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The tent’s interior was roomy, with a ceiling tall enough that a man only needed to stoop slightly stepping inside. Logan’s “bed” was actually no more than a pile of dirty furs on the ground.
The campfire had been put out hours ago when they retired for the evening, allowing the shadows of night to creep in and reclaim the camp. The air was surprisingly alive with the sounds of nocturnal creatures—chirping insects, hooting cave owls, and the occasional fluttering of bat wings high overhead. A couple of times Logan had woken in a panic to the howls of caits, realizing with relief that they were faraway in the distance. Even the trees around the tent sounded alive, their leaves rustling in the cool night breeze.
When Bruno ducked under the flap, the oaf was surprisingly nimble of foot for his size, careful to make no sound, his large stone-headed axe in hand. He stopped short, sensing Logan stir under the furs. Once he was confident the man was asleep, he tiptoed closer to the bed.
Grimy, calloused hands gripped the hilt of his shoddy weapon, lifting it silently overhead and throwing all his weight into the blow, crashing down into the furs through the man’s head, which popped like a grape. Bruno could not help hee-hawing in delight at killing the stupid man. He must have really lodged the axe into the little bastard’s skull, because it refused to pull out, wedged in between the bones as if they were stone.
“Tut tut,” a voice mocked him from the shadowy corner of the tent.
Before Bruno could turn around, Logan threw a large stone, connecting solidly with the brute’s throat. Bruno clutched his crushed windpipe, gasping for air, frantically trying to call out to his partners. Logan ran in, throwing three sharp jabs into the giant bandit’s side with his human hand, before shattering Bruno's pelvis under the power of his mechanical fist. The force of that last blow knocked Bruno out through the tent’s opening, roughly dropping him on his back in the coarse dirt.
Maxwell was completely caught by surprise seeing his man lying on the ground. When Logan ran through the opening, he barely had time enough to get out of the way as a hot beam scorched the air where he had been standing.
Logan let off three more shots from his laser rifle, each missing their mark, as an angry Maxwell moved with far more agility than he looked to possess.
“Stay still, Maxie boy,” Logan said, “I want to thank you for the royal accommodations.”
Maxwell let him prattle on, using Logan’s cocky demeanor to work his way in closer, making it difficult to get a good aim in the close range. He barreled into Logan, roughly backhanding him.
Logan tried to roll with the sting of the man’s attack, thinking to spin around behind him, but the burly bandit was not about to let him get away that easy, throwing both arms around Logan’s body in a grizzly bear hug. His rifle clattered to the ground as the air was squeezed out of his lungs by the man’s powerful grip.
“Ha, ha, ha, whelp, you thought to come into Maxwell’s house without offering me a present?” the beast of a man cackled, his sour breath filling the air. Logan wheezed unintelligible words as Maxwell squeezed tighter, his arms locked around the foolish young man’s flailing body. “Eh, what does the little piggy have to say then?”
Light flashed as energy crackled over the large man’s body in burning waves. For a moment his grip locked even harder, muscles in a spasm from the electric shock that assaulted him. Then his body flopped limply to the ground.
Logan rubbed his sore ribs, looking down at the bastard. He had to take a moment to catch his breath, which came in ragged gasps. The metal of his hand was still smoking from the electro-shock he had lit Maxwell up with, and his glove was a ruined mess. Logan slammed his boot down hard onto the man’s ribs, cracking a couple under his heel. Maxwell could do nothing but shriek pathetically, as he was completely unable to move, paralyzed from the attack.
“I said…you’re not the first idiot to try and bear hug me. Don’t know why you fools are always trying to cuddle instead of fight. Eh? What was that you were saying, Maxie, my man?” Logan cupped a hand to his ear as if listening. “Oh…that’s right, you wanted a present. Sure, sure I have a present for you right here, friend.”
Logan threw all his strength into a blow from his mechanical fist, shattering the bandit’s right kneecap. Maxwell let out a bloodcurdling scream before blacking out, unable to bear the pain.
“Don’t even try it, Wart,” Logan growled over his shoulder.
Behind him, Wart had nocked an arrow with shaking hands and fear bubbling in his eyes.
“P-please don’t k-kill me,” Wart cried pitifully, dropping the weapon to the ground.
“Is this what you bastards do to new Wilders? Bring ‘em back here, tell them some stories so you can get them nice and comfortable before you murder them for all their belongings?”
“P-please, it wasn’t never my idea mister, honest to death,” Wart whimpered like a rat.
“Shut up and get out of my way before I shoot you dead, bandit. Show me where you keep your cache.”
Logan flicked the rifle to the right of the man, ordering him to move, to which Wart readily complied, scurrying across the camp and nervously checking to see if Logan was following. They walked by the spot where Bruno lay unconscious, and Logan gave him a sharp kick in the side for good measure.
Wart stopped beside the largest tent, where a couple of crates were stacked.
“Go on and open it up,” Logan ordered.
The bandit pried the lid off with shaking hands, then stepped back, looking as if he might die of fright.
The unexpected stench hit Logan’s senses hard, and he almost lost the contents of his stomach when he saw the crate’s wretched bounty. Catching himself with a couple dry heaves, he eyed the greasy little bandit he had followed into this nightmare, trying to comprehend exactly what it was he was seeing. Wart gave him an uneasy toothless grin and shrugged.
The crate was half full of the rotting meat of butchered humans, arms, entrails, blood, and gore. These fiends were cannibals. They were eating other wildlanders!
“What the Hel is this, you sick little bastard?” Logan screamed.
“It’s the bounty, Master Logan,” Wart said. “This is what we… they trick people into the camp for. But now it’s all yours, seein’ as how your my new boss an’ all.”
It settled over Logan at that moment that in the lands outside of Fal, it was a game of survival of the fittest.
“You knew I was following you here?” Logan asked, the doubt keenly edged in his tone.
“No, no sir, you was a happy surprise for Max. He said you were a gift from the All-Father, dinner and weapons, a rare delight for those exiled.”
“Close that damn thing back up!” he ordered, pointing with the rifle muzzle while his free hand only half protected his face from the stench.
Wart did as he was told, scrambling to cover the box back up, and Logan slammed the butt of his rifle across the back of the man’s skull, knocking his unconscious body atop the sealed box.
Then he leaned over and finally let his stomach loose on the ground as another whiff of the rotting meat filled his nose to the point that he could actually taste it.
Another crate next to the unconscious cannibal began frantically thumping. At least a dozen images raced through Logan’s mind of what might be inside. As he pried the lid off, he envisioned everything from a damsel in distress to a large man-eating creature waiting for him, although none of those images quite prepared him for the naked gnome he found instead.
The little man’s pudgy hands were bound at the wrist by a dirty length of wire cutting into his flesh, and he was gagged with a filthy rag that had been stuffed into his mouth.
Logan hurried to lift the three-foot gnome from the crate and pulled the disgusting rag out of his mouth. The gnome unleashed a flurry of curses, desperately spitting to the side, while Logan worked to remove the wire binding his wrists.
“Blech, thank you, thank yo
u, oh thank you.” He jumped up and down, getting the blood to circulate back into his stubby legs.
“Don’t mention it, pal. Are you alright?” Logan asked the gnome, unsure what else to say in a situation like this.
“These weirdos were going to eat me for dinner like I was a roasted ham! Heard them cackling about it night before last!” he raged, running over to Wart and kicking the cannibal’s limp body repeatedly with his plump bare foot.
He would have made an impressive show of it too, cursing as he was, if one blow had not missed, causing him to stub his large toe against the corner of the crate instead. That sent the gnome hopping up and down in circles on one foot.
Logan could not help smiling at the little man’s funny behavior. “Settle down, fella, everything’s okay now,” he said, reaching out to steady the gnome but then pulling back, not wanting to make contact.
The gnome stopped short, looking down at his flat belly and blanching as he remembered that he was completely naked. He stammered to excuse himself and darted into Maxwell’s nearby tent, returning a few minutes later wearing what Logan assumed were the clothes the vile cannibals had stripped him of when they had taken the gnome prisoner.
He was much calmer now, standing with his small chin proudly raised and tightening the last strap of his studded metal bracers. The gnome wore black buckled boots under brown canvas breeches, with purple suspenders over a gray tunic. He also had a small hammer latched to his belt. Logan wondered how the gnome had put on all his gear in such a short time; he even looked like he had combed his unkempt mane of silver-grey hair, taking care to pat down his overgrown sideburns and smooth out his matching bushy eyebrows.
Logan pulled a clean rag out of his pack and handed it to the gnome so he could wipe the dirt off his large bulbous nose and small smooth forehead.
“Feel better, friend?” he asked.
“I surely do, good sir.” The gnome beamed. “Logan, was it?”
“Yes, but how do you know my name?” Logan asked, checking over his shoulder to be sure the bandits were not stirring.
“Heard it last night while you lot were chatting around the fire. Just took you for another one of these bastards at first. Hard to hear locked in a wooden box, you know.”
“And you are…?” Logan asked.
“Name’s Brillfilbipp Bobblefuzz of the Dudje Bobblefuzzers, friends call me Bipp, and it has never, in all my years, been more of a pleasure to meet any human’s acquaintance,” Bipp said, proudly offering his stubby hand, which Logan heartily shook.
“Same here, Brill-fil-bipp of Dudje…same here.”
“As I said, my friends call me Bipp, and you, sir, have certainly earned the right to claim that title!”
Cait howls rose from the west, similar to those Logan had heard while lying in his tent, but these seemed nearby, like they were closing in on the camp.
“Must have heard all the commotion from that nice rifle of yours,” Bipp said. “They have keen hearing, to be sure. Best we be getting out of here right quick, eh?” He waved for Logan to lead the way east, away from the camp.
Logan could not agree more, but before they left, he had to grab some supplies of his own while the opportunity presented itself. Rummaging through the nearest tent, he grabbed everything useful he could get his hands on, and a handful of gemstones that caught his eager eye, to boot. After he picked the area clean, Logan ran to retrieve his own backpack from his tent, and another howl came from the woods outside the camp. This one was so close it must have been just over the chasm.
“Okay, Bipp, time to run,” Logan called. “Lead the way!”
He eagerly followed the gnome out of the area and into the night.
CHAPTER 15