He stopped, bent down beside a flat stone, and lifted it up, muscles straining. When he had it high enough, he peered beneath it, frowned, and let it drop back to the ground with a thud. “Yuck. Nothing but bugs.”
“Is there a key of some sort?” Brightdawn asked, looking around dubiously.
Kronn tugged his cheek braids as his eyes scanned the undergrowth. “No, not a key,” he muttered. “Not a key… aha!” With a snap of his fingers, he trotted over to an old, fallen tree. It was old, its bark covered with fungi and thick, green moss. “This is it, I’m sure of it.” He spat in his hands and gave the log a push. It didn’t budge. “Humpf. It’s stuck. Can someone help me over here?”
Riverwind and Swiftraven exchanged confused glances, then walked over to join Kronn. Brightdawn and little Billee stayed with Catt.
“That thing must have been lying there for a hundred years,” Swiftraven said, shaking his head as he looked at the tree. “Look, it’s sunk halfway into the ground. I don’t think an ogre could lift it-and I know we can’t.”
“We can try,” said Riverwind.
As Swiftraven-looked on incredulously, the old Plainsman and Kronn braced themselves against the tree and shoved. It resisted a moment longer, then moved so suddenly that Riverwind fell to his knees. The log wasn’t embedded in the earth at all; it had been sawn in half, then carefully laid upon the ground to give the illusion that it was nothing but an old, fallen tree.
It wasn’t just a tree, though. It was a door.
“Mishakal’s mercy,” Riverwind gasped. The log swung aside, revealing a dark, yawning hole in the ground.
The others gathered around the opening. It was deep, sloping out of sight beneath the earth. Worn steps, made from packed earth, led down into the gloom.
“The entrance might be a bit cramped,” said Kronn, “but things should open up a bit down below. Here we go.” Smiling with satisfaction, he produced a small, brass lamp from his pouch.
Riverwind frowned as he looked at the lamp. “Isn’t that from the Inn of the Last Home?”
“Is it?” Kronn asked, surprised. “You know, now that you mention it, it does look familiar. Caramon must have given it to me as a going-away gift, I suppose.” He examined it carefully. “Good, there’s still oil in it. Can anyone give me a light?”
There was no room in the tunnel for the horses, and though they were loath to do so in such dangerous lands, the companions had no choice but to set them free. They stripped off their mounts’ saddles and bridles, gave each of them a handful of oats from their feed bags, then slapped them on their rumps, sending the startled animals trotting away through the forest. When the animals were gone from sight, Riverwind and Swiftraven fashioned a stretcher from a pair of stout branches and an old blanket, and laid Catt on top of it. The wounded kender grimaced, groaning dully, as the Plainsmen lifted her off the ground.
Kronn lit his lamp and gave it to Brightdawn. “Go on ahead,” he told the others. “Wait for me at the bottom of the stairs.”
They moved slowly down the crumbling steps, the little lamp dimly lighting their way. When the Plainsfolk had vanished into the darkness, Kronn descended the first few stairs, then reached to the wall. His grasping hand closed around a rope that hung down from the log door above. He pulled at it with all his strength, bracing himself against the wall of the tunnel. Slowly, the log slid back into place across the opening. Daylight narrowed to a sliver of dancing dust, then disappeared completely, replaced by utter blackness. Carefully, Kronn headed down the stairs, moving by touch as he followed the Plainsfolk.
The stairs wound down for what seemed forever, though Kronn knew from experience it was less than a hundred feet. Tree roots hung down from the ceiling, slapping at the kender’s face in the darkness. The steps were treacherous and uneven, some of them slick with moisture. The air was dank and close and smelled of wet earth. It took Kronn many long minutes to grope his way to the bottom.
At last, he saw the ruddy glow of lamplight below. Recklessly quickening his pace, he bounded down the last dozen steps. The Plainsfolk were waiting for him, staring about in amazement.
They stood in a dark tunnel, which stretched out of sight in either direction. It was much broader than the stairway, and higher as well. Even Riverwind, who towered a head above the rest, could stand in its midst without stooping. The walls were made of packed earth, shored up with broad timbers every dozen paces or so. Next to each timber, a wall sconce held an unlit torch. Kronn pulled down two such torches, lit them with the lamp, and handed one to Brightdawn. The crackling flames seemed almost blindingly bright after their dim descent, but they still only carved small pockets of light out of the gloom.
“Almighty goddess,” Swiftraven breathed. “Did your people build these, Kronn?”
“Us?” the kender asked, and chuckled. “No. We just keep them from falling apart. Come on, it’s this way.” Holding his smoldering brand aloft, he led the company down the passage to the left.
“Who did build them, then?” Brightdawn asked. Her voice echoed weirdly off the walls of the tunnel.
“Goblins, mostly,” Kronn answered. “At least, they were the first-that was about five hundred years ago.”
“Before the Cataclysm,” Riverwind murmured, regarding the earthen walls with renewed awe.
Kronn nodded. “Before both Cataclysms, actually. It started when the Kingpriest of Istar issued some edict or other, saying the goblins were a pox upon the land and had to be exterminated. Now don’t get me wrong, I don’t much care for goblins, but that seems a bit extreme, you know?
“Anyway, suddenly there were warriors everywhere, hoping to collect the bounty the clergy put on goblin ears. I guess things got pretty bad, because the goblins decided to go underground, literally. They dug warrens and hid down here, only going up to raid for food and such.
“Of course, it doesn’t end there. As time went on, the Kingpriests had started to get a little… funny. Not calling-down-fiery-mountains funny, but not at all right in the head, either. With the goblins gone, they needed a new enemy. They started going after heretics-and their definition of ‘heretic’ kept getting broader all the time. The heretics, in response, came up with the same idea the goblins had. They started to dig catacombs.
“It didn’t take long, of course before the heretics and the goblins met. There was fighting at first, of course, but after a few battles the two groups decided they’d be better off working together. Kind of like how everyone fought together against Chaos, actually. So they called a truce, and the warrens and catacombs became one great, big underground city. And it just kept on growing, every time the Kingpriest declared holy war on some other group-priests of the neutral and evil gods, wizards of all kinds… even a lot of my people, toward the end. Can you imagine? The Kingpriest thought we were a blight upon the land!”
Swiftraven made a soft, snorting noise. Brightdawn glared at him. “I don’t understand,” she said. “Istar was hundreds of miles to the north of here. What are these tunnels doing here?”
“Istar was more than just a city Brightdawn,” Riverwind answered. “It was a great empire, stretching all the way from Nordmaar to Balifor, and from Neraka east to the sea.”
“Right,” Kronn agreed. “The Kenderwood didn’t always belong to the kender, you know. Before the Cataclysm, this was actually the southernmost province of Istar-the part that didn’t fall into the sea when the fiery mountain fell. After the Cataclysm, when my people came north out of the ruins of Balifor they found the tunnels here, abandoned. The people who’d lived in them had all died or moved above ground. The tunnels were in rough shape then, from what I gather, but we fixed up what we could, sealed off what we couldn’t, and hid the entrances with secret doors like that log back there. These passages run almost the whole length of Goodlund and connect every town from Flotsam to Blood Watch-including Kendermore, of course. We’ve got tunnel entrances all over the place there.”