| The Trouble with Goblins |
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The rain poured down around her, forcing her heavy mage robes to cling tightly to her body and weigh down her slender limbs. Lightning streaked across the sky in an angry flash that made her violet eyes shine in the darkness of the wet autumn night. The sound of a snapping branch behind her alerted her to the presence. Her quarry was near. She tightened her grip on her weapon as she whirled around, sending a spiraling arc of water out from the hem of her drenched robes. Long, pointed ears perked up as she tried to get a fix on where the sound had come from, but the thunder clap that followed the lightning tore through the glade and jarred her sensitive elven hearing.
Focusing her senses on the tree line, her ears splayed out trying to detect any sound that did not belong. Another flash of lightning dazzled her vision for an instant. Before the next boom of thunder she heard the quick, light foot-falls approaching her from behind. Willing her body into action, she spun around and set her feet in a fighting stance. Bringing her weapon into a defensive position, she countered her sister's stick just in time. With an indignant huff, Riana pushed her sister back, forcing her to backpedal. With a quick, controlled movement she brought her own stick around in a short arc and landed a solid blow to Katrina's side.
Katrina recoiled a few paces, breathing heavily and holding a hand to her ribs where the make-shift sword had impacted. Her ears were cocked back in determination. Her long platinum hair was thick with water and matted against her head. "Damn you!" She hissed through clenched teeth as her yellow eyes narrowed at her sister.
"Don't hate the player..." Riana chirped back as she slid a rope of her own platinum hair out of her field of view.
Katrina shifted her weight and brought her stick to bear, narrowing her eyes further. Cocking her long, tapered ears straight back from her head; she sprung into range and brought her own make-shift sword down in a vicious over-head blow.
Riana effortlessly blocked the desperate attack and stepped inside her sister's guard in one fluid motion. Katrina looked up at her, a visage of disbelief on her face, just before Riana twisted around and forced her sister to tumble backwards onto the muddy ground of the small clearing. As if to add insult to injury, Riana jabbed the tip of her stick harshly into Katrina's stomach, eliciting a sharp exhalation of breath and a low moan from the prone figure.
"Alright, alright. You win..." Katrina gasped as she tried to catch her breath.
Riana reached down and helped her sister out of the mud with a broad smile on her face. " As if there was ever any doubt!" She admonished her sister playfully.
"Yeah right." Katrina said sarcastically as she rubbed her stomach. "Do you have to hit me so damn hard all the time?"
"My instructor says it is best to practice as you would actually fight. That way you will always fight the way you practice!" Riana quipped as she hooked her arm in Katrina's elbow and began heading into the small stand of trees and back toward the city gates. "Besides the healer is taking new cases at all hours now, what with the attacks and all."
"So I understand." Katrina remarked as the massive stone gate came into view beyond a thin barrier of small trees.
"Who goes there?" One of the armor clad guards demanded through the din of the downpour. He raised a wicked looking weapon consisting of a short pole capped on either end with a two-foot long sword blade. Pointing the tip of the weapon at the sisters, he put his other hand to his forehead and squinted through the thick curtain of rain.
"Riana and Katrina Thorindal." Riana said happily as they moved themselves into view of the guards.
"You girls are out late this evening." The armored man chided them.
"So are you Captain." Katrina shot back acidly.
The three stared at one another for a long moment before the Captain finally capitulated. "You girls had better get inside. If your mother catches you out here you'll be done for."
"And so would you when she found out you were the one keeping us outside!" Riana added as the twins moved through the narrow gap in the gate.
"Can you believe that guy? What a twit!" Katrina said as they cleared the gate and it swung closed behind them. She was very careful to keep her voice at a level that would insure the Captain could hear her.
"He's always been like that." Riana added. "Remember that time he wouldn't let us in because we were covered in mud? We had to walk all the way around to the north gate!"
"Yeah. We should put a stink spell in his armor or something one of these days."
The pair giggled and chatted as they dashed through the streets of Rathalon towards home. Bursting through the outer door and into the hallway leading to their suite of rooms within the large stone building they stood in the entry way and tried to shake as much water loose from their heavy robes as they could.
Suddenly Katrina put her hand on Riana's arm. Riana was reaching for her saturated shock of platinum hair to squeeze some of the rain water from it. "Ree. Look!"
Riana looked to where her sister was pointing. On the stairs in front of them was a set of tracks. Tracks from a creature that should not feel at all comfortable inside the walls of Rathalon.
"A goblin!" Riana almost cooed. While a lone goblin was really not much of a threat to any able individual, the problem was the fact that goblins rarely—if ever—worked alone. In fact they were usually found in droves if someone encountered them at all. Normally, they stayed down in the caverns and mines, preferring to be near the precious metals and stones that they seemed to covet so highly, but now…
"Just the one set." Katrina said suspiciously.
"Yeah. Heading up the stairs and then back down again." Riana added as she cautiously slid her small dagger from its sheath on her hip.
"If it went up and then back down again, why do you need your knife?" Katrina looked a bit concerned as she too withdrew her dagger from its own sheath.
"Better safe than mugged." Riana shrugged.
Katrina stifled a giggle as the pair made their way up the carved stone stair leading to their home on the second floor.
As they ascended the smooth granite stairs they confirmed that there were indeed two sets of tracks, one going up the stairs and a second, drier set heading back down again. As they approached the door to their home it slid noiselessly out of their way, granting them an unobstructed view of their living room. The place was in a shambles, pillows tossed here and there, furniture toppled over and throw rugs balled up in corners.
"What the hell is this all about?!" Katrina spat as she stepped over the threshold into the mess.
Riana followed her sister and began poking around to try and figure out what the creature had been searching for. As near as she could tell nothing of any value had been taken, but with things tossed everywhere, it could take days to figure out if anything had, in fact, been stolen.
"Crap!" Katrina called from the next room after a moment's investigation.
"What?" Riana hollered as she made her way into their mother's room where Katrina was poking through a similar mess.
"Mom's flower is gone!" Katrina half shouted as she waved her arm toward the empty spot on the dresser.
"Oh gods! Who would steal something like that?!" Riana gaped at the empty spot. "We have to get it back before she gets home from Cohai. That's the flower dad gave to her before he died."
Katrina nodded in agreement. She knew well how much the flower meant to their mother. "Where do you think the goblin might have taken it?"
"I don't know. But I bet if we went down to the inn we could find someone who knows how a goblin would get into Rathalon unnoticed."
"Ok. Let's do it." Katrina replied as she jabbed her dagger back in its sheath and made her way toward the door.
The inn was a large, squat stone building with a wide, covered patio wrapping around the front and adjacent sides. In the center of the front patio, a set of large double doors were almost always open wide, inviting travelers and residents alike inside to partake in a warm meal, good company, and fiery drink. The sound of conversation could be heard from the other side of the street, even through the torrential downpour, as the twins approached.
They passed a few small groups of people engaged in quiet conversations and were careful not to disturb them as they moved toward the doors. The inside of the inn was—much like the rest of Rathalon—hewn from the stone of the Uraval Mountains, however unlike the rest of the city this place was made to feel much more comfortable and welcoming. There were several fire places built into the exterior walls and one large fire pit in the center of the large common room. The floor was covered with rugs and animal hides dampening the sounds and cushioning weary feet. The place was filled with people of every description.
There were dwarves, humans, felinoids, reptillians, even the occasional troll, ogre, and even stranger, an elf or two. It was not common to see elves outside of Pandoria, the twins and their mother being the rare exceptions.
Trying to maintain their calm, the girls made their way across the room to speak to the innkeeper about who they should speak to for information about goblins in the city.
"Wassat? Goblins?" The man slurred through his thickly scarred lips. He seemed a nice person, but whatever had caused the damage to his lips made all of his words very difficult to understand.
"Yes. Goblins. We're trying to figure out how a goblin might enter the city undetected." Riana replied with a hint of agitation in her voice.
"Oh." The man continued, ignoring the tension. "Well I reckon that a Ranger or summin would prolly be what'cher lookin' fer. Ye'should try tha feller ther."
As he stopped speaking he pointed to a figure sitting near the fire pit poking at the coals idly with an iron rod.
"Thank you." Riana replied as she looked the man over.
As the twins approached man, he suddenly looked up at them. The deep shadows created by the hood of his cloak kept his features hidden, as they jumped slightly at his unexpected interest in their approach.
"What do you want younglings?" His voice seemed just a bit too loud for the room, causing the girls to flinch.
"We don't mean to intrude. We're just…" Riana began.
"Looking for someone who could tell us how a goblin might enter the city without being seen." Katrina finished.
The figure watched them for a moment before jabbing another log in the fire pit with the iron poker. "A goblin, eh?" He said thoughtfully as he twisted the poker around in his hand, causing a cascade of logs inside the fire pit that showered the three of them with sparks and embers.
The girls jumped back from the fire and quickly tried to dust the hot debris from their soaked robes. A moment later they were both covered in dark soot smears that stood out starkly, even against the darkened color of the wet fabric.
"Only one way I can think of for those little beasties to get into the city, noticed or otherwise. That would be through the aqueducts running beneath the city."
"Aren't those tunnels guarded?" Katrina sounded as though she was talking to an idiot. How could someone even suggest that the mighty city of Rathalon could have a goblin problem?
"Not so well as you might think youngling." He didn't even turn to look at them as he answered, instead choosing that moment to jab another log with the poker and shower the area with sparks again.
"Alright. How would someone get into the aqueducts if all of the major access points ARE guarded? I've been by them all before and they are all manned, at least on the city side." Riana sounded as though she had investigated the matter thoroughly at some point.
The ranger turned his head back toward them and slowly stood up. Casting a deep, dark shadow over them, he stood between them and the fire. "You just have to know your opponent well." He commented as he purposefully pushed between them and vanished around the corner that led to the inn's rooms.
"Ok, that was odd." Katrina said quietly as the man vanished.
"No kidding." Riana agreed as she plopped down in the chair the ranger had been sitting in. "Ouch!" She was suddenly back on her feet again with her hands rubbing her back side, glaring angrily at the chair.
"What?" Katrina spun around to look at her sister briefly, then turned her gaze to the offending furniture. "Oh!" She smiled a bit as she reached into the space between two cushions and withdrew a small, rusty, iron key. "Hmmmm… Now what do you suppose this is for?"
The twins exchanged a mischievous look before dashing back into the torrential downpour outside.
It took the rest of the evening, hanging out in the quiet corners of taverns and common rooms for them to find any sign of what they were looking for. When they got their sign, they were not entirely convinced it was pointing them in a direction they wanted to go…
They were sitting at a table in another large inn, enjoying a mug of warm spiced milk when an old human man stumbled in and ordered a drink with a shaky hand. He spoke to the barkeep for a few minutes before he was waved away in favor of apparently less troublesome customers.
When he made his way to a table, it was one close to where the girls were perched. Wary for any information, they focused their acute hearing on the muttering old man. Katrina elbowed Riana in the ribs to get her sister's attention.
"Ouch!" Riana protested, offering her sister her most evil 'you're about to get it' look.
"Shhhhh…" Katrina hissed as she looked at Riana with a sly grin on her face and jerked her thumb toward the old man.
Riana glared at Katrina for a moment, even as she focused her hearing on the old man. Finally she shifted her gaze in his direction and saw him leaning heavily on the table, looking into his ale stein forlornly.
“N’body lissin’n t’me… damn gob’ns c’min up outta’me well mddle’o d’nite… Eat’n m’garden’n kill’n m’chkns…”
He went on for a few minutes before Riana and Katrina looked at one another and smiled knowingly. Offering one another a quick nod, they slipped across the way and sat down on either side of the old man who suddenly sat up, sloshing his ale onto the table. Nervously, he looked from one sister to the other as they smiled slyly up at him.
“So…” Riana smiled at him as she spoke.
“You have a goblin problem…” Katrina added from his other side.
“Anything you can tell us about where they are coming from?” Riana finished.
The old man looked, bleary-eyed, back and forth between the girls for a moment. Looking back toward the table and his spilt ale, he muttered “N’fn y’lil elv’n girls’cn do ‘bout it. Yer too young’n they’re c’mn up ot’a th’well.”
“Really?” Riana smiled, blinking her violet eyes at the man.
“Out of the well huh?” Katrina drew a circle on the table with her index finger innocently.
“Isn’t that the well over by the bazaar?” Riana pressed on despite the man’s strange look.
“It couldn’t be,” replied Katrina before he had a chance to formulate a response, “that well has far to many travelers around it at all hours. It would HAVE to be the one near the Boar’s Head!”
“The Boar’s Head?! No way! …” Riana began to protest but was suddenly interrupted by the old man.
He whipped his arms out in front of him, stopping them in front of each girl as if her were a referee in some gladiatorial ring. “ ‘The heck’r you grls talk’n ‘bout? S’not any’dem wells… s’my well! Th’one next’ta the smithy’s shop… An’if ya’think…” He made to carry on with his commentary but was cut off as the twins suddenly slipped out of their chairs and dashed out the door of the Inn , with giggles on their lips.
As the pair peered down into the well, they realized it was going to be a difficult climb. The well, like everything else in Rathalon, was carved from a solid piece of stone. This meant there were no mortar joints or edges that they could hope to use as finger holds. Further, the pouring rain made the sides of the shaft slick with water, and it was wide enough that their small frames could not reach from one side to the other.
They stood and stared into the dark hole with more than mild apprehension, trying to think of a way to safely descend into the depths.
Katrina was about to suggest walking away and telling their mother what had happened when a flash of lightning illuminated a series of rough hand-holds that had been carved down one side of the well. They were tiny depressions set in the smooth face of the shaft. They looked well used.
The twins looked at each other and gulped.
“It isn’t too late to just go find mom.” Katrina offered a way out.
“True.” Riana agreed. “But then we’d never know if we can do this or not.”
Katrina sighed as she looked into the blackness of the well. “Well. I suppose there’s nothing for it but to find out then.”
Riana grinned at her sister and swung herself over the edge of the well without a second thought, slipping her fingers into the shallow depressions and making her way down.
The descent seemed to take forever and there were numerous times when one or the other of the girls thought they were going to slip and fall. They managed to help one another down and slip quietly into the water at the bottom, moving around in the darkness, treading water and feeling the walls above and below the surface for some gap or break.
“Maybe we missed something on the way down?” Katrina suggested, her voice wavered. She wanted to turn back, but wouldn’t dare suggest it.
“This water has to be coming from somewhere…” Riana said determinedly then she rolled forward and disappeared beneath the surface of the water.
Katrina stayed where she was, floating in the darkness, alone. She forced her vision into the heat-sensitive spectrum but because of the cold water all around her she could see nothing but her own dimly glowing limbs. All too quickly, a feeling of dread began to wash over her. She started looking over her shoulders reflexively and finally in a panic she spun around and began frantically searching the walls for the tiny hand holds, intent on scrambling up the shaft and back out into the open.
Her hands slid across the curved surface of the wall, desperately seeking the hand holds, when Riana erupted from beneath the surface and gulped in a huge lungful of air.
Katrina shrieked at the sudden noise and spun around, planting her back against the shaft and raising her arms defensively. As soon as she realized that it was only Riana, she threw her arms around her sister’s shoulders and began sobbing. “Oh Ree I thought you left me! This place is so scary, and I can’t find the way up.”
“Forget up.” Riana panted. “We’re going down. I found an old iron grate that this key unlocked. It felt like the goblins squeezed between a bent bar and the side of the shaft.”
“Ree I don’t think I can. I can barely see the walls its so dark, and I’m cold and I’m scared and I really don’t want to be down here…”
“It’s ok Kat. I’m here. We’re together. I won’t let go of you. We just have to swim for a little way and then we’re there, ok?”
Katrina relaxed her grip a bit and tried to steady her breathing, forcing her panicked body to calm down. It seemed to her an exercise in futility; she was terrified of the dark, especially when her elven ability to see heat afforded her no respite.
“Ok.” She managed in weak reply.
“Ok.” Riana mirrored as she put one of her hands on her sister’s and squeezed it reassuringly. Gently, she removed the hand from her shoulder but kept a firm grip on it. “Alright. Deep breath, it’s a long swim, but you can make it. I’ll be right with you the whole way.”
Katrina nodded her head. It was really all she could muster. She gulped in a huge lung-full of air just in time to be pulled under the water by Riana’s tug. She tried as best she could to point herself in the same direction as Riana, kicking her legs furiously in hopes of making the terrible journey as short as possible. The darkness seemed to go on forever, her only comforts were the reassuring grip of her sister’s hand on her own and the warm spot, dulled by the cold water surrounding them, that indicated her sister.
After what seemed like an eternity, the panic began to set in on her again. Convinced that the nightmare would never end, that they would be swimming, freefall-like, for the rest of their long, elven lives, she felt her lungs burning with the lack of fresh oxygen. She was about to open her mouth and scream into the icy water when they broke through into a faintly lit tunnel. A path rose gently out of the water arcing up and out of sight around a corner.
The girls panted and gasped for a long moment before either of them even considered moving on.
The aqueduct was carved into the bedrock of the region. and was currently playing host to a small river of water at its base. A dark stain on the sides of the tube indicated that the water level was regularly much higher than that, well above their heads in fact. Even in the dim light, this fact didn’t escape Katrina, who was clinging to her sister’s arm as if Riana would disappear were physical contact lost.
They followed the tunnel around a couple of gentle turns before they heard noises. Noises that were defiantly not flowing water. It started off as a soft tapping and as they moved closer to the source, it grew into a loud banging. It was the sound of mallets on chisels working their way through hard stone.
“It sounds like someone mining for something.”
Riana glanced over at her sister and shrugged her arm in an attempt to shake her loose. After several unsuccessful attempts, she finally gave up and said, “I don’t know, but from the sound of it, you may not be too far off.”
Moving deeper into the tunnel, toward the ever-increasing clanging, the light level began to rise as well. Finally, they could make out a large chamber up ahead. As quietly as they could, the twins snuck toward the chamber. Drawing nearer, they could make out the diminutive forms of goblins moving back and forth. The creatures seemed to be carrying armfuls of rocks over the small stone bridge across the water flow before returning empty handed for more.
Creeping closer, they eventually found themselves crawling along the floor until they could peek into the room. What they saw was at once frightening and at the same time, comical to behold. In the large stone chamber there was a reservoir of water, one of many such places beneath the city, around which a dozen tiny goblins had set up camp. Of the dozen or so goblins in the cavernous space, it seemed as though four or five of them were half-heartedly chipping away at the wall of the room, while two more scrambled back and forth with armloads of debris from the excavation to dump the leavings in a slowly growing pile on the other side of the tunnel. The other goblins seemed to be trying to motivate the working ones through various means, not the least of which was banging on them with large, for a goblin, timbers.
At first glance the girls were confused by this sight, thinking perhaps it was some sort of goblin forced labor program. Until one of the hammer-wielding goblins turned on his motivator and they exchanged implements, the one with the timber took up the hammer and chisel and took to carving away at the wall while his companion took to smacking his backside with the log.
They couldn’t see the excavation’s purpose or design from their vantage point, but the creatures were so involved that they didn’t take notice of them. Peering cautiously around the edge, they saw that the carving was taking the shape of… Some sort of structure. None of the edges were at right angles to anything else in the room and a half-carved window was taller in the middle than on either side. Placed next to a door that was easily five feet tall on one side and only three feet on the other, however, it really didn’t look that out of place.
Riana had to stifle a laugh, forcing her hand tightly over her mouth. She almost shrieked when Katrina yanked her back into the tunnel by the collar of her robes.
“You’re going to get us killed.” Katrina hissed at her.
“Nu uh. Look at those things! They’re funny!” Riana pointed back toward the room behind them as she sniggered.
“Well they may be funny but there are at least twelve of them and only the two of us!” Katrina was only barely keeping her voice to a whisper.
“C’mon. Let’s just go get mom’s flower from them.” Riana started to stand up but was dragged back to her knees by her sister.
“Ree! You don’t even know if they have it!”
“Well we know that a goblin took it. And these are goblins, so I say we go ask them about it.”
“Riana! We need some sort of a plan! We can’t just rush in there and go tossing through their stuff. They’ll take us apart!”
“Ok genius. What’s the plan then?” Riana sat down with her legs crossed, leveling her violet eyes on her sister’s golden pools expectantly.
“Well I…” Katrina sat down as well, lacing her fingers together and resting her chin on them.
“You don’t HAVE a plan DO you?” Riana taunted her sister, ears cocked back and eyes narrowed.
“I do too! I mean, I’m coming up with one! What we need is a distraction. Something to draw them all away from the camp so we can search for mom’s flower.”
“Ok. What kind of distraction?”
“I don’t know! Something to get them out of the room. Something to make them run. Like a bright light or something.”
“Uh huh. And do you happen to have any bright lights handy?” Riana asked skeptically.
“Well I just learned a new cantrip at the academy this week. It’s kind of a fireworks display. It could do the trick.”
“Alright.” Riana said, her ears perking up. “So here’s what we do. You go over to the next aqueduct and toss one of those light shows down the tunnel then hide. While the goblins are checking it out, I will look through their stuff for mom’s flower.”
“Um… Me? Way over there by myself?”
“Kat you said it yourself. We need to draw them off so we can check their camp.”
“Well why don’t YOU go over there and be the distraction?”
“Two reasons.” Riana held up two fingers and ticked her reasons off with her other hand as she spoke. “First, it’s your plan. And second, I don’t know whatever spell it is you’re talking about so you have to be the one to do it anyway.”
Katrina was in the middle of protesting, but stopped short, mouth open and finger raised in dying protest. “Fine. I’ll go. But you had better wait for me. I don’t like it down here at all.”
“Don’t worry sis. I’ll meet you right back here when it’s all over.”
Katrina slipped quietly into the stream at the bottom of the aqueduct and, holding desperately to the side, made her way quietly toward the bridge that the goblins were hauling their stone debris across. As she neared the bridge, she unconsciously held her breath. The sound of tiny stones dropping on the slab over her head each sent shivers through her overly-tense body. Each impact sounded like a bow shot, making her envision a volley of arrows arcing through the dark air toward her, helplessly stuck in the stone channel.
After a few moments she rounded the corner into the reservoir. Slowly, she let her breath go and leaned into the sheer face leading up to the open space where the goblins were working. It took the better part of twenty minutes for her to make her way around the pool to the next closest aqueduct and then far enough down that she could pull herself up out of the water and onto the flat of the tunnel.
She sat there for a moment, catching her breath and gathering her wits before she stood up. Steeling herself for what she was about to do, she began shouting at the top of her lungs. Facing the pool, she began yelling about how nice the weather was, whether or not there was light in the aqueducts when no one was there to see it and what the price of tea in Talanor was this week. After a few moments, she concentrated and chanted the brief cantrip, causing a series of bright sparks to shoot forth from her finger tips into the tunnel. In the dim light, the sparks were blinding.
With the last bit of her courage, she sent one more shower of sparks down the tunnel. Diving back into the water, she swam as quickly and quietly as she could back toward the reservoir.
Riana, watching her sister disappear around the corner into the inky darkness of the pool, sat quietly against the side of the tunnel. When the shouting started, she almost jumped out of her skin, ears perked up and alert for the source of the cacophony. An instant later she realized what was going on and crept stealthily toward the large chamber just in time to see ten of the goblins charge off toward the source of a sudden light show.
Looking back toward the small camp she saw the two remaining goblins standing there watching their comrades running off to investigate the ruckus. As thoughts of failure began to play through her mind, she forced herself to calm down and examine her surroundings. Suddenly, she came to an idea. Closing her eyes and concentrating she spoke a minor telekinetic cantrip and then opened her eyes again, focusing on the debris laying on the floor around the excavation site.
The spell was not a powerful one, but it would have to be enough. With a thought she caused dozens of pebble-sized chunks of rock to leap across the space between the wall and the remaining goblins, showering them with a hail of tiny rocks. The hail of rocks continued until the goblins were forced to dive off the platform into the reservoir to escape the assault. Riana gritted her teeth as the spell began to strain her. It wasn’t meant to be used for so long at once, but she forced herself to push on. She knew they would be back soon and she had precious little time to act.
In a flash, she was in the camp, tearing through their things. She came on the small wooden box that was set aside carefully away from the rest of their used and half-destroyed possessions. She licked her lips as she stood in front of the box, hands poised to open the lid. Holding her breath, she lifted the lid and saw the flower inside, floating lazily as if gravity meant nothing at all to it. Cautiously, she reached out and snatched the rose and tucked it gently inside the breast of her robes.
A scuttling sound behind her alerted her to the presence of the two goblins, hoisting themselves out of the water in the tunnel. Without a second thought she dashed to the edge of the platform and dove head first into the dark water.
The rain was beginning to subside as the twins ran full bore toward home. They didn’t stop as they traveled across the large capital city of Kalijor . After swimming non-stop through the aqueduct they had scrambled up the side of the well using the tiny hand-holds in less than half the time it had taken them to get into the tunnels initially.
Barreling through the front door of their building, they stopped briefly to try and shake off the water soaking them to the bone. Then they dashed up the stairs and through the door of their home. As Riana slipped past the sliding stone slab of their door she ran head-long into something solid. Her feet flew out from underneath her, rolling them upward in front of her before gravity brought her down with a thud on the smooth stone floor.
Katrina managed to duck under the object but then tripped over her sister, launching head first into the living room and crashing into one of the overturned chairs.
Riana could now see, through bleary eyes, that a wooden stave had blocked her path. As she stared past it, trying to catch her breath, the stave was replaced with the head of a large goblin. The creature sneered down at her with wet, black eyes that showed no emotion at all. A grinning mouth full of stained, cracked, needle-sharp teeth sent a shiver down her spine. The creature raised the staff over its head, preparing to deal Riana a crushing blow. Her instincts took over as she kicked off of a piece of near-by furniture and spun herself around quickly, sticking out her foot and driving it forcefully in the back of the creature’s leg.
The goblin howled in surprise as it dropped to its knees, yelping in pain as a thin tongue of flame arced across the room to hit it in the head. Its few scraggly hairs burned into black cinders as it rolled around in circles on the floor, furiously beating its clawed hands on its head in an attempt to prevent further damage.
Riana rolled over and staggered back to her feet, trying to get clear of the goblin’s thrashing limbs, then drew her small dagger and held it tightly in her hand. Watching the creature writhe on the floor, she concentrated and uttered one of the only offensive incantations she knew, causing a series of electrical sparks to cross the distance between herself and the flailing goblin. The goblin wailed in pain as the electricity coursed through its body.
Katrina stood up, holding one hand to her forehead. A trickle of blood slid down her face. Pointing her other hand, she spread her fingers open and offered Riana a serious look before speaking another incantation. A light breeze, blowing across the entry-way, served to feed the flames on the goblin’s head in response to her spell.
“Go get the guards.” Katrina said, her teeth clenched in concentration.
“We have to finish it Kat. There isn’t time to get the guards. You’ll use up all your spells before I can get back.” She looked down at her sleek, silver dagger and then back up at her sister.
Katrina nodded solemnly, focusing on the goblin once more. The creature was trying to force its way to its feet despite its predicament. Leaning heavily on its stave, which had caught fire, it stood stubbornly. Patches still burning on its head, it growled at them.
Her dagger at the ready, Riana steeled herself for an attack. Katrina uttered another incantation and the goblin suddenly spun around as if it had been hit in the cheek by a strong punch. Riana pounced.
The creature wheeled, its flaming stave carving an orange arc through the air. Riana ducked under the burning weapon and drove the dagger home in the creature’s side.
The goblin yowled, swinging the stave back and striking Riana in the side. Knocking her against the wall, it forced the air from her lungs.
“Ree!” Katrina called out as the goblin turned its moist black eyes on the stunned elf. Without thinking Katrina sprung toward the door, drawing her dagger mid-air, and slammed bodily into the creature. Driving her own dagger into its back, she knocked it out into the hallway where the two of them slumped into a heap against the wall.
The room fell silent. Riana’s pained gasps seemed too loud as she tried to suck air back into her pleading lungs. Finally, she caught her breath and twisted her head to look out into the hallway. In a panic, she scrambled out into the hallway and pried the figures apart. Noting the second dagger in the goblin’s body, she kicked the thing a couple of times to make sure it was dead, before kneeling by her sister. Putting a hand to her face, she was relieved to find Katrina breathing. She coughed a sigh of relief and then dragged her back into their home and to the couch.
Riana sighed with a healthy combination of relief and weariness as she set the last item back where it belonged and then flopped down onto the couch next to her sister.
“That’s it then.” Riana said aloud, not really to anyone specific.
“Yeah, finally. I can’t believe those creatures made such a mess of the place.” Katrina rubbed her shoulder in an attempt to sooth the ache there.
“-I- can’t believe mom made US do all the clean up!” Riana scowled, rubbing her own sore muscles.
“Well it could have been worse. She was REALLY mad at us for chasing the goblins into the aqueducts.”
Riana snorted. “What else were we going to do?”
“Call the guards?” Katrina said with a smirk.
“I suppose…” Riana responded noncommittally. “Still, who’d have thought the preservation spell mom used on her rose was like some sort of goblin magnet?”
“No kidding… So… did they figure out how the big one got here ahead of us?”
Riana shrugged. “Their best guess seems to be something about it being attracted to our house because of the residual energy of the flower. Since it has been here for years it has left some kind of footprint or something. It all sounds pretty iffy to me.”
“Huh…” Katrina said, not knowing where to take the conversation next.
“So…” Riana mirrored. Then a sly smile began to form on her lips, “I hear old man Tiburra has been having a problem with orcs…”
“Yeah?” Katrina responded almost dismissively as she looked out the window at the early afternoon light.
“Yeah…” Riana confirmed solemnly, a nod thrown in for good measure.
“Mom will get hot enough to roast a pig if she finds out…” Katrina finally said after a long pause, turning to look at her sister.
“Uh huh.” Riana agreed as she fingered the pommel of the new dwarven dagger the city guard had given her for finding out about the goblins.
Katrina looked down at her own newly-awarded dagger, then back up at her sister. Golden eyes locked with violet and mischievous grins formed on mirrored lips. “Last one there has to search through the coop!” She shouted as she sprung off the couch.
Together they raced out the door, toward the East gate and the farm lands beyond.