Nine Goblins(12)

This one, though…gods.

“I can splint it,” he said to her, fairly sure she didn’t understand him. “Splint it, and wrap it, and put some plaster on it. You’ll have to stay off it if you can. You probably can’t. Um.” He was very aware of the stag’s not-eyes boring into the back of his head.

“Let’s start with that,” he said, and got up. The stag rattled a little, then stopped, as if embarrassed. Walking backwards, making “wait” gestures with both hands, he got inside the barn and began rummaging around for supplies with which to, once again, do the impossible.





“War is just not efficient,” said Murray.

This was such a typically Murray comment that Nessilka snorted with laughter, even under the circumstances.

They were standing in ranks on the top of the hill. Elves and humans stood in ranks at the bottom of the hill. In a few minutes, somebody was going to break and yell “Attack!” and the humans and elves would come up and the goblins would go down, and then it’d just be shouting and hitting and pointy things.

“Look at this,” he continued. “They’re going to charge up here, and we’re going to beat them back, and at the end of the day, we’ll probably still be up here, and they’ll probably still be down there. We both know it. The battle isn’t going to change anything, and it’s all for control of this stupid hill, which neither of us would give a rat’s hind end for if there wasn’t a war.”

“S’nice hill,” rumbled Algol. “S’pretty, anyway.” He had a wildflower tucked behind one ear.

“It’s a trollslip,” he said helpfully, when they all looked at him and his flower. “They grow on hillsides like this.”

“It’s very…um….pink,” said Murray.

“My mom used to grow them back home.”

There didn’t seem to be anything more to say on that front. They all looked forward again.

He was right, so far as it went, but so was Murray. It was a hill, with big grey rocks scattered around the top, and little pink trollslips tumbling over them. Here and there, an oxeye daisy nodded in the sun. The hill had risen gently out of the woods behind them, leaving the trees behind in favor of a band of heather, and the wildflowers. The other sides ranged between steepish (in front) and suicidal (to the sides.) It had a pleasant, but not particularly dramatic view of the fields below.

A nice place for a picnic, maybe, but probably not a place you’d build a house.

Being the highest point for some miles, it was, however, the perfect place for a battle. Everybody wants the high ground, particularly if you’re only four feet tall and need all the help you can get.

The elves down below looked like tall white foxes, all narrow pointy faces and broad pointy ears. Their pale silver hair floated around their heads like haloes. They stood in grim silent ranks, and watched the goblins through narrowed almond eyes.

The humans below were a more varied lot, and came in almost as many colors as goblins, from dark brown to pasty pink. No green, though. You couldn’t trust a species that didn’t come in green.

At least they fidgeted before the battle. Nessilka appreciated that. The elves stood like carved marble. The humans sweated and twitched and snickered and poked each other, very much like goblins.

“They say the waiting…”

“…is the worst part.”

Mishkin and Mushkin had taken Algol’s advice literally, and were crowded up next to him like two ticks on a tomcat.

Algol considered this.

“Nah. The worst part is the bit where you hit the other guy and hope he doesn’t hit you.”

“Oh.”

“And the bit where they hit you, that’s the worst, too.”

“…oh.”

“And the bit where they’ve already hit you, and you’re not sure if you’re alive or not, that’s definitely the wor—”

“Corporal!”

Algol blinked at Sergeant Nessilka. “Yes, Sarge?”

“It is possible to be too honest, Corporal.”

“Yes, Sarge.”

They all stood and fidgeted for a while.

“Do you think we could make tea?” asked Gladblack, who had a purple tint to his skin most of the time, but was now a kind of unhappy grey.

“No.”

Weatherby was tugging at his clothes again. Behind Nessilka, Thumper was singing something tuneless under his breath. She caught something about “with a whack-whack here, and a whack-whack there…” and tuned him out.

“Do you think—” Murray began, and then there was no time for questions, because somebody had yelled “Charge!”