“… and then I punched him in the face.” Finished Katlin, the only alf Erika had ever met, expert Gothi of Baldr and as it turns out a teller of some exceptionally dirty stories. Erika snorted and giggled which was drowned out by Bjorn’s roaring laughter which boomed over the plains and bounced off the distant hills.

The expedition was still running from however was chasing them but nobody could be vigilant all the time so most people had calmed down and those that hadn't were sent out in shifts to scout ahead. Erika had asked Helga to slow the caravan down a little bringing it in line with a blue roofed one that carried some of the supplies and the injured including Bjorn and being driven by Katlin, Erika found that most of the delvers weren’t exactly chatty with a vitki but they weren’t chatty with an alf either so the two women found they got along very well especially with Bjorn there to grease the social wheels.

“What happened then?” Asked Bjorn slurring slightly, Erika couldn’t prove it but she was pretty sure he had gotten into the medical alcohol somehow, he certainly seemed extremely jolly.

“Oh, I think I slept with his wife… or his brother… Maybe both?”

As the laughter echoed again Katlin turned to Erika with a smile. “Ah but here I am monopolising the stories, come vitki you must have a few good ones.”

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Erika thought for a moment then nodded slyly. “One or two, none quite as grand as yours I'm afraid, I haven’t gotten into the same trouble you have but I did once…”

Before Erika could begin however Bjorn raised his hand. “We’ve stopped.”

Looking up ahead they saw that the main body of the expedition (the largest caravans and the sturdiest riding droogs) had stopped in the middle distance atop a small rise in the terrain. Sigrun seemed to be talking animatedly with Ammeris whilst Alvis looked at something hidden by the slope of sand.

After a moment Sigrun turned and gestured back at the line of delvers, her arms formed a complex pattern in the air, then another, then a repeat of the first. Bjorn cursed quietly and with a short huff leapt off the caravan and onto a leashed droog. “We need to move.”

“What did she say?” Asked Erika as Helga began to lash the reigns of the caravan.

“Come quick, big thing, come quick.” Katlin translated flexing her finders and shoulders, she was also pushing her droogs forwards falling into a tight column with the other vehicles, wooden wheels spinning inches from each other.

Erika felt a bolt of real fear at that and cursed loudly it better not be another damned troll she thought as she held on to the rattling wagon below her.

It wasn't… it was worse.

The first clue was the sound, Erika heard it suddenly rising over the hills a tidal wave of noise distant and muffled but still fierce and utterly distinctive, a gushing sound like spraying water mixed with crackling like a fire. Only one creature could make a sound like that.

“A linnorm,” she muttered to herself. “They’ve found a Hel damned linnorm”