The Woman in the Woods

The Woman in the Woods

T

he woods were the remains of the great forest that had covered most of the area between the Razorback mountains and the river Blue. Five people stood at the trailhead that led into the dense copse of fir and ash trees. One stood apart, holding a lantern, and gestured at the trailhead.
         “This is the only way in for a couple of leagues in either direction. I bid you good luck and god-speed,” the man with the lantern said as he turned to go.
         “I thought you worshiped ...” said a small, voluptuous woman wearing a thin robe that hid little of her charms. She had a tiara on her brow with a blood-red gemstone in it, and in her hand a leather-wrapped wand with a blue gemstone in one end.
         “Aye, don’t mean I want to meet her, though,” he said over his shoulder as he walked briskly back the way they’d come.
         “We gotta do this, right?” asked a young man in green garb, a longbow in his hand and a large quiver of arrows over his shoulder.
         “Yup, Darren,” replied a very tall woman wearing strategically placed armor. She had a short sword at each hip and the handle of a war ax showing over her shoulder. Her breasts bulged as much as her muscles.
         “Keena is right. We have to get a vial of blood from her, so we can trade it for the Gem of Remathrasis. We then can use that to open the gate of Lorta and get the great battle horn of Gental. Once we have that, we can … we can … crud, I forgot,” said a thin man with wisps of a beard in a colorful robe that fell shy of his curly toed shoes. He had a plain wooden staff with iron-bound ends in his left hand. His right hand was buried in a pocket of the robe.
         “It’s OK, Justin. Darren, what should we expect in the woods?” asked the small woman.
         “Let me think,” the man in green said, paused, then continued. “Wild boar, leopards, Wyverns (small ones), dire wolves, goblins and tree-men, Laura.”
         “Tree-men?” Keena asks.
         “Yeah. Some kind of intelligent, belligerent (of course), semi-ambulatory tree,” Justin replied with a shrug.
         “Let me get us some light,” Laura said, pointing her wand up. She said, “Lumenus estrellus,” followed immediately by. “Oh crap.”
         A ball of bluish light shot out of the end of her wand and up into the sky for about 100 yards. It then exploded into a bright bluish light.
         “Well, that should give them fair warning we are coming,” Keena said sarcastically, then asked. “How long do we have?”
         “About an hour, I think,” Laura answered.
         “Let's get to it,” Keena said, drew her short swords, and led the way into the forest.
         
         Roughly, two hours later they staggered, warily, into a clearing. There were trees on all sides, but no visible creatures. Fortunately, there were enough fallen trees that they could all sit. They collapsed exhausted on the logs. Laura sat only for a moment, got up, and started tending her companion's wounds.
         “What even was that?” Keena asked.
         “I don’t know. I want to say a manticore but,” Justin said, shook his head then just stopped talking for a moment. He then added, “Crud, I am down to 4 arrows.”
         “Yeah, I got 3 good charges on my staff,” Darren said.
         “I think my left arm is broke. Hurts a lot,” Keena said, wincing as Laura gently ran her hands over the arm.
         “No, just a nasty bruising. I can relieve some of the pain, but I don’t have enough mana left to do more than that,” Laura said.
         They heard from the other end of the clearing a loud crack, then cursing. They leaped to their feet, got themselves prepared for battle. At first, nothing could be seen, but the cursing could still be heard. Then a medium height blond woman with an hour-glass figure in a thin, almost transparent, white shift, popped up from behind a bush, lifted one arm up pointing generally in their direction, and said, “You have come far traveler ... oh ... travelers just to fail!”
         She blinked several times as if trying to focus, then a loud belch came out of her delicate, red colored lips.
         To her left, the trees rustled and a short figure, that looked like it had strips of tree bark strapped to it's torso, and a tree branch strapped to it's back with leaves sticking out above it's head, came to a staggering stop next to the woman. He grunted, waved a short wooden sword at them, mumbled something incoherent, wobbled a bit, then hiccupped.
         The foursome cautiously approached the woman and tree-man. When they got close enough to detect the reek of alcohol, they stopped, and looked at each other.
         “You know why we are here?” Justin asked.
         “Yesh, but you can have it! Tree-man will defend my precious, precious blood to death!” the woman said as she tugged at her shift.
         “Hic,” said the tree-man, then said to the woman, "You said they 'can' have it." Then he started giggling.
         “Huh. Well, they know what I mean. Right? Oooo, you're a pretty one ... are you the healer. I like healers," the woman said, trying to leer at Laura, but ruined the moment by belching again.
         “So … ah … guys, how do we do this?” Justin asked.
         “Hey, is that a cabinet over there?” Darren asked, pointing to a small wooden cabinet between two trees behind and to the right of the inebriated duo.
         "Hey! Don' lookatthat! itsnotinthere! c'mon fight tree-man! Go get ‘em, tree-man!” the woman snarled, belched, farted, and waved a hand in their general direction.
         The little man, charged at the foursome, tripped, tumbled, and landing on his back. He laid there, waved his sword in circles above himself, and started mumble singing to himself.
         “Oh no, you’ve killed ... mortally wound ... knocked down tree-man! I have no cho<belch>ice but to give you a vial of my precious, precious blood! I know you need it so you can get the whatsit and do the thing ta get the other thing and then other stuff,” she said as she waved a hand toward the cabinet, then sat down abruptly, started weeping, repeated “poor, poor tree-man” until she passed out and started snoring.
         "That was a bit anti-climatic," Justin said as he returned the arrow he'd drawn to his quiver.
         "Don't know how I feel about that," Keena said as she resheathed her swords.
         The group stood a moment longer, then Darren limped over to the cabinet. After he opened it, he found a vial filled with a ruby red liquid. He picked it up, put it in a pouch at his waist, closed the cabinet, and returned to the group.
         "Well, that's done," Darren said as he eyed the snoring woman.
         "I hope there is another way out of here. I don't want to face those creatures again," Justin said, looking around the clearing.
         “That looks like a trail to her shrine,” Keena said, wincing as she waved her arm further to the right of the cabinet.
         "How do you know that?" Justin asked as he turned in that direction.
         "Probably that sign is the clue Keena picked up on," Laura said.
         At the edge of the clearing, opposite the path they came in on, was a hand-painted sign that had an arrow pointing down a trail and the word 'Shrine' in big letters and the word 'exit' in smaller letters under it.
         The group organized themselves and headed down that trail.