Chapter 53 Seriously, Goblins?
As we burst through the opening of the tunnel, Brynn leaned over and bit into one of the goblins’ hands.
The goblin shrieked, dropping her as he hopped around, shaking his wrist. Brynn reached across her chest to grab the other goblin, who had hold of her other side.
She grabbed his ear, yanking so hard that he screamed and let go.
The two goblins holding her feet gave each other a strangled look and then raced away.
The rest of the horde started shouting, but as we charged toward them, they cut their shrieks short and headed for the opposite side of the cavern, through another tunnel opening. I wasn’t sure whether to go after them or not, but decided to check on Brynn first.
She was pushing her way off the floor, looking disgusted.
“Nasty little vermin,” she said. “They’re low-level, I’ll tell you that. They had to resort to spells in order to go after us.”
“What were they going to do with you?” I asked, walking over to the altar.
The stone had channels cut in the shape of a human size body, and as I saw the dried blood covering the bottom of each channel, I realized that they were going to bleed her out, probably offering the blood to their equally odious god.
Shuddering, I turned back to the others. “What do we do? Do we go after them?”
Thornhold shook his head. “Do you remember the scene in Lord of the Rings? The one in Moria, with all the goblins?”
I thought about it for a moment, then nodded.
“You make a good point,” I said. “There’s no way that we want to run into their central horde. As for a smaller group of goblins? We can take them on. But a goblin city? Not so much. Okay, so what do we do about the cave upstairs?”
“We fill in the holes,” Ray said. “We can build fires in front of all the entrances until morning, then before we take off again, we do a little earthshaking and bring the ceiling down. That way it will make it safer for any other travelers coming this way.”
“An admirable thought,” I said. “But it doesn’t take into account the possibility that we’ll bring the ceiling down around our shoulders as well.”
“I have an explosion spell,” Reggie said. “I’ve never used it before — either in-game or out, of course, now. But it’s like time-released medicine. I can set it, and then we can hurry out and see if it works. I think I have all the components.”
I worried my lip. “I don’t know how we’re ever going to sleep tonight, even if we do build fires against the tunnel openings. What if they bring their hordes back to attack us? I don’t want a hundred goblins swarming that cavern.”
I tried to think of what we could do. We could camp outside on the ledge, but that didn’t guarantee safety in case the goblins decided to come back en masse. Climbing in the dark seemed like a stupid idea, but was it any more dangerous than hanging around like a group of sitting ducks?
Thornhold seemed to sense my hesitation.
“I suggest we try Reggie’s spell. Then, if it brings down the rocks and leaves the cave intact, we can spend the rest of the night there near the exit. If there are aftershocks, we can scramble outside without worrying about getting crushed.”
I glanced over at Ray and Brynn, both of whom nodded. I didn’t like the idea, but majority ruled.
“All right. Let’s give it a go. Reggie, how long a period do we have between the time you cast the spell and the time it fires?”
“If I remember right, about ten seconds. I suggest that the four of you stay near the door. All cast it, then run like hell back to you. I’m sure I can make it in time.” He sounded frightened, but seemed entirely willing to take the chance.
“All right, let’s set it up. What do you need?”
As Reggie began to prepare the components for the explosion, it occurred to me that we would probably be better off staying outside after this. The mountains were most likely crawling with enemies, and next time it might not be low-level goblins that we found ourselves facing.
If anyone ever needed to roll a twenty on a twenty-sided die, it was Reggie. Unfortunately, the explosion ended up being—at best—a three. As we scrambled off the ledge, I thanked the gods that we’d gotten our gear together, just in case, because it ended up being a just in case scenario.
One moment, we were all gathered at the entrance to the cavern as Reggie finished the spell. Ten seconds later, we—including Reggie—were running for our lives. The entire cavern began to come down the moment the spell hit, and the ledge itself began to crack under our feet.
“Run!” I screamed, pushing them toward the mountain path.
And we ran.
We managed to get off the ledge before the entire rock shelf fell away.
Then the outer side of the mountain began to crumble, and an avalanche of rock and snow tumbled down the side.
Worried that we’d have another avalanche to contend with—on the main path—I flipped on my watch light to try to pierce the darkness.
We were still a few hours from dawn, and while the snow provided its own natural brightness, it was hard to see anything.
“We need help,” I said. “We can set up our gear out here, but it’s going to be cold the rest of the night, even if the mountain quiets down.”
“We don’t have much choice,” Thornhold said.
“We can’t take a chance on hiking through the dark.
” He paused, turning back to the mountainside where the ledge had stood.
The rockslide had come to a halt, with just a few trickles of snow and pebbles left.
After a few minutes, he turned back to me.
“I suppose we’ll just have to take our chances.
Let’s set up the biggest tent we have and huddle away from the cold. ”
I nodded, thinking about how stupid we’d been. “Yeah, let’s do it.”
As we made camp, it hit me—this was life or death. We could have died in that explosion or the avalanche. Even though I knew that, the realities of our situation were being brought home in more ways than one.
Sighing, I went to work, helping the others as we set up a makeshift camp on the trail.
With luck we’d see morning light, and now we knew better than to set off a potential death trap while we were in the mountains.
We had a long way to go to reach the Summer Kingdom, and I wanted to get there in one piece.