THEY MITE BE KOBOLDS
They could see the 100-foot-tall sycamore from several miles away. As they drew closer to it over the next few hours, only then could they truly appreciate its immensity. Still, it was what they discovered along their trek to the tree that absorbed their attention. There were only one or two bodies at first…pitiful, small, twisted things that had obviously died violent deaths. The kobolds were easily identifiable, but the other creatures, blue-skinned, bug-eyed little vermin, were a bit more of a mystery.
“They’re mites,” Stevhan announced after he’d examined one of them more closely. “Fairy creatures, though not the butterfly wings and unicorn giggly kind you might imagine. They’re vile, evil little beasties, though I can’t complain about their choice of enemies. Maybe they’ve taken care of our kobold problem for us.”
By the time they reached the tree, the bodies had become much more numerous, and it had become obvious that a sizeable battle had been fought there recently. The roots of the giant sycamore were a massive, gnarled tangle, but Stevhan’s sharp eyes spied the small shaft that opened amidst them. It was a tight fit, but one-by-one they dropped down the shaft, which gave onto to a low tunnel that ran off in two directions. Following the left-hand branch, they shortly found themselves in a room of sorts. Three crude, wooden workbenches occupied the center of the area, their tops strewn with various tools, metal and wooden hardware, and blocks of wood. A pair of mites stood across from each other on the far side of the room. One of them manned a miniature catapult built out of bones and branches, firing small caltrops at the second one who, apparently, was trying to catch them in his mouth. Their goggly eyes grew impossibly larger when they saw the hunched over giants enter their workshop. They shrieked in unison and, incredibly, charged towards the company, small daggers clutched in their knobby hands.
What followed would have been comic if it weren’t a violent life-and-death struggle. As Velox raised his sword to smite one of the little trolls, it forked its fingers at him, and in an eye-blink, the oracle began shaking and quivering as if he’d seen a ghost. When Davrim and Stevhan joined the fray, their size in the cramped quarters caused them to bang their heads on the ceiling, crash into each other when they tried to swing their blades, and overall prove themselves completely ineffectual against the mites, which darted in between their legs, thrusting their tiny blades into their feet at every opportunity. In the end, it was Mox who brought an end to the farce, blasting each of the mini demons with a mystic bolt.
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They continued deeper into the catacombs beneath the tree, and next found themselves in a much larger, but no taller, cavern. The wet-looking floor of the chamber was crisscrossed by several shallow trenches, each of which contained trickles of putrid-looking fluid. Six foul mounds of compost and dung lay heaped about the room, each studded with small spherical eggs. Across the cave, a female mite sat on a low stool in front of a large, wooden bowl, from which she was ladling a foul-smelling paste to a trio of centipedes the size of small dogs. When she saw looked up, she squealed, and tumbled backwards off of her perch. As she scrambled away through a tunnel, the centipedes swarmed towards the group. Velox stepped forward and pinned one of them to the floor with his sword like a specimen on a collector’s table. Stevhan quickly dispatched a second one, but when Davrim moved towards the last one, it sank its pincers into his ankle, and he felt a hot fire shoot through his leg. He felt it going numb as the insect lunged for him again, but Stevhan stepped in front of him and cleanly swept its head off.
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Their pursuit of the mite took them to a damp room haphazardly cluttered with broken beds, chairs, wagon wheels, and an assortment of worn, tattered, dingy, and broken objects. A row of bookcases stood crookedly propped against the far wall, the shelves filled with bits of bone, feathers, and dried centipede legs. Old window frames, cracked and splintered, hung upon the wall like works of fine art. When the little female came screaming into the area, six more mites were sprawled about. Two were attempting to play a folk song on a shabby, stringed instrument, while two more sat nearby, jeering and throwing rocks at them. The third pair lay beneath ragged sheet reading a book with torn pages that was, incidentally, also upside down. They all lurched to their feet when the trespassers came barging in after the female and, like the gentlemen they obviously were, they promptly fled after her after she darted out the far side of the room.
“This is gettin’ awfully irritatin’,” Tungdill growled.
“Don’t worry,” Mox smiled as she squinted one eye down the length of her finger. “They’re not all getting away.”
She quickly snapped off twin magic bolts, dropping two of the trailing mites.
As it turned out, the fleeing mites were not as cowardly, nor as stupid as they appeared. When the six companions rounded the corner into the next chamber, they found themselves face to face with no less than ten armed mites, one of them, a gap-toothed fellow with a disgusting scattering of pimples on his face and tongue, mounted on the back of a very large, and very disgusting, tick!
“Me Grabbles!” this apparent leader barked, “You big feets! You no want here! Tickleback, kill!”
The tick rider then began pushing forward, driving his minions before him. Stevhan, Davrim and Velox stepped forward to meet the horde, and the blood began to spill. The sheer number of mites actually worked against them as they stumbled over one another and lost their ability to maneuver. One after another fell beneath the warriors’ blades, and one or two to Mox’s devastating barrage of arcane missiles.
“One big bug deserves another one!” Tungdill crowed as he waved a mistletoe branch and slashed his palm with a small, silver sickle. In a flash of light and smoke, a winged ant the size of a pony appeared right in front of Grabbles and Tickleback. The mite chieftain squeaked, and then squealed again a moment later as one of Mox’s bolts struck him directly between the eyes, knocking him dead to the floor. The ant launched itself at the tick, sinking its mandibles into the arachnid’s eye. Tickleback hissed and writhed as it rolled onto its back. The ant followed, not releasing its hold. Within moments, the tick’s legs folded in on its abdomen and it fought no more. Within a few more moments, not a single mite stood.
Rows of wooden pegs lined the earthen walls of the chamber, some hung with tiny, filthy cloaks. In the center of the room stood a rickety table held together with twine, covered with a filthy red-checked tablecloth and heaped with mounds of dirt and twigs and gravel, apparently arranged to form some sort of map. Sitting at the edge of the map, weighing down a scrap of paper, was a bloodstained ivory statuette of what looked like a crouching reptilian devil. A bulging burlap sack sat beneath the table.
“Looks like a battle map of some sort,” Stevhan said as he peered at the odd tableau. “The twigs represent this tree, and this,” he pointed at the gravel, “I’m pretty sure is where the kobolds are. Looks like it’s not too far from here.”
“Might carry some weight with’em if we finish wipin’ out their enemies,” Tungdill huffed. “We’re already off to a good start.”
Velox sighed. “It doesn’t seem like the mites are willing to be diplomatic with us,” he said. “If they’re not going to be a help to us, then I suppose we are bound by our charter to make sure that they pose no threat to the rest of the Green Belt.”
Just beyond the far side of the ‘war room,’ a deep and ominous chasm split the passage. The chasm was a few yards wide, and twice as deep, but thick ropes of tangled roots filled the entire area. The passage continued on the far side of the chasm, and between the two ledges, numerous loops had been tied into roots to serve as hand- and footholds. Velox took the lead, sheathing his sword as he reached out for the first loop and began hauling himself across the chasm. He’d gone about ten feet when the loop that he’d just put his foot into, broke. With a gasp, he plunged twenty feet straight to the bottom, landing heavily on his back.
“Velox!” Davrim called. “Are you ok?”
It took the oracle a few moments to catch his breath.
“I…I think so,” he wheezed. “Can you throw me down a rope?”
“Sure!” the half-orc shouted. “Just hang on!”
Velox started to climb to his feet, but just then he heard something moving in the darkness further down the chasm. A moment later, he saw something huge looming up out of the black. It was a centipede, but it was fully 25-feet-long from its dripping mandibles to the tips of its twin, whip-like tails.
“I don’t think I can wait on that rope!” he cried.
Up top, Stevhan hissed when he saw the enormous beast bearing down on Velox. He knocked, drew and released in one fluid motion, sinking a shaft deep into the bug’s carapace. Then, to the shock of his companions, he leaped from the edge of the chasm, and plunged through the roots, rolling to his feet as he hit the bottom. Velox glanced back at him, relief and gratitude in his eyes that quickly turned to shock and pain as the centipede struck. The oracle screamed as the monster’s jaws clamped down on his thigh, his words shifting into the cryptic Celestial tongue that took him in the midst of crisis. Stevhan drew his sword as he charged the brute. It had rolled, exposing its underbelly when it bit Velox, and that’s where the ranger drove his blade, sinking it in to the quillons. With a gurgle and a gout of black blood, the creature sank to the ground, releasing its grip on Velox.
“Well done, boy!” Tungdill called down. “The half-breed’ll be lowerin’ a rope in a minute! I’ll meet ya on the other side and tend to the young’un’s injuries there!”
Laughing, the dwarf rose into the air on the back of the flying ant. It landed gently on the far side…where six mites stood crouching in the shadows.
“Bloody Hells!” Davrim snarled from the other side when he saw the little demons leap out at the druid. “Hang on!”
“Don’t worry ‘bout me none!” Tungdill bellowed laughter. “Me an’ Adam got this covered!”
By the time the others reached him, all of the mites lay in pieces around him, blood dripping from the ant’s mandibles.
It was only at that moment that the companions took note of their current surroundings. The walls of the small, egg-shaped room they were in were obscured by thick tangles of long, pallid roots. Four black-scaled kobolds were tied into these roots. Only one of them was still alive. This pitiful creature squeaked weakly as the group approached.
“Doesn’t he look familiar?” Davrim asked.
Velox peered closely at the little creature. “I think you’re right,” he said thoughtfully. “That mark over his right eye…it looks the same.”
“That me!” the kobold piped up. “Me Mikmek! Big foots let me go in radish patch!”
“Well what do’ya know?” Tungdill grunted. “Seems like ya got yerself in a spot of trouble, runt. What’cha doin’ here?”
“Mikmek brave Sootscale warrior,” Mikmek replied, puffing out his chest slightly. “Chief Sootscale choose Mikmek special for important mission! Sent to get back Sharptooth, Sootscale holy statue. Dirty little mites steals it from Sootscales!”
“You mean this?” Tungdill hefted the ivory demon statue.
Mikmek’s eyes went wide, and he nodded so hard it seemed his head might fall off. “Yes! Yes! That Sharptooth! If Big foots give it to Mikmek, he take them to Sootscales! Chief give them many treasures for reward!”
“Well, well,” Velox nodded shrewdly. “Perhaps we will do just that very thing…,”
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As Stevhan had surmised, the lair of the Sootscale kobolds was not more than a day’s ride from the giant sycamore tree. Along the way, Mikmek told them tales of his tribe’s bravery in the war against the mites.
“So then Tartuk send Mikmek and others to get back Sharptooth,” he finished.
“Who’s Tartuk?” Tungdill asked. “Thought ya said yer chief’s name was Sootscale.”
Mikmek looked as if he’d been caught with his hand in a cookie jar. “Well…,” he paused, his voice lowering as he looked around warily. “Nobody like Tartuk. Everyone except chief afraid of him. Not want to get cursed. He tell us that if we no bring back Sharptooth, we all turn yellow and die! Chief not afraid, though! Him bravest Sootscale. Mikmek think big foots should give Sharptooth to chief. Him know what to do.”
As it turned out, the Sootscales had made their abode in an old mine. A weathered sign near the entrance identified it as the Oaktop Silver Mine.
“Silver and gold,” Mox hummed to herself.
As the group approached, a lone kobold stepped out of the shadows of the mine opening.
“Who go there?” he squeaked.
“It me, Mikmek,” Mikmek replied. “You let us by, Nakpik. We got big business with chief! Bring Sharptooth home!”
Nakpik gasped, but quickly stepped aside. Mikmek led the companions deeper into the mine, along the way picking up more kobolds, who followed along in silence, a combination of wonder and fear on their faces. Finally, they reached a very large cave. The air inside it was warm and close, thick with a reptilian stink mixed with smoke and burnt meat. Numerous beds of furs lay scattered throughout the room amid smoldering cookfires, while at the far side, a wide alcove contained a large mound of furs framed by dozens of sticks upon which were mounted the skulls of many birds and small animals, all smeared with ash. Six more kobolds milled about the room, while seated upon the larger mound of furs was a tall, burly kobold, who wore a lizard skull as a crown, and carried a wrapped thigh bone in his hand like a scepter.
“Mikmek!” the chief roared as he leaped to his feet. “Thought you dead! Why you bring big foots here!?”
“Chief Sootscale!” Mikmek fell to his knees. “These the big foots that let Mikmek go before! Now they rescue him, and kill Grabbles, and bring back Sharptooth!”
At that point he held up both the statue, and the head of the mite chief, Grabbles.
Sootscale hissed. “Give it to me!” He snatched the statue out of Mikmek’s hands. For several moments, he simply stared at it, his brow furrowed. Finally , he seemed to reach some sort of decision. He raised the statue over his head, then threw it the floor, smashing it into a hundred pieces. All around him, the other kobolds gasped, and some of them screamed out.
“Death to Tartuk!” Sootscale cried, raising his fist over his head. After a moment, Mikmek echoed the cry, and after that, so did the entire tribe.
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Tartuk closed his eyes and took a deep breath. The purple-scaled kobold shaman knew they were coming for him. This moment had always been inevitable, and in some ways, he welcomed it. Tartuk was tortured. He had not been born a kobold, but in fact, had begun life as a gnome. He had been slain in a fight against a group of ogres that had been tormenting his village, but his ‘heroic’ sacrifice was enough to give his people a chance to defeat the giants and, sorrowed by his death, unanimously vote to restore him to life…by having him reincarnated! The bitter irony of the whole situation was that Tartuk had never meant to give his life in defense of his village. In fact, he’d actually been trying to surrender to the ogres, and had offered to help them in return for sparing his life, but the ogres had crushed him before he had the chance to speak his peace. When his people saw his new body, they were scandalized. Enraged, he fled into the forest, nursing a deep grudge. He found a tribe of kobolds, joined them, used his magic and manipulative lies to rally them, and led his new army in an attack against his old village. Since that time, the mad sorcerer had drifted through several River Kingdoms, periodically haunting towns and murdering gnomes he found, and at other times, insinuating himself into kobold tribes, taking them over from within, and then driving them to extinction by forcing them into wars they could not possibly win. The Sootscales had been but his latest project. Now, apparently, his ruse had been pierced and they were coming for him. Tartuk sighed again. At least it would save him the trouble of doing himself in. He opened his eyes once more, and their they were…his executioners.
The battle, such as it was, was quick and decisive. Though Tartuk exhorted the other kobolds to kill the “infidels” for daring to defile their holy statue, his tribemates did no such thing, instead cheering madly when Stevhan’s blade felled the shaman.
“Now Sootscales and big foots can be friends!” Sootscale declared as his people danced and capered about.
“Yes, about that,” Velox said, “do you know that you’ve made your home in a silver mine?”
Sootscale shrugged. “Sootscales can’t take shiny out of walls.”
“We can,” Velox said calmly. “Would you let us?”
Sootscale shrugged again. “Sure…as long as Sootscales get a percentage.” His grin was wide and toothy.
“Kobolds small…not stupid!”
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With the Sootscale problem sorted out, the companions were very close to fulfilling the demands of their original charter from Restov. All that really remained was seeking out the Stag Lord…a task which sounded much easier than reality was likely to dictate. The explorers decided a return to Oleg’s was in order before they bearded the bandit lord in his lair, and so they turned their horses north once more. On the way back, they took a more circuitous route, and found themselves on the southern shore of the Shrike River. A thick, sagging rope hung across the river, apparently all that remained of a bridge that may once have spanned it. A signpost read, “Nettle’s Crossing…5 coppers…ring bell for service.” Sure enough, a rusty bell hung next to the sign. A little way down the shore, the crumbled remains of a burnt-down wooden building was slowly being overtaken by encroaching vegetation.
“Guess we oughta do what the sign says,” Tungdill grumped as he reached for the bell.
“No, wait!” Velox cried, but it was too late. The dwarf had already given the bell a tug. As its tinny peal was fading, Stevhan spied movement some distance down river.
“Look…there!” he called, pointing.
When the others turned, they beheld a truly horrible tableau. Crawling up from a large pile of rubble mid-stream, was the corpse of some long-dead unfortunate. Its flesh was putrescent, and it clutched a dripping ranseur in its bony hands. It stepped out into the water, and then, to the disbelief of the watchers, began walking upon the surface of the river…against the current!
“You are not my tormentors!” the corpse called out in an eerie, soggy voice. “I am he who was called Davik Nettles! Throw the Stag Lord’s body into the river, that I may look upon his death…or join me in his stead!”
“We share a common enemy!” Velox called back. “If we are successful in our endeavor, we will return his body here and do as you ask!”
Davik bobbed his head once, then simply melted back into the river.
![:]](http://www.enworld.org/forum/images/smilies/devious.png "Devious :]")
