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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Whizbang Dustyboots" data-source="post: 3377094" data-attributes="member: 11760">Tucker and Katadid can barely hear the sound of Renraw casting a spell as they run toward the sound of the fighting. A moment later, he sprints past them, his eyes watering, his feet spraying them both with mud and snow. The magic keeps him just as sure-footed as he would be normally, and he finds himself running through the Tulgey Wood alone, icy wind whipping past his face and then suddenly, he's bursting into a small clearing painted red with gore.At the far end, he spots two kobolds stopped over the fallen bodies, the cleric Pick and a male. While Pick roughly searches Bufer, the male leaves off going through his fellows' belongings and stands. He points at Renraw hurtling toward them and Pick looks up. Renraw is too far away to hear their words, but the bottom line is plain: Pick makes an obscene gesture with one hand and the forearm of her other arm. And then both kobolds run.Renraw could catch them, he knows he could, but when he arrives at the scene of the battle, all such thoughts leave him.Emus and Bufer lay in the snow, surrounded by red slush, into which they continue to pump new steaming hot blood.A look at Emmerson tells a different story: While he, too, is surrounded by red slush, no more blood pours from his body. His face is white and pale, his eyes colorless as they stare at the sky.Renraw drops to his knees in the bloody snow and begins digging through Bufer's pack for his bundle of bandages, needle and thread.He bandages Emus, yanking them tight around a thick dwarven bicep with a rough jerk."You can't die yet, you stupid dwarven bastard."Over his shoulder, Bufer makes a wet gurgling noise."And you, chum," Renraw says, "You can seep mongrel ooze until you've no more to seep. I hope you're in agony."He glances up, strangely surprised to see Kat and Tucker further off, still running his way. Renraw curses under his breath and moves to help Bufer."You don't know it now, gnome, but it won't be long before you're wishing I let you die this day."A minute later Katadid runs up and collapses on the wet and bloody ground. His body wracked with coughs, he looks toward Renraw, whose hands are covered in blood as he gives a shaky nod.Kat launches into a coughing fit that lasts a full minute. His clothes getting wet and bloody from the ground, he looks at the carnage around him. He's surprised by the dwarf's presence, but he's unsurprised to see Emmerson in this state. Kat surveys the gnome's barely breathing form and at the reptilian bones, organs, and shattered limbs around him."Idiots."He mutters to himself softly as he searches the area and the kobolds' bodies, finding them picked clean of coins. Later, the group discovers the same has happened to Emus, Emmerson and Bufer. The gnome is also missing his weapons as well.Kat is still breathing heavily as he turns one set of protective goggles worn by the kobolds over and over in his hands. He holds them up to his own eyes, finds himself barely able to see, and pulls them down. While Renraw finishes bandaging Bufer, Katadid looks to the cold paladin."Tombstones eighty. Everything's even, can't have ..." his voice drains away and his face turns back the way they came. "Any odds ..."He leaps to his feet, only to slip on the blood and fall to the ground again, igniting a new coughing fit. He flails a pointing finger helplessly back in the direction they came from.Renraw has no idea what has Katadid so agitated, nor does he care. He bundles up the healer's kit and shoves it into Kat's arms."You did this. Not a word."He sprints off before the deputy arrives.Katadid's coughing fit has finally subsided as Tucker arrives."Wormy," Kat gasps, his eyes running after the fit. He climbs to his feet and heads back the way in the other direction at a run, but he soon slows to a brisk walk. There's no reason to run: He already knows what he's going to find.The ropes that tied the kobold now swing in the cold wind. Scraps of rope litter the ground. The tracks around the base of the tree are a mess of old and new footprints, and where they lead off to, Katadid cannot tell. But Wormy is gone.He holds the scraps of rope and sighs. The ropes look like they've been both chewed and cut. Kat can picture Wormy twisting around frantically, pulling out a hidden dagger and cutting his way free.One hand holds the goggles. The other holds torn ropes."Bodies," he mutters as he walks back to the cairn, tapping the goggles constantly and touching trees and branches as he walks. "Will need ..."* * *A sound. Another. Hazel listens keenly, her body tensing beneath the pines. Her eyes track the edge of the clearing.C'mon, Tiberius, show yourself.But the figure stepping into the clearing isn't a stranger. Hazel tries to peer past him, looking for Tucker and the shackled pair, ready to ask the deputy what the hell he's thinking, bringing them all back to the cairn.And then the dangling rope and goggles catch her eye, and she sighs. Their captive escaped.My fault. The knots must've been weak. Her hand tightens on the axe. Now we have nothing to trade for Bufer.There's barely a trace of any of the party's tracks in the snow before the cairn, at least not to Kat's untrained eye. He's not sure where the ranger is either, so he simply stops in the middle of the clearing and speaks loudly."The paladin is dead."</blockquote>

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