“What’s your name?” Todd asked his new companion as he followed his little green guide.

“I is Gnar. Who is you?”

“I’m Todd. How did you end up living by the river?”

“We’ve been movin for a whiles now. Always get pushed out by bigger meaner baddies. Tribe used to be twice size, but most friends get munched.”

Todd didn’t really know how to respond to this so he just nodded. They slowly made their way through the snowy forest. It was hard for Gnar to move at a fast pace since his legs were short and the snow was deep. Goblins might not have been the most attractive creatures, but from what he had witnessed they seemed to be pretty sensible. If he wasn’t in a rush, he might have asked about how their culture operated.

Eventually Todd came in view of the familiar wooden cabins. It didn’t take long for Todd to locate the house he had stayed at in small nonexistent community. The lights were on suggesting someone was in the house. Hopefully Sasha was still there not dead or locked away somewhere. As he slowly pushed on the front door, Gnar was hiding behind the other side of the house. He clearly didn’t want any part of what was inside.

Todd could see Sasha sitting on the couch. Vanessa looked outraged and was shouting at his travel partner. She had gone from looking like a lovely host, to a complete mess. Her hair was disheveled and dark circles surrounded her eyes.

He barged in and quickly tackled Vanessa to the floor. Sasha, who was standing by the sidelines, was shocked to see Todd on top of Vanessa pinning her to the ground. The pale girl struggled and schreached.

“WHAT DID YOU DO TO MY DARRELL! YOU SHOULD BE GONE BY NOW!” screamed the now psychotic Vanessa. She bit Todd's arm and dug her fingernails into his skin.

Sasha glanced over to her left and saw a small green goblin lazily sitting next to her. “Today was getting weirder and weirder,” she thought.

“I killed him,” Todd responded

“NOOOoooo” Vanessa screamed. She was barely able to muster up enough strength to break away from Todd’s grip. It only took seconds for her to slit her own throat with her own razor-like nails.

Vanessa slumped to the floor and the room was silent.

“I can explain,” Todd said.

The three of them sat on the rug in the living room, while Todd recounted how he had almost died to a vampire and how he managed to find his way back. He told her about how he had met the goblins and their deal to return Gubba hopefully alive. Todd had assumed that Vanessa had also been a vampire.

Vanessa’s obsession with Darrell didn’t make sense if she was a vampire. Todd and Sasha spent some time trying to figure out why Vanessa hadn’t drained Sasha’s blood and why she killed herself when she heard Darrell had died. They came to the consensus that Vanessa was some sort of thrall which would explain the erratic behavior when he was gone.

Neither one of them knew for sure whether other vampires lived in the other houses but Todd suspected they did after finding the blood marked coin. They decided to wait until the cover of nightfall before they began their hunt for Gubba since they didn’t want to attract unwanted attention.

Gnar was perfectly fine with this plan because it gave him the opportunity to raid the pantry for food. Todd caught the little guy chomping on some moldy cheese and a rotting apple he had found. He tried to share it, but Todd refused pushing away Gnar’s disgusting dinner.

As the night grew darker, it was time to see what lay behind the walls of the other buildings. Sasha and Todd crept up to the entrance with Gnar dragging his little feet behind them. Todd slowly opened the door and peered inside. The room was empty, nothing hung from the walls and the floor was plain dirt. It looked like the inside of a movie prop.

They next two houses were the same, clearly the vampire was using these houses to lure suspecting travellers to their death. It was easier to justify staying the night in a full-fledged community rather than a sole cabin in the woods. It didn’t explain what had happened to Gubba, nor why Sasha was kept alive.

Gnar wanted to open up the last door, after seeing Todd and Sasha do it a couple times. Goblins rarely interacted with doors since they didn’t feel the need to build them onto their huts. He stood on his tiptoes and couldn’t quite reach the knob. Todd picked up Gnar so he could turn it and open the door.

On the inside of this last room was a heavy metal latch in the center of an otherwise empty house. The group tensed in anticipation as Todd heaved the solid iron metal off the hole it covered. All three of them peeked into the endless dark pit below them.