Shadow Chaser

4 The Trouble Continues …

The next morning I was woken by Invincible’s shrill, furious squealing. At first I was too sleepy to understand what was going on, but as usual divine enlightenment struck me out of the blue. The answer was very simple—I could hear Invincible squealing because a certain little green stinker had decided to annoy the formidable little mouse.

“Ai! He bit me! I swear by the great insane shaman Tre-Tre, the little rat bit me!” the goblin roared.

“You only got what you deserve. And when Marmot finds out you’ve been teasing his little friend he’ll tear your head off.”

“You’re a fool, Harold,” said Kli-Kli, licking his terrible wound.

“Oh, no. I beg your pardon,” I said, getting up off the bed. “You’re the fool here, not me.”

“True, I am a fool,” Kli-Kli agreed amiably. “But then, I’m wise, too. And you’re just a fool.”

“And how did you get to be so wise?” asked Lamplighter, who was listening to our conversation.

“What do you mean?” I snorted as I put on my shirt. “He was dropped on his head as a child, and ever since then he thinks he’s a wise fool.”

“Maybe I am only a wise fool, but you, Harold, are a genuine fool. And you know why? Because a wise man knows he’s a fool, and that makes him a wise fool. But people like you, who think they’re the cleverest and wisest of all, don’t even realize what absolute fools they really are.”

“What wonderful reasoning,” I remarked, feeling slightly confused. “Did you ever think of becoming a professor of philosophy at the university?”

“Oh, what big words we know,” said the little goblin, who found this exchange very amusing. “Phi-lo-so-phy! It must have taken ten years for a fool like you to learn that word. And as for reasoning, I can prove to you that you’re a fool in no time at all. Do you want me to?”

“No.”

“That’s because you’re a fool,” the goblin snapped back. “Are you afraid?”

“I just don’t want to hear any proofs from the king’s fool. You’re an idle chatterbox, Kli-Kli.”

“I’m an idle chatterbox? No, I’ll prove to you that you’re a fool who doesn’t listen to wise men,” said the goblin, getting furious. “Look here. Proof number one. Who would ever take on a Commission to get the Rainbow Horn?”

“A fool!” I said, forced to admit that the green midget was right.

“Oh, you grow wiser by the hour,” the jester said with heartfelt sincerity as he bound up his bitten finger with a handkerchief.

The handkerchief wasn’t exactly fresh and clean, and it had very vulgar little blue flowers embroidered along its edges.

“To continue,” the green bedbug said, “proof number two! When you refused to accept the authenticity of the goblin prophecies about a Dancer in the Shadows, that is, about you, you acted like the greatest fool of all time, didn’t you?”

“I acted like an intelligent man. Why would I want to be in any of your ludicrous prophecies? I became a fool when I allowed you to call me the Dancer in the Shadows.”

“Oh!” he sighed disappointedly. “Now you’ve started turning stupid again. But never mind, you may be a fool, but you accepted the name, and now there’s no way you can get out of it. The prophecy will be fulfilled.”

Kli-Kli simply adored the Bruk-Gruk—the goblin Book of Prophecies that’s supposed to predict every important event that will ever take place in Siala. And supposedly there’s a special cycle of predictions called “Dancer in the Shadows.” The goblin insists that these fairy tales are about me, but I don’t want to have anything to do with any crazy goblin shamans. The last thing I need for a happy life is to find that I’m the hero of some silly book.

“And how did he accept the name, Kli-Kli?” Mumr asked.

“How, Lamplighter-Mamplighter? Very simply. Because he’s a fool.”

Something must have got stuck in the goblin’s brains. He’s obviously going to repeat that word all day long now, like a green parrot. Lamplighter wasn’t satisfied with this answer from Stalkon’s personal jester, so Kli-Kli kept up his harangue: “I’ll tell you. The prophecy about the Dancer in the Shadows says that this dancer, who will definitely be a thief, will save the entire world from a nasty villain. But before he does that, a whole heap of events and signs have to happen. There are all sorts of ways you can recognize the Dancer, that is, our very own much beloved, absolute fool Harold, also known as the Shadow. First the Dancer has to bind demons using the Horse of Shadows, then he has to kill a purple bird, and then take up the name.”

“And what’s all this got to do with Harold?” asked Mumr, puzzled.

“Oh, it’s hard work talking with you fools,” said Kli-Kli, stamping his foot and pretending to be angry. “We can say that Harold bound the demons, can’t we?”

“Not me, the magicians of the Order bound the demons.”

“That’s not important,” said Kli-Kli, brushing aside my objection. The jester was riding hard on his favorite hobbyhorse—the prophecies of the crazy magician Tre-Tre, may the light be a curse to him!

“Did the Order bind the demons with your help? It did! Has the sign come to pass? It has! Was there a purple bird in Hargan’s Wasteland? There was, and not just one, either!”

“If goblins call those flying monsters birds…”

“It’s a literary expression, my lad. You don’t know a thing about art. So, was there a bird?”

“Have it your own way,” I sighed. I couldn’t be bothered pointing out to this cocky small fry that the creatures spawned by the Kronk-a-Mor used by the Nameless One’s shamans should be called nightmares, not birds. “Okay, so there was.”

“Right! And you have a name now, don’t you?”

“Aha! Ever since I was a child. They call me Harold.”

“Pah, you’re hopeless! Are you really a total numbskull or just pretending so well that I can’t tell the difference? I’m not talking about the name you were born with, I mean the name you were granted from above. Dancer in the Shadows—that one! You agreed that I could call you that. And so you accepted the name.”

Yet again I cursed the day when I told Kli-Kli that he could call me that. The only reason I did it was to make the little pest leave me in peace, but instead he started yelling out loud for all to hear that the sign had been fulfilled. And now I could expect more, equally stupid goblin prophecies.

“And what prophetic sign do you have lined up next?” I asked the goblin scornfully.

“Next?” The jester screwed his eyes up, gave me a cunning look, and declaimed:

“Right,” I said, and couldn’t help laughing out loud. “It’s like I’ve always said: Your crazy shaman Tre-Tre ate too many magic mushrooms for breakfast.”

“Let’s have a few less unjustified insults, if you don’t mind!” said the goblin, baring his teeth at me. “Tre-Tre was my people’s greatest shaman! Artsivus and his Order can’t hold a candle to him.”

“Maybe not, but I’d rather let someone else decide that. Have you even figured out what that little jingle of yours is all about? I didn’t understand a thing.”

“That’s because you’re a fool,” the jester reminded me yet again. “It’s a prophecy, so you get to understand it when it happens. But it’s about to happen any minute, because the crimson Key has departed. Or to put it in normal language, someone has walked off with our artifact.”

“That Key of yours? Is it crimson, then?” Lamplighter asked.

“Well, no…,” said Kli-Kli, confused by the question. “It looks more like it’s made of crystal.… All right, Harold. Go and fill your belly, you and I have got a job to do.”

“I only have one job to do, Kli-Kli, the one I swore on Tomcat’s grave to finish. I’m going to get the Rainbow Horn, hand it over to the Order, grab my honestly earned loot and charter of pardon, and start living the good life. Nothing else concerns me, unless, of course, it happens to be a threat to my life or a chance to pick up some money.”

“But we do have a job to do,” Kli-Kli said very seriously. “Mumr and Eel are going to relieve Marmot and Egrassa.”

“I don’t see the connection. What’s that got to do with me?”

“In the first place, you can give Marmot his ling back.…”

“I can do that here,” I said, interrupting the goblin.

“In the second place,” Kli-Kli continued imperturbably, “Miralissa has asked you to take a look at the house and say if you can get inside and filch the Key from under the very noses of the Master’s servants.”

“Filch it? From under their noses?” I asked like an echo. “Me?”

“Yes, you! You’re our thief, aren’t you?”

There was nothing I could say to that. I picked the mouse up off the pillow, put him on my shoulder, and said: “Let’s go. Do you know the way?”

“Honeycomb came back this morning and told me. Eel’s coming along. Lamplighter, are you with us, too?”

“Yes.”

“All right then,” I said to the goblin as I walked out of the room. “But there’ll be no strolling round the city until I get my breakfast.”

“You’ll get your breakfast. Master Quidd laid the table ages ago.”

Birds were singing their song of summer joy, flowers were blooming, the sky was blue, the grass was green, the sun was shining. If I could have forgotten that the Key had been stolen from right under our noses and we still didn’t know what had happened to Loudmouth, it would have been a wonderful day.

“Do we have a long way to go?” I asked the goblin.

“Not very,” the jester muttered.

He was holding on to my sleeve with his right hand and hopping along on one foot, amusing himself and all the passersby. I couldn’t tear myself free, because the jester had a grip on my shirt sleeve like a tick on a dog’s ear, so I had to try persuasion. But my polite and heartfelt request to stop playing the fool and walk on two feet like normal people was refused. Then I tried to ignore the hopping goblin; after all, I couldn’t fight him in the public street, could I?

“How far is not very far?” I asked my companion after another unsuccessful attempt to tear my sleeve out of his tenacious fingers.

“About an hour,” Kli-Kli replied indifferently, and hopped over a stick lying on the ground.

I groaned.

“We’re going to the southern part of the city on Motley Hill. It’s quite a walk to get there.”

“For some it’s a walk, for some it’s an excuse to skip about and play the fool,” I remarked.

But Kli-Kli was all set to hop on one foot for the entire hour. “I’m so sorry they didn’t give us the carriage today,” the king’s jester quipped, hopping neatly over a puddle.

The little creep had lied. It was no more than twenty minutes from the inn to our destination.

The street leading up Motley Hill was an incredibly steep climb. By the time we reached the region where the big cheeses lived, I was drenched in sweat. But at least, Sagot be praised, the goblin finally let go of me.

“We could take a ride down the hill,” the jester murmured dreamily when we were almost at the very top.

I followed the direction of his eyes. There was an old, dried-up cart standing outside one of the houses, with wooden chocks under its wheels to stop it accidentally taking off down the hill and crushing some unfortunate pedestrian.

“Don’t even think about it!” I warned him.

“You don’t understand a thing about lucky finds, Harold. A fool, there’s no other word for it. Just look at that hill. We’d go flying along like a hurricane.”

“I don’t like this little idea of yours.”

“What little idea? Flying along like a hurricane?”

“The idea that we’ll go flying along like a hurricane. You may have decided to commit suicide, Kli-Kli, but there’s no need to go tangling other people up in your crazy plans.”

“Harold, you’re a real bogeyman. Relax, there’s no danger. Why bring up the subject of suicide?”

“Because, my little muttonhead, that hill is more than four hundred yards long! We’d get moving all right. And we’d pick up speed, too! Fly like a hurricane!” I said in a squeaky voice, teasing Kli-Kli. “But how are we going to brake, my little peabrain? Our bones would be scattered halfway across Ranneng!”

“Oh!” the jester said thoughtfully when he’d pondered my arguments. He glanced regretfully at the carriage. “I didn’t think about that.”

“Now who’s the fool and who’s the wise man?”

“You’re the fool, I’m the wise man. Even a boneheaded Doralissian can see that. By the way, we’ve arrived, that’s the manor over there.”

The manor standing right on the very top of the hill looked about half the size of the king’s palace, but I couldn’t really see it properly from where we were standing. Most of the building was hidden by the thick crowns of the trees growing in the park around it.

The private area was surrounded by a tall gray wall with quaint little steel figures all along the top. I wasn’t fooled by their appearance—first and foremost they were a barrier of spikes to prevent anyone climbing in over the wall. Their role as decoration was strictly secondary. And I had no doubt that after the spikes there would be dogs or garrinches or guards waiting for us inside. Maybe even all three of them.

The steel gates were covered with images of birds. Birds flying, birds singing, and doing all sorts of things. When I looked closely at them I realized they were nightingales. So whoever lived in this nest of vipers was a nobleman from the House of Nightingale.

“Impressive!” said Lamplighter, looking at the house appreciatively. “What do you think, Harold?”

“Difficult.”

“How do you mean?”

“Difficult to get out of.”

“But you’re a master of your trade, aren’t you?”

“Right … but that doesn’t make the job any easier. Where are Marmot and Egrassa?”

“Probably pretending to be trees, and that’s why we can’t see them,” Kli-Kli suggested. “They’re hiding, Harold, hiding. Or do you think that two handsome fellows walking round and round a house wouldn’t attract any attention?”

“Well, if they’re hiding, you can look for them. I’m not going to play hide-and-seek.”

Naturally, the goblin didn’t find anyone. If an elf doesn’t want to be seen, then he isn’t. And the Wild Hearts, especially their scouts, have always been famous for their camouflage and their ability to hide even where it seems impossible. Marmot and Egrassa emerged like two phantoms from the clumps of bushes growing along the wall surrounding the mansion. I would never have thought that two sturdy warriors could have been sitting in there.

“You’re late.” That was how Marmot greeted us.

“I should think so. Even a h’san’kor would have trouble finding you!” I said, handing the joyfully squealing ling to his master. “Have you found out who the house belongs to?”

“No. How about you?”

“No,” Eel replied. “Is everything quiet?”

“As a graveyard. At least, no one has left the house through these gates, but about an hour before dawn seven men went in. You’re welcome to use our little lair. It’s good cover, very convenient, and it’s not visible from the road. There’s a perfect view of the gates.”

“Good luck,” taciturn Eel said to the others, and started walking toward the bushes. He slipped in through a narrow gap and the branches immediately hid him from view.

“Come on, Harold. You’ll stick out like a sore thumb hanging around here,” Kli-Kli said.

I followed him in, comforting myself with the thought that until Miralissa found out whose house this was and she and Alistan came up with some way of getting into it, there was nothing for me to do. It made no difference whether I lay around here or sat around at the inn. True, there was no pestiferous Kli-Kli at the inn, but Miralissa was there. I would have been happier to be with the elf than an annoying clown. Ever since Valder’s ghost saved me from the red flyer in Hargan’s Wasteland, the dark elfess had been eyeing me with great interest. I hadn’t told her or anyone else that I had the spirit of a dead archmagician living in my head. And after what happened at the wasteland I had pretended to be a complete fool, claiming I had no idea what had happened or how I’d been saved.

During the night Marmot and Egrassa had created a magnificent shelter. If you looked at the bushes from the road, you couldn’t tell they’d been touched, but inside there was a cozy green lair with trampled branches and grass, quite big enough for two men. Of course, there were four of us, not two, but Kli-Kli was not very big, and I huddled up a bit and we fitted into the observation post quite comfortably.

Lamplighter immediately stretched out on the ground, picked a stalk of grass, put it in his teeth, and started staring through the branches at the clouds drifting across the sky. A fine occupation for a man who wants to fall asleep.

Eel set to work observing the gates leading to the house and Kli-Kli and I were the only ones left suffering from boredom. The fidgety goblin couldn’t sit still for a moment, and the longer we stayed in our hideaway, the more fidgety he got.

The goblin counted the clouds floating past, too, but he soon got fed up with that, and less than five minutes later he started squirming about, kicked me in the side, and crawled over to Eel.

“Nobody?” Kli-Kli hissed curiously.

“No,” the Garrakian replied tersely without taking his eyes off the gates.

“A-a-a-a,” the goblin drawled in disappointment, then kicked me in the side again and went back to counting the clouds, taking no notice of the less than kindly glance I gave him.

Ten minutes later the whole business was repeated. He kicked me in the side, crawled over to Eel, asked his question, got the answer, said “A-a-a-a,” kicked me in the side.

When he started for the third time I couldn’t take any more.

“Kli-Kli, lie down, or I won’t answer for myself!”

“I’m just going over to Eel for a moment.”

A kick in the side.

I flew into a fury and swung my foot to kick him back hard, but somehow he managed to avoid it. He giggled in delight and stuck out his tongue. But I could wait for when he came creeping back!

“Nobody?”

“No.”

“A-a-a-a … Oi!”

Just as Kli-Kli was about to come back to his place Eel pinned him to the ground with one hand, without even looking at him.

“Stay here.”

“Why?”

“You’ve annoyed Harold enough already.”

“But it’s all in fun!” said Kli-Kli.

The warrior didn’t answer him and the jester took mortal offense. He called me a sneak, but he didn’t dare go against Eel, and stayed where he was.

The time dragged out endlessly. Mumr chewed his grass stalk. Kli-Kli fell into a doze, exhausted by doing nothing; my side went numb from lying on the ground, so I turned over onto the other one. But Eel sat, as still as he had been two hours earlier, watching the gates. There was no movement or any signs of life. The gates had to be very well guarded, since a member of one of Ranneng’s militant noble brotherhoods lived there, but we couldn’t see any guards.

Just as the third hour was coming to an end Eel sat up sharply and chuckled.

“At last!”

I started and carefully moved aside a branch to look out. Two guards, evidently from the personal bodyguard of the owner of the house (they had emblems of some kind sewn to their uniforms, but I couldn’t make them out from that distance) were hastily opening the heavy gates.

“What’s happening?” asked Kli-Kli, yawning widely as he woke up from his doze.

“The nest of cockroaches is stirring,” Mumr muttered. “Harold, squeeze up a bit, I can’t see a thing.”

Horsemen came riding out of the gates. One, three, five of them. And Paleface, may the darkness take him!

“Rolio’s with them!” I whispered.

“Where?” Kli-Kli almost tumbled out of the bushes straight onto the road to see the killer I’d told him so much about.

It would have been no laughing matter if the jester had ended up under the hooves of the horses. But Eel was alert: He grabbed Kli-Kli’s leg and pulled him back into the bushes.

“Relax, lad.”

“It was an accident.”

“That’s Paleface. The rider dressed all in black,” I explained. My hands were itching to let the killer have a crossbow bolt, but unfortunately I didn’t have my weapon with me. “Where are they going?”

“Ah, universal darkness! They’ll get away!” Eel exclaimed. “I swear on a dragon, they’ll get away!”

“And what if he has the Key?” I asked, pouring oil on the flames.

The horsemen rode off.

“Mumr, after them, quickly!” Eel ordered.

“But they’ve got horses!”

“And you’ve got legs! They won’t gallop through the city, you can see they’re riding slowly. Try to find out where they’re going.”

“All right,” said Lamplighter, spitting out his grass stalk. “I’ll try.”

“We have to let Markauz and Miralissa know,” said Eel, standing up and emerging from the bushes. “We still have a chance of intercepting them at the city gates.”

“There are a lot of gates,” Kli-Kli said doubtfully. “We’d better hurry.”

But we never got to the inn. Or rather, we weren’t allowed to. As soon as we reached the street we had walked up a few hours earlier, two men blocked our way. They were dressed in the modest clothes of craftsmen, with sullen faces and cold eyes. The lads looked very confident, and they had very good reason to be—each of them was holding a naked sword.

“It looks as though we were spotted at the manor after all,” I muttered, taking my dagger out of its sheath.

A dagger against a sword is like a crossbow against a ballista. I couldn’t speak for Eel, but I knew they would carve me into little pieces without the slightest trouble.

“Look behind us!” Kli-Kli squeaked.

Six men were approaching us from the rear. They were still quite a long way off, but each of them had a crossbow. And then I noticed that they hadn’t come out of the manor grounds—the gates were still closed. They had arrived in a huge carriage.

“They’re not Nightingales! They’re the Nameless One’s henchmen! We’ve been followed!”

Eel gave a low growl and pulled out his daggers.

“Harold, don’t stand there like a fool!” Kli-Kli hissed as he watched the men with crossbows approaching. “Have you got your bag of magic bits and pieces?”

“No, I left it with my crossbow and long dagger.”

The goblin groaned. “That’s the most foolish thing you could possibly have done!”

I didn’t argue with that.

Then suddenly I had a bright idea. I reached for my trump card—a magical vial full of potion. When it broke it should produce a flash, a loud boom, and smoke.

An absolutely useless little toy really, but I had got it for nothing, and I didn’t want to just throw away a magical vial. I’d never had a chance to try it out. I’d stopped carrying the flash-bang in my bag in order not to confuse it with the other vials, and after I put in the special pocket on my sleeve I’d forgotten all about it, because it weighed next to nothing.

“Close your eyes,” I yelled to my comrades, and flung the vial down at the swordsmen’s feet. There was a bright flash and a loud bang and a section of the street was hidden by thick, swirling white smoke. One of the men with swords cried out in fright.

“Stay behind me!” Eel ordered, and dashed at our stunned enemies in spite of their swords.

One of them was sitting on the ground in the smoke and rubbing his eyes in confusion. The lad had forgotten all about the sword that was lying a few steps away from him. The other one proved less timid. He swung rather clumsily and tried to slice Eel’s head off, but Eel ducked under his sword, blocking it with his left dagger, and thrust his right dagger into the swordsman’s neck.

The first lad was still sitting in the street rubbing his eyes, so I swung my foot and kicked him hard on the jaw. The would-be killer’s teeth clattered and he collapsed on the ground.

“Take the sword!” Eel told me as he picked up the sword of the man he had killed.

I handle a sword about as well as a baker handles the wheel of a royal frigate, but in this particular case I didn’t really have time to explain that to the Garrakian. As soon as the men with crossbows saw what had happened to their comrades, they broke into a run. Unfortunately my magical trick hadn’t impressed them, and they were running toward us, not away. The most impatient of them fired at us and the bolt scraped across the road dangerously close to Eel’s foot.

“They want to take us alive!” he growled.

“Follow me!” Kli-Kli squeaked, realizing that a spot where the air is filled with screaming crossbow bolts is not the right place for any respectable goblin to be.

The jester disappeared into the thick white smoke, I darted after him, and Eel covered our rear.

After ten steps, we broke out of the wall of smoke covering the street. The men with crossbows were firing without worrying about taking us alive anymore. The only reason our skins weren’t full of holes was that thick wall of smoke. One bolt whizzed past my head and thudded into the side of the wagon with the props under its wheels. Kli-Kli wanted to take a ride, didn’t he? It looked like his dream was about to come true.

“Harold, what was that stinking muck you tossed on the ground?” Eel asked me.

“A mere trifle that saved us a little unpleasantness! Stop, Kli-Kli!” I said, grabbing the goblin by the scruff of the neck. “Into the cart?”

“Don’t be a fool!”

“Ah, but I am! In you go, wise man.”

Without bothering to ask any questions, Eel tossed the protesting goblin into the cart. He realized that we couldn’t outrun the crossbow bolts. Another few seconds and our hides wouldn’t be worth a bent farthing. I jumped in after Kli-Kli.

“Harold, I hope you know what you’re doing!” he said. I think it was the first time I’d seen the jester frightened. Even during the attack on the royal palace by the followers of the Nameless One, or at Vishki, or in Hargan’s Wasteland, His Emerald Skinship had never turned that pale lettuce color.

With mighty blows Eel knocked out the wooden chocks that were holding the wagon in place, and it started rolling downhill. The cool-headed Garrakian even gave it a push, although that was quite unnecessary. The slope was steep enough, and our elegant vehicle was soon traveling at a terrifying speed.

“I-I-I th-think th-this was a b-bad id-deaa!” Kli-Kli stammered in fright as the wheels of the cart skipped and bounced over the stones of the street. He clung to the side of the cart with both hands, his eyes wide with terror as the houses rushed past.

People walking along the street jumped out of the way to avoid being crushed under the wheels, and rewarded us with choice obscenities and directions into the darkness.

Another bolt thudded into the back of the cart.

“Keep down!” Eel yelled, trying to shout above the rumbling of the wheels and the wind roaring in our ears.

We kept down. A deadly rain of crossbow bolts started falling on the back of the cart. Either there were a lot more pursuers than we thought or they were virtuoso marksmen. Not many of the king’s soldiers could fire and reload as fast as that.

But even so, Kli-Kli stuck his head up, looked ahead, and exclaimed, “Oi!”

At that moment either of the goblin’s eyes could have swallowed the moon. I was intrigued and decided I wanted to know what the wise man’s “Oi!” signified.

Sad to say, the street ran on for another hundred yards and then made a sharp turn to the left. So there was an extremely unpleasant little surprise in store for us—our wagon was hurtling straight toward the wall of a house.

I looked back—our pursuers were seriously outpaced by the insane speed of our wagon, but they were still rushing after us, as stubborn as imperial dogs that have scented their prey.

“Let’s jump for it!” I yelled.

The wagon was moving at an incredible pace, and if we were foolish enough to stay in it, we would end up smeared across the wall.

“If we jump, we could hurt ourselves!” Kli-Kli objected.

“If we don’t jump, we’re certainly going to hurt ourselves! Jump on two!”

“One…”

It was too late. The wagon caught up with the wall, or the wall caught up with the wagon, I don’t know which.

We slammed into it.

The impact was appalling. Kli-Kli, who was balancing on the side of the cart like a tightrope walker, waiting for me to say “two,” was thrown off into the air. He was lucky—unlike the jester, Eel and I were inside the cart.

When we hit, the world went dark. I thought a couple of rabid giants had come running down from the Desolate Lands, especially to dance the djanga on my ribs. I still don’t know how my ribs weren’t smashed. My ears were ringing, there were stars in my eyes, my left side was a solid mass of pain, and my head felt like it was made of lead.

I don’t know how long I lay there like that. Maybe it was a second, maybe an entire age. The stars stubbornly refused to disappear and their crazy spinning was beginning to make me feel sick. And even worse, after the blow I could hardly even think, and only in short bursts.

After that it was like I saw everything that happened from the outside.

Kli-Kli was leaning down over me. The goblin looked completely unhurt, apart from a graze on his cheek and a tear in his cloak.

“Harold! Come on, Harold! Darkness take you! Get up! Get up!”

Why was he shouting like that? I’m not deaf. And where have all these planks come from? Ah yes! The cart!

“Get up, Dancer in the Shadows! They’re almost here!”

May a h’san’kor eat his tongue! What is this jester pestering me about now? All I need is to lie down for half an hour, and I’ll be as good as new. Let him go and pester Eel instead. Yes, I wonder how he’s getting on.

I had to make a real effort to look away from Kli-Kli, who was trying to tell me something, and turn my head toward the spot where I thought the warrior must be.

Aha! Eel was there beside me, only an arm’s length away. His face was covered with blood and he was leaning on the sword he had captured, trying to get up from his knees. I admired the Wild Heart more than ever. Our Eel was a stubborn lad, all right.

“Run, Kli-Kli! Warn them!” the warrior hissed.

Run? Who from? And warn who? When he heard the warrior’s order, Kli-Kli’s face clouded over in fright.

“I’m not going to leave you!”

“Go on, jester,” I said. My voice certainly didn’t sound any better than Eel’s. “Warn everyone who needs to know and we’ll have a glass of carrot juice together.…”

My throat was so dry, I could have drunk the entire Cold Sea dry, even though it is so salty.

“Try to stay alive, Dancer!” Kli-Kli gave me one last glance and disappeared from my field of view.

“Where has he gone to? Ah, yes, of course. He’s gone running off somewhere to warn someone. He moved so fast, he must really want that juice. Well, good luck to him. And all the best…”

The Garrakian wasn’t allowed to get to his feet. Some men surrounded him, knocked the sword out of his hands, and hit him on the back of his head. Eel fell down onto the ground and stopped moving. I tried to get up, but my arms and legs wouldn’t obey me and I closed my eyes to let these bad men know I was too well brought up to talk with people like them.

A thousand devils of darkness! We smashed into a house that was standing in the wrong place! Why couldn’t it have gotten out of the way? Darkness! That wasn’t what I should be thinking about.

“Is this one alive?” asked someone standing over me.

“Aha! But he’s out cold,” someone else said, and gave me a kick under the ribs.

I knew they were bad men.

“You halfwit. You let the shortass get away.”

“Well, how much trouble can a goblin cause?”

“He can cause us a whole wagonload.”

“Shall I send the lads after him?”

“Ha! Now you think about it. There’s no way you can catch him, we’ll never find him in the alleys now. No more talk. Load these two before the guards turn up and a crowd gathers.”

They tossed me onto a hard surface. Someone swore, a door slammed, the floor jerked and creaked. It seemed like I was in a carriage. But why had they dumped me into it like that? The lads could at least have invited me to take a drive with them. I’m so polite and obliging, surely they didn’t think I would refuse to get into the carriage?

I heard someone groan close to my ear. Eel?

I had to open my eyes to satisfy my curiosity. I discovered that I was lying on the floor of a carriage beside the unconscious Eel. The other people in the carriage were the lads with crossbows who five minutes earlier had been trying to shoot down Harold and his companions.

The orcs have a wonderful saying: “Curiosity led the goblin into the maze.” One of the bad lads noticed that I had opened my eyes and exclaimed, “Hey, this one’s come round.”

I wanted to tell him that I hadn’t done anything of the sort, and I had a name, but somehow my tongue wouldn’t obey me.

“Then knock him out again,” someone advised the crossbowman indifferently.

The last thing I saw before I plunged into nothingness was the bludgeon descending on my head.