El-Dreg-Anie stood in a small clump of trees watching the group of survivors enter the city several miles ahead. There would be a reckoning for this disaster the only instruction he had to follow had been too make sure that no-one got out of the mountains alive. Thinking back it had all started out well, where had he gone wrong and could he shift the blame.
They had left the caves one week ago thirty dark elves all members of the Tash-La-Ari, over six thousand goblins had been waiting for them. Lord Dal-Rugia had ridden forward to met the twenty goblin chiefs. They had brought their clans together for the undertaking mostly goblins but a couple of ogres as well distant cousins of goblins ogres were taller, as stupid but much more vicious than goblins.
With a wave of his hand, Lord Dal-Rugia had waved Del-Ronan-Atel over.
“El-Dreg-Anie, Tor-Fusi-Lian, Ker-Halion-Darmare and Grel-Grus-Antel follow me.” He said to four of the squad leaders as he strode over to stand beside Lord Dal-Rugia.
“These men will lead you in your conquest of the mountains” Lord Rugia had said to the goblin chiefs. “Obey them in everything, they have been instructed in all areas of your mission. Do not fail them”.
The goblin chiefs had looked at the squad leaders with trepidation. The squad leaders had looked back at the goblin, each one was itching to strip the hide of the goblins just for being in their presence and the goblins knew it.
Turning to the squad leaders Lord Dal-Rugia continued “Each of you will take five of the clans and proceed to wipe out the mountain villages. Let none escape, now go”
Each squad leader signalled the three members of their squad and took five of the chieftain’s and left.
El-Dreg-Anie turned to the five chiefs that were to come with him, “We will be hitting the northern villages. There will be a few villages between here and there no one must see us until we are in the mountains is that understood.”
The force in El-Dreg-Anie’s words struck fear into the goblin chiefs. God how he hated these spineless creatures that bowed and scraped for the scraps from a dark elf table.
Setting off southwards towards the mountains they had spotted several bands of human caravans none were left alive. They had swept over the caravans and took no prisoners. The goblins had hacked the humans to pieces and fought over the meat. Arg-alon a goblin chief walked near him sucking on the arm bone of one of the humans.
As they had neared the mountains the level ground had quickly turned into foothills of the mountain. They split into the different groups each lead by a squad leader and his squad. The trees had thinned out and it was easier and faster to move along the roads that the humans had made. El-Dreg-Anie had laughed at that, the stupid humans were helping in their own destruction. Eventually, they had made it to a small village just before dusk. there were no more than a handful of houses and no wall to protect them.
El-Dreg-Anie had ordered the goblins to wait until dusk had truly fallen and then to surround the village. He had made it abundantly clear none were to survive this attack.
The goblin chiefs that were with him had grinned and the saliva had dripped from their mouths at the thought of the humans they would feast on tonight.
None had survived that night, they had burst into each home as they were sitting for their evening meal, Men women children and babies had all died. Cut up and put into the goblin cook pots.
The next morning the twelve hundred goblins with El-Dreg-Anie had been split up into smaller groups to attack the ten or so villages in this section of the mountains.
The orders had been simple, they had to be, for the goblins to remember them. They were to travel into the mountains and kill everyone they came across. The mountains were to be purged of all humans. The goblins had jumped and danced with glee and at the time praised El-Dreg-Anie profusely.
They had swept into the mountains and overrun five of the villages completely. The mountain folk had been hardy folk who had taken huge losses but had inflicted as much damage in return. A quarter of El-Dreg-Anie’s forces had died in the campaign. Acceptable losses in his opinion as he felt he could hold the mountains with the numbers he had. Several survivors of the villages they had attacked in the previous night had banded together.
Not that it would do them much good tomorrow they would be swept off the face of the mountain. That had been when news had arrived of a band of mountain men trying to make a break to the nearest city.
Turning to Arg-alon he said, “If they get through I’ll flay you alive”. The race was on they were a couple of days behind but other groups of goblins were closer. The sounds of horns in the distance had echoed over the mountain range. They had ran for most of the day trying to catch up to the lead group of goblins.
Eventually, they had come across a wounded goblin that had been left at a camp on the road. El-Dreg-Anie had been called over when he had been found.
“What happened here” he snapped at the goblin.
“We wasss chasssing a small party of the puny humansss but the ogre had got tired and refussssed to continue. When the ssssub-commander ordered usss to continue. He ssstruck out hitting me and killed the ssssub-commander. He then ssssat down and ate the ssssub-commander. It wasssn’t until morning that he let usss continue. I can’t walk ssso they leftsss me behind.” He hissed in the garbled way that the goblins spoke.
Screaming in the face of the goblin El-Dreg-Anie took his anger out on the goblin his dagger slashed and stabbed the goblins chest eventually piercing the heart.
“You better hope they don’t get through Arg-alon. I’m holding you responsible for this disaster,” he said in a tone as cold as death, “I’m going to flay the skin of every member of that group while you watch if the humans get away and then I’m going to flay you alive too.”
The goblin chiefs quivered and shied away from the rage in El-Dreg-Anie’s eyes and voice.
They had raced ahead trying to catch up to the fleeing humans, War trumpets had called far ahead they had engaged the humans. El-Dreg-Anie smiled maybe this wouldn’t be as big a cockup as he feared. Since this was his first leadership test he didn’t want to fail. Failure would be hard to take. El-Dreg-Anie like most dark elves hated failure as there would be consequences for failure. Ones he wasn’t yet prepared to pay.
Still, they ran on more horns announced that another wave of goblins had engaged the humans. But why? Why had it needed a second wave of goblins, had the humans prevailed, the goblin had said there was a small party.
The answer was revealed when they crested a hill and a small village lay burning at the bottom of the hill. No battle had taken place here and the goblins had destroyed much and set the buildings on fire. Probably wasting time as well he thought his anger building to a boiling point.
El-Dreg-Anie’s legs were burning now they had been running for most of the night and early morning. The path that the goblins took was easy to follow. They continued on and coming to a clump of trees. There in front no more than two miles below on the flatlands was a battle taking place the goblins had engaged the villagers but all was lost. At least a hundred and fifty mounted men had just engaged the goblins that had been about to overwhelm the fleeing villagers.
The twenty goblins that El-Dreg-Anie had with him wouldn’t survive attacking such a large group. Maybe the screams of Arg-alon would satisfy him but first, he needed to see if he could figure out if any of the survivors were mountain folk. If there was any mountain folk in the survivors then there would be no excuses. If there wasn’t then there might be some leg room to save his life.
El-Dreg-Anie shook himself from his thoughts and turning away from the city he led the smaller band back to the mountains there would be a reckoning it would start with Arg-alon. He had been planning the death of Arg-alon since this morning. If the ogre still lived then he would have taken great pleasure in punishing it.
Once back in the foothills El-Dreg-Anie called a rest period. As chief Arg-alon turned to give orders to his men, El-Dreg-Anie drew his sword and slashed the goblin across the back of the knees. His bulky weight could no longer be supported as the tendons had been cut. Screaming in agony the chief fell to the ground. Glancing at El-Dreg-Anie he started to beg for forgiveness but El-Dreg-Anie had resheathed his sword and was slowly pulling a whip from his pack.
The whip was only a couple of feet long with three leather plaits each tip contained a sharp silver barb. El-Dreg-Anie raised his arm high above him and struck the chief who’s words were quickly replaced with screams.
Blood sprayed in all directions as the barbs on the ends of the leather strips tore into his flesh. El-Dreg-Anie continued to whip and flay the goblin his anger wasn’t sedated even when the goblin drew its last breath and gargled blood.
By the time he was finished the goblins face had been torn off completely. The other goblins shied away from El-Dreg-Anie in case his anger wasn’t finished and they would be next.
“What hateful creatures, look at them, not one ready to come to their chiefs aid or beg for his life,” thought El-Dreg-Anie.
“You,” he said pointing at one of the goblins “You will be chief now. Make no mistakes or you will wish for a merciful death like this one” he said in a tone that sent shivers of fear down the spines of all of the goblins present.
“What is your name?”
“Gar-lang, Massster,” stammered the goblin.
“Gar-lang, we move on leave this,” he said pointing to the carcass of the late chief on the ground “to the wild animals we head into the mountains now.”
Turning he led the way into the mountains proper. It was the early the next morning before they were back to the positions they had been in before. A goblin came into camp to report to Gar-lang. It turned out that the mountain men had started to fortify their villages. Out of the one thousand two hundred goblins that he had at the start only two hundred were left. Between the mountain men attacking and destroying small roaming groups of goblins and the fiasco of the ones that had escaped El-Dreg-Anie was worried that he would now need more goblins to successfully wipe the humans out.
Tired El-Dreg-Anie headed to his tent to sleep for a couple of hours. Leaving orders not to be disturbed he entered the tent and lay down on the sleeping mat.
He woke to the smell of burning and his first thought was that the humans had counter-attacked here at his camp there were only himself and twenty goblins here. Sitting upright quickly he came face to face with the glowing burning eyes of a demon. Then he noticed the smell of burning also had a strong smell of sulphur.
Saliva from the mouth of the demon and dripped onto his leg, the burning acid saliva sent shock waves through his body. Screaming out in pain he tried unsuccessfully to roll away from the demon.
The demons arm whipped out quickly snatching his arm. Where ever the demon touched, his skin felt like it was on fire the pain seared his brain. As the demon dragged him back in front of him he swore that the demon was smiling at his torture.
Peering into the eyes of the demon was hard as the pain levels kept increasing.
“YOU HAVE BEEN BAD BAD BAD EL-DREG-ANIE, YOUSS HAVE BEEN GIVEN TO ME” laughed the demon taunting him.
El-Dreg-Anie screamed in terror as the demon raised his arm towards his mouth.
“YOU MUST BE PUNISHED FOR YOUR FAILURE. LORD DAL-RUGIA WANTS YOU TO KNOW THAT HE IS DISPLEASED.”
Putting El-Dreg-Anie’s hand into its mouth the saliva started to burn his hand. The demons teeth bit deep into one of El-Dreg-Anie’s fingers. Releasing El-Dreg-Anie to fall on the floor the demon sat down and chewed and sucked the bones of the finger clean. When all of the flesh was removed his powerful teeth crushed the bones and sucked out the marrow in the middle. Finally, he swallowed the bones as well.
El-Dreg-Anie wept in pain and fear he had felt the demon eating the finger and could still feel the demon devouring his flesh.
“WE ARE LINKED NOW EL-DREG-ANIE. I WILL KNOW WHERES YOU ARESS AT ALL TIMESS. YOU WILL CALL ME MASTER AND OBEY MY COMMANDS. IF YOU FAIL ME I WILL TAKES ANOTHER FINGER UNTIL YOU HAVE NONE LEFT THEN I WILLS TAKES YOUR HAND, THEN YOUR ARMS THEN TOES THEN LEGS. YOUR DEATH WILL TAKE A LIFETIME,” laughed the demon before disappearing.
El-Dreg-Anie lay still in his tent sleep refused to come. Every time he closed his eyes he could feel his finger burning and being devoured. Eventually, exhaustion forced him to sleep. He only got a few hours sleep before the nightmares woke him.
Leaving the tent he stepped into the night the two bright moons above covered the camp in a pale light. To his elven eyes, it was as bright as full day. Looking at his hand the skin had no burn marks where the demons saliva had burned him last night and the only thing out of place was the little finger that was now missing. The tip was completely healed over without a scar but the finger burned.
Kicking the first goblin awake as hard as he could. He screamed at it to wake up. Kicking and screaming he woke the whole camp and led them off into the forest towards the nearest village to exact as much pain and anguish from them as possible.
When they arrived at the edge of the forest near the village they were met with silence. The village was empty with half of the building smouldering ruins.
El-Dreg-Anie anger started to boil, he felt the need to lash out as his grip tightened on the hilt of his sword. As the muscles in his arm tensed to draw the blade forth and deliver his anger.
The missing finger on his hand burnt like the fires from hell. Somewhere deep in the back of his mind, he heard a demonic voice “NO I FORBIDSSS IT,” followed by the demons’ laughter at his fear. As his hand released its grip from the hilt on his sword the demonic laugh disappeared and the burning of his hand ceased.
Staring at his hand the look of fear etched on his face. It took him minutes to realise that the silence was total. Looking up the goblins were staring at him and they were uneasy. Did they sense his fear would they sense it and decide that they didn’t need to fear him.
“What are you standing around for? Find their tracks now!” he snapped backhanding the goblin that was nearest and knocking it flying such was his rage.
It took El-Dreg-Anie himself to find the tracks as the goblins that had originally attacked the village had left so many different tracks.
Eventually, after two hours of tracking all the forest paths out of the village, they found a bunch of tracks leading deeper into the mountains. They were almost a day old and El-Dreg-Anie cursed his luck for the delay.
With his patience paper thin, El-Dreg-Anie force marched the goblins along the forest path. His temper was stretched to breaking point when one of the goblins stood in a bear trap off the side of the path by some wild berries.
The strong hinge of the bear trap had cut deeply into the goblin’s leg and had only stopped when it hit the hard bone in his leg.
El-Dreg-Anie was left with the decision to help or leave the goblin behind. Neither of which appealed to him. The screams of the creature were pleasing to his ear but would alert anyone in the region that they were about. What he wanted was to exact his anger on someone. If he killed the goblin would the demon punish him?
Evaluating that the goblin wouldn’t be much any more and would actually be a hindrance. El-Dreg-Anie’s hand gripped the hilt of his sword and withdrew the blade. The slow scraping of the blade on the scabbard as it came free along with the look on El-Dreg-Anie’s face had the goblin backing away begging for forgiveness.
After El-Dreg-Anie had sated his anger on the goblin he turned and left the half-dead goblin behind whimpering as the blood slowly seeped from its wounds.
They followed the tracks through the mountains they were moving further up the mountain. The air was getting colder not that it mattered much to El-Dreg-Anie but the goblins were starting to complain.
They came across two more villages half burnt but empty of anything useful like food, livestock and tools. The mountain folk had stripped the villages of everything they could possibly need but why?
The tracks were easier to follow as the livestock cut a clear path up the trail. Sending two goblins ahead to scout the path they followed along behind.
A scream ahead announced that one of the goblins was in distress. Racing forward El-Dreg-Anie was annoyed to see only one of the two goblins on the path. The goblin was looking down the steep slope.
“Massster the ground gives ways,” hissed the goblin backing away from the fearsome El-Dreg-Anie as he stalked towards him.
Cowering from El-Dreg-Anie rage the goblins started to move off down the trail. It wasn’t until the next morning that they crested a ridge and looked into a valley.
There sitting in the middle of a freshly cut valley was a wooden fort. Humans could be seen walking along the wooden walls. They had cleared the trees away from around the village for almost two hundred yards.