Private Tales I miss the mountains

[Hath Charosh]

Hath lifted one hand to his chin and brushed ice from his beard. Whilst he always enjoyed visiting the tribes in the spine, he had been raised on the savanna and the cold always bit deep.

He took two steps back from the ledge and looked towards Bula. This pass was ice troll territory. They had intended to pass through it within a few hours.

Then the winds had whipped through, carrying ice and debris. They have been forced into shelter.

At the other end of the pass, half a tribe was heading into a trap.

"We'll have to brave it soon," Hath grunted.

 

[Bula]

Something akin to the beginnings of a disgruntled snarl twitched the corner of her lip. The orc's gloved hands rested up on the hilts of her axes, the feel of their hafts against her fingers familiar and comforting. Black braids hung around her face, flecks of snow and ice caught in their thick strands. A few steps brought her nearer to the downfall of ice.

"Now," she corrected, glancing sideways at Hath. As she spoke, she dropped to one knee, a single hand releasing from its axe to touch the ground beneath her. A wave of spirit energy swept along the path between them and the tribe down below. Whatever it returned darkened her brow as she stood up and, without a word, left the shelter they'd found.

As to be expected of the shaman, she had a way of heading straight into the dangers that might lay ahead. Clearly losing her eye and nearly dying on more than one occasion was not enough to crumble her resolve. There was no denying that she was a product of her mother though, in the way she moved with determination. She was confident, but not in the way of arms.

Bula called back at him, without even looking over her shoulder, "Or they die."

In the distance, a horrific sound echoed along the mountain's ridges and the rumble of tumbling snow seemed to come from the way they'd come from.

 

[Hath Charosh]

"Now," she corrected, glancing sideways at Hath.

Hath grunted. He wasn't going to protest, but the tone of the sound let her know that he wasn't looking forward to stepping back into the winds.

Bula called back at him, without even looking over her shoulder, "Or they die."

Hath broke into a light jog after Bula. He needed to keep moving or else the cold would bite through into his muscles. The cave had kept the wind off them, but they would have needed to light a fire or keep moving inside the small shelter to stay warm.

In the crisp and clear air he had been able to see places where trolls were likely to live. He could even smell them.

"Do not rush!" he called out.

One of their scouts had returned, wounded and covered in their own blood. They had been chased by the kobolds after seeing them set up for the ambush on the northern path.

The pass had been the only way to get ahead of their tribe. They were being led by Mabess' current husband. Hath lost track.

Hath shielded his eyes against the wind. The light changed. The sound of cracking rocks made him realise that it wasn't a change in the clouds, or the way he covered his eyes.

Behind Bula and ahead of Hath an ice troll had been frozen into the rock face. Limb by limb, he pulled itself free.

 

[Bula]

"Do not rush!" he called out.

Bula skid to a stop, digging her heels into drifting snow as the wind picked up. Her head turned, jaw clenched into a grimace. Her gaze settled on the wounded man, as if locked in a trance. Something moved in her blind eye, a faint glimmer she thought was phantom memories–brighter than what told her those below were in trouble. A couple blinks, with emphasis on the ruined eye, seemed to brush whatever she saw away.

It was the glimmer of the wounded orc’s spirit, the beat of his soul dancing to the cadence of the banshee’s keen. He would die, but would his death come with the honor their kind craved? She twisted around almost losing her footing for a brief second as she called out to Hath:

"He–" The first word of whatever she was going to say was lost beneath thunderous cracking of the ice as the troll broke free of its slumber. "Hath!"

Too many thoughts raced through the shaman’s mind as the troll rose to its full height and released a sharp bellow that echoed through the pass. Loose snow shuddered upon the earth’s shoulders, threatening to be knocked to the ravines between. She glanced back down the path, to where the flickering lights of fire obscured the battle down below.

Bula felt a pang of guilt, and though it was one of several fathers she’d had that fought the kobolds below, she knew that to keep going would do more harm than good. She could only hope they could dispatch the troll quickly enough to still be of aid–and give the scout the honorable death she felt his spirit crying for.

"AAARRRRRHHGGGHGHHH!" the shaman cried, hands dropping to the hatchets at her side. She unhooked them from her belt with practiced ease and brought them to bear as the troll swung first toward Hath. As she lunged at the monstrosity, she called to ancestors for aid. Along the blades of each, soulfire bloomed into life and granted her a boon in the form of increased strength.

 

[Hath Charosh]

Hath took a sharp step back. It was just enough. The back of the troll's arm struck the face of the rock beside him. Loose chips of rock and ice went tumbling down.

He had warmed up his bowstring in the shelter of the cave, but there was no room to maneuver. There would only be a few spots in the troll's hide that an arrow could pierce, even up close.

Hath swung his axe. From his left, on the open side of the pass, up to his right. The troll tilted it's head away and lifted its shoulder.

Hath didn't know whether it was rock embedded in its skin or some kind of chitnous growth that protected the troll, but his axe glanced away.

Rock trolls and ice trolls were slow and lumbering but hard to kill. The savanna trolls of his home were pale and lanky. Easier to kill, but they hid in the long grass and covered open space very quickly to ambush.

As Bula rushed in, Hath tried to back up to put a little space between himself and the troll. There was no way to get past it to Bula's side of the path to flee.

 

[Bula]

Bula had little more luck than Hath and when the blade of her hatchets–first one, then the other–struck the hide of the ice troll, it bit through the armor. Only enough to draw a sliver of icy ichor and irritate the creature, but it was enough.

Unable to free either one of her axes, even with the practiced use of her weight, Bula soon learned she’d successfully caught the creature’s attention. A roar ripped from the monster’s gaping maw, its rank breath a welcome warmth. Silver linings, perhaps. The creature swung its arm upward and Bula’s grip on her hatchets slipped. One hand fell free, leaving her hanging from the other.

"Go!" Bula barked at the other orc, swinging dark braids with a sharp tilting of her head to the path behind. "We’ll be down shortly!"

The we referred to the shaman and the scout, though only one of them would be following after Hath. Only one that Hath could see. She didn’t doubt the other orc’s ability. In fact, she trusted in his more than her own from the years that they’d known each other. He could hold his own, and that made him a valuable asset.

No, if Bula said she’d be somewhere, she would be there. On her own time, at her own pace. It was a stubbornness worthy of any orc, but it was not pride that guided the shaman’s words. It was experience.
The troll swung its arm again, and this time Bula’s other hand slipped. A fraction of a moment later, the orc struck the ice divot in the wall from where the creature erupted moments before.

 

[Hath Charosh]

Hath grunted in frustration. The troll was barely wounded. It bled freely from two hatchets, but it had plenty to spare.

If Bula had a plan then he had to respect that. Hath rushed past the troll, barely keeping his balance on the treacherous surface.

An arm as thick as a small tree trunk swung out at him. Hath dove for the ground, rolling across the rocks.

There was no time to breath a sigh of relief as he dragged himself to his feet. He might not have timed over the edge, but he needed to push ahead through the storm.

 

[Bula]

Hath already slipped, albeit without any smoothness to go with it. Ice had a way of taking away one's independence simply by existing. Out of her sight, the half-blind shaman rose carefully to her feet to prevent any unwanted slippage. The scout was nearer now, eagerly throwing his weight into what he knew was his final battle. Once Hath Charosh was gone from the immediate vicinity, it was Bula's turn to truly act. She left the crater behind, letting the scout play with the troll now.

The impending loss of the orc in front of her was not the only one to be felt this night. The spirits sung of losses from the ravine below that the others traversed. They mourned the death that would come on this path tonight, knowing that yet another has been claimed by their fate. It was that aid that Bula reached for now, just barely safe from swinging, trunk-like arms of ice.

It was the ancient web of interconnected existence that ran beneath the ground that often served as her font for the deeper magicks she possessed, and so it would be again tonight as she knelt down to touch the ground, almost as if in prayer.

"Lend us your aid," the orc murmured softly, and her own self reached out, fanning ever outward to connect with the lingering spirits of the freshly departed. Her eyes shut, and when they opened later, it was with the renewed strength of her ancestors that she stood. It was a weird sort of healing that took place, a permanent boon granted the shaman by the spirit world, next. Her facial scarring lifted, eyes both taking on a fiery orange glow.

The world appeared different suddenly, but she would have to figure out the why of that later. Instead, she exhaled: "Go."

And like that, the glow left her. It was the scout that received the rest of the boon placed upon them by their fallen. He know, just as Bula did, that it would be his last battle. When he glanced her way, he called the same syllable. Their loved warriors would fight with him now, granting him the strength needed to overcome the troll.

Bula took off down the path, moving as quickly as she could and even sliding on occasion.

 

[Hath Charosh]

Hath didn't understand the magic that Bula called upon. He didn't understand how any kind of magic worked. He might curse the uncontrolled magic of the humans and be glad of shamanic advice, but it was all beyond him.

He looked over his shoulder once. They had a job to do. He set his gaze on the path ahead.

He didn't know this territory. Hath had to pick his path carefully across the loose rocks.

"We have to pass kobold scouts to get ahead of our people!" he shouted over his shoulder.

It felt as if the cold wind was peeling the skin from his cheeks.

 

[Bula]

Bula was less careful in her pursuit, perhaps lending too much of her trust to chance as she followed after Hath. Her gaze remained ahead of them, even as the clashing of the remaining orc in battle with the troll rolled down the road in their wake.

"Hug the wall," Bula called out to him, meaning the words quite literally. Slip off the road and through the foliage that weighed the bottom of the small valley they funneled into. Soon after, she slid past him, knelt down to better guide her momentum as she took full advantage of the ice, snow, and jagged rock beneath their boots.

A hop as the road veered one direction to follow a flatter path, and soon the shaman skipped through the more rugged terrain of the pass.