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Nott hadn’t known that you could become afraid for so long that you eventually stopped being afraid and were just tired and numb instead, but that’s exactly what she was feeling as she huddled in a corner of the cell they had thrown her in. She wasn’t sure why she was here. Oh, she knew why she had been arrested, she had been caught stealing after all, she just didn’t know why they hadn’t killed her in the street right away instead of locking her up. People who weren’t goblins killed goblins. That was what they did. Goblins killed goblins too, but they didn’t make you wait for your death. Maybe the rest of the world was crueler to goblins than goblins were to themselves, and that would have been a terrifying thought if Nott had been able to feel anything.
The sound of a door being opened elsewhere in the jail followed by shouting made Nott shrink further back into her corner, ears twitching. Footsteps echoed down the long hallway that lead to the single cell where Nott was.
“No, please, my books! Don’t take them, I need—“ The man’s voice, full of desperation, was cut off suddenly and replaced with a small cry of pain. Nott winced. The guards hadn’t hit her when they had brought her in, but they hadn’t exactly been gentle with her either.
“Guess you’ll have to find some other way to pass the time until the law master comes.” Nott recognized the gruff voice as one of the guards that had brought her down here as she heard the jangling of his keys, then the click of a key in the lock. “Don’t have a lot of space here, gonna put you in with the goblin kid. You two play nice. Or don’t, doesn’t matter to me.”
“I’m not a kid.” Nott mumbled as the door opened, but not too loudly. That possibly explained why they hadn’t just killed her already, they thought she was a child. She was not, she was just small, and the meager amount of food she had managed to scavenge for herself both before and after she had left her goblin tribe had done nothing to help her grow. She watched as the guards pushed what appeared to be a human into her cell, shoving him so hard that he hit the opposite wall, before slamming the door shut once more.
Nott stayed huddled in her corner, not moving. The cell was dim, what little light from outside coming from a window too high up and too small for Nott to escape from. It was possible that if she stayed very still, the human wouldn’t see her and would forget that she was there. She silently appraised him, wondering if this was someone who might be able to help her escape. He didn’t look strong, so probably not. He was filthy, his shirt and pants stained and frayed, his hair wild. There was a bruise already turning purple across one cheekbone and his eyes were blue, not like the sky, but like gems made of ice. Nott wished they were gems, because then she could have stolen them. Her fingers twitched and she clenched her hands into fists. She hadn’t had a drink in days, and her brain itched with the need to steal something.
The man slid down the wall of the cell until he was sitting on the ground, his head in his hands. He was muttering something in a language that Nott didn’t know, something guttural and rhythmic. Cursing maybe, or a prayer, or perhaps just nonsense, Nott wasn’t sure. She hoped they hadn’t locked a madman in with her.
Eventually the man lapsed into silence, pushing his fingers though his tangle of hair before leaning his head back against the wall. He seemed to be staring up at the tiny window, lost in thought.
“You don’t have to hide from me, you know. I will not bite you.” The man’s voice was soft, thick with an accent that Nott could not identify. He didn’t look over in Nott’s direction when he spoke, just kept looking at the window.
Nott didn’t move from her corner. She liked corners in general. No one could sneak up on you when you were in a corner. Though, now that she thought about it, being in a corner meant there was no where else to go if someone was in front of you. Like everything that might offer Nott safety, there was always a catch.
“My name is Caleb,” the man said. “Caleb Widogast.”
“I’m Nott,” Nott said, because that’s what you were supposed to do when someone gave you their name, you gave yours back. Besides, talking to the stranger would at least help distract her a little.
There was a pause. “You’re not what?”
The guard had said the same thing to Nott, except his tone had been angry. It had taken Nott some thinking to realize what the misunderstanding had been, so she had a better reply for Caleb, who didn’t sound angry, just confused. “The other goblins called me Nott the Brave. It was a joke, because I’m not brave. I’m not big either, not strong, not useful, not hardly a goblin. So that’s my name. Nott.”
“Hmmmm.” Caleb hummed thoughtfully. “I think that is a pun. I am no good with those. So what did you do to get yourself thrown in here, little one?” His tone was gentle, kind, like she had heard humans use when they were speaking to children.
Nott bristled and sat up a little straighter, annoyance making her bolder than she normally would have been. “I’m not a child either. That’s another thing I’m not.” Her voice sounded hard, but she immediately shrank a little further in her corner when Caleb looked at her. He was bigger than her, and though he looked weak he might be able to hurt her if he had a mind to. He didn’t look angry though, just sad, and his eyes only fixed on hers for a brief instant before drifting off over her right shoulder somewhere.
“Ah, my apologies,” Caleb said softly. “I should not have assumed that the guard who brought me in here had any idea what he was talking about.”
“That’s all right,” Nott said quickly. She was honestly surprised at the apology. Humans didn’t apologize to goblins, they just screamed and ran away or tried to kill them. At least, that was her experience with humans so far. Halflings were nicer. She had spent some time near halfling settlements after she had first run away from her tribe, and they hadn’t thrown rocks at her or threatened to kill her or anything. “The villagers caught me stealing something.” It had been food she had been trying to steal, not even something shiny for her collection. Nott thought wistfully of her small collection of shiny things, the pouch taken from her along with her other belongings. She wished she had the objects now, touching them always made her feel better.
“Ahhh, a thief. I am in good company.” Caleb smiled, a humorous little twist of a thing, and looked away, back toward the tiny window. “I tried to run a con on the wrong person. Bound to happen sooner or later, I suppose.” He sighed. “Town this small doesn’t have a law master of their own, it’ll be a few days before we can be properly judged, and I need to be gone long before then. So do you, I think.”
“They’ll kill me,” Nott said, surety in her voice.
“Me too, maybe. If they—“ Caleb trailed off, tilting his head. “Ahh, there you are.”
Nott looked up at the window. There was an orange cat outside blocking the late afternoon sun, eyes shining as it peered into their cell. It made a little mrrrp sound, tail lashing, before it darted off.
“Well that’s a bit of good luck, I was afraid maybe something had happened to him after I told him to hide and find me later,” Caleb said. “Excuse me for a moment, if you would, Nott.”
Nott didn’t even have time to ask what Caleb meant by that before the man’s eyes went entirely blue. Nott stared at him, her own eyes wide. She knew what magic looked like, though only a few goblins in her tribe had possessed such skills. “What are you doing?” She asked, curious.
Caleb didn’t answer her directly. “Only two guards, that’s not so bad. Now where is—?” A long pause. “There they are. I should have asked—“ Caleb blinked, his eyes fading back to normal. “Nott, did the guards take anything from you?”
“I um, had a dagger. And some thieves tools that I stole. They weren’t very good. And a cloak. And a pouch.” Her flask had fallen in the dirt when she had been captured, and she doubted the guards would have picked it up.
“Right, okay.” Caleb’s eyes went all blue again. “I do not see your things, but this room is very untidy and Frumpkin can only see so much through this window.” Caleb stared into the middle distance for a few moments longer before blinking and looking over at Nott, his eyes normal once more.
Nott put two and two together. “Is Frumpkin your cat? Were you using him to see? With magic?”
Caleb smiled. “Yes! You caught on very quickly. He is my familiar, and I can use him to see and hear things for me. Right now he is keeping an eye on the guards.”
Nott felt herself starting to get excited, hopeful even. “If you have magic, you can use it to get us out of here, can’t you? You can explode the door or kill the guards or something!”
“I am not as powerful as all that,” Caleb replied. “And I’d rather not be killing anyone if I can help it. That is a last resort, ja?” Caleb stood up and walked over to the door of the cell. It was old, made of heavy wood, and freshly marked by Nott’s claws. She had panicked that first night, clawing at the door until her claws had dulled. “The door is too thick for me to burn through quickly, the guards would notice long before we could escape.” Caleb looked at the lock thoughtfully, tapping it with a finger. “This though…”
“It’s a simple lock,” Nott said. It was frustrating to be stuck in a cell with such a poor lock, it was practically an insult.
“I would not know,” Caleb said. “If you had your tools, you could do something about it?”
“Well sure,” Nott said. “I could probably open it with a hairpin, it’s that bad.” She eyed Caleb hopefully. “You don’t have anything like that on you, do you?”
“No.” Caleb’s eyes darted around the room, which was empty except for Nott, a poor mattress stuffed with straw, and a bucket in the corner. His eyes settled back on the door, fingers trailing over Nott’s gouges in the wood. “If you had a few small slivers of iron, a couple of inches long, would those work? As lock picks of a sort?”
“Maybe?” Nott shrugged. “It’d be better than nothing.”
“Hmmm, okay then.” And as Nott watched, Caleb started working at the gouges she had made in the wood, trying to use his dull human nails to pry up some splinters.
Nott left the safety of her corner and crept closer to Caleb. “What’re you doing? Wood isn’t going to help.”
“I can turn the wood into iron if I can just—“ Caleb said something that Nott assumed from the force of it was a curse. Nott watched him pull a splinter from his finger.
“Let me do it,” Nott said. She thought she understood what Caleb was trying to do now, and even though her claws were dull they were still stronger than human nails. It took her until the sun was nearly setting, but she managed to pry several long, unbroken splinters out of the door.
“Very good,” Caleb said, holding the bits of wood in his palm. “Now here is the plan. You unlock this door, we sneak out into the main building, grab our things while the guards are distracted, and get out. Nice and easy.”
Nott frowned. “How are we going to distract the guards?”
“That will be my job,” Caleb said. As Nott watched, the bits of wood in his hand slowly began to turn iron dull. “I am very good with fire.”
************
Nott still couldn’t believe that the plan had worked, even while they were running through the fields, the smell of smoke clinging to their clothes and the angry, panicked shouts of both guards and villagers fading into the night. She was running as fast as her small legs would carry her, eyes locked on Caleb’s back. The moon was bright and high, which was the only reason he wasn’t stumbling around, she was sure, and his long stride was taking him further from her with every step. Nott knew she didn’t have to follow him. She could easily just lose herself in the tall grass, and let him leave her behind. He probably didn’t want her following him anyway.
Caleb looked back, turned, and swept Nott up onto his shoulders. Nott let out a little screech and clung tightly to Caleb’s hair.
“Sorry, didn’t want to lose you,” Caleb said, panting as he ran. “Once we get into the woods we can probably slow down. They will have a harder time following us there, if indeed they are following us.”
Caleb kept saying “us” like they were together, would still be together after this. Nott wondered if that’s what Caleb meant by it. At home… well, what used to be her home, weaker goblins often did things for stronger goblins, in turn for their protection. Did humans do a similar thing? Nott wasn’t good for much except stealing, but that was a useful skill! Caleb had smiled at her when she had finally managed to pick the lock on their cell, and he hadn’t yelled at her when her first few attempts had failed. Maybe he’d protect her if she stole things for him.
“We work well together, don’t we?” Nott asked.
“We do,” Caleb replied. Ahead of them, Frumpkin ran, orange fur washed out in the moonlight.
Nott could have left it at that. They’d reach the woods soon and they could both go their separate ways. Nott could go back to lurking in shadows and shivering in corners and being alone and afraid. She swallowed hard.
“Maybe—maybe we should stick together?” It was a squeak of a question. “I can be useful!”
There was silence except for the pounding of feet on grass and Caleb’s panting for what seemed like an eternity.
“I am not always the best of company,” Caleb finally said. “But maybe it is time to stop being alone. Sure. Okay. Why not?”
The two of them headed off into the world, for the first time in a long time, not alone.