Chapter Five: The Problem with Cushing

Clackhissis brought her leg down on another opponent, and blood sprayed from the wound as she severed the creature’s spine. She regretted the loss of such vital fluid, but it could not be helped. There would be blood enough when the fighting was finished. The only question that she had in her mind was if the human would manage to survive. She kept an eye on him and could see that he was holding his own, but it was clear that he was becoming tired. Each time he raised his sword, it was not nearly as high as before, and his swings were not nearly as fast as they had been when they had started the battle.

She had warned him that he didn’t know he was in danger, and he had not listened to her. She’d known he wouldn’t, so she’d allowed him to blunder into a small band of goblins. Clackhissis had felt their movement tremors long before they had been visible and had said nothing as the manling rambled on and on about pigs and spiders, insinuating that she might try to be more like her imaginary counterpart in her tolerance. His insolence grated on her, and she now wondered what kind of a man Cushing had been to garner such respect from Kaali. The god had to believe Cushing to be an exemplary example of humankind because he’d partnered the two legs with her. Clackhissis didn’t see it. Not one of her eight eyes spied a trace of awareness or talent in the manling. In fact, he seemed to be, if anything, subpar as an example of his species. She found it insulting that Kaali had believed him worthy enough to work with her. She would have been far better off doing her god’s bidding alone.

When she killed the last of her goblins, Clackhissis turned her body to watch the man skirmish with the last three humanoids. He breathed hard, and sweat flowed from his pores like water down a mountainside. Conversely, the goblins looked to be doing reasonably well in the fracas. Cushing had only managed to score a blow on one of them, and while it bled freely, the cut was not deep and bore little danger to the green-skinned combatant.

“Please,” Cushing pleaded, “I really don’t want to hurt you, but you’re forcing my hand.” He kept walking away from them, parrying their strikes in a futile effort to get them to back down.

They finally managed to back him up against a rock face at least fifty feet tall by jabbing their spears at him in alternating thrusts. She could not believe the fool had legitimately tried to talk them into not fighting, even as the tiny goblinoids swarmed around them as if you could dissuade a monster that was hellbent on killing you from engaging in battle.

“Are you just going to sit there and watch, or are you going to help me?” The frustration in his voice was evident, as was the anger lurking just beneath it.

“I am,” said the spider to the fighter, “Curious to see how this plays out.” She did not move when she spoke, but one of the tiny humanoids turned back to look at her. It did not speak spider and took her clicks and hisses to affirm her assistance. Cushing took advantage and swatted aside a spear with his blade, and thrust his sword into the distracted goblin’s belly. Smoke roiled up from the monster’s guts, and he arced the blade upwards until it exited the monster’s chest. He then pivoted and spun as he crouched low to the ground so that his sword was level with his attacker’s heads. His blade swept through the shafts of their spears and cleaved both of their heads from their shoulders in one fluid motion. As their heads bounced on the ground, he stood upright and held his sword before him with both hands. Clackhissis watched as he was covered in a faint glow. His body began to convulse, and his face was a picture of ecstasy.

“There can be only one,” he yelled in a gravelly voice as he dropped to his knees and released his sword. He looked to the spider expectantly, but Clackhissis gave no indication of what he was doing. He held his hands out and waited; frowning, he said, “Ding?”

“What are you talking about,” Clackhissis inquired irritably. Just when the manling had finally shown some glimmer of promise, he began to act touched in the head.

Cushing rolled his eyes, “I just leveled and did an incredible Kurgan imitation while I was at it.”

“Kur-gan,” the spider inquired, half afraid of the answer she would get from the crazy person she was forced to partner with.

Cushing smiled, “Let me tell you all about the immortals . . . ,”

----

Tes, despite her terror, could smell food. It was not Ogre food. She could tell by the odor. This meal was comprised of dead things that had been found, not killed, and put into a kettle. Things that had been dead long enough that few sentient creatures would find it palatable. Even as hungry as she was, Tes knew she would pass up the opportunity to sup on that vile stew.

She had been running for over half an hour, and still, she was pursued by the big men. She hoped they would give up after a while, but she must have angered them because they showed no signs of letting her go. Up until this point, she’d had no hope of finding a place to hide or leading them into a den of big bads that she could scoot around and let them duke it out. Used to running for her life, Tes was barely tired and was not even breathing hard. This was something she was made for; a kobold’s best defense was escape. Nature had designed them so they could practically run all day and never tire. Tes was not only a marathon runner but also swift and agile to boot. Her ability to dodge and evade was beyond Olympic levels. The kobold counted on her speed to get her out of tight situations, so the kobold decided to run through the camp of whomever or whatever was ahead and pray that she would get away before she was noticed.

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The best outcome would be her bursting into the keep and stirring the inhabitants up like bees so that they would all be good and mad when the Ogre arrived. She angled herself so that she would end up at the heart of the encampment. She knew from experience that fires were generally the center of the site, so she just followed her nose.

Shocked that she hadn’t surprised a guard, she shot from the brush and nearly tripped over the stew pot. She quickly counted four figures that were just barely larger than she was. They were green, and all held spears. She counted more tents than there were goblins, the camp’s owners, and realized that there might be more out on a patrol or hunting. The goblins watched her in slack-jawed amazement as she scurried through them. Tes had the courtesy to warn them that she was being followed before she made her way back into the brush. “Big guys, comin’,” was all she managed to get out before she saw the first of the Ogres break out of the dense foliage she had just come from. Damn, they were fast for their size.

As she ran, the kobold heard the goblins scream and clash with the invaders. Part of her plan had been pinned on the hope that Kaali would be true to his word and not let another monster harm her. She suspected he had, as the goblins would normally have reacted much faster to her appearance. Tes hoped that they would slow the Ogre down enough that they would give up on her, but she wasn’t going to count on it. She would keep running until she found a goodly place to hide or Tes came across the people she’d been sent to help.

----

“Then, after he cuts off his head, all of the power of the other immortals he’d slain rushes into him, and he gains mental powers and becomes mortal,” Cushing finished his tale by clapping his hands together and spreading his arms wide.

“That,” Clackhissis stated, “Is another fairy tale. It serves no purpose but to make prey feel like they are predators.” Cushing tried not to look at the three cocooned bodies she had placed on her back as food stores. He didn’t mind since it meant that she wouldn’t kill him in the immediate future for use as food. He had no doubt that she’d meant what she’d said.

Then her words registered with his brain, and Cushing nearly choked, “What do you mean? That is one of the greatest stories of all time!”

“It is a pack of lies,” the spider replied calmly. “Your hero slays the warrior using the sword of his mentor? The one that failed to behead the Kur-gan in the first place?? That would never have happened. The big man, with the strange voice that you make that sounds like growling bees, would have killed the smaller one and won the prize.”

“Baloney! You have no idea what you are talking about.”

“Untrue,” came her retort, “The big man stalked and hunted all his adversaries, even your hero. He actively sought them out and defeated each one quite easily. He even killed the cloud man’s mentor. He practiced his swordplay, while the man of clouds did not. As you said, the Russian was bigger and stronger, more warlike and aggressive. To presume that the smaller and undisciplined man could come close to winning when he was distracted by his woman’s safety is a denial of the highest magnitude.” She clicked her chelicera and gave a sharp chirp, “You have terrible taste in stories, human.”

“Oh, you wouldn’t know a good story if it bit you on your spinnerets,” Cushing countered. He was going to say more, but he stopped when Clackhissis held up a leg for him to be silent. Cushing immediately froze in place. He knew enough to trust the spider’s sense of awareness. As far as he was concerned, Spider-man had nothing on her. She pointed her leg at him in a gesture that he took to mean that he was to stay where he was, and then she vanished into the woods. The shadows seemed to follow her as lost children, and the darkness of the night embraced her like a loving mother.

His hand casually fell to his sword, and he began muttering to himself to keep up the guise of the two of them still having a conversation. They had been speaking moments before, and it would not do for the discussion just to stop altogether.

“So, there’s this guy named Freddy, and he has this awesome glove with finger knives …” he rambled about whatever came into his mind. The fact that few people could speak Spider didn’t matter; they would have heard him more than her anyway. Her voice was a series of sharp clicks, chirps, huffs, and clacks that were not easy to hear if she spoke softly. She would probably chew him out for making noise, but he considered it and was sure he was doing the right thing.

Cushing kept his eyes open and scanned his surroundings. He could not see, hear, or smell anything out of the ordinary, so he had to assume that the spider had felt the vibrations of whatever was approaching through the hairs on her footpads. That sense of hers was impressive, and he was a little jealous of her vibrational sense.

He was just about to start walking when he heard a shriek, and Clackhissis stepped from the woods with a tiny creature dangling before her extended fangs by her pedipalps. The horned canine creature struggled and kicked but looked exhausted. Clackhissis threw the insignificant figure on the ground before Cushing and stepped over the body. Her fangs menaced the humanoid, and he could hear a high-pitched whimper issue from its throat.

“Wait,” he shouted, “Don’t hurt it!”

The spider shuddered and reluctantly stepped away from the small thing before her. It lay on the ground before her, trembling in abject terror, eyes wide and wild. It was looking for some path of escape but could find none between herself and the human. Tears streamed from the thing's large eyes as it darted to and fro, seeking some avenue of freedom.

Cushing stepped forward and bent down on one knee beside the frail thing. He reached into his satchel, pulled out some jerky, and offered it to the pitiable creature in front of him. He spoke in a soft, gentle tone in a language that Clackhissis did not understand, and she asked him what he was saying.

“I’m using my Monster Speak ability to tell her we mean her no harm,” Cushing said in a voice like he was trying to soothe a baby.

She did not know what he said, but the thing calmed down. It took several deep breaths and cautiously took the meat from his hand. It was a foolish thing to do, giving it food. He would need that food later and not have it because he shared sustenance with some wandering monster. Cushing was as crazy as he’d claimed. He loved monsters. That proclamation was true. She, however, hated monsters, and she was one of them. Her siblings were little more than competition for food, and every other thing that crossed her path was either meant to be eaten or battled; most times, it came down to both.

She watched as the manling stood and then helped the tiny figure up as well. Cushing stroked its head a few times and gave it a reassuring pat on the shoulder; then he turned to her and said, “You aren’t going to believe who this is!”