“I do trust in you, Lydia; I trust in you all. Never doubt that, and please, I don’t care what Barrett said, call me Jax. We’re all in this together. When I give an order in front of others, or we’re being formal, you can call me ‘Lord’; otherwise, just call me Jax, okay?”
I turned to face the rest of the group squarely, and I spoke quietly, but my voice was pitched to carry to all of them. “We’re going to go and rescue the prisoners up there…might be that they don’t want to join us, might be they do. Either way, I’ll not leave them in the hands of goblins. I’m proud of you all, both for the fights we’ve had, and the trip so far. I know you’re scared; fuck, I’m scared, but I’m going up there. I’m going to kill those goblins, each and every one of them, because from what I know of them, they’re evil little shits. They’ve captured Flux’s younglings, and that alone would be enough for me. Some things, you don’t let happen, and they’re exactly the kinds of things goblins do to prisoners."
"This is your last chance to walk away; if you do, I’ll understand, but if you come with me, if you’re going to stand by my side up there, then I need to know…” I paused for a long second, making direct eye contact with a few, “…because there might only be a few dozen to a hundred goblins up there, and I saw you buggers fight in the Tower. If you’re all going to come up there and fight, I need to know, as I’ll need to kill some quick to be able to keep up with you all!”
There were a few scattered snorts and grins, but nobody walked away, and I heard Lydia mutter just loud enough to be heard. “…really is crap at speeches….” I turned to Flux and his two scouts, noting how exhausted they all appeared.
“Are you able to do this? Seriously, Flux, you all look terrible.” And they did; they were leaning over, clearly out of breath still and their skin looked… dry. “Is this because of the water? Do you need it?” I asked and Lydia pulled out a waterskin, throwing it to Cheena, who immediately offered it to Flux. Flux emptied a little over his head, gills at the sides of his tendrils greedily pulling it in, before he passed it back, allowing Cheena and the unnamed youngling to do the same.
“We are a species that cannot live long from the water, Jax; our kind can adjust, becoming more used to the arid atmosphere you all prefer, but it takes time, and we cannot survive without water for long.” Flux said, a low whistle accompanying his words, and I guessed that it was his equivalent of a concerned sigh. “We will go on, though; we must.”
“Here, will this help?” I asked, casting ‘Summon Water’ to bring a gentle fountain of clean, cool water up from beneath the forest mulch. There was a brief pause, before Cheena stepped forward and leaned into the water, letting it coat her head and pour over her body for a handful of seconds. When she stepped back, shaking herself, I felt a low vibration in the air. Immediately, Flux gestured the youngling forward and rested a grateful hand on my shoulder.
“Thank you, Jax. This will indeed make things much easier for us. I had not considered that you might know magic that could be useful to us in this way.” While he was speaking, I felt Oracle cast a second spell, and a new fountain sprang to life next to Flux, who nodded his thanks and leaned into it. When he was refreshed, the other two started taking turns in the fountain as my own squad took advantage of the spell to wash hands and faces, took drinks, and generally relaxed a little.
The spells only lasted ten seconds usually but channeling a little extra mana into them kept them around long enough for everyone to use. The mana cost was less than forty in total, and I’d recover that in just over fifteen minutes. I gave everyone a minute to get themselves together.
“Okay, Flux, if you and Cheena can lead the way, you’re both a lot better at stealth than we are. Watch out for any scouts. When we get closer, we’ll take a look and come up with a plan.” I said getting a round of nods and general acknowledgement.
The last mile of the hike took about thirty minutes.
The forest was overgrown heavily enough that we could only see, at most, a few dozen yards at a time, and the trail the goblins had made seemed to follow the path of least resistance, always dragging left and right, heading in the general same direction, but we probably walked twice as far due to the zig-zag nature of the trail.
“Hsst!” Cheena let out a hiss of warning and dropped down low, seeming to melt into the bushes and vanish without a trace. I paused for a second, then hurried to hide behind a fallen tree to one side of the trail. Looking around, I could see the others were as poorly hidden as I was, all except the three Mer. I concentrated, searching where I’d last seen the youngling, and picked him out after an extensive search, and I’d only found him because he made an awkward wave at me, having caught me looking. He was crouched by the side of the trail, daggers and short spears drawn. I watched him an amazement as he slowly seemed to blend into the long grass, and I cursed myself, remembering my own chameleon spell. I cast it quickly, and a second later, saw my mana drop again as Oracle cast
