Still, he wondered if things would be different there. Jig’s world was a constant battle for territory between goblins, hobgoblins, and the other creatures. But the world below belonged to the Necromancer. Maybe he would keep the creatures under his control from charging off to be senselessly slaughtered every time something came through the entrance. The monsters there might actually win battles from time to time. Jig’s imagination conjured an image of a patrol all his own, returning to the lair with the bodies of the adventurers dragging behind them. There was cheering and shouting and singing. Songs that weren’t about goblins getting themselves killed.

He didn’t care if he was the one leading the patrol. Even to be a part of such a group, to work with other goblins to win battles, would be a thing worth all the treasure in Straum’s lair.

Reality intruded as Jig remembered the sound of Porak’s last gurgling breaths, right after Barius’s sword poked out of his back. Jig shook his head, angry at himself for his silly fantasies. Goblins were nothing. The natural hierarchy meant the deeper you went, the stronger the monsters. That was why goblins lived here, closer to the entrance than any other monsters. Things had always been that way, probably since the day Ellnorein made this place.

“Goblin, get in here,” Darnak yelled.

He joined the others. Ryslind held out five vials of a dark green liquid. “This is an antitoxin,” he said. “I had hoped to save it for emergencies, but I see no other way to survive the lizard-fish.”

Jig took one of the small vials and stared at it with suspicion. What had died to create these potions? he wondered, remembering what Riana had told him about the blue powder. And how had Ryslind known to bring antitoxin? Was this common practice among mages? Maybe so. If Ryslind was a normal mage, Jig could understand why people would try to poison them.

The others drank it down, even Riana. If anyone had reason to doubt the mage, it was her. Jig shrugged and swallowed his own potion in one gulp. After all, it couldn’t be worse than bread.

The potion tasted salty, and it was thicker than he expected. A thin, slimy coating clung to the roof of his mouth and the back of his throat. This would save him from the sting of the lizard-fish? He didn’t understand how, but what did he know about magic? If Ryslind said this would work, who was he to question? Nobody else seemed to have any doubts.