Ch: 210 Bound Upon A Wheel Of Fire
It was a lovely morning by the river; one very nice yacht and a barge so big it was mildly ridiculous were moored by the bank, a few miles downriver from Wheaford. Colorful pavilions and a thriving small encampment sprawled in good order over a meadow.
Squads of foot soldiers were out in the scrublands, searching for child sized, lunatic murdergnomes with a hunger for living flesh. They were beating the bushes with extreme prejudice.
Duke Holloman’s light mace dashed the skull of a grinning, sharp toothed woman inside out, mere moments before her dagger found his family jewels. A glance at her necklace said he had broken a very disturbing streak with his quick mace work. Go team not hacking people’s balls off!
Lucuis Holloman was past his prime… and getting a little soft around the middle, but he was still a true belted knight of the realm.
He whistled to his guard, bringing them around in a tight group. “Mount up, we cut left for the road. my brother’s team is heading downstream on foot, we want to cut off any escapees.” Herbert blew three sharp blasts on his trumpet and the sound of hooves answered, as the grooms brought their steeds.
It was grisly and unpleasant work and especially dangerous for the beaters and trackers, who were searching out any fleeing bands of redcaps.
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“Ogre!” Rolf shouted from the front line, as a huge humanoid appeared among the dense foliage and scrub. Twelve feet tall and muscled onto a lumpy mockery of the human form, a feral and unpleasant intelligence shone in his small, piggy eyes. With thick gray skin, covered with horny warts and tufts of thick fur, the being was largely naked as it roared a challenge at the small, armored humans.
Adam and Jack advanced on the creature, intercepting its lumbering charge for the horse lines. They jabbed, danced and stalled it with their spears, as a troop of heavy foot in red armor wheeled to meet the thing. Susan, their team’s archer whipped arrow after arrow into the monstrous creature, with little visible effect.
Even a direct hit to the throat only caused it to swat the arrow away as a mere nuisance. The wound bled fitfully for a second or two, then scabbed over and stopped.
The horses whinnied in terror, as Rolf’s team and the warband delayed and distracted, leading it off and away from the terrified mounts.
Thundering hooves and the muted clatter of heavy cavalry swept over the chaotic battlefield, duke Belen’s green and gold banner waving in the morning sun.
#
The towering creature turned to face the noisy band of mounted snacks thundering onto the menu. “Green and gold… I come for your flesh, duke of men!” It bellowed in challenge, startling some of the newer mounts and disrupting their precisely ordered ranks…
“Javier, Kurnzt! Control your mounts or fall out of formation! Bannock, Herlick, with me!” Duke Belen shouted, as he spurred his black and brown charger forward.
Lances glinting in the sun, they hurtled forward at the enormous lumbering creature. With a grin of savage pleasure, the creature barked a guttural mouthful of syllables and made a rude gesture with his right hand. Murky and foul light and shadows swirled into being, in the form of a huge spear of filthy ice.
“Mage!” Leo shouted, as he lowered his lance and urged his horse on, directing her with his knees. He spurred her on, sitting high in the saddle, shouting a mindless roar of challenge. His lance had a scant foot of reach on the monster’s weapon, not nearly enough to risk a frontal attack, instead he swept by, just a few feet out of range, taunting the giant.
Duke Belen drew the creature into a lumbering run, it pursued him, ignoring the two knights who were closing the gap from behind.
Herlick gave a shout and leaned forward, jamming her lance into the soft meat behind the monster’s knee. She darted off to the left, slashing at its reaching arm with her sabre. Bannock swept in from the right, skewering it with a very long and slender lance, right through the pelvis. The monster’s high pitched shrieks of rage said the knight had struck the target.
It slowed and stumbled, with a troublesome length of wood and steel jammed through its tenders. It staggered to a stop a hundred yards from the moored barge roaring at the mounted duke in impotent rage as he rode off. The brute hurled his icy spear with terrible might, missing the fast moving duke by just a few feet. The spear shattered into razor sharp shards of cruddy bog ice in impact, slicing an empty pavilion into rags.
“Return Fire!” Someone called from the deck of ‘Tastes The Golden Spray’. A loud sound of scraping metal and wood was immediately followed by an iron tipped bolt six inches thick, fletched with leather and hurled by a ballista mounted on the foredeck of ‘Spray’. The Ogre looked down, puzzled by the new addition to its warty, horny hide; two feet of waxed yew, with three silly leather things tacked on.
It fell over backwards, driving three more feet of ballista bolt into the soft soil of the fertile meadow, neatly pinning itself down.
Within a minute, it was swarmed with armored men and women… The roaring ended quickly after that.
“Nice shooting! Now we know how the little shits felled those trees. How many ogres does that make?” Leo called to the captain.
“Four by my count.” He tapped his finger to his jaw, listening to something only he could hear. “Two more coming in from downstream… and goblins. Fore battery, reload, shore parties form up and prepare for battle!”
Duke Belen rejoined his troop and wheeled to face the downstream threat, while two dozen light marines came boiling out of the barge. They formed two squads of mixed crossbowmen and spears, setting up for a vigorous action.
Two figures broke cover eighty yards down the riverbank, hurtling up the narrow towpath on horseback. Khan and Luna stampeded past the marines and joined the cavalry troop, shouting as they rode by. “Two minutes, maybe three!”
Luna slipped to the ground drawing her bow, while Khan entered the formation. Winslow scampered off to the horselines like a good boy, Annie was a good influence on him.
“At least two ogres, more than twenty goblins and I think I spotted a troll… this could get sticky.” Khan reported to the duke.
“Sound recall! Bring the troops in!” Leo shouted to his signalman. Khan sounded the recall on his horn, while the signalman, Rusk used the magic earring to call in the commanders of the groups.
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“Yes, that’s the Recall…” Rolf muttered, as his team slowly backed away from the huge, scaled humanoid stalking them through the dense undergrowth. “We have a swamp troll between us and the recall point.” He reported calmly.
“We could use a little help…”
The monster had a good sized beech tree in its grip, roughly uprooted and snapped off to make a hefty club. At nine feet tall it was imposing and had long, gangly limbs that gave it odd skittering movements, as it slipped through the trees silently.
Smaller, gibbering forms moved in the underbrush, tiny greenish men with long pointed noses and jagged teeth jutting from torn and bleeding lips.
“And we have goblins.” Rolf grumbled.
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Duchess Sheng sipped her broth and sighed deeply, until she winced and let out a small gasp of discomfort. “My warriors seem to handle these kinds of things so well…” She whispered to her strange new orphan friends. “This is terribly painful and distressing.”
“Our magic bath is super magical…” Amy said firmly. “Gary gets cut up alla time, an’ he swears by it!” Amy, Rio and Wilf were in the grotto pool with the injured duchess, under strict ‘no nonsense’ instructions from Shai and Becky.
She went on to relate the story of how, ‘a mean bug snipped his insides up’... as though she had been there for the events.
“Amy…” Gary spoke gently to the little smiling girl in the pool. “Have you been watching my memories?”
She giggled at him and shook her head. “Nuh uhh… Shai’s. She was real scared! Watching those was worse than a scary movie!”
“Love… ye should nae peek in folk’s memories wi nae permission.” Shai siad firmly. “There be things ye are nae ready tae learn an things we would spare thee learning…”
Rio sat up and looked embarrassed. “Mostly, just Wilf likes to watch Gary make things… that’s all. He likes to watch him spin his soul out like thread and make magic with it.”
“We’ll talk about this later, kids. We need to let Grace rest now.” Grace was already asleep, drifting comfortably on a cloud of blissful good feelings when Tawny spoke. “I gave her a tincture of duskmoon nectar in some of your pear brandy. She’s going to be out for a few hours.”
They dressed and left her grace, Grace, floating in Angie’s care.
This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.
Outside, things were buzzing. Two troops of horsemen kitted for War, went cantering down the River road as they watched the morning come to life from a bench in the garden. They jingled and rattled away at a brisk pace, looking like serious business on hooves.
“More trouble downriver?” Gary asked Barney, who was seated on a bench, contemplating his little ship.
“Trouble indeed lad… forgotten fairy stories are roaming these woodlands, not just your sprites and pixies. Word is, ogres and gobbos are about. Tis at least three clans of the unseelie fae have come calling in Wheatford duchy.” He put his flute to his lips and began a contemplative little air in C, sprinkling his music in with the birdsong.
Tawny and Liam appeared, a few minutes into a quiet and thoughtful jam sesh by the River Road… Gary and Shai were coaching Barney and the kids through ‘Blue Moon’ and making good progress.
“Are you two just going to sit there?” Tawny demanded, her eyes flashing golden in the morning sun. “Monsters are battling the forces of man eight miles from here. My family is at war, Gary.”
“We’re mostly under arrest on suspicion of murder Tawny… and we kinda raided a manor house in the uplands quarter.” He tried hard to hold in his smug grin of satisfaction and failed.
“I’m aware… Sir Klyburn has agreed to allow you supervised travel, to aid the war effort. He will accompany us…” Tawny’s mouth fell open in shock as Gary shook his head.
“Nope. I told you guys not to mess with my kids, you think I’m leaving them here alone?” He shook his head firmly again.
“Hey!” A high pitched, but not so tiny voice snapped behind him. “If people are in trouble, you should help! We can stay with Ranza.” Amy declared firmly, countering his prior firmness.
“Amy, it’s more complicated than tha…” Gary got cut off with a single sharp glare from three tiny faces.
“They hurt Grace… Angie’s sad.” The tiny girl in blue looked at him, tears shimmering in her eyes. Rio and Wilf followed her lead, with a deft and skillful bit of emotional jiu jitsu.
#
Most of the barges and boats were gone, Kingfisher was still wedged into Mikkle’s clay bank, though a few lines had been pegged in to hold her in place.
Poor seahorse was back from his shadowy nether world, where she had been awaiting repairs, again… at least the damage was mostly cosmetic and the new motor was intact. It was a complex shape of curving, twisting metal loops, a möbius strip of interlinked metals and damnably complex inscriptions that defied casual observation and easy description. The disturbing flattened ovoid device was mounted under the stern on a complex gimbal and rudder system, it gave startling mobility, once one got the hang of it.
Dannyl tipped the rudder too far forward and gave it too much power, when he took the long handle of turned oak from Becky for the first time. The aft end dug in, nearly swamping Seahorse, as water jetted in a swirling column out behind them.
“Easy, it really goes when you hit it, but you’ll black out if you run empty.” Becky told the woozy lad, while taking the handle back. Ivy, Tallum, Mikkel and a few pensioners and retired veterans were in the boat, taking a ride to the front; while the rest of her team tore off down the road, under the influence of Gary and Shai’s madness.
She had a dozen lightly armored geezers aboard, they held a mix of spears, swords, javelins and bows… and old Hanna, who wore leather armor, a long, wide bladed knife and a simple leather sling.
Becky eased the boat into the river channel and started going. “Hold on tight… and if anybody feels sick, over the side… no puking in my boat.” She never heard any complaints, but the wind was moving pretty fast.
Seahorse creaked and groaned a little, as Gary’s repairs and the latest indignities the little boat had suffered, took their toll. “We’re taking on a little water at the bow, just a little…” Tallum called back, sounding nervous.
“I’ll have a look…” Barney grumbled, as he wriggled his way forward in the crowded boat. It took a few minutes to get to the bow, where the armored giant was eyeing a seam near the bowspirit with deep suspicion.
“Ahh lad, that’s fine… the water will swell the caulking and the boards and seal itself… I’d be nervous too, if I wore a metal suit on the water.” He clapped the huge man on the shoulder and grinned. “A bit of action will get your blood pumping again!”
#
Between the enormous troll and a small force of green, sneaking ankle stabbers, Rolf’s team were having a tough time of it.
Susan was doing yeoman’s work, keeping the goblins in hiding. Anything they poked out got poked right back in with an arrow, she’d taken out the two gobbo archers first, silencing that minor threat quickly was key… her quiver was running empty though.
Jack and William were keeping the little sneaks and the troll busy, while Rolf and the others pressed the attack on big green and scaly.
The sly and cowardly creature healed absurdly fast, but was very reluctant to take injuries, sending goblins staggering at them instead.
Rolf’s spear had neatly gutted the thing in their first exchange, but now it was back, looking fit and hungry. Only a faint scar of pinkish green remained on its gaunt and hideously muscled abdomen.
It swung that beech tree club at Adam, the heavy fighter of the team, who dodged behind a sturdy oak. The blow shook old leaves and an abandoned bird’s nest from the tree, shaking the earth all around.
They were being backed out onto a lightly wooded hillside, overlooking a splendid meadow and the river; it was a fine view, with a huge cottagewillow standing by the waterside. View aside, the trees were what was keeping that dangerous club under control… as the trees thinned, the danger increased.
“Rolf! Arrows!” Susan called, from upslope, as her bow thrummed, sending another goblin slumping to the ground. Rolf tossed a bundle of arrows, tied with a linen cord from the handy enchanted belt Tawny’s mad pet had gifted him. It didn’t hold much, but it was perfect for a few bundles of shafts and some foodstuffs.
A gobbo took his moment and lunged at the distracted knight, his rusty dagger thirsty for man blood. He tasted a steel shod boot instead, as the small warrior in silver armor deftly sidestepped, poked the troll in his scrawny green buttocks, piercing both cheeks through.
As the troll roared, the gobbo choked on his own jagged teeth and severed tongue… Rolf helped the struggling creature out, by hammering a gauntleted fist into its tiny skull. Backing off to savor his handiwork he gave a low chuckle. Eight feet of tough, springy ash wood was a serious impediment to the gangly creature’s movements. It thrashed and flailed, trying to spin around and seize the offending weapon, but kept getting caught in the trees.
Jack, Adam and Habib kept the troll interested in them and its own abused backside, while Rolf, Susan and William tried to address the growing goblin problem.
#
Esperanza’s bounty sailed downriver with a full crew, the Red Ascots were aboard, all armed with bows and spears, along with a few more old timers and a small team of novices from the cult of Healer, led by Celeste and venerable Naiomi. Otho was below decks with the kids, singing songs and smiling, with his snail shell shamisen on his lap. He smiled soothingly when the ship slowed and halted.
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Rolf’s team was not faring well. The troll had managed to snap off the spear haft and claw the stub of Rolf’s barbed weapon from its backside… and now it was angry enough to take risks. It charged across the open and rocky ground, leading with that huge club, as the tiny humans scattered before it, as was proper. More humans were coming, from the boat down on the water, but that was no matter… With a lunge and twist it batted the largest human down the hillside, clattering and rolling to a stop far below. The fallen man’s tiny companions jabbed it with their puny spears, but the wounds were nothing. Arrows pierced its skin, but only just barely, hardly a concern, it just needed a snack…
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Adam went flying down the hill, in a clatter of loose limbs and armor, dashed away by the massive club. Rolf sprinted forward as the beast reached for Jack, snatching up his friend with those long, filthy claws. Its head snapped forward, that jagged and toothy maw engulfing most of Jack’s left shoulder in a single bite.
Too late, the small knight barreled into the thing’s knee, dislocating the long, wretched and scaly limb. Jack’s scream still sounded in his ears as Rolf began twisting that leg around and around, wrenching it into a new and exciting shape. He drew a dagger and jammed it into the tortured limb and gave a savage wrench and twist. Both men went flying as the creature roared in agony and rage.
Jack landed in a bloody heap among the scrub brush, while Rolf sprawled, equally bloody on the rocky ground nearby, clutching the monster’s lower leg.
An unholy cry of rage and pain bounced off the hillside, startling birds on the other side of the river, beyond where men were leaping from the three masted ship anchored at the riverside.
A mixed troop of noisy warriors came pelting down the road a half mile below, joining those from the boat… All much too far away to be of any help, until long after this snack was finished. Most were horseback, a few rode less easily identified creatures.
The troll shrugged his bony shoulders and grinned a lipless smile. All meat was edible, even his own tasty looking leg... but first he needed to unwrap and devour the shiny treat holding it. He sucked on a few bloody rags caught in his teeth from the other one… this was going to be a big meal.
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Rolf staggered to his feet, dazed and still holding his gruesome trophy. He grunted and tossed that trash aside, drawing his sword.
The creature seemed to take offense at that, it hopped up on its three and a half remaining limbs and skittered at him like a maimed spider.
He met the first slashing claw with bright steel, shearing a few fingers off, his sword rang on its bones like they were forged of brass, shrieking as his edge blunted. Another claw raked his sturdy steel breastplate, gouging ribbons of metal from it and sending him for a stumble.
Rolf spun on his left foot and leapt, hurling himself aside as a huge fist slammed down, cracking the barren soil where he would have been.
William dashed in from the flank and jammed his spear someplace tender, judging by its scream and backhanded swipe that shattered his weapon and sent the smaller warrior flying.
Habib was bent over Jack, hurriedly smearing violet goo on the ragged mess of the fallen man’s shoulder, when William fell on top of the pair in a boneless tangle of limbs.
Rolf dashed forward, burying his sword in its guts and wrenching savagely, spilling noxious and foul insides on the ground and himself. He stabbed and slashed like a rabid badger. The small steel coated man seemed to be trying to burrow into the monster’s bowels and make a nest.
A massive clawed hand grabbed Rolf by the legs and ripped him out of his colonic campout with a squelching tide of guts spilling out after him. He flailed his bent and blunted sword wildly with one hand, while clinging desperately to something with the other mailed fist.
Those awful jaws were descending at his face, when his prize finally became visible. He lashed out with a desperate slash, shearing away at a mess of tough, bloody gristle until it was his… Rolf crushed the monster’s still weakly beating heart in his fist and threw it off into the woods.
#
The monster threw Rolf’s bloody form aside and lurched into the scrub brush, while Gary and the team were still furiously riding up the slope toward the action. Esperanza’s Bounty disgorged a squad of pensioners with spears and a platoon of healers led by Celeste, who all pelted up the hill in fine formation. Susan kept hurling arrows at the thing, while it searched desperately for whatever Rolf had thrown. It roared and flailed around still entangled in its own entrails, which seemed to be slowly drawing back up inside the beast, as it screamed and beat the shrubbery in a mindless, desperate rage.
It shouted in wordless triumph, holding up a crumpled and weakly twitching clot of dirty, battered meat and snarled at the armored man staggering to his feet nearby, still clutching a broken sword.
The monster grinned and reached down to cram its heart back inside with the rest and stopped in confusion and distress… A fresh line of pinkish green skin crossed the previous one, intact and tough hide, that resisted having a squishy and mangled heart crammed back in. It screamed in rage and lurched back at Rolf, staggering with its heart still gripped in one claw. The sneer of hunger and cruelty on its bestial face slowly faded as it’s shambling, limping charge petered out and it collapsed face down in the dirt.
Shai and Gary got there first, flying up the hillside on their machines; his thumb bell singing its war cry into the suddenly very quiet morning.
Rolf was bent over his fallen teammates, helping Habib get them untangled and assessing the damage.
It could have been worse; Jack had a savage bite in his shoulder and arm, dangerously close to his neck, the wounds were already starting to fester with black pus and ooze gathering at the edges of the many many punctures and tears in his flesh.
William had a few broken ribs, breathing was going to be a struggle for a while. Habib was sporting a gash over his right eye and a broken forearm, from his impact with the flying William missile.
A cluster of gold robes and a ring of spear wielding men and women in old fashioned armor surrounded Adam, far down the slope. Their quick and controlled movements said he was at least alive still.
Gary and Shai blasted up on their weird mounts and leapt off, as weapons appeared in their hands. The strange devices fell over immediately and lay quiescent and still… so strange.
Tawny joined him a few moments later, Magnus stood nearby, snuffling and chuffing with displeasure at the scent of blood and violence in the air but determined to watch over his humans, as Annie had instructed him… He snorted as Annie’s foolish pet went over to poke the fallen monster with his long pointy stick, the stupid boy.
#
“Hey Shai, hit this guy with your forge lighting spell… he’s still alive!” Gary yelled, jamming his spear in again for good measure.
“Ye must burn the heart or the brain, an ye wish tae end a troll, or so me grams always did say…” She murmured in satisfaction as her cantrip incinerated the ragged scraps of twitching meat clutched in its claw… and the claw as well.
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