Goblin King’s Palace at the Bloodbarrow Citadel
General Alaura Moonclaw (Laura Lockley)
I still couldn’t understand how Lucien got away from me.
Since last night, the concept has been bothering me to no end. I did everything right, but everything backfired! From the poison to his great escape. I still can’t fathom how everything went from smooth sailing to sunken ship in a matter of minutes. There was no way I botched the recipe—my special poison should have made him an easy target on the off chance he could use his powers.
Killing Lucien was the final piece of my plan, and he ruined it!
What’s worse is that I had no idea where he went! Not only that, I’d lost my divine crystal, the Phembros Ignis, in the hands of the demi god himself!
Ugh, I needed a face to punch! Being back at the palace empty-handed, going back to that insufferable chubberch! If things had gone my way, he would have been dead by now!
I needed Lucien’s soul to be mine…. I needed to be part god to bring Sbuangarr to the ground….
Wait, could there be a chance that he was transported here, in Etheryn?
I’d have to scour Etheryn for him, and I had no idea where he could be, but him being local was better than him being in a different galaxy. Our world was big, and my options were scarce. When I went through the portal, we separated. It didn’t help that I had no idea how he’d opened one in the first place. Understanding that would have helped me in some way, serving as a starting point. But I was clueless—I hated being clueless. Now, I had to find a way to separate from my squadron again. This time would pose more of a challenge, seeing as we didn’t have any expedition assignments coming up. In our last assignment, King Chubberch had us invade a small village in Nemetesnia, Ugos, where the Ugos tribe was slaughtered by my women and his men under his orders. Just like when that disgusting goblin king had raided the Moonclaw pack in our hamlet, many women slaves were taken, and the men were tossed in a corpse pile for the fire. Seeing that again and again brought back painful memories, and it was more fuel in my fire to stick a pitch fork right up that bastard’s ass!
“Hey, Moonclaw,” Regis cawed at me as soon as me and my warriors walked through the grand palace doors. Regis was a soldier from the Goblin King’s Royal Guard, and a man I detested. “King Norruk wants you in the underground. Now.”
Oh, how I wanted to punch his pug face in.
Esthedia, one of my Moonclaw sisters, took a step closer to me as Regis walked off, and said to me telepathically, ‘What are we going to do now?’
It was the sixth time she asked me that question since I came back. Since we were abducted by Norruk’s men 10 years ago, stripped away from our family, I’d established a telepathic link among my sisters. It’s a blood bond, as strong of a blood bond as I could create as a sorceress. Esthedia, Luma, and Dapheen could open this channel at will, and we could talk to each other in secret. It was a connection I created the moment we were carried away from our hamlet in those small wagon cages that smelt like death and shit. Those pompous bastards didn’t know, and for a decade, they still had no idea….
This blood bond made plotting against the king easier. Even so, complications rose the moment he promoted me to general. I had no option but to accept the promotion. Before then, my sisters and I were mercenaries. We had gotten so effective that we became members of his militia.
Warming up to scum like him wasn’t hard at all. I’d always been a crafty girl, and I knew how to charm my targets. However, this assignment was my longest one yet—murdering Norruk wouldn’t be easy. I needed the strength of a god to get the job done. He had power, power that was stolen from a witch. And now Norruk was the strongest goblin warlock in all of Etheryn.
‘Alaura?’ Esthedia called to me again, and I snapped out of my daze.
‘I am working on it.’ I had to admit to myself that I was so bothered by my failed attempt at killing Lucien that I hadn’t thought about much else. My sisters needed answers.
‘Alaura, how much longer must we wait? You still refuse to tell us how your search for the demi-god went. Do you still have the crystal?’
‘Be patient, Esthedia. I will tell you everything when the time comes.’
‘We need something to hold onto,’ she insisted. ‘It was difficult telling those men that you went out to scope the mountainside without them. They are growing suspicious.’
‘We will talk more when I get back, all right? I will see you soon.’
‘But, Alaura?!’
Esthedia was never the patient one, though, I couldn’t blame her. When Lucien tore that portal open, I fell in elf country. Luckily my codex spawned the moment I landed back to my home planet, and I was able to teleport to my assignment site. Ever since, the girls have been bugging me for answers. I couldn’t tell them that it tanked. Getting his soul was the last critical step to my plan, and I botched it.
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I couldn’t let my sisters down. I thought about the consequences of giving up as I followed Regis to the underground. But there was no way I could let them go through another month of this bullshit let alone another year! I had to think of a backup plan and fast. The King Asshole was raiding these small villages one by one, slowly building his empire. I’d be damned if I expanded his reign and made him more powerful before I could get my hands on a way to destroy him.
As soon as Regis led me down to the dungeon of horrors, I heard the faint sound of goblins cheering at a distance. Through the stone steps and into a dimly lit corridor, the smell of rotting flesh started to grow more and more prominent. Here, in the heart of Norruk’s personal hell, was his amusement—a ring of goblins and beasts baying for blood in an underground makeshift arena. A cruel spectator sport held for the pitiless warlock king and his sadistic court. Around these parts, these green assholes called it The Pit.
“Watch your step, Moonclaw,” Regis sneered, his gray eyes grinning in the faint torchlight that flickered along the path. “Don’t want you sullying your pretty boots.”
Ignoring his taunt, I focused on my own thoughts. As we navigated through the narrow subterranean passage, my mind raced with plans. Rallying allies was an option, but it was too risky. Prison allies would need convincing, and those chances were slim. And then there was also the option of going back to square one and finding another hidden temple of the gods. Ley line crystals like Phembros Ignis were hard to come by, but finding another crystal would help me find Lucien, if he was actually in Etheryn. I thought this was my best option here. Finding allies could go south. Finding Lucien could be easier. That was… granted he remained powerless. He didn’t put up much of a fight back on Earth, I thought to myself as I stroked my chin. A ley line crystal that branched from Tree of Infinity could track down any celestial energy. A decade ago, all of the gods and titans disappeared, but one remained. He wasn’t from our planet, but our sister planet, which was good enough for me. Opening a portal to cross such a vast space was taxing, though doable. But since he could be here, I could skip that step, and this new search would be faster.
I smirked.
Okay, this could work. I had the means of finding another hidden temple. I just needed to collect ingredients for my spell. I’d saved some from the last spell, so there, a few more steps could be skipped. My sisters wouldn’t have to wait much longer, I could do this. I could save the Moonclaw pack….
“And why the fuck are you smiling for?” Regis hissed at me as he stopped by the barred gates.
I chuckled softly. “Oh, it’s nothing.”
He scoffed. “Dumb bitch.”
As soon as he turned his head back from over his shoulder, my grin went wider.
Regis was the fourth man on my kill list….
Unfortunately, my joy in slaughtering the chubberch and his men vanished as soon as I turned the corner after entering the gates, noticing a familiar wolfkin in the ring with a giant orc.
Grestin… Grestin Moonclaw….
What the hell? I thought he’d died with the others….
“Ah, there she is!” King Norruk greeted me with his arms stretched out as I continued walking up the steps toward him. His wives Percernys, the human, and Elshe, the 12 inch fae, were with him on his spectator throne overlooking the ring two stories high.
I bowed just as Regis did.
Against everyone’s stereotypical conception of those green imps, King Norruk didn’t fall in the category of a grotesque goblin, not in the physical sense. In fact, he was quite the lady killer for a goblin king—the towering height, the sharp jawline, the long locked hair, and the toned body. Percernys loved complimenting his striking silver eyes while Elshe loved to gloat about mini Norruk who she swore was the same height as her. But in the mental sense, he was a typical goblin scumbag, grotesque in the atrocities he committed in his quest for power and endless lust for brutality.
“Interesting to see you in such high spirits, Moonclaw.” The king smirked, relishing in the ring’s ongoing carnage where Grestin was desperately trying to defend himself against the orc’s hammering blows.
Battling the urge to jump down into the ring and help my kin, I maintained a smirk. “Always good to attend these games of yours, King Norruk.” He didn’t mention the fact that one of his victims was a wolfkin of my pack, which meant that he wanted to get a reaction from me. Unfortunately for the prick, I wouldn’t give him what he wanted.
“Word from my men is that you’ve been doing a lot of solo scouting. Is this true?”
“Yes, my lord.”
“You may pardon us, Regis,” he said, waving his guard away. He exited, leaving me on the high spectator box along with the goblin king and his wives. “This is troubling news, as it isn’t the first time this routine has been brought to my attention.”
“I felt there was no need to scout with a party along the mountainside of Ugos. It would have been a waste of manpower where their services could be better utilized in the mainland, capturing prisoners,” I responded, trying to diffuse his suspicion.
“True, but that also means you are taking unnecessary risks, Moonclaw,” he replied, his silver eyes still locked on the fight. “Your life is valuable to me, after all.”
“I think I can handle myself just fine, my lord,” I shot back, forcing my voice to remain steady under the weight of his presence.
Norruk let out a low chuckle. The sound gnarled inside my ears. “Indeed, you can. But you must consider how your actions might affect your squad. More precisely, your people.”
His implications were boiling my blood.
“You do value your people, right, general?” he asked, as my brother continued to be pummeled mercilessly in the ring by his many orc prisoners.
“I do. Very much so.”
“Especially your sisters in my force?”
“Of course.”
“And you appreciate everything I have done for you?”
His human wife glared at me from the corner of her eye, while the short one continued kicking her feet delightfully as she sat on his shoulder, humming to herself.
“I appreciate the opportunity to serve in your relentless, powerful, and superior army,” I praised, the words making me ill as they escaped my lips.
He chuckled. “That is good to hear, but I am not convinced.”
“Alaura? Alaura, is that you?!” Grestin begged, clinging onto the bars in the back of the ring as the giant orc marched his way behind him.
He was reaching out to me, but I couldn’t do anything. I fought my lips not to quiver at the sight of it, and fought the urge to close my eyes at what came next.
“Perhaps we have a misunderstanding, general,” the bastard continued. “I order you to raid, you raid. You must raid with my men. That is my term. It’s a simple order, wouldn’t you agree?”
“Please, Alaura! Save me!” he pleaded.
“Yes, my Lord.”
“If I get more reports like these from my men, I’ll be forced to personally intervene. Do I make myself clear?”
“ALAAURAAA!” Grestin cried, the thundering steps of the orc growing louder. My eyes ballooned when the orc cocked his fist back, Grestin’s sweaty bloody face begging out to me. “Alaur—”
I couldn’t help but press my eyes shut, the sound of his squelching skull being bashed against the bars making my stomach turn.
“I said, do I make myself clear?” he asked me again as he got off his seat, the depth in his voice deadly.
“Y-yes, King Norruk,” I said through gritted teeth.
“Good.”