Chapter 4

Karephay Wildlands

Karnas was suspended in mid air as the eyes of hundreds of horses, oxen, and various forest animals beheld him. To his right floated Raste, now shifted from his beetle form back to the aged wood elf with one droopy eye and a scraggly beard. To his left he saw Melissa the ox. She looked, well, normal. For whatever that was worth. Her big eyes gleamed in the aura of the goddess’ magic that swirled all around them. Next to Melissa was another figure. A handsome man in purple velvet clothes and a sharp looking hat with a white feather sticking out of it. Who in the hells is that?!

“Rise, my chosen!” Gaiya, the Nature goddess, sang out into the night.

“I can’t go any higher, your godessness!” Raste shouted. Then he swiveled his nobby head to see the newcomer. “Who in the hells is that?” The fancy human floated there with an expression of shock on his face but as Karnas stared at him he reached into his pocket and took out what might have been a small slice of pie and began to nibble on it. His eyes moved between the goddess and the other floaters, finally resting on the ox. He chewed slowly. “And why is he eating pizza?!” Raste added.

Gaiya chanted some kind of spell and a swirling storm of magic erupted from the goddess. It arced high into the treetops and then down directly into the mouths of the four chosen. “Glug! Glurk!” Karnas said through a mouthful of tangible spellcloud. He felt like a stuffed chicken. The magic seized his very soul but soon it felt absolutely wonderful. A true boon from a goddess! Whatever was happening to him, as alien and strange as it was, it had to be good.

Gaiya kept going. “Tonight you all will be under my protection! The caravan is under attack and I am afraid it will be far too dangerous for any of you to leave this glen until sunrise. Eat heartily, frolic in my wood, rest your weary hooves! Come morning my herald will come and explain to the chosen the tasks that I have set before them. I leave you now, with my grace.”

The warm verdant light of the nature magic faded away and the vision of the goddess disappeared as well. Karnas felt gravity return and slowly he fell back down to the mossy ground. Glancing around he noticed the animals begin to disperse and soon the four chosen were relatively alone. He felt exhausted and flopped down then splayed out like a starfish. He sighed deeply. Gaiya had said that the caravan was under attack but here they were safe. That was lucky. But why had she chosen them? Does the goddess know about the Wish scroll? Thinking was too hard. It was all he could do just to lie there and gaze at the stars that shone between the trees.

Then a big wet tongue slopped across his face.

“Lover, are you alright?”

Melissa was standing over him with those orange-sized eyeballs glistening not four inches from his face. A glob of slobber hung precariously from her lips and then fell right in Karnas’ mouth.

“Blaaaach! Oh my god!” Karnas rolled over and spat.

“Oops,” the ox said and then made a sound that had to be a chuckle.

“Melissa,” Karnas said, rising to his feet. He gagged on the taste of the ox’s spittle. “Please, for the love of the Prism, never do that again.”

“A man as beautiful as you should never make such an ugly sound.”

She was into me when I was a male ox! Why is she still doing this?! He paused for a moment and a thought occurred to him like a slap in the face. “Why can I understand you?”

Raste limped over to them and patted Karnas on the shoulder. “That was a fresh experience! A goddess! My aching banana! Can you bloody believe that?!” The coger was in good spirits. Does anything phase this withered creature? “The beast tongue, though. That is a special thing! I’ve heard of this phenomenon before, very rare. That powerful magic from the goddess bonded the necklace to you, and mine to me too! Some of the effects, I think, are now permanent. We’ve both got a little druid in us now, boy!” Raste said in a sing-song voice that made Karnas unusually angry.

He glared at the sorcerer, “I find none of this amusing, Raste! What in the Hells just happened?! You heard what she said about the caravan, yeah? They’re being killed! Now we have no way into Collum’s camp! This was such a bad idea!”

“Twas destiny, I believe,” Melissa said. Karnas wanted to tell her to stuff it but there was something about the ox, not exactly pity and certainly not any soft feelings, but something that made him want to treat her gently.

“Alright, Melissa. That’s... that’s fine, but what are we going to do?”

Raste pointed at Karnas. “What’s that you’ve got there, on your wrist?” All three of them looked to see a charm bracelet on Karnas’ wrist. It was gold with numerous tiny leaves of green and silver all around. As he turned his hand over he saw three charms dangling from the bracelet.

“What are those? Let me see, damn you!” Raste said and yanked the hand close to his face. “The ox medallion from the transfiguration necklace. A rat-faced half-elf. That’s gotta be you, Karnas. A perfect likeness. Ah, one more. A hobgoblin! What on Earth is the Goddess of the Woodlands doing giving you this?”

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Melissa snorted and said, “There is one on your wrist too, boney one.”

“Boney?! Listen, you cow-”

Karnas cut him off, “She’s right! Look! There’s the same horse medallion, it’s smaller now. There’s one that looks like you, and a third!” He stood there in utter shock. This had been a strange day but upon seeing the third charm he became aware of a new dread that would pale all of the strangeness a thousand fold. “By all that is holy, please... please tell me that won’t do what I think it does.” Raste was already casting Identify on the bracelet. The old half-elf laughed out loud.

The third charm was the face, neck, and shoulders of a beautiful young woman. “Never! You are not allowed to use that!” Karnas said.

“Relax, kid,” he said. Raste was still laughing. Karnas was doing everything he possibly could to not imagine him transforming into some hot trollop.

The world is not ready! Dear goddess, what have we done to deserve this penance?

Melissa interrupted him before his mind’s eye developed the image of Raste in a corset. “I have three charms as well. See? A very beautiful ox, some kind of fish, and- oh look, old man! Another woman!”

The half-elves approached her and took a closer look at the bulky bracelet above her hoof. It did indeed hold three charms. Like she said, one was her original form. The one she thought had been a fish was actually a fennec with a big bushy tail. The medallion of the ‘beautiful woman’ was in truth the image of a half-orc with a steel cap and pigtails. The figure was holding a battle axe in one hand and a kite shield in the other.

“Three Ensigns of Transfiguration,” Raste said. “On three enchanted charm bracelets.”

“Four,” Karnas said and pointed at the fop in the purple doublet. He was a human of around twenty-five or thirty years. He wore a velvet hat to match his doublet and fine boots. He looked like an up-jumped grape with a thin moustache. The clasp on his little cape was a grim skull of silver. On his hip he wore a bejewelled cutlass and across his back was some large rectangular object. Karnas put his hand on the hilt of his dagger and eyed the man who had been standing under a nearby tree and who probably heard everything. “You,” he said as threateningly as possible. “Who are you?”

The man approached the three, stepping into moonlight. He threw his cape over his shoulder and bowed. “Greetings. I am Aloysius Custodes Gray,” he said with an accent Karnas didn’t recognize. “I apologize for eavesdropping. I assure you it was not on purpose. I was merely still in shock from,” he waved a hand around the glen. “Well, as you can see. It’s been quite a night.”

Aloysius quickly overcame his loss for words and began to rattle off his tale, accentuating the story with theatrical hand gestures. I think I know what trade this one plies, Karnas thought. Aloysius was indeed a bard of some sort. The thing on his back was an instrument he called a ‘koto’. He was from the southern continent of which Karnas had only heard legends, and he’d come to Dayberry to escape ‘political persecution’. A fugitive, more likely. A gangster had laid a price on his head so he joined the caravan to escape the city and then got swept up with the beasts before the goddess had blessed them. Karnas knew a load of bullshit when he heard it but neither he nor Raste challenged the story. The bard’s charm bracelet held a skull, an acorn, and a man in a fancy hat.

For whatever reason Gaiya had chosen the four of them and come sunrise they would learn what she had in mind. It made the thief shudder thinking of becoming a puppet for her or any god. May ye ever avoid the eyes of the gods. Hadn’t that been a common saying in the slums, especially among the more roguish of the citizenry? And now one had picked them out. And what do I get out of it? I now possess the power to turn into an ox. Or a hideous hobgoblin. Wonderful.

Melissa was standing at the edge of the glen looking out past the treeline toward the valley where the caravan had been encamped. Karnas went and stood next to her. A small army was approaching the caravan. Figures in armor, some on horseback, were lit by torches. The defenders were outnumbered and soon they would be overrun. The goddess told the beasts to stay put. That we’d all be protected if we stayed here. I guess luck is on our side at least in this small part. There was no joy in Karnas seeing what was about to happen to the caravaneers down in the valley that night. With the moon almost full he would be able to see the entire spectacle unfold before him. While it was mostly drivers and caravanserai guards, there were some camp followers and with them a few children. Long ago he had been a child not very different from those that would die tonight. Innocent and unlucky, going wherever there might be a slightly better circumstance than the place before. Just poor folk clawing for any crumb of hope they can get their hooks on.

And here come these bastards who think nothing of slaughtering them for merely stepping foot on to their territory.

Karnas had come to Dayberry in a caravan of sorts, from the north but what was the difference? His whole childhood seemed like a maelstrom that swept him from shantytown to slum, from one type of desperation to another. Becoming a shadow had given him some control over his own fate, and coin. If you took a job it was yours to finish, and if you died or fucked it up it was nobody’s fault but your own. A simple exchange of blood for money, though Karnas was no assassin. Raste said that he was too soft for knife-work, but so was Raste. Maybe it’s that softness that’s the reason we’re even in this jam. If we were hired killers we’d never have been picked by the High Mage to loot a cursed crypt. We’d be... If he was honest about it they’d most likely be dead. That softness within him was rearing up right then as he watched the unknown army approach the caravan.

“Looks like you’re thinking of doing something stupid,” Raste said.

Karnas rubbed his jaw. He’d been clenching his jaw so tight it was beginning to hurt. “That’s about four-hundred armed soldiers down there. Gods know which of the warlords they carry the flag for, not like it matters now. They’ll raid the caravan, kill the men, and you know the rest.”

“Unless...”

“Unless we make some kind of distraction.”

“Shift the paradigm on ‘em, eh?” Raste chuckled. “And give the caravan an opening to dead-head east to the river. If they try to ford, they won’t all make it.”

“And as it is, none of them will make it.” Karnas turned and saw everyone looking at him. There was a heavy anticipation in the air. The sense of impending violence that would break the night open. “So, who wants to do something stupid?”

Melissa grunted and blew the orange mop of hair out of her eyes. “I will join you to save the humans. But I will find the cart driver who whipped me and stamp on his testicles.”

There was a pause while the group considered this.

“Sounds about right!” Raste said. “And I think I have just the trick to get the party started!”