The Escape
“I told you to be gentle with the vault door!” Indigo shouted as he flew just above Loanna’s shoulder as they raced down a corridor of the surprisingly large Elfling dungeon.
The giantess was as big as the corridor would allow her and the large sack she carried over her shoulder. Occasionally she’d bang her head on a horizontal support beam. The beam would crack loudly but she was practically oblivious to the effect. Giants were always stronger than they appeared to be and much harder than most creatures among those of the Realms.
”Can I help it if they make those vault doors so flimsy?” Loanna rebuked as they made a sharp turn as a crashing sound behind them confirmed that they were being followed. “What were they thinking when they built it?”
“Fists of steel and soles of silk, the bigger they are the harder they laugh,” Amber said repeating an old adage regarding giants as she flew opposite Indigo. “The vault door was just there for decoration. The real guardian was inside asleep until you took care to wake IT up.”
‘IT’ was a six-hundred pound hulking green mass of tentacles known most appropriately as a Tickle Beast. Created by magic for the sole purpose of hoarding and protecting magic, they are a favorite guard for magic treasure rooms. The creature is simply a heavy lumbering body with a myriad of tentacles of all shapes and sizes that propel the beast forward at an alarming speed. The Beast’s tentacles are used to grab and tickle multiple victims at once from the size of a towering Giant or Ogre to the size of diminutive Fae Folk.
An unrelenting creature with no need for rest or sleep, Tickle Beasts have been know to hound magic thieves for days at a time if need be.
Such was the case at the moment.
“Look! Ahead!” Indigo warned as he pointed at a group of Elfling male and female sentries.
Loanna simply lowered her head and plowed through the sentries.
They were taken completely off guard. Elflings, helmets and weapons were cast in all directions.
The trio did not look back but they suddenly heard muffled cries of terror followed by a cacophony of laughter. It is sometimes said that the Tickle Beast has a roar similar to laughter, but that is not true. The characteristic roar is that of its victims being dragged behind the beast and being tickled into submission. It is not uncommon for a Tickle Beast to tickle a score or more victims at once. The more magic it takes from its victims, the more its powerful rampage grows.
“That could be us,” Amber remarked worriedly.
”We’ll cross that bridge when we get there,” Loanna said gruffly making another sharp turn.
“How will we cross that bridge?” Amber asked as she saw a group of sentries ahead set their spears at their approach. The Tickle Beast was on their heels and the sentries would halt their advance.
“Hold on to my shoulders,” Loanna ordered as she increased her speed.
“Hard skin or not, you’ll be impaled on those spears,” Indigo shouted as he grasped her shoulder firmly.
Loanna touched her magic necklace and spoke words of magic:
Gib si tervelai, kame em het zeis fo a exipi!
The necklace glowed and Loanna shrunk to the size of a pixie. Amber and Indigo held on tight because even though Loanna was the size of a pixie her weight was still many times that of a normal pixie.
They flew past the guards like a trio of sparrows and just had time to hear the guards gasp as the Tickle Beast advanced. The spears did no damage to the creature, but its tentacles were occupied taking away spears from the shocked sentries and tickle attacking them.
The trio advanced and they slowly heard growing laughter as the sentries were seized by the tickle beast.
Lalms si tervelai, kame em het zeis fo a nam!
Loanna grew back to her size that filled the corridor and they continued to advance.
“Why’d you go back to large?” Indigo asked.
”Esmeralda needs to know we’re coming,” Loanna said placing two fingers to her mouth and pursing her lips. “I need as big lungs as I can get.”
She blew and shrill loud whistle only a giant could make was heard through out the dungeon.
* * * * * *
“What was that?” Gabrielle asked as Esmeralda’s torture continued.
“My cue,” Esmeralda replied as she shook free of the shackles that Indigo had picked open before Hayden’s arrival.
In one movement she swept off Haydeen’s tickling tools. The cantrip on the multiple tools was effective with immobile victims. They fell lifelessly to the ground.
Silk was trapped in Esmeralda’s clenched fist since Indigo had picked the shackles and she held him out on her open palm for all to see!
Yarsp hey yees, peke meth huts! she commanded.
Silk sent a stream of sticky webbing into Haydeen’s eyes while Esmeralda used her other hand to open the stocks.
Haydeen was in total confusion unable to see and struggling to remove the webbing. Esmeralda watched the Elflings Serge and Gabrielle dash for the exit. She took Haydeen’s short dagger and cut her big toes loose. She then leaped through the air after the Elflings, grabbing Serge by the neck from behind in a Demon Sleeper Hold and with one of her legs she deftly trapped Gabrielle in a Demon Leg Sleeper Hold. One arm strangled Serge while the other pulled on her ankle effectively strangling Gabrielle.
They struggled for a few seconds and quickly passed out. Deana had taught her well. What might have taken a lifetime to learn on Earth, Esmeralda had mastered in matter of weeks.
She let the Elflings fall to the ground with a loud thump.
Praw reh pu, a conoco rof het yettubler!
She said the magic words to Silk and the mechanical spider obeyed. Haydeen had just barely pulled off the webbing when Silk attacked her going around her in circles tickling and spewing webbing as she went along.
In a matter of seconds, Haydeen was trapped in a cocoon of webbing.
“I have no quarrel with you,” Esmeralda said to the cocoon. “Your Elfling colleagues are another story, however.”
Lea was still in a corner of the chamber still feeling a little dazed from the Pixie Dust. She watched but it all didn’t seem to mean much to her.
“I have an idea,” Esmeralda said to herself.
* * * * *
Gabrielle was awoken by a soft slap to her cheek.
It was the Manling Esmeralda. The Tenderfoot looked upon her with a look that transmitted a deep sense of satisfaction that sent a chill up her spine.
She was in the very stocks where Esmeralda had been prisoner only moments ago. Next to her was her brother Serge in a similar set of stocks and suspended by her wrists from the ceiling by some white webbing was Lea who seemed to be recovering from a drunken stupor.
“How does it feel to be on the receiving end?” Esmeralda asked Gabrielle as she drew her fingernails lightly up and down her bare feet.
Gabrielle gasped. “Stop it!” she shouted as she laughed uncontrollably. She was a great tickler but she was hopelessly more ticklish than the great majority of her victims. She always tried to give an air of not being ticklish and she had been tickled very little since her coming of age and only by tickle mates she had had over the years.
Her most ticklish spot by far were her feet. A light breeze on her bare soles was enough to send her into a fit of giggles. Fingernails caused her to screech for mercy.
Esmeralda taunted her and enjoyed watching Gabrielle’s hopeless fit of laughter. After half a minute that seemed to be hours to Gabrielle, Esmeralda shifted her attention to Serge.
She tickled his feet as well and she laughed as she watched the Elfling male struggle and resist and finally explode when the laughter was too much to contain.
Gabrielle was short of breath. Had it been so long since she was last tickled?
”You’ll never tickle us in time and still escape the dungeon,” Gabrielle said trying to convince Esmeralda of the folly of torturing them. “There are hundreds of sentries stationed her.”
“True. I won’t deny that,” Esmeralda said drawing forth a feather from a secret pouch. “This is one of Madame Jordana’s magic feathers. It can tickle one of you quite easily into total oblivion. Who shall I leave it for?
The eldest?” she said drawing the feather softly against Gabrielle’s pretty pale sole and watching the toes clench together tightly. Gabrielle shrieked.
”The daring young male?” she asked as she tickled Serge’s bare foot making him yelp.
“Or the youngest one?” Esmeralda asked as she tickled the Elfling’s ear making her giggle uncontrollably.
“Lea! Lea!” Gabrielle and Serge shouted in unison.
“Very well,” Esmeralda replied watching Serge and Gabrielle sigh in relief.
Clekit reh llew fi hes sedo ton clekit, vegi reh pestrie fi hes sedos!
Esmeralda said and the feather glowed and came to life.
It jumped to Lea and began to tickle her lightly around the neck trying to get under her clothing. Lea giggled softly.
“It doesn’t mean you two are off the hook,” Esmeralda said.
Gabrielle felt a chill go up her spine again.
“If you tickle your cousins,” Esmeralda explained to Lea as she cut her wrists free, “the feather will ease its tickling. If not, it will grow in intensity. It’s your decision.”
Lea need not be told twice. She quickly and without a word, dashed to Gabrielle’s and Serge’s feet. She promptly tickled them both.
They both began to laugh loudly as Lea relaxed realizing that what Esmeralda has said was true.
Lea had never tickled Gabrielle or Serge ever before. The table had finally been turned. They laughed at her command as she explored their tickle spots with relish.
An evil smile appeared on Lea’s face. Such evil, nor Serge nor Gabrielle had ever seen before on their cousin’s face.
“Don’t worry about the possibility of rescue,” Esmeralda said as she approached the door. “Silk will seal the chamber off. It will take hours for them to get you free.”
Between her laughter and that of her cousin, Gabrielle heard Esmeralda say one more thing before leaving the interrogation chamber.
“Now we’re even.”
* * * * *
Esmeralda left the chamber to see Loanna and the pixies approach running at a back breaking pace.
”A Tickle Beast,” Loanna said huffing and puffing. “Right behind us.”
Esmeralda frowned, but quickly pulled Silk free and spoke again words of magic.
Nips a bew, nips a lawl, nips a lawl gronts sa tlees!
Silk glowed once more and in a flash of an eye spun a web blocking the corridor where the trio had come from.
It was not a moment too soon. The Tickle Beast crashed against the wall of web and could not pass.
“That will buy us maybe five minutes,” Esmeralda remarked. “That is some Tickle Beast. What has it tickled? A full squad of Elflings?”
“Going on a dozen, I figure,” Amber answered wiping the sweat from her brow with the back of her hand.
”There’s another difficulty I didn’t take in account,” Esmeralda said. “They brought me here under a magical sleep spell. I have no idea where the exit is.”
“I know where it is,” a voice in a nearby chamber called.
“Who is that?” Indigo asked as they entered the chamber.
”I am Lauranis, Princess of the Centaurs,” said a beautiful centaur female that was chained in the next room. “I was brought here semi-conscious and I recall the way. Free me, and I will show you.”
“I don’t know, Esmeralda,” Loanna said skeptically. “We Giants don’t get along so well with those Centaurs.”
There was a tearing sound outside and it sounded like the Tickle Beast was one step closer to breaking through.
“I am the swiftest among my kinfolk,” Lauranis urged. “Once in a gallop with my magic spear, there is no force that can stop me and no Tickle Beast that can reach me.”
The four heroes looked at each other and nodded in agreement.
Loanna broke the shackles and chains holding Lauranis prisoner. The Centaur stretched her equine legs and picked up her magic spear that was left in a corner of the chamber.
“I can’t carry the Giant though on my back,” Lauranis said cooly. “She might be a runt among her kind but she’ll break my back for certain.”
“Runt!” Loanna exclaimed shaking a fist. “I’ll show you runt, horse face!”
“Calm down,” Esmeralda ordered. “You’ll shrink down to pixie size and then that won’t be an obstacle.”
Loanna grumbled but did as ordered and Esmeralda placed her in one of her pouches. Amber and Indigo perched on her shoulders.
“Ready!” Esmeralda said as more tearing was heard at the wall. Any second the Tickle Beast will fall through.
“On my back, fair Tenderfoot,” Laurannis said kneeling on her forelegs and offering and arm to help Esmeralda on.
“Wrap your arms around my waist and hold on tight,” she ordered as she pointed her spear and broke into a light gallop. “Once I cast my spell we’ll go much faster than you can imagine.”
She spoke words of magic and the spear glowed brightly.
“And don’t tickle,” she warned. “I’m quite ticklish and I can let you know that more than one well intentioned Tenderfoot has taken a kick to the face for tickling me while galloping.”
Esmeralda nodded to herself making a mental note of the comment.
A moment later Esmeralda felt the Centaur take off like a rocket. It was all she could do to just hold on.
* * * * *
Lauranis thanked Esmeralda and her friends once they had escaped the Elfling Dungeon and were safe on the edge of the Mushroom forest. Lauranis went as far as to shake Loanna’s hand in parting friendship. It was a rare gesture of mutual respect among Giants and Centaurs.
“If you ever need help from my kin, simply mention your name and they will aid you anyway they can,” the Centaur Princess said to Esmeralda. “We are wary of Tenderfoot Manlings, but your name will be whispered favorably among all our kind.”
The Centaur lowered her spear and cast her spell and sped off away from the forest, one her way to the Centaur Realm.
“You can’t trust those Centaurs,” Loanna said shaking her head. “Fickle as a pickle on rye. Still, I am thankful we didn’t have to face the Tickle Beast or any of those Elfling sentries.”
“Let’s not be too hasty declaring victory,” Esmeralda said as she opened a hidden wormhole under a purple toadstool. “We still need to hear Madame Jordanna’s evaluation.”
* * * * *
Madame Jordanna, Mistress of the Academy, and Deana, Keeper of the Academy, listened intently to every word as Esmeralda reported their tale while they all sat seated in the Hall of Heroes surrounded by statues of the greatest spell casters and ticklers to have graduated from the Academy.
Esmeralda told the tale in detail from the moment of her capture until their escape with the Centaur Princess Lauranis.
The Elfling master spell caster listened intently to every detail but did not say anything. Once the tale was told, she spoke.
“I spent quite a bit of magic sending you there and maintaining the wormhole open to return to the Academy,” she said coolly. “What do you have to show for my efforts?”
Esmeralda nodded to Loanna and the giantess pulled forth a huge sack and dumped its contents in front of Madame Jordanna.
Hundreds of bright red magic jewels piled up upon the ground. It was a giant’s take of the spoils from the Vault deep in the Elfling Dungeon. It was as much as the giantess was able to carry in her sack.
“A king’s ransom in magic!” Deana exclaimed excitedly.
Madame Jordanna glanced at Deana sharply and the Demon became silent.
“You still have much to learn, Esmeralda,” Madame Jordanna said tersely. “You took much more risk than I would have recommended, however the spoils are indeed admirable. I’m afraid, however, that your days here at the Academy have come to an end,”
Esmeralda was shocked. She grew pale and the only thing she could utter was “Why?”
“Your mentor has come for you and I promised only to release you if you were ready,” she answered. “And as I have mentioned, you are still a far cry from a master spell caster, but you are no longer a Tenderfoot in my eyes.”
“Mentor?” Esmeralda asked in confusion.
“She means me,” called a familiar voice as a dark figure garbed in black who stepped from behind the statue of the Tickle Scourge. The black cloak was cast to one side and Esmeralda could see dark brown leather armor, a pair of fighting sticks and the blond hair and blue eyes of the woman who donned them.”
“Patrisa!” Esmeralda gasped.
To be continued….
NEXT: The Return of the Tickle Scourge!
“I told you to be gentle with the vault door!” Indigo shouted as he flew just above Loanna’s shoulder as they raced down a corridor of the surprisingly large Elfling dungeon.
The giantess was as big as the corridor would allow her and the large sack she carried over her shoulder. Occasionally she’d bang her head on a horizontal support beam. The beam would crack loudly but she was practically oblivious to the effect. Giants were always stronger than they appeared to be and much harder than most creatures among those of the Realms.
”Can I help it if they make those vault doors so flimsy?” Loanna rebuked as they made a sharp turn as a crashing sound behind them confirmed that they were being followed. “What were they thinking when they built it?”
“Fists of steel and soles of silk, the bigger they are the harder they laugh,” Amber said repeating an old adage regarding giants as she flew opposite Indigo. “The vault door was just there for decoration. The real guardian was inside asleep until you took care to wake IT up.”
‘IT’ was a six-hundred pound hulking green mass of tentacles known most appropriately as a Tickle Beast. Created by magic for the sole purpose of hoarding and protecting magic, they are a favorite guard for magic treasure rooms. The creature is simply a heavy lumbering body with a myriad of tentacles of all shapes and sizes that propel the beast forward at an alarming speed. The Beast’s tentacles are used to grab and tickle multiple victims at once from the size of a towering Giant or Ogre to the size of diminutive Fae Folk.
An unrelenting creature with no need for rest or sleep, Tickle Beasts have been know to hound magic thieves for days at a time if need be.
Such was the case at the moment.
“Look! Ahead!” Indigo warned as he pointed at a group of Elfling male and female sentries.
Loanna simply lowered her head and plowed through the sentries.
They were taken completely off guard. Elflings, helmets and weapons were cast in all directions.
The trio did not look back but they suddenly heard muffled cries of terror followed by a cacophony of laughter. It is sometimes said that the Tickle Beast has a roar similar to laughter, but that is not true. The characteristic roar is that of its victims being dragged behind the beast and being tickled into submission. It is not uncommon for a Tickle Beast to tickle a score or more victims at once. The more magic it takes from its victims, the more its powerful rampage grows.
“That could be us,” Amber remarked worriedly.
”We’ll cross that bridge when we get there,” Loanna said gruffly making another sharp turn.
“How will we cross that bridge?” Amber asked as she saw a group of sentries ahead set their spears at their approach. The Tickle Beast was on their heels and the sentries would halt their advance.
“Hold on to my shoulders,” Loanna ordered as she increased her speed.
“Hard skin or not, you’ll be impaled on those spears,” Indigo shouted as he grasped her shoulder firmly.
Loanna touched her magic necklace and spoke words of magic:
Gib si tervelai, kame em het zeis fo a exipi!
The necklace glowed and Loanna shrunk to the size of a pixie. Amber and Indigo held on tight because even though Loanna was the size of a pixie her weight was still many times that of a normal pixie.
They flew past the guards like a trio of sparrows and just had time to hear the guards gasp as the Tickle Beast advanced. The spears did no damage to the creature, but its tentacles were occupied taking away spears from the shocked sentries and tickle attacking them.
The trio advanced and they slowly heard growing laughter as the sentries were seized by the tickle beast.
Lalms si tervelai, kame em het zeis fo a nam!
Loanna grew back to her size that filled the corridor and they continued to advance.
“Why’d you go back to large?” Indigo asked.
”Esmeralda needs to know we’re coming,” Loanna said placing two fingers to her mouth and pursing her lips. “I need as big lungs as I can get.”
She blew and shrill loud whistle only a giant could make was heard through out the dungeon.
* * * * * *
“What was that?” Gabrielle asked as Esmeralda’s torture continued.
“My cue,” Esmeralda replied as she shook free of the shackles that Indigo had picked open before Hayden’s arrival.
In one movement she swept off Haydeen’s tickling tools. The cantrip on the multiple tools was effective with immobile victims. They fell lifelessly to the ground.
Silk was trapped in Esmeralda’s clenched fist since Indigo had picked the shackles and she held him out on her open palm for all to see!
Yarsp hey yees, peke meth huts! she commanded.
Silk sent a stream of sticky webbing into Haydeen’s eyes while Esmeralda used her other hand to open the stocks.
Haydeen was in total confusion unable to see and struggling to remove the webbing. Esmeralda watched the Elflings Serge and Gabrielle dash for the exit. She took Haydeen’s short dagger and cut her big toes loose. She then leaped through the air after the Elflings, grabbing Serge by the neck from behind in a Demon Sleeper Hold and with one of her legs she deftly trapped Gabrielle in a Demon Leg Sleeper Hold. One arm strangled Serge while the other pulled on her ankle effectively strangling Gabrielle.
They struggled for a few seconds and quickly passed out. Deana had taught her well. What might have taken a lifetime to learn on Earth, Esmeralda had mastered in matter of weeks.
She let the Elflings fall to the ground with a loud thump.
Praw reh pu, a conoco rof het yettubler!
She said the magic words to Silk and the mechanical spider obeyed. Haydeen had just barely pulled off the webbing when Silk attacked her going around her in circles tickling and spewing webbing as she went along.
In a matter of seconds, Haydeen was trapped in a cocoon of webbing.
“I have no quarrel with you,” Esmeralda said to the cocoon. “Your Elfling colleagues are another story, however.”
Lea was still in a corner of the chamber still feeling a little dazed from the Pixie Dust. She watched but it all didn’t seem to mean much to her.
“I have an idea,” Esmeralda said to herself.
* * * * *
Gabrielle was awoken by a soft slap to her cheek.
It was the Manling Esmeralda. The Tenderfoot looked upon her with a look that transmitted a deep sense of satisfaction that sent a chill up her spine.
She was in the very stocks where Esmeralda had been prisoner only moments ago. Next to her was her brother Serge in a similar set of stocks and suspended by her wrists from the ceiling by some white webbing was Lea who seemed to be recovering from a drunken stupor.
“How does it feel to be on the receiving end?” Esmeralda asked Gabrielle as she drew her fingernails lightly up and down her bare feet.
Gabrielle gasped. “Stop it!” she shouted as she laughed uncontrollably. She was a great tickler but she was hopelessly more ticklish than the great majority of her victims. She always tried to give an air of not being ticklish and she had been tickled very little since her coming of age and only by tickle mates she had had over the years.
Her most ticklish spot by far were her feet. A light breeze on her bare soles was enough to send her into a fit of giggles. Fingernails caused her to screech for mercy.
Esmeralda taunted her and enjoyed watching Gabrielle’s hopeless fit of laughter. After half a minute that seemed to be hours to Gabrielle, Esmeralda shifted her attention to Serge.
She tickled his feet as well and she laughed as she watched the Elfling male struggle and resist and finally explode when the laughter was too much to contain.
Gabrielle was short of breath. Had it been so long since she was last tickled?
”You’ll never tickle us in time and still escape the dungeon,” Gabrielle said trying to convince Esmeralda of the folly of torturing them. “There are hundreds of sentries stationed her.”
“True. I won’t deny that,” Esmeralda said drawing forth a feather from a secret pouch. “This is one of Madame Jordana’s magic feathers. It can tickle one of you quite easily into total oblivion. Who shall I leave it for?
The eldest?” she said drawing the feather softly against Gabrielle’s pretty pale sole and watching the toes clench together tightly. Gabrielle shrieked.
”The daring young male?” she asked as she tickled Serge’s bare foot making him yelp.
“Or the youngest one?” Esmeralda asked as she tickled the Elfling’s ear making her giggle uncontrollably.
“Lea! Lea!” Gabrielle and Serge shouted in unison.
“Very well,” Esmeralda replied watching Serge and Gabrielle sigh in relief.
Clekit reh llew fi hes sedo ton clekit, vegi reh pestrie fi hes sedos!
Esmeralda said and the feather glowed and came to life.
It jumped to Lea and began to tickle her lightly around the neck trying to get under her clothing. Lea giggled softly.
“It doesn’t mean you two are off the hook,” Esmeralda said.
Gabrielle felt a chill go up her spine again.
“If you tickle your cousins,” Esmeralda explained to Lea as she cut her wrists free, “the feather will ease its tickling. If not, it will grow in intensity. It’s your decision.”
Lea need not be told twice. She quickly and without a word, dashed to Gabrielle’s and Serge’s feet. She promptly tickled them both.
They both began to laugh loudly as Lea relaxed realizing that what Esmeralda has said was true.
Lea had never tickled Gabrielle or Serge ever before. The table had finally been turned. They laughed at her command as she explored their tickle spots with relish.
An evil smile appeared on Lea’s face. Such evil, nor Serge nor Gabrielle had ever seen before on their cousin’s face.
“Don’t worry about the possibility of rescue,” Esmeralda said as she approached the door. “Silk will seal the chamber off. It will take hours for them to get you free.”
Between her laughter and that of her cousin, Gabrielle heard Esmeralda say one more thing before leaving the interrogation chamber.
“Now we’re even.”
* * * * *
Esmeralda left the chamber to see Loanna and the pixies approach running at a back breaking pace.
”A Tickle Beast,” Loanna said huffing and puffing. “Right behind us.”
Esmeralda frowned, but quickly pulled Silk free and spoke again words of magic.
Nips a bew, nips a lawl, nips a lawl gronts sa tlees!
Silk glowed once more and in a flash of an eye spun a web blocking the corridor where the trio had come from.
It was not a moment too soon. The Tickle Beast crashed against the wall of web and could not pass.
“That will buy us maybe five minutes,” Esmeralda remarked. “That is some Tickle Beast. What has it tickled? A full squad of Elflings?”
“Going on a dozen, I figure,” Amber answered wiping the sweat from her brow with the back of her hand.
”There’s another difficulty I didn’t take in account,” Esmeralda said. “They brought me here under a magical sleep spell. I have no idea where the exit is.”
“I know where it is,” a voice in a nearby chamber called.
“Who is that?” Indigo asked as they entered the chamber.
”I am Lauranis, Princess of the Centaurs,” said a beautiful centaur female that was chained in the next room. “I was brought here semi-conscious and I recall the way. Free me, and I will show you.”
“I don’t know, Esmeralda,” Loanna said skeptically. “We Giants don’t get along so well with those Centaurs.”
There was a tearing sound outside and it sounded like the Tickle Beast was one step closer to breaking through.
“I am the swiftest among my kinfolk,” Lauranis urged. “Once in a gallop with my magic spear, there is no force that can stop me and no Tickle Beast that can reach me.”
The four heroes looked at each other and nodded in agreement.
Loanna broke the shackles and chains holding Lauranis prisoner. The Centaur stretched her equine legs and picked up her magic spear that was left in a corner of the chamber.
“I can’t carry the Giant though on my back,” Lauranis said cooly. “She might be a runt among her kind but she’ll break my back for certain.”
“Runt!” Loanna exclaimed shaking a fist. “I’ll show you runt, horse face!”
“Calm down,” Esmeralda ordered. “You’ll shrink down to pixie size and then that won’t be an obstacle.”
Loanna grumbled but did as ordered and Esmeralda placed her in one of her pouches. Amber and Indigo perched on her shoulders.
“Ready!” Esmeralda said as more tearing was heard at the wall. Any second the Tickle Beast will fall through.
“On my back, fair Tenderfoot,” Laurannis said kneeling on her forelegs and offering and arm to help Esmeralda on.
“Wrap your arms around my waist and hold on tight,” she ordered as she pointed her spear and broke into a light gallop. “Once I cast my spell we’ll go much faster than you can imagine.”
She spoke words of magic and the spear glowed brightly.
“And don’t tickle,” she warned. “I’m quite ticklish and I can let you know that more than one well intentioned Tenderfoot has taken a kick to the face for tickling me while galloping.”
Esmeralda nodded to herself making a mental note of the comment.
A moment later Esmeralda felt the Centaur take off like a rocket. It was all she could do to just hold on.
* * * * *
Lauranis thanked Esmeralda and her friends once they had escaped the Elfling Dungeon and were safe on the edge of the Mushroom forest. Lauranis went as far as to shake Loanna’s hand in parting friendship. It was a rare gesture of mutual respect among Giants and Centaurs.
“If you ever need help from my kin, simply mention your name and they will aid you anyway they can,” the Centaur Princess said to Esmeralda. “We are wary of Tenderfoot Manlings, but your name will be whispered favorably among all our kind.”
The Centaur lowered her spear and cast her spell and sped off away from the forest, one her way to the Centaur Realm.
“You can’t trust those Centaurs,” Loanna said shaking her head. “Fickle as a pickle on rye. Still, I am thankful we didn’t have to face the Tickle Beast or any of those Elfling sentries.”
“Let’s not be too hasty declaring victory,” Esmeralda said as she opened a hidden wormhole under a purple toadstool. “We still need to hear Madame Jordanna’s evaluation.”
* * * * *
Madame Jordanna, Mistress of the Academy, and Deana, Keeper of the Academy, listened intently to every word as Esmeralda reported their tale while they all sat seated in the Hall of Heroes surrounded by statues of the greatest spell casters and ticklers to have graduated from the Academy.
Esmeralda told the tale in detail from the moment of her capture until their escape with the Centaur Princess Lauranis.
The Elfling master spell caster listened intently to every detail but did not say anything. Once the tale was told, she spoke.
“I spent quite a bit of magic sending you there and maintaining the wormhole open to return to the Academy,” she said coolly. “What do you have to show for my efforts?”
Esmeralda nodded to Loanna and the giantess pulled forth a huge sack and dumped its contents in front of Madame Jordanna.
Hundreds of bright red magic jewels piled up upon the ground. It was a giant’s take of the spoils from the Vault deep in the Elfling Dungeon. It was as much as the giantess was able to carry in her sack.
“A king’s ransom in magic!” Deana exclaimed excitedly.
Madame Jordanna glanced at Deana sharply and the Demon became silent.
“You still have much to learn, Esmeralda,” Madame Jordanna said tersely. “You took much more risk than I would have recommended, however the spoils are indeed admirable. I’m afraid, however, that your days here at the Academy have come to an end,”
Esmeralda was shocked. She grew pale and the only thing she could utter was “Why?”
“Your mentor has come for you and I promised only to release you if you were ready,” she answered. “And as I have mentioned, you are still a far cry from a master spell caster, but you are no longer a Tenderfoot in my eyes.”
“Mentor?” Esmeralda asked in confusion.
“She means me,” called a familiar voice as a dark figure garbed in black who stepped from behind the statue of the Tickle Scourge. The black cloak was cast to one side and Esmeralda could see dark brown leather armor, a pair of fighting sticks and the blond hair and blue eyes of the woman who donned them.”
“Patrisa!” Esmeralda gasped.
To be continued….
NEXT: The Return of the Tickle Scourge!
