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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Lazybones" data-source="post: 4745618" data-attributes="member: 143">Chapter 21Jaron fumbled for an arrow, but he’d been anticipating a climb, not another shot, and he wasn’t able to beat the new arrivals up on the balcony.  He twisted aside and narrowly missed getting impaled by the first shot.  Even so, the arrow clipped his shoulder, going clear through the leather of his jerkin and the heavy wool of his cloak, and taking a divot of flesh with it.  He grimaced as the pain tore through his body, but he knew he’d gotten lucky.  Hobgoblin bows were powerful, and that shot could have just as easily gone through him as his garments. The other archer exchanged fire with Gezzelhaupt.  Both missed, though the hobgoblin’s arrow came close enough to stir up the hairs on the left side of his head in its passing.  The soldier, all too aware of his disadvantage, took cover behind the statue on the far side of the alcove.  Jaron had no such opportunity, and as he looked around in vain for a chance to escape this trap, he realized that he could be in serious trouble. But as the hobgoblins reloaded their bows, Gral stepped back into view.  The dwarf lifted his staff and fired a ray of frost that struck the archer on the left solidly in the chest.  The hobgoblin grimaced as the blast formed an icy rime across his torso, but as he drew his bow the crystals shattered, and he managed to get off his shot.  His companion fired almost at the same time.  Jaron looked back over his shoulder to see that the dwarf had taken both missiles in his chest, the arrows jutting out like pins from his body.  He sagged under the impact, only the support of his staff keeping him from keeling over right there. Jaron shouted something incoherent as instinct replaced conscious thought, and he brought his bow up.  He targeted the one that Gral had injured, and his shot flew true, barely missing he lip of the balcony and driving deep into the hobgoblin’s meaty thigh.  But even that wasn’t enough, and while the archer’s face was twisted into a rictus of pain, it didn’t stop him from reaching for another arrow.  His companion did the same, and as both took aim at Jaron, the halfling wondered if the story of his adventures was coming to a rapid and abrupt end. Carzen and Vhael were in no position to help him.  While they still held the doorway, the threshold offering them some small modicum of cover from the devastating and powerful swings from the hobgoblin flails, the enemy continued to press them hard.  Carzen took a solid hit to his right arm that bruised him to the bone even through his greave, and as he shifted back the arrow still jutting from his leg almost caused him to fall.  Vhael stepped forward and delivered a gout of flaming breath that made the hobgoblins hesitate, if only for a few seconds.  “Shake it off!” he growled at Carzen, offering him a hand to pull him back into place next to him.  “Fight or die, there’s no other option!” Carzen looked sick, but he did as the dragonborn said, shaking off his hand and lunging into an attack that almost cost him his renewed balance.  The hobgoblin he hit only grunted as the fighter’s sword struck him in his gut, and in turn Carzen nearly died as he brought his shield up just barely in time to deflect a blow from the adjacent hobgoblin.  He heard a strange noise next to him and nearly lost his concentration, before he realized that it was Vhael, and the noise was the dragonborn… singing?  The warlord’s echoing roar was louder even than the banging of the hobgoblins on their shields earlier, but even that wasn’t as loud as the crash as he brought his sword down in a glittering arc that crashed through a hobgoblin helm and the skull beneath it, splattering out a mess of blood and brains in a wide spread.  The hobgoblins, their order sundered by the attack, were slow to react. But their side still had the odds in their favor, a fact that was reinforced again as one of the human bandits that had been lurking behind the hobgoblin line leapt forward, darting in and stabbing with his long dagger before Vhael could recover from his attack.  The dragonborn’s cry became a trill of pain as the knife tore down into his neck, opening up a vicious wound that spurted forth a garishly bright stream of blood.  Now it was his turn to crumple, his nails digging furrows into the door as he fell back against it, his heavy sword falling with a clatter at his feet. The hobgoblins, reenergized, surged forward to finish him off. Beetle dodged and tore maniacally through the room, narrowly avoiding the axe blades that swiped dangerously through the air in his wake.  He sprang over a row of heaped crates and ducked under a cot, moments before a goblin axe smashed it into ruin.  Thus far the thickening smoke and his own quickness had kept the goblins from pinning him down, but there was no way that his luck could continue forever. It came to a sudden end as he leapt up from the collapsing cot and onto a barrel near the stairs.  That barrel wasn’t as securely seated as its neighbors, and the sudden weight of the halfling on it caused it to topple over.  Beetle let out a surprised yell and flipped over roughly onto his back, coughing at the acrid smoke stinging his lungs.  His head pounded where it had caromed off the unyielding stone plates of the floor. He looked up to see all four goblins standing over him, a promise of death in their eyes.</blockquote>

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