Installment 21 [https://squirrel.dogphilosophy.net/Installment021.png]
The concern for being able to sleep was Al's last thought before he was awakened by a sudden burst of light. He jolted upright and looked around. It was daylight. The sun had risen high enough to shine through the window into Al's face.
Wikwocket was sprawled ungracefully across her cot, snoring lightly and tangled in the thin blanket as though locked in battle with it. Quiet breathing from under Al's cot confirmed Gruntle was still there. Bote's pack was next to their cot, but Bote themself was gone.
That mystery was resolved moments later when careful footsteps arrived outside their room's door and there was a gentle kicking at it.
"If you would please open the door, I have food for us," came Bote's voice.
Al's cot was jostled as Gruntle poked his head out from underneath. Simultaneously, Wikwocket went from snoring gently to sitting up and fighting to free herself from the blankets.
"Food??" they both said together.
Wikwocket looked at Gruntle and laughed, still disentangling herself. Gruntle just watched the door.
"If the door remains closed, there will soon no longer be food for us unless you want to eat it from the floor," Bote insisted.
Al got up and opened the door. Bote stood outside, stoically balancing three bowls and a bucket in their arms. The bowls and bucket had been filled from this morning's gruel-pot. Al carefully took a bowl and the bucket from Bote.
"Henry kindly allowed us to borrow the bucket. He even washed it first. We do, of course, need to return it before we leave."
"Who's Henry?" asked Al.
"He is the tavern keeper. Did you not know his name?"
"It never came up in conversation. How did you know it?"
"There are many paths to knowledge," answered Bote.
"...right. Which one led to the tavernkeeper's name?"
"The one that starts with asking. Not all paths need to be esoteric."
Al shook his head and turned back to the room, where he was met by the expectant stares of gnoll and gnome.
"I see some of us are in danger of perishing from starvation," Al joked.
"Me! I am!" Wikwocket cried out, "It has been a number of days since I have had any food!"
"You had plenty of food just yesterday evening."
"One is a number!"
Al stepped back into the room and handed the bowl to Wikwocket while Gruntle slid out from under the cot and stretched dramatically. Al handed the bucket of gruel to him. After a single grunt of what Al assumed was gratitude, Gruntle had his snout in the bucket and was noisily eating. Bote passed out spoons to the rest of them.
"Eat up," they cheerfully advised, "the crowd downstairs is eager to see us."
Al really didn't care what their unexpected audience wanted, but he added his own encouragement for everyone to eat quickly for other reasons. They were getting a later start than he'd expected. He had assumed he was going to have a night of fitful, uncertain sleep and get up at dawn with just enough rest not to be impaired. Under the current circumstances, he would never have believed he'd have felt comfortable enough to sleep soundly through the night and wake up so late. Perhaps knowing that any danger that showed up in the room would be met with a face-full of gnoll was reassuring somehow, Al hypothesized.
Mysterious though it was, he wasn't complaining. He felt refreshed and invigorated. He shoveled his bowl of nutritious slop into his belly and began packing for the day's march. Once the others had finished doing the same, they headed out.
Coming down the stairs, they were greeted with cheering and some scattered applause, mixed with a few groans of disappointment from a few folks who had been betting there would be obvious injuries or deaths overnight. Al and Bote returned the bowls, spoons and bucket to Henry. Wikwocket gave the assembled patrons a promise that she'd have more exciting stories the next time they passed through the area, to more applause. Then, they were out the door and on their way to the smithy for Wikwocket's supplies.
It was still very early in the Spring season, so finding the ground covered in a few inches of wet snow in the morning wasn't too much of a surprise. The cold storm that had blown through overnight and been replaced with clear skies and calm winds. They left their odd collection of muddy footprints through the town as they visited Roderick's smithy and collected what they'd paid for from a tired Hilda, and then made their way out of town along the southern road.
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The air along the forest road was chilly but clumps of heavy wet snow melted in the sunshine and dropped periodically from the newly-budding trees of the forest.
Al let Gruntle lead the way. This was purely a strategic matter of his height and feral instincts making him more likely to spot any dangers that may be up ahead of the party. It was certainly not because Al still didn't feel comfortable having a big demonic beast stalking behind him.
Gruntle was still carrying more than his fair share of the party supplies and equipment. He trudged through the dense snow wearing no clothing besides his leather "loincloth", and the plain leather collar around his neck. Despite all of this, he made no complaint. He hadn't even objected when Wikwocket clambered up and sat atop the pack he was carrying. Gruntle's bare feet left behind large footprints in the snow, resembling tracks of a giant wolf or perhaps a bear.
Other than the extra effort of occasionally slogging through a damp snowdrift, it had been a nice enough few hours of hiking south along the forest road out of Silveroak when Gruntle's ears twitched and he suddenly spoke up.
"Somebody up ahead."
Al squinted into the glare of sunlight reflecting from the snow. Just up ahead of them, the road curved sharply to the right to avoid a rocky outcrop. "Who is it?"
"Don't know. Edge of the road by the curve. Was just looking around the corner and ran off."
Gruntle's ears swiveled. "Think I hear talking but can't hear what they're saying."
He shifted his shield down from its resting position and down to his hand without breaking stride.
"Think I hear crossbow being wound up."
Wikwocket hopped down from her perch on Gruntle's pack and darted into the foliage beside the road. Al thought he spotted her scurrying up ahead of them for just a moment before losing sight of her. He looked back at Bote, who was scratching their beard and looking thoughtful as they trudged along. They saw Al looking at them.
"This seems familiar to me, for some reason," they said.
"Maybe we should stop, if this is an ambush we're about to walk right into..."
With a muffled THUNK a crossbow bolt appeared in the road in front of Gruntle's feet. He stopped. From up in a tree to their right, the sound of a crossbow being rewound was heard. To their left, a man with a still-loaded crossbow stepped out from behind a wide oak, shifting his aim back and forth between Al and Bote. Just ahead, four more emerged from the bushes. Three of them warily aimed crossbows at Gruntle, being the largest and most dangerous-looking of the travelers. The fourth bandit approached and pointed a worn but sharp curved sword at Gruntle as he looked at Al. Al noted that despite his bravado, he'd stopped well outside of Gruntle's reach.
"What is this thing, your pet?" he asked Al, to the subdued chuckling of his companions.
"Nah," answered Gruntle, to the surprise of the questioner.
"Hey, it talks! Well, then, whatever you are, maybe you and your two owners are smart enough to know what's happening here. I'm sure it'd be a relief to you if you didn't have to carry so much. It just so happens that we're kindly willing to take on the burden of any heavy valuables you may be carrying."
"Nah," Gruntle repeated. His right hand slowly rose up and unconsciously rubbed at the collar around his neck. "Not that heavy."
"Are you stupid?" the bandit leader asked, getting another round of chuckles from his gang.
"Kinda. You?"
One of the bandits snickered.
"All right wise-ass, I'll make it simple for you...," their leader began angrily.
"Hey, now, I wouldn't provoke...," Al started to say.
"I wasn't talking to you!" yelled the bandit, not taking his eyes off of Gruntle. He looked at Gruntle's right hand, still rubbing at the collar. "Let's start with that collar. You like that collar?"
"Yeah," answered Gruntle.
"Well, too bad. It's mine now. Give it to me."
"Why?"
"Because if you don't we'll kill you all and take it anyway!"
Gruntle's short burst of barks sounded to the bandit leader a bit like nervous laughter. Al noticed that it must have sounded like something else to Bote, judging by their widening eyes and growing grin.
Gruntle's brow furrowed deeply with intense mental effort. "Yes...sir...," Gruntle said, much to Al's confusion. He turned slowly back towards Al and Bote as he fumbled with the buckle on the collar.
"My...dear...colleagues...," he said, each word chosen with slow deliberation, "...these...ruffians...outnumber us. We must...give it to them." He raised his left hand, still holding the shield, just enough to point at Al's hip. "Do not ... seek to hide...what you have...hidden there...from them. Give it to them."
Al looked into Gruntle's eyes, and felt a burst of adrenaline. Gruntle's pupils dilated until his eyes appeared completely black as the buckle on the collar came loose, and he started to slowly turn back to the robbers.
"Yes. I guess I should give it to you, then?" Al said, as he pointed to the one aiming the crossbow at him. It was a subtle bit of magic, much maligned among wizards, but just perfect for this situation in Al's opinion. Guided by supernatural insight, he'd already decided how to make the first strike, as he slowly reached under the robes with what he hoped would be seen as a conciliatory not making any sudden moves manner.
This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
"Kind...sir...," Gruntle said with deep concentration to the bandits' leader, who still held the saber threateningly in his right hand as his left made hand it over gestures. "As per...your...instruction...I give this...to you."
With a gentle underhand toss, he sent the collar towards the bandit leader at eye level. Smirking, the bandit reached to grab it out of the air.
At the moment his attention was on his fingers closing around the flying collar, the explosion of action began. He heard the sudden snarl and flash of motion as the seemingly subdued creature whose collar he now held leapt towards him, clumps of wet snow launching upwards from its feet. Its right hand smoothly took the flail from its belt as it closed in. Its shield deftly knocked aside his desperate attempt at a stab. He heard his companions' crossbows fire, saw one of the bolts strike the creature below the shoulder as the flail came down. He felt more than heard the loud crunch in his head. Then nothing else.
Gruntle's sudden rush carried him past the collapsing bandit leader and headfirst into one of the three who had been behind him. Gruntle's teeth sank into the wide-eyed robber's shoulder as he tried to drop the crossbow.
Al shouted a quick invocation and made a gesture with his left hand as his right pulled the mace from under his robes. His foe fired the crossbow at him, but the bolt was deflected away by the magical ward Al quickly conjured up to stop it. Al heard Bote calling for the favorable attention of the gods as Al ran forward to swing at the man who'd just tried to shoot him. His mace slammed satisfyingly right into the bandit's ribs, exposed below where his arms were raised to hold the crossbow.
Up in the tree where they'd heard the crossbow being wound, there was a startled cry of pain and a crossbow bolt flew aimlessly into the forest. This was followed by another shout as a man fell from the branches and hit the ground with a thud. Wikwocket jumped down after him far more gracefully, then disappeared again into the brush.
The remaining bandits were realizing their advantages had evaporated suddenly and they dropped their crossbows, drawing a collection of short blades as they tried to back away from Gruntle. Al's opponent swung and stabbed wildly, wincing at the pain in his ribs. He managed to get around Al's guard to inflict shallow stabs to Al's leg and arm.
Bote called down divine punishment on Al's assailant, who screamed as flesh seared in the light that stabbed down from the heavens. The slightly smouldering bandit clumsily tried to hold Al off as their exchange of blows continued. The bandit was tricky and light on his feet, but at the last moment Al felt a subtle spiritual nudge change the angle of one last swing just enough, and his mace struck the bandit across the temple, felling him.
Now Al could finally pay attention to what was happening in the noisiest part of the fight, where the last three bandits were throwing themselves at Gruntle. The bandit missing a chunk of flesh from his shoulder was being smashed to the ground by Gruntle's flail. As that bandit fell, Gruntle rushed a second one who raised an arm defensively, then screamed as jaws closed on it, crushing it. The last bandit was able to get in a slash across Gruntle's abdomen, though Gruntle didn't seem to even notice.
Al had heard of battle rage before, but to him this didn't look like rage at all. The feral grin and eager animalistic vocalizations seemed more like an ecstatic mania. Gruntle was enjoying this. Al wasn't sure what to think when he realized he was enjoying watching it, too, from far enough away to keep the melee from running over him.
"Should we help this Gruntle?" Bote asked, walking up to watch with him.
"I...don't know," Al replied. Would it bother Gruntle if they joined in? Al didn't think so, but...
As they hesitated, the bandit with the crushed, bleeding arm tried desperately to avoid death. His wild swings were keeping the gnoll busy, but then he and the other bandit turned to run. Gruntle's flail smashed across the back of the broken-armed man's skull, and Gruntle gave chase to the other.
The twang of a crossbow being fired came from the brush at the side of the road, and a bolt struck the fleeing bandit in the back. He stumbled, but kept running.
Al sighed. He made a brief incantation and a swift gesture, and three shimmering slivers of magical force manifested themselves in front of him. Al mimed firing a bow, and the three slivers shot down the road and struck the last bandit in the back of the head.
"Still feels like cheating," Al muttered.
Gruntle reached the body as it fell and he lurched forward, tearing a ragged strip of flesh from the body's neck with his teeth, leaving no doubt that the last bandit was dead.
Gruntle spun on his feet, panting eagerly, looking for more enemies. He took a step forward as he heard motion in the bushes nearby, but it was only Wikwocket, dragging a crossbow that looked to be far too large for her to comfortably use. She cheered and pumped a fist in the air. "WHOO! Adventure!"
His clan-party safe and the excitement having run out, Gruntle hung his flail back on his belt. As he did this, he closed his eyes and took a deep breath, then let it out in a raspy sigh of relief and contentment. Al thought it was a sound that wouldn't have been out of place coming from the other side of a door to a bedroom shared by lovers.
Thanks, Al, he sarcastically thought to himself, that is not the kind of association I wanted bouncing around in my head.
Still grinning and, Al noted queasily, quickly chewing and swallowing something, Gruntle opened his eyes again and stepped back to where the bandit-leader's body lay. He felt around in the snow, then stood back up, buckling his collar back around his neck.
"Now what?" Gruntle asked Al. Al regarded the amber-colored eyes of the gnoll. They looked back at him, alert but unbothered. Their pupils had returned to normal.
"Is your collar enchanted or something?" asked Al.
"Nah. Just a belt. Bought it from a gnome. It's a reminder."
Blood dripped down the front of Gruntle's body, some of it his own. A crossbow bolt still jutted from under his right shoulder. It hadn't gone in far, but it still looked like it ought to hurt. Al pointed to it. "Uh, you've got a little..."
Gruntle looked down. He twisted his head to the side to grasp the bolt and yank it out with his teeth, adding a little more to the blood. Speaking of blood...
Al looked around the scene of the carnage. The snow was trampled, muddy, and blood-stained. The corpses of the bandits were scattered around in ragdoll poses.
"We should do something about our injuries, then I think we should do something about all the dead people. We can see what we can confiscate from them, then we should figure out some way to dispose of the bodies."
"Eat 'em?" Gruntle asked. Al shuddered.
"We really can't be eating people, Gruntle. That kind of thing would give us a bad reputation. The food in Henhaven will be better anyway I'm sure. Besides, we'd still have to do something with the bones."
"Eat 'em?" Gruntle repeated.
"Still no, Gruntle. Please, we need people to want us around. It's going to be hard enough for us to be the 'gnoll party', it'll make it much harder for us to be successful if we become known as 'the cannibal party', too. I promise we'll get you something better than dead bandits to eat when we get to town."
This was something the stories always left out. They always described the heroic battle in glorious detail, and then jumped to the triumphant protagonists marching away with riches plundered from their attackers (loot, in the trashier stories).
Al was pretty sure "heroic adventurers" didn't just leave mangled dead bodies in their wake. What did they do with them?
In the army, they'd had a dedicated team that roamed the battlefield respectfully gathering their own fallen soldiers for proper burial, and gathering the fallen enemies to be piled up and burned after confiscation of useful equipment. Sometimes the stories said the heroes hired people go travel with them and take care of chores. Was Al supposed to have hired some people to collect dead bodies for them?
This "adventuring" business was turning out to be more complicated than anticipated.
"Well," he said to his expectantly-watching companions, "All I've got for digging tools is a small camp shovel, so it'd take at least a few hours to dig a proper hole to bury these bandits in. Even though it's wet right now I still don't feel comfortable leaving a big fire burning in the middle of the local forest, even if that wouldn't take as long to get going as digging a hole would. I also don't think it'd be good for our reputation to leave the bodies rotting on the road, either. We're already behind schedule and the longer we take here, the more time we're going to spend walking in the dark after sunset before we arrive. Any ideas?"
"I think perhaps Gruntle's idea is the most practical," Bote said, to Al's visible horror. Bote laughed and explained.
"I do not mean that we should eat them."
"Why not?" asked Gruntle.
"Because in addition to Al's entirely reasonable concerns, even all of us together could not eat all six of them, so we would still be left with the same problem. Also, I think the attempt would take longer than either of the other solutions put forth."
"So, who do you expect to eat them?" Al asked, not sure if he wanted to know.
"I expect we will have plenty of volunteers here in this healthy forest. I propose we simply move whatever we do not intend to confiscate a reasonable distance into the woods, and leave them as an offering to the bears and wolves and crows. That will at least minimize how much other travelers might be disturbed while freeing us to continue sooner."
"Well, I can't think of anything better," Al conceded. He looked to Wikwocket for consensus. She was looking at one of the dead bandits thoughtfully.
"You have a better idea? You look like you're thinking."
"Well...no, not really. Just curious. What do people taste like?"
"Kinda like pigs," answered Gruntle off-handedly.
"Okay, I officially no longer want to continue this line of discussion, can we just get on with disposing of them and move along?"
"No, wait, think about it!" Wikwocket insisted gleefully, "Can you imagine how funny it would be next time someone tried to rob us? Do you know what we did to the last bunch of bandits we ran into?"