The Iron Teeth: A Goblin's Tale - From RoyalRoadl.com by ClearMadness

It Echoes Onward 9

The sound of his own deep breathing filled Blacknail's ears as he sat among the loose rocks from the landslide. The corpse of the huge boar lay behind him and in front of him was the fallen body of the mutant wolf. The bloody beast was finally dead. Blacknail had killed it.

Not that the outcome had ever been in question. Sure, the monster had been tough, but Blacknail was a master ranger and swordsman. He could beat anything.

Now, Blacknail was taking a quick break. The energy from the fight and the Elixir were starting to wear off. Pain was beginning to flare up as Blacknail lost the numbness caused by his rage, and he had more than a few injuries. The wolf had gotten in several good blows and had bitten Blacknail's arm quite hard. The hobgoblin had also fallen down a hill and hit the back of his head against a rock so hard he lost consciousness. He was probably going to need to stitch himself up.

It was a good thing he'd managed to stun the wolf with that thingy... Wait, had he just used Elixir to do some sort of special magic?

"I'm magic!" Blacknail remarked in excitement as he perked up. Ow, the sudden motion had hurt his neck.

All Vessels were technically magic users. That's why they had increased strength and speed, but real magic was flashier than that. What was the point unless you could do something impressive like breath fire?

"Now I'm the greatest magic hobgoblin warrior ever!" Blacknail announced proudly to the empty air. "And I'm the leader."

What exactly had he done, though? The wolf had seemed to spasm and panic. The hobgoblin hadn't shot fire out of his eyes or zapped it with magic death beams, but whatever he had done had also scared the nearby birds in flight. Scared.... Was that it? Had he simply used magic to terrify the wolf into running away?

That sort of sucked. He wanted to shoot fire out of his eyes. Well, at least he was alive and could brag about having real magic. He might even be able to use it to finally get Khita to leave him alone.

Hmm, maybe his power wasn't so bad, even if it wasn't fancy looking. There were probably a lot of great and terrible things he could accomplish with such a power, like jumping out at people to scare them silly. He couldn't wait to see the faces of some of his human minions!

"Oh, wait," Blacknail suddenly muttered to himself. He had a problem. He was out of Elixir now. He had used his entire last vial to fight the wolf, and Blacknail had no idea where to find more. He couldn't ask Mahedium.

The sun overhead was heating up Blacknail's clothes, so he got up and shuffled under a nearby tree. Once there, he pulled off his torn clothes and took out some supplies. His wounds needed looking after. Blacknail gritted his teeth as he applied stinging ointment to himself and sowed up the deeper cuts. When that was done, he took a seat on a large root that jutted out from the bottom of the tree, leaned back, and closed his eyes. He needed a quick break.

No strange dreams overcame him as he rested in the cool shade. The birds resumed their chirping and a breeze blew through the trees. The tired hobgoblin nodded off.

Time passed. A shuffling sound intruded into Blacknail's sleepy mind. He lazily opened one eye and looked around for the source. There was movement a few feet away, over where he'd dropped his bag. Someone was going through it. Was that Scamp? Blacknail stared at the hobgoblin. It was Scamp!

As Blacknail watched, Scamp finished rummaging through the bag. The other hobgoblin pulled a knife out of the sack and then causally ambled over towards Blacknail. He was still holding the knife up, as if he had plans to use it.

"What are you doing here?" Blacknail hissed angrily as he opened his eyes. He wasn't sure what Scamp was planning, and because he was a hobgoblin he was untrustworthy.