The Iron Teeth

Honor Among Thieves 9

No one got a lot of sleep that night, and not just because the watch was doubled. Everyone was too on edge to relax.

The only exception to this was Blacknail. He was reasonably certain that with all the big pink humans running around nothing would bother going after a skinny little goblin. Also, if anything really dangerous attacked the camp then all the human screams would wake him up.

When dawn finally brightened the camp, Saeter led a search party out to look for traces of the missing men. After an extensive search they found nothing, not even the smallest signs of a struggle.

"I really don't like this," one of the scouts told Saeter.

As was usual when Saeter was talking to people, Blacknail followed his master quietly and listened in. Everyone ignored him unless he spoke up.

"Who would?" Saeter replied with a grunt.

"True, but what I meant is that it's one thing for something to kill two men, but it's another thing entirely for something to do it while leaving absolutely no tracks! Your goblin couldn't even smell anything, Saeter!" the scout continued excitedly.

"Maybe they walked off together. Could've been bedmates or something," someone else guessed.

"That's bloody disgusting. Jon was my friend and he was no bugger. He also sure as all hells wouldn't have gone walking out into the forest in the middle of the night without telling anyone!" another bandit answered angrily.

"There ain't anything wrong with two men sharing a bed out here. The god Slyph-Usra himself smiles upon it. It's just like sailors when they're out at sea...," the first man began arguing defensively.

"You're like the only follower of that god in the entire camp," the other bandit countered angrily. "Most of us are soldiers. We follow the Azur-Waj, the war god, and he doesn't look so kindly upon such things. It's undisciplined and plain unhealthy."

"Ha, we're thieves now, even if we used to be soldiers. Most the band worships Cor-Dius, and he doesn't care what people do in darkness," a third bandit added dismissively.

"This isn't relevant," Saeter remarked sternly as he cut off any further argument.

A few hostile looks were exchanged but all the other bandits stopped arguing. Saeter was in charge and they had a job to do.

"I hate to be the one to say it, but this is looking more and more like the work of someone in the band," a mustached man remarked, which caused several others to give him annoyed looks.

"So, someone just decided to murder two men who barely knew each other and were on opposite ends of the camp?" a short bandit countered.

"It does seem unlikely, but they must have been in on something together. Murder would explain the lack of anything but human tracks, and nothing else will," the mustached bandit responded with a suspicious glance at the man arguing with him.

"Not necessarily," Saeter mused aloud.

Everyone else grew quiet. Most of the bandits looked confused, but a few of the more experienced scouts looked grim or upset instead.

"Well, feel free to enlighten us Saeter," someone eventually said to break the silence.

"I can think of a few things it could have been. Firstly, it could've been some sort of crystal host with a weird power," Saeter explained.

The outlaws threw each other questioning looks and spoke among themselves for a few seconds. They didn't seem convinced.

"That's only one thing. What are the others?" someone asked.