Chapter 17: Price

The fat mill boss dropped a small cloth coinpurse onto the table across from the ranger. The contents barely made a sound when they tapped against the wood surface. He then slid the pouch towards the ranger and gave the young man a toothy grin when he saw Thaelin's brow raised in curiosity.

Thaelin unfurled the drawstring to the pouch and emptied the contents into his palm. Three yellow stones gleamed in the candlelight of the boss' tent. The little nuggets were in all sorts of smooth shapes resembling common river stones but, lacked any small veins of other minerals mixed in. The ranger's eyes were spellbound on the little rocks. He couldn't even tell that a greedy smile took his lips.

"Solid gold." Nodded the boss "That there is yer startin' wage. Kill them elves, and you'll get yerself a hefty sum. My scouts found what they claim to be a village in the trees towards the Northwest. Well within our side of the border.

"Hastur ain't gonna like this job." The ranger sighed pocketing the stones

"Dont worry, lad. The law strictly says we have the right to retaliate if they invade our side."

"Alright. You got yourself a ranger." Thaelin said shaking the fat man's sweaty hand.

"Right-o. Oh, and if yer feelin like filling a second contract, there's a certain witch among them twiggers, bring her alive. And you'll get yerself a bonus."

Those magic words ignited a warm light in the ranger's belly. If he's being paid in gold, then a 'bonus' was surely going to be a great sum. More than he could earn in Hayak for a petty crook.

The fat man smirked at his newest employee. "Happy hunting, lad."

The ranger exited the tent and gathered his companion tending to a few overworked laborers

"Come on Hast. Jobs on."

The cleric took a final look around at the camp. While Thaelin talked she saw the men gather planks and start construction next to a long water trough. As if in unison, holes were drilled, wooden peg tapped home and oakum and pitch were added to the corners to make it water tight. The teamwork of the laborers building skills was amazing to the half elf.

The ranger and the lleric left the camp with their fur coated escort. The smell of smoke permeated their clothes. It was all the mage could smell when they walked. After a few yards, the sounds of labor became a distant lull. And once they were pointed towards their way to the Elven settlement, their guide slipped back into his position hidden among the undergrowth. It seemed that the second they left the smokey camp, the half elf was assaulted by mosquitoes.

Almost an hour later, the duo made their way Northwest passing through a break in the dense wood. The trees became sparse and they reached a rivers edge. A course sand bar outstretched into the river resembling a thorn on a bramble

The refreshing air was a great relief to the sweltering mage. Hastur gave a quick look around for a lumberman scout hidden in the wood before she lowered her hood. The cool air by the river felt wondrous now that she didn't have to wear that heavy cloak hood. But her relief was soon short lived a swarm of mosquitoes soon found their way to her cheeks.

Thaelin dropped his knapsack and unlaced his doublet. The man hopped on one foot as he tugged his boots off and curled his toes into the warm sand.

"Ahh! now this is relief." he sighed letting the gentle river current wash over his toes.

"So…what are we going to do?" Hastur asked shooing away another mosquito swarm

"Sit, rest, and chill. This seems a good enough place for camp."

"That's not what I meant." Hastur said tugging at the length of her cloak to cover hers eat as she sat in the shade next to the ranger. "I meant this job…"

"Dunno. But we can deal with it in the morning. These elves don't seem to be going anywhere. But its buggin me-"

"-Only thing bugging me are these damned bugs." Hastur muttered slapping her right ear when the high pitched whine of a mosquito passed by.

"How do you feel about this? These guys are encroaching on elf territory. And I don't really think those loggers have the paperwork to be here."

"People are being killed. I can't stand for that."

"Will you be able to do it? If it comes to fighting the elves, I wanna know. Will you pull your sword?"

Hastur pursed her lips and remained silent for a while.

Seeing the half elf get troubled by the question, Thaelin chose to lighten the mood in his usual way. He unbottoned his knapsack and started rumbling through it.

"Drink?" he asked retrieving the small leather flask.

"Ya know all this drinking is bad for your health right?" she said taking the flask and sniffing the mouth of the little costrel.

The ranger smirked at his friend as her face contorted from just taking a small sip of the rum. "So is fighting monsters. Yet here we are…"

As he reclined by the river a memory wondered its way into his head. One that he thought might help ease Hastur's nerves more than the rum could.

"Hast, have I ever told you about the time me and some friends went on our first dungeon crawl?"

"No...I don't think you did." She coughed, handing back the flask. The spice flavored drink coated her throat as it went down.

"This was a long time ago. Had to be about 16-17 maybe. Anyways. Our archer picked up a line about a couple bodies from a graveyard started going missing. Little did we know the dungeon belonged to a necromancer."

Hastur's eyes started to go wide with intrigue as her friend unraveled the tale

"The four of us go on through the usual dungeon path: checking for loot, traps, and stuff, when all of a sudden Angus, the archer, starts floating all of a sudden. He goes up, say 20 feet before he hits the ceiling and starts freaking out. We are all laughing thinking 'hey, looks like we found a trap'. Monty, our spell caster, starts joking with him threatening to leave him there."

"Oh wow!" laughed Hastur this possible dungeon belonging to a necromancer.

"Angus gets so mad he starts pulling out his cock and pissed on us from up above." Chuckled the ranger as he reminisced from his youth.

Between bellyfilled chuckles, Hastur managed to ask "Did you help him down?

"Yeah. Varris took a rope from her pack and pulled the idiot down. He was fuming red after that. It was great. But that's not the best part.-"

At the mention of the warrior, Hastur's arm twinged slightly from where it was broken by the paladin. "I didn't know she used to be an adventurer…"

"Yeah. She was with me since our little party began. If ya wanna piss her off tell her about 'the game'."

"The game…?"

"After tossing a few stones through the area. Monty, our wizard, deduced that it was a 'slowed time' thing with an after effect of levitating anything heavier than about 10 pounds. Once we figured we can get around it, Angus got the idea to play a game of roulette with it. He pulls out his cock again and starts beating off." The ranger struggled to say from cackling so hard.

"OH MY GOD!" Hastur yelled, face turning red from the sudden plot twist

"After he finishes we start running around the column watching this load fly through all slow like. And Varris takes the load right to the fucking face!"

The cleric fell backwards with laughter. Her sides started to hurt. No matter how hard she tried to

"Worst part was, my dumb ass, tells her 'hey Myshka, after we leave here, how about we go to a bath house and you can get a real facial'. She chased me all the way through the dungeon and next thing I know, I bump into the fucking necromancer."

"Re-Remind me to never go in a dungeon with you." Hastur laughed while trying to regain her composure

"Yeah. We didn't get much loot. Just some lousy books and a health potion or two. Nothing great."

Once the laughter subsided Hastur laid back on the shoreline. She watched as the clouds floated by against the crystal blue afternoon sky. The cleric felt the warm sun's rays on her as the rays broke through the tree canopy. She felt she could understand why the loggers wanted to stake their claim here and why the elves would want them to spoil such beauty here. This was a peaceful place. All except for the damn bugs.

The duo's merriment was broken when the slapping sound of a fish breaching the river took Thaelin's attention. The ranger shuffled through his knapsack again, but couldn't find his tin box of tackle and line.

"Damn! Must have left it at home." He mumbled as he rose to his feet. "Hast, you're about to see what a real badass ranger looks like." He said rolling up his

"What? You have a ranger friend coming to meet us?" she smirked to herself "What are you doing, idiot?"

"Fishing." He said rolling up his left hand and wading out into the center of the river. I'm going to catch us dinner like a true badass. With my bear hands."

The cleric rolled her eyes "You're not going to catch anything like that."

"Yes I am"

"No, you're not. You would have better luck with using a sharpened stick or something." Hastur retorted slapping another blood sucker on her neck

"Why do you have to doubt me all the time? I'm an expert fisherman. Just because of that, the only thing you're going to eat tonight are your words."

"Whatever, idiot."

Thaelin stalked his way through the river and found the fish that caught his eye, a river trout swimming in front of him. He slowly moved himself to where he was standing over the fish and his his hands ready to go in for the kill. As fast as an arrow, he clamped his hands around the slick body of the fish. Just as he tried to pull it to the surface, he felt the fish squirm and escape his grasp

"Damn it!"

"Told you." she mumbled under her breath The half elf shook her head at the sight and swatted at another mosquito against her neck.

She looked down at where the water met the sand when something odd caught her eye. A shining little rock. The mage dug out the rock from the sand and her face lit up.

"Thaelin…"

"Shut up! You're scaring them away with your negativity" The ranger said scanning the flowing stream for the shadow of his next prey.

"No, Thaelin. You gotta see this." She said fining a second stone not far from where she found the other yellow stone.

"Shut it! I can do this."

"Ouch! Son of a-" the last bug bite pierced the mage's skin a tad more painful than the last few. She rubbed at the sore spot and felt something strange. Something like a twig with feathery fluff lashed to the end.

"Thaelin!" she managed to say before feeling her tongue go numb.

"Fuck off Hast!" he said stalking another fish in the current. He cautiously approached the second fish he kept his hands wide as to not alert the thing of any danger. Inch by inch, he crept closer and closer until he could almost touch it. Then like a viper, he clamped his palms around it and scooped the fish to the surface.

"Eat your fucking words, bitch!" the man laughed as he started making his way to the shore. Just as he glanced up from his mighty catch, his mouth was left hanging when he saw Hastur drop to her knees face planting into the sand.

"Oh shit!" he growled dropping his catch back into the water as he ran to grab his sword belt by his knapsack

the ranger scanned the tree line searching for any foes but found none. His shilled eyes and sense of smell failed to find anything that could have been from an attacker. But he did hear something. It was faint. Soft as a whisper, but rather foreign to him. The way it struck his ears, made the sound something like a song. A beautiful song.

Just as she had, a small pin prick struck his neck. His fingers felt the dart when he scratched at the injection area.

"Shit."