CHAPTER 17: Lower Scum

I turned and raised my hand. The axe it was holding glistened, hungry in the dim cavern. But I halted at the familiar form and the sound of a high-pitched voice. "Honored Clanfriend, the King of this clan, Blecs, asks that you come safely to them!" His gravelly little voice was surprisingly loud. I quickly turned back to the faces in the darkness, but the 'ENEMY' indictor was gone, and the feet of little humanoids pitter-pattered into the darkness. I didn't put the axe away, however, until I was within a dozen paces of King Blecs. Threepaw briefly told him what happened, and King Blecs replied.

"I am the leader of this group, true, but there is always someone who wants it for themselves. I've always been the smartest, but even while my intelligence grows, it is beginning to not be enough. You're lucky she was there."

"Lucky who was there?" I asked. "There was only me and Threepaw."

"It is to Threepaw that I refer." Said King Blecs, with his eyebrow raised. "Without her, I'm not sure what would have happened." I looked at Threepaw, then, feeling a little bit sheepish. How was I supposed to know she was a girl? Didn't Blecs refer to her as a him? Or was that just me? I found myself thinking back to all the times that Threepaw said 'they' and 'them'. I thought back to when Blecs told me she'd serve as my 'squire'. Suddenly, I thought about something that I'd read within the last month some time. Something about the requirements for being a 'Soldier'.

"Of course, you're right, King Blecs. In addition, she is a wonderful squire." This time Threepaw seemed to be sheepish. Her dirty little cheeks even blushed a little. "About that," I said, "Since I have a squire now, and I'm a Clanfriend and all, that means I'm part of your army, right? Or is everyone here? I was wondering what my title was." At this, Blecs paused. I could almost see the gears turning as a slow second passed while he thought.

"…Yes…" He began nodding slowly. "Yes, of course. The first title any goblin has is 'Lower Scum'. That is where you will start." He waited for a moment, perhaps thinking that I would protest, but the system didn't really care what he called me, so why would I? I summoned the interface in front of me to verify and was happy with the results.

Soldier. Spend 10,000 hours as an active member of a military unit.

20/10,000 (RANK; LOWER SCUM)

"Yes, of course" then I added "sir!" because it felt appropriate. Blecs was silent for a moment, but he must have made up his mind about something, because he smiled then, and I noticed a small indicator above his head, and the head of Threepaw. Thankfully, these indicators were not the familiar red 'ENEMY' indicators that I was used to seeing. Instead, they were blue. The one over Threepaw said 'LOWER SCUM'. Huh. Interesting. So Blecs wasn't just calling me names. As a member of Blecs army, or because of the system, more likely, I found that I had an intuitive understanding of the structure of enlisted ranks. 'Lower Scum' was like a 'private', and as I turned to the self-proclaimed goblin king Blecs, his blue indicator simply said, 'COLONEL'. Somehow, I was sure that he'd just fought his way up the ranks. Call me a skeptic, but I didn't think that he'd been to officer school.

"Then you'll be abiding by the regular rules." He said, "Fight the enemies of the Goblins. Do not attack the allies of our army. And add to the wealth of your clan." An innocent little smirk found its way to his features. "Clanfriend, you are not a goblin, though. I will expect much food from you in order to prove your loyalty. Let's call it your dues and say that you owe twice what you'd eat. This shouldn't be a problem. After all, the bear has made a large profit to the larder, and this town you speak of should have at least enough to cover any debts you have. Isn't that right?"

"More than enough." I agreed. I thought about the village and its food stores and tried not to think about what else these creatures considered food. "But I want to do this my way." We went over the distance and direction to Willow's edge – he was familiar with the area, even though he'd obviously never been to visit. I laid out my simple plan: I'd go in and create a diversion, and the goblins would move in. Simple. Blecs was not impressed.

"I won't be having you march in there and warning the children away" snapped the 'Colonel' coldly. "or worse, switching sides."

"There are no children in Willow's Edge." I said truthfully. All the children leave for Mirtulfield after Harvest time for school or work. They'd stay there until planting time, too. I explained as much to Blecs, but he still seemed troubled.

"I'm still not letting you go alone. You'll take an escort." He looked to my side at little Threepaw, who, until now, had been nodding along dumbly, almost able to pretend that she understood what we were speaking about. We were speaking in goblin, of course, but while Threepaw seemed smarter than a run-of-the-mill goblin, she wasn't exactly Blecs. It had become more and more obvious over the small time that I'd spent with him that most – if not all – of the attribute points that he'd earned had been put into INTELLIGENCE… but a genius, Threepaw was not.

"Wait," I said, feeling a little slow myself, " No. No WAY. She'll stick out like a sore thumb!"

"Their complexion looks human enough to pass from faraway. I suggest that while you make your distraction, you keep your distance." Then, switching to Dwarven for a moment, he said quickly, "You'll uhh… definitely need to give them a bath." As he said this, he produced a pile of cloth that heaped over his arms as he held it. He then handed it to Threepaw. To her he said in Goblin, "A gift for the Squire" he announced it while doing his best to be regal. "This disguise is to celebrate their promotion to 'Scum'. Continue to follow this human's orders, until at any time, they go against mine." Then to me, he continued, "That makes you Scum, too. Assuming that you can lead us to Willow's Edge, you'll be promoted all the way to (corporal)." Instead of 'corporal', it seemed like he just made a snarling noise. Or maybe it was just something that the system couldn't quite translate from Goblin. Either way, his meaning came across.

"But what about her tracks?!" I protested. Even if she had shoes on to hide her toes, goblins have an awkward, waddling gait to their walk. I've noticed it before, but there was a good chance that in boots to hide the shape of her footprint, the strange spacing of her tracks wouldn't be noted. Not that I'd admit it.

"Can you think of no way that such a thing might be disguised?" Asked the pompous little king gazing toward my boots. I looked down at my own feet. At the Boots of False Tracks. He was right. Damn.

I should have known not to expect to go in alone. It was too much to hope that the boots wouldn't fit Threepaw – magical items like these resize themselves to fit the wearer. I really was planning my own distraction. I was in the earliest stages of planning, but I really was planning! Now, after talking with Blecs for a bit, and tracing some crude maps in the ground and taking care of some other little odds and ends, the only thing that I was planning was how to drag her into a washing basin.

"Well, Threepaw," I said after the king dismissed us, "All of this planning has really made me want some more beer." Her face brightened, and she led the way back to the larder. There I found a large empty barrel and used Create Water to fill it. Threepaw's eyes widened in what looked like shock as I grabbed a nearby bit of cloth that seemed not to have much grease on it. Shock turned into terror as I produced a bar of soap from my inventory. She screamed a little as she ran, but I was too fast for her. I would have rather fought that bear again than had to bathe Threepaw – especially after she tried to bite me! But after a few good scratches and bruises, she was surprisingly clean. It wasn't until she was partially washed that I realized that the goblin king was right – her skin tone EXACTLY matched a human. She'd been so dirty that I thought she was much darker. The cloth that Blecs had given her turned out to be a set of what I recognized as traveler's clothes. They were sized for her - actually, the system probably sized them for Blecs – and certainly helped.

We set off early the next day, mostly travelling in the dark and sleeping huddled . The other goblins around us were noticing Threepaw. Changing their pace to peer into her face. Blecs clearly noticed, too. "I can't believe that they are so clean", he said. "I've never seen a living goblin with so little dirt."

Threepaw spoke then. "Was easy to wash Threepaw. They are a very brave one." At a look from me, she went on to explain, speaking more of her bravery: "During the whole torture, Threepaw didn't even use their knife!" Then looking into my eyes, said in an ice-cold voice, "And Threepaw DEFINITELY could have."

I recoiled a little at this but put it out of my mind as we set off to Willow's Edge.