~~~
Finally, Robert and Kile recognized the near proximity of the troll entrance and said so to both of the Johanssons.
“Thank goodness,” Sara breathed. They clambered through the thick trees and over a few boulders near the clearing before it and sure enough they could discern the ever so slightly glowing blue energy of the markings inside.
Mother dropped her pack and Kile quickly followed suite. Rob seemed to subconsciously be awaiting his father’s direction, who was busy looking about and scanning the area immediately around the entrance.
“Kile? Didn’t you two say there would be a guard here? A really big troll named Donut? Or something like that?”
“Dronosh,” Kile nodded. “Yes. He should be here somewhere.”
Suddenly, several crashes and broken twigs resounded in the forest to their South West and father motioned them all behind a collection of large boulders near the perimeter of the clearing. Kile turned to the sound and stood, smiling.
“Kile!” Robert hissed. “Get down!”
Kile looked briefly at the trio huddled behind the rocks and then pointed his upturned hand with index finger extended towards the sounds, shrugged and said, “Dronosh!”
Instead, practically falling out of the thick tree line a beautiful young red-headed human tripped into his arms startling him. He dropped her to the ground immediately and hissed at her, “Marissa?!”
On her hands and knees, she looked up at him and at first squealed, “Eeeeya?!”
Then she recognized what she’d bumped into. She stood quickly and looked about for the family. Seeing them she took a few more quick steps and then squawked at them in a tired and raspy voice as though she had a throat full of bark, “They’re coming!”
Kile turned and looked into the forest. As Rick Jr. motioned Marissa to join them behind the boulders a deep guttural, animalistic howl resounded not nearly as far away as any of them hoped. The little troll waddled over and cowered with them too.
“Where Dronosh?” he asked in a whine. His English seemed to be reverting in the situation.
“What happened, Marissa?” Mrs. Johansson asked in a whisper.
Rick watched for her answer. The girl was still trying to catch her breath, shoulders heaving, eyes watering.
“I…think…they can smell me!” she finally got out.
“Damn!” Rick cursed. “Didn’t think of that.”
For a few seconds everyone seemed to be pondering on their own what best to do next. Robert looked Marissa in the eye and asked in a low voice, “Goblins?”
Marissa simply nodded, still breathing heavily.
“Let’s enter the caves!” Kile excitedly whispered.
“Yeah!” Rob confirmed.
“Wait! I don’t want to go waltzing in there unless your family knows we’re coming. I don’t like the sound of surprising a potential enemy at their dinner table,” Rick suggested.
“What do we do then, Rick?” his wife asked.
For a moment, he thought. Then he began opening his large military style pack. From inside the main, large compartment he pulled out all nearly three feet of Robert’s Chinook and the controller after.
Both troll and boy grinned. Rob asked, “Whoa! So, you did bring it! What did you bring it for, Dad?”
“Thought you and Kile might like to show Little Ricky together.”
He continued to prepare the copter by folding out and locking in place all the rotors, flipping the batteries around in the controller into the right position and handing it to Robert, and then removing his army-issued rifle from his back and checking the clip.
“Do you really need that?” Sara asked. Kile sat beside her eyes nervously flicking from Rick to Sara and to the gun.
“Yes. I think so.”
As Rick set his M-16 against the base of the boulders so as to prevent it from pointing at anyone, he pulled his handgun out as well from a holster tucked under his shirt, and then pulled back the slide on it. As he checked over the guns and equipment he engaged Kile again, to ensure none of his party were going to panic in the case he had to start firing.
“So, tell me, honestly Kile. Is there any good Goblin?” he asked.
Kile still stared at the M9 in the soldier’s hand, heart beating rapidly. But he did finally answer. “No, Mr. Johansson. They are very much like animals. No faerie has ever seen a goblin act in any other way but to destroy.”
“This is important, Kile. If it comes to I have to decide whether or not to shoot I can’t be thinking about whether or not they’re innocent, or…just following orders. Or anything else. I can’t have it be a case where you just don’t like them, like the bridge trolls or something. I gotta know these are mortal enemies who will not spare us.”
The troll’s face grew very serious and he nodded twice. “Goblins are the enemy of nature. They only consume.”
Rick nodded and leaned back against the rock. Kile could sense he needed to extend more, so he rose and waddled over to the older human and placed his hands upon his forearm.
“Goblins come from darkness. Most faerie folk don’t even think they have souls. They’re like animals or trees. If they attack, you must defend yourself.”
Rick nodded a thank you to the troll and he waddled back to Sara’s side to sit down. Marissa, whose breathing had finally calmed down mumbled under her breath, “Animals and trees have souls.”
Kile merely looked at her expressionless not sure what to say. She scowled at him.
The racket in the forest grew closer and then the big cat’s howl came again, far too closely for Rick’s comfort.
“Okay. Here’s what we’re going to do. Since supposedly goblins and faeries don’t like to interact with humans,” he started. He gave Kile a sideways look. “…we’re going to make them think there’s a big bunch of humans camped up right here. That ought to scare them off, and it should also make them think twice about checking this area for trolls, right Kile?”
Kile only gave him a hesitant look. He wasn’t sure what to think of the plan.
“So! Robert, when they get really close, I want you to fly that copter around here. If they see the kind of things humans have maybe they’ll think twice about coming any closer.
Then the rest of us are all going to talk loudly. About anything. About hunting, or fireworks. Whatever you want to. We just need to make it seem like there’s a lot of us. We’re sort of marking our territory. Get it?”
Sara and Marissa nodded. Kile looked around and followed as well, nodding his head vigorously.
And so the ruse began. As the goblins neared right up towards the tree line a large model of a Chinook helicopter rose above the boulders and hovered momentarily, and then moved along the tree line. Laughter and shouts resounded and echoed off the rocks as well. Twenty pairs of beady black eyes stared at the odd flying machine, some cowering as it slowly moved past their positions. None of them were quite willing to risk entering the sunlit clearing ahead of them to survey the human party before them.
A few goblins had taken the initiative to start backing away from the area to which they’d traced the odd human smell seemingly running from them earlier. But then their leader’s voice scratched the still air between the trees and overpowered the ruckus from the human flying device in the clearing ahead. It chattered and scolded and told them to move up.
The unlucky cat wrangler was assigned the task to enter the hated sunlight and investigate the number and nature of the humans there. A pair of archer goblins nocked their arrows and then their mate lit the poisoned tips on fire. Better to cover every base with the humans. If the tip missed its mark, and the poison didn’t do one in, perhaps flame would catch grasses or human in its grip and do the job.
Both archers lobbed their heavy arrows over the rocks and bounced them off the more disguised side of the cave entrance boulders. They landed on the soil in front of Rick. Kile squealed in fright and hunkered agai
nst the rocks next to Mr. Johnasson.
“So, that’s how it is, then,” the soldier nodded. He looked to his wife who first wrapped one arm around Marissa and then the other around Robert. She nodded in return.
Rick Johansson engaged his training. He lay against one of the lower boulders to the side of where they’d been hiding and flipped the safety switch on his rifle to fire only one bullet per pull. Then he waited.
Soon, the cat-wrangler crept from the edge of the forest a little further to the east than Rick had expect and he had to reposition himself again.
“Robert?” he whispered.
“Yeah, Dad?” the boy responded quietly.
“You don’t happen to have any of those firecrackers we talked about last night maybe bringing, do you?”
“Yeah, I do.”
“Light one and toss it over the boulders and into the forest. Tell me when you’re tossing it.”
Rob did as he was told with a little help from his mother. He flicked his lighter several times nervously before it caught and then he touched it to the end of one cracker he pulled out.
“Go!” he said, as he tossed it over.
Within a second they all heard the sharp, tinny burst of a firecracker, immediately followed by the slightly deeper and more penetrating crack of Rick’s M-16.
Rob and Kile leaned over to peer around Mr. Johansson and the large boulder. A glistening and grotesquely shaped frog-rat body, loosely wrapped in tattered leathers rolled onto its back from its side on the ground. A very large cougar a few feet away turned to investigate and realized its braided leather leash had suddenly gone limp. It raced away with one sharp howl into the forest on the other side of the clearing. One goblin down.
It seemingly took a moment for the rest of the goblins to realize what had happened between the crack nearby and then the site of their comrade falling heavily to the ground, cat escaping their possession. Several let out hoots that sounded like howler monkeys Rob had seen on TV once and began retreating through the forest. Their leader howled a lengthy screech that seemed to reverberate off the rock around the Johanssons and then he paced after them on all fours.
Their ruse seemed to work and Rick rotated around so he could rest his back against one of the larger boulders again, rifle upturned and safety engaged again. Everyone else breathed a sigh of relief at once. Robert turned to Kile and together they said, “Where’s the bear?”
Rick looked at them suspiciously, along with the two women. Sara looked at her son and repeated, “Bear?”
The blank stare she got from both boys was enough. This would be a topic that would come up later.