“Why would they send any reinforcements?” Fyron asks. “I already took care of all their scouts.”
He then gestures towards all the dead trolls lying on the ground around him.
“Nobody else should know that we’re here,” Fyron continues.
“Speaking of the trolls,” Arraka says, “are you guys going to hide these bodies any time soon, or are you planning on hanging them as decorations? Not that I’m against either of those ideas, of course.”
“Can’t you just wake up Flower, and have her incinerate the troll corpses?” I ask Illuna.
“I’d rather not wake up Flower unless it’s absolutely necessary,” Illuna says. “Stealth missions were never exactly her specialty, and she doesn’t really get along with Fyron all that well, either.”
“No need to worry,” Fyron says. “I’ve got everything covered.”
The goblin then smacks his staff into the ground, and all of the troll corpses get engulfed in flames, at the same time. After a few seconds, the flames disappear, and the dead bodies are replaced by ashes.
“Shall we proceed?” the goblin says.
“Arraka, are there any enemies in our way?” Illuna says.
“Nah,” Arraka says. “You’ve already killed most of the guards from this area.”
“And no one is hiding invisibly?” Illuna says.
“No one,” Arraka says.
“Excuse me,” Leila writes, as she looks at Illuna. “Did you just say that the banshee from the amulet is named Arraka?”
“I did,” Illuna says. “You’ve heard of her?”
“I’ve… heard a few things, yes…” Leila writes.
“What exactly have you heard about her?” I say.
“I’ve heard that she’s a very evil and powerful spirit that played a major role in the still winter war,” Leila writes. “Is this really the same Arraka as the one from six hundred years ago?”
“It is her,” Illuna says. “I guarantee it.”
“Who the hell are you two talking to?” Arraka says. “Have you both gone insane?”
“We were talking to Leila,” I say.
“Who the hell is Leila?” Arraka says.
“The lessathi girl,” Illuna says. “She’s been communicating with us through written messages, floating in the air, in front of her.”
“Oh, so that’s what she was doing!” Arraka says.
“Can’t you see the writing?” I ask her.
“No, I can’t ‘see’ anything from inside here, are you stupid?” Arraka says. “I have no eyes. To me, it’s all auras and magical particles. I sense the auras of objects in order to ‘see’ them, and I sense the sound vibrations in the air, in order to figure out what you people are saying. I can make out most things with my magical sense, so I don’t really need my eyesight or my hearing for anything important, but to me, the girl’s drawings in the air were just magical particles, floating around at random. Now that I know what they’re supposed to be, I might be able to make a little more sense of them.”
“Are you sure it’s safe to carry her around like this?” Leila writes, looking concerned.
“Don’t worry, she’s not that tough!” I say. “Hell, I fought her with a dagger while she was in her best condition, and she still couldn’t kill me!”
“You really like to play with fire, don’t you, Barry-boy?” Arraka says.
“As long as she stays in that amulet, she’s not a threat to us,” Illuna tells Leila. “Come on, let’s get going. We’ve been standing in one place for long enough.”
She pauses.
“But before that,” Illuna says, “I’m going to cast a few healing spells. Most of your wounds seem to be older than one day, and they’re not severe, so I should have no trouble healing them completely. Barry, I have no idea if the blood on your clothes comes from your wounds, or from the trolls I killed earlier, but if you need healing, I’ll tend to you afterwards.”
“Thank you,” Leila writes, as Illuna begins to cast her healing spells.
After Illuna is done with the healing, the goblin general takes the lead, and he guides us through an empty tunnel, on the opposite side of the tunnel we came in from.
“That is quite an interesting method of communication you are using, young girl,” Fyron says. “Judging by the way the magical particles are forming in the air, I would venture a guess that you are using some kind of modified version of a stat booster to transmit your messages, am I correct?”
Leila does not answer the goblin immediately, and she takes a few moments to look him in the eyes before she writes her response.
“I see that you are very knowledgeable when it comes to magical devices,” Leila writes.
“I’ve fiddled around with a few artifacts and devices, including my staff, yes,” Fyron says. “But nothing as complex as your translator. It must have taken a very thorough understanding of the ins and outs of mind reading magic and years of hard work to make something this sophisticated. Whoever worked on your device must have been very talented.”
“He is,” Leila writes, with a solemn look on her face.
“So, uh,” I say, “why are you looking to invite the minotaur into your army? Are you planning to go to war against the dragon?”
“How intriguing,” the goblin general says. “You have absolutely nothing to gain from this information, yet you are casually asking me to divulge to you some of my most important military secrets without offering me anything in return. I know that you’re not a spy, because no spy would be stupid enough to ask me something like this directly. So what is the reason behind this question, I wonder?”
“I believe this is what humans like to call ‘small talk’,” Illuna says, in her usual indifferent tone. “Empty words, with the sole purpose of engaging in a conversation, for no reason in particular. Barry is just particularly bad at being discrete, so he never stopped to think whether his question was appropriate or not, for this situation.”
“Give me a break!” I say. “If you were so worried about me knowing your plans, then you would have never allowed me to find out about the minotaur in the first place. If you have any reason to think that I might somehow leak the information, then you can just tell me that you’re looking to hire the minotaur as the army’s accountant, and leave it at that. It’s not like I can verify the information that you give me, anyway.”
“Ah, so you are not completely stupid after all,” Fyron says, with a smirk. “That is a relief. Well, in that case, as you’ve said, the minotaur will be joining our accounting team as soon as he completes his training program. I am expecting great things from him in the months to come.”
Arraka laughs.
“If I were you,” she says, “I’d make the minotaur do the accounting anyway, just to mess with him. I hear that jobs that do not involve physical labor are considered to be the most dishonorable, by minotaur standards.”
“I’ll keep that in mind,” Fyron says, as he knocks on a wall with his staff, and a secret path opens up in front of us.
“You really know your way around these tunnels, huh?” I tell the goblin, as we all enter the hidden corridor.
“Fyron spends a lot of his time exploring hidden passages and underground ruins,” Illuna says. “His hobbies are not much different from those of Flower, in that regard.”
“Now, now, Illuna,” Fyron says, “there is no need to insult me like this. After all, isn’t it due to my so-called hobby that we have managed to remain undetected thus far? I would appreciate it if you refrained from comparing me to your dimwitted companion over a small similarity such as this.”
“Oh?” Illuna says. “Did you forget perhaps that it is thanks to my dimwitted companion that you were able to build that staff of yours? We would have never met in that cave twenty years ago if not for Flower’s unrivaled stupidity.”
“Aha- Ahahahaha!” Arraka laughs. “I still remember your face when you woke up in the middle of that cave, surrounded by fire elementals! I can’t beli
eve that she actually fell for my bluff! Just thinking about it makes me burst into laughter!”
“Hello?” we hear a voice coming from a dark corridor to our right. “Is anyone there? Can you hear me?”
We all stop suddenly, and we look towards the corridor, in an attempt to find the source of the sound. The voice seems to have come from the end of the tunnel, but it’s much too dark to see anything clearly.
“If you can hear me, please, help!” the voice says, again. “I’ve been trapped here for months. I’ll do anything you want! Please!”
“Hmm…” the goblin says, as he creates an orb of light with his staff, and then he makes it float all the way to the end of the tunnel.
Now that we get a clear look, we see that at the end of the corridor there is a locked cell, which holds only one prisoner: a tiger.
“Were you the one calling out to us earlier?” Fyron asks the tiger.
“Yes,” the tiger answers him. “Please, let me out of here! I’ll do whatever you ask!”
“Oh?” the goblin says, with a mocking smile. “Are you certain that it’s a good idea to be addressing us in Common like this? I heard that the old fox is executing anyone who dares to speak in this language nowadays.”
“The golden fox can go to hell and so can her rules!” the tiger shouts. “I’m never going back to that horrible place again!”
“You do not wish to return to the fox’s domain?” Fyron says. “But what other place is there for animals like you? Who else is going to protect you, if not the spirit fox?”
“I don’t need anyone’s protection!” the tiger says.
The goblin grins.
“Is this why you are in this cell, alone, begging for our help, then?” he says. “Because you do not need anyone’s protection?”
The tiger lowers his head, and he does not say anything.
“Let me see if I understand this fully,” Fyron says. “From what you’ve hinted so far, I’m assuming that you’d abandoned the fox’s domain long before you’ve been captured, am I correct?”
“Yes,” the tiger says, with his head still lowered.
“Were there other animals captured alongside with you?” Fyron asks.
“No,” the tiger says. “I’ve been living by myself, ever since I left the sacred woods.”
“I see,” Fyron says.
He then makes his orb of light float inside the tiger’s cell, and the light from the orb begins to fade. However, as soon as he moves the orb away from the cell again, its brightness immediately gets restored.
“Hmm,” Fyron says. “As I suspected, the cell you have been placed into restricts the use of magic. Should I take it that you are a mage, then?”
“I am,” the tiger says.
The goblin grins again, and he turns his gaze towards me.
“It appears that I’m in luck, Barry,” Fyron says. “I may have just found myself the perfect candidate to lead my army’s accounting team! What do you think? Does he look fit for the task?”
“I’m going to tell it to you straight,” I say. “I don’t see him holding a pen anytime soon.”
“Fortunately, he will not be needing a pen in order to lead his team,” Fyron says. “He just needs to be good at calculations.”
“I’m sorry,” the tiger says. “You want me to do what?…”
The goblin laughs.
“Pay us no mind,” he says. “We were only jesting. Although, you did say that you’d do anything I ask, so you should not act so surprised, even if I made you arrange desk papers for a living.”
“I suppose…” the tiger says.
“Illuna, could you take care of those iron bars for me?” the goblin general says. “The anti-magic properties of the cell do not seem to spread beyond those bars, so you should be able to slice them with your water whips from the outside.”
“Very well,” Illuna says.
She then conjures two whips made out of water that she appears to be holding with her hands, and she uses them to slice the iron bars into pieces.
“You are now free!” Fyron says, looking at the tiger that is now walking out of his cell. “And by this I mean that you are free to do my bidding. I really do hope that you are not planning to betray me and rejoin the fox immediately after we get out of this place.”
“I assure you, that is not going to happen,” the tiger says.
“Hmm?” the goblin says. “May I ask what it is that the fox has done in order to lose your loyalty to such a degree? Why would you still refuse to go back to your homeland, even after all this time has passed?”
“I have my reasons,” the tiger says.
“See, that’s not very reassuring,” Fyron says, as he points towards the tiger with his staff. “If you’re going to give me vague answers like that from the very beginning, what’s to tell me that you didn’t in fact make up that whole story about leaving the fox’s domain, just to gain my sympathy?”
“The fact that I’m speaking to you in the Common language,” the tiger says.
“Explain,” Fyron says.
“Eleya, the great golden fox,” the tiger says, “has a habit of interrogating all of the animals that return to her domain, after a long period of captivity. One question that is always asked is if you’d spoken to any humans in Common, while you were away. There is no way to hide the truth from the great fox. As long as she is studying your aura, she can easily tell if you are lying or not. Even if I weren’t an exile, like I said, going back to my homeland now would be nothing short of suicide. She would execute me on the spot.”
“I admit that I have heard of the fox’s interrogations,” Fyron says. “But I assumed that she would make an exception for mages, and for other valuable members of her community.”
“The fox does not make exceptions,” the tiger says, with a look in his eyes that seems to show both anger and terror at the same time. “I used to think the same as you, before she murdered the leopard’s son in cold blood.”
“The leopard?” I say. “You mean Leo, the leopard?”
“Yes, that is who I was referring to,” the tiger says. “He was her most loyal retainer. He still is. But that did not stop her from executing his cub, for the heinous crime of begging for his life in Common, to a couple of human hunters. The leopard may have accepted her judgment, but I never will.”
The tiger pauses, for a few seconds, and then he repeats himself, in a lower voice.
“I never will,” he says.
“Ah,” Fyron says, “Now things are starting to make more sense. If the fox later also executed your family, in a similar manner to how she executed the leopard cub, I can see why you would choose to leave her domain forever. That would also explain why you left your homeland by yourself.”
The tiger is looking pretty angry, after hearing the goblin’s words, but he chooses to remain silent.
“You’ve said enough,” Fyron tells the tiger. “At the very least, I would find it very unlikely that you would return to the golden fox after all you’ve just said. Regarding your debt to me, I ask only that you accompany me to my goblin camp on my way back. If the life there is not to your liking, then you may leave at any point, and consider your debt to me paid. I am, however, quite confident that you will choose to remain.”
“And why is that?” the tiger asks.
“You will understand, once you get there,” Fyron says. “Now, follow us. There is still another prisoner that we need to rescue before we can leave this place.”
“Another prisoner?” the tiger asks, as he joins us, and we all resume our walk through the caves. “You don’t mean the minotaur, do you?”
“Who else could I mean?” Fyron says. “Is there anyone else here that would be worth the effort of releasing?”
“I suppose not,” the tiger says. “The minotaur is likely the only prisoner from this place aside from me who is not some mindless beast.”
“I’m curious,” I say. “You say that all the creatures trapped in these caverns are mi
ndless beasts, but I’ve also seen some sabre-toothed tigers on my way here. Do you feel the same way about them, too?”
“Of course I do,” the tiger says. “What kind of question is this?”
“Well, they are tigers…” I say.
“No, they aren’t!” the tiger says, furiously. “They are sabre-toothed tigers, not tigers! How can you even compare the two?”
“Barry is not from Varathia,” Illuna says. “Believe it or not, in the continents outside of Varathia there isn’t much of a difference between animals and creatures. A tiger from the Western Continent is just as much of a mindless beast as a sabre-toothed tiger.”
“You can’t be serious!” the tiger says.
“On the contrary,” Illuna says. “I am quite serious. I do not know if the high level of intelligence shown by the animals in Varathia is due to the golden fox’s influence, or due to some other factors, but the fact of the matter is that Varathia is the only place in the world where animals can speak, and it is the only place where they live in civilized societies.”
“Hah!” Arraka says. “How does it feel to know that there are animals out there who are dumber than ogres? Did you think that you were anything special? I’m willing to bet that people from outside of Varathia would not even be able to tell the difference between you and a wild beast. To them, you’re nothing but a mindless creature, no different from a harpy, or a giant slug. Isn’t that right, Barry?”
“Well, it’s a bit hard to treat him like a dumb beast, when he can speak Common,” I say.
“Don’t worry, I have an easy fix for that!” Arraka says. “Just ignore what he says. If you don’t pay any attention to him, you’ll find it much easier to treat him like an animal. Oh, I’m sorry, did I say animal? What I meant to say was creature. I always get the two mixed up! Aha- Ahahahahahaha!”
“Who the hell is that clown from the amulet?” the tiger says. “Some sort of prankster spirit?”
“That’s rude, you know!” Arraka says. “You should not assume I’m a clown just because the girl wearing my amulet is dressed in clown clothes! Don’t they teach you manners in animal school?”
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