Episode 16

Rak was the first of the patrol to reach the guard room area, and therefore the first to realize the guard room team had all been killed. He backed out of the room and called the news back to warcaster Gazh and the rest of the patrol, keeping his voice low.

"Looks like those idiot door guards have been taken out. No sign of anyone, but there's some blood. Must've been those adventurers the Warchief warned us about."

"The beast?" Gazh asked.

"I didn't go that far, but I couldn't hear any of the usual scrabbling about."

"Right. Scout it out." Gazh gestured for the patrol's two archers to move up for support. The team knew the moves and Rak unhooked the flail from his belt and moved silently back into the guard rooms. The area was two rooms each with a well in the centre and each with an adjoining dorm. The first well room held the stairs to the outside, and a side chamber that housed a war beast that the guards could set loose if they were attacked.

There was no sign of a fight in the second well room, and the adjoining dorm was empty of occupants, so Rak moved into the first well room where he'd first seen blood.

Closer inspection proved that the first well room was clearly the scene of a battle. Rak edged around the room, covered by the two archers, discovering that the side chamber that held the spider beast now held a spider corpse. The door to the adjoining dorm, however, was closed. Rak crouched at the door for several minutes, listening intently. Then he padded back out of the room, leaving the door shut.

"I reckon they've bedded down in the first well room's dorm." Rak announced.

The patrol's other soldier swung his own flail free. "Sweet! A small room with no other exits - I say we barge in and pound the bastards!"

Rak spat on the floor. "Nah. There's at least one stinking spell caster in the group. Who knows what that little jerk has going on for protection. The door probably explodes if you touch the handle, or some shit. Begging your pardon, guv'nor," he added, with a nod to Gazh.

The robed warcaster dismissed the minor affront with a wave of his hand. "An ambush then."

Rak nodded slowly. "Yeah I think so. They're still here, so they intend to push further in. I say we put strike teams in the second dorm and the hallway to the council room. If they run into either team the other will attack from the rear. If they head toward the statue room we regroup and force them south. Either way, our flails will churn their brains."

Gazh nodded his agreement. "Okay. you take the dorm." He glanced around the patrol. "You can keep cash from your kills. Equipment goes to Kalarel for assessment. Got it?"

There was a muttering of reluctant assent, then the hobgoblins deployed as arranged.

An hour later the ambush was enacted, and it worked perfectly. The invaders hardly scouted ahead at all, and just as the rogue was about to round the corner to the council room hallway, the group's god botherer wandered into the dorm where Rak was hiding. Rak timed his swing perfectly, smashing his flail into the cleric's face just as it appeared around the corner.

As she staggered back, Rak's archer followed with a point blank shot to the cleric's torso. She collapsed onto the ground just outside the door. A spellcaster leaped forward and shoved the dorm's door shut. One of Rak's grunts seized the handle, expecting to shove it open, but the latch seemed frozen. "Fuck! Locked!" he exclaimed.

Rak knew spellwork when he saw it. He yelled at the hobgoblin at the door, "No worries guv! I've brung the keys!" and smashed his massive hobnailed boot into the door. The door banged open, wood splintered around the latch.

The cleric has recovered somehow, but the invaders were retreating in disarray across the room, pursued by Gazh and the rest of the other strike team. Rak's group poured into the well room as the last invader, a sword wielding human male with a ridiculously tall helmet, fled back into the first well room.

The hobgoblins pursued the fleeing humans and fey through the well rooms and up the stairs. Rak led his group through the deserted zombie crypt, but stopped when he realized he couldn't hear anything ahead of him. He cursed under his breath at spell casters and all forms of invisibility. Gazh caught up a second later, and after a brief discussion left Rak and his team to search the crypt while Gazh took the rest of the patrol to scout through the rest of the upper level.

Ten fruitless minutes later the hobgoblins regrouped at the entry to the crypt. Gazh laid out what they knew. "They didn't get any further. So they'll be back. We'll lay another ambush, in the first well room. And when it comes to the spoils, I won't look that closely at what they're carrying. If all that makes it to Kalarel is a few swords and daggers, then that's all they had. Right?"

"Right!" "Hells yeah!" came the replies. One of the archers was more specific: "Dibs on magic armour!" he yelled.

The two hobgoblin strike teams deployed through the first well room, hiding in the dorm, adjoining spider cage room, and in the second well room. Shortly the invading group returned, sneaking into the room like clumsy thieves. Rak and Gazh led the patrol into the ambush. Initially the fight went well for the hobgoblins. The stupid-hat human killed a grunt by — bizarrely — throwing the bucket from the well at him, but then Rak's archer dropped the human with a well placed arrow.

Rak managed to shake off most of the effects of a freezing cloud of ice from the spell caster, while Stupid Hat was helped to his feet by the gap-toothed cleric and immediately landed a massive sword swing on Rak that numbed his arm and shoulder. Rak let out a snarl of defiance, which turned into a grunt of surprise and pain when a javelin lanced into his leg.

His surprise became astonishment when he picked out the javelin's origin — a goblin he vaguely recognized from the upper level's goblin guard team. He cursed the goblin, wondering if this was a random defection or if the treachery ran deeper.

A glance around the room showed at least half the patrol were down. Gazh was readying a spell, his staff crackling with sparks. Rak raised his hand, about to rally the remaining hobgoblins for a fresh attack. His war cry died in his throat, however, as a wicked shuriken buzzed through the air and buried itself in his neck.

Rak fell to the floor, spitting blood. He couldn't move, and could only watch as the invaders took out Rak's fellows with fire, blade, and a hellish curse that somehow seized a heavily armed hobgoblin soldier and dumped him into the well.

As the grey veil of death fell over Rak's vision, Gazh launched his spell, a magical pulse of force that threw half the invaders to the ground. The human with the stupid hat leaped back up with apparently renewed energy. He sprinted in a short arc that took him to Gazh, and smashed into the hobgoblin warcaster with his shield, knocking Gazh into the well. He then charged into to the last hobgoblin standing, and buried his sword into the archer's chest, but by this time Rak' soul had already passed on to Orcus.