Unicorn Point

Sirel whirled on the other, her own knife flashing. The gobliness, startled by the fall of her companion, was slow to counter, and Sirel’s knife plunged into her chest. She sighed and collapsed, looking so woebegone that Sirel felt horribly guilty. She wanted to stop and try to help the girl, but she remembered two things: her mission, and the warning about supposedly dead goblins. She turned away.  An arrow swished by her. Was Forel firing at her? Then something touched her leg, behind. She jumped and turned—and found the stabbed gobliness, fallen on her face, her arm outstretched, knife still in hand. Forel had caught her with the arrow as she tried to stab Sirel in the back. She had indeed not been quite dead! She had pretended to be more grievously wounded than she was, so as to put Sirel off guard, and it had worked. Except for Forel’s alertness.  Sirel went up to the flag. She climbed the tree and took it down. But as she touched the ground, another goblin appeared. His mouth opened—and Forel’s third arrow smashed into that open mouth and through the head.  Sirel tucked the flag out of sight in her clothing. She walked by Forel’s bush. “We must go!” she whispered.

“Thou must walk, masquerading,” he whispered back. “I will follow concealed and guard thee.”

She nodded. It was the best way. She had the flag, but she was not yet out of the goblin region. The longer she could pass for a gobliness, the better.

She walked back toward the region of the blue flag. All around were the bodies of wolves and of goblins; the carnage was horrible. She was glad that this was a siege and not a real battle; it certainly looked real!

A goblin staggered back from the front. “More troops!  More troops!” he gasped, seeing Sirel. “They ambushed the tunnel; we took awful losses! All’s lost unless—”

“Let me bandage that arm,” she said, realizing that she still had a part to play. She bent to rip the material of a dead gob’s shirt, to make a bandage. The goblin would not suspect her of being a wolf, this way!

“No time!” he protested. “Got to put in our reserves!”

“The ones guarding the flag are dead,” she said. “Wolves broke through. There was a terrible fight, and the wolves are dead, but so are the goblins.”

He sagged. “Then all be lost.” Then he looked more closely at her, as she approached him with a strip of cloth.  “In which case, might as well have some fun.” He grabbed for her.

Oops! Maybe she had played it too well. “Wait, let me bandage thee first! Thine arm—”

“Bandage me second,” he said, catching hold of her with his good arm, with surprising strength. He bore her back against a tree, crowding close.

Then he sagged. An arrow had sprouted from his back.

Forel had struck yet again.

But the delay had been critical. Now more gobs were straggling back from the front. “Hey, look what we got!” one cried, seeing Sirel.

“Change and run!” Forel cried. “I will hold them here!” She didn’t argue; she knew they would catch her, rape her, and soon discover her nature and kill her, in the process stop ping her ploy with the flag. She assumed wolf form and leaped away to the side, seeking the cover of brush.  “Wolf! Wolf!” the goblins cried, recovering excitement.

“Catch the bitch!”

But the first to start after her was felled by an arrow. The others whirled at this new menace. Much as they liked raping girls of any species, they liked living more. As Sirel reached the brush, she saw them closing in on Forel who, retaining manform, was methodically putting arrows through them. But she knew his supply was limited; he had already expended several in the course of guarding her. There were too many gobs; they would get him and kill him. So it was that Forel sacrificed himself to spring her free, and she had no choice but to accept.

She burst through to the wolf section of the range. Here the gob tunnel debouched. Goblins lay all around, and there was a huge pile of them in the depot; evidently in the end there had been too many bodies for the cleanup crew to drag, so they had been left. A few wolves were licking their wounds, getting ready to resume duty.

She looked to the blue flag—and it was gone! The gobs must have gotten it! But they had not brought it back to their own flag. It must be somewhere in between.  She assumed girlform. “Where be the flag?” she called to the nearest wolf.

He looked at her—and growled. Suddenly all the few wolves of the vicinity were growling, coming for her.  “Wait!” she cried. “This be but a costume. I be no gob girl!” She changed back to wolf form, to prove it.  They relaxed. One of them turned out to be Kurrelgyre.

He was wounded, but could still fight. “Didst get it?”

“Aye!” she said, returning to girlform and pulling out the red flag.