by L. S. Emory
I was starting to understand why wizards and goblins didn’t get along. But I knew that I had to keep my emotions under control. I couldn’t get mad. I thought about it for a minute, staring back at him the way that he stared at me. I needed him to agree to this.
“Even split. 50/50.”
He didn’t move. No facial expression. No anger in his eyes. No laughter at my offer. I bet he was a good poker player, if goblins played poker.
“I don’t need to find what the map is leading to. You do. And I’m assuming more risk. And more loss of income. The longer I wait to find that elf, the easier it is for him to get away,” he replied. “Behind door number one, you go through the forest alone, maybe get lost, maybe get killed, and don’t pass your test. Behind door number two, you get whatever we are looking for, and we split anything else we find 60/40, my way. Which door are you going to choose, Annabeth?”
He was right. He didn’t need me. This goblin was smart. “Fine. I choose door number two.”
“Let’s make a deal!” Kirby exclaimed, throwing his arms in the air.
“I thought that’s what we were doing,” I said, getting tired of this conversation.
“Well, yes, you know, the game show?”
I didn’t know what he was talking about and said so. But it didn’t matter. Time was wasting. We needed to get moving now that we had an understanding.
“I swear, the younger generations. Didn’t you ever study human history? It wouldn’t be a bad idea to do so if you ever plan on living out there in the rest of the world, outside the magical cities.”
“I did, but we did not study game shows.” I tapped my finger on the map, trying to get him to focus. “Can we get started now, or do you want to teach me more about things that I don’t care about?”
“You don’t have to get snippy about it,” Kirby said with a huff. He looked down at the map again. “First thing is that we have to get back on the path. Follow me. And try not to make any noise. We don’t want anyone or anything to know that we are out here. And keep your eyes open. Keep looking.”
“For what,” I asked.
“For anything that moves.”
Chapter 13
It didn’t take us long to get back on the path. We weren’t as far off as I had thought. The forest was quiet, at least from what I could hear. I knew that Kirby could probably hear better than I could, if for no other reason than his ears were so much bigger than mine. But I wasn’t going to trust him or his hearing. I did just as he instructed, constantly looking around and being aware of any strange sounds.
Every few feet, he would look at the map again, and point in the direction that we were going to walk. I would start to say something, but he would immediately put his finger to his mouth, meaning that I should be quiet. I tried to not let my mind wander, but I couldn’t help but think about what we were walking towards. I had no idea what I was looking for. Cody had disappeared before I could ask any questions that would help me.
All of a sudden, I felt something burn in my nose. There was something in the air, a putrid smell, so bad that it made me stop. I touched Kirby on the shoulder to get him to stop.
“What is it? You see something? You hear something?” He whispered to me, holding his staff out in a fighting stance, darting his eyes from side to side.
Then I realized what it was. “I smell smoke,” I whispered back to him.
He stuck his knows up in the air and sniffed. “You have a good nose. I barely smell it. Which direction?”
I breathed in again. I wasn’t sure, but I thought I could point out the general direction. “Over there,” I pointed.
Kirby leaned on his staff, staring out in the direction that I had pointed. “There’s a clearing over in that direction, a little way deeper, past where those trees get thicker. Smoke means fire. Something’s burning.”
Well, that was obvious. The question was, what was burning? “Could the forest be on fire? I’ve seen what wildfires have done out in California, and if that’s what’s happening, we have to get out of here in a hurry.”
“No, that’s not it. First of all, there isn’t enough smoke for a forest fire. I’ve seen fires like that, and this isn’t nearly that big. And this isn’t California. It’s the southeastern U.S. There aren’t fires in this part of the country like that. They did teach you basic geography in that fancy school, didn’t they?”
“Yes, and I know where we are. The question is, what is burning? And what does it matter? We have a mission. We don’t have time to be bothered with this.”
Kirby shook his head. “Unfortunately, we do have to be bothered by this. Look,” he said, pointing on the map. “It’s right in the path that the map is showing us that we are supposed to be going.”
I looked down at the map. He was right. The path highlighted on the map was going straight through where I thought the smoke was coming from. And that was the only section of the map that was being shown, so I couldn't see any alternate routes. “Can we go around it? You’ve been around here before, right? Where do we go?” I asked.
“This is the path that is on the map. First, it is the one that the map is showing us, so I suppose there is a reason for that. Second, no, we can’t go around. The forest is pretty thick on both sides. We could try backtracking to where I had my trap and go come up the other side of the forest, but that would pose certain challenges.”
“Like what?”
“You don’t want to know. That’s the dark side of the forest. Nasty things over there. I wouldn’t even chase a bounty over on that side.”
Kirby shivered as he said that. “Then I guess we only have one choice. What do you think it is? A dragon, maybe?” I tended to look for the worst-case scenario first.
“Don’t be silly, Annabeth. There is no such thing as dragons.”
“Says the goblin to the wizard,” I mumbled.
“You’re not a wizard yet. Come on. Let’s do some recognizance. I don’t want to walk into something that we’re not prepared for.” He pointed his head toward the smoke and started walking. I knew that dragons weren’t real. Dragons were things that showed up in children’s stories, to scare us into not wandering off from home, or in to the human world.
I was also aware that I was not a wizard yet. Kirby didn’t have to keep reminding me. It was the only thing that I had been thinking about ever since I started at the school. And it was especially on my mind today. But I was a wizard, and I knew it. I was there to prove it.
I always wondered what humans thought about people like me. Granted, they had their stories, books, and movies about supernaturals. They would probably freak out if they knew how many supernaturals worked in Hollywood, or that how close to the truth some of the things that they read and watched were. But that also worked in our favor. The more they believed we weren’t real, the more they rationalized their encounters with us. That kept the supernatural races safe.
When I was younger, my parents took me to Atlanta to visit the zoo and the aquarium. They explained that seeing the different animals was something that we had in common with humans. Both supernaturals and humans shared the world with one another. And we both had a responsibility to care for our world. That applied to more than just animals. That’s one of the reasons that supernaturals worked with humans in government, the military, and business. Supernaturals may have only been a small part of the world’s population compared to the humans, but we still did our part.
Of course, some things were different. I remember asking my parents where the unicorns and hippogriffs were at the zoo. A human couple were walking by and overheard me. They just laughed. I was asking a serious question. My parents explained to me that humans thought they knew about every species of the animal kingdom but didn't’ really know about some that we knew about. Some animals were in places that were controlled more by supernaturals, so humans didn’t have the same access that we did. They told me that had to be our secret.
I loved the animals, so I told my parents I w
ouldn’t tell anyone. Not that I had anyone to tell that didn’t already know. I had not had any interaction with humans, at least without parental supervision. My parents would occasionally take me to safe public places like the zoo and the aquarium in nearby human cities, or while we were on vacations, so I wouldn’t grow up being afraid of the humans. And it worked. I wasn’t scared. I didn’t really see a lot of difference between us and them. Except, of course, being able to do magic.
And if they knew that a want-to-be wizard and a goblin were out in a forest evading a werewolf and following a treasure map made by someone from a race from a different world, they might freak out even more.
“We’ll try to get as close as we can without being seen,” Kirby said, interrupting my thoughts. “Or heard,” he said gruffly, his eyes pointing down towards my feet.
It wasn’t that easy being quiet in a forest. I had been able to carefully step around the crunchy brown leaves that were all over the ground fairly well. But not always. I wasn’t used to being careful like this. I was used to paved streets and sidewalks.
“I’ll try to be quiet,” I replied.
“Yeah, and try not to get us killed,” he said, staring in the direction of the smoke rising above the trees. He then took off, hardly making a sound. I didn’t know if this was common for goblins to be that quiet, or if Kirby had just learned how to do this in his line of work. “Follow me,” he grunted.
I didn’t like being told what to do. That’s another one of my problems. Or virtues, depending on who you asked. Strong-willed is what my mother used to call me, which was far kinder than what Aunt Linda used to call me. My father always told me that being my own person and thinking for myself were things that would help me succeed in life. “Strong-willed people will change the world, Annabeth, because the world won’t change them.”
We crept across the path, with me following as instructed. I wasn’t about to take any unnecessary chances, despite my ego. As we got closer, the wind shifted, pushing more of the smoke in our direction. Now I could not only smell the smoke, but I could feel it against my skin.
“Over there, behind that fallen tree,” Kirby whispered, while poking me with his staff. “Get lower to the ground.”
“Alright, alright. Watch it with that thing.” I bent down as far as I could, and followed him, scurrying across as fast as possible. My knees started to ache pretty quickly. I wasn’t made for this kind of exercise. Wizards don’t usually run with our backs bent over. We generally prefer some type of teleportation spell. Or just a casual stroll. Strolling would feel a lot better right about now. Finally, we made to the huge pine tree that was laying across the path. I collapsed behind it, pushing my back against the trunk of the tree and facing the direction that we had just come from.
“I thought you were going to be quiet,” Kirby said.
“I am being quiet,” I replied, between gasps of air.
“I could hear you huffing and puffing from a mile away.”
“I’m sure you could. You just have to point those radar dish sized ears in the right direction.”
“This is no time to be funny,” Kirby said as he started mashing buttons on his staff.
“Well at least you think I’m funny.”
“I assumed you were trying to be funny. And failing miserably at it,” he replied. “And these ears are the normal size for a goblin of my age, height, and weight.”
“Ok. Don’t get so defensive. Why are we stopped here?”
“We are here…” he said as as he placed his staff horizontally across the tree trunk, “...to take a better look at where that smoke is coming from.” He rotated s couple of the sections of the staff, pushed three buttons, and pulled what looked like lens caps off of both ends of the staff. He then pointed the staff towards the smoke, and looked through the end, like looking through a telescope.
I hadn’t even looked in that direction since we had gotten there. I had been too out of breath. I turned around, careful to not make any sound, and looked to where he was pointing the staff. There were a lot of leaves and branches in the way, but I could barely make out what looked to be flames.
“I thought that was a staff,” I said. “I didn’t know it was a telescope.”
“It’s both,” Kirby replied, still adjusting various parts of the staff. “That’s something you will finally figure out one day.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“Dualistic thinking. Judging everything in the world, placing everything in to categories. What happens if things have traits, or aspects that put them in to more than one category at one time? The world is complex, and nothing is just ‘one thing.’”
“I have no idea what you are talking about.”
“And don’t judge a book by its cover!”
I didn’t have time for this. I could tell that my temper was getting shorter and shorter the longer I was with Kirby. “How about we save the philosophy lecture for later? Do you see anything?”
“I do. Just let me me finish adjusting the infrared and x-ray settings…” he said. “Oh, no…”
“What is it? What do you see?” I whispered loudly.
Kirby was silent for a few moments, staring intently through the end of the staff. “I see trouble. Big, big trouble.”
Chapter 14
“What kind of trouble? And how big?”
Kirby looked back at me. “Bad trouble, bigger than you’ve ever imagined that you would see, I’ll wager. It’s a camp. The smoke is coming from a fire in the center. It looks like something is being cooked. Or worse.”
“Why are there campers out here?” I asked.
“They’re not campers. It’s a camp, as in some kind of base. Sometimes poachers come out here. Scumbags. They hunt the animals of the forest. Supernatural animals.”
“For what reason?”
“You can just about name any reason. The thing is, these hunters are humans. I have no idea how they even find the forest, much less do any hunting in here without getting themselves killed. Griffins, balding bears, vampire boars, our friend the werewolf we saw earlier, it doesn't matter. Those animals, dead or alive, will bring top dollar in the human black market. The humans will take pictures of them, and sell them as proof of whatever cockamamie conspiracy theory of the week their trying to pull on others. The animal parts will be sold to the witches, or other humans that try to tap into black magic. Magic that is dark and evil.” Kirby then turned and spat on the ground. “These hunters have no respect for the forest, for the animals, or for the balance of nature. Sometimes these hunters don’t make it out alive. Sometimes they do. From the way it looks, whoever is there might be one of the ones that do.”
“Why do you say that?” I asked.
“Because they’re still here. Nothing has killed them yet. This isn’t a place that people come out to for a picnic. This forest is filled with magic. More magic than you can understand. The fact that they are here and set up camp means that they have something, magic, weapons, something that is giving the power to stay alive.”
“So they might not be human?” I asked. It would make more sense for a supernatural to be out here than a human. I didn’t even know this place existed. How would humans find it?
Kirby nodded. “It could be. But if a supernatural comes out here, there is still a reason. And that reason is usually that they are looking for something.”
“Do you think that they are after the same thing that we are? I mean, they are directly in our path that is on the map.”
“I don’t think so. That wouldn’t make sense. Unless…” Kirby rubbed his goatee. “Unless the guy that you got the map from sent others out here.”
That didn’t seem like the answer. Why would Cody send others out here? This was a test for me. And nobody else was anywhere near his shack. We would have seen some evidence of people there, or at least that they had been there. And Cody seemed surprised when we showed up. Then it hit me. “I can tell.”
Kirby kept looking through
the end of the staff, apparently not paying attention to me or what I was saying. “You can tell what.”
“I can tell if they are human or supernatural. I can cast a spell to detect magic. If they are supernatural, I’ll know. If I don’t detect anything, then they are human.”
Kirby stopped, and turned around. “You can do that?”
“I told you before that I could. You asked me.”
I’m not sure he believed me. He seemed to have more confidence in my abilities before I told him my story.
“This won’t backfire? Alert whoever is over there of our location? I ask because you did get thrown out of school for not being able to control your magic.”
I could feel my blood pressure rising. But I needed to keep my composure, keep my emotions under control. And it was a fair question. Detecting magic wasn’t a complicated spell. It was one of the first ones that I learned, one that I had a lot of practice with.
“It won’t be a problem.” I said that with a lot of confidence, hoping we weren’t going to get in some kind of discussion about my skills again, or lack thereof.
“Alright. But we need to get a closer look. I can’t get a clear view of who is out there.” He peered over the top of the tree trunk and looked around. “Over there,” he said pointing at the end of the tree trunk, about twenty feet away. “I’ll go over there. You stay. When I can see who is out there, I’ll give you the signal. Then you work your magic.”
“Ok. I can do this,” I said, nodding my head to assure him. This was a chance to prove myself, at least in a small way.
Kirby pulled his staff down and started creeping down to the end of the tree. Moments later, he was there. He set up his staff, just as he had done before. It took him longer than I expected, but I assumed that he was getting as good of a look as he could. Part of me was scared, not knowing what was out there, hoping I could pull off a simple spell. But part of me really liked the thrill of danger. I hadn’t felt this before. I gripped the hilt of my sword tightly, just in case something went wrong and I had to defend myself. That made me feel better. It made me feel stronger in some way.
