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Goblins can move very quickly when they have to - so quickly that a human might blink and miss the movement entirely. From Glen's point of view, both Mayfield and I must have disappeared in a blur. I just caught the surprised look on his face as I raced across the room. I had spotted the hidden exit when I had entered the farmhouse. Nothing so obvious as a sign or marker or anything; it was just the way the furniture was arranged to allow a startled individual to follow a direct line to this particular featureless point on the wall from almost any part of the room. And even if I had not identified it for what it was, I would have instinctively followed Mayfield; I was only a tiny fraction of a second behind her as we passed through the glamour that concealed the passageway behind the illusion of a rough stone wall. Behind the glamour was a drop tube, perhaps fifteen feet deep. I bounced off the landing mat and set off after Mayfield. We were underground in a narrow earthy tunnel barely tall enough for a Goblin to run through. It was very dark; my eyes instinctively opened wide to take advantage of the few glowing patches on the walls that might conceivably have been natural luminescent fungi or, more likely, a few splashes of that paint-on illumination so widely used in the Lower Realms. Unusual to find it up here, though. I ran hard, barely able to keep up while dodging protruding roots and stones that the builder - presumably Mayfield herself, although I wasn't convinced she would be up for that kind of physical labour - had found too inconvenient to remove. The tunnel twisted and turned unpredictably, to the point where Mayfield would dissappear from view entirely, even though she was only a few feet in front of me. After a few minutes the tunnel began to ramp upwards and then suddenly narrowed to the point where progress could only be made on hands and knees in the increasingly damp and muddy floor. It seemed that my expenses were going to include a cleaning bill for my raincoat and quite possibly a new pair of trousers. With Mayfield's feet - she was barefoot - practically kicking soil in my face, we crawled out of an opening which would probably have been mistaken for a badger sett, even by those who would consider themselves Proper Country Folk. I stood up and looked around cautiously. There was no sign of any pursuit, anything other than the cautious noises of timid woodland creatures when a couple of noisy bipeds had suddenly appeared in their midst. "This way," Mayfield hissed, indicating a direction slightly to our left. I shrugged. How she knew which way to go was beyond me. I was turned around; I had no idea where I was or even which was was north - although I'd have a pretty good idea of the latter once I managed to get a good look of the stars unobscured by mist and foliage. Navigation by starlight was a skill I had learned and mastered a hundred years ago, thanks to a cut-price correspondence course I had bought from the small-ads pages. The trade press is a mixed blessing for a Goblin in my business, but occasionally turns up the essential necessities. I followed Mayfield's heels closely. We threaded our way along a rough path in the middle of a woodland of mature trees interspersed with patches of undergrowth which made it difficult to see very far, but at least allowed the moonlight to shine brightly through the branches. I could hear some indistinct noises from behind us but I could not immediately tell whether it was a sign of pursuers or merely some alarmed animal making themselves scarce in the underbrush. We ran on. Suddenly, Mayfield pulled up, then diverted off the obvious if extremely muddy track and plunged into a thicket. A handfull of steps later, we were in the bottom of a hollow - complete dry, despite the recent rain - and so sheltered by foliage that we would have been hard to observe from even a few feet away. Mayfield clearly knew about this refuge; it even seemed as if it had been prepared especially for such an eventuality. Typical Goblin forward thinking and not, of course, mild paranoia at all. I bent double and tried to control my breathing, unable to speak after the intense physical exercise. I put it down to incipient old age, or maybe just too many late nights. Mayfield seemed to have no such problem; She probably was just as fit as she looked. "Are we safe?" I wheezed to Mayfield as soon as I could speak. She was peering though the latticework of leaves and braches that enveloped us. "Probably," came the laconic reply, "Nothing out there I didn't expect." To my surprise, Glen caught up with us a few minutes later. He was breathing heavily and unable to converse at first, but he had made good time though the escape tunnel and the woodland paths. He ducked into the foxhole under the bushes beside us, hardly breathing hard at all. "Why did you run?" he demanded, looking from his girlfriend to me and back again. I glanced at Mayfield. She seemed completely nonplussed. "I don't understand," she murmured. "Surely that was a Goblin speaking?" he replied, his own face now taking on an aura of confusion. I stared at Glen, then turned back to Mayfield. Her mouth was a round "O" of surprise. Glen was right. Thinking back, although the speaker's English had been very good - better than you would normally expect in France - the rich undertones of a Goblin accent were entirely apparent. Which left the question: why would another Goblin be tracking down Mayfield?
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As is well-documented in these chronicles, no Goblin feels truly safe in a place with only one exit, especially on the surface where an encounter with a surprised human is more than just a remote possibility. Underground, those who cannot afford better will have a residence with just a single door but, once over one's own doorstep, there will be a plethora of alleys, ginnels and passages leading in every direction, with cut-throughs, tunnels, staircases and drop-holes enough to confuse any pursuer. Goblins with more wealth will have at least one extra entrance, often plainly visible, and very probably another one carefully hidden, while the most nervous or perhaps overtly paranoid will have several boltholes including those which use expensive one-time glamours to transport the escapee instantaneously to a place of safely.
Part 15