Chapter Three: It Lies at the Center

Huiln, still leaning against the cold wall, righted himself and climbed flight after flight until his calves burned and his chest tightened. In his shortness of breath, he knew that he yet lived; his pains assured him he was no webbed mouthful trembling as his thread of life unreeled. If even his pain deceived him, Huiln mused, then he was a rodent spinning a brass wheel to the dark god's amusement, and he would never know if his hard-won victories were real.

Huiln found Cyhari in the upper stacks, on a stepladder, dusting books on a top shelf so high up that a tree could have fit in the space between them. For a moment, she seemed translucent, and the halls of the Quront Sabata again seemed gossamer-thin, as if the towering building was spun from gauze. If he was seeing clearly, he would have been impressed by this cavernous floor. Titanic shelves, lining its walls, scraped the ceiling seventy feet above, and surrounded hundreds of smaller shelves that averaged twice his height. This level would have contained two Grand Goblin Libraries, and if he stumbled into it yesterday, he would have been lost for hours and staggered to a reading room under a ridiculous armload of books, but now all that struck him was the Quront Sabata's vaporous ethereality. He rubbed his eyes, which were already sore from physical exhaustion, as well as the strain from reconciling the impossible with his belief in none of it.

While family and friends knew Huiln was once The Three Sisters' devotee, they believed he turned from that vocation to make a better use of his madness: traveling The Five Worlds as a worldly adventurer. None knew—not Kuilea, Khyte, nor his esteemed father—that he had rejected all the articles of his faith. He was unable to restrain the resentment of his intellect toward the unlikely delusions of religion, and when the dynamic hostility between the two states of mind reached a breaking point, he broke and ran. So when the Spider God herself made her miraculous appearance, it was tempting to flip his godless preconceptions just as easily, for if True Nature was not the material world but the warring minds of the gods, then his mind had been confined by the materialism of his intellect, whereas the dogmatism of his youth may have freed him to pursue divine destinations. Money and erudition had been most important to him that morning, but as he had seen neither coin nor books in his vision of the webs, the shadows, and the Spider God gliding on them, the half-forgotten religious creed of his youth began to disorient his opinions. But ironically, the implications of religion led him away from the dogma of his youth, away from devotion. Many times he had chided Khyte—who, like Huiln, believed in nothing—for his hedonism, but in truth, Khyte was righter than he knew. And since the devouring divinity that laid in wait for the dead in the UnderAbyss was worse than nothingness, should he not take what pleasures that he could?

While gazing upon Cyhari with eyes that were, depending on your point of view, either unclouded or clouded by this sudden revival and reversal of long dead faith, his desire for the elf became real. Yesterday he would have preferred a good, hot, Nahurian meal, a comfortably long book, or the satisfaction of winning sacks of coin, but today his craving for her outstripped his much smaller goblin body, as if he had peeled away his coarse goblin hide to find a dizzying new dimension to himself. Was it cobori, he wondered, not only to desire Cyhari, but to identify with her elven disdain of the sensual and disapproval of the savory? No doubt Lyspera resided on the Elven World, apart from her goblin worshipers, because she also identified with a world that was less hospitable to its inhabitants than to the abstractions they venerated.

Cyhari swept the loosened dust to the floor, then climbed down, holding a cloth the dust had blackened. When one of the dust mice settled on Huiln's collar, Cyhari smiled. "I'm sorry," she said. When Huiln did not respond, she pressed on, asking, "Is he ok?"

"Who?", snapped Huiln. Hearing the levity in the elven woman's voice, and having become exhausted by his undignified trip to Kuln, Huiln was in no mood for the whimsy of elves.

"The prince you mugged."

Huiln forced a laugh; while he knew they were undignified when he put them on, on the way through the gate, he had forgotten himself and identified with the ridiculous finery. Perhaps that was his true first act of cobori, he thought to himself. "Give me a knife," he said. "And I'll make it mine." When Cyhari handed him her blade, in return, he handed her the dumpling soup. Then, he split the cuffs of his pants by an inch, destroying their tapered fit, so they fell loosely around his ankles; second, he cut his sleeves to elbow length; lastly, he turned his shirt inside out, to feature the coarser interior and make the hems appear brighter and more rustic. Now, Huiln thought, he looked the part of one of the Three Sisters' ascetic monks.

"You've flipped," she said, "from an ugly elf prince to a handsome goblin farmer."

"Handsome?" asked Huiln.

"No, not really," said Cyhari. "It's horrible."

"If you're ashamed to be seen with me, I'll never make it to Azuri's, as I lost the map. To be precise, my clothes and the map were burned by your colleagues."

"Yes, I heard about that," said Cyhari, not bothering to apologize. "I understand. Once I sweep the floor, we can leave." When the elven woman swept the dust with her broom, Huiln followed with the dustpan. Huiln loved the smell of old books and libraries, but the upper stacks were unpleasantly moldy, as if the dust had died, and decomposed into the corpse of dust. Moreover, the seafloor smell of squid ink, the aroma of char, and the scent of library paste tinged the mustiness, and jogged the goblin's memory of pages which described how ancient elves harvested their ink from the sea and crushed charred bones into paste. Huiln once would have been interested in the vile aromas of these books, as their scents passed on the tales of their ancient manufacture. Now these odors recalled the Spider God's shadowed webs, where the goblin had smelled bones, gore, the acrid scent of death, and the pasty smell of the webs.

"That's that," she said. "What's in the bag?"

"That's yours," said Huiln. "Your soup."

"That smell," said Cyhari. "I love that smell. It's very distracting. When I lived on Nahure, the embassy's goblin chef said distracting was good. I believe you called it savory. And I do feel like I should eat it now. But I'm very conflicted—dinner is in less than an hour."

"Heat it up later when you're feeling peckish. Or does the House of Azuri have no stove?"

"'You mean 'House' in the goblin fashion?"

"Come with me to House Hwarn, and I'll show you what I mean." They descended the spiral steps, where the Quront Sabata's sconces glowed brighter, and a cool breeze blasted through the stairwell windows, through which the city lay in the creeping darkness of a grumbling storm.

"Are you inviting me, goblin prince?", she asked, smirking.

"Now I'm surprised," said Huiln. "You're smiling!" Huiln did not deny he was a prince, because if she was being glib or facetious, he would seem the fool for denying it in earnest, and if she truly believed him a prince, he might profit from her misunderstanding.

"Elves smile," Cyhari scoffed. "There is a time and a place for everything."

"Yes, even for flirting," he snickered. If you had seen his grin, you might call it a leer.

"You wish," she said. Through another stairwell window, lightning alternated its white flash, first downward, then zigging into the Abyss toward Ielnarona.

"We should have taken the skywalk," Cyhari scowled. "The walkways will be crushed with workers and shoppers."

"Does it matter? Rain makes you wet no matter how close you are to the sky."

"Not in Julaba," said the elf. "Our street sidewalks are canopied."

"What canopies?"

Cyhari gave him a quizzical look. "When you said you hadn't eaten since you entered the Quront Sabata, I didn't believe you. But it's clear that you've never seen our Alfyrian streets. It's almost pitiful—you love books so much that you only stepped outside once, into far-off, sweltering Kuln. Don't judge our fair world by Kuln."

It was true, Huiln realized. He dropped from the Alfyrian Ladder to a rooftop, walked the skywalk with Cyhari, and roamed the Quront Sabata's books for two days until he traveled through the Kuln gate, where his feet first touched the soil of the Elven World. Alfyria's maze-like interpenetration of its buildings and cities was so incredulous as to make this story impossible to share with Kuilea without first educating his sister on the peculiar points of elven life. As if peering from a far off cliff, he faintly remembered his father telling him about walkways that folded and unfolded the sky, roof to roof, across the elven capitol. It had sounded ludicrous then, and in hindsight, Huiln could see that Lord Hwarn, who did not have the benefits of education like his son, was unable to articulate the absurdity of elves that thought, perceived, and even built, in a dimension to which goblins, humans, giants, and dryads were blind. Huiln wrote off his father's story as gibberish. But if Huiln had paid attention to Lord Hwarn's tales, he might have been better prepared for this trip to Alfyria.

In descending to the first level, they passed three robed Alfyrians and a wizened human warrior on their way upstairs. At the bottom, Huiln paused to look at the concourse hub from which storefront gates to other cities radiated like the spokes of a wheel—or the legs of a spider. The re-opened lines roared with chattering patrons and embattled clerks, but as each patron was admitted, the heavy black iron turnstile grated over all the noise with its rusty ratcheting. While the crowds fought for the license to go upstairs, Cyhari led him down one more flight, to the stairwell's end: a long hallway, lit by the ensorceled green sconces, that nonetheless tapered into pitch black. As they walked briskly towards that darkness, rainwater trickled down the hallway's slight upward grade, and the blackness ahead, pierced by a few pricks of light, dissolved into the charcoal gray of the city. They exited at street level under the sidewalk canopy, which, compared to the lit tunnel, was so darkened by the storm that it seemed crowded not with people but their silhouettes. As Huiln's eyes accustomed to the darkness, and the shadowy Alfyrian multitude became more and more distinct, he could see that they varied among themselves as much or more than Hravakians or Nahurians. While the Human World was splintered into clans, tribes, and nations, and even the Goblin World was balkanized to a lesser degree—its cities not shedding blood but warring in matters of fashion, aesthetics, and taste—in the Alfyrian throngs he saw elves of all varieties. Under the canopy, he did not see the uniformity that he did in the skywalk or in the Quront Sabata, and to see laborer elves, elves in professional attire, elves in rustic garb, elves speaking unknown dialects, elves as green as dryads and as blue as oceans, astounded the goblin. And perhaps because Huiln was in a better mood, due to his flirty banter with the attractive elf, it seemed that there were dapper, even jovial, Alfyrians that smiled as they braved the rain. Cyhari set her teeth on edge at the sound of elven laughter, but to Huiln, it seemed the most beautiful and unaffected sound he had heard on Alfyria, and he craved to hear more. When he sloshed through a puddle and muddied his princeling's suit, he remembered the misery of being on Alfyria, his hunger, his thirst, and his desire to be done with this squalorish mission so that he could return to Nahure, where there was excellent cuisine, sensual arts, and his rightful estate and wealth.

"Many, even today," said the elf, "live only the brief life their breeding allows, have no interest in cobori, and will not be allotted a taste of kinulcra."

"Because they laughed?"

"It is one thing to smile, but laughter is unrestrained, diametrical to the spirit of cobori, and unseemly in those worthy of kinulcra."

Huiln stopped to scrape the mud from his elven shoes. They had been the most comfortable part of his new ensemble, and now the sodden footwear felt leaden and pinched his feet. He scowled when he recognized the implications of Cyhari's ingrained bigotry. Alfyria was as broken as Hravak or Nahure after all; while it pretended to unity, and all Alfyrian cities were joined by the Quront Sabata's doors, there were at least two distinct Alfyrias—one of cobori and kinulcra, Quront Sabata, Treikondant Cerund, the skywalks, and the High Tzhurarkh and his Tzhurarkh legions; and another, which lacked those benefits but occasionally laughed, though their lords scorned them for it.

"Anyone that laughs like that can't be all bad, Cyhari," said Huiln. Then he muttered, Maybe they can cook, too."

Cyhari had not stopped when he did, but now turned and called back to him. "What?"

"Never mind," the goblin said, choking back a snort. Unfortunately, this bit of snark brought back the flat aftertaste of Cyhari's nutritious and filling rolls, which still sat in his guts like a brick.

"I looked up cobori, you know," said Huiln. "It was one of the things I studied in the Quront Sabata." A gust pulsed through the canopy's uncovered sides, spattering Huiln and Cyhari with cold sprinkles of rain water.

"Of course," said Cyhari.

"Cobori means web—neither knowledge nor identify."

"Your reading hit a wall, then."

"The Alfyrian Dictionary runs to three volumes, but I only had to look under C."

"Are all Nahurians so literal?" asked Cyhari.

"Are all elves so obstinate?"

"Ekinda's It Lies at the Center, a primer for Treikondant Cerund initiates, holds the abstruse definition of cobori."

"I'm curious. What lies at the center?"

"The title is not a question—it's a meditation on truth and the science of knowing."

"Of course it's a question; to goblins, it is also a riddle, though implicitly phrased. 'It lies at the center' means 'What lies at the center,' unless the author definitively—and unambiguously—tells us what 'It' is. As soon as you mentioned it, I was intrigued, and recalled many historical riddles that were tacitly stated: I am a heart hard as rock really means 'what heart is hard as rock'; the giants run in fear of me is actually 'who do the giants fear?'; and, I am colder still than death is actually 'what is colder than death?' In this case, my recent experience strongly inclines me to answer Ekinda's riddle literally, that a spider lives in the center of its web; but considering Ekinda was a Treikondant Cerund scholar, I'd guess the answer is knowledge, and that the book concerns epistemology, the study of mind."

Cyhari smiled. "Though I am bound by oath not to answer, you should read Ekinda's scroll for yourself—if you can find an unrestricted copy. I will say that you are wiser than you know."

"Or perhaps I am wiser than you know. Though the extra dimensions of Alfyrian cities are beyond me, and I can only guess at the truths in hidden elven scrolls, my imagination can fill in the blanks of what I cannot perceive and do not know, just as I have crossed the chasm of my inborn goblin fear to live boldly in a world of depths and heights that the rest of The Five Worlds take for granted. Goblinkind say madness is a bridge to the divine, and fills the gaps which the mind cannot leap. No doubt those you consider lesser beings would think elves insane for weaving your cities like webs, not only binding your buildings together and constricting your parallels, but spinning the skywalks through this irrational geometry."

"Your eloquent bragging," smirked the elf, "is worthy of a Hravakian, your insults couched in praise are worthy of an Alfyrian, and your mad bridge to the divine is not unlike cobori."

Huiln had much to say in answer, but it ebbed away when three days' exhaustion abruptly hammered him. "What is maddening," he said, yawning, "is that you heard any praise. How much farther?"

"Not long," she answered. Rain pounded the streets, streamed down the sidewalk, guzzled in the gutters, drummed the canopies and blasted their open sides as well, so that when they reached Azuri's house, they may not have been drenched, but their shoes were soaked and their garments were spotted from the rainwater spray. And when they left the canopy to cross the rain-slicked grass, they were utterly doused by the pelting downpour.

Azuri's house would be a monstrosity on Nahure, where the goblins' fear of heights made single story dwellings the rule, but on Alfyria, three stories marked the residence of one that was only well-to-do. Though Azuri lived respectably, Huiln groaned to see that his dwelling abutted his neighbors', and had a negligible yard, as such a house did not signify a resident with any political influence. Still, it was an ancient abode that possessed some grandeur, with windows of imperial blue glass and, flying over the threshold, a violet banner depicting a silver guornt—an Alfyrian beast noted for savagery and sought-after ebony horns. If this flag marked Azuri's service to the High Tzhurarkh, or if Azuri's name carried enough historical clout, Huiln might get the face time he needed with the elven monarch.

When Cyhari leaped up the stairs two at a time, swung the doors wide, then peered inside, a not-unpleasant aroma blasted back—a crusty, salty, and oily scent which suggested that Azuri wished to please his Nahurian guest, but while the result was an aroma quite unlike any other on Alfyria, it was also quite unlike savoriness. While there may have been a point at which the unknown taste might have satisfied, it had baked for too long, and the odor was now tainted with a singed smolder.

"The door was open," Cyhari said. "And my father's honor guard were not at their stations."

"It's raining," said Huiln. "Wouldn't he invite them in?"

Cyhari glowered. "No. And they wouldn't accept if he did."

"If he stepped out," suggested the goblin. "would they accompany him?"

"Yes," said Cyhari. "But where did they go in the rain, with a guest on the way?"

"I see. You assume foul play," said Huiln. "And me without my sword. And you with a choice between the burnt feast or lukewarm dumpling soup."

When Cyhari entered, Huiln stepped in behind her. Mud and rainwater were already trod into the entryway, both the wood and the carpet, as if a great many inconsiderate guests had barged into Azuri's house. In a sitting room on the left, the spout of a coffee pot trickled steam, and an upturned mug's spill stained paper stamped with a violet seal. When the elven woman ran upstairs, Huiln looked for the kitchen. While the burning meal was no doubt unsalvageable, the air could be less rank, and Azuri's house shouldn't go up in smoke before Huiln had a chance to sleep in his bed.

"Pechare!" Cyhari called several times, as she ran through the house. Huiln noted that even in this moment of fright she used the formal Alfyrian 'father,' not the informal or familiar pecha, meaning 'dad' or 'daddy.'

To the right of the sitting room was a small office with a humble bookshelf holding no more than twenty tomes and the cluttered escritoire where Azuri may have written the lamentable Twenty Goblin Myths. Next to that was the dining hall, on which a meal was half-served; while places were set, and candles were lit, and a large salad bowl rested there, the burning meal that offended Huiln's nostrils was not yet plated. That he found through the kitchen door, a fabric barrier curiously buttoned to the bottom, sides, and top of the jamb. While it was the first elven kitchen innovation of which Huiln approved, as no doubt it was easier to clean and contained kitchen smells and sounds more securely than a wooden door, in that moment it was irritating to unbutton, especially in that the top buttons were far out of his reach and he had to stand on a chair to reach them. Once he unsealed the fabric door, the great heat of the kitchen basted him in his own sweat, and the stench of Azuri's burned feast was even more oppressive, so that Huiln gagged more than once as he read the Alfyrian controls of Azuri's oven. Fortunately, the magical construct was easy to operate.

Afterward, Huiln returned to the sitting room, where he picked up the letter, which was still damp from spilled coffee, and concealed another sheet underneath it. As he read them, the carpet darkened under his wet boots. The first sheet was brief, but written with an authoritative, strident tone:

By order of High Tzhurarkh Leturo, Third of His Name, General of the Tzhurarkhs and Spymaster, Grand Hero of Nahure and the Hravakian Tribes, and Liege of the Abyss

You will allow entry to the bearer and any other appointed representative, for the purpose of search and seizure of treasonous correspondence, undisclosed quantities of kinulcra, or any goods bearing the stamp or seal of any foreign power.

Signed,

High Tzhurarkh Leturo, Third of His Name, General of the Tzhurarkhs and Spymaster, Grand Hero of Nahure and the Hravakian Tribes, and Liege of the Abyss

The second sheet was a more serious document:

Azuri gon-Szyvan gont-Tsarna,

It is with a somber heart that I write you. While I would have preferred that you answer to me directly for your crimes, the urgency is such that I must assume the appearance of treason is reality. You stand accused not only of treason, but espionage, insurrection, conspiracy, abetting assassination, dereliction of duty, malfeasance, theft of kinulcra, and disruption of the social order. An attempt to combat or flee my representatives will judge you guilty and mark you forever as an enemy of the crown.

High Tzhurarkh Leturo, Third of His Name, General of the Tzhurarkhs and Spymaster, Grand Hero of Nahure and the Hravakian Tribes, and Liege of the Abyss

Huiln's first thought was that with so many honorifics, this High Tzhurarkh Leturo should invest in a rubber stamp. Then Huiln called to Cyhari, but when she did not heed him, he pulled up a chair and poured a cup. Finding no sweetener, only a thick syrupy milk, the irked goblin scrounged the room until he was satisfied the creamer was all there was. He sighed as he poured the half-coagulated liquid into his coffee, swished it vigorously with the spoon, then sipped to discover it imparted a mild sweetness, which made him curious to its origin and as to whether the austere elves had any worthwhile vices other than sweet, creamy coffee.

When Cyhari entered the sitting room, Huiln handed her the paper. "He's not here," he said.

With an anguished look more angry than frightened, Cyhari snapped up the sheet, read it, then smacked it onto the table. Huiln dabbed sloshing coffee with the tablecloth hem, and sighed when he felt the warm coffee dribble on his pants through the crack between the table leaves. "Which is a good thing," he added, "as I'd make a horrible impression in these coffee and mud-stained toy clothes."

"He dares call my father a spy!"

"He's High Tzhurarkh. Kings don't dare; they do or don't as they will."

"You don't understand! It's hypocrisy! Of course my father is a spy! What do you think he did on Nahure?—and who do you think he did it for?"

Huiln could not contain his outburst of laughter, but stifled it a moment later, then affected sympathy when Cyhari continued her rant: "The High Tzhurarkh is not only the monarch in times of peace, but General of our Armies and Spymaster. And pechare was decorated for service in both theaters of war, that of battle and that of espionage."

"While our kings won't admit it, it's much the same on Nahure," said Huiln. "I'm assuming Azuri is accused not of these patriotic duties, but in spying for enemies."

"Yes, and pechare is innocent. He did not do these things." Cyhari's choking tone drew a glance from the goblin, and he watched as she turned her head and covered her face, drawing out her muffled sobs. When Huiln couldn't turn away from Cyhari's grief, for one mortifying moment he felt that he shared her shame, though it was also cause for Huiln to wonder: why should Cyhari be not surprised and indignant, but broken, by an accusation against her father?

Huiln chose his next words carefully: "I believe you." When she looked up, her eyes were tear-flecked and crimson, as if she wept not tears but thorns, and the curl of her lips did not suggest grief but a bared blade. Only with great difficulty could Huiln gaze into that enraged grimace.

"Do you believe, Huiln? Do you?", sobbed Cyhari.

"Of course I believe you, Cyhari. On this rude world, you're my only friend."

The elven woman choked back another sob. "That pleases me. But it is not what I meant. Do you still believe, Huiln? In her murmured wisdom, her secret splendor, and the echoes of her glory?"

Huiln shivered as he recalled the verse. "My faith is irrelevant."

"Is it? Why did you come to Alfyria?"

"I already told you."

"No, you told me the how of it—and lied."

"No I didn't. I came by Alfyrian Ladder."

"That's only a half-truth. You came because she brought you."

"Eurilda?"

"No. It Lies at the Center," she said. If Huiln was ever going to be seduced by an elf, it would be one that played at riddles, but while his throb of desire flared, it faded in his growing sense of alarm that nothing was right with Cyhari.

"When you put it that way," Huiln answered, "No, I don't believe that. There were too many circumstances that precipitated my unwanted and unwelcome arrival on your world that one will couldn't have spun it all."

"A web of circumstances?" Cyhari sniffled, choked back her sobs, and smiled. When he didn't answer, she repeated the question: "Why did you come to Alfyria?"

"While I can't be forthright, for fear of embroiling you in conspiracies laid on other worlds, you should know that I was happy to meet Azuri's daughter, for I seek an audience with the High Tzhurarkh, and initially reciprocated your friendship to win your father's influence. I arrived on Alfyria scruffy, disheveled, strapped, without retinue, and unheralded, and unlikely to be of interest to your monarch without a good reference."

"Who sent you?"

"The High Tzhurarkh or his spies may question you about Azuri's affairs, and I won't pollute you with schemes laid a world away."

"Huiln, who sent you." From within the folds of her cloak, Cyhari drew a wicked weapon with blades protruding both above and below the hilt, and when she rested her fist on his chest, one point pricked his chin and the other his navel.

"I admit it," said Huiln. "She sent me."

"Who?"

"The Spider-God. I admit her hand in all things."

"It's past the time for you to prove your faith. Who gave you your orders?", the elf said. No, thought Huiln, she was no longer woman, friend, or even elf. Cyhari was a spy, and an enemy, answering to the dryad pretender, Inglefras. But why did he feel that Cyhari ought to be rescued, to be protected, even with the point of her double-bladed dagger able to choose one of two lethal wounds? She was no helpless waif, as she owed her youthfulness to the longevity drug kinulcra, and was likely Huiln's elder. She may even have been older than Lord Hwarn, his father, who was still held hostage in Ielnarona, and more deserving of his son's concern. "Answer me, Nahurian."

The elven woman, trusting too much to her weapon, had not noticed Huiln's foot sidling between her legs; with a sweep of his foot, he could put her anywhere in the room. And yet, he couldn't bring himself to hurt the young elf—not a young elf, he insisted to himself—the only kind voice he had heard since his arrival. "You don't need the knife, Cyhari. Though we were only halfway to being friends, I prize nothing on the Elven World more than that near-friendship. I will tell you."

"I am halfway touched by your near-declaration," she said. "Sit if you like, but I'm not so touched that I'll sheathe my dagger." She stepped back, and with the tip of her blade, pointed toward the sitting room table.

Huiln said, "Thank you. Let me refill my cup, for the threat of death has made my throat very dry." Cyhari rolled her eyes in a wide arc, then rolled her head in an even more exaggerated effort to dodge the well-aimed wave of hot coffee the goblin hurled. When she turned back, her soused, red eye squinting through coffee flecks, Huiln smacked her twinned blade with the coffee pot. As the dagger fell from her struck fingers, Huiln snatched it from the air better than a trained juggler, ran out the door, and sprinted toward the canopied sidewalk.

The tall Alfyrian spy's much longer stride would beat him in any sprint or marathon, but if he made it to the canopy, which was still bustling with foot traffic, his smaller size would work to his advantage—so long as she had no co-conspirators. By the time he realized how easily she could turn the friendliest crowd against him, it was too late.

"Stop, thief!" Cyhari screamed. Two black-clad Alfyrians stood aside, as if to allow Huiln to pass between them, until one stuck out his foot, and Huiln skidded into a canopy pole. When the goblin staggered to his feet, the other elf seized his collar, yanked him into the air, and swung him around. Huiln bobbed at the end of the elf's fist as his head was buffeted off the inside of the canopy, and he could scarcely guide Cyhari's dagger, but as it had two blades, and he was held by his target, he was bound to hit something. While the goblin had acute intelligence, strong will, and immense presence of mind, his thoughts on the matter were much more addled, amounting to ow ow ow hit it hit it hit it! And when the blade connected, it gave him little relief, as the elf's reaction to having his fingers and thumb sliced to nubs was to drop the goblin to crack his tailbone on the sidewalk.

Huiln had staggered to one knee when Cyhari jumped him, closing her larger elven hands over Huiln's. While he had the advantage of strength in his grip on the hilt of her twinned dagger—goblins are muscular, and Huiln was a barrel-chested, broad shouldered, and iron thewed goblin—her greater size, reach, and weight gave her the leverage. As they scuffled on the sidewalk, Huiln couldn't escape Cyhari's tumult of arms and legs; there was simply more of the elf than there was of the goblin, and she cruelly pressed her weight advantage to make it more than an even match. But as she pushed his neck toward the dagger's edge, with his other hand he twisted the thumb of her knife hand until it broke. When Cyhari screamed, she let go of the dagger, and Huiln kicked her repeatedly until she fell off of him.

Huiln collided with a passing elf as he fled, as he could barely see; his vision was blurred not only from the rain, but from having his head rattled against the canopy, and from Cyhari's thumb poking him in the eye when, to grab her knife-hand thumb, he had let go of her other arm. However, in leaving the Quront Sabata, Huiln had paid close attention to the route to Azuri's in the event that he wore out his welcome there. Huiln hoped to return to the Quront Sabata by memory, but now the rain poured down in cascading sheets, hurling jets of rain water under the canopy to collide with the windy spatter, so that everyone under the canopy was drenched, and everything outside of the canopy was concealed by the deluge. The Quront Sabata may have been there, or possibly the end of the world. In either case, he was grateful for the ambiguity, for hopefully it confounded Cyhari as well.

No sooner did he think it than the rain thinned, then slowed to a sprinkle, revealing the Quront Sabata, but also making Huiln feel exposed; when he looked behind him and saw no one, he picked up his pace. While Cyhari would reason Huiln knew only one refuge on Alfyria, he hoped the second leg of his route wasn't so obvious. He told himself not to underestimate the Alfyrian spy, who need think back only to the dumpling soup for a clue: where there was a goblin restaurant, there may be a goblin community. Huiln would seek allies in Kuln.

As to his goal, the goblin wanted to be done being the Councilor-Generals' gofer; their alliance with the High Tzhurarkh would proceed without his advance warning,. If tragedy befell in the interim, he couldn't be blamed. And if he was, he couldn't care. The Five Worlds' fate shouldn't rest on one goblin's shoulders, especially when their salvation was such a thankless and needless task. And if more elves and dryads died...he couldn't finish the thought without breaking into a wide smile.

If only, Huiln rued, he was another goblin's son. Lord Hwarn instilled reverence for duty and honor, so that Huiln's inborn madness was now layered: courage to defy heights, confidence to defy the odds, and conscience to satisfy obligations. If his confidence wasn't sandwiched between the twin insanities courage and conscience, Huiln could have been a banker or merchant of repute, or simply lived off the largess of Lord Hwarn like his despicable kinsmen. That his kin shunned him for his madness was now understandable to Huiln, who for a moment resented these more social insanities in himself. Honor was like greed that had no one's interest at heart. To slake honor's thirst, he would follow through with his commitment, and scheme not how to advance his own ambitions, but how best to fulfill his duty. Without the possibility of a normal goblin life, he would have a name as great as that of his noble father—not only on Nahure, but on every world, he would be famed far and wide.

Sometime during Huiln's meditation, Julaba had become nearly bright as morning. Swirling clouds melted away with great speed, but were outpaced by Alfyria's smallest moon, Gimas, which hurtled across the sky as it made the first of three nightly circuits. Most of the light streamed from Alfyria's largest moon, Atoma, which blazed in the Abyss so bright that it made the night sky deep blue. Though Nahure only had one moon, the sight of the illuminated Elven night made him homesick, and also a little jealous of the surreal beauty with which the gods had imbued Alfyria when they invested it with three moons. In addition to the mercurial Gimas and the titanic Atoma, there was Sardom, which orbited opposite to Atoma, and would no doubt appear for a few moments before morning after Atoma had disappeared. If this was a pleasure trip, Huiln would look forward to seeing Sardom rise, for that Elven moon was supposed to be the most beautiful of the three, a silvery and unblemished mirror world, the surface of which the philosophers conjectured was still water. Useless knowledge, his dear father would have said. No, he realized; he was not homesick, but heartsick for his detained father.

The Quront Sabata's lights traced a green outline over its silhouette, subduing its structural nonsense with a stately grace. Huiln hesitated, then passed, the basement entrance, thinking that he did not have the stairwell key, and Cyhari would catch up to him in the tunnel. Not finding the Julaba storefront, he took a cross street to examine another face of the elven bookstore. Desperation to find the entrance flooded him with the fear of discovery. He craned his neck not once, but several times, to look behind him, to the right, and across the street. The thought of looking so stupidly suspicious filled him with embarrassment, but that vanished at the sight of the queue of applicants marking the Julaba storefront gate.

Unwilling to risk waiting in line, he looked for a goblin, but saw only many elves and several humans from a tribe unknown to him. Bluffing humans was always tricky, for their tribalism made them suspicious by nature, but elves, though more trusting, were harder to motivate. And as it would be easier to persuade a skeptical human than motivate an aloof elf, he chose the Hravakians for his marks. "Thank you!" he said, joining the Hravakians in line. "Thank you very much."

"You're welcome," said the human, taking Huiln's outstretched hand. The huge hand that swallowed the goblin's was black as iron, and belonged to a person who looked, despite his amiable and amused tone, less friendly than flinty, with the scarred and veined muscles of his chest and neck protruding from a tunic that did not fit him very well. As Huiln only met the Drydanan and Cuvaernian tribes, which were peopled by pale and paler humans, respectively, the goblin had only met one other that resembled this stranger, his estranged friend Khyte.

"Hey!" shouted an Alfyrian.

"The end of the line's over here, Nahurian!" shouted another.

"It's good to see a friendly face," continued Huiln, wishing Khyte was there. While the goblin had not forgiven Khyte, it was hard not to think of his treacherous friend as he met those that could be from Khyte's unknown birth tribe. Huiln had heard often the story of how Khyte had been taken, as an infant, in spoils of war. Though this fact accounted for Khyte's darker complexion compared to his tribesmen, the Drydanans knew little else about them, and Khyte's curiosity about his origins was never met with any satisfactory answers. Twenty years ago, the Drydanans were nomads that strove not to leave tracks for their enemies to follow, and illiterates that left no written record of their conquests. While the Drydanans now lived out of a sacked castle like a hermit crab using a shell too good for it, they still remained largely an illiterate, oral culture, so that the only remnants of the conquest were songs and stories shared on festival days. Even if the Drydanans were inclined to be honest, they couldn't have told him their name or direction.

Though Huiln wanted to unravel the mystery for his treacherous friend, and was even more interested in satisfying his own curiosity, to ask genealogical questions so bluntly was presumptuous and would draw suspicion from one that stood between himself and the end of the line, where Cyhari could be waiting for him.

"Do I know you?" scowled the Hravakian.

"Have we not met? I have a common face, and it is understandable if you have forgotten me."

The human's demeanor softened. "I meant no offense. Perhaps it is as you say, and we have met. Where was that again?"

"Was it Kreona? If you do not remember me, perhaps you know The House of Hwarn, or my father, Lord Hwarn?"

Whether it was luck, or that Huiln was a titled goblin, and his father was renowned on many worlds, this was exactly what to say.

"Lord Hwarn traveled to my tribe ten years ago," said the man. "It is to him I owe my knowledge of the Five Worlds." Hravak was a wet, rainy, world covered by haze and clouds, so that the Five Worlds were seldom visible. With no moons in their heavens, and primitive mathematical lore, the humans believed their world flat, and its often obscured neighboring worlds to be not regions of the Abyss with their own peoples, but mythological or religious destinations. Many human chiefs, lords, and kings would slay those who spread knowledge of the Five Worlds, as they viewed this lore as a pernicious lie to distract from the labors of their slaves, serfs, and workers.

"Your tribe?" said Huiln. "Oh, then you're Lord..." The goblin trailed off, not because he hadn't heard of this journey, but because he ignored Lord Hwarn's story, believing it a fabrication. In any case, he didn't know this human's name, title, or mode of address, and arrived at 'lord' as a guess.

"Kuruk, but I'm no Lord," he said. "Though once a King, I'm not one anymore."

"How does one stop being a King without losing one's head? I'm sorry—was that rude?"

"Not at all. It is the way of the Inamu. A King must abdicate when his counselors feel his son is a stronger candidate, and after coronation, the former King is exiled. My son supplanted me five years ago." Keruk looked ahead. "The line is moving. You had best find your place in it."

"King Kuruk..." started Huiln.

"I am no King."

"Your lordship..."

"Neither am I a Lord."

"Help me, as Lord Hwarn helped you."

"You speak as if his help was free. He plied me for every favor: fine meats and wines on which to dine, and gold and spices to carry home."

"I have nothing, save these lamentable rags," said Huiln, "and this dagger."

"An Alfyrian honor blade," said Kuruk. "is not yours to give."

"I won it," said Huiln.

"Even so, I could not accept, as Alfyrian honor blades have pedigrees. Many in the peerage would know the lineage of its wielders, and I would be unable to explain my ownership."

Several times during this conversation, and as unobtrusively as possible, Huiln glanced over Kuruk's broad shoulders to look for Cyhari, and when he at last saw her approach, he stooped behind the wall of humans. Kuruk's brow creased and the bridge of his nose wrinkled as he looked down on Huiln, who, subject to that fearsome scrutiny, realized that the former king had witnessed all forms of dissemblance and saw right through him.

"He is behind us, no?" asked Kuruk.

"Yes. She is," said Huiln.

"She?" laughed Kuruk, the stage laugh of one who spent long hours at court—quiet enough to be construed as discreet, but loud enough to signal admirers of the king's wit. "Did you leave her with child? Or owe her money?" While the others observed Keruk's low tone and stifled their squealing laughter, one bent double with his silent laughing, and another tossed his head back so that his quiet mirth resembled choking, save for his grin and streaming eyes.

Huiln was less offended by these scandalous accusations than by the casual misogyny of humans. Goblin men and women were equals, a fact so innate to goblin culture that when he heard this former king speak in this ogrish way, for a moment he forgot that he needed every friend he could get—even a misogynist ogre.

When they were among the next group admitted, Huiln was so relieved the Quront Sabata's wall concealed him from Cyhari that he felt a wave of fellow feeling for those that just mocked him. "Neither," Huiln responded. "She revealed she was a spy, then drew this blade." As this was the first moment he could reflect on what happened at Azuri's, conflicting emotions overshadowed him—though Cyhari menaced him with a dagger and thumbed his eye, and he should feel less enamored, his thoughts of her were nonetheless charged with excitement, though the feelings were colored with violence and he would be just as excited to kill her as to kiss her. Once he admitted Cyhari was an enemy, the dispirited goblin fell silent.

Kuruk cut through his misery, saying, "you have nothing I want, Son of Hwarn, not on this or any other world. You owe me."

When the old king and his men were called to one of the licensing windows, Huiln was called to another. "Name?" The Treikondant Cerund behind the window was cyan-haired, his wispy beard trailed on the desk, and he held an odd stylus, a pinprick of illumination gleaming where its point should be, poised over a tablet of paper. So disinterested was this elf that he did not look up from his paper tablet, and may not have seen his current client.

"Huiln, Son of Hwarn, of the House of Hwarn."

"City of origin?"

"Kreona."

"Is that on Nahure?"

"Yes," frowned Huiln. "It's the capitol of the Goblin World." Even then the Alfyrian did not acknowledge the goblin in any way.

"You're already registered, but your patron only paid through today. How would you like to continue your license?"

"My patron?"

"Yes. Without a new billing party, we can't extend your license."

"Who is my patron?"

"You don't know?" The clerk fidgeted, and finally looked up at Huiln, though his flat gaze held no opinion. "I'm not sure I should say."

"Never mind," Huiln said. "I know who it is." Though Cyhari was undoubtedly his benefactor, she was unlikely to extend his license, as she wanted to revoke his lease on life. Huiln again felt conflicted, as the elf woman's pity and sympathy for a new arrival had been real. "Is there an account for my father, Lord Hwarn? If so, did he leave the account with any credit?"

The clerk seemed indisposed to answer. After a few moments, he responded: "It will take time to locate your father's account in the archives." The clerk drummed his fingers and cleared his throat. "Due to an unexpected closure yesterday, we are extremely busy. Could you come back later?"

If Huiln's face was a stone, it fell too far to hear the impact or the echo. "No."

The clerk impassively looked at Huiln, then signed and stamped a form and gave it to the goblin. "Please enjoy a one day complimentary license. Come back tomorrow, and I'll have your father's records."

No sooner was Huiln holding the license than he sprinted for the stairs, not even sparing a kind word for the clerk, for he was neither feeling kindly toward the clerk, nor returning, if he could help it. If Huiln's theory was right, he would never eat another nutritious elven roll. After learning every Alfyrian city had doors in the Quront Sabata, he was curious, and he was impressed, but he was not amazed, as he had first seen the Doorways, which interconnected every city in the Five Worlds, whether they were on opposite sides of their World or the Abyss. After the giants discovered them, the Doorways became a poorly kept secret. While Huiln was told The Alfyrians were still ignorant of the ancient network, the existence of the Quront Sabata made it more likely the elves created them or discovered them so long ago that they were now building their own Doorways, and the Quront Sabata was their prototype.

'What are these lines spun between worlds, if not webs?' When the dulcet voice reverberated, Huiln saw only a single web swaying over the stairwell from two lazy threads, a loose line dangling from the ceiling, and a sagging one attached to the wall. Had she spoken through this cobweb, he wondered. Was ignoring a god a fatal faux pas? Was he lying to himself? If he was merely one of the teeming faithless that lived their days as if they were stuck in the Abyss, why was the Spider God's eye on him? Huiln turned his back on the fraying web, and began his search for the Doorway.