Completed The Fragrance of Dark Coffee

[Elinyra Derwinthir]

A snarling battle cry had sounded from the wild expanse of the book aisles. The first cup had been fired; thusly another battle for the coffee of Kin'Kenny's Trove began, marking the third in the series of intermittent violence between the Librarians and Quasits that would come be known as the War of the Beans.

General Kin'Kenny rallied his forces valiantly to the defense of the sacred brew. No quasit would lay a single, nasty claw on the coffee as long as he held this fort. The Librarians had held off the first offense with a hail of spellfire and slapdash projectiles, but there was no time to rest. The battle had only just begun.

The Librarians formed a hasty barricade of overturned tables and chairs as Lieutenant Rillon escorted survivors of the brutal surprise assault to safety behind the makeshift walls.

"Lieutenant, what is the situation out there?" Kin'Kenny asked gravely, assessing the condition of one of the many refugees that had come flooding into the foyer.

Rillon wiped some sweat and ink from his brow and frowned. "It's quiet for the moment, but we should expect another attack; those little demons are gathering en masse, mark my words! We should send a small scouting party, see who we can rescue before they regroup."

"No. The risk is too great." Kin'Kenny scoured the no man's land for signs of movement, though he doubted he'd find any. He disagreed with the lieutenant's opinion on the nature of an attack; Kin'Kenny was not green to the art of war, and he knew well the guerrilla tactics of their enemy.

Rillon sighed deeply, wearily, as he glanced out at the cleared battlefield between the fort and the dense cover of shelves and tomes.

"Gods have mercy on those trapped behind enemy lines."

------------------------​

The two heroes that had been caught up in this war, quite by accident, were in a spot of trouble. Deep in the heart of the library, cut off from allies and supplies, they would have to rely on their wits to survive.

 

[Garrod Arlette]

Long had they suffered, amidst the stacks and the shelves, hidden away behind the monuments to their torment. The works of their own labors. A cruelty that was forced upon them, by He. The Silver Eyed Devil. Keepr of the Beans. Kin'Kenny. The books they so dutifully shelved and organized and dusted. Without the aid of the sacred bean.

No more, Vex whispered in their ears. No more. They called out in response, as their shadows loomed large about the glow of magic lamps. Like cat eared giants, dancing about a flame, their weapons, books, bottles, cups and feather quills, raised up in fervent clamor.

Deep, bass note horns sounded from the shelves. First only a few. Then more, and more. A monotonous dread that shook the bones and swirled the soul. Come the chatter. The chitter. The shouts and screams and yips of chaos that was sure to come. They would have coffee. They would taste victory!

Vex, Vanguard of the Grubby, stood atop one of the orange glow lamps that hung from the centermost ceiling. A score of quasits emerged from their hidey holes, they stood tall, their eyes glowering and full of defiance. Vex rasped and roused, raising her hands and motioning them to stir the very spirits. Let Kin' Kenny try and stop them, she seemed to say. They would not fear! She gestured. For if even one of them drank the beans, it would be a victory for them all. The quasit coffee bean revolutionaries roared in their cheer.

With a strike forward of her curled claw, Vex unleashed the hordes.

Gron whimpered, Aggie glowered, and the half-orc scholar, Wiltolin, stared in wide eyed horror as they all watched the little demons pour out of the shadows and holes and crawl spaces from which there barely looked to be any space to crawl out of! But hidden away in the corner as they were, no quasit seemed to pay them any mind. So transfixed by the allure of that most fragrant substance that was their desire.

"They have forgotten about us," Garrod whispered.

"Forgot, forgot, but never got," Gron sang softly.

Aggie smacked him square on the nose. "Quiet, you fool, less they hear us!" he said harshly.

A quasit heard Aggie, eyes turning to find the ogre. A screech, a yowl. A swarm of quasits veered to attack the stray heroes of the librarian forces.

 

[Elinyra Derwinthir]

Having been discovered in their hiding place, Wiltolin, Garrod and Elinyra formed a defensive line around the ogre. Gron’s arm hoisted a decorative pillar the size of a man. Wiltolin hid his face behind some tome that he had an impressive grip on.

“Here they come,” Elinyra breathed and raised the only weapon she’d been able to find – a dragon-shaped bookend.

The quasit swarm skittered towards them with howls and jeers, tiny claws and teeth bared in menace. One of them, a scrawny creature wearing half of a cracked clay cup on its head like a helmet, hissed something that sounded suspiciously like “coffee”.

“We don’t have any coffee!” Wiltolin sputtered in response. This only seemed to incite the quasits more; they leaped at the four defenders.

“Bad squirrels!” Gron exclaimed and smashed the pillar down into the floor, sending quasits flying in every direction as well as poor Wiltolin, who was still clutching his book for dear life.

Aggie chanted something, raising his hand in to make a sign with his thick fingers. As one, the quasits around them toppled over, snoring noisily.

“That should buy us about twenty-two-and-a-half seconds. Hurry now!” Aggie snarled and charged forward. Gron’s head yawned and dozed off until Aggie’s arm snapped around and slapped him awake.

Elinyra helped Wiltolin to his feet and, with a wary glance at the torpid quasits, followed Aggron through the debris of the destroyed bookshelves.

-------------------​

“Here they come!” one of the fort’s defenders cried from the barricade. Kin’Kenny rushed to the parapet of stacked tables to assess the situation. Catching the grey blur of movement in the distance, he commanded the archers and the one other mage to hold the high positions. Below, the few footsoldiers at his disposal formed a line, preparing to intercept any intruders who made it over the walls.

He looked around at the ranged unit. Many of them were but patrons, forced into this war by a bad turn of luck. Young and old, with hopes of a peaceful place to sit and read. He could not let them down. He would not.

The quasits advanced like a swarm of locusts, jumping and chittering as they separated and rejoined in chaotic ranks. The librarians waited for the horde’s advance in dreadful silence. Some prayed, some cursed, others simply stared out onto the battlefield with grim determination. Even Kin’Kenny grew anxious as the enemy closed in, hissing and snarling in demonic rage, but he withheld the attack order until the enemy was so close that they could smell the quasits’ stink.

“Fire!” his voice boomed. A rain of projectiles followed; cups and empty copper coffee pots and spoons and potted plants. Magical bubbles floated up from the floor at Kin’Kenny’s command, trapping small groups of quasits that scratched at the slippery inner surface to no effect.

The librarians held a reasonably defensive position here, but their enemy still held the advantage of numbers. Vex’s war of attrition would likely run into the ground before long, and then the librarians would take the offensive.

Vex, you old fool! You can never best me in a frontal attack! Kin’Kenny thought with an arrogant huff. Though he kept a careful watch over his shoulder; who knew what rats could sneak through the tiniest crack in their defense?

Garrod Arlette

 

[Garrod Arlette]

Scores and scores of those quasits stank. Scores more scores bubbles did take. But let them take. Thought Vex the Great. Let them pull poor quasits far. Trap them, yes, in stinky, moist, smelly soap. Bad for filth those bubbles were! Bad for the crusties and the musties that warmed and were crumbly. But let them clean one hundred quasits, and two hundred more! Let them think poor quasits fools, as copper pots and clay plates bonked demon domes and knocked patrons down. Let them think, only one way, did quasits take.

In the shadows, a dreaded shape did slink and scrape. Smaller shades, there too, behind the big thing that scurried in the dark, right through. With claw and toes that scrabbled and scratched, they went round the walls all gibbldy-batch. They went 'ver the stacks of books and the turned 'ver tables, and there they saw one wizard, no two.

One, Not Kenny or Kin', but George, who was in charge of the bean tin.

So, slink and slide those shapes did go, till demon eyes took in the glow, that let George the spellcaster flow. They sprung, they sprang, the muffled and tied 'im as tools were picked up and went big wallop across George's head. He wasn't dead. Just out with zeds.

---

"Squirrels! Out of Gron's way PLEASE," Gron boomed, and the blast of sound bowled over a swath of the quasit flows, and with sweeping arcs of the pillar club, Aggie bat away scaley bug eyed fiends.

Wiltolin bat a quasit away with his thick tome. "I SAID!" another scaley figure smacked away by the thick leather binding. "I Don't!" another sent flying. "Have!" his voice grew more shrill. "COFFEE!!!!!" he shout out as he flowed from one book strike to another, sending quasits flying like so many kernels of popped corn bouncing off the hot black iron kettle. He laughed wildly.

Garrod had picked up a broom, and with a two handed grip, he swung its bristly head in a flat arc, sweeping up a score of little bodies with a blast of conjured wind. "Kin'Kenny!" the swordsman cried out as Vex rose up upon a counter, behind her most hated rival, an iron pan in hand. "Beh-" the floor shook.

A rumble. A thud. A thunder. A quake. Garrod froze, and turned his eye, and there, within the heart of a rune-lit stonework frame, was Bogbert, scowling as he sat like a jewel upon its facet, a strange metal helmet there upon his head, etched with runes that matched the stone body that stood about Garrod's height. It had thick arms, and stubby legs, and its limbs seemed to hold together with a magical magnetism. Bogbert brought his tiny clutches together, one balled fist clasped by the other, and the stone-body followed suit. Heavy hands cracking into one another, like mortar and pestle.

"A construct?" Garrod asked in disbelief.

Aggie narrowed his eyes, whirring the pedestal club about as if a trained sword dancer of Amol-kalit. "Go, now," the serious head said. "I will hold back this monster," and he ran forward with a bellowing challenge.

Garrod stared wide eyed as the two titans crashed. The club, jabbed and swept with a surprising deftness, while Bogbert and his stone-work body curled up against the blows, pillar-like arms raised as shields. Realization dawned on Garrod's face, and he turned back to his fellow heroes. "We have to get to Kin' Kenny, Vex is-"

A loud and morbid clang sounded through the din.

 

[Elinyra Derwinthir]

The remaining unbubbled quasits had made it to the walls. The creatures were cleverer than they looked – they formed a living ladder until a number of them managed to claw their way to the top and tumbled inelegantly over the barrier. Archers dropped one by one from the barricade as they were overwhelmed by swarms of tiny claws and teeth. Clouds of shredded paper stirred from the floor as the defenders engaged the infiltrators in a desperate melee.

To make matters worse, the lights flickered and dimmed around them as other quasits, far out of the range of the archers, covered the battlefield in twilight by systematically smashing the wall lanterns.

From atop the parapet, Kin’Kenny had a sobering view of the tide’s turning. He caught a large form moving – no, two of them – among a group of humanoids running towards the fort. He recognized Aggron’s bulk, and there behind him Garrod, the elven necromancer-druid and… was that the half-orc accountant he’d hired to help with his taxes?

In the gathering gloom, he could swear that Garrod was looking at him in alarm. Or rather, past him.

He whirled around just as the frying pan in Vex’s nasty paw came down. The lich brought his staff up just in time, deflecting the blow meant for his skull in a shower of sparks.

“Fiend! You shall never lay claim to the coffee!” he shouted and swung his staff around in a fierce counterattack. His would-be assassin took a step back, caught by surprise for a moment. She hissed in outrage as Kin’Kenny brought his hand up and uttered a spell. The soft outline of a bubble rose around her, transparent and quivering, but she merely laughed at his attempt to ensnare her.

“No jail of soap shall ever hope - to hold me, my filth, behold!” he roughly translated from Vex’s jittery howls and growls as the bubble convulsed violently like someone who’d put something truly awful in their mouth. Then it popped.

Vex gurgled a horrible, triumphant laugh through her crooked face before launching at him again with all of her miniature, vengeful might.

The few lights that had been out of the quasits’ reach did little to illuminate the library, but in the darkness the electric energy of Kin’Kenny’s staff flashed with each parry, each strike against Vex’s weapon.

-----------------------------
​

“Kin’Kenny needs our help!” Wiltolin finished Garrod’s exclamation as the voltaic battle raged on the parapet. The three of them rushed towards the fort, dodging groups of angry quasits and the continuing hail of miscellaneous objects from overhead – lessened now by the impact of the first wave – until they came to the wall. Here the quasits had worn a gap in the barricade, and they were able to slip through relatively easily.

Wiltolin took the lead now, though he grumbled something about his paycheck, and started the climb up to the parapet with a zealous fire in his eyes, clutching his precious book close to him.

Elinyra paused mid-climb when she heard a strange, metallic scrape from below. Glancing down at the fort’s heart, she noticed a form slumped on the ground and a small demonic shape scratching across the great copper pot in an attempt to overturn it. Cursing, she pushed past Garrod and dropped down to the floor, intent on the monster who would be king.

 

[Garrod Arlette]

Lights smashed and magick thunder cracked through the air of the Trove as bauble glass rained from on high. Kin'Kenny, master of this domain, and not wanting to suffer litigation for any serious harm that befell one of his patrons while visiting, pushed the dread Vex back with his crystal-headed staff and swept his arms up quick, the great bubbles that had failed to ensnare his foe caught the shards of broken magic lamps, the shards piercing through their filmy veil only to bounce along the inside.

Vex would not waste her opportunity.

As Aggron and the construct traded blows, resounding thumps that seemed to blast the air itself as stone met ogre's flesh. "Oooh, ooh, ouch!" Gron whimpered as he shook his reddened fist.

"No, Gron, not yet," Aggie tried to will another seal forth, tracing his thick digits through the air.

But bogbert and his stone-work body bulled over the big ogre. The Quasits gave out a cheer in triumph.

Garrod looked down, and saw the scene, his hands gripped to the stacks that made the tower. Sparks sizzled and zapped up above, but down below, the defenders were being overrun. Something "Elinyra!" Garrod called out as he watched the druid descend.

"There's no time, hurry!" Wiltolin cried, and went on with his climb.

A curse left Garrod's mouth, trusting she would get through this chaos, he climbed on.

Atop the parapet, a ghastly sight awaited Wiltolin and Garrod, as they hoist themselves up.

Vex stood above Kin'Kenny, a proud gleam in her wicked eye, the cast iron pan held up as if an executioner's axe.

Kin' Kenny, laid against the floor, turned back around to face his foe, his staff raised up in defiance. Deftly, Vex struck the magic weapon away, the scepter sent spinning with a trace of lightning.

"My paycheck!" Wiltolin cried out!

A harsh clang saw Kin'Kenny's head removed from its neck socket. The jeweled skull sailed through the air and clattered before Garrod, who was still climbing over the lip of the parapet.

"Vex! You killed Kin'Kenny!" Wiltolin cried.

'Curious," said Kin' Kenny's head. "Most curious, Wiltolin, that you would think I would die so easily!" the head near bounced there on the floor of the parapet. "Now, stop Vex!"

Garrod rose with broom in hand, and Wiltolin stood beside him. Vex cackled madly, with cast iron in hand. The false sky of the trove was dark, and the bleeding light of the magick lamps looked as if the sun tried to peer through the billows of putrid smoke.

 

[Elinyra Derwinthir]

Elinyra heard Garrod call her name from above, but she couldn’t make out whatever else he said past the rising crescendo of scuffling claws and clashes of nearby battle. Demonic shapes were quickly encroaching on the tower of books she was standing beneath. No choice now but to press forward.

At the core of the fort, where Kin’Kenny had stashed all of the coffee-filled copper pots, the trio of infiltrators who had first found the stash were squabbling. Squibert, Mudclaw and Boot had tried every method known to quasit – which wasn’t a great many – to open the gleaming containers of brew. They tried scratching at them, gnawing on them, cursing at them, pleading with them, but nothing had met with success. They’d even tried just absconding with one of the pots across their warty backs, but even one proved too heavy and unwieldy with its treasure sloshing inside.

“Kin’Kenny must have magicked them! We need a magic-y thing to make first magic go boom!” Mudclaw contended.

“Can’t be magic… no itch! Just need stronger claws!” Boot argued, miming scratching her backside.

“That one magic-y?” Squibert asked in his slow, thoughtful way while poking George. George had regained consciousness and was now busy reeling from the biggest headache he could ever recall having; a problem growing worse when he realized he was now captive to three tiny demons who were hissing and snarling at him menacingly.

Mudclaw grinned toothlessly and commanded her peers to push the coffee pot into the wizard’s hands. Boot growled in obvious condescension at her but did as she asked. Of course, the problem with this idea being that George’s hands were stuck at his sides at awkward angles thanks to their method of tying him up, something that Boot was quick to point out.

This was the scene Elinyra stumbled upon as she came around the toppled ruin of a shelf. She stopped and stared at the arguing quasits; they stopped and stared at her.

“Help me! I have no idea what they want from me!” George the wizard muttered fearfully when he saw the druid. One of the quasits snarled something at him and threatened him with a bookbinder’s type holder-turned weapon.

The second quasit, wielding part of the bookbinder’s shattered frame, turned to Elinyra and waved its weapon in warning while muttering something at its peers. One of them was still pushing one of the coffee pots towards George; the other spat something back, apparently in disagreement.

So there was some dissension in the ranks…

“Well, it seems that you have your coffee. So now what?” Elinyra asked, gesturing to the stash. The quasits paused and looked at each other.

“Coffee!” Squibert screeched excitedly and renewed his efforts to claw the pot open.

Mudclaw gave a rousing micro-speech about the future of quasits everywhere, about freedom for quasits and the subsequent subjugation of large, stomping folk with their horrible bathing routines and perfumes – none of which was comprehensible to Elinyra or George.

Elinyra glanced around at the pile of pots, then at the three quasits with an expression of feigned puzzlement. “There doesn’t seem to be enough coffee for all of you. So… who gets the coffee?”

She had their full attention now; the tiny wheels in their heads seemed to be casting off a few years’ worth of dust as they set into motion.

“Do you get it? How about you? Or you – you clearly have the biggest weapon.” She pointed to each of them in turn.

As expected, as soon as the first quasit started to utter some response, the second one hissed and gibbered angrily. The third continued its attempt to push one of the pots into George’s reach.

“Although…” Elinyra added nonchalantly with a glance behind her in the direction of the horde’s approach. “There’s a lot more of your kin coming, and they all want this coffee. Will there even be any left for you, the first and bravest?”

This thought spurred Boot and Mudclaw into a violent competition for the honor of the coffee pot; they bowled Squibert over as they pounced on the pot in a frenzy of curses and threats.

The druid used this distraction to make her way to the stash. She managed to grab one of the pots before the furious quasits saw her. Holding it behind her back, she nodded again to the growing noise from the direction of the wall, where the silhouettes of the quasit army flickered into sight in the preternatural gloom. This distracted their attention for a few moments longer, enough time for her to cast an ancient druid spell on the pot’s contents.

“Hey, here’s your coffee!” she shouted while loosening the lid. She flung the pot as far as she could towards the approaching army, the liquid inside shooting out in a hectic spiral as the pot flew end-over-end.

The quasits wasted no time as the object of their desire rained down on the floor; mesmerized, they abandoned the locked hoard for the chance to be first to taste their penultimate victory.

Elinyra rushed over to George and helped them to his feet, scrambling to untie his bonds.

“Do you realize how dangerous those monsters are when they’ve had even a drop of coffee?!” he exclaimed in horror. Elinyra smirked.

“I purified it – all of the ‘coffee’ is a solid chunk at the bottom of the pot. That liquid? That’s just water,” she explained as she slipped the poor excuse for ropes from him. Luckily, quasits seemed to be as expert at tying knots as they were at identifying a ploy.

“We’re out of time. We’ve got to get out of here!” she whispered harshly as the approaching mass of the quasit army came around the same shelf she’d first seen the stash from.

“Wait!” George called before she’d taken two steps. Holding one hand to the rising lump on his forehead, he turned towards the coffee stash. Letting out a slow breath, he started to chant something beneath his breath. Before him, the air shimmered and wavered, and it seemed to all observers that the pile of copper pots warped like a watercolor painting in the rain until they were instead a pile of bars of soap.

“Soap?” she asked with a confused glance at the wizard. It was his turn to smirk now.

“Just trust me.”

She shrugged before they both fled from the onrush of quasits.

------------------​

Above, Wiltolin and Garrod found that Vex was a surprisingly adept opponent. Even with both of them on the attack, the quasit leader was holding her own not through a strong defense nor strength of arms, but rather a tactical genius of dirty fighting. She had full control of the landscape of the tower’s apex; at one point she appeared to over-commit in a swing at Wiltolin only to jab him with her sharp-ended tail while he was focused on her first attack. As the two fighters coordinated their attacks, she evaded by dropping out of sight against the side of the tower. She clawed her way around to the other side before they could spot her and leaped back up behind them with a taunting snarl. As they turned, she blew the clawful of shredded paper pulp she’d torn from the books ahead of her like a cloud of irritating dust.

“Garrod!” Kin’Kenny’s severed head called from the ground. “There’s only one way to end this… you must get my axe!”

Garrod Arlette

 

[Garrod Arlette]

A paper storm clouded their sight, and both Wiltolin and Garrod turned their heads away to avoid the flurry of smacking sheets and smothering leaves. Garrod growled, and swept the broom in an arc, from low to high, and a gust of wind blew the papers out of their way. Vex, snickered and snarled and rode the wind, and tossed book after book at them as she swam through the current of air, all with a serious accuracy. Pages fluttered and snapped, violent in their motion as they near tore out of their bindings.

Kin'Kenny called out to them, Garrod's eye pulled down to witness the disembodied head give direction. A moment of disbelief, and the hard corner of a book's spine clunked him right on the head. He recoiled, and staggered. Vex laughed her harsh hissing laugh.

"The axe..." Wiltolin muttered. "I know where it is, Garrod!" the half-orc cried out, and turned and pointed to an instrument, stringed and big bellied, its body, curved and shaped like an axe, if only a bit wider.

Garrod's eye sparkled with aww, and his mouth hung agape.

"Go!" Wiltolin cried out. "I will do my best to hold," A wallop across the face with the heavy hard cover binding of a most ancient and hefty tome of beasty-fication studies thumped across Wiltolin's face, his whole head turned and spittle sprayed out of his mouth before he fell to the ground like a stack of books. Vex encroached upon him, vile humor twisting about her hideous maw, chipped fangs poking out as her insectoid eyes squinted.

With broom in hand, straw bristles fanned out and pointed at his wicked enemy, Garrod stood in short guard, weapon close to his body, easier to whip around and sweep.

The quasit queen, Vex, howled a violent cry and leapt forward with pan still in one hand. Fast as a bolt, she zipped forward and swung her weapon. Garrod knew better than to bat it away, relied on his reach and stabbed out with the bristly head of the broom. It pushed Vex back, but she laughed, a little grubby claw grabbed the wooden shaft of the broom's long handle, and she hopped right onto it, running up its length with frightening speed, the round black disk of iron that was her smashing club, held out behind her like a warhammer being wound up for the killing blow. Her lungs pushing out a most violent screech.

Quick thinking had Garrod fill his lungs with a whole gulp of air, his body bending back, as if to give the bellows of his lungs more room to fill, and just as Vex was bringing her pan forward, Garrod snapped forward and let out a stream of magicked breath turned spout. With force, Vex was pushed back, blown away, and Garrod too flew back and off the side of the tower.

Wiltolin, still dazed, worked himself off the ground, slowly, as Vex bounced and squeeked and clattered across the floor of the tower's zenith.

It was with some luck, that Garrod fell into an oversized floor pillow. It still hurt. But he would have time to complain later, as the yipping and yapping of a quasit horde rapidly approached. He groaned, and turned off his back and got up onto his feet, his eye blinked, and he found... "The Axe," he said as he laid eye on the instrument that seemed to glow of gold. He ran towards it, got to its glass case, and carefully opened the display.

His hand reached out and he grabbed the big bellied instrument, and he felt it hum with power.

Elinyra

 

[Elinyra Derwinthir]

At first it seemed that The Axe was merely the chimera of a nonsensical weapon and the strangest lute ever made, but the golden halo of light around it told of the mystical power chords within. What Garrod now held in his hands was a weapon unlike any he’d ever touched before – a force of sound, an implement of purest metal.

All around him the noisome bantering of the quasits grew; a vicious audience gathering for a concert they’d never forget. The swarm of tiny bodies formed a semi-circle around the lone warrior, demanding in a singular, hissing voice that he relinquish the location of the coffee. All they had found so far was a pile of horrible soap, which had only piqued their fury. They scurried and shoved each other like miniature gladiators in some sort of pit.

He had but one answer for them. Or rather, the Axe did. It began as a hum of electric energy in the air, something akin to the feeling of tiny strands of hair rising in advance of a lightning strike. The instrument’s strings vibrated in a harmony Garrod felt rather than heard, an almost-sentient sort of anticipation.

Garrod Arlette​

 

[Garrod Arlette]

​

The instrument, charged as it was, glowed golden and ready. His hand, as if by its own volition, reached out and grabbed Kin'Kenny's Axe by its elegant neck, lifted it from is rest and worked the sling over his head before he turned to face the snarling throng of coffee wanting quasits.

How they snarled and snapped and jigged and jibed. "What, what?! He holds the axe!" one of the older and more ancient demonlings hissed.

"Blasphemy! he is not the wretched one! He is not Kin', Slayer of Strings, Kenny!" a small, near-squeak of a voice sounded out.

"Let fly the junk!" One called out, and a rain of refuse flew across the sky.

Wide eyed, with one hand grasping the neck of the instrument, and the other hovering above its open mouth, he pressed his fingers down along the strings with his grasping hand and strummed across the strings with his other. A sweet and powerful sound thrummed out of axe that froze the missiles mid flight, even blew back a few rows of quasits, leaving those who remained standing wide eyed.

Garrod, who felt the immense power of the instrument in his hands, mouthed his amazement.

"Are ye fae?" one little hobbling creature asked as it coward forward.

"No," Garrod answered. "I am but man!" he shout and his fingers pressed down and his hand strummed down again and again and again. Chords progressed into streams of strings and running notes. The power of the axe imbuing the lone hero with a power far beyond his mortal capabilities.

The power, of shred.

 

[Elinyra Derwinthir]

In a clearing betwixt a mound of broken furniture, shards of clay cups and tattered books, George the Wizard and Elinyra the Druid had found a hiding place behind a large potted fern. They’d settled here to wait for the hoard of little coffee-mongers to pass them by, but a small squad of quasits had remained behind and were searching the area – until a deep, thrumming sound caught the creatures’ attention.

The hidden pair let out a unified breath of relief as the remaining quasits were drawn away. The noise came again, a low vibration that shook motes of dust from the floor.

“What is that?” Elinyra asked no-one in particular, poking her head out from their hiding place.

George followed suit, his face screwed in the process of trying to focus on a vague memory. Apparently he managed it, for a weird smile crept across his face.

“I know that sound!” he exclaimed victoriously after a third wave of sound formed into – a rhythm? He turned to Elinyra, his eyes glinting with excitement. “The Axe!”

Before Elinyra could even attempt to question him, George took off towards the disturbance at a dead run, suddenly oblivious to the army of quasits ahead of him.

“Come on!” he cried and then was gone.

It was apparent that this war had driven poor George insane. With a sigh of resignation and a frustrated mumbling, Elinyra chased after him.

The sight they came around to was unexpected, to say the least. What had once been a quiet reading nook had been transformed into a bizarre concert hall. A mass of quasit bodies and limbs flailed around in a frenzy, but it wasn’t on account of coffee; the quasits seemed to all be mesmerized by some commanding weave of rhythm and melody emanating from the front of a glass-faced display case.

“Garrod?” Elinyra blinked, but there was no confusing the one-eyed white-haired human standing there. She tried to call out to him, but her voice was drowned out by a new wave of noise.

Not noise – music. Of a type she’d never heard before. As if the song had been melted down into raw emotions and reborn into the deadly majesty of a thunderstorm. It resonated through the soul with a rough ferocity that inspired awe.

It held a power over the quasits, too, it seemed. They swayed and yelled and made strange gestures with their claws as if worshiping some sort of god. A few were even blown from their feet by the mystical power of the strings. George was now whooping and shouting along with them, carried along in the same hysteria.

The crowd’s energy reached a crescendo as Garrod finished playing, and it appeared for a moment that the quasits had completely forgotten about their battle until a shrill whistle broke the moment of grandeur.

The quasits all fell silent and turned toward the whistle’s source in unison. Elinyra followed their gaze; there shined a shiny quasit in the middle of the horde, grizzled and defiant. Vex whistled again, and her minions obediently fetched a variety of sizes of pots and cups that were set up all around her. She twirled two sticks between her claws and hissed a challenge at the wielder of the Axe. The quasits and the Librarians who were here to witness the duel looked on in a stunned silence that permeated the entirety of Kin’Kenny’s Trove.

Then, with a triumphant snarl, Vex drummed.

Garrod Arlette​

 

[Garrod Arlette]

With axe in hand and electric breath drawn in and out of his lungs with each pull those organs made, Garrod watched the shiny quasit, Vex, beater of a thousand rhythms, take to her kit. wicked smile wide and toothy across her buggy face. Up, she raised her twin sticks of drumming, and clacked them once, twice, thrice.

She started as she was. Small. Quick. Nasty. A flurry of beats that seemed little more than noise. Seemed little more than the mindless thrashing of rage-filled being.

No. Garrod's heart panged. His eye was wide as he saw Vex grin with pride, saw her sticks twirling with flourish betwixt her little claws. She waited.

The quasit crowd roared in response.

It was a call. One his fingers itched to answer. One the Axe would not let him pass down. Garrod grinned. He had faced monsters before. What made this so different?

He thrashed out a progression, fingers' flesh near shredding as thumb, fore finger and middle clawed and picked the strings while the other hand twist and contort along the neck of the instrument. The last chord twanged out sharp, crisp and clear with power.

Vex snarled with delight, sticks crossed quick overhead once, she started to drum, started to rata-tat-tat-tat against the pots and cups and leather bound tomes that made up her kit, her long talon-toes tapping against metal plate for an extra layer of percussion.

Garrod felt his mind melt. Twist. Get sucked in to the beat. His fingers moved before he could think. His arms worked the Axe with all he had. A duel. Yes. They were dueling. But the sounds melted together. As sweat poured down his brow. As his fingers stung with pain and their tips seemed to spark with fire. His heart rang like metal true. His eye alit with a demonic light.

Tit for tat. Thrash and churn. Their duel turned to a violent symphony. A roar of beastly hunger. Music, not of this world.

Elinyra

 

[Elinyra Derwinthir]

The battle had become a matter of acoustics. This development was understandably surprising to the non-quasits in the crowd. The quasits themselves seemed to consider this the most memorable event on record, regardless of the outcome; an outcome that had no clear verdict as two titans of rock collided in antagonistic harmony. A bar or two of their impromptu song crossed the universe’s very fibers into a neighboring dimension, causing some cosmic horror to pause briefly and look around with a murmur in an ancient, eldritch language. It roughly translated to: What is that?

The debate of timbres reached a crescendo that disturbed the crowd like a pebble in a pond. George and Elinyra, standing beside one another, had to duck when a splash of quasits cascaded off of the walls of the nook. George yelled something at Elinyra as he tossed her a coffee pot. Elinyra yelled something back with a confused look on her face. Amidst the loudness of instruments and tiny demons, neither one of them had any idea what the other was trying to say.

Perched upon her throne of a half-broken stool, Vex indeed channeled all of her rage into the drums. It might have been enough to win the day had not the magical properties of her earlier swig of coffee chosen that moment to dissipate into the void. Now, with a mundane normality looming over her, she mis-calculated her next few notes. She hit the medium tom when she should have hit the floor tom, then a cymbal in a place where a snare should have gone.

The other quasits turned, aghast at their leader for such a heinous disruption of their musical enjoyment. Vex attempted to right the cosmic imbalance she’d created, but already she was being pelted with clawfuls of balled-up papers and detritus. Drum sticks flew up in the air. Vex’s gurgle of defeat was quickly muted as she disappeared beneath a growing pile of rubbish.

Cheekier scholars would later joke about how the War of the Beans ended on a sour note. A less-popular group would retort that it actually ended on a bonk when Elinyra, who while intrigued by the whole affair was thoroughly done with the business of quasits, smacked Vex on the head with a coffee pot when the old demon failed to accept her defeat with grace.

With their rebellion’s leader seeing stars, the quasit army soon dispersed. Those that didn’t found themselves enclosed in magical bubbles when Kin’Kenny – his skull having been restored to its rightful place – made his appearance with the abused Wiltolin lagging behind.

“Well played!” the lich laughed as he arrived at the display case where Garrod, George and Elinyra had gathered to admire The Axe. “Quite a show! A shame that I was in pieces for most of it.

“I don’t normally do this but...” He muttered as he fished around in one of the deep pockets in his purple robe. After a moment, he withdrew four strips of paper and handed one to each of them. “I feel like you all deserve it, after such a curious incident.”

Kin’Kenny turned to the prostrate form of Vex, who he had finally managed to bubble. The pinkish gem in his brow turned a crimson hue and the silver flames of his eyes danced dangerously in the pits of his eye sockets.

“You and your demons will be cleaning this up! In the forms of toads! Until you get everything spotless! And no snacks!” the lich roared, although it seemed that the quasit was not conscious enough to hear him.

Wiltolin frowned at the little paper before informing Kin’Kenny that he was going to charge double his normal rate, sparking a second contest of wills carried out by heated discussion.

Elinyra glanced down at the paper strip in her hand. Written in silver ink, in a curving script, it said Kin’Kenny Coupon: One minor enchantment *Redeemable only at Kin’Kenny’s Trove, Alliria. Cannot combine with other offers. No gold value. Void where prohibited. Excludes conjurations. Terms and conditions apply. Offer not valid in all dimensions). She considered asking Kin’Kenny about it, but thought better of interrupting a debate between two wizards. Instead, she turned to Garrod.

“So then, would you like to go out for a beer?”

Garrod Arlette​

 

[Garrod Arlette]

Garrod looked down at the silver lettered slip. Thought on the offer of enchantment. A handsome reward, for any adventurer.

Would you like to go out for a beer?

Quickly forgotten. "Depends," he said with a smirk and slipped the note into an inside coat pocket. "What sort of beer you like?" he started to make for the exit, the Axe sparkling proudly behind him, and the quasits quickly falling into work to clean the horrid mess around them. "I ain't much of a lager man, to tell it true," he went on.

Elinyra

 

[Elinyra Derwinthir]

So it was that, after a brief and bizarre war – which may or may not have actually occurred within the space-time boundaries of Arethil’s universe– Kin’Kenny’s Trove returned to an era of peace. Eventually, Vex and her quasits managed to make a deal with the lich for coffee breaks (uncaffeinated, of course) in return for a promise that they would never again assault the patrons. Vex also reluctantly agreed to stop tearing up Kin’Kenny’s romance novels for nesting material.

Wiltolin was finally able to finish Kin’Kenny’s taxes, though he would forever refer to the incident as a ‘damnable nightmare’ of accounting. He used his coupon to create an enchanted abacus he named the Calculator, and continues to run a very successful accounting firm in Alliria.

The events of the battle between Garrod and Vex inspired George to learn to play the mystic lute. He started his own band named “Dying for A Coffee”. They weren’t widely popular, but they found a niche with certain Underrealm venues.

No one knows how Aggron escaped the battle, but the ogre still visited the Trove from time to time, ever eager to learn more about curses and small fauna. By some reports, Aggie and Gron were able to put their heads together and create Arethil’s first and only Refuge for Cursed Squirrels and Other Forest Friends somewhere in Allir Reach.

In a nearer time, Elinyra and Garrod laughed at a private joke as they walked together down one Allirian street known for its quiet taverns and very average shops. They found one such tavern and settled in a spot to enjoy drinks while trying to piece together all of the recent – for lack of a better word – oddness; as if one of the gods had decided today was the day to shake all the collected motes of weird from their rugs. She had a semi-sweet white wine (or two). He had an imperial ale (or three). Still a little confused and now a slight bit tipsy, they tried to figure out what to call Garrod and Vex’s new style of bardic magic. Nothing they came up with proved very fitting, but the only thing that mattered was the unexpected adventure. After all, what’s a little adventure between friends?

Garrod Arlette​