The Goblin's Heir

Chapter Twenty Three: Hunting Party

It was difficult not to stare at the spot on the study floor where Knut had died. The children had tried their best to wash away the blood, but a stain remained, a dark muddy puddle on the carpet. We'd likely never get it out. It was as ruined as everything else. 

"What makes the most sense to me is to start here and work our way up The Hollow." Odd said, tapping a claw at the city gates. "We'll scour every edge of the empire until we find him." He stood in the stain, seemingly unbothered by it. I swallowed the need to scold him.

"What if he isn't in the empire, though?"Floki asked. 

Frit stepped closer to his father's desk, touching his lips in thought as his eyes twitched over the expanse of the map burned into its surface. "Yes, as warped as his mind might be, I don't think he'd make the mistake of staying within our territory. If I were him, I would have fled to the human lands." He slid his fingers from the entangled roots that illustrated the Underground to long stretch of The Hollow's trunk. "It's large, the land disconnected by vast seas. It won't be so easy to search."

"Agreed." Cat hummed from her perch on top of a book pile, well away from the stained rug. "The human world makes the most sense, but where would we even start? There are islands larger than both sides of The Branches put together. It'll be like trying to find a needle in a haystack the size of this palace."

I tore my eyes from the stain, lifting them to the map. I leaned against it, studying it. As great as my empire was, the human world dwarfed it ten thousandfold. Our hunt was swiftly turning into a hopeless endeavor. There had to be a way. There just had to be.

Bran suddenly cleared his throat. "I...have an idea, though I know you will not like it." He said. His silvery eyes, the pupils blown wide in the dark of the Underground, moved over us and settled on me. "We're going to need help from the elves."

A dark laugh shot up my throat, whipping my head back with the force of it. "You're joking, right?" I asked, between cackling fits. "I'd sooner burn the empire to the ground myself than ask an elf for help."

"Who said anything about asking?" Bran asked. He knew me, how I thought, or at least he was learning. I never asked for anything. Everything was a demand. "They're your subjects, are they not? Order them to help us. Force them."

Odd growled lowly at him. "We don't need their help. I can track just as well."

"Yes, you are very skilled, but you aren't an elf. Goblins are designed to overcome with numbers, not for ambushing prey. They possess abilities you can't mimic."

"bullshit."

"Oh?" Bran raised an eyebrow, clearly amused that he'd managed to ruffle Odd's feathers. "Can you understand animals now?"

He shrugged. "I could probably figure it out."

"I'm afraid we don't have time for you to learn." I let out a long and weary groan. As much as I hated it...no, that isn't a strong enough word...as much as I despised it, it was a better plan than I could currently think of in that horrid little room surrounded by reminders of death and stabbing pain. It was, at least, a way forward. "Everyone that will be going with us on our hunt will need to go to The Boughs with us. I do not plan on returning for anyone."

"If it isn't too much trouble, I'd like to go," Cerise said, looking down at the map with the rest of us. Her eyes moved with much more interest than anyone else's, curiosity as to what lay out there beyond our borders burning brightly there. 

Floki frowned at her, scratching his beard. "It's going to be dangerous." 

"Everywhere is dangerous to us now." She said. "I know I'm hardly a warrior, but if your hunt is going to take you to the human lands, then I want to go with you. I want to see the world I was born in."