Notice: This work is not stolen, it's from my website, Alabaster Ink. I'm simply copying it here in hopes that it'll receive some love. So if you happen to have seen this on my personal site, that's why.

It was the sound of singing that first drew the creatures in. It came, clear and calling, across the stream, luring them away from their shadowed camp in the trees. There were six of them, scrawny and spindly things. Their skin ranged from a pasty yellow to pale green, and their teeth were sharp and crooked. Beady black eyes peered out from tangled mats of greasy hair. Each of them stood only about four feet in height, and carried crude weapons made from wood and sharpened bone.

The goblins were cowardly creatures by nature, but when they saw the singer, they immediately began fanning out to encircle their unwary prey. The singer herself was an unusual person. Standing only three feet in height and being slender of frame, she had sweeping dark hair hanging pulled back from her face and was dressed in a sturdy leather traveler's outfit. Threads of steel were sown into it, making it into a kind of light armor, and a sword sized for her hand sat nearby her.

The singer was sitting on a rock bathed in the afternoon sunlight, enjoying a lunch of wayfarer's bread and cheese, complimented by water from the stream in a tin cup. It was meager fare, but that didn't seem to dampen the singer's spirit. She continued her song blissfully unaware of the goblins circling around her, creeping slowly closer to their intended prey.

The singer reached down to the rock, her hand closing on the neck of a mandolin, and began strumming on the instrument in accompaniment to her singing. The goblins crouched quietly in the long grass around them. As one, they leapt up to ambush the small woman.

"Look out!" the call echoed across the hills as a party of four men rushed towards the singer's rescue. The warning had been unnecessary; the singer smoothly sidestepped a goblin's clumsy attempt to grab her and kicked the creature's legs out from under it. Still singing and picking at the strings of her mandolin, she slid to the right as another goblin reached for her.

The men closed the distance quickly and lit into the goblins with a fury. Only one stayed back, and his hands flashed through the intricate signs and weavings of magic as he forced his voice to utter the syllables to summon forth his art. Streaks of light burst forth from his hand, striking one of the creatures in quick succession, lifting it off the ground with every one.

The singer hopped off the rock, and was quickly engaged by two of the goblins. She flitted first one way, then the other, easily evading the clumsy swings made by the ugly creatures. One of the three men that had rushed into combat jumped between the woman and the two creatures, thrusting ahead with a short sword and blocking their attacks on a hard wooden buckler strapped to his other arm.

Seeing that her would-be rescuers had everything well in hand, the singer sat back down on her rock and continued to play her mandolin. The melee was swift and brutal, but ended quickly with four of the goblins down and dying, the other two fled as the men reached for bows and drew beads on their backs. A set of shafts sped through the air, one finding its mark in the center of a fleeing goblin's back. The other went wide and clipped the second creature's shoulder, spurring it on to even greater speeds.

The men all turned to the singer, but only one stepped forward. "Greetings. My name is Daedric," he said with a small, formal bow. "May I know my lady's name?"

Daedric was solidly built, of only average height but with an athletic, muscular frame. He wore the clothes of a nobleman, and carried himself with the bearing of one. A light cloak hung about his shoulders, probably more as a decoration than for actual warmth.

The woman stopped singing and smiled up at Daedric. "Me? Oh, my name is Seraphina. It's very nice to meet you," the replied, sticking a hand out at Daedric for him to shake. Daedric took the hand uncertainly, and Seraphina pumped her arm up and down vigorously.

"I'm Feran," another of the men said. He looked a lot like Daedric, though obviously a good deal younger. It was easily apparent that the two shared a close relation. The other melee fighter introduced himself as Balv, but said little beyond that.

The man who'd cast the magic out of his hands at the goblins approached the gathering. He was tall and thin, and his clothes were eccentric and impractical, but it all seemed to fall together to make a striking impression. His hair, pitch black and cropped close, spiked out from his head, and he wore a disarming grin splayed across his face.

"Larsik," he said by way of introduction.

"Hi, Larsik," Seraphina said, still smiling. Her smile began to slip though, as Larsik stared at her, longer and longer. The small woman was beginning to feel uncomfortable when Feran slapped Larsik across the back.

"Good show with the magical backup," he laughed.

"Yeah," Larsik agreed, pulling his eyes away from Seraphina. Inwardly, she sighed. Like everyone else she'd met, the man didn't know what to make of her. She wasn't a halfling, though she was certainly small enough to be one. Larsik was learned enough to know this, but he wasn't sure what she was then.

"I'm a gnome," Seraphina said to the unspoken question. Larsik half turned, but shook his head and looked away. Daedric wore a puzzled look on his face, while Feran was unaware that anything unusual had happened. Balv simply stood there, occasionally surveying the area around them.

"Well, Seraphina the gnome," Daedric said finally, "you can see that these roads aren't so safe to travel right now. How would you like an escort back to town?" The nobleman extended a hand towards the gnome to help her up from her seat.

"Hmm," Seraphina murmured, her chin in her hand, "Well, what town are you talking about?"

"Garrin, of course. What other towns are there around here?" Daedric replied.

"Oh, I don't know. I'm a traveler, and I'm not really familiar with this area."

"Ah. I understand," Daedric nodded. "Then Garrin is definitely the place to go. It's the center of the whole region, where my father's keep is."

"Well in that case then, I'd be delighted to go with you," Seraphina said with a laugh.

The unusual traveler walked with the men from Garrin for some time, chatting easily with Feran and Larsik. Daedric occasionally chimed in, but for the most part, spent his time watching around them, a frown on his lips and deep creases in his forehead. Balv, for his part, said nothing, and in fact rarely walked with the others.

Seraphina was showing Feran how to play the mandolin, and laughing with Larsik as the younger nobleman produced horrible warbling sounds from it, when Balv jogged up to Daedric and murmured something in a low voice. Immediately, the nobleman's face went dark. He snapped out, "Feran, be silent."

Feran fell quiet instantly, recognizing both his brother's tone and his face. Trouble brewed, he knew. His hand eagerly grasped the hilt of the sword strapped to his waist. Larsik fell quiet as well, and looked more thoughtful than troubled or eager. Seraphina continued on with an easy smile, watching the world around her with wide eyes.

Daedric motioned them all closer towards him. "More goblins," he announced grimly. "Maybe as many as a dozen, holed up nearby in a shallow cave. We need to wipe them out, quick and hard." He turned to Seraphina, then continued, "I'm sorry, but we have to do this. If you continue straight ahead on the road, you should reach Garrin within an hour. Well," he amended with a smile as he looked at her legs, "maybe an hour and a half."

"No, no, that's ok," Seraphina said. "I'll go with you, if you don't mind. I do know how to use this thing, actually." She patted her own sword, then looked around at her new companions as if daring anyone to disagree with her.

No one did, and, with a nod, Daedric motioned everyone to follow Balv. The grim man led them silently off the road and into the brush. They traveled for about five minutes, before Balv held up a hand before them. The party came to a halt, and Balv parted the brush quietly for them to see the cave entrance. Daedric nudged Larsik and gestured first to him, then the cave.

Larsik nodded, then scrounged around on the ground for a second before coming up with a rock. Quietly muttering, he stared at the rock for a few seconds as light began to pour forth from it. He cupped it in his hands, shielding the light, then, with a nod from Daedric, threw it into the cave.

Both of the noblemen and their silent companion charged into the cave, with Seraphina hot on their heels and Larsik bringing up the rear. By the time he walked under the stone roof of the opening, pitched combat had already begun. Several goblins lay dead on the floor as others battled the three humans and single gnome. More goblins poured forth from a secondary room behind the first, these ones armed with crude clubs, spears, and in one case a sword.

True to her word, Seraphina leaped into the fight, whipping her blade about to hack into a goblin, then slipping under its arm and lunging at another behind it. The second goblin caught up her blade with its club, pushing the sword high and shoulder checking her. Seraphina rolled with it and tripped the goblin up as she went down, kicking it over top of her and rolling back to her feet in the same motion.

Beside her, Daedric darted between three goblins, keeping each on the defensive and blocking their assaults with his shield. He had sliced into each of them several times, but had yet to score a definitive hit. Suddenly, bolts of light twined around him and struck two of the goblins, stunning them and allowing Daedric to slit the third open from belly to groin.

Larsik stood in the back, watching the battle with a keen eye and unleashing bolts of magic where he felt it would be most beneficial. He watched Balv do battle with the sword wielding goblin, and, once the goblin had shown that it could be a formidable opponent, launched into another spell, summoning a giant beetle into existence.

His concentration focused on his spell, he missed the goblin Feran was fighting go down. He didn't see the second goblin behind it leap forward and impale the young nobleman's throat with its spear. He didn't know anything like that was happening until he heard Daedric scream his brother's name.

"Feran!" the cry cut through the cavern as Daedric went mad. He hurled his shield into the face of a goblin, then took a two handed grip on his sword and scythed his way through them to his brother. No longer bothering with finesse, he blasted through the spindly creatures' defenses with sheer brutality. It was a matter of seconds to see him across the cave, a trail of seven bodies left behind him.

Daedric reaches his brother, cleaved the goblin's head with his sword, then fell to his knees to check Feran for signs of life. There were some, a flickering pulse, but the life blood pumped from the younger nobleman's neck, thick and steady, then slowed to a trickle.

"No!" Daedric howled as he rose in a rage. He charged forward, heedless of the crude bone axe wielded by a nearby goblin. Blood splattered on the cave floor, but onward Daedric rushed.

He punched through the goblins near him, lashing out at any who got too close. Seraphina squeaked as his sword cut by, barely missing her, and wisely dropped back. Between Daedric and Balv, the rest of the goblins were soon routed, and the enraged nobleman chased them down relentlessly. Seraphina approached Feran, checked him, and found him already faded away.

"That's a shame," she said, pulling her mandolin off her back. She strummed a quiet, somber melody, one that Larsik had never heard before. He stood silently by while she played a song of lament for the fallen man.

Daedric returned several minutes later. He stopped at the cave entrance and listened to the woman play, then approached when the song had finished.

"Your end shouldn't have come this way," he muttered to his brother's body.