Good fortune

Good fortune

                   

Ryan Harris

                   
Word count: 4994
                   


         Sivia was terrified. Only a month into her new marriage and it didn’t look like it was going to last much longer. She stood trying to figure out something better to do then watch helplessly. Behind her back she fingered the guard of her sword, knowing the weapon would do her no good here. While there were very few problems she couldn’t solve with a sword; one of those problems was her mother.
                   
         Her mother had ruined her first marriage. As a younger girl she’d married a Goblin warrior named Elkbleed. Sivia was a half blood, half goblin, half human, and she’d missed both races definition of beauty by a wide margin. To humans she was too muscular for a female, too boney in the face, and the olive tone of her skin was off-setting if not disturbing. To goblins she was too pale, and not having a single wart was a deformity. So when she met Elkbleed and he took a liking to her she counted herself lucky. He was a catch: a vicious killer, fantastic with a double bladed axe, and fast on his way to ruling his own clan. When she’d brought him to meet her parents she was certain they’d approve. Instead, Mother bit his nose off, before he even got in door. Elkbleed had run off into the woods hands clutched over his face, trying to keep the juices in, and crying.
                   
         Mother had watched him go, still chewing, a smug grin on her face, and blood running down her many chins. Sivia never saw Elkbleed again; no one did, that she knew of. The whole thing had been horrifying.
                   
         If they’d had anywhere else to go she’d have never brought Gerstan home. As it was, she was starting think they should have stayed and fought the knights.
                   
         They stood on the doorstep of her parent’s home: a mud brick cottage built deep in the Olkam forest. It was dark out with a kind of blue tint to everything. Outside the forest it might have been a sunny day, but under the ancient and tight weaved canopy of the Olkam it was always some shade of dark.
                   
         Gerstan was shaking.
                   
         He was a human, and a skinny one at that, weighing less then a hundred fifty pounds with his armor on, spread out over a tall lanky frame. His skin was so pale it nearly glowed in the dark. His red hair was sweaty and tangled. They’d been running for a day and a half straight. They were both exhausted, and filthy.
                   
         Mother was walking around him, chortling to herself: a noise reminiscent of bovine. Like Gerstan, she was human, but at six foot seven and more then four hundred pounds she looked more like an ogre, with stringy black hair tied back through opossum skulls, and a mad look in her eye that came from nearly a hundred years of cannibalism.
                   
         As mother passed behind him, Gerstan gave her a pleading ‘help me’ look. Sivia tried to imply back with her eyes: Run and I’ll follow! Saying it out loud would certainly have meant one of mother’s meaty fists crushing his skull.
                   
         Gerstan wasn’t running. Mother stopped in front of him.
                   
          “You’re stringy!” The old woman screamed at him. “But, are you a stringy turkey, chicken, or piglet?”
                   
          “Mother if you -”
                   
          “Shut up girl!” Her mother commanded.
                   
         Sivia shut up; her mother still scared her.
                   
         Mother turned back to Gerstan and held her hand up in front of his chest, palm out. Mother’s eyes closed, and she stood there for a moment unmoving. Then her hand began to quiver. The muscles in her arms, normally hidden beneath the many layers of blubberous fat strained and became visible like she was pushing against something very heavy.
                   
         If she kills him, Sivia promised herself, I’ll slit my throat right here and show the old bag what she’s done.
                   
         Mother stepped back, her hand dropping as though whatever she’d been pushing against had knocked her back. Her eyes opened, staring Gerstan in the face. “He can stay,” she grumbled, “but no shitting on the furniture, boy!”
                   
          “No Ma’am,” Gerstan stuttered. He now looked confused in addition to frightened.
                   
         Mother growled in a low tone, her lips curling up to show her teeth, then she lumbered off into the house, mumbling as she went.
                   
         It was a better judgment then Sivia had hoped for. It seemed Gerstan would even be allowed inside the house.
                   

~~~~~~~~~~

                   
         Her old room was a shrine to her early childhood, or a picturesque fantasy of it. The place had never been this neat when she lived here. Her toys covered the shelves, carefully aligned, dusted, and polished to perfection. None of the furniture had been moved an inch. Even her old quilt, albeit with many of its patches repaired, was draped over the bed’s footboards, clean and folded as though her twelve year old self might want it any moment.
                   
         Gerstan sat on the edge of the bed. His hands still shaking as he emptied his bags.
                   
          “What about your father?” he asked.
                   
         She envied women who could say they fathers were all gruff. “Lets worry about one problem at a time.”
                   
         Bending over at the waist she shook off her chain mail. Sweat had pasted the gambeson underneath to her skin. Painfully, she had to peel it free. Now naked from the waist up, she glanced over at Gerstan. He was stacking his whicker cages on the nightstand, and paying no attention to her. She’d scolded him a while back about gawking at her tits every time she changed clothes; of course, she hadn’t really wanted him to stop.
                   
         She hurried to undo her greaves, then kicked off her boots and shook out sore legs. She set her sword on a weapons rack she’d made for her first knife when she was eight, and free of her armaments slid onto the bed beside Gerstan.
                   
          “I think we should head out tonight,” He said without looking up.
                   
         Sivia frowned. Now that she knew her mother wasn’t going to kill him, she was starting to look forward to weekend with a real bed. They’d yet to have any sort of a honeymoon.
                   
          “Are you that scared of my father?”
                   
          “Yea, actually. But, I’m more worried about bringing law to his door, and getting his daughter hung in the front yard.”
                   
         He pulled a piece of moldy bread from his pocket, crumbling it up to feed his tiny prisoners. Most of the cages were empty. He was down to only three fairies, having had to use several against their pursuers. He had a male forest fairy, a red mountain female, and a cave female. He’d been so happy to find the cave one. Gerstan collected fairies, having found a variety of cruel uses for them, and rare specimens excited him.
                   
         They looked like humans after he cut their wings off, except at a hundredth the size, and with neon skin. They were cute in a way, like cowering dolls.
                   
         Gerstan rationed out the bread crumbs.
                   
          “Seems a silly time to panic,” Sivia said worming her way behind him so she could rub his shoulders. “Correct me if I’m wrong, but we made it.”
                   
          “I don’t make it,” Gerstan said shaking his head. “I get caught. There’s some rule to the world that says the good guys will always win, and that I’ll never, ever have a plan that works out.”
                   
          “This was our plan.” She raked her knuckles down his ribs. “I’ll bite you.” She kissed him under the ear, letting her teeth graze him.
                   
          “I’d rather you didn’t.”
                   
          “Then quit worrying. I’m sick of worrying; we lost them, and… we’re wasting time in which we have a bed.”
                   
          “Oh?”
                   
          “Yea,” She whispered, breathing heavily on him. “We’ve a while before dinner, and we could spend it worrying or…we could count all our money!”
                   
         Gerstan grinned. The money pouch sat beside him on the pillows. They hadn’t dared do much more then open it in the brush. He looked at it, then back at her. She challenged him with an arch of her eyebrows.
                   
         They both dove after it, slapping and kicking at each other like two greedy children fighting over a toy. Gerstan was closer and got a hold of it first. Blocking her with his shoulder and a hand in her face he was starting to open it when she changed strategies. Giving up on reaching the bag by going over top of him, she went around and put him in a choke hold.
                   
          “Uckk,” he choked, “honey…ack”
                   
         He now had to devote both his hands to pulling her elbow away from his throat so he could breath.
                   
          “Give me the bag!” She demanded.
                   
         Gerstan threw himself backward taking her with him. She hit her head and shoulders on the wall. The impact broke the shelf above them and it fell, boards and wooden animals raining down on them.
                   
         He conceded first. “Truce,” he managed to say under her grip.
                   
          “Truce,” she agreed, letting go of his neck to rub her head.
                   
         With one hand each on the bag they dumped it between them, and then stared down at its contents in slack-jaw reverie. It was the most money she’d ever seen in one place, more money then all the fortunes her father had ever gained and lost in his whole long life of scheming. They were solid gold marks of the realm. Their value aside they were almost pieces of art, cast with the Artemian seal on one side: a compass devoid of the direction south. From the other a relief of the king smiled, which was sort of funny considering they’d killed his son to get it.
                   
         Sivia picked up a handful of the coins and let them slip through her fingers. They were heavier then they looked. Gerstan had a smile ear to ear. He was smearing the pile flat. Then he scooped it back up and started again. She lobbed a coin at him; bouncing it of his forehead. He threw a handful of them back at her. She shielded her face with her arm and a few of the cold things went sliding down her shirt.
                   
         She shrieked, and Gerstan laughed at her. Growling playfully at the insult she tackled him, knocking him to his back. She pinned his arms down above his head. Too competitive for his own good Gerstan strained against her trying to up.
                   
         Dipping down she licked him on the cheek, moving back quickly before he decided to head-butt her.
                   
          “Yuck.” She stuck her tongue out at him. “You need a bath.”
                   
         He quit struggling and she let go of his arms. His efforts turned to the leather ties that kept her pants up. While he worked, she picked up scattered coins and built a pile on his chest. Little kings smiled up at her.
                   

~~~~~~~~~~

                   
         Father had aged a lot since she’d left. He’d shrunk at least a foot in height. Sitting in his chair, he could barely see over the table. His skin had turned brown, or as he explained it: his spots were connecting. A hundred and five was an unheard of age for a goblin, a race whose doctors determined the health of their elderly by throwing stones at them to see if they could still move fast enough dodge. But, father wasn’t a normal goblin. Even in his youth he’d preferred study over fighting and stranger still his sharp mind and desire to learn had earned him the respect of other races. Even the elves of black kettle hill had once let him into their library, though they watched over him swords in hand. Now, he was both feared and respected by all the goblinac clans. They thought him a sorcerer who could turn a man into kindling wood with little effort. It would take a very brave doctor to throw a rock at him.
                   
         Though, Sivia had never actually seen him do anything more arcane then read.
                   
          “What color were their uniforms?” Father asked, peering up from a scroll that charted the various local coat-of arms. His plate of food was growing cold on the table in front of him.
                   
          “Most wore blue with white or yellow markings in all different patterns. There were a few others leading them, dressed in snot green with darker green stripes. They had short bows instead of shields.”
                   
         Seated across from her, Gerstan frowned and fidgeted in his seat. Digging into the collar of his tunic he produced one of their gold coins.
                   
         She had to clamp her hand over her mouth to keep from laughing. In the sudden effort to be silent she choked on a piece of meat and after gagging and having to cough it up, she ended up making more noise then if she’d just laughed.
                   
          “You forget how to chew girl?” Father snapped, he sat his scroll down to peer at her, his eyes looking huge behind his spectacles. Father hated to be interrupted while he was trying to look intelligent. That of course went double for having to impress his new son-in-law.
                   
          “Sorry,” she got out, draining her ale, tears streaming down her face.
                   
          “The greens are Cason Rangers, local band of bandits and poachers.”
                   
         Father rolled his scroll up, setting it aside, and pulled another from his pile. He mumbled under his breath as he searched the new one. “Nothing fits the others exactly, single color but not being uniform; my best guess is your others are Artemian guard, personal militia of the noble families. If they’re together they’ve either been conscripted by royalty or the nobles actually agreed on something…”
                   
         Father gave her a hard look; his features wrinkled at the corners, and the hide atop his nose scrunched up making his moles move. “Either way those would have to be some very angry Artemians.”
                   
         Sivia swallowed hard then got up to refill her glass.
                   
          “There was another man with them,” Gerstan said. The coin in his fingers disappeared with a coin trick disguised as him reaching for his fork. “He was wearing all white, and carried a wooden sword like a child’s toy, no armor, no other weapons.”
                   
          “Sounds like a fool to me,” Mother grunted looking up from her food for the first time. Gravy and debris of chicken was smeared across her face.
                   
          “I think he was in charge of the whole group,” Gerstan said. “Could just be some crazy captain. But, he was riding front most of the way, and I got a pretty good look at them crossing the river. Something about the way he carried himself worries me a little. I’d like to know if he’s someone important.”
                   
          “Important?” Father’s leaned onto the table to glare at Gerstan. “What have gotten my little girl into, boy, that important people are chasing you?”
                   
          “Couldn’t say sir,” Gerstan replied doing a good job of sounding genuinely ignorant. “Maybe they’re after someone else and got after us by mistake.”
                   
          “Humph,” Father grumbled, settling back in his chair. “I know you’re lying to me you little shit! And I’ll tell you, neither of you is leaving until I find out how much trouble you’ve gotten her into! Lots of people owe me favors and I’ll find out.”
                   

          “Quit threatening them Ural!” Mother snarled, slamming her fist down and shaking everything on the table. “You’ll scare them off and they’ll never bring the grandchildren to visit us.”
                   

          “You’re the one who -” Father started.
                   
         Mother jumped from her chair and grabbed the cleaver from the roast daring him to continue.
                   
         Sivia covered her eyes with her hand. She could tell by his expression that Gerstan’s nerves were shot. She thought: next open window he sees and I’ll never see him again.
                   
         Father went quiet, but gave her and Gerstan one last glare each, before turning to his food, eating with a frown still on his face.
                   

~~~~~~~~~~

                   

         Sivia slipped into the room shutting the door behind her. She did a little spinning dance move that was really a duck and riposte without the sword, and an added not so subtle swivel of hips. She didn’t own any fancy lingerie so she made do with a clean shirt unbuttoned in suggestive places.
                   
         Already in bed Gerstan gave her move an appreciative whistle.
                   
         Her strut across the room had too much of her customary stalk in it, but it was all about knowing your audience, and he liked it. She rattled the bars of his cages with her fingernails as she passed disturbing his miniature captives. One of them yelled a squeaky profanity at her.
                   
         She took her time climbing into bed and straddling his lap, making a show out of it, grinding against him like a cat trying to get comfortable. His hands came to rest on her backsides with an audible slap. She made the yelping noise he wanted to hear, and endured his massage of her ass. She’d yet to break him of the instinctive male desire to knead her softer spots like they were made of dough. That would take time.
                   
         She took his hands and moved them around to the front of her hips where he had a better idea of what to do. Leaning back with the rest of her body to press her lower half into his fingers, and get him on the right track.
                   
         There was loud banging sound from downstairs. Gerstan’s eyes widened and a chill ran down her neck. They were trying to untangle themselves even before the banging ended in a crash.
                   
         Sivia snagged her sword from the rack and flew for the door.
                   
          “Torches,” Gerstan said from the window. “Lots of torches!”
                   
         She was already in the hall, sprinting for the stairs, drawing her sword, not caring that she was half naked. There was yelling. Already she could hear combat. Her heart was pounding. She was worried about her parents, angry at having invaders in her house, angry at being interrupted.
                   
         There was the clank of armored boot coming up the stairs, and she met a knight coming up. His sword was still sheathed. He reached for it, and she cleaved his head in halve spilling its liquid contents into the rim of his gorget. Sivia pushed past him, his body taking to long to fall. She changed direction at the landing, and jumped the lower steps.
                   
         She found the downstairs a battleground, a battle her parents were losing. Knights packed the rooms almost shoulder to shoulder.
                   
         Father was being backed into his study by four men with thick bladed, cleaver like, short swords. He was swinging a fire-poker at their faces, and screeching Goblinac curses.
                   
         Mother was in the kitchen. Wearing a night gown, with her hair up in curlers, she was frothing at the mouth and swinging her spiked ‘hog killing’ club. With every swing men where sent flying. Her mad, raving rant about ‘cooking them all for Sunday supper’ had them scared, keeping the ring of men around her too timid to attack and press their advantage.
                   
         Sivia charged the knights attacking her father, running the first one through the back, killing him before he could even turn around. But when she tried to withdraw her sword she found it stuck. So, when the huge sergeant beside him whirled around to face her she had nothing to block with.
                   
         She abandoned her sword and jumped back just in time to avoid losing her head.
         The knight plowed towards her, ignoring a kick to his knee which hurt her foot more then him.
                   
         A gauntleted fist connected with her jaw. It felt like an explosion in her head. Her vision flickered for a moment, and she felt a tooth, or multiple, come loose in her mouth.
                   
         She staggered backward, and would’ve fallen if she hadn’t run into a wall that managed to prop her up.
                   
         Dazed, Sivia watched the fight end miserably for her parents. A sword finally caught Father, and she heard his bones crunch. On the other side of the fight a man with a spear got himself set behind the shield men and killed her mother like a hunter would a bear. The old woman killed three knights in her death throes.
                   
         Sivia would have died too right then, if the man who hit her had struck immediately instead of taking the time to stare at her bare legs. They must have been desperate in the army.
                   
         By the time he did attack Gerstan’s knife was there to catch it. Gerstan deflected the blow, and sunk his knife through the seam of man’s armor at the arm pit, plunging it in to the hilt. The knight fell over mewing like a dying cat.
                   
         She wasn’t crying, but he must have guessed from her expression because he didn’t ask about her parents.
                   
          “We need to go,” He said.
                   
          “Where?”
                   
                   
         From one of the cages that adorned his belt he removed the red fairy. The little woman gripped in his hand screamed and pleaded up till the moment he bit her head off. Gerstan upturned the dead fairy like a shot glass, draining the twitching corpse of its juices; then turning to the group of knights standing between them and the door, he spat it back out. As it left his mouth the liquid burst into a giant fireball that would have made a dragon proud.
                   
         In a two second flash twenty some men were torched. Steel armor blackened, their skin bubbled and cracked, falling apart into a gooey ash. The smell of burnt flesh burned her nose, but when it was over there was a clear, smoldering path to the door.
                   
         Walking backwards, Gerstan glared at the remaining knights, keeping his mouth shut and his cheeks puffed out, as though he could perform that trick again. When their hands were on the door latch, He pulled the green fairy. Snapping its legs like a wishbone, he threw the dying creature to the floorboards. Where it hit grass appeared, followed by vines and leaves.
                   
         They bolted outside, slamming the door shut behind them, and holding it. The house shuddered and creaked as an acre of forest tried to fit inside. There came screams that where shortly muffled. Branches shattered through the windows, and the door bowed out cracking around its hinges.
                   
         Then everything was quite. Sivia was starting to cry now, even as she breathed a sigh of relief. Her parents were dead, her childhood home destroyed.
                   
         But she and Gerstan had made it, just a little further.
                   
         She turned around just in time to see a wooden pommel break Gerstan’s nose. Gerstan wobbled on his feet for a moment, and just when she thought he was about to say something sarcastic he fell to the ground, out cold.
                   
         Sivia snarled at the man in white.
                   
         He was older then she’d expected. His face was heavy with lines and he was nearly bald. What little hair still clung to his head was white and thinning, almost translucent in color. He wore no armor, no marks, just a blank tabard over ivory robes.
                   
         She snatched Gerstan’s knife from the ground beside him, tossing it from one hand to other, and back again.
                   
          “I’m going to break that toy sword over your head! And then, I’m going to gut you old man, pull all your guts out, and knit myself a sweater out of them.”
                   
         He brought his wooden sword down to a low guard with a flourish.
                   
         She lunged at him, feinting for the thigh then reversing her grip at the last moment and swinging up, aiming to stick the blade in his chin. She missed. The man in white dodged her blow with a calm fluidity. He was fast for his age.
                   
         That pissed her off. Screaming profanities at him, she charged into his guard swinging at whatever was offered: his neck, his chest, arm, neck again. She really wanted to open his wrinkly neck. But, her every attack was dodged or blocked. She’d get close, and yet the man in white never even looked concerned. He was fast for any age.
                   
         A sweeping kick to her ankle stumbled her, stopping her charge, and the man in white spun around her in a mono-color flash, ending up behind her. The blunt edge of his wooden sword came crashing down into her back just above her hip.
                   
         She wasn’t sure if she heard a crack or if the searing pain just overloaded the rest of her senses forcing them to join in. It took her breath away. She let herself fall to the ground, rolling forward and coming back up with a spin to face him again, hoping the movement hid how much that had hurt.
                   
         The man in white leapt, bringing his sword over his head and down in a strike meant to break her arm or shoulder. She caught it on the knife bracing her wrist with her other hand. Pushing his weapon aside as hard as she could, she tried to force him out of position to block, and then charged him again wielding the knife with both hands throwing power blows. When he dodged she’d come in again staying close to him. When they literally collided, she drove her knee up into his ribs. It landed with a satisfying impact and bent him over with a groan.
                   
         His chin forward, she threw an uppercut connecting perfectly and standing him back up. His eyes sort of glazed and she expected him to be out. She lashed out for his neck with the knife.
                   
         He dodged: leaning back just in time. Her blade missed his throat by the smallest of measurements.
                   
         And, now she was off balance. The wooden blade came up into her right wrist with splintering force. Bones broke with a sickening pain and then her whole hand went completely numb and useless. Her fingers let go of the knife. She tried to catch it with her other hand but it had reflexively gone to clutch the other.
                   
         The man in white was already in motion.
                   
         He spun his sword around him bringing it back then lunging out in a kind of stab she’d never seen before. His arms barely moved. All the motion was completed by a twist of his legs, the power driven from his hips. The blade of his weapon smashed into her abdomen with an incredible impact. Bugging her eyes and momentarily ending all thought.
                   
         Sivia fell to her knees.
                   
         The man in white brought his ridiculous sword back to a guard position with the same flourish he’d used before. The tip had broken off, and her blood stained the splintered blade. It was a lot of her blood.
                   

         A euphoric, warm feeling spread from her stomach out to the rest of her body. The body’s way of patronizing you, and sure proof that something was really wrong.
                   
         The man in white raised his weapon, twisting slightly about to throw his whole body into cracking her skull open. She just watched him.
                   
         He never struck the blow – instead he screamed. The man in white stiffened, sucking in a long breath he held till his face turned red.
                   
         It was like watching a cricket stung by a scorpion. His eyes became soggy then turned into black goo that drained from their sockets. He fell to his knees, and then all fours. The black liquid flowed from his every orifice in enough quantity to indicate everything inside of him must likewise be melting. His skin cracked around the joints, blackening like burnt paper at the edges of his ears and fingers, before the husk finally collapsed inward and the man in white became just white clothes slowly sinking into a hideous soup.
                   
         It was sight that demanded respect for the cave fairy.
                   
         Gerstan stood behind the mess. Blood streaked out from his busted nose, and he was smiling. Black gore still stained his lips.
                   
         Sivia tried to get up and found she couldn’t. The hand she clutched across the hole in her stomach was soaking in blood, and as a whole her effort to keep her innards in was failing.
                   
          “Sorry,” She told him, “but I’m not going anywhere.”
                   
         His face fell. “Does it hurt a lot?” He asked in a gentle tone.
                   
         She shook her head no.
                   
         Gerstan walked to the edge of the trees, took the money pouch from his belt, and threw it as far he could.
                   
          “What are you doing?!” Sivia screamed at him, then doubled over in pain from the effort.
                   
         He walked back, plopping down beside her in the grass. He put his arm around her shoulders.
                   
          “Get off me,” She ordered, using her free hand to push his arm off. “Go get our money, and get the hell out of here!”
                   
         Gerstan lay back in the grass, looking up into the darkness of the trees.
                   

          “Black fairies are poisonous,” he said matter-of-factly. “I was going to use her for my arrows. They’re not so good for you orally.”
                   
         She stared at him for a moment in disbelief. “Well that was stupid.”
                   
         He chuckled.
                   
          “He already had me!”
                   
         Gerstan shrugged.
                   
         Wincing as she did it, Sivia eased herself back so she could lay with her head in his lap. “I was lying,” She explained. “I didn’t want you to feel bad, but since you went and acted like an idiot, of course this hurts I have a hole in my stomach.
                   
          “I’m sorry.”
                   
          Reaching up she found his arm and draped it back over her.
                   
          “We didn’t get real far, did we?” She said.
                   
          “No…” He was starting to sound sleepy, “…not too far.” He had one of the gold coins in his hand and was rubbing it between his fingers. “You know what?”
                   
          “What’s that?”
                   
          “I’m really glad your mother bit that one guy’s nose off.”
                   
         Sivia smiled. “So am I.”
                   

The end.