“Goblins do not believe in the gods.”
“Aye, Foreman,” Horace said. “You’ve mentioned that to me on more than one occasion.”
“That dwarf …”
“In Reorx’s Cradle?” Horace still watched the sick goblins under the tree. He had thought about the dwarf too. “The old one, you mean, who cursed us all and begged her god to send us to the deepest pit in the Abyss? The one who rendered your maps?”
“Yes, that one.”
“I believe in the gods, Foreman Direfang. But I do not believe any mortal can call down such a malady. That dwarf, she is not responsible for this sickness, and neither is her god, Reorx.” He wrung out his big hands and pushed away from the trunk. “I will be famished when I am done for the day.”
“Pippa will bring you some food,” Direfang said. “And skull man?”
Horace paused.
“Be fast with the magic. Make the goblins well.”
The priest shuffled over to the black willow and knelt next to Spikehollow. “Sea Mother,” he began.
“Best to keep your distance from the sick, Foreman Direfang,” Grallik advised the hobgoblin leader, putting an arm out to stop him from following Horace. “Wouldn’t do for you to succumb to the black spots.”
Direfang raised an eyebrow, as much as asking “Why would you care?”
“I’d not fancy being led around by that old yellow goblin,” said Grallik, meeting his eyes.
“Saro-Saro,” Direfang supplied.
“He seems an ill-tempered soul.”
“With no tolerance for Dark Knights,” Direfang added.
Grallik dug the ball of his foot into the ground and grimaced. Both of his boots were falling apart. “Yes, Foreman. I feel I would be safer with you. I fear that old yellow goblin will not realize how useful I can be. His indifference worries me. And his ambition.”
Direfang cocked his head.
“And his contempt for magic, save for what Horace offers,” Grallik further explained.
“Goblins hate Dark Knights for good reason,” Direfang said. “Saro-Saro has good reasons too.” He waved a hand to indicate he was finished talking to the wizard and headed toward the river, pulling his tunic up as he went.
“Wait, Foreman.”
Direfang slowed but did not stop.
“I know of a much shorter way to the Qualinesti Forest,” said Grallik, hurrying to follow the hobgoblin leader. “Shorter, safer. Certainly a shorter journey than even to the Plains of Dust.”
Direfang turned. He held his tunic loosely in one hand, shaking the dirt from it.
“Mudwort found the way, actually, though she didn’t realize it at first. She and that bumpy, brown-skinned-”
“Boliver.”
“Yes, the other night in fact. They found a much shorter way with that spell they cast. I was part of that spell, remember.”
Direfang snarled. “This faster way, wizard,” he said skeptically. “What is it?”
Grallik tugged the goats to follow him as he walked along with the hobgoblin. “It will take a little explaining.”
Horace’s face was a stoical mask. He’d learned long ago not to let patients see his concern; it only added to their worries and worsened their chances of recovery. But he almost couldn’t help himself after easing himself down next to Spikehollow and touching the back of his hand to the goblin’s forehead.
He almost yanked his hand away. “So hot, you are.”
Spikehollow’s eyes fluttered, and his head turned slowly as though he were trapped in a bad dream. His fingers wrapped around the top of the quilt, clenching and unclenching.
Horace tucked his chin close to his chest and prayed in Ergothian, wanting no one else to hear his desperate words. “Sea Mother, such a sickness I have never tended. This could well be beyond me. Sea Mother, hear my-”
Nearby, a brown-skinned goblin coughed so hard that his body shook against the ground. He turned onto his back and vomited a spray of blood that spattered against Spikehollow and the priest. Tremors wracked the goblin’s thin body, and Horace briefly stopped his work on Spikehollow and turned to aid the brown goblin. He moaned in pain and retched again, and Horace grabbed his shoulders and turned him onto his side so he would not choke on his own vomit. Then Horace tilted his head so he could breathe easier. The priest’s hands glowed orange, and he rattled off the words to a healing spell he’d been casting frequently-with diminishing results.
Blood seeped from the goblin’s mouth, though he stopped shaking as Horace’s spell progressed.
“Shad bleeds inside.” That was spoken by a yellow-skinned goblin propped against the trunk of the black willow. She had black spots on her neck, but they had not yet abscessed. An old, gray blanket was draped over her legs. She’d taken it from Bugteeth after he had died. “The sick is deep with Shad, isn’t it?”
She spoke in the goblin tongue, her voice so soft and raspy that Horace had to listen hard to pick out the meaning.
“A deep, deep sick, isn’t it, skull man?”
Horace nodded but kept his face a mask and slowly answered in her language. “Yes, this one is bleeding inside- his lungs. But my healing spell-”
“Shad will die, eh?”
The priest shook his head. “Not if I can help it.” His hands glowed bright, but the glow didn’t spread far across the brown-skinned goblin, as though the illness fought back against the priest. Horace redoubled his effort and was rewarded with a shower of blood when the goblin vomited again. The thin body shook once more, then stopped moving. Horace bowed his head and closed the goblin’s eyes.
“Shad is dead?”
Horace didn’t answer. He futilely tried to wipe the blood off his robe and hands and returned to Spikehollow. Horace was particularly concerned about that goblin, whose name he couldn’t remember, despite Direfang telling it to him more than once.
“The sunlight is too bright,” Spikehollow croaked. He raised an arm to shield his eyes. “Skull man, it is too, too bright. Painful.”
Horace looked up through the branches. The light was still thin and should not have bothered Spikehollow. But the disease seemed to make the goblins acutely sensitive to light and noise and temperatures, Horace reflected.
You were among the first to get sick. Why? Horace hadn’t spoken aloud; the question was in his thoughts. He didn’t think the goblin knew the answer any more than he did. What, the priest mused, do you have in common with the others? The answer might go a way toward healing you and stopping this from spreading further.
Horace stared at the goblin, then more closely at the quilt.
The others who were among the first sick also wore blankets and quilts taken from the Reorx’s Cradle, Horace realized. He recalled the ancient dwarf who had cursed him and all of the goblins for descending on their village; he couldn’t get those frightening words out of his head. Yet the priest could not believe that the sickness was Reorx’s doing. A god wouldn’t meddle in something as petty as goblins raiding such a small-
“Small village.” Horace’s eyes grew wide. Even Foreman Direfang had noted that there were far more homes than necessary for the number of dwarves living there. And the garden was much larger than was needed to support the population. The village had certainly been larger at one time, but it hadn’t shrunk because of dwarves moving away, as the priest had heard the goblins speculate.
The population had dwindled because of the sickness.
The ancient dwarf had tried to warn him at one point, when he was translating Direfang’s demands. But she stopped short, no doubt hoping all the goblins would catch the malady and die.
As some of them already had.
He stared at the patterns in Spikehollow’s quilt, not really seeing them, seeing instead the village with its too-many homes.
“Goblin, tell me what you’re feeling.” Horace spoke those words aloud, in the human tongue, having heard that goblin speak in the language of humans before. He didn’t want all the goblins under the tree to listen and understand their conversation.