"Watch out for stragglers. Even a cornered chicken will fight to the death," said the Squad Leader.

The party hurried towards the clearing in the goblin village. The cries for help seemed to have come from one of the reed cages at the edge of the common area. The weak voice had only called out twice, so the party split up to investigate each of the dozen cages.

Ben peered through a gap in the nearest cage and saw the form of a child bound by their wrists to a stake in the dirt. He dropped his spear and began to tear at the cage, but he failed to break apart the tough, woven reeds. He stood back, retrieved his spear from the ground, and began to hack at the structure with the blade of the spearhead. After several strikes, Ben cut a gash big enough to pry open a small hole.

"I’ve got one here!" He exclaimed as he pulled at the reeds.

Immediately, he was assaulted by the foul stench of excrement and rotting meat. Sunlight poured through the opening, and he looked inside to see the corpse of a black-haired girl who would’ve been in her mid-teens.

"Is she alive?" Ainsle’s animated voice tore him away from his morbid fixation.

"She didn’t make it," Ben said without turning to face the old woman.

"Fuck! Check the other ones!" She ordered in a coarse voice.

The young man hurried over to an adjacent cage, while Ainsle mirrored him on the opposite side.

"Empty," called Jor from the furthest cage.

"Two bodies," said Ann.

Ben peered through a cage to find it empty before moving on to the next one.

"Here!" He heard the Berserker's call.

Ben checked the last two cages and found them to be empty. He jogged to the party, which had cut the occupied cage completely open. He saw two obscenely thin forms tied to a stake by their wrists. One was a female with short, reddish-brown hair and pale skin who lay on the ground, unmoving. The other, a boy with similarly colored hair, gasped as Ben drew closer.

Ainsle ripped the stake out of the ground and tore apart his bindings with her gauntleted hands. The old woman picked up the boy and held him to her armored breast. The young man saw the glint of a tear in her one eye before it closed tightly as she hushed the weak moans of the child.

"Shh. Shh. Aunty Ain’s got you. You’re safe now," she repeated to comfort the boy as she began to walk out of the village.

"Priestess, if you would," Jor said as she gestured with an open palm toward Ainsle.

Ann nodded and followed the old woman. Ben turned to join them, but the Archer stopped him with a hand on his shoulder.

"She’s taking him away from this… carnage, to our supply stash for food and water." She paused as Ben turned to face her. "You and I are on cleanup duty. I estimated roughly a hundred goblins when I was here. Some of them have most likely fled, but there could very well be some hiding in the huts."

"Should we check every single one of them?"

Ben asked, daunted at the task of checking so many dwellings. The Adrenaline had begun to wear off, and his weak body wasn’t used to the physical exertion.

"Just a quick sweep should be fine. The aggressive ones will come to you, and the others… well they’ll get away." She paused, and her big green eyes became contemplative. "You know, back in the woods, the Priestess and I had to discard most of the non-essentials when we carried the two of you to the village. Among those supplies was that bag of coins you collected."

"You mean we should loot the village? What could they possib-" Ben suddenly remembered their encounter with the hobgoblins. "The big hut where the hobs were?" He asked Jor.

"Yes, let’s go have a look before we sweep the area." The Archer began to walk, and Ben followed. "That staff the female hob had looked like something crafted at the College of Arcane Arts in the capital. I’m guessing they might have more scavenged or stolen gear in the hut."

The pair walked a short distance to the scene of the encounter.

"To be honest, I’d usually be averse to looting, but times are changing, and we’d best change with them," Jor mentioned as they approached the corpse of the Shaman.

She bent down and pried the brilliant white staff from the tight clutch of the dead hobgoblin. She held it up in two hands and inspected it with critical eyes.

"As I thought. It's academy made and is worth enough to buy half a dozen horses," she said as her eyes squinted at the weapon.

"What does it do?" Ben asked curiously.

"I’m not sure, but if I were to guess, it looks like a focus. It draws in ambient mana, or is charged by its wielder, and stores it here." She pointed to the red, glassy sphere attached to the top of the staff. "There are very fine runes inscribed on the clasp, see here? I don’t know what it does, but these things can usually cast the spell inscribed on them or augment the Caster's spells."

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

Ben was fascinated by the attention to detail in the craftsmanship of the item. He squinted to try to make out the details of the tiny rune inscriptions, but soon he felt the bloom of a throbbing headache begin to take root in his head. He was dissuaded from any further attempts. Jor chuckled.

"You’re pretty brave to try to read unknown runes. People have been driven mad or comatose after trying what you just did." The Archer smiled a rare smile that he hadn’t seen since what he supposed to have been her confrontation with Ann.

Ben forced a blank stare. "Yeah, I totally knew about magic staves and coma-inducing runes. I just like to live on the wild side, you know."

His response elicited another chuckle from the Squad Leader. He smiled but then grew melancholic as he observed the scene of carnage around them.

Is this going to be normal now?

The Archer’s laughter abated as she seemed to notice his plummeting mood.

"Sorry. I forget that you’re not used to this… I’m not enthusiastic about slaughtering these things either. But-" Her eyes grew hard. "It needed to be done. Probably even if we didn’t plan on traveling through the pass, it still would’ve been necessary."

"Right. I just… I just need some time to deal with it. Don’t worry about me."

She turned her gaze toward the hut.

"Let’s have a look, shall we?"

The young man nodded, and the pair bent to enter the hut. A pungent smell of sweat and excrement made both party members cover their mouths. In the dim light, Ben could see dirty animal skins, no doubt used to sleep on, and various bones littered across the ground. At the far edge of the hut, there was a large pile of indiscernible goods, which the pair went to inspect.

The Archer drew a small cube from somewhere, seemingly beneath her breastplate, and shook it vigorously. Slowly, the cube began to emit a dim white light, which illuminated the loot on the floor. Ben saw many odd boots, pieces of dirty steel and leather armor, and weapons in various states of repair on the pile.

"I guess the goblins don't need money?" He sighed, dejected at their find.

Jor turned to him and raised a brow.

"Ben. Have you seen what you’re wearing?"

The young man looked down to see a filthy, blood-stained tunic and a pair of trousers that were several sizes too small for him. He felt embarrassed as the Archer continued.

"We have a few days trek to the port, and those rags aren’t going to last the journey. Besides, if we can put together a set of armor that fits you, it’ll give the Priestess peace of mind at least."

She began sorting through the various armor and weapons, and Ben found a matching pair of dark brown, leather boots that seemed to be just the right size. Jor nodded in approval as he discarded the dirty hide shoes he had worn and slipped on the new pair. The leather was supple, and it seemed to fit well enough. The Squad Leader continued her rummaging and began sorting various pieces of plate and leather into three neat piles behind her.

After about five minutes of sorting, the pair had begun picking up and discarding the same miscellaneous pieces several times.

"Okay, I think this is the best of what was in there. Let’s take these outside; the smell is driving me up the wall." Jor said with a nasal voice.

Ben nodded and slid a large, ornate dagger he had found into the vacant loop of his belt. He helped transfer the armor and leather apparel from their heaps to three identical piles outside the hut. The pair stood opposite each other and inspected the piles between them. She pointed to the first pile with what seemed to be leather armor of some sort.

"These should be enough to allow for unhindered movement and offer basic protection. The leather is worn in places, but it’s better than what you have now. We should check the fit, but I’m optimistic that you’ll grow into it."

Ben nodded along as the Archer spoke. She pointed to the second pile of dented, dull-grey steel plates with black leather straps hanging from each piece in tangled clumps.

"This is an incomplete but matching set of light plates. I’d recommend we try getting this on and see how well you move. I couldn’t find the right pauldron or bracer, I suppose its owner may have lost an arm at the shoulder. We can ask Ain to help us bang out those dents in the chest plate."

The dull steel plates were dirty, yet there was no rust that Ben could see. He considered the half-plate set for a beat before looking towards the third pile, which was comprised of a black, lightly padded gambeson and a mix of dirty miscellaneous items of clothing.

"What about these?" He asked.

"Well, depending on which of these two fits you better, these are what you’ll be wearing under the plate or leather. I’d suggest taking the linen either way. We can clean our gear at a stream about half an hour's walk from here."

Ben’s neck was getting tired from all the nodding he had been doing in Jor’s company. After a while of silence, the Squad Leader spoke up.

"So… are you going to try them on?" she asked as she gestured to the armor with upturned, open palms.

"Right. I suppose I’ll try the plate?" He decided that he’d want the most protection possible, as he wasn’t as fast as Jor or Ainsle.

"I thought so. You’re a bit like her, you know?" Jor remarked as she knelt and began untangling the knotted mess of thin leather straps attached to the various pieces of plate. "You can keep your tunic on, but those trousers have to go. Grab that gambeson and see how it sits on you," she said casually.

Benjamin, the soon-to-be trouserless, complied with the Squad Leader’s instructions and spent the next half hour, with her assistance, strapping on pieces of armor over the light gambeson. Fortunately for the young man, he noticed that Jor had found a pair of slightly oversized, black, stitched leather and linen pants. He hurriedly discarded his old trousers and settled into the comfortable replacement. Jor had the grace to turn and inspect the bloodied sand behind her during the exhibition.

Ben jumped and stretched to test the range of movement his new armor would afford him. His right arm was completely bare of steel in contrast to his left, which was adorned with a pauldron over his shoulder and a bracer that covered the length of his forearm over the padded black sleeves of the gambeson. A dented chest plate covered his ribcage and was strapped to its counterpart that protected his upper back. The dark padded linen reached to his mid-thigh and his old, thick leather belt fit snugly around his waist. His ‘new’ leather boots had a pair of shin guards of the same dull steel fastened around his insubstantial calves.

"Looks good," Jor said as she watched Ben move around. "The gambeson was a good choice, I think, though it’ll get a tad sweaty as we descend the mountain."

"It feels great. Thanks for the help," said the young man, with a note of weariness in his voice.

Ben felt a pulse of Ainsle’s presence wash over him for a heartbeat, followed by the sound of a chilling wail echoing in the distance. The Archer looked at him with a startled expression and immediately turned and sprinted towards the source of the cry. Ben followed, his exhausted body burning with adrenaline.