Dark Obligations: Book One of the Phantom Badgers

by Krpoun, RW

  Javelins began to drop amongst the Badgers from a line of Goblins on a ledge some distance up the fault’s side as the two komad, now free of their pack saddles, roared into the Goblin ranks with much the same enthusiasm as Kroh, followed closely by Janna and Arian. Bridget cursed and dropped her sword, raising her hands to chant in a high and carrying voice as Johann, Trellan, and a wooden Robin, who had stolidly unsheathed Moonblade, set about keeping the Goblins off the children and ex-slaves.

  Before the Goblins could send down a third volley a linked series of exploding fireballs rippled across the length of the ledge, the flashes of light and flame briefly revealing the uppermost regions of the fault. The effort left her drained and spent, magically speaking, but about a third of the Goblin missile troops fell shrieking from the ledge, their clothing blazing, and the rest fled back into the mountain.

  In the rearguard position Starr and Durek had received the warning of impending danger, but before the Captain could order one of the guards on the children to come back and relieve him Kroh’s bellowing shout was heard, followed instantly by the higher-pitched howls of the attacking Goblins.

  The Captain cursed bitterly. “Help ward the children,” he motioned Starr forward as he trotted towards the head of the column. “Stay close to the others and don’t try to be a hero.” Dropping a Goblin with a snap shot, Durek discarded his crossbow and brought his axe to the ready position.

  Snow Leopard in hand, the little Lanthrell slipped past the ex-slaves as the fault rebounded with screams and the crash and wail of battle; javelins began to drop amongst them, and one of the ex-slaves shrieked like a wounded rabbit, the cry tapering off into wet howls.

  She had no time to see what had happened to the man, for new cries and wails broke out in front of her: a knot of Goblins had reached the center of the formation, such as it was, and the Badgers were in danger of being overrun. Bridget was on the floor struggling with a knife-wielding Goblin while a short distance away Robin, his face as blank as a stone slab, had set his back to a solid section of the fault’s wall and was defending himself, the three dead Goblins at his feet deterring any other attackers from trying their luck. Johann and Trellan were trying to keep the Goblins off of the children and had their hands full doing it. At least the missile fire from above had stopped.

  A Goblin warrior whose metal cap and short sword marked him as a Het (junior officer) just as surely as his insignia, had the last girl in a file of four by the hair and was dragging her and her companions back towards a narrow crevice; he was too intent on his prize to notice Starr until the crystal blue blade slid into his kidneys. Jerking her blade free, she gave him a good chop to the throat the way Kroh had showed her and booted the dying Goblin in the ribs, knocking him aside.

  Deflecting a spear point with her buckler, she drew a line of red down the wielder’s arm, the oddity of left-handed swordsmanship giving her a slight edge in this fight. Parrying with her shield, she slapped the end child on the rump with the flat of her sword, herding the girl, and the others she was tied to, back to the center of the fault. Bridget was back on her feet, she saw, sword-rapier and dagger in hand.

  The two komad had plowed into the Goblin ranks which were still disordered from Kroh’s passage, knocking the short humanoids aside and trampling those who could not jump clear. They cut a wide swath, their bulk and ferocity intimidating the Goblins who knew that the pig’s tough hides and subdermal fat were nearly as good as mail against clubs and light impact weapons, and that a spear would only penetrate if braced, an action which took more nerve and confidence than any of the komad’s foes were able to muster at the moment. The sudden volley of burning Goblins crashing down from above did nothing to raise the ambushers’ morale or aid their leaders’ attempts to rally the unit’s crumbling cohesion.

  Behind the pigs Janna was a stone-faced engine of destruction, working her broadsword and shield for all she was worth, Arian covering her back. Not that it was very tough fighting, as compared to some fights: the Goblins were so hopelessly scattered that her engagements were one-on-one, single actions where she had a superior weapon, longer reach, better armor, and greater experience. Methodically, never losing sight of the fact that a misstep or lucky blow could kill, she worked her way down the fault, killing or driving off every Goblin in her path.

  Racing to find the head of his column, Durek found that it had far outdistanced him; reaching the abandoned pack saddles, he saw two Goblins cutting the ropes that held Gabriella’s body to the top of the nearest saddle in order to get to the goods strapped on beneath. The Captain cut one down before they could scramble to their feet, and dealt with the other before it could flee. As the pack saddles and all their loot were left alone but for a few skulking Goblins, the Captain unhappily remained in place to secure the unit’s supplies, cursing his luck.

  In twos and threes Goblins darted out of crevices and side passages hoping to drag a pack or file of children off, keeping the four Badgers (Robin maintained his position against the wall of the fault, slaying any Goblin who came within reach of Moonblade) darting back and forth between files of screaming children and howling pack-bearers, some of the latter having armed themselves with weapons from the fallen Goblins.

  Slapping aside a spear point, Starr drove Snow Leopard through the Goblin’s throat, twisted, and ripped the blade free, glad that for once she faced opponents with a similar reach. Leaping back and looking about, she saw that a half-dozen Goblins had dragged a file to a side-passage opening and had severed the ropes leashing the children together; Duna had landed on a Goblin’s back and was flailing madly, if ineptly, with her knife while Picken clung to the leg of another attacker, bashing at its thigh with a rock. The other, younger, children were being dragged into the passage. Shouting a warning that went unheard, the diminutive Badger sprang to help, only to find herself facing two unengaged Goblins. She was no Janna, no master swordswoman able to parry and feint with sufficient skill to overwhelm multiple opponents, and it was all she could do to hold these two at bay.

  Then Trellan was racing past her, his sabre flickering out to hamstring one of her foes; as the surprised Goblin staggered back she leaned in, taking a club-swing on her buckler that numbed her right hand as she ripped the second warrior’s face open with a vicious thrust. Dancing back, she sidestepped and finished off the crippled Goblin as the club-wielder fled.

  For sheer confusion this fight was worse than any boarding action he had ever been in; Trellan wouldn’t have even noticed the children being taken if he hadn’t stumbled on a discarded Goblin shield and ended up facing in that direction. Leaving Starr to deal with the two guards, he raced towards the passageway, running the point of his sabre through the throat of the Goblin who was trying to get the screaming, kicking, and wildly slashing Duna off his back as he passed by.

  The Pa in charge of this bunch had gotten Picken off his leg by rapping the boy above the ear with the butt of his small axe, careful not to kill the child. The ex-sailor caught the ‘beard’, or down swept bottom edge of the axe blade on the top of his sabre and jerked upwards as he stepped in, sweeping the weapon out of the way and following with a thrust with his off-hand dagger. Leaving the dagger wedged in the mortally wounded Pa’s chest, he leapt into the passageway, deathly afraid of bearding the Goblins in their den, and praying that Starr was doing well enough to follow.

  Starr grabbed Duna’s shoulder and dragged the girl from where she was enthusiastically kicking in the face of the dead Goblin. “Grab Picken and take him to Robin and stay there,” Starr shouted, pointing to the swordsman who still held his position against the wall of the fault, indifferent to the fight around him; if the swordsman wouldn’t go to the defense of the children, she would send the children to him.

  The crevice was not much more than shoulder-wide, and up ahead the Goblins had halted for some reason and were struggling; the light in here was too poor to see why, but Trellan was grateful of the delay. Running on his toes, his soft buskins making litt
le noise, he was on them before they knew he was there. The delay, he saw as he closed, was due to the child being dragged off by the lead Goblin having gotten in a lucky blow to her captor’s groin; he still had a fistful of hair, but he was in no position to move forward and the Goblin behind him could not pass in the narrow passageway without releasing his own captive. Trellan stabbed the second Goblin in the base of the neck, cursing as his sabre’s point caught between two vertebrae and snapped, costing him an inch of blade. Smashing the convulsing warrior in the face with his sword’s guard, he ripped the child free of its grasp and half-shoved, half-threw the boy down the passage towards the fault.

  The lead Goblin heard the commotion over the shrieking of his captive, but he was too slow in releasing the girl and turning around, and Trellan opened the warrior’s throat before the short humanoid could bring his club to bear. Grabbing the girl, Trellan pushed her towards the fault. “Run, run!” Movement caught his eye as he straightened; looking down the passageway away from the fault he saw a half-dozen Goblins hurrying towards him, evil grins on their malignant little faces.

  “I’ll be keel-hauled and hung from the yardarm,” he cursed bitterly, backing carefully past his two dying victims, pausing to pull his boot-knife free of its scabbard and briefly wishing he still had his dagger. He was twenty feet from the fault and ten from the trotting warriors. “Damn you for a pack of land-loving nancy-boys,” he roared, moving a step back. “Come on, come on, one line, we’ll dance a hornpipe and double drink for all hands when the detail’s done.”

  The lead Goblin stumbled over the body of one of the two would-be abductors in his haste to close and nearly fell; Trellan lunged forward and stabbed him through the throat before the warrior could recover, immediately skipping back a couple steps towards the fault. “Watch your footing there, mate: an untidy deck’s a dangerous thing.”

  He backed up another step as a club wielding Goblin moved up at a more careful pace, its beady eyes gleaming in the poor light. “You remind me of an old whore I knew in the Suflands, forget the port,” Trellan observed, feinting with his boot dagger. The Goblin swung mightily only to have the Badger sidestep and plant four inches of sabre in its belly, twisting as he withdrew to widen the wound. “She never kept her mind on the job, either.”

  He caught the movement further up the passageway as the wounded Goblin staggered back, clutching at the bulge of intestines protruding through the rent in its rat-leather tunic, but it was too quick to react to: a hurled javelin flashed in and caught him in the left side, punching through his mail shirt and driving in between two ribs. The pain was a red-blue flash before his eyes; his knife clattered to the floor as he instinctively grabbed the shaft of the javelin as the weapon’s weight caused the shaft to sink towards the floor and the head levered upwards between his ribs.

  A Goblin Lapla, or serjeant, wearing a studded tunic and carrying a buckler and short sword knocked the mortally wounded club-wielder aside and rushed to close with Trellan, seizing the shaft of the javelin and shoving hard as he thrust with his sword.

  His grip on the shaft and staggering a half-step backwards helped, but still the javelin’s head slid in deeper; Trellan ducked the Goblin’s blade, which tore a line of fire across his cheek and hung agonizingly on his ear, in order to lash out with his sabre at the Lapla’s javelin-hand. Screeching, the Goblin released the shaft having lost most of the first two fingers. Ignoring the blood filling his mouth from his rent cheek, Trellan dropped his sabre and slid the javelin free of his body, using the bloody weapon’s shaft to parry the next swing from the short sword and managing to gain another step back towards the fault. He had covered half the distance back to his goal, he realized dimly through the pain, but he was beginning to doubt that he would make it the rest of the way.

  It took everything he had, but he reversed his grip on the javelin with a shaky flip of his wrist, brought the weapon to his shoulder as he hopped back a step, and cast. It was a desperation move to throw his only weapon, but it was getting hard to breathe and some of the blood in his mouth was coming up his windpipe; if he didn’t get back to Bridget and her Healing very soon, he might not get back at all.

  Luck or the Eight favored him: the Goblin saw the throw coming and blocked with his buckler, but the wounded hand wasn’t up to the job, merely deflecting the cast so that the javelin slapped the Lapla across the face sideways, breaking his snout. The Goblin reeled back into its comrades as Trellan staggered down the passageway and into the fault.

  Starr was holding off two more Goblins when he emerged, hard-pressed but doing all right, and the two children he had rescued from the passage were by Robin with the other two, safe as houses for now. Bridget and Johann were back to back a short ways up the fault, but the Goblins seemed to be losing their taste for the fight: even as he stepped out and bent painfully to rock his dagger free of the corpse at his feet the two in front of Starr disengaged and raced for the far wall of the fault. His legs gave way as he tried to straighten back up, toppling him onto the ground.

  He rolled over onto his back, painfully aware that he wasn’t going to be able to stand up again by himself. Things were getting a bit dim and calm, just like when the drink had really bit in and the floor was only a half-pint away; he watched a Goblin charge from the passageway with a spear aimed right for his chest without a worry in the world. Starr’s sword flickering out from the side and catching the warrior in the neck brought a warm sense of approval, as if he were watching a competition from the sidelines. It was growing harder to breathe, but to counterbalance that the pain was growing more and more away from him, as if he was feeling it from a great distance. Any minute he knew, Bridget would come over and Heal him and everything would be all right. Until then he planned to close his eyes and concentrate on his breathing.

  Janna darted around Iron Tusk, who was dancing atop a Pa she had just knocked down, and found a blood-drenched Rolf sitting against a solid section of the Fault’s wall bandaging a gash in his thigh.

  “Where’s Kroh?” Janna asked, breathing hard; the Goblins were fleeing, having had quite enough. “Is all that your blood?”

  “No, Kroh decapitated one and it sprayed all over me,” The half-Orc finished the knot and picked up his bloody dirks. “Kroh was right... there he is.” The battered and bleeding Waybrother emerged from a crevice, gory axe in one hand, the Serao’s totem in the other.

  “Right, can you walk? Good, then we’re pulling back to the main body, this lot’s finished.”

  “Damn good fight,” Kroh bellowed cheerfully as he swaggered up. “Must have killed a dozen, I have, probably two dozen.’

  “Good work,” Janna observed. “Now come on, we’ve broken the Serao as a unit, but there’s plenty Goblins still alive so we’ll need to run off any stragglers and head for sunlight before they reorganize.”

  “Be pretty tough for them to do that,” Kroh observed, his pace slowing as the fighting rage left him and fatigue began to creep in. “I killed the Serann myself.”

  Their Captain was still guarding the pack saddles when the four Badgers and two pigs arrived, his axe well bloodied and several dead Goblins littered about. “Good, you’re back. Are they broken? Great. Get these back onto the komad, and Arian, start tending wounds; I’ll see to the others.”

  Durek found Bridget bandaging a nasty scrape on a child’s arm amidst a litter of corpses. “Looks like it was a damned hard fight back here,” he observed, trying to remember where he had left his crossbow. “How is everyone?”

  “Trellan’s dead,” Bridget covertly wiped tears from her eyes. “Too much blood lost too quickly. He died getting four children back from the Goblins.”

  “Damn.” Durek scrubbed at his face with a filthy hand. “This has been the worst...anyway, what of the others?”

  “Robin, Starr, and Johann are all right, as are all of the children. One of the ex-slaves took a javelin and is dying-I cannot Heal at all, my powers were used up in offensive spells. Another was slain in t
he fighting, and two more are gone along with their packs, run off or dragged off is anyone’s guess.”

  “Only one made it, eh? They were a hard-luck bunch. Get the children sorted out as quickly as you can, I don’t want to waste any time getting out of here. The Hydra could get reorganized or another Serao arrive.”

  The Captain paused by Trellan’s blanket-wrapped body for a moment, lost within his own thoughts. Finally he stirred himself and told Johann and Starr to carry the dead Badger to the pigs.

  He found the only surviving pack-bearer, the man who called himself Pelhan, sitting with his back to the fault’s wall, a bloody small axe in his lap. “Right, we’re pulling out now, we’ve lost two packs and the rest of the bearers, so what I want is for you to put your pack on, and tie a rope to that pack there, and drag it along behind you. It’s only a short ways to the surface, so you won’t have to drag it very far. And you can leave that axe behind.” Pelhan fixed the Captain with a murderous stare, but rose to his feet and sullenly followed his instructions. Durek looked about a bit for his crossbow before writing it off; like as not some Goblin had snatched it up. Unstrapping the weapons from the three remaining packs, he rejoined the main body, followed by a cursing Pelhan.

  After borrowing one of Rolf’s crossbows and stowing the weapons from the packs onto the komad the Captain set the order of march while Rolf, freshly Healed, limped around the fault finishing off Goblin wounded; like most half-Orcs raised in Human lands, Rolf hated Orcs and their cousins the Goblins with a terrible intensity.