The Goblin Wood
| Author | Hilari Bell |
|---|---|
| Cover artist | Eric Bowman |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Genre | Fantasy novel |
| Publisher | Eos |
Publication date | April 2003 |
| Media type | Print (Hardback & Paperback) |
| Pages | 304 pp (first edition, hardback) |
| ISBN | 978-0-06-051371-9 (first edition, hardback) |
| OCLC | 50767753 |
| LC Class | PZ7.B38894 Go 2003 |
| Followed by | The Goblin Gate |
The Goblin Wood is a 2003 teen fantasy novel by Hilari Bell.
Plot summary
Makenna is a hedgewitch. Her mother is killed when a new priest is sent to town. Makenna flees for her life, and tries to flood the town as her last act of vengeance. She flees to the woods and is teased by a group of goblins. Soon, she catches one goblin named Cogswhallop. She spares his life, and to repay his debt, he helps her out and convinces his fellow goblins to stop taunting her. Makenna later meets a friendly trader in the woods who tells her of the events taking place around the world. He tells her that the priesthood is working to eliminate all sources of magic they consider to not come from divine sources, goblins and hedgewitches among them. The goblin Cogswhallop and his friends ask for Makenna's aid in rescuing a small goblin family from being burned to death by a priest. Makenna aids the goblins, and they form an alliance to help goblins and find a place where they can live in peace.
Tobin, a young knight, finds his brother out late one night fleeing from the guards for helping the rebels. Tobin assists his brother but is caught himself and is branded as a traitor. To help save his name and family, Tobin accepts a mission to rid the northern lands of the goblins so that settlers who have lost their lands to the barbarians in the south may have a place to live. Tobin sets out alone to the far village to the north to rid the lands of the goblins and their leader, a "sorceress." Tobin travels to the town, where he meets a priest of the Bright Ones. The priest informs him of his mission: Tobin is to seek out the goblin lair and plant the Otherworld stone near the sorceress's headquarters so that they can spy on her through the stone. Tobin sets out to find the lair and is caught by the goblins, and is taken to their village. While trying to escape, he drops the stone.
While Tobin is a hostage in the Goblin village, he is kept chained to a post in a small jail. There, he watches and learns the customs of the goblins and how they are not so different from human children. Makenna (the "sorceress") sits in with him one day and performs a spell to learn what information he might have. Makenna tells Tobin that she's only a hedgewitch. Tobin is released from his prison to walk around the village with the children. He meets many goblins and becomes a familiar face around the goblin village. That night, the village is raided by knights that lived in the human outpost where Tobin had met the priest. The knights had been able to find the village because of the Otherworld stone Tobin had dropped earlier. The town is soon overtaken and but Tobin helps many of the goblins flee.
Makenna sneaks into the human village as a servant and lives with a small family where she saves a seven-year-old from choking to death, causing the hiring family to accept her. She flees that night and meets back up with the goblins, where they plan their attack. The next night, Tobin and the goblins try to sneak into the village, but he is caught while trying to raid the priest's tent and steal his books of spells. Makenna then valiantly jumps in to save him and they flee with the books, in hope of leading the goblins to a new world.
Makenna, Tobin, and the goblins are all huddled together as Makenna, using a magical wall, performs a spell that opens a portal into a whole new world. Just as the army comes over the hill, the goblins, Makenna, and Tobin disappear into the portal, never to be heard from again. Cogswhallop and some other goblins stay behind to continue to attack the humans.