by Megan Derr
Before him was another entrance. Laying his hand upon the words carved deep into the stone above the rough doorway, he whispered four words in goblin speech, 'I am called friend'. The entryway seemed to flash, like metal struck by sunlight. Then came the warm glow of torchlight, seeming from nowhere, but it had been there all along, behind the thick veil of protective spell work.
Just past the entrance was a set of stairs, and he took them with the same ease and familiarity he exhibited in his forest. The goblins had called him friend ever since he had saved a handful of their children from a senile and therefore extremely dangerous dragon. The children had run off against orders to stay where they were, and gotten lost. Attempting to seek refuge in the familiar dark of a cave, they had instead woken an old dragon. Calder had come along just in time, called by animals who knew the goblin children were in danger.
The goblins had called him friend after that. Over the years, the friendship had deepened—especially with Goulet, whose little sister had been one of the children. He and Goulet had shared a brotherly bond right from the start. It was Goulet who always did his tattoos, a high honor indeed, as he was an Ink Master and his time and talent were not parceled out idly.
Calder greeted and waved to all the goblins he passed, but did not linger with any of them, simply made straight for the house at the end of the main road, a simply little cottage that was surprisingly humble for a goblin of Goulet's skill and renown.
Torches and fairy lights kept back the otherwise overwhelming dark of living underground, and there was so much of the light that it could almost be day. Above Goulet's little house, a sign was carved with the needle and ink sigil of what the goblins called 'skin artists'. Tattoos were the defining mark of the goblin, more recognized than even their odd features, the way they most often lived in caves. No one could mark skin like a goblin, and anyone serious about having his skin so marked went to a goblin to have it done. The cost was notoriously high, but Calder had never met anyone who complained about having to pay it.
Being an honorary member of this tribe, he paid nothing, unless one counted being at the whims of Goulet—which many goblins would say was a price.
"Brother," Goulet greeted as Calder slid inside. "What brings you…?" He drifted off, and frowned, standing up from where he had been idly drinking and reading before one of the odd smokeless fires they used to aid in living underground. "You are troubled, and tainted with foul magic. Sit down; I'll get you something to drink."
Normally, Calder would have refused to have anything to do with the potent alcohol the goblins brewed, but right then, as he finally allowed himself to tremble with exhaustion and fear and disgust, it was precisely what he needed.
It burned going down, made his eyes water, made it hard to breath, but when he finally regained control of his senses, the warmth in his belly, in his blood, steadied him as he related to Goulet all that had transpired.
When he finished, Goulet said nothing, merely frowned at the scuffed table at which they sat, and thought.
Calder was not offended. Goulet was the silent type, unless you got him outrageously drunk. Letting him think, Calder sat back and sipped more of the potent alcohol, what most people called Goblin Whiskey.
Goulet was handsome, as goblins went. Calder had arrived more than once to see that his friend did not suffer from a lack of bed partners—male and female, and more than once both together. He was oddly tall for a goblin, a race that in general tended to be short. They were all slender to the point of being boney, with dark skin that ranged in color from a greenish tone to somewhat violet, and even pitch black. Goulet's race was of the greenish cast, his skin the shade of leaves in the fading evening light. His eyes, by contrast, were a sharp, bright yellow. His hair was true black, the very same shade as the costly ink the goblins used for their tattoo work.
Like most goblins his age, very little of Goulet's skin was left unmarked. He was inked from face to toes, with hundreds of designs large and small. Only his throat, groin area, and ass were left unmarked—intimate places, saved for whenever Goulet decided to settle down. The old saying went that the only thing worse than being a goblin's enemy was being his friend—but far worse, Calder had often said to Goulet, to marry one. Goulet had only ever laughed, and said at least Calder was not the poor bastard who had to ink a remarkable number of dicks every year. Calder had agreed.
"I think you are damned lucky that someone cared enough about you to give you an amulet like that," Goulet said at last. "Let me see your necklace."
Calder pulled the necklace out and off, and handed it over. Goulet frowned over it for several, silent minutes, then handed it back. "That is old magic, to be sure, and part of its making is that it goes completely unnoticed. Only those stupid know-it-all dwarves would have realized what saved you without first being told."
Shaking his head in amusement at the unconvincing show of distaste for the dwarves, Calder replaced the necklace and started to ask what else Goulet knew, when Goulet beat him to it.
"That mirror you described sounds familiar, too," Goulet said, gnawing at his bottom lip in a way that never boded well. "Unless I am mistaken, they were all supposed to have been destroyed after the Blood & Magic Wars. That's when goblins were banned from making the magical relics for which we used to be so famous—including the All Seeing Mirrors. We'll have to go speak with someone who can say for certain, because I hope to the Great Depths that I am wrong."
"I hope you're wrong, too," Calder said. "I have no idea what an All Seeing Mirror is, but if it's what I saw then I wish it had been destroyed."
Goulet nodded, and pulled on more clothes, having been until then only in a loose, threadbare pair of breeches. Stamping into the special boots used to maneuver through the caves, he led Calder from his house and along the streets toward the end of the village where the half dozen Chiefs resided.
The Chiefs were all older in age, goblins believing that no one under fifty was smart enough to lead a tribe, and that sixty was even better. They listened quietly as Goulet related to them what Calder had said, and at the end motioned only for Calder to tell the tale himself.
"Why did you come to us, Brother Calder?"
"Only for any information you might have," Calder immediately replied. "My problems are my own, but to solve a problem, one must first fully understand it."
They nodded, and murmured to each other briefly in gobbling speak—too rapid and low for Calder to follow, as his own understanding of the language was still rudimentary at best. Finally, the most senior of them spoke. "When magic was more common place, goblins were renowned for creating magical objects. The All Seeing Mirrors were the pinnacle of goblin craft. At the command of its master, the All Seeing Mirror can display whatever its master desires to know—but it must be asked a specific question, and able to give a precise answer."
"Such as, 'who is most powerful in all the land?'" Calder asked.
"Yes," said another of the Chiefs. "Or 'where is my Huntsman' to give another example."
Calder grimaced. "Then I had best leave. The very last thing I need her knowing is that I am called friend by the goblins."
"It takes magic to fight magic," said another of the chiefs, an old woman nearly eighty years of age. "At that level, only magic can combat magic. You must find a witch or wizard willing to help you. Perhaps the one who gave you that protective talisman?"
Touching the jeweled pendant, Calder replied, "He is long gone from my life. I know not where he lives, or if he would remember me."
"One who gave you that, would remember," said the senior Chief.
Calder nodded obediently, the matter not worth an argument. Ten years had passed, and they had agreed to go their separate ways—had agreed, right from the start, that their affair would only last through school. Lev had probably set him aside as a fond—he hoped fond—memory. He probably had a magnificent lover at his side, someone who perfectly complimented a great wizard and the courtly life he probably led.
No, he would not bother Lev. There must be another way to stop the Witch-Queen. "How does one destroy an All Seeing Mirror?" he asked.
"The spell within must be broken, and the mirror shattered, then the pieces melted down."
Calder bit back a curse. So he would need a magic user of some sort. That figured. He would have to cross that bridge when he reached it, however. For now, he still had to scale the cliff back up to the bridge.
A touch to his arm made him jump, and he realized he had been completely immersed in his thoughts. He looked up at Goulet, who motioned they should be going. Making his thanks to the Chiefs, he turned and followed Goulet back to his house, where they both had another drink.
Goulet rocked back in his chair, feet stretched out on the table, precariously balanced on the two back legs of the rickety old chair. "So who gave you the necklace, Cal, and why are you so reluctant to seek his help again?"
"It doesn't matter," Calder replied. "The past is the past."
"Hmm," Goulet said, unimpressed. He regarded Calder in silence for several long minutes, then said, "You were in love with him."
Calder flinched. "Fine, yes," he bit out. "I was in love with him—but he wasn't in love with me, and we went our separate ways when we left the academy. I came here, he went north. That was that. I seriously doubt he remembers me, and after ten years I have no right to go begging for his help, or any reason to expect it. That aside, I cannot leave the forest, and I dare not leave the princess alone for as long as it would take."
"I could go for you," Goulet replied. "What can it hurt to ask?"
"No," Calder said flatly. "This is my forest, my kingdom. I will protect it."
"You are a stubborn fool," Goulet said with a snort. "I think it is just that you are afraid of what you might find, should you go to see your old lover. Cowardly, human, very cowardly."
Calder stood up, not in the mood to hear it, even if it was probably true. "I came here for help, not to be lectured. Thank you for the help, brother. I will hopefully see you again, and may the bitch be dead when that day comes."
Goulet rolled his eyes, but bid him farewell—but he spoke again right as Calder reached the door. "What was the name of your wizard, brother? Tell me that much."
He thought about telling Goulet something rather vulgar, but in the end conceded, because he knew Goulet would not do anything with the knowledge if he did not have Calder's permission. "Levaughn Galus."
"An interesting name," Goulet said dryly. "Good night, brother. I hope you kill the Witch-Queen soon."
Calder nodded, and departed.
Instead of returning to the castle, the very idea of which made his skin crawl, he went to his own little cabin in the heart of the woods, a place Huntsmen through the ages had used. It was old, but sturdy, and the inhabitants of the forest helped to maintain it in exchange for all that the Huntsman did for them.
Inside, he stripped out of his weapons and equipment, then burrowed beneath the blankets, tension easing as he slowly warmed.
Sleep, however, did not come. He worried about the Princess. He feared for the King. He tried not to think about his time with the Queen, feeling cold and sick and alone whenever he did. Loneliness made him think of Lev, which just increased his despair, which made him start worrying all over again, over and over and over, until he wore himself out, falling into a restless sleep. Even then, he was far too aware that come the dawn, the nightmare would begin again.
*
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Part Two
Why, Levaughn thought, was there never an emergency when he needed one? The quarterly tax meetings had been droning on for what seemed like a century, and if the tedium did not end shortly…
Well, he would not be held responsible for what happened.
Stifling a sigh, he turned his head the barest amount, just enough that he could look out the window with it seeming as though he was doing precisely that. It was a beautiful day, the sort of day meant to be spent outside. He should be tending his garden, or playing with his pets, riding his horse… He wanted to smell the earth, the trees, feel the wind in his face, the hint of sea that it carried.
Instead, he was being bored to bloody death by the most tedious discussion in the world. Honestly, he wished the King would stop insisting upon his presence at every last single meeting. As the royal wizard, he had much better things to be doing with his time.
Such as jumping out the window to end his suffering.
If he blew something up, could he blame it on Marcum? Possibly, and Marcum would be more than happy—or at least amused enough—to accept the blame. Biting back another sigh, Levaughn silently consigned the whole castle to the deepest rings of hell. All the times he had helped the castle inhabitants, and they could not suffer one small, more or less harmless emergency that would free him from dying a slow and painful death by calculation of taxes?
He knew he should have brought his dagger.
Was one teensy emergency really too much to ask?
Still staring out the window, Levaughn stroked at the scar that ran from the outer corner of his left eye, curving along his cheek to end just at the edge of his chin. Though the scar was seven years old, it would always be a livid mark. The result of his first truly grueling wizard task—put a stop to a group of bandits assaulting travelers on the road to the castle, and who were using illegal magic to do it.
The bandits had been comprised of two ordinary soldiers, two mages, one ogre, and three goblins. It had been one of the goblins—from a northern clan, Levaughn thought—who had managed to slice his face open before Levaughn could strip away the spells making the bandits all but impervious.
From the nearby cathedral, the bells began to toll the first hour of the evening. As suddenly as that, men began to shuffle paper and push back chairs and make excuses—then they were gone, off to their dinner. Levaughn rolled his eyes, and bolted before the King could pin him down and force him to attend dinner in the great hall.
He made his way swiftly through the halls of the lavish castle, working hard to avoid everyone—now that he was free, he did not need an emergency, and was eager to avoid them again. It was all well and good to set him against bandits and illegal witches and other such normal wizard fair, but if he had to rescue Mittens or make a poultice one more time…
Perhaps he did need a break, as cranky as he had been of late. Turning sharply at the end of the Glass Hall—so named for the very obvious reason that the walls were almost entirely made of stained glass—he made a last dash for the one place no one in his right mind would dare to go except on pain of death.
Opening the door, he stepped into the laboratory of Prince Marcum, the King's youngest son of three. Marcum was roughly five years his junior, but they had very quickly become fast friends when Levaughn arrived to take up the post of Royal Wizard. They were both experimenters, used to taking risks, to being hurt in the course of taking those risks, to using their skills for tasks both pleasant and grim. Both their rooms were filled with books, strange ingredients and spell components, talismans, charms, and other miscellany that filled the lives of royal wizard and alchemist prince.
"Hullo, Lev," Marcum greeted cheerfully, waving with one hand, a glass tube held in the other. "Survive the tax meeting, or did you turn them all into mice?"
"Do not put tempting ideas in my head," Levaughn replied, making Marcum snicker. He moved slowly across the room, weaving his way through the familiar mess. When he reached what seemed to be a more or less safe-looking stool, he carefully unearthed it and then gingerly sat down. It held, and he let out a sigh of relief. "What are you doing today, Marc?"
Marcum did not immediately reply, tongue between his teeth as he concentrated on measuring a blood-red liquid from the glass tube into a glass jar filled with looked like nothing so much as liquid diamonds. Habit and long experience made Levaughn brace for the worse—but the two liquids combined without incident, and he let out a long sigh of relief.
"M
aking a love potion," Marcum said, holding up the glass jar, which now contained a liquid that was a delicate rose pink in color.
Levaughn rolled his eyes, long used to the way nothing an alchemist said meant what it seemed to mean. "Translation?"
Laughing, Marcum poured the love potion into a glass apothecary bottle and corked it. Then he carried it to his desk and began to compose a label for it, shoving his slipping spectacles back up his nose. His desk was situated right in front of one of three windows which provided the laboratory with light, and the sunlight spilling in drew out the hints of deep red in curly hair that usually was so dark a brown it could nearly pass for black. A bad incident years ago had severely burned part of the prince's face, scaring most of the right side of his face and that portion of his nose—he was fortunate the mess had not taken his entire face, or even his right eye. But, since then, Marcum had spent more time in his laboratory than ever.
"Translation," Marcum repeated, "it's a deadly poison."
"Love being that which can break even the greatest of men," Levaughn replied, rolling his eyes.
Marcum laughed again, then cast him a sideways look, smirking a bit. "A rare side effect of this potion can be a certain…restlessness? That is part of the reason for dubbing it a 'love potion'."
"Alchemists," Levaughn said, throwing up his hands. "You call death love, and love death, and expect everyone to believe you make perfect sense."
"Because we don't make sense," Marcum replied.
Levaughn only rolled his eyes again. "Give me proper wizardry any day."
Marcum grinned and pasted the label to the dark brown glass of the bottle, then set the finished poison on one of his many shelves. Levaughn had a rough idea of how they were sorted, but he hoped his life never depended on knowing.