I followed the shore of the tiny lake until the water started to flow a little faster and came across the small ditch he’d been digging. It hadn’t cut all the way to the waterline yet, but it was obviously planned as his irrigation canal. I rinsed my clay covered shirt in the lake there, then wrung it out and put it on wet before following the canal into the woods. The clammy feel of the rough fabric against my skin was unpleasant, and I realized I should have grabbed my spare shirt when I was back up at the keep. It was too late to worry about it now, and I followed the ditch into the tree line. There were a couple of points where he must have put some serious effort in chopping out roots in his irrigation line and I wondered why he didn’t just start the field somewhere else. I decided I’d just blindly fall in with the professional in hopes he actually knew what he was doing and continued to walk.

When I reached the clearing John had chosen, I figured out that Steve and Allison had finished up the trap line already and kicked down to help John. It didn’t look like he needed the manpower much, as all three were sitting on their ass playing in the dirt.

“Y’all living the hard life of a farmer? I always heard the best way to starve a farmer to death was to weld his mailbox shut.”

John took offense, “I always heard Jack was a fucking asshole. I ain’t exactly got a rototiller or anything here. I turned the soil over, but we’ve got to separate out the weeds and grass before we plant if we are going to have any chance of growing a crop. Ain’t no herbicide here, at this tech level it’s done by hand.”

I nodded in what I hoped was a placating way. “Alright, I’ll help. Ya’ll scooch over.”

Allison shook her head, “Nope.”

Steve held up the end of the entrenching tool. “You dig up the soil before sieving it. Start from the edge of the disturbed area and only work out as far as you believe you’ll be able to finish today.”

Everybody had to dig their own patch apparently. It sounded fair enough, but I passed on using their folding excuse for a shovel and got a proper spade out of my messenger bag. I used a boot to shove it down through the turf, and started to dig. It was a weird feeling, digging a hole and immediately filling it back in. It took the strain out of lifting the spoil very far, and I got into the habit of just kind of rotating the shovel on each scoop to spill the earth back as a part of the initial digging stroke. I was zoned out, focused on the mechanics of it, trying to find the most efficient way to do this when I heard voices cry out in warning.

I spun around just in time to see something huge come charging out of the treeline. It was probably as big as the bear, and my brain said horse, then stuttered and corrected it to moose. Pissed off moose intent on trampling me for killing its squirrel or something. I swung my shovel without thinking about it. It was a graceless lateral baseball type swing, and it made a metallic clang as the thing tossed those giant antlers to the side. I felt the vibration clear through to the balls of my feet. Before I could draw back to swing again it had closed the distance, swinging its antlers back to the other side but down low into my legs.

I tried to jump them. I know that the spread of the things rack was probably 10 or 12 feet altogether, and I probably couldn’t have cleared them with a running start, much less caught flat footed and carrying a shovel. It’s hard to think fast when you’re charged by a mutant moose, and when I saw it’s nose swing around and the antlers come towards me, I tried to jump them. The first went by underneath like I planned, but the second was still coming full speed after my jump had peaked and I came down into them. I’d like to say I jumped off it’s antlers in a crouching tiger hidden moose kind of move but that didn’t happen. My boots came down and made contact, but not at exactly the same time. I tried to straighten my leg and kick off, but the pain of the impact and the speed involved were too much for even my decent reflexes. The hit shoved at me, but not just up and out. It was swinging to the side even as it charged forward, so the hit came in at and angle. My feet flew out moving faster than my body and I inverted while I was in the air. I don’t know if I did a 360 in the air, or maybe spun a couple of times. I just know I saw the ground flash in front of me, and then the sky, and then I lost track until I hit.

I blacked out from either the spin or the landing, but I came to laying on my belly in the grass of the meadow. I immediately scrambled to my feet and looked for danger, and it was easy to find. Steve was chanting and a golden glow surrounded John as he slammed his hatchets repeatedly into the moose’s antlers. The moose was pushing forward unsuccessfully against the glow, and using its natural defenses to fend off John’s blows in a kind of impasse. It can’t have gone on too long. As I watched Allison finally moved far enough out on it’s flank to have a clear line of sight at the beast, and she immediately let fly an arrow. It sank into the thick bunch of muscle at the hump on its back. Definitely not a kill shot, but the thing must have known one was on the way. It spun around and charged out of the clearing, moving so abruptly John didn’t get a lick in when it turned away. By the time I staggered over to the others they had regrouped and were peering cautiously into the woods.

“Damnit, I lost an arrow. What the hell was that thing?”

I was quick to answer because I was tired of people coming up with stupid names for these animals.

“They call those a Hell Moose. You’ve never seen one before?”

John spit and slid his hatchets into the little holsters he’d put in the side of his overalls. “What kind of stupid name is hell moose?”

Steve fielded that one for me. “It was obviously a moose. A caribou is smaller, and an elk has a more slender nose. Hell probably refers to its aggressive and generally disagreeable behavior.”

The other two stared at Steve but I nodded along. “Obviously.”

I felt like I had had the shit kicked out of me, which was oddly appropriate, and I flopped down to rest in the meadow while Steve and John went back to work. This marked the second time I got into the shit without remembering to cast obsidian skin first and I decided right then to quit sinking points into magic I wouldn’t even use. Allison stood guard with an arrow knocked and I had a feeling that was something we were going to do a lot more from now on. In a remarkably short time I felt almost human again, the regeneration points were amazing, and I rolled over and got up to pitch in. I’d only worked for a little while when John called it and we all headed back to the keep for food.