The blips and splashes of the river echoed off the cavern walls as Robin, Anzo, Gwynt, and Hudtan followed the flow away from the well. There were footholds along the bank, but barely. Robin slipped, and caught the wall to catch herself, but quickly withdrew her hands. The cave wall was slimy and probably had bugs on it. Robin wiped her hands on her pant legs, and became acutely aware of how raggedy her clothes were. Stumbling around in the dark underground was only serving to get them dirtier and more torn.
“This isn’t too bad,” Gwynt said in a voice that was a bit too high-pitched to call calm. “We’ve got water, and I’m sure we can find rats or something to eat. Sure, it’s dark, but what good are colors anyway?”
Robin
followed his voice. “Gwynt, don’t you have a smoke bomb or
something? I think we should use that the next time we’re being
chased by people who want to murder us.”
“Doesn’t
matter now!” Gwynt said, laughing briefly. “This is our home
now.”
“Could
we light a torch?” Robin asked. “My bruises would be sincerely
grateful.”
Hudtan’s
voice came from farther ahead. “Do not. Someone is giving us
pursuit. I heard another set of footsteps make contact after
Robin’s.”
“They
can join us in our new life,” Gwynt said. “They can be the
butler.”
“We
can lose them up ahead in one of these tunnels,” Anzo said.
Robin
realized she was falling behind, and scurried to catch up. “You
mean it’s not just a dead end? How can you tell?”
“The
echoes from the river,” Anzo said. “I, like you, dear Robin,
cannot see in the dark. It will be up to Hudtan and Gwyntmarwolaeth
to lead us to safety.”
“I
wonder if cave spiders make good pets,” Gwynt said with a strained
sigh.
“Okay,
it’s up to Hudtan to lead us to safety until Gwynt’s mind isn’t
broken.”
Robin
put a hand out in the direction of Gwynt’s voice in an attempt to
comfort him, but ended up nudging his face instead. She felt him
reach up and grab her hand, then slowly moved it up and down in a
formal handshake. “Don’t worry, Gwynt,” she told him, “we
don’t have to live down here forever. We can head back up once
night falls.”
“If
we can shake our pursuer,” Hudtan mumbled.
“Are
you sure that’s what you heard? I don’t hear anything,” Robin
said.
Hudtan
cleared her throat. “Please do not take dire offense to this, but
your human ears compared to my elven ones are like a spider sensing
every vibration on its web is to the vision of the fly that waltzed
right into it.”
“Wait,
so my hearing is better than yours?”
“No,
the-It’s the other way around! You know what I meant!”
“Please,”
Anzo said, “if we are being stalked, the less sound we make the
harder it will be to follow us.”
“It’s
so lovely to meet you!” Gwynt said in a sing-song voice, still
gently shaking Robin’s hand as they walked. “Welcome to my humble
abode. Can I interest you in some rock cake? It’s made from real
rocks.”
“Gwynt
has the right idea,” Hudtan said. “Let us grasp each other’s
hands and form a succession so that I may lead us silently.”
Robin
and Anzo waved their arms around until they finally bumped into each
other. Anzo’s half-ogre mitt almost completely enclosed Robin’s
hand, but he held it without squeezing and tugged her in the right
direction. They started moving away from the river. Robin could walk
through the new tunnel while still standing upright, although it
seemed Anzo was crouching. They then took a turn down another tunnel,
and another, always with the sound of the river echoing around the
walls, sometimes farther and sometimes closer again. How
long had these tunnels been underneath the town,
Robin
wondered. And
where did they lead?
“Follow
Hudtan, everyone,” Anzo said. “And make sure you stick with your
buddy.”
“Gwynt,
did we lose whoever was following us?” Robin whispered.
“This
will be a lovely spot for the dining room!”
“Would
you snap out of it already-”
Hudtan
suddenly stopped, causing Anzo to bump into her. Robin walked face
first into Anzo’s back, and Gwynt stepped on her toes. “Oh, my
gosh, I’m so sorry!” he whispered.
“Nnh...Why
did we stop?”
Hudtan
was silent for a moment, then whispered, “I think there is someone
up ahead.”
Anzo
tugged both Hudtan and Robin’s hands so that the whole group was
flung against the tunnel wall. “Is it our pursuer?” he said. “Did
they find another path that brought them in front of us?”
“How
am I supposed to know?!” Hudtan hissed.
Now
Robin could hear it too: a quick series of footsteps that suddenly
stopped before starting back up, short and quick breathing, the sound
of something metal scraping against the cavern wall. It sounded like
it was coming from every direction at once due to the echoes. Unless
it actually is coming from all sides,
Robin
thought, just as her fears were confirmed.
Gwynt
shouted and let go of Robin’s hand; Anzo’s grip only tightened.
She heard a growl, but it sounded like a person imitating one rather
than something a wild animal would make. Hudtan shouted, “Draw your
weapons!” Robin held up her free hand and balled her fist.
“What
are we fighting?” Anzo called back. There was more snarling and
chittering, and a clash of blades. He finally let go of Robin’s
hand to draw his mace. She shook the feeling back into it and raised
it up next to the other, in case something attacked her.
“Goblins!”
Hudtan shouted back. Robin heard one of them gurgle as Hudtan’s
dagger found its mark, but still she backed closer to the wall.
Goblins were a short, nasty people who were known for sowing as much
chaos and violence as possible. It was not a good idea to get into a
fight with a goblin, for they would not hold back from even the
dirtiest of tactics.
Gwynt
had drawn his rapier to fight them off. “Can’t even get any peace
and quiet in my own home!” he said.
Robin
scrambled to remove her backpack, searching for a torch or at least a
match, anything to let her see what was going on. The elves and
presumably the goblins could both see in the dark, so Anzo was the
only other one currently blind. He didn’t seem to care; from the
sound of the battle, he was swinging his mace in wide circles around
him while telling off the goblins for daring to do battle against the
mighty Bedlam. Robin dug around the bottom of her bag, but there was
only some rope from the orphanage heist, the broken lockpick she
found in the alchemical warehouse, and some “healing potions”
that Gwynt had given to her.
Robin
heard the wind get knocked out of another goblin with a sound like a
tomcat not landing on its feet. “We’ve got them on the back
foot!” Anzo said.
“That’s
great,” Robin replied, trying to find something to do with her
hands. The other three were keeping the goblins away from her,
leaving her to sit there feeling useless.
There
was a chorus of goblin war cries coming from down the tunnel, and
Robin heard Hudtan gasp and shift backwards while parrying the blows
from at least two goblins in front of her. From the sounds of the
footsteps, there was a huge crowd heading down to reinforce the
troops currently fighting. Although, Robin realized, knowing goblins,
it was probably not a military tactic, but rather that they had just
heard the fighting and wanted to join in.
Anzo
grunted as several bodies a fourth of his height leaped onto him,
trying to drag him to the ground. Gwynt ran past Robin to assist on
the new front, and a gurgling goblin fell at her feet, dying from the
poison that tipped every one of his weapons. However, the horde had
already overrun Anzo and now surrounded them. There was no one to get
in between the goblins and Robin any more. She quickly bent down and
felt for the dead goblin’s hand, grabbing his dagger and holding it
up in front of her with two hands.
She
heard a snarl and movement in front of her, so she slashed the dagger
sideways. She felt contact and heard fabric tearing, and whatever
goblin had charged her fell to the side. Another one shouted and
jumped at her from the left, so she jabbed at it, and the dagger sank
into its chest. There were more guttural mumbles around her, but the
goblins now seemed more reserved and reluctant to jump at her. She
couldn’t help but laugh. “Look at me, I’m fighting!” she
said.
“Great,
now we’ve lost two of them to madness,” Hudtan said. She then
yelped, and Robin heard her fall to the floor.
The
cave was suddenly bright with light, and Robin held up a hand to
shield her eyes. The goblins took the opportunity to rush around her
and grab her arms, pulling her to her knees. When her eyes adjusted,
she could finally see their faces. They had green and purple skin,
wide faces with smiling mouths, showing off their crooked teeth, and
most had little or thin and wispy hair. The light was coming from a
cold-torch, held by a goblin standing at the back of the throng and
dressed in furs that seemed to be from rats. The others looked to
this one for their next instructions.
The
chieftain surveyed the scene. Anzo was struggling still, but eleven
goblins were sitting on him to hold him down. Hudtan and Gwynt were
both similarly restrained as Robin, and Hudtan had a long red gash on
her arm. The chieftain pointed down the tunnel, in the direction of
the river. They said something in the goblin tongue, and the others
started dragging Bedlam away, literally in Anzo’s case. Robin
looked over her shoulder at the way they had come in, wondering what
they had got themselves into.
