Chapter 10

Gigantic Flowers

Barnacle-eyes

My crew and I harvested onion and garlic week after week. Under Abigail’s direction, we only harvested half the amount of onion so that they could go to seed. After all the garlic was pulled from the raised beds, we divided some into cloves and replanted those. Boggo was the only one who was tired of garlic and onions.

During those weeks, we only encountered one storm. It rumbled like Thrush’s belly but lacked lightning. There was no other obstacle between Hawkin’s woods and Laven-what’s-fish.

Boggo shouted from the crow’s nest. “Lavenfauvish!”

Remember-not, Belut, and I rushed out of the deckhouse and to the port side taffrail. We’d been following the coast for a while now and there had been nothing but green leaves, dark tree trunks, rocks, and sand. Until Lavenfauvish came into view. The pier was a sprawling stretch of docks and ships. Plain ships without flowers, without hammered flower sails, and probably without the best crew in the world.

As we sailed into port, bright lights caught my attention. Colossal monsters made of translucent colors were perched upon Hiccup’s mansion. They were taller than some of the oaks that Hawkin felled and spent entire seasons chopping up. There was a red two-headed snake, a yellow hawk with goat legs, a white feathered ape, a green radish, and a black horse. I could see the city through their bodies and they were perched like statues.

I could only spend so much time staring in awe because the pier guards were waving to guide us in. My crew threw the mooring lines and the guardsmen wrapped them around the cleats.

“So many humans,” Remember-not said.

There were more than twice as many humans on the pier as there had been during winter. All of them had stopped to stare at the ketch. It dawned on me then how much change my ketch had gone through. The borage flowers were as large as the tiger-lillies had once been. The tiger-lilies were as large as umbrellas. The white trumpet flowers were each as large as a 15.5 gallon barrel. The honeysuckle were as large as trees—we’d had to prune those. Everything that Abigail’s Aggravated Wild Growth attribute beer touched had gigantified. The moment I stepped back to admire how much the flowers had really blown up, I gawked just like the humans of Lavenfauvish.

It was the voices of the pier guards that pulled me from the ketch. I dropped the gangway down to the dock, slid down, and paid my docking fee. With the matter settled and Remember-not wanting to stay aboard, I bounded toward the city and followed the boardwalk to Green-fin.

“Oops.”

I skidded to a halt and withdrew a dreambon ale from my inventory. I pulled the cork with a clamp of canine teeth and pulled it free. Nearby humans jumped and frowned at me. I poured a libation and hopped. After a few moments of hopping, my excitement waned. Thrush wasn’t appearing. I dumped the whole bottle, but Thrush still didn’t appear.

“Little goblin,” said a woman. “Please don’t do that.”

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

“Do what?”

“You’re spilling junk everywhere! People walk here!”

I tucked the bottle back into my inventory and skirted the woman. I sprinted to the Green-fin goblin shack. Goblins sat in the shade of the shack and on the steps of stairs that led down to the water. There were all kinds of goblins. Bright green ones with long ears like wings, dark green goblins with short human-shaped ears, gray-green goblins with curling noses, and gray-purple goblins with shiny bald heads. They eyed me as if I couldn’t eye them right back.

I pushed open the creaky door of the shack. It was as crowded as flowers on a vine. Goblin limbs moved like creeping ivy. Their clothes offered pops of colors. Each goblin slurped beer like bees chewing pollen.

I squeezed through the crowd and asked for a beer at the bar.

“Two copper,” said the bartender.

In exchange, I received a full tankard, big enough to fit two Boggos inside. I sloshed and spilled beer as I made my way through the crowd and found a place to sit.

The murmur of goblins was music that made my legs swing. I hummed a tune as I took a sip. But the tune drowned in my throat when I discovered that the beer tasted almost like foamy seaweed water. Hawkin brewed better spit beer; I brewed better spit beer.

“That your ketch there?,” a goblin said. He was green-ochre with skin like a naked mole-rat. “With the flowers?”

“That’s mine,” I said.

“You’re Barnacle-eyes,” another goblin said. “Remember me? Us? We were here last time you stopped by.”

By those beady eyes—it was Far-see. And beside her was Wrinkle-knuckle with hands twice as large as Hawkin’s.

“I know you snots!” I said.

Far-see grabbed me by the collar of my dress and pulled me into her group of goblins. They gushed about my ketch and I went on and on to tell them all about it. Eventually, by the time I’d gone through one whole beer and had another in my hands, Far-see asked what I was doing back in Lavenfauvish.

“I told you I’d be back to sell spit beer.”

“Will you be coming to Lurk-murky marsh?” Wrinkle-knuckle said.

“Of course, but I have to deliver beer and a hurlicorn to Fiber-Thorn cove first.”

“When?”

“I’m waiting on my best friend to answer my call. I’m here to sell beer to any goblins who want some before I sail off. Boggo too.”

“Is Boggo the other goblin in a dress?” Far-see said.

“He’s my ship rat—bestie.”

“Ship rats are the best,” Wrinkle-knuckle said. He sighed.

I brought out my sea map and asked Wrinkle-Knuckle where Lurk-murky marsh was. By his description, it was a large marshy island off the coast of the same land where Fiberthorn cove was. It was more south, but not quite as south as Float-some Barge where I planned to seek out Pock-ears. I asked about Pock-ears.

“Left Lavenfauvish around the same you did,” Far-see said.

From then on we talked of goblin things: promotions and captains, hard work and goof-off, goblin lore and green ancestry, spit beer and better spit beer, the aftertaste of humans and the sugar of a juicy onion, better sticks to clean ears with and which teeth better pruned toenails; I couldn’t remember what we talked about. But it was more than Far-see, Wrinkle-knuckle, and I that talked. 13 other goblins had joined in until beer wasn’t enough to fill bellies with.

I wasn’t the only hungry goblin. We all split up to fetch food. While others ordered soup from the Green-fin kitchen, I skipped back to my ketch. I raced up the gangway and it bounced with every footstep I took. When I stepped off the gangway, it continued to bounce.

My new acquaintances had followed me! They spilled onto my deck,and wrung their hands. Their eyes ballooned at the sight of giant flowers.

What a poor lot they were. Their garments hung by shreds. All were barefoot except for one that had a pair of sleeves for socks.

“Come to see my ketch?”

“We were wondering,” said the tallest with his gaze stuck on the honeysuckle, “if you were hiring.”

One goblin nudged another and pointed at a barrel full of garlic.