This was the only spy here! A hobgoblin that could crawl in his head and read his thoughts, turn them against him and play on his already growing doubt. He would hear no more. Deglan threw his rod into the water and backed away, his hand going for his cleaver before realizing he had not taken it to the Moot where weapons were forbidden. He continued to back away, eyes never leaving the hobgoblin who simply stared back at him, face full of serene regret.

“Deglan,” he said aloud. “Would you ever set foot in the Ever Dark?”

“So,” Deglan replied taking another step, “now you threaten me with death?”

“No,” Curdle said. “It was an honest question. Would you ever willingly go down there?”

Deglan thought about that horrible unseen place; a twisting network of narrow tunnels and tight, low chambers where the gnomes housed their dead. No light had ever touched those crypts, the bodies being tended by blind gnomes so ancient they might as well have been walking spirits. Deglan imagined their huge, bleached, unseeing eyes, their lank wisps of white, silk-thin hair, their bony hands handling the corpses, dragging them, laying them in their nooks. He shivered. Deglan did not much fancy going there in death. He would never venture to the Ever Dark in life.

“No gnome would,” Curdle said.

“Get out of my head,” Deglan warned.

“It was your face I was reading, Master Loamtoes. I am speaking to you aloud, taking a tremendous risk, because I need you to trust me.”

“You want me to believe my own people capable of--”

“They are my people too, Deglan.” Curdle said. “I was born a goblin, but this is my home. I am not trying to deceive you. I need your help.”

Deglan paused. “Why did you ask me about the Ever Dark?”

“Because that is where they imprisoned him,” Curdle replied. “The Flame Binder. Surrounded by miles of impenetrable Earth on all sides, with a lake guarded by the undine above. Earth and Water kept him contained and the only way to get to him was through that winding tomb. You would not go there. I would not go there. I doubt any gnome or hobgoblin would willingly.

“So, that leaves the Red Caps. Goblins from outside who have no fear of the Ever Dark. But they would need light to see or they would have no hope of finding their precious Flame Binder. Even a tiny candle would have alerted the grave diggers. For all their age and blindness, those gnomes are wielders of potent Magic. It would take an army to overpower them and no army can operate in those cramped passages, even if it could reach the entrance without alerting the city.”

“Then,” Deglan said uncertainly. “How did they get him out?”

“It took centuries,” Curdle said. “But they tunneled in.”