Table of Contents – (spoilers)
Up on the Tanglefoot Trail on the ridgeline to the east of Bristlehump, the squad were working their way back towards town to find the trailhead. They rode slowly with Pinch and Peep again alternating point. They moved in the same manner as they had when approaching the Old Mill, only this time mounted. The person on point would move on ahead to a place with good cover and a view of the trail ahead. They would pause and watch for a moment, before signaling for the others to join them. Then the person on point would switch and the process would repeat.
As they moved down the trail, they began to get views of Bristlehump down in the little valleys ahead. Soon after this the ridge dropped sharply towards the Bristle Creek, and the trail began to work its way down the north side of the ridge. At this spot, there was a bit of a campsite with a crude log lean-to for shelter and a couple of old blinds. The campsite was not occupied. The blinds had a good view of the trail heading east and its drop down towards the ravine below.
“There ought to be soldiers stationed here,” Choke said as they took a moment to dismount and poke around the camp.
“No doubt. There’s an awful lot that ought to be happening here that isn’t,” Pinch seconded.
“Didn’t Dixon say that he’s keeping his men stationed in the bush to prevent trouble?” Peep asked.
“Yes. He did,” Choke said.
“Well, ye’d think this would be a prime place to put some, wouldn’t ye?” Peep said.
“As I just said, yes,” answered Choke darkly.
The squad continued on. From the little campsite, the trail worked its way down to Bristle Hollow in a series of switchbacks. There was still a good amount of tree and bush cover here, but there were stretches where riders would be plainly visible to well-situated observers below.
At the first of these open stretches, Peep and Pinch dismounted at the edge of the trees and crept forward to scan the bush below carefully.
“This sucks,” Peep whispered.
“Yup,” Pinch agreed. Then he pointed down below: “There: is that a blind?”
“Yeah, I reckon so. Good eye.”
The two sat watching the blind for a good five minutes. Besides a few birds, there was no sound or motion.
“Seems okay,” Pinch finally said.
Peep chewed on her lip pensively. “Yeah,” she eventually said, “seems to be. But that’s exactly how it’d be if someone who knows their shit is down there waiting for us.”
“So, what do we do then?” Pinch asked.
The two retreated back to Choke and Knuckle with the horses to have a quick word and hash out a plan. Then, with the squad all dismounted and with bows at the ready, they moved down the trail as stealthily as was possible with four horses in tow.
Peep and Pinch went ahead on foot, with their bows fully at the ready. Choke and Knuckle followed, each handling two horses. To cross the first open stretch, they went one at a time. Peep went first, moving low and fast to the next cover. She and Pinch watched the blind as first Choke, and then Knuckle, crossed with the horses. Pinch crossed the gap last. At the next open stretch, they repeated the procedure, but this time with Pinch going first, and Peep last.
Finally, after one more such move across open ground, they were around the last switchback. Here they were in tight bush looking down a long, straight stretch of trail that went down into the less densely forested Bristle Hollow. The blind that had been menacing them was about thirty meters down the trail and to their right. It was not visible from their position.
“Okay,” Peep said in a barely audible whisper. “Me and Pinch are gonna slip into the bush and creep up behind that blind. You hear, ‘all-clear,’ come on down with the horses. ‘Alarm,’ and ye leave the horses and come running. Right?”
The other three nodded. Then Peep and Pinch dropped into a crawl to slip off the trail into the underbrush. While not silent, the two of them were very quiet. Keeping a few meters apart from each other, they worked their way right up behind the blind. There was a little clearing there with another simple camp. This one was also unoccupied. At the back of the camp there was a small trail leading off through the thicket.
Crawling out of the thicket into the camp clearing, Pinch and Peep took a moment to brush themselves off. Then Pinch gave the “all-clear” bird whistle. He and Peep crouched down behind the blind to have a look up at the switchbacks of the trail above. While the trail itself was not visible from that angle, they knew right where it was and there was no doubt they would have been plainly visible in crossing the open stretches on the way down. The last open area was within easy long or crossbow shot.
“Whoever set this up knew their business,” Pinch whispered.
“Yup. They been slipping though,” Peep said as she reached out to finger the dead and dry branches that had been lashed to a rough stick trellis to make the blind. “If this shit was fresh, we wouldn’t a spotted it.”
“Good spot to know if we ever get someone chasing us up there on the trail,” Pinch said.
“There ye go, now yar starting to think like a bandit,” Peep said giving Pinch a friendly bump with her elbow.
“Scout, please.”
“What’s the difference?” Peep asked.
“The one gets rewarded by the Baron for killing the other,” answered Pinch.
“Good point.”
By now, Choke and Knuckle had stopped on the trail right in front of the blind, still leading the horses on foot. Out in the sun, they were squinting at the blind, trying to see Peep and Pinch in the gloom of the forest behind. Peep gave Pinch a wink and raised up her bow to mime shooting Knuckle in the neck, who was no more than two meters from her. Then she then gave a little cheerful warble of a whistle to alert Choke and Knuckle to their presence, who both startled at the proximity.
“Ye see?” she whispered to Pinch, but loud enough for Choke and Knuckle to hear as well. “This shit works.”
Peep and Pinch were about to come out from around the blind to join Choke and Knuckle on the road, when a noise from behind them back in the thicket pulled them up short. The snap of a twig was followed by the rustling of some bush. Both Pinch and Peep whirled as they pulled and notched arrows.
All was quiet again.
“What is it?” Choke whispered behind them.
“Don’t know. Sit tight,” Pinch whispered back.
Nothing moved in the bush. Then, almost a full minute after the first noise, there was a strange, muffled sort of bleat from further back in the bush. There was another rustle of bushes and then another bleat, followed by a deep grunt.
“The fuck?” Peep whispered.
“Is that a goat? Goblins?” Pinch whispered to her.
“Fucked if I know.”
There was now more rustling, bleating, and grunting from the bushes.
“I gotta see what this is,” Peep whispered loudly to Choke and Knuckle through the blind. “You guys stay with the horses. If anything shows on the trail, ye shout loud and I’ll work to flank. Pinch, follow me a ways and watch my back.”
Without pausing to check if anyone agreed, Peep quietly scooted across the camp clearing to the little trail into the thicket. She kept in a deep crouch, with her arrow still notched and ready to be drawn back. As she slipped into the trail, Pinch followed.
The trail was relatively straight and ran only about ten meters before it opened up into another little clearing. With Pinch about five meters behind her, Peep stopped just before the clearing. Whatever was making all the noise was just out of sight around a large, thick, berry bush. The bush was shaking this way and that. The strange bleating had subsided, but the guttural grunting had intensified.
Peep waited for about twenty seconds, listening to the ruckus carefully. Then she smiled. With her bow ready to shoot out in front of her, she nodded to Pinch behind her, and then moved around the bush and into the clearing. She came face to face with a goat that was being fucked by a man. The goat was tied to the bush, thus all the rustling. The man behind her was on his knees and was pumping away, gripping the goat by the hind legs at the hips to pull her into him, as one does when fucking a sheep, pig, dog, or even, perhaps, a fellow human in such a position.
The man had his head thrown back and was deep into whatever mental contrivance he used to manage this disgrace. So, with Peep being as sneaky as she was, he did not even notice her. The goat, however, did. With Peep popping out of the bush right in front of her, the goat startled and bucked.
“Fuck, Nelly! Settle down!” the man barked, lightly cuffing the goat as he opened his eyes.
Peep took a step back from the man as she leveled her bow at him. The man screamed and fell back on his ass. He scrambled back as he tried to get his breeches up.
“The fuck you doing, man?” Peep yelled at him with a big grin. “Goat fucker!”
The man finally managed to roll over onto his belly and get his breeches up. He was in basic peasant clothes with a knife on his belt, and had no other weapons or gear laying around the clearing.
“Don’t get up,” Peep said sharply to him once he had done his breeches up.
Pinch stepped out into the clearing with his bow at the ready.
“Oh shit,” he said, as he beheld the scene.
“Yeaaaah. We got us a goat fucker here,” Peep said.
The man was now kneeling on the ground with his head very low as he trembled.
“Bestial sodomy!” Pinch exclaimed. “Dood! You can hang for this!”
“Really?” Peep said, surprised.
“Yes! It’s an abomination!” Pinch exclaimed, obviously very amused.
The man, however, was not picking up on the humor. Trembling, he gagged, and then threw up in the grass at his knees.
“Ye hear that, goat fucker? We drag ye over to Barrelmender, and then we get to string ye up for this!” Peep said.
“Ohhhhh!” the man wailed.
“What’s happening?” shouted Choke as he came down the trail towards them. He was moving quickly and had his longsword drawn.
“Ye may as well come on and see,” Peep called over to him. “Where’s Knuckle?” she asked as Choke approached.
“On the trail with the horses,” Choke answered as he entered the clearing. His nose wrinkling at the smell of the vomit, he looked around, confused. “What’s going on here?” he asked Peep sharply.
“This guy is a goat fucker. Caught him balls deep in this nanny here. And I’ll testify to that to Barrelmender, ye dirty fuck!” Peep said to the man with a big grin.
“We shouldn’t be split up like this,” Choke said. “Pinch, can you go back to Knuckle and then the two of you get the horses into the site behind the blind. Shout if you see anything.”
Pinch nodded and left smartly.
Peep clucked her tongue and shook her head as she put her arrow away. “Goat fucker. What are we gonna do with you, huh?”
“Please don’t hang me! Pleeeeeease! I’m sho shorry,” the man sobbed.
“No shit ye are. Sick fuck!” Peep said. “Well, I tell ye what we’re gonna do. And ye need to thank Altas and Stron that we’re such kind, wonderful people. Ye’ve lost yar goat privileges. I’m taking the nanny. Nelly, ye called her, right? Sick bastard. Naming yar fuck goat like that. Ye probably weren’t even thinking about a person as ye put it into her, huh? Is she yar one and only?” Peep laughed.
“Peep, come on,” Choke said tiredly.
“Oh, right. My bad. Mustn’t be mean to the poor goat fucker here. Okay. What’s yar name, goat fucker?”
“Theon, ma’am.”
“Theon the goat fucker. Works for me. So here’s what we’re gonna do, Theon. We’re taking the goat. And then we’re gonna let ye go.”
“Oh, thank ye, ma’am!”
“Don’t ye thank me yet, ye fuckin pig. Tomorrow, Brother Bartholomew here is gonna give mass up at the church. So when you hear that church bell ringing, you come. Yar a church-going, Stron-fearing man, now. Got it?”
“Yesh! Thank ye, ma’am.”
“You mark me well: if we ring that bell and ye don’t show up, we are coming for ye. And then we will hang yar dirty, goat fucking ass. You understand me, Theon?”
“Yesh ma’am! Thank ye, ma’am.”
“Okay. You got any other livestock we need to be worried about?” Peep asked.
“I do. But ye don’t need to worry! I won’t even do thish again. Please, ye have to believe me!”
“No I don’t. Because if we want, we can drag ye in front of Barrelmender, and he’ll know the truth of it when Stron tells him it. And then ye’ll fuckin burn, and ye’ll wish we’d hanged ye here and now like ye deserve. Understood?”
“Yesh, ma’am! Thank ye, ma’am!”
“Okay then. Fuck off. We’ll see ye tomorrow at mass,” Peep said.
When the man had scampered off, Peep untied Nelly from her bush.
“There we go!” Peep said cheerfully to Choke, who was staring glumly at the goat. “We got us a goat and a snitch! A good afternoon’s work!”
Muse Vassal 