As the Goblin army got closer to the castle, King Carlyle decided to go over and see if they couldn’t be reasoned with. As always, he took his two sons George and Rufus with him. But once Henry found out they were going, Henry grabbed his sword and asked to come as well. King Carlyle agreed, and then Grace asked to come. And when King Carlyle agreed to that, Robert said he would like to come with his friends as well. Thomas, when he heard Grace was going, pleaded with his grandfather to be allowed to go as well, and King Carlyle also allowed it.
They geared up for battle. Henry, Grace and Robert were given some of the armor from the castle. Henry still had his sword, but he was given a shield. Robert took a sword from the castle. Grace was given a bow and a quiver full of arrows from the castle.
They walked through the forest until they got to a big river that the Goblin army was busy crossing. The goblins were preparing to chop down trees to make a bridge.
“Careful Grinthal,” King Carlyle called across the river to the Goblin King. “You know the trees in this part of the forest are under our protection.”
“Come and stop us then,” howled the Goblin King back, and then he laughed maliciously. “If you can.” Then he called out to his soldiers. “Hurry up, lads. Chop these trees down quickly.”
One of the goblins took an axe and swung it at the tree. But no sooner had the axe blade touched the tree, then the tree screamed out in pain. The tree then bent down and picked up the goblin with its branches, raised the goblin high in the air, and then quickly brought the goblin back down, whacking its poor little goblin body against the ground. The other trees, when they heard their friend cry out, quickly woke up, and began picking up goblins with their branches and throwing them into the air. The goblins tried to defend themselves with their axes, but the trees were everywhere, and they were soon overwhelmed.
“Hurry, into the river!” yelled Grinthal, the Goblin King. And the goblins jumped in and began swimming across.
From across the river, King Carlyle, George and Rufus watched. “If we had brought more men, we could have stopped them right here,” said George. “We could have easily stopped them from climbing up the river bank when they are disorganized and swimming one by one like this.”
“Ah, alas, how right you are George,” said King Carlyle. “With just the sevenof us here, we can’t very well stop an army of goblins, even if they are disorganized. But let’s not beat ourselves up about it too much. We didn’t have time to organize a larger force. We had to come out quickly to see what they were up to. Nevertheless, maybe we can talk some sense into them.”
As Grinthal the Goblin King neared the river bank, King Carlyle reached his arm out and plucked him out from the water. Grinthal was only about the size of a small child, so King Carlyle was able to pick him out of the water quite easily. He lifted him up by the back of his shirt, and held him up in the air.
“My dear King Grinthal, do you see how all my advice to you is always only out of affection and concern for your well-being. For it was as much for your sake as for my own that I warned you the trees were under my protection. If only you would listen to me on all matters, and you would avoid such catastrophes as have now befallen your army.”
“You didn’t tell me the trees here were alive and awake,” said Grinthal angrily.
“But what else could I have meant?” said King Carlyle. “Surely by telling you these trees were under my protection, I was trying to communicate to you that they were more than just sleeping trees.”
“I’ll flay your skin for this! You never told me that the trees would attack!” yelled King Grinthal. (Goblins, although they are small in stature, can be horribly vicious and vindictive.)
“Come, come, you know I’ve nothing but your best interests at heart in all the advice I give. And your army is still alright. Some of them are a bit bruised, it looks like. A few broken bones I’d wager. But they have all survived. Now, King Grinthal, what is it that you want? Why did you bring your army this way?”
“We’ve come to plunder,” said Grinthal. “We want gold, and silver, and cloth and wine, and whatever else you forest people keep in your houses.”
“Well, you’ve come at a bad time just now for wine,” said King Carlyle. “We just had a human army come through, and they’ve cleaned us out of it. Otherwise I’d be sure to treat you and all your army to the finest Elvish wine, just like I did the last time you were here.”
Grinthal screamed with outrage. “No wine? You’re lying! We’ll skin you alive for this.” Grinthal was still being held in the air by King Carlyle, but he twisted his body back and forth in the air, trying to free himself.
“Yes, I’m terribly sorry. But the good news, Grinthal, at least good as far as I’m concerned, is that we now have plenty of human soldiers in the forest to contain you and your army, should you try to start any trouble. Now, we can’t give you anything just now. We’re using all our resources at the moment. But we can give you safe passage through our kingdom, if there’s somewhere else you want to go.”
“We don’t need your permission to go anywhere!” said Grinthal.
“As you like. But if you give me your word you won’t harm any of the creatures in my kingdom, I’ll not hinder you either.”
“You are our prisoner now,” said Grinthal. Then he yelled out to his army, “seize him.”
The goblins had been coming across the river and climbing up the river bank all this time, and there were now a large number of them assembled on the river bank. There was now quite a large force assembled, and they looked like they could quite easily overwhelm the small group of humans.
“Now, King Grinthal, you remember what happened to your army when you tried to fight us two years ago. I’d hate for that to happen to you again,” said King Carlyle.
“We outnumber you!” screamed Grinthal. “You cannot defeat us all.”
The goblins were beginning to run towards them. King Carlyle nodded to the rest of them. “Try not to kill them,” he said. “I don’t want to spill any more blood than necessary.”
The goblins swarmed forward holding little goblin swords and axes. The humans did their best to hold them at bay without killing them. They circled together so that they could protect each other’s backs. King Carlyle put Grinthal up in the branches of a tree, and left him there while he turned to deal with the advancing goblin soldiers. George and Rufus looked like they had experience with dealing with the goblins before. They were very good at deflecting the goblin sword thrusts, and they used the flat of their blades so that they could hit the goblins with their swords, but not cut them. Robert tried to follow his uncles’ lead, and was attempting to only parry the goblin’s swords, but he was having difficulty with so many goblins. Henry swung his sword wildly, and didn’t seem to be paying attention to King Carlyle’s order not to kill. But once they saw how ferociously Henry was swinging his sword, the goblin’s decided to attack the others, and stay clear of Henry. Grace took out her bow and began fitting it with arrows. She aimed the arrows to injure the goblins, hitting them in the arms or legs, or pinning their clothes to the ground. Thomas, who was carrying a huge shield, blocked most of the goblin swords with his shield, and also tried to parry their thrusts with his sword.
They spent some time engaged in the fight like this. They kept pushing the goblins back, but the goblins kept swarming forward. It looked like they might soon exhaust themselves except, in the confusion, one of the goblins swung his axe at Rufus, and when Rufus dodged the blow, the axe accidentally hit a tree instead. The tree howled with pain, and bent down and picked the goblin up by his feet, before throwing him across the forest. The other trees then also came alive, and started attacking the goblins.
The trees in their outrage were attacking everything, but King Carlyle quickly cried out. “It’s us. It’s King Carlyle. We are not part of the attack against you,” and the trees then left them alone.
The trees beat the goblins with their branches, and picked goblins up and threw them across the forest. Many of the goblins jumped back into the river, and tried to swim back across to the opposite river bank.
As the goblin army fled in disorder, Thomas turned to Henry and Grace and Robert. “What did I tell you?” he said triumphantly. “The goblin army is never a real threat. Grandfather knows how to handle them.” Although Henry and Grace and Robert noticed that Thomas did have a rather painful sword gash on his arm. It appeared that even if the goblins themselves were not particularly smart, their swords were real enough.
Grinthal was still stuck on the tree branches even after his army had retreated. “No sense allowing the army to re-group around their king,” said King Carlyle, as he plucked Grinthal down from the tree. “Let’s take this one back to the castle with us. If the goblin army wants to re-organize, they’ll have to fight about who their leader is first.”
“Put me down!” demanded Grinthal, and he tried to scratch and bite, but King Carlyle held him by the back of his neck so that he couldn’t harm anyone. George had a big black sack with him, and King Grinthal was dropped into the sack, and then they tied the sack closed.
“Has he got enough air in there?” asked King Carlyle.
George made a couple of small slits in the sack with his sword. “He should be fine,” said George.
They walked back to the castle with the sack slung over George’s shoulder. Occasionally Grinthal would thrash about and try to free himself from the sack, but then he would tire himself out after a while, and he was silent for most of the walk back.
No comments:
Post a Comment