Chapter 4 #2
I stopped outside the bedroom with Valance inside. At first, I thought it was him, almost called out that I was here.
It wasn’t him.
A goblin stood in a junction at the end of the tunnel, dressed in a brown coat and top hat, carrying a cloth sack.
“What are you doing?” he asked.
“Passing through,” I answered with the first words that popped into my head.
His eyes narrowed. “I come here expecting celebrations, but I hear nothing. Only silence where there should be excitement for the feast to come.” He sniffed the air. “I smell blood. Lots of blood.”
“You’ve just arrived?” I asked.
“I have. Why are you carrying those things? Why is the food moving around freely?” The goblin smiled. “Oh, are you being put to work first? Are you free range? Is Clementine trying something new?” He laughed. “She is brilliant. Clementine?” he called. “Where are you?”
Obviously, no answer.
“Strange,” he said, looking over his shoulder. “There is always someone to greet visitors at the door. Clementine would never neglect her formalities, especially knowing I am coming from so far away.” He talked to himself more than me. “Something strange is going on. I don’t like this.”
The good news was that he hadn’t come across the bloodbath in the dining room yet. All the death was concreted there. Which led me to wonder about the exit. Not to his right, because that went back toward the dining room. On his left, my right, had to be where the exit lay.
Now to deal with him.
“Clementine?” he called.
I slipped into the bedroom.
“Come back here!”
I heard him running across the packed earth floor.
Kicking the door closed, I dumped our stuff and ran for my sword. The door flung open.
“You’ve done something!” the goblin screamed, pulling a blade from his coat pocket. “You sneaky, evil—”
I didn’t give him a chance to finish, charging at him with a fury of my own. With one swing, I took his head off. It bounced across the ground. Blood spurted from his neck stump, his arms thrashing.
“Fuck you,” I growled.
The body hit the dirt.
A groan from the bed.
Valance.
His eyes were opening, a hand on his forehead. “Wh-what… Kormac?”
I went to him, kneeling on the mattress. “I’m here.”
He blinked, wincing with pain. “Where… What happened.” His eyes widened. “By Danu… We’re—”
“We’re safe,” I said. “For now. We have to get moving.”
Valance tried to sit up. I helped him.
“I feel dreadful,” he moaned.
“It’s probably the…” I hesitated.
“The what? Oh. Goodness. I killed… My curse. Are they all dead?”
“Now they are,” I said, explaining the decapitated goblin body.
“I killed again.”
“Yes.”
He bit his bottom lip, closing his eyes for a few moments. “More goblins may come,” he added.
“Exactly why we have to leave. Do you need water?”
“Yes, but not from here.” He rubbed at the smooth skin of his forehead. “Never anything from here.”
“We’ll a find a spring. Let me help you dress.”
I expected resistance, but none came. He let me lift his arms, slip on his boots. Even adjust the almost fetishistic straps of his black leather armor across his chest.
His breath washed over my face, warm and labored.
“Can you walk?” I asked.
“Let me try.”
I helped him to his feet. He swayed a little but soon steadied.
“I’ll be fine,” he said and sighed. “I just need sleep.”
“I’ll find you somewhere to sleep.”
“Thank you. You must be tired yourself.” He was staring at the goblin corpse.
“I am. But I want to live before I rest.”
“We should burn this hell to the ground.”
I handed him his sword. “Let’s just leave it behind. It’s not worth it.”
“Vengeance is always worth it.”
“Not always.”
He looked at me, his eyes full of obsidian rage. They were breathtaking.
“Vengeance is all I have left, Kormac.”
I didn’t know how to answer that.
“I want to see it all burn down.”
Were we still talking about the goblin tunnels? “They’re all dead, Valance. If we start a fire, it might spread to the forest above. It could be devastating.”
“Good.”
“How is that good? What about the rest of the forest creatures?”
“I don’t care. Burn them all. Let them scream. Let the trees be ash.”
As if my hand were on puppet strings, it curled around his arm. “You don’t mean that.” Gods, even my mouth wasn’t in my control.
“I…” He shuddered, looked confused suddenly. “I don’t mean that.” He shook my hand off him. “I’m just angry.”
“I am, too. But let’s not make the forest pay for these green hellpissers.”
He nodded. “You’re right.”
“I am?”
“What else do you want from me?”
Idiot.
Not an idiot…
“I want you to get moving.”
Without another word, he started to walk.
“And I want you to follow me,” I added, taking point.
He let me take the lead.
I took a right at the junction the goblin had appeared in. There was a door between doors, hidden by mud. Disguised. I only noticed it because it was ajar by a tiny crack, saving us hours of investigation.
“Sneaky,” I said.
The prince hovered behind me.
Cautiously, I opened it. Another tunnel, more lanterns, and vines in the ceiling. Smaller than the others.
“We’ll have to crouch-walk through,” I told Valance. “Can you manage that?”
He answered with a breathless, “Yes.”
I faced him. “Are you feeling okay?”
“I’m fine. Let’s just go.”
I nodded and crouched, easing into the tunnel. Careful not to bump into the lanterns. Not the most comfortable of places to move through, but not a long stretch to navigate. Before I knew it, we were on the other side, climbing a small incline out of a hole into the nighttime.