There were no torches to light the throne room. None of its occupants needed light to see in the complete darkness of the place. Much like the great rats nesting in the unused rooms, the goblins and hobgoblins had perfect night vision. As for the giant snakes that hunted the huge rodents and, occasionally, the goblins, they had no eyes at all.
Ragglenash the Mighty stared at the female goblin cowering before his throne. She was about the size of a human child and was wearing a worn dress that had been stolen from one of the farms they raided during the Winter. As the Cook for the Stone Halls tribe she was better cared for than many of the others in her tribe. Goblins had hard lives unless they developed a special skill just as she had. Only Guards or Soldiers were treated better than her but they were all hobgoblins like Ragglenash himself. Most goblins were used as thieves, gathers, laborers, and breeding stock. The cook had escaped those fates by overcoming her natural fear of fire and learning to cook. She was especially glad to have escaped the role of breeder. Many goblins died giving birth, especially those unlucky enough to birth a hobgoblin. Hobgoblin babies were twice the size of goblin babies and hobgoblins were twice the size of goblins, sometimes even larger than that.
“Why you want see King?” The throne, once the seat of a human ruler, creaked in protest as the huge hobgoblin leaned forward and leared at the female goblin. She was beautiful with long, slender ears, a wart on her cheek, and almost a full head of hair. She would be in his harem but she’d proved to have greater worth by bringing him a roast rat the first time she was sent to him.
“I see a thing. A man. He kill big rats. He have dog.”
“Where he kill rats?” The King liked rats, especially the giant rats in this place. Before coming here the tribe lived in a system of caves deep in the mountains many weeks walk away. Last fall they’d been driven from their home by a family of cave trolls. Half of the tribe had been killed. The weeks of wandering in the night and hiding from the sun during the day had been terrible. Finding this place was the best thing that had ever happened to the tribe.
“Dead rats by cooking place.” The little goblin fiddled with the hem of her dress in her nervousness.
The King looked past the goblin to the four hobgoblins guarding the door to his throne room. “Tell goblins. Get rats. No eat.” The hobgoblins argued amongst themselves until the smallest was shoved out the door to do as the King commanded. Focusing on the Cook the ruler asked, “How many rats?”
She blinked and considered for a long moment. Finally she said, “Lots,” and held up a hand with all five clawed fingers spread.
As the King thought of it he began to drool on his own leg. His face scrunched up in incredulity and he asked, “Why they not run?” The huge rats usually traveled in packs. They would kill and devour any goblins they found and even a hobgoblin may fall to them if caught alone. A patrol of hobgoblins who attacked a pack of rats would get a kill but the rest of the giant rodents would flee.
“Man kill fast. Boom boom boom boom,” she thought for a moment, “boom boom.”
“What boom?”
“Kill with boom. Loud.” The Cook’s eyes were wide.
“Kill with boom?” The ruler asked. “Hitting boom?”
“No. Big loud boom. Fast boom. Lots” She held up a hand with all five clawed fingers spread.
Skepticism on his face Ragglenash asked, “Big Boom?”
The Cook said, “Big Boom,” as she spread her arms out in an arch to illustrate the magnitude of the sound.
“Where man? Where dog? Can cook dog?” The King hadn’t eaten dog since the glorious night the entire tribe attacked the humans, stole everything they could carry, burned the buildings, and killed many people and animals. The days that followed were a feast of humans and different animals including a few dogs all of which were eaten raw. The Cook was missing during those days. She claimed that she got lost and had to search for the Stone Halls for a few nights. In the weeks that followed goblin scouts found the town with its high walls. The hobgoblin King knew it would be harder to raid than the farms had been. He’d sent several goblins to test those walls and they’d been killed by arrows trying to climb them. He’d even sent a few goblins and hobgoblins with hated fire to set the walls ablaze but they had been killed as they approached the fortified town.
“Where man? Where dog?” repeated the female goblin. “Me not know,” she said.
The King was obviously disappointed, then he brightened, “Guards find him. They search.”
“Night soon. Sun down. Me go outside. Me find cooking things. Me no stay.” She did not tell the King that the man had entered the tables room by the cooking place. She would go back there but not for a while. He would have left by the time she returned. She would go out into the forest to forage for good plants, berries, roots, and mushrooms. The more tasty things she found, the more creative ways she used them, the safer she would be from the King’s harem, or worse, the breeding pits.
“You go. You get good things. Rats ready later. You cook tasty.” Once again the King drooled on his leg.
The Cook rose and headed for the exit. As she approached the hobgoblin guards at the door they stared at her lecherously. She looked each of them right in their red eyes and said, “Me cook. No touch. King say.” They let her go by them untouched. When she was outside the door she took a relieved breath and fled down the corridor. She watched for a telltale arrangement of stones in the wall. When she found them she made sure no other goblins or hobgoblins were around and pressed on one of them. Silently a few stones next to it swung out and an entrance to a hidden tunnel was revealed. She entered it and pressed another stone on the inside to close the entrance. It made a soft ‘thump’ as it settled into place. She had never encountered another goblin, hobgoblin, or any other creature in these tunnels. They were hers and hers alone and she used them to go everywhere. After walking for a while and taking several turns she pressed her ear to the wall and listened. Hearing nothing she pressed the stone to open the wall and entered the corridor that went to the great doors which led out into the forest.
Hanis Gruber stood at the counter in his butcher’s shop drying his freshly washed hands on a small clean towel. It was a family business and had been for two generations now. His son Birnir was already helping on busy days. It would have a third generation for sure. The Gruber family was one of those who founded the town of Knollburah some fifty years back. Once this area was the domain of the Lord of the Hill. He and his people had all died out over a hundred years past. Plague had ravaged the halls of their underground kingdom. Less than a decade after establishing the town the early settlers had found the doors leading to the underground halls of those lost people. Seeking treasure they’d tried to explore them but found a population of giant rats being fed on by giant snakes. After losing more than a dozen people the doors were sealed. Since then the towns folk stayed clear of the place and scared their children away with stories of monsters roaming the halls that would eat them alive. Last winter those stories had become a dark and terrible truth.
“The skins are piled f’ the fur man, feathers are sacked f’ the fletchin’ fella, and the meat’s eitheh smokin’ or curin’ up with thet salt an’ rosemary blend. Embla’s watchin’ Emil playin’ in the backyahd theah.” Franny Gruber peered through the window at the front of the shop. She saw a few people on the cobblestone street but no one was paying any attention to them. She pinched her husband on the backside and kissed him when he turned to scold her. He kissed her back and gave her a hug.
“Franny, ya’re a wondah, by Gorry” he said as he held her. He kept her in his arms as he leaned back against the counter. “Theah’s still one huntin’ pahty t’ come back in yet.”
She sighed and put her head on his chest. “Ayuh, Sebastian Legue an’ his boys.” It wasn’t a question. They hunted the farthest from town and were always back last. The lamps were lit in the shop and the colors in the sky outside were fading to darker hues. “Cuttin’ it close this evenin’. Menfolk got theih own kinda sense, ya know?”
“Maybe.” he said and breathed in her scent. Even after sixteen years, three kids, and a hard day of work in their shop it was his favorite smell in his world. They stayed that way until the front door swung open and the bells attached to it rang.
Franny pulled away from her husband and headed into the back of the shop to get things ready for the last bit of work they’d have for the day. Hanis turned around and saw the Cousins Legue and Gregory Garrons standing just inside his door.
“How are ya doin’, Hanis?” asked Sebastian.
“I’m doin’ good, Sebastian, been a busy day heah.”
“Does thet mean the otheh huntin’ pahties done real good?” asked Timmon as he swung the pack off of his back and set it on the counter.
“No records were broken, but we’ve had worse takes,” replied the butcher. “How’d ya boys make out?”
“We didn’t break any neitheh,” Gregory grinned.
“We didn’t break any eitheh, Greg,” Timmon said, correcting his friend.
“I know Tim, I was right theah with ya,” Greg said.
“Let’s jest see what ya boys got heah,” said Hanis, unbuckling the flap on the pack and pulling out the woodchuck. Next came the two rabbits and the four partridges. “Not a bad haul. These birds are nice and big.”
“Theah was thet big old rat,” Timmon added helpfully. “We left it behind theah. Thet’s a heavy load f’ the few folk who’d eat it.”
“Ayuh, It’s a good thing ya left it behind. Franny was beside herself the last time ya brought one of them nasty crittehs heah. Did this one go afteh ya boys jest like the last one ya killed?”
Sebastian heaved a sigh and pulled the handkerchief with the small piece of metal in it out of his pocket. “Ayuh. Since the squirrel’s outta the nest and chitterin’ up in the trees…” He dumped the object from the cloth onto the counter. “Eveh dug anythin’ like this heah outta any animal brought to ya, Hanis?”
Poking at the bit of metal with his finger the butcher shook his head. “Wheah’d ya get this thing, Bastion?”
“Would ya believe a man put it right through thet giant rat’s head an’ inta the ground undeh it?”
“Some fella done thet? Ain’t foolin’, are ya? Is this some bit of dahk fun ya’re havin’ or what?” He met the Hunter’s eyes and after a moment he whistled a long, low whistle. He glanced at the other two men standing across the counter who solemnly shook their heads. “This man who killed the rat. Did ya meet him?”
“Theah were only tracks t’ be found, tracks thet headed this way f’ a bit then off t’ thet place.” said Gregory.
The Butcher looked grave and opened his mouth to ask another question but just then Franny came through the doorway behind him. He swept the metal mushroom up in his palm. “So theah, boys,” he said, “Thet’ll be three princes an’ five dukes f’ this haul heah.” He passed eight copper coins, three larger than the other five, and the bit of metal to Sebastian who tucked them all into his pocket.
“How are ya doin’ theah, Mrs. Gruber?” Timmon asked politely.
“Well as can be, boys,” she replied, sweeping all of the men with a critical eye. “What’re ya talkin’ about theah?”
“Jest huntin’,” said Sebastian.
“Jest this an’ thet,” said Timmon
“Ayuh, we’re not talkin’ ’bout nothin’,” said Gregory.
“The day’s trade, an’ the price of the meat theah,” said Hanis.
Franny gave them all a skeptical look and asked, “All thet at once, eh?”
Sebastian put his hands in his pockets and began inspecting his boots. Timmon fumbled with his emptied pack. Gregory took interest in the construction of the ceiling. Hanis Gruber grabbed the rabbits by the hind legs and started for the back of the shop. “Let’s get to it so we can be done with the day an’ turn our minds to suppah. Could ya grab a couple a them partridges, Franny? Thank ya, boys. Goin’ to be at the Wolf’s Head tonight?”
All three of the men told the butcher that they would be there and then they piled out of the shop.
“Ayuh, they might be, but ya won’t be unless ya tell me what ya’re hidin’ theah.” Franny scolded her husband in a tone part playful and part serious.
John stood in the primitive kitchen examining the pots and pans on the shelves. They gleamed in the brilliant light of Shirak sitting on the rectangular table behind him. He was amazed at how clean they all were. Someone had polished them to a lustrous shine.
He thought of the rabbit that Dingo Boy had killed earlier in the day and he reached into his pocket that contained. Fur materialized in his hand when he thought of the dead rabbit and he pulled it out of his pocket. The blood on its nose glistened in the light. “Time doesn’t exist in these pockets,” said John aloud, in awe. Could he store fresh food without needing to preserve it?
“Angelic power is amazing isn’t it?” said a voice in his head.
“God’s power you mean?,” the man asked the gun in a teasing tone.
“Well of course God’s power!” The revolver sounded a little hurt. “It’s all His power though, if you think about it. He grants us the authority to use it as long as that use isn’t in conflict with His design. Everything is by His will.”
“Everything is by his will,” John repeated, “What about evil?”
“That’s a big question John, really big! The evil of humanity is the product of free will. The evil of demons is connected to the War in Heaven and The Fall. Just plain old evil in general? Creation exists on a foundation of many balanced forces. Gravity and inertia, force and friction, order and entropy, good and evil, and many more.”
“Isn’t God all powerful? Why not just make all of Creation good.” The man asked as he selected a pan that looked appropriate for baking. He put it on the long table and took the dead rabbit to the sink.
“I, well Nathanael and so I, work for The Almighty. We serve Him, love Him, and praise Him. We harness the power he grants us but we don’t know His mind or all of His will. We’ve existed for time outside your comprehension and have observed that the balance of Creation is like the rods, bearings and gears of a machine most enigmatic.”
“So it’s all a mystery. Unknowable God?”
“No John, knowable and loving, and far beyond any of His creations. The best of us is an ember to His bonfire, the first child while he is the last elder.”
“So why do good people suffer? Why can bad people do evil things to good people?” The Warrior had paused in this exploration of the kitchen. He stood at the sink with the rabbit in it, talking to Nath-esh.
“You want it straight?”
“Sure, sock it to me.” said the man unenthusiastically.
“When you enter the Gates of Heaven nothing that came before holds sway. All of the pain and suffering of Life or Purgatory is meaningless compared to that final existence.”
“So none of it matters?” John asked in a resigned voice.
“All of it matters my friend. The deeds, joys, sacrifices, suffering, all of the experiences of Life and Purgatory are the preparation for your existence in Heaven. Life and Purgatory are moments and Heaven is eternity. It’s the comparison of a grain of sand to the totality of an evergrowing beach.”
“I get it, it’s not the answer I was looking for, but I get it.”
He left the sink and opened the tall cupboard closest to the door to the hallway. Inside he found shelves with various lidded containers on them. Some were made of pottery, some glass, some wood, and others metal. They were varied in style, some were simple and some were fine. They reminded him of items on a thrift store’s shelves, incongruent but of a theme. There were also some corked bottles on the shelves in the cupboard. Looking through the containers he found grains, herbs, salt, and flour. In the bottles he found oil in most, honey in a few, and two contained a strong alcohol. In the next cupboard he found woven baskets of various sizes, several cups and mugs, utensils for cooking and eating made of wood and metal, and in the bottom of the cupboard there were several wooden buckets full of water. The last cupboard had a shelf filled with cloth towels of various sizes from dishtowels to washcloths. They were made of a rough fabric similar to the fabric his shirt was currently made of. The other two shelves were empty. More buckets of water were in the bottom of this cupboard. He picked one up and set it next to the rabbit in the sink.
“Change of subject?” John asked the gun in his jacket.
“Shoot,” the revolver said.
“Exactly,” said the Warrior, “at least that’s what I wanted to talk about. You ran out of ammo for a few minutes back there.” Time had gotten fuzzy after he hit his head.
“Yep,” replied the Angelic Shard without remorse. “I’ll get faster at reloading the rounds. It’s new to me and it’s a complicated thing to do. It involves matter manipulation and precise measurement. I’m just happy I haven’t blown up the gun.”
“Yeah,” said John, “please don’t blow up the gun.”
“The longer I spend in it the more I learn about it. I can clean it now and I’m sure I can repair it soon. Maybe even more than that someday but I don’t want to get your hopes up.”
“What do you mean more than that?”
“It’s a surprise.”
John contemplated that as he grabbed Shirak and walked out of the kitchen to the round table with the sheathed knife on it. Dingo Boy looked up from the spot on the floor he’d staked out for a nap. John picked up the knife and headed back to the kitchen. The Heeler watched him go and after a couple of seconds picked up the red ball laying nearby and followed. As John walked through the archway into the kitchen the dog passed him, dropped the ball, and went to the sink. He peered into it on his hind legs and sniffed, smelling the dead rabbit. He dropped back to his paws and padded over to the long table. He chose a place under it and curled up to continue his nap. John put Shirak back on the table, unsheathed the knife, and inspected it. The blade looked clean but he couldn’t tell for sure. He decided he’d wash it before gutting and skinning the rabbit. He left the sheath on the table and walked to the sink. As he worked on the rabbit he thought about what the revolver had said about reloading taking time and he began to strategize.
“Can you reload the rounds one after the other instead of all at once?”
“Sure,” replied the gun. “Come to think of it, I can reload one faster than all of them at once. I see what you’re getting at. Reloading them all at once probably takes less time overall but reloading them one at a time will get you the next shot faster.”
The Warrior thought for a moment and said, “Okay, here’s the strategy. You reload them one at a time when we’re fighting and all at once when time permits. Sound like a plan?”
“Sounds like a plan, Stan.”
“Call me John.”
“Call me Nash.”
“You really like it? I didn’t mean to call you that. Things were just a little crazy at the moment.”
“I like it,” said the gun, “I’m not ready to put in paperwork at the Social Security office or anything but when things are spicy ‘Nash’ is faster than ‘Nath-esh’.”
“How can you and Nathanael be so different? I mean in the way you speak.”
“I’m not everything he is. I’m just a shard of him, a piece. Well, pieces really, aren’t we all the sum of our parts? Anyway… He chose the pieces, pieces of pieces I guess, that would help you the most.”
“So are there other differences than the way you speak?” John asked as he finished with the rabbit and lifted the bucket of water to wash it and the knife. He wondered if he should use the water from the silver bowl instead. Putting a finger into the water in the bucket he used his Alchemical Naturopath skill to check it and found it clean or at least not harmful.
“I’m much more handsome,” said the gun flippantly. “I also can’t create the dimensional gates that he can. Other stuff too. He’s the whole package after all.”
John thought of the archways of light he’d stepped through twice now. “It sounded like we’d be going to more than one world. Will he appear to make a gate to the next world when it’s time?”
“He could. I’ve never been on one of these adventures.”
“Other Purgated don’t get…”
“Angelic Shards,” provided the gun, “a few of them but certainly not all of them. It’s a pretty rare thing really.”
John nodded as he put the cleaned and washed rabbit into the pan. He returned to the sink and got the liver, kidneys, and heart, and washed them with the remaining water from the bucket. Afterward they went into the pan with the rabbit. Finally he cleaned off the rabbit skin, got a new bucket of water, and washed it. It was then folded up, and put into one of his pockets. He went to the cupboard with the towels and took out a couple of them about the size of dishtowels. He dried his hands on one and tossed it on the table. He set the other one down next to it. Then he washed the knife, dried it, and returned it to its sheath. He put it next to the towels on the table. He put the guts and the rabbit’s head in the empty bucket and used the water from the remaining bucket to wash out the sink. The water flowed out of the drain in one corner and disappeared into the wall.
Dingo Boy watched John’s tall boots from under the table. He was speaking out loud. It must have been to someone else because it didn’t sound like it used to when he talked to himself. The man had done that for a while after Lynn left but the habit had faded. The dingo mix was glad when it stopped, it confused him. This didn’t sound like that, this sounded like one side of a conversation. Like when John would talk on the dreaded cellphone. He reached out with his mind-leash and listened. Yes, John was talking to someone else. Another voice, not his, appeared in the man’s head. The dog knew it belonged to the smaller Nathanael he’d seen after the rat hurt him. It seemed the little Virtue had a mind-leash of his own.
The smell of meat was in the air, he was glad he’d killed the rabbit in the forest. John was cooking it and he loved it when John cooked. His food was even tastier than snackies in crinkly bags. He wished he’d caught both rabbits in the forest. What had happened to the first one he was chasing? He never found a hole in the ground or the scent of a warren. He had gotten distracted by the other animal smell that turned out to be the great rat.
The dog shuttered, the giant rodents were loathsome and after the ambush in the darkness, the wounds he sustained, he hated them to his core. The rats’ scent was everywhere in the corridors. There were also the scents of two other creatures. One was the Bob creatures he’d smelled in the large hallway outside these rooms. The other scent was strong in this room and the one with the tables and chairs. He hoped it wasn’t a dangerous creature. He’d had his fill of dangerous creatures for a while.
“What!?!?” roared Ragglenash, King of the Stone Halls tribe. The three goblins kneeling before him babbled and cowered. The huge hobgoblin was known to kill goblins who displeased him and, on rare occasions, eat them on the spot.
The goblin who had just delivered the bad news tried to flee for the door. The other two goblins on the floor with him grabbed him and forced him toward their ruler. He turned so pale that he was barely green anymore. He repeated his news, “R-r-r-rats gone.”
“You eat?!” the King asked and accused at the same time. The goblin swooned and almost fainted. The other goblins started pinching him and slapping him back to consciousness.
“N-n-no! No eat!” the pale goblin replied too loudly. Realizing he was yelling at the volatile ruler he softened his desperate tone. “S-s-snake eat,” he said in a decidedly apologetic tone with his forehead pressed to the ground.
“You see snake eat?” Ragglenash was both disappointed and suspicious of the goblins.
“No see.” This was said so softly it was barely a whisper.
“How know snake eat?” The King’s suspicion and distrust were growing.
“Tracks. Blood tracks.” Offered one of the other goblins. The pale goblin looked as if he might kiss the bold goblin for his bravery and for drawing Ragglenash’s attention away from him.
“Snakes no have tracks.” Ragglenash said, his suspicion and distrust becoming anger again.
“Blood whoosh, whoosh, whoosh.” said the brave little goblin slithering his hands to the left while moving his hips to the right then slithering his hands to the right while moving his hips to the left. He did a very impressive impersonation of a snake as he drew imaginary tracks in the air before the King’s throne. Snickering could be heard from the area of the door and the goblin glared over his shoulder at the hobgoblin guards. Realizing what he was doing he suddenly became very interested in the big toe on his left foot.
His majesty also noticed the snickering hobgoblins and said to them, “You! Go see. Find snake tracks”
The hobgoblins argued amongst themselves until the smallest one was shoved out the door to do as the King commanded. A moment later he poked his head back into the room and inhaled as if to protest then dejectedly retracted his head and closed the throne room door.
The three goblins standing before the King started for the door, pushing and shoving each other to reach it first now that their job was done.
“Wait,” the King commanded the goblins, “you wait.” He pointed to a corner of the throne room. The three goblins, shoulders slumped, mopped toward the corner he pointed at. “No snake? No tracks? Then you be rats. You be dinner.” The pale goblin fainted dead away and the other two drug him to the corner by his feet.
Sebastian, Timmon, and Gregory split their pay and parted ways after leaving the Gruber’s butcher shop. The Hunter and the Packer stopped by their shared house to change out of their hunting clothes and freshen up a bit. They agreed to meet up with the Tracker later. Now the cousins sat at a table in the common room of the Wolf’s Head Inn. It was the biggest building in the town of Knollburah. There were a dozen tables like the one they sat at and a few smaller ones. Most of them were occupied as were about half of the stools at the long bar that stretched across the back of the room. Above that bar was mounted a very large wolf’s head, mascot and namesake of the inn. Few of the rooms for rent were filled. The ones that were occupied were home to the survivors from the burned farms outside of town. One of them was rented to Gregory Garrons. It was a stark change of pace from the days when the inn had been full of travelers most every night of the week.
The traders who came through town had spread word of the Night of Fire and Horror to the surrounding towns. Incidents on the road going to and from Knollburah had also occurred. Giant rat sightings and a goblin raid on a traveling Tinker that left the man barely alive. All of his copper cookware was stolen as well as his wooden buckets and a few other items. He’d managed to jump onto his horse when the goblins turned from beating him to pillaging his wagon. He’d rode for the town as fast as he could push the old mare scattering goblins and housewares in his wake. It was a close thing getting the gates open and getting him in safely before the goblins following him reached the walls of the town. Stanich Buillins, the Tinker, had stayed in the Wolf’s Head for a few nights as he recovered. He had left a few months ago and no one had visited since. Knollburah was beginning to struggle from the lack of trade. Spices were running short as well as other foodstuffs not grown or foraged by the townsfolk. Pots and pans and other items that the local blacksmith didn’t have the expertise to maintain needed mending. There was also economic stagnation happening with money pooling in the hands of some while others who were more dependent on trade found themselves destitute.
A young woman every bit as tall as Sebastian with red curly hair, dancing green eyes, and freckled cheeks approached the table. She was in a long blue skirt with a frilly white blouse. “Heah ya go, boys,” said Tannyah Jacobs as she placed three pints of ale in wooden mugs on the table, “Greg’s still up in his room. Want me t’ tell him thet ya fellas are heah?”
“Ya don’t need t’ do thet, Tanny,” said Sebastian, taking one of the pints and passing one to Timmon, “he’ll be down soon ‘nough.” Tannyah, and the Legue cousins had been friends since childhood. Now she worked in her parent’s inn and the young men hunted during the day and ate every supper in the common room. They still saw each other everyday, just as they had as children.
“Can I bring ya some grub?” the barmaid asked, laying a hand on Sebastian’s shoulder. Her fingers gently rubbed where they lay.
“Ayuh, thet’d be nice. Got stew an’ some bread?” said Sebastian laying his hand on hers.
“An’ some pickled vegetables?” asked Timmon.
“We have all of them. Plenty f’ three?”
“Thet’d be real good.” said Sebastian, letting go of her hand. She patted his shoulder and whisked off to the kitchen. He watched her walk away and turned back to his cousin who he found watching him watching her. Timmon grinned and Sebastian grinned back. “Figuhe Joy’ll show up heah t’night?” the Hunter asked.
“Ayuh,” said the Packer.
“Ya know she’s sweet on ya, cousin.”
“Ayuh,” said Timmon. Tannyah’s younger cousin had been following them around since they were kids. Once her awkward stares and attention grated on him. Lately his eyes had been turning the Seamstress’s way. “Playin’ matchmakeh now, Bastian? Gonna find ya in the knittin’ circle next with the otheh blue hairs?”
“I’m jest sayin’…”
“Ya fellas been waitin’ long heah?” interrupted Gregory as he pulled out one of the four remaining chairs at the table and sat down in it with a sigh. He was across from Timmon and to the right of Sebastian who was at the end of the table.
“Not too awful long, no.” said Timmon, sliding the third pint of ale over to the Tracker.
“Thanks, Tim! Theah’s no way I won’t enjoy thet!”
“Jest say ya’ll enjoy it, Greg!”
“I jest told ya thet I would, Tim!”
“We ordered vittles,” Sebastian said to Gregory, “we got bread, stew, an’ pickled vegetables comin’.”
“That sounds tasty Bastion, thanks.”
“I thought of the pickled ones.” said Timmon
“Thanks f’ thet, Tim. Pickin’ up the tab too?” Gregory smiled and held up a coin.
Timmon dug a coin from his money pouch holding the Tracker’s gaze while he did. Without a word the Hunter produced a coin as well. On an unspoken signal all three of them flipped their coins onto the table. All three coins showed the profile of a man. All three coins were retrieved and flipped again. This time Sebastian and Gregory’s coins showed the man’s profile but Timmon’s showed a tree with a leaf falling from it. Timmon groaned and the other two young men laughed. Sebastian patted his cousin’s back. They’d been doing this since they were little boys visiting the bakery or candy shop. The ritual over the three of them sat in silence and drank from their pints. Two of them grinned and one looked sullen.
Tannyah returned carrying a tray laden with food. She placed a bowl of stew in front of each young man, then put a larger bowl of pickled vegetables in the center of the table, and set a plate of fresh sliced bread down next to it.
“Thanks, Tanny. Much obliged.” said Sebastian with a smile for her.
“Ayuh, thanks,” said Timmon reaching for a slice of bread.
“This is real good stuff!” exclaimed Gregory looking over the spread, “Oh yeah, an’ thanks!”
“Ayuh. Ya’re all welcome theah. No trouble at all.” said Tannyah. She looked at Sebastian and added, “Want anythin’ more?”
“Three more, Tannyah! Tim’s payin’ tonight.” Gregory said. He finished his ale in one long swallow. The other two men immediately drained theirs as well and nodded their agreement as they handed over the empty mugs.
“Awright, awright.” she said and loaded all three mugs onto her tray. With a smile and a quick wink for Sebastian she swept off toward the bar and the hunting party set upon the food with vigor.
The goblin Cook stood on the bank of the stream that ran near the entrance to the place the goblins called the Stone Halls. Those halls had once been called Kiningdom Burruh, by its long dead people. The goblins did not know that nor did they know sickness had once ravished the place. Now it was their domain and that was all that mattered to most of them. The little Cook wondered, sometimes, who built her home. She wondered about a lot of things. She wondered why the hidden ways she used to hide from the dangers of the Stone Halls were built. She wondered why the other goblins were so often spiteful, mean, and cruel. She wondered if she could leave her tribe and find a better way to live. A frog croaked and jumped into the water, the splash brought her out of her reverie. She should get back to her cooking place to cook for the King. It was the best way to remind him of her unique value.
She listened to the stream burble for just a moment longer then bent down and retrieved the basket from the ground. The berries that filled it were plentiful and easy to find. These blue ones were a little tart this time of year but some of them were nice and sweet. She would try putting some of them inside the next rat she baked in the large oven. Her ruler was tolerant of some experimentation. He’d been dubious the first time she had served him a rat that she had gutted and skinned before roasting. Now he insisted she make ‘no skin’ rat every time.
When she reached the tall carved doors of the Stone Halls she knocked and yelled, “You open! Me cook! No touch! King say!” One of the doors opened with a creak and a grunt. A hobgoblin head poked out and looked down at her. Without a word she entered and hurried down the wide hall. When she reached the right spot she waited for the guards to turn away and pushed on a stone in the wall. A few stones next to it swung out silently. She entered the hidden tunnel and quickly pressed the stone on the inside wall that would close the entrance. She watched it swing in and seal shut with a soft ‘thump’ then made her way down the tunnel.
When she reached her destination and exited her secret tunnel into the tables room, the little Cook noticed that someone had moved one of the chairs and put it up against the door. She grumbled to herself about that. Ever since the night the King’s dinner was stolen from the oven none of the hobgoblins or goblins were allowed in the cooking place or the tables room. Ragglenash the Mighty had proclaimed it.
She was about to walk across the room to remove the chair when she noticed a beautiful light coming from the cooking place. It was like moonlight, which she loved, but brighter and much more beautiful. She leaned against the wall and accidentally pushed the stone that closed the hidden tunnel. She grabbed her basket and, quiet as a moth on the wing, scampered into the corner to the right of the archway leading into the cooking place. There she was hidden from view and looked at the pool of light on the floor in front of the opening. As she silently stood in that corner she heard a human man talking to himself in the cooking place. He must have been talking to himself, there was no other voice coming from the room. If this was the man with the dog maybe he was talking to it? She liked his voice. It was soft and deep, nothing like a goblin’s voice which was rough or a hobgoblin’s voice which was even rougher. She tried to resist the temptation but she needed to see the owner of that voice. She carefully, quietly, crept to the archway and peeked around it.
The human in the cooking place, her cooking place, was indeed the man with the dog. The man who killed the rats with the boom, boom, boom! What was she doing!?! She had to get away, she had to risk running for the secret door, she had to… wait… he had a pan on the table. The pan had some kind of meat in it. He had a bottle and several of the containers from the cupboard out and he was sprinkling their contents, pinch at a time, over the meat. He was cooking!