Two knights stood over her, the only two she’d heard names for: Tanner and Donnel, both words, both humans hated more than anything in the world. The latter had skin the color of milk. There were four other knights in the clearing, all on their feet and chattering to one another about how pleased their commander would be with the goblin, though one of them was shaking his head and saying: “One goblin is nothing. Less than nothing.” He argued that they should go hunting for more.
“You’re from Steel Town, rat.” Tanner spoke slowly, and Mudwort guessed it was so she might better understand him.
She nodded without hesitation. “Yes, Steel Town. Hell Town.” The latter was what she’d heard some of the knights call the mining camp.
“See the whip scars?” He bent and ripped the tunic off her shoulder. “See? I told you she’s from the mines.” Tanner broke into a broad grin, and Donnel slapped him on the back.
Mudwort cradled her injured hand. The broken fingers still throbbed, but the ache had eased just enough so she could also register the pain in her twisted leg. Had they broken her leg too? She tried to sit up and move her leg, but Donnel stepped hard on her good ankle to hold her in place. She writhed in the dirt and cursed at them in goblinspeak.
“Take care,” one of the other four knights said. “Don’t kill it. We’ll have to bury it like the last one.”
Tanner leaned close. “Little rat, you are indeed from Steel Town, yes?”
“Yes. Already said so. Yes. Steel Town. Hell Town.” The words hissed out between clenched teeth. She dug the fingers of her good hand into the ground when Donnel placed more pressure on her ankle. All the competing pains in her little body threatened to drive her to unconsciousness. “Steel Town, yes. Yes. Yes.”
There’d been birds singing when they’d carried her to their small camp. Odd, she thought, that she’d noticed and remembered that. But the birds had stopped, and all she could hear were the men breathing, the ones she couldn’t see clearly whispering, and the quick thunder of her heart.
“Iverton,” one of them said. “They used to call the place Iverton.”
“They don’t call it anything now,” said another of the four. “It’s buried under ash and rock, like soon we’ll have to bury her if they’re not more careful.”
“So the others are nearby?” Tanner asked, raising his voice. “The Steel Town goblins?”
She opened her mouth and raised an eyebrow, trying to decide what to say.
“The other escaped slaves,” Donnel clarified. He raised his voice too. “You didn’t come all this way by yourself, little thing. There were shiploads of you stinking rats.”
“Nearby,” Mudwort admitted when he reached for her again. She nodded. “Yes. Walked from nearby. Not far. Not terrible far.” Her breath came in ragged gasps when Donnel pressed harder on her ankle before finally stepping back. Her mouth was filled with dust and blood. She’d bitten her tongue hard. “On a bluff. They are all perched on a bluff. There is a river, and-”
“And the traitor wizard?” That came from one of the other knights. She couldn’t see him well, as he stood behind Tanner. His voice was scratchy and unpleasant. “Is the traitor wizard nearby? Guardian N’sera they used to call him.”
“Grallik,” Mudwort supplied, drawing smiles from Donnel and Tanner. “Grallik is there, perched on the bluff with the others.”
Two of the knights in the background talked rapidly, one claiming to have known Grallik from before Steel Town. That was the one with the scratchy voice, and Mudwort realized he had some age to him.
“Never cared for the wizard,” he was saying so softly that she had to strain to hear him. “Only interested in magic. Kept to himself. I never trust magic. Not even Isaam’s dark arts.”
Mudwort wondered who Isaam was, and if the scratchy-voiced knight was with the search party because he’d recognize the wizard.
“Grallik from Steel Town,” she said with a little more volume. “Grallik is nearby, yes.” She held her injured hand to her chest and drew her sore leg in closer. She could wiggle her toes, a good sign … until they decided to break them like her fingers. She kept her good hand in the ground where they couldn’t reach it.
“And you can lead us to them all, can’t you, little rat.” Tanner did not speak it as a question. “You can lead us to Grallik and the escaped slaves.”
Mudwort vehemently shook her head, blood drops flying from her lips. Even though she could move her toes, her leg was twisted so badly that she wasn’t sure she could lead anyone anywhere. But more than that, she wouldn’t lead them to Direfang. “No,” she spit. “Never.”
“You know where they are!” Donnel shot back. “You’ll take us to them or we’ll kill you.”
“She knows we’ll kill her anyway,” Tanner said in a low voice. “They’re not completely stupid.”
“Oh, this little rat will lead us straight to them. I promise you that. Lead us to them, and then we’ll bring Commander Kata here. There’ll be promotions and decorations for all of us.” Donnel made another move toward Mudwort and stumbled, crying out.
In the next moment, all of the knights were shouting and struggling, arms flailing like animals caught in a trap. Mudwort had trapped them with her magic, rode the earth up over their feet and hardened it. She pulled her good hand free of the earth and scrambled forward between Tanner and Donnel, dragging her injured leg and narrowly avoiding a sword blow from one of the other stuck knights.
She crawled faster and got farther away then spun back and sat and glared at them, waggling her fingers and coaxing the ground to continue to do her bidding.
All six were caught up to their ankles in the earth that she had pulled them down into and magically strengthened.
“What sorcery is this?” shouted Tanner. He was struggling the most, and in response the ground started cracking around him. “Is the goblin responsible? Did that rat do this?”
“Aye, foul thing that it is,” Donnel spit. He was wriggling out of his boots. “We were told there might be spell-weavers among them.” He grunted and twisted, working his right foot halfway out.
“Never escape,” she told them in goblinspeak. “Stuck forever in the ground. Be buried in the ground, reeking Dark Knight corpses.” Ignoring her pain, she thrust her good hand into the earth again, the dirt softening like clay around her fingers. “Buried. Buried. Buried.” The earth softened around the knights and began to soothingly suck them down.
The Dark Knights stared wide-eyed as her arm sank in up to the elbow and she pointed the thumb of her mangled hand at them. “Ever and ever and ever stuck! Buried! Buried! Buried!”
Ripples spread out from her embedded arm, like mud sliding down the side of a hill in a summer storm. It rushed forward and, like a wave, rode up past their knees. At the same time, the ground turned to liquid below them, tugging them down like quicksand.
“Ever and ever,” Mudwort repeated. She turned the words into a chant.
They screamed obscenities, their voices filled with anger and terror, so loud that she thought the rest of the knights-there had to be more of them somewhere-or Direfang even … someone would have heard their death cries.
How many more knights?
And how far had those carried her from where she’d been captured? How far away were Direfang and the others?
As they struggled like bugs trapped in a spiderweb, she slammed her eyes shut and pushed her senses through the mud and toward the knights several feet away. In the back of her mind, she could see their legs churning uselessly through the muck.
Ever and forever, she mouthed.
She picked two pairs of legs that were churning the most violently and created a vortex that sucked them down faster. Within the passing of a few heartbeats, two chests were surrounded by mud, then two faces, their arms above their heads waggling almost comically. Mudwort could see through the earth like others could see through the air on a clear day. She saw the utter panic etched into their faces, mouths gulping in her liquefied earth, eyes wide and seeing nothing but blackness.