Goblin Queen

by D. L. Harrison

  “Strange?”

  Randall shrugged, “It didn’t have horses, some kind of magic drove it. Never seen one like it before. It was also made of metal instead of wood.”

  That sounded interesting, but my speculation broke off as the chamberlain announced the king and his family. I turned and watched the door they came out of, looking for the surprise guests, and a few moments later the chamberlain made another announcement.

  “Ambassadors Tursac Goldborn, and Hanathra Goldborn of Belirith, along with royal guardians Norrig Lightfeet, and Nolebera Lightfeet.”

  Tursac and Hanathra walked out arm and arm, obviously married based on their last name. They were the first dwarves I’d ever laid eyes on, and they were shorter than humans, but far less stockier than the gamer geeks back home would have guessed. In fact, Hanathra looked rather petite, and had all the familiar curves a human would have, just at the height of about four feet, and her husband was slightly taller.

  They both wore reddish brown robes, Tursac’s was a little darker in shade. Tursac had brown eyes, and red hair and a beard which made his face hard to read. Hanathra had brown eyes and honey brown hair which was in an elaborate ponytail accented with jewels and gold chains.

  The royal guardsman were similarly a couple if the last name meant anything, though I supposed they could be brother and sister so I left that judgement to the future. Norrig and Nolebera both wore steel armor, with wicked looking axes hanging from their hips on both sides. They were on either side of the ambassadors as personal guards, male to male, and female to female which I found interesting.

  Norrig had brown eyes and dark brown hair and a beard, and Nolebera had brown eyes with bright red hair in a simple ponytail not nearly as elaborate as her charge’s. Their vastly different hair colors pushed me toward the idea they were husband and wife, but I didn’t want to make assumptions.

  All four of their faces looked stern and supremely confident, though on the men’s part it could have just been the beards, but I picked up the worry and anxiety in their emotions, and wondered why they were here. Then again, my life was complicated enough right now, but I was still curious about the dwarves. I really needed to read those last three books, between a war brewing between Trelin and Jendas, and now the dwarves of Belirith visiting after who knows how many years of silence, it would be the smart thing to do.

  Did I have really bad timing when I was banished here? Or was this world always so… exciting.

  Gerard sighed and I looked over to him in question, but he shook his head and mouthed, “Later,” at me.

  The king and his family sat, and the ambassadors split and sat on either side of them with their guards.

  The king cleared his throat and all the murmuring died immediately.

  “The dwarven representatives are welcome to the kingdom. Let us share a meal together.”

  Short speech, I approved. I wondered what the significance of the phrasing was, if there was any. I was starving, but what else was new?

  The king drank from his goblet, and then we all started to eat. I had a million questions, but it seemed prudent to eat and hold those until Gerard and I were back in private. Besides, from the speculative looks on Gerard’s, Randall’s, and Karen’s faces, they didn’t know any of the answers either. At least not most of them.

  Except, whatever had brought the insular dwarves out here couldn’t be good. No one had to tell me that, it was obvious.

  After we ate, the king stood and the dwarves followed him out, I could tell everyone in the room was disappointed he hadn’t made an announcement. Gerard and I said our goodbyes as well, and headed back to the suite for our last night of the honeymoon.

  When we were alone I asked, “What’s wrong? You looked grim about their arrival.”

  He nodded, “I’m not sure what it’s about, obviously, but it really doesn’t matter. The elves showed up here two weeks ago, and now the dwarves? What do you think the ambitious and paranoid king of Jendas would think about that?”

  Oh, “He’d think Alexander was making allies, to fight him?”

  He nodded, “That’s part of it certainly, but he’ll also be insulted that when the elves and dwarves broke their silence they both went to Trelin. We’ll see what happens over the next couple of weeks I guess. I’m curious about the dwarves and why they’re here, it’s been many years since they’ve made official contact like this, but it will have to wait.”

  I thought of the book guiltily as I asked, “What happened last time?”

  He replied, “The dwarves live inside the mountains in caves, caverns, and corridors, much like the ones we saw going after the demons. Their farmland outside is limited, and there was flooding. This was over a hundred years back, so the dwarves came and traded some of their forged steel and gold for food supplies for a year.”

  “So, no war?” I asked, feeling rather pessimistic that I’d jumped to that conclusion.

  He shook his head, “We’ve never been at war with the dwarves. They just don’t like mixing with us, and see no need for regular contact or trade. So that they’re here now, means they have a problem they need our help with. I imagine most of the talks will be the king trying to get as much dwarven forged weapons as he can out of this latest emergency of theirs, whatever it is.”

  Huh, then they were even more isolationist than the elves then, at least the elves tried to work with us every couple of centuries, until it failed in a big way because noble men were pigs and elven maidens were exotically beautiful, and then they went back to ignoring us. After all the killing was done I mean. Then again, if there’d been no wars between human and dwarves, perhaps they were onto something. I knew that was pessimistic, but it was just the truth. For every nine people that would love to trade and make friends with the dwarves, there was one overambitious greedy asshole that would screw it up. Suddenly, the one-time trade deal every time there was a great need seemed rather wise.

  That doesn’t mean I didn’t think that was a shame. Dwarven weapons were coveted, and humans had plenty of farms, cooperation and trade was possible, but people messed it up. I was sure the dwarves had their share of overambitious ones as well.

  Back to the real problems I guess.

  “So Jendas has even more of a reason to attack now? Are we sure they even have to use the pass, didn’t there used to be gates?”

  Gerard nodded, “Yes, but they were all destroyed. The mages still know how to make them, but to work it needs a gate built on both sides, and it takes a lot of mages to do it so just a small group sneaking over wouldn’t help them that much. It takes almost a week to make one and carve out all the magic symbols, and then almost a day to prime it with enough magic with a large group of mages. Even if they managed to get enough over here to build one, the mages here would feel it being powered even from hundreds of miles away. Gates aren’t quiet magically speaking.”

  I had more questions about it, but felt guilty. I really should read the books, and just ask the questions not covered in there, but I wasn’t about to waste the last night of our honeymoon reading.

  “Let’s go to bed, I imagine we’ll find out about the dwarves and Jendas soon enough.”

  He didn’t argue…

  Chapter Nineteen

  My mother called again the next morning, and after sending a message to the king that we’d be out of reach for the morning, I teleported us onto mom’s ship, and we joined them for breakfast. Chocolate chip pancakes with whipped cream, and a large pile of sausage links and bacon later, and I felt rather content.

  When we retired to the lounge, my mother took a few minutes to change, and when she walked in I smiled. She was in a light brown dress again, with the jetpack and harness, and she also carried her new weapon. It was bigger than a .357 magnum, but smaller than a rifle. It looked pretty cool, the stock was made of some kind of hard white polymer, with two black barrels coming out of it, the one on top slightly longer. On the bottom, there was a circular fifty round magazine that just held stee
l bullets without a case, since it used electro-magnetism railgun technology to fire the bullets, instead of primer and gunpowder for gas expansion. The stock also had a selector switch to change between the bullets, sonic, laser, freeze, and disruptor beams.

  I wasn’t surprised at all that there was no safe option.

  Honestly, I doubted with that thing she’d even need our help with the mage, or anything I’d already run into on this world.

  “What’s up mom?”

  “The mage necromancer, Shadow, lives in a large mansion that’s walled off, and I believe he has a large crypt, or possibly a labyrinth underneath it. So far, my forces and the spheres have stolen most of his forces in the surrounding area, as usual that part of things has gone well and Chilik is almost ours with the exception of this last step. I shouldn’t need your help this time, but your father insisted it would be prudent to have you around in case Shadow hits me or the ship with a spell. I must admit, that dispel magic thing you do is useful.

  “Regardless, the plan is to enslave the remaining ogres in the compound, and destroy all the undead and the mage himself. To that end, I created a new version of the spider war-bots as well, this one with high intensity lasers which should burn up the undead, and of course their forward blades should cut them up if necessary. According to the satellite images, Shadow has just over a hundred undead, but I worry he may have a lot more than that under the mansion. We’ll know shortly.”

  She said, “Specifically, the twelve war-bots will start clearing out the undead, the spheres will hunt the ogre family, while I hover above and wait for the mage to show himself. Once he does, I’ll nail him with the sonic pulse. Then we just need to clean up, assuming his death won’t kill the undead.”

  I frowned, “How are the undead outside in the sun?”

  Dad said, “There’s a lot of cloud cover, and it doesn’t move with the wind. Maybe some kind of mage spell? Whatever it is, it’s blocking the sun completely for miles around.”

  Gerard answered, “It’s possible, the elements including weather systems are under a mage’s sway. Most necromancers don’t bother, but I suppose he might’ve needed outside forces in case some of his slaves rebelled during the day.”

  “So, where do you want us?”

  She said, “Stay on the top of the ship with your father and watch, unless something bad happens. I’m going to leave it hovering about nine hundred feet up, just below the dark clouds.”

  “We can do that.”

  She cackled and then grinned as she said, “Let’s go,” and I felt the thrum of the ship increase as it moved. We all got up and followed my mom out into the hallway, and the top of the ship opened up and we rose up on deck. There was no wind, the shield took care of it as we zoomed through the sky. I hoped the battle would go to plan, my mom seemed really prepared this time, but I was glad I was here, just in case it didn’t…

  It was a bit disorienting when the ship simply stopped, and I didn’t feel a thing at all when my mind said I should have flown off the ship. Gerard and I looked off the edge, as my mom circled down with her jetpack, and the twelve spider war-bots lowered down the anti-grav beam at a high velocity. It was actually fairly dark, and I could barely see the zombies and skeletons and they were blanks to my telepathy and empathy. I was also a good six hundred feet out of range for telekinesis, so couldn’t find them all that way either.

  They were much easier to spot, after the war-bots started firing lasers and they went up like little bonfires.

  The only things down there I could feel was the ogres, even the mage must have protections over him so I had no idea where he was.

  “Love?”

  “Yes Katrina?” Gerald asked.

  “Do you think high intensity lasers will work on non-corporeal undead, like the wights and specters?”

  Gerard answered, “No idea at all. They usually require magical damage of some sort, and are immune to bare steel, but perhaps your mom’s scientific energy is just as good as magic for that?”

  I sighed, knowing my mom’s luck, the answer was no, but Gerard did have a point. They were creatures of death energies, why wouldn’t a laser disrupt that? At least one thing was going well, all six of the ogres I felt down there were knocked out and napping, and the bots weren’t having any problems burning and dismembering the zombies and skeletons. Even the armed ones, the blades looked to be causing no damage at all to the special alloy the spider war-bots were made of. I was surprised that the necromancer hadn’t come out yet though, and felt my mother’s impatience.

  Perhaps he’d make her go inside? No doubt where his most powerful undead were.

  “It looks like Shadow is going to hunker down, and make her come after him. Want to take a walk?”

  My dad shook his head, and muttered something about all the women in the family being crazy.

  I giggled, maybe I was just a little bit like mom. I’d make a terrible supervillain, and wouldn’t stand for my attacks to cause collateral damage, but I did enjoy a fight. Especially one against a clear evil. I still didn’t like the killing, and doubted I ever would, but there was a sense of accomplishment in meeting the challenge, and stopping evil beings from hurting any more innocent ones. That I had to kill was just a reality of this world, one I’d had to accept. Paladins were the cops, judges, and executioners on this world.

  I supposed in the end, I was both a superhero, and a paladin who fought against evil, including evil men.

  Gerard said, “That sounds romantic, lets.”

  I laughed when my dad rolled his eyes, and we teleported down to the wall, close to where my mother was hovering.

  Mom asked, “What are you doing down here?”

  “Well, we have to follow if you go in, or I won’t be able to see if you’re in trouble. Unless you want to pull back, and turn the mansion into matchsticks.”

  I was only joking, I knew she wouldn’t do it, there was no challenge in mass destruction, but my mother made an annoyed face anyway and said, “That’s just boring. Alright, but stay behind me.”

  She lowered to the ground. The outside of the mansion was clear of undead, many small pyres were still burning, and I imagined they’d never be raised again. I teleported us down from the twenty foot high wall, and then ran a three tiered scan now that I was on the ground. I not only found the necromancer mage, but about two hundred more undead, and those were only the corporeal ones, I didn’t think I could detect the others.

  “Mom, looks like the mage is underneath us. You were right about there being a lot more undead, it looks like three floors of catacombs, and he’s in a large chamber at the end. There’s probably magical traps as well.”

  She grunted, “Good point, let’s wait for the ogres to wake up and they can lead. It shouldn’t be long now.”

  Normally I’d be offended by using minions as unimportant fodder, but sacrificing evil minions didn’t prick my conscience in the slightest. Was that wrong? Honestly, I wasn’t sure, so many things in my life had changed recently. I wouldn’t hesitate to kill them if they attacked me, but sacrifice them? It didn’t bother me, they were evil, but what did bother me was I wasn’t sure if it shouldn’t, bother me I mean. I didn’t think it was a slippery slope either, because I’d never sacrifice a human, elf, or dwarf in such a way.

  While we waited I cast holy weapon on my dagger. I still had the holy sword too if I needed two weapons at once, I hadn’t used it on the large demon because I didn’t know if the chaos magic in his body would have harmed it. Probably not, but why take the chance if my cheap and easily replaceable daggers could get the job done?

  Mom asked, “What is that for?”

  “Just in case your lasers don’t work on non-corporeal undead, we think they might but we aren’t sure.”

  Mom turned her head, “Good, Sia said they should be programmed and awakened in the next few seconds.”

  The ogres woke up and stood, they were green, and between eight and nine feet tall. I sure as heck didn’t want to figh
t one up close and personal. They moved toward the mansion, and then tried to break in the door. It didn’t work, there was some kind of ward of protection on it.

  They moved away, and my mom shot it with sonic bolt. I knew I was right about her building it stronger in the new weapon, when the door didn’t just break but exploded into the house in small splinters.

  Havoc cackled, and the ogres moved into the house and headed for the door to the stairway down, while the spider war-bots, my mother, and then Gerard and I followed. We’d have to loot the house on the way out, if it was still standing when my mother was finished that is. I swallowed a curse, when we followed mom down the stairs, and my holy symbol went dead. I couldn’t feel Arella’s presence anymore, just like the obsidian castle north of Jendas.

  I wasn’t sure what the cause was since I couldn’t feel magic, it was either one of Shadow’s spells, or he was working for one of the evil gods of Chilik and it was shielding the catacombs from Arella’s reach. It also meant Gerard and I couldn’t use dispel magic, if something happened we’d have to retreat to undo it.

  The ogres roared up ahead, and started smashing the undead skeletons with their large clubs. The bots following them got off a shot with their lasers whenever they had opportunity. It quickly became a slaughter, the undead just couldn’t match the strength and reach of the ogres’ clubs, and the lasers from the spider war-bots.

  We made slow but steady progress, as we walked toward the other end of the catacombs on the top level, and so far, my husband and I hadn’t needed to do a thing. The ogre in front screamed in pain as the stairs came into view, and I could see the highly transparent form of a specter touching the ogre.

  One of the spiders fired a laser, and the specter let out a chilling moan of pain. Two more war-bots fired at the same time, and the specter screamed and broke up into wisps of light that slowly faded. Maybe Gerard and I wouldn’t need to fight after all, but I was pleased all the same that energy weapons of science were just as deadly as magical ones to the non-corporeal evil undead.