Victory on the High Seas
"2 Silver? To Flotsam? You have to be mad!" roared Homlin to the ship captain. Hull Nightstar, captain of the Golden Lion sighed irritably. Once he would have scorned a captain who took passengers on a ship as fine as his, but in these times, with war between the Allied forces and the horde from the Misty Mountains flying the standard of the Army of Angmar, money was hard to come by.
"You think he is still afraid of boats Vaktoth?" smirked one of the irritated dwarf's two companions, a dark-eyed half-elf who was complacently leaning on a large claymore.
"Now, now Houdini, you know how dwarves are about each copper they spend" laughed Vaktoth, an elf of noble bearing and the third member of this group.
"Calians" muttered Hull, as Homlin turned in righteous indignation on Houdini, poking the half-elf with the butt of his trident. Hull sighed again through his teeth as he looked over the docks of Sparkle. He had been docked here for too long due to bad weather and was impatient to get moving.
"20 seconds and the Golden Lion will be departing!" He roared in frustration, making the three jump and hurriedly search their pouches for coins.
"Humans... always in a hurry" muttered Vaktoth as the trio watched from the deck Sparkle vanish on the horizon. The remark drawing a chuckle from Homlin, and a laugh from Houdini, a laugh that ended as the half-elf turned his gaze from the sea to a figure standing in a shadowy corner of the deck.
Houdini's suddenly stern demeanour attracted his companions attention to the object of his stony glare. Staring across at them with sickly yellow eyes was a sinewy fanged horror. The form of a goblin.
"Who is it?" queried Vaktoth quietly. His eyes still locked on the creature, Houdini replied simply "That would be Jadavin.".
No more needed to be said. Jadavin, a foe to all these three held dear. Once, this creature ranked highly in the ranks of the army that now caused such havok in the lands. Jadavin, who once lead bands in merciless raids against any who stood in their way. Now though, he stood alone.
Raising his claymore aloft, Houdini launched himself across the deck at Jadavin, Vaktoth and Homlin quickly swarming around their leader like wolves, with sword and trident strikes leaving Jadavin bleeding heavily in no time. Outmatched and outnumbered Jadavin panicked, fleeing towards the side of the boat in a desperate attempt to escape. With a roar, Homlin hurled his runed trident at the fleeing goblin with a furious force, impaling him to the deck. With a shudder and a final gurgle, Jadavin's sickly yellow eyes closed a final time in death.
For a moment, no one moved, not even the rough crew that stared on with no small amount of wonder, until Homlin stumped over to the cooling corpse to retrieve his weapon.
"Goblin blood" he spat in disgust as he turned and stormed back to the other side of the deck. "I'll never get the smell off the trident."
"I think I chipped a tooth" muttered Houdini as he followed after Homlin, rubbing his jaw tenderly. Chuckling at the antics of his friends, Vaktoth motioned for the now slack-jawed captain to throw the remains overboard, and followed the two to the other side of the deck. Silently, the three stared out across the unending expanse of sea.
"I can't believe it" sighed Homlin, shaking his head. "2 silver!"