by Marcus Sloss
My inner aura was an inferno of desire to be released and I called upon it with hunger. My legs propelled me into giant leaps dozens of feet between steps. My feet shot clods of earth high and far as I rocketed at speeds beyond what a mortal should be able to achieve. In mere fractions of a second, I was upon my foes. The first I hacked in half at the waist, and the second I shouldered into the ground with such force his bones snapped in thousands of places. My momentum never stopped though, the lightweight shaman a mere bump in my auras burn.
My left foot anchored into the dirt and ejected bits of Vin as I continued my charge of death. The final retreating female shaman erected an air shield that I approached. I threw my sword at her to weaken its defense as I neared. The amount of force I applied in my throw was barely contained. The shaman’s face contorted in focus as she fought to keep her shield up. I shouldered my body through her shield, shattering the spell. She went to crumple to her knees, exhaust evident on her face when I plunged my hand into her chest. I softly grabbed her heart, a peal of mad laughter on my lips, as her eyes locked in fright to mine. She was dead and just now realizing it. I yanked the heart free and let her fall.
Dizziness swam through me and I shuddered as I released my aura. I quickly shifted the bag off my back and stuck the heart in. I then beheaded the shaman and stuck the bloody head in as well. The remaining goblins were in full retreat to the east. Wolves were baying at them hungry for the easy kills. Five dozen had been resettled here and as they howled to the sky, I saw most chasing our fleeing foe. They ran into the woods and out of my concern. We had sixteen yakins and four wagons of loot to secure.
“Traz update!”
“The goblins are routed and no word reached the rest of the caravan. I am sure they will eventually notice, but for now, you have time. You have a few issues though. There is no clear path for these wagons unless you go north to the river bend and float them down to Lakeland. Well, that or you clear a path direct, but you don’t have enough time or earth mages. Lord Nova is on the way… He may allow us to lava burn you a trail if you go north then swing west… Yes, that is approved. Problem solved. Load up the dead bodies and go north. I will guide you from there.”
I jogged to my team who had mostly split up to handle each wagon. Both Brads were shifting the first wagon to the north while the others were piling bodies.
“We got lucky, the rest of the caravan has no idea we attacked yet. Luckily we have secured all four wagons. I am sure some of the escaped goblins will eventually get word to our foes, but for now, we have some time. We are going to go north with this mini caravan. Pile the dead on the decks and let’s turn these wagons around.” I said as leapt up the ladder on the fourth cart. I turned the yakins with the reigns, who politely told me to bugger off. I grabbed a wipe and laced one yakin with a thundering clap. It bleated in pain. From that moment on, all four wagons did as the new drivers instructed. “Hurry up we need to be moving. Tammy steer this thing north. Correction I need Janice in the front.”
Janice ran over from piling goblins on the second wagon and scurried up the ladder to the driving platform. “What do you need my lord?”
“You are going to follow that griffin north then turn left west when he shifts. You will see a trail of cooling lava…” Right as I was talking, a sizzling smoke climbed into the sky to our northwest. A nice line of black soot indicated I had a newly cleared road. The spell and the casters were never seen. “That is our new path right there. It may be too warm for the wheels. Add water if you need to. The steam coming off will signal where we are, but we have to risk it. Here take these reigns.”
“Got them, have fun stacking bodies Gryff,” I got a smile from her. As to be expected, it was a nice victory. I jumped down and rolled again. The damn driver’s platform was fifteen feet tall. I ran to find Nate. Most of the bodies were being piled on the platform of the third wagon. The fourth wagon was passing the third right now with the Brads giving a wave. The yakin eagerly moving to get in line behind the third wagon and away from the death.
I was about to ask for a report when Nate provided one.
“You took the worst of it. A few arrows got through and Tammy had one in her foot. Besides that and the fireball your face ate, the healing was minimal with no fatalities. We stacked the orc bodies first on the now third wagon. Pain getting them this high up. The goblins we can at least throw. A few with damaged faces will get left behind but I figured we were about speed over thorough looting. Plus the wolves will happily eat them. Haven’t inspected what is in the wagons, I say we wait until we're safe.”
Nate tossed me a body from the ground and I threw it onto the deck easily. The man knew my abilities and we formed a small chain. Light toss to me, then long throw onto the platform. Donnie sorted bodies up there. A few minutes later and the battlefield was almost completely cleaned. I climbed up to sit on the dead goblins with Donnie, Nate, and Fwar.
Donnie handed me the whip and I cracked the air. It was enough for the yakins to start a slow run to catch the other wagons. The added weight could be heard in their grunts of exertion. I was okay with it, we did not have a long way to go. The wheels creaked and I handed off the reigns back to Donnie.
I climbed onto the roof of the wagon to watch south. Dina soared overhead to hover not far away.
“The first wagon is on the cleared ground now from vole fire. Your water mage is burning catalyst fast. If we had some we could help. Lord Nova said I should stress that to you. I think you know though. The smoke followed by steam was enough to pique the interest of the caravan south. A warg party is heading your way but you should be mostly inside by the time they reach. Lord Nova said if they overextend we can burn them to a crisp with golem blood. I am hoping they do. Actually, I am going to antagonize them and draw them this way onto the path. That way we can add them to the dinner buffet.” The pink tipped griffin said to me.
With that, she rocketed off south. I watched from my perch as we turned left and bounced on the rough new road of cooled lava. Sure enough, a party of eight wargs came charging north for us. Dina pretending to fly scared towards us. I watched the orc masters savage their creatures for more speed to catch us. The first wagon was entering the barrier when the warg teams caught sight of me. They blindly charged onto the path.
Lord Nova in his majestic purple and gold slowed to a hover beside me. Then Traz and Dina formed a battle line. Sly and a fifth griffin I did not know closed the trap from behind the enemy. The alpha warg paused and tried to skid to a halt realizing he had run into an ambush. The orc on his back was still clueless.
As one, all five unleashed a torrent of flame. The fire engulfed its targets resulting in the cooking of the eight wargs and orcs. They never stood a chance. Every flame was cast below the tree line at minimal height and every opponent died a fiery death. It was a sight to behold. The five griffins returned back into Streb as if they were bored. This was power that was mesmerizing to watch.
As wagon one and two crossed the barrier, members of my team spilled out to collect the dead. There was no wasting here. I scurried down and waited for Janice to cool the bodies.
“I need more catalysts. Like a lot more if we are going to keep mixing fire with water. You have an excess of one and the scarcity of the other.” Janice said as she froze the warg and orc bodies for us. The ice quickly melted as it battled the burning heat until the temperatures equalized. “Some of the catalysts are super easy. A small frosting spell is merely a seed from the arctic. A full water spell is a bit more, as are large ice sheets or foot freezing. Most of those you harvest from ice cats nails and teeth. For the yetis we need the heart, tongue, and brain. Not easy and rarely farmed. Nothing too challenging for a well formed team though. There is also the warm ocean water pearls and the leviathan monster hearts from the deep. The pearls are found in shallow to mid deep waters. The goliaths of the deep are feared and own large swathes of ocean area. I have never heard of them being farmed but very rarely their bodies wash up onto the
shore. Too bad we have no access to the tropics for the pearls.”
This was exactly what she had reported to King Aves and King Horus. Which meant that a week ago I was ordered to head south when able. She knew this and was merely furthering her point. She had utilized far more spells this battle than I had thought possible. Snagging four wagons right out from under the Hordes caravan was sure to bring attention. It was probably time to head south to the Venisis Sea.
I snatched a warg and tossed it onto my shoulder. Janice tried to lift one but it was too much. The larger wolf brethren were insanely heavy, a couple hundred pounds at least. She drew her short sword and hacked to get the beast into parts. I managed a second charred wolf over my shoulder and ran for Streb.
The last wagon crossed the tingle barrier with me as I tossed the two bodies back into the safe zone. The entire team was running back and forth collecting the extra wargs and orcs. I loaded the last two furry bodies onto my shoulder and got inside the zone.
“The entire caravan as far as the eye can see has stopped. Troops are marching north now and pooled before the valley. The wargs with riders are arriving first. It looks like an army is heading this way. I am interested in what is in those wagons.” Lord Nova said.
So was I. I walked to the last wagon to cross the barrier and climbed to the driver’s platform. The tan leather had buttons and loops to help seal the protective cover shut. Each wagon was being opened by team members at the same time. Mine revealed a large amount of yakin feed. More than I could have wanted for a single winter. The entire back of the wagon from deck to cover was stacked tall in squares. There were varies types of feed like oats, grass, and even moss. Awesome, I forgot about growing moss. If these yakin naturally ate it, then I needed to add it to the production chain. I paused and even noted it on my list for later. I then looked at the four Yakins and saw they were all female. My eyes darted to the next wagon and it was all males. Maybe keeping sexes separate was a thing. Nate waved to me from the other wagon.
“We got weapons in here Gryff! Spears as far as the eye can see. All metal too with what looks like silver tips. No idea why the silver but there must be thousands.” Nate yelled and jumped with joy. That was welcoming news. “What you got in that one Donnie!?”
The shouting to each other was a bit much, but we were safe behind the barrier.
“Um… Sails. That is it. Endless amounts of fabric that look like they are to be strung up on a mast for a boat… I don’t get it. What you got in that one Winst?” Donnie shouted at the last wagon.
“Oars, like the kind for rowing a large boat. They are all in pine and get this. Hand carved… Why would they not use earth magic to mold them?”
I pondered the mystery as I worked my way to the goblin bodies. The deck needed to be cleared and we need the parts in storage. Then we could haul this meat northwest to Fernlan and have it prepared for winter.
I cusped both hands around my mouth. “Hustle people, we need to get these bodies ready to go north and jar the hearts as well as bag the heads. There are supplies in the bottom of the roost to store them in. Hurry up, there is an army approaching that may make leaving via griffin challenging until nightfall.” I tossed the bodies down to the ground where Tammy and Janice waited with Velia. The three of them had saws and daggers ready. The bloody tasks performed by the women was a chain of morbid efficiency. They decapitated and removed hearts with speed. “Lord Nova, can you send Dina home. Ask for a few dozen griffins to help move this feed and spears. We can leave the sails and oars for now. Take the goblins and orc bodies though. It will take a few trips unless you swarm down there.”
“Already done, the enemy continues to amass. My best guess is that the area around Streb will have ten thousand plus Horde around it tomorrow. I dare not risk lives carrying loads during the day once they encamp the village. Even the nights will be risky. We will have to wait for the pallets and sacks to arrive though. Only a few here. I suggest loading the wargs and orcs first.” Lord Nova said then tilted his head in thought. “Why the boat supplies, what is your thought?”
“I cannot rationalize any scenario besides them fishing our seas. They control ports all over Vin. East, west, north and any direction I can think of besides south. Why would you need ships south unless you wanted to cut off our fishing or to visit the same ice tundra we do? Or maybe that is it, they wish to battle our fishing vessels on the waters. Or it could be there is something in the ice lands they want. I have a feeling that Virtue may pay us a visit when he learns his ships lack sails or paddles to move them.”
Lord Nova shook his body in a ruffling of feathers. “That vile little shaman, I look forward to eating him one day. I saw you snatch out that shaman’s heart. May I have it for study?”
This forced me to pause my chucking of goblin bodies down to the girls. I unslung my backpack and found the head as well as the heart readily on the top. The girls were going to be pissed to be cleaning blood off my supplies. Well, it would be tasked to Pipi, who actually, never complained…
“You want both and want me to toss them or set them down?” I asked and Lord Nova landed on the carriage roof then leaned down. His saddle mere feet from my face. I stuffed both into his saddle pouches and he took off for Fernlan.
“Thanks, Gryff, interested to see what shaman parts can do!” Lord Nova said in excitement as he quickly shrank in size as he sped away.
I immediately returned to my work. There were still dozens of goblin bodies left to throw down. I had to ensure I kept my footing as the deck ran slick with blood but after ten minutes the process was done. The open flap of the feed was my next target.
Each square of compact food was actually more of a rectangular brick shape. One foot wide as well as tall, and then two feet long. I tilted my head in calculation. The math said fifteen of these deep on the thirty foot deck by thirty wide. That gave me four hundred and fifty on the base layer. I swirled the number in the blood. Drew an x and then thirty under it in more blood to do the math. No way was I crunching four fifty by thirty in my head. I wondered if someone sent to clean this up later would ponder on the math etched in dried blood. It was wet for now and at least easy to work with. I carried some numbers and got thirteen thousand and five hundred bricks of feed. Holy seven hells I was going to be tossing for days.
I glanced over to see a chain of people unloading the silver capped metal spears. So no help there. The girls were still sawing heads off and cutting hearts outs. Okay, enough of this… I grabbed my sword and climbed on the carriage roof. There were cross beams every five feet to secure the cover over the goods. They could always be fused back together later by an earth mage. I smashed the left side of the first beam with my aura to chop through the blocky structure. Then I went to the next and proceeded to break all six beams on this side. I crossed over to the next side and smashed the supports there too. I then cut the canvas holding the braces together and removed the entire roof of the wagon. In the end, I was standing on all the yakin food easy to be grabbed by griffins and loaded onto pallets.
Even with them exposed I tossed food down for the yakins that would now call this place home. Eventually, someone would have to remove the harnesses on the beasts. Actually, after I tossed a hundred bails of food down, I went about that next. I left them tethered to the wagons but free from the pulling harness. They could roam with limits. I had forgotten to tell Lord Nova to send an earth mage when I had an idea.
“Traz you out there on recon? Can you swap with another griffin?” I asked.
“On my way,” Traz said and landed moments later with a thud beside me. “They are still massing to the south, my guess they will march tomorrow. What did you need?”
I walked over to Velia who was on heart cutting duty. There were dozens of hearts piled. I grabbed three, thought on it, and then added a fourth. I walked over to Traz who glared at me in confusion. I then stuffed the hearts into his saddle.
“Uh… Gryff why are there bloody hearts on my feathers?” Traz ask
ed.
“I need a wall. Channel your inner earth aura and build me a wall around Streb… Inside the barrier only. At least eight feet high. Allow for a west and east exit, but fill them in for now. I need to let these Yakins free. Think you can do that?”
The griffin danced in excitement. No griffin had the opportunity to use a goblin heart yet with earth magic. He bounded over to the edge of the barrier and a twenty foot wall that was ten feet wide shot into the air. He cursed at overdoing it. As the wall formed, the first section collapsed in on itself. More curses and he went back to rebuild that portion. That was all the lessons he needed. Traz then ran in a circle around the inside of Streb, an eight foot wall materialized as he was casting. Three quarters of the way, he ran back over for two more hearts which I inserted into his saddle. Shortly after, the wall was finished and two towering gateways defined exits. I would need to tear down the wall in place later and insert doors but it was perfect.
“Excellent work Traz, when the griffins arrive and find out you did the walls they will be clamoring to do Fernlans. Good for us right, the more proficient you all become with actual use the better.” I said and Traz nodded. That was an issue we were having in both the mage academy and the griffin mage academy. A lack of real world applications. Simply put, the catalysts were too expensive to readily expend. I heard no end of how we needed tree worms from the north. We wanted to build books in griffin sized type and we could do the one but there were no more catalysts to make copies. There were lots of requests for desert grubs from the northeastern continent of Darunsa. Almost all of the air magic’s catalyst was in the windy deserts far north in Darunsa. Wind elementals were essential for constant venting airstacks. While sand scorpions could buff shields with their blood, which from my understanding was extremely hard to get. King Aves and King Horus mentioned we needed to find a way to the north. The best thing we came up with was to head east to a port city and sail north for months. It was a terrible plan. Few ships sailed those waters because the large ocean monsters lurked in the warmer seas. Add in the raging spring and fall the storms. Well, those sunk ships caught out in the open ocean and the entire idea became too dangerous. It was a primary reason trade went overland so often on Vin.