“William?” roared a voice from my left. “William?”
I turned and shouted out in joy. Igor was here! My joy turned to despair as I realized that he was bound in heavy chains, and that the reason I hadn’t seen him before was that he was surrounded by goblins who were tormenting him.
“Igor!” I cried, starting to move toward him. The goblin behind me yanked the rope that was tied around my wrists and pulled me back.
Before I could think what to do next Borg, the old goblin who had been talking to me, ran up the steps and gave the King’s box a sharp rap. “This is William of Toad-in-a-Cage Castle!” he cried excitedly. “Our William!”
“William of Toad-in-a-Cage Castle?” cried the King in astonishment. “The liberator of the goblins? The hero of the goblin race? The only human we are going to allow to live after the war?”
“The same!” said Borg.
“Welcome, William!” roared the King in a voice that could be heard from one end of the room to the other. “Welcome to Castle Nilbog. Come, you goblins, and welcome the boy who freed you from your prison!”
With a shout goblins came running from all directions.
“No-o-o-o-o!” cried Igor. He began thrashing wildly, trying to break his chains. I wanted to run to him, reassure him that I had not released the goblins on purpose. But before I could move a step a dozen goblins had lifted me to their shoulders and begun marching around the hall chanting, “William! William! The hero of the goblins!”
I twisted to look behind me. The goblins had overcome Igor. Like me, he had been lifted to their shoulders. Unlike me, he was being carried from the room. He was no longer struggling. A moment later our paths crossed.
“Igor!” I cried. “It’s not like you think!”
My voice was lost in the tumult of the cheering goblins.
Igor stared at me as he was carried past.
The sorrow in his eyes nearly broke my heart.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
AT THE GOBLIN BANQUET
After they finished celebrating the discovery of their “hero” the goblins carried me to a large room. It had a cozy four-poster bed, some wooden chairs, and a large wardrobe. Against one wall stood a stone basin through which sweet water flowed without stopping. Bed, chairs, wardrobe, and basin were all carved with either goblin faces or pictures from the forest. Metal sconces mounted on the wall held large clumps of the glowing fungus. The sconces had hoods you could pull around them to darken the room.
The place had a friendly look, and I remembered what Granny Pinchbottom had said about the goblins being household helpers.
On the far wall was a large window that looked out over the city. I crossed to study the view and was surprised to find that the window had no glass. Then I realized that there was no need for glass, since down here there was no wind or rain. (Later I learned that the temperature always stayed the same, too.)
While I was looking out the window the old goblin named Borg came through my door. “William!” he cried cheerfully. “I hope you like it here!”
It was clear he was trying to be nice to me. I was in no mood for it.
“Where are my friends?” I demanded.
“What friends?”
I decided to work my way up in terms of trouble. “Let’s start with Herky, the little goblin who was traveling with me.”
A puzzled looked wrinkled Borg’s rounded orange features. “I’ve never heard of a goblin named Herky. Of course, I wasn’t able to keep track of all the young ones, even before the trouble. I’ll try to find out for you.”
That sounded encouraging.
“How about Fauna? That’s the girl who was with me.
Borg looked more serious this time. “She is not a goblin friend. The fact that she was with you has saved her life, at least for now. But she is not a goblin friend.”
“Where is she?”
He shook his head. “You don’t need to know.”
“What about Igor?”
A look of fury crossed Borg’s face, and he spit on the floor. “Igor is our enemy! Igor is bad, bad, bad!”
“Igor is my friend,” I said firmly.
The old goblin shuffled over and stood right in front of me. He was about a head shorter than I was. He looked up, stared me straight in the eye, and tapped my nose with a long orange finger. “You can be Igor’s friend, or you can be the hero of the goblins. You cannot be both. If you are smart, you will be the hero of the goblins, because if you are Igor’s friend, you will have to go into the dungeons with him. Then, after a while, you will be dead.
“The goblins are furious, William. They are furious at all human beings except you, because you are the one who freed them from their prison. Everyone is going to suffer, William. Everyone except you. Now, what will you be? Igor’s friend—or the friend of the goblins?”
Is it fair to make someone choose like that? I didn’t think so. I made a decision. I decided I would have better luck trying to get Igor free if I stayed free myself.
“I’ll be the goblins’ friend,” I said. Something seemed to freeze inside me as I spoke. It’s not easy to say what is not true, what is not true for your heart. I felt sick.
Borg nodded. “You are a smart boy.” For a moment I wondered if he had read my mind. “Let’s sit down,” he continued.
Actually, I wanted him to go. I wanted to get the cloak and the collar out of my shirt and hide them someplace. I felt nervous around Borg. His eyes were wise and knowing, and I was afraid he might figure out what I was up to.
“I am counselor to the King,” said Borg, settling himself on one of the wooden chairs. “I am also one of the Ten Oldest Goblins. I have seen much, William. I have done much. I am an angry goblin.”
I sat in the chair opposite him.
• • •
Borg told me many things over the next three “days.” He told me about life underground. He told me about goblin society. And he told me about The Time of Troubles, which was what the goblins called the time from about a year before the Baron’s grandfather had trapped them in the tower until the night I released them.
The current time they referred to as The Time of Revenge.
“It was hard to understand, William,” said Borg, sitting across from me, his wise old face lit only by the fungal lamps. “For as long as we could remember, people had either ignored us or been glad we were around, despite our little jokes. We like to help. We like to tease. That’s how we were made. Then for some reason people began to grow angry over our jokes. It was as if someone was stirring up trouble against us.
“One night our friend Igor brought us a message from the old Baron inviting all of the goblins of Nilbog to Toad-in-a-Cage Castle for a celebration. He said it was going to be a peace party. He lied. It was a trap. When the Baron and his wizard lit fires all around we knew there was trouble. Goblins don’t like hot fires; we like the cold glow of our fungus. Within seconds a ring of fire surrounded the castle and all the land around it. We had no place to run.
“Then the Baron and his wizard cast their spell. Can you imagine what it’s like to feel your spirit being sucked out of your body, sucked out and drawn into a huge, empty place?”
“The place behind the tower door,” I whispered.
Borg frowned. “We stayed there for one hundred and twenty-one years, William.”
I shivered. I had only been there about ten minutes, and it was the worst memory of my life.
“For the first ten years we mourned and moaned,” continued Borg. “For the second ten years we said we would give a reward to anyone who rescued us. For the next ten years we said we would destroy the world if we got out.
“After that, we just went crazy.
“One thing gave us hope. Every eleven years, on Halloween night, we could feel the strength of the spell that sealed the door wane. We knew if we ever got out, it would be at this time. So every eleven years we called and cried for someone to open the door. But no one ever came. No one seemed to understand.
No one heard our call.
“Until you. We had ways of seeing into the castle, and we watched you from our prison. We knew you were the one. We called you, and you came! You set us free! That is why the goblins will love you forever, William. But you are the only one. No one else ever came. No one else ever helped us. They left us alone in the darkness for over a hundred years, and now they have to pay!”
• • •
Nilbog had no day or night, yet there were times when the castle grew quiet and most of the goblins rested. Then I would slip into the cloak of invisibility and search for Igor and Fauna.
Each time I did this I traveled deeper into the castle, which seemed to extend as far into the rocky island where it was built as Toad-in-a-Cage Castle extended into the ground beneath it.
I found strange and frightening things: huge, ancient statues that didn’t seem as if they had been made by goblins at all; a room filled with bones; a room that had no floor, only a raging whirlpool twenty feet below the door. One night I came across the skeleton of a giant lizard.
I found these things. But I could not find my friends.
I heard things, too. Whenever I paused, invisible, outside a room where goblins were awake, I could hear them talking softly about the war to come, and about their anger with the outside world. Often they were making spears and arrows.
Though the goblins treated me well, the talk of war made me nervous. If I did not succeed in my mission, who knew what might happen?
I began to wear the cloak and collar under my shirt again for fear the goblins might search my room sometime when I was not in it.
• • •
In addition to searching for Igor and Fauna, I was looking for the King’s body. I wasn’t sure it existed, but I figured if you could have a head without a body, you could have a body without a head. I also knew there was no way to put the collar around the King’s neck unless I could find his neck, which I assumed was attached to his body.
I found it on the fourth “night” of my stay in Nilbog. Hidden by the cloak of invisibility, I was exploring the halls above the main floor. I felt bolder now that I had done this a few times, now that goblins had walked right past me without any sign of seeing me. Quiet was important, of course, and sneezes were always a danger, since I had caught a bit of a cold from the drenching I got on the first part of our trip. But overall I was feeling fairly confident.
The books I had read in the Baron’s library made me expect that places would be guarded, but in Nilbog that wasn’t so. This confused me until I realized that the goblins didn’t think there was much to guard things from. They trusted one another, and it was unlikely that any enemies from the surface world would actually find their way down here.
Anyway, I had found one of the seven towers. At the top of the stairs was a thick wooden door that swung open easily, revealing a large room. On the far side of the room a big round window looked out on the glowing city of Nilbog.
In the center of the room was a large bed with a golden cover.
On the center of the bed lay the headless body of the King.
Well. I knew where his body was. I knew where his head was. The only problem was, they weren’t anywhere near each other. The body was too big to take to the head, which left only one option: I would have to steal the King’s head and bring it to his body.
I planned to visit the Throne Room the next night to see what it would take to kidnap the King’s head. But the goblins had other plans: They were going to throw a banquet in my honor.
All the important goblins were invited. Of course, no one had nice clothes anymore, because so much had decayed during the hundred and twenty-one years that the goblins were gone. Much in Nilbog had gone untended then. Borg had told me that the reason some places in the city were dark was that the glow fungus had died. In other places it had grown out of control, covering entire buildings, and the goblins were still cutting it back.
• • •
That night the goblins gathered in the great hall of the castle at long stone tables covered with glowing green cloths. I sat at the head table. Karl had told me that was the name of the table where the guest of honor sits. But I was really at the head table, because that was what was next to me: the King’s head.
All through the meal I kept looking at it, wondering how I could steal it. I was tempted to ask the King how he had gotten that way, only it didn’t seem like the kind of thing you asked a king at dinner.
Two young goblins were assigned to take care of the King. They fed him and wiped his mouth, and when he wasn’t looking they made silly faces and generally acted up. They reminded me of Herky, and I wondered what had happened to him.
“Eat up, William!” cried the King every five minutes or so. I would smile and nod and chase some food around my plate. But since it was mostly things like boiled lizard tails or fried fungus glop (that wasn’t the real name of it, but it’s the best way to describe it), I wasn’t eager to stuff any of it into my mouth. I don’t think dinner should glow in the dark.
Borg sat on the other side of me, pointing out important goblins and telling me hilarious stories about jokes they had played on humans back before The Time of Troubles. I had a feeling that one way you got to be an important goblin was by pulling off a really major joke. I liked the idea. It was better than getting promotions for winning wars.
Only now the goblins had traded in their jokes and were going to war themselves.
When the meal ended someone banged a huge gong for silence. It took a while for the room to quiet down, and we had to wait for three or four food fights to be settled before the King could really talk.
“Goblins of Nilbog!” he cried. “How glad I am to gargle your eyes! War is coming, and we shall splat the bongus of our enemies. Death shall be our uncle’s sister. Our victory shall glow in the dark like beezlenuts.”
He went on, getting crazier and crazier. He talked about how wonderful the goblins were, how wonderful he was, how wonderful I was, and how wonderful the war was going to be.
The goblins cheered like crazy.
“And now,” cried the King, “now it is time to see our greatest enemy!”
The gong sounded again. The great doors at the end of the room swung open, and five huge goblins pulled an enormous wooden cart into the room. I felt as if someone had poured ice into my heart. On top of the cart was a wooden structure: two posts with a crossbar. Chained to the crossbar was Igor.
When the goblins saw him they began to hiss and shout. “Igor!” they screamed. “The enemy, the enemy! Igor, Igor, Igor!” Then they started throwing things at him.
Igor didn’t say a word. His head hung down so far that his great black beard drooped beyond his knees. As the cart rolled toward the head table the goblins continued to jeer and shout. Pieces of lizard, bits of fungus, even plates and cups flew through the air, striking his head and back.
Finally I could stand it no longer. Sweeping my arm across the table so that my dishes went clattering to the floor, I climbed onto my chair and then onto the table.
“Stop it!” I cried. “Stop it right now! Igor is my friend !”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
OUT OF THE DARKNESS
I had a lot of time to think about what I had done at the banquet, and I didn’t regret it.
Well, I did in a way, since it looked as if I was going to die and the goblins were going to launch an all-out attack on the world above. Still, the look on Igor’s face when I had announced to the assembled goblins that I was his friend—that had been worth a lot.
I didn’t have much time to enjoy it. The King went berserk and started screaming and yelling so hard that his head rolled out of the box and came snapping at my ankles. Borg grabbed my other ankle and tried to pull me off the table. Igor, roaring in rage at the goblins trying to hurt me, pulled his chains so hard that he snapped the wooden beams they were connected to.
It was thrilling to watch him spin around, making the chains and beams swing in a big circ
le that sent the goblins trying to attack him flying in all directions.
“Leave him alone!” I had cried, leaping off the table. “He’s my friend! My friend !”
“William Igor’s friend!” he roared, trying to battle his way toward me.
But there had been several hundred goblins and only two of us. So now Igor was in a cell somewhere, and I was in a cell as well, no longer the hero of the goblins, no longer living in one of the best rooms in Goblin Castle, merely a prisoner locked in the dark. At least I still had the cloak and the collar hidden under my shirt—though at the moment the amulet would have been more useful.
Time went on. I began to wonder how long I had been there and how long I had to live. I called out to Igor and Fauna, but they didn’t answer.
I don’t know how long I had lain in the darkness when I heard footsteps coming in my direction. They stopped outside my cell. Had the goblins come to kill me?
A squeak, then a tiny sliver of green light near the floor. Something blocked it. A scraping sound, another squeak, and then footsteps going away.
After a moment I crawled to where the light had been. I found two metal bowls, one holding water, the other food. The food was probably disgusting, but at least it didn’t glow. I ate it, glad, for a moment, of the darkness.
• • •
I began to count how often food and water were brought—though since I didn’t know how many meals a day they were giving me, I still didn’t know how much time had actually passed.
Shortly after the tenth meal I was lying in the darkness, counting my sneezes and wondering what had happened to my friends, when I heard the little door through which food was delivered swing open again.
What was going on? It was only a short time since my last meal—much too early for the goblins to be returning.
I heard a slight noise off to the right. Before I could move, something jumped onto my stomach and whispered, “William!”
“Herky!”
“Shhh-h-h-hh! Don’t be loud, William. Just be happy.”
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