“But the clan must return someday, Saarh. Goblins belong to the earth.”
“Yes,” she agreed. “That is also certain, a return.”
“Goblins were meant to live under the press of the dirt and stone.”
The sky darkened suddenly and lightning began to flash. Many of the goblins had never witnessed such a display and stood transfixed. Some were terrified and ran for reassurance to Saarh and the goblin with the crooked face.
The air was electrically charged and the wind gusted, setting Saarh’s beads to clacking and the young trees to bending. Thunder boomed, and a few goblins screamed in response. When the lightning came again and again, forking brilliantly and followed by more thunder, some of the goblins streamed toward the mountain.
“Stop!” Saarh cried. But her pained voice was too soft.
The crooked-faced goblin added his voice to hers, telling the clan to stop, and the goblins nervously returned.
“This is a storm,” she explained. “Chislev’s touch. Nothing more.”
“Chislev.” Mudwort spat. The goblins long ago revered some gods, that clan recognizing Chislev apparently. She spat again.
“S’dards! Fools, the lot.” But she scratched her chin thoughtfully. Perhaps the goblins of long ago were unaware that the gods had no regard for their fate. Perhaps in that faraway time they’d not experienced slavery yet, had not been hunted and maligned by Krynn’s more powerful races.
But they will learn the falseness of the gods, Mudwort mused. “A bad, sad, painful lesson.” She looked up, still keeping her senses locked into the seeing spell and focusing on the shaman. At the same time, a part of her registered Direfang approaching, a stern expression on his craggy face. She dropped her gaze and held tight to the scene from the past, angry with herself that she had not done her “seeing” farther down river where the hobgoblin wouldn’t have spotted her.
Saarh raised a fist the next time there was a crack of lightning. The lightning illuminated her proud, determined face, her wide, wild eyes glistening with excitement. “It is Chislev calling this clan to this place. The lightning is Chislev’s touch.”
“Chislev, Chislev, Chislev!”
“Saarh is Chislev’s claw!” That was intoned by the crooked-faced goblin. “Saarh rules here! Rules for Chislev.”
“Saarh, Saarh, Saarh!”
The sky opened up at that very moment, the rain pattering against the ground and the goblins, loud and insistent; many who had never seen a storm were startled.
“No fear!” Saarh tipped her face up and opened her mouth, drinking in the fresh water and knowing that many of her people would do the same to imitate her.
“Saarh says ‘no fear!’” The crooked-faced goblin moved behind the shaman and rested his hands on her shoulders.
“There is more here, in this little forest, than food and space to grow,” Crooked-face whispered softly into her ear. “There is more, isn’t there?”
“Yes,” she hissed. “There is much more.”
“And that something more is …”
“Is Chislev’s gift to goblinkind. There is power here. The pulse is too strong to be denied.”
The lightning flashed, a wide, bright stroke, and the thunder boomed even louder.
Direfang nudged Mudwort with his foot.
She cursed as the spell slipped away and the image in her mind of the infant forest and the shaman melted away.
“Mudwort, the wizard says there is a faster way to the Qualinesti Forest.” Despite the news he brought, Direfang looked positively glum, thought Mudwort.
She got to her feet, excitement on her face. “Yes, the forest that the elves used to call home. That would be the best home for Direfang’s army. The forest … the one I saw in the vision … the forest …”
“But the skull man does not want to leave this place,” Direfang interrupted, his face growing even more solemn. “The skull man says this sickness is a plague, and that the plague must not travel elsewhere. Says it must end here with the goblins.”
Mudwort cursed again. “The skull man does not lead the goblin army; Direfang does. It is what Direfang says that matters, not what a hated Dark Knight says.”
Direfang looked north to the dead black willow tree. “Mudwort, soon there may be no one left to lead. Even though more and more goblins arrive, everyone is getting sick. Everyone might die.”
THE PLAGUE TREE
Rain clouds scudded across the moon, hiding the river and thickening the darkness beneath the black willow. Lightning flickered high overhead, but it was brief and did nothing to cut the shadows, and the thunder that followed was little more than a whisper.
Leftear didn’t need the moon to see by. He found Horace tending a retching goblin, waited until the priest was done with that patient, then stepped in and picked the priest up by the throat and pressed him against the willow trunk. He cursed at him in the goblin tongue and shook him.
Horace was so spent, he couldn’t defend himself. He feebly kicked out at Leftear, but his feet didn’t reach the goblin, who squeezed harder and drew blood.
Still holding the priest, the goblin balled his free hand and rammed it into Horace’s stomach, grunting happily at the dull thud.
“Again,” Pippa urged him. “Hit the skull man again, harder! Break the skull man! Make the man bleed.”
“Kill the skull man,” that from a one-armed goblin called Upana. “Be fast!”
Leftear grinned widely and hammered his fist into the priest’s stomach again and again, careful as he did so not to step on his sick kinsmen sprawled under the tree.
Pippa was a few yards behind him, dancing between two ill goblins, deftly avoiding pools of vomit and blood while watching Leftear maul the priest. She’d briefly mourned Spikehollow’s passing on that very spot a scant few hours earlier and had instigated the attack to avenge his death.
“The skull man did not save Spikehollow!” she hollered. “Kill the skull man! Get revenge for Spikehollow in blood!”
“Stop! Leave him alone, you monsters!” Those words were spoken in the human tongue, coming from the wizard rushing up to them. Though the offending goblins didn’t comprehend the language of the man, they well understood that Grallik was also their enemy and, without releasing Horace, Leftear turned to threaten the newcomer, snarling in defiance.
“Stop this now!” Grallik pulled his three goats as close as he dared, staying well short of the first rows of the sick. He strained to see through the darkness, but saw only black shapes shifting and groaning. “You’re fools, the sorry lot of you! Horace is your only chance to survive this plague!” When it was clear they didn’t fathom his words, he realized none of them spoke the human language; desperately, Grallik searched his memory for a spell.
“What say?” Pippa called to Leftear. “What does the foul wizard say?”
Leftear grunted happily and turned and punched the priest again.
“The wizard wants Leftear to stop hitting the skull man,” Upana, who had caught the gist of the human words, explained. “The wizard is stupid. And the wizard cannot see in the dark.” The one-armed goblin laughed loudly and made a punching motion to imitate Leftear.
More words tumbled from Grallik’s lips, those uttered in an arcane language that none but he could decipher. “I begged you,” the wizard said. “I warned you, you vile little things.”
Grallik waited for the lightning to flash again, and when it did and he could see his target, he pointed his free hand at Leftear. Fire shot out, striking the hobgoblin squarely in the back and pitching him forward into Horace. The two fell in a heap at the base of the tree, while Pippa howled in rage. The goats tried to bolt, nearly pulling Grallik down, but he spread his feet and kept his balance, searching his memory for another spell and praying for another fork of lightning so his tired eyes could better spot his next target.