4
Parn and Etoh picked their way carefully down the path through the woods, watching for any movement as they approached the hills where the goblins lived. The area was littered with boulders, providing cover for their approach.
Despite moving with caution, the duo was making their move in broad daylight. Goblins lived in darkness and abhorred sunlight, which meant they usually came out at night and slept through the day in their caves. Parn and Etoh relished the spring sunlight as they walked along.
The first part of Etoh’s plan was simple: use ranged weapons to take out any lookouts, and take them by surprise. They’d keep the rocks at their backs to stop the goblins from getting behind them. The fact that the sun was out would weaken them further.
Parn was reluctant to attack from a distance but had begrudgingly agreed. The goblins were evil creatures, after all, and there were too many to make it a fair fight.
Having a plan put Parn at ease, as if knowing what they wanted to do meant they’d already succeeded. Etoh, the brains behind the attack, was still worried. He glanced at his friend as Parn crept forward, sword at the ready—and reached up and gripped his talisman, reciting a short prayer to himself.
When they reached the cave, Etoh sighed and looked to the heavens. The bad feeling gnawing at his gut had been right.
There, before them, were two ugly goblins. They were shaped like humans, but only half as tall as a grown man, and their bare limbs were thin and gnarled like weathered trees. They had no hair, and their bald heads made their already large eyes and ears seem even larger. Their noses were so flat that their nostrils looked like two gaping holes in the middle of their faces, and their mouths were slits with yellowed fangs and blood-red tongues peeking out. They wore filthy rags tied over their reddish skin, and crude daggers dangled on straw ropes around their waists. Each of them held a wooden shield in its left hand, and they stood hunched and blinking in the bright sunlight.
They hadn’t noticed Parn and Etoh hiding among the rocks yet—they were milling around, aimless and bored.
“Looks like we’ll have to improvise,” Etoh whispered with a wry smile. They’d assumed there would only be one lookout, and between Parn’s bow and Etoh’s sling they would’ve had a good chance of taking a single enemy down in one hit. With two opponents, if either of them missed their mark, their plan would fail.
Etoh took his sling out of his pack and started clumsily gathering suitable rocks.
“I’ll take the one on the right—you get the left,” Parn muttered as he took the bow from his shoulder and tightened the string. He pulled out two oak and eagle feather arrows and nocked one to his bow, drawing it back as he did so. Etoh tucked a rock into his sling and started swinging.
At Etoh’s signal, they both let their weapons fly.
“Gah!” the goblins squawked as they were hit—they both staggered, and one fell to the ground. Etoh’s rock had hit the goblin square in the head and crushed its skull, but Parn’s arrow missed its mark, burying itself deep in the goblin’s right shoulder but leaving it alive.
“Hofurk!” the surviving goblin howled into the cave.
“Blast!” Parn shouted, quickly nocking the other arrow to his bow and making a shot. This time, he pierced the goblin’s gut, and the creature fell to the ground gushing dark red blood.
“We have no choice—we’ll have to kill them one by one.” Parn jumped out from behind the rocks, followed closely by Etoh, their armor clanking as they moved. Parn drew his sword and pointed it toward the sky, the blade shining in the sunlight.
Etoh, determined to at least try his plan, pulled two vials of oil from his satchel and threw them into the cave. The glass shattered, splattering a slick liquid all over. But when he took out his flint to light it aflame, he realized it was too late—the hideous creatures were already leaping out of the cave. A few slipped on the oil and fell, and one hit its head on a rock and stopped moving, but the rest kept coming.
“Die!” Parn roared beside him.
“Parn! Put your back to the rocks so they can’t get behind us!” Etoh yelled before Parn could leap into the fray. Etoh retreated; Parn hesitated a moment, but followed.
The goblins were already upon them. Each was armed with an axe or dagger, crude and rusted and disgusting. The blades were all coated with a thick, green liquid.
“Careful, the blades are poisoned!” Parn warned. With the rocks at their backs, they at least only had to deal with the goblins in front of them—but both of them still had to fight multiple foes at once. There was no escape—the only way out was the goblins’ extermination, or their own deaths.
Parn wielded his sword and shield deftly, blocking one attack while stabbing at another foe. One goblin failed to block and fell, blood spurting from its shoulder. Parn finished it off with a thrust to its back. He may not have been a seasoned veteran, but he could keep up with goblins.
Etoh had been trained for combat at the Pharis Temple and was used to handling a mace and shield, along with holy spells of attack. In his lighter armor, he was quicker than Parn—he danced artfully around the goblin blows and swung his mace hard when he saw an opening.
The clang of metal on metal and the dull thud of striking flesh blended together. One by one, the goblins fell, but the survivors made no move to retreat—they stood their ground to protect their lair.
As the battle raged on, Etoh started to tire; his arms felt as if they were made of lead. Parn noticed him flagging and tried to shield him, swinging his sword in wide arcs to threaten the goblins attacking his friend. He was tiring too, but the sturdier man had stamina to spare.
They were through about half the horde—a dozen bodies were strewn around them, the smell of blood thick in the air. But the remaining goblins boldly clambered over the corpses. Perhaps their rage overcame their fear, or maybe they could sense the humans’ fatigue; goblins were ferocious when they could smell victory.
“It’s over…” Parn mumbled. His parries had slowed and his feet dragged. Etoh was overwhelmed by a coughing fit and slumped against the rocks.
Parn knew what he had to do. He threw down his shield and, wielding his sword with both hands, let out a mighty roar to summon all the courage he had. Then he slammed into the two goblins poised to finish off the immobile Etoh and charged like a berserker into the other five that remained.
Will this death be honorable? he wondered. Dying in battle should have been a noble end for a warrior—and yet, his father’s hopeless battle against bandits had been deemed dishonorable, forcing Parn and his mother to leave Valis altogether. Disease claimed his mother’s life when he was ten, and ever since, Parn had helped in the fields and hunted in the woods to earn his keep. At sixteen, when he could finally fit into his father’s armor, he went to Flaim to fight desert savages as a mercenary; he’d then returned home, taking jobs guarding the village or the occasional trade caravan, waiting for a chance to return to the battlefield. That was his dream—to be a knight, serving a king somewhere.
If this death isn’t honorable, then what was my life for?
Suddenly, he felt white hot pain slice into his left shoulder. A goblin had gotten behind him—with gritted teeth, Parn turned and slew it. But that left him in an awkward position where his legs couldn’t support the weight of his armor. Metal slammed against rock in a shower of sparks as he fell to one knee.
Another goblin pounced and stabbed him in the left thigh. It tried to yank out its knife, stuck deep in the muscle, and every jerk sent a new shock of pain through Parn’s body.
Soon, though, the pain started to fade, and the world slowed like he was wading through molasses. The poison on the blades worked quickly. Parn struggled to stand, but his energy was gone. Even craning his neck to look for Etoh was too much effort.
All he could see was the cloudless blue sky. He suddenly felt oddly free. He dropped his sword and flung out his limbs. He could only stare blankly while a filthy goblin aimed its dagger straight at his throat—
And then an arrow punched through the goblin’s chest.
It collapsed in a heap, almost seeming to deflate. Parn heard someone new speaking, though he couldn’t understand the words. His vision began to fade, and he struggled to draw breath.
As the darkness overcame him, one final thought crossed his mind.
I get it now, Dad…
Then everything went black.
“Looks like we made it just in time.” Slayn breathed a sigh of relief as Ghim took out the attacking goblin with a crossbow.
Three of the goblins noticed the new arrivals. They let out a wild screech and charged, but Slayn gave his staff a quick wave and began reciting, “Tranquil breeze that brings slumber…”
The charging goblins pitched forward as if the life had been sucked out of them. He’d cast the spell Slumber Cloud, which created a soporific haze in the air. Only two goblins remained.
Ghim switched from his crossbow to his battle axe and charged. In one blow, he cleaved the head from one goblin’s body—it still had a shocked expression on its face as its head flew through the air. When the other one turned in panic to flee, the axe sliced into its side, tearing the goblin’s body apart at the chest and sending its legs toppling sideways in a shower of blood.
“Finish off the sleeping ones, will you?” Slayn requested while he carefully scanned their surroundings. Nothing else moved. He turned his attention back to the goblins’ lair—he focused briefly and recited a short spell, sending his perception deep into the cave. Advancing slowly, he searched ahead for any creatures left lurking.
Once he confirmed that the depths of the cave were clear, he stopped chanting and said, “We’re safe now.”
“I’m done, too. They’re all dead,” said Ghim as he remorselessly chopped off the last sleeping goblin’s head.
Slayn nodded and made his way to Parn’s side. Kneeling, he pressed his fingers to the young man’s neck. His hand came away covered with blood.
He’s alive, Slayn thought, but this is bad.
“I need some help over here!” he yelled to Ghim, “We need to get him home, now. He doesn’t have much time left!”