FREE FICTION - WOO-HOO!
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Five blood-faced
vultures hunched like priests in their cowls, arranged on the branches of a
lone tree that had been stripped of its leaves by lightening early last Spring.
A short figure dressed in a leather vest, breeches
and buckskin boots approached from the south-east, walking the dust trail that
passed for a road.
He interrupted their
feast and now they stared down at him, patient as only carrion can be.
The traveler gave the birds no mind as he
squatted next to a white-skulled carcass.
He drew an iron
knife, as long as the span of his hand, from a plain leather scabbard on the
inside of his boot. With it he slowly
lifted the foreleg of a dead goat. He
held his other hand, palm down, over the chest-cavity and felt a slight heat
still rising. He thought this odd because
the head was stripped of all hair and flesh, as dead and aged as the tree. Even the eye sockets were dry, as though
bleached in the sun for a summer. Yet
everything else told a tale of new death; even in the goat’s stomach, beneath
the blue and red gut ropes that had been pulled out by the vultures, was a cud
of new chewed grass. It was green and
individual blades were evident in the silvery slime ball.
He wiped the
blade on the ground and sheathed it, raised to a half-crouch and squinted at
the ground. Seeing no tracks and nothing
to bear the blame, he stood fully and stared up the path, to the
northwest. His hand rested on his second
weapon, another blade of iron, this one as long as his forearm, hanging from
his belt in its own scuffed and unadorned scabbard. The trail faded into the vast miles of hills
and grain-lands that most simply called the meadows. He reckoned to have another twenty leagues
before any town would be large enough to let a goblin hide in its alleys.
“Until
then,” the goblin said aloud to himself, “I’ll just have to be slim enough to
survive.”
He closed
his eyes and drew air deep inside his hooked nose. All he detected were the molts and droppings
of the vultures, and the new shed blood and intestines from the goat. He muttered an obscenity, ran a hand through
his greasy black hair and smacked his lips from thirst.
“To your
lunch then,” he told the birds, and continued his trek.
Travel is
always dangerous, especially alone.
But
since the death, three days earlier, of his companion, Girok had walked
alone.
He and his half-brother Kuune had
emerged from the brackish swamps surrounding their home village long enough to
first learn of and then thieve through four of the seven cities of men.
All went well until a certain merchant,
well-off enough to employ guardsmen, offered a bounty on both their heads.
Two summers
they spent in the civilized lands, burglaring houses and rolling drunks inside
the walls of the men-cities. Kuune had
been taller and slower, especially when noising through alleys. And so it was, perhaps a two-step behind,
Kuune caught the bolt from a crossbow in the back of his neck. Since, Girok thought often of the last slobbery
gulp of air his brother had made and then of his face-first slump into the
slimy mud of that particular back street.
“No
matter,” he said aloud to himself. “No
matter,” and nothing indicated the haunting of his memory would cease.
The sun crossed
the midpoint on its journey to nightfall.
The sky was a deep crème blue and the light hurt Girok’s eyes. That he traveled in the open, at day, was
testimony to the fact that fear of capture outweighed the unnaturalness gnawing
at his goblin instincts to lay low until dark.
Men, he had
learned, were persistent and loved their rules and a thief’s head was a prize
that would pay. So he kept walking, aware
of the lack of heft in his coin pouch as well as the emptiness of the water
gourds half-slapping his back with each step.
Before him, the dust trail parted last year’s brown grass like the scalp
line along the poorly parted hair of a village child.
It curved up
a gentle slope. New grass was just
beginning to form green shadows under the browns left by winter. At the top, Girok paused and looked behind
him. He saw no pursuit.
Ahead of
him he saw an equally gentle downward slope.
Off to the left, towards the south and at the bottom of an easy valley,
a creek meandered and there, along its side, sat a small yurt with clay-red colored
walls. From the top of the round tent, a
scribble of white smoke floated and then faded into the air. The tent sat off the path by, perhaps, two
bow-shots.
Girok
squatted to his haunches, craned his neck, and surveyed more carefully. He saw two mottled and shaggy ponies tethered
near the creek. Their heads were down,
grazing.
Thirst
first, he decided. He would get a drink
of water, fill his gourds, and only then explore the situation.
With his
knees up to his shoulders and his arms extended for balance he looked like a
crab, extending first one leg and then the other, edging away from the path and
down the hill towards the creek. Last year’s
grass, up to his nose, he hoped, adequately covered him from view.
Slinking
like that, it took him an hour to get to the creek where he stopped and lay on
his back, extending his cramped legs and waiting for blood to ease the aching in
his thighs.
The water
was clear and the sand and pebbles on the bottom told the goblin this creek ran
most of the year. It was two hops across
in most places and perhaps waist deep in the middle. Girok removed his boots and spent just a
while picking four or five fleas from his ankles. Then he dunked his feet into
the cold water until they ached. He
filled his gourds and buried them in a place where he would not forget.
As he
covered their hiding place with a final palm-sized stone, he looked up in time
to see a tabby cat; a town cat of indeterminate grey, brown, and that odd other
color that cats that fat sometimes acquire.
The cat, the size of two green melons and not skinny at all, sat by a clump
of reeds, several arm reaches away. It
seemed half-interested, not at all alarmed, and completely delicious. Girok reached over for his boot knife. He was a great thrower and confident only a quick
jerk and snap of the wrist kept him from an early supper.
The boot
joggled but he managed with his fingertips to slide the knife from its scabbard. He moved his hand back behind his head and,
as if on queue, the cat leapt behind the reeds.
Girok called himself a filthy name for being too slow and then
scrambled, all knees, elbows and bare feet, over to where the cat had
been. Other than paw prints, he saw no
sign.
He closed
his eyes, sniffed and listened. He
smelled only the creek, its rocks and pebbles, and the cool mould of loam.
“To the
yurt then,” he whispered and shrugged.
He went back to his boots and slipped them on.
Following
the creek he again slinked up to a point where he could see the round tent. There was no sound from within, yet still the
strand of white smoke twisted from the tent to unravel in the air. It reminded him again of how hungry he was. The ponies were on the other side and showed
no alarm. From this vantage he stopped
and lay flat like an old log. He put a
hand to the sun and splayed his fingers under it to guess that, perhaps, two
hours of light remained. Resting his
head on his arm, he napped.
When he
awoke it was much cooler, and dark.
Night crept in and were it possible, the evening was even more still
than the day.
The silver stars blinked
at him from the feather-black night sky.
A dew was already forming and he flexed his hands and toes to awaken
their nimble abilities.
He listened and
slowly raised his head to look at the yurt.
No commotion nor movement came from it.
Yet the smoke still floated, nearly straight, into the sky.
As silently
as the moon sliding along its path, Girok edged himself closer and then closer
to the yurt. So cautious he was that
even the stands of dry grass yielded without noise. Yet, Girok felt he must be announcing his
approach because, as goblins go, he was a middling sneaker.
At midnight,
he finally reached the hide-wall of the tent.
He closed his eyes and slowly drew the night air. He smelled horses, then smoke and food, the
old tannic of the hides, and lastly, from within, a light musky odor, female. Yet nothing noised.
Slowly he
lifted the lip of the hide before him and peaked into the structure. He saw a small stove in the middle of the
round, with a pipe of metal leading to the top.
Along the walls and hanging from wooden pegs were no end of pouches,
bundles of dried plants, and curious things he had never seen before. And there, to his left, on a mat of blankets
and hides, lay a form, asleep he gauged, by her breathing. He could tell little of her, wrapped as she
was in her blankets.
In Girok
beat the heart of a thief, as many of his kind are. Like a hunger, the lust of coveting made his
fingers involuntarily clench at the thought of taking some of the things arrayed
along the walls. Then, from a darker
place, the thought of murdering the woman in her sleep surfaced. Perhaps he would, perhaps he would not. By then he had his head and both shoulders
into the sturdy tent.
Then the
yeowl of a cat ripped through the still of the night. He looked to where it came from, where the
woman lay, only now she was not there and in her place was the tabby he had
seen along the creek-bank. He shook his
head and blinked hard. Still the woman
was gone and the cat stood on her blankets.
Superstition
was no stranger to Girok and he felt the thick hairs on his back stand up
against his jerkin. The capillaries
along his arms tightened and his thick skin goose-bumped.
“Well
goblin,” spoke the cat, “what do you want?”
Though well
he believed of men who turned to wolves under the gaze of full moons; women who
turned to cats for no reason whatsoevers was something he never considered. At best, such things were tales told to
entertain children.
“Was it not
enough I let you live, though you drew your knife?” the cat asked.
“Had I
known…” he said, continuing to edge forward.
She
laughed. “Do you see anything you want
here?” Still eyeing the goblin, the cat turned
so that her entire length was to him.
She swished her tail and asked, “Isn’t that what you are here to
do? Steal?”
“I am
hungry, and that is all,” he lied. “And
I have coin to pay.” Girok eased himself
further into the tent and only his legs remained on the outside. When he looked up the cat was gone and in its
place stood a woman. Again the hairs on
his arms and back stood up.
She was bare
footed, wearing a simple, unbelted, black smock that hung to her knees. Her white arms stood in contrast to the dim
of the room and black of her garment.
She smiled and was not unpretty.
Her hair was black to match her garment and fell about her shoulders in
loose ringlets. It was too dim for him
to make the color of her eyes. They
rested outside the light, in the shadow of her brow.
“I have no
need of coin.” She took another step towards
the stove as Girok pulled his legs inside the tent. He now crouched on the ground before
her. His knees again up to his
shoulders, his eyes followed her.
“What is
your name,” he asked, “if I may?”
A corner of
her mouth curled into a smirk and she looked down at him. Even were he standing she would be the
taller. “I am Euthena.”
“Euthena,
then, if you need no coin, perhaps a servant?
I am not without skills.” He
bowed his head to the ground, ears perked for her movements. Humans, he learned, could be lured to danger
by their own egos. He heard nothing in
answer and so raised his head. The tabby
had reappeared, now on the other side of the stove.
“Can you do
this?” she asked, taking another step.
“No,” he
guessed she spoke of turning into a cat.
“Then of
what use are your skills to me?” The cat
continued walking. Girok noticed a
wooden box against the yurt wall. That
was where she seemed to be moving.
He stood,
eyes intent on the cat, and took a step towards the box. Some element long-lost to man, deeper than an
intuition he could articulate, connected something and Girok followed the voiceless
cunning within himself. He knew his path
led to either doom or escape.
The cat
stopped, “Where are you going?” she asked.
Girok
pulled his long knife from its scabbard on his hip. “I looked away from you once and missed my
mark. I will not look away again.”
The cat
turned knowing, somehow, her secret lay open to the goblin. It was true, Euthena was a witch with the
most remarkable power to turn herself into a cat and back again to a human and
other spells she had, some even more powerful.
Yet that spell could not be undone while someone was watching. The goblin had guessed and now, as a cat, she
was unable to perform any other spell and he, until she left his sight and only
until then, would be free to do as he wished.
“What’s in
that box?” he asked.
Euthena
turned and walked back to the stove, hoping for a blind spot.
“Do not,”
he said, “take another step. I am more
than fair at knifing.”
Something
rang true in the timbre of his words.
She stopped and faced him. “What
will you?”
Knowing how
easily tables turn, Girok did not gloat, though the burglar in him would have
something. “Food,” he said, “and
this.” Still eyeing the cat, he reached
his hand to the wood box. It clutched the
surface like a drunken spider until it pinched the thing he thought she had
been moving towards. Not daring to look,
he felt a thin, light length of wood.
“I can give
you more than that, goblin,” Euthena said, almost immediately. “But to do so I must turn back.”
He took a
step towards the cat. “At what
assurance?”
“I give you
my word?”
“What
word? Spell it out,” he took another
step and could have struck her with the long-knife, had he chosen to do so.
Euthena the
cat sighed. “I give you my word that
this night I will not try to harm you.”
“Or?”
“Or kill
you.”
“Upon
what?” Girok knew very little about
witches and only guessed that an oath upon something important would stay her
hand. What he had seen of humanity had
been, towers, weapons, and pouches of gold not withstanding, without honor.
Euthena
cleared her throat. “I give you my word,
upon my order, that this night I will neither try to harm or kill you.”
At that, and
still following the voiceless cunning that was as much a part of him as the
blood in his veins, Girok bowed his head and raised his arms. When he looked up, Euthena the human stood
before him.
“That,” she
pointed to his hand, “is but a trifle.”
He looked
to see he had grabbed a slender bit of wood, thicker than a twig but not by
much. In the dim light it was hard to
tell but it seemed the color of ash and was as long as the dagger in his
boot. “What is it?” he asked.
“Sit,” she
said, ignoring the question and holding out her hand. “I will bring you food and wine.” She did not move, her hand was still out to
him.
“Not yet,”
he grinned.
Without further
waiting she turned and walked to a mound of pouches on the other side of the
yurt. Her feet were soundless as the
floor was padded by thick hides, similar in color to the outside of the tent. “Where were you going?” she asked, “Before
you decided to sneak into my tent?”
He watched and
noted she moved quickly, and with confidence – even in the semi-darkness. That was rare for a human.
She looked
over her shoulder at him. “What’s the
matter, a cat have your tongue?” She
grinned and went back to the food pouches.
It was indeed
a good question. Hitherto, Girok had not
given much thought concerning what he was moving to. He and Kuune planned on visiting the next
walled man-city. Although his departure
from the previous city was mostly unplanned, he supposed that was where he
would eventually go. Though he knew he
must first go through a smaller town, a place called Rylar’s Crossing. “I travel to Rylar’s,” he said, splitting the
difference.
Euthena
stood and turned, with a cup in one hand and a bundle of something in the
other. “I see,” she said, walking
towards him. “Sit, please,” she nodded
to the floor.
“I’ll
stand.”
“As you
will.” She held the cup to him. “But something will have to go.”
Girok’s
hands were still full. He walked back to
the wooden box and placed the stick of wood atop it. Euthena’s black eyebrows raised ever so
slightly. Still with the long knife in hand,
he turned and took the cup. He sniffed
it, a rich drink smelling of raisins. A
port, he had learned in the taverns. Another
thing about the humans, they liked their drink and had as many different types
as a goblin sow has children. He took a
mouth of the blood-colored vintage and swallowed. His throat tightened as the doubly fermented
wine, with just a drop of something else, burned its way down.
"I will
keep my word,” she said. “You can sheath
your knife.”
Girok
considered this and then did. Already
the port eased his thinking. He was
hungry, hadn’t eaten in two days of heavy walking. He looked into the witch’s dark eyes and she
smiled, handing him the bundle of food.
He smelled both bread and meat and he began eating the first thing his
hand found inside the pouch.
“Would it
be a fair trade,” she began, “if I were to get you to the Crossing quicker than
you could make it by foot.”
“I don’t
know. How far is it?”
"It is yet five
days. But I can get you to the outskirts
before dawn.”
He
considered this, gulped more port and began chewing a strap of dried meat, of
some sort. He’d had no real encounters
with magic, aside from his village shaman, and that had been entirely
different. He finished the meat as
Euthena waited for him to finish the cup.
“That would be fair,” he managed to say before taking a final drink,
after which he held it out for more. It
would, if true, throw, finally, any pursuers from the city.
That’s a
funny way to think it, he mused, and soon became lost in a meandering trail of
thought. The witch faded as a threat and
he became consumed by his own failure to think through what he was trying to
think.
“A little
sleep never hurt anyone,” Euthena said.
And so it happened
that in the morning Girok the goblin found himself outside the yurt, straddling
three long boughs of dried sassafras bound together with coarse twine. He held the unleaved ends in his hands, like
a child would hold a stick-pony. Behind
him, Euthena anointed the branched ends with a green pungent; a snot-like goo
of henbane, yarrow, and who knew what else.
She said it was a flying salve.
“Hang on,”
she said, “and you will soon be on your way.”
In her left hand was the wand the goblin hand nearly taken. “If we meet again,” she told him, “I’ll scald
the meat from your bones.”
Setting the
clay pot on the ground she stepped back.
“Now lift your feet,” she commanded, and he did.
Several
things happened at the same time. He and
the impromptu broom were immediately airborne.
He gasped and felt his innards pull back into themselves. His hands tightened on the thin stalks of
wood as the air rushed into his face so that his eyes began to water and a
terrible, horrible, dizziness spun all around him. He pitched hard to the left and then rolled
completely over. He hung upside down
with his knees and elbows locked around the wood while he hurtled at an unknown
angle from the ground.
After the
first moments of this he looked over his shoulder and through the water in his
eyes could see very little. He thought
he saw the ground but was unable to spot the yurt and, indeed, its presence was
a small concern. Suddenly very sober,
and of all things, Girok remembered his buried water gourds and knew
they were lost for good.
He
tightened his grip on the wooden stalks and cried out to Grimpse the Unfair to,
just this once, keep him from harm.
Euthena understood
much better the physics involved with her flying salve and how she crafted her
brooms, though, of course, she did not call it physics in any true sense of the
word.
For that part of her craft, she
was a very good, albeit illiterate, cannoneer.
She knew, for example, an approximate trajectory, and for this broom an even
less approximate duration of flight for the amount of salve she had used.
Euthena did, at least to herself, keep her
word and barring things like wind and fatal landings, the Goblin would be
within a long day’s hike of the town.
Whether or not he had the wherewithal to find the village once he
landed, well, that would be his problem.
This was
her final thought on the matter as she went back inside her tent, hoping to
salvage some type of sleep with what remained of the night.
