Raven and I exchanged frowns and shrugs. We did not know what he was talking about.

Goblin sounded like he was regressing toward childhood. Make it stop looking at me. Make it stop. Ive been good. Make it go away.

One-Eye was on his knees beside Goblin. Its all right. Its all right. Its not real. Its going to be all right.

I exchanged glances with Raven. He turned, began gesturing at Darling. Im sending her to fetch the Captain.

Darling left reluctantly. Raven took another sheet from the pile and resumed reading. Cool as a stone, mat Raven.

Goblin screamed for a while, then got quiet as death. I jerked around. One-Eye lifted a hand to tell me I was not needed. Goblin had finished delivering his message.

Goblin relaxed slowly. The terror left his face. His color improved. I knelt, touched his carotid. His heart was hammering, but its beat was slowing. Surprised it didnt kill him this time, I said. It ever been this bad before?

No. One-Eye dropped Goblins hand. Wed better not put it on him next time.

Is it progressive? My trade borders theirs along the shadowed edges, but only in small ways. I did not know.

No. His confidence will need support for a while. Sounded like he caught Soulcatcher right at the heart of the Tower. I think that would leave anybody rocky.

While in the presence of the Lady, I breathed. I could not contain my excitement. Goblin had seen the inside of the Tower! He might have seen the Lady! Only the Ten Who Were Taken ever came out of the Tower. Popular imagination invests its interior with a thousand gruesome possibilities. And I had me a live witness!

You just let him be, Croaker. Hell tell you when hes ready. There was a hard edge to One-Eyes voice.

They laugh at my little fantasies, tell me I have fallen in love with a spook. Maybe they are right. Sometimes my interest scares me. It gets close to becoming an obsession.

For a time I forgot my duty to Goblin. For a moment he stopped being a man, a brother, an old friend. He became

a source of information. Then, shamed, I retreated to my papers.

The Captain arrived, puzzled, dragged by a determined Darling. Ah. I see. He made contact. He studied Goblin. Said anything yet? No? Wake him up, One-Eye.

One-Eye started to protest, thought better of it, shook Goblin gently. Goblin took his time awakening. His sleep was almost as deep as a trance.

Was it rough? the Captain asked me.

I explained. He grunted, said, That wagon is on its way. One of you start packing.

I started straightening my piles.

One of you means Raven, Croaker, You stand by here. Goblin doesnt look too good.