Chương 60: Chapter 59

My legs pumped as I dashed out the back door. I stumbled for a second, my eyes going to the battle taking place in the ruins of our backyard. Initially I had planned to run to Gramps for help, but that wasn't going to be an option. While we had fought the rat tide inside, the battle outside had continued. Hurin's corpse lay nearby, his flesh pale and emaciated, stretched tight across his skull like a long-dead cadaver that had been unearthed from a grave.

I wondered what the hell could've done that to him, but I didn't have time to give it more than a moment's thought. One of the miners was on the ground as well, unmoving with blood spilling from his chest around a broken spear. The other miner held back three skeletons as he waved his pick in front of him. Another half dozen skeletons were pressuring Gramps, but every time he swung his makeshift club at them a screaming bolt of dark green and black aether shot out of the forest at him.

My Path of Aethersensing ticked up again, able to sense the lingering feeling of death in those bolts. Gramps seemed to be deflecting them with burning discs of fire, but they were distractions he could ill afford. More importantly, I couldn't get to Gramps without going through the undead, which just seemed like a dumb idea unless my goal was to get stabbed.

In the distance, I could hear the roar of the undead bear and the smash of sword against bone, but the battle was mostly hidden from me by one of the earthen bulwarks. With nowhere to go and the pitter patter of feet coming up fast behind me, I veered right and ran, hugging the edge of the outpost as I sprinted east towards where Griselda had gone. Perhaps the orcish woman could protect me. Ducking around the edge of the outpost, I found the other side of the battle and realised that I would find no solace here.

Griselda waded into a pack of undead wolves, hatchets in either hand as she cleaved skulls in half like they were so much kindling. Martin stomped behind her, his hammer swinging in circles to protect his wife's back. The miners were trying to emulate the pair, along with Frederick Kellin, but where Griselda destroyed the undead with a single swipe of her axes, the trio were lucky to hobble them with their makeshift weapons.

Two of the wolves howled, the sound an unholy dirge, then they broke away from the dozen or so wolves left in the pack and started charging towards me. I didn't need another reason and continued my sprint away from the battle, circling back around the outpost towards the front door. I would've crashed back through it and headed for my Mum but the door itself was barred from the inside so I kept going, the muscles of my legs burning and my breaths coming in ragged gasps.

Despite my fear I never once let my grip on my wooden sword relax, holding onto it like a piece of flotsam at sea.

"I'm going to kill you!" yelled the goblin from behind me, still chasing me, though it moved at a hobbling pace as though already wounded. If not for that, I think it might have already caught me. I ran to the edge of the outpost again and veered towards the kitchen door, completing my circuit of my home. Rats were streaming out the kitchen door, squeaking furiously as they climbed over each other to escape the building. Gramps was still pinned down though he'd managed to destroy another skeleton, as had the miner.

We're winning! I thought, right as the goblin came careening around the corner after me with two wolves on its tail. With the door blocked, I did the only thing I could think of, shoving my wooden sword into my belt and grabbing onto the wooden slats by the kitchen. Controlled Grip activated, my aether flowing into my fingers as I pulled myself up the wall, more monkey than child.

"Nooo!!" howled the goblin. The wolves instead charged at Gramps and I shouted a warning. Two balls of fire formed behind the old man, each no bigger than a fist. They shot out at the wolves, sending the pair of undead bouncing across the rocky ground. Gramps tried to create another ball of flame, his eyes on the goblin, when one of the skeletons managed to cut him with a rusty sword. I wanted to go and help him.

Thankfully he recovered quickly, spinning his club around and crushing the chest of the skeleton that had managed to cut him.

"Go!" he yelled.

"You won't escape!" hissed the goblin, rushing in the backdoor. I realised it was a race now. Hand over hand, Controlled Grip turning my ascent into a run rather than a walk, I climbed up to my bedroom window. Without thinking I pulled out my wooden sword and smashed the glass in before using my coat to protect my hands as I scrambled inside. Immediately I activated Muffled Steps, more aether leaking from my core as I utilised the only Skills I had available to me.

A thought occurred to me, and I quickly plumped my sleeping mat up with my pillow to make it look like I was hiding underneath it. Then I slipped behind my door, my feet silent on the wooden boards thanks to my Skill. The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement. Clawed feet scratching against wooden steps let me know the goblin hadn't given up.

Bursting into my room it immediately charged for my pile of bedding, claws stabbing into the fabric as it tried to get at what it thought was me. On silent feet I crossed the room, aether still flowing into my Muffled Steps Skill, the fuzzy feeling comforting as I swung my wooden sword in a sideways arc as hard as I could. The crack of bone was accompanied by a scream of pain from the goblin as it rolled away from me.

Even in the dark of the room I could see how its upper right arm was broken, white bone jutting out from where I had struck. The creature was even weaker and more brittle than I thought, but now it knew where I was. I stepped back, raising my sword up into a guard position like I had been taught, and waited. The goblin charged me. It was faster than I was, just like Brin had been. I gave ground, swinging my wooden blade only for the goblin to use its broken arm as a shield as it barrelled into me.

The beast bellowed in pain but its gamble succeeded as I was thrown to the floor. My head crashed into the wood and I saw stars. Scrambling away, I felt its fetid breath on the back of my neck as it pinned me down with one of its clawed feet. Then it was my turn to scream as the sharp nails, so like a bird's talons, gouged cuts through my fur coat and into the soft flesh of my back. I thrashed, trying to roll away.

While I succeeded in getting out from beneath its foot, the movement tore a second set of cuts into my back. Coming to my feet, warm liquid dripped down my skin accompanied by the sound of my blood splashing onto the wooden floor. The noise filled my ears to the backdrop of crying and yelling from the common room below. Pulling myself to my feet, dizzy and bleeding, I raised my hand as though ready to continue fighting only to find my wooden sword was gone.

It lay nearby on the floor, out of reach and far too close to my enemy.

"Time's up," the goblin whispered, looking every bit as broken as I felt. It stumbled forward and I tried to backpedal away, only for it to reach me quicker than expected. Its clawed hand wrapped around my throat. I screamed as it cut into me, but it was the pressure that was the real problem as it started to choke the life from me. Unwilling to go down without a fight, my left hand reached out and grabbed the goblin's own throat. Then I activated Controlled Grip.

The goblin's eyes went wide as my fingers closed around its own neck with a vicelike grip. I could see its fear, but deeper than that, its resolve. It would be a race to the finish line, who could hold onto consciousness the longest. The loser would die, the winner would survive. This close to it, skin pressed to skin, I finally felt the sensation it had mentioned. A feeling beyond flesh, blood, and bone. A sense of something 'other' hiding beneath the thin veneer of pale green and grey skin.

There was a darkness inside this goblin, filled with an unending rage. Its lips parted in amusement, once more showing off its broken and yellowed sharp teeth.

"Finally, you reveal yourself," it choked out.

"I can sense you clearly now, Prince of Shadow. Your powers will be mine…" I wanted to reply. I wanted to rail against the end, screaming my defiance in the face of this being wearing a goblin like a flesh suit, but all that came out was a choking gasp. No air could enter my throat, darkness starting to creep in at the edge of my vision. We were fighting a battle of survival, and I was losing.

But in these final moments, with yellow striated eyes staring at me, gloating about their imminent victory, I had my enemy right where I wanted them. One arm hanging broken at its side, the other too busy choking the life out of me. Eyes staring into my own, savouring my death, too oblivious to notice as my right hand slipped inside my coat and pulled out the kitchen knife I had kept concealed there. Then the look of surprise on its face as that short blade passed between ribs and into its rotten heart.

The grip on my throat loosened then vanished as the goblin crumpled into a heap on the floor, still alive, but not for long. Air rushed into my lungs and I bent over, coughing frantically as I gulped at the oxygen I had been denied. Adrenaline kept the pain at bay for now, but I knew it wouldn't be for long. Blood was leaking down my neck from where the possessed goblin had held me in the palm of its hands.

I stood over the beast, still coughing but my eyes hard as I watched the life leak from its chest with every beat of its ruined heart. It tried to speak but all that came out was frothy red blood. I watched the light leave its eyes with a sense of grim satisfaction. As it died, just like with the crow and the rats, I could sense something lingering within the corpse of the goblin. That same something that I had felt hiding beneath its skin.

But where the crow and rat had felt like little more than a vague flickering candle, this one burned with the heat of a fireplace. Without thought or understanding, I inhaled, drawing the energy into me. Notifications started going off in the corner of my vision but before I could pay attention to them the energy I had inhaled escaped my control. In my stomach, where I had sensed my aether core more than once, a roiling ball of shadow began to expand.

Rather than fire, the sphere of energy felt like ice, cold enough to burn. Then it expanded, tendrils of aether reaching outwards as they extended in lines up through my chest and down towards my feet. When the questing tentacles of shadow reached my head I started screaming, icy pain seizing my head so much that I couldn't even tell if those same tendrils had moved down my arms. Down on my knees, bleeding from my back and neck, in agony both inside and outside of my body, I witnessed my Mother burst into my room!

She ran towards me, catching me as I collapsed like a puppet with its strings cut. I felt my consciousness finally slipping, blood loss, bruised throat, pain questing out from my aether core, and fading adrenaline finally combining to strip me of my awareness. Before I passed out, I looked at my mother, her bright blue eyes filled with tears as she clutched at me.

"I got him," I whispered, then darkness claimed me.