But that would come later. For now, she had a prison break to pull off. Somehow.
Twelve
Scavengers
Corey
“The stream is flooding again.”
Ket was right. Water was beginning to pool on top of the clay flats, where, if left unchecked, it would slowly creep inland toward the barracks.
"But we just shored it up!" I complained. I spent several moments cursing vehemently, until Ket got bored of hearing it and cleared her throat.
"Yes, and now we'll have to shore it up again. It's not a big deal."
I carried on grumbling, though I was already using Divine Inspiration to convey to Gneil that he should instruct the builders to increase the flood barriers. Though I didn't really like dragging him away from his post, it was much quicker that way, either because I'd done this with him so many times or because he was my high cleric.
Whatever the reason, within moments three builders were stuffing dirt into burlap sacks until they were full to bursting, then tying them off and hauling them across the bridge. They stacked them atop and behind the existing barrier of sacks along the bank, then did the same around the north and west walls of the barracks.
"See? No big deal," said Ket brightly.
The sprite zipped off to check again on Longshank, who was hobbling around supervising the placement of the makeshift sandbags. I noted Ket glowing with approval as she admired his initiative.
I'm still not making him overseer, I thought grumpily. Though he is doing a pretty nifty job with those defenses...
As Ket said, shoring up the flooding hadn't been such a big deal. But it wasn't the task itself that was making me irritable.
The stream had been swelling for days. But the weather up top—which by choice I only ever experienced through the hole in the Grotto's ceiling—had been no rainier than before.
What was more, I'd noticed parts of the wall through which the stream flowed into the cavern beginning to crumble away. Even as I watched, a few more clods of dirt splashed into the stream as the crack in the wall widened by yet another increment. I felt a twinge of worry, not for the first time.
Thankfully the scouts chose that moment to return from their latest expedition, providing a well-timed distraction from my water-based worries.
A few more uneventful patrols underground had confirmed the mole-rat threat was now well and truly dealt with. So, at Ket's insistence, I'd been sending the scouts out above the surface. They'd returned the first time with an array of biological treasures from what Ket suggested must be the corpse of a wild sheep: wool, meat, and a waxy substance Ket called 'lanolin'.
(I’d initially misheard the latter as 'lamb-olin', and replied, "Oh, because it's a sheep?" This had prompted much mirth and mockery from the sprite ever since.)
The lanolin had proved a timely find. When applied to the surface of other materials—like wood, hide, and the rough hessian fabric the gnomes used to make their clothes—it imbued them with minor waterproofing properties.
It looked like the scouts had brought back more of the same this time. One by one they climbed down the ladder from the hole in the western wall, which led windingly to the surface by way of the badgers' former sett. The scouts' packs were bulging with evidence of sheeply bounty; they'd gathered so much wool this time they looked like walking clouds.
Two of my recently matured gnomes—to whom I’d assigned the ‘clothier’ vocation—scurried forward to meet the scouts, crooning over their new finds and rubbing the latest samples of fleece between their fingers.
"Ooh, I wonder if they'll use this wool to try out the new spindle the carpenters made!"
The last batches of wool had somehow all found their way into the badgers' nest. I suspected some of the children had had a hand in that, and knew for a fact that Binky had as well. In fact, he'd had eight. His relationship with the stripy little mammals really was bizarre.
"If you can call it a spindle," I replied to Ket. I eyed the wonky shroomwood construction dubiously.
"It's their first attempt. Of course it's not perfect." Her tone was reprimanding. "But at least starting now means they have lots of time to practice before the cold weather starts to set in."
I grunted in agreement. "And at least their winter outfits can't be any worse than their summer ones." I glanced from the clothiers' rough togas—recently customized with snail shells and wilting daisies—to the scouts' wrinkly mole-rat armor. "Or their scouting gear."
"At least we solved the mystery of where the skins came from," she said brightly.
"True. I'm sleeping much better at night now I know that."
"Pah! You and I both know that if you did sleep, it wouldn't be at night."
"How many times, Ket? I am—I was—a dark elf. Not a vampire. They're not the same thing." Before she could argue to the contrary, I added, "Besides, it's always dark underground. Night and day are meaningless down there."
"Is that why you still refuse to go up to the surface yourself even when the sun is down?"
Here we go again.
"I don't need to go up to the surface," I told her. "We have everything we need down here. And the scouts—"
"The scouts provide the rest, yes. But don't you feel a little foolish?"
"Why should I feel foolish?"
She shrugged. "I mean, you're basically ignoring half—half!—your entire Sphere of Influence because of your irrational fear—"
"Irrational? A fear of spiders is irrational. And anyway, I'm not afraid of the surface."
"No?"
"No."
"Okay."
"Right, then."
Why does it feel like I lost that argument even though I had the last word?
I spent several minutes scowling down at my scouts before I realized something. "Hey, where are Swift and Cheer?"
There'd been a bit of a kerfuffle recently, which I'd gathered was a result of Swift and Cheer somehow fixing the outcome of their beetle races—something the builders betting on them did not take kindly to.
Seeing the glowering looks sent their way, I'd decided
