Fate Deals the Cards Temperance
Chapter 24 The Breakfast Of Champions
Some nights you just can’t find a place to ditch a possessed slaver knight with a shadow spider demon up his ass. Goblin life can get complicated, doubly so in the witch-doctor game, I was finding.
I dipped out of the late night picnic party with a quickness, because I recognized the unwashed smell of those escaped slaves and they didn’t need any more trouble from me.
I was also not interested in finding out what would happen if that thing ate more people, for just all sorts of reasons. I kept my sweet psychedelic rock anthem going, as I slid back down the embankment and made my way downstream, taunting and waving my ass at the demon spider, as one does.
/
“White Rabbit?” The deranged man asked, with a deeply confused look on his face.
“My name’s Reggie, Reggie Ward.” He grumbled, his head aching something awful. “I don’t call you crazy human, uncle Wheel.”
“You remember me? You were so little, last time I saw you…” He sighed fondly, as old men will.
“No, but my folks always said, stay well clear of the Wheel.” He grumbled unhappily.
“Kid, do you have any idea how astronomically unlikely your rescue was, and still is?” The man looked deeply puzzled and amused by some fool whistling a merry tune in the woods. “It is, Jefferson Airplane. Crazy! Hey Reggie, is there another person in these woods? A weirdo like me?”
Just then, all hell broke loose, as a hideously ugly goblin man sprinted naked through the camp and dipped back out into the gulley, whistling a sweet bit of classic rock.
“Wow, that seemed unlikely!” Wheel remarked. “Imma put a pin in that.” He mumbled with deep amusement in his voice.
“Listen up folks… This scene is getting too popular, let’s head for the after party.” The man shouted, suddenly seeming rather reliable and sensible, after all. “We’re gonna march out, not far from here a couple miles. There, we’ll wait for our ride out of this place.”
He waved his hands at the tired, frightened and confused people. “Up-up! Let’s go, leave your rubbish, camping etiquette is out the window, off we go!”
He called the sleek cat woman over with a wave. “We haven’t really talked, and you don’t know me, but here. You move like you know how to use these things.” Wheel pressed that fine sword and dagger into her hands. “I need your help with these people.”
“I will aid you so far as my honor allows, lord Wheel. I am Thera, former Adventurer, though only iron rank… now former slave… So perhaps…”
“Ah! A guild sister! Splendid! Those are my gifts to you and any help you can provide will be both appreciated and richly rewarded.” He flashed a shimmering silver Adventure badge, signifying the rank of master, before letting his tattered cloak hide the thing once more.
Wheel gently and vigorously urged his two dozen dazed people off into the woods in the middle of the night, leading them where only he knew.
“The key to moving a group of traumatized beings away from a battle between an aberration that should not exist and a nameless horror from beyond, is to not mention either one to the poor folks.” He remarked to Reggie and Mary a long while and a few miles later.
“Equally important, is to not disclose that we are actually being guided through the woods by a ghost, who is leading us to his unquiet grave, even now.” He paused his disturbing diatribe for a moment and looked puzzled. “Where is your feline friend going?”
“My honor calls me back, master Wheel. I go home to the princess and sensei Ghnash.” She saluted with her shiny new sword and slipped into the woods, vanishing in the fading night.
/
I could feel the night slowly slipping away; and with it, my chances of slipping away in the dark, leaving this clown alone in the woods to be hunted down later.
I was unlikely to kill the man, without getting got by his demon shadow and he was clearly not in charge anymore; which was a real load off my mind. The spider seemed super dumb, just raw hunger and predatory instincts.
I could run circles around the stumbling host body, but once the sun blinded me, all the advantages I enjoyed at the moment would vanish.
With my plan to abandon him in the woods ruined, I was stuck with plan B… Which was still evolving as I ran and taunted the otherworldly nightmare. I flung stones at them, hooted, gibbered, did plenty of ass waving… It was my whistling that seemed to key the thing in on me most effectively, it seemed to be sensitive to higher pitches and would stumble and lose focus if I made sudden key or tempo changes. That helped me ring the human host’s bell with a few thrown stones. The shadow was adept at intercepting my projectiles when I tried to dent the metal man, but timing a sudden key change to my attacks let me rattle a few rocks off his armored dome.
I had no destination and the gully flattened out into the sea in a half mile, where the little river sank into the sand and entered the sea. It was kinda home turf, cause we’d been camping in the area and I like to roam, but that wasn’t much help at the moment.
As we left the gully and woodlands, the fog thickened and became a wet, physical presence. By the shore, it had a texture to it, one I enjoyed, since I was always naked and oiled up.
Feels good, bro. Try it on some foggy night by the shore with someone you care deeply for, and maybe some of those twiggy little brown mushrooms…
By now, I was whistling Billy Joel’s greatest hits, just to keep the thing going, it really tweaked the spider’s tits… “Heh, who ever heard of spider-boobs?” I muttered, while skipping over a shallow stream, onto the sandy shore.
As the thing lurched and grabbed at the bait, a role performed by the goblin king tonight, I started to notice… in the mist and fog, it was slower and less nimble, a lot less nimble. Like it weighed a lot more and was maybe less shadow and more spider, here.
On instinct, I grabbed a nice sharp rock and hucked it at my dance partner; at the shadow, rather than the man.
Unlike all the other shit I’d pelted it with, the rock hit with a wet sounding thunk and sank in, before beginning to sink through the shadow beast’s form. The thing didn’t enjoy it, not at all!
While the rock was slowly, ever so slowly sinking through the thing to land on the shore, the critter was even more sluggish.
“Papa’s got a brand new bag!” I muttered, while skimming another rock at the shadow.
/
On a lonely, wooded hill with a pretty unremarkable stone cairn atop, the group halted. Around two dozen beast-folk, men women and a few teens, of several races waited there; led by the strange man in brown robes who’d showed up with Reggie and the girl out of nowhere.
“What are we doing here?” Someone asked. “I swear we just wandered deeper into the wilderness!”
“We did, we did indeed!” Wheel announced with glee. “You are about to take part in a daring escapade, one no one will ever believe!” Baskets of pies appeared from his voluminous sleeves, with jugs of cold tea, as the sun began to rise over the hills. “Eat, drink, my friends…”
He sat on the cairn and watched as the hungry and thirsty folks devoured the food and chugged down the tea.
“That stuff was all drugged… you’ll thank me later.” He remarked as they began passing out one by one.
“You suck, Wheel.” Necro complained, as he stepped out of the shadow of the cairn. “They’re gonna freak out when they wake up!” He complained, before shaking his head and grinning with all those sharp teeth at his fae and mad brother. “You got the kid… and all these strays too?”
“Better and better!” He whispered eagerly. “I think one of us is here!”
“Really? I’d heard rumors of a warrior musician in the winds lately. The dead do gossip.” Necro mumbled, lost in thought. “I can touch this place now, but not for long. Would you mind staying and finding this new card?”
“Aw, you know I’m not good at recruiting… The Hive won’t even answer when I call!” Wheel whined and grumbled.
“You thrive in low magic worlds like this one… you know you want to.” Necro wheedled and cajoled. The truly ancient and wise know when to bend a little; stiff necked pride is a foolish thing. “Full autonomy. Judgement and the Tower will be strictly need-to-know and hands-off.” He promised.
Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.
“You recruited the Lovers after I failed, brother. He aids our cause now… and he made contact with the Plague Doctor. He too will join us. Have more confidence.”
As he spoke, the single humble cairn became a vast necropolis, hoary and dusty with ages long forgotten. When the sun finally rose over that queer and eldritch city of the unquiet dead, only misty woods remained; and a single cairn with a brown robed man seated on the lowest stone.
Of the slaves and the dead city, no sign remained.
“Thank’s friend, rest easy.” He whispered to the haunt drifting over the cairn, lost on a world not her own.
“Let’s go find our brother… well, my brother. And you’ll have to wait here. Toodles!”
He began to skip and prance down the hill, leaping from one stone to another and skipping across meadows more swiftly than a fallow deer sprints through the woods.
“I really hope the demon and that monster kill each other…” He remarked to the ghost of one of those men. “Choked on your own toxic dart? Tough break! Fuck you, slaver.” He scolded the ghost. “You clowns unleashed a child of Ungoliant on a populated world! Nightweaver spawn are stupidly dangerous!”
He walked through the distraught shade, dissipating it rather rudely, as spirits measure such things. “Messes to clean up, shadow demons to evict… Weird goblins and who the fuck is Temperance?”
He muttered to himself
/
The first light of dawn landed like a death knell on my spine. I was exhausted, far from home, in the open and about to be mostly blind, while fighting for my life against something uncanny. I was running low on options and throwing rocks at it was only getting me so far.
Running on empty, with few options and no help incoming, I settled my obsidian knife and oar-shield into my hands, drawing them from my shadow even while the creature observed me… Which suggested it was non sentient and that the human was no longer an active participant in our games. My best bet was to immobilize the man and run for it, before the approaching sun blinded me entirely.
In a story, this was the point where an ally would show up with a magic sword, or something to turn the tide of battle. But in stories, nobody shows up to save the goblin, ever… even in goblin stories.
/
Thera patted her fine new sword and dagger with pride… if that man was truly one of the Tarots, this was a princely gift indeed, one that was meant for great deeds. Such a sword could cleanse her stained honor, if wielded with a firm wrist, a true point and some guts behind it. She smiled as she dashed through the forest before dawn, headed toward her duty and her fate.
/
“Thera!” Saphie cried, when the cat woman emerged from the brush, exhausted and smiling.
“Princess… I have returned, the human and the rabbit are safely away.” She knelt before the tiny gobbo much as she always had, but now without the collar and a sword at her hip, she knelt as a retainer should. As a bodyguard should, head high and eyes roving the scene.
“You didn’t go help King-papa! Those was orders!” The tyke cried angrily.
“Sensei fights a demon of shadows and darkness, a hunger for blood, made manifest; I would be no help there.” She replied soberly. “I will die in your service, princess, but I will not cast my soul into darkness. Sensei will return to us. I am certain of this.”
“Hmph.” She grumbled, hugging her friend fiercely. “I was worried.”
“Worry not, princess. I will be with you, always.” She soothed the tiny goblin, rocking her gently.
/
I found a nice jagged lump of flint on the beach during my predawn exercise, leading the all night rave. That gave my foggy brain the germ of an idea.
I’d binged the knight a few times in the dome with no result. His helmet was dented, but he wasn’t slowing down. My guess was that lord Dipstick was either dead or catatonic and getting the Weekend at Bernie’s treatment, puppeted by the critter. I decided to test my theory and my luck, with a dicey move.
I whipped a nice round rock into the shadow, slowing it down, followed by my jagged flint chunk, thrown with maximum force at lord Fuckstain; not at his dome, but at his groin.
Horseman's armor tended to skimp on groin protection, since from the saddle, there was a whole horse in the way… and a saddle too. Crotch armor, when seated, was a bad choice for some obvious comfort and quality of life reasons.
The super sharp, wickedly pointed stone slashed into his lightly protected tenders in a very satisfying way, but got almost no response… aside from a gout of blood that would be a real problem for a living man.
He kept staggering after me, as the world slowly lightened in the east, trying to get his grasping, reaching shadow in range of your friendly local witch-doctor.
As clumsy and slow as that zombie puppet was, I was dragging ass and it was getting way too bright, as the fog became a dazzling display of colors to the east.
I moved in fast, plunging my glass knife into the back of his knee as I rolled by, desperately blocking the spider’s flashing legs and fangs with my sturdy, obsidian rimmed oar.
The human made no sound when his leg became useless meat, tumbling him to the rocky shore; his life-blood gushing out in great spurts that quickly slowed.
Enraged and less mobile, the creature flailed at me, growing feeble and slow as it’s host died.
I got a lucky block in, staggering the beast, so I took a chance, ripping one of my square, chunky edges of glass down the monster’s flank as I rolled away.
To my surprise, it shrieked, wailed and discharged a great gout of something that evaporated away in the softly glowing fog.
As the light grew brighter, it became more substantial and less… just less! With giddy delight, I circled the creature, just out of reach.
That was my mistake… The first real rays of the sun cast a proper shadow of me on the sand; diffuse and hazy, but my shadow. The spider pounced on it in an instant, dropping brave lord Deadguy, the not even a little bit lamented, into the sand; stone dead at last, as the creature sank into my shadow, into me...
/
Wheel watched from a low dune, hidden among the clumps of grass and weeds, his robe blending in with the stones and sand. “A pity… and he was doing so well, too.”
The green guy had been good, startlingly good. Wheel had fought goblins before; savage packs of raiders led by ogres or trolls, and the marching hordes of the light cult in their thousands… Live long enough and you will fight at least one of just about everything, in the Adventure game.
Goblins were a constant and pernicious threat, across the universe and realms. They were always cunning, sneaky, vicious, quick and surprisingly tough, but never skilled. This one had trained, long and hard to become the sly, drifting, effortless dancer who evaded with such grace, yet attacked with precise, carefully controlled and economical movements.
When the demonling got into his shadow, that was that; Wheel watched the little guy stop in mid-attack and fall over, his body engulfed in black, swirling shadowstuff. With the host dead and sunrise incoming, the demon was a goner, at least. The shadow dribbled into the sand, leaving nothing behind at all, not a trace of the crazy gobbo remained.
“Well fought, little dude. Better luck in your next life.” He stood and walked away, headed for the road and off to find the face-card that his divinations promised was here, somewhere on this miserable rock.
“Where are you, my brother?” He asked a crystal pendant, dangling on a chain of interlinked bones, sparkling in the sun. It twitched and spun a few times, as if the object of the spell were very close at hand, then failed and dangled there inert…
“Huh… Vanished! What are the odds of that?!”
/
Far to the north and east, Hessen sat up from her nest with a gasp, as her pain and cramping ended, suddenly and with finality. The sensation of her hexes and curses shattering was a little jarring, but the pleasure that flooded her…! Just knowing that the ‘king’ was no more, left her giddy.
/
Emmie and Saphie watched from high in a tree, looking out to see if the king would stumble home late, sun-blinded and grinning like an idiot, as usual. He never showed, not through three long days and nights encamped in a dale between two hills, far from anything, just as instructed.
Slowly, girls began to drift away, seeking better forage and hunting, as food became scarce around the meeting point. In ones and twos, they left, some sobbing with tearful farewells, most just vanishing into the woods, seeking a new place to dwell.
/
I fell and fell through endless, featureless half-light and near-darkness for a long time, while wrestling that damned spider thing for all I was worth.
If we were falling, even; perhaps we were just lost between the worlds of light and darkness, where nothing is really distinct.
I was beyond caring about anything but an absolute certainty that I was going to eat this fucker, before it could eat me. That was how this was going down and what came next… that was a problem for later.
In the battle of appetites and feral, carnivorous rage, the Will to survive was more of a factor than any real size or mass difference between us. It had no actual thoughts, intent, or plans, just mindless hunger and a ferocious desire to gobble me up; I had a lot more going on upstairs and I’d tangled with a lot of carapaced, multilegged prey. They were kinda a speciality of the house… and I was HUNGRY.
We tussled and fought, the thing trying to get me in position for a fatal bite, while I was more interested in getting it out of its shell for easy snacking. I didn’t care if it died, I was just gonna eat it.
My uncooperative snack bit at me and got a face-full of obsidian-rimmed oar-shield, which hyphenated its fangs into a gory mess of dripping shadow-goo. I took the initiative and a good chunk of its eagerness for the fight with that one. It was time to peel this critter and have a snack.
The thing twisted in my grip, seeking to flee into the endless dark, which did not align with my current objectives. A quick slash of my claws and a sharp twist and wrench, the first leg came free, erupting into nothing in my claws. The shudder that ran through it was delicious to me, like cool water in the summer, as I went back for another leg.
Things got a little hazy and violent from there, until eventually… Snicker-snack, and I was on its back, raking its bulbous shadow-backside with my claws and just wrecking stuff, burrowing into it, just the way it burrowed into me.
At the core of the thing somewhere much deeper and farther inside than the being’s size suggested; I found a tiny nugget of tasty, delicious spider meat.
It was a little, throbbing, beating heart that really satisfied me when I snarfed it down and burped loudly into the rushing wind that suddenly buffeted me out of nowhere… Literally out of nowhere and into somewhere and it was freaking bright out!
I opened my eyes on a devastatingly bright and blinding world of everything being awful… Even face down in the pebbly sand, beside the gull pecked and crab nibbled corpse of lord Spider-butt, the stinky-dead-guy.
I dragged my awful goggles, a hat and cloak from my shadow, which now felt really rich, deep, dark and extra… shadowy.
“Oohh.” Was all I could say, cause I gagged on the stink of my dead buddy and sucked a corpse fly down my throat. It was gonna be one of those days. I puked a few times, hurling up a ton of that weird silver goop I remembered from before… Once again it evaporated away quickly, leaving no residue.
I staggered away from the shore, across the road and away into the woods, cause I’m a goblin! That’s what we do, when we eat a shadow demon spider! We puke up weird silver slime, stumble away and hide in the woods until dark. Standard stuff, really.
/
Dawn broke over the small collection of burrows that housed the Hessen clan, deep in the hills to the east and north. There were few apprentices left, after the humiliating and distressing conclave duel and her prolonged ‘illness’ which confined her to her nest… Heather took a long deep breath of gratitude, as the sun came up. Mother had been a pleasure to deal with these last three days of peace and bliss. Now the apprentices would slowly begin to return, or new ones would gather to learn at the mother’s feet…
A soul rending wail of misery, pain and despair shook the camp, as mother Hessen once more felt that cruel fist grip her insides and twist.
/
In the cloistered inner cathedral of LightHome, the secret pontiff of the Light, cardinal Hammond watched as an intricate web of black silk vanished from the corner of his ritual chamber, dropping the tiny corpse of a sacrifice to the flagstones with a wet splat. He shook his double chins and sighed with distress at the unsightly heap of decaying flesh and loose bones.
‘Even infant humans leave a sloppy mess behind, when used up.’ He reflected as he clambered out of his voluminous robes and descended to enjoy a meal. The cardinal’s face blinked and grimaced stupidly, while the hermit crab being inhabiting his head consumed the remains.
His pincers picked and sorted the choicest morsels as he purred and blew happy bubbles. “Yes, summoning the spider was the right choice… a blunt instrument!” The cardinal mumbled, mindlessly expressing the thoughts of the creature as it devoured the sad remnants.
Capturing a daughter of the night-spinner was fraught with perils even the undying prefer to avoid, but one cannot argue with consistent results. Nothing could escape her mindless fixation, once set on her prey. That matter was closed permanently and it only cost a few slaves, a few troops and poor lord Periwinkle… Poirot?
He climbed back onto his body construct and settled in to wait… The new slave girl he’d ordered would be coming soon. There was nothing so fine as breaking fresh young things apart and devouring them alive, once he was done playing with them. Being the lord of the goblin dungeon was tiresome, but the perks… the perks!
/
