Grinna called out to them.

“Your blaze spell works like a charm, Sage. Repeat it as often as you can. Dawn, your lightning mostly seemed to paralyze the ones on the outside of the affected area. Save your mana for healing, we may need it.”

Dawn nodded to the ranger. What a pity, at first it had looked as if she had taken out quite a few of the horde. The cubs at her back were squirming and mewling in their sling. They had been awoken by the uproar and of course would have liked nothing better than to poke their little noses into the action.

Their whole group kept retreating slowly all the time before the approaching masses of crabs. Nathan activated his heating spell once more, and more pops could be heard as crab shells cracked open and the inhabitants died.

The Kharlins mostly kept their eyes on the scene and safeguarded their backs, arrows being pretty much useless in the fight against the armored crabs.

Teren came closer to her and Nathan, his face grim.

“Grinna and me can’t do much against the beasts.” He said, frowning fiercely.

“Grinna would need to get close with her sword and with that many of them it is practically a given that their claws would pierce her, then. My piercing arrow might take out a few of the crabs, but in the face of such a horde,…” he shrugged and trailed off.

Nathan laid a calming hand on his shoulder.

“Don’t worry, Stone. It may take some time but we will prevail in the end. As long as we have a path to retreat on, I will simply cook them from afar. Too bad we can’t eat them, that would surely be enough for a feast otherwise.”

And so, they retreated further and further, while Nathan used his fire spell from time to time to take out the front of the horde. In between he activated his freezing spell to slow down the crabs. All the time he was careful to keep his mana from being drained completely. And so it looked as if it was only a matter of time until the horde would be defeated.

Grinna stayed in front of them, closest to the beasts and used her sword to fight off singular front runners. But it was obvious that even she with her sword had difficulties to get through the armored shell of the beasts.

And for the first time, Dawn saw the always calm Teren getting nervous. It was clear as day that he feared for his wife, but nevertheless he held himself back rigidly from voicing his concerns.

Dawn herself was afraid for Ankou. The lynx wasn’t in sight, she thought he might be stuck on the other end of the horde, and could only hope that he had taken heed of her warning and wouldn’t try to fight the crabs directly.

Dawn kept her gaze roaming at all sides during the fight and so she was the first to catch sight of movement on the cliff face to their right.

It seemed that a part of the crab horde had taken to the cliffs to attack them from the side as well as from the front.

“Look out”, she called out. “They’re on the cliffs to the right.”

Nathan cursed and clenched his fists.

“By the abyss! Can’t the beasts stick to our plan!”

He turned to the right and after studying the cliff face started to use his spell on the enemies there. The first ones had already started to reach the ground and Grinna sprinted over to take up the fight against the few that had reached the ledge. Their efforts barely kept the enemies on the cliffs at bay, but at the same time it meant that those in front of them on the path gained ground.

“We have to take shelter on the island again.” Dermo exclaimed as he hurried over, tension written all over him. “The lake will keep them away.”

“No such luck,” Nathan replied and shook his head. “Those crabs can swim. Let’s just hope my mana holds out.”

At the same moment a scream sounded in front of them. They wheeled around and saw that one of the crabs had managed to approach a Kharlin hunter unnoticed and had pierced his boot and foot with its claws. The Kharlin, Dawn saw that it was Niko, shook his foot wildly and managed to shake off the beast.

In one motion, Teren took up his bow and pierced the offending crab with an arrow. But the damage was already done.

Niko put down his foot and cried out as he started to crumple. While the surrounding Kharlins watched out for any more beasts that had reached the ledge around them, Dawn ran to him.

He had taken off his boot and sock and with horrified fascination Dawn saw a wave of gray spreading out from a wound on his instep.

Praying to all the gods that would be willing to hear her, Dawn laid her hands on him and activated Nurture. She concentrated with all her might and saw that the spread of gray was coming to a stop. Still it took another application of her healing spell to turn back the tide and a third one until the wound in Niko’s instep closed and the pelt on his foot around it returned to his regular sandy colour.

At the same time a notification popped up.

You have leveled up Nurture +1

Sighing in relief, she looked up and took a quick look around her to make sure there were no crabs waiting to attack them in the direct vicinity.

Then she stood up and told Teren and Dermon who had looked on with concern.

“I was able to heal him, but it took three applications of my spell, and that was when the petrification had just begun. Let’s hope they don’t get to more of our people.” She said and nervously brushed her hair out of her face.

Then she looked at Nathan. The ranger had started to sweat, it was obvious that the fight against the cliffcrabs took a lot out of him.

Grinna was occupied with studying the cliff face earnestly. Luckily, it seemed as if only a small part of the crab army had taken the way over the granite walls into the middle of their formations.

“These forsaken things are really difficult to perceive on the cliff face,” she said without turning around when Dawn approached her.

“I’m no slouch in perception, no ranger can afford to be, but you seem to have beaten me there.”

“For me, it’s one of the stats that gets raised every level automatically.” Dawn replied.

“Ah, that explains it.” Grinna muttered and sprinted away to kill another beast that had reached the ledge via the cliff wall.

The fight against the crabs extended over another hour, and twice more Dawn had to heal Kharlins that were surprised and injured by cliff crabs that had managed to overcome their cordon unnoticed.

Finally, the horde began to thin out and their relentless approach started to falter. Still, the company waited for what amounted to another half hour while Nathan’s spell and Grinna’s and Teren’s swords took care of the last stragglers and they were assured at last that their attack had come to an end.

When it was over, Nathan sat down where he stood, trembling all over and said.

“That was a close call.”

Grinna and Teren shared a hug, relief written all over Teren’s face as he held on to his wife and fellow ranger closely.

Finally, Grinna tore herself away reluctantly and said.

“I’ve rarely felt more useless than in the fight just now. You really are a godsend, Sage. Without you there’d only be a group of very lifelike statues left on this ledge.”

Combing back her hair with her fingers nervously, she continued.

“But I have to say it is very strange. A few days ago we encountered a veritable army of greyscale lizards on this same trail. Today it’s a horde of cliffcrabs of nearly epic proportions. It is unusual at the very least, to have two such encounters just days apart in nearly the same location.”

“Must be your attractive personality, Spark.” Nathan countered drily. “Even the beasts love you.”

Sighing deeply, he leaned back on his hands and continued.

“At least the horde gave me a lot of experience. You’ll never believe it, but I gained two whole levels just now.”

Grinna’s eyes widened.

“Two! Well, congratulations. But now I’m eaten up with envy.” She laughed.

Dermo came over, ears flicking rapidly all the time.

“Well, if that fight didn’t manage to turn my pelt gray, nothing will.” He said with feeling, his whiskers quivering as he talked.

“Thank you for your efforts on behalf of the group. Surely we’d all have died without you,” He bowed to Nathan, laying a clawed hand on his heart.

“We’ll rest for a while and eat, then continue on. I for my part will be only too glad once we’re back in the village and have some reassuring stone walls around ourselves.”

“Right you are,” replied Nathan. “I had quite enough excitement for the day.”

They rested for a while, right there on the stony ground, chewing on jerky and dry hard-baked bread.

Then Nathan started to get to his feet with a groan.

“We’ll have to craft a broom or two to brush the crabs away from the ledge as we proceed.” He said to Dermo. “Even in death the venom on their claws stays dangerous.”

The group leader nodded and went over to another group of Kharlins to explain to them what they would need. Several of the group started to take down some of the scraggly little trees on the edge of the ledge and to rapidly fashion improvised brooms out of twigs and leaves.

Their advance on the trail afterwards was pretty slow. The Kharlins took turns with their brushes to sweep away the crabs from the ledge and into the lake, but it was slow going.

Dawn shook her head at the proceedings. “That poor poor lake. It must resemble a beast graveyard on the bottom after the last few days.”

Grinna just shrugged. “What can you do? Better a graveyard in the lake than petrified hunters on the trail.”

Dawn was feeling quite antsy at the glacial progress. She wanted to return to Ankou. Though she could still feel the lynx, agitated and anxious as he was, she needed to see him with her own eyes to reassure herself that he was unharmed.

Finally, they reached a part of the trail that was blessedly free of crab corpses and at once a big silver cat came bounding over to Dawn, putting his front paws on her shoulders, rubbing his head on her chin and anxiously peering into the sling on her back, that contained two by now very unhappy cubs.

Dawn had kept them on her back all the time, afraid that one of the always curious twosome would get too close to the dead crabs.

“It’s alright Ankou,” she said soothingly. “We all got through unscathed.”

[They have deadly claws], he said. [I could not touch them, had no way to fight them.]

His voice in her mind sounded very forlorn, no trace of the sometimes arrogant lynx she knew and loved.

“I know,” she agreed. “I had no way to fight them as well. But Nathan could. Let’s just be glad that we have good friends with useful spells on our side.”

Ankou got down on the ground again and peered intensely at the ranger. With a huff, he approached Nathan and rubbed his cheek on the ranger’s thigh.

Nathan was taken aback and looked somewhat alarmed at his behaviour.

Dawn chuckled.

“Ankou says thank you,” she told Nathan. “He felt very helpless during the fight, obviously he knew that he shouldn’t touch the beasts. So he is glad that you killed them with your spell.”

Nathan smiled warmly and slowly laid a careful hand on the gleaming pelt of the big cat.

“You’re very welcome, my friend.”