To Town with a Smile

Perhaps farm life wasn’t so bad after all. Things were vastly different with Shar in my life now. I wondered what I was thinking to turn her away and give her such a cold shoulder. Thought I lusted after the maids at the pub, with their ample bosoms and wide hips. Shar without a doubt knew how to make be feel like a man. I actually felt amazing and attracted to her now. I couldn’t wait to get back. We were almost done for the could go back to her hut and make love for the rest of the day. I was hard just thinking about it.

I got the team ready and the cart loaded in no time at all. Ready to head to town. I wanted this trip to go fast.

I headed to town to the general store. There was an issue with the order and we got it resolved. I glanced over at the pub where I had previously planned to leave all of this. To ask a few of the hero’s a couple questions about the dungeons and monsters to get money. But perhaps just enough to set us up in a proper house, maybe with some land of our own at the edge of town. I daydreamed about how great this can all be, that and plowing her fields all night long.

My day dream was shattered as one of the farm hands came galloping into town as fast as the horse could carry him yelling “THE FARM IS UNDER ATTACK! HOBGOBLINS ARE ATTACKING THE FARM!”

He repeated himself as hero’s poured out of the pub, but my only thought was of Shar. I layer into the tea of horses drawing the card with the reigns and pushed them as hard as I could. My heart sunk as I saw smoke in the distance from the farm. There was fire and it wasn’t small. When i finally got there the barn was ablaze, the massive structure on fire. Was Shar still there. I came up to the barn yelling “SHAR! SHAR WHERE ARE YOU?!”

The I spotted on of the hobgoblins as he spotted me he pointed at me and cackled his raspy high pitched laugh. “You! The killer of our generals, we have your woman! We are going to throw her into the pit of Hore!”

I drew my sword and lunged at him with a single clean strike removing his head from his shoulders.

I glanced around and also struck down the other hobgoblins that were within reach of my wrath as I healed “I will kill you all!”

I had no idea where this pit of Hore was, when the hero’s finally arrived they saw the eight Hobgoblins I had slain in rage. The largest hero Bram stepped up to me in a calm voice, looking at the brownish blood dripping from my sword. “Did you kill all of these guys?” as he glanced at the Hobgoblins laying dead.

I said in a fit of rage “Yes and I will kill them all if they harm Shar”

“Shar?”

The Forman interrupted “Mouse, they took his mouse.”

Bram’s eyes widened, “oh mouse, they took her?”

I glanced at the Forman who was a good foot and half taller then I and twice the bulk. “Yes I saw it, they grabbed her from in front of her quarters she was yelling for John when they did it.”

I looked at him, “If you saw it why didn’t you stop them” the anger in my voice was obvious.

“I couldn’t There was too many of them, I had to flee to save my life.”

My anger was almost blinding at this point.

Bram said “why would they ever take someone, they never take humans, only raid.”

I spit and said. “They told me they were taking her to the pit of Hore because I killed their general.”

Will laughed “you? You killed their gen.” My hateful glair and the hobgoblin blood coated sword I was holding made him suddenly stop his sentence cold.

Bram’s eyes looked of fear. “Hore?! By the gods your woman is lost, no hero has ever returned from Hore!”

Will grabbed my shoulder as I pulled away from his grasp.

“Where is it, where is Hore?!” I looked at Bram with purpose that and anger burned deep inside of me.

He pointed above the distant tree line to the peak of the tallest mountain in the distance. “It’s there the tallest peak, but I’m telling you even the largest party of Hero’s have never come back from there. She is gone man.”

The mountain was in the distance far in the distance. She wasn’t there yet, not if they were carrying her. I could catch them long before they got there.

I looked for a horse and started for it when Will grabbed my shirt firmly. “She is gone, we need to save the farm, you need to get.” I swung out of rage hitting him hard on the jaw laying him out flat. I pointed my sword at his throat with hobgoblin blood dripping off my blade as he was first stunned, mad, and then the clear look of fear in his eyes, he was no different th7en any other coward. I said in a clear low voice firm with the hate in my heart so it would never be misunderstood as to my intention. “You coward, I should end your life right here! You could have easily stopped them from taking her, but you fled! You touch me again and I’ll end your life I swear by all the gods that are wholly I will end you!”

Bram drew his sword out of reflex to my threat. “Easy ca..” he hesitated, everyone called me cat. “..John,” he said my proper name, to get my attention. “listen, lower your sword. There is no coming back from Hore.”

I said as I stepped over the cringing Will “They have to get there first. That mountain is far away, and I’ll catch them before they get there. I went over and grabbed Will’s horse. It’s saddle already on it and rode towards the mountain peak as fast as the horse would run. It was becoming dusk, but still plenty of day light.

I could hear Will shouting at me about his horse but Bram, to his credit, told the coward Will to leave me be and to focus on the farm. Bram yelled after me that he would try to catch up when he can.

As I approached the tree line I ran down a few more hobgoblins who where making a run for the tree line, I cut them down with the hatred in my hart and the anger in my sword arm.