Stolen Lives: A LitRPG/GameLit Novel (The Underhill Chronicles Book 1) Keith Ahrens (best e reader for epub txt) 📖

she smiles up at us. “That was one hell of a ride. Had to drag myself under the traces and harness to put the fire out, then I couldn't get back up. I was just hoping these beasts would run out of steam before we went off a cliff,” she finishes with a tired laugh. She sees the remains of her wagon, still burning in the meadow, and her smile fades. “Shit. We just lost another five good people.”

There's nothing I can say to make that any better, so I say nothing. We sit down in the mud near her. Miles hops down from the back of Colt's wagon and joins us. He passes her a waterskin he found from under the driver’s seat. She accepts it with a grateful nod and takes a deep drink. Then she passes it to me with a weary smile. We all decide to take a break and wait for the others to catch up with us. After a while, I finally realize that it's stopped raining.

“So, what happened with that last guy?” I ask as I stand to greet Haynes and Grayson walking their horses over to our impromptu camp as we begin breaking out our meager rations.

“He got away,” Haynes says simply.

“Ha! The elven bastard started to cast something, and the Sarge shot him like a gunslinger! But then he just teleported away after throwing some kind of crystal on the ground. Effing coward,” says Grayson in his loud, booming voice.

“All right, folks. Five-minute break, then we gotta get moving,” says Haynes, still scanning the road.

Jesse's wagon pulls up a few minutes later. “Got another wounded for the physicians!” I run over to the wagon and see Thirax curled up in a ball, lying in between the benches. There is also a pile of dead elves stacked behind him, but that doesn't seem as important right now. Thirax opens one bright yellow eye and stares at me.

“I hurt, human. Go and fetch our healer.”

“Can't. Thorn is busy keeping Nian alive. I'm all you got.”

Now, I don't speak Gnoll, but the obvious translation here is, “Shit.”

It’s tough to tell with all the fur, but he seems to have amassed an impressive collection of bruises, lacerations, and abrasions. And what appears to be a broken spine. He can't move his right leg, and his left leg is weak. His right arm is broken clean in half at the upper arm, but like the bruises and small cuts, it's not the big worry.

I carefully help him to roll over onto his stomach. I explain to him what’s going on, and he seems to accept it, his demeanor stoic and hard. I take a small knife from his belt and cut away some of the leather padding above his spine. The metal plates must have been knocked off during the impact. They probably saved his life, absorbing a lot of the impact before being torn away.

I run my hand down his spine until I feel his muscles tense in pain, and a small growl escapes his lips. Gentle palpation allows me to feel jagged bits of bone, like a small bag of broken glass under his skin. This is bad.

I lean back to retrieve the healing stones when Thirax grabs my wrist.

“Human, promise me that if this does not work, you will not let me endanger the Pack. You will leave me with a weapon, and the Pack will go on to the gate!”

I squat down in front of him. Time to deliver the ‘bad news speech.’ “Look, Thirax—”

He cuts me off and squeezes my wrist with a surprising amount of strength. “Promise me, or leave me be now!”

I freeze for a moment, feeling his feral anger and fear. Anger at himself and his injuries, and fear of jeopardizing his Pack. He sees my hesitation and activates his own stat sheet. Scanning down the page, I see he has half his Hit Points and his ‘Base Movement’ is down to 5 feet. Under ‘Special Conditions’ it simply says ‘Paralyzed-both legs.’ Ah, shit.

Hooking his claws onto the top of my breastplate, he pulls me toward the image, forcing me to look right at it. “I lose strength as we argue, soon it will be too late anyway.”

“All right… I promise.”

He relaxes his grip and sighs. Then he closes his eyes and nods.

I take a healing stone, the fresh one, and place it on his shattered spine. I leave the depleted one in my belt pouch. I take a deep breath and try to calm my thoughts and relax my mind, forcing myself to go slowly and not burn out. I struggle against the need to fix this horrific wound quickly before shock sets in and he dies anyway. On second thought, I take the drained stone out and place it next to the first one. Couldn’t hurt. Then I get to work.

After an eternity, or perhaps twenty minutes, I can't feel any more injuries and no more broken bones scraping together. But what I do sense is blood flowing and electrical impulses traveling past the healed section of spine. From here, I see the full red of his tat through his course fur.

Slumping back, I let both stones disintegrate in my hand, the dust falling through my fingers. I close my eyes and wish I could sleep for just a minute (or two more) as exhaustion overwhelms me.

Nope. Two hundred pounds of deliriously happy Gnoll is pulling me up and into a rib-crushing bear hug. “You have restored my legs, human! The Pack is stronger for having you!”

The hug goes on way too long for comfort, but then he releases me and hops out of the wagon, stumbling a little.

“Take it easy for a bit, you might be a little weak for a time,” I admonish the giant dog-man as I climb down. We kind of lean on each other as we make our way back to the rest of the group.

Vince is sitting next