And that’s when I met chocolate. Sweet-tasting, mind-altering nectar of the gods. You can’t blame me for not knowing I could be enslaved by food. A thousand excuses allowed me back to the human world five times a week, where ribbons of silky, cocoa milky goodness awaited. Soon, greed ate holes in my better sense and burrowed into my heart. The all-consuming obsession for one more piece drove me to near madness. I squirreled my portions in the nooks and crannies of my Faerie home. When I ran out of money to buy more, I began to steal.
Often. From the king’s coin chest.
One of his elvish advisors, Maldor, a particularly high-handed twit, found me mid-theft, my fingers grasping desperately at royal treasures. He froze me with ice magic and the king was summoned to witness my crime. They searched my lodgings and found the plentiful stores of chocolate. A forbidden food.
I was brought before the king for judgement, and he cursed me to the Dark Realm, with conditions.
“Hergnab the hob,” stated Maldor with a smirk. Hobs and elves weren’t the best of friends. “Royal physician and healer to His Majesty, you are a traitor and are henceforth stripped of all titles. You will live out your days as a blood goblin, unless you make your way back to the Bright Realm and beg for the king’s mercy.” The elf screwed up his nose.
Blood goblins drank blood—no surprises there—and were not welcome in the Dusk Vale or beyond. My curse was unsurpassable.
And with a wave of Maldor’s ugly, magic-worn hands, black blobs of fuzzy black light sprung forth and hunted me like a bird spider. The hair on my body fluffed, and my beard sprung up into my face just before those black blobs stabbed my flesh like a hundred daggers, tearing me navel to neck.
The pinkish flesh on my body darkened to ash, and the thick, rugged skin on my body cracked like parched earth. My arms lengthened, and my already gargantuan hands swelled to sprout razor-sharp claws with a burst of blood.
A pixie brought me a hand mirror, and I almost whimpered when I saw the abominable thing’s reflection. Blood goblins were the subject of many tales, with each description more horrendous than the next. None of those tales had prepared me for the monster staring back at me. Eyes that were said to paralyse your body, leaving your mind aware while they sucked your veins dry.
But my exterior was a façade set to fool the world into seeing me as evil. The Fae of the Dark Realm could sense the light of the Bright Realm on my skin. The dark ones find Bright Realm flesh as irresistible as I find chocolate. A thousand years had passed since I was cursed, and in that time I had died several hundred times, slain mostly by another cursed being named Ragella.
Ragella was my first assassin, rotten to the core, a powerful hag whose own magic cursed her. The time of our first meeting, the moon was in a half cycle. I had travelled near to the Dusk Vale’s edge, and she sprung up from the shadows to entwine me with snake rope. The pain of being dragged for forty moon cycles drained me of joy, and at the ruins she called home, she picked apart my body with savage tools to drain the magic locked within my hob self. That was my first rebirth. I awoke in the bowels of a Death Willow, my sense of time and place stolen by the memories of my pain. I clawed at dirt and root, venomous insects biting my fingers, until I’d broken free of my living tomb. The curse kept me immortal.
I fell into depression, terrified of the screams, bellows, and shrieks common to the Dark Realm creatures. I’d never felt more alone, and I’d never hungered so strongly for company. These sounds soon drove me to plan for another journey to the Bright Realm, so I collected black and red leaves—there were no green—stuck them to my body with mud, and made my way for the land of Dusk again.
Ragella the hag found me again, and I suffered the same tortures. After ten deaths, trial and error brought me skill in evading her magical senses. I had become wise to her tricks. Adventurers from the human world became my second biggest threat. A blood goblin’s fangs, when worn around the neck, toughened the wearer’s skin to a thickness resembling bear hide. The pain of having my fangs yanked from my mouth made me wish for death, and when I screamed like a harpy, my wish usually came true.
Again I was reborn. Undead.
A clan of the blood goblins adopted me, and there was contentment for a while until they noticed I hadn’t feasted with them.
When the moon was in its dark phase, they captured and killed a night horse for their supper. They severed its leg, and offered it to me raw so I could drink the blood. When I gagged at their offering, they attacked me, saying, “The Bright Light is on him!”
“Imposter!” said another. “Drink him!”
A dagger was produced, and my neck sliced. Again I arose in the Death Willow’s bowels, entangled by its stinking roots where earth decayed. I couldn’t have been very tasty, because the blood goblins only hunted me as a kind of sport to raise their spirits. At least someone took enjoyment from my existence.
Ragella’s traps grew sophisticated. And after my fiftieth death, she’d harvested enough of my magic to enslave the minds of trolls, wraiths, and giants. When the winds whispered her name and the storms gathered to obey her command, I decided to accept my fate and avoid her. She became a powerful witch who ruled the border of Dusk Vale, which, ironically, prevented me from ever going home.
The Death Willow grew by a swamp, which was three days’ walk from the Dark Court, and over time the blood goblins got bored with hunting me and only sought me out if they had no better occupation for their time.
It had been three months since I’d died, and one night, after collecting several acid frogs and boiling them in hot water over a fire, I nibbled at their fleshy limbs. Eating enough of the poison would kill me, but at least it satisfied the pangs of hunger in my gut. Dying at night when I was tired was easier, and acid frogs gave a euphoric high before death took me to my root-trunk coffin. The sleep of death was peaceful, utterly refreshing, and made me feel powerful.
The hum in my body grew louder; a few more bites of this acid frog’s rump and the deed would be finalised. I’d slip into that blissfully unaware sleep and wake to alertness and life.
“Ha ha!” said a familiar, valiant voice. The kind all adventurers from the human world possessed. Why tonight? Why not tomorrow? I groaned and turned my head nonchalantly as the man stepped into sight. “I’ve got you now!”
Firelight glimmered off the human’s biceps, which peeked out from heavy knight’s armour with a Bright Realm sigil. His helm covered his face, but I saw the light reflect off his grey eyes, and the sword raised high into the air. For any adventurer to make it this far was rare since Ragella had grown in power, and I always wondered at the luck such fools seemed to possess.
“Go ahead,” I said, lying back against the mossy earth, staring up at the velvety black sky. I opened my mouth, revealing my fangs. “Take them.”
The warrior’s face hovered above me, murderous eyes fixed for the kill. But he hesitated.
Amateur.
“What?” he said finally, obviously confused.
“The fangs are mine to give and so I have declared them yours.” I fixed my eyes on his, making him turn his head. Every magical creature knew that catching a blood goblin’s eyes meant certain death, if even for a heartbeat.
He wriggled his fingers with engaged curiosity and then exclaimed, “I can move!”
“How lucky you are. I have no need of your blood, but if you’ve any salted mutton or rabbit to spare, you’d make an ancient goblin exceedingly happy.”
“Happy? Dark Realm creatures aren’t happy. You are an Illusionist, no? Trickster, perhaps?” He placed the tip of his blade against my hairy black chest.
“No trick. No magic.” I detected a red pulse around his knee; he’d been stung by a Red Senseless, the most beautiful and deadly of the Dark Realm flowers. It was so named for its paralytic effects, which were caused by the spores—mischievous microscopic pixies—that fed off the creature’s life until it rose again, soulless, and stumbled for many moon cycles until it burst with festering s
pores that were carried away on southern winds. The spores would land at the cusp of light and Dusk to feed off the faint brush of sunlight until they germinated.
“That’ll need seeing to,” I added. Humans were more sensitive to magic than any indigenous creature, and he would die before long.
The man lifted the visor on his helm to reveal the soft cheeks and sporadic beard of a young man about nineteen in human years. Just a lad. A germinating seed in the Fae world.
“Treat what?” he boomed, trying and failing to maintain intimidation.
“You’ve been stung by a magic flower. Soon you’ll hallucinate, dance a jig naked, and then walk yourself into the nearest swamp where the chitter fish will eat you. Your soul will be collected by the next nightmare and you’ll be trapped in hell, forever.”
“Goblins always lie,” he said with a strange accent.
“Aye, they do. But I’m no goblin, and you are no warrior.” He smelled of youth and foolishness, and I envied whatever protected him from death.
“I am a warrior. I’m Fred, Knight of the Light.”
“Fred?”
“Yes.”
I burst into laughter, which caused my fangs to stab my lower lip painfully.
“Do not mock me,” he boomed. That was getting irritating.
“There’s only one antidote for the Red Senseless poison, Fred.”
He ground his teeth. “Which is?”
“The magic from a Bright Realm healer.”
“Bright Realm? But I’ve travelled all this way, it would take days, weeks to get there.”
“You’re in luck, then. I’m from the Bright Realm. And I’m a healer. If you help me get home, I’ll make sure to heal you in time.”
He staggered at my bluntness, and then narrowed his eyes. “Rubbish.”
I had no idea what that word meant, but by his tone I knew it was modern. And human, so ineloquently human. “Come with me.”
I got to my plank-like feet and hobbled across the burr-filled itching grass until we came to the Death Willow, my life giver. Fred craned his neck to see the top of it and whistled. “Holy crap.”
“What a curious phrase. What is this ‘crap’ you speak of?”
“My bad, I meant by my sword.”
I stared at my tree. “This is where I rebirth after every death.”
“Rebirth? You mean respawn?”
“I am no devil’s spawn,” I spat.
“No, I mean, Dark Realm creatures don’t come back to life.”
“Kill me,” I said.
“Um, sorry?”
“I said kill me. Now.”
Fred just stared. “You’re the weirdest Feyland quest character I’ve ever met. You must be an update. A custom install, maybe.”
“Stop your abuse of our language and take the life from my body.” I dropped to my knobbly knees and raised my face to him. “Sever my head from my neck.” I put a hand at my throat. “The thinness of it makes for an easy cut.”
“Very well.” Fred raised the sword to the side and swung.
The next moment, I was awake inside the Death Willow, almost cackling with the thought of finding a youngster so witless that I might finally go home to the Bright Court and be remade as the hob I was.
I dug out from the roots, spread my arms wide, and said, “Immortal, see?”
Fred glanced at his surroundings; sweat had brewed like a fever’s weep on his forehead. “This is a glitch. You’re a glitched goblin. Blood goblins should die. You should be dead.”
“Obviously.”
“This isn’t the first…” He swallowed. “Are you a hacker?”
“A wood chopper? A carver of meat? No.”
“No. No. A computer hacker. You’re not listening to me.” His chest rose and fell with his panic. “What year do you think it is?”
“The days and nights do not pass here. Time is determined through other means.”
Fred threw his helm to the ground and started clawing at the moss on a log. Red brewed in small cuts on his fingertips, and he tasted the blood. He’d slumped onto the wet grass, continuing to dig down into the soil and occasionally tasting things.
“I wouldn’t do that if I were you.”
“Why?”
“As a human, to eat of our food is to imprison yourself in our realm.”
Fred looked panicked. “This must be a dream… the graphics are never this real.” He jumped to his feet. “Why can’t I abort the game?”
“The Dark Realm sends many a man mad, Fred—”
“You don’t understand! You’re not real. This is supposed to be a game, a virtual reality.” His eyes scanned the ground as if he were reading a book. “I have to die. That will shock me out of the system and restart.” Fred unclipped his steel armour, let it fall to the ground, and then lifted his tunic to expose his stomach. He placed the tip of his sword at his navel.
“Wait,” I said. “To die here will send you to hell. If you must kill yourself, we should travel to the Bright Realm. Their life magic will protect you from eternal passing.” That wasn’t exactly true; I just wanted him to stay alive so he could take me to the Bright Realm, and defeat all my possible foes along the way.
“No, I will die now.” He gripped the handle of his sword and closed his eyes, but before he could push the blade inwards, I ran to his left leg and bit him. Hard. My fangs finally had a purpose. They sank straight through the muscle, and the impact of my fangs on bone made pain shoot deep into my skull.
Fred yowled as the blood ran from the wound. “Why’d you do that?”
“To protect your soul from the devils below!” Lying was the only way to get home.
Blood magic was knowledge given only to hobs of the Dusk—something forbidden in the Bright Court. I took Fred’s blood in my hand and used it to cast a spell of binding that stuck his feet to the ground and locked his hands at his sides.
“Cold… cold…” He shivered. “Okay, okay, I believe you. No suicidal tendencies, I promise. Please help me get home.” His tone had become desperate, almost a sob.
I could sense his heart beating in his chest, under his breastplate, but I didn’t free him from the spell, because I still needed to obtain his cooperation. So I relayed to him my story, my obsession with human chocolate and how I was unfairly cursed. After all, I had no knowledge of chocolate’s power over magical creatures. And when my story was concluded, I released Fred’s feet and he collapsed beside me.
“That’s a… wow. I can’t believe all that happened to you,” he said.
“Aye.”
Fred suddenly cried out in pain. “What did you do to me? I can’t feel my hands. I can’t feel anything.”
Fred’s eyes turned black, and I knew the Red Senseless had taken him.
“Do you trust me, Fred?” I asked.
“Where are you? I can’t see. I can’t see. Help me, Goblin!”
And then he fell unconscious. The bridge about his eyes resembled the necrotic skin of a death rat. I plucked three exploding mushrooms—powerful little buggers, they are—and positioned them under two wet ghosty logs. I uttered the common words for fire magic, and smoke billowed up from the fire until flames flared to singe the hairs on my hands. As the blaze calmed, I took a stick and plunged it into the searing coals until the end of it glowed red.
Being three times taller than me, it took an almighty shove to roll Fred over onto his stomach so I could access his calf muscle. In the process, I somehow burned my finger, not on the stick but on a tiny iron sword suspended by a silver chain about his neck. Iron could be deadly to magical creatures, and like chocolate, it was banned in all realms.
The flower’s taint recalled my attention as it pulsed brightly under the lad’s pant leg. I rolled up the linen to see the spreading pattern of glowing red. I took the burning stick, blew out the flame on the end, and rolled it over the wound. Fred’s body twitched.
As the pulsing dimmed, I used magic to heal the blackened flesh and close the wound.
Then I waited. The campfire dimmed, and Fred’s life force strengthened. Healing Hobs could sense every organ in a creature’s body, but with my giant claws, I could not make the complicated magical patterns with my fingers that I used to. Even so, Fred had been lucky; healing him had been fairly straightforward.
In one moon cycle, Fred would recover from his brush with death. At least he could die. Immortality had made time obsolete and my life meaningless, but now, with Fred’s help, the odds of going home had strengthened in my favour.
Elated feelings brimmed, sensations heightened, and colour bloomed richly in my surroundings. With hope came happiness. I made future plans—once the curse was removed, I could move back to Hobton in Dusk Vale and try to live a normal life among my kin.
The lad finally awoke; he groaned and pushed himself up into a sitting position. He leaned back against a log and rubbed his temples. “I want to go home.” His face was pale, even more pale than the moon, and I pitied his unfortunate encounter with the flower’s venom. “Can we go now?” he asked.
“Very well, but you must obey my instruction.”
He nodded, and so we set out, guided by The Snare: a set of stars in which a complex mathematical and magical formulation could set any creature on its true path north.
Healers were educated in the strongest of magical arts. Reconstructing a body was like weaving the fabric of the universe, and so I was sensitive to danger. Even the ones I could not avoid, which meant we required no guiding torch for our journey through the dark. Additionally, the moon shone like an orb flower helping to light the way forward.
“Mother is going to kill me,” Fred said sullenly.
“Mothers never kill, only love,” I replied.
He looked at me dubiously and said, “You really are ugly.”
“Say that again and I will sew your lips together.”
“How come you haven’t been able to get home?”
“I don’t have the right blood.”
“Well you’re not having mine.”
“Fool. Not for drinking, for magic. I can protect you, if you protect me. You will fight, and I will heal you by your blood. That is how we both get home.”
Chronicle Worlds: Feyland Page 18