Chapter Eighteen

Igneous leans against a tree, exhausted from the days hike, and finally being allowed a break. Igneous watches as the priestess and priest fall to the ground to tired to remove their bags or find a decent spot to sit. The only ones not exhausted are Yasevl, on account of his newly acquired demi-godhood, Nora, and the bard , Vance, Marigold had sprung on them at the last minute. Vance, the bard, sits on a mossy boulder and begins strumming a soft relaxing melody on his lute, and sings softly. Igneous can swear he sees magic coming from the bard, extending around, and reaching towards the exhausted group.

Carry me to the nearest bar,

Put me down next to a pretty girl,

fill my cup with something strong and sweet,

I’ll tell you a tale of a time, when I was young and strong.

I could march all day long, swing a sword or two,

I could dance and sing, just as the bards do,

Keep my cup full, and I’ll show you,

That I am still young and strong too.

After singing a few verses, the bard simply hums along with the tune, and strums his lute. Igneous can feel the tiredness leave his body and a warm happy feeling replaces it. Igneous is not the only one that feels different, Igneous watches as everyone in ear shot of the bard begin to get to their feet with a new sense of vigor. After the last person stands, the bard ceases playing and jumps off the boulder and takes a small bow. A few of the priest and priestess clap, including Thomas, and no more so than Marigold. Marigold runs over and gives the man a hug and exclaims, “ That was amazing!”.

The bard plays coy and says , “ Oh that? That was nothing, really.”.

“ No that was great, you gave everyone a second wind.”, Marigold insists. Even Korren walks over and praises the bard, “Yes, that was quite amazing. How do you do that? Its like a spell, but I didn’t hear you cast a spell.”.

“ Oh, that’s because I didn’t. I simply allowed mana to flow through my fingers into the lute and allowed it to be carried by my voice. Really simple. Nothing too spectacular.”, Vance says rubbing the back of his head, feigning humility. Korren looks at the bard with amazement, “ What I didn’t even know that was possible. I must know more.”.

Igneous tunes them out as Korren begins asking the bard unending questions. Even though he is no longer tired, Igneous closes his eyes and tries to rest. All to soon though, Nora calls out that its times for them to head out. Sighing, Igneous stands to his feet and grabs his bag. The group groans but does as Nora says. The group of travelers fall into their marching line, with Nora in the front, along with Yasevl, the priests, Korren, and Nelly in the middle, Mitch walks behind the priest and Igneous brings up the rear. As they trudge through the forest, Vance slowly falls back till he is walking along Igneous. The bard smiles and asks, “ Mind if I walk back hear with you? I don’t want someone to accidently trip me and break my lute.”.

Igneous shrugs and says noncommittally , “ Yeah, sure.”.

Vance smiles and says, “ Awesome! Thank you, my imp friend.”.

Igneous stops suddenly the group marching forward and Vance stopping shortly after Igneous does. Igneous looks at the bard with uncertainty, “ How do you know I am an imp? Only a few people know about that.”.

Vance shrugs, “ Marigold told me.”.

Igneous shakes his head, and allows magic to begin flowing to his hands, “ No, Marigold doesn’t know.”.

Vance twists mouth up and taps his head with his index finger, and hums as if thinking, “ Maybe I heard it somewhere.”.

Now flames began to lick around Igneous’ finger tips, “ The only people who know are Yasevl, me, and some… people, that I doubt you heard say it.”.

Vance nods and shakes it finger in the air, “ That’s right. Dorean told me.”, looking towards their group, that is getting farther and farther away, adds, “ Hey, we need to catch up, come on.”.

With that the bard runs towards the group, leaving Igneous to stare dumfound after the mysterious bard. How could this bard, possibly know Dorean? Igneous asks himself. Igneous ponders this for a moment when he notices that his group is getting way a head of him. Cussing, Igneous breaks out into a sprint to catch up. When he gets caught up, he sees that Vance had made his way up to the front, talking to Yasevl. Out of the corner of his eye the bard sees Igneous and turns slightly and smiles at him. Igneous glares back, he doesn’t trust this man and he is going to find out what he is hiding.

Gimmel sits in the top room of his keep, with the leaders of the wood elves and goblins, as he had learned they were called, each speaking in the others langue in hopes of getting a better grasp of it. Nevil, the wood elf chieftain, stands and looks out one of the many windows that allow air and sunlight in, “ Very nice….. what word?... view. I see more of you people make…. home… here.”.

The elf was right, after being told there was free land to have, many gnomes and dwarves flocked to Surface, as they had come to call their new home. Many of them, merchants, craftsmen, and scholars all seeking to study, or exploit the new resources that this cavern had to offer. Well not a cavern, at least according to Gimmel’s new allies, the goblins and elves, in fact supposedly there was not ceiling or walls to this place, only the ones that people build. While Gimmel trusts them, there is no way they could be right all places had ceilings and walls, they just hadn’t found them yet. Gimmel cuts off his inner monologue and responds, “ Yes… many come.. to Surface. Very… tiny…no… cramped.. in other caverns. Here space to go round. Is that… not good…umm.. issue?”.

The elf smiles at the gnome has he tries to navigate the foreign tongue, “ No… it all good… with me… Heva?”.

Nevil looks to Heva, the goblin leader, who had remained quiet. Heva looks up in surprise upon hearing her name, looking between the Gimmel and Nevil with confusion. Unlike Nevil, Heva was having trouble learning the new langue. Nevil repeats the question in their langue and Heva nods and says slowly, “ It…good.. wid.. me.”.

Gimmel smiles at the goblin, completely understanding the issue of learning a new langue. Gimmel looks to Heva and does his best to say, “ Thank you, for not… stopping us from making.. home.”.

Heva smiles and nods her head. Gimmel smiles back when the door to the room bust open and a winded gnome messenger says, “ Keeper Gimmel, you are need in the northern part of the settlement.”.

Gimmel stands and asks, “ What is the issue?”.

The scout looks between Nevil and Heva then back at Gimmel with nervous eyes. Gimmel sighs and states sternly, “ You can speak in front of them, they are allies.”.

The gnome scout looks at them again, but continues, “ There is a large group of elves approaching.”.

Nevil perks up at his and looks to the scout and asks in a broken tongue, “ Wood elves?”.

The scout looks to Gimmel for conformation, which Gimmel gives, before answering, “ They do not look like your elves, they are blue skinned and blue eyes.”.

Nevil nods his head and Gimmel and Heva look at him. Nevil looks up and, returning to his native tongue, says, “ Must be high elves. The human adventures I told you about, told me of these elves. They were at war with the humans and another race for many years, according to the humans they attacked without warning.”.

Gimmel swallows the lump growing in his throat, Nevil had told him about the humans, and they seemed far more advanced than the wood elves and if these high elves were able to wage war on the humans, what hope did the still growing Surface have. Gimmel looks to the scout and asks, “ Where is Keeper Rix?”.

“ Already on his way there.”, the scout states quickly.

Gimmel turns to the wood elf leader and asks, “ I hate to involve you, but you are an elf, even if you are not the same kind. Having you along with us may help keep things calm. Would you mind coming with me? If not I understand.”.

Nevil studies Gimmel for a moment then turns to Heva and speak too fast for Gimmel to fully follow. Heva seems to get angry, the two yell at each other, before Nevil seems to win the argument. Heva stands and nods to the gnome and says good-bye before slipping by the scout still in the doorway. Gimmel turns to Nevil with confusion and shakes his head not understanding what just happened. Nevil smiles weakly, “ She… go home..make ready… incase.. this bad... I go with Gimmel.”.

Gimmel returns the weak smile and turns to the scout and says, “ Take us to them.”.

The scout nods and replies, “ Yes Keeper.”.

The scout turns and heads out of room and through the keep, leading the wood elf and gnome behind him towards Rix and the high elves.

In the village of Forestedge, General Von Dee rides his warhorse up and down the line of troops before him. Over a hundred human soldiers, covered from head to toe in bronze armor, stand ready. The general looks toward the dozen woodsmen they had hired had already made head way towards making way for his men and women to march through. In the back he can hear some of the adventures the local lord had insisted on hiring laughing and cutting up. Von Dee snarls and spurts his horse towards them, coming to a stop just before them. The general barks at the adventurers, “ Shut up! You miserably sell-swords! I may have to put up with you being here, but I won’t put up with any of your shenanigans!”.

The adventures look at the general, wide eyed, mainly out from the suddenness of his outburst rather than fear or respect. After a brief moment, one of the adventures in a blue robe holds up a staff in his hand and says sarcastically, “ Not all of us are sell-swords, some of us are sell-staffs.”.

The adventures break out in laughter, and other begin to pipe up, one holds up a shield, “ Yeah, I’m a sell shield”. Another raises a mace, “ Sell-mace here!”.

The adventures go on and on, their laughter growing with each outburst, as the laughter grows so does the general’s anger. His hand begins to drift to the sword on his side, when the local lord, Sven, comes riding up on his own horse. Lord Sven maneuvers his horse to be in between the general and the adventures and yells out , “ Enough! I pay you, so shut up when the general says so.”.

The adventures groan and gripe but do as their current benefactor says and cease their laughing and joking. Although they do whisper and snickering softly among themselves. Lord Sven turns to General Von Dee, and nods his head, “ General, ready when you are.”.

The general looks at Lord Sven and nods, “ Keep your bunch of malcontents in check!”.

With this the general turns his horse sharply and mumbles to himself, “ Should not have yelled at a lord, even if he is only a lord of a backwoods settlement, he can still get me fired. Should make that right later.”.

General Von Dee brings his horse around to the front of troops and straightens his back and speaks loud enough for them all to hear, “ Five years ago the war came to an end! On the day it ended, we swore that we would be ready to fight if any form of aggression was shown! There are reports of elven activity to the north, deep in the forest! While Albion has no claim to such land at this time, nether do the retched elves! Will shall march through these woods in search of our enemies and shall make claims of the land to prevent them from getting closer! If they dare challenge us we shall end their horrible lives, in the name of our kingdom!”.

The general draws his sword and raises it high above him, the sun glaring of the polished bronze. With this the soldiers cheer, so do some of the adventures gathered, as well as the gathered villagers. General Von Dee turns his horse around and brings his sword down and points in the direction the woodsmen had already cut down and yells, “ Spell-soldiers clear that road and assist the woodsmen!”.

At these words on either side of the assembled troops a row of fully armored soldiers step forward, pulling staffs off their backs, and begin casting spells. Some of them are clearing the road of stumps with burning fire, others push the trees aside with gale-force winds, and some cast spells over the woodsmen causing them to cut deeper and at greater speed. Before long the woodsmen and spell-soldiers are almost a hundred yards away, growing further away by the minute. The general sheaves his sword and yells , “ Forward march!”.

The boom of a hundred feet marching in unison echoes over the village and through the woods, sending flocks of birds flying, followed by the disorganized varying gait of adventures behind them. The soldiers march forward with the general riding his horse in front, with the spell-soldiers and woodsmen ahead, working feverishly to keep ahead.

As the battalion marches out into the forest, a hood figure darts into the tavern and makes to the second floor and to the last room on the right. Placing their hands on the door the figure casts a quick spell and flings the door open and the slams it. Rushing to the bed, not bothering to recast the ward on the door, the hood figure rips its hood off to reveal the face of a blue skinned, silver haired, elven woman. Snatching a mirror from under the bed, she casts a spell and draws an arcane symbol on the mirror. Soon her face is replaced by that of a elven man, “ Do you have something to report?”.

The elven woman nods and says in a panicked voice, “ The humans know of the elves to the north and are on their way there now. They have just left, but they have spell casters and human woodsmen clearing the way. They could be there in a matter of days!”.

The elf in the mirror goes pale and says, “ Understood! This must be relayed right away. Wait for further orders.”.

With that the mirror returns to showing the woman’s own frightened face. The woman returns the mirror to its place and lays on the bed. Breathing deeply, the elf prays, “ Goddess please watch over us.”.