Chương 58: Chapter 43: We Need To Talk (Part 1)

Morning reached the cavern slowly, carried in by the faint gray light that crept around the edges of the doorway. Grub woke to warmth that still felt like a trick. The firelight hadn't changed. The stone hadn't changed. The tribe hadn't suddenly become richer in furs or meat. Yet the cavern held its heat, while the cold morning wind groaned beyond the wall and searched uselessly for a way inside. The remains of the celebration lay scattered around the hearths.

Goblins sprawled beneath loose furs or across one another, while overturned bowls and stripped bones marked the places where the feast had stretched late into the evening. A few groaned and rolled over with the slow misery of full bellies and too much Thornbrew. The wolf pups shifted among them, ears flicking whenever the muted wind pressed against the door. Grub lay still for a moment and listened. He didn't let himself smile too widely.

Pride was useful, but it could make him careless, and he'd survived this long by avoiding that particular mistake. Footsteps approached. Dravak stopped beside him, his shadow falling across the coals.

"Up," the Chief said. Grub sat up slowly, blinking grit from his eyes. He pushed himself to his feet and rolled his shoulders as though he hadn't spent the past two weeks working them raw. The soreness remained, but it was the familiar pain of effort rather than the biting ache of cold he'd grown all too familiar with. Dravak looked past him and raised his voice.

"Throk. Kesh. Medics. Builders." Heads lifted throughout the cavern. A few groans answered him. The Medics rose more quickly than most, already accustomed to waking when someone needed them. The Builders followed, rubbing sleep from their eyes. Throk stood as though he'd been awake the entire time, while Kesh rose more quietly, her gaze already focused. Dravak pointed toward the door.

"All of you. Outside. Now." His eyes settled briefly on Grub.

"You too. Come." Dravak led them to the wall. The guards shifted the heavy door aside long enough for the group to pass, then lowered it back into place as soon as they were outside. The world beyond the cave mouth had turned pale and hard as winter continued to deepen. Frost crusted stone. The ridge line wore a thin sheen of ice. The forest ahead was a tangle of dark trunks and bare branches that creaked in the wind like old bones shifting.

They moved up the small rise toward the stream, makeshift boots crunching on frost-stiff ground. The water ran clear and thin, cutting a bright line through the dull winter colors. Dravak stopped at the top and turned to face them. The others gathered in a rough arc before him. His gaze settled upon the four Medics first.

"The System gave you a new name," he said.

"I want to know what came with it." The Medics glanced nervously among themselves. They worked with blood, rot, and open flesh every day without hesitation, yet Dravak's question left them uneasy, as though speaking the answer aloud might reveal that the System had placed something inside them that didn't belong. The oldest finally stepped forward. His eyes flicked toward Grub before returning to the Chief.

"I don't feel any different," he said.

"Not most of the time." Throk looked him over.

"No new arms? No second mouth?" The Medic stared at him.

"That would be useful," he added with a grin. Dravak ignored him.

"When do you feel different?" The Medic frowned, searching for the answer.

"When someone is hurt."

"How?"

"I look at the wound, touch around it, and…" He flexed his fingers uncertainly.

"I know more than I did before." Throk grunted.

"You knew when a wound was bad before."

"No," the Medic said, confidence entering his voice.

"Before, we knew there was blood. We knew when flesh smelled rotten or when a goblin burned with fever. We cleaned it, bound it, and waited to see if it helped." He paused, then glanced toward the other Medics.

"Now I can tell sooner. I can feel when a cut will close cleanly, or when swelling has begun beneath it. I know when a fever is easing and when it's only resting before it grows worse." Another Medic nodded.

"Sometimes I know where the sickness is strongest."

"How deep it has gone," the third added. The fourth rubbed one hand across his forearm, his expression distant.

"And whether what we're doing is helping. Not exactly why. I just know when something has changed." Dravak studied them.

"The System speaks to you?"

"No," the oldest said.

"There are no words."

"Then what is it?" The Medic's brow furrowed.

"The same as knowing when meat has cooked long enough, maybe. Or when a spear shaft will split if you bend it. You look, and something inside you understands." Kesh tilted her head.

"How long does it take?" The Medic looked toward her.

"If a wound is worsening," she continued, "do you need to watch it for a day? An hour?"

"No." He considered that, then shook his head.

"I have to examine it. Look closely. Touch it. But once I do, the answer comes quickly."

"And all four of you can do this?" The Medics nodded. Kesh's eyes moved across them one by one, weighing the answer before she filed it away. Throk folded his arms.

"Has the System made you better fighters?" One of the Medics gave him a flat look.

"No." Throk's mouth pulled downward.

"But it didn't take our hands away," the Medic continued.

"We can still carry spears when the tribe needs us."

"That isn't the same."

"No," Dravak said before Throk could continue.

"It isn't." His attention lingered upon the Medics.

"Warriors face whatever threatens the tribe. You make sure the wounded survive to stand with us again." He paused.

"You'll carry spears when the tribe needs every hand it has. Until then, your place is in the alcove." The Medics nodded, and while Throk didn't look satisfied, he offered no further argument. Dravak turned toward the Builders.

"And you?" One of them answered after only a brief hesitation.

"It's much the same, Chief. Our hands aren't different, but when we think about making something, there's less guessing." Dravak studied him.

"What does that mean?" The Builder rubbed his palms together, searching for the right words.

"I was thinking about building another rack for drying meat. Before, I would've tied branches together, seen where it leaned, then moved them until it stood properly." He paused.

"Now, I think I have a better sense of where the poles should stand. How far apart they should be. Where another branch might need to cross them." Kesh studied him.

"And you could tell that before you touched the wood?" The Builder hesitated.

"Yes, but not the way I know something I've already done. It just… felt wrong." Grub leaned forward slightly.

"Can you see the finished thing in your head?"

"No," the first Builder said.

"Not clearly. But if I imagine one pole too far from the others, it feels like the whole rack would pull to one side. If I imagine moving it closer, or putting another branch across it, that feeling eases."

"Like your head knows where it should go before you begin," another added, then frowned.

"Or almost knows." Kesh's eyes narrowed.

"Instinct." The Builder snapped his fingers and pointed at her.

"Exactly." Dravak folded his arms.

"Would that instinct help you make something you've never seen before?" The Builders fell quiet and exchanged looks.

"If it was simple," one said at last.

"Maybe. We haven't had enough time to really know." Grub stepped closer.

"What if someone showed you what they wanted? Drew the pieces in the dirt and showed you how they were meant to fit together?" The first Builder looked down at the frost-stiff ground as though the lines were already scratched there.

"If we understood the drawing, I think we could try."

"And if the idea wouldn't work?" The Builder considered that.

"Maybe we would notice something was wrong before we wasted the wood." Throk gave a low grunt.

"Maybe isn't much use."

"No," the Builder agreed.

"But it's more than we had before." Throk worked his jaw for a moment, then looked away toward the stream. Dravak looked over the four Builders before nodding once.

"Then start small. Find out how much this instinct knows." He jerked his chin toward the cave.

"Medics. Builders. Back inside. Grub, stay. We have more to discuss." The Medics and Builders didn't argue. They thumped their chests once with their fists, turned, and began the walk down the rise, their feet crunching across the frost. Their shoulders looked lighter than they had when they arrived, as though finding words for what had changed, and hearing those changes accepted, had steadied them somehow. Grub remained behind, watching them descend toward the cave mouth.

Soon, only Dravak, Throk, Kesh, and Grub stood beside the stream, with the forest at their backs and the wind gnawing across the ridge. Dravak waited until the Medics and Builders had descended far enough that their voices wouldn't carry back. His gaze followed them toward the cavern.

"Medic and Builder," he said.

"I have never seen either designation on a goblin."

"Neither have I," Kesh added. Throk grunted.

"Because goblins are Warriors, Hunters, or Scouts."

"They were Warriors," Dravak said.

"Now they're something else." He turned toward Grub.

"This began with you. Tell me what happened." Grub looked down the rise. The Medics and Builders had almost reached the wall, their figures passing beneath the pale stream of smoke drifting above the cavern entrance.

"I gave them different work," he said. The author's content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

"And the System gave them different names." Dravak gave him a flat look.

"Yes." Dravak waited, making it clear that one word wouldn't satisfy him. Grub drew a slow breath.

"I don't know what happened, honestly. I think the System responds to what someone keeps choosing to do. Not something they do once or by accident. Something they do repeatedly, and for a reason." Throk folded his arms.

"Kill often enough and you become better at killing. We already know this."

"That's part of it," Grub said.

"But the Medics didn't kill anything."

"They treated wounds."

"For weeks," Grub replied.

"At first, they were Warriors, slaves helping because I asked them to. Then they learned the wash, the bindings, the herbs, and how to watch for fever on their own. They kept doing it even when I wasn't standing over them. Eventually, healing the tribe stopped being just another task and became their place within it." Kesh glanced toward the cavern.

"And you think that the System recognized the role."

"I think so."

"And the Builders?" Dravak asked.

"They worked for less than two weeks." Grub hesitated, arranging the thought before speaking.

"I think that the Medics changed slowly because their work was made of hundreds of small things. One wound cleaned. One fever watched. One goblin kept alive. The Builders changed faster because they helped complete something that changed the entire den at once." His eyes moved toward the wall.

"They didn't only carry logs. They learned why the gaps mattered, why the supports had to sit where they did, how the wind moved, and where the smoke needed to escape. Then the wall and vent were finished, and the cavern became warmer for everyone inside." Kesh considered that.

"So you believe the System measures importance."

"Maybe not importance exactly." Grub rubbed his hands together against the cold.

"Weight. Meaning. The Medics proved what they were through repetition. The Builders helped create something that changed the tribe's home. Maybe the System noticed them faster because of that." Throk looked toward the wall. He gave an unimpressed grunt.

"They followed orders and tied wood together. Not exactly world-shaking."

"They understood enough to finish it," Grub said.

"That may have been all the System needed. I really don't know. This is all guesswork."

"Then every goblin who helped should have become a Builder."

"No, I don't think so." Grub shook his head.

"Most carried what they were told to carry. Those four spent the entire time thinking about how the pieces fit together. They adjusted supports. Closed gaps. Helped solve problems when the wall didn't behave the way we expected."

"They only did that because you showed them how," Throk said.

"Yes." The blunt agreement pulled Throk's attention back to him. Grub continued.

"They did the work, but I gave them a direction they wouldn't have found on their own. I think that matters too." Kesh watched him closely.

"You gave the System something new to recognize."

"I gave the tribe something new to do," Grub corrected.

"And then the System decided what to make of it." Dravak's eyes remained steady.

"And how many more new paths do you intend to place before my tribe?" The question carried no accusation, but Grub heard the warning beneath it.

"I don't know."

"That answer is becoming common today," Throk muttered.

"I'm not going to lie just to sound certain." Dravak ignored the exchange.

"What do you want the Ironfang to become?" Grub looked toward the entrance again. The guards had opened the heavy door, and the returning goblins were slipping through one at a time.

"Strong enough that surviving isn't the only thing we ever have time to do."

"That isn't an answer," Dravak said.

"It's the only one I have."

"At first you wanted survival. Then freedom."

"I have my freedom. I still want survival."

"And now?" Grub watched the door close behind the last Builder.

"Now I want a tribe that isn't always one bad hunt, one sickness, or one hard winter away from breaking." Throk gave a low grunt.

"You expect us to believe you suddenly care that deeply about the tribe?"

"Yes and no." Throk grunted in irritation again, his eyes growing angry.

"Another half-answer."

"It's an honest answer." Grub turned toward him.

"A strong tribe protects me. It gives me shelter, food, and Warriors, Hunters, and Scouts between me and danger. Every goblin who survives makes the tribe harder to destroy, and that makes me safer with it." Throk's expression eased slightly. Self-interest, at least, seemed to be something he understood without effort. Grub continued.

"But I care too. More than I did when I first came here. I don't know exactly when that changed." Kesh tilted her head.

"You didn't notice?" He shrugged.

"Not until it'd already happened." Dravak studied him.

"You have altered more within this tribe in less than two months than most goblins alter in a lifetime." Grub said nothing.

"You showed us that a wounded goblin wasn't always strength already lost," Dravak continued.

"And that effort spent early could return that strength to the tribe. You looked at smoke and winter wind as things that could be dealt with, rather than facts of life to endure. When direwolves entered our territory, you were the one who suggested bringing back their pups if we destroyed the pack, because you saw something the tribe could raise into strength instead of another danger to kill before it grew." Throk's mouth twisted with irritation.

"He thinks he's special." Grub looked at him.

"Do you think I'm not?" Throk drew breath to answer, then stopped before his mouth closed again. The silence lasted long enough for something hot and stubborn to rise beneath Grub's ribs.

"I think differently from ordinary goblins. I know things they don't. I see uses in things they would walk past or endure without question." He gestured toward the cavern.

"The proof is breathing easier in the alcove, sleeping beside our fires, and holding the wind outside that wall."

He looked directly at Throk.

"That doesn't make me stronger than you. You could kill me before I finished casting a Spell. I can't lead Warriors or fight the way you can. I can't track through the forest like Kesh, and I can't hold this tribe together the way Dravak does."

His attention moved across all three of them.

"But am I 'special' compared to an ordinary goblin? Yes. Obviously." Throk stared at him, but Grub didn't soften the answer.

"You would have to be a fool to look at everything that has happened since I arrived and pretend otherwise."

"At least you finally say it plainly," Throk said.

"I've never claimed to be ordinary."

"But you've done a good job avoiding explaining why." Grub's jaw clenched.

"Yes."

The wind moved through the branches below them, carrying the dry creak of wood across the ridge.

"I know things you don't," Grub continued.

"I'm not ready to tell you where all of that knowledge came from. I've already told you that, and my answer hasn't changed."

Dravak's expression hardened slightly, but he didn't interrupt.

Grub forced himself to continue.

"What I can tell you is where I stand now. I am Ironfang. This is my tribe, and I'll use what I know to strengthen it, not to work against it."

He faced Dravak fully.

"That is the truth I can give you now." Dravak held his stare.

"That tells me what you've chosen to become," the Chief said slowly.

"It doesn't tell me what you were before."

"No," Grub admitted.

"It doesn't."

"One day, I will expect that answer from you." Grub inclined his head.

"One day, you will have it. You have my word." Dravak grunted, but didn't push further. Kesh stepped closer.

"Knowing strange things doesn't explain why the System responds to you." Grub looked at her.

"I don't know that it responds to me specifically." She raised an eyebrow.

"The new designations appeared around your work."

"Around the tribe's work," Grub corrected.

"Work that you began."

"Yes." Kesh remained where she was, waiting.

"Then if the System isn't responding to you, what do you believe is happening?" Grub looked down at the running water while he considered his answer.

"I think the System is less rigid than you assume," he said eventually. Throk frowned.

"Rigid."

"Fixed. Predetermined." Grub glanced toward him.

"If every path already existed exactly as it was meant to, then the System would only be waiting for someone to step onto it."

"And you think that isn't what happened," Kesh said.

"I think the Medics and Builders may have made paths that didn't exist for goblins before." Kesh lowered her voice.

"You think the System created something new."

"Or changed something old to fit them." Throk shifted his weight and glanced toward Dravak.

"You speak as though it decided."

"Maybe it did." Dravak's mouth thinned, and he glanced upward.

"Careful."

"I'm not claiming to understand it," Grub said, holding his hands up before him.

"But it doesn't behave like something blind." Kesh took another step toward him.

"Why do you say that?"

"Because it notices more than actions." Grub hesitated before continuing.

"When the wall and vent were finished, I earned an Achievement." Dravak turned fully toward him, interest clear on his face.

"What did it say? Exactly." Grub recalled the words as clearly as though the pane still hovered before him.

"It said 'For the first time, the Ironfang do not merely endure the elements. They alter them.'" The wind hissed through the trees. Grub hunched his shoulders against the cold. Throk's eyes moved toward the wall.

"It named the tribe," Grub said.

"Not goblins. Not Builders. Not a wall. The Ironfang." Kesh glanced toward the cavern, then back to Grub.

"It recognized who benefited."

"It recognized what the work meant," Grub replied.

"We didn't simply stack wood in front of a cave mouth. We changed how our tribe survives winter, and the System understood the difference." Dravak remained silent for several breaths.

"I received an Achievement as well," he said at last. Grub looked at him.

"For the wall?"

"For what the wall made the cavern." Dravak's brow drew together faintly.

"It said, 'Others roam and endure. You have chosen to make a place endurable.'" Grub's eyes widened slightly.

"It spoke directly about your choice to allow me to work."

"Yes."

"And it spoke about your tribe," Kesh said.

"Even if it didn't name us directly." Dravak nodded once. Grub looked between them, his thoughts gathering steam.

"That's exactly what I mean. Those words weren't prepared for just any goblin who happened to build a wall. They were specifically about us. About what happened here." Throk glanced upward, as though the System might be hanging somewhere beyond the pale clouds.

"You speak of it like it watches."

"I think it does, in a way." His attention returned to Grub.

"You said you didn't know."

"I don't know what it is," Grub replied.

"That doesn't mean I can't see what it does." Kesh kept her eyes on him.

"If it observes, then it responds."

"Yes."

"To actions?"

"Actions. Intent. Consequences. Maybe all of it."

"And you believe you can influence that response." Grub took longer to answer.

"I think I can create opportunities for it to respond," he said carefully.

"That sounds like the same thing," Throk said.

"It isn't." Grub turned toward him.

"I can teach goblins to treat wounds. I can't command the System to make them Medics. I can show Warriors a new way to work. I can't decide what designation they receive afterward." He looked back toward Kesh.

"I can push in a direction. I can't control where the System takes it." Kesh considered him for a moment.

"But you intend to keep pushing."

"I intend to keep helping the Ironfang." Grub said.

"If that opens new paths for goblins, good. If it doesn't, then the work still benefits the tribe." Throk breathed out heavily through his nose, sending a cloud of fog into the air.

"And if one of those paths makes us weaker?" Grub shrugged.

"Then we stop following it. I can only tell you my intentions are to help the tribe. I can't predict every outcome." Dravak stepped closer.

"You don't make that choice alone." Grub looked up at him.

"Your ideas have saved lives," Dravak continued.

"I won't pretend otherwise. But they've also changed the Systems place in my tribe in ways none of us fully understand." He glanced briefly toward the cavern.

"Four Warriors became Medics. Four others became Builders. Those changes appear useful. The next one may not be." Grub thought of the Medics' lost designation and the uncertainty in the Builders' answers.

"No," he admitted.

"It may not."

"Then remember this. Anything that may change how the tribe lives, fights, or grows comes to me first." Grub nodded.

"That's fair." Dravak's expression hardened.

"It isn't fairness. It is my command." Grub swallowed.

"Yes, Chief." Dravak held his gaze a moment longer before continuing.

"I don't say this because your ideas lack value. I say it because they carry enough weight to become dangerous if they lead us somewhere neither of us expects."

"I understand."

"Good. The Ironfang have gained much because I allowed you the freedom to pursue them," Dravak said.

"I intend for that to continue." His eyes moved briefly toward the wall, where smoke rose through the vent in a thin gray stream before the wind scattered it among the trees.

"But before the tribe follows you down another path, I will know where you believe it leads." Grub inclined his head.

"Yes, Chief." Throk looked past him toward the wall and grunted in annoyance.

"You speak as though making life easier always makes a tribe stronger." Grub turned toward him.

"That isn't what I said."

"It's what you believe." Throk planted his feet more firmly against the frost-stiff ground.

"You shut out the wind. You pull smoke from the cavern. You keep goblins alive after their strength fails them."

"Their strength didn't fail them. They were wounded or sick." Throk turned back to Grub.

"Weakness has many names." Grub's irritation stirred again, though he kept his voice level.

"And death only has one." Throk's eyes narrowed.

"Winter isn't an enemy. It is a test. Smoke is the price of fire. Hunger teaches Hunters to range farther. Pain teaches Warriors what they can survive." His gaze shifted back toward the cavern.

"A tribe that removes every hardship becomes soft."

"We haven't removed every hardship."

"You've tried." Grub felt his frustration rising, and this time he couldn't keep all of it from entering his voice.

"I've tried to stop the ones that accomplish nothing." Throk stepped closer, his brow furrowing.

"You call them useless because you don't understand what they make."

"They were making corpses," Grub spat back.

"They were tempering us." Heat flared in Grub's chest, and this time he didn't force it down. He stepped forward as well, closing enough of the distance that he had to crane his neck to hold Throk's stare.

"They were choking children," he said.

"They were rotting Warriors alive. They were freezing Hunters who could still bring meat back to the tribe."

Throk's jaw set, but Grub continued before he could answer.

"You call that tempering. You say it makes the tribe stronger." Grub thrust one hand toward the wall.

"I call it waste. I call it spending lives for nothing because no one ever stopped to ask whether there was another way."

"Suffering teaches."

"Sometimes." Grub's answer came hard and immediate.

"Training teaches. Fighting teaches, if you live long enough to learn from it. Losing half the warband to the direwolves taught us what they could do, but it didn't make the seventeen goblins who died any stronger." Throk's nostrils flared.

"We aren't made of stone," Grub continued.

"We bleed. We break. Suffering doesn't create strength merely because someone survives it. Enduring something for a purpose can make you stronger. Needless suffering only leaves fewer goblins standing afterward." He pointed toward the cavern entrance.

"A tribe that survives winter whole emerges stronger in spring. A tribe that buries half its Warriors dies out." Throk held his stare.

"If winter is a test," Grub said, "then passing it with fewer dead is strength, not weakness." Silence followed. The stream flowed across the ice-rimmed stones beside them. Wind pulled at their furs and carried the creak of bare branches across the ridge. Throk continued to stare at Grub. Then, slowly, one corner of his mouth pulled upward.

"Finally you show some fire." He rocked back onto his heels, putting a little space between them.

"I was beginning to think you only knew how to fight with questions." Grub didn't smile.

"Questions seem to bother you more than spears." Throk barked a laugh, and the tension eased. Dravak had watched the exchange without interruption. His attention remained fixed on the wall for several breaths after their voices faded.

"A tribe that survives winter whole..." he said at last. Grub looked toward him. Dravak repeated the words more quietly, turning them over as his attention traveled from the wall to the bare forest beyond it.

"A tribe that survives winter whole while the others do not."