Too difficult. She dropped it against the base of the building and headed for the bag. Easier to grab the other end.
Another two goblins appeared.
She hadn’t had time to reload. She pointed the pipe at them all the same.
“Try the other door,” she said.
Then she moved to slam the pipes together-
They were gone.
Goblins were cowardly, as a general rule. One of the first rules she’d learned.
She touched the two ends of chain together, then moved the bag’s contents so the metal there would help bar the gap.
As barriers went, it was weak. Metal charged by cold. She only needed it to hold for a minute.
Her hand touched the hole Buttsack had used to get inside. Big enough for a raccoon to crawl through.
It would have to do.
The bucket was in the bottom of the bag, fitting the bag’s shape. Most of the stuff was packed inside.
Ideal. It made it easier.
She struggled with the buckets, moving it, removing the chain by tilting the bucket, then fed it through the nearest available hole in the structure.
grabbing the sandwiches and drinks, putting them in the bag with the remaining bucket. Now it was light enough to sling over one shoulder.
Bucket, marbles.
And one of the items that Andy had given her. The same item he’d stuck to the door.
A rectangular package wrapped in butcher’s paper.
She unfolded the paper.
The contents were mostly soft, dull beige, with a bit of hardware on the one end. A microchip, a bit of wiring, and a dull screen that might have fit on a calculator. All in all, it was surprisingly small.
Then again, she had no idea how big these things were supposed to be.
She dropped it in the bucket, then packed it in with the steel wool.
She tossed the bucket inside.
She could hear the confused comments, the swears. She could see them peering through the holes. She was already limping away.
“Fuck? What the fuck!?” one goblin. “What’s this?”
“Hey! Bitch!” Buttsack cried out.
“You’ll live,” she said, without turning around.
“Cant get at whatever she shoved inside!”
“Break it!” Buttsack was shouting.
She walked until a good sized tree was between her and the goblins.
She pulled the transmitter out of her pocket.
Safety off.
She pressed the button.
She’d thought the pipe shotgun was loud.
When her senses returned to her, she was lying in the snow.
The world was a little darker, and not because time had passed.
Cracks ran through everything, as if the world were a picture, and the bomb had broken the glass in the frame.
Here and there, the cracks opened wide enough for a foot to slip through.
She crawled to her feet, careful to avoid the gaps.
She suspected she didn’t have the strength to open a door at this point.
It would be ignoble, if somewhat fitting, if she couldn’t do this next part.
Walk around the shack…
Stepping further out of the woods, she had a view of the town.
Most of it. It was faint, faded, and further away than it should have been. Everything looked like it was uphill, as if she stood in the midst of a great depression.
Not the small explosive’s work.
The door had been partially damaged.
Right.
She moved slowly, taking a moment to reload the pipe shotgun.
She pushed the damaged door open, and the middle held fast, held by chain, while the part that should have connected to the hinges swung inward.
She squeezed through, stumbling and nearly falling on her way in.
The goblins were wounded, but not killed, filled with glass marbles or shards of the things, as well as bits of plastic bucket and maybe some steel wool.
Buttsack was already on his feet, glaring with the hate of a thousand sociopaths. He started to hobble her way.
“Stop,” she said.
He didn’t. She didn’t have that much sway over him anymore. He spoke, and his voice was a growl. “I could-”
She shot him in the leg.
He screamed.
“Now you can’t,” she murmured.
She pulled the chain to the middle of the room, then arranged it in a circle, looped three times over, avoiding the spot in the floor which opened up into some seemingly bottomless pit.
The darkness shifted, and in the corner of her vision, it was worse. She couldn’t shake the feeling that it was getting worse behind her, in all of her blind spots, waiting to catch her by surprise.
Her sanctuary was against goblins alone. A circle Seven feet in diameter.
She sat down, cross-legged, and pulled the remaining items out of the bag, collecting it in a pile.
She’d opted for the lighter fluid and matches over a large battery because she hadn’t been sure how strong she would be. Her plan had been to use her own blood if she had the strength, and the lighter fluid along with improvised materials if she hadn’t. As it happened, she hadn’t needed to worry.
Flecks of goblin had been scattered throughout the room.
She used the end of her scarf to clean the inside of the circle, then painted a circle around the inside of the chain. Goblin blood.
Chalk for a third circle.
Chalk for circles inside the circle, and lines that led to where her legs and rear end met the floor.
She pulled off her scarf. “My dads bought this for me. They gave me shelter, in more ways than one. They gave me strength. They’re at the core of who I am.”
Scarf in one circle, with the word ‘Dads’.
“My mom…”
She put in the phone Johannes had lent her, the vehicle for her latest, freshest communication with her mom.
An ‘x’ in goblin blood. “My hometown…”
There weren’t that many connections she could secure.
Pipe shotgun. “My relationship to goblins.”
She picked up the book on Demesnes, then shifted position until a circle was in front of her. “Blake. He told me he’d teach me magic. My first real friend here.”
She opened the book, paging through it.
“Biiiiiitch,” Buttsack groaned. He didn’t move, still staring up at the ceiling.
Others were rousing, reaching into open wounds to dig out marbles.
“Take your time,” she said. “I’m… well, I won’t say I’m not in a hurry, but I can wait.”
She found the page on Demesnes.
But there was one more circle to attend to.
She pricked her finger with the stiletto, then let the blood collect.
The cracks around her yawned wider. The structure shook.
She could see one or two of the goblins smiling.
One drop.
She let the blood collect again.
The cracks widened further. A deep, endless darkness, a void that beckoned.
“If you want me,” she told the void, “You’ll have to take me.”
Second drop.
“I’ll take you,” Buttsack said.
She ignored him.
The third drop collected.
Reality cracked and creaked, straining to hold together, as the blood filled the little square of her baby fingernail.
She let it drop, and her vision wavered. She very nearly fell over into the nearest crack.
There was barely any light now. A crack ran through the window, allowing only a sliver through.
“Molly,” she said.
The word passed her lips, and she sat.
Waiting.
In the dark space around her, barely visible, the goblins moved, picking bits out of their wounds.
One slipped outside.
He came back with friends.
An hour might have passed, she couldn’t be sure. She read through Demesnes to pass the time, to learn.