The Goblin's Throne

The Boughs One Week Before the Winter Solstice

The air of The Boughs was acrid. It burned its way through his nose and stung his lungs, yet his chest rose and fell in steady, easy breaths, as though it were as clean and clear as it had been six years before when he'd been fighting a very different war...and he'd been the happiest he'd ever been. 

Knut stalked through the tightly packed limbs of the elves' homeland, his slight frame allowing his movements to be silent and quick. His claws were painted in gore. A dead man's skull was still tied fast over his face. All he could smell was death. Such a sweet scent it was. He wanted more. He needed it and his one eye sought it out. Death. Killing. It was the only thing that could distract him. It was the only thing he was good at. A flurry of movement drew him in towards the direction of that blessed pond where he'd hidden away with his wife while the elves played and danced. He could see a small figure disappear into the leaves overhead, a bit of long brown hair dancing in the wind. A child, a young girl, older than Frit and Floki, but not yet bound, was trying to climb her way to The Branches. The poor stupid thing thought she could escape.

He closed his eye a moment and listened. He could hear her panicked breathing, the frantic pounding of her heart beneath the rustle of leaves, the scrape of fingernails on The Hollow's bark. The sound of fear. Of true terror. There was nothing quite like it. His life had been so strangely peaceful since The Upheaval, he'd almost forgotten what it sounded like. Squatting, he tightened the muscles in his legs, drawing himself up like a spring, then released. He launched himself up, up, up, until he was nearly level with the girl.

"Oh, no you don't!" He cackled, grabbing her by the ankle, he dragged her back down to the forest floor. The child's body slammed against the interlocking branches beneath their feet, landing with a sickening splat. Knut landed beside her without sound and nudged her with his foot, turning her onto her back. It wasn't one he recognized, but that no longer mattered. Nor was it surprising. Everyone he knew here was either dead or in a dungeon. "Did you really think you could scurry away from me, little rabbit?" He'd taken to calling all of the elves that. It was what they'd become to him.

There was a deep gash along the side of her face, she clutched it with one hand as she tried to drag herself away from him. Blood poured out of the wound undeterred, washing over her brown skin and suit of green summer leaves. "Please, please, don't-" She went suddenly silent as Knut's foot pressed down on her throat. 

"Please what?" He asked his one eye wide open and staring down at her through the space where her king's eye used to be. "Spare you?" He mocked her, copying her pitiful whine. "Oh, but my dear rabbit, your family's already in the stew pot. Don't you want to join them?" 

The girl tried to scream. He let her start, but he didn't let her finish.

Knut dragged the corpse back to the goblins' shiny new headquarters. They say Rome wasn't built in a day. Well, the Romans didn't have an endless supply of workers who didn't need food or sleep. Fort Boughs Break was built in just four hours. It was built for function, not flash. Its walls and turrets were plain, built with black stones brought up from The Underground. They'd mixed elf blood into the mortar that held the bricks together though and bodies surrounded the perimeter, skewered on tall spikes. He thought that was a nice touch. It certainly got his point across. 

In his quarters, above the main gate, he found his sons and niece exactly where he'd left them. Cat and Ask were playing cards on her cot over in the corner. His sons were huddled together in his chair by a window, a blanket pulled up over their noses to fend off the smoky, stinking air. Against all advice, he'd brought all of the children with him to The Boughs so that they could see, and learn.

"I've brought dinner, lads." He announced, tossing the elf girl down in front of the chair. "Eat up." 

"Do you have any eights?" Ask asked.