‘It’s quite possible that the boulders there will hop up and down if we pass by them, or that they will beat us to death. Goblins are unpredictable.’
He slapped Ahren on the shoulder and turned him gently around.
‘We should go back to the others. Two Forest Guardians on their own will certainly not be sufficient to persuade them to help you, and it’s questionable if my authority as Paladin will carry any weight. The Wild Folk hardly got involved in the battles of the Dark days. Anytime that HE, WHO FORCES tried to put down roots here, they would chase him and his creatures out, but nothing more than that. HE tried to conquer and destroy Kelkor out of revenge on three occasions, and every time HE got nothing more than a bloody nose.’
Falk frowned as he continued speaking.
‘Unfortunately, every delegation from the Free Folk was also rebuffed. We sent people, elves and dwarves here on more than one occasion, but they could never negotiate anything more than a ceasefire. At least the dwarves are friendly with the giants, but even that hasn’t helped us. Personally, I think the Wild Folk shy away from forming alliances because they’re afraid that the individual races on Kelkor will start arguing and fighting with each other.’
‘Giants and dwarves like each other?’ asked Ahren in surprise.
Falk shrugged his shoulders. ‘Dwarves like everything that’s big and strong. Giants love glittering objects. From time to time they send the giants a chest filled with semi-precious gemstones, and in return the giants protect the few trading caravans that take the land route to the Silver Cliff. You’ve seen how dangerous it is in Kelkor. A fully laden trader wouldn’t get very far here without help, no matter how many mercenaries he might have hired from outside.’
Ahren considered how important relationships between different tribes were, even in this untamed part of the world, and his respect for Senius Blueground, the king of Knight Marshes grew even further. The monarch had to keep the interests of so many barons, guilds and neighbouring countries in harmony and at the same time look after the simple people and their welfare. All of a sudden, the young man was happy that he was only going to become a Paladin and all he had to do was hunt down the Adversary. That seemed a lot simpler when compared to a king’s responsibilities.
They returned to the others and to his relief Trogadon was already awake. His head had a bluish-violet colouring on account of all his bruises, but the dwarf seemed in a cheerful mood and as unfazed as ever.
Falk greeted the squat warrior by striking his chest lightly with his fist.
‘You gave us a big fright, you old warhorse. How did you come up with the crazy idea of swallowing a Grief Wind’, he exclaimed.
‘Actually, I breathed it in’, said the dwarf jokingly. ‘It’s an old dwarf solution to a Grief Wind attack. Normally we spit it out again and it flees, but our example from yesterday was quite old and stubborn. The mind games of those things can’t do us much harm, in fact we think of them of nothing more than an annoyance. Some of our more secluded clans even find them useful because they can keep unwanted visitors at bay.’
He nodded his head airily.
‘I see things differently. Anyone who doesn’t survive isn’t a potential customer.’
Then he smiled mischievously and Ahren had to laugh at the dwarf’s black humour.
‘Still, you’ve saved our bacon and thank you for that’, said Falk.
‘So now it’s nineteen to twenty-six, isn’t it?’ joked the dwarf.
Falk puffed himself up before responding. ‘Twenty-six? How did you arrive at that number?’
‘Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten the siege of Shallow Ford? If I hadn’t rescued you from that, you’d have ended up being burned at the stake!’ bellowed the dwarf.
Ahren listened to the pair of friends as they continued to exchange stories of their derring-do in mock argument, and hoped that at least half of them were invented or at the very least exaggerated. The feeling of camaraderie connecting the two was real and tangible, and clearly seemed to do Falk a lot of good. Uldini and the Paladin didn’t seem to have ever achieved that level of closeness, or if they had then it had been buried by the Night of Blood and Falk’s flight from his own past.
The apprentice hoped that sometime in the future he too could exchange stories of shared exploits with them, but for the moment he was content to listen to the pair and absorb some of the air of invincibility which their anecdotes conveyed.
Chapter 22
17 days to the winter solstice
Uldini and Jelninolan only awoke from their sleep trance the following day, but even then they were still exhausted.
‘If we’re really going to be dealing with a goblin, then it makes no difference if we’re not back to full strength. So we might as well get going’, said Uldini stoically, after Falk had brought him up to date regarding their search.
The Arch Wizard was still suffering the emotional after-effects of the magic he’d used to hold the Grief Wind at bay. Attack magic made you aggressive, healing magic made you lethargic, but when you exorcised a being, it seemed to bring forth a stoical indifference.
‘What does that mean exactly, exorcising a being?’ asked Ahren quietly as they were gathering their things together.
Falk scratched his beard for a moment and then spoke.
‘You can only exorcise things that are without material existence. That’s how Uldini described it once. So, other magic, curses, spirits, and heat and cold in small quantities, things like that. To put it in a nutshell, the conjurers wish the intended target away, and if they do it powerfully enough, it dissolves. Uldini explained to me that performing an exorcism is extremely difficult and always dangerous, because you are interfering with nature. That’s why as a rule only non-substantial things are exorcised, and even that is hard enough.’
That explained Uldini’s current apathy. He had wished something away, and now his emotions were gone too, or at least not in the immediate vicinity. In time, Uldini would be back to his old self, but for now he wasn’t up to much.
Jelninolan, on the other hand, while weak and a little irritable, was still willing to share her knowledge with them.
‘Goblins are also fay-creatures. To be precise, they’re male fays, even if they don’t look fay-like. The female fays keep the goblins in check, making sure that they don’t put a hole in creation with their pranks by mistake. Eathinians have good relations with the fays, so I will try to speak to him. I have one or two ideas which might persuade him. Thankfully, Uldini isn’t such a mystery-monger as a certain odd Forest Guardian, which meant I was able to prepare myself a little before our journey’, and she looked over accusingly at Falk, who looked back at her guiltily.
She rummaged around in her rucksack and put something small in her jerkin. Ahren craned his neck and could make out a small flower.
Jelninolan looked at him furiously and stamped her foot.
‘Is there something under my jerkin that you find particularly interesting?’ she fumed.
Ahren gasped and went a deep red.
Eh...no…I didn’t mean to…’ he stammered.
Then he gave a quick bow and fled out of the cave, the elf’s icy stare following him.
Soon the whole group set off on their way. Ahren and Falk were a hundred paces ahead of the others and kept an eye out for potential dangers while Trogadon and Khara kept close to the two conjurers.
‘The nearer we approach our target, the less we need to fear other creatures. Nothing and nobody hangs around in an area inhabited by a goblin.’
Ahren was nervous enough as it was, and Falk’s statement only made him more anxious. The trick with the rocks may have been impressive, but the fact that the monstrous creatures of Kelkor fled from a goblin was, to put it simply, terrifying.
They found the strange boulder tower quickly again and steered a wide berth around it. Then they came upon an increasing number of signs suggesting they were nearing the goblin. A tree that was rammed into the ground with it
s roots in the air on which were growing small flowers, a little river with a powerful current that circled around a rock, but which had neither a source nor an outlet.
They were proceeding with more caution now because the pranks against nature were testing their nerves, when suddenly they heard a loud, complaining laugh behind them. Ahren spun around, as did all his companions.
Right on top of a throne of snow, exactly where they had passed by a few short heartbeats previously, sat a blue-skinned, tiny figure, who from a distance looked like a mixture of human and frog. He had long limbs and a bulbous body with shiny, oily skin with big pores and filled with wart-like growths. His bald head with enormous lidless eyes which were almost laterally positioned, and the lack of ears or a nose, strengthened the frog-like impression, as did the broad mouth with its few stumps of teeth which could be seen, now that the creature was beginning to speak to them.
‘So many visitors in the one day. What could you possibly want here? Too meagrely laden to do trade with the short ones. Too poorly armed to go dragon-slaying. You really are a puzzle.’
The goblin’s voice produced a curious echo, as if another person were whispering what he had said half a heartbeat later and in a shrill tone. A primeval fear came over Ahren when he heard this sound and he felt paralysed.
The enormous eyes of the fay-creature stared at them and a curious look came over the goblin’s face.
‘I love puzzles. So you may speak.’ He wagged his hand about, and Ahren felt an unbearable urge to speak. He began chattering wildly and began telling his whole life story in random sentences while staring fixedly at the frog creature. The others were doing exactly the same - even Trogadon seemed unable to escape the charm.
The goblin listened to the chaotic sounds for a while, then wagged his hand about again and immediately everyone closed their mouths.
‘My goodness, but some of you are old. You wouldn’t guess it by looking at most of you.’ He looked over at Falk derisively. ‘We’ll be here for years if we carry on with this method and I’m getting bored already.’
He pointed at Khara.
‘You. Explain why you’re here.’
The girl stood for a moment frozen and then began to speak in the Empire language, so quickly that it seemed to Ahren to be one continuous sentence. After something like thirty heartbeats the goblin made an abrupt hand movement and she stopped speaking abruptly.
His unyielding eyes were now fixed on Falk.
‘I knew I recognised your ugly mug from somewhere. You hung around here for a while after the Dark Days and you slaughtered a few of the large creatures that lived here. For trophies, if I remember rightly.’
Falk turned and said, ‘they were a danger to the farmers who lived on the borders…’ but the goblin interrupted harshly.
‘Lies don’t pay, Paladin. Let’s be nice and truthful here’, he cackled.
‘After a hundred years of resting on my laurels as a Paladin, the memory of our deeds began to lose their significance. I began to fall into debt and a few of the exotic animals here brought in good money if you sold them as trophies. And so I came here, until I grew tired of fighting again’, said the old man through gritted teeth.
Ahren was shocked by the brutally honest words of his master. He knew that Falk had lost hope and his moral compass after the Dark Days, but he had had no idea of how low his master had sunk during his crisis.
The goblin sat motionless in his throne for a while. Rather than look at his guests, he stared up at the skies and hummed. Nobody could move and when Ahren tried to whisper something, he noticed that his tongue was paralysed.
The pale eyes of the goblin now fixed themselves on the apprentice, and Ahren could do nothing but stare back at the creature’s strange pupils. Ahren forgot to blink, his whole world was held spell-bound by the two yellow-white pools.
‘You really think you can defeat HIM, WHO FORCES? At any price? Even if you have to pay for it with your life or the lives of your friends?’ The voice, which sounded like two, bored in through his head and into his very being.
Ahren saw flashes of his life appear and disappear, as the creature sought out the answer in the young man’s reason, an answer that the apprentice himself didn’t know.
The goblin clicked his fingers and released everyone from the spell by which he had held them captive. Ahren collapsed into himself and fell down on one knee. The threatening feeling that the goblin had radiated was slowly diminishing. Falk leaped two paces forward and was pulling his sword out of its scabbard when Uldini intervened and a sudden gust of wind threw Falk backwards to the ground.
‘Use your head, old man’, whispered the Arch Wizard and gestured to the snow in front of the goblin’s ice throne. Translucent snakes were wriggling around and they had already bared their fangs in Falk’s direction.
The fay-creature cackled with amusement and the snakes disappeared.
‘Spoilsport’, he said to Uldini and hopped off his throne. With an odd waddling gait, he walked in among the travellers and turned to face Falk.
‘I have done no harm to your precious apprentice. He is remarkably honest for a human, if more than a little naïve. I even like him in some odd way. So ask what you wish to ask and we’ll take it from there.’
Ahren picked himself up. It was hard to fathom the goblin’s strange facial gestures, but still, Ahren didn’t believe him for a heartbeat. His furtive tone suggested that he was only toying with them.
The young man went over to his master and pulled him to his feet. They exchanged looks, and Ahren gave a reassuring nod to indicate that he was fine. Falk placed his heavy hand on his apprentice’s shoulder for a moment, then they turned to face the goblin, who was now looking up in surprise at Jelninolan, who was now standing upright before him and looking down at him with a stern look.
‘With the first flower of the springtime, a gift from your mistress Tillimandra Jul-Jilran, I command you to tell me your name, goblin!’
Jelninolan had intoned with the full authority of a life-time’s experience as a priestess and Ahren trembled at the power of her words even though he wasn’t the target of her command.
‘Tlik, my name is Tlik’, called the goblet out hastily and then clapped his hands over his mouth, his face a picture of rage and respect.
Jelninolan spoke on before the fay-creature had a chance to react.
‘Tlik, by your name I bind you to our task. Help us achieve the Naming of the Paladin Ahren, and you shall be free.’
The wind that had been blowing all day suddenly died down, the sun darkened for a heartbeat and it seemed as though the whole countryside was holding its breath. Then everything returned back to normal, only the goblin continued to stare at the elf, his hands still in front of his mouth.
Jelninolan looked down sadly at her own hands. Withered petals slipped between her fingers and onto the ground - dried out and without any life, they settled in the snow.
Uldini whistled out as the penny dropped.
‘A powerful trump you had there, auntie. And you played it excellently if you don’t mind me saying so.’
A triumphant smile flashed across her face, chasing away her sorrow, and she curtsied playfully.
Ahren was completely baffled but his master took mercy on him and explained what had just happened.
‘Every summer Eathinian gets a blossom from the mistress of the fays. Supposedly it’s the first flower of the spring and its power is simple yet powerful. With it you can compel a member of the fay court to be of assistance. Usually, selected elves seek out a friendly fay and their wishes revolve around things like eternal love, peace or the healing of a serious illness.’
Uldini pushed his way into the conversation, an admiring spark in his eyes.
‘Our scheming priestess actually used the blossom on a goblin. That’s certainly never happened before. Why ask a goblin, when you can ask a fay? But Jelninolan unlocked his name with her wish. And unlike fays, goblins are bound to their task through t
heir name.’
He looked with an air of superiority down at the goblin.
‘And she’s just done that. Our recalcitrant friend here has to help us until your Naming has been achieved.’
Ahren looked down at the goblin, who had dropped his arms and now looked the very picture of blue misery. The fay-creature looked piteously up at Jelninolan and asked with his croaking voice: ‘would you not like to reconsider it, your highness? I’m sure I can fulfil many wishes for you, if you only let me free…’
Jelninolan shook her head firmly.
‘No thank you’.’
The figure of the goblin seemed to shrink even further, and he nodded respectfully.
‘As you wish, your most high and mighty’.
Trogadon let out a rumbling laugh.
‘He’s very cute now, isn’t he?’ he asked his companions.
Ahren was about to agree but Uldini interrupted. ‘Please don’t antagonise him. Once he’s carried out his tasks, he won’t be so friendly, and we don’t want to give him any more reasons for wanting to wreak his revenge after he’s been set free.’
The dwarf’s laughter died down and he eyed the goblin thoughtfully, while he nodded in agreement.
So, Tlik. Where exactly is the place that Ahren’s Naming must be carried out’, asked Jelninolan firmly.
The blue figure examined Ahren thoroughly by looking him up and down, and wagged his hand once. In an instant the apprentice was surrounded by a pattern of incredible colours and shapes. He flinched in surprise but was frozen to the spot when the goblin snapped his fingers.
‘No fidgeting, please. Your aura is complicated enough to read without everything becoming blurry.’
The goblin floated up to him, his ugly face coming nearer and nearer until finally it was only two hands away from his own. The apprentice wanted to flinch backwards, but the goblin’s magic was ruthlessly effective, and he couldn’t move. He began to sweat.
Tlik looked over his shoulder at Uldini.
‘What sort of bungling chaos of strength lines did you cobble together that time? This is your amazing ritual that sent HIM to sleep? It’s nothing short of a miracle that HE hasn’t already sucked the young lad dry and that he isn’t dancing around on your graves.’
The Naming Page 36
