Haunted Gold Mine

"Uncle Holin, weren't you asleep?"

At dawn, Annan woke Martin, who was about to fall onto the floor. Martin rubbed his eyes and walked out of the room to find Uncle Holin chopping firewood in the yard, his right foot wrapped in linen.

Uncle Holin managed a weary smile. "I... was worried something might happen to Annan at the gold mine."

"Good morning, Uncle Holin."

Annan came out behind Martin, and Uncle Holin's smile grew more genuine.

The smell of cooking drifted from the kitchen into the yard, while smoke from the chimney rose into the thin mist blanketing Pinglin Town.

Aunt Susan brought out breakfast: mashed potatoes with chicken broth, several pieces of soft baked brown bread, and a dish of apple pie.

"Why didn't we have any of this yesterday?" Uncle Holin froze at the sight of the feast as he sat down on a low stool.

"You two don't need food this good!"

Aunt Susan waved her ladle, swatting away her husband's and Martin's dirty hands. She picked up Annan's wooden bowl first and filled it to the brim.

"Eat plenty, little Annan. You'll need your strength for work."

"Thank you, Aunt Susan."

Aunt Susan looked after Annan for more than affection alone. There was another reason: after Holin and Martin ate, the table looked like a wasteland ravaged by demons.

Before they left, Aunt Susan reminded Martin, "Take good care of little Annan. Don't let me down!"

That morning, Annan and Martin set off under Aunt Susan's worried, reluctant gaze.

According to the bard's tales, Pinglin Town lay in a godforsaken corner of the frontier. Around it stretched thousands of miles of forest, reaching the coast, the Snow Mountains, and the swamps. There was no church here, no shrieking Greenskins, no feuds or conspiracies, let alone other races. Even those tired of conflict and longing for peace found it too quiet. Perhaps only Druids who lived among the trees, and hyena-like Kobolds and Gnolls, would enjoy the place.

But the bard had also said never to believe a word a bard said. They would invent any lie to complete a story and sing any word to make a poem rhyme.

The Haunted Gold Mine stood at the edge of the forest, not far from where Annan had appeared.

At first, Annan tried to find a way back.

On his third day at Aunt Susan's house, Annan offered a stumbling excuse and set out with Uncle Holin at dawn to return to that part of the forest. But when he slipped away to search for the grassy clearing among the trees, he ran into a pack of Kobolds that had wandered there.

The yapping Kobolds looked more like lizards than dogs. They wore rags that barely covered them and carried crooked short spears and stones for weapons.

Annan resisted the urge to greet these "fantasy creatures" and fled back to the forest's edge. The odds of being killed by Kobolds might be low, but they were not zero.

When Annan later told the bard what had happened, the bard said he had been right to run. More unlucky souls were killed by Kobolds than by Dragons. Those bullies loved nothing more than a lone adventurer.

Then he told Annan about Kobold habits: they liked dark forests and caves, would never attack enemies who outnumbered them, and a lone Kobold would want to flee at the sight of a sheep—

At a fork in the road, Annan and Martin met their foreman, a lame old man called Old Zoran. He had supposedly once been a soldier.

"Holin couldn't come?"

Old Zoran looked Annan over. His linen clothes were faded from washing, and his skin was a sickly gray yet pale and delicate. He did not look fit for physical labor. But Old Zoran was unlike the others—he firmly believed mining was a matter of luck. "Poor Holin got his foot smashed by a rock after just one day. Let's hope you bring us better luck."

"How are you related to Holin?"

"I'm Martin's cousin."

Old Zoran's expression softened slightly, and he explained the mine's rules. His slurred speech was thick with slang, and Annan could barely understand him... but the gist was easy to guess: no stealing gold from the mine.

"Martin, take him to the shed first." Old Zoran waved a hand, then noticed Martin had not moved. "Martin?"

Martin snapped back to attention and puffed out his chest. "He's my cousin!"

Annan followed lame Old Zoran toward the gold mine, with Martin a beat slow to react. Sheds dotted the barren ground outside the mine entrance on the desolate hill, and figures moved among them.

At first, Annan thought the miners worked for Old Zoran, but they paid him no attention. Then he assumed Old Zoran was their foreman, only to find he did not get along with the other foremen.

The camp was strange, too. Ordinarily, a gold mine would strictly limit contact between miners and the outside world. Here, supervision was lax. Miners came and went as they pleased, lit fires to cook in the clearing, and some foremen were even handing out pay...

Old Zoran took out a key and opened a shed. Several crude, crooked wooden beds stood on the dirt floor. Ants and insects came and went freely, and the bedside cabinet doubled as a dining table.

This was where Annan and Martin would live from now on.

They picked up their iron pickaxes and were about to follow Old Zoran into the mine when Annan saw a lavish carriage bearing an ornate crest pass along the distant road.

He caught sight of the wealthy owner Mr. Fast had mentioned: Lady Fine Wine.

The splendid carriage and beautiful lady seemed to belong to a different world from the shabby, filthy sheds and Annan himself.

Annan lowered his head slightly and followed Old Zoran, who carried an oil lamp, into the gold mine.

The gold mine had long been abandoned. Many tunnels had already collapsed and were impassable. Old Zoran lit the lamp and led them deeper inside. A faint smell of scorching hung in the air, while the sound of pickaxes rang out all around them.

The oppressive darkness made Annan tense and uneasy.

In the dim lamplight, old tools lay abandoned and scattered beside broken supports. Annan realized this was an exhausted gold mine. From the other miners' quiet conversations, he learned that many were townspeople trying their luck.

Old Zoran was doing the same. He had hired Uncle Holin and the others to try their luck: any ore they found would be his, and if they found none, he would bear the cost.

That was fine by Annan. At least there was little conflict between miners, or between miners and foremen. Old Zoran left them where they had been digging the day before. It was nearly the deepest part of the mine, if not quite, but the supports there were in good condition.

"Hope you bring us luck." Old Zoran left them one oil lamp and took the other away.

Martin crawled into the low passage they had dug the day before with his pickaxe. Annan raised the lamp and looked around.

The echoes of pickaxes came from every direction, impossible to place. Dense dust motes drifted through the lamplight.

"Cousin, I'm stuck!"

A muffled shout suddenly came from the passage. Annan turned and saw Martin's upper body wedged inside, his backside sticking out and wiggling.

Annan set down his pickaxe to help, then hesitated at the awkward position. Instead, he told Martin to let go of his pickaxe and crawl out, then retrieve it afterward.

Martin crawled out and reached for the pickaxe, but for some reason he gripped the handle and began tugging against the edge of the passage.

Annan was about to tell him not to pull the pickaxe out sideways when Martin suddenly dragged a pale, gauzy figure out of the passage.

"A Ghost!!!"

Martin dropped the pickaxe and ran.

"A human!!!"

The Ghost shrieked and crashed into the rock wall deep inside the mine.