CHRONICLES OF GEMCLOD

Mid-spring 262: The Bloodsuckers, part II

We jumped off the wagon and rushed to help the others. It was a long run to the brook, and honestly it's not that easy trying to wade through all the mud when there's so many brambles and roots and other things. We could only watch from distance how our friends got entangled with the harpies into one big ball of feathers, talons and flying shreds of clothing.

We were almost there when something horrible happened.



Enzer, the dwarf lady who we all though was useless, took down one of the monsters and then crushed its head by her delicate hand. It twitched and little and then was dead.

The victory wasn't painless though. By this time all of us (except me and Vox Nihili, of course) were bruised, scratched and bleeding from various parts of our bodies. Star Guarded even screamed at a broken thumb, I believe, and then collapsed under the sheer pain.

A horrible realization came a few seconds later. CommaToes was not there! And the second harpy was also gone!



We saw them several hundreds feet away. CommaToes got wounded and tried to run, but the harpy caught him and knocked him down into a puddle. Somebody had to help him, but most of us had been too mangled to fight on. It was up to me and Vox Nihili.

“Don't worry, I'm actually a great wrestler,” smiled Vox. And so we went, once again trotting through the soaked soil. But alas! We were too slow and by the time we've arrived, it was already over.



Though he was wounded, CommaToes killed the harpy the same way as Enzer before him – by his bare fists.

quote:

Medical log, written by the acting chief medical dwarf Vox Nihili

Upon close inspection, it turned out only three of us needed medical attention, and we brought them to the newly build bedhouse. Unfortunately, one of the wounded was our medic K0npeito. One of the harpies sunk her talons into his face, he was badly cut, couldn't see on one eye and was unable to perform any medical duty. We didn't know what to do.

“Don't worry,” said Vox Nihili, “besides being a proficient metalworker, a skilled carpenter, and a great fighter, I'm also an accomplished field medic.” And he went to assess the wounded and wrote the report I've included on this page.



“So what do we do now?” asked Enzer after Vox finished the assessment. “How do we take care of them?”

“Oh, that's easy,” said Vox. “Just go outside, look through the puddles and catch me some leeches. There's no wound those bloodsuckers couldn't heal.”

And just like that, K0npeito was out of the bed and on his legs, claiming he suddenly got better, that he can see just about fine, and that he can take over after Vox Nihili now. He had a miraculous recovery.


(Seriously, K0npeito healed all by himself, mere seconds before Vox actually got to fix stuff. I'd say it's luck for you wounded, but he's as skilled as Vox was – ie. not at all.)

Knowing the patients were in good hands, I went to grab something to eat. You see, so much running and fighting in one day will make you quite hungry! At this point, we had been at Gemclod for almost two months and had already finished our travel rations. Just about time we opened the barrels with the meat Star Guarded was supposed to bring with us.

Something went wrong.



The barrels were full of some black powder that didn't look edible at all! I stormed back into the infirmary, asking Star Guarded in no meek voice what the heck was that supposed to mean. Turns out he was unable to harm any “proper” animals so instead of hunting us a couple of fresh roasts, he hunted insects. Delicious!

Enjoy your meals, Star Guarded, because you'll have to stay in bed for several weeks and it'll be my pleasure to feed you the insect parts while we fish for something more edible!



Later that night I was approached by K0npeito. Star Guarded's thumb will heal easily, he said, but because CommaToes spend much of the fight lying naked in the swamp, his wounds caught something ugly and had festered. He might not live through the spring.