TS6 - Chapter 32

Kat could hear the orcs chasing after her.  Their heavy breathing and angry yells followed her as she wove in and out of the trees.  Despite all her stat points in agility, Kat didn’t dare to look back.  Her legs might be faster than an orc’s, but theirs were twice as long and she wasn’t thrilled about her chances in a long distance foot race.

Luckily for her, she wasn’t traveling a long distance.

Barely a minute later she spotted the first of the bushes that Dorrik had set up to mark their traps and pre-made defenses.  Kat veered toward it, reaching out with her mind toward the clearing just behind the plant where Kaleek had created a huge pile of loose dirt.

The orcs were right behind her as Kat when she arrived at her target.  She scrunched her eyes shut and yanked on the soil with her domain, creating a huge cloud of dust and leaves just as she jumped.

A second later the first orc yowled in surprise as it broke through the thin layer of twigs and leaves that Kaleek used to conceal the pit.  Kat didn’t bother to look back to see how effective the trap was, instead angling herself toward another one of the bushes Dorrik had set up.

She slowed slightly, giving the orcs a chance to clear the cloud of dust and leaves and spot her again.  Of the eight orcs that had taken off after Kat, only five emerged from the chaos of the first trap.  As soon as they caught sight of her another angry shout went up and they gave chase.

Kat darted toward the second trap, grabbing mental hold of the loose dirt and leaves even as she bolted around the mat of freshly cut branches that marked the pit itself.  Just as the orcs were about to catch up to her, Kat threw up another smokescreen, blinding her pursuers right before they plummeted headlong into the yawning pit.

This time when she slowed on the other side of the trap, there were only three orcs and all of them were moving cautiously.  They still pursued Kat, but much more slowly and none of the monsters seemed willing to let their companions stray more than an arm's length away from them.

She changed direction, running toward the third and final pit trap.  When the orcs seemed a bit reluctant to chase her, Kat wheeled around and drew one of her throwing daggers, whipping it at the leading raider.

The orc brought its heavily muscled forearm up in time to block the thrown blade.  It sank about a finger’s length in, almost as much as the previous crossbow bolt.

Her opponent bellowed, more in anger than pain, and ripped the dagger free, throwing it to the side before barreling after her.  Its two companions sprang into motion a heartbeat later, flanking the injured orc on either side as Kat spun around and sprinted for the next row of traps.

This time the sudden spray of leaves and dirt that marked the edge of the pits didn’t fool the orcs.  They stopped in their tracks, wary of falling for the same ruse that had claimed their companions.

Unfortunately for the monsters, Kaleek and Dorrik weren’t content to let them reclaim the initiative.  Kat’s companions burst out of the undergrowth, swords glinting in the sunlight as each of them managed to take a half-blind orc by surprise.  Kaleek’s attack severed a leg outright, his armored shoulder hitting the suddenly destabilized opponent a fraction of a second later and sending it tumbling into its companions just as Dorrik arrived in a whirlwind of flashing steel.

Neither of his swords had enough weight to cut completely through the orc’s thick head and heavy muscles, but that barely even slowed him.  Each cut was as quick and precise as a striking viper, severing tendons and opening arteries with horrifying efficiency.

The sole uninjured orc surged back to his feet only to meet a follow up attack from Kaleek.  Its axe swung downward, slamming into the greatsword with enough force to make Kaleek’s knees buckle.

Dorrik took that moment to finish off his opponent, cutting open both of his orc’s jugulars as the reeling creature stared dumbly at its suddenly unresponsive limbs.  The second his opponent went down he circled around Kaleek, blades flickering in and out of the fray as he began systematically dismantling his enemy with the same precision he had used on his first target.

By the time Kat had returned to the fight, all three of the orcs were down, Kaleek beheading the legless orc just as she arrived.  Without further comment the three of them shared a quick look before moving on to the other two pit traps.  The orcs below bellowed in anger and tried to climb the slick dirt and clay that lined their prisons, but Kat ignored them as she sought out and quickly found the piles of kindling that the three of them had prepared and began showering the angry raiders with dried pine boughs and what looked like great strips of birch bark.

Kaleek stood next to the top of the hole, sword at the ready just in case one of the orcs managed to escape during the five or so minutes it took Kat and Dorrik to half bury their opponents in flammable material.  Then, with a wide grin, he took a chunk of flint and ran it along the edge of his blade generating a shower of sparks that quickly ignited a branch in Kat’s hand that was covered in orange, bone dry pine needles.

He took the flaming brand from her and dropped it into the pit.  It took a second for the birch bark to catch fire, but almost immediately after the flames started, the bellows of anger transformed into screams of pain.  Kat shuddered for a second as she stepped back.

Part of her wondered if it would’ve been easier for her to collect the stones she’d used on the stockade to pummel each earthen prison individually, but that probably wouldn’t have worked.  Despite Kat’s efforts the walls of the pit were only made from dirt, and the orcs in the second hole were already making progress toward climbing out.  Traveling all the way back to the fort would have given them enough time for one or two to escape.

With that thought in mind, the three of them hurried to the next location just in time to see one of the orcs clamber over the edge.  Kaleek hit him like a freight train, shoving his sword through the creature’s shoulder before he smashed the reeling monster back into the pit.  

Once again he stood guard while Kat and Dorrik hurried off to gather the pre-stored kindling.  Five minutes later, they walked away from another smoking pit, the screams of pain in their wake painting a fairly creepy smile onto Kaleek’s face.

As for the stockade itself, Kat’s barrage had collapsed two of the three watch towers, and the orcs had left the front gate ajar when they had rushed out to chase her.  The three of them carefully entered, wary of an ambush or survivors.

Inside, there were two dead orcs and two that were heavily injured.  The ones hit by Kat’s larger rocks didn’t survive.  The heavy stones had enough momentum to penetrate their dense flesh, snap thick bones and crush organs underneath.  For the remaining two orcs, one was half buried under the wreckage of a demolished watch tower and although the other managed to stand up, it had a broken arm and leg and was completely unable to defend itself when Kaleek charged it and quickly put it to the sword.

The rest of the palisade wasn’t anything special.  There was a fire pit with some sort of meat on an iron spit suspended over it.  From the nearby midden pit, Kat was able to guess that it contained what remained of the sheep that had been stolen from the village.  Beyond that there were two buildings, one was a large, roughly built bunkhouse with beds for roughly twenty orcs.  The other was a smaller and more securely constructed building with a crude lock on its door.

Kat raised an eyebrow and nodded at the smaller building.

“Our princess I suspect,”  Dorrik said, walking over and inspecting its lock.  After a moment or two of fiddling with it, the lokkel stood up with a satisfied expression on his face and drew his right sword.

With a flick of his wrists, a flash of steel, and a spray of sparks, Dorrik’s sword slashed through the pitted and rusted iron of the lock.  It fell to the packed soil of the palisade floor with a heavy thud.

He pushed the door inward with his upper left hand, sword still at ready.  Inside a woman was laying on a cot, a book of some sort in her hands.  She looked up but Kat couldn’t really see past Dorrik as the lokkel stepped into the room.

“Thank God,” she said, her familiar voice striking Kat like a bolt of lightning.  “I thought I was going to be stuck in here forever.”

“Whip?” Kat asked incredulously, pushing past Dorrik.  Sure enough, inside the small room, Whippoorwill was dog-earing the page on a book and standing up.  Other than the cot and a wooden plate with some crusted food scraps on it, there wasn’t really anything else inside.

“What are you doing here?”  Kat pressed.  “This dungeon is supposed to be a challenge for my team.  It could last up to a month.  The notice we got about being sent here didn’t mention anyone else.”

“Surprise?”  Whippoorwill said dryly.  “I thought I was going to have another regular day of training when I went to bed but instead I woke up in some medieval village with a notification saying that I was going to have to play the role of a non player character in one of my companion’s trials.  They gave me a lot of scenario information that I don’t really need, but the long and the short of it is that the orcs worship some dragon and have built a small city around its lair.  The only way to sneak inside to ‘recover its treasure’ is to sneak past the orcs and ambush the dragon while it’s sleeping.  Supposedly I have some sort of temporary clairvoyance powers that will let me help you out and that’s why the orcs decided to kidnap me.”

Kat shared a quick glance with Dorrik.  Her tongue darted out to nervously wet her lips as she prepared a tactful reply.

“What, uh.  What level are you?”  She asked.  “Last I checked you were level eight, but even if you made it to level nine, this dungeon is-”

“Oh I’m not fighting anything,” Whippoorwill replied quickly.  “I saw how strong those orcs were when they raided the village.  No thanks.  I don’t want to get torn in half.  No, my job is to use whatever fake magic they have built into the tower to help you plan a heist on this dragon’s lair, all while staying safely well away from combat.  If anyone with a sword gets within five hundred paces of me, it means that something has gone very very wrong.”

“That’s your job,” she continued, standing up to walk out of the prison room.  “Honestly?  It feels like this level was designed for us.  I heard the orcs talking and apparently they captured a crystal ball that I used as the ‘town princess’ in order to observe people from afar.  It should be in one of the chests over in their barracks.  Allegedly, I should be able to use that to scry your movements and give you updates.”

Kat felt her worry melt away and a smile began to blossom on her face.  She was still stuck in the middle of a tough scenario, and she had no idea how to defeat the dragon at the end, but things were starting to feel familiar.

“Just like old times,” she said, turning to walk toward where the orcs had been sleeping.  “It’s refreshing actually.  There’s something about the simplicity of the old days.  None of the corporate wrangling nonsense, just you and me against the world.”

“And us!”  Dorrik said cheerfully.  “Don’t forget that Kaleek and I are against the world alongside you as well.”

“Don’t be a third wheel,” Kat replied, winking at the lokkel.  “I was trying to turn this dungeon excursion into a bit of a date for Whip and I.  Obviously you’re here and I’ll be fighting beside you, but you need to learn to read the room.”

Dorrik looked around, crest swaying in confusion as he cocked his head to the side.  “But Miss Kat, there is no writing in this room.  In fact, I have not seen any writing in this entire outpost.”

His voice dropped to a hushed, almost theatrical stage whisper.  “I suspect that the orcs may be illiterate.  A true shame really.”

Kat’s brain stuttered to a halt.  It tried to restart itself, only to fail once again to comprehend why Dorrik had decided to bring up orcish literacy rates in response to a failed idiom.

“I don’t know about a third wheel,” Kaleek said thoughtfully.  “There are two of us.  That would make Dorrik the third wheel and me the fourth.  I get that three wheels are fairly strange, but four wheels is a car, and for all the things your world gets wrong, sports cars are one of the things it absolutely gets right.  If our presence turns this little outing of yours into a muscle car, I am proud to say that I had a part in improving it.”

He winked at her, and internally some of Kat’s tension released itself.  At least ONE of her friends knew what was happening and was actively playing along with it.  As dear as Dorrik was to her, Kat wasn’t sure if she could take two of him.

Scratch that.  There was no way she could handle two 

“How about you honey?”  Kat asked, turning back to Whippoorwill as a flash of pink hair scurried past her and into the orc barracks.  “Do you mind if these two gentlemen join us for our little excursion?”

Whip broke out into a laugh, pausing her search of the barracks to spin on a heel and smile back at Kaleek and Dorrik.

“Of course,” she said brightly.  “I’d be happy to have the two of them along.  I’m sure it will be all kinds of fun.”

“Plus,” Whip continued, a hint of shyness slipping into her voice, “I’ve always wanted to see how the three of you worked together in the Tower.  I’m pretty close with my team, but we don’t seem to be anywhere near as inseparable as yours.  When I watch Kat sparring with one of you two, sometimes I see one of you acting before the other moves.  It’s clear that your group has fought together so much that you can anticipate each other’s moves, and I want to see that in action.  Even if it’s something to strive for, I want to know what that goal looks like.”

“Be honest,” Kaleek replied, reaching out a big furry mit to ruffle Whip’s hair.  “You just want to see Kat in action.  For all of the things I might say to tease her, there’s no denying that she’s an artist with those knives of hers.”

Whippoorwill just blushed, sending a rush of blood to Kat’s face as well.  She’d made a joke about the dungeon run being a date, but it was just that a joke.  The same sort of back and forth ribbing that she was used to with Kaleek and Dorrik.

But Whip’s face didn’t lie.  Her girlfriend honestly wanted to know more about the way that she fought.  That shouldn’t have been cute or endearing, but somehow it was.  Whip wanted to know more about her, she wanted to be involved in something that was an essential part of Kat’s because she cared about her.

“It is always good to learn more about how your partner fights,”  Dorrik said, nodding sagely.  “I know that I have not officially asked Jaalin to be my mate, but I can feel that the two of us are working toward that end.  Jaalin and I spend a good amount of time sparring.  My hope is that once Miss Kat manages to take control of Earth, we can slow down our pace a little bit.  Once things calm down a bit, we can start doing missions with her again.  I can only hope that one day, Miss Whippoorwill can join us properly for an adventure or two.”

“What the big guy said,” Kaleek agreed.  “I don’t want to put her at risk or anything, but it’s good to have little team building exercises like this.  It’ll be fun.”

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