Kull batted her away as if she were a gnat, then stood over her. Welts rose from a gash in his neck, but he didn’t seem to notice. “Who are you?” he demanded.
“I’ll never tell you.” She lunged at him, her talons aimed for his face. I heard a ripping sound as the creature gouged his neck again. He knocked her backward, but she didn’t seem to notice as she hurled herself at him for another attack.
He darted to the side, but the goblin followed. She leapt so fast I barely followed the movement. Kull knocked her backward again, but not before she lashed another mark across his cheek. The goblin regained its footing, pounced, and knotted her grimy fingers around Kull’s throat.
As if by instinct, magic swelled inside me. I needed to concentrate my attack so I wouldn’t harm Kull. I racked my brain, searching for a word that would accomplish what I needed.
Flame.
A thin line of blue fire erupted from my fingertips and hit the goblin. The creature fell back with a howl of pain.
Kull’s face looked absolutely primal, more beast than human, as he crushed his heel into the goblin’s leg. I heard a pop—not a loud sound, but the definite sound of bones breaking—and wondered how goblins handled broken bones.
She squealed with pain and grabbed her leg.
“Why are you in Earth Kingdom? Who are you?” he yelled.
The howling continued. She writhed on the floor until her screams turned to moans.
Finally, the creature looked up and locked its black, orb-like eyes on the warrior. “Theht will return. You shall die. You all shall die.” Its gaze locked on me.
Kull knelt and grabbed her neck in a chokehold. He used her turtleneck sweater to guard his hands. “How did you get here?”
The goblin writhed but didn’t answer.
“Who sent you here?”
“You shall… die.”
His knuckles turned white as his grip tightened.
“You… think you know… everything. You’re wrong!”
“Where are those children? What are you doing with them?”
“I’ll die… first,” the creature gagged.
“No. But you will wish you were dead.”
“No.” The goblin’s writhing turned frantic as it clawed at Kull’s wrists. Goblin-Melanie flicked its snakelike tongue and lashed at Kull’s hands. He jabbed his knee into her sternum. She writhed beneath him.
“How did you get here?” he demanded. “Who sent you?”
The creature gagged. A deep gurgling rose from the back of its throat as it gasped for air. Its eyes bulged. Its writhing lasted only a few seconds, though to me it felt like hours.
“Stop,” it whispered. “Stop… please!”
“Tell me what I want to know.”
“I… won’t.”
“Tell me.”
I shuddered at the sound of his voice. It wasn’t the sound of violence or anger, but the calm voice of authority, of the surety that he meant what he said. “Who sent you here?” he repeated.
The creature spasmed, its entire body racked from the violent motion. Its eyes turned glassy, transforming from black to silvery-gray. “Dream…” it whispered.
I knelt beside Kull. I couldn’t pass up an opportunity like this. This goblin had crossed from its own realm into Earth, posed as a human, and helped take part in the abduction of little children, all for purposes of bringing an evil being back to our planet. Goblins are shy and reclusive. To be this bold, it must’ve had a good reason.
“Did the Dreamthief send you here?”
It looked at me, its eyes glazed, and nodded.
“Is the Dreamthief a mortal person in disguise?”
Another nod.
“What is her true identity?”
It shook its head.
“Who?” Kull asked.
It squirmed but didn’t attempt to break free. “Deathbringer. You will fail. Your world… will crumble. Ruin to you… to your children.”
I ignored its threats. “Do you know where Mog’s Keep is?”
Her eyes bugged out. Her mouth parted, but no words came. Kull relaxed his grip.
“Speak, goblin,” Kull said.
It gasped, choking on yellow goop that clung to its cracked lips. I wrinkled my nose as the smell of bile filled the room.
“Mog’s Keep,” it whispered in a hoarse, raspy voice. “I know where it is.”
Maybe the creature had finally come to its senses, realizing that the Wult would kill it soon; perhaps it had decided to save its own life by answering our questions. I couldn’t blame the creature. Kull could be a persuasive motivator.
“In the goblin lands?” I asked.
It nodded. “The northern peninsula. None go there. It is protected. You will never enter.”
The northern peninsula—that was more info than I’d gotten so far. Time to keep pushing. “Is my godson there?”
It nodded.
“Is he alive?”
Another nod.
“Where are the other children?”
“With him. Stolen… by the Regaymor. They will die soon.”
My stomach churned. After everything I’d been through, I didn’t need to hear that. “When?”
“Soon,” it answered.
I wanted to kill the creature. I wanted to tear it to pieces, to make it suffer. But that would accomplish nothing.
“How do I get to him?”
“None go there. You will never find him.” The goblin’s shoulders slouched. The muscles in her face relaxed. It was such a hideous creature, as if it had evolved for the specific purpose of being abhorrent to humans. Everything that made a person who they were, it lacked—the face of a snake, the skin of a corpse—I had trouble looking at it without feeling the urge to flee.
“Find… the magic.”
“What magic?” I asked.
The goblin made a sound. At first I thought the thing was crying, but then I realized it was a laugh, a horrible, pain-inducing sound that made my skin crawl. The creature died making that sound. When the light finally burned out of its eyes, its face stayed frozen in a mocking expression.
Chapter 28
I searched every inch of that office. With all we’d been through, all the places I’d traveled, how could the goblins be so close? I felt like a failure, and worse, I knew my godson would die
