The Blight

[PepsiWhirda]

Whirda only nodded, crouched low and too focused for a proper reply. As dusk fell over the forest, she glided from tree to tree, her movements the practiced, ball-to-toe movements of a skilled predator. The goblins took no notice. Distracted by the outraged cries of their kin, they wouldn't stand a chance.

Tree to tree, up and over a fallen branch, treading neatly around fallen sticks and leaves, Whirda was soon upon them. Her light jog became a run, her run a full on sprint, and then she dove, fully outstretched, parallel to the ground. The bruiser, a great wall of meaty flesh, hefted a battle axe and bounced from heel to heel. The scout, looking bored, picked its filthy nails and adjusted the crossbow slung over its shoulder.

Whirda spread her arms and struck each of them with a single kukri. Before the weapons could dig into flesh, she called on her sorcery and trapped them both in cyclonic prisons, buffeting winds that jostled them to and fro, silent and immobile. She turned her momentum into a forward flip and landed with one steadying hand on the ground.

To its credit, the slender mage reacted quickly, swinging to face her and leveling a spindly wand. Before it could enact its sorcery, Whirda kicked straight up. The wand flew high, spinning, and before it could land the goblin mage fell, grasping its torn throat, its warning emerging only as a gurgling wheeze.

Whirda pounced next on the bruiser, dissipating the cyclone with a wave of her hand. She barreled through him with her whole weight, taking advantage of his disorientation. They fell, her knees forcing the breath from its diaphragm, her weapons sliding with precision between ribs and into its lungs. It gasped for air, flopping like a fish that couldn't tell upstream from down, and died.

The scout's cyclonic prison faded next, and Whirda was already up and running. The scout emerged stumbling, bent over, and dry heaved. As Whirda neared, it stood straight. The dazed look on its face showed it hadn't yet realized what was happening.

Nyx's first blood bolt caught it square in the side of its head, sending it stumbling. The second, Whirda noticed with a flash of approval, neatly severed the crossbow string, rendering the weapon useless as anything but a blunt object.

"Shit," she mouthed a moment later, seeing the goblin shaken from its reverie.

The guttural, panicked cry reverberated off trees, filled the air to capacity, echoed even over the howls of the rest of the war band. A swift kick to the scout's stomach and a blade dragged across its throat cut the cry short, but the damage was done. Whirda looked up, and into a hundred furious yellow eyes. The war band stared at her, almost with incredulity. More than fifty armed goblins, three of them riding monstrous, scaled creatures of Chultan myth, were now aware of her presence.

Nyx appeared at her side, and for a moment all Whirda could focus on was how pale she looked, scarlet eyes sunken, face wan and etched with exhaustion.

"Shit."

For a moment, everything was quiet. So quiet she could hear her own shallow breathing. Then it wasn't.

The leader of the war band, a hulking, yellow-green monstrosity bedecked in feather and bone, raised its great staff high. At the tip gleamed a hunk of ruby the size of Whirda's fist. The gem flashed intensely, the weapon spitting a coruscating stream of sparks. It howled something Nyx couldn't understand, but to Whirda meant only one thing.

"Run!"