Mythical Book #1

Chapter 26

Cronos fully wakes up after hours of tossing and turning on a bed of small river rocks that he has been forced to sleep on. It is a still night out, and the stars shine brilliantly. In the near distance are several Goblins milling about around some bonfires, fending off the slight chill in the early morning night air. Faintly, Cronos hears one of them complain, “Why are we here just waiting? This is ridiculous!”

“I suspect he’s making this all up, and we should just eat him for breakfast,” Another Goblin says.

‘Eh, go ahead, none of you will make it out alive if I’m gone,’ Cronos says to himself.

Cronos fails in trying to find some comfort, and stands up. He then stretches with his tail shivering. Cronos then wanders over to the small cove where the event is supposed to occur. The Goblins are huddled close around the fires and don’t take mind of him.

He rounds a corner to a point where he can’t be seen, and it blocks out the light from the fires. He leans up against the cliff wall, then he looks straight up to stare at the starlit sky. ‘Wait! Was that a glimmer of light?’ Cronos notices on top of the cliff above him. ‘There it is again! And there was a Petnubus silhouette, I'm sure of it!’ Quickly Cronos finds a stone about the size of the palm of his hand.

Petnubus trade a lot with Fanachcroi, and Cronos has befriended quite a few of them, who in turn have taught him a few things about their culture, one being that they use rhythm as one of their forms of communication. Cronos starts tapping in a simple beat on the canyon wall to send out a message to the Petnubus soldiers hiding amongst the cliffs.

“HEY!” a Goblin shouts angrily at Cronos. “Stop that annoying tapping, you waste of a good horse!”

To Centaurs, those are fighting words, and so Cronos chucks the stone at the Goblin, hitting him in the side of his head. Quickly the Goblin recovers and storms over with two of his closest mates.

Drawing his sword, he snarls, “I overheard the King say that he didn’t need this ass and would reward the Goblin who finds the path. I think I’ll...” He stops suddenly, with a very surprised look on his face, then he falls forward dead with two arrows in his back. His buddies turn to see a silhouette on top of the cliff behind them, and then a wing shimmers in the moonlight. Turning back to Cronos they quickly notice a large Petnubus curved blade in his hand that was dropped down to him. He grins, and then doesn’t hesitate to use it to cut them down. Simultaneously the Petnubus army sends a barrage of fiery arrows at the unsuspecting Troll army.

The Trolls scramble for cover and try to gather their weapons. Some try to flee the way they came through the canyon, but are attacked from the shadows by the Felinala army, who then start forming ranks and advance on the Trolls. The Petnubus soldiers enter the canyon by climbing down the walls.

The Troll King shouts at his army to form “Packs!” Quickly the Troll soldiers separate into groups of seven, standing back-to-back, with one archer in the center. As a barrage of arrows rain on the Trolls, they put their shields up to create a metal umbrella blocking the arrows. The instant the arrows stop, the shields come apart and the Troll archers take their shots, injuring and killing several Petnubus archers and soldiers. The Felinala try to attack the packs but are unable to because they are either cut down when they get close or are shot by the Troll archer.

Bannick gets the attention of three Felinala fighters, “We got to take out those packs!” He says to them.

“How?” one of the Felinala soldiers ask.

“Just pay attention. I’ll create and opening, and give cover,” Bannick pulls his bow around.”

“But, what are we supposed to do?” another soldier asks.