The pudgy man stood before Skree, a vaguely greasy and expectant look upon his face. “Well Skree, you’ve had time to think about my offer, and you know a better one won’t be forthcoming. What say you?”
“Same answer as I gave ya last time. Piss up a rope,” the goblin said with annoyed disgust.
“Skree, be reasonable. Your sister will have a better life in our care, and you’ll get a fat chunk of change. You could get some real schooling, maybe even make something of yourself. Really, it's the two of you I’m thinking of,” the man said in reasonable tones that, nonetheless, made Sigrid’s skin crawl in disgust.
“Yeah, sure. Just like you gave ma a ‘better life’, got her hooked on all that crap and strung her along,” Skree sneered.
The man frowned, his face artfully arranged into one of sorrow. “Skree, your mother was a depressed woman who had trouble handling the life she was forced to lead; it’s not strange for someone in that position to look for anything to… take the edge off. I did my best to keep her from the hard stuff but there’s only so much that can be done.” He spread his hands in a sorrowful, beseeching gesture.
“Drakeshit,” Skree shot back. “And the answer is still no!”
A deep sigh came from the human, and then he waved a hand at his two bruisers. “I really hoped it wouldn’t come to this. But really, we can’t leave Anx in your care, it’s just not good for a girl her age. I mean you clearly can barely clothe and feed yourself. If you refuse to turn her over peacefully we’ll have to escalate this. I’m sorry Skree, but that’s just the way it is.”
“Yeah, sure,” Skree said, slowly standing to his feet, even as the twins ambled forward, clearly preparing themselves to grab the much smaller goblin and begin doing damage.
“Stop.” A voice rang out, loud, clear, and commanding. For a moment surprise reigned in the small clearing among the brambles as heads turned to find the source of the word. No one, however, was more surprised than the speaker. Sigrid Hall had no intentions of interfering in whatever was about to happen. But… but there was that tiny, near-imperceptible thread between her and the goblin boy. He might not be hers, not yet. But he could be. And she would never let this happen to one of her grandchildren.
“Ma’am,” the greasy, pudgy man began. “I know this must be distressing to one of your years, but I assure you its necessary for the survival of a small girl. Why don’t you just walk back into town proper and rest at ease knowing that an innocent is going to be warm and fed tonight.”
“You are a slimy little weasel, aren’t you?” Sigrid said, almost unthinkingly and the man blinked in apparent shock.
“I’m not sure what you mean ma’am,” he began again, but Sigrid cut him off.
“You should be utterly ashamed to spout such vile nonsense. I swear to the gods, if you were mine I’d disown you,” she said, speaking the worst curse that existed in her family. Halls did not turn their backs on Halls, it simply wasn’t done.
The man look sick, almost stricken, while his two compatriots seemed to sway as if they’d been hit by some kind of by-blow.
With a thought she reached out to the three with her new-found sense, and found the threads touching each of them. The ones touching the pudgy man were both frayed and broken, torn apart by grief and death. As for the twins, they had two strong lines, each pulsing with love and affection. Immediately she knew where to target her assault and her eyes trained on them like vivid blue thunderbolts.
“I wonder if your grandmothers know where you are and what you’re doing?” She asked, and they flinched slightly. “I see they don’t. I wonder how they’d react if they were aware you work for a scumbag who kidnaps little girls and forces them into slavery by any other name.”
“N-now just a moment!” blustered the man in question.
“Quiet you; you’ve already disappointed your grandmothers enough, do you really need to dishonor their memories to this extent?” Sigrid snapped, she then looked back to the two large men, no, boys, really, they couldn’t be more than sixteen or seventeen. “You’re going to go home and [Tell Grammy All About It],” she commanded, and felt a small portion of power leave her.
One of the boys whimpered slightly. “Please,” the other murmured desperately, even as they both began to walk slowly in the direction of the shanty town and the city walls beyond.
“I’m afraid not boys, coming clean is the only amends you can make at this point. I just hope your grandmothers have enough love in their hearts to accept what you’ve done,” Sigrid said with a sad sigh. She then turned her eyes back on the shorter man, who was opening and closing his mouth silently, like a gasping fish. “As for you. You should be ashamed, I know I am and my only relation to you is species. Git going. Go on! Git!”
“You—” he spluttered. “You can’t talk to me this way! Do you know who I am?!” he cried, drawing himself up to his unimpressive five foot five.
“A piece of scum I just found upon the bottom of my shoe,” Sigrid said disdainfully.
“I am Linus Earlminster! I own—” Sigrid cut him off again.
“The biggest brothel? The biggest three brothels? All the brothels and a drug ring? Don’t care. What I do care about is that when your grandmothers died they were sick with grief and despair over who you were and what you’d become. And honestly, I can’t blame them, gods rest their souls.”
“You,” he gasped out, face turning thunderous as he started to march directly toward her, hands clenched.
“[Don’t Make Me Get The Spoon].” The words were instinctual, drilled into her by decades of dealing with unruly children and grandchildren, but in this time and place they seemed to have a true magic all their own, as she was suddenly holding a comically oversized wooden spoon that would easily double as a club.
The pudgy man came to a sudden, and abrupt halt, looking between her and the magically appearing implement, seemingly re-evaluating the threat level of the old woman. He then shook himself like a particularly irate dog and carried on with his charge.
Sigrid Hall didn’t hesitate for a second. The moment he was in range the spoon came down on him with a meaty ‘THWACK’ that elicited a squeal of pain not unlike that a pig might make. The man stumbled back, tears suddenly streaming down his face as he babbled out garbled apologies and stammered about how he’d be good and would never do it again. Then, still sobbing, he fled down the dirt track.
Skree, who’d watched the entire encounter slightly slack jawed, watched the flesh peddler retreat in ignominious defeat and then looked to the elderly woman who’d so casually routed him. “Do… do spoons usually elicit that kind of reaction when you hit humans with them?” he asked, slightly stunned.
“Honestly? No, it usually just makes them upset, angry, and sullen. It’s a terrible way to instill any kind of discipline, the only reason I’ve ever threatened it is because my mother threatened it. I think this may be the first time I’ve ever actually done it,” Sigrid admitted.
“Why would you threaten something you’d never do?” the goblin asked, further perplexed.
Sigrid shrugged. “Tradition, I guess.”
After a moment of staring down the now empty street Skree shook himself. “Ya really shouldn’t have done that,” he said. “Now you’ve made an enemy of him, he’s going to remember this and will do everything he can to get back at ya.”
She shrugged. “And?”
Skree goggled at her for a moment then shook his head. “You’re a crazy old bint, ya know that?”
“More importantly, where did this come from?” She shook the spoon. “I said… what did I say… [Don’t Make Me Get The Spoon],” she intoned once more, and the magical serving implement faded out of existence. “Well that’s handy.”
The goblin cocked his head to one side, looking vaguely confused. “What do ya mean where’d it come from? You’ve obviously got some kind of manifestation [Skill], how do ya not know that?”
“Skill?” Sigrid echoed.
“No, [Skill],” Skree put emphasis on the word, and this time the grandmother could hear the special undertones.
“I’m not sure what that means,” she said after perhaps ten seconds of thought.
“Eh? It’s… it’s one of your [Skills], ya know? [System] granted powers?” Skree said perplexed.
“Obviously I’m lacking some context here, what’s this [System]?” Sigrid asked.
The goblin looked at her flabbergasted. “You- ya know, [The System]? The thing that we use to interact with magic?”
Sigrid shook her head.
“Look, it’s just… just a thing, okay? Ask it about your status sheet and stuff, that should explain better than I can,” Skree explained, sounding uncertain.
The elderly woman frowned, but focused her eyes on the air in front of her. “System, I’d like to see my status please,” she said, nothing happened.
“No, no, not like that. Ya gotta convey your intent, just think really hard about seeing your status,” Skree said in frustration.
Pursing her lips, Sigrid did as instructed, only to have a series of words and numbers blossom suddenly in her mind’s eye.
[Name: Sigrid Hall]
[Age : 74]
[Species : Human (Deity)]
[Class : Grandmother Goddess]
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[Divine Ranking : 1]
[Divinity : 100/100]
[Divinity/Day : 10]
[Skills]
* [Divine Immunities]
* [Divine Senses]
* [Don’t Make Me Get the Spoon]
* [Encourage]
* [Scold]
* [Tell Grammy All About It]
[Celebrations]
* -
[Rituals]
* -
“Alright, I see a bunch of information, but what does it mean?” she asked.
“Just focus on each piece and will yourself to know more,” Skree said, sounding annoyed.
“It’s cell phones all over again,” Sigrid muttered as she examined the statistics.
[Species: The overall species to which you belong. In this case you are a [Human] with the [Deity] subtype.]
[Deity: A being of divine origins. You do not need to eat, breath, sleep, or perform any of those other nasty bodily necessities, though you may still find the first three beneficial. You also cannot die. Destruction of your mortal form will see you banished to your [Divine Realm] until you can reconstruct your [Avatar].]
[Class: Your current vocation. While you are not ‘trapped’ in your current class, changing it can be difficult and in your case probably isn’t worth the result. Your current class is [Grandmother Goddess].]
[Grandmother Goddess: You are the Goddess of Grandmothers, you embody the quintessential grandmother, kind, caring, loving, but capable of giving as good as she gets and taker of no nonsense. You can sense the bonds of grandmotherhood between sapient beings and even manipulate them if you so desire. Forging such bonds is possible as well.]
[Divine Ranking: Where you stand in the divine power scale as determined by your number of worshipers. The higher the number, the more power you have. Your [Divine Ranking] is 1; you’re not very powerful, sorry.]
[Divinity: The power by which you can change the world for good or ill. By expending [Divinity] you may create temporary or permanent changes to the world; the more in line with your concept, the less divinity is required and the easier it is to make your changes stick. The amount of [Divinity] you have scales with your [Divine Ranking].]
[Divinity/Day: The amount of [Divinity] you recuperate per day. This number is always one tenth of your [Divinity]. Divinity may also be regained through the sincere prayer and worship of others, celebrations held in your name or honor, or the practice of rituals sacred to your church or cult.]
[Divine Immunities: As a divinity you are immune to many merely mortal magics and [Skills], such as those that manipulate the mind or body.]
[Divine Senses: As a divinity you have access to an increased range of senses, allowing you to perceive things specific to your domain.]
[Don’t Make Me Get the Spoon: You may summon, or dismiss, your [Divine Weapon] at will. This weapon takes on the shape of a familiar tool that is in keeping with your theme and appearance. Anyone struck by your weapon must pit their will against your divine influence or suffer one or more instances of [Remorse].]
[Remorse: A status affliction in which the suffer reflects upon what they’ve done and feels contrition for their sinful deeds. This may have lasting consequences. These consequences may not always be good.]
[Encourage: You may speak words of encouragement to any, giving them a boost to confidence and morale, while also granting powerful bonuses to actions and tasks.]
[Scold: You may speak words of condemnation to any, pitting your will against theirs; should they fail in this clash they will be chastised and have their confidence and moral lowered, while taking a powerful malus to most actions and tasks.]
[Tell Grammy All About It: Grandmothers have a way of extracting the truth, the full truth, and nothing but the truth. This power may be invoked to get the truth out of someone, or to make them confess the truth to their own grandmother. If used correctly, it can bring healing and catharsis to the afflicted.]
[Celebrations: Days, weeks, or even months that are considered holy and in which the faithful celebrate or observe certain religious rites or rituals. You have one free slot available.]
[Rituals: Acts or ceremonies that the faithful practice regularly or even daily, usually in your name or honor. You have one free ritual slot available.]
It took her several minutes to parse all the information, but she eventually felt she had a handle on it. “Alright then,” she said finally. “That seems… straight forward enough to be getting on with.”
“Great, now not to sound ungrateful, but ya should probably get going before Linus comes back with more and bigger goons,” Skree said.
“Well, where are we going then?” Sigrid asked.
“Huh?” Skree blinked at her, slightly confused.
“You can’t stay here either; if he’s coming back with more and bigger any time soon they’re like as not going to kill you and take your sister as anything else,” the grandmother pointed out.
Skree frowned. “Where would we go?”
“Anywhere,” Sigrid replied. “Literally anywhere that’s not here.”
“But how would I feed us? Cloth Anx? Where would we live?” Skree argued.
“Skree, you need to think. You’re not going to be living at all past that pig’s return, and your sister will become little more than a slave. How will you feed her then? Cloth her? Where will you two live?” the old woman asked, her voice sad but not unkind.
The young goblin looked at her, indecision and worry clear on his face.
“Look, I know I’m not your grandmother; hell I’m some random old woman you just met far as you’re concerned. But I do know that you will lose everything if you stay, and you only may lose everything if you leave,” she urged.
Skree fingered the bone charm at his throat once more, and then finally nodded with a sigh. “Alright,” he said. “Anx’ll be home soon, I’ll get everything packed and we can leave when she gets here.”
Sigrid nodded, then watched as the young goblin all but ran into the tiny shed. Letting out her own sigh she sat on the stump and considered her day so far.
She should never have engaged with that thrice-damned piece of paper; it couldn’t have bound her to her words if she’d never said them. Still, seeing Skree, and dealing with the men who’d come to take his sister away, she wasn’t entirely sure she had made a mistake. Just the thought of the man’s slimy, reasonable words made her hairs stand on end. Why had he even been talking like that when his real intentions had been so blatantly obviou—
“It was a [Skill],” she murmured, cutting off her own thought. “He sounded reasonable because that’s a prerequisite for whatever skill he was using.”
“Uh, duh?” said Skree as he dumped a ratty, heavily-laden bag next to the stump. “Course he has mental manipulation skills. Pretty much all his kind do.”
Sigrid shook her head. “That sounds like something that should be illegal.”
“Depends on where you are, but being exposed to it helps you gain resistances to it, and there are things you can make or buy to shield you,” he explained. “So most places don’t bother and say it's on the individual to take precautions.”
“That’s horrible,” the old woman muttered.
“Says the woman who beat a man into crying and blubbering; with a single hit, no less. Your spoon has mind magics on it or I’ll eat my bag,” Skree pointed out.
Sigrid grimaced by didn’t comment further.
For a moment they sat there in awkward silence before the young goblin spoke up again. “So why are ya here now?”
Sigrid looked over at him and sighed. “I didn’t receive your letter until today, I don’t know how long it took to reach me… or how long it took me to reach you,” she admitted. “What about you? How’d you send a letter to an old woman in an entirely different world?”
“Some old guy ma got to watch us one night had me write that, told me what it was like to have a grandma and said maybe iffn I reached out to one maybe I could have a grandma too. Also, he said I could keep the colored wax sticks, which seemed like a good deal at the time,” Skree replied.
Sigrid considered the answer for a few moments and then nodded. Wizards pretending to be normal old men were a staple of the magical world, though thankfully infrequent on her own planet these days… she paused at that thought. Her own planet, Earth, was it really hers anymore? She was here now, charged by magic and injudicious words to be a grandmother to those who needed it; how she’d get back in time for Easter dinner was a question, but she was sure she’d figure it out.
A small figure came from the mess of buildings making up the podunk town, walking down the road toward them. She was shorter even than Skree, with a ratty, dirty dress, but there was a bounce in her step and a small smile on her face.
Skree picked up the backpack and Sigrid stood up, the two walking out to meet the small figure who stopped, head cocked to one side as she eyed the old woman.
“Who’s dis?” She asked in a slightly high pitched voice.
“This is… grammy,” Skree said after a moment of struggling. It was obvious he didn’t remember her last name.
Anx’s eyes went wide. “Are you here to be our grammy?” the girl, who couldn’t have been more than twelve, asked innocently.
“If you want me to,” Sigrid said with a soft smile.
Anx beamed at her then rushed forward, throwing her arms around Sigrid’s legs in a surprisingly strong hug.
“Anx,” Skree said, then paused when the little girl looked up at him expectantly, as if he didn’t know what to say.
The grandmother shook her head slightly and looked down at her new grandchild. “Anx dear, there are some bad men who want to take you away, so we need to go somewhere else where they can’t find you.”
The tiny goblin looked back up at Sigrid, and then at her brother, suddenly sporting a serious and knowing expression that didn’t belong on any child’s face. “If we leave, they’ll just take someone else. Nax, or Craz maybe.”
“Nax and Craz aren’t my sisters, I can’t let what happens to them stop me from taking care of you,” Skree said, his words cold, but tone pained.
Anx stayed silent and just looked to her new grandmother.
To anyone who needs it, echoed in Sigrid’s memory and she closed her eyes with a soft sigh.
“Ya can’t be serious,” Skree muttered. “Look, if we take them, we’ll need to take their families, and their friends, and their families, and so on. You’re talking about a mass goblin exodus all on the words of a single old woman who hasn’t even promised us safety or a place to go!”
Sigrid’s eyes slowly opened as she contemplated an idea; it all hinged on a few things though. “How many goblins live inside the city walls?”
“None that aren’t the playthings of the rich,” Skree replied, clearly agitated at the obvious non sequitur.
“Where would you describe the place of goblins in society?” she asked, already having guessed the answer.
“We’re nobodies, nothings; goblins are savages, barely people in some places, we should be happy with what we’re given and not make trouble,” Skree responded, his voice dripping with scorn and hatred.
“And why haven’t goblins formed their own cities and towns?”
“What does it matter?” the young goblin asked, clearly annoyed.
“Just answer the question please, it’s important,” the grandmother pressed.
“We had cities, once. Same thing happened to them as everyone else during The Sundering; only difference is goblins never recovered. While everyone else rebuilt from the rubble we became tribes and family groups; by the time we were ‘recivilized’ there was no place for the ‘savages’ in good company,” he explained impatiently.
Sigrid nodded as she listened, then thought for a moment before asking what she hoped was her final question. “Where’s the nearest of the ancient goblin cities?”
“Huh?” Skree asked.
“The nearest goblin ruins,” she said again.
“Gritmere, but that’s like, two hundred miles away, in the middle of a forest,” Skree replied.
“Is it a dangerous area?” she asked, mentally amending this to be the final question.
“Not really, the entire area has been thoroughly scavenged, so most monsters and animals have been driven out too. You can’t expect that we’re just going to go take up residence in some old ruins though!” Skree said with clear disbelief.
“Why not?” Sigrid rejoined.
“Because there’s nothing there!” he exclaimed.
“Yet,” she said calmly.
“What?” he replied.
“There’s nothing there, yet,” she expounded. “But I think we can make it work.”
“How?!” he asked incredulously.
“I think I’ll save that explanation for later, as it seems we’re going to have to talk to a lot more people before the day is through,” she said, smiling down at Anx, who beamed back at her. “Let’s go find your friends, little one.”