The lizard-folk hunting party has been captured. They’re struggling to remove the web covering, but it’s big and unwieldy. Not to mention the poison which coats it is no doubt making their movements more difficult and their minds more foggy.
Already, I see less movement than before. Hopefully that means the poison is taking effect, not that they are preparing to do something to us when I remove the web. I will have to do that, though – I don’t actually want to send them into comas, which I know can happen with too much exposure to this particular poison.
“Well done, team,” I say to everyone. River, now re-entering the clearing. Fenrir, ‘resurrected’ from the dead and peering curiously down into the pit below. Bastet and Lathani, rubbing affectionately against me. Artemis, a bit more stand-offish and looking into the forest. Trinity, her heavy footsteps thudding as she comes closer. Sirocco, landing on my shoulder – she wasn’t needed in the end as none of the lizard-folk ran, but she was prepared to do her part if needed. The ten other Bound who had filled the air with growls and snarls and flashes of movement to disturb the lizard-kin and make them fear.
I’ll need to say well done to those waiting back at the cave too – this really was a team effort; even some of those who aren’t here now helped dig the hole. There’s no way I could have created it by myself. Not unless I spent a week or more on it.
The pit is big. When I tested its diameter down at the bottom, I could lie flat with my hands above my head and almost brush my fingertips against one side while my toes touched the other. As for its height, it’s half again as tall as River, which makes it about the same height as it is in diameter.
It was a challenge in several ways and, frankly, I’m still surprised and pleased that we managed to pull it off in as little time as we did. Digging such a massive hole in a single day seems impossible, or at least improbable, but with almost all of my Bound helping with something, we managed it.
Fifteen of my Bound ended up digging in shifts, five at a time. Some were better than others, sure, but they all attacked the task with single-minded focus. In between times, they rested or ate.
River, Catches-leaves, and Louie – the omnivorous henerm who looks rather like an orangutan except with four arms, a tail, and scaly skin – as the most dextrous of all my Bound had another task. They filled a couple of buckets I’d made out of hide with the earth the diggers disturbed and spread it around the clearing so it wouldn’t be obvious to our targets.
When the hole started getting too deep to easily step out of it, I had to set up a primitive rope-pulley system. I did this by using a tree and several strands of my cord twisted together. Trinity, as the heaviest and strongest of my Bound, was responsible for pulling any of my Bound out of the hole who needed to be, and the bucket of earth itself. Just walking back and forth throughout the day didn’t seem to bother her too much as long as she was still able to eat, which was fortunate.
As for the others, I kept some of the predators back as guards, and sent Bastet with a couple of captains to take a group out to collect food to feed the workers – for both carnivores and herbivores. In the course of doing that, I learnt something useful about the new delegating aspect of my Tame Skill: I can create a hierarchy.
If I assign the manager role and a number of Bound to a creature, and then add that manager to another Bound’s group, then there’s an enforced chain of command. That worked very well as it meant that I was able to assign the predators to one of my new Bound, the prey to another, and then assign both leaders to Bastet’s party. She therefore had overall command, but her two sub-leaders were able to maintain control over their own parties in the absence of a specific order from Bastet. Very useful indeed.
So, we had quite a good system going there of food and resources being collected and brought back to the clearing to keep the workers here able to do their tasks without worrying about getting hungry.
Meanwhile, my role was mostly one of supervision and creation. Namely, the two pieces of web and the poison which has now almost finished doing its job. Such large pieces of fabric took a long time to grow since I needed to keep waiting for my mana to replenish. Being able to dip into Heavy Meditation and significantly increase my mana regeneration rate is probably the only reason I was done before dark as it was. At least it’s given me a couple more levels in that Skill: one more and then I’ll be on the precipice of Master with Meditation too.
Creating the poison was another challenge, though it was getting the dosage right which was the main issue. I don’t actually want to knock the lizard-folk into a coma, after all. I asked Bastet to bring a few live test subjects back with her – I needed to know how it worked on creatures who weren’t Bonded to me, in case that made a difference.
A laborious series of testing ensued, and included testing on River and Catches-leaves too – that was unavoidable, unfortunately, unless I wanted to just guesstimate the required dosage.
After I’d figured that out, I needed to lace one of the pieces of web with enough to deal with the whole party. That one was folded and tucked on the branch I was planning on watching everything from. The other piece was laid across the top of the hole, its size only just a bit larger than the hole itself.
I spun thick pieces of web from the edges while my Bound held it in place, using quickly crafted wooden pegs to hold them in place. Much like a trampoline or a tent, really.
To disguise the shifting feel a little, River, Catches-leaves, and Louie piled some earth on top that they’d set aside for this very purpose. Besides, we were hopeful that the lizard-folk would be sufficiently distracted that they wouldn’t notice how the ground beneath their feet wasn’t quite as stable as it should be. Evidently, we had good reason to hope.
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I was worried for a little bit that the earth would be too heavy for either the webbing threads or the wooden pegs, but it turned out that my worries were groundless. Even when the three of them stepped on top, it didn’t shift. I didn’t ask Trinity to test it, though – the hulking cyran would probably have been a step too far.
Our final task was to make the clearing look as though nothing had happened – a bit of a challenge, but one that apparently my two lizard-folk Bound were perfectly capable of. I suppose they would know what their kin would be looking for, so with a bit of thought and ingenuity, they were able to disguise our activity.
Now it’s time to see whether all that effort was worth it.
Using a stick which I’ve tied another stick to at an angle in order to form something of a hook, I slowly lift the webbing off the lizard-kin’s heads.
As the off-white material reveals the hunting party below, I see that not everyone is unmoving. The Unevolved all seem to be still, though I note that they’re all breathing, which is one worry off my mind. The Warriors, though, are mostly still awake, though clearly battling with the soporific nature of the poison. One actually grabs his spear and moves as if to throw it at me, but halfway through the attempt, his hand relaxes without his instruction and it falls out of his grip. The red flashing through his spikes show his anger and frustration. The two lithe Warriors seem the worst off, unable even to stand anymore, though still trying to force their eyes open.
The Pathwalker, too, seems to be trying to fight off sleep from sheer determination and stares up at me with a glare. I might feel more intimidated if her eyelids didn’t keep trying to close and her eyes didn’t keep losing focus, but I can tell that she’s not happy with me.
She’s also trying to use magic, I think – she’s touching roots sticking out of the earthen walls and appears to be…weaving them? I have to admit that I wasn’t exactly impressed with her showing in the confrontation, but maybe she doesn’t really have battle-suitable magic?
Anyway, that doesn’t matter too much: she might be trying to escape, but even if she managed to do it, she would be facing us while fighting off the poison; not a good position to be in. Especially because her back up would be equally afflicted.
But I have other plans for her. While I’m aware that diplomacy might not work, especially considering all the things River has told me about the village, I’m keen to at least try.
“River, help me communicate with them, would you?” I ask and my first samuran Bound quickly assents. “Tell them that I mean them no harm as long as they don’t attack me or mine.” He does, repeating what I said word for word as far as I can tell. Still tapping into his understanding of his native language, I also understand her response.
“The Great Egg take you, traitor!” she spits. “Don’t think I have forgotten how you killed one of us on your way out. And to bow to a prey-thing? Have you no shame?”
“He is not prey,” River argues, without me even needing to prompt him. “He is worthy of respect. He is going to save our village from the Forest of Death, and bring knowledge of how to control the life-devourer!”
“Our village? No more, outcast – you are to be brought back to justice. If you are lucky, you will only be banished,” the Pathwalker glares and spits again with all the strength she can. Not literally spitting – I’m not sure their mouths are suited to that physical action – but the way her teeth click almost enough to cut her own gums and the grunts make her chest move sharply tells its own story.
River reels back a little as her words hit him – although he’d told me before that he felt he was betraying his village, I’m not sure it had ever fully registered that everyone he loved would feel the same way too. That Catches-leaves doesn’t is a bit of a miracle, probably mostly due to him being so far down the hierarchy that no one really cared to tell him anything.
“And saving our village from the Forest of Death? Controlling the life-devourer? Don’t make me laugh!” She doesn’t look anywhere near laughter, instead appearing enraged. “You’ve been listening to too many hatchlings’ tales. Or perhaps you just don’t want to admit that you betrayed our people for a prey-thing which cannot offer you anything like what you had with us.”
I make a ball of fire appear in my hand but she’s already turned back to the wall. I dismiss the flame with a hint of annoyance – her expression would be fun to see. Unfortunately, instead of looking around, she’s redoubled her efforts in trying to create a way out of the pit, even as the poison takes greater and greater effect on her. And the others are too sleepy and glazed to even notice. Pity.
Looking down, I see that River’s claws have curled into balls, cutting his own palm if the blood which abruptly drips through his fingers is anything to go by. He seems about to tear a patch from the Pathwalker, but I put my hand on his shoulder.
“Calm,” I say quietly.
But master, Honoured Weaver disrespects you! he almost shouts through our mental connection.
“Because she hasn’t learned to respect me,” I sigh. “I understand what you were telling me before: first I’m going to have to force them to acknowledge my power. Then maybe we’ll get somewhere.” River’s fist loosens and he grimaces as his claws pull free of the wounds. I quickly send a little magic down through where I’m still holding his shoulder, healing them in a few moments.
Then you are going to-
“Yes,” I quickly reply. “Though I hope it will only be necessary with her.” I’ve already got enough Bound, after all – I don’t need a whole village of lizard-folk tied to me like that too! If I’m lucky, once I’ve got the Pathwalker under my control, the others will fall in line: they’re used to looking to the Pathwalkers for instruction, after all.
Well, I’ve tried the diplomatic route and it failed just as River thought it would. I could try using Catches-leaves as my mouthpiece – clearly the way we left the village means that River is persona non grata with his people – but he’s so low-ranking that I doubt it would be any better. River had the Pathwalker clearly angry; she would probably just ignore Catches-leaves.
Oh well, I guess it’s to the Battle of Wills I go.