Natural Magic

Chapter 4 - Special Ingredient

Chicken was running. He liked running. This was because while Chicken was running, he wasn't being pummeled and bitten by the horde behind him. And so, Chicken liked running.

This wasn't just a flat-out foot race against the angry mob, however, because the terrain in the geyser field wasn't laid flat. It was broken, like a smashed ceramic plate amidst a pile of other smashed ceramic plates. The rocks jutted out of the ground, laying on top of one another at odd angles, baking in the noon day sun. The horizon flickered with illusory water. Chicken hastily clambered up a steep incline and leapt down to the surface below, his scales protecting his skin from the blistering rocks.

This route was a straight shot back to his home. He hadn't taken it on his way out because it was also a suicide course.

The rabbit bounded headlong through the terrain, up boulders, over steep drops, with Chicken matching it step for step.

The geyser fields were incredibly dangerous, and the rabbit he was following was headed straight through it. Only a master pathfinder could navigate through one successfully, because it took more than avoiding the super-heated blasts of underground water. The water came to the surface inundated with magical energy. Once that hit the open atmosphere, the magic was free to precipitate as enchantment on the surrounding grounds.

In short, you never knew what you were in for when you traveled through the geyser fields.

The rabbit rebounded off a wall, disappearing behind a clutter of boulders. Chicken grabbed a large and twiggy scrub bush, its roots clinging to a vertical surface for dear life, to swing himself around the corner.

The rabbit bunny-hopped in stages down an incline. Chicken took it by sliding on his feet in a half-crouch.

With the rabbit's white tail just in front of him, he climbed and slid and clambered all while carrying the large brown mushroom in the crook of his scaly arm. He juggled it constantly to free up either hand, elbow, shoulder, or to shift his weight to maintain his pace and course.

A calamity was chasing him, the mob hurling insults in Gobbledygook. They were incomprehensible, but stung him nonetheless. They were certainly words more heinous than "thief". The goblin language is increasingly versatile in that any phrase may be augmented to yield insult. Chicken had no way of knowing, but he was being described in acute detail, every aspect of him cursed and likened to all manner of slime, ichor, and unpleasantness. It was like an exacting verbal portrait, from a palette of raw sewage, on the broad side of a hog.

Chicken looked back, despite his better judgement. He had yet to see the body of the calamity, the mob of goblins angry at him for stealing their precious mushroom. For interrupting and ruining their goblin boil. They had no reason to believe he wasn't the cause of the drop of water that had fallen from the sky, so they channeled their malice into the chase. The riotous tide of sharp-toothed, red-eyed, pallid-skinned, dirt-encrusted goblins from the goblin encampment scourged hand and foot over the obstacles with none of Chicken's grace, but with bonus points for passion. The nose slits on their faces flared with effort, keeping their bodies moving and curses flying. The long pointy ears on either side of each head bobbed in all directions.

Luckily for Chicken, the few with crude or rusty weapons were in the back of the mob, slower for being unable to use of both hands. But it was a mere consolation. The ones in front were liable to get the job done before a blade could ever reach his skin. He instantly regretted the glance. It might be the last thing he ever saw.

When he looked back, Hare was gone. A wall of red rock lay just before him.

"Hey, wait!" he cried, casting around for his guide, trying not to slow.