by Jim C. Hines
“Aunt Trockle—” said Ramma. That was as far as she got.
“We found these goblins fleeing the pixies,” said Arnor. “Ramma and I spotted them coming up the pit, and—”
“I said we should kill them,” Ramma piped up. “But he—”
“You told us you wanted to know of anything strange at the pit,” Arnor said, glaring at Ramma. “This—”
“Shut up, both of you.” Trockle stepped forward, scowling at the goblins. Her fingertips brushed the floor as she walked.
“Sorry, Aunt Trockle,” said Ramma. At the same time, Arnor said, “Sorry, Mother.”
“I told you I wanted to know what was happening at the pit,” Trockle went on, her voice growing more and more shrill. “I didn’t say you should bring goblins into our homes.”
“He’s a hobgoblin,” Braf said, pointing to Slash. Grell smacked his head before he could say more.
“They were coming up the pit,” Arnor said. “I thought we could question them to learn what’s happening back home.”
“They were running away from the pixies,” said Trockle, her voice stern. “So you thought you’d lead them straight to us?”
“I told you,” Ramma said, elbowing Arnor in the side.
“And you went along with him,” Trockle said sharply. Ramma flushed and glared at Jig.
In that instant, Jig knew exactly what was about to happen. He had been on the receiving end far too many times. Ogres were larger and stronger, and their family arrangements were bizarre, but the humiliation and anger on Ramma’s and Arnor’s faces was universal. Just like goblins being chewed out by the chief, they had been shamed in front of the others. Next they would need a victim, someone upon whom they could vent their rage, to help them regain their sense of power and strength.
How many times had Jig been punched, chased, tormented, and teased because a larger goblin got caught messing around on duty?
“Do you want me to—” Arnor began, stepping toward the goblins.
“No, I can—” Ramma interrupted.
Jig was already moving. He grabbed Braf by the arm and said, “Get behind me.”
Braf stared. Jig pulled his sword, swiping the blade past Braf’s face so he stumbled away. Jig spun around, waving his sword back and forth at the three ogres.
“Just kill them and be done with it,” snapped Trockle. Her face scrunched with annoyance as she regarded Jig’s sword. “Leave the bodies by the pit. Make it look like they turned on one another.”
“That won’t work,” said Braf. “The pixies will never believe we just killed each other for no reason.”
Jig answered without turning around. “Sure they will. We’re goblins.”
Arnor pulled out his ax. Next to the ogres and their weapons, Jig’s sword looked little better than a kitchen knife.
“But they won’t believe it when Braf runs screaming down the tunnel,” Jig continued, praying Braf would understand. He would have preferred the hobgoblin. But Slash and Veka were unconscious, Grell was far too slow on her feet, and if Jig tried to run, he had no doubt the others would do the same. So Jig clutched his sword with both hands, tightening his jaw to keep it from trembling. “Go, Braf. Grell and I will slow down the ogres. You tell the pixies they missed some ogres. They’ll probably retreat through one of those tunnels on the far side of the cavern. I’m sure the pixies will be fast enough to catch them.”
He glared at Trockle, who hadn’t moved. “That way we all die.”
Arnor glanced at Trockle. “Mom?” Beside him Ramma had drawn her weapon and stepped sideways.
Grell limped forward, and her cane made a ringing sound against Ramma’s blade. “You wait right there until your aunt tells you what to do, girl.”
“The pixies will kill you anyway,” said Trockle. “They plan to kill every last thing in this mountain. My boy here will make it quick. Put away that sword, and he and my niece will finish all three of you before you can feel it.” She sounded completely calm and reasonable, as if letting the ogres kill them was the most sensible thing in the world.
Jig shook his head. Trockle might be right about the pixies, but the pixies weren’t here yet. The ogres were.
And they were still going to kill him. For the moment they were at an impasse, but already Jig could see other ogres moving toward the tunnel. From the sound of it, Braf had taken a few steps back toward the pit, but even if he did manage to reach the pixies, it wouldn’t do Jig much good. They couldn’t stand here forever. Arnor was playing with his ax, and Ramma had drawn back her fist to strike.
“You take your ogres to safety,” Jig said. “I’ll take care of the pixies.”
His heart pounded as Trockle stared at him. Slowly she began to chuckle. “You? You’re going to fight the pixies?”
“You must have knocked this one on the head when you caught him, cousin,” said Arnor.
“How exactly do you intend to do that?” asked Trockle. “We saw what they did to our people, and you’re nothing but a goblin runt.”
Jig straightened his spectacles. “No,” he said, feeling like a fool. “I’m Jig Dragonslayer.” Gods how he hated that name.
“Jig Dragonslayer?” repeated Ramma.
Jig’s cheek twitched. “That’s right.”
Ramma glanced at the others. “He’s the one who—”
“I know who he is,” snapped Trockle. She studied Jig more closely now. “You’re shorter than I imagined.”
Jig couldn’t think of a suitable response, so he said nothing.
“You’re no ordinary goblin, that much is obvious,” said Trockle. “Most of you would have either run away or charged in like idiots.”
Both of which were time-honored goblin tactics, and both would have gotten them killed. Jig waited. His arm was beginning to hurt from holding his sword like this.
“Go on then,” said Trockle. “Fight the pixies.” Jig lowered his sword, resting the tip on the ground. His hands were shaking, and if he tried to put it back in the sheath, he would probably cut off his own belt.
“We should wake up Veka and Slash,” Braf said, stepping toward them. “Veka’s magic would help against the pixies. Maybe she can fling the hobgoblin at them.”
“Not with the pixies controlling them,” Jig said wearily. “More likely she’d fling us all into the pit.”
Absolute silence. Jig could feel Smudge growing warmer. Slowly Jig realized what he had just said.
“These two are pixie-charmed?” asked Trockle.
“Um.” Jig glanced at the other goblins. Braf was still staring at him, as if he didn’t quite understand. Grell looked annoyed. Ramma and Arnor had both raised their weapons again. Jig could feel his brief respite disappearing as quickly as gold from the dead.
“Kill them all,” said Trockle.
“Wait,” said Jig. “We can tie them up.”
“The pixies can see through their eyes,” said Arnor, reaching toward Jig.
Jig twisted away from that huge hand and nearly lost his balance. “We’ll blindfold them,” he said. “Even if they woke up, they wouldn’t know where they were or how they got here.”
“They’ll know we exist,” said Trockle. “That’s enough.”
“What if—” Jig bit his lip. Once again he could see what was about to happen. His stupid comment was about to get them all killed. And this time he couldn’t see a way out.
“Oh, for Straum’s sake,” Grell said. “You know what you have to do, Jig.”
Jig stared. She was looking at his sword. Did she expect him to fight the ogres? “I can’t—”
“That’s your problem.” With an annoyed grunt, Grell pushed Jig to one side and grabbed the sword from his hand. “Sorry about this, hobgoblin,” she muttered. “At least it’ll be quick.” With one cane hooked over her arm, she shoved the blade into Slash’s chest.
Slash jerked once, then his head dropped to the ground. Grell lost her grip on the sword and stumbled back. She would have fallen if Braf hadn’t caught her
shoulders.
“A shame,” Grell said. “He wasn’t such a bad sort, for a hobgoblin.”
Slash’s breath turned to tight, wheezing gasps. Jig didn’t move. Neither did the ogres.
“Otherwise they kill us all, chief,” said Grell, stressing the last word. “Now, are you going to take care of Veka, or do I have to do that too?”
Before Jig could respond, the voice of Tymalous Shadowstar overpowered everything else.
Jig, heal the hobgoblin.
Grell was wiping blood from her hands. “Should have stayed on brat duty,” she muttered.
JIG, HEAL THE HOBGOBLIN.
The force of Shadowstar’s command made Jig clutch his head. I didn’t know Grell was going to kill him, but you can’t blame her for—
He’s not dead yet, and the spell dissipated the instant your blade pierced his chest.
Jig stared at Slash’s body. His sword stuck up from the hobgoblin’s chest like a skewer in one of Golaka’s barbecued rat kebabs. So all we have to do to break the pixies’ spell is stab the victims?
Now, Jig.
Jig moved forward until he stood in the puddle of blood seeping from Slash’s body. He knelt, cutting his fingers on his own sword as he probed the wound. In the corner of his vision, he could see the ogres reaching for him.
“Let me help him,” he said. He ripped the sword free, and blood spurted like a miniature fountain onto hands and arms. He put both hands over the wound, feeling hot blood cover his fingers and seep onto the ground. He would have hobgoblin blood all over his favorite boots. “Bring that torch closer.”
“What are you doing?” asked Ramma.
A new kind of heat flowed through Jig’s limbs, past the blood and into Slash’s body.
Grell missed the heart, but she nicked one of the arteries. This is going to require a bit of precision. Put your fingers inside the wound.
“Ick.” Jig closed his eyes and pressed two fingers through the skin. Something scratched the back of his finger. Was that bone? And what was that pulsing thing pressing against his knuckle? Everyone talked about how Jig Dragonslayer could cure any wound, but nobody realized how truly gross the process could be.
Got it.
The flow of blood slowed. Jig slid his fingers free and wiped them on Slash’s pants. He reached down to retrieve his sword. It was warm to the touch, or maybe the intensity of Shadowstar’s magic had left his body feeling cold.
“When Grell stabbed him, it broke the pixies’ spell,” Jig said to the confused onlookers.
He couldn’t have gotten a stronger reaction if he had told them Straum himself had returned from the dead and would be dropping by later for deep-fried bat wings. Arnor and Ramma started talking again, each trying to drown out the other.
Trockle rolled her eyes and grabbed each one by the ear, her nails digging cruelly into the lobes. “Stop talking.”
To Jig’s great surprise, they obeyed. Arnor and Ramma were both younger and stronger than Trockle. If this scene had been played out by goblins, Trockle would have found herself beaten and tossed into the cavern. But the ogres merely glared at one another and rubbed their ears.
“After the invaders began killing us, we sent a group to Straum’s cave to try to bargain with them,” Trockle said. “We offered to share the cavern, or even to leave the mountain altogether. Those ogres returned the next day, enslaved. They killed dozens of us before we managed to stop them.” Trockle stared at nothing. “I cracked my own cousin’s skull with a club, and he remained a slave of the pixies until the last breath left his body. How can you be so certain this one is free?”
Jig hesitated. Because my god told me so wasn’t the most convincing answer, but it was the only one he had.
“They want us dead, Jig Dragonslayer. Only when this mountain belongs entirely to the pixies will they feel safe.”
“Aunt Trockle,” whispered Ramma, “the hobgoblin is stirring.”
“I see that,” Trockle snapped. The ogres stepped closer, forming a partial circle around Slash, with Jig crouched near his feet.
Slash’s tongue slipped out, moistening cracked lips. He groaned. “My chest feels like Veka sat on it. What—” His fingers touched his bloody vest. His eyes widened, and he sat upright. “Which one of you ugly, blue-skinned rat-eaters stabbed me?” He looked around, and his eyes fixed on Jig.
Jig glanced down. Hobgoblin blood covered his arms and sleeves. If that weren’t incriminating enough, his sword was dripping with the stuff. Blood had dripped down the blade to form a sticky mess near the hilt. Really, Jig’s entire outfit had been recolored in a kind of “slaughtered hobgoblin” theme.
“You did this!” Slash roared, pushing himself to his feet. The ogres glanced at Trockle, who shrugged, obviously waiting to see what would happen.
“Wait, I didn’t—” Jig scrambled back. “Oh, dung.”
Slash took two steps, and then the color faded from his cheeks. He stared at the blood on Jig’s clothes. His breathing quickened, and he wobbled a bit. “I hate goblins,” he muttered.
With that, he dropped to his knees and passed out.
“I think you might be right,” said Trockle. “I’ve yet to see a pixie-charmed slave faint.” She reached over to pluck the bloody sword from Jig’s hand. “It doesn’t seem to be an enchanted blade,” she said, holding it close to her lantern. She wiped a bit of blood away from the blade by the hilt. “Magical steel wouldn’t tarnish like this.”
She handed the sword back to Jig, who nearly dropped it. He was still shaken by Slash’s near-assault. “Do you mind if we tie him up before he wakes up and tries to kill me again?”
Trockle produced a thick coil of what appeared to be gray string and handed it to Arnor. He shoved Slash onto his stomach, then began binding his arms and legs.
“Are you sure that stuff is strong enough to hold a hobgoblin?” asked Braf.
Arnor gave it a sharp tug. “This is elven rope. Got it from Straum’s lair. Thin as string but strong enough to hold four ogres. After a few of us escaped to these tunnels, we tried to use it to haul the rest of the family up after us.”
“What happened?” asked Jig.
He spat. “Ever try to climb string? It’s impossible to grip the stuff. It’s so darned thin you slice your hand to the bone. Stupid elves.”
Jig stared at his sword, wondering if he should stab Veka as well. If it worked for Slash, there was no reason it wouldn’t work for Veka. Of course, there was no real reason it would work, either. Perhaps it would be better to simply tie her up until he figured out what had broken the spell.
He glanced around, and his stomach began to hurt again. “Um . . . does anyone know where Veka went?”
There was no sign of Veka. She must have fled while they were busy stabbing and saving Slash.
“I should have stabbed ’em both,” Grell muttered.
Jig had a hard time disagreeing. He was a bit surprised Veka hadn’t attacked them the moment she awakened. If she could fling Slash about and seize control of giant bats, surely she could do a fair amount of damage to a few goblins and ogres. He remembered the wild glee on her face while she was riding the giant bat. The only reason Jig could think of for her to retreat was so she could return with reinforcements.
Trockle seemed to be thinking along the same lines. She scowled at her son and niece. “You’ve brought the pixies down upon us.”
“Sorry,” said Ramma and Arnor in unison.
Trockle turned to Jig, and he raised the bloody sword. She shook her head. “Killing you wouldn’t help us now. Go fight the pixies, if you can. You might buy us a brief head start. Or if you prefer a quick death, we can—”
“We’ll fight the pixies,” Jig said.
Trockle turned and punched Arnor in the arm. “As for you and your cousin, you’re going to be on dung-drying duty for the next month!” Both ogres shot hateful glares at Jig as they left.
Grell and Braf looked at Jig.
Jig knelt, wiping his sword on Sla
sh’s pants. Why did they keep expecting him to tell them what to do? Any other goblin would have killed Slash and Veka the moment they learned of the pixie spell. Because of Jig, Veka had escaped to warn the pixies.
You goblins are so quick to deal out death. What happens when you err? Some deserve death, it’s true, but can you restore life to those who don’t?
Jig glanced at Slash’s body. Well, it was pretty gross, but—
That’s not what I meant, Shadowstar said, sounding cross.
I’m a goblin, remember? We don’t care who deserves death and who doesn’t. We care about not getting killed ourselves.
Will you just go fight the pixies? snapped Shadowstar.
Right. Jig stared at his sword. One old goblin, a runt, and an idiot against Veka and the pixies. Not to mention a fainting hobgoblin warrior.
“Braf, would you wake Slash up?” Maybe this time the hobgoblin would stay conscious long enough to help.
Not that he really expected it to make much of a difference.
CHAPTER 8
“A lot of fledgling heroes have asked me to teach them, but I tell them to take a hike. Mentor a newbie, and next thing you know you’re getting slaughtered by some demon from the depths while your student escapes. Sure, the Hero eventually avenges the poor Mentor, but I’d rather be the avenger than the avengee any day.”
—Nisu Graybottom, Gnomish Illusionist From The Path of the Hero (Wizard’s ed.)
There was nothing quite like watching someone run a sword through your traveling companion to help you shake off the last vestiges of unconsciousness.
Veka kept her free hand on the rock as she hurried through the tunnel. Blind panic had brought her this far, with no thought except to put as much distance between herself and Jig Dragonslayer as she possibly could.
