The Dark Knight priest said Graytoes’ stolen baby required milk, which the goats could provide. Direfang suggested the goblin younglings in the throng could also benefit from the milk. Hence a few goats were saved.
The entire army looked like refugees streaming from some village with everything they owned on their backs.
Indeed, they were refugees, and Direfang intended to find them a home.
Saro-Saro and his most prominent clansmen had claimed a wide spot in the trail, one where a rocky overhang sheltered them. Direfang stepped around members of the Woodcutter clan and beyond Graytoes, who belonged to no clan. She held the baby close, rocking it and singing an old song to the youngling that Moon-eye used to sing to her. She smiled at Direfang and immediately returned her attention to the baby.
Several Flamegrass clansmen were mingling with Saro-Saro’s clan. Direfang thought it good to see the two groups getting along.
“Saro-Saro.”
The old goblin snorted and got to his feet. He adjusted a green cape he wore over his shoulders, his fingers wiping off a silver pin that held it on. He nodded to Direfang and suppressed a yawn. Around him, members of his clan stood and stretched, some of them beginning to eat vegetables they’d harvested from Reorx’s Cradle.
“It is time to go over the mountains. The pass will end ahead where a trail leads up and to the west. It will be a few hours of walking to that trail.” Direfang pointed to the western range. “A narrow trail and probably difficult to climb. But there is a river on the other side.”
“Thirsty,” Pippa said. She sniffed at herself. “And dirty. Cleaning in the river would be good.”
Saro-Saro looked thoughtful. “A mountain trail. Steep?”
“Looks to be steep.”
“Dangerous?” Pippa asked.
Direfang shook his head. “Dangerous only to those who are not careful.”
The hobgoblin did not notice the glimmer in Saro-Saro’s eyes.
“This river,” Saro-Saro said. “The one on the other side. It leads to the New Sea Mudwort talked about?”
Direfang nodded. “Spikehollow?” Direfang looked around. He expected the goblin to be somewhere near Saro-Saro, as he usually was. “Where is Spikehollow?”
Pippa scowled and tugged on Direfang’s arm. “Spikehollow is a little sick,” she explained. “Maybe more than just a little sick. Maybe Spikehollow should have talked to the skull man last night. But Spikehollow-”
“Is fine,” Spikehollow finished, emerging from between two burly, yellow-skinned goblins. He still wore his quilt, but he’d tied it around his neck, wearing it like a cape. It looked garish, the colorful thing fluttering around his shoulders. “The sleep helped a lot, Pippa.”
Direfang turned and walked toward the front of the column. “Spikehollow will lead this army,” he said over his shoulder. “For a while. At least until the pass ends and the trail up the mountain begins.”
“The very steep trail,” Pippa whispered. She rubbed her hands together gleefully. “And when Direfang reaches the top …”
Saro-Saro’s voice became barely audible. “Spikehollow will push the big, ugly hobgoblin down the mountain.” He paused. “And this time Direfang will not survive.”
Spikehollow, nodding to them over his shoulder, followed Direfang. But the young goblin did not walk as fast as usual, and he was shivering despite the warmth of the early morning. He breathed shallowly to keep from coughing.
“Feel better,” Spikehollow said to himself, “but not much.” He tugged the quilt tightly around him and tried to pick up his pace, stumbling when he bumped into a goat tethered to the Dark Knight named Kenosh. He hurried around the three Dark Knights and avoided Graytoes. Spikehollow didn’t want the others to see him sick.
“Saro-Saro is old,” Spikehollow mused, knowing he stood a very good chance to inherit the clan at Saro-Saro’s passing. “Saro-Saro might not live to reach the New Sea. Spikehollow lead now, but soon it might be Spikehollow’s army truly.”
He passed a brown-skinned goblin he’d befriended in Steel Town, one who often worked the same shift as he in the mine. He’d given the goblin, Bugteeth he was called, the gray blanket he’d plucked from the home in Reorx’s Cradle. He stood tall as he passed him, not wanting to appear as sick as he felt. He smiled and gestured.
Bugteeth smiled a greeting, then turned and coughed and wiped a speck of blood off his lips.
HOPE
Graytoes ran her finger along the baby’s bottom lip. It was soft, softer than anything she’d touched before. The goblins who walked at her side said the baby was an ugly thing. Its skin was too light and uninteresting; it was all smooth with no bumps or growths. And it cried for seemingly no reason.
At least its nose was wide, one goblin told her, and its eyes were reasonably large.
It didn’t have much hair on its head, another pointed out. So while it was a dwarf baby, it didn’t look like any of the dwarves in Reorx’s Cradle; they were all hairy creatures.
Graytoes knew the speakers hadn’t seen the other babies in the house. None of those babies had much hair, and admittedly the one she had taken had the least. She hadn’t picked that baby because of that fact; she’d picked it because it was the smallest and would be the easiest to carry. And she picked that one because she liked the cooing and gurgling sounds it made when it seemed to be happy. She told herself that the baby would be far happier with her and the rest of the goblins than stuck in a village that had been plundered to the point where nothing of any value remained.
She looked forward to naming the child. But what should its name be? A dwarf name might be appropriate, but Graytoes had never seen a dwarf before Reorx’s Cradle, and she did not know any of their type of names. Goblins and hobgoblins were often named after their physical traits or acquired habits or sometimes for the area in which a clan lived. Her dead mate, Moon-eye, had been given his name because one of his eyes was a solid white, overlarge orb that looked like a full moon. Bugteeth ate bugs, probably from a very early age, and often legs and wings got stuck to the front of his teeth. She had no idea how Mudwort got her name, as she was red skinned and did not at all look like any patch of mud.
Then there were goblins named after ancestors, such as Saro-Saro. She’d heard him say that his grandfather Saro was a clan leader, and because he was the second Saro in the family, they doubled the name. Spikehollow said he thought he was named for the tall, scratchy reeds that grew around his home. Some goblin names made no sense to her, seeming to be sounds more than anything else. Other names likely had a significance known only to the parents or the clan.
If Graytoes had a name when she was a youngling, she couldn’t recall what it was. She’d acquired Graytoes in Steel Town, working in the mines. Her feet were often gray with stone dust, in stark contrast to her yellow skin. Graytoes didn’t want her baby to be named for her slave work or her bug-eating or Baby Graytoes. She needed something special to call the child.
Wide-nose, she could call her baby that.
Or Large-eyes … no, that would always remind her of Moon-eye, and that would make her sad.
Smooth-skin. That would be a good choice, except as the baby got older, its skin might not stay so smooth.
Sabak, that was the interesting name of an old goblin hero she’d heard a story about in Steel Town. Maybe Sabak.
Direfang-Direfang would honor the hobgoblin who led the escape from that hated mining camp. But that was too long a name, she decided after running it around on her tongue a few times.
Hmm … Paxtan, that was a goblin word for traveler, and the baby would be traveling a lot before settling down in the forest Mudwort had told her about.