The Wyvern's Spur - Kate Novak [46]
What she said, only without the dramatic touches, Olive thought.
"If Steele and I don't come back, my Cousin Freffie will come down looking for us. If you wait in the crypt for him, he'll let you out."
Cat frowned with displeasure. Olive thought, She doesn't want to take a chance on Freffie. He might not fall for her story as easily as Giogi did.
"I'm not leaving you," Cat insisted.
Giogi sighed with defeat. "Then you'd better stay behind me," he stated, holding an authoritative finger up to her nose. He turned about and crept down the passage.
The corridor turned, and there Giogi halted, peering around the edge. Cat stopped behind him and peeked out from behind his back.
The passage opened into a larger chamber ten feet farther down. Inside the room, a tangle of white-horned, black-scaled creatures smaller than halflings jumped up and down on a massive mahogany tabletop. The monsters wore nothing but raggedy red shifts with belts of rope and dagger sheaths.
The table rocked on the splintered stumps that had once been its legs, and on a prone human body. Protruding from beneath the table were Steele's head and shoulders; the rest of him was pinned by the tabletop and the weight of the creatures swarming on top of it. A moan escaped Steele's lips and his head lolled to one side. From Steele's stillness and closed eyes, though, Giogi guessed his cousin was mercifully unconscious.
"Kobolds," Cat said with scorn. "Just a few stupid kobolds."
Giogi counted at least twenty, which ranked slightly higher than a few, in his estimation, but he kept his growing sense of alarm in check. He could hardly convince Cat that he could protect her from her master, he realized, if he cringed from a battle with kobolds.
"Right. You wait here," he ordered. "And I mean right here." Having laid down the law, Giogi plunged into the room, foil drawn in his right hand, finder's stone raised high in his left, shouting an inarticulate battle cry.
"What does he think he's doing?" Cat muttered.
Proving himself, obviously, Olive thought.
"Idiot," Cat said, pulling something out of one of her robe pockets. As Cat dangled it in front of her, Olive got a closer look at it: a finger bone. Cat began chanting softly. Motes of light began to sparkle about the bone.
The burro pulled back quickly. Don't want to get in the way of a spell that involves anyone's finger bone, Olive decided.
Oblivious to the magic being cast behind him, Giogi rushed to his cousin's side. The kobolds, alarmed by the sudden loud intrusion and the finder's stone light, scattered before him. Their surprise gave way to rage, however, when they realized they were beset with only a single foe armed with nothing but an oversized skewer. With cruel smiles on their muzzles, the kobolds drew sharp daggers, which glittered in the light of Giogi's stone. The beasts began encroaching on him in groups of three or four, snarling like dogs set to bait a bull.
Assuming a combat stance, Giogi pivoted about his left foot, lunging with his foil in the direction of any kobold who came within range.
Back in the corridor, Cat ceased her chanting and the bone she held crumbled to dust. Suddenly, the kobolds surrounding Giogi fell back in terror. Impressed with the effect his prowess seemed to have had on the creatures. Giogi jabbed his foil a few times in their direction to test their reaction. The kobolds cowered like whipped dogs.
The nobleman didn't have the heart to skewer any of them. Keeping a wary eye on the little monsters, he bent over to examine his cousin. Steele's breathing was shallow and his face pale.
Cat padded into the room, smiling with pleasure at the effect her scare spell had on them. The creatures trembled at her gaze. Olive stood watching from the shadows near the room's entrance. According to common adventurer lore, pack animals were seen as a delicacy among kobolds and other underground races. She didn't want to take the chance that the sight of dinner on the hoof would prick up the monsters' courage.
"I thought I told you to stay put," Giogi