Blue skies, chirping birds, and an enchanting day heralded the kind of warm Sunday day people paid exorbitant sums to Weather Mages for. Of course, what truly made this day special for Vera Bloom was that she got to spend it with her granddaughter.

“Ivilandra Bloom, do not climb on the slide! Go down it properly or we will have to leave!” Vera shouted, cutting off Bridgit’s question. “Sorry about that. Can you repeat your question?”

“Yes, Guildmistress! I mean, Palad—“

“Vera is fine, dear.”

“Could you describe a challenging time in your life?” Bridgit asked carefully, full of hesitance and uncertainty. Vera hated how soft everyone was in this new age. At least, until she looked at her granddaughter play with all the other kids.

“What kind of question is that? Madeline, you need to complain to the principal. These homework assignments get worse everywhere. ‘Describe a challenging time,’ ha!”

“Sorry, V-Vera, that’s the question?” Bridgit smiled politely. Madeline, the girl’s mother, nodded.

“Well, I faced quite a few challenges. I daresay more than most. I served four consecutive terms as a Paladin with my team, fought in the Ivory War with Extara. Then I worked at the Adventurer’s Guild when I retired as a Paladin.”

Bridgit stared at her mouth agape in that common look of youthful, pimply awe. Oh, to be a teenager again.

“How about this. What would you say was the most difficult? And why?” Madeline asked, swooping in to save her daughter from having to speak or think for herself.

Vera thought it was a shame how much this generation coddled their children. By her Oath, she would never let Sevren, her son, and his wife pander little Ivy so. It was simply bad parenting.

“Hm, let me think about that,” Vera hemmed to buy herself some time. Ivilandra threw herself off the top of the playground with Rebecca, her avian friend, no matter how many times they all told to never rely on the safety charms.

She lost herself for a few minutes watching all the different children play no matter their species or creed. Avians flew and preened, dwarves dug or built sandcastles, humans frolicked with Ivilandra the lone half-elf, and goblins swarmed.

More and more of them found themselves at bittersweet peace since the accords were struck after they turned against their home nation Extara. Now, they were granted rights the same as everyone.

Vera caught more than a few distrustful glares and sniffs from the parents. Shameful. Without the goblins, they would have lost the war.

“Miss Bloom?” Madeline said, interrupting Vera’s musings. “If this is too difficult for you to talk about…”

“Nonsense. I would say my hardest challenge was delving Hollowleaf’s dungeon. Every level was worse than the last. Not to mention the forest outside of it is a deathtrap itself. Did you know my son and daughter-in-law are down there right now?”

“Really? I heard there were dragons down there!” Bridgit squealed.

“Oh, there are. Countless more monsters lurk down there including chimera, manticores, dryads, and worse. Some escape into Hollowleaf Forest from time to time. Never wander there, especially not alone.” Vera glared at the girl with her full authority as one of the Guildmistresses of the Adventure’s Guild.

Bridgit’s head wobbled from how hard she nodded. Madeline paled at the thought of losing her daughter to the hordes walking those woods. Vera continued.

“We spent years of our lives carving our names into that dungeon. I bet we collectively bled gallons down there.”

“So, I need your take on how you pushed through. Would you say that perseverance is what let you overcome those challenges?”

“Ha! Without perseverance we never would have made it out the Adventurer’s Guild door! I feel as if laying our success on something as simple as us refusing to give up is inaccurate. We were not reckless or foolhardy. Greed kept us going and caution kept us alive.”

“Okay.” Bridgit wrote her words down, frowning while her mother whispered to her.

Vera ignored them. What she said was true, cold and sharp as Candor’s steel. This generation never understood that it was not about ‘giving up’ or ‘chasing dreams’.

Duty had kept them hunting in the dark.

People would have died if they never culled the monsters in their nests. It was not noble. If they did nothing, they would have in return when the gold dried up. Starvation had that effect on young adventurers with no place to call home except for each other.

Ivilandra scrambled up over the slide again in direct contradiction to Vera’s warning. Vera opened her mouth to shout when Ivilandra climbed back over without needing to be told. That had certainly never happened before. Ivy was a more willful child than any she had ever met.

Unease sparked golden in her gut. Deja vu struck. All the children screeched and ran in the same exact way they had five to ten minutes ago.

“Ivy? Let’s go home, okay?” Vera’s steps crunched the sawdrust strewn mulch of the playground under her boots. One of the packs of children darted right in front of her. Intuition guided her step forward and—

Nothing happened. They walked through her.

“Ivilandra!” Vera roared with a touch on the remainder of her oath. Light flashed over her best Sunday dress. Everyone stared.

“Uh oh, think the Adventurer’s Guild will need a new Guildmistress?” Someone whispered from one of the benches.

Vera clenched her fists. Ivy didn’t respond, neither did any of the kids. She drew upon the remnants of her oath, left to rust over nearly three decades of disuse.

“Dispel Magic,” Vera spat. Watching as the children twisted into glowing blobs of mist that broke. Illusions.

“What did you do? Evette?” shrieked a mother.

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Other parents joined their voices together in outrage and shock. All of them demanding to know what happened. Blame fell upon Vera easily. She turned to glare at Madeline as she ran up to her with her daughter clutched in tow.

“Vera, what—“

“Alert the Watch. Some of the children are missing,” Vera snapped. More parents rushed toward the playground, prepared to trample over any evidence.

“Keep back! Wait for the Watch to arrive.” Barriers of golden light sprang in front of them blocking them in their path.

Vera’s gaze roved over the miniature castle enchanted to survive anything. Meant to shield and protect the children from harm. Swings and rope bridges swayed empty on the breeze. She searched for any hints or clues to how or why they disappeared.

There was nothing.

No obvious footprints or tracks of anything monstrous or malign except for that of the youth at play. She was the first to have noticed anything.

Ire flickered away from Vera nearly as quick as it had landed on her to begin with. Only the kids playing on the playground were missing. Parents who had stuck close to their children, kept them.

Only the goblins had their young still.

“I knew it! Those filthy monsters should never have been let in. They aren’t like us at all.”

Vera turned.

A mob pressed around the small leathery impish green folk. She knew without a doubt that if this had been twenty years ago, blood would have been shed already. It was also just as apparent to her that they were innocent.

None of them bore the stain of a guilty conscience.

“Leave them alone,” Vera called, shoving herself between them and the goblins. Bulwark to protect innocence from the bloodthirsty masses. Ironic how she had filled more graves and pyres with goblin corpses than most.

Yet, now she defended them. Even in retirement, her oaths steered her toward righteousness.

“Stay back. Let the Watch handle this and do their jobs.” Vera placed her hand over her hip where her sword, Candor, had not hung since she reached her fifties ten years ago.

“How dare you defend those murderous monsters? You’re one of the Guildmistresses of the Adventurer’s Guild!” Madeline shouted, shaking her fist.

“Exactly. Would I not know better than you that we are just as monstrous as they are? Need I remind all of you that goblins are the reason why we won the Ivory War?”

“Who cares about ancient history when these bastards stole our kids? I say we kill ‘em all!” Hesria said. Her alchemist apron was still tied in front of her. Vera did not see either of her twins.

People crowded around Vera and the goblins at her back. None of her training or experience applied here. She could not swing a sword aglow with holy fire and vengeance to uphold her oath.

These were not faceless strangers of her past. They were neighbors. Friends.

“Move aside, Vera.”

“Yeah, get out of the way!”

“Kill all goblins!”

Vera yanked on her oath’s light. Framed it into the invisible structures of a sword and shield. Heat blazed in her chest thumping in time with her heartbeat.

Ba-da-bump-honor. Friends encroached around her flanks with fists outstretched and elementary magic held aloft.

Ba-death-bump. If it came to a fight, everyone would get hurt. Someone could, no, they would die. Paladins, even retired Oathtouched, fought with their all.

Horror. Vera doubted the threatened goblins or enraged parents would do any less. In her truest heart of hearts, she wished her hands shook. But they never did when battle was certain.

Mr. Thomas Alphine, owner and grocer of the local supermarket stepped into her range. Bared steel glinted from the hilt in his hand. Dagger. Sharp.

“Do not approach.”

“Will you stop us, Vera Bloom?” He bared his teeth.

“I will do what I must.” She always had.

“So will we. Guess Paladin oaths aren’t what they’re cracked up to be, are they? If you can cast yours aside so easily.”

Golden light flared in a crackling edge revealing the sword clasped in her hand. Agreement chorusing from the mob died in stifled throats. Everyone’s attention was on her more than it had been when she stood in front of them. Stooped over and steeped in her elderly age.

Vera hated how she longed to thrust it in his gut and twist. Forsake her vows and never stop. How could they not see that this was not helping? Bickering would not return their missing children to them.

“Look at you, goblover. How much should I bet that your halfbreed son isn’t mixed with some goblin? Or worse.” Thomas chuckled, dark with violent avarice. “Heard you put down a number of trolls and minotaurs in the Ivory War. Did one of them fath—“

A large hobgoblin, nearly as old as she, shoved her own way past Vera to backhand Thomas. Flecks of blood and spit sprayed onto the grass. Teeth swished in the grass, audible in the droning silence.

“You call us monsters. Beasts. Call yourself a man with that filthy mouth of yours. Shut. Up.” Button stomped next to his foot. She was the impromptu leader and representative of the goblins.

Knives, shortswords, and wands sprang from sheaths and hiding places. Fury throbbed in the air. Vera dropped her oath sword, letting it disintegrate, in favor of glowing shields.

Battle lines broke. Walls of light appeared, blocking stabs and wild slashes from connecting. She resolved herself to use barriers as much as possible. Even if it burned her out. That was better than turning the normally good people in front of her into ash and limbs.

Piercing whistle blows splintered the brawl. Watch’s Peace rolled over them in a pacifying wave immobilizing them. Vera froze with everyone else.

“What in the Planes is going on here?” barked a Patrolman decked out in the Watch’s uniform. Medals shone on his chest, polished brighter than mere metal.

“Looks like a riot, Patrolman Tarin.”

“I concur. Will someone tell m—“ Tarin cut off with a wide-eyed when he noticed Vera standing in the thick of it. “Guildmistress Bloom? Can you tell me what is happening here?”

“Did no one tell you? All the children went missing.”

“Except for the stinking goblins, Patrolman,” Thomas interrupted her.

“Nuh-uh. Twiggy is gone too. So is Needle and Ember.” Button shoved her way back into the conversation. Most of the older goblins had no trouble shrugging off the Watch’s peacekeeping effects.

“Better your children than ours, gob,” Thomas spat. Veins in his forehead bulged.

“Enough,” Patrolman Tarin shouted. “Guards will take your name, vocation, and address. After that, disperse. Let us investigate and we will reach out to you with updates and any questions if we have them.”

Watch’s Peace presence vanished.

Vera took a moment to watch everyone sheath their daggers. Fewer expressions than she would have preferred shifted from rage and fear to guilt.

Ivilandra’s salvation did not lie here. Not in the hands of the Watch or her neighbors. They would rather squabble. Burn each other down instead of help each other.

Vera left.

“Where are you going?” Button said once she caught up.

“Home. Then the Adventurer’s Guild.”

“Whatcha going to do? Put up a bounty? Gather a team to rearrange Thomas’s face?”

“No. As tempting as that is, I need something of my granddaughter’s for a scrying spell. Then I need the archives to find where Arwin Birchleaf lives nowadays.”

“Fancy name. Who’s that?” Button scratched at her thigh.

“He was the Wizard on our team. Better spellcaster than anyone the Watch has access to.” Vera shrugged. “Especially since they stopped bothering him because of his… peculiarities.”

“Well, alright, then. I guess we’re off to see a Wizard,” Button grinned. “After that, we’ll break Thomas’s face and whoever snatched the kids.”

Vera thought it was more likely she would end whoever took Ivilandra from her. No oaths necessary.

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