Installment 47 [https://squirrel.dogphilosophy.net/Installment047.png]
As Al and Bote trekked back to the turn-off to the keep, the sight of extra-short Wikwocket and extra-tall Gruntle moving smoothly into positions to guard a donkey - and their cart of possessions, of course - struck Al as something that he should find absurd, but it had seemed perfectly natural. This thought just emphasized to Al how strange his life had gotten recently.
Besides the sound of their footsteps, a light breeze and the chirping of birds in the trees were the only disturbances in the peaceful march up the hill to the keep. The doors into Wulfcynn Keep were closed, and the one stained-glass window in the wall where Fortuna's chapel was seemed to be intact and unharmed.
Rather than rudely barge in, Al pounded on the thick front doors as politely as he could, given the amount of force required to be audible.
Al and Bote waited patiently for a minute or so before the sound of someone laboriously sliding the bar away from the inside of the doors was heard, and one side of the door was pulled open. Al was momentarily taken aback as a familiar-looking face greeted them.
"Yes?" asked a short man dressed in the neat clothing of a noble's household servant, who looked, aside from his height and cleaner clothing, remarkably like the bandit leader whose head Gruntle had crushed a few days ago. "Yes?" the man repeated with just a hint of impatience as Al stared.
"We have seen a possible threat nearby and wanted to make sure the baron was properly warned," Bote said as Al collected his thoughts.
"The baron is occupied and is not to be disturbed at this time. I can take a message for him," the bandit-faced servant responded primly.
"Have...have we met before?" Al asked the man cautiously.
"I don't believe so. You are...?"
"I'm Al, this is Bote. Sorry, you look...familiar. Do you have a brother?"
"Many. The baron told us about you, he is grateful for your party's service. What is the nature of the danger that you wanted to warn him about?"
"Oh," Al replied, "well, we just fought off a goblin ambush and they ran off into the woods near here..."
That's as far as Al got before the servant's laughter interrupted him. He seemed honestly amused.
"The baron has nothing to fear from goblins," the chuckling man finally said.
"Well, they are very tricky and unpredictable."
"Thank you. Yes, we are very aware of the nature of goblins."
The servant took a moment to calm his mirth, brushing wrinkles from his clothing, adjusting his gloves, and finally standing up straighter.
"I shall inform the baron of your message, and I thank you for your concern on his behalf," he said with a small, polite bow. "If that is all, I shall return to my other duties."
"I guess that's all," Al answered a bit uncertainly. This interaction hadn't gone anything like he'd expected.
Without another word, the servant bowed once more, then pushed the door shut again. Al heard muffled grunting and sliding sounds from inside as the short man muscled the bar back into place behind the door.
"Should I feel bad about us probably killing one of that man's brothers?" Al asked Bote as they made their way back down the hill.
"It would not be unusual to feel some discomfort. Suicide is an unpleasant subject, and suicide-by-gnoll is a rather dramatic method."
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Gruntle huffed in disappointment as Al and Bote returned with no sign of another goblin attack.
"Were you too late? Was baron whatever-his-name-was murdered by goblins?" Wikwocket asked hopefully.
"No! Well, I don't think so anyway. One of his servants said he was busy but they didn't seem at all worried about goblins. He did thank us for telling him, though."
"Was his servant a little green-skinned guy? Maybe holding a bloody dagger or something?"
"No. He was a bit short, but he actually looked a lot like the guy who was leading that group of bandits we fought on the way to Henhaven. I guess there are a bunch of brothers that look similar."
Wikwocket huffed rather gnollishly in annoyance. Al shook his head.
"Maybe you've been hanging around Gruntle too much. I guess we're done here, shall we get moving again?"
This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.
Grinning mischievously, Wikwocket grunted.
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The last of the forest gave way to grasslands as they continued south. After a few hours, Al could see a few thin columns of likely chimney smoke in the distance, suggesting the village wasn't much further. Al began to feel uneasy, like this was a waste of time and they shouldn't have bothered. He knew it would be irrational to give up and leave after coming this far to do a job, so he said nothing as they kept walking. He did find himself hoping someone else would mention they felt the same so they could talk him into leaving anyway as they met their first villager from Turnipseed.
A roadside stand was just outside the village limits. It was constructed of roughly-cut, unworked logs and tree branches, mostly lashed together with fraying rope, but with a few bent, half-driven nails in places. There were boxes of turnips, parsnips, beets, and potatoes behind it, along with a barefooted, pot-bellied man wearing a dirty, half-fastened pants-and-bib coverall garment over a dirty shirt, and a wide-brimmed straw hat with multiple holes worn in it. The man even had a stalk of grass in his mouth.
On a flat stone leaning against the stand, the word "RUTS" was painted in barely-legible black letters.
The man gave the approaching party a grin that could be called "toothy", but only because he didn't have enough of them to call it "teethy".
"Y'all cityfoke wan ruts? We got taters, nips, beets, 'n' nips. Bes' ruts ennawahr," the man drawled nigh-incomprehensibly.
Al tried to parse what the man had said, dread rising in his guts.
"Roots?" he guessed
"Yeh, ruts. Better'n'y'all git 'na city. Yew feelin' alraht?" the man asked, as Al was unable to completely suppress the look of horrified disbelief from showing on his face.
Feeling it was too late to recover his composure and not wanting to spend any time trying, Al plowed ahead.
"Maybe later, uh, we came about the notice on the board up in Silveroak? About the flowers that need to be taken to a tomb? We're here to help."
"Cityfoke cominta hep us? Ain't ne'er seenat 'fore. Y'all gon' wanna tawk ta shehrf DaisySue. Sheeza one noes bowt dat."
"Sheriff DaisySue?"
"S'whatahsayed. Teller BobbyWayne sentcha."
"Where will we find Sheriff DaisySue?" Al asked quickly, at this point feeling an urgent need to finish the conversation and leave.
"She'll be inna charch. Bigges' bild'n in tayohn. Caint missit."
Still trying to figure out what the man had just said, Al thanked him and resumed walking quickly towards the village. He looked to his companions, and saw that they were equally in disbelief. Even Gruntle looked confused.
"Talks funny," Gruntle grumbled.
"Yeah. That wasn't real, right? He was playing a character as a sales gimmick or something," Al insisted. "Nobody is that rural. Not even rural characters in satirical plays are that bad. That was just offensive."
"It was...well, I can't make myself call it good," Wikwocket agreed, her own face showing as much disbelief as Al's,"but it was surprisingly convincing acting."
Things didn't get any better as they made their way into the village. Most of the buildings seemed to be dilapidated wooden shacks. The stench of neglected pigpens was everywhere. The few people they saw were all wearing the same sort of one-piece garment, most of them fastened with only one of the two suspenders. Straw hats and a lack of shoes was almost universal. Both the men and the women dressed the same, except most of the women wore dirty aprons as well. Everyone watched them with quiet suspicion as they passed by. The party went as quickly as they could towards the center of the village, where they could see a spire with a misshapen lump atop it, rising over the other structures, which they assumed would be the charch.
They passed by the local inn on their way. Its construction was no better than the other buildings in town, though it was much larger. Sloppily-painted black letters on the unfinished wood announced that it was CletusWayne's Place. Al shook his head, and looked to his companions for reassurance as they went by.
"They're...doing this on purpose, right? Is this some kind of extreme prank the city-folk thing, or some sort of cult?"
"I have no knowledge of any cult whose practices include the offensive stereotyping of rural human society," Bote suggested, looking only a little less uncomfortable than Al and Wikwocket, "but it feels like that may not be far from the truth. This all does seem intentionally discomforting."
"Don't like it," Gruntle announced, unbidden. "When can we leave?"
"As soon as we can get this job over with," Al grumbled, glad that someone else had finally said it.
They rounded a corner and found themselves in front of the charch. It was in better shape than the other buildings they'd seen, but not by much. The irregular shape atop the spire was roughly oblong, and stylized eyes were painted all over it. The doors were still nicely finished, at least, though the paint was peeling from the wood of the walls.
"Ah. Holus," Bote explained. "A god of cthonic agriculture."
"Chtonic? Like in the ground? This is the potato god?"
"And turnips, carrots, parsnips, yams, radishes, and so forth. Yes."
There was a hitching post outside the the building. They tied Haunch loosely to it, then Al looked at the others.
"Somebody should probably watch our stuff," he suggested.
Bote stared off into the distance for a moment, then quietly said "The folk of Turnipseed will not steal in front of this holy place." Then, in a more normal voice, "I am not comfortable here either, but I don't believe that we are in actual danger."
Al found himself reluctant to even touch the doors, but Bote obliged by pushing one open to let them inside. Wooden floorboards creaked under the party's feet as they entered. Most of the interior of the church of Holus was one large nave. There was no separate sanctuary at the far end, just a platform for a preacher to stand on. The benches were of plain wood, and the walls were decorated with worn-out antique shovels, hoes, water buckets, and other farming implements.
"We was tol' y'all was a-comin'!" a loud, rough, but still feminine voice called out in greeting from under the floor. Wooden stairs squeaked behind the preacher's platform and a wide trapdoor in the floor was pushed open for a slim, wiry-muscled woman to come up from the cellar. She froze when she saw the gnoll.
"Whut'n'thuworl' is thayuht?"
"Huh?" Gruntle answered, looking completely baffled at what was being said. Al wasn't doing much better, but he figured it out.
"Oh, he's okay, he's with us. He...helps us fight monsters."
"Lahk fahtin' fahr with fahr ah rekkin," she said a little skeptically, "Rekkin 'e ain't gon' do nuthin' on this'ere holy place. Y'all done come ta take flars ta the ded'un?"
"Uh, hello, yes," Al floundered, "uh...Bobby...Wayne sent us."
"Aw, yeh, BobbyWayne gots good ruts."
"Yes, very, uh, earthy," Al tried. He glanced down expecting Wikwocket to interrupt and remind him how bad he was at small-talk, but she seemed to be distracted with trying to look politely interested. It seemed to be taking a great deal of concentration.
There was a moment of awkward silence.
"So...uh...do you maybe have a map and some written instructions for what you need us to do?" Al hoped, but not too much - he thought it was probably likely their writing would be as hard to understand as their speech, but at least they'd be able to make the effort to figure it out somewhere else in that case.
DaisySue just laughed. "We gots orl tradishin," she told them, "Lemme tell y'all a stor'boutit."
Al's heart sank as she stepped dramatically up on to the platform and spread her arms.
"Back inna days o' mah grammaws maw, thar's a heeruh done pertected us..."