Thornscales Arrive At The Citadel

The morning was quiet in a way that had nothing to do with sound. Goblins moved through their routines on the battlements. The wind came from the south, carrying smoke from the cookfires and the green smell of the hills.

Falwan was halfway through the morning's supply ledger when the sentry horn sounded. An approach pattern: two short notes, then a long one. Something coming up the road from the south.

She set the ledger down and climbed to the gate tower.

Helba was already there, crouched on the parapet with her arms crossed over the stone, watching the road. She did not look up when Falwan arrived. "Ack. Small-folk." She pointed. "Eight. Maybe nine. Moving slow."

Falwan followed her gesture. A line of figures picked their way along the switchback trail below the citadel's southern approach. Short. Scaled. Moving with the careful pace of people who were not entirely sure of their legs.

"Kobolds," Falwan said.

"Know that." Helba shifted her weight from one foot to the other. "Question is whose."

They watched. The lead figure, slightly taller than the rest, carried a walking stick fashioned from three different branches lashed together with vine. Behind him, the others moved in a loose cluster, some helping one another over the rougher patches of trail. One of them had a bundle strapped across her back that was nearly as large as she was. Another kept stopping to look up at the citadel walls, mouth open.

As they reached the final approach, the lead kobold stopped. He squared his narrow shoulders. He looked up at the gate, jaw set, blinking too fast.

Then he called out, in accented Common that cracked slightly on the second word: "We are, ah... we are the Thornscales! Friends of the sun-priestess and the sky-touched one! We were told... we were told there is a place for us here!"

Helba looked at Falwan. Falwan looked at Helba.

"Nadira mentioned them," Falwan said. "The Cinderclaw mine in the Mwangi↗. Arsenic poisoning. She healed them and sent them this direction." She paused. "That was months ago."

Helba's eyes narrowed. "Months."

Falwan nodded.

Helba leaned over the parapet. "Open the gate!" she barked to the goblins below. Then, louder, pitched to carry down the approach road: "You! Thornscales! Come in! Ack! You look terrible!"

The gate groaned open. The Thornscales filed through in a line, blinking at the courtyard, at the goblin sentries watching from the walls, at the sheer size of the fortress around them. The youngest, a female with amber scales, turned a complete circle in the middle of the courtyard, head tilted back, staring at the towers.

Krezek planted his walking stick in the ground and bowed. His clothes were filthy and his scales had lost their sheen, but the bow was precise. "I am Krezek. Spokesman of the Thornscales. We come..." He faltered. Started again. "We come seeking the sanctuary that was offered to us by the heroes who, who healed us in the Mwangi. The priestess. The goblin oracle. The others."

Falwan descended from the tower and crossed the courtyard to meet them. She crouched, which brought her closer to Krezek's eye level. She counted heads, noted the frayed packs, the way two of the kobolds leaned on each other for support.

"Eight of you?"

"Nine." Krezek gestured behind him. The ninth, smallest of the group, was half-hidden behind a larger companion, peering around scaled shoulders with wide, anxious eyes. "Tikra is... she is shy of new places. She will warm."

"The party told you to come here," Falwan said. It was not a question, but she waited for confirmation anyway.

"The sun-priestess. Yes. She described this place. A fortress with goblins and kobolds already living together. She said..." Krezek swallowed. "She said strong friendships make communities stronger."

"That does sound like Nadira." Falwan stood. "You're welcome here. We'll sort out quarters, food, and work once you've rested. Helba runs the garrison. She'll explain how things work."

"We can work!" Krezek said quickly. "We are miners. We know stone. We know tunnels. We can, we can be useful. We are not asking for charity. We will earn."

Falwan looked at him for a moment. She had heard this speech before, from other people in other places: the urgent need to prove that shelter would not be wasted on them.

"You'll earn," she said. "But today you rest. That's not optional."

Helba had climbed down from the wall and now stood with her hands on her hips. She paced the length of their line, looking each kobold up and down. They shifted nervously under her attention.

"Mining," she said. "Ack. You know stone?"

Krezek nodded. "Stone, ore assessment, tunnel shoring. It was our, our life's work before the Cinderclaws took it from us."

Helba stopped pacing. "Good. Walls need work. Lower east section, the mortar's been crumbling since before Helba's time. You fix walls?"

"We can fix walls."

"Then we talk tomorrow." She jabbed a clawed finger toward the kitchens. "Food first. Ack! You're skinnier than goblins, and goblins are already too skinny." She turned to one of the sentries. "Fetch Pib and Zarf! They should meet their kin."

"Not kin," Krezek said. "Not the same clan. But... kobold-kind."

Helba waved this distinction away. "Close enough. Pib and Zarf have been wanting to be important. Now they get to show the new small-folk around. Ack! Keeps them busy, keeps them out of Helba's stores." She paused, then added, in a slightly different tone: "They are good. Annoying, but good. They will help."

There was a clatter of small feet on stone, and then Pib and Zarf arrived at speed, skidding around the corner from the eastern passage. Pib got there first, which Pib would later confirm was deliberate and not because Zarf had tripped on a flagstone. Zarf arrived half a second later, which Zarf would maintain was the result of a strategic choice to guard the rear.

Both of them stopped short when they saw the Thornscales.

Nine pairs of kobold eyes looked at two pairs of kobold eyes.

Pib recovered first. He drew himself up to his full, modest height. "Welcome to the domain of the Mighty Dragons Pib and Zarf! We are the defenders of this citadel! We have a hoard of four silver pieces and we killed a cultist once!"

"I threw the stone," Zarf added. "The big one."

"It was MY stone," Pib said.

"You threw the small one."

"We are arguing about this LATER." Pib turned back to Krezek with enormous dignity. "You are kobolds. This is good. The goblins are fine but they do not understand proper hoarding practices. Come. We will show you where the best sleeping spots are. There is a room with a draft but the ceiling is very high and the echo is good for, for telling important stories about your deeds."

Krezek looked at Falwan. She nodded.

"Go with them. They know the citadel better than anyone except Helba, and they won't admit it but she knows it better."

"We heard that!" Pib called over his shoulder, already leading the procession toward the eastern wing.

Krezek fell into step beside Pib. After a moment, hesitantly: "You said... four silver pieces?"

"The beginning of the hoard," Pib said. "There will be more."

"We had a hoard once," Krezek said quietly. "Before the Cinderclaws."

Pib glanced up at him. The bluster dropped.

"Then you will build a new one," Pib said. "We will show you how."

The procession disappeared into the eastern corridor. The youngest Thornscale, Tikra, lingered at the entrance, looking back at the open courtyard, at the sky above the walls. Then she turned and followed.

Helba watched them go. She made a sound in her throat, not quite a word.

"Nine more mouths," she said.

"Nine more hands for the walls," Falwan replied.

"Ack. Falwan always does the math."

"Someone has to."

Helba hopped down from the barrel she had climbed onto at some point during the exchange and walked toward the kitchens. Where to put them. How the watch rotation would shift. What the food stores looked like through the winter.

"Falwan."

"Yes?"

"Where were they? Months on the road from the Mwangi?"

Falwan considered this. "I'll ask Krezek when he's rested. But kobolds in unfamiliar territory, no guide, no map, trying to find a specific fortress in Isger↗ from directions given in a jungle..." She shrugged. "I'm surprised they found us at all."

Helba grunted. "Good navigators don't get lost for months."

"Good navigators aren't usually crossing a continent on foot with nothing but a bone token and a promise."

Helba didn't answer that. She went to count the stores.

The courtyard settled back into its rhythms. The wind still carried that faint warmth from wherever the gods had touched the stones.