Goblins

I’m not liking all the non-writing I’ve been doing lately, and I’d really like to do something about that this week. But you know as well as I that the road to Hell is paved with good intentions.

I can’t even use the weather as an excuse for my lack of ambition. Or at least I can’t blame the lack of sun. We had quite a few sunny days last week. And then the temperature took a nosedive and we got SNOW on the weekend.

Snow. In May. Makes me glad I listened to my neighbour – I was thinking of getting my garden started last week but she told me to hold off for a couple of weeks. There are a lot of people who didn’t wait and it remains to be seen whether the shoots coming up in their gardens will survive or not.

The other thing I can’t use as an excuse for not writing is reading. I finished my last Nora Roberts book on Monday or Tuesday and haven’t read anything since. I was supposed to get a couple of books I’d ordered on Thursday but . . . nothing. I’ve got two more scheduled to arrive at the end of the month, but I won’t hold my breath.

It’s not like I don’t have other books to read, I just don’t wanna.

Looks like I need to give myself another stern talking to. And this time I need to listen

Once again we’ll see how it goes.

* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ *

After the goblin invasion we realized all the dark lords were dead.

It’s easy to forget what life was like before the coming of the dark lords. Heroes were few and far between, there weren’t enough to go around. The woods were filled with ogres and there was a troll under every bridge. Goblins were thick as thieves but more meddlesome. Life was hard.

Then the dark lords came with their promises and magic. They would gladly drive back the ogres for us, happily clear the trolls out so it was safe to travel across the bridges again. They could control the goblin hoards. But of course there was a price to pay. If only we had known how that price would increase over the years.

At first it was just a few gold coins, a sheep or two, maybe a goat – certainly not as much as the trolls and ogres took. Likewise the occasional request for a virgin seemed reasonable enough if it meant they no longer had to worry about dragons.

They were called dark lords for a reason, however. They demanded complete obedience, total subjugation. Before long we were nothing more than slaves, toiling for their gain, living and dying at their whim. We’d made a poor bargain.

They built a tower of black stone where they lived and worked their magic. Those they considered most useful were forced to live in the lower level to serve their needs, the rest of us were allowed to bring our tribute and return to our homes.

But the thing about a small group with a great deal of power is that there’s never enough power to go around and each individual thinks they should be the one in charge. It was bad enough the yoke we were under threatened to break us, but we were also expected to pick a lord and swear allegiance to him, aiding him in the struggle for power.

We began to meet in secret and we formed a plan to set them against each other. A nudge here, a whisper there, and they began to look at each other with suspicion. Those dwelling in the tower reported the dark lords were becoming increasingly paranoid, and soon enough even the servants were banished from the tower.

There were several disappearances, unearthly screams heard from within the tower, but we saw no sign of the dark lords for several weeks. Then the goblins came and we knew the dark lords had killed each other off. We would have congratulated ourselves for a job well done, but we were too busy defending ourselves from the goblins.

* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ *

Wordage Report

Wandering Wizards – 0 words
I cannot tell a lie, I got zero words written last week. None. Nada. Zip.

Weekly Prompt – 442 words
Considering the amount of time I sat with my lap top on my lap to work on this thing, I would have expected a better story. But at least I made the effort.

New Prompt
Use this as your first line:
The text message simply said 'very clever'.

Happy Writing!