Season of Bloom - 2. Rough Rest

The trip took ages, through the worst bog Kiba had ever seen. Lapis seemed to share his discomfort, as did Khemet, both cats working to avoid the worst of the wetlands. But their companions seemed to be pushing them on near mercilessly, the cleric and the bard urging them further and faster. There was a sense of desperation hidden to their travel, and Kiba started wondering if perhaps the softskin leader was in danger.

He didn’t seem to be the only one with that thought. Talk was near nonexistent as they pushed the horses, hours of tense silence filling their travels as they approached a rise in the land, a hill that rose from the bog to blessed dryness. Just outside the bog, they finally paused to rest the horses, the beasts exhausted from the day of travel through the wilderness.

“We sleep here,” Lapis said, helping Kiba off the horse.

The kobold nodded, his entire body stiff from a day of riding. He nearly collapsed as he was set down, the cat grabbing his shoulder to steady him. Once he could stand on his own, Lapis left Kiba to his own devices, and the kobold maneuvered himself away from the group, finally pulling Apsu from his pocket.

“Forgive Kiba, Great One. Hunt in peace,” he breathed, setting the silver lizard on the ground.

The lizard vanished quickly, running off to gather insects for his own supper, and Kiba felt that strange tug in his mind that always came when the dragon was getting away from him. He always figured Apsu felt it too; the lizard never failed to return to him if they got too far apart.

Magic. It had to be. A divine magic granted by the Father of Dragons. Apsu had claimed Kiba for his messenger and protector, polymorphed into a weak form so none would ever suspect him. The kobold was honoured to be the dragon’s chosen guard, and he worked tirelessly to keep him sated, ever Apsu’s faithful servant.

He never worried about where they were going; surely the god put people in their path for a reason, and Kiba followed willingly. If the Great One wanted him to ride with Lapis, or to help the dark one save the softskin chieftain, then Kiba would do it with a smile on his face, knowing he was doing his god’s bidding, making the world a little better, a little more just and good.

A quiet chuff made the kobold nearly jump out of his scales, Kiba whirling around with his scimitar raised defensively. He frowned at the tiger behind him, Khemet’s nose pushing past his blade to knock the kobold over. The tiger stood over him, head lowered, and a rough tongue suddenly flicked out, scraping the dirt off the kobold’s head.

Kiba flinched at the quiet rasping of the tongue, his head bathed in hot tiger breath as he was licked repeatedly.

“What is this? What are you doing cat?” he grimaced. “Kiba is not your snack!”

He stood up, sheathing his blade as he began poking through the area for forage. Cattails, berries, various weeds, most of it seemed edible to the kobold, and it wasn’t long before he had an armful of foodstuffs to carry back to the camp. He had to make himself useful or the dark one would get rid of him, and there was no way he could leave the softskins to their fate. They were under Apsu’s protection, and Kiba was not going against his god, nor would he allow others to go against the Father Dragon’s commands. The fact that Apsu hadn’t actually said anything meant nothing. He knew where he was needed.

A pair of skinned and gutted carcasses dropped onto a relatively clean rock, Lapis letting out a sigh as he looked around the camp at the group.

“Faes, can you cook these? I found them drowning in a pond nearby so I put them out of their misery.”

Most of their food on the road had consisted of plenty of trail rations, dried sausage and bread with cheese. But that was long gone now, and he needed someone to cook the unfamiliar animals he had shot as they swam near a small wooden den. Fortunately dressing them hadn’t been too difficult. The amurrun just hoped they had enough meat on them. And they weren’t poisonous.

“Beaver?”

Regongar let out a bellowing laugh, startling the catfolk.

“Cat, those weren’t drowning, they were swimming! But they will make for great food tonight.”

Lapis felt his heart sinking. He had been sure they were drowning, and he wanted to spare them a slow death. He had never heard of people swimming in water… well, unless he counted the docks of Sothis, but that was different, that was salt water that couldn’t be used for drinking.

“Wait… is the water around here bad?” he frowned. “It smells like the holy water from An, that means it’s been sitting under the full moon, right?”

“The water around here is certainly bad,” the cleric of Sarenrae said with a small chuckle. “We are in a fen-”

“Bog,” Faes corrected, looking the beavers over. “Too acidic to be a fen. There’s probably a fen around here though, or the fen became the bog over time. I wonder why trolls would make this their home with the acid around here, but perhaps it’s not strong enough to burn them. I dare say their guts could handle still waters.”

“I stand corrected,” Tristian frowned. “Either way, they are a good catch. Perhaps the dam will fall apart now and waterflow will return to this region and purify it.”

“I would think it doesn’t need purifying,” Faes added with a smirk. “Look at what the amurrun caught. There’s plenty of life even here, where most would say it’s a dead region. It’s just dark and dreary, but that’s just another kind of living.”

Lapis shrugged, letting the two work out philosophical differences. It had been something he never understood as a temple cat. Who cared why you did something? All that mattered was making people happy and obeying the gods. He had learned his lesson about that long ago. There were times when the means did not justify the ends, and he bore the scar to remind him of that, but as long as no one was hurt, making people happy was good.

The amurrun turned back toward the pine trees, a low groaning call escaping his maw. He could feel eyes on his back, and Lapis gave out one more call before turning toward the others.

“Khemet’s returning with Kiba,” he explained, before picking up his bag and pulling out a long branch of pine and a knife.

He spent the next hour cutting a shaft from the pine, adding it to a small collection in his bag. When he got the chance, the amurrun would find a stone or some bone and fashion a head for the arrows. They wouldn’t be the best quality, but they would kill, and that’s all he needed them to do.

It didn’t take long for Khemet to return, the kobold riding his back unsteadily with an armful of berries and nuts and a pair of long reeds. Sliding off the tiger’s back, Kiba stepped over to Faes, bowing to the half-drow as he presented his findings.

Faes picked through the offering, tossing aside a few nuts and cranberries before taking the rest for supper. He shooed the kobold away, Kiba scurrying toward the outskirts of camp.

“Thank you Kiba,” Lapis called, the kobold freezing at the words.

The amurrun wasn’t sure, but it looked like the kobold smiled slightly. Faes was busy digging a small hole in the somewhat moist dirt, creating a pit that he proceeded to fill with dead wood. A set of small rocks surrounded the hole, a tiny spark emerging from his finger to start the flames below.

Linzi helped as much as she could, the halfling excited to learn a new way of concealing a campfire.

“No more nights without a fire for us,” she grinned, dragging foliage around to cover the camp in general, and making them near invisible in the darkness of the bog.

Lapis raised an eye, glancing at the work with a small frown. He’d used holes to hide flames before, in the Osirion desert, but he wasn’t sure the fire could hold out against the moisture in the dirt.

“Is it supposed to be smoking like that?” the amurrun frowned, watching the billowing white smoke flowing freely high into the night sky.

“No… Calistria save me… did you bring me pine wood?” Faes growled at Linzi.

“I tried not to,” the halfling protested. “But I can’t even tell what’s pine and what’s ash!”

“We’ll have to put it out-”

“Now hold on a moment,” Regongar said, stopping the elementalist. “We are cold and hungry. I don’t know about you, but I’d rather not eat raw meat again.”

“You’ll be raw meat if those trolls up there catch wind of this smoke,” Faes scowled.

A branch snapped suddenly, and the camp went deathly silent, Lapis’ ears swivelling as he tried to find the source of the noise. All he could hear was the crackling of the firepit as it burned the pine wood within.

The half-drow lowered his hood for the first time since meeting their new companions. Maybe he would have to fight them over being “evil” later, but if he couldn’t fight properly against the trolls that were no doubt coming for them, there wouldn’t be a later.

Setting his legs slightly apart, Faes took a deep breath, settling into a fighting stance. Energy flowed from the trees around him, the souls of frogs and birds filling him as he prepared to fight for his life.

A dark face pushed through the foliage Linzi had built, a dog following a brown skinned man. The man’s stern countenance broke into disbelieving relief as he found Linzi and Tristian loading their crossbows.

“You live?! But how? I saw you fall!” he demanded with a thick Garundi accent.

Faes didn’t lower his hands, though both Linzi and Tristian let out sighs of relief at the sight of the man.

“Lower your weapons, he is a friend,” Tristian said.

Taking a deep breath, Faes released his hold on the souls of the animals around him, letting them pass into their afterlives as the energy from them faded.

“Thuvian?” he frowned at the man, trying to place the accent.”

The man nodded with a similar frown, setting his longbow back in the quiver on his hip.

“I do not know you three. Or your tiger,” he said.

“Ekun, this is Faes, Lapis, Kiba, and Khemet,” Linzi introduced them. “They are helping us look for Cassiel, but you know where he is, right?”

Ekun’s face darkened, and Linzi faltered.

“Right?” she demanded, almost pled.

“Hard was the battle of the gates,” the ranger scowled. “The barbarian fell not long after you were crushed, or it seemed you were crushed. How are you alive?”

“Oh, that, Tristian and I are shielded by our goddesses,” Linzi waved off. “Amiri is okay, right?”

“No,” both Ekun and Tristian replied evenly.

“So let me get this straight,” Faes frowned, pouring water over the firepit and putting out the smoking wood. “This was never a mission to kill the trolls, it was a rescue mission, and doomed to failure before we even started?”

“Doomed missions are the best,” Regongar smirked at the half-drow. “They always come with the best rewards. I came out here for the gnome; he still owes me another round.”

“Another round? You mean a gnome was still walking after a half-orc was through with him?” Faes asked, raising an eyebrow.

“Keep talking like that and you won’t be walking either.”

“I have the feeling that was the plan from the beginning,” Faes sighed, looking back at the Thuvian ranger.

“I thought I was the only survivor,” Ekundayo frowned. “I thought I could bring the baron’s body back, but then I thought, the city knows not the ranger. They would think I murdered their baron.”

“Linzi and I discussed this a few days ago. Do you have our bags? There was a scroll to raise the dead in there from Lady Jamandi,” Tristian said.

“Yeah, she gave it to us before we left to kill the Stag Lord,” the halfling nodded. “Cassiel always kept it on him so if one of us were injured, we could be called back to his side.”

“I do not know what happened to the bags, I was busy trying to escape the trolls with the baron,” Ekun frowned. “But he has lost his lover. Does he wish to come back?”

“Heh, I know I wouldn’t want to miss out on the freedom of life,” Regongar smirked.

“Cassiel is invested in the barony, of course he would return,” Tristian said sharply. “He knows well his duty. And if that means he needs to find a way to return Theofrid to his side later, I am sure he’ll do what is required of him.”

“You talk too much of duty,” Faes said. “Tell me, if you lost a lover, would you return without him? What are you going to do when your baron doesn’t return? And who will pay us when you are left leaderless? After all, we didn’t agree to this out of the goodness of our hearts.”

“No indeed, I doubt you would know goodness should it stare you in the eye,” Tristian scowled.

The cleric let out a small gasp, his face falling instantly.

“I… I apologize, that was unworthy of me,” he murmured.

Faes shook his head, brushing it off.

“So, as it stands, we need to break into a troll fortress, kill everyone inside, and find a hidden bag with a scroll that might or might not bring back the man responsible for this barony,” he said.

“And kill Kargadd,” Ekun scowled.

“Is he inside the fortress?”

The ranger nodded.

“Then he is counted in killing everyone inside,” Faes sighed. “One of us clearly needs to wait outside. Linzi-”

“Oh no, I’m coming with you,” the halfling frowned.

“Fine… Kiba…”

The half-drow grunted, picking out the Draconic words he needed for the kobold.

“Kiba, you will stay here tomorrow and guard our camp. There will be a body, you will keep the body safe. If we aren’t back in a day, you take the body and the horses back to the city. Understand?”

Kiba nodded quickly, muttering something under his breath as he touched his pocket.

“Good. Then if that’s settled, we have nuts and blueberries for supper. Enjoy.”