Paul Crilley - Night of Long Shadows

It turned and walked into the darkness. Within three steps it was invisible. Wren closed his eyes and watched through the creature’s senses. It walked down the street, searching all around for signs of ambush. But nothing stood out as unusual. Wren called it back.

“It seems to be clear,” he said, turning to face Torin.

Four goblins stood behind them, waiting patiently to be noticed. They were typical of their kind, squat and ugly, their flat faces making Wren think that whatever god created them had pressed them up against a wall and pushed until all their features flattened out.

“Uh, Torin. Could you take three large steps forward and turn around please?”

Torin did as Wren asked. When he saw the goblins, he cursed and drew his sword. “Where did they come from?”

“I have no idea. And why are they just standing there?” He glanced over his shoulder. “Renaia, please keep well back. Unless you have a weapon?”

Renaia shook her head.

“Fine. Just keep out the way, if you please.”

Wren turned from her and muttered some words beneath his breath.

“They don’t usually attack like this,” whispered Torin. “They usually have a leader or something.”

That was worrying Wren. He finished activating the infusion he had cast into his belt and felt a rush of strength surge through his body. And not a moment too soon. The goblins glanced to their left, speaking to each other in their guttural tongue. Wren thought he heard the word chib , which he knew to mean “big boss” in their language. He took a wand from his belt and held it ready.

“Torin, you deal with the goblins. I’ll deal with whatever else is coming.”

Wren instantly regretted his words as an eight-foot-tall creature lumbered around the corner, swinging a mace that was the same size as Torin. A bugbear. Thick, bristly red hair covered its body, and it had lost both ears in some past encounter. It raised a salute with the mace.

Wren didn’t hesitate. He pointed his wand and a ball of flame roared into the creature.

The bugbear lifted a shield that looked as if it might have once been someone’s front door. The fireball exploded into the wood, blackening it and sending the bugbear staggering backward.

Well, that hadn’t done much good. And Wren had only a few more charges in the wand. He knew he shouldn’t have left the house without his full arsenal, but he hadn’t expected to need any major defenses. He was supposed to be at a party, for Flame’s sake!

He could hear Torin shouting at the goblins as he tore into them with his sword. The bugbear looked at its shield, then grinned at Wren, huge sharp teeth jutting crookedly in its mouth. How the creature managed to even speak without lacerating its face was a mystery.

Wren sighed. No other way around it. He would have to get his hands dirty.

He released a charge from his wand, this time aiming for the head of the bugbear. The creature brought up its massive arm to block the blow, but Wren had expected it to do that. As soon as the fireball left the wand, Wren sprinted after it, lowered his shoulder, and slammed into the creature. His enhanced strength knocked the bugbear off its feet with a grunt of surprise, sprawling it on its back. Wren leaped to his feet and fired off the last charge. The fireball hit the creature full in the face. The bugbear screamed as the hair shriveled from its head and its skin bubbled and blistered.

Wren put the wand back in his belt and unhooked one of a pair of specially designed crossbows. He’d constructed them himself and was quite proud of them. That wasn’t to say they didn’t have flaws. Reducing their size so they fit easily into a single hand put the small weapons under an immense amount of pressure. An unforeseen side effect of this was that once the safety was off, the crossbows had a habit of unleashing the bolt at the slightest bump. Not the most dependable of weapons.

But they were good when their wielder was backed up against a wall.

Wren gagged at the stench of cooked flesh and leveled the crossbow at the bugbear as it writhed on the ground.

“Wren! Behind!”

Wren dropped and turned, loosing the bolt straight into the face of the goblin running at him. The creature’s head jerked back and its legs flipped into the air as the force of the blow stopped it in its tracks.

Wren reached into his coat for his second crossbow, but before he could get hold of it, something smacked into his shoulder and sent him spinning through the air. He slammed into a wall and fell to the ground in a crumpled heap, his shoulder numb and useless beneath him.

Struggling to sit up, Wren saw the bugbear on its feet again, flailing with its mace. The beast was blind, the fireball having shriveled its eyes in their sockets. It was striking out blindly. Wren had been clipped by a lucky hit.

Torin was down to the last two goblins, but the bugbear was headed for the sound of their fighting. Wren winced in pain and pushed himself to his feet. He pulled out the other crossbow and staggered over to the creature, pausing to time his attack. The mace flailed through the air in wide arcs, accompanied by screams and sobs of pain from the bugbear. Wren felt a twinge of sympathy for it.

Wren tried to dodge under the swing but the bugbear was moving too fast for him to get close. He stepped back and decided on another route. He waited for the bugbear to turn its back, then jumped up and grabbed it around its huge neck. The creature screamed in anger, but before it could do anything, Wren reached around and loosed the crossbow straight into its mangled eye socket.

The bugbear froze in place. Then it twitched slightly, dropped the mace and shield, and toppled over backward. Wren threw himself to the side before he was crushed beneath the weight. He landed on his injured shoulder and cried out in pain. He kept rolling and pushed himself to his feet just as the creature hit the ground with a clatter of rusted armor.

The noise distracted the last goblin long enough for Torin to swing his sword into its neck, cleaving the creature down to the chest bone. The goblin looked at the wound and opened its mouth as if to say something, but a bubble of black blood welled out and the creature collapsed at the dwarf’s feet.

Silence followed, broken only by ragged gasps as they tried to regain their breath. Renaia emerged from the shadows and hurried over.

“Are you hurt?” she asked.

Wren glanced at Torin. “I’m fine. But the dwarf looks like he’s taken a few cuts.”

“Hah!” said Torin. “Speak for yourself. That arm doesn’t look too healthy hanging there like that.”

“A mere bruise. Two seconds at a Jorasco healer will do me fine.” He winced and rolled his shoulder. It was just a bruise, albeit it a very deep and large bruise that would spread down his arm and over his back. He would have to visit a healer, or he’d be stiff for weeks.

“Renaia. Lead the way, if you please. And no more dark streets. I don’t have any wands left. Oh, that reminds me.” Wren walked over to the bugbear and bent over to examine the creature. He wanted to retrieve his bolt, but it had gone too deep into the skull. He wrinkled his face with distaste. He had no desire to cut it out.

He made do with the bolt from the goblin and reloaded his other crossbow with a spare from his belt. He had only five left. Host, after this he would never leave the house without a full belt of weapons.

They walked away from the scene of the fight. Wren glanced over at Torin. “You’re limping! I win.”

“What do you mean, you win? You can’t move your arm!”

“Yes, but I can run. You can’t. Which means I can leave you behind if we get outnumbered. Therefore, I win. Renaia, lead on!”