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.
"Go fish." Cat replied.
Frit's lip curled at his father's gift, "I'm not eating a person!"
And right on cue, Floki started crying. He tried to hide it, tried to hurriedly clean his face of the great fat tears rolling down his cheeks, but it was too late. There was no way his father hadn't noticed his whimpering. Knut had already mentally made a note of it.
The youngest, Odd, slipped out of the chair without question and set to gnawing on a leg with all his tiny but very sharp teeth. Knut couldn't help but chuckle. It was a rare sound these days and it was more brittle and dry than his laughs used to be. "I was joking, My Little Monster. Though I appreciate your enthusiasm." Knut scooped him up, prying the toddler's jaw from the elf's leg and unfortunately setting off a shriek that could be heard from The Winter Branches.
"Now look what you've done." Ask scolded him. She got up from where she'd bee playing cards and rushed over to take his son from him. "I just got him quiet." She bounced him around until his screams had softened to a low unhappy growl.
Knut didn't reply. He pulled his mask off of his face and set it on his bedside table. He sat heavily onto his bed, all the while watching his sons intently, noticing their curious stares, their unique reactions.
Frit and Floki grimaced at the dead child he'd laid before them. Floki continued to cry. Frit's lip curled in disgust at the awkward twisting of the girl's broken neck, but he stood up from the chair and took a step forward. Hesitantly, still sobbing and shaking, Floki followed suit.
"Why'd you bring her here, then?" Frit asked, his black eyes narrowed at him, burning with that new anger and distrust his father's failures had instilled in him. "If we're not going to eat her, then what do you want us to do with her?"
"What do you want to do with her?" He asked them both. "If she were still alive, how would you kill her?"
Frit's gray brows furrowed more as he tried to think of something to say. Floki was the first to answer. "I don't want to do anything to her!" He cried, still staring at the corpse with wide open eyes. He couldn't look away from her neck, from the bruises blooming across it. Knut smirked to himself. He didn't know it, but Floki had just become the first goblin to ever lie about his own nature.
"I don't want to play this game. Can't we just burn her?" Frit muttered, stuffing his clawed hands into his pockets.
"They're not people, boys," Knut said sternly. He went and knelt over the dead girl. He fisted his hand in the girl's hair, lifted up her head and made the girl look at them with her dead eyes. "This one might be a child, but these are the things that took your mother from you. They killed your brother. They mean to kill you too. Bite them first before they have a chance to bite you." In his mind, he begged them, "don't make my mistakes." Knut retrieved two knives from his belt and boot and handed them to his eldest sons. Each son held his knife in his own way. Frit held it up in the light of the window, turning it and admiring the way the light shimmered across the metal. Floki clutched his in a trembling, but tight-fisted grasp. Nervous, but willing. "Now, tell me, what do you want to do to this elf? How would you take revenge for your mother and brother?"
He could see something beginning to register in Frit's eyes, could see the gears in his mind turning.
"They're our prey, Fritjof. No different from the deer they hunt. Both of you need to stop thinking of them as equals. They certainly don't think the same of you."
Frit's brows lifted and his face relaxed in understanding or acceptance. Slowly he moved towards the dead elf.
"Frit?" Floki, called to his twin. He grabbed Frit by his wrist and held him there. "What are you doing?"
"Getting back at them." Frit answered, shaking his arm from his brother's grip. With a roar, he plunged down onto the elf, driving his knife between her ribs. He yanked the knife back, spraying himself and his family and the floor with blood, then plunged forward again and again. Each time his roar grew louder and less human.
Floki watched him, his eyes following the arc of his arm. His knife trembled in his hand.
Knut smiled and laid a big hand on his middle son's mop of golden hair. "Floki, he's only doing what goblins do. Aren't you a goblin too?" Knut said. "Don't you want to make them pay for what they've done to us?"
"I don't care if I'm a goblin." Floki blinked away more tears. "I don't want revenge. I just want Mama back." The knife slipped from Floki's hand and clattered against bloody stones at his feet. "I miss her."
Knut felt his insides melt. He wanted to wrap his arms around Floki and tell him everything would be okay very soon. The Solstice was only days away now then Matilda would be home. But even with their happy ending on the horizon, he couldn't allow this to continue. His own failure to protect his family had brought his sons shortcomings to light. They had to be made better. Knut picked up the knife and placed it back into Floki's small hand. "I miss her too." He said, curling Floki's small fingers around the knife's handle. "All of this is for her. She wants the elves dead, so I'm not going to rest until all of them are. Don't you want to make your mother happy too? I bet she'll be so proud of you when she finds out how much you and your brothers helped."
"What in The Hollow's name are you doing?"
Knut turned to see that Ib and Bran had returned from their patrol for survivors as well. Ib was gawking at him with horror. Bran slinked passed him to wash the blood from his hands.
"Care for another game?" Cat asked him, reshuffling the card deck.
"And get utterly destroyed again? I think I'll pass." He sat down with her on her cot anyway and she dealt him in.
"Teaching lessons." With a soft exhale of breath, Knut stood. He smiled down at his sons. Frit had stopped stabbing the corpse. He was looking up at him with unfocused eyes. Floki had stopped shaking and held the knife with a now firm grip. He clenched his teeth and sniffled, holding back the tears that still wanted to flow. "Just because we're not at home doesn't mean we can neglect our studies."
"A word. Now." Ib hissed. He stalked back out into the hall.
"Think about it, Floki," He patted his soft golden hair. "You can give me your answer later." Then he followed Ib out into the hall.
"You're doing the thing, aren't you?" Ib growled, crossing his arms angrily over his chest.
"What thing?" Knut knew exactly what he meant.
"The thing your father used to do. Manipulating your sons into doing things you think will toughen them up. Don't you remember how much you hated it?"
"I was too young to understand what he was doing back then. Maybe if I had never been taken away, maybe he would have succeeded and I wouldn't have turned out like this." He motioned towards his gut where his crown sat like a benign tumor. "I've been stupid. I spoiled them. I have to correct it. I can't keep protecting them from what the world will do to them. They have to see it. They have to learn."
"They're five." Ib reminded him. He frowned as he took Knut in, noting every change. He hardly smiled anymore and milled around the fort like a ghost on the rare occasion he was even there. He spent most of his hours out hunting.
"I was younger than them the first time I killed a man. You weren't much older."
Ib clenched his jaw. "Didn't you see how much you were scaring Floki?"
Knut's black eye flicked towards him and Ib swallowed. It was the darkest shade of black he'd ever seen. "I didn't see any fear. Not in either of them. Now that they're here, surrounded by the smells and sounds and tastes of battle, their goblin instincts are waking up and I don't think their magic is far behind. Frit is curious about them. He's eager to learn and grow stronger. Floki, who already had that inborn love of fighting, is beginning to understand the purpose of the fight. It's not just to please me, but the killing itself. He's not shaking in fear. He's shaking with anticipation." Knut stepped closer until the two men were a breath apart. Knut peered into Ib's violet eyes, his expression stern and chilling. "They may only be five now, but before I know it, they'll be men dreaming of ways to kill me. I'm preparing them for that so they can become whoever they will be, be it a king or ashes."
"I see." Ib's eyes narrowed. "Is everything going to be about The Coronation now?"
Knut cocked his head at Ib, looking at him like he'd just said something immensely stupid. "It always was." Ib took a step back from him. "I have to test them, Ib. I have to make them stronger. If I want one of them to kill me, they must first surpass me."
Ib shook his head as if doing so could make Knut stop talking.
"I am a fraud. I shouldn't have won my crown. I should not even be alive. She made all of it possible and I failed her too. My own wife was stolen right from under my nose. Kai would never have let that happen." Knut's throat constricted the moment his confession left his mouth. It was a difficult thing to admit. "I am imperfect, but the one that succeeds me will be."
Ib didn't linger to hear any more of his friend's ramblings about coronations and tests. He turned and hurried back down the spiraling staircase that led back down to the main courtyard, eager to get away and forget everything he'd heard. All he could see was Knut laying dead in The Hollow's arena, his belly split open and his sons devouring his flesh. He slapped his hands over his mouth as his last meal returned for revenge. He tried to make it outside but ended up ruining his new pants and boots.
Knut watched his friend flee, running from the truth he'd laid bare. His ears wiggled slightly as the sound of soft rustling met them. "How long have you been there?" His eye cut to the side, but he never turned to face the man behind him.
"Forever," Bran purred, a raspy echo to his voice giving away that it wasn't Bran at all. "If the changeling is finished scolding you, there's something I'd like to discuss."