He stood, and a cheer erupted.
“Direfang!” the chant grew louder.
Mudwort nudged his leg. She’d crept up behind him. “All look to Direfang,” she said. “Commander Direfang. Marshal Direfang. Guardian Direfang.” She used Dark Knight titles.
He sighed again, scratching at his chin.
“Say something,” she urged.
“What?” he mused to himself. “Say what?”
“Something,” she repeated. “Say something important.”
He edged forward and raised his right arm, holding the left, still numb, close to his side. “Free of the Dark Knights,” he began. He said something else, but his words were lost in the whoops and cries of the throng below.
When the cheers quieted, Spikehollow climbed on Erguth’s shoulders and waved a fist. “South now, Direfang?”
“South when?” Gnasher shouted.
They all intended to follow him wherever he went, Direfang realized. He shuddered again, clenching his teeth tight. The previous night, he had said he would go south, and he expected some to accompany him. Others might also go south, wandering on their own. But he never intended that they move as one massive army, sticking together in freedom.
He’d needed their numbers for last night’s raid on Steel Town. But he didn’t need all of them following him anymore.
He opened his mouth to tell them to split up, go away, that a force the size of theirs would be difficult to feed, perhaps impossible. A force that size would have to raid more human camps, perhaps ogre camps, and would have to capture merchant caravans. More than once he’d thought about the notion of robbing caravans of food and valuables, but how could he lead so many, feed so many?
“Could capture caravans,” he whispered. “But goblins would be no better than Dark Knights to hurt others and steal.”
“What Direfang say?” Mudwort asked, tipping her ears toward him.
Yet a force that size could not be enslaved easily. Could it? Ogres would indeed think twice about attacking them.
“South together!” Spikehollow called as loud as his hoarse voice could manage. “South with Direfang!”
“South alone,” the hobgoblin said softly. “Wanted to go alone, maybe with Mudwort and some others. Not all.”
Direfang did not want the responsibility of leading such a massive army. He’d only wanted out of Steel Town-wanted all of them out of that pit of hell. There were far too many of them for him to manage. As a foreman in the mine, he was in charge of shift after shift, but never so many all at once. But the slaves had always obeyed him, to the point that he couldn’t remember being forced to punish one of them. Perhaps because he’d supervised so many of them over the past few years, they still looked to him for orders. Maybe they’d been slaves for so long they couldn’t think for themselves.
“Lead, Direfang!” Boliver howled.
Maybe they really did need a leader.
They were all free. They could do as they pleased. In smaller groups, they wouldn’t need as much food and water. In smaller groups they could hide in caves and under overhangs in the mountains and in others throughout Neraka and Khur. Those groups that reached the forests could hide amid the trees and cool shade, maybe regroup and start villages.
But maybe the ogres would hunt them and sell them as slaves again.
Direfang knew that slaves were a precious commodity to Neraka’s Dark Knights and, therefore, a lucrative business for those who caught and sold them.
Smaller groups would be easier for the slavers to catch and control.
Many of the goblins had held on to the swords and knives they’d carried away from their battle with the knights. Those weapons could prove useful in fights with ogres or minotaurs.
Direfang knew there were tribes of ogres in the hills, and some minotaurs had moved in from the east. He’d been captured by ogres years past and sold to the Dark Knights. He knew ogres to be vicious and formidable, three times the size of any goblin, outweighing even himself. Yet at that moment, he didn’t fear them as much as he feared leading more than one thousand goblins.
He could recall the day he was captured with clarity. He could still feel the steely grip of the ogres’ hands on his shoulders and legs, feel himself being lifted high and tossed onto the ground with others from his clan and chained hand and foot. He remembered the ogres’ pungent breath and their large red-rimmed eyes, their bugcrusted hair and yellowed teeth.
He trembled from the memory.
But then, he realized, his band of rebellious goblins-his army-could crush a village of ogres.
He looked down at them. Their faces were turned expectantly toward him.
“Together there is strength,” Direfang said finally. He swallowed hard and suppressed a shudder. “Together there is power,” he said. “Together …” The rest of his words were drowned out in a cacophonous cheer of agreement.
When the cheering subsided, he heard Graytoes talking. She and Moon-eye had climbed higher and knelt on a table rock below him.
“… to command all of the goblins, Direfang,” Graytoes said. He didn’t catch all her words-the cheering was too loud.
But he understood what she meant. It was up to him now. He had to hand out orders, command all the goblins, just like the Dark Knight’s Marshal Montrill had ordered around all of the knights in the mining camp.
“South now!” he called to them. “Find food and water along the way. More sheep and goats penned by men. Together there will be strength and power.” There was more cheering as Direfang eased himself down the slope, Graytoes and Moon-eye fussing over him, and Mudwort following close behind.
“You have looked to the south?” Direfang asked Mudwort. “What is to the south?” He’d seen her meditating on the rocks and knew she had been talking to the earth.
The red-skinned goblin pursed her lips. “Freedom is to the south,” she answered, but she did not meet his eyes.
“Then let us go south now.” Direfang began to march, moving his feet in time with the thrumming in his head, his right leg no longer paining him. It was a slow pace for him but one that allowed him to think and to not worry about the older goblins keeping up as he pondered where exactly to lead his eager army.
To the south, certainly, and south would take him along the foothills and deep into the Khalkist Mountains-away from Jelek and the city of Neraka and the major roads where they might encounter significant Dark Knight forces.
Suddenly, Direfang felt thirsty again.
He stared at the ground as he tramped across it, seeing cracks everywhere as though the entire landscape were a dry creek bed that stretched to the edge of his vision. The unevenness of it could have been natural or caused by the quakes; it made no difference to him. The sun continued to beat down on his shoulders, though after a few miles, clouds diminished the heat. At least he thought clouds were responsible until he heard worried murmurs from the goblins directly behind him.
The hobgoblin looked up to see a billowing gray mass pass overhead. It carried with it the stench of sulfur, which he knew well from the mining camp. But it was a slightly different smell, harsher and more painful and at the same time more interesting. It was followed by another gray puff, the tail of which led to one of the volcanoes that towered in the southern half of the country.
The volcanoes belched frequently at night, coloring the darkness with their ribbons of orange, red, and glowing yellow. Sometimes they rumbled, as the ground had done during the quakes. And on more than one occasion, they’d sent so much steam and smoke into the sky that the sun was blotted out for days. There’d been only one significant eruption of the volcanoes during Direfang’s stint in the mining camp, and he wondered if another were imminent.
The top of the volcano he stared at was glowing as red as coals at the bottom of a goblin funeral pyre.
“Yes,” Mudwort said, answering his unspoken question. “The mountain is angry now like the earth was angry.” She grinned broadly, her eyes sparkling. “That mountain will break very soon. Good we go south and thread through the angry volcanoes. Dark Knights will not follow us across such angry ground.”