(Original Publication Date: August 16, 2016)

"How big is this forest?" asked Julian. "How have we not randomly stumbled upon a road in three days?"

Tim sighed. "We would have been home a long time ago if it wasn't for Dave's shortcut."

"You were the one who wanted to take a shortcut," said Dave. "I told you I didn't have any ranks in the Survival skill."

"It's a Wisdom based skill. You're supposed to have this incredible fucking Wisdom score."

"And I said it would be wiser to stay on the goddamn road!"

"Everyone calm down," said Cooper, not usually the voice of reason among the four of them. "So Dave fucked up. It's not the end of the world."

Dave shook his meaty dwarven fist at Cooper. "I didn't fuck up! I said we should –"

"Everybody shut up!" said Julian. He was suddenly overcome with panic. As there was nothing particularly panic-worthy in his immediate surroundings, he assumed the feeling must be coming from his familiar. He gestured for everyone to crouch down and stay quiet. He whispered, "I think something, or someone, just scared the shit out of Ravenus."

"How hard is that?" asked Dave. "He's just a bird."

Cooper snorted. "About as hard as I got looking at your mom's Pornhub videos."

"Fuck you, Cooper."

"Dude, I was agreeing with you. I didn't get hard at all. Hell, I was afraid I'd never get hard again after that shit with the donkey."

Tim threw a pine cone at Cooper's face. "Knock it off. You're being even more of an asshole than usual."

"I'm fucking hungry, man," said Cooper. "Ragging on Dave's mom is the only sustenance I've got."

"Ow!" said Dave, his head jerking forward as Ravenus bounced off the top of it and landed on the ground in the middle of the group. He looked at Cooper. "Have you ever tried raven?"

"Apologies," said Ravenus, flipping himself over and getting up on his large black feet. He shook the dirt off his back feathers, then looked up at Julian. "I saw something in the forest, sir."

Julian's heart was beating hard. "What was it?"

"Two large women."

Tim and Dave frowned in confusion at each other.

"Will you please calm down?" said Julian. "You're going to make my heart explode. I don't think two large women warrants this kind of response."

"That's what the bird is so freaked out over?" said Cooper, the only one of them who couldn't understand Ravenus's speech. "He'd shit himself if he ever set foot in a Walmart."

A grim thought occurred to Julian. "What if we've stumbled upon some kind of special Mordred fantasy zone?"

"Are you fucking serious?" asked Tim. "This whole goddamn world is a Mordred fantasy zone. How are you only now coming to terms with this?"

"That's not the kind of fantasy I was talking about." Julian paused to collect his thoughts. "He created all these game characters, right? And he could possess the body of anyone he created? Maybe he also made himself a variety of pleasure stops out in remote places where he didn't think anyone would ever travel. He inhabits the body of some burly woodsman and pays his women a visit from time to time between gaming sessions."

Tim, Dave, and Cooper gazed thoughtfully into the distance, no doubt imagining that was exactly what they would do if given similar power.

Tim was the first to snap out of his imaginary harem trance. "You think Mordred's a chubby chaser?"

Julian shrugged. "He's a big guy. Maybe he likes a –" He shook his head clear of jiggly naked women. "Who cares what his tastes in women are?"

Tim, Dave, and Cooper shared an exchange of glances, then slowly raised their hands. Even Ravenus raised a wing.

Julian looked down at Ravenus. "Why?"

"Ravens are curious by nature, sir."

"They might have food," said Dave. "How else do they stay so fat out here in the woods?"

"And booze," added Tim enthusiastically.

Cooper stuck a finger two knuckles deep into his ear, perhaps trying to scratch his brain. "He might have them programmed to be perpetually horny."

Julian frowned at Cooper. "You really want to sink to Mordred's level?"

Cooper looked down at his crotch. "Dude, give me some credit. I can probably sink an inch or two deeper."

"Jesus Christ," said Tim. "Just stab me in the fucking ears. I don't need the image of your scabby dick sinking into anyone in my head."

"You know, guys," said Julian. "That fantasy zone theory was just that. A theory. I'm probably way off base with it." He looked down at Ravenus. "What were the two ladies doing when you saw them? Were they kissing each other? Or licking? Or spanking? Or putting their fingers in each others' –"

"Fucking enough already!" said Tim. "Let the bird talk."

Ravenus looked back and forth between Tim and Julian a couple of times, then answered. "None of that, sir, as far as I could tell. One of them was tied to a tree, and the other was lighting a fire under a large iron tub."

Tim grinned at Julian. "Sounds like your theory just got confirmed."

"What?" said Julian. "How does that sound even remotely like a sexual fantasy?"

"Aw shit." Cooper rubbed his hands together. "What did the bird say? Midgets? Ping pong balls? Jell-O?"

"He saw something that sounded a lot more like cannibalism than porn, at least to a sane person."

Dave cleared his throat. "Then maybe we should check it out just the same. We can't very well leave an innocent large woman to die, can we?"

That was just like Dave, masking his true motivations to make himself look like a hero.

"Fine," said Julian. "Let's go sneak a peek at the big girls, and then get back to finding our way back to Cardinia."

Ravenus dutifully led them to the clearing in the woods, but Julian could still feel the unease in his familiar's mind. "It's just beyond those trees, sir."

"Stop," said Tim as Cooper started forward. "Let's be smart about this." He looked up at the branches of a nearby tree. "We'll scout the scene before rushing in there. Cooper, give me a boost up to that first branch, would you?"

Cooper grabbed Tim by the torso and tossed him onto the branch, where he landed as sure-footedly as a bird.

Julian pulled a coil of rope out of his bag. "Tie this to the branch. I'm coming up."

"Why?"

"I want to see what Ravenus is so freaked out about."

Tim rolled his eyes. "Fine."

Julian had a feeling he would comply. It was an excuse to have a drink while Julian climbed up the rope. Sure enough, as soon as Tim's knot was secure, his flask was out before Julian started climbing.

The branches above the first branch were closer to each other than the first branch was to the ground, allowing both Tim and Julian to ascend with ease.

Tim was smaller than Julian, had a higher Dexterity score, and a bonus to his Jump skill, which allowed him to climb the tree much faster than Julian. But he stopped suddenly. The look on his face matched the dread Julian felt through his Empathic Link with Ravenus.

"Holy shit!" Tim spoke softly enough such that Julian wouldn't have heard him without his elf ears. There was something more nefarious afoot than two big girls making out in a tub of Rocky Road.

The first thing Julian saw as he reached Tim was a very tall woman, at least eight feet, standing with her back against a thick pine tree, her hands tied to the trunk above her head. She was obviously a giantess of some sort. Not particularly heavyset, by giant standards. Ravenus must have been referring to her height. Her face appeared pained and distressed as she struggled to free her bound wrists.

Two women, rather than one, were manning the cauldron Ravenus had mentioned. They were hunch-backed, but looked to be just as tall as their captive if they were able to stand upright. With their misshapen backs to him, they didn't look all that frightening. Maybe they weren't in the running for Homecoming Queen, but—

Julian gasped.

When they turned, he could see their faces and hands. They had deep blue wrinkly skin, long pointed noses, and fingernails like blackened dagger blades.

"Ravenus!" Julian whispered.

"Right here, sir." He was perched on the branch just above Julian's head.

"You said there were only two."

"One of them must have been inside at the time."

Julian looked at the clearing again. There was some kind of artificial earthen mound, covered in hanging vines. He supposed that it might serve as the old crones' home.

"Why didn't you think to mention that one of the women you saw had wrinkly blue skin?"

"If you don't mind me saying so, sir, the subject of skin color has more than once set the four of you off in heated and confusing discussion."

Julian nodded. "It can be a bit of a hot-button topic where we come from. Still, you might have mentioned how horrific-looking she is."

"I didn't want to be rude, sir. And I don't feel I have an adequate appreciation for your elven standards of beauty."

"I say we get the fuck out of here," said Tim.

Julian glared at him. "We can't just leave that poor giant woman there to be murdered and eaten."

Tim looked down at Dave and Cooper. "We'll put it to a vote."

Julian felt the struggle between doing what was right and his own cowardice fighting for dominance inside him. He knew in his heart that agreeing to a vote would just be justifying cowardice. Dave would side with Tim. The best he could hope for was a stalemate, unless they let Ravenus break the tie. Doubtful.

"Agreed."

They climbed down the tree and described what they'd seen to Dave and Cooper.

"It sounds like a trap," said Dave.

"What?" Julian had to hand it to Dave. He always came up with creative excuses to tuck tail and run.

"You said all three of them are approximately the same height. That doesn't seem a little odd to you?"

"Not really," said Julian. "Most of us were within a couple of inches of each other before we turned into..." he waved his hands between the four of them. "... all this shit."

"And what are the odds that we arrived here just in time to rescue this woman from being eaten? How long does it take to ready a cauldron?"

"Depending on what they're cooking, it could take quite a while."

"So let's say it takes hours," said Dave. "That amounts to nothing on a long enough timeline. Of all the times we could have stumbled onto this clearing, how small a window is it to arrive here between the time she was captured and the time she was killed? That doesn't seem just a little bit convenient to you?"

Tim shrugged and took a swig from his flask. "That could just be game mechanics."

Dave glared at Tim, obviously not appreciating the crack in their solidarity. "What are you talking about?"

"We might need to activate a trigger to initiate certain events. Remember the RPGs on the NES?"

"NES?" asked Julian, proud of himself for at least remembering what RPG meant.

Tim sighed. "Nintendo Entertainment System. Jesus, didn't you have a childhood? What the fuck did you do all summer?"

"I went to the pool, rode my bike, played outside with my friends."

Cooper put his hand on Julian's shoulder. "You poor, poor bastard."

Julian looked at Tim. "You were saying something about a trigger?"

"Let's say you walk into a village, and there's a woman there with a sick baby. You move your character over to face the mother and press the A button. She tells you her whole spiel about her kid, and you keep hitting the A button because who gives a fuck, you just want to know what she needs. You with me so far?"

Dave and Cooper nodded.

"I guess," Julian lied.

"Depending on the choices you've made in the game, or how shitty you are at playing it, there could be discrepancies of months of game-time for when you even reach that village. Every time you sleep at an inn to replenish your Hit Points, that's another whole day gone by."

This didn't match Julian's experience with RPGs. "You could replenish all your Hit Points by spending one night in an inn?"

"It was a simpler time. May I continue?"

"Sure."

"Now let's say I'm playing the game at my house, and Dave's playing the game at his house. It could take Dave six months to find the same mother and child that I find within a couple of weeks, because he sucks."

"Fuck you," said Dave. "I preferred platform games."

Tim had likely purposefully antagonized Dave just so that he could pause for a drink. When he was done, he continued. "In real life, that fucking kid would have been a worm-ridden corpse by the time Dave showed up. But in the game, he's just as sick when Dave shows up as he is when I show up. It's a side quest which isn't triggered until you actually talk to the mother. She sends you out to go collect some bullshit herbs. You bring them back, the kid gets better, and the mother is so grateful that she gives you the Heartstone Gem that you need to continue along in the game."

Julian tugged on his long ears. "So... How does that apply to our current situation?"

"Who knows? Maybe not at all. I don't know all the technical details of how this game works. But if it works anything like the example I just explained, those two old women might stir that pot forever unless we step in to rescue their captive." Tim took a swig from his flask.

Julian frowned at Tim's flask. "How do you still have anything left in there after three whole days?"

Tim shrugged. "I'm small."

Dave rubbed his hands together. "If Tim's theory is correct, no one gets eaten or murdered if we just mind our own business and go on our way."

"It's just a theory," said Julian. "And not a very convincing one. You were all convinced about my fantasy zone theory a few minutes ago."

"I'm still not unconvinced," said Cooper. "How gross did those old blue bitches look?"

It was time to break out the Diplomacy. Julian folded his arms. "Are you guys really going to tell me you're so afraid of a couple of old ladies that you'd let an innocent person die rather than face them?"

Tim, Dave, and Cooper glanced knowingly at each other, and Julian felt even more like an outsider.

"You saw those fingernails," said Tim. "How frail do you think those two old ladies are to be able to get so old living in this monster-infested forest? Even if we were to try some sort of ill-advised rescue mission, it wouldn't involve marching in there and facing them head on. We'd have to slip in unnoticed somehow."

"You're sneaky," said Julian.

"Yeah, and I'm three fucking feet tall. That woman's wrists are tied ten feet up on that tree. How the hell am I supposed to get up there unnoticed? Climb up her tits?"

"I'm sure she'd be understanding."

"Why don't you send Ravenus?"

Julian shook his head. "It's too dangerous to send him in there alone."

Tim stoppered his flask. "You were ready to send me in there alone."

"Ravenus is a bird," said Dave. "He wouldn't look out of place landing on a branch."

"As long as he keeps his fucking mouth shut," said Cooper.

Julian had managed to talk himself into a corner with his own Diplomacy skill. The others were right. Objectively speaking, sending Ravenus in there alone posed the least amount of risk to everyone. It was either that, or let the giant woman die.

"We'll have to distract the old ladies."

Dave frowned. He'd clearly been hoping Julian would choose to ditch the giant. "Do you have any ideas?"

"We could set a forest fire," suggested Cooper.

Julian licked his lips. "I've got something a little more subtle in mind."

Tim shook his head. "You're going to summon a goddamn horse, aren't you?"

"No," said Julian. "I mean, I'm not just going to summon a horse." He pointed at the ground. "Horse."

A brown horse appeared next to him, saddled and ready to ride.

Julian removed his right boot. "I'm going to create a story." He fixed the boot into the right stirrup so that the top of it dragged along beside the horse.

"Horse and Boot," said Cooper. "A timeless classic."

"Very funny."

"I'm kinda with Cooper here," said Tim. "I don't really get what this story is supposed to be."

"That's exactly the point. I let the horse wander into the clearing, drawing the old ladies' attention to it. While they're pondering what events may have led up to this, Ravenus should have plenty of time to claw through the ropes binding the giant woman."

"I'd say that's the dumbest idea I've ever heard," said Dave. "But you've had dumber, and they've worked."

Julian looked at Ravenus. "You'll be taking most of the risk. What do you think about my idea?"

"Positively brilliant, sir. I'm honored to be a part of it."

Tim took hold of the rope still hanging from the tree branch. "I, for one, would like to see this brilliant plan play out." He started climbing.

"I'm with you," said Cooper. He was tall enough to jump up and grab the first branch without the rope.

Julian struggled up after him, and Dave needed to be pulled up. But soon enough, they were all in the tree, Cooper and Dave cringing at their first view of the wrinkled blue women.

Once Ravenus had taken his place on a branch of a tree near the edge of the clearing, Julian whispered down to his magical horse. "Go!"

The horse walked casually toward the clearing. Julian lost sight of it through the trees for a full minute. Thinking it had wandered off course, he felt a sense of relief at the thought of having to call off the mission. They'd have to think of another plan. Hopefully one that didn't involve Ravenus going in alone.

His anxiety was doubled when the horse suddenly reappeared exactly where it was supposed to be, much too close to the clearing for him to do anything about it.

As he'd expected, the two crones looked curiously at it when it came into the clearing. They hobbled slowly toward it with the support of the same sticks they'd been using to stir the cauldron.

Julian nodded at Ravenus, who then made his move.

The giant woman grinned as Ravenus landed on the branch her arms were tied to. Just as he started clawing his way through, she grabbed him.

*SQUAAWWWK!*

"Ravenus!" Julian cried.

An equine scream rang out. When Julian looked at his horse, the old women had sunk their nails into its flesh. They both grinned in Julian's direction as the horse vanished into a whiff of magical energy.

"Shit!" said Dave as he fell backward off his branch.

Julian was no less unnerved by their horrible faces, but he'd been hugging the trunk. He looked for Ravenus again. The giant woman held his wings against his body. Her hands were turning blue and growing long black fingernails. Her back hunched over as her hair darkened and her skin turned wrinkly and blue.

Tim and Cooper were on the ground by the time the transformation was complete. Julian looked down at them.

"It was a trap. The giant is one of them."

"I called that shit," said Dave. His face was bruised and bleeding. He'd apparently hit a few branches on the way down. Julian was sure he should feel good about that, but Ravenus's confinement and terror were overriding any of his own feelings.

When Julian looked again, the old woman holding Ravenus squatted on the ground. A cloud of green vapor began seeping out from under her ragged, filthy skirt. It soon obscured both of them from view, and Julian felt a new sensation.

His stomach turned as he breathed short shallow breaths. There was no point in trying to contain it. Lunch was coming back up. Still clinging to the trunk of the tree, he doubled over and vomit spewed from his throat like an exploding can of equal parts peas and botulism.

"Goddammit," said Dave, just after the splat.

Julian actually felt a little bit of relief fighting through Ravenus's terror. He hoped that his puking on Dave was giving his familiar at least a little comfort.

Getting down from the tree proved challenging, as Julian's stomach felt like it was spinning in a random orbit around his body. When he made it to the lowest branch, he let himself drop to the ground. It might have hurt if his nausea hadn't been distracting him. He picked himself up and began stumbling toward the green smoke, now seeping out of the clearing between the trees.

"Julian!" said Tim. "Stop, wait!"

Julian paused only long enough to throw up one more time and give the finger to whomever wasn't coming with him.

Once he was engulfed in the green fog, he was completely blind and even more nauseous. He felt his way from tree to tree, his eyes stinging, and his insides threatening to abandon his body entirely. It was as though he were trapped inside a bag of old rotten eggs.

He choked and gagged as he made his way farther into the clearing. He wanted to call out Ravenus's name, but he was having enough trouble simply breathing. A particularly heavy fit of coughing sent blood rushing to his head until the green fog faded into black.

Julian didn't think he could have been out for more than a second, but when he came to, the air was clear. He could breathe and see. But he couldn't move.

If Tim, Cooper, and Dave were any indication as to why he couldn't move, it was because he, like them, was bound from the shoulders down in a tight coil of rope. They were sitting up against a stack of firewood. Julian was facing them. From the ache in his back, he guessed he was leaning against the stump of the tree which had provided said firewood.

Julian looked down to confirm that he was, indeed, completely swaddled in rope. The four of them sat helpless in hemp cocoons. Even Ravenus hung upside down from a branch, coiled down to his neck in twine. To make matters worse, Julian could feel the rope against the skin of his right foot. His boot was still missing.

"You followed me," said Julian. "Whatever happens, I want you to know I appreciate that."

Dave frowned through his vomit-crusted beard. "That really makes it worth it."

"Where are the old ladies?"

Cooper looked past Julian. "They all went into the side of the mound. They've been in there a while."

Tim was the only one of them who had a high enough Dexterity score, and enough ranks in the Escape Artist and Rope Use skills to have a prayer of getting out of his bindings, but he was also the only one who was still asleep.

"Dave," said Julian. "See if you can wake up Tim."

Dave, being a dwarf, wasn't especially lithe to begin with. With his body coiled in rope as tightly as it was, it was a wonder he could manage to squirm at all. But with all their lives on the line, he shifted his broad torso around until he was facing Tim. "Tim," he whispered. "Tim! Tim!"

Tim's only response was a chunky tendril of drool.

"Tim!" Dave repeated, leaning over to nudge him with his head. "Tim!" He leaned too far, falling over and planting his face in Tim's lap.

Cooper snorted. Dave and Tim looked like a fat maggot going down on a skinny maggot.

Undignified as they may have looked, Dave had at least succeeded in waking Tim up.

"Dave?" said Tim. His eyes widened like Dave's head was made out of bees. "Dave! What the fuck, man?" And with that, all hope of a quiet escape was lost.

To Tim's credit, he had just woken up, and Dave's peculiar and untimely decision to grunt and thrust his face against Tim's crotch only added to the ambiguity of the situation.

Dave discontinued his head thrusting and sighed. "Sorry, man. My nose itched like a sonofabitch."

"I see our guests have awakened," croaked a haggish voice from behind Julian. Tim and Cooper looked scared shitless. Dave glanced up, then quickly shoved his face back into Tim's crotch.

Julian fell backward trying to get a better view. Three giant blue women stared down at him. Up close, they were even bigger and more horrible. Their faces were a mass of sagging, wart-riddled wrinkles. Their filthy black hair was so infested with roaches and centipedes that it moved like stormy seas atop their heads. They grinned down at Julian and his helpless friends through chipped yellow teeth. But their eyes were worse than anything. Orbs of bulging red capillaries surrounding solid black irises. Maybe not the worst thing. It was a toss-up between the eyes, the hair, and the skin. All of it was the worst thing.

"Are you hags?" asked Tim.

Julian turned his head to glare at him.

Tim stuck his tongue out at Julian. It was a poor substitute for the middle finger he no-doubt would have offered instead if he could move his arms. "That's what they're called in the Monster Manual."

"Aye," said the woman in the middle. "We are Annis."

Cooper tried to hold his breath, but giggles and snot bubbled out through his nose.

"She said Annis," said Dave. "It's a type of hag."

This conversation was only going to lead to bad places if Julian didn't intervene. He flipped his head over and blurted out the first thing he could think of. "My name's Julian. What's yours?"

"My name is Annie."

Diplomacy was working well so far. In spite of the balance of power weighing heavily in the hags' favor, she was willing to engage in a civil conversation.

"It's a pleasure to meet you, Annie the Annis."

Julian may as well have called her Biggus Dickus for how his friends reacted. He should have expected laughter from Cooper and Tim. For being a decade older than he was, they were about as mature as Tim looked. But Dave was a humorless fun-sponge at the best of times. He turned his head back to Dave and attempted a 'What the fuck is wrong with you?' look with his eyes.

"I'm sorry," said Dave. "We knew a girl in high school who had a... similar nickname."

Julian turned back to the annis. "Listen. Maybe I can't make much of a case for why they don't deserve to die. But Ravenus and I are good people."

"No one need die this day," said Annie. "Death is but one of your options."

"Oh," said Julian. "Options are nice. What's Option B?"

Annie grinned at her two silent companions, then at Julian. "One of you must give me your seed."

All residual chuckles from his friends stopped abruptly.

Julian held on to a flicker of doubtful hope that she might have mistaken them for wandering farmers. "I think we might have, like, half of an apple. You're welcome to whatever seeds you can –"

"The seed of your loins!" said Annie. "I wish to bear a child before I'm too old to do so."

"Surely, you've got plenty of time," Julian lied. Her face looked like Yoda's scrotum.

"Excuse me," said Tim. "Sorry to interrupt. We're really flattered and all. But is there, by any chance, an Option C?" It wasn't a polite question, but considering that Options A and B involved death and arguably worse, Julian supposed there was little point in trying too hard not to offend.

"Excuse us," said Annie. She and her companions stepped away and huddled together. Julian caught pieces of their conversation.

"We can't. We'll lose them all."

"They came for the bird once. They'll come back for it again."

"If the others were smart, they'd knock the elf unconscious and escape."

"I don't think the others are smart."

"What if they're killed by girallons? Then we all have to share one bird."

"We'll give them the eye."

"Hmm..."

That last suggestion seemed to satisfy the three of them, leading Julian to suspect that 'the eye' was more than just a stern look and a warning to not be killed by girallons, whatever the hell they were.

The three hags approached Julian and his friends.

"There is a third option," said Annie.

Tim, Cooper, and Dave exhaled.

"What is it?" asked Julian, more cautious than relieved.

"You must travel deep into the forest and find the Amulet of Mighty Fists. It was worn by a monk whom we have reason to believe perished in this very forest not long ago."

"Awesome!" said Dave. "We'll take Option C."

"Whoa," said Julian. "Hold on just a minute. Let's not rush into anything."

"I assure you I've taken all the time I need to think this through."

"Just shut up for a second." Julian flipped his head toward the hags. "Would it be possible for my friends and I to discuss this amongst ourselves?"

Annie nodded. "Very well." She twitched her long fingernails, and one of her companions produced a dagger from beneath her rags.

"That's my dagger," said Tim, as if petty theft was currently his biggest concern.

The annis with the dagger sliced the rope near Julian's ankles, giving his feet some room to wiggle. She did likewise with Tim, Cooper, and Dave.

They could have hurried the process along by cutting the ropes near their hands as well, but chose not to. It was either some kind of psychological game they were playing at, or they just found it entertaining to watch their captives wiggle, squirm, and roll in the dirt.

Tim was the first one free of his bindings, which accelerated the process as he helped to free up Cooper and the two of them went on to assist Dave and Julian. Ravenus still hung upside down from the tree branch. He was awake, but remained quiet.

Julian knew better than to request his familiar be allowed to join in the conversation. His seed wouldn't be of any use to the annis, and he would be their hostage if Julian and his friends chose Option C.

They huddled on the other side of the tree from where the annis remained.

"What are girallons?" asked Julian.

"They're like gorillas," said Dave. "But with two extra arms."

"That's it?"

"Pretty much."

"That's so stupid. You can't just throw a couple of extra limbs onto an existing animal and call it a monster."

Tim cleared his throat. "Were you going somewhere with this? Why are we talking about girallons?"

"The annis said there were girallons in the woods."

"I didn't hear them say that," said Cooper.

Julian pointed to the pointed tip of his left ear.

Cooper nodded. "Sweet."

Julian looked at Dave. "Are we strong enough to fight them?"

"Who?"

"Jesus Christ, Dave! Pay attention. The girallons."

"You could have been talking about the annis."

"I know we can't fight them. They incapacitated all of us with an old lady fart."

Dave stroked his beard. "I don't know. I don't remember what the Challenge Rating is for a girallon."

"It doesn't matter," said Tim. "Even if we could take down a few of them, there's no telling how long we'd have to wander around in the woods on a wild goose chase for a magical item which may or may not even exist. Option C, in all likelihood, amounts to the same as Option A."

Cooer pulled his finger out of his nose. "I forgot. What was Option A?"

"Death."

"Shit. That's no good."

"The only option still on the table isn't much better," said Tim. "One of us is going to have to probe that annis."

Everyone took a moment to cringe and shudder before Dave asked the obvious question.

"How do we choose who does it?"

"I vote Dave," said Cooper. "His first time should be memorable."

Dave gave him the finger. "Tough shit, Cooper. We can't vote now, because you just tainted the process."

Tim rubbed his chin. "Interesting. How do you figure?"

"By declaring his own vote early, he ensured that both you and Julian would also vote for me. Not because you're an asshole like Cooper, but because you want to save your own asses, and that would guarantee you an automatic majority."

Tim sighed. "Dave killed democracy. Any other ideas?"

The obvious answer was Julian, seeing as how it was his familiar who was keeping them all from just running away. He wondered why no one had brought that fact up.

Cooper was a loyal friend, and was probably still hoping Dave would have to do it. Dave had a high Wisdom score, and was possibly weighing the long-term repercussions of throwing Julian under the bus. But Tim's motivation for keeping quiet was still a mystery. Perhaps it had something to do with why he was squatting down and playing with grass.

Tim stood to his full three-foot height. "We'll draw straws." He cupped his hands together and made the tips of four blades of grass sprout from between his thumb and index finger. He raised his arms and offered Dave the first choice.

Dave licked his lips and wiped his right hand over the leopard fur on his left arm, either to remove sweat or for some new luck ritual. He placed his fingers on one blade of grass, then switched to a different one, keeping his eyes on Tim's. Tim raised his eyebrows and gave him a weak smile. Dave grunted, then pulled one of the blades he hadn't yet touched. Without knowing the length of the straws, it was impossible to tell if Dave was holding the short straw, or one of the long ones.

Next was Julian's turn. He didn't trust Tim any more than Dave did, knowing Tim had a high Intelligence score, a bunch of ranks in the Sleight of Hand skill, and a sense of ethical responsibility as small as his little halfling dick. Julian kept his hands at his side while he chose a blade of grass in his mind. When he'd made his choice, he plucked it out of Tim's hand like a striking cobra.

Dave sighed with relief. His blade and Julian's were approximately the same length.

"Down to you and me, buddy." Tim offered his hands up to Cooper.

Cooper frowned down at Tim's tiny hands, then placed two giant fingers on either side of one of the two remaining grass blades.

Tim's gaze darted back and forth between Cooper's eyes and fingers. He swallowed hard. His relieved sigh when Cooper pulled the blade from his hand confirmed Julian's suspicion that Tim wasn't leaving this contest entirely up to chance.

Cooper's straw was half the length of Julian's and Dave's. Tim pulled the final blade, then wiped his hand on his pants. Julian watched half a grass blade flutter from Tim's hand to the ground. Though it was exactly what he'd expected to see, he told himself it didn't prove anything.

"Tough luck, Coop," said Dave. "Have fun probing the annis."

Cooper sighed. "It's a step up from your mom." He started back toward the tree. "Might as well get this over with."

Julian followed along behind, feeling a mixture of guilt and relief.

"Have you come to a decision?" asked Annie. Her two subordinate hags rubbed their fingernails together in anticipation. They sounded like tarnished silverware.

"It's your lucky day, lady," said Cooper. He pulled down his loincloth and stepped out of it. "So you wanna do this here? Or should we –"

"You can accompany me inside." Annie took Cooper by the arm and led him to the mound, not looking the least bit put off by the sight of his schlong, even though it looked like a Dali painting of a rotting ear of corn.

"I don't know who I feel worse for," said Julian.

Dave nodded grimly, but Tim had just up and disappeared.

The sneaky little jerk was walking out of the mound, sucking back stonepiss from his flask, as Annie and Cooper approached. As soon as he cleared the vines hanging over the entrance and saw Cooper's junk, he spit out what he'd been drinking.

"Jesus Christ, dude! You couldn't wait until you got inside?"

The next couple of minutes seemed like years. How is one supposed to pass the time while one's friend attempts to impregnate a giant blue hag a few yards away?

The other two annis didn't seem uncomfortable at all. They merely watched Dave, Tim, and Julian.

"Salut," said Tim. He took a small swig from his flask. One of the annis winked at him. He took a much larger swig.

Only about a minute of awkward silence followed before an ear-shattering scream sent birds flying out of trees all around the clearing. It was Annie.

"Ow!" said Cooper. "What the fuck is wrong with you, lady? No, don't – Ow, goddammit! Knock that shit off!" He ran out of the mound bleeding a pattern of diamonds from the chest. Four deep cuts from either shoulder, crisscrossing downward to his belly.

Annie came out after him, seething at the entrance, naked as the day she clawed her way out of her mother's wrinkly blue vag. Her breasts hung like a couple of moldy pomegranates in crusty tube socks. The carpet matched the drapes, right down to the bugs and worms.

"How dare you!" cried Annie. "We shall revel in your slow and agonizing deaths!"

"Hold on," said Julian. "Let's everyone just calm down, huh? Whatever happened, I'm sure we can come to some sort of agreement."

"You are in no position to negotiate, elf. You have nothing we want."

"But what about Option C? We could get you that omelet."

"Amulet," said Dave.

"Sorry. I'm just hungry. Amulet. What was it called? The –"

"The Amulet of Mighty Monkey Fisting!" said Cooper.

Annie's face briefly showed more confusion than anger.

Julian frowned. "I'm sure it wasn't that."

"The Amulet of Mighty Fists," said Tim. He glared at Cooper. "Worn by a monk. Not a monkey."

Annie didn't immediately reject the idea, but she was going to need some more convincing. Julian was trying to think of how best to exaggerate their qualifications for the job when the other two annis escorted Annie back into the mound.

"Think of the power!" said one of the other annis. "Think of Lord Wallace. How he disgraced us. The amulet will tip the balance of power. We can paint the walls of his keep with the blood of his sons."

"The amulet is gone," said Annie. "We searched the monk's body and could not find it. What makes you think those four fools will have any better fortune?"

"The elf is versed in the ways of magic. He can spot with ease what is hidden from our old eyes."

Annie re-emerged from the mound. Thankfully, she was once again dressed, and seemed to have calmed down a little.

"Very well, elf. You have one more chance. Fail me again and all the sniveling in the world won't save your precious bird."

She wasn't bothering with niceties anymore. All they could do was find that amulet.

"Can we have our weapons back?" asked Dave.

"No."

Julian looked down at his feet, one booted, the other bare. He probably shouldn't push his luck, but one more good Diplomacy roll could make a hell of a difference strolling around in the woods.

"Can I at least have my boot?"

"GET OUT OF HERE!" screamed Annie. Even the bugs in her hair burrowed deeper in fear. Julian tried not to stare.

Julian backed away, and Cooper took a step toward his loincloth.

Annie hissed and brandished her fingernails, causing Cooper to stop dead in his tracks. She hobbled quickly to the loincloth, picked it up, tore it to pieces, and threw the pieces into the fire under the cauldron.

Cooper frowned. "That's just mean."

"Let's go," said Tim.

Julian looked up at Ravenus as they passed underneath him. "I'll be back for you."

"Very good, sir. Do try not to be too long."

Just before they exited the clearing, a haggard old voice called from behind them. "Wait."

One of the subordinate annis had followed them. She held up a blue gemstone hanging from a silver chain. "There is danger in the forest. Wear this." Strangely enough, she offered it specifically to Cooper.

"Okay, thanks." Cooper looped the chain over his head. The stone rested high on his chest. It was a gaudy piece of jewelry which looked especially out of place on his bleeding torso.

The annis twitched her fingernails. "Travel north until you reach a creek bed, full of stones and roots where once there ran water. Follow it eastward until you see the Great Elm. Beneath its mossy branches, you should find the remains of the deceased monk. I suggest you begin your search there."

"Awesome," said Tim. "Thanks for the tip." He clapped his hands together. "Well, daylight's a-wastin'." Not the most polite way to disengage conversation, but it got the job done. The hag retreated back to her mound, and Julian, Tim, Dave, and Cooper stepped into the forest.

Once they were a little ways out of the clearing, Tim turned around abruptly and glared up at Cooper. "Do you mind telling me just what the fuck happened back there?"

"I'm in a little bit of pain here," said Cooper. The entire front of his body was sticky with fresh blood, still running from his chest, coating his belly, and dripping from his dong. He pointed at Dave. "Dude, how about shooting me some fucking Hit Points?"

Dave touched Cooper's finger. "I heal thee."

Cooper farted ecstatically as his wounds closed up. "Oh that feels so much better."

"All right," said Tim. "Spill it. What did you do to piss her off like that?"

Cooper shrugged. "Fuck if I know. I stuck my finger up her ass, and she flipped the fuck out."

"What the... Why would you..." Tim was trembling with frustrated rage. "Do you even know how fucking babies are made?"

"I thought that was, like, their thing. You and Dave both told me to probe her anus."

"We said probe the... You know what? Never mind that. How would we even know if that was her thing?"

"Maybe it was in the Monster Manual. I thought it was weird, but you both insisted, so..."

"Have you ever seen anything like an anal fetish in any of the monster descriptions?"

"Hang on," said Dave. "Is that the finger I touched to heal you?"

"Um..."

"Goddammit, Cooper!"

"Shut up," said Julian. "Let's just go and find the amulet. She said to go north, right?"

"Maybe," said Dave. "She was so gross, I was having trouble paying attention."

Tim nodded. "I zoned in and out. North sounds good."

In the distance, some kind of beast let out a terrible howl.

"That came from the north, didn't it?" said Julian.

Dave sighed. "Of course it did."

They trudged along at the speed of Dave, which was just fine with Julian. His right foot was aching from all the rocks, twigs, and roots he was stepping on. Removing his other boot might have distributed the pain more evenly, or it might have just made his left foot as sore as his right one. He kept his one boot on for now.

Half an hour later, they came to a dry creek bed, which prompted a memory of the annis having mentioned one.

"Okay," said Julian. "This is a good place to take a rest." Before anyone could object, he sat down on a big rock and started rubbing his foot.

No one seemed remotely interested in objecting. Tim sat against a tree and had a drink. Dave picked bits of dried vomit out of his beard. Cooper scooped up a fistful of dirt and scrubbed the dried blood off his chest, belly, and junk.

As he massaged the soreness out of his foot, Julian looked down the creek bed to see if he could get some idea of the terrain. A deer nibbled on some leaves about fifty yards ahead. Just a deer. No wings or tentacles or extra legs or anything. Just a simple white-tailed deer. There was something reassuring in that. It put Julian's mind at ease.

"Guys," he whispered. "Take a look at that."

There was an air of peace and awe as everyone stared at the deer, soon broken as a blur of white crashed out of the branches above.

Julian, Tim, Cooper, and Dave ducked into the creek bed like they'd been sucked into it by a force more powerful than gravity.

"What the hell was that?" asked Julian.

"A girallon," said Dave.

Julian peeked over the bank.

The giant, four-armed, albino gorilla grabbed the deer by the antlers and savagely slammed its body against the trunk of the tree it had just been nibbling until the antlers snapped off. It paused for a second, staring first at the very dead deer on the ground, then at the antlers in its hands. Apparently not a fan of shoddy animal craftsmanship, the girallon screamed and pounced onto its prey, pounding the shit out of it with all four of its fists.

"Goddamn," whispered Cooper, who had joined Julian at the bank. He squeaked out a soft fart. "Sorry."

Julian couldn't blame him. He was relieved that he was able to remain in control of his own bodily functions while witnessing such a brutal attack on another living thing. And as Cooper's farts went, it was a pretty tame one.

The girallon bit into the side of the deer and tore away a massive amount of flesh and fur, which it spat on the ground so that it could continue tearing the rest of the corpse apart. After about ten more seconds of ripping apart the deer, the girallon froze. A second later, it turned around, vaguely facing Julian's direction. It twitched its nostrils, pivoting its head back and forth more and more narrowly, gradually homing in on Julian's exact location.

It took a step toward them, still sniffing the air. Julian and Cooper ducked down.

"It's coming this way," said Julian. "I think it picked up Cooper's fart."

Cooper stuck out his bottom lip. "I was nervous."

"I know. I was too. Maybe it'll just go away if we're really quiet and don't fart anymore."

Dave shook his head. "I don't think that's a good idea. We have to pass through its territory. Shouldn't we confront it while we know where it is instead of waiting for it to jump out of a tree and catch us off guard?"

"Confront it with what?" said Julian. "We don't have any weapons. Did you not see that thing?"

"What happened to 'That's so stupid. It's just a gorilla with two extra arms'?"

Julian couldn't believe Dave wanted to use what little time they had to gloat, but he felt he had to defend his statement. "Just because it's big and scary doesn't mean it's any less ridiculous a concept. Yeah, it could probably kill us all in under a minute, but that doesn't change the fact that it looks like a short guy waving his arms behind a tall guy."

"Brilliant," said Tim. He looked at Cooper, then at Dave.

Dave shook his head. "No fucking way."

Tim took a swig from his flask. "It's the only way, Dave." He offered the flask to Dave, who accepted it and gulped down most of what was left.

Cooper scratched under his armpit. "So... What's going on?"

A minute later, Dave was silently sobbing with the side of his face pressed into the small of Cooper's back.

"Stop crying, Dave," said Cooper. "This isn't any more fun for me than it is for you. And keep still. Your beard is tickling my ass."

Julian and Tim scrambled under some exposed tree roots so that they could watch without being seen.

Together, with tiny strides for Cooper and long strides for Dave, they walked out of the creek bed.

The girallon stopped sniffing the air when it spotted something not entirely unlike itself. It barked what Julian hoped was a friendly greeting. It didn't sound all that friendly. Dave waved his left hand.

They were all going to die.

Cooper barked back an impressive imitation of the girallon's initiating call.

The girallon approached warily on its legs and lower arms. Cooper and Dave stood their ground, probably because there was no way they'd be able to imitate the girallon's walk.

When it got within five feet of them, the girallon attempted to look over Cooper's left shoulder. Cooper turned left, and Dave sidestepped behind him. When it tried to look right, they repeated the move in the opposite direction.

"I think this is a good sign," said Julian. "It suspects something's amiss, but it's too dumb to know exactly what's wrong. It's not perfect, but under the circumstances..." He realized he was talking to himself. Tim was nowhere around.

The girallon leaned in to get a close look and a good sniff of Cooper's junk. A fart wheezed out like the last note of a dying trumpet player. Dave's fists balled up tight enough so that solid iron might ooze out from between his fingers if he'd been holding some.

The girallon stood on its legs alone, its head rising a good foot and a half above Cooper's. It roared what sounded to Julian like a challenge, and pounded its chest and abdomen with its fists. It sounded like it was carved out of wood.

"Raaaaahhhh!" said Cooper, thumping his own chest as Dave flailed his fists against the sides of his belly, which sounded more like someone slapping a waterbed.

A stream of urine spouted out from between the girallon's legs, forming a puddle at Cooper's feet. Perhaps the relative sizes of their members was another point of contention. Julian could hardly make out the tip of the girallon's penis poking out from its fur. It must have been as small as Tim's, which Julian had seen more times than he'd ever wanted to. But to the beast's credit, he put out some strong-smelling urine. Julian could smell it from way over by the creek bed, like spoiled meat marinated in vinegar.

Cooper was doing an admirable job of not pissing himself for once. He stood his ground while the girallon pissed gallons of urine in a stream that Julian thought would never end. It finally did end when the girallon lost its shit for what seemed like no reason at all.

It screamed and bared its fangs just before punching Cooper in the side of the head, sending him a good five feet away from Dave.

The girallon stopped screaming and stared down at Dave, then at Cooper who was struggling back to his feet, and then at Dave again.

"Fuck," said Julian.

"Fuck," said Dave.

"FUCK YOU!" said Tim, from somewhere above everyone else.

The girallon looked up, and its face was met with a falling backpack. Judging by the impact, it was full of rocks.

Dave took advantage of the distraction, running between the girallon's legs and Super Mario punching it in the nuts.

There was no longer any point in hiding, so Julian grabbed a rock from the creek bed and ran over to join the fray.

While the girallon cradled his balls, Cooper jumped on its back and caught it around the neck in a choke hold.

The girallon backed up hard into a tree trunk.

"Ugh," said Cooper, squashed in between. But he kept his hold.

"Shit!" said Tim as he fell out of the tree. He caught one of the beast's flailing upper arms, wrapping his own arms and legs around it.

Dave did likewise, wrapping his arms and legs around one of the girallon's legs. The poor creature looked like it was working at a daycare for troubled youths.

By the time Julian reached the fight, it looked to be just about over. The girallon's formerly pink face was now a deep shade of purple, and the arm supporting Tim's weight hung limp at its side. Its free upper arm took some desperate swipes at Cooper, but didn't have the reach.

Finally, it just couldn't stand anymore. It fell forward to its preferred walking position on legs and lower arms, then the arms buckled and it collapsed onto its face.

"Hurry up!" Cooper said to Julian. "Bash its brains in with your rock."

Julian frowned down at his rock. "It's helpless. Can't we just leave it unconscious?"

"You can be such an idiot," said Dave, pushing himself up from between the creature's legs. "It was your stupid idea that almost got us killed. And now you want to leave it alive so it can wake up pissed off and have another go at us?"

"It was my idea," said Tim. "Julian only inspired it." He too had let go of the girallon, and was now staring down into its piss puddle. "And it worked. Cooper, punch it in the head a few times if you like, but stick to non-lethal damage. It doesn't deserve to die for defending its territory."

Dave stomped over toward Tim. "Have you all lost your minds? Since when do you give a shit about animal rights or whatever? And how can you possibly say that your stupid idea worked?"

Tim looked down at Dave's crotch, then at his legs where his armor was dripping. "You pissed yourself, didn't you?"

"And you, of all people, are going to judge me for that? Do you know how many times you've pissed yourself since we've been stuck in this game? It's like you think you're going to win a prize if you do it enough. I thought I was going to die with my face in Cooper's ass, so don't even –"

"I'm not judging you," said Tim. "I'm just saying that my idea was working until you blew it." He gestured down to the piss puddle.

"What are you talking about?"

Tim squatted down over the puddle. "See this big puddle here? That's where the girallon pissed. He was marking his territory. And that little puddle over there, that's where you pissed. And see this little stream running from that one to this one? When your urine mixed with his, you challenged his territorial claim. That's when he went apeshit, if you'll pardon the pun."

"Nice going, Dave," said Cooper, who had finished his business with the girallon and joined the rest of them. "Don't cross the streams, dude. Didn't you see Ghostbusters?"

Tim dumped the rocks out of his backpack. "Stay here for a minute. I'll be right back." He darted back toward the creek bed.

It was an awkward wait. Julian didn't want to start up anymore shit with Dave, but he couldn't very well make small talk either. Any idle chatter on his part would be interpreted as "I'm deliberately not talking about how you endangered all of our lives by pissing yourself, because I'm a better person than you." Fortunately, Tim didn't take too long. He returned wearing a refilled backpack, and holding his seemingly endless flask of stonepiss.

"Maybe we should tie this thing up," said Julian. "We could knock him out again and cut him loose on our way back." He looked at Tim. "You got any rope in there?"

"Nope." Tim necked back the last few drops from his flask. It had a finite supply of booze after all. Next, he did something that Julian felt safe in assuming that none of them were expecting. He knelt next to the puddle of girallon piss and submerged his empty flask, holding it there until the bubbles stopped.

"Dude," said Cooper. "Who the fuck are you? Chipmunk Grylls? I'm sure there's a stream or something nearby."

Tim smiled up at Cooper. "Better to have it and not need it than need it and not have it."

As Tim stoppered his flask, Julian tried to envision a scenario in which one might need a flask full of gorilla urine. None came to mind.

"Um... Okay," said Dave, clapping his hands together. "Now that that's done, shall we continue on our way?" He seemed in better spirits now that someone had taken the pee spotlight off of him.

Tim put the flask inside his backpack. "Not yet. Girallons track by scent. Before we leave this girallon's territory, we should mask our own scents as best we can."

"Should we all piss ourselves?" asked Cooper.

"No. That's like ringing a cowbell. In fact, you and Dave are going to have to work extra hard to mask your scents."

"With what?" asked Dave.

Tim plucked a five-pointed leaf from a vine wrapped around a nearby tree trunk. "Smell this." He passed it to Dave.

Dave sniffed. "Smells kind of minty. What is it?"

"How the fuck should I know?" said Tim. "But it's the most pungent thing around, it's native to the area, and there's a shit-ton of it growing all over the place. It's our best bet." He climbed up the tree trunk, using the vine for hand and foot holds, then crawled out onto a branch where a similar vine was hanging down almost to the ground. He slid down the vine like a fire pole, stripping leaves off all the way down. He packed some into his backpack, and stuffed the rest into his tunic and pants.

Fifteen minutes later, Dave, Julian, and Tim were all stuffed like fat scarecrows, and Cooper looked like Swamp Thing, wrapped up from head to toe in vines.

"That should do us," said Tim.

After thirty minutes of traveling up the creek bed, Tim stopped. He sniffed the air, looked north, then pulled his flask back out.

Dave cringed. "Please tell me you aren't going to drink that."

"Shh," whispered Tim. "Don't worry. It's empty."

"You drank all that gorilla piss already?" asked Cooper. "You should pace yourself, man."

"Just stay quiet and keep me covered." Tim silently crept out of the creek bed and tiptoed northward from tree to tree, keeping his eyes focused on the treetops.

When Tim was about sixty yards away, Cooper started to get fidgety.

Julian put his hand on Cooper's shoulder. "I'm sure he knows what he's doing, and has a good reason to –" His words lost their credibility when Tim knelt down and submerged his flask in another puddle.

"What the fuck?" said Cooper. "Do girallons piss scotch?"

When Tim was done refilling his flask, he hurried back to the creek bed. "Let's keep moving."

They repeated this bizarre ritual three more times before Julian finally spotted a tree worthy of being called the Great anything. He didn't really know his trees, but it was probably an elm. Its roots were responsible for diverting the water that once flowed down the bed they'd been traveling. A younger, shallower creek ran from the tree to the northwest.

"I guess we're here," said Dave. "I'm going to go wash my finger." He waddled off toward the stream.

Julian looked up into the massive branches of the tree, hoping not to see a giant four-armed gorilla monster. "This is an elm?"

"Yeah." Tim picked up a stick and prodded a conspicuously writhing pile of worms and beetles, some of which scattered to reveal black decomposing flesh. "And this is an arm. I guess this is our dead monk." He unstoppered his flask and didn't flinch at all as he sucked down a couple of gulps of the liquid inside.

"Jesus, Tim," said Cooper. "There's a running stream right fucking there." He pointed at where Dave was squatting.

Out of instinct, Julian looked in the direction Cooper was pointing, but he saw something out of place in the leaves about halfway between where he stood and the stream. Something rectangular and brown, but a different shade of brown than any of the nearby fallen leaves.

"Hey guys, check this out." Julian led Cooper and Tim toward the conspicuous object.

Dave waddled toward them excitedly, as if he too had just made an unexpected discovery. He held up the soggy leafy part of a carrot. Only a sliver of orange dangled beneath it. "Look what I found!"

Julian and Tim frowned at Dave. They were all hungry, but Dave's excitement at about one cubic centimeter of carrot was a little sad.

Cooper's stomach rumbled. "You wanna split it?"

The enthusiasm faded from Dave's eyes and was replaced with annoyance. "Do you know what this means?"

Julian, Cooper, and Tim shook their heads.

"It's a domesticated plant. Look at the bottom. It's clearly been cut with a knife."

Cooper scratched his ass. "You want to avenge it?"

"Goddammit, no! This means that somewhere upstream from here there is a farm. Civilization. And they might be cooking."

"Excellent," said Julian. "That will be useful information to know after we rescue Ravenus."

Dave looked up at the gem hanging around Cooper's neck. "Of course."

"I found something too." Julian bent over and picked up the object he'd spotted before.

It was a book. Or rather, the cover of a book. The pages had all been ripped out. The cover was made from thin, flexible leather, and was smeared with blood, which covered a large portion of the letters on the front.

 T_E J_UR__L OF

 BR_____ _______STER

"What do you make of this?" Julian held out the journal for the others to see.

Dave stroked his beard. "Tejurlof? Sounds dwarven, but I don't recognize it. Maybe gnomish?"

"Focus, Dave," said Julian. "This could be a clue. Some of the letters are covered in blood. I'm guessing the first word is THE."

"Second word is JOURNAL," said Tim.

Julian looked closely, filling in the missing letters with his mind. "I think you're right. How did you figure that out so fast?"

"I'm Pat Sajak's bastard son."

Julian bit his lower lip. "THE JOURNAL OF who?"

Cooper frowned. "If it says CHESTER COPPERPOT, we're fucked."

Julian held the cover in front of Tim's face. "What can you make out of the rest of it?"

Tim shrugged. "I don't know. Brewster?"

"Too much empty space for that."

"Monky Brewster," said Cooper. "I like it."

Julian looked up from the book. "What is it with you and monkeys today?"

"That's not what I meant," said Cooper. "I was talking about... Never mind. It was before your time."

Dave's eyes lit up. "Brandon! The dog's name was Brandon. That starts with BR!"

"Why the fuck do you remember that?" asked Tim. "And what makes you think that this monk has any relationship to a shitty 80s sitcom?"

Dave looked at his feet. "I liked it."

Tim snatched the leather cover out of Julian's hands. "I'll tell you what it says." He ran his finger along the words as he read them. "THE JOURNAL OF A DEAD MONK TORN TO PIECES BY FUCKING GIRALLONS WHOSE NAME ISN'T GOING TO HELP US FIND ANY GODDAMN AMULETS."

Cooper frowned. "I know I'm illiterate and all, but I feel like that's a lot to fit in to that space."

"The amulet's got to be around here somewhere," said Tim. "Let's start poking around in the leaves and see if we can find this dead fucker's neck."

"Or I could use a Detect Magic spell," said Julian, failing to give credit to the annis for that idea.

Tim raised his flask. "Now you're thinking. Get on it." He proceeded to imbibe a healthy dose of girallon pee.

Julian cringed, then regained his composure. "Detect Magic!" His vision turned grey and hazy. He scanned left and right. The gem Cooper wore around his neck glowed bright blue, but everything else was grey as far as he could see in any direction... until he looked up.

A green aura radiated out from a clump of leafy branches high in the Great Elm.

Julian pointed and whispered, "Up there."

A blurry white stream spouted out from the magical aura, hitting Julian before he had a chance to react. It was wet, and smelled like—

"Get out of the way," said Tim. He shoved Julian away from the stream, sucked down what was left in his flask, and held it under the stream.

"Goddamn," said Cooper. "I guess if that's what you're into, it doesn't get any fresher than this."

Julian's vision returned to normal, his concentration on maintaining his spell broken by Tim's sudden insatiable thirst for animal piss.

"What the hell are you –"

Tim shut him up with a severe look. "Keep your voice down or we're all going to die." His look and tone suggested that he had a far better idea of their situation than Julian did.

"What are you thinking?" Julian whispered.

Tim waved Dave and Cooper over into a close huddle before responding. "How tough would a monk have to be to go walking in these woods alone?"

Dave shrugged. "Pretty tough."

"Give it a number. Let's say the girallon we faced earlier today was a six."

"I don't know," said Dave. "He'd be a ten maybe?"

"With or without the Amulet of Mighty Fists?"

Dave sighed. "I have no idea."

"It's just for illustrative purposes. Make a guess."

"Fine. Ten without. Twelve with."

"Okay. Now let's say there's a bigger girallon around here. One that claimed the Great Elm as his territory. And let's say that it kicked this monk's ass, even while he wore the amulet. How tough would you say that girallon had to be?"

"Fourteen." Dave's tone was bored. He was just spouting numbers at this point to get Tim to his point.

"And if that same girallon were then to adorn itself with the Amulet of Mighty Fists?" Tim now had Dave's full attention.

Dave squinted up into the branches. "Fuck."

Tim nodded. "I'd say that's an accurate assessment of our current situation."

"I'm with you so far," said Julian. "So how do we get the amulet away from the girallon?"

"We don't," said Tim. "We're probably a collective four in this situation. The only reason that first girallon didn't rip us apart was because we surprised it."

"So what do we do?" asked Dave.

Tim shrugged. "We go with Plan B."

"Shit," said Cooper. "We have to go fuck the hags again?"

"That was Option B, in a different set of circumstances."

"So what's Plan B?" asked Julian.

"First, we retreat very slowly and quietly back to the creek bed."

They stepped as quietly as they could. Dave and Cooper made a little noise, but it was covered by the stream of girallon pee still flowing down out from the branches of the Great Elm.

"How many Level 1 spells do you have left?" Tim asked Julian once they were about thirty yards down the creek bed.

"Three."

"That'll do. We need three fast horses, and I need your boot."

Walking around on one boot was something Julian was more than ready to discontinue. He started to take off his boot, then hesitated.

"Come on, Julian," said Tim. "You can have it back when we're done."

"It's not that. I just wanted to make sure... I mean, you're not going to use the horses as bait, are you?"

"No more than I'm going to use the rest of us."

Julian frowned. "I guess that's fair." He removed his boot and handed it to Tim. "Three horses coming up."

"Wait," said Dave. He looked at Cooper, then turned away from him. "Cooper, you need to give that necklace to Julian."

"Fine with me. It hasn't done shit to protect me anyway."

"That's because it's got nothing to do with protection. Don't take it off just yet."

"What do you know, Dave?" asked Tim.

"It's a Hag Eye. I remember it from the Monster Manual. They're using it to spy on us. I didn't say anything before because I didn't want any of you to act weird around it and let on that we know what it is. But if Tim's plan involves double crossing the annis, –"

"It does," said Tim.

"Then they might kill Ravenus long before we can get to them."

Tim gave Dave a thumbs up. "Well done. So what the fuck are we waiting for?"

"Cooper can't just hand it over to Julian for no reason. That will arouse suspicion. We need a credible reason to take such an action. Cooper, crouch down in front of me."

Cooper crouched down in front of Dave, not looking at all amused.

Dave put his finger over his lips, pointed away in a random direction, then did some kind of weird gorilla dance. Again, he put his finger over his lips, then pointed at Cooper. He made a show of flexing his muscles, roaring, and beating his chest. Then he pointed at Julian, after which he wrung his fists under his eyes in a crying gesture. Adding more than what Julian deemed necessary, he made twisting motions with his thumbs and index fingers over imaginary nipples on his breastplate. Finally, he pointed at the gem hanging from Cooper's neck, then at Julian.

"Are you done?" asked Cooper.

Dave nodded.

Cooper pulled the silver chain over his head and handed it to Dave. "What the fuck was any of that supposed to mean?"

"I was saying that you're big and strong, and that Julian's a little titty baby, and so he needs protection more than you do."

"I'm not sure you communicated anything of the sort," said Tim.

"Titty baby?" said Julian.

Dave offered the necklace to Julian. "Put this on, but casually slip the gem underneath your shirt."

That was the first thing Dave said that made any sense.

When Julian had donned the necklace, Tim cleared his throat. "Now can we summon some goddamn horses?"

"Horse. Horse. Horse," said Julian, pointing at three spots on the dry creek bed, and consequently summoning three horses in rapid succession. They whinnied nervously.

"Keep them quiet!" snapped Tim.

Julian stood in front of the horses, rubbing their noses, but keeping his eye on Tim.

Tim set his backpack on the ground and pulled out a flask.

Julian shook his head. No point in dying sober.

To Julian's surprise, Tim set the flask on the ground and pulled out another, then another, and still another. When he was done, he had seven flasks in all. He unstoppered the last two and sniffed each, cringing at the first one and drinking deeply from the second. He slipped the flask with his preferred vintage into his vest pocket and handed two flasks each to both Cooper and Dave, keeping the remaining two for himself.

Tim, Cooper, and Dave huddled around Julian's boot.

Tim licked his lips and looked into Dave's and Cooper's eyes. "When I say go, we pour."

Cooper frowned. "We're going to cross the streams?"

"Exactly. You guys ready?"

Dave and Cooper nodded.

"Come on, guys," said Julian. "I need to wear that."

"Pour."

Tim, Cooper, and Dave emptied their flasks into Julian's boot. Before the flasks were empty, a roar boomed out from the treetops like an angry god had just finished the series finale of Dexter.

"Time to move!" said Tim, no longer bothering to keep quiet. "Cooper, help Dave onto his horse. I'm riding with you." He dropped his empty piss flasks and picked up the boot.

As soon as they had Dave mounted, the ground shook beneath Julian's bare feet. He slipped one foot into the stirrup and pulled himself up.

"GO! GO! GO!" shouted Tim, mounted in front of Cooper and hugging his boot full of urine.

The horses didn't move.

"Julian!"

"Shit, that's right," said Julian. "GO! GO! GO!"

The horses went full-throttle into a gallop along the creek bed. Julian chanced a peek behind him.

"Holy fucking shit!"

It was the biggest, meanest-looking girallon Julian had ever seen. Sure, it was only the second one he'd ever seen, but this one could have been that first one's daddy fresh out of prison. It crashed through the trees and bounded after the horses in a curious six-limbed gallop, and it was catching up to them, slowly but steadily. Sure enough, Julian could see a green amulet around its meaty neck.

"We're not going to make it!" cried Julian.

"Just hang on a little longer!" said Tim.

Riding in front of Cooper, Tim obviously didn't have an appreciation for just how little longer they all had to live.

"Drop the boot!" said Julian. "We'll think of something else!"

Tim hugged the boot tight, trying to minimize the amount of piss sloshing out of it. "Just... a little... longer..."

"I'm telling you, man! It's right on top of –"

Something crashed out from the trees at Julian's five o'clock. Two angry girallon screams rang in his sensitive ears. He looked back, and found that they were regaining their lead as the huge girallon, and a second smaller, yet still very scary girallon, stumbled over one another, the creek bed being too small for the both of them.

"Ha!" cried Julian. "You crazy son of a bitch, you did it!"

Tim cocked an eyebrow and casually sipped from his flask.

The third and forth girallon slowed the whole pack even more.

The fifth girallon leapt out from a tree branch overhanging the creek bed. It's timing was off, and it landed hard behind them, just missing the ass end of Dave's horse.

"How many of these were there again?" asked Julian.

"One more," said Tim. "I think."

And there it was, the first girallon they'd faced, standing ahead of them in the creek bed. It looked even more pissed off than the others. Beyond urine-induced territorial instincts, it had personal reasons to want to tear them apart. It screamed and bounded toward them.

"Go left, into the woods," cried Julian, not waiting for any deliberation. Now that they'd reached this girallon's territory, it was pretty much time to start heading south anyway.

Any one of the girallons could have caught up to them with ease, but even in the open forest, they continued to bark and swipe at one another as they gave chase. More importantly, they continued to lose ground.

"Ravenus!" cried Julian when he thought they must be getting close. He realized that there were no landmarks which would lead them directly to the clearing, and he didn't want to waste a lot of time seeking it out.

Off in the distance, a raven let out a mighty caw.

"This way," said Julian, guiding his horse slightly to the right. He shouted ahead, "We're coming for you buddy!"

A couple of minutes later, they trotted into the clearing. Ravenus still hung from the tree branch. The annis were assembled in front of their mound. Greedily rubbing their blue hands together.

"Do you have it?" asked Annie excitedly. "Where is it? Let me see!"

"You heard her, Julian," said Dave. "Let her see."

Julian looked at Dave. "What?"

Dave whispered, "Give me the eye."

Julian pulled the silver chain over his head and handed the hanging gem to Dave.

Dave pointed his middle finger at the gem in his hand. "See this, bitches." He shoved the gem deep in his mouth.

"No!" screamed the annis who had given Cooper the eye.

Dave bit down hard. The gem crunched, eliciting ear-piercing screams from all three annis.

Annies eyes bulged until they popped and ran down the sides of her face.

"You fools!" cried Annie. "You think that will save you?" She grinned wickedly. "I won't need eyes to savor your screams. When I'm finished with you, you'll wish you'd never –"

Girallon howls and screams grew closer.

"What's that?" said one of the lesser annis.

Tim smiled. "We invited a couple of friends."

"Girallons?" said Annie. "How many?"

Tim guided his horse forward. "Hopefully enough." He threw the boot at Annie, hitting her in the tit and splashing girallon urine all over the three of them.

The first girallon crashed out from the trees and into the clearing, heading straight for the annis. Aside from punching Dave off his horse, it paid the rest of them no mind.

Tim guided his horse to the tree where Ravenus hung upside down. Cooper tossed him onto the branch, where he easily untied the knot.

All three annis had their claws buried deep in the attacking girallon. It barked and swiped at them, but was gushing gallons of blood from dozens of holes.

Julian, Tim, Cooper, and Dave stood out of the way as five more girallons came barreling into the clearing.

Cooper helped Dave back onto his horse. "Let's get our annises out of here."

When they made it back to the creek bed, and the sounds of screaming hags and girallons began to fade in the distance behind them, Julian looked at Dave. "You knew about the eye this whole time?"

"I suspected it was a Hag Eye when the annis handed it to Cooper. He's taller, which would give them a better field of vision, and he's the only one that wasn't wearing any clothes."

"Why didn't you crush it right then and there?"

Dave shrugged. "I might have been wrong. It wouldn't have made a big enough difference anyway. They still would have probably killed us."

Julian pulled aside his serape, where Ravenus sat nestled against his chest. "You holding up okay?"

"No worse for the wear, sir. Just a bit peckish is all."

"You and me both, buddy." Julian really hoped Dave was right about there being a farm nearby, and that they were cooking something. They should at least be able to barter a meal from the silver chain which had held the Hag Eye. But Ravenus's culinary tastes and nutritional needs differed from theirs. "Fly on ahead until you see a big tree. There's some good monk up that way."