Blood and Sawdust Pt. 3

A Mage Hunter short story

Part 1 | Part 2

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“Now then,” Captain Buzely proceeded with his meeting after Vance elaborated on the Carpenter’s plans, “let us now address the more serious threat: The Druids of Jubilee.” The papers shifted by his hands and revealed several portraits of alleged members. “Sadly, these are only approximate sketches based on witness testimony. These harlots are incredibly super elusive.” Harlots they were, according to the documentation revealing a history of prostitution among the majority. All except a few were of female blood of certain elven lineages. However, what caused a few gasps and utterances were a surprising amount of plum and charcoal-colored elves and their black and red eyes. Jorghan, and the other dwarves who gathered today, especially had a fiery gaze upon the revelation. Their impulsive tongues cursed in their native language. Rion placed a hand on his distressed friend’s shoulder in an attempt to relax him.
“Calm down everyone! That’s right: dark elves. So-called ‘vampires of the underground.’” Dwarves especially had a long-lasting history of deep, subterranean war with this race. They were like thieves to them, conquering the tunnels that once belonged to the dwarves, spitting in the face of the years of their hard-earned digging. A few tales told of their ability to carve their own tunnels using magic, but their civilization insisted in their crime-written culture. No wonder their organization is so heavily elusive if they hide underground. “Rarely do they make a presence on the surface, yet they have become a major nuisance for us. More astounding, you might have some interesting feelings about this,” the captain then revealed another parchment, this time a full-bodied sketch of what appeared to be an elf no taller than that of a gnome, sprouting butterfly wings and a pair of antennas emerging from her hairline. “The druids are led by a fae who call her ‘The Flower.’” Faes are even more obscure offspring of the elven lineage, containing a mixed blood of both elves and fairies. “Thanks to an adventuring group we contracted a while back, we discovered their leader who’s responsible for the influx of illicit magical potions. We don’t know why a fae would bother meddling with a city, given their nature.” They always tend to stick to the Enchanted Forests towards the west, and despise the presence of towns and cities. “This is where we need your team especially, Rion. She’s a powerful archdruid who’s even been able to conjure these enchanted plants for their potions.” The mage hunter leader pondered the facts laid before him. There was little time to strategize. The safety of his loyal guild was a mounting pressure. He was starting to regret not asking Tychon for his aid. Rion prayed the tools and the talents of his members, and his own planning will lead to victory.

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The florescent flora proved to be a wonderous alternative to the night sky inside the rocky dome. A beautiful grove would be a precious sight to behold, if it weren’t for the pressing matters at hand for “The Flower” and her congregation, among them a shadowy representative of the Thieves Guild, shrouded in his black and brown cloak masked under an equally mysterious dark hood. “I pray you understand the plight of this stunt you caused,” the deep, reverberating tone serviced the warning. “The last thing we at Thieves Guild desire is a light shined upon us.”
“Aye aye aye,” her head swayed side-to-side as she rubbed her temple just under her antenna, already exhausted of this debate. “You knew, and so did they, that these concoctions are unstable,” her fingers moved in a snark gesture. “Mind you it was not our hand that caused that kerfuffle.” The voice of ‘The Flower’ was of a sinister calm, masking a brewing fury. Her underlings sensed the tension. Though they could easily destroy this one messenger for his hot words, the notorious underground guild could as easily return the favor.
“Was it not you who solicited for our aid to deal with this matter? Did you not seek us to act as an interim into this affair, to help you two come into agreement?” The shadowed man walked around, his fingers interlocking behind his back. “Or… were you foolish to believe we would blindly side with you and argue a more favorable deal?”
The archdruid, once sitting cross-legged on her throne of plants, stood her small frame up. She waltzed around the representative as he did the same in an ominous standoff. “Are you foolish to underestimate my concoctions, young man? Or, maybe you dolts were blind to put together the hints I laid for you. Here – let me just spell it out.” Abruptly, her hand wave caused a series of vines to shoot out from the ceiling and the ground. They lashed and strangled the man by the wrists and ankles. “You negotiate the terms favorably, and your guild will receive a month’s supply of the venom.” Her arm extended upward from her small frame towards the man’s face, brushing his cheek with her tiny hand in condescension, “Was that too complicated?”
The messenger was perfectly stoic in his restraints. Not a grunt or a sign of struggle. The eyes only showed disappointment. “Hmph. Insulting. To believe we require your drugs? You ladies should stick to peddling your… venom to those who are desperate.”
The fae’s brilliant eyes expressed a horrific fury as she was ready to snuff the life out of this human, consequences be damned. She was interrupted when one of her subordinates spoke out of turn, “Jasmine!” Normally it would be a fatal error. She was to be called “Matriarch” by her congregation, or “The Flower” by those outside. She was too staggered to consider punishment on a whim all thanks to the drama with the Thieves Guild. The follower, shaken in fear as she gasped at her mistake, presented an orb-shaped plant, glowing and offering visions. Jasmine saw, and was alarmed at the sudden urgency of their situation.
The plant revealed their adversaries, armed with shovels and hatchets, prepared to demolish their hideout. “Damn it! They found us!” She released the man as abruptly as she captured him. The issue they face wasn’t as much about the meat headed thugs. Jasmine knew they could easily end them, but the secrecy of their hideout is in jeopardy, and she would immediately have to upend all of her original plans in order to find, or build, a new location.
“Shame. Not even the elusive Druids of Jubilee could keep their hideout hidden. Good luck finding another.” The hooded figure vanished in a cloud of black smoke, leaving his mocking words behind.
The archdruid’s teeth morphed into wild fangs as her face nearly resembled a bear as she struggled to quell her rage, letting loose a bestial roar. The sisters felt primal fear. “NGH! FINE! Let them come! We’ll rip and tear every last one of them!” she fumed with a gnarling, warped voice of her mid-transition.
The follower returned with the scrying plant, adding, “I… don’t think we will be able to…” she stuttered. Jasmine composed herself as she observed the crown guard successfully apprehend the brutish carpenters. This hastens her worry. “Gather all the supplies and make for the tunnels!”

Rion stood side-by-side with Jorghan as they lead the armed mage hunters through the caverns, the elf was armed by his arcane-summoned blade, and Jorghan his mighty enchanted war maul. Several plants were scattered that provided much needed light in these almost too-tight passageways. They were fully on-guard, and anticipated an ambush. One of the core tenants of being a mage hunter is having knowledge of the various schools of arcane. Druids were especially crafty and difficult to deal with thanks to their wide toolset, as Tychon once explained. Rion knew they would have means to detect their presence given their deep connection to nature; every root is a potential spyglass for them. Jorghan broke the steady silence with an utterance, “I do not like this… it’s too quiet.”
The deeper they ventured, Rion decided to enchant his eye with magical sight. Like a mystic tier of instincts, he was proven to have made the right move. Right after he summoned his cantrip and when they reached a large opening, the lights of the fluorescent plants shuttered, leaving only the dim light of his arcane blade and the magical hammer as the only sources of illumination. “Lights! Now!” Rion commanded. The sorcerers and the priests summoned orbs of light. Tyra, the senior elven wizard, ached to use her flames, but would easily cause great suffocation. “We got five hostiles! Two are above! Watch out for the bats!”
The artificial lights revealed the shadowy figures to the party, perched on elevated ground as Rion stated, both weaving their magic through a dance of their hands. Before he could offer another command, vines lashed out and restrained both the elven leader and his friend. The companions behind them were stuck as they blocked the path into the dome. Three large shrieker bats flew in from above, and they were as large as hounds. One landed a grazing slice across Rion’s face with its protruding claw, another missed. But Rion’s blade tore through the wing of the third, causing it to tumble behind the party. A war club came down to smite it, but the bat mutated into a small mole and quickly burrowed into safety.
“NGh! Get into the center!” Jorghan commanded with his maul pointed downward towards the vines, and with a mighty hammering thump, it’s magical power shattered it’s grasp, freeing both of them.
The mage hunters, now gathered in the center, struggled against the five druids. The marksmen and the mages struggled against the barriers of the druids above, on top of their low-ground disadvantage. Spears of ice and iron bolts either missed on the rocks or were thwarted by thorny barricades. Meanwhile, their swarm of hornets caused great distress among Rion’s forces. Tira used her wizardry to conjure a small bolt of lightning to zap away the insects, with minimal friendly damage. The swelling of the stings became apparent, and made the fight more difficult for the ranged combatants.
The two bats harassed from the air, and the mole returned with a vengeance, this time as a rock snake. Though its elemental armor was difficult to crack for blades and hatchets, Jorghan’s mighty hammer was able to smash it to bits, the dark elf druid’s frail body left unconscious as she lost her will to fight. One bat flew onto the ceiling and morphed into a quillrat, a cavern rodent with a thorny back-side. She used its quills to snipe down from above, striking one of the mages in a nearly fatal blow. Another bat turned into a Maneater, a predatory plant adventurers dread of encountering. It’s many vines captured some of the mage hunters, and the massive jaws voraciously chomped down upon three of them, all at once. The mighty claws of Steppenwulf forced it to cough out his allies, swiping the bulbous head like paper. The druid remained alive thanks to one of her companions above rendering her healing magic, and escaped the claws of the wolf beastman in the form of a bee.
This vicious fight was turning into a war of attrition, and several of Rion’s men were incapacitated. Thankfully the light priests were treating them, desperate to bring them back to fighting condition. What turned the tide was a clever use of a spell scroll by Tira, offering her telekinetic magic that ripped one of the druids off her perch, the dark elf was knocked unconscious from the fall as the ranged fighters kept her partner druid too occupied for aid. With the source of healing thwarted, the other druids were struggling, yet was no small feat as the five alone were able to stall a dozen of the king’s skilled mage hunters.
The remaining druids-maintained distance, in a greater effort to stall. One turned into a monkey and barraged the party with rocks and stalactites while using its nimbleness to stay on the walls. Another returned to the form of the bat to harass and swipe on them, and the druid maintained her dark-elf form pelting them with razor-like leaves. Rion saw this as a good sign… until an ominous light emerged from the corner of the cavern. A series of bright white fangs struck fear in those who saw it. With a shadowy speed, the lunar fang tiger leaped and pinned Rion down. It was a vicious, magical beast, and she spoke before clamping its maw down at the elf, “Get out of my cave!”
“Rion!” Jorghan shouted as he chucked his arms with that mighty hammer, but she reacted with grace as it nearly brushed against her skin while hopping off her prey. The dwarf followed through the attack and lunged at the beast with the handle, pinning the tiger against the cavern wall. He stalled for the priest to turn his aid onto the leader, helping him up in the process.
“Easy easy…!” the bishop channeled his holy light into the swelling wound. The fangs punctured straight through Rion’s shoulder armor through and through.
“Ngh… unbelievable,” Rion shook his head, upset more at his ineptitude than the wound itself. Just as the wounds closed, the elven leader stood up with haste, ignoring the lingering pain in his once-torn muscles, “That’s good, Jorghan!” The bishop instinctually wanted to stop him from rushing to the dwarf’s aid, as the healing was incomplete.
Jorghan did a good job wrestling the beast for a moment, but her body proved slippery. She slumped down and rolled with a swipe that prevented the dwarf from regaining hold. With distance, the tiger lowered her form, and her wicked eyes glowed green. From her paws, a series of thorns and bark surged forward and entrapped Rion’s party in its foliage, leaving only a few trapped hands exposed from it. With only a few light orbs scattered peering through the small openings, the remainder of the light was obfuscated by the brush.
The tiger waltzed around cautiously at the two mage hunters as she slowly dispelled her beast-form. “The Flower” revealed her small, lithe body to them. Small, yet commanding with authority. “Sisters, gather the last of the supplies and leave!” She licked Rion’s blood and flesh from her lips, “It was foolish to think your lot can take me.”
Jorghan disregarded her for a moment to express concern for his officer, “Lad, are ye alright?”
“Yeah… just a flesh wound,” Rion sighed. The wounds remained and would need further treatment, but the centuries of combat experience taught him how to suppress the pain. Summoning his strength, he conjured three more arcane blades, all of which hovered over his head in an arc, “Alright, Ms. ‘Flower,’ you are under arrest by the authority of the king. Don’t make this messy and come quietly!”
“Aye ya faegan wench! Be lucky we’re men of law!”
The fae gritted her teeth with a fierce gaze of disapproval. “Tch. Imprudence.” She took to the air using her wings decorated with brilliant blues and greens with thick black lines. Her palms tilted up and glowed as she conjured a spell. “Your stubborn sense of justice will get your lot killed!” Her hands flung forward and tossed two yellow glowing orbs before them. The two mage hunters leapt backward as they exploded, but it wasn’t the small blasts that threatened them. Rion conjured an arcane barrier with his back against the wall with assurance to shield him from the spores that came from those bombs. Jorghan was coughing a fit, but thanks to his dwarven blood he remained stalwart. Stun spores, Rion recalled, struggling to consider how he could combat it in his precarious position.
“Get your whore ass down here!” Jorghan commanded, picking up a hefty stone and chucking it at Jasmine. The mighty force of his throw called her to reel back in the air, almost causing her to lose her flight. The jagged stone caused a gash in her temple.
“Clever...!” she hissed, and with another dance of her arms, the bundle of vines and bark, that captured their companions, extended and broke off into two more piles that towered into tall, thick creatures of wood, treants. Normally they are magical, wild creatures that lurk in forests, but the arch druid’s powers are strong enough to conjure such life.
Rion quickly assembled a cloth into a mask to shield his breathing of the spores that lingered. He had to gamble on its makeshift effectiveness to aid his companion. With a fierce sprint, he slashed and diced the branches of one of the treants, while his partner fended off the other with his war maul. Their blows were effective, slicing and smashing the branches. However, they kept regrowing at an alarming pace.
While their backs were turned away from the fae, she was readying another one of her spells, only interrupted by the echoing chirping of birds. “Hmph. Pray you don’t find me again. Next time I will not be so eager to toy with you.” She fluttered gently onto the ground thanks to her butterfly wings. While the two hunters struggled fending off her summoned tree beasts, she made her way into one of the dark tunnels.
“Damn it!” Rion cursed, unable to find an opening.
“W-wait…M-matriarch!” the fallen dark elf pleaded after she awoken from her treacherous fall. She crawled desperately, and with great strain lifted herself up to her feet. Jasmine was far ahead of her, “Wait…for me!”
She returned a vicious glare, and an equally vicious retort, “Consider this your punishment for earlier. You will never call me by my name ever again!” With a wave of her hands, she conjured more vines that shot into the walls of the cavern. Their roots dug into the stones, and with a tightening strain, the rocks tumbled and crumbled, closing off the path.
“I’m sorry! P-please!” she begged, even stumbled towards the caving rocks in a desperate plea to make it to the other side. She fell forward without a chance to even get crushed by the boulders. “Don’t abandon me! Noooo!” She pounded her fist onto the ground, a deep sensation of betrayal as she was left to be captured by the enforcers.

The summoned treants were a tough fight, but thanks to the fae abandoning the cave, they lost their regenerative abilities and were eventually taken down. The mage hunters were unsuccessful in capturing the matriarch of the Druids of Jubilee, but were able to capture two of their members. Guard Captain Buzely met with the men and women on the surface commenting, “Well… that could’ve gone better… but that could have gone a lot worse. A valiant effort Mage Hunters.”
Rion and Jorghan sustained many scrapes and bruises, and so did a few of their members. The fatal wound of the sorcerer was patched and he was resuscitated. No one died, and that’s what Rion treasured above all. “Yeah… I guess.” However, he was still disappointed with the results.
“I don’t understand though,” Buzely continued, “Why not just… suffocated them out with fire?”
Rion shook his head, “Would be convenient if we could, but druids have such a diverse arsenal of magic. Breathing spells certainly aren’t foreign to them.”
“Dang. Were they really that tough for even the mighty mage hunters? Maybe I should’ve sent my men in with you after all.”
Rion almost took offense. Sure, the Mage Hunter guild was still in its adolescence, and there is much to learn about combating sorcery. Given the best knowledge and tools though, he held high regard not just for himself, but for his own team. He stood up after contemplating an answer, “Hmph. I would’ve loved to see how your men would’ve handled that.” Regrets however followed him regarding Tychon. His unique skillset would have been an ace in their hand, as much as he hated to admit it. The half-orc, half-elf man was a valuable co-leader, and he could always rely on him. However, Tychon should not be the only one who has access to the school of counter-magic. Rion is now inspired to give him a new mission in between his duties investigating the elusive necromancers.
The Mage Hunters need Tychon’s magic.

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