I told the group of my plan. Moira in her wolf form and the two panthers would attack the camp as far away from the sleeping goblins as possible. Open up a gap so Rodriguez could go in and get the children. As he knew them I hoped that they wouldn't be as freaked out. At the same time, I would have Damian do his cavalry charge ability right over where the goblins were sleeping. Tobias in his spectral form as it was dark now, would be right behind that.

I was hoping that that would get the ones that survived to run away, as goblins are notorious cowards. If they didn’t Damian and I would charge in and Moira would change into her Valkyrie form.

I crept up as close as I could to the side the panthers would attack. I started the fight by using my sniper shot on one of the sentries, dropping him instantly. At that signal, the panthers and Moira each took out one as well.

I looked over and saw the spectral knights appear. They were mounted on big warhorses that had on full-plate and carried huge lances. They charged straight through the camp avoiding the children.

The sleeping goblins were all caught unaware, and most were trampled to death. On the way out the charge took out a few more sentries. Tobias charged in and started to take out those goblins that were injured but not dead yet.

The remaining half dozen goblins that were still standing turned and fled, seeing most of their party dying in the last thirty seconds.

I had Moira and the panthers give chase. Rodriguez Damian and I made our way to the children and untied them. There were twelve foxkin five catkin one wolfkin and a single bearkin in the group. We then moved about two hundred or so feet away so they wouldn’t see the dead bodies and made camp again.

The kids at this point were freaking out. Some were crying, others just sat there silently staring into the darkness. As soon as I got a fire going I gathered them all around, and using some skills I learned from my dad before he died I proceeded to tell them a bedtime story, keeping my voice low, calm, and as soothing as I could.

I first had Tobias lay down in the middle of the group, the bearkin immediately snuggled up to him and seeing that Tobias didn’t mind the rest of the group soon followed. “Gather round kids, I will tell you a story about how Tobias here gave his life to protect his friend Ethel the wolf and her cubs.”

After only a couple of minutes, the children started to fall asleep one by one. When Moira and the panthers came back I moved off a bit to the side a bit to get the report. Moira transformed back into her normal form. Keeping our voices low as not to disturb the kids she gave her report. “We took them all out easily. It seemed they were heading straight towards the river. Might be worth scouting that out in the next few days.”

“Ok, I have two jobs for you, if you think you are up for it Moira. I need you to head back to the village and tell the parents there that all the children are fine. Have a few come this way in the morning with the skeletons escorting them, preferably with a cart or two to carry the kids. After you have done that I need you to head back to Storm Cove and if Grim and the rest are there give them directions to head here. If they are not leave a message with either Janet or with Dave. Have them buy as much food as they can before heading over. I have a feeling we will be staying here a while.”

“I think I can do that. Will take me about two days to get back to Storm Cove.” And with that Moira took off back to the village. I had Damian keep watch over the camp and I made my way back to where the goblin bodies were and did a search to find anything that would tell me why they took the children.

All I could find was that a few of the goblins had the same necklace with a spear symbol hanging from it. Other than that all I could find were just basic spears and a few flint daggers. These goblins were not well equipped. Most had on nothing more than a loincloth. I kept the spears daggers and necklaces and put them into my bag of holding. I then took all the bodies threw them in a heap, took a lot of dried brush and created a makeshift pyre around them, and set it alight. That way the dead bodies wouldn’t attract any predators.

By the time I was done making sure that the fire would do its job it was almost dusk. So I made my way back to the camp and slowly started to wake the children up. I had a small amount of food left and gave all of it to the children. It wasn’t much but it would make do until we got back to the village.

I had some of the younger fox-kin children get onto the panthers each easily able to carry three each. Two more fitted on the Rodriguez’s boar Then had the rest get onto Tobias. The only ones who didn’t fit were the bear-kin and the wolf-kin. Damian and I each lifted one onto our shoulders, and with that, we started to slowly make our way back.

About two hours later we ran into the skeletons and about half a dozen villagers dragging a couple of carts. A few of the children leaping off the mounts and running to what I assumed were their parents. They told us that the camp was attacked twice during the night but with the help of the skeletons had been able to chase off the goblins each time. All the villagers were going to keep themselves up in the trees until the group returned.

After a small rest, I had Tobias and the boar get hitched up to the carts and had the villagers and the kids get onto them. I had the drummer boy sit in one of the wagons to entertain the kids. Making some good time we got back to the village a few hours after midday.

When we got back the whole village came down. I set up the skeletons to form a perimeter sentry and Damian joined them. The elderly fox-kin village-head came up to me.

“Thank you for saving the children. Yesterday was a bit chaotic and I don’t think that I properly introduced myself. I am Chief Horace the person in charge of the village. But you can just call me Horace.” Then followed with stage whisper “Everyone else does.”

“Any idea why the goblins attacked?” I asked

“Our scouts have seen the goblins on the other side of the river before. They seem to work together with the orcs to the north. As we hadn’t seen them on this side before we assumed that they wouldn’t cross the river just like the orcs. We were wrong.” Horace scowled.

“We will stay here for a while. Help you rebuild the village. I have sent my companion back to Storm Cove to get more of my friends to join me here. When they get here we can see about scouting the river to see where they were coming from.” Horace looked relieved when I told him that.

“We don’t really have anyone that is able to fight in the village. Most of our fighters died in the battle yesterday. We have only a few hunters and scouts left. Speaking of which.” And he then turned to Rodriguez. “Good work in helping to get the kids back. I need you to round up the hunters and scouts. Have a few keep a lookout for more goblins. The rest need to start hunting for some food as a lot of our food-stores were burned down.”

“I'll help as well.” And I took out my bow. “Between me and the panthers, we should be able to track down some larger game.”

Before I moved out I decided to use a few more path points.

I decided to pump all the command points into Moira’s wolves. Taking them up to 40 total points.

I then used up one more point to unlock the next level of skeletons.

Too bad I didn’t get a new unit slot as archers would be helpful at this point.

The next few days we got busy. I spent most of the time hunting and making sure everyone had enough food.

I had half the skeletons on the perimeter now keeping watch. The rest of them and the villagers I had chopping down trees to make a palisade and have a clear line of sight for at least 50 feet beyond that. I anchored the palisade between the furthest most tree houses and used them as makeshift lookout posts. Inside that we rebuilt had most of the houses by the time Moira came back with Grim and the rest of the group. It seemed that the twins' parents and their group tagged along as well.