Woad Children (Challenger's Call Book 3)

by Nathan Thompson

  “Alright,” I said. “Let’s move a few feet away and go quiet again. Alum, pick a good spot for us to rest.”

  The woad-marked man nodded, and led us a good distance away as I reactivated the shroud.

  There was a problem with my strategy. My dagger’s shroud required mana to maintain, and looking at my current mana pool I realized I couldn’t keep it up indefinitely. If I wanted to whittle away the spider-army’s patrols, I’d need to come up with another plan.

  I shouldn’t have been complaining. It was still an awesome power. But I really didn’t like being trapped underground with an army of spider monsters that could hear, see, or smell me. Focus, I told myself as I deactivated the shroud. As far as Val and Alum could tell there weren’t any freaky spider monsters within at least a hundred meters. Get more info, then figure out a plan. I turned to our newly rescued Gaelguard.

  “I need any information you have on what’s down here. How big is this underground forest? How many monsters did you originally battle? How many do you think are left?”

  “That last one’s going to be tricky,” Virtus spoke up. “They would have bred since then.”

  “Only to replace their losses.” Alum shook his head. “We battled their kind on the Woadlands long ago, even drove a nest of theirs out. The young they are unable to feed would have been consumed themselves.”

  Gross. But it was in line with all of the other crap I’d had to kill so far.

  “But there should be no more than a few hundred Arachmen, several times that many spider-slaves, a handful of Arachknights, and their honor guards.”

  “Fantastic,” Virtus muttered. “This will be difficult.”

  “We’ve dealt with high numbers before,” I pointed out, worried about morale.

  “And you did well. But Keepers set traps themselves. They won’t swarm out and die to your own traps like the Horde and our cohort’s fodder warriors did.”

  “We’ll have to figure it out,” I insisted, then something clicked. “Wait, do they primarily use webbing in their traps?” Both ancient warriors nodded. “How long does the webbing last? And do they bother replacing it when they know there’s no more remaining prey?”

  “If there’s prey, or if they’re expecting an attack, they rebuild it daily,” Alum answered.

  “But if they don’t, in a place like this, it would probably last several thousand years,” Virtus confirmed. “I was part of two contracts that dealt with reclaiming a Keeper-infested world. If there was no nearby prey, then they only webbed their dens and larders.”

  “Then they would be constructing traps behind us or where they predict we’d go,” I whispered. “Which means we either need to hit their dens or their larders. Come to think of it, with spiders, those two things are usually in the same place.”

  I couldn’t count on taking out random patrols, because they were just as good at stealth as we were and I had no idea what their routes would be. But Alum should have an inkling or two regarding their permanent locations. I hoped.

  “That reminds me,” I continued, turning to look at him. “How are you recovering so fast? Our healing wasn’t enough to make you immediately bounce back.”

  “I still haven’t.” The celtic-styled warrior shook his head. “I’m so weak I’d barely be a match for yon hollow-man.” He pointed at Virtus, who somehow snorted in contempt. “But the Woadblood pulses in tune with my heart, letting me be a little more alive every moment. It may well be a decade before I’m my old self again.”

  “It’s the tattoos, Wes,” Breena whispered. “Unlike normal Woadfolk tattoos, they’re a form of magic. They give the Gaelguard some of the Woadfathers’ strength and vitality.”

  Alum nodded, and his tattoos glowed as if in answer. Then he closed his eyes, as if he was concentrating, and the glow dimmed completely. “I was one of the last claimed, so I have an idea of where the others were taken. If we can save them too,” he said desperately, then took a breath and calmed himself.

  “I’d like to try,” I replied, grimacing. “But even if we can cure more people, I’m not sure we can protect them in a fight. The main reason we risked rescuing you was because we needed more information.”

  “You won’t have to protect us in a fight,” the woad-man snorted. “My people will be a match for these things even fresh out of the cocoons.”

  “How did you lose, then?” Virtus asked bluntly.

  “Same way the Earthborn lost to your people,” Alum retorted. “The Thing Below. Its magic turned the tide of every battle. So did the great beasts that hid in its shadow.”

  “Great beasts?” I asked, looking at Virtus. “Thing Below? You got any info on that, Virtus?”

  “He may be referring to our employer,” the skeleton hedged. “I never encountered him, so I can’t swear that’s what he’s referencing, but my understanding is that he was the reason we were able to outnumber the Earthborn warriors so badly.”

  “We were worse off,” Alum said bitterly. “We had to hide in the thing’s wake, and its tamed beasts were a match for entire teams of Gaelguard and awakened Woadfathers. That gave the Keepers too much advantage. We killed many, but they picked us off one by one, before we could reform our warbands.”

  “Alright,” I said. “We’ll decide what exactly to do based on the opportunities we see. Take us to a location you think we can hurt them at.”

  #

  Alum recommended that he lead us to where a small handful of Gaelguard were likely kept, and I agreed because there wasn’t much of a better option. This would increase our numbers and decrease the enemy’s fighting strength. That would have to be enough.

  To save my mana, we focused on traveling to a location that wasn’t too far away. Tied directly between two massive Woadfathers were two more statues, suspended in a massive black web. Five multi-eyed Arachmen were chittering quietly and angrily, while several scores of dog-sized spiders loomed over their heads.

  Alum stopped us from moving closer by pointing to all the lines of barely visible black silk running along the floor. That meant we either needed to fight them at range, cutting our attack power by half and giving more time for reinforcements to arrive, or I needed to change the terrain to where we could rush in more easily.

  Can the captives and Woadfathers burn? I asked in the mindlink, annoyed that Alum wouldn’t be able to answer me.

  Not easily, Virtus answered. The stone coating protects them somewhat, but I wouldn’t create a fire right next to them, or leave one in the vicinity going for a long time.

  The Woadfathers will burn if you try really, really hard, Breena answered. They would take about half an hour of effort just to catch fire.

  Got it, I answered. I’ll hit the floor. Everyone else hit spiders in the trees.

  I patted Alum and told him to go on my mark. He nodded.

  Then we opened up.

  Lightning, arcane bolts, and arrows coated with a vortex of sharp air fired into the trees. When the Arachmen shielded their eyes in surprise, I cut loose with another Fire spell Breena and I and been working on. Fire Curtain created a tall trail of flames that snaked toward two Arachmen standing next to each other. They screeched and leaped away from the new fire-curtain, ducking at the same time as they tried to figure out where all of the fire and lightning and death was coming from.

  It was a reminder that no one down here had been in a real fight for millennia.

  I knew I had to work harder to exploit that, so when my curtain of fire was no longer a threat I dropped it and charged down its web-free trail. Eadric, Alum, Virtus, and even Val followed in my wake. We sent two javelins and a bolt of lightning into the head of the burned Keeper on the right, and he crumpled to the floor in a smoking heap. To my further surprise, my bolt of lightning jumped from its now-dead target and burned its way into the next Arachman. His body suddenly went rigid with paralysis. Two more javelins followed, and then the total number of freaky man-spiders dropped to three.

  Your Lightning Magic has ad
vanced again, Karim sent to me as he fired another cluster of bolts into the trees. Well done.

  I didn’t really have time to thank him. Instead I bounded toward the nearest Arachman and directed Eadric and Virtus to close with the other two, and Val to assist where she could. I went with a horizontal slash this time, cutting across the monster’s right arm and chest as it leaped backwards. The thing hissed at me and slashed down with its top scythes. The sharp appendages skipped off my hastily-raised parry and I slashed out again. The creature leaped backward, but as it did so, a small, dark-haired figure darted by, and its left leg buckled. Its vital guard stabilized the damage a moment later but that was enough time for me to put my full weight behind my next swing and slam my glowing cleaver directly into the monster’s face. As my weapon parted the thing’s face, my Lightning magic triggered, and the Arachman went down, twitching and cooking. I stabbed the curved point into its neck one more time for good measure and looked around.

  To her credit, Val hadn’t lingered after helping me down the Keeper. She had immediately rushed to Virtus, staying low to the ground and projecting her intent through the mindlink. Virtus nodded and began stepping backward as the six-armed creature in front of him whirled its sharp appendages. Through my own mindlink I could see my adopted sister flash by the monster’s rear flank just as it was stepping forward, slashing quickly through the joints on both of the Arachman’s knees. My giant skeletal commander immediately reversed his momentum and drove shield-first into his crippled opponent, bearing the smaller creature to the ground while stabbing into it repeatedly.

  Eadric and Alum had finished their own Keeper before I could close in to assist. The dwarf had simply borne the monster’s attacks on his shield and bronze platemail while breaking three of the monster’s limbs with his hammer. Before its vital guard could help with the damage, Alum had stepped forward and driven my silvery short sword into the monster’s mouth.

  Once again, we cleared out all the humanoid enemies, and far faster than I was expecting. But their arachnid pets had begun streaming down the trees in dangerous clumps. By my guess at least twenty of them were still alive. Too many to take on without somebody getting swarmed and poisoned.

  There was no choice. I mouthed an apology to Smokey the Bear and hurled a fireblast at the largest cluster still coming down one of the trees.

  Wes! Breena snapped in my mind.

  Sorry! I retorted. Out of good ideas!

  To my surprise, this time my fiery blast sent several small balls of fire splashing outward after it detonated. Nearly a dozen arachnids hissed, bubbled, and fell to the floor in curled-up heaps. Also, there was a large scorch mark on the side of the extremely rare petrified god-tree that Breena would be bringing up for the rest of my life.

  They were covered in stone! I protested as I fired off my electric finger bolts into the other large cluster of giant spiders. And you said they were fire-resistant!

  I also said not to use fire directly against them! Breena hissed. We’ll talk about this later!

  Half of the surviving pet-sized spiders were picked off by our missile fire. The remaining four realized we outnumbered them by the time they reached us, but it was too late for them to run away. We picked them off quickly and took a moment to recover energy.

  “Two-minute rest,” I called out. “Then we recover the people and move.”

  “That was really, really easy,” Val spoke up. “Shouldn’t these things be stronger?”

  “The ancient ones probably still are,” Alum said as he walked toward the two cocooned statues. He looked down, and pointed to a clump of objects wrapped in silk. “These were new Arachmen. Young, untested. They didn’t even know how to use our old weapons.”

  I could make out several small, short-hafted weapons in the pile. There was some kind of one-handed, single-bladed axe; another short-bladed sword, similar to what I had lent Alum; and what looked to be another round wooden shield at the bottom. But the Gaelguard had barely given them more than a glance before he kept walking over to the two statues hanging in the web.

  “I’m sorry,” the man said softly. “I meant for them to come after me instead.”

  “You knew these two,” I stated as the rest got into position for removing the poison. I used more fire magic to carefully burn them clear of the web one by one, giving Virtus time to carefully lower the bodies to the floor.

  “My wife,” the man said quietly, pointing at the woman’s statue, and then at the male statue. “And my firstborn son. The Woadfathers found them worthy, and I let them follow my example. I was wrong.”

  “Maybe, maybe not,” I answered, shaking my own family issues from my mind. “We need to move quickly, so we’re going to cure them, grab the weapons, and move out. I’m assuming that those are their own weapons in that pile there.”

  “Aye,” he answered. “My own had long broken before I was taken. I had no spoils left to claim.”

  That was all I needed to know for the moment. We began the ritual to expel the poison from their bodies and to restore what had been lost from their bodies. Once again, powerful Blood Magic wracked through my body and once again, Teeth added his power to mine to expel Aegrim’s voice. This time we were able to purify both bodies in a burst of power, though the act left me panting for half a minute.

  When I recovered, I noticed Alum embracing his tattooed son and wife. His wife was a woman with dark brown braids, wearing hide pants and a chest band, while the son looked and dressed almost identically like his father, and was just a tad leaner. All of them had the scrawling woad tattoos glowing dimly on their bodies.

  “Daft fool,” the woman said, her voice hoarse. “Ye were supposed to get away and take our boy.”

  “Brama, that was my plan for ye,” Alum whispered. “I’m sorry it failed.”

  “You’re alive,” I interrupted gently. “So no one’s failed yet. I’m sorry to interrupt, but we have to move. Can you both walk?”

  “Who is this?” Brama said as she turned her head. Her eyes widened at the sight of me. “An Earthborn? Did we hold? Wait—” her eyes narrowed—“why is he so small and young? Can he even grow hair? He’s younger than Breyn!”

  Apparently that was the son’s name. He looked to be maybe five years older than me, and was currently giving me an apologetic glance. I decided he was the more reasonable of the three.

  “And why is one of the fleshless with him?” Brama growled, looking at Virtus, who sighed patiently.

  “Long story, and we don’t have time,” I answered, a little more irritably than I meant. “Virtus left his old legion to work for me, and I’m responsible for taking back the rest of Avalon. Yes I’m probably hundreds of thousands of years younger than you and yes, my sister—” I pointed to Val—“is even younger than me. But we’re all that you have to work with. I need to know if you’ve recovered enough to use those weapons, and if you need me to provide any. But if we don’t move now, the spiders will catch us all again and this time no one will come to rescue you.”

  “He’s right, Brama,” Alum whispered. “We have no time. Can you still feel the Woad-stream?”

  “Of course we can still feel the Woad-stream,” Brama muttered, her tattoos flaring suddenly. “We wouldn’t be sane or standing if we couldn’t.” She stepped away from her son and husband and tore the axe free of the webbing. “Let’s go.”

  We were up to ten people now, all armed after we burned the webbing off of the rest of the gear. This time I felt Carnwennan strain to shroud that many bodies, so I gave up on the idea and had us move out as soon as our mana pools had recharged.

  I was expecting us to get swarmed any second, but when we had more time to talk Virtus and Alum assured me that wouldn’t happen. The grove down here was large, and Arachmen colonies turned on each other when they reached a certain size. Since they were trapped down here and unable to secure more food, they would run into the same conflicts Virtus’ company had, only that rival Keeper groups, or Webs, would go a step further and
start viewing each other as food.

  Even though there was a whole, underground, national-park-sized forest of god trees to feed off of. That was the problem with Descending, though. The more monstrous one became, the more one became convinced that there was never enough food or prey, and that sharing whatever was left was the same as starving oneself.

  That was all explained to me in the break we had taken after rushing away from the last location. After that, we let the newly rescued Gaelguard pick a new location for attack, and they guided us over to another patch of Keepers and their petrified prey. Virtus and Alum were proven right. Instead of forming a massive hunt for us, the monsters had now fallen back to their nests around their prey-statues and webbed treasure, setting webbing traps so thoroughly that it actually made it easier to spot them. This group contained a hundred dog-sized spiders and seven Arachmen, and looked to have even more captured Gaelguard with them than the last group had.

  This time we took advantage of their self-isolation and went with the ‘shock and awe’ approach. As soon as Val told me they noticed us I created another explosion of light and sound. Again, my team shielded themselves beforehand and again, the arachnid monsters reacted with a cacophony of screeching, writhing, and clutching their eyes. That gave me enough time to burn the webbing again with my Fire Magic while everyone else pelted the spiders from the trees or got in position to close in on the man-spiders. Alum’s family tore into a whole pack of Arachmen and made such short work of them I had trouble believing they had spent untold centuries as poisoned food for the beasts. I’d have to get the full story from that later, I decided, when there weren’t any nightmare bug monsters snapping and clawing at my face and turning people into food-statues.

  Despite their numbers, this group of Keepers proved to be even weaker than the last. The spider-pets had been completely neutralized by my magic flash-bang and were picked off in whole groups of precise arrows and magic. The Arachmen were similarly dazed and their bodies came apart easily under our attacks.