Over the next couple weeks, Meg wondered what was going to be done about that sword-like object found under the cyclops' lair. She asked Taryn and Baxter, but they only answered that they didn't know themselves. Eventually she learned the cyclops had calmed down and been helped out of the hole by the villagers. Good, so the effect wasn't permanent and it survived... though it'd departed the area after, perhaps spooked by its encounter with the sword's power. She could hardly blame it.
One day, instead of resuming training after lunch Taryn had them gather for an announcement. She told them there were reports of strange creatures being spotted near Bergin, and the town requested help again. "What do you think?" Meg asked Patrick while Taryn predictably confirmed the fort would be sending a team to investigate. "You want to go?"
"I don't see why not. Especially if these creatures might be monsters, that's our specialty after all."
Thus Meg raised her hand and said, "If you don't have everyone who's to be on the squad already in mind, Pat and I would like a spot."
Taryn regarded them ambivalently. "I had thought to give other recruits a chance instead of letting the same ones go out again and again... but on the other hand, your experience with monsters could prove valuable here. Hmm, there is a possible solution. I'd planned to send an equal number of recruits and veterans as before, but with your level of savvy, perhaps you could take the places of two veterans instead." She looked to the older soldiers. "Does anybody object?"
"We're all in the same boat,"said Terrence, a grizzled man with thinning blond hair. "If you trust their skills enough that you would have them stand beside us, we shouldn't be offended just because they're young." If any of his peers disagreed, they didn't voice it.
"Then it's decided. This time it will be eight recruits backed up by four veterans... with two of the former being veterans among recruits, in Meg and Patrick."
"Yes!" Meg said, bumping fists with Patrick.
Saul spoke up. "Let me come too. I wouldn't mind seeing this sword-shaped object myself—and yes, I'm aware of the dangers."
Taryn gazed doubtfully at him. After a moment, she replied, "Fine, I suppose you haven't been on a mission yet anyway." She chose the rest of the recruits to send out, who wound up including Rich along with four others. Two were curly-haired brothers named Ken and Caleb, the duo who had abandoned the bunk bed Meg and Patrick used now. Then there was Neil, a squinty-eyed youth known for struggling whenever they practiced with ranged weapons, and willowy Dana whose name, build and flowing straight locks drew teasing from the other boys. Although he wasn't really a girl as they joked, Meg identified with him for being underestimated for his physical attributes, and hoped she could help him win the respect of his fellows.
Baxter again joined the veterans accompanying them as they set out for Bergin, probably because only he could communicate with monsters if that was indeed what troubled the town. Terrence came along too. "I'm guessing you wanted to come so badly because just training and hanging around gets boring for the likes of you, correct?" the lieutenant asked Meg and Patrick while they trudged over the muddy road during a light rain.
Patrick laughed. "You got us, but not entirely. We're used to fighting monsters, so we figured our presence might help everyone's chances of making it through safely. Didn't expect to replace two veterans instead of our own peers, though. Sorry if we stepped on any toes."
"Don't worry about it. Like Terrence said, you have plenty of proven ability, so it would be immature of us to hold your youth and being new around here against you. The captain must've felt the same way to propose what she did."
One of the older soldiers behind them said, "The captain is young herself. I wouldn't put it past her to be showing favoritism towards these whelps." Baxter didn't respond. So not all the veterans accepted her and Patrick to the same degree. It was expected, anyway.
"Do you think these creatures appearing has anything to do with that sword?" Saul asked.
Meg shrugged. "I don't know, could be. Definitely something to keep in mind as far as possible causes go."
When they got to Bergin and spoke again with the chief, he informed them that shadowy beings walking on two legs had been spotted going in the direction of the cyclops' former hideout. One man claimed to have been attacked, but escaped with a fairly mild gash on the arm. However a couple other people were missing, so some feared the mysterious creatures had already claimed casualties. Baxter asked for clarification on what the chief meant by "shadowy beings," but was told the witnesses had been unable to get a good look at them in the night and could only describe them as such. Traveling towards the hills, most of the recruits looked quite anxious at the prospect of facing unknown peril, even Rich whose fighting experience was limited to human foes. Dana kept up a calm exterior better than the rest, though Meg didn't know how much of that was him forcing it in an attempt not to confirm others' low expectations.
Arriving before the familiar cave, Rich asked with a slight tremor in his voice, "Do you think those creatures actually went in there, or was it just a coincidence they passed by this way?"
Meg herself felt uneasy not knowing exactly what they might be up against. The description they'd gotten didn't quite fit any monsters known to her, though that could be attributable to the panic of the villagers or environmental conditions distorting what they saw. "Only one way to find out."
They approached the cave mouth and listened in, trying to hear anything they could. At first they heard nothing, but as they slowly advanced, Meg began to pick up faint hissing and scratching noises from ahead. "You hear that?" Patrick whispered. "Sounds like it's coming from under the hole."
"Yeah. Everybody get ready to defend yourselves."
Because this was still meant to be live training for the recruits with the veterans only to aid them if required, the youths took the lead while their allies fell back except for Baxter, who needed to be ready to talk to monsters. Meg and Patrick weren't sure which group they should stick with, given their unique position, but decided to accompany the youngsters while keeping in mind they should intervene only as much as necessary. They neared the hole—then a black form flew up out of it, landing before it to loom over them. It looked like a mass of shadow over ten feet tall in the rough shape of a man though its boundaries shifted nebulously, with twin points of light like miniature stars for eyes. Had it just jumped from the floor of the lower chamber, over fifty feet below, straight up here? Incredible...
"What the hell is that thing?" Dana asked in a shrill tone suiting his girlish appearance, all traces of his courageous demeanor evaporating. Not that Meg could fault him, when she herself gawked in bewilderment. "Do you two know?"
"We never encountered anything similar before," Patrick said in a small voice while Baxter spoke hastily in the monstrous tongue. "In fact, we've never even heard of a monster that looked like this."
It didn't seem the creature understood what Baxter tried to say to it either, unless it just ignored him. It shambled forward menacingly in spite of his words, emitting a kakakaka sound from the indistinct darkness where its mouth should be while the soldiers backed up. Two other shadowy giants leapt up from the hole, followed by two more which followed behind them. For all her experience and combat skills, Meg's heart pounded. She and Patrick never faced this many large monsters at once before, plus they had no idea what these were even capable of. She really hoped they could avoid fighting right now, but the chances of that seemed increasingly slim...
The first creature sprang, swinging an arm down at Baxter so fast it appeared a blur. He jumped back while Ken and Caleb dashed around him, swords poised to strike. "No, wait!" Baxter cried while Meg stared. No way would she have predicted the brothers hurrying to attack those things, but then fear could have wildly different effects on people. Its arm swept down again, splitting both their shields and going right on to strike them across the chests. Blood sprayed out as if they'd been cut open. They fell to the ground with bodies torn and eyes fixed in death. Meg's breath caught in her throat. Claws? Or did the whole arm have an edge like a blade, whether it always did or had been transformed? The way the creature's whole outline remained vague, there were many things she couldn't tell.
"Ken, Caleb!" Rich shouted furiously. He rushed forward as they had, tears escaping his eyes but stubbornly looking to avenge them or at least die well trying. Not wanting to lose another comrade, Meg and Patrick charged alongside him. The monster brought its arm down at Rich. She jumped in front of him and blocked it in midair while he ran under her. It threw her back, but she was relieved to see him drive his sword into its center mass, followed by Patrick cleaving through its side with his poleaxe as he passed. It crumpled, presumably dead. So they were mortal, thank the gods... though it wouldn't bring their friends back, those of them who lived might yet make it through the day. Meg faced the four beings still standing as Patrick and Rich did, waiting to see what they might attempt.
"What should we do?" Neil asked behind her. "I thought we weren't supposed to kill."
"Never mind that! They slaughtered our comrades, our first priority is to get out of here alive and everything else is secondary. Besides, these might not even be among the monsters Saint General Julianna doesn't want killed, considering they're like nothing we've seen."
"Yes," Baxter agreed, "survival must be our chief concern." He and the veterans stepped forward to stand alongside Meg, Patrick and Rich, Saul accompanying them too. "Perhaps you and Dana should stay back though, and allow us to handle this." She was about to protest when she realized he was talking to Neil and not her.
Instead of moving towards them, the four monsters simply stuck their arms forward. Meg's heart skipped a beat as the limbs inexplicably extended, shooting at her and the others. So they could transform at least parts of themselves, to what extent was unknown. She parried the arm streaking at her face, and found its tip seemed hard as it made contact with her blade. She tried a chop at the segment of arm behind it, found that her sword glanced off that as well. At least their torsos were vulnerable... or could they harden those too? Meg thought to test the extent of their shapeshifting, only to pause when she heard a gurgling to her left and looked.
Saul lay kicking his legs weakly on his back, blood spurting between fingers as he clutched his throat. Her heart sank as she recognized it to be a fatal wound. The young artist would never get to see the giant sword let alone draw it, and all his dreams would fade into oblivion... Past his dying form, she spotted one of the veterans get speared through the chest by an arm and then dashed bloodily against the floor. They were losing people so fast, could they not handle these fiends? Leaning aside from another strike of a long arm, she sprinted at its owner. More thrusts came at her which she dodged or deflected, one ripping her shoulder when she ducked a split second too late. She drew close, rolled forward under a swipe of its second arm which it finally brought into play and slashed at its legs. It hopped back with surprising speed—or perhaps not so surprising given the way it came out of the hole. She would have to work around its swift reflexes, then. She feinted another slash, making it start to dodge, but burst forward instead so she remained in close range at the end of its movement. Leaping skyward, she whipped her sword up between its legs. Her blade continued upward as she did, slitting it open from groin to neck.
It crashed down, and she gazed around to see how her allies fared. Patrick was wearing down one creature with help from Rich, and Baxter and another veteran held their own against another. The last beast sent an arm out at Meg, apparently having killed or incapacitated everybody who opposed it. She blocked, but the force of it sent her tumbling painfully over the hard earth. She stumbled to her feet wincing from her damaged shoulder, looked up to see the monster towering over her. Its arm came down and she jumped back in the nick of time, the tip still grazing a fiery red line down her front. She caught its other arm on her sword, straining to hold herself up under its weight. The arm that had knocked her down took aim again.
She spun out from below the limb pressing down on her, batted the one flying at her aside but staggered from the impact. This wasn't as easy as before with her wound increasingly affecting her, but she had to stay strong. She heard an agonized scream from behind and looked. Baxter had fallen after being driven back past her, the veteran aiding him lying still nearby, and crawled painstakingly away from the shadowy thing that stalked him. Meg would've expected him to fare better based on his bouts with her and Patrick, but they were more used to fighting and adapting against varied types of creatures. She didn't know what to do. She wanted to save him, yet if she turned her back on her foe...
Patrick's poleaxe buried itself into the thigh of the one facing her, making it hobble sideways. He and Rich must have defeated their adversary. "We got this!" Rich yelled, pounding his sword into the beast's ankle. It fell, and both boys rained down blows relentlessly. "Help the lieutenant!" Meg sucked in a deep breath and darted towards the monster raising its arms over Baxter. Just before it would have finished him, her blade sliced across the back of its knees. It fell to all fours. She jumped on its back, ran up it and plunged her sword down through its neck. It collapsed, and quite exhausted she too collapsed atop it.
"We did it," she said as Baxter rolled over to gaze up at her, hearing that Patrick and Rich's attacks had stopped and they panted to catch their breath. "We won."
"Yes," he replied weakly, "but at what cost?" The fact four or more of their squad were dead fully dawned on Meg, and tears flowed down her cheeks. She didn't know the brothers well, nor the veterans who had fallen injured or dead, but Saul... The plump good-natured boy she'd sat with during many meals had gotten his life cut short, and she would never laugh at his crude drawings or slap his hand away when he tried to steal her food again. She wept lying there draped over the monster's corpse, a tad surprised how much this affected her. She was a seasoned warrior who'd seen death many times before and thought herself inured, yet it seemed she had already come to regard some of those at the fort as valued friends in her heart.
Nonetheless, she couldn't do anything for the dead, so she'd better concentrate on taking care of the living as best she could. She dragged herself off the carcass and straightened, then noticed something. "Where are Neil and Dana?"
Patrick and Rich walked over, both beaten and bruised. "They must have run off seeing us to be in danger of losing," Rich said while Patrick went to Baxter's side. "If we don't see them outside, we'll probably find them in town."
"No faith in us, I guess," Patrick replied, shaky voice not conveying the humor he probably thought he did. "Understandable though, given what a close call it was."
Meg bowed her head. "Let's check if anyone else is alive. Saul and the brothers aren't, but a couple of the fallen veterans might be."
The man impaled through the chest had passed, along with the one who fought with Baxter. But Terrence, who'd battled alongside Saul before being overwhelmed, still lived albeit with a dangerous head injury, blood oozing from an ear. She was glad to save one more life at least, with any luck.
They left the cavern, Patrick and Rich carrying an unconscious Terrence while Meg supported Baxter who couldn't walk on his own with a possibly broken leg. With her and the boys being hurt and weary as well, this wasn't an ideal arrangement, but it was all they could do. "We managed to eliminate the immediate threat to the town, if that was all of them," Baxter said as they struggled along, "but there's no way we can continue investigating with half our squad dead."
Not that they were necessarily qualified to do so anyway, given how poorly that had gone. "We should report back to Taryn," Meg replied, "and come up with a new strategy."
"What the f-flying fuck were those things?" Rich stammered, his composure noticeably frayed now that the rush of battle didn't help him hold it together. "Did that sword you mentioned attract them?"
"We have no clue what they were either. But as to the second question, it seems very likely."
A short ways from the cave, Neil and Dana popped out from behind a clump of brush with shameful looks on their faces. "Sorry about running away," Neil said. He probably wanted to add something else like an excuse of sorts, but seeing how few of them had emerged couldn't bring himself to voice it. Dana didn't speak at all, just looking at his boots in silence.
"We did tell you to stand back," Baxter said tiredly.
Rich snapped, "They still should have tried to help when they saw us in trouble, some of us falling! What kind of cowards are you, you don't even deserve to call yourselves men! You lazy-eyed bastard and you effeminate little bitch, I ought to beat the chickenshit out of you until you welcome death."
They ambled along with shoulders slumped, taking his continued verbal lashing in stride. Eventually Patrick suggested, "You know, one way you could help is by carrying Terrence so our battered frames can get a rest." He and Rich passed their burden to Neil and Dana, who held him with more effort but dared not complain.
Returning to Bergin, they gave their account of the incident, and the chief reacted with alarm to hear what danger the creatures posed. He wanted reassurance no more such beings would threaten the town, but unfortunately they couldn't make any guarantees. They left Baxter and Terrence in the care of the local doctor, and returned to the cave with a wagon to hold the deceased's remains. To their shock, the bodies of the monsters were no longer there as if they'd evaporated. Or could they somehow be alive?
As they piled the brothers, Saul and the veterans into the cart, there not being enough room for them to all lie side by side, Rich asked, "What manner of unholy power is in that sword, to draw such entities here and drive the cyclops insane? We ought to destroy it before anything else happens."
"Maybe it should be destroyed," Meg said, "but we probably aren't equipped to do it at this time. Besides, if we destroy it, that might release its power into the world and cause an even bigger problem. We should just go back to the fort and tell Taryn what happened, though she might not even be able to make a decision as such an ominous artifact may require the involvement of higher authorities."
Back at the village, they picked up Baxter whose leg had been splinted. As Terrence was grievously hurt and still hadn't woken at all, he would be staying put until he recovered some—if he ever did. They headed back for base, the horse-drawn wagon laden with corpses over which flies buzzed a depressing ever-present reminder of the tragedy. How had things gone so wrong so fast? It was just supposed to have been field training for the recruits, yet even most of the veterans who supervised them wouldn't be coming back.
Everyone stared in shock as they passed through the fort's gate into the courtyard, young faces crinkled with disgust at the smell while older ones remained mostly more stoic but still grave. Some of those who had lost friends cried after confirming their deaths with the survivors, and almost all bore evident fear in their eyes. "What could have done this?" an irate-looking veteran asked Meg. "I thought you were seasoned monster hunters, yet you let so many get killed and barely escaped with your own lives?"
She felt horrible herself about how badly they'd failed to protect the group as a whole, but answered to the best of her ability. "They were like nothing we'd ever seen. And we thought the lieutenant could speak with them to try and resolve things peacefully, but they either didn't understand or didn't want to."
"Don't put the blame on them," Baxter added. "It was a dire situation, and they reacted best to it out of all of us. If not for them being there, possibly not a single person would have gotten through alive."
Taryn arrived outside, eyes widening as she took in the scene. "Gods, what happened? I never thought..." What was left of the mission team shared their harrowing tale, the other soldiers' expressions growing ever more unnerved. After they finished, the captain said, "I already contacted Duke Malin indicating that expert assistance might be needed here, but with this development it seems I'll have to send him a reminder with more urgency."
"What about us?" Rich asked. "What should we do?"
It took her a moment to respond. "What can you do? We can't bring your friends back, and the monsters that killed them are already dead." Well, to the best of their knowledge. "So you had best move on, and continue in your duties as they would have."
"So you want us just to carry on like nothing happened, after that? I want to do something more—even if the creatures directly responsible are gone, I want to ensure no one else falls victim to similar perils."
"You mean deal with the sword?" Taryn frowned. "I can see why you would have that desire, but we can't act rashly. We should probably leave such matters to those more knowledgeable than us, aside from providing any aid they ask for."
He didn't seem very satisfied, but relented. "We killed a bunch of the monsters," Patrick said. "Will that be all right?"
"Legally it can be excused, considering it was in clear self defense. And since your description doesn't make them sound like children of the Father of All Monsters which we're trying to make peace with, it should be fine in that regard too."
They returned to life as usual around the fort, or rather a dreary semblance of it with a huge hole, particularly noticeable at mealtimes, where Saul had been. It was upsetting in the barracks not seeing him in the upper bunk across from hers, and the absence of the others she didn't know as well bothered her too at times. There was a lot less talk at the meal table, and Joel drifted away after Rich berated him for carving a likeness of the giant sword, calling it disrespectful to those who had died. Don tried to sing a sad ode to the fallen once, perhaps trying to sooth them in his way, only for Rich to bark at him to shut up too. Meg thought he overreacted, but didn't chastise him knowing it might aggravate his mood further. They probably all just needed time for the grief to subside to a bearable level, and she shouldn't try to force anyone to behave more rationally before then. She did reach out to Neil and Dana, letting them know they could talk to her about anything, but they declined the offer. If it was because they didn't want to be reminded of their dreadful experience together, she understood that too.
Everybody else spoke less to the bunch of them too, owing to similar awkwardness at least in part due to their demeanors. Meg didn't want to push people away by being unpleasant to be around, but how could she stop herself from being sad? If she tried to pretend to feel better, putting on a false smile, she would likely be seen right through and only make things worse as she wasn't used to doing that. She had a thought that her group, those who'd endured the trauma together, should support one another through this. But the words of comfort she offered rang empty, having no effect in the face of recent sorrow, and she soon gave it up. When she saw Saul and the others' bodies being sent out to be returned to their families, her guilt increased. She had failed them, and their loved ones too would suffer for it.
Other recruits got their chance to try out tasks in the field, though less dangerous ones than those she had done. She thought of Joshua and hoped he would learn to be less reckless, if he hadn't already.
One time late at night in the barracks, when Patrick awakened needing to relieve himself and everyone seemed to be asleep, Meg expressed her own distress. "I thought this would be relatively easy for the likes of us, but it's not. I miss Gavin... it was easier out there with just us three, who could all hold our own and rely on each other. I don't fault anybody for being weaker than us. But it turns out caring for more people makes life harder, which I'd kind of forgotten."
"Sorry if this is affecting you badly, Mouse," Patrick said. "I'm sad about those who died too. It shouldn't be that surprising something like this could happen when we're all soldiers, though."
"Yes, but it's peacetime. In that case, I doubt soldiers are being massacred by the half dozen on a regular basis. We just happened to be unlucky, to stumble upon this unearthly sword."
He raised an eyebrow. "Unearthly? What, do you think the thing's from another world?"
"I, eh, I don't know. It was just a passing thought, but it scarcely seems like it belongs in ours, so I imagined it might come from a different one."
"I wonder how long it'll take for that 'expert' help to come. I'd feel better to know there's someone less ignorant than us dealing with this situation, though we might have to help guard them should more shadowy beings be drawn to it."
Hearing that, she acknowledged their involvement with the sword might not be finished yet. Though tendrils of cold dread coiled around her heart to picture the foul object, she wouldn't really mind that. If they could work to mitigate the threat it posed, she'd happily take the chance to at least somewhat make amends for their previous failings.
A week later they got word that a team had been dispatched from Ostuh, the eastern country known for scientific and magical research, to investigate the mysterious phenomena surrounding the giant blade. Taryn announced that since the team would be small, soldiers would be dispatched from the fort again to assist and defend them. Rich predictably volunteered his help right away, clearly wanting to see their conflict of sorts with the sword through to the end, and Taryn didn't deny him. Meg and Patrick did likewise, and after that the captain picked the remainder of the squad. She chose Christopher and Joel, but they were the only other youths who would come; the rest would be veterans, leaving just Baxter and two others here. Meg hoped nothing bad happened at the fort while most of its experienced personnel were away.
"By the way," Patrick asked after the members had been selected, "only ten? Seems a bit of a small group after we had so much trouble even with twelve."
Taryn looked down. "It is smaller, since some of our veterans are gone and we can't have all those we still have leave the outpost. And for obvious reasons I don't want to send anyone new who I don't trust to hold their own. But it'll be eleven, not ten. Baxter can look after things here." She patted the axe on her back. "I'll be going with you."