“Cloudy mountain, underground, mystery deep and dark,

Mundane magic, fire of Earth, hunger’s grim echo, great,

Mining full bellies, bread cast in flame, death from a spark,

Lives snuffed like candles, never searched, no one knows their fate.”

— The Ballad of Sir Joe, by “Golden-Voiced” Garbeaux.

We stood in awe on the natural overlook by the entrance to the facility, possibly the single biggest facility for processing grain into flour the planes had ever known. It was overwhelming, with clouds of flour swirling ethereally everywhere you looked. Thousands of mortars in which thousands of pestles ground countless tons of grain to powder. Seeing me enter along with my chaperone, Aimee and McGrue slid in behind us. Tiny Fleegle paid them no mind save to mutter, “Huh, more hobs? Wish we had bread when I was young; maybe I’d be bigger.”

He left us to our own devices, confident that we, as goblins, would act in our own self interest, making food to make more goblins. I could only wonder aloud, “What do you think their plan is here?”

Aimee panned her eyes across the cavern, with its vaulting, natural ceiling, “My guess? A horde. A bigger goblin horde than has ever lived.”

“Obvious, I guess. Still…” Something quivered in my spine and I let out a shuddering breath, “A few goblins aren’t much of a threat, but with this much food…”

“Pah,” muttered McGrue, “How many could they have? It’d take decades to shore up enough numbers to pose a real threat. Let’s just find this LePhisto, gank him, and be done with it.”

It sounded reasonable for a moment, but then I remembered, “Wait, Fleegle thought I was just a few years old.”

“So?’ McGrue growled, impatient.

“So I’m bigger than any goblin we’ve seen here. Even the big examples are below my shoulder. If a five-year-old goblin is an adult, and goblins never have just one child, I don’t think this village has ever been sacked by the king, and they’ve had unlimited food for who knows how long? I … gods…”

McGrue gestured wildly, “What? Out with it. Stop with the hysterics.”

I couldn’t just say it, even with the bustling crowd of workers in front of us, the message wouldn’t get across. Finally I hit on it, “Think about it. You get a mouse in your grain silo, it’s there for a year, how many mice do you have at the end of that year?”

He didn’t flinch, instead rolling his eyes, then Aimee gasped, slapping her hand over her own mouth and smearing her muddy disguise, “Thousands.”

McGrue’s mien softened, and he finally took it all in, “Just the goblins here, more than I’ve ever seen. We watched Joe go through a village of hundreds. These are just the workers supplying the food.”

I started walking, “You’re getting it. Now Fleegle said that this was their ‘secret entrance’, and mentioned the main gate to their village. That tells me this cavern lets out into the village proper somewhere. We just have to find that opening.”

On the cracked stone cave floor of the flour factory we found our feet warmed from the bottom up, “What is that? Why is the floor hot?” asked McGrue.

We looked in all directions, realizing that, to the north, there were sporadic bursts of flame. Finally, one was close enough that, when it flared, doing away with that section of flour cloud, we saw, “It’s an oven. It looks … volcanic.”

The open iron grating showed what appeared to be a volcanic vent over which several loaves of bread were being frantically retrieved, along with the corpse of the baker who had been slain when the oven ignited the flour, “The magma ignited the flour,” I muttered, shocked. “Did we know that flour was explosive?”

“I didn’t,” said Aimee, “I haven’t baked in years and, now, maybe I never will again. If the fire spread who knows what could happen.”

“Eh, yeah, so we get through quick, and leave out that main gate your little friend mentioned,” said McGrue.

“Ye gods! They’re just tossing the baker into the vent,” gasped Aimee.

“How do we find the way through,” asked McGrue.

“I’m not sure,” I pondered, “Ask?” A grain grinder returned to his over-large mortar and pestle. Shockingly muscular, he brutally tamped down with his mortar, pulverizing the grain in the pestle. “Ah, hey there. We’re done with our first day of work, can you point us to the way out? These clouds, we can’t see anything.”

Turning, the goblin inhaled, choked, held up a finger, then started striking a piece of steel against a piece of flint, igniting the flour around him, “Ow,” he shouted as he was flung to the floor by the resulting burst of flame.

“Whoa! Why’d you do that? Are you okay,” I asked, shocked.

“Oh yeah. Like you said, you’re new, but you’ll get used to it. I mean, if you live through six months of barrow duty, anyway. Can’t let the stuff build up too much or one little spark would kill us all. Big boom.”

I took in my surroundings again, but it felt like the first time, “Why? Why is it set up like this?”

“Hey, you don’t look a gift dog in the mouse, okay? You eat the dog, you eat the mouse, and then you stab a bloke in the woods to steal his boots. That’s the goblin way. Again, you’ll learn. But hey, the entrance is that way. The slope up bottlenecks, so, really, if you keep going east, you can’t miss it.”

We headed upslope, continuing to marvel at our surroundings, “How did they carve these columns? How did they get up there to make them into goblin statues,” I mused aloud.

Aimee spoke in muted tones, “My people do this to our trees. Sometimes they even gain sentience through the rituals, becoming real people. Or, well, nymphs. I’ve even seen this sort of thing in dwarf caverns but goblins, we always assumed that they weren’t capable of such wonders.”

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

Away from the work area, glancing back, I realized, “You can’t even see the end of it. There’s a city’s worth of goblins just in here.”

McGrue whistled, “Oh, Gabbo, if that’s blowing your mind then don’t look outside.”

“Why?” my heart raced. He was well ahead of me, and I dashed to catch up, “Why’d you say that?” All around us goblins milled, and my distracted eyes failed to focus several times. McGrue was stiff as he walked, Aimee clinging to him, silently. I pushed around, through the stream of worker goblins coming and going, to see the cave opening that led to the city beyond. It seemed endless, “How?”

—

Wandering the city, we saw everything you’d expect the human world, but dirtier, more rustic, built with whatever scrap wood, mud, or gravel was sitting around. McGrue scoffed, “I wonder if there’s any good goblin restaurants around. Maybe somebody selling cousin meat.”

I tapped him on the shoulder, “McGrue, come on. You’ll blow our cover.”

“Unlikely,” he retorted, “These goblins are more oblivious than any back in Fanreal or her castle grounds. I’ve seen nobles addled by lead powder with more awareness.”

Watching passerby briefly, I had to agree, “It does seem as if they’re not even noticing how tall we are any more. Good to know that the only real threat is the numbers game that goblins play.”

“So what’s the plan, Gar? You’re the big mastermind here,” asked Aimee.

How had I become leader again? Right, because I didn’t want to lose the status afforded to the minion of a noble superhero with a reputation for toppling nations and strangling dragons. In that moment I was questioning my life choices, “Well, it seems the best course of action would be to find where the gate is, where LePhisto beds down, kill him and get out.”

Shocked by my boldness, McGrue grabbed me by the shoulder, “You feeling okay, Gabbo? That sounds suicidal.”

I chuckled, “C’mon. We just beat a legendary wraith into submission. You think we can’t handle some goblins? How’s Ignus doing Aimee? Still behaving?”

“He’s fine unless someone else gets a hold on him again,” replied Aimee, looking especially concerned, “But Gar, this place, we might be looking at millions of goblins.”

She was right. Towering over them, it was easy to miss the sheer number of the bustling masses. “Let’s just find out where everything is and play it by ear. McGrue, keep an eye out for threats. Aimee, try to get the layout down. You have blank scrolls, right? And graphite? Let’s see a map. I’ll … navigate, I guess.”

Aimee rifled through her pack, “I’m no cartographer, but okay.”

We continued on, following the easterly path to a central bazaar. Every animal imaginable was dead and hanging, either as butchered meat, a skin for crafting clothing, or for more arcane purposes. There was a spicy haze over all of it and a sense that breathing it all in might be dangerous, “I wish we could eavesdrop, but nobody here speaks common unless we speak it first.”

“What are you supposed to be?” asked a deep voice.

“Threat,” bellowed McGrue, lunging, but both Aimee and I grabbed him, “Let go!”

We looked at the newcomer, a human, dressed in fine silks, “What,” I asked, caught off guard, “We’re goblins. We were grain fed growing up, which explains perfectly why we’re so large!”

“I’m only five years old,” growled McGrue, menacingly.

Pinching his chin, our new friend, obviously a merchant, chuckled, but whispered to us in reply, “No. You’re a man like me, she’s … an elf? So slender but athletic in appearance. Your five year old there has short tusks so do I even have to say?”

I threw my hands up to stop him, “What do you want?”

“First off, I’m Eamon, nice to meet you. Care for a map? Only one silver,” he smiled, engagingly.

Shiftily, I tossed a coin on the counter of his stand and snatched up the offered map in a single motion, “So we’re in the bazaar. Due north is the … palace? A goblin palace?”

Eamon snorted with laughter, but stayed pretty quiet, “You guys are pretty damned conspicuous. Who are you trying to fool with those disguises?”

“Everyone but you up til now, so keep a lid on it, smart guy,” growled McGrue. All he had was growling at this moment.

Well that’s just great but there’s more than goblins here, y’know? If you keep on going through the bazaar, there’s going to be more than goblin drones who have been whipped until they stopped questioning anything. Whatever you’re doing, you’ll want to go around all these stands,” said Eamon, looking at us as if we were the stupid ones. Can you imagine? In a massive goblin citadel. How rude.

“Yes, well, thank you for the tip, Eamon. We must be on our way,” I whispered, and we turned to go.

“Hold on,” he said, shaking his head, “What kind of merchant would I be if I didn’t demand a bribe?”

“What,” exclaimed McGrue, reaching for his ax.

I interposed between him and Eamon, trying to keep a lid on the situation, “We’re on a mission for the king, sir. There’s a real threat here. We have to shut it down.”

Eamon gesticulated and got to his feet, leaning out, checking his neighbors to be sure nobody was watching, “Whoa, wait a minute, shut what down? The goblins? Can you wait a month? This is when they bring in their harvest and I make my money.”

I leaned in close, “It’s not their harvest, Eamon!” I hoped to impress upon him the dire nature of what was happening here, “Fanreal is near famine, man. The goblins are taking most of the grain and leaving the civilized people to starve.”

“These goblins haven’t raided anyone or anything in years, Mister…” Eamon thought hard, “I’m sorry, I just realized you never replied when I introduced myself. You are?”

“Ah, pardon,” I bowed, “I am ‘Golden-Voiced’ Garbeaux, bard of renown in service to the hero of the realm; Sir Joseph Mulfinger.”

He stabbed a finger in my face, touching my nose, “Well, Mister Garbeaux, who still hasn’t given his first name, I’m gonna need a bribe or you’re gonna need a casket. I yell ‘guard’ one time and your ass will be so full of goblin feet that your head will pop off.”

Briefly, I considered. McGrue, always aggressive, was audibly growling. I had little time to resolve this, “How much?”

He sat back down, “One gold. Non-negotiable. I’d demand more but if we haggle too long someone’s gonna realize we’re not just coming to terms on a map sale and raise the alarm for us.”

I turned to my companions, “One gold?” asked Aimee, “Do we even have that?”

“Yeah,” muttered McGrue, “You each owe me thirty-three silver.” He slapped a single gold coin down on the counter, “Let’s go.”

As we walked away, Eamon called after us, “Pleasure doing business with you fine goblin folks. Ah, how I love goblins!” He was laying it on thick, but that was, apparently good enough for the residents of the city.

We huddled out of sight, at the intersection of an alley, reading the map I held, “Okay, so to the south, we can just barely make out the gate. You can see the posts, taller than that … horribly tall log wall. The palace is north. Looks like that crow’s nest is its tallest point. I’m guessing there’s a goblin with a spyglass up there, overseeing the path up to the gate.”

“So is that it,” asked Aimee, “Is the map enough? Do we go get Joe?”

“Who’s Joe,” asked another newcomer.

We all looked up at once. A goblin jester, a white-haired, eyepatched goblin veteran who looked like hip-high death, and a velvet-robed wizard lost in his oversized robe, titanic pointed hat, and a scarf that covered all but his green, goblin eyes, “Goblin McGrue?” I exclaimed.

Goblin McGrue sneered, “What? Did you just call me a goblin? Aren’t you a goblin too?”

I sputtered, “Uh, yes, of course, you see–”

“Can it.” belched Goblin McGrue, “See, you’re infringing on our territory here, kids. You look like taller, uglier versions of us, and we can’t have that. LePhisto trusts us, but he puts a premium on height, because he’s tall. So, before he gets wind of tall goblin wizards, warriors, and bards, you gots to go.”

“Okay, we’ll go,” and I turned, towing my companions in an effort to exit the alley and then the goblin city.

Goblin McGrue blocked me by my testicles, painfully, “Sorry bucko, but we get to decide how you leave. And we prefer you leave this mortal realm. Say goodnight.”