The Goblin Warrior (Beneath Sands Book 2) by Emma Hamm (100 books to read txt) 📕

She swallowed hard, but bent until her knees hit the soft sand. The woman’s head tilted slightly towards her and Jane touched the corner of the woman’s mouth. Her hand came away with a black spot of blood upon it.

“What is your name?” She asked quietly. Her hand stroked the hair away from the woman’s forehead. There was no response to her question.

The wound upon the woman’s stomach was revealed to her. Jane stared into the gaping dark abyss that used to be smooth skin. There was no way to fix what had been done.

“Can you help her?” The words were said first in the goblin language, and then repeated back to her.

Her hand pressed down upon the cloth against the wound as Jane measured her choices. Eventually, she let out a soft breath and nodded.

Once more, she tried to gain the woman’s attention. But as she tilted the pale face towards her, Jane saw no recognition in her eyes.

“Yes.” She said quietly. “I can help her.”

Her hand rested upon her hip, where the goblins had given her a knife to carry. Her fingertips brushed against the stone handle. Once more, she felt as though time moved slowly as she brushed her thumb over the woman’s high cheekbone.

The goblins were so focused upon the woman in their lap, that they did not notice her movements.

Jane leaned down to brush her lips against the woman’s forehead. “Your pain ends here.”

The blade parted the skin at the woman’s neck easily. Jane had pushed down with enough force to sink the obsidian blade nearly to her spine. It was a killing strike. The woman breathed her last quickly and in the arms of creatures she did not understand.

There was complete silence until the rattling sound of the woman’s breath ended. Then the soft keening sounds began.

Jane had never killed someone before. Not like this. But she was silent as the goblins around her mourned for a woman they had never known. Her spine remained straight and her stature regal until she could no longer stand their cries.

She scrambled to her feet and stumbled away from the scene.

Everything around her was a massacre. There was blood splattered upon sand and now it stained her hands. Black was streaked across her clothing and gleamed all around her.

Her eyes looked upon the bodies that littered once pristine land and she wondered how long it would take until this blood swallowed them all.

A little bit of that darkness sank inside her. It swirled around her mind until everything became numb. The whirl of emotions within her slowed and then stilled.

She turned towards the goblins that rocked back and forth over the body of the woman. Their hands hovered above her as though she was something precious. They had no way of knowing it was likely the woman had been born into slavery and had never known a soft touch in her life.

If she had survived, the goblins would have given her a good life. She could have returned underground and been taken care of. She might have known peace.

Jane shook her head at the thought. The woman was dead. There was no use lingering upon what could have been.

Goblins were not meant to see the death of something they held so sacred. Jane slowly let out a breath and walked back towards the creatures who needed her strength. She now understood how necessary it was for the males of this species to have a female with them. They needed someone to be strong for them when everything fell apart.

Her hand touched Ruric’s shoulder. He rocked back towards her and her hand traveled in a soft stroke from his shoulder to his cheek. As she pressed his face into her stomach, she stared up at the twin moons above them.

The moons stared solemnly down at her blood splattered body.

“Come on you big brute.”

The words were said loudly, though they had been muttered for many days now. Simon was close to the City. He could hear the chatter of people and the tinkering noises of metal. That was the beauty of his home.

Now that the dangers of the sands were gone, Simon only had to worry about other people taking what was his. Right now, that was the goblin that he was towing behind him.

“Come on, we’re almost there now!”

He had thrown a blanket over the creature. It was sensitive to the light, but Simon was not. He refused to stop for an animal that was simply being stubborn. He had read the books about breaking wild stallions from long ago. Simon had never seen a horse before, but he assumed that the same tricks could be used upon the creature he dragged behind him.

He had no way of knowing that because he had forced the goblin to walk during the bright sunlight, he had blinded it.

The goblin’s feet were bleeding from the heat of the sands. His skin was peeling from dehydration. What little fight the young warrior had left drained from him as soon as the sun had touched his skin.

Finally, Simon could see the stone walls of the City. They gleamed in the sunlight and caused bright sparks of light to blink in his eyes. Home. He had missed this place.

Simon had a plan that would get him back within those walls. He had been banished, sent to work in the mines because they had thought he would die. But he was stronger than that. Now he would walk back into the City with a test subject they had never dreamed possible.

They would let him back in. They would give him whatever he wanted. A house. A wife. Food. Water. Gods how he wanted water.

He lick his lips and stalked past the line of people standing outside the City wall. They waited on the off chance they might be allowed inside the walls. There were always a few that were chosen to come inside, but only for a few hours. It was better