Goblin Nation

BERA’S GRIEF

We go at them come first light,” Bera was saying. She walked in a tight circle in front of Isaam and Doleman, striking her fist against the palm of her hand, her eyes boring into theirs. Her thoughts whirled; she did not try to hide her haggard, harried expression. She’d let her men march into a trap.

And she’d let Zocci die.

They’d cut off his head-a big, ugly hobgoblin had done that. And then the murderer had taken Zocci’s ancestral axe, taken his life.

Her throat was tight and dry; her breath came in ragged bursts. She had rarely given vent to grief because she had never let herself get close to any of her men before. But the grief over Zocci hit her like a hammer. She’d had honest feelings for Zoccinder; she’d never know if they would have had any future together.

By the memory of the Dark Queen, don’t let me cry! She paced faster, thinking, trying hard to push the memories of the lost men out of her mind, striking her fist with renewed fury.

“Rats, they are. Stinking, filthy, a disease festering on this land.” But she couldn’t call them stupid any longer. “Kill them all. We must kill them. Come first light, there will be so much blood, the ground will not be able to drink it all in.”

She abruptly stopped and squatted. Isaam held a lantern over a patch of ground she’d been drawing on. “Here’s the bluff. I don’t think they’ll run far from it. The place is fairly defensible with all the pits they’ve dug, and with their druid who can bring the trees to life, but there must be a way. I wish we knew how competent the druid was, the scope of his magic.”

“I’ve an answer for that, Commander,” Isaam answered. “I’ve a way to neutralize their druid.” The sorcerer touched his finger to the lantern glass, raising his eyes to meet hers.

“I think I well know what you’ve in mind, old friend. Be careful with that sort of magic.” Bera made a mark to show their current position. “They knew better than to follow us here, the stinking rats. With Isaam’s shield keeping them at bay and us having the advantage here, they will stay put. They’ve no traps to rely on here. The advantage is ours away from their wretched camp.”

“But the druid,” Doleman risked asking. “Won’t the druid have every advantage here, where the trees are thick?”

“Apparently you did not hear Isaam.” Bera shook her head and continued to draw in the dirt. “We will come at them here and here and here, forcing them to the edge of the bluff and over. Three positions this time, at first light. Their eyes are best in the darkness, I believe. So we’ll have to wait until our eyes have the edge. Too, Isaam has some important work to do first.”

Word had reached her that the prisoner Horace had escaped during the brief battle. She had fumed then, and she fumed again.

“No provisions now or in the morning for the men who guarded him,” she ordered. “And no one goes looking for him. In his condition he won’t go far. Let some bear eat him.”

“What if he makes it to the goblins?” Doleman was again the only skeptic. “He could tell them our strength.”

She rubbed out a few marks and made some more. “He’s not so stupid, Lieutenant. They’d kill him before they recognized him. And if by chance they didn’t, then we’ll kill him at first sight when we march into goblin town.” She drew lines to indicate the river and made scratches for the pine forest on the other side. “Isaam’s shield-what he used to protect us-will be erected here and will keep the goblins from climbing down the bluff and escaping. We’ll pin them at the edge of the bluff.”

“What makes you think they haven’t already fled?” A knight who had been watching from a polite distance asked softly.

“Because they’re not stupid.” Not like I once thought they were, she added silently to herself. “They know we’ll come at them again and again and again. So they’ll make their stand because they have no choice. And they’ll make it here because of all their clever little pits.”

“And because they’re tired of running,” Isaam added. “I know I would be tired of running from us.” The sorcerer put the lantern on the ground and peered away into the growing darkness where the vast ranks of Dark Knights waited, some standing, some sitting, none of them having removed their armor, many of them eagerly polishing and sharpening their weapons for the coming fight.

He backed away and let the growing shadows to the south swallow him.

Bera pointed at her crude map again, a gesture that drew Doleman down close by her. “Here and here and here. Yes, they’ll be expecting us, but this time they’ll be the ones trying to retreat.”

“And failing.” Doleman seemed to be persuaded, pointing to the line Bera had drawn to indicate Isaam’s shield spell. “They’ll be caught against an unseen wall conjured by Isaam, and we’ll pin them with our arrows.”

“And with Isaam’s fire magic. They like to burn the corpses of their fallen? We’ll burn them alive. Victory will be ours at first light.” Bera rose and brushed the dirt off her knees. “Pass the orders to the other lieutenants. Set up a watch.” She stared at the men and lowered her voice. “How many did we lose, Lieutenant?”

He stood and spoke equally as softly. “Fifty-one, Commander. Others are badly wounded.”

“That’s fifty-one too many.” She stepped carefully through the underbrush, relying on the emerging stars for light. It took her a while to find Isaam as he’d walked farther south than she’d expected. He stood, his gaze searching ahead.

He turned to meet her eyes. “You blame yourself for the battle’s loss. But you must realize the outcome of this day was not your fault.” Isaam could say such things to Bera because of their years together. “I doubt any other commander would have done things differently. You knew where the goblins were and you-”

“I don’t know if I loved him, Isaam.”

“But you cared for him.”

“Yes. He made me feel young again.”

“Then grieve, Commander. Grieve while I go to work.”

“The goblins smell horrible, Isaam. Good that the wind blows toward them. It keeps away their stink. They are hideous, and they chatter endlessly in a vile, vile tongue that sounds like wild dogs in heat yapping. The clothes they wear mock men. Shirts too big, hanging on them like rags. Most of them have yellow eyes like raw egg yolks, making them look sick. Bumpy skin, scabrous, looking worse than sickness. A veritable disease, I say they are, on this land. They sully the earth. They killed him, Isaam.”

“Grieve, Commander.”

Tears hung at the corners of her eyes, but she would not surrender to them. “After the last goblin is dead, old friend. And after the traitor Grallik N’sera has been burned. Then, perhaps, I will allow myself to grieve.”

She watched Isaam, who went down on his hands and knees at the base of a dying oak. The sorcerer began to speak in a sing-song pattern from a language Bera guessed was old and magical. She squinted, thinking she saw the earth crack around Isaam’s fingers. She looked closer, just as leaves fell from the oak, curling and drying up. More leaves fell as she watched. Isaam’s breath grew ragged.

“Drawing the life out of the woods,” Bera observed.

“Consider this in memory of your Zocci, Commander.”

“How far does your magic range, my old friend? As far south as the bluff, where the goblins are surely burning their dead? Is your enchantment that strong?” She pictured their funeral pyres. The wind continued to blow toward the river, so the stench traveled in the opposite direction, away from her nostrils. “I can’t smell their stink, but I can well imagine it. Will your magic stretch that far, my old friend?”

The sorcerer didn’t answer, the ancient words tumbling faster from his lips. He threw his head back, and Bera saw that his face was fuller, his eyes shining dark in the pale light. His lips were puffy, as if he took the moisture of the woods into himself. His hands looked fleshier. Or was that her imagination?

“To your last measure, Isaam. Until you’ve only a faint heartbeat left. Drink in the life of this accursed forest. And let it be the death of the damnable goblins that took Zocci and my men.”

Bera watched the sorcerer until the sky grew darker and the stars brighter. How long did she watch him? How long had they been there? An hour? More?

Her legs were stiff from standing still so long.

“They come!” She turned, startled.

She heard the call only faintly because of the distance Isaam had put between himself and the rest of her men.

The warning grew louder as other voices joined. “The goblins are coming for us!”

Bera ran back toward her camp.