Nine Goblins

by T Kingfisher

Episode 1 – Episode 2 – Episode 3 – Episode 4 – Episode 5 – Episode 6

The goblins approved of the zucchini, in goblin fashion. They sat around the table on barrels, crates, and anything else that would hold them, complaining happily.

“This is terrible!”

“Worst zucchini I’ve ever seen! Looks like baked dog turds!”

“And they’re gritty! Did you even wash them?”

“What’s with this bread? I could use it to fix my boots!”

“I think this butter’s about to turn.”

The Nineteenth polished off three bowls apiece, five loaves of zucchini bread, and Mishkin and Mushkin were licking the casserole dish clean. (Continue Reading…)

Nine Goblins

by T Kingfisher

Episode 1 – Episode 2 – Episode 3 – Episode 4 – Episode 5

The farmhouse was very quiet.

It was too quiet.

Generally when people say it’s “too quiet,” it’s a prelude to a monster with a lot of teeth jumping out of the grass. In this case, however, since the only thing that could qualify as monsters with a lot of teeth were the goblins themselves, it was just plain too quiet.

The farmhouse was a small sod building—and that was odd, too, since there was a whole forest right there, and who builds out of sod when they have wood?—and the fences were the low dry-stone affairs that look cute and quirky and charming until you realize they’re made of all the rocks that some poor farmer had to haul out of a field by hand.

There was wood, but not much. The timbers were in place only where nothing else would do. A few scattered tree stumps around the farm showed where they had probably come from.

It was a neatly kept yard, with a thatch roof and a small henhouse and a pigpen. Around back, a low stable held three empty stalls.

It was very, very quiet. (Continue Reading…)

Nine Goblins

by T Kingfisher

Episode 1 – Episode 2 – Episode 3 – Episode 4

Sings-to-Trees stood on his porch, a cup of tea in one hand, and frowned into the darkness.

He wasn’t particularly scared of the dark. He knew most of what lurked in it, and had occasionally removed thorns from their paws. And although he was careful never to rely on it, he was fairly certain that there was an understanding among the smarter denizens of the forest that he and his farm were off-limits. He suspected he’d been lumped in with the little birds that pick the teeth of crocodiles, something too useful to waste on a whim.

For the predators that went on two legs, there were always the trolls. A desperate man had come to the farm once, and he’d been much more desperate after the trolls got him cornered on the roof and the gargoyle sat on his head. He’d been positively grateful to see the rangers when they came to take him away.

Sings-to-Trees had lived out here for years, more or less by himself, and never had any particular cause to fear the dark.

Still…

There was something odd about the dark tonight. (Continue Reading…)