12-04-2010, 10:33 AM
He was alive again. More importantly, Anya was alive. He reached up and brushed a lock of her red hair out of her face. Her grey eyes sparkled like diamonds, and he kissed her. They had set up a picnic under a tree in Westfall which overlooked the ocean. The ocean lapped at the sand, with soft rhythmic breaths. They were lying in the grass and she drew in close to him wrapping an arm around his waist. It was slightly cold, so he put his hand over it.
"I love you, Razan," she whispered.
"I love you too, Anya," he said.
"Do you want to <grunt> <snort>"
Razan frowned at his wife. "I'm sorry, what did you say?"
His wife grunted again. Her arm, around his waist had gotten heavier, and had doubled in size. He tried to get up but was being held down. Anya's nose poked at his face, but it wasn't her nose anymore. It was a pig snout, cold and metallic. Her body disappeared leaving only her head, which was now a small metallic pig, that whirred and snorted.
Rincewindy woke up. He was staring directly at the pig from his dreams. The pig was pawing at the dirt and vomiting something into it. A small thorny vine sprouted immediately, growing at an alarming rate. It looked like the vines down in the southern Barrens that the Razormanes grew. He sat up...that is he tried to sit up, but was being held down around his waist by a vine with thorny spikes as big as his forearm. He cried out in alarm.
He was still in the library, and the book that he'd been working on was covered in black ink and metallic pig prints. The candle that he'd been using to light the pages had about half an inch of wick and wax left.
He cried out even louder, "Somebody help!" He'd hoped that he had yelled loud enough for someone to hear.
The second vine was now the size of a small child, a thorny spike was jutting out and headed right for his face. He began to squirm in the grasp of the other vine, trying to wiggle out of the entrapment. "Help!" He was screaming at the top of his lungs. A thought crossed his mind, and he used his free arm to cast a frost bolt on the smaller vine. The blast hit the vine, squarely, and the growth seemed to slow, briefly. He cast another frost bolt on the vine and another. Finally, the vine was completely covered in frost, and sagged lifelessly to the ground. He looked around for the pig and saw it pawing at the ground on the far side of the room.
Out in the hall he could hear more metallic grunts. He heard the sound of something crashing to the ground.
He reached into his tunic and tugged at the knives wrapped in cloth. One of them came free and he began to stab at the vine around his waist. The vine resisted the knife, itâs hard casing as tough as the bark of a tree. He cursed and stabbed at it repeatedly.
Out in the hallway, the pigs scampered around, pawing at the dirt and vomiting their thorny seeds. Further down the hallway, vines were growing at an alarming rate. The metallic pigs grunted and snorted as they moved about.
There was the whisper of a door being closed. The gnome breathed a sigh of relief as he travelled down the hill, using his stealth and the cover of night as his allies. It would be light soon, and he didn't want to be anywhere near the place when the inhabitants awoke. He smiled, as he recalled the interaction he had with the pig people. They were so pleased at his suggestion of him planting the seeds and all they'd have to do was take care of the occupants while they were distracted with the vines. He smirked as he saw the movement along the horizon. The Quillboars certainly knew how to raise an army. He met up with Ryak, behind a rocky outcropping. "Things couldn't be going better. Perhaps the pigs will do a better job of taking out this threat than the cultists did."
Ryak nodded wordlessly. It had gone beyond payback, now. He quietly thanked Squigvicious for bringing this threat to the Alliance to his attention. He would be rewarded greatly if things did go as planned. He watched through the telescope as a the vines began to overrun the complex.