Jean Rabe - Death March

Spikehollow bent and picked up the piece of tylor meat that Grallik had dropped. Not bothering to brush off the dirt, he stuck it in his mouth and then joined Saro-Saro for the ceremony.

The hobgoblin’s hide was crusted with blood, and flies swarmed him. He didn’t bother batting them away anymore; he was too tired, and what little strength he still had, he needed for running.

Two other hobgoblins trailed him. He didn’t know their names; he was a loner and knew the names of only a handful or so of his kinsmen.

“Slow, Ruffem,” one called. “Slow, please.”

Ruffem slowed several minutes later but only because the muscles in his legs refused to take him farther. They clenched and he dropped to his knees; a moment more and he fell forward, turning his head just in time so his face would not slam into the earth.

He registered the sound of his heart pounding, nearly in time with the slapping of the other hobgoblins’ feet as they finally closed the distance and dropped down beside him.

“Free, Ruffem,” one of them wheezed.

Ruffem couldn’t tell which one was talking as he’d closed his eyes and tried to shut out the sound of his pounding heart and everything else. He’d never run so fast in all his young life, and he feared if his heart did not slow down, it would burst out of his chest.

He felt a hand on his back, jostling him gently.

“Ruffem?” Ruffem growled softly, a warning to be left alone.

But the jostling continued.

“Free, Ruffem,” the one continued.

“But maybe not for long,” the other hissed.

That got Ruffem’s attention. He sucked in a breath, inhaling dirt too, which stuck to his teeth. He coughed and pushed himself up.

The other two hobgoblins were indeed from his clan; Ruffem recognized them once he looked at them, though he still couldn’t put names to them. One had pockmarks on his face and neck from some malady of youth; the other had a head that seemed too large for its body. Both had mud-brown hides and wore boiled leather breastplates, marking them as clan warriors. It was the one with the pockmarks who had said they might not be free for long. Pockmark helped Ruffem to his feet.

“Too many minotaurs,” Pockmark said. “Wise to run, Ruffem. Would that everyone had run.”

“Others ran,” Ruffem managed to gasp. Some part of him thought his cowardice was justified because he’d spotted some of his kinsmen fleeing. “Others ran first.”

The hobgoblin with the overlarge head snarled. “Foul creatures from the pits, minotaurs. Man-bulls that should burn in the abyss.”

Ruffem nodded in agreement.

The pockmarked hobgoblin brushed at Ruffem’s chest to get the dirt and sticks off. “Hagam warned the clan about the minotaurs. Hagam days past said slavers were coming and that a shaman promised freedom to the south. Should have listened to Hagam.”

“Hagam ran days past,” Ruffem said.

The pockmarked hobgoblin prodded Ruffem’s chest and stomach and picked at the blood. “This blood …”

“Belongs to a minotaur,” Ruffem finished.

They got on either side of him and propped him up as they continued south, trying for a steady pace.

“A dead minotaur,” Ruffem added as he shook them off and regained his footing. He grinned widely so they could see the blood on his teeth and gums. He made a snapping gesture, indicating he’d bitten the minotaur. The minotaur had held Ruffem in a bear hug, waiting for another minotaur to bring a rope to tie him. Ruffem had stretched up and clamped his teeth on the minotaur’s neck, releasing a rush of blood. “A very dead minotaur.”

“Should have listened to Hagam, though,” Pockmark repeated. “None would be caught to be sold as slaves. All would be free.”

“South,” Ruffem said, pointing. His legs burned, but his muscles still worked, good and strong. “Run now.”

Ruffem took off at an easy lope, the others following.

Mudwort smelled the goblin bodies burning; the stench was so thick in the air and heavy in her lungs that she took only the shallowest of breaths. Although she’d smelled death often, it was an odor she’d never allow herself to get used to. Other goblins cast the smell off as commonplace; even Direfang seemed inured to it. But Mudwort thought it should always bother her, even if she had no special attachment to the ones who’d died.

The world was harsh and everything eventually died. But did goblins have to stink so badly when they stopped breathing?

She’d smelled nothing truly pleasant in a long, long while.

When she concentrated on the rocks and dirt beneath her fingertips, the odors from inside the earth grew stronger and helped mask the death scents, but it did not get rid of them entirely. The Dark Knights and goblins had moved away from her, and Direfang was busy helping the injured. So she relished the relative peace and silence that had settled around her.

When she was alone, it was easier to listen to the stone.

Exploring, she discerned traces of copper far below, and when she stretched her mind to the south, she found glistening fibrous blue crystals melded in bumpy, gray rocks. They were mixed with dark green hairlike threads in places, and there was a taste to them that reminded her of early summer mornings from before she was a slave. She lingered over the bumpy rocks, which she’d not encountered before, and her mind teased the hairlike threads.

“What do the rocks say? What say?” She cocked her head. “Saying something, but talking too soft. Stop the whispering. Say something louder.”

Mudwort heard crows cawing and angrily gnashed her teeth together. They’d inadvertently drawn her senses back to the surface. Many crows were circling, she knew, waiting for the goblins to leave the tylor carcass, waiting to feast on whatever was left … and on any flesh remaining on the goblins and hobgoblins that were still burning in the death pile.

“Stone saying something,” she scolded the crows. “Saying something more interesting than crows and bugs and Dark Knights and goblins.” She leaned forward and pressed her ear to the ground and twirled her fingers deeper into the dirt. She squeezed her features together, and her head started pounding.

“What say?” She jammed her knee hard against the ground in consternation. “What?”

It was a soft sound at first, for the most part words that were too indistinct for her to comprehend. But she picked out a few phrases in goblinspeak.

“Huh. Stones not speaking at all. Goblins are.”

She strained to hear clearly, finally managing to block out the crows and concentrate on the distant whispers that had become insistent and were pulling at her.

“Goblins are talking of magic!” She let her mind flow like water through cracks and over slices of shale and around the gray chunks filled with the hairlike green crystals. Then she detected the cavern below and raced toward it, finding the familiar oval with the symbols around it that she’d spotted a few days past.

It was near! That cavern had to be close to where she sat in the mountains! It felt close, but Mudwort couldn’t determine precisely where.

Her heart raced as she hurried down a corridor, spying a light ahead and focusing on it. She pressed her senses against the wall and instantly faulted herself for trying to hide. Whoever-whatever-was down there could not see her. She wasn’t really in that place. She was still above the ground, too close to the Dark Knights and the rotting tylor and all the burning bodies. Too close to the ceremony for the dead that she knew was happening and that she had no interest in.

Only her mind was below the earth.