The cool air stroked their faces as they leaned over. There was no glimmer of water at the bottom. The well looked to be as wide as a war bow was long. ‘Six feet wide but no telling how deep. How did they ever dig this deep through this bedrock?’ said the archer.

Blackstone raised the lantern and studied the egg-shaped tunnels. ‘If it’s as old as the castle then it was dug a hundred years or more ago. Our forefathers were tougher men than us, Will. Drop the torch.’

The flame plumed into the darkness. It showed the cut, stone-clad walls, bounced and ricocheted; sparks flew but still the burning torch did not reach the bottom. Will Longdon shook his head. ‘Thomas, perhaps we’ve found the entrance to the devil’s lair?’

The dim glow grew fainter and then finally disappeared. Blackstone raised the lantern. The well’s curved wall had another turn on the far side, as if they had built a second well alongside. ‘Will, look there.’

The two men edged around the half-wall.

‘God’s tears, Thomas, were these miners goblins?’

Blackstone stepped down onto the spiral staircase. ‘We’ll see where it leads.’

Will Longdon groaned. ‘That means we have to come all the way back up.’

The deep spiral stairs followed the curve of the well, wide enough for both men to cautiously edge down. Blackstone held the lantern with one hand and used his other to feel the way. His stonemason’s eye marvelled at the precision of the ashlar stone that had been so meticulously laid. It took highly skilled masons to cut dressing stone. Every so often a window slit was cut into the well’s wall, allowing light to penetrate the darkness. Blackstone mentally calculated their descent and after thirty feet the spiral staircase became a corridor that curved around to the other side of the well to meet the next staircase that wound down in the opposite direction, no longer right to left.

‘They must have changed the way down because the goblins got dizzy digging this,’ said Longdon. ‘Have you ever seen anything like it?’

‘Nothing,’ said Blackstone and carried on his descent. The same change of direction occurred every thirty feet as stairs became a corridor around the well and then reversed direction again.

‘The muscles in my legs feel as though they are being torn from the bone,’ said the stocky archer as they turned again at the next level.

‘Can’t be much further, Will. This is the fourth change so we are about a hundred and twenty feet deep.’

The lower they descended the clearer they heard the soft echo of flowing water. Blackstone halted. Will Longdon nearly bumped into him, his mind numb from the tedious descent.

‘What?’

‘You hear that?’ said Blackstone.

‘The water?’

‘Listen.’