They lay back under the wagon and waited for the worst of the day's heat to pass, Mosus burped contentedly and picked a seed from his teeth. As he went to flick it away Rith cuffed his ear and took it from him.
"Saving the seeds Mosus" he said without real rancour.
Mosus grinned sheepishly and nodded.
Rith peered toward the spot where he had turned the soil, might plant the seeds from what they had eaten as soon as this wretched heat subsided. Get things moving, keep them moving, if he let the little band's momentum falter things would fall apart in a hurry. At least they had a small pile of food for now, things were moving.
*KETHUMP*
Rith snapped out of his reverie, the lads were looking around wildly.
*KETHUMP*
He scrambled out from the wreckage of their cart and almost fell backwards over his own feet in shock.
About 30 urists away was some hideous beast, a stony looking thing, tall as a troll with batlike wings that creaked as it bounded towards their shelter in a series of short glides that ate up the intervening distance at a worrying rate.
"Lads!!", he bellowed. "It's goin down, protect the fucking food!".
He was sure they were as scared as him but these were his lads and they performed as he expected, the thundering of little legs pumping told him they were right behind him.
As he neared the thing a tendril of doubt snuck into his mind....he'd read once (he could read after a fashion) about something like this, was this a gargoyle? They were only supposed to inhabit the most desolate reaches of the world, this was.......this was not great.
All thought departed as he closed the last of the distance and the beast let out a bellowing roar. Rith answered with one of his own, spittle foaming in his beard as he hurled himself at a leg like a small tree trunk.
The next few moments were a blur, he supposed they could only have been moments but they seemed like hours as the dwarves swarmed over the monster, grappling, kicking, punching and scratching. At one point he saw Mosus sink his teeth into a wing membrane. Smoke billowed as Kol, who was an obsidian dwarf, hurled fire at the thing. Rith coughed and gagged on the thick fumes, damn obsidian's were as dangerous to their friends as their foes, he swung blindly and once more made contact with the beast's leg, he latched on and started pummeling the knee-joint.
At length the thrashing stopped and the dwarves were beating a carcass, Rith staggered to his feet and blinked dazedly in the wisps of smoke, he wiped a thin trickle of blood from his lip and gazed about.
Fortunately the fire Kol had hurled hadnt spread, this accursed plain didnt have grass to ignite. Their foodpile and little plot had survived the attack. He made to say something but his voice failed him and he stumbled off toward the river for a drink to ease his throat with the rest of his band following unsteadily behind like a herd of semi-concussed goats.
<<There was gonna be much more, i've played through to the first caravan and taken screenshots, but im having too much fun writing and the first battle deserved a reasonable description. It was a Giant Gargoyle and actually appeared immediately on embark, I didnt notice and sent everyone but the fisherdorf picking plants with the result that it chased Knarfle about for like 10 days without being able to corner him. As the benny hill themetune rolled through my head I let him kite it about while I got the farm and a bit of food sorted then brought him back to the wagon for the showdown:) Genesis threw me a curveball with the obsidian dwarf Kol, acting like a fireimp isnt funny when the dwarf is a wrestler. All 7 dwarves are now naked since everyone's clothes caught fire>>