I gazed out across the warrens of my youth and picked out the notable landmarks from the mess. A good chunk of the mountain was hollow, from where I stood at maybe two-thirds the way up the wall to well below what was surface level outside. The warrens sprawled out across most of that space, from the mushroom farms stretched across the bowled out curve of the cavern floor to the precarious perch of the Drake’s Roost.

It was the latter I’d be visiting today. It rose from the warrens beneath like a mountain among smaller, shittier mountains. The architects, if you wanted to be generous enough to use the term, responsible lacked the skill to construct the sheer faces of a human towers and the Drake’s Roost represented their best imitation. Having never seen the real deal, it was impressive enough for the average chieftain looking to inflate their own importance, hence the tradition of naming it after whoever held power at the moment.

It would be called something different now. It had played host to Drakul’s war meetings ever since he’d swept in and displaced Arrakai Strongnoggin. It would be Stel’s Roost now, or Stel’s Perch, or whatever inane name happened to stroke her ego. It wouldn’t really matter, except to confirm she was still here. If she wasn’t… I still had to kill someone to gain the form I wanted and it would be a shame to kill anyone else.

But no, I could still make out the red and brown of Drakul’s banner on the sides of the Roost, complete with the faint outline of his fang and wing insignia. Those colors would be Stel’s now, as befitted his second. Drakul’s legacy as a powerful warlord would be tempting to many, but there wasn’t a goblin alive who would dare to fly his colors without Stel’s permission.

For all his power Drakul had worked hard to inspire love and loyalty in his troops alongside the more natural fear. Stel had not.

Her life was mine, but any life was easier claimed than taken. Stel’s more so than most. She hadn’t earned her status as second to the most dangerous warlord in the Devain Mountains by sitting on her ass and growing fat. Conventional attacks wouldn’t work, even Garret’s fine blades might not be enough.

Fortunately unconventional attacks were a staple of the goblin curriculum.

I reached out and drummed my fingers on the post next to me. I would have thought Stel would have worked harder to preserve what Drakul had left behind, but the rope stretching off towards the warrens proper was sagged and rotten. It was no longer functional as a rapid transport for the high lookouts to report, instead serving as a home to bats.

I sighed and turned away. Perhaps the zip line was still navigable, but I was looking to strike from nowhere and be gone, not arrive in a flock of bats. It was the long way for me.

That meant going up. The safe and stable stairs leading down to the cavern floor were left alone and forlorn behind me as I took the half assembled trail upwards instead.

There wasn’t much higher than where I already was, but a handful of pathways had been anchored along the cavern roof. It was a project that demanded near constant shaman attention to plant the anchors that the rest of the structure would rest on. Given the reluctance of your average shaman to lower themselves to such petty things as menial labor it came as no surprise to see the structure unfinished.

The heavy decking died out by the time I was halfway up, replaced by sparser scaffolding left over from the construction. After so long in the jungle the height didn’t frighten me even if the relative exposure of the scaffolding was unnerving. There just wasn’t enough of the structure left to offer the same concealment.

Particularly by the end. There was little left but the raw support beams, rough-hewn pine trunks rooted into the wall as firmly as they’d been to the mountainside in life. I leapt from trunk to trunk slowly, taking each jump as it came, landing heavily with scrabbling claws before finding my balance and taking the next one. It took me longer than I might have hoped. God, I hoped my new form offered some way of dealing with the added weight. If it didn’t…

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I shook off the self-doubt. I had reached my destination.

The structure was more complete than the path to it, supports and connecting beams forming a hollow skeleton empty of flesh. You could see the signs were the organs would have been, denser scaffolding outlining the placement of the great weights and pulleys meant to be the beating heart of this place.

I set out across one of the great struts that held this place together. Solid old growth, long enough we’d had to bore a new entrance just to take it in. For all that effort, all to support the weight of one goblin. It performed the task admirably at least.

Things became a little more sketchy when I reached the next support intersection, but only a little. The vertical log holding this whole thing aloft was lashed to three others with heavy rope and pitch, forming an uneven blob to sink my claws into.

With solid purchase for my toes I swung out over the corner and moved on to the next strut. I was a real bastard, doing this to myself. Climbing up to some balance beam countless feet above the cold hard stone when I could just walk. What were the chances that anybody really remembered one goblin?

I didn’t turn or even pause. Whatever my self-recriminations might be, I knew perfectly well what would happen if I went down there. Best case scenario I got drafted into some work gang or another, worst case someone did recognize me. The tribe didn’t tolerate exiles coming back.

That was kind of the point of exiling them. I scratched the spot just off-center of my collar bone. It still itched where it’d been branded.

I was scuttling on all fours, face mere inches from the wood I was so low to the beam when I picked up a scent. I slowed to a stop, softly sniffling. A scent wasn’t weird, there were always scents, but this was a new one. Not quite the aged pine scent or the reek of set pitch, but something with a bit more… hair.

I scrunched my nose up against my face, nostrils flaring. Fuck. There weren’t many in the tribe that could hope to find me when I wasn’t interested in being found. Fewer still would possess any ability to challenge me in direct combat after they found me, not with all I’d gained. But that number wasn’t none.

I crept forward with a newfound haste. The scent felt old, but it always did with him. I didn’t know what he was bothering with up here, but I aimed to pass through and be on my way before he was back. The big ol’ winch-cranks should still be here. A bit of oil in the disused gears and I’d be descending like a spider from her web. Stel would never see me coming and nobody up here would either, not without a sudden career change from sneak to engineer.

When I reached the one open space Drakul had managed to finish I was beginning to think I’d make it. The winch-houses were a central feature of the construction, and had been finished before many other parts had even started, with further construction radiating outward over time. It even had an actual floor, splintered planks laid out to facilitate the transfer of lumber from the winches outward to new construction.

I scurried across the shadowed floor, [Soft Step] killing any sound my footfalls might have made. I disappeared through the open doorway of the winch-house without pausing, sliding to the side as soon as I was in. I crouched next to the threshold, eyes adjusting to the increased light as I scanned the inside. It was properly floored, but only in a thin catwalk around and between the two massive holes beneath each half of the winch mechanism. One hole was full, a rough amalgam of loose rubble and boulders stopping it up.

The other yawned empty, a wrist-thick rope stretched downward through its center. I frowned, peeking over the side. The rope reached down all the way, visibly anchoring in a platform within the warrens themselves.

Right against the base of the Drake’s Roost itself. A truly vicious grin began to tug at the corners of my lips. Perfect.

A whisper in the wind was all that warned me, but it was all the warning I needed. Adrenaline shoot through my veins and I dived forwards, cutting across the corner of the hole before I landed on the walkway between them and rolled to my feet.

Twin blades sprung into my hands as I spun around to face the crashing sound where I’d been half a second ago. I found a wrecking ball of muscle unfolding itself into the shape of a goblin half again as tall as me. Stocky for a Hob, his bulk more than made up for the missing mass.

A jagged smile unfolded itself beneath two glowing blue eyes. “Hello, little goblin.”

My stomach sank in my gut. “Hello, Katturk.”