Chapter 6: Digging In Part 2

Grand-dam Choch was pleased with what they had accomplished in the brief time they had been given, and the time the adventurers had taken to travel to their home had been a boon.

Granted, the traps they had been able to place were simple and not deadly, but there hadn’t been time to try for lethality. The time gained was more critical and would aid their purposes.

The adventurers guild would send someone more potent and far deadlier should this party be wiped out.

The rest of the Goom had left earlier in the day with provisions and supplies for the trip, though they were still determining where they would end up. The new settlement would need to be close enough to humans for them to scavenge supplies and food.

A town about the same size they were leaving would be ideal, but a little bigger or smaller wouldn’t be unacceptable. The real problems occurred when the humans were so numerous discovery was inevitable. Or so small that any scavenging would be immediately noticeable.

It was terrible luck that Jerry had announced the presence of the Goom in a way that made them be seen in a bad light. Nevertheless, there were tales of Goom and humans living cooperatively in the past.

But Grand-dam Choch was doubtful those held any truth. In her experience, humans were too focused on creating more for themselves and cutting down any competition in her experience.

The rest of the settlement had left earlier in the day. As soon as the adventurers had shown up at the farm, the Goom started moving east around the town. It was a shame they needed to evacuate, but sticking around after Jerry’s injuring of the farmer and the adventurers being called in would be fruitless.

As Choch was thinking about this, she spotted the adventurers approaching under her scouting position in the trees. One looked particularly bad, limping along and cursing as the party moved closer toward the Goom’s now abandoned home.

From the smell of the wind, the stinker-tons had done good work. She would have to thank Lester for keeping them around.

She took a shallow breath and, with an effort of will, silently cast the long speak spell to reach Lester and Mina. It was a handy spell that allowed silent, long-range communication. It was pretty mana intensive, though, so she tried to keep it short.

‘Good job on those traps, you two. The party is almost to the burrow. Move into position on their flank.

We’ll see how much we can draw them away with direct attacks. Remember, non-lethal if you can manage it. Try to draw them away from home towards the stream. We need to delay as much as we can.’

There were several moments of no response. Choch waited patiently for the other two Goom to get into position.

‘Lester, in position.’

‘Mina, in position.’

Choch nodded in satisfaction before replying,

‘I’ll start. You two come in on a count of three after I make contact. I’m going to target the limping one, I won’t cripple him, but I will get their attention. Watch out for that magic user.’

Her instructions were given. Choch descended from her scouting position and moved silently into the brush along the west side of the forest trail the adventures were moving down.

She paused briefly to gather herself. Then, unlimbering her small, wicked club, careful not to disturb the greenery around her, she waited for the party to move closer.

With a high-pitched, chittering war cry, she burst from the concealment and rushed the limping, cursing, and leather-clad stinky man leading the party down the trail. But, of course, the cursing wretch was not expecting to be rushed by anything yet. Choch got that impression from the startled curse and widening of eyes.

He took a hobbling step back instead of drawing the weapons sheathed at his sides. The larger female behind him was more aware.

She made wild gestures and started to chant at the sound of Choch’s war cry. Then, with the girl’s mystical arm flailing, vines began to spring from the path, attempting to snare Choch as she advanced.

She twirled, dodging around the vines, and quickly closed with her intended victim. Arcing her swing in a chopping motion toward his shin, she connected and heard a very satisfying,

“SON OF A BITCH!”

As she connected with one of his shins.

Her club wasn’t dangerously heavy or being swung with all the force she could muster. However, no one would be happy about being cracked across the shin with a two-inch thick, wooden rod with strips of metal inlaid down its length, especially on a Tuesday.

Continuing her attack, she used the rebounding force from her strike to whirl around in a tight circle and strike his other shin as he started hopping in place on his less injured leg.

He howled in a loud, angry voice,

“Always the legs!”

And fell to the path rolling back and forth, holding his shins.

Choch knew that staying still would quickly end her assault. So she moved on to the more prominent blond woman behind her first victim—the one who had summoned the vines with a now squawking, panicking owl on her shoulder.

She reached into her deep pocket and sub-vocalized a brief spell during the charge. It caused her weight to lessen as she leaped into the air far higher than she could without it.

Reaching the height of her much larger opponent’s head, she withdrew a pawful of sand and threw it hard into the wide-open, surprised eyes of the large, blond woman. The owl on her shoulder screeched and took to the air as the large woman uttered a cry that interrupted her chant.

The vines the woman had summoned sank back into the ground as the chant was cut off. Then, clutching at her now sandy-textured eyes, the woman staggered, screaming at the pain.

At the same time Choch was disabling the second of the adventurers, she heard another angry squawk that came from behind her opponent. She looked over the woman’s shoulder as she descended to see Lester. He was occupying the dwarf coated in heavy armor.

With light, quick blows about the dwarf’s head and shoulders, Lester was berating them. It was a chittering stream of invectives the dwarf probably couldn’t understand.

The dwarf was fending off the quick blows with an absurdly large axe being wielded, if with some difficulty. Choch could tell the armored figure was far more used to dealing with larger opponents. But the armor was doing its job as clangs rose into the air.

The lighter weapon of Lester’s bypassed the dwarf’s guard sometimes, and every gong was a sound of victory in Choch’s ears. Meanwhile, Mina was riding the shoulders of the magic user while pulling at the distraught woman’s red hair. Choch thought,

‘How had she managed that? Well, it works.

The first part of getting the attention of the adventures was going well, but they needed to draw them further away from the fleeing settlement. So Choch called out to her son and his wife,

“To the west! Protect the dibbun!”

It wasn’t likely that any of the adventures spoke Goomish, but a little deception couldn’t hurt on the off chance. So Lester broke off exchanging blows with the dwarf, blasting a flashy but mostly harmless shower of frost and snow out of his paws with a quick spell. He then retreated into the brush as the ice frosted around the dwarf’s head thickly.

Mina summoned a caustic, small blob of slime into her hands. She released the screeching magic user’s hair and slapped her in the face with it, where it clung, and started to eat at the flesh of her face.

Choch nodded to Mina as she ran. That was a creative use of a simple cleaning spell and probably painful, judging from the angered screams from the red haired-hairedscraping at her face.

The three Goom scurried away as the adventurers dealt with their minor but inconvenient injuries.

***********

Cato rolled on the ground holding his shins and swearing furiously. Winnie was sitting and clutching at her eyes, trying to summon a small water Nyad to help wash out her eyes. This was partially successful, as a malformed water sprite did form. But it started slapping her in the face everywhere but her eyes.

Omara was screeching as the cleaning slime continued to burn at her face with the caustic juices. Nixen was calmly bashing the flat of the axe they carried into the helmet’s faceplate coated with ice, clearing their vision.

After a minute or two, Nixen had cleared most of the ice from obstructing the helmet’s vision and started helping Omara. Then, through a joint effort and Omara’s panicked whimpers, they started removing the caustic slime from her face.

Using some cloth drawn from the dwarf’s pack and a water canteen, it was difficult. Omara didn’t want to stop helping in her panicked state, and getting the burning sludge off her face was not accomplished efficiently.

Winnie finally managed to get her sprite of water to focus on clearing her eyes and was helping a still cursing Cato to his feet. Looking at the rogue, Nixen commented with a straight face,

“Concentrating on your footwork today, I see. I’m glad you don’t skip leg day.”

Winnie started to chuckle a bit as she steadied the hobbling rogue, and Omara followed her example with an uncontrollable giggle through her tears as Cato scowled back briefly.

He let a slight, pained grin appear and replied,

“At least you can keep a cool head.”

All of the adventurers started laughing, though Omara winced at the skin of her face tightening with her laughter. She held either side of her face with both hands, trying to soothe her skin as Nixen finished working to clear the slime from her.

Nixen worked around Omara’s ineffective self-healing. Finally, the dwarf tossed the cloth into the bushes at the side of the road. Omara nodded to the dwarf in thanks. That had been unpleasant.

Nixen continued,

“Now, we have confirmation of what we are facing. I haven’t seen these mobs before, but that will give us a bit of a bonus reporting them.

Though I don’t know what was going on with the clothing of the hairless one, mobs typically make do without. They’re are headed west, so we have a choice to make-”

“How do you know they’re not just circling?”

Cato interrupted.

“I understand their language, the largest one who started the ambush said to the others to head west. Evidently, their cubs are in that direction.”

“I thought you said you hadn’t seen these mobs before. How did you understand them?”

The three novices shared a glance. Cato did have a point.

Nixen replied stoically,

“Journeyman is when you can start taking any lessons you want on mob language. A few are familiar enough among mobs to make it occasionally useful.

“However, barring a few specific positions in the guild before journeyman, it’s a waste of time as you may not survive long enough to talk to them.”

Cato looked at the dwarf’s grim pronouncement with an offended expression. The dwarf ignored him and continued nodding towards the forest path leading towards the mobs’ home,

“Mobs are more intelligent than most people realize. However, they do use strategy, tactics, and communication to accomplish their goals.

“Their goals are very different from most people. They focus almost entirely on survival and growth instead of which curtains will make their home the talk of the town. Think territory and food.

“What we have here is three options. One, the leader was scared or excited enough to reveal where the rest of this group’s most precious members were.

A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

“Two, we follow them. That one’s unlikely to help us. Since all the traps and even the ambush were about delaying rather than stopping us entirely. I think it’s an effort for them to distract us from the others.

“Three, the home is empty, and the rest are fleeing in a different direction from the ambush party.”

Cato had been trying to contain his anger during the end of Nixen’s short lecture. Instead, he spat at the dwarf in disbelief.

“That’s ridiculous! A distraction? I won’t be walking right for days! Winnie was damn near blinded, and Omara’s face is-”

Cato broke off as Omara’s hands became enveloped in flame with a quick muttering of an incantation. A dangerous glint entered her eye as she interrupted in a cranky voice,

“Omara’s face is…?”

Cato bit back a reply that might get him fricasseed and said in a reasonably respectful and questioning tone,

“Well, er, ex-foliated?”

The mage thought about this response a moment before dismissing her fiery vengeance. She nodded to Nixen for the dwarf to continue.

Nixen did, with a smile at the brief interplay,

“You might find it ridiculous, Cato, but they weren’t trying to kill us. Some of you would be dead if they were.

“Remember that true monsters have the strength and natural skills to wipe out parties of adventurers. They fight for survival, not glory or gold…as far as we know.”

Nixen’s head shook slightly before continuing,

“No, it simply isn’t possible for all of you to be alive against mobs that were seriously trying to kill you. So I think our third choice is most likely to finish this quest.

“Even if we could keep up with that ambush party on their home turf and eliminate them, the quest is the removal of ten mobs. We need to find the majority and take them out.

“Better would be to capture at least three of those and kill the rest—ten total, with proof of removal for the quest to be completed.

“I doubt the lair has any of them still there with the delay tactics we’ve seen so far. Forethought like this from them is a dangerous thing. I keep harping about how smart mobs are, but they are usually much more territorial too.”

Nixen paused in thought.

“Winnie, send out Pellet to the east and see if she can spot a group of mobs moving in that direction. The opposite direction of those three is kinda obvious, but the most likely.”

Winnie nodded and started whispering to her owl that had settled back onto her shoulder after the brief skirmish had finished. After receiving her instructions, the owl flew off to the east, winging quickly and silently between trees.

Cato looked uncomfortable as he asked,

“Why do you keep saying some of us would be dead? Wouldn’t you be in as much danger? And why are you focusing on just the ten? Shouldn’t we try to take them all out?”

Omara nodded her head in agreement,

“He makes some good points.”

Nixen gave a wave of acknowledgment and answered with a measured response as Winnie’s face turned stoic,

“Alright, settle in and listen up. This is gonna take a minute to explain to you all.

“Not gonna lie to you, I wouldn’t be in as much danger as all of you. I’m better equipped and thoroughly trained and have been doing this for a long, long time. Lastly, I have a literal God on my side.

“As your journeyman, my job is to train you all. Help you gain experience and keep everyone alive to do so.

“Eventually, you’ll reach novice and attend the academy. After that, you can start your own parties with other apprentices.

“One day, if you live that long, you might reach journeyman. At that point, you’ll gain more advanced training for your specialty before taking on a party of novices.”

Cato predictably opened his mouth to protest. But, instead, Nixen cut him off with a pointed finger.

“Yes, lots of what-ifs and where-for-tos mixed in there, but the point is. Until you do, you can’t keep up with me if I go all out. Me stomping all the mobs into the dirt for you doesn’t teach you anything.

“If a real threat to our safety appears, I will step up and handle it. But until then, I will let you fail unless you make a mistake that jeopardizes your life or the life of one the others.”

The dwarf paused and seemed to consider their next words,

“I’ll heal the life-threatening injuries after a fight. I’ll offer advice and teach you how to represent the guild. I’ll continue to guide you in tactics and strategy.

“I’ll make sure you learn the basics you need to survive, and if you fuck up in a way that puts more than one of us in unnecessary danger, I…will…let…you…die.

“The guild is more than a way to glory. We stand before danger, so others don’t need to. If you can’t stand and support your team members because you are too cocky, greedy, or self-absorbed,”

He said this piece of his lecture with pointed glances at Omara and Cato before continuing,

“Then you won’t survive the learning experience. We rely on each other to be the best we can to complete the quest as requested. If you can’t handle that, I’ll help you complete your withdrawal paperwork from the guild when we finish this quest.

“The guild masters will back me up on this. No one in the guild wants a party member incapable of dealing with the dangers we face daily. I’ll even pay for your withdrawal fee.”

Omara looked angry but resigned to this long-winded explanation. She had received a much-abbreviated version when she had first joined the guild.

She knew it was up to her to succeed, but the details and reasons behind that statement had been glossed over. Instead, the guild recruiter had been enthusiastic about her talent with magic.

He had gone on at length about the advances she could make with her spells without explaining the cost or the details of how to do so.

Cato had paled significantly at the lecture. His recruiter hadn’t mentioned any of this. Uncle Darik had rambled about some of this, but Cato had been daydreaming about riches most of the time.

Sure, everybody in his hometown knew it was a dangerous life. Still, the adventurers he had seen before joining up permanently seemed to have a swagger of confidence that drew admiration from his friends and family.

He had never put it together before that the swagger was earned through loss and failure. He thought his uncle had mentioned something about it, but honestly, he had daydreamed through much of the more boring stuff he had discussed. The recruiter certainly hadn’t explained that price.

In a hesitant voice, Cato spoke a question,

“Why didn’t you want me to train with Master clemency? Cause I wanted it for just myself?.”

The dwarf gave a negative shake of the head,

“I wanted you to train with Master Ian because he can teach you more about facing direct attacks while dealing with fear. He’s an eight-foot-tall bear that deals in the absolute destruction of his enemy.

“Master Clemency is very good at what he does but still spars with Master Ian because he knows real danger improves his skills with an edge he wouldn’t get otherwise. He can teach you skills and tricks to improve you at being a rogue.

“Master Ian can teach you to stay alive against a much more powerful opponent. Situational awareness…and we would all get a kick out of it.

“Though I think Master Ian has enough self-control to not actually try to kill you.”

Nixen grinned at Cato, who gave a weak smile in return before nodding in agreement,

“I’m still unhappy about it, but if Master Ian is willing, I’ll do it when we all get back.”

“Good. I’ll make the arrangements when we return. Omara? You still with us?”

The red-haired mage was looking at the ground with one hand softly stroking the damage to her face. It was red and raw from her jawbone to her forehead where the caustic slime had been. She looked up at Nixen, and her eyes were still clouded with doubt as she responded,

“I…may have gotten into this for the wrong reasons… But I’m not sure how I feel about withdrawing. I want to finish what I started and keep working on magic.

“I won’t go back home and only read about it in the rare books I can scrounge up. My aunt is generous with her small library, but access to the guilds is too good to pass up.”

Nixen nodded,

“Since you’ll put in the effort to continue, we can talk about a transfer when we get back. The guild has other research and development divisions that may better fit you.

“The knowets recruit directly from us. So do the tinkers, as well as the military’s R&D sections.

“Combat isn’t the only way to advance after apprentice. If we can cap the mobs we need to advance you three, I can recommend more research-focused training for you.”

Omara looked very relieved to hear this and smiled. Her reddened skin lent the sense of a happy off-color tomato to her look of gratitude.

Winnie, who had been watching for Pellet to return from her scouting mission, looked over her shoulder and spoke to the mage,

“You’d be a good fit in any one of them. You have options…try not to become an arrogant snit if you choose the Knowets.”

Omara smiled wider at the tall woman’s words and nodded her thanks before asking the amazonian blond woman,

“Why don’t you seem surprised by this?”

Winnie, her eyes still searching the trees on the east side of the trail, responded,

“I’ve been with Nixen a lot longer than you two. I’ve seen what it costs to be an adventurer. I still want to do it for reasons I won’t go into right now. Won’t quit now.”

Cato snorted,

“Two months isn’t a lot longer.”

Winnie stared at Cato before replying,

“Master Ian can teach you how long a few minutes can be. So survive till then, and I won’t slap you too hard for saying that.”

Cato edged farther away from the tall woman and looked at Nixen with a worried expression again.

As Winnie finished her sentence, Pellet winged from the tree line and landed on the arm she outstretched for her to perch on. Then, Pellet started making chattering noises while moving her head in owlish ways.

Winnie observed and listened to this odd communication, seeming to have no trouble understanding, before turning to Nixen.

“She says you were right. A group of these mobs to our east are headed away from us. She’s not good with numbers but says they are “herd” sized.”

Nixen checked the armor protecting their stout frame, then said,

“Guess that’s one choice made for us then. Cato, Omara, do you want healing now or later? I have a few favors from Jeph left for the day after healing that farmer, but it’s up to you.”

Omara shook her head,

“I’ll be fine for now.”

Cato winced and bent over to rub his legs,

“I can’t move as well as I should be able to with these stumps beat to hell. So give me a patch job for now.”

Nixen nodded and moved to the rogue’s side. They touched the taller man’s hip as a soft glow enveloped the dwarf’s hand and murmured a brief prayer. Cato thought he had heard something about sourdough having more flavor.

The light spread to the rogue, and the man stood easier before a few moments passed. Then, after the glow had faded, the rogue cautiously bent his knees and performed a few basic stretches of his legs.

“Much better, thank you.”

The dwarf’s head moved in a negative,

“Thank Jeph. He healed you. I am just a vessel for his might. It isn’t free, though.

“A dozen cupcakes made by your own hand should suffice, with frosting. Bumps and bruises don’t take much divine power to smooth out. That wasp venom is a little extra, though.”

The rogue looked perturbed by the statement,

“I don’t know how to make cupcakes. And your god is weird. Why does he require baked goods anyway? I’ve seen you heal without asking anything.”

“I ask mostly when there is only one person to heal so that that person can spread the word of his goods. Or, at great need, I can shoulder the cost and add it to what I usually bake. The monthly bake drives the church holds cover large-scale healing.

“I’ll give you a recipe for the cupcakes. No knead to be sour about it,”

Nixen replied with a straight face as Cato looked at the dwarf suspiciously.

“If that was a baking pun, I didn’t get it.”

Ignoring this and turning to the east, Nixen hefted the large battle axe always at the dwarf’s side and stated,

“Alright, let’s finish this. Winnie, have Pellet lead the way.”

The adventurers started heading east through the underbrush toward the conclusion of their quest, hurrying to follow the small owl as they went.

***************

As the party departed, Choch’s head poked out from behind a tree on the opposite side of the path they had been standing on. Lester’s robed form and Mina’s diminutive one also appeared across from where the adventurers had been recuperating from the light ambush.

Choch looked at her children and stated quietly,

“Well, shit. I thought they would follow us.”

Lester was brushing some of the debris accumulated from the skirmish, and the following run through the underbrush from his robes as he replied,

“The dwarf knows our language or at least understands a little. He was suspicious. And I think they would have caught on since we were so close, even after they had been talking for so long.”

Mina looked understandably worried at the adventurer’s departure to pursue and slaughter her fellow Goom. She was gripping her weapon tightly and shuffling impatiently in place as she chirped,

“Ma, I know we shouldn’t kill them because more powerful ones will show up for revenge, but what if we just take out one or two? Wouldn’t they back off or retreat so we get more time to escape?

“If we put them into our deep pockets, they won’t even leave bodies to show where they disappeared.”

Choch looked thoughtful and hesitated before responding,

“If it comes down to it, then we will, but killing humans should never be our answer. It’s too risky. Even if we hide the bodies in the deep pockets, that’s different complications.”

Choch dismissed the idea with a shake of her head.

“So let’s follow at a distance and keep harassing them. If they get too close to our family, we will strike violently. Distanced spells should suffice to keep them cautious. The more we slow them down, the more time the others have to make a clean escape.”

Lester nodded in agreement as Mina walked toward where the adventurers had disappeared into the brush. Choch concentrated for a few moments and used another large portion of her Mana to send a communication to Mearah with the fleeing group of Goom,

‘Adventures in pursuit, we follow to slow them down. Speed is better than concealment. Get away.’

Her message sent, she ate some more gold pieces to replenish her source and followed Lester and Mina.

*********