Ringo hopped down from my shoulder and scurried toward the nearest cushioned chair. “I’ll stay. When the magic goes wild the trolls are always out.”
Gabriel frowned, but Mistral sighed. “Stay with Gabriel, then.”
Gabriel opened his mouth to argue, but Mistral cut him off. “If you try to leave her behind, she’ll just jump to you anyways.”
“Exactly,” I agreed.
Swiping a palm down over his face, Gabriel shook his head, but then took my hand again, tugging me toward the door. I followed after him, hoping whatever Mistral sensed was nothing serious. Surely the fates would not throw yet another curveball at us.
Surely.
With the Bogsacting up and affecting the magic flowing through the land, we had intended to ride to Evenlee, the nearest village, but we only made it as far as the stables. There were all sorts of little goblins running around, many of them closer to animals than humans, their furs, scales, and skins conspicuously damp. A fuzzy green creature that looked a little bit like a hedgehog scampered right across my path, shaking droplets of water everywhere as it went. A more humanoid goblin the size of a small child but with incredibly wrinkled skin hobbled inthe other direction. His pallid skin and rough looking clothing dripped with moisture.
I shut my gaping jaw, then looked at Gabriel, whose hand was hesitating near his sword hilt. “Why are they allwet?” I asked.
“The pool. The pathway. It has to be. They are coming from the goblin realm.”
“But that isn’t anywhere close to here. They should be dry by now.” Just as I said it, the ground lightly rumbled beneath our feet. “The Bogs is having fun,” I realized. While my connection wasn’t as strong as Mistral’s, I could still feel the playful energy coming from the ground at my feet. The wild magic was loving the new pathway, and was attracting creatures to pass through.
“What should we—” I started, but cut myself off, sensing it the moment the Bogs turned its attention to us. “Uh-oh.” I grabbed Gabriel’s hand, knowing what the Bogs was about to do.
We reappeared moments later near the gates leading out to the city. There were more creatures here, some on four legs and some two, many of them going to investigate the gates.
“Crap,” I muttered, dropping Gabriel‘s hand and running toward the gates. I wasn’t sure what I was going to do, but if the creatures were from the goblin realm, we couldn’t let them pass out into the city. Many of them wouldn’t understand that their magic wouldn’t be as strong there, if it was accessible at all. Not to mention that they would probably get run over.
Gabriel quickly caught up as I reached the gates. I was already waving my arms as I slowed. “Hey! Stay away from there!” I really wished I had taken the time to learn more of Mistral’s language.
Another one of the green hedgehog things was squirming through the bars, and I took a chance by grabbing it and pulling it back. It squirmed in my grip, scratching me before Gabriel took it and tossed it away from the gates.
I stepped between another smaller humanoid goblin and the bars, holding out my hands. “You can’t go out there. It’s not safe.”
The goblin tilted its head, fluffy brown hair floating around its face and bobbing with its movement. While it observed me, several other goblins tried to rush toward the gates.
“Stop!” I whipped out my arms in both directions. Darkness flowed out of my hands, swarming around me and blocking the rest of the gates. All the goblins skittered back, making either strange noises or speaking in the goblin tongue.
I was pretty sure my heart stopped beating for a second as I looked back at the wall of darkness I had formed. I still held out my hands. No more darkness came out of them, but I was afraid to move. Despite the possible danger of the occurrence, Gabriel remained right next to me.
He spoke calmly in the goblin tongue, addressing the creatures who were now all huddled away from me. They chattered amongst themselves, then turned and ran in the other direction.
As we watched them go, Mistral appeared amongst them, walking toward us. I lowered my trembling hands and the darkness receded from the gates, absorbing back into me, which only made me tremble more. Gabriel stayed close, but seemed unsure if he should touch me. And I was feeling pretty unsure about that myself.
Reaching us, Mistral looked at the gates where the darkness had just been, then observed me and Gabriel. “Many lesser goblins have come through the pathway. I believe the Bogs lured them here and provided extra magic to speed their travel.”
I stared at him. “Really?” I asked, my voice hoarse. “No comment on—” I gestured vaguely at the gates behind us.
He inclined his chin. “I’ll admit, I am curious. But you seem on the verge of, to put it quite plainly, freaking out.”
I glanced at Gabriel, then back to Mistral. “Yeah, that’s a pretty accurate way of putting it.” It was one thing when I was making darkness disappear, quite another when I was shooting it back out again. And shooting it back out onearth. The whole point was to keep it away from this realm.
“Well you don’t seem to have harmed anything.” Mistral stepped past us toward the gates. We turned to watch him kneel down, placing a hand on the earth. Vines snaked up, weaving their way around the bars until they formed a solid wall. He stood, dusting off his hands. “That should keep them contained for now.”
Unlike Gabriel, he didn’t seem worried about touching me, and slid an arm around my waist before grazing his lips across my cheek. “Thank you for keeping them safe.”
My bark of laughter sounded a bit hysterical, even to me. “Yeah, no problem. Didn’t want to see anyone getting hit by a car. But what are we going to do about them now?”
“I will encourage the Bogs to send them back.”
I pulled away just enough to observe his face. “And you think it’s going to listen?”
