The Hag and the Goblin

  The face of my friend twisted in a sneer that was never meant to be on it. And when she broke out of the freezing enchantment, she moved her arms and legs all in right-angled crawl. I feared each moment that her body would be broken by the possessing hag, but while there was creaking and grinding of teeth, nothing could be heard to snap. As for the Silver Emperor, he was frozen- by fear, not by magic- still within a lunge of me with a knife.

  “You cast that spell all wrong, boy, or did you just pick up a stick that had it stored in it?” the Hag said. When she spoke, it was Artemis’ voice, but the intonation and the words she used were those that we’d heard on that horrible night before coming to the Swinging Donkey.

  “Stand back! I don’t know how you got out of it, but I’ll kill him!” the Silver Emperor said.

  “Do it, you pussy. You don’t know the first thing of treason, just what your pretty little book told you. A coward and a follower. How dare you wear that mask?” the hag said.

  The spell on me was coming to an end, and the traitor must have known it too. Otherwise he might not have leaped for me. But the Hag had Artemis’ body, and with it all of her physical attributes. I don’t know what Artemis’ stats are, but I do know they are higher than any other Earth person I’ve met. And so, in the time that it took for the Silver Emperor to stab out at my face, she was on him. The steel spike of a dagger hit me, but where he was aiming to skewer me through the brain and eye, it just pierced my cheek. The sting of pain was intense, and I couldn’t move to react to it, but I was alive.

  The hag had grabbed him by the top of his head with one hand and pulled him back. The spell on me ran out. I jumped back to my feet as soon as I could, and I saw the Hag pulling the Silver Emperor back toward her.

  “Stop! Stop, I can be useful,” he said.

  “Wait!” I said.

  “Shan’t,” the Hag said, and began turning his head to the left. He began screaming when it was to the side.

  “I swear to god, stop right now!” I shouted.

  “Or what? You are going to harm this new body of mine?” she cackled over the screams. They stopped with a snap. It happened in a slow ten seconds. But she wasn’t done. She kept turning it.

  “Oh come on, he’s dead. What is the gain?” I said.

  “Satisfaction,” she said, and twisted it further, until it was all the way back around, and then kept going, until eventually the skin broke and with a burst of blood and terrible tearing the masked head of the Silver Emperor was held in her outstretched hand.

  “What the fuck was that for?” I said.

  “Is that any way to talk to your savior and old friend?” the Hag said.

  “You’ve done enough. Artemis, it’s over, fight her, come back to us,” I said, walking toward the Hag with my head high, staff in hand and book floating in front of me.

  “Doesn’t work like that, dearie. Your friend made a choice, we had a deal. She is having her own little adventure inside our head, and I have her body until she completes it. Now, what should I do with it?” the Hag said, stroking her own- Artemis’- cheek as she spoke contemplatively.

  “There are a hundred veteran adventurers just outside. We can subdue you without killing you. It won’t be easy, but we’ll do it,” I said.

  “Or I could just jam this knife here in my eye. I am not enjoying the inside of your friend’s head, see. Maybe it would be better to just move on,” she said, letting the head finally fall to the ground with a metallic thunk and leaning to pick up the dagger instead.

  I tackled her then, but what I mentioned about Artemis’ attributes hadn’t changed. I hit a dense body of muscle, standing in a low stance, and I could no more have moved it than exorcised the Hag then and there. She patted me on the top of the head with the other hand.

  “Tsk, tsk. Don’t be so hasty. I am as yet undecided, after all,” the Hag said, then pushed me away with an easy shove that sent me tumbling. I heard the doors from downstairs open, and the sounds of fighting filled the hall. The hag put a finger in front of her smiling lips and gestured with the dagger at her own throat. I heard the stomping of armored boots enter the Guild hall.

  Hannah ran up the stairs, and the Hag spoke in Artemis’ voice.

  “Status report,” she said.

  “Holding. Need the wizards. Alex?” Hannah said.

  I paused only for a moment. I had to fucking go along with it, didn’t I?

  “They’ll figure out something is wrong. I don’t really have a way to get in touch, but they’ll be back,” I said.

  “Good. Take me to the front, I need to see how the w- FFFUUUCK YOU! Stupid fucking bitch, making me kill my family doesn’t fucking work if I goddamned know it isn’t real,” Artemis said, then bent over in apparent pain, grasping for her branded eye.

  “Oh thank fuck. I’m guessing she expected that to take longer,” I said.

  “What?” Hannah said.

  “Hag problems. I’m fine. I’ll be fine. I guess she held up her end of the bargain,” Artemis said.

  “I’m alive. The traitor isn’t,” I said.

  “Fuck. Well, nothing to do about that now,” Artemis said.

  And I had a thought. It would be an excellent ruse to pretend that the spell was broken, while still remaining in control of Artemis.

  Stolen story; please report.

  “I need to get the mask off the traitor. It’ll be uncomfortable for anyone seeing it, so you two go ahead,” I said. And when they turned and began walking away, I whispered the incantation for the Mind Worm at Artemis. I had meant to do it anyway, but now I had double the reason.

  I rushed up the stairs. And it was not there. The decapitated body of the traitor lay alone in the hallway. Of fucking course it couldn’t be this easy. I made sure to check under every bench and open door, but I knew where it had fallen and didn’t expect to find it. Fuck. I had just assumed we three (and Chum) were alone in here during the confrontation, but I hadn’t actually checked. A smoky breeze wafted in through an open door and I swore and ran down the stairs and outside of the building.

  And I was just in time for the fireworks. Anna had clearly made it close enough to see the horde of zombies approach, as a pillar of flame the width of a town square erupted toward the sky northeast of me. That side of the town stopped getting undead reinforcements, and so the heroes stationed there soon consolidated their wins and moved to envelop the rest of the horde. Then the mechanical disposal of thousands of zombies began. I helped the best I could with my dwindling magical reserves, mostly by throwing ice elementals into the midst of the horde. It was very efficient. I killed several zombies per point of mana spent. But it was neither impactful nor impressive.

  An hour later the battle was coming to a close. The streets were piled two, three bodies high with the corpses of the zombies, with no spaces in between, and the stench of both burned and rotting flesh was overpowering. Hannah stood atop a hill of bodies in the middle of the town square, finishing off the final stragglers as they charged at her with the same mindless abandon as the first ones, and she dispatched them with the same sweeping, practiced blows of her glowing sword.

  The cost had been dear. Among the thousands of zombie corpses there were hundreds of humans from Earth. Zack was literally holding his sliced-open belly together with one hand as he stumbled toward the Swinging Donkey, from which Will was running with two pitchers of wine he’d gone to get when we’d explained Zack’s healing ability to him. Surprisingly, most of the buildings stood. The only exception was several apartment buildings that had been in the way of Anna’s most impressive spells. Apparently her anti-enchantment ability combined with the sheer destructive power of her spells was strong enough to shatter even the Tower enchantments put on them.

  “We got the coins back,” someone sifting through the ashes of one called.

  “All my stuff was there!” came the response.

  “I already said I’m sorry!” Anna yelled at both of them.

  Artemis approached me, the flaming mace she used as a weapon hanging off her right hand.

  “Could have been worse, I guess,” she said.

  “Okay. Okay. We get Jea in the tower, Emma can re-enchant the anti-magic room to keep her magic suppressed. The corpses need to be burned there are too many to bury and besides, see how that turned out. We need to figure out who’s died and what their responsibilities were. Then-” I said, basically on autopilot.

  “Alex. You’re not the only one responsible for sorting all of this out. It’ll get done,” Artemis said.

  I was about to argue that I was fine and could at least do some good, when there was a commotion from beyond the field of bodies. It was a screeching voice, almost kind of reminding me of Chum, but feminine. I called the imp to me and told him to check it out. Soon, he found the person causing the ruckus. A small humanoid, just about my waist height, dressed all in black, was stumbling over the corpses toward us. As she approached, I saw that she was a goblin, wearing a mourning veil, a black tank top, and a long frilly skirt.

  “It’ll be one of the Monarch’s. Doubt it’s good news,” I said as she came within earshot. Artemis tensed up, only knowing the Monarch of Goblins from my warnings that they were extremely dangerous.

  “It’s good news, boss!” Chum called.

  “Stop stealing my thunder, imp!” the goblin woman said, as she clambered over the last row of bodies to arrive face to face with us.

  “I am Alex Vorhal. This is Artemis, our guildmaster. How can we help you?” I said.

  “You helping us is what got us in this mess, so why don’t we flip that over? I am Dorothea of the Monarch’s tribe, and I bring tidings and news of how your favor is being repaid,” Dorothea the goblin said.

  “We are kind of in the middle of something,” I said.

  “Nah, you got them all. You’re at the end of something. Now, you need a witch for anything?” Dorothea said.

  “I think we’re good with our own,” I said.

  “Pity. Well, can’t blame a girl for trying. So, I was to bring intelligence and a message from the Monarch of Goblins, so why don’t you call your little council to hear Their words,” she said.

  “Just tell us now, we’ll forward it to the rest of the Guild and Checkpoint?” Artemis said.

  “I’m afraid I cannot do that, Guildmistress,” Dorothea said. “The Monarch was quite specific that I had to be treated as a diplomatic envoy and an honored guest, or else I couldn’t tell you all nothing. Then They clarified that Their use of the double negative was vernacular, and what They meant was that I couldn’t tell you anything if you didn’t treat me as mentioned before.”

  “That’s, uh, great!” I said, meaning it. I knew that the Monarch still felt they owed me two more favors. I didn’t really see it the same way from my perspective, but I did see the value of their favors returned.

  “So, that includes refreshments, drinks, a suite- though I guess that can be brought down to room since you have lost buildings and everything, and, of course, a figure of a small wooden horse,” Dorothea said.

  “How is a small wooden horse-,” Artemis began, but I’d dealt with the Goblin Market before, and she knew I could take lead on this one.

  “That can be done. I really think we should hear her out,” I said.

  Artemis gave me a studying look, but eventually shook her head, stood and called to the town in the twilight of the day. “Alright, everyone, use your recovery abilities. Council meeting in an hour!” And we began to get ready to plan our next steps.