fantasy – The Odd Cat Lady

The Adventures of Garl and Odra Manyboots- Heatwaves and Zombies

“Gaaaarlll… it’s fucking hot ooouuuut…”

Garl groaned softly but made no attempt to move from his place under the tree or to even open his eyes. Odra rolled across the ground and finally came to a stop in front of the gargoyle.

“How is it so hot? It’s not even midday yet. And I’m gonna burn to death.”

“It’s a heat wave, Odra,” Garl said, trying to be patient with the cranky child that was his companion. “We’re taking the day off from getting to the Underdark because of it, calm the fuck down and stop moving so much. Movement brings up your body heat. You’re not helping yourself.”

“Everything makes you hotter though!” Odra complained, throwing her arms up in the air. “Drinking booze makes you hotter, dancing makes you hotter, the only thing that cools you down is snow, ice, or a lake! And we have none of those!”

Garl sighed and pressed his hands to his temples. The heat was giving him a headache. “Odra. Are you naked?” he asked a question he already knew an answer to.

The Adventures of Garl and Odra Manyboots- Bathtime

“NO! LET ME GO! FIENDS! MURDERERS! SOMEONE HELP ME, HE’S GOING TO KILL ME!”

“Odra, it’s a fucking bath. Let go of the wall.”

Dullahan paused when he saw Odra gripping onto the front door for dear life while Garl tried to pull her free. “Won’t she melt if she’s put in water?” he asked.

“No, she showers in the rain all the time, but she’s starting to smell like week’s old garbage,” Garl grunted as he gave her another yank. “The guild master said either she takes a bath or he’s giving her the boot.”

“I’ll take the boot! I’ll take the boot! Don’t put me in the bath!” Odra shrieked.

The Adventures of Garl and Odra Manyboots- The Showdown with the Black Knight

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“Calipha. So this is where you’ve ended up. How have you been?”

Calipha clenched her jaw as she lifted her mace in front of her, staring down the smarmy bastard of an aasimar smirking at her.

“Calipher. I’ve been worse. Now leave.”

“No welcome for your brother?” Calipher tutted his tongue. “Shame. Not even inviting me in for tea and-”

Calipha didn’t even look, she slammed her mace into the face of the raider trying to sneak up on her right. The man dropped to the ground with a scream, clutching onto his broken nose. Calipher cackled and tossed his head back.

“Very well then. Least you’ve learned a thing or two since we’ve last seen each other.”

The Adventures of Garl and Odra Manyboots- When Garl Met Odra

Three years ago…

There was something following him in the brush.

Garl wouldn’t have noticed it if he hadn’t dropped a few gold out of his pouch. Damn thing had a hole in it. He’d bent over to pick the coins up when he saw the brush twitch. Just a little twitch, just enough that he knew something was there. It wasn’t an animal. An animal would run. No, this thing was following him. It was intelligent.

It was hunting him.

How adorable.

Garl waited. Whatever was hiding there couldn’t have been very big. Probably a pissed off gnome from that caravan he hit a few days ago. He didn’t even take much, he just fucked their day for giggles. Not like there was anything else to do. Gods, could he be any more fucking bored?

The Adventures of Garl and Odra Manyboots – Battle at Dimborough

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Traveling with Aunva and her party was quite enjoyable. Even if things started off on the wrong foot by Aunva announcing she’d gotten horses for the whole party and Odra screamed in terror, Garl quickly resolved things by plopping Odra on his back and declining to take the draft horse that she’d secured for him- even an enormous steed like that would struggle to carry a pure stone gargoyle. That was fine, they’d just use his horse to carry their supplies, and by every god masked and unmasked Aunva did not know how to pack light.

It was fun traveling at first. Aunva’s men always competed with each other to see who would be lucky enough to sleep in the same tent with her, striving to always have her approval. Dullahan was a hell of a story teller, keeping them all preoccupied in the daylight hours when they had to stop since Aunva couldn’t travel then. Sylvia’s dark sense of humor had Odra laughing and Sahsi looking paler than ever.

It was a great time… until they reached their destination.

The Adventures of Garl and Odra Manyboots- The Knight in Black Armor

Smoke. Smoke and blood.

Odra stumbled back in the village, spinning around and around to look for any survivors. Any at all. All she could see were corpses. Corpses of her fellow goblin defenders, but also the bodies of the elders, the farmers, the ones that just stayed home to mind the village… the ones who never hurt a fly.

Why? Why would someone do this? Odra weaved through the ruins and the death, whipping her head back and forth as she searched for her friends. “Mitemouth? Fatgut? Where are you guys!?” she called out. “Pach? Uglap? Anyone?! Clammaw?! Hello!? Come on, this isn’t funny anymore! Get out here, you all can’t be dead!”

They couldn’t be. She’d only ran away from the fight as a joke. They couldn’t be dead because of her joke.

Her pace picked up as she reached the center of the village, where some of the fires were still going. The smell of burning flesh made her eyes water but she sped up, the babies were there, if they weren’t moved away the fire would soon-

Odra skidded to a dead stop as she realized the fire was located inside of the pen.

No. They couldn’t have been that cruel.

But they’d been crueler.

The Adventures of Garl and Odra Manyboots- Garl and Odra Meet Dullahan and Sylvia

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Odra and Garl.

Garl and Odra.

That was all they needed. No one but them. The perfect pair.

“Who the FUCK are you two!?”

This was a simple job- clear out the abandoned tower from the squatters inside. The typical affair. Your typical shifty bunch. Easy peasy. So when Odra and Garl popped out the other end of the trail to almost (quite literally) run into a pair that were clearly plotting on the best way to enter the house.

The Adventures of Garl and Odra Manyboots- Witch Hunt

“Garl. There’s someone at our table. I want her gone.”

Garl grimaced as he lifted his head off the bar just enough to look at his minuscule partner. “Mmm? What’s that? What time is it?” He murmured.

“How much did you drink last night?” Odra rolled her eyes. “Whatever. I got down here, there’s a bitch at our table, and she wants to talk to us. Says she has a job. Are you sober enough to hear it so she’ll leave?”

Grumbling, Garl slipped off the bar stool, cracking his neck before looking up at the corner table that Odra claimed was ‘theirs’. Sure enough, there was someone there- two hobgoblin bodyguards and one fine lady they were accompanying. She had fiery red hair down to her waist, the slit in her dress went up her thigh… she was a sight for mortal and god alike. She spotted Garl and winked, and like that Garl was wide awake. The gargoyle bolted to his normal seat, nearly trampling an unfortunate gnome on his way to get there.

Odra sighed. “Every time it’s a hot one…” she murmured to herself before following her companion. She pulled herself up onto her chair and glowered at the ‘table thief’. “Sup.”

The Adventures of Garl and Odra Manyboots- A Rough Introduction

It seemed the Eswa Adventurer’s Guild was the place to be tonight. The music was playing, the beer was flowing… And at the bar, Sterling Van Broom, a broomstick of a man with a curled handlebar mustache and a haughty expression was discussing some more sinister work with the guild master.

“So, do you have anyone for the job?”

The guild master sighed, rubbing his right temple and cursing the god that brought this man into his guild. He glanced over the adventurers in the room, the happy go lucky halflings singing about their latest heroics, the cheery gnomes playing cards, the delighted elves and humans mingling together after the successful defeat of a red dragon… and then his gaze stopped at the table in the far corner, tucked away just out of sight from anyone casually entering the guild.

“For something like that, you’re gonna want Manyboots and her friend,” the guild master said, pointing towards that table.