The 5th Traveler

Four human children of exactly the same age as you dear listeners, Jack, Jackie, Jacky, And Jak, skipped down the road to find their fortune. They followed the sun by day, and the stars by night, and trailing behind was the 5th. But it was the road of the goblin king, who saw them and was envious.

"I shall capture these [children of humanity], suck their beauty and potential out, and become all that I am not, and then not only the goblins, but the humans too shall I rule over" he croaked from his warty lips and snaggley teeth, eyes burning red beneath his crown of beaten tin. "Send forth the trolls!"

And so the trolls were sent forth to dismantle the bridge over the Rough and Tumble Road and River Ramble. But the children were clever, and they rebuilt the bridge, bringing floating logs together and fastening them with knots, and nails, and joinings, and balancings.


Foiled, the Goblin King called forth a shard of Winter he kept under his throne to freeze the children, but the children were clever, and remembered their childhood lessons about the moon, and the strong one chopped down logs, the keen-eyed one collected sticks, the humble one collected twigs, and the wise one collected tinder, and so a fire was built to keep the cold at bay...


Foiled again, the goblin king just dispatched his knights to kidnap the children, which was easily accomplished but also cheating, as the children had not failed any tests of character. They were tossed into the dungeon, but the goblin king was surprised to find the fifth in his throne room, having somehow been missed by his knights.

"Greetings, goblin king. I claim hospitality, and ask further, will you not grant me 4 things?" said the traveller in the dark, hooded and cloaked.

The goblin king, fairly certain he knew where this was going, told the 5th "There is a way things are done here in goblintown- you must bring me 4 things first."

"Very well" the 5th said, and the goblin king grinned a toothy grin. "Then bring me the legs of YG, the crown of the king of apes, and the most precious pearl of the Ningen of the sea, and the head of Anathemant the dragon!"

"Very well." the 5th said. "It will take some time."

The goblin king insisted "No more than a year and a day, or you must forfeit your all to me!"

"So be it." the 5th said, and the goblin king chuckled at the naivetie of this 5th child agreeing to all these magically binding terms, who would soon be his, along with all their friends.

"Best be off then- no time to waste" The king mocked, and the 5th bowed and left on their quest.

A year passed, the children languishing in prison, waiting to be drained of their youth and never speaking of the 5th. But they were brought out to stand in the court of the goblin king to be mocked.

"Your friend is to arrive to day... if they yet live, of course, to face their failure.

"We have no friends save for we four who stand here" Jack insisted. The four always insisted as such, and never revealed the slightest detail of the 5th traveller. This frustrated the goblin king, for he worried a little that if he didn't learn a weakness of the 5th traveller and exploit it, the 5th might actually succeed. That was how these things tended to go.


As the moon of day reached the midnight peak, the gates opened, and there stood the 5th traveller, who walked forward through the aghast ranks of the goblins. The goblin king swallowed, but did not see the head of Anathemant, so he knew the traveller must have failed and relaxed a little.

"Brought you me the legs of YG?" The goblin king demanded.
"YG has no legs, so I bring you nothing." The 5th replied, and the Goblin King scowled, for this was true.
"Brought you me the crown of the ape-king?" The goblin king demanded.
"The apes have no king, so I bring you nothing" the 5th replied. The Goblin King scowled, for this was also true.
"Brought you me the most precious pearl of the Ningen?" The goblin king demanded.
"Yes." The 5th dug in their pockets and threw a single grain of sand on the ground, and the Goblin King scowled, but had to play along.
"What is this grain of sand?" The goblin king asked, and the 5th replied.
"It is the most precious pearl of the ningen- for they see pearls as the diseased secretions of an agonized mollusc that ruins what would be their meal, and so the most precious pearl is one that never grew."
"Well, you don't have the head of Anathemant-" The Goblin King started to say, until Dread Anathemant walked into the hall behind the 5th and lay down like a cat, the  dragon eyeing the goblin king's tin crown with a reptilian amusement that made the Goblin King fume mightily.
"Here is the head of Anathemant the First Dragon, beloved of Yes and No, and the rest of him besides. Now."

"YEs yes" The goblin king fumed, but was hardly beaten yet. "You may ask of me any four things." And the four children looked up hopefully, but the goblin king waved a signal to his servants, who pulled down the curtains to allow a parade to come block the view of the children. Treasures of gold glittered, concubines of every shape danced, ultimate tomes of magic whispered. "Any four things at all."

The 5th was unmoved by the temptations, though Anathemant was at least lured to the basement to be a problem for a later age.

"My desire is set and does not change, goblin king."

The goblin king sweated, but had one last trick.

"First, a dance!" He croaked. "Will you not join the celebration of your efforts and eat, drink, sing, and dance?"

The fifth traveller paused. "I will dance." And the goblin breathed a sigh of relief.

"Blade Dancers! Dance!" And the blade dancers stepped from the shadows and spun and whirled and each performed a killing technique, executed so perfectly that death would have smiled to see it.


"That was dancing?" A voice came, measured and monotonous, from what should have been a corpse.

"Yes!" The goblin king jeered. "Long has the art of blade dancing been a dance we goblins enjoy. So no complaining, ghost, begone to your afterlife!"

"This was a dance I did not know." The blade dancers fell dead around the traveller. "I know it now." Ticking, the 5th traveller, whose cloak had been shredded, walked to the goblin king, dead yellow doll eyes unblinking, and the Goblin King hastily motioned for the 4 children lest the dance continue.

"Very well, Jack Jackie Jacky and Jak, it seems you are rescued. Here are your four friends, traveller-"
But the doll ignored them and spoke over the goblin king, binding him to his agreement.

"You will render unto me the sun, the moon, and every star in the sky, and also too the black stars that wait behind the pale. But more generous than thou art I, goblin king- For this task, I grant you eternity to complete it, for good or for ill."

And the traveller left, and the goblin king stole the fair looks and symmetry and potential of the 4 children and called himself Elf, and shared the blessings among those loyal, and together the Elves took over the world, and were loved for it.

Yet after the immortal elves had sampled every pleasure and every pain, they did not rest easy, for the debt, source of their immortality, was yet unpaid...