Chapter 1: The Odd Goblin
On the Ebon Realm, within the ashen trees of Vulture Woods, an odd child was born to a goblin tribe. He was a goblin, yes, but odd. He was smaller than the rest of the goblins, and where most babies were a shade of chubby forest green, he was a sickly blue. Not sickly because of the color blue - in fact he had a few traces of cyan - but because he came out frail, scrawny even.
He coughed incessantly the first few nights. The goblin Mothers were annoyed by the baby’s wheezing, saying it only denoted his weakness. Some of the hunters found it odd that the Mothers would find coughing annoying, after all they were surrounded by crying babies. But after First Mother knocked one hunter out cold, the rest quickly decided to stay quiet.
Most of the tribe thought the baby wouldn’t survive the first week, but he did, which simply made him more odd. To the bewilderment of the Mothers it took two entire weeks for him to finally open his eyes. Even stranger, while the child had slit pupils like them, he had lilac eyes too. They had never seen a goblin with lilac irises, although they had never seen one with blue skin either. Had he been born albino they would have burned him over the fire pit and had him for dinner; tragically, he was instead born odd. His name was Stryg.
For the most part the first few years of his life were the same as other younglings, Stryg was raised collectively by the goblin Mothers. They taught him the most important things in life, such as how to hide from wolves prowling the ashen trees of Vulture Woods.
The cooks showed him how to skin a rabbit or even better, how to skin and cook goblins from rival tribes. Stryg ate enemy flesh like any other upstanding goblin, especially when the tribe managed to get the rare prize, salt.
Although, if Stryg had to be honest with himself he much preferred eating venison. Sadly, deer wasn’t very common in the area, what with wolves and all. Of course, most goblins hated the taste of venison anyway, so Stryg had learned not to request any from the hunters; that and he wasn’t very popular with them.
All Stryg wanted was to be strong like the hunters. So, when Sigte, one of the older and more eccentric hunters, offered to give him private training lessons, Stryg couldn’t have been more ecstatic.
Unfortunately, Stryg hadn’t expected the lessons to be about drawing strange symbols on the ground with a stick. Sigte called it the dangerous technique of words. He said it was a powerful weapon, in the right battle, a different kind of strength. Stryg had a difficult time believing him since the goblin laughed as he spoke about this so-called reading thing.
Stryg knew there were different kinds of strength though, like Crovor, the tribe’s venerable shaman, who could make fire with his mind. And since Stryg had no other hunter willing to teach him, he gave it his all to learn the strange technique of writing.
It had taken him over two years to master the skill. But, when he went to proudly present the squiggly symbols he had drawn to the other goblins, they all laughed at him. Stryg had run off in shame, his face a shade of dark blue. He was no longer odd, now he was just weird.
As for Sigte, he had gone on a hunt one day and came across a dire bear. All the hunters found of the bear mauling was Sigte’s broken bow and left shoe.
So much for the special technique of words.
At least the Mothers had taught Stryg important matters. Especially the most important life lesson of all, “The strongest get what they want, so be the strongest.” Such a simple yet profound lesson, Stryg mused.
He was closer to being the weakest, but that didn’t stop him from dreaming. He was grateful to the Mothers for their teachings, even if he was one of the few goblins who didn’t actually view the Mothers as parental figures.
None of them were actual mothers. Most goblins didn’t know who their parents were. It was almost impossible to tell who a goblin’s father was, since most goblins were polyamorous. As for the women, birth mothers gave their babies to the tribe’s Mothers immediately after birth, so the goblin could be raised not as an individual but as part of a collective, part of the tribe. After all, a lone goblin would get picked off by the wolf packs, but a group of goblins could slay a dire bear.
Goblins didn’t bother telling the young who their actual birth mothers were. All except for Stryg, he knew about his mom. Some of the Mothers had made it abundantly clear that she had died during his birth, a bad omen sent from Lunae, the moon goddess herself.
Stryg guessed his mom had been weak, how else could she have died in labour while the rest lived. To be honest, he didn’t really care much for her death, he never knew her. All he knew was that she had passed on her weakness to him. He cursed her for that. As for the bad omen, he knew he looked different from the rest, with his grey hair, and strange skin. He didn’t even want to think about his pale purple eyes, they were practically pink for moon's sake! He wished he had bright yellow eyes like the rest.
Stryg was now seventeen years old but still quite skinny, not that any goblin was very stocky. But Stryg somehow managed to look wiry besides the other youth, despite being an inch or two shorter. His smaller build had made it harder to follow the hunters on their trails, or even train with them in the village square.
Stryg always fell behind the more resilient goblins his age, no matter how much he tried. And he did try, he was the first of the young to wake and the last to go to sleep. He practiced the spear and bow for twice as long as the rest.
Though he had some success with the spear his bow skills left much to desire. He simply didn’t have the strength to properly pull the bow string back. When it came to hand-to-hand combat, Stryg always came last. He had memorized the basic moves, he was even agile enough, but he just didn’t have the suitable strength to take down another goblin. Which of course, caused the others to laugh at him behind his back, some even to his face. Normally, one would fight back, but Stryg had learned early in his life that he wasn’t very strong. So, he simply swallowed his anger and ignored the ridicule.
One morning, he crawled up from his straw mat and looked around the tent at the fellow goblins, they were all still asleep. Stryg knew he should be sleeping too, after all, he’d need his strength for tonight’s challenge, but he was too excited.
He quietly crawled around his sleeping brothers and walked out of the tent. The sun was only beginning to peek through the forest’s red canopy.
Today would be different, Stryg swore to himself.
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