The Timeline of Tauber - The Gnome Accord - Circa ~600

It was a beautiful morning in the peaceful hamlet of Goesforth. The place was only small, being no more than a tavern, a farm, a smithy, and other necessary amenities, surrounded by meagre dwellings, all positioned at a crossroads. Indeed, it was the crossroads that gave Goesforth its importance. A crossroads made it a destination, a place where people stopped off rather than passed through. And that was vital for the latest trend that was sweeping Tauber; trade.

Trade, Nightsnake reflected as he made his way to the meeting place, had done wonders for the communities between the Darkwood and the Forsaken Forest. Bonds had been strengthened. Secrets had been shared. Common causes had been found. All of which made his job a whole lot harder.

The goblin had many jobs, depending on what was called for. On the road he was a highwayman. In villages he was a raider. On the high seas he was a pirate. Theft, robbery and burglary were terms he did not differentiate between. He left such things to the lawyers. All he knew was that he made a living taking what was not his and he’d been very good at it. Until recently.

Gnomes had been the best targets. They were trustworthy and believed that others were likewise. Not one of them would consider their neighbour a threat to their goods. Everything was shared in any case and if you stole from the collective you risked no longer being a part of it. All of which was fine by Nightsnake, who preferred obtaining goods that weren’t his with as little effort as necessary.

And what goods they were! Gnomish baking was phenomenal and their beer was even more so. And, whilst only his band and the cluster of gnomish settlements were aware of that fact, things had gone well. The gnomes had become more inventive about preventing his raids and he’d had to change his tactics in response, but that was all part of the game as far as he was concerned. But then they’d gone and got the humans involved, which didn’t so much stop the game as smash the board.

Suddenly there were a lot more people who cared if the goods arrived at their destination. And all of those invested parties combined to ensure that the settlements where said goods were made were harder to raid and that the caravans that transported said goods to their destinations were more heavily guarded.

“Boss!”

Nightsnake span around at the cry, the long lengths of his patchwork overcoat trailing behind him. A goblin, lanky by the standards of their race, was hurrying towards him in long, ungainly strides. The tails of a tattered jacket streamed behind him and one hand clutched a squashed top hat to his head whilst the other reached out to him beseechingly.

The newcomer arrived at a rush, almost overshooting Nightsnake’s position in his graceless haste.

“What do you want, Hairless?” Nightsnake hissed. “Why aren’t you with the others?”

“Thought you might need some help, boss!”

The goblin spoke everything with great enthusiasm, whether enthusiasm was called for or not. Hairless Richard, to give him his full name, was a strange creature. Many goblins were bald. Hairless had no hair anywhere on his body. No arm hair, leg hair, chest hair or back hair. No facial hair and, more alarmingly, no eyebrows. It all made for a quite unsettling aspect. Despite this, he always wanted to be helpful. The trouble was that he very rarely succeeded and only then seemingly by accident.

Nightsnake sighed. “And you thought you were just the goblin for the job?”

“Of course, boss!”

Nightsnake shook his head in resignation. Hairless’ positivity was well-meaning. He just wished that the outcome of whatever aid he rendered was equally positive. He should have been with the others. He wasn’t. He’d have to make the best of it.

“How do I look?” he asked, holding his arms out wide.

Hairless regarded him critically. “Your right eye is staring at me but your left is looking over there.” He paused and looked at his hands. “Or is that your right?”

After a brief pause to comprehend the misunderstanding, Nightsnake recalibrated the phrase to something more on Hairless’ intellectual level.

“Considering I’m meeting the town’s best,” he tried, “do I look smart enough.”

“You look plenty clever to me, boss!”

Nightsnake sighed. It was a common occurrence around Hairless. It wasn’t easy finding intelligent henchmen but the lanky goblin was on another level. A low level, somewhere in the region of an earthworm. Still, there was something to be said for stupidity. He followed orders more or less to the letter, providing you explained carefully and used plenty of short words, and, because he was constantly looking to Nightsnake for the answers to questions such as, “what should I do next?” there wasn’t much chance of him challenging for leadership.

“Just follow me. And say nothing.”

The meeting had been scheduled to take place at what was nominally known as the town square. In truth, Goesforth wasn’t big enough to be a town, despite it being referred to as such in common parlance, and it didn’t have a square. Nightsnake had no idea what sort of shape it was. The crossroads about which the hamlet was situated played host to all of the primary trades. The stables occupied one corner of the intersection and before that was space for horses to arrive and get out of the road before being taken within. A tavern, the sign outside of which proclaimed it regrettably to be known as the Goblin’s Head, occupied another and before that was space for outdoor drinkers to congregate. Then there was the smithy - always handy for when a pack animal had thrown a shoe and a natural meeting place, especially around Grimblesnacht when the weather really had a bite - and in front of that was space.

Finally there was the sheriff’s office, home to the hamlet’s sole lawkeeper and a good reminder to the many visitors to the settlement that there were consequences to their actions. Before this there was a stockade and gallows on a raised plinth but these, as far as Nightsnake knew, had only ever been for show. Now the platform had been rigged as some sort of stage, with the instruments of death and humiliation decorated as best as possible to disguise their true nature.

To say that the combined spaces around the crossroads were crammed with people would have been generous, but there were certainly more present than Nightsnake was comfortable with. He was used to sneaking around or else confronting people when the odds were in his favour. Now as he approached he was the centre of attention and heavily outnumbered. He didn’t like it one bit.

Up on the stage stood a man with “mayor” written all over him. He was slightly portly, in keeping with the general tradition of people who spend far too long sitting down discussing politics over multi-course meals, and had around his neck a chain that, whilst clearly not gold, was at least of a metal that glinted enough in the sunlight for it to be noticed. Beside him, a stocky gnome with hair slicked back from a centre parting and who sported a glorious moustache across his upper lip regarding the approaching duo with disdain.

“Remember, Hairless,” Nightsnake muttered, as the pair began the ascent, “say nothing.”

Mutterings susurrated through the watching audience as people broke off conversations and nudged their neighbours, ensuring that as many eyes as possible were fixated upon the events upon the stage. This would be an event to tell your grandchildren about, after all, Nightsnake reflected, though probably for reasons other than what were currently expected.

The mayor cleared his throat noisily. “Good morning…errr…gentlemen,” he managed.

“Nothing!”

Nightsnake turned to Hairless. The goblin’s yell had given him quite the start!

“What?” he hissed.

Hairless looked nonplussed. “You said to say nothing.”

Nightsnake stared at his subordinate, a myriad of responses vying for primacy in his mind.

“Oh,” said Hairless, realisation seeming to dawn, “you told me to say nothing and I yelled it instead. Sorry, boss. Do you want me to say it now to make up for it?”

Nightsnake didn’t know where to start. “Do not,” he managed, through gritted teeth, “say…another…word.”

“Right you are, boss,” said Hairless, nodded his head with enthusiasm and clearly still oblivious as to what he had done wrong.

Nightsnake turned back to the mayor. “Mornin’,” he said. “Nice day for it.” He glanced around at the sea of watching faces. “Quite the turnout.”

The gnome laughed. “I don’t think people would have believed us if we’d simply told them it had happened. This is the sort of thing people needed to see for themselves.”

“Quite,” said the mayor. “This is a new chapter for us all.”

A new chapter in the same story, Nightsnake thought.

“So,” said the goblin, injecting a note of levity into his voice for good measure, “people are here for a show, are they?”

“They’re here to see the deed done, yes.”

“But surely they want to see more than some people stood up here, filling out forms. What kind of a day out would that be?”

“A historical one,” said the gnome, his booming voice a perpetual bark of command that was quite at odds with his frame. “People have things to do. This is a working town. Can we just get on with it, Darling?”

The mayor winced. It did not go unnoticed.

“Darling?” Nightsnake enquired.

“Mayor Cartwright Darling,” said the man, his cheeks beginning to redden. “Just mayor will do, thank you.”

“Maybe for the goblin,” the gnome boomed, “but we’ve been friends for years, Darling, since long before you were a mayor!”

“So,” said Nightsnake, “if he’s Darling does that make you Sweetheart?”

The gnome harrumphed, his moustache bristling with indignation. “I am Anthony Cecil Hogmanay,” he declared.

“So not Sweetheart for short?”

“Gentlemen,” the mayor implored, raising his hands, “please keep things cordial. The world is watching.”

Nightsnake took a very deliberate look about him. “The world?”

“W-well,” the mayor stammered, “this slice of it, at least.”

“Can we just get on with it?” Hogmanay demanded.

Nightsnake smiled and spread his hands wide. “What’s the rush?”

The gnome forced a smile onto his features. “Some of us are busy.”

“You can’t rush history-making,” Nightsnake volunteered. “Very careful business. You don’t want people leaving here with the wrong idea.”

“I imagine they’ll leave here with the right one,” the gnome snapped. “It seems to me that you’re playing for time. Now why would that be, I wonder?”

Nightsnake met the gnome’s gaze. If Anthony Cecil Hogmanay thought he could glare a confessions out of the goblin, he was sorely mistaken. Nightsnake was a born swindler; a professional. He’d left his scruples behind long ago and wasn’t in the market for any new ones.

“If you would be so good as to read and sign the document, gentlemen,” said the mayor, attempting to distil the clear hostility between the pair.

Hogmanay didn’t even read the document laid out on the table. He seized the quill, dipped it in the ink pot and scrawled a signature and his name.

“Your turn,” he grunted.

But Nightsnake was not to be rushed. He cast back the trailing end of his great coat with a theatrical flourish. He took purposeful steps towards the table on which the document was laid. He scooped it up and read each section and subsection with great care. His lips moved as he read, more to convey that he was digesting each and every word than for anything else. Give them a show. Keep their attentions fixated. When all was done, they’d remember that he’d been there.

“Is there a problem?”

Nightsnake glanced up from the parchment. The mayor was regarding him nervously.

“Just making sure it’s all correct.”

And correct it was, the words reflecting the long negotiations they’d undergone to reach this point. Prices on goods. Penalties for any raids on either settlements or caravans. A peace, of sorts, between his crew and the local communities. An invitation to join the rest of civilisation and prosperity for all.

Yet he didn’t want it. He enjoyed what he did. He enjoyed the game. The gnomes got wise to his tricks and so his tricks had to evolve and, with that, so did he. Wasn’t that also progress? Did people not thrive on adversity? Surely there was more than one way for civilisation to advance?

All he was waiting for was the signal and he could end this charade. Tell them he’d had second thoughts. A goblin was allowed to change his mind, wasn’t he? Those gathered about the makeshift stage would still have their show, still have something to tell their children and grandchildren about, but it would not be the story that the gnomes had planned out before him.

“Sir?”

Sir? thought Nightsnake, frowning. That wasn’t what his crew usually called him. It wasn’t what they’d agreed upon as the signal, either. Still, he couldn’t have expected everything to go to plan.

“What is it, Bob?”

That was Hogmanay’s voice. Nightsnake raised his eyes from the parchment and followed the gnome’s gaze. There, striding with purposeful steps towards them from the direction of the stables, was a stocky gnome in hard-wearing dungarees over an off white tunic. She was female. Definitely female. The crowd was parting to let her through.

Questions fought for control of Nightsnake’s tongue.

“Bob?” he asked, the question coming out in one strangled, flat syllable.

“Barbara. Bobby. Bob,” said Hogamanay in a low voice by way of explanation and without taking his eyes off the advancing gnome. “She likes it. Who are we to argue? I’d be more concerned by who’s with her, if I were you.”

Nightsnake looked again and just about managed to stifle a groan. There, partially hidden behind Bob’s broad shoulders and being dragged along by one powerful arm, was a goblin. He was a sorry sight. His clothes hung off his gaunt frame and he walked, if such a generous term could be awarded to his current mode of movement, in an awkward crouch. The hand that wasn’t attached to the arm by which he was being pulled was clamped firmly over the goblin’s backside. Bulging cheeks and rolling eyes rounded off his sorry aspect.

“Pursea,” Nightsnake hissed.

He glanced towards Hogmanay, whose moustache now curved upwards in a huge smile, and knew that the game was up.

“One of yours?”

Nightsnake grimaced. Was there any point in denying it? Hogmanay didn’t give him a chance to.

“Where did you find this one?”

“Well, sir, you’re not going to believe this,” said Bob, “but he was caught drinking our wares. Whilst we were all otherwise engaged at this honest and trustworthy celebration of the start of our future together, too! Who’d have thought?”

“Oh deary me!” Exclaimed Hogmanay in a mocking tone. “Surely not from the barrels labelled “Really Gud Beer” spelled G U D just in case a phonetically-challenged individual might happen across them?”

“The very same,” Bob replied gravely, keeping up her side of the mummer’s farce.

Nightsnake’s mind raced. So, Pursea had been caught. They’d referred to an individual. Had the others got away, then? Maybe there was a way out of this yet.

“I can’t believe you’ve betrayed me like this!” Nightsnake raged. “After all I told you about how important this meeting was and how you were to do absolutely nothing to mess it up! How could you?”

Pursea looked like he wanted to respond but quickly put his hand over his mouth. Which was just as well, Nightsnake thought. Who knew what the idiot would come out with.

Hogmanay was regarding the goblin leader carefully, eyebrows raised. “You’re asserting you had nothing to do with this?”

“Absolutely!” Nightsnake insisted. “I can’t be held responsible for the actions of one rogue goblin!”

“Oh, he wasn’t acting alone,” Bob clarified. “This one was just the least…messy of the lot.”

Hogmanay tutted. “People really should be more careful what they drink. There are so many natural laxatives in Tauber. They could be in anything, ready to take, for example, a common thief unawares.”

The gnome fixed Nightsnake with a keen stare that went on for far longer than was comfortable. The gnome knew and the goblin had run out of excuses. This was one game he hadn’t won. Maybe he never would again.

“Now see here, Nightsnake,” the gnome began in a more conciliatory tone, his voice low so the watching audience couldn't hear. He hesitated. “Listen, do you have another name? Nightsnake sounds ridiculous. Like it or not, this is the future. Your thieving days are over. You’re upsetting too many people to continue. Dangerous people. Someone will put an end to you if you carry on. It’s time to join civilisation and to do that you need a civilised name, one you’re going to sign with on this contract to start a new life for yourself and your kind.”

Nightsnake stared glumly at the parchment. Hogmanay was right. The game was up. The fun had ended. Civilisation beckoned. A world full of complex rules and wordy agreements. Of tighter and tighter language designed to squeeze every conceivable loophole out of every eventuality.

Slowly, a smile spread across the goblin’s features. A world where the rules were so complex that understanding them and bending them until just before they broke was a game in itself. A world where there were loopholes to be found and exploited and, when the rules evolved to eliminate them, where more loopholes were waiting to be discovered. This was a game he knew all too well; the game where both sides vied for supremacy and grew as a result.

Suddenly he had found the fun again and he was all too eager to start. All he needed was a suitable name to fit into this new world. Fortunately, he’d had such a name bestowed upon him at birth, long before he’d adopted Nightsnake as a moniker to hide behind.

Still smiling, Nightsnake picked up the quill and scrawled his signature before neatly printing his name beneath.

Edmund.