by Jim C. Hines
“Say no more,” Veka said, waving her hand in what she hoped was a gesture of generosity. She turned to Slash, reached out her hand, and tried to pull some of that light back into herself.
Nothing happened. She frowned and tried again. The spellbook said the caster would have total mastery of any effects they produced.
“I . . . I’ve changed my mind,” she said. “Leave the hobgoblin to his discomfort. He can tie a rag over his face if he wants. At least that would spare us the ugliness of his features.”
She saw the muscles of Slash’s neck and shoulders tighten, but he didn’t say anything. He was too afraid of her!
“Here,” said Grell, handing him an old stained cloth.
Slash’s hands shook with anger as he tied the cloth around his nose. The light shone right through the cloth, but it was significantly softer. “What is this?” he asked.
“Old diaper,” Grell said. “Don’t worry, I rinsed it out before I packed it.”
“Veka. . . .” Jig’s voice trailed off. He looked nervous. Was he starting to realize she would soon replace him in the eyes of the other goblins? Already Braf stared at her with new respect, and Grell . . . well, Grell looked annoyed. But she always looked annoyed.
Veka smiled. “Shall we proceed, Jig Dragonslayer?” Beside her, Grell shrugged. “Might as well. I’ve got no interest in standing here staring at the hobgoblin and his amazing glowing nostrils.” She turned away and started walking. With a shrug, Braf fell in behind her.
Veka gave Slash one last smile before she followed. Fortunately, Slash had no magic of his own. Otherwise the hatred on his face would have melted her to a puddle of goo right there.
Veka found herself walking beside Slash, to the annoyance of them both. Without her firestarting stick, the only way for her to read was by the light of his nose. Several of the glowing bugs she had seen in Jig’s temple circled Slash’s head, evading his angry swats.
“I’m going to kill you and feed your body to the tunnel cats, you know,” Slash said.
Veka ignored him. His bluster reminded her of the goblin guards boasting about what they planned to do to the hobgoblins. They were too afraid to follow through. Those few who tried tended not to return.
“What are you planning to do when the ogres and the pixies find us?” he asked. “Making pixies glow isn’t going to do much good.”
“There are other spells,” she said, giving him a side-long glance. Though they would be far simpler to master if her spellbook weren’t in such wretched condition. Here was a spell to fling fire at one’s enemies, but most of that page was blackened beyond legibility, all except the warning at the top: Do not cast near a privy. Another page contained the first few steps in what seemed to be a very advanced spell, but the last part of the title was smudged.
“Shadow Beam of what?” she muttered. Shadow Beam of Darkness? Shadow Beam of Death? This could be Shadow Beam of Endless Belching for all she knew. If the rest of the spell had been present, she would have tried it on Slash anyway, but without the later instructions, the page was worthless.
A draft of warm air brushed her face. She glanced up and, for the first time since leaving the woods, really noticed their surroundings.
The dust ahead was heavily scuffed. She spotted large footprints ahead of Jig and the others. Ogre footprints.
She could hear a humming sound farther down the tunnel, like a giant playing the world’s largest wind instrument. The air was drier than before, and it smelled of bat guano.
Ahead, Jig had stopped moving. He looked frightened.
“What is it?” Veka asked.
“I know where we are. Where we’re going, at least.
I hoped I was wrong.” He leaned against one wall and wiped sweat from his face. “The Necromancer transformed his tunnels into a labyrinth full of traps and spells, and every tunnel led to the same place: a bottomless pit where he could dispose of those who weren’t ’worthy’ of joining his dead servants.”
“I know the song,” Veka said. Keeping her voice low, she sang,
“Deep in the mountain, to the blackness below,
that’s where the Necromancer’s victims all go.
Your screams start to fade as you plummet and fall,
so bring a good snack and don’t bounce off the wall
of the Necromancer’s Bottomless Pit.
The Necromancer’s Bottomless Pit.
You can fall for a lifetime, if you come prepared.
Bring food and klak beer, there’s no need to be scared
of the Necromancer’s Bottomless Pit.”
Slash grunted. “We hobgoblins sing something like that. The chorus is a little different, though.
“How many squirming goblins will fit
in the Necromancer’s Bottomless Pit?
Keep tossing them in as they beg and they shout,
keep tossing them in if you want to find out
just how many terrified goblins will fit
in the Necromancer’s Bottomless Pit.”
“Will you please both shut up?” Jig asked. “Those giant bats, there was a whole nest of them living in the pit. That must be where the ogres are going to collect them. You can already feel the wind. This tunnel leads to the pit. We’ll be trapped if we go there.”
“So let’s go back,” Veka said. The others stared. “We passed at least one other tunnel, back where the ogres had broken through. All we have to do is—”
“The ogres have been following us for a while now,” Jig said. “Can’t you hear them?”
Veka’s ears swiveled, trying to shut out the sound from ahead as she listened. She flushed. Jig was right. The sounds were faint, but the grunting and clomping of the ogres was unmistakable. How could she have missed it?
“They don’t know we’re here though, right?” she asked.
“I wouldn’t bet on that,” Jig mumbled.
Braf was looking back and forth between them. “So what do we do?”
“We go forward,” Veka said. “Follow the path.”
“And hope it branches off again between here and the pit,” Jig added. He mumbled something about ogres being the least of his worries, but by then Veka was once again scouring the pages of her spellbook.
The wind picked up, ripping the page Veka had been studying from her hands. She barely managed to clamp down fast enough to keep the rest from following. She watched as the instructions for transforming urine to beer fluttered down the tunnel. The wind was making it impossible for her to study.
She grabbed Slash by the arm. “Come on. I need the light.”
Slash growled deep in his throat as she led him back down the tunnel, chasing the flapping paper. After several failed attempts, Slash shoved her aside and stomped on the page. He picked it up, ripping the edge, and shoved it into her hands.
“Thank you,” said Veka.
Grell shook her head. “Next time you go running off like that when we’re trying to avoid an ugly, ogre-inflicted death, I plan to put a knife in your belly. I thought you’d like to know.”
Veka bristled. Didn’t Grell understand this was the magic that would save them from the ogres and the pixies, not to mention this bottomless pit? Well, maybe not the urine-to-beer spell, but magic in general.
The wind grew stronger, tugging wisps of hair from her braid and whipping it into her face. Grudgingly she conceded the older goblin might be right. If she kept trying to read, it would probably cost her any number of spells.
Her muscles tightened as she shoved the pages into the pocket of her cloak. It was as if her body were physically rebelling against the idea of giving up her studies, even for a short time. So many things had begun to make sense, so many possibilities were becoming clear, and she was supposed to simply set it all aside?
The noise was louder here. Despite Jig’s hopes, the tunnel had taken them farther and farther down, following a relatively straight line through the rock. They were trapped between the ogres and the pit.
T
he pit itself was visible now, a black shadow at the end of the tunnel. Jig stood to one side, staring at the darkness as if he could somehow transform it into a bridge or a ladder.
For a goblin who had fought and triumphed over adventurers, the Necromancer, and even a dragon, Jig didn’t act like a Hero. He acted . . . well, more like a goblin, really. He preferred to cower and hide, to run away from danger and avoid the glory of battle.
Jig was what Josca called a Reluctant Hero. Chapter ten discussed the various kinds of heroes. For herself, Veka had every intention of becoming a Hero of Legend, one whose triumphs would inspire her people for generations after she was gone.
But Jig was clearly a different breed. She rested one hand on the comforting weight of the book, reciting the passage to herself from memory. The Reluctant Hero wants nothing more than to be left alone, but such is not the fate of the Hero. The Hero is destined for great things, and destiny is not easily fooled. Destiny uses a variety of prods to push the Hero into adventure, the destruction of his village being one of the most common. The murder of friends and/or family is also popular. If you feel you may be a Reluctant Hero, you are advised to go forth into the world as soon as you can. It may be your only chance to protect your loved ones from the cruel, crushing hand of destiny.
Yes, Jig was definitely a Reluctant Hero. Given what she had seen, Jig was a Dragged-Along-Kicking-and-Fighting-the-Whole-Time Hero.
How had he survived everything that happened to him in “The Song of Jig”? He wasn’t strong. He looked more like a child than a full-grown goblin. His poor vision handicapped him further, even with those ridiculous lenses. His magic seemed to be limited to fixing wounds. Faced with an impending battle against the ogres, his whole heroic plan was to run away.
Veka moved past him, keeping her head and shoulders high to project an air of confidence. Whatever luck had saved Jig in the past, it didn’t appear to be helping him now. He didn’t know what to do.
She beckoned to Slash. “Come with me.” His silent obedience was proof of how far she had come since leaving the goblin lair.
Crumbling, sloping rock marked the end of the tunnel. The ground tilted downward, and it would have been easy for her to lose her footing and fall. Bracing the end of her staff against the opposite wall, she pressed her other hand to the stone and crept forward until she could see out into the pit.
Orange light from Slash’s nose barely reached the far side of the pit. The wind rushed downward, sending a low hum through her bones as it passed the tunnel entrance. Slash had stopped a few paces back. His tiny pupils never left the emptiness beyond.
Veka leaned forward and looked up, trying to see how high the pit went. The pit itself seemed to extend as far upward as it did down. She supposed it couldn’t go up forever. The mountain itself only went so high. That started her wondering if the pit were truly bottomless. Not that it mattered much. If the bottom was deep enough, a regular pit was just as effective as a bottomless one. A bottomless pit just sounded more impressive.
A good thirty or so feet up, a dark shape arched over the center of the pit. That would be the bridge at the center of the Necromancer’s maze. This last tunnel had sloped deeper down than she had realized. “Bring your nose closer.”
Slash took a half step, then folded his arms, refusing to take another. Veka squinted, trying to make out the details of the bridge. She could see square gaps where the blocks or tiles or whatever they were had fallen loose, but the bridge itself still appeared to be stable. All they had to do was reach it.
“The ogres will be here soon,” Grell commented. “If you’re through sightseeing, maybe we ought to figure out how to fight them.”
Veka was tempted to wait. Once the others were dead and dying, she would stride through to stand in the center of the tunnel. The ogres would pull back, momentarily confused by her confidence. There, with the wind rushing past her face, fluttering her cloak in a dramatic fashion, she would slam her staff against the ground and say in a booming voice, “Go home, you stupid ogres!”
No . . . that wasn’t dramatic enough. Slamming the staff was good, but the dialog needed work. She would have to sit down with The Path of the Hero and reread Appendix C: Heroic Declarations and Witty Remarks.
The end of her staff slipped, and she fell back, kicking to keep from falling. On second thought, maybe fighting wasn’t such a great idea. Not when a misstep could send even a Hero tumbling into the darkness.
She could hear Jig mumbling to the others, trying to come up with some sort of battle plan. She ignored him, setting her staff to one side as she yanked the pages of her spellbook from her pocket. The pages rustled and slapped her hands in the wind, fighting to escape, but she held tight until she found the burned page with her levitation charm. Still prone on the ground, she tucked that page beneath her arm and shoved the rest back into her pocket.
She had to sit up in order to read the charm. Slash had turned away to listen to Jig’s plan, but he was still bright enough for her to skim the words that hadn’t been seared away. A quick binding spell to tap into the magic. A second to anchor the spell to her staff. She ignored the margin notes and a doodle of an overly endowed elf girl as she read the true heart of the charm.
“Another straightforward bit of sympathetic magic, with the magical component providing the necessary leverage.” Whatever that meant. She tucked the page back into her cloak pocket, grabbed her staff, and finished the charm, carefully enunciating each tongue-twisting syllable.
Slash yelped as his head bounced against the roof of the tunnel. He kept yelling as he floated and bobbed, so the damage couldn’t have been too bad.
“Veka, if we’re going to fight the ogres, we’ll need that hobgoblin!” Jig shouted.
She could hear the ogres running, and the far end of the tunnel had begun to take on a pinkish tinge. “Not yet,” she muttered. “I’m not ready.”
A twitch of her staff shot Slash out of the tunnel and into the pit. His shrieks grew higher in pitch as his arms and legs whirled, as if he were trying to swim through the air itself. Veka slowly spun her staff, rotating him until he was facing the tunnel.
“What are you doing?” Braf asked.
“Saving our lives,” said Veka. She gave him a fierce grin as she cast the charm again.
Nothing happened. She tried a second time, tracing the binding with her free hand, then connecting Braf to her staff. He should have floated out to join Slash in the pit. She had done the spell correctly. Why wasn’t he flying?
“You’re doing that?” Jig asked, pointing to Slash.
She nodded.
Jig glanced at the approaching light, then back at Slash. Sliding his sword into its sheath, he moved to the end of the tunnel, muttering, “I hate magic.” When he reached the end he braced himself and leaped. His arms clamped around Slash’s waist, his legs locked around the hobgoblin’s knees.
“Get off of me, you stupid goblin!”
“Don’t squirm,” Jig yelled. “Do you want me to bite you to keep from falling?”
Slash stopped moving. A wise choice, given where Jig’s face had ended up.
“Bring him closer to the tunnel,” Jig yelled. “If we all pile onto Slash, can you float us up to the bridge?”
This was her plan! Why was Jig giving orders? She scowled, trying to come up with a reason it wouldn’t work. But she was having no trouble levitating the additional weight, and the bridge wasn’t too far away. It would probably work, darn it all.
She turned away. “Grell, you go next,” she said quickly, before Jig could make the decision.
Grell tucked her canes through her belt and limped to the edge of the tunnel. Veka twitched her staff, bringing Slash and Jig closer . . . closer. . . . Slash stretched out his arms, trying to reach the rock. Veka spun him around again, rapping his head against the stone for good measure. “None of that, you.”
She lowered him a bit, and Grell half stepped, half skidded off the edge. Her arms circled Slash’s neck, and
one of her feet kicked Jig in the ear.
A high-pitched scream echoed through the pit, and for a moment, she thought Jig had fallen. She froze, trying to sort out whether she should feel guilty or relieved. Perhaps a little of both? But as the scream repeated, she realized it was too loud and too high to have come from goblin lungs.
“Veka, we have a problem,” Jig shouted.
A flick of her staff moved them to one side as she peered into the pit. Far below, a giant bat flew toward them, its huge wings flapping hard against the wind.
“You there, goblin!” Two ogres had come into view. One pointed a crude wooden spear at her and Braf. “We’ve come for Jig Dragonslayer.”
Veka felt as though the ogre had walked up and slammed a fist into her stomach. “Jig?” she repeated. “You want Jig? I’m the one doing all the work!”
Beside her, Braf squeezed past to leap onto Slash. She was too stunned to even notice whether or not he made it. After everything she had done, the ogres wanted Jig. She was the Hero here, not him. She was the one wielding the magical energies. Didn’t they see the floating, glowing hobgoblin?
“Veka,” Jig shouted. “The bat!”
She ignored him. “Why do you want Jig?”
“That’s not your concern, goblin.” The two ogres began to move forward. The pixie still hadn’t shown herself.
“Veka, stop playing around and do something about this bat,” Grell shouted, her tone so sharp Veka started to obey without even realizing it.
The other ogre shoved past his companion. “Jig is there, in the pit. Kill the fat goblin and grab him before he escapes.”
Kill the fat goblin. She was nothing but an obstacle to be tossed aside. Her fangs bit into her cheeks, and her hands shook with the grand injustice of it all. Nothing she did would ever be good enough to erase the mighty Jig Dragonslayer. Forget her victory over the pixies, forget her mastery of powers Jig couldn’t even understand, none of it made one bit of difference. She was nothing. Nobody.