Kinderling 35

 In case you are interested in starting this story at the beginning, Kinderling 1 can be found here:

The Tricycle of Thought: Kinderling 1

Please don't judge the story or the writing too harshly, this story is written with little to no editing.  It is just meant to get me writing regularly for practice.  

Now back to our story, already in progress...

When the day finally came for me to leave, I found that I didn't want to.  The Garrison at Outcropping was safe.  My family and friends were all there.  Mizzy was there.  Why would I want to leave?  

I left Smoke with Mizzy.  The two of them had become very close.  For being my familiar, Smoke sure spent a lot more time with Mizzy than she did with me.  I know that makes me sound jealous, but it's not like that.  The bond between Smoke and me matured during my weeks of recovery.  If Smoke was in danger, I would now sense it.  So leaving smoke with Mizzy gave me a way to know that both of them were safe.  I had a feeling I would need that reassurance in the days and weeks to come.

But duty called.  

I was surprised to find Flower, Mouse, and Watcher all three waiting for me when I walked outside.  Mama, Mizzy, and I agreed that it would be better to say our goodbyes inside.  No sense in crying and lamenting in front of the Gorfs.  I'm sure they would  understand, but I'm also sure they would feel bad about taking me away from my family, and I didn't want to be like that.  

"Watcher, I didn't expect to see you on this trip."  I said.  Watcher had all but told me he wouldn't be coming along because of his orders from the Gorphum Priesthood.

"There are times when what the priests say, and what I know of Gorphum, is at odds.  In those times I pray that Gorphum will forgive me for disobeying his servants and doing what I know is right." Watcher answered, "Besides, how much more exiled could I be?"

We set out going North at first, but soon turned to the west towards the home of the Mountain Gorf tribes.  Our route took us overland for most of the day rather than by road, although I suspect that where we were going there were no roads to take us.  Most of the trip we walked through the forest, and while there was a slope, but it wasn't a hard journey because we were mostly going across the slope rather than up or down.  That changed by early evening when we reached the Mountain. 

"Up till now, we have been avoiding established paths, if you can call them that.  Soon we'll need to risk the path up the mountain, because the climb will be too hard otherwise."  Watcher said.  "We'll have to be alert to anyone on the trail.  Nobody we meet on this trail is likely to be friendly.  On the positive side, the trail ahead starts zig-zagging up the mountain, so the climb should not be too hard."

"We will need to find a place to stop for the night soon." I observed.  It was already getting into early evening and the light was already starting to fade.  I didn't think we would want to be on the trail at night, but I didn't see any cover.  Maybe we could make camp behind some rocks or something.

"There is a place not far ahead that the Watchers use, we will shelter there."  Watcher replied.  "<grumble>, of course knows about it, in effect it is one of his places.  But there is no reason to think he knows we are coming and this outpost is far enough away from the Mountain Tribe that I don't think he'll have any reason to come here."

The grumble, of course being the name of that un-known watcher who our Watcher believes betrayed his kind.  I wondered if he had a Kinderling-friendly name, but I didn't want to ask.  I guess if I needed one I would just make one up.  Yea, judging from how odd Gorfs seemed to be about names, nothing could go wrong with that, right?

After a short climb, Watcher guided us to what I initially thought was a shallow depression in the mountainside.  Just as I was thinking "yea, if we all squished ourselves into that, we might be out of the wind."  Watcher surprised me by pushing on a protruding rock and the back of the depression pushed in like it was a door.  I have to admit, I was suitably impressed.

"Welcome to Watcher outpost fifty three."  Watcher said as he preceded us inside. 

The place was a little dusty, but other than that it wasn't bad.  Once the door was shut, we were well and truly out of the wind.  I hadn't realized how cool and ever-present the wind was until it was gone and I was able to start warming back up.  

The cold reminded me that it was getting well into autumn.  Autumn is usually my favorite time of year, with berry picking and the harvest festivals.  Because I'm one of the few Kinderlings who brave the forest, I usually made enough money in autumn picking and selling berries that I had spare spending money for the rest of the year if I was careful.  

That made me think of the garrison at Outcropping.  It was an amazing piece of foresight that the garrison had been kept up and was able to house and feed so many Kinderlings.  Bez and Tilly sure did a lot of work keeping the mushroom farms going all these years.  But it also confused me some.  Mama and Father seemed to know about the Outcropping and the garrison, but if they knew about it, why didn't Baot?  Not to mention all the other Kinderling villagers?  I kept my ears open when I was recovering in the garrison.  One of the main topics of conversation among the villagers was how nobody even knew the garrison existed and how lucky they were to have it.  But why would it have been kept so secret?

Those melancholy thoughts, and a small meal of mushroom jerky and dried berries, carried me off to sleep and some disturbing dreams.

The next morning was an early one.  Luckily, I had the exuberance of youth to carry me on.  Poor Watcher creaked and groaned a bit before finally getting moving.  Flower already had a small meal of some kind of Gorf porridge ready for us.  The flavors were odd, I could taste mushroom, of course, because mushrooms were one of the cultural things that Gorfs and Kinderlings held in common, but there were other flavors that I couldn't place.  I just hoped they weren't anything too weird.  I've seen Gorfs put all kinds of things into cookpots.  I ate it anyway.

"We have to use the path up the mountain for today." Watcher told me over breakfast.  "The way is just too steep, and there is no other option for this next part of the journey.  By mid-afternoon we should find a cave that I know of that will take us on up by a more hidden route.   The mountain tribe Watcher will know of this path's existence, but I don't think he dares share that secret with the mountain tribes."

I hoped Watcher was right.

Turned out I was right to worry.  I hate when that happens.

We were lucky climbing the path.  It switched back and forth up the steep mountainside, so the going wasn't too hard.  A constant gradual incline is wearing, but not so much in that it is hard, more in that it is a constant resistance that doesn't let up.  By the time that Watcher found the right place to leave the path it was getting on early evening and we were all pretty beat.  I had taken to riding my go-stick, which helped a lot.  About half-way up, Mouse put Flower on his back and carried her the rest of the way.  Surprisingly, Watcher did all right for his age, but he was looking at my go-stick sideways, and I could tell he was wishing he had one too.  Frankly, I don't know if a go-stick would even work for a Gorf, and while he wasn't Mouse's size, Watcher was probably too heavy for my go-stick anyway.  There is a decided difference in speed between when I ride a go-stick and when Mama rides one.  Then, of course, there is the question of if the runes would work for a Gorf or not.

When we reached the cave, my worst fears were realized.  It was a trap, and we blundered right into it.

Well, blundered is a rather strong word.  We tried to be careful.  We crept up to the stones that Watcher said hid the cave entrance looking for any sign that anyone had been there recently.  I regretted leaving Smoke with Mizzy; having a scout would have been incredibly handy. 

We detected nothing.

The cave entrance was just as Watcher had described it.  Watcher went in first to make sure it was safe, then waved us all in.  It was cool and dry in the cave, and we all stood still as we could listening.  We could only hear our own breaths.  

Exhausted from the day's climb, we ate whatever we had to hand and rolled into our bedrolls for the night.  Of course we set a guard, we always did that.  Watcher took first watch, then he was to waken Mouse for the second, who would in turn wake Flower.  I took the last watch.  This was the normal arrangement that we used every night of this expedition.  

When I was woken, it wasn't by the gentle shakings of Flower, who on the first morning became very aware of my penchant for coming up swinging.  I have to say, she handled it surprisingly well, gently pushing my flailing fists out of the way.

The Gorf warrior, equal in size to Mouse, didn't fare so well.  I got him good, a solid hit right up side his nose, which was easily bigger than my whole head.  Apparently they grow them big in the mountains.  Of course he was more surprised than hurt due to the sheer size difference, but I'll have you know that Gorf noses are as sensitive as they are ugly, and that Gorf soldier's eyes were watering up a storm.

I'd love to say it was me who saved us, but sadly I was too surprised to take advantage of the situation.  Flower, on the other hand, must have been waiting for the chance.  She grabbed me and headed for the exit.  As we went past the dog-pile that represented Mouse being held down by what looked like an entire squad of Gorf soldiers, Flower pulled her paring knife from under her apron and slashed and stabbed for all she was worth as we ran by.  It was just enough to give Mouse a chance to fight back, which was all he needed.  Last I saw of him as Flower and I ran away was Mouse picking up a wicked looking club and covering our escape.  I didn't see Watcher anywhere.

It was early morning when we exited the cave.  I looked around for a place to hide but I'm a forest creature.  I don't know mountains, and we passed the tree line shortly after the path started zig-zagging up the mountain.  So there were no trees to hide in this high up.

One plus was that Flower grabbed my backpack on her way through, so at least I had my things.  It occurred to me that I could just pull out my go-stick and fly away.  That thought made me sick the instant I thought it.  I couldn't abandon Flower like that.   It was bad enough that we lost Watcher and Mouse.

Standing at the edge of a cliff with the only way to go was back to the cave, full of Gorf soldiers, or the way we came when we climbed up from the switchback road was the only two options, and with Gorf soldiers in pursuit, I turned towards the road.  Only to find another squad of soldiers marching up it.  We were cooked.  I was afraid literally.

My mind went back to my go-stick.  That wasn't a way out because I couldn't abandon Flower, and the go-stick wouldn't be able to lift both of us.  But, maybe it didn't have to.  Maybe all it had to do was slow our fall.  

With no time to think about it, and no time to spare, I pulled the go-stick out and grabbed Flower.  

"We're going to ride this down!"  I shouted, hoping she understood.  Apparently she did, because she wrapped her arms around me and we jumped.

I was right, the go-stick wasn't strong enough and we dropped like a rock.  Only, not a particularly heavy rock.  Then I leaned forward and was surprised to find that I could control our descent, which was just in time to steer us past a particularly nasty boulder.

We were going faster than I ever dreamed, and I was having problems breathing because Flower was crushing my ribs holding on so hard.  So far I was right, we weren't flying, but we were doing a pretty good imitation of falling and somehow managing to miss the ground.  So I'll call it a win.  My concern was at this speed, the idea of stopping was shaping put to be the opposite of fun.  That's when I saw the tree-line coming up.

Trees?  So not helping.

I admit, when I came up with this lame-brained idea, I had a vision of Flower and I floating down like maybe a feather.  Yea, that would have been nice.

To top it off, I was starting to feel some vibrations from the go-stick.  That's never a good sign, because it usually means that a cloud of black dust was sure to follow. 

I started frantically looking around for anything that might slow our fall when the inevitable end of our flight came.  Then, as if the universe wanted to throw us a bone, I saw a flash of sunlight reflected  off a small lake through the trees.  I had no idea if we would make it, but we had to try.

Fighting the go-stick, I managed to get it pointed in the right direction.  We were traveling so fast, we got there a lot faster than I expected and just as we burst from the tree line around the lake, we were falling, trailing a black cloud of dust.

The water was hard.  I never knew that water could be hard.  I swear I skipped like a skipping stone a few times before I finally stopped and clawed my way back to the surface.  Then I realized, Gorfs don't swim!  And started looking around for Flower in a panic.  

I guess I shouldn't have worried so much.  When I finally located Flower, she was already on the shore, still holding my backpack, watching me like "are you going to play in the water all day?"  I Tandy-pattled over to the bank and she helped me out of the lake.

So there we were.  On the edge of a lake I didn't even know existed.  With half of our rescue party captured or worse.  I feared it was "worse".   At least a squad of Gorf soldiers were already, or soon would be, after us, and my go-stick was gone.

"Any ideas what to do next?"  I asked Flower.  She shrugged.