“Wow! Dad, come see this!” A Mulatto kid called.

He was around ten years old, had a flat nose, brown eyes, and curly short hair. His mouth was locked in a surprised face.

A tall black man came into the kitchen.

“Mom, what the hell happened here?”

When he came into the house, he never expected to see something like this. The whole place was a mess, with broken dishes, some kitchen appliances still on the floor, and some blood sprinkled all around.

“Oh! Just a small fall,” answered the old black woman coming into the kitchen.

“All this blood... are you hurt?” The worry on the man's face was evident.

“Oh! Don't worry, just a small cut in the arm.”

“Small cut? Look at all this blood. Let me see your arm.”

“I told you not to worry; the blood is not mine,” explained the woman while her son was checking her arm. There was nothing but a small cut, which was already correctly bandaged.

“And all this blood?”

“That damn Turkey, I slit his throat, but the bastard was too strong; I lost my grip, and he started running, jumping, and making a mess, but don't worry, I got him in the end.”

“Not to worry, look at this place... Mom, listen, why don't you move with us?”

The old woman smiled. She got closer to her son and held his face in her hands. Her brown eyes looked full of life for a woman in her seventies.

“I am fine.” She let him go. “And I don't want to be a bother; I know that couples need their space; just with the kids is enough; you don't need an old hag telling you how to run your house; that is your house; this is my house; everyone should live in their house and organize accordingly.”

“Mom, you need some help; how about a nursing home?”

"I would rather die, thank you.”

“How about I hire you some help? I know this great girl...”

“Eduardo Mariano Martinez Rodriguez de la Vega”

"Oh, oh!” said the boy, who was just watching the conversation. His face and his father's turned a bit scared. All Latinos knew one thing: when mom called you by your full name, she was angry, and you were in deep shit. You might not know what you did wrong, but there was only one acceptable course of action... you apologize.

“This is my house; I will die here,” the old woman started her rant. “I raised six kids in this house; I battled with your father's cancer; I worked my ass off to pay these four walls to that damned bank; and I...” the old cord-line phone ringing cut the woman short.

She went to pick up the phone while the man and the boy looked at each other in relief.

"Sure, my dear, come in a few hours; I need to do some cleaning first,” the woman was saying on the phone. “Just a little mess, things that happen in the kitchen,” the other person said some words. “Sure, why don't we bake something? Bring your cookie jar,” and just like that, the conversation was over.

"Well, boys, you should go now. I need to clean this up. Teresa is coming soon.”

“Let me help you clean up; this looks bad,” Eduardo offered.

“Please! This is nothing,” the woman signaled at the roof.

The stain on the roof from when his brother tried to bake a surprise cake was still there. It didn't matter how many times they painted that damned roof; somehow, a few months later, the stain was back.

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

“That was a real mess; you and your brothers were a real handful, thats for sure. Now get going. I have things to do." The old woman got two cookies out of her jar and gave one to her son and her grandson.

“Thanks grandma”

“Thanks mom”

They walked out of the kitchen; before they even knew it, the cookies were gone, and they were walking out of the house into the car while the old lady waved them good-bye with a smile.

As soon as they took the corner, the smile on her face disappeared. She looked all around the neighborhood and then walked a bit around her front yard. She went into the house and started cleaning the blood on the walls and cabinets. The doorbell rang. She took a look outside by the window. Another old woman was standing there with a cookie jar on her arms. The old lady opened the door.

“Hello Marta”

"Teresa, my dear, you look lovely today.”

They hugged and smiled at each other with the cookie jar pressed between them.

“Please come in.”

As soon as they went into the house and the door closed, their smiles disappeared.

“What happened?” asked Teresa while she put her cookie jar next to Marta`s one in the kitchen.

“Goblins”

“Really? How many?”

“Just four of them.”

The two women moved to the kitchen. Under the sink, two black plastic bags rested in two big trash cans.

“Help me here.”

Teresa helped Marta take the trash cans from under the sink.

“They are heavy,” complained Teresa.

“Yeah, they are well fed." Marta opened the bag and lifted up the corpse of a horrible gray-skinned creature by one of its two skinny legs. It was about one foot tall, and the small head had pointy long ears, puffy milky white eyes, a wide mouth with thin lips, and pointy sharp black teeth, with a long purple tongue hanging out. The wound on the small chest was still dripping some blood. The thin little arms hang flaccidly to the side of the head, and the hands had four fingers and sharp black nails that had a metallic dull shine.

“Do you think there is more?" asked Teresa.

“I'm sure there is. Stray cats, some dogs, and a few birds are missing. But the thing is, I am almost sure they came for my cookie jar.”

“Impossible. Not even the goblins are that stupid,” refuted Teresa while looking at the jars.

“Maybe it wasn't their idea,” proposed Marta.

“Are you suggesting someone made Thralls out of goblins? Ew! Thats disgusting. Not even the necromancers want them.”

“I know, but they didn't behave as normal goblins; those little fuckers were hell bent on taking my jar. They didn't run away, not even from my wolf-bane traps. I tell you something is off.”

The old phone rang again. Marta picked it up.

"Hello, Veronica, my dear, what a wonderful surprise. What a coincidence; Teresa is here too; we were just talking about baking some cookies,” Teresa watched as Marta used their code.

“Yes, I know, the flour seems to have a certain drop in quality; mine has gotten a little gray too lately. Maybe we should change brands,” said Marta while looking at the trash cans. “What a wonderful idea! I needed some supplies anyway. Let's shop together. Perfect. See you soon, Ver.”

“So Ver also got attacked?”

“Thats right. Once may be a coincidence; two times is an attack. Who is leading the coven?”

"Sarima,” answered Teresa.

“We must convene; we might be dealing with insane goblins or an oath-breaker.”

“I don't know which one is worse,” commented Teresa, feeling goosebumps.

“I rather prefer the oath-breaker; a goblin infestation is the worst thing that can happen. Help me get rid of these things.”

"What do you plan to do?” asked Teresa.

“Their life force is trapped in my kitchen,”

“Oh no! Are you going to cook them? Really? Goblin cookies?”

“Why not? We can try.”

“They are goblins!”

“Oh! Don't be silly, Teresa; I'm sure we can fix something.”

“What ever. But this is not going to work,” Teresa had given up.

Marta took out a huge pot and a cleaver, cutting the corpses into pieces and throwing them in, creating a mix of bowels, feces, internal organs, meat, and blood.

Marta and Teresa started whistling, and the pot turned hot without any flame. Marta looked at Teresa and changed the tune of her whistling. The vapor from the pot condensed and formed a ghostly representation of the four goblins; they seemed to be in pain and seemed to want to escape by swimming in the air. Marta Tune dragged them into the pot. Once again, Marta and Teresa synchronized their whistling. Their work was complete; the corpses had turned into a gray kind of flour. The two women went to work; they added butter, milk, eggs, and sugar to prepare a dough. Forty-five minutes later, the clicking sound of the oven announced that the cookies were ready.

“Well, they don't look that bad if you don't mind gray cookies,” observed Teresa.

“The smell is alright too." Added Marta, grabbing one of the gray cookies and taking a bite to spit it out and try to wash her mouth on the sink. “This is horrible.”.

“Didn't I tell you? No matter how good your skills are as a witch or as a cook, Goblins are useless, just plagues. Now let's stop playing and go meet the others.”.

The two old women got out of the house and waited for the bus. No one would suspect that they were witches or that a few hours ago, in the kitchen of the house, they came out from one granny and four goblins had a bloody battle royale.