text: In your eagerness to fight at Jon’s side, you forget the most important lesson of your training: always dodge.
  
  
  A troll whips a horse leg in your direction. Off balance and off guard, you cannot avoid the hurling limb as the hoof nails you in the shoulder, severing your sword arm. Blood spouts like a geyser from your body as you crumple to the road.
  
  
  “Bowie, help Jon!” Samwellington shrieks. “I’ve got the kid.” Samwellington stumbles to your side and rolls you onto your back. “Hang in there little buddy. It’s going to be alright.”
  
  
  Blood loss is making you delusional. It is the only way to explain what is happening. Samwellington draws his dagger and sticks himself in the gut. He drags the blade across his stomach, slips his hand into the incision, and pulls out a chunk of his own fat. He smacks the lard on your wound and it sticks in place, stemming the blood flow.
  
  
  “Can you walk?” asks Samwellington.
  
  
  “Can I walk? Can I walk! I just had my fucking arm cleaved off. What the fuck do you think?”
  
  
  “Yeah, an arm, not a leg. Don’t be a baby.”
  
  
  “Sam we could really use your fat ass over here,” shouts Bowie. “Any motherfucking time!”
  
  
  You hear a gurgle and a gasp just before Bowie’s head goes sailing through the air. Samwellington gulps and scurries away to hide behind the wreckage of the wagon. What a coward. Oh well, at least he saved your life.
  
  
  Leaning against your sword, you stagger to your feet. One of the trolls ravages Bowie’s headless corpse. The crunching and snapping of bones sickens you, and you fight the urge to hurl as bile tickles your throat. Jon appears to be holding his ground against the other troll, but once his friend finishes devouring Bowie’s corpse, even Jon won’t be able to fend off their combined savagery. You have to do something quick or all of your worthless lives will be over.
  > You charge into the fray.
  You throw caution and sanity to the wind and charge into the fray.
  
  
  Well, charge is a kind term. You mostly stagger along the blood-slicked road, swaying from side to side, until you topple over and slam your head against the cobblestones. Your sword flies from your grasp and slides beyond your reach. Adjusting to missing limbs takes time.
  
  
  Both trolls look up, and in your blurred vision, you swear they are laughing at you.
  
  
  Mocked by a troll, you think, how embarrassing.
  
  
  Jon takes advantages of your momentary distraction and hacks his troll in the legs, sending the beast to its knees. The troll roars. Jon drives his blade into the troll’s open mouth and out the back of its throat. One down.
  
  
  The second troll grabs the remnants of Bowie’s body and rushes toward you. The troll stands above you and squeezes the juices from what used to be Bowie, taking care to cover every inch of you in Bowie juice. The stink is agonizing.
  
  
  “Oh my god,” Samwellington cries, “He’s marinating you!”
  
  
  “Just kill me you son of a bitch,” you sputter as you spit some of the vile goop from your mouth.
  
  
  The troll grips you by the shoulders and bares his teeth. The tip of a blade tears through the troll’s chest. Troll blood and the sweet smell of apples descend upon you. And the troll’s lifeless corpse… which crushes you.