Mother of Goblins, Part 1 (Goblin Broodmother TFTG Preg)

By FoxFaceStories

A Story Tier Prompt for Babjie

Malcolm is a giant of a man - literally! Or at least, he’s half-giant on his mother’s side, giving him a huge stature within his adventuring party. But when he gets separated from his fellow heroes in a dark forest, he finds himself treated with hospitality by a goblin tribe. Little does he know that the tribe is lacking a broodmother, and their food and drink will ensure that Malcolm will soon be transformed into one . . .

Next Part

Mother of Goblins, Part 1

Malcolm swung his sword, and the last of the ogres was extinguished. Specifically, this one was literally cleaved in half, the body sagging in two directions, the smell of rotten offal and intestines spilling out.

“Eghh,” Taleria said, the elven archer covering her nose.

“Did you have to open him that far?” Jarice said. He was a human soldier and trained martial artist, and even his seasoned senses rankled at the smell.

Malcolm blushed heavily. “S-sorry. I just swung my sword like so. I didn’t expect him to just sort of . . . split open.”

There was a general groan from the party, but Wilkins, the short dwarven axe-wielder, just burst out laughing.

“Well, what can we expect of ya, laddie? Nae can we expect anything but cleaved enemies with a stature like yours!”

Once again, Malcolm blushed, looking over himself, and certainly down at the rest of his friends and adventuring party members. No one could mistake Malcolm for being entirely human, not given that he was literally over eight feet tall and built like a king’s wagon. His mother had been a giant that his father had somehow seduced, and while he’d been raised by the pair quite lovingly, he always felt out of place - too short for the immensity of giants, and definitely too tall for everyday folk. Even orc-folk were tiny compared to him, and these ogres, while large, were only fatter - he still loomed over them! The half-giant scratched the back of his head, tousling his brown hair, and made a sheepish grin.

“I’ll try to be more surgical next time?”

“No, it’s alright,” Taleria said. “You keep on being you, Malcolm. It’s not like you aren’t our first line of defence.”

“Or attack, given that reach,” Jarice joked.

At this, Wilkins just bellowed his laughter harder. “You’re practically an adventuring party all to yerself, laddie! Still, I’m thinking we should get upwind of that wee dreadful draft, don’t ya think?”

There was agreement all around. Malcolm outpaced the group by the sheer breadth of his stride, and had to keep reducing his step so that they could catch up. He apologised often, as was his gentle way when he wasn’t in combat. Taleria even patted his thigh kindly as they moved up the hill to the edge of the Sakaria Forest, a silent apology for her earlier words.

The party made camp. It was getting late, after all, and they wanted to explore the forest in the daylight, so that they could follow the trail of the lost treasure they were seeking. Somewhere in the Sakarian Forest was the Lost Tomb of King Adumere, and within it would be his enchanted sword, Nahalis. It was said to be priceless, but they’d be happy to put a real king’s ransom to it. Malcolm even dreamed of buying a mansion with doorways high enough for him to easily walk through, not to mention a larder big enough for his appetite. It groaned now, and he ate easily as much as the other three companions put together, much to his embarrassment. He sometimes wished he could be smaller. Often, in fact. He knew that his height and reach and strength made him a powerful fighter and defender, but was it worth all the fuss? He dreamed of becoming rich enough to hire a wizard to reduce his size, if such a thing was even possible. Then he could truly feel like part of a community instead of standing out. 

“Tomorrow, we begin our journey towards riches and glory!” Jarice announced as they readied their tents. 

Malcolm could only nod in hope. He didn’t have a tent. He was simply too big.

***

The Sakarian Forest was immense, its trees tall, their canopies so thick that light sometimes barely escaped through them. Already they’d tangled with a pack of direwolves and needed to stitch up Wilkins, not that he minded the new scars. But the thing about the forest was that it also possessed inhospitable geography; massive cliffs and low valleys and winding paths that never took you exactly where you wanted to go. Taleria held the fragile map they’d uncovered, the one that would lead them to Adumere’s tomb, and took them up a winding cliff path. Their space to move around it was so thin that they were literally moving sideways to prevent themselves from going over the cliff; there was nothing but hard rock against their backs, and progress was slow. Even Wilkins had stopped joking; the dwarf’s fear of heights was greatly evidence.

“Why would anyone want to live above ground!” he exclaimed.

But Malcolm was even more nervous; his boots could barely fit on the tiny ledge. Naturally, he went last of the group, but he had to edge along carefully, taking each footstep with an elegance and delicateness that he certainly didn’t naturally possess.

“You can do it, Malcolm!” Taleria encouraged, the elven woman having made it to the other side with the others. “Just a few more steps!”

Malcolm took a deep breath, the half-giant summoning the courage. He moved his boot to the left . . . only for the rock to crumble beneath his weight. Everything seemed to happen at once.

Jarice reached out to grab him. 

Malcolm flailed and began to fall.

A rockslide began. 

The others jumped to safety.

And then, careening down the cliff like a dive-bombing bird of prey, like a great boulder cast from the heavens, Malcolm fell. He didn’t even had time to scream; Taleria did that for him.

SPLASH!

He fell into the raging torrent of the river below, and somehow missed every rock and jutting knife-like formation. He was sucked under, gasping for breath. He tried to signal to the others that he was okay, but he was so far beneath the water that they likely hadn’t even seen his miraculous survival. And while the giant was strong, the river was stronger. It took all of his strength to keep with the current and - THWACK!

He crashed into one river rock, then another. They batted at him, knocking him about, then finally unconscious. His vision turned to black, and the last thing he realised was that he’d opened his mouth to breath, only to fill it with water.

Ah, he thought. I am dying after all.

Funny, how he finally felt so very small. What a cruel joke.

***

Malcolm woke. To his shock, he was not in the Ever-Mountains as his mother had taught him he would go when he died, the afterlife of all giantfolk. Nor was he in the Shining Eternal that his father believed in, with its golden gates and never-setting sun. Instead, he was in . . . a cabin of sorts. One with a low ceiling and many hanging trinkets. The smell of boiling and cooked meat filled his nostrils, immediately eliciting a loud groan from his ever-hungry stomach. There was a fire in the cabin, and it warmed him, making him forget how strangely claustrophobic it was in here; small, even by human standards.

“Wakey wakey, big man!” 

Malcolm leapt up, his adventurer’s instincts rising in response to the unexpected and guttural-sounding voice. He was rewarded with a hearty thwack upon his forehead as he smacked right into the ceiling. The man folded like a flimsily-constructed cake, collapsing in on himself and nearly breaking his feeble bed. A loud cackle followed, and looming into view was a creature he had fought many times early in his heroic career: a short, green-skinned goblin. He was male, with darker splotches on his skin and a simple leather tunic and fur pants. His ears were long and pointed, sweeping back behind his head, and he had sharp, triangular teeth, perfect for a carnivorous creature. His golden eyes with their vertical slits showed excitement, perhaps even anticipation. It made Malcolm’s stomach groan even more loudly, now from nervousness instead of hunger. Well, mostly instead of hunger.

“Looks like the big man is awake!” the goblin announced cheerfully. “Finally! We was worried we’d have to carve you up and serve out chunks of meat if ya didn’t wakey wakey soon, heha!”

Malcolm reached for his enormous sword, but it was long gone. Probably fell from his person in the river, or the goblins had taken it. He rose again, slowly this time.

“Beware, foul creature, I will not be torn apart so easily if you think you can devour me.”

The goblin sized him up, then burst out laughing and slapped the half-giant on the calf. He was so tiny compared to Malcolm that the action was almost comical. 

“I’m just kiddin’ with ya, stranger! Ya think we want ta really eat ya? I’m just yanking ya chain! We done been keeping ya alive these past few days, making sure to rest ya up and tend to ya wounds.”

He extended a small hand; green, with clawed fingers. “Name’s Kagga.”

Malcolm didn’t know what to do.

“I hear that in polite society and all, it’s good to return a name, yeah?”

Malcolm blinked. “Oh, ah, of course. I’m Malcolm. Thank you for saving me, though I don’t know how.”

He shook Kagga’s hand, enveloping it entirely. It was like forming an agreement with a toddler, one with a very green skin condition. The goblin chuckled as their hands parted.

“Wasn’t easy, can tell ya that! But I sure as shit didn’t work alone! Come, come! Grab some rabbit and lamb stew and eat ya fill, big man! Not sure we can keep feedin’ ya as much as we have, but the others’ll want ta meet ya! See the fucking tall giant who washed up by our village!”

Malcolm nearly banged his head on the ceiling again. “I’m in a goblin village?”

“The best fucking goblin village around, yeah! Or at least, it was. Haven’t been having too many good times lately, not since our beloved broodmother passed on into the Great Feast.

Malcolm nodded. This part of goblins he understood. Their societies were usually tribal, though evidently this one might not be violent, isolated as it was. Goblins bred like anyone, of course, but there were often far more males than females. The true job of swelling their population came from a goblin broodmother, a female whose body took on immense fertility, sometimes to the point of being able to carry multiple partners’ children at once, even at various stages of pregnancy! It was, in some ways, a fascinating and very strange part of their physiology.

“I thought, um, that a female would become a broodmother if there wasn’t one in the tribe?” he asked. He took the ladle and ate some of the stew, and immediately sighed in relief; it tasted amazing, and clearly had some exotic spices in it that were almost addictive.

“Normally they do, normally they do! But we had a sickness come through years ago. Real shit stuff. Our females can still produce but can’t become broodmothers, and so our ranks are falling, yeah?”

Malcolm nodded after devouring more stew. “In that case, I especially thank you for your kindness in aiding me. I fell from a cliff while travelling with my friends, I need to find them and - agh!”

He rested too heavily on one left as he shifted, and the pain radiated upwards. Kagga simply grinned.

“Methinks ya might wanna be here a bit longer, mate. Rest up and meet the village till we get ya back on those giant legs of yours.”

Malcolm nodded, understanding just how close he’d come to death. Certainly, he still felt quite weak, that was for sure.

“Again, I thank you. If I could try to send word to my friends and-”

“We’ll work all of that out later. Come on, finish up and see the village. Ya got a good few goblins ta thank for you surviving an’ all.”

Malcolm, always polite when not in battle, hurriedly finished up his food. His stomach wanted more, but he wasn’t about to complain. He shuffled out of the thankfully large entrance to the cabin, though he had to get down on his hands and knees to do so. Mind, it wasn’t as tight a fit as he’d first assumed. Hell, it almost felt like he’d shrunk in height a little, though that was obviously crazy.

He exited out onto the grass and dirt, finally able to stand again. The sunlight filtered through the thick canopies above in only a few places, illuminating the wider goblin village. Despite his impression of goblins, the area was surprisingly beautiful: their huts were simply log constructions with thatched roofs, but they were also build up into the trees above, merging with the great trunks, with plank bridges connecting them like a series of spiderwebs without clear pattern. Torchlight lit the darker spaces, and there were many totem carvings and spiritual displays, including chalk murals upon sacred stones in the centre of the village. Numerous goblins moved to and fro, though clearly less than a full village’s worth: there were only a scant few children around, some carried by mothers, none of whom appeared pregnant bar one. Slowly, attention turned to Malcolm as it always did, and the giant felt a great deal of embarrassment at how much he stuck out - even more among small goblin folk! They were mostly green-skinned, though there were some yellows and dull oranges around as well. Fur and leather were evidently the extent of their clothing, and the scant few females wore fur wraps around their breasts and short fur skirts, otherwise leaving their midriffs on display. Few wore shoes of any kind, but then they would have hardy feet.

“Um, hello?” Malcolm said, somehow making it a question. His voice bellowed throughout the village, to the point where others emerged from their high huts in the trees to look at him. Still, the village looked easily less than half its capacity, perhaps only a third or so!

“Welcome, outsider!” a loud voice declared, also male. A tiny green-skinned figure, aged and wrinkled, approached. He barely stood to the height of Malcolm’s calf, but his elaborate headdress and many trinkets gave him an air of importance anyway. “I am Skurg, the village elder and chieftain! From whence to ya hail?”

“Um, from Portis,” he said.

There was a general grumbling among the goblins. “Never heard of it!” one cried. “That’s made up!” said another.

“I assure you, I am. It’s well beyond here, out of the forest.”

Another rumbling. “Far from home, eh?” said one. “Wandering by himself?” said another. Skurg looked up, as if directing the questions to Malcolm.

“Um, I’ve got friends in the forest. They think I’m dead. I need to find them once I’m better and tell them I’m alive - we got separated.”

More rumblings, this time with excitement.

“He’s alone! He needs help!”

“Doesn’t look human to me, is he magic? Please let him be magic!”

“He looks more like a giant than a man!”

Malcolm smiled awkwardly. “Well, I’m half-giant, technically. My mother was a giant, and my father was human.

This caused an immense excitement which Malcolm certainly didn’t understand. Kagga went over to Skurg and whispered something in the aged chieftain’s ear, and the chieftain’s eyes lit up with renewed youthful vigour.

“A half-giant, ya say? There’s real fuckin’ power in a giant’s blood, I tell ya. Real magic power. The power of change. The power of renewal. Did ya know that?”

Malcolm slowly nodded. “Mother told me such things, though not much. Um, thank you for saving my life. All of you.”

“Nah, we thank you!” one woman cried, one of the only ones Malcolm could see. She carried a babe who was suckling at her full green breast, and she looked to Kagga, who gave her a meaningful nod, at which point she erupted into tears. Goblins gathered around her, offering comfort. The entire display confused Malcolm.

“Look, I don’t know how I can repay you all, but unfortunately I can’t do magic. But if there’s something I can do while I recover, I promise to help you if I can just stay here for a time.”

“Of course ya can!” Kagga declared, and Skurg repeated the proclamation more officially. “You’ve got the magic of change in ya, lad! You’re exactly what we’ve been waiting for, a sign from the Great Mother of the Feast!”

Malcolm had no idea what that quite meant, but the crowd erupted into cheers, wailing, and tears, all of it like a religious awakening. He was even more thoroughly confused, but clearly these people viewed him as a good omen of sorts. He felt a little deceitful, but if they saw it that way, who was he to argue? He needed food and healing, and these kind goblins had provided it. Slowly, he sat down to be closer to their level, and it was Skurg who stood beside him, readying a proclamation to their village.

“It is our job now, fellas and lasses, to make this giant welcome! He’s got the magic we been waiting for! The Great Mother of the Feast hasn’t abandoned us! She’s sent us this sign! Ready a great feast! Fill this hungry big fella up with as much wine and pork and good tucker as he can take! He needs healing! His leg is frickin’ busted and needs mendin’! Ladies, gather your things to help him! Fellas, get hunting! Shamans, say the words upon the blessed tucker they bring back! Tonight we’re havin’ a feast in here Malcolm’s honour! The village’ll be restored, and all of us with it!”

The group erupted into cheers, and Malcolm found himself swept up in it a little; he cheered too, happy to be among people that simply accepted him, even if their near-worship was a little odd. It was only when the party parted that a female goblin approached him. It was the nursing one who had cried earlier, but she seemed to have regained herself. She was actually quite beautiful, at least for a goblin, and had quite the curvaceous figure on her little form. That was another thing that sucked about being a large half-giant man; finding date partners was almost impossible.

“Thank ya, Malcolm,” she said in a husky voice.

“I didn’t really do anything. You all saved me.”

“You a gonna save the village though.”

“Er, how am I doin’ that?”

She grinned, sharp teeth on display. “The most important way. The secret way.”

“Not being eaten, I hope?”

She cackled. “Not at all! What do ya fuckin’ take us for? Nah, much better than that. You ever had a goblin feast before?”

“I can’t say I ever have, no.”

She grinned. “It’s a wild show. Much better than you prudish non-green folk have it. And the food is delish. You ever try goblin patter?”

Malcolm shook his head, trying to keep up with it all. The goblin woman drew out a package from her satchel, mindful of the babe nursing at her breast. It looked like a hunk of meat, but it was wrapped in green vines of a sort, albeit they looked like rolled lettuce leaves, sort of. It also smelled wonderful, those same exotic herbs in it. Other goblins were watching this interaction, and Malcolm got the sense that he had to eat it as a form of politeness. He took it, sniffed it, then swallowed it.

It really was delicious. Or delish, as the woman had said. He actually moaned a little from the taste.

“Holy shit.”

“Much holier than shit,” the woman said. “You ever want more, you come to me. I’m Cazzi.”

Malcolm thanked her. The contents hit his stomach and seemed to bloom within him, and Gods it was tasty. His stomach rumbled happily, and there was a strange . . . pressure in his body. Just slightly. He blinked, and was surprised to see that the world looked smaller, as if the goblins had grown, or he had shrunk. He gaped at his fingers, still with a little patter on them, and blinked several times. Could it be that this humble goblin village could make him smaller with such a delicious spice?

Without thinking, he licked the delicious spice upon his fingers, already addicted to it.

He didn’t notice, but every goblin in the village was watching with excitement.

To Be Continued . . .