Capítulo 15: Chapter 14 - Something’s Hiding in the Bushes from Us
It didn't take long for the goblins to reach the cliff face. Shota really underestimated the true size of this mountain. If it weren't for so many other mountains surrounding it and the snow blending into the clouds at the top then this mountain would be visible from anywhere on the continent. Moidra walks up behind Tect, her jaw hanging open as she stares up at the unbelievable sight ahead of them. "Tect, I have never seen a mountain as large as this. Is this where the scroll was leading us?" Tect looked down at the scroll in his hands, a wide smile forming on his face. The arrow on the scroll is now a solid dot. "Yes, I believe we are here. It's possible that there is a large cave complex in or under this mountain that we can use." "Ok Ill get a camp set and we can explore the area." Tect nods, "Thanks Moidra, that would be great."
The goblins set up a camp at the base of the cliff then begin to explore the surrounding woods. Not too far away a small stream bubbles out from a small crack in the cliff face, the water is slightly warmer than the temperature of the air causing a slight steam to rise from it. Tect inspects the crack hoping to see an open cavern or tunnel at the other side, but the stone is too tough and the crack is too narrow to see anything. Shota and the scouts show up a short while later, they have not been able to find a single cave, though they have explored for a long distance. The good news is that the stream leads to a large pond with fish and a type of local freshwater crustacean that rolls into a ball to protect itself. Shota reaches into his pocket and pulls out a shiny blue ball. "Once they roll up we can't get them to unroll, but check this out." Shota tosses the creature at the cliff rather hard causing Tect to wince. When the ball hits sparks fly from the point of impact and the ball bounces back. "I think we should call them cracklers, or sparkers, or sparkleballs." The other goblin scouts begin to laugh at the name sparkleballs, clearly this is their favorite name. "As hard as they are, do you think we can eat them?" Shota shakes his head, "Nah, they are all shell, and if we cook it but it doesn't unroll we couldn't crack the shell with a sledgehammer. They are fun to throw though." Shota threw it as hard as he could against a tree, there was another shower of sparks and the tree cracked right down the middle. " Shota caught the rebounding ball and blushed, "Oops, I didn't think that it was that powerful." The scouts are now rolling on the ground holding their sides from laughing so hard. Tect's expression slowly changes from a scowl to a smile. "Bring the sparkleball and follow me." Tect leads Shota to the crack in the cliff where the steam flows out. "Throw that thing as hard as you can." Shota and Tect moved as far back as they could and Shota let it fly. The ball hit perfectly and the resulting shower of sparks lit up the cliff face for nearly 30 feet. Unfortunately it failed to break the stone. Instead of flying back to Shota's hand the sparkleball dropped straight into the stream burrowed into the ground and was gone. "Damn, I loved that little guy." Shota pouts. Now Tect can't take it anymore and he burst out laughing. The two return to camp smiles wide across their faces, the first day of searching has gone poorly, but there is still hope for tomorrow.
The goblins in the camp have had a much better day. The surrounding forest is full of good plants to forage. Tonight's dinner includes wild tubers, the nuts from some poor squirrel's winter stash, and a few hearty herbs that grew in the warmer areas around the spring. Moidra even managed to find a few medicinal plants, unfortunately they were long dead from the cold, but she got seeds from a few and a root. All said this was an excellent area if they could find a decent enough cave to call home.
With no plans to move come morning the goblins set shifts to cover a nice long night of sleep, and the number of goblins assigned to night watch was at the minimum. Tect took first watch with a younger goblin named Erdrin. Erdrin was a very small goblin, for a time he had worked in the Overseer's kitchen as a spit turner. Erdrin had been treated well enough by the head cook, a woman in her 60's who thought him small and cute. During his time there he had learned quite a lot about how to cook from her, it was thanks to him that the recent meals were so good. With Tect's permission he has shaved a few pounds of deer meat into thin strips, coated it in a mix of herbs and spices, and was now using a wooden rack to dry the strips into jerky by the fire. Tect had been smelling it for nearly two hours and it was torturing him. He really couldn't take it any longer so he got up to walk the perimeter and take a leak.
"I'll be back in a few, I need to stretch my legs." Tect walked out of the campfire light and into the darkness. Ever since he changed his night vision was even better than before, with the light of a nearly full moon he could see clearly to around 120 feet, past that his vision slowly got worse until at 200ft he couldn't even tell the trees apart. As he looked around the shadows cast by the moon on the cliff caught his eye. The cliff in the daylight looked natural, but now it seemed like the cliff was somewhat sculpted, with some of the protrusions causing the shadows to take on a vague shape like the flowing letters humans would sometimes use when signing for work to be done or that the church posters had. Tect could read and write the common tongue but didn't recognize any shape made by the shadows. "I must be way more tired than I thought. There is no way that those could be letters. Who the hell would need giant letters on a cliff face." Tect shook his head at his stupidity and returned to camp.
"Damn it, I forgot about the smell. I wonder if he'd notice if I took one." As Tect came back he noticed Erdrin had dozed off. Now was his chance, if he was quiet enough maybe he could snag one. Tect crept up behind Erdrin so unbelievably slowly, he reached out and was so close to snagging a piece of jerky. "Chieftain's don't need five fingers to lead, right?" Erdrin's eyes were still closed. "How the hell did you know?" asked Tect shocked that he had been so easily discovered. "Smell. You have worked in the smithy so long you smell like hot steel and coals." Tect smelled himself, he couldn't smell hot metal or coals, but he did have to admit he needed a bath. "You won't be able to smell it, your nose isn't as sensitive as mine. In addition to you, I can smell a small dog of some kind, it's been hiding near camp all day, and the smell of the meat is driving it closer. If you sit down and be quiet he may show himself." Tect was amazed, he'd never heard of a goblin having such a unique ability. Now Tect realized why the food was always so good, Erdrin could always tell what to add and when to add it just by smell.
Tect and Erdrin waited in silence for the small dog to come close enough for Tect to see it. Unfortunately, the bright fire total took away his advantage in night vision so he could see no further than Erdrin right now. After what felt like a lifetime, but was more like 30 minutes, a small movement caught Tect's eye. A very small animal was slowly creeping forward it's eyes glued to the rack of drying meat. Erdrin slowly reached forward and grabbed a piece. The dog turned its focus to the goblin it had thought to be sleeping. Erdrin grinned and took a huge bite of the meat. "Ok that's some bullshit. He needs to share with his Chieftain." Tect scowled art Erdrin but kept quiet. "The dog was drooling now, inching ever closer to the goblins. It was really an ugly thing in Tect's opinion. Its fur was heavily matted but even so he could see its hip bones, spine, and ribs. Clearly this pup was not being cared for by its parents, and was likely to starve soon. Erdrin leaned forward again, grabbing another piece of meat. This time he tore it into three smaller pieces. He tossed one to the pup and it immediately wolfed it down. Now it was drawing much closer. Erdrin threw the next piece, it was less than three feet from where he sat. The pup didn't want to come closer, it's instinct was telling it to stay away,but it's stomach was screaming about how good that meat tasted. Inevitably the stomach won. The dog ran forward, grabbed the meat, and retreated to lay at the opposite side of the fire. It stayed there slowly savoring the meat. Finally, Erdrin threw a piece to Tect. The look of pure joy that had been gracing the face of the half starve dog was now mirrored on Tect. It was too odd of a similarity to Erdrin who tossed another piece to the dog then packed up the rest. Soon the dog could be heard whimpering as it stared at Erdrin with huge dilated eyes. "No, you'll get sick if you eat too much." Erdrin was stone cold. Even Tect wanted to feed that poor ugly dog more jerky. Soon the first watch ended. Tect and Erdrin stood to wake the next two and the dog seeing the movement ran off into the night. Erdrin smiled, "Didn't even run 60 ft, I'll have it tamed in a fortnight." Tect chuckled, at the comment such an odd pairing that would make, a starving dog and a cook with the nose of a hunting hound.
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