“…it wasn’t your imagination. The plains are thick with goblins, especially along those dark gullys and river bottoms where no man has travelled in a thousand years. The natives learned to avoid the areas and the white settlers soon after. There are goblins and ogres all along there. No trolls though, no trolls…”
— transcipt of a raving madman in Watertown, SD
I don’t know how long I sat on the deck. The moon wasn’t bright, and the lights were off in the house by the time I finally took notice of my surroundings again. I pushed myself to my feet and massaged the small of my, which was complaining about sixteen hours in a car. I hadn’t slept since the night before last.
Somewhere during this musing, I realized I wasn’t alone. I’m not sure what gave me the hint, but when I turned the direction my intuition pointed, there was a shadow where there shouldn’t have been in the treeline next to the house.
“Who’s there?” I said, glancing around the deck for some sort of weapon. Nothing. Would have been nice if there’d been a big meat fork next to the grill at least.
The voice that spoke was gutteral in a way that made me realize I’d never truly understood the word. “We’re not your enemy, Sean.” The large not-supposed-to-be shadow split into two: one shorter than me and one… still much larger. The shorter one spoke again. “We’re after the same things that took your father.”
“Things?”
“Dirt-eaters.” He sounded hungry when he said it. He sounded like he was smiling.
