A Guild Meet

[Meglomania]

] A guild Meet

 

 

Aduard sloshed along the narrow muddy trail; his head bowed watching where he placed his now sopping boots. He could feel the annoying trickle of water running down his neck and back. Swiping his hand over his face he brushed away the heavy droplets from off his bushy brows, then pausing just long enough to wring out his long graying beard before continuing his steady pace. It was almost dark and he knew before long the Gargoyles would be about looking for fresh food and he didn’t want to be part of their intended nightly meal.

 

It was the 1st of Terun in the month of Akbar in the Eternal Lands and the rains had come with a vengeance for once. Aduard hated this month, always wet, always muddy, it did his dwarven bones no good at all, he much preferred a deep cave somewhere "any damn where but here, somewhere where it was nice and warm and dry" he grumbled quietly.

 

“What was that Ad?” A youthful grinning voice asked.

Aduard stopped once more and looked over his shoulder at similarly soggy Digi, a young human male that Ad had taken under his wing to train when he found him wrapped in the silky spider web of the notorious Tarsengard Spider caves.

 

Where Aduard was a short stocky dwarf with long graying hair and beard, weather beaten skin that looked tougher than the boots he wore and piercing black eyes that were overshadowed by heavy bushy eyebrows and a large blunt nose. Digi was a lanky slim built youth with the trend of the day collar length black hair. A slight egg shaped face with a narrow chin lightly covered in fine blond down like fuzz which had not yet begun to grow the same jet black color of his hair.

 

For a moment Aduard felt like punching the face grinning back at him.

 

"Nothing…..he growled, just watch where ya going and keep ya trap shut."

 

Digi’s grin increased even wider as he looked back innocently at the dwarf. He well knew Ad’s bark was far worse than his bite and he loved to needle the *old* dwarf as Digi fondly thought of all those who even showed the slightest signs of maturity.

 

Aduard’s eyes flashed momentarily at Digi then with an inward groan ignoring him he turned back towards the trail pulling his cloak tighter about his shoulders and trudged stoically on towards their destination of White Stone City Tavern.

 

An hour later the city’s walls loomed up out of the gloomy evening and the duo lifted their pace as one thought of a good tankard of Ale and a hot meal… the other of skimpy clad barmaids and dancing girls.

 

They didn’t even notice the gently swaying sign depicting a Unicorn so intent they were on getting out of the foul weather.

Pushing open the door a cacophony of noise hit them like a sledge hammer along with a rush of warm air smelling of damp clothes drying, pipe tobacco, stale sweat and the delicious aroma of well prepared meals and fresh baked bread.

 

“Crap! the damn place is packed,” growled Aduard, “why by orcs blood did we have to meet here!”

 

Digi chuckled while scanning the room and spoke with just a hint of his normal sarcasm

“Because Maxine said to and besides you’ve been moaning the last hour how wet and hungry you are and now you’re here you’re moaning again. At least we are out of the rain and there’s food to be had, a warm fire and friendly faces.”

 

A loud gurgling rumble came from the dwarf’s mid-riff as the smell of food sent his taste buds watering. Looking towards the bar Aduard with years of practiced skill lowered his head hunched his shoulders and began bulldozing his way forward….

Ouch!!... sorry …. Damn…. Pardon…..what the!!!.... make w…BANG!!!

 

Aduard’s head suddenly felt as though it was caving in and was trying to be repositioned around his waist line. Feeling a concertinaed two feet tall instead of his normal four foot he gazed up into a pair of humor filled pale blue eyes. Aduard’s return look was pain filled and sour as he growled….

 

“What the ruddy hell you doing in here in full armor Meglo, ya bloody git, ya coulda moved ya know.”

 

“Its night time Aduard, the gargs are out and I wanted some sport on the way.”

 

The Dwarf looked the armor over noticing the splattering of gore and blood mixed with mud.

“God damit man ya didn’t even clean it before coming in here, you’ll be stinkin the place up worse than a goblin den …. ogre brain.”

 

Meglomania a tall man with snow-white hair and graying beard smiled and shrugged his broad shoulders and patted the top of the dwarf’s head, an act he knew riled the fiery adventurer more than anything.

 

“You do realize of course Ad that the tavern does hold even more ale than you can swallow in one night and there’s no need to flatten half the patrons trying for the bar”

 

A sour grunt followed Meg to the bar as Aduard used the path his fellow guildie was making.

 

Standing on the specially built raised platform put in just for gnomes and dwarves Aduard banged his fist on the bar “Ale!! Gummy ya ugly old bugga, come on ‘op to it. A dwarf’s dying of thirst here and his throat needs a quenching.”

 

Gummy glared down the bar wondering who the foul mouth was that was demanding his immediate service.

Then seeing his long time friend and companion he relaxed and shouted back. “Watch who you’re calling ugly, you’re not actually a picture of beauty yourself unless you think a barrel like blob of lard that waddles around like a chinso peguin is a beauty to behold.”

 

Aduard chuckled and looked at his friend with a beaming smile. “Ah tis good to hear ya voice old timer now how about a shot of the good stuff and none this crap you keep for these yokals.”

 

As Meg watched Gummy approach he couldn’t help but feel a pang of sorrow for the old adventurer. He was after all, indeed, the ugliest person he had ever seen. Gummy’s face was a mangled mess of flesh and shattered bones and cartilage poorly set and healed. His nose or what was left of it was not much more than two holes on what Meg thought looked like a lumpy pancake. His lips were smeared, ragged bits of flesh that hardly covered a couple of tobacco stained teeth.

A double cleft chin that was a splotchy bright red in color, a contrast to the deep brown of the rest of his face.

The story, as was told by others was that Gummy and another adventure called magpielee had decided to tackle a giant; an act that had gone horribly wrong when the hammer wielding giant had laid a backhander full into Gummy’s face.

 

Gummy quickly whipped up a couple of clean tankards, filled them from his special barrel and passed them over to the two companions.

 

“Now just a word of warning you two; there’s a few of those scamming, bag jumping, Jolt crowd here tonight and I don’t want any trouble… Gummy glared at them …. Got it ?”

 

“Yeah sure Gummy” Aduard replied in a much more humored voice now he had a tankard of the good stuff held in a tight grip. He raised it and nodded to Gummy

 

Slosh……!!!!! Just as the dwarf had the tankard almost to his lips Meglo’s elbow connected with Aduards arm and the ale slopped over the dwarf’s face drenching him.

 

“DANG BLAST IT” …. What the bloody hells wrong with ya, ya bloody dumb galoot”

 

Aduard’s voice was an anguished wail as he saw the fine ale pouring down his beard, he quickly scooped up his hairy pride and joy and began licking off the remains. Then he hauled out a wet rag from his jacket pocket and busily wiped his face grumbling a long list of profanities into his hands.

 

Finishing cleaning up the mess he wagged his rag filled hand at Meglo ‘Watch what you’re bloody doing ya big oaf’.

 

Meglo looked at the rag, snatching it from Aduard’s hand before the dwarf could react and began to wipe down his armor. When he had finished cleaning off the blood and gore he handed it back to the now spluttering dwarf who was still struggling to find the right words to aptly express his point of view.

 

"F… d…. yo….. st….. bl……" Adurad’s face underwent a myriad of changes as he tried to get the words out.

 

“Thanks Ad, appreciated” Meglo replied politely “I was wondering how I was going to clean it off.”

 

Aduard now looked at the rag pressed firmly back into his hand and with a savage jerk he rammed it into his pocket again, then reaching over he scooped up Meglo’s tankard grumbling as he left “I am going to meet the others, you’ll need a refill and don’t take all day.

 

 

Not sure if this belongs here or not.

 

Just the opening for now: comments welcome

Edited August 15, 2007 by Meglomania

[PhilDaBurn]

A very nice beginning indeed. Very good imagery - congrats. Btw, it's spelled Tarsengaard (with 2 A's toward the end) and I only saw a few minor grammatical errors.

 

Looking forward to reading more from you. Keep up the good work.

 

Phil...

[Roja]

Yes you do very well with imagery indeed, nice dialogue too

I will move this to the fan-fiction forum.

[StaTic]

This was a good story, i cant wait to read more of your work

[Roman]

This is brilliant I reckon this could be with the official EL stories, gratz!!!!