind them. The sounds of breaking wood had faded to a gentle murmur, marking the position of the bull. He could no longer sense the creatures at all.
Malem swerved to the north, hoping that the ghrips would lose the trail, and then slowed down, lowering Abigail to the ground so she could walk on her own.
“So what happened back there?” Abigail said. She moved a bit stiffly at first, but soon was walking at her previous pace, as was Weyanna. “You didn’t detect those things?”
“Not until they were almost on us. Told you my beast sense doesn’t always work.”
“Sometimes you can’t detect when the Darkness is coming, and sometimes you can’t detect monsters,” Abigail said. “Our lives depend on your abilities, and yet they’re more fickle than Weyanna’s choice in mates!”
“I’m not sure if that was meant to be an insult or a compliment,” Weyanna said.
“In your case, both,” Abigail said.
Weyanna snorted. “Bitch.” Then she promptly bowed her head. “Sorry, highness. Sometimes I forget my place.”
“What are you doing, Wey?” Abigail said. “You’re my cousin. Call me a bitch if you want.”
Weyanna looked up. She smiled sadly. “No.” She pressed against one of the bandages in her sides. “I guess I don’t really feel like your cousin, not like this. Dressed in clothes that aren’t my own, unable to transform, running away from lesser monsters in the woods. And injured unlike any Metals are supposed to be injured.”
“I hear you,” Abigail said. He felt her energy bundle flare-up with agony as she was reminded of her own pain.
Malem cocked his head. “We got two more creatures incoming. They’re big. Time for another strategic change of direction.”
He turned toward his best guess at west, as estimated by the current position of the sun above the trees.
“Two?” Gwen asked as she ran alongside him.
“They’re coming from different directions,” he said. “I don’t think they’re allied.”
He took cover behind the bole of an ancient oak, along with the rest of the party, and peered past the edge. He watched as a large ogre walked past in the distance.
It appeared similar to a hill giant, except its features were more distorted: its long nose was more a beak than anything else, and its two eyes were so close together he wondered how it could see. It was bald, had pointy ears like an elf, and had an immensely fat belly. It was completely naked, but a thick region of hair hid its privates. Purple splotches marred its pale skin in places, and big warts grew everywhere, with a particularly nasty one inside its nose, pushing out the nostril to make it appear bigger than the other.
It carried a club that had once been a tree. Most of the upper branches had been stripped away save for one, which the ogre used as the grip; the bole expanded outward toward the tip, where the root system had been broken away, leaving a series of sharp spikes that amplified the damage caused by the bludgeoning portion of the weapon.
Malem reached out to its mind, and when his will wrapped around it without evaporating, he almost giggled with glee: it was weak-minded, as he had hoped.
He squeezed his mental tendrils around its will, and the surprised creature physically stiffened. Its mind thrashed about but couldn’t break free, and he allowed his will to seep deep inside. He Broke it as easily as if it were a horse, no doubt thanks to the boost provided by the most recent addition to his coterie: Ziatrice.
As he took control, the creature’s mental presence expanded to fill his own, and took up five slots within his mind.
“All right, this one is
mine,” Malem said. “I’m calling it Frank.”
Gwen erupted in a laugh. “Frank? It doesn’t look like a Frank. A Boffin, maybe.”
It was Xaxia’s turn to snicker. “Boffin kind of suits it.”
Malem directed the ogre slightly toward the group, moving it as quietly as possible. “I’m sending Frank behind a tree. I plan to ambush the other monster that’s coming.”
The ogre took up a position behind another thick tree nearby, one that was directly in the path of the second creature he sensed closing.
“You Broke that?” Rathamias said in awe. He glanced at Ziatrice. “I always thought a Breaker had to physically subdue or injure higher level monsters first.”
“Where were you when he broke the hill giant?” Gwen asked the orak.
Before Rathamias could answer the rhetorical question, Ziatrice commanded: “Silence, slave.”
The black mage immediately lowered its gaze.
“Is it just me, or is she just taking out her own anger at being a slave on her servants?” Xaxia commented.
The night elf glared at the bandit.
“She’s not a slave,” Malem said. “No more than you are.”
“Really?” Xaxia said. “But if I misbehave, you can’t drain my stamina.”
He ignored the comment. But it did hit close to home. In the first few days after he’d Broken her, Ziatrice often tried to fight his hold on her. He’d responded by draining her stamina so severely she could barely walk.
He heard the distant thud of heavy footfalls then, slowly growing in volume. Another creature lumbered into view.
This one was a little bigger than Frank. It was humanoid in shape, but had two heads, each with one large eye. It was leaner than the ogre, and wore an apron-like garment that covered its chest and waist, revealing muscular arms and legs thick as tree trunks. It didn’t carry any obvious weapons.
An ettin.
Malem reached out, but this monster was stronger willed, unfortunately, and the tendrils of his mind fell away upon contact. Though it had two heads, he was only detecting one overall mind. Perhaps it really did have two, but his beast sense interpreted them as a single will; that would explain why the creature seemed harder to Break, since overcoming two minds at once was definitely harder than one.