NOW LIVE! Today's the day you meet your new best friend. You don’t have to leave Wolfy behind... In 'Pets & Sidekicks' your companions level up with you!

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Lazybones" data-source="post: 1276273" data-attributes="member: 143">Chapter 89Hey!  You’re running the wrong way, girl! The little voice in Mole’s head drew her up short, and she stopped running, looking around the street in confusion.  There were a few people around her, all moving in the same direction that she had just been, but none of them seemed particularly interested in stopping to explain to her what was going on.There was a battle, that... thing appeared, then...Everything after that was a jumble, confused memories that seemed quite unlikely now.  A particularly disturbing image leapt into her mind, of her shooting her best friend with her crossbow.  She looked down, but her bow was gone, and her sword was missing from its scabbard.  Did she throw her weapons away?  She couldn’t remember... but it was clear, from the noises of destruction coming down the street, that some bad business was still going on down there. And her friends were probably right in the middle of it...Grimly she started running back down the street, her magical boots carrying her in long strides back into the fray. * * * * * “Don’t look directly at it... avoid its gaze!” Dannel cried in warning, as he and Arun—reinforced now by a quartet of city guardsmen—reengaged the rampaging umber hulk.  The creature turned from its dismantling of the moneychanger’s shop to face these interlopers that would interfere with its swath of destruction.  The guardsmen were burly, muscular half-orcs, part of the cadre that the mayor had recently recruited to bolster the armed forces of the city in light of the recent disasters facing Cauldron.  Two of the four guards heeded the elf’s warning, averting their eyes in time, but the other two looked into the creature’s multifaced orbs as its gaze swept over them.  One screamed and leapt at the creature, sweeping with its halberd, while the second lowered his weapon and just stood there, a vacant look on his face. Arun didn’t look away either.  “How am I supposed to bash it, if I cannot see it!” he shouted to Dannel, leaping forward to join the guardsmen in engaging the hostile creature.  Its gaze swept over him again, but once more he fought off the deluge of confusing thoughts and images that threatened to temporarily unhinge his sanity.  The first guardsman, driven into a rage by the effects of the umber hulk’s gaze, lunged at the creature, bringing down its halberd in an overhand chopping motion.  The polearm managed to cut a shallow gash in the creature’s shoulder, but the guardsman had little time to revel in his achievement as the hulk swept out one arm, grabbed the guard in its claw, and pulled him bodily up to its snapping jaws.  The guard had just barely enough time to scream before the mandibles sank into the sides of his head, squashing his skull like an overripe melon.  “Die, bug!” Arun cried, leaping at the hulk from the side.  The umber hulk almost casually swept out its other arm, forcing Arun to dodge to the side.  Even with the protection of Zenna’s mage armor, its claw dug heavily into the dwarf’s side, knocking him roughly aside.  The creature let out a terrible keening howl as another arrow from Dannel’s bow sank into its body, piercing its thick armor and digging into the meaty flesh underneath.  The elf had taken up position in a wagon left empty and unattended by its owner in the street in front of the shattered shop, and was firing arrows as quickly as he could lift them to his bowstring over the heads of his allies battling the creature.  The two remaining guards—aside from the one standing confused—poked at the creature with their halberds, trying to keep their eyes averted from its dangerous gaze while striking at its body.  Not surprisingly, their attacks were ineffective.  Zenna was rushing across the street toward the battle when a faint sound over the din of combat brought her attention around.  It sounded like a child’s crying, and it took her a moment to determine the source: a third-story window of the inn across the street from the moneychanger’s shop.  Her eyes widened as she saw that the crying was from an infant child, half-wrapped in swaddling, balanced precariously on the windowsill overlooking the street, a good twenty feet below. Caught be indecision, she glanced back at the ruined front of the shop, where the hulk was wreaking havoc upon the defenders, then up again at the struggling child.  Then, suddenly, the child slipped from the ledge and started to fall toward certain death below. The hulk lashed out with its claws, striking both of the guards menacing it.  Both men went down, one with its face now a ruin of deep gashes, the second knocked roughly into his confused comrade, sending both to the ground in a jumble of arms and legs and blood.  The hulk did not have time to follow up on its triumph, however, as another arrow slammed into it just below its jaws, releasing a jet of blood as it sank deeply into its body. The hulk screeched and crouched low, digging once more into the ground, but before it could disappear from sight again Arun charged into it from the side.  “Not again, beastie!” he cried, and brought his hammer down in a powerful two-handed stroke that landed squarely atop the umber hulk’s head.  With a sick squash, the creature shuddered... and fell limp. As the baby started to plummet, Zenna reached out desperately with her mind.  The words of the spell flowed instinctively from her lips, and she focused on a dangling awning that fronted the display window of the bakery located in the front of the inn.  The awning billowed out, filling with air as it stretched out over the cobbles of the street below.  The baby impacted a moment later, landing in the middle of the awning like a stone dropped onto a down pillow.  The baby’s weight quickly dragged it down, but before it could fall from the awning Zenna was there, catching the child as it rolled from the awning into her waiting grasp.  The baby squirmed in her grasp as she looked back across the street.  The child was ugly, with thick limbs and a pudgy nose.  Dannel caught her eye and nodded, offering a reassuring wave.  The ruined front of the moneychanger’s shop had grown quiet, but she could see Arun doing something within the rubble, with no sign of the hulk.  Then she caught movement out of the corner of her eye, and saw Mole rushing up the street toward them. She skidded to a halt in front of the ruined shop, looking at each of the companions in turn. “So, what’d I miss?”* * * * * Note: I will be traveling in Europe from Dec.26-Jan5; the story hour will be on hiatus during that time.  I think I've come up with a suitably dramatic cliffhanger to tide you over; I should be able to get in 3-4 more posts before then.</blockquote>

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