Tarmy fit-for-nothing was apprenticed to the sorcerer Spindlecroft - not that he ever learnt any magic, as most of his time was taken up by doing what dogsbodies do best, that is mopping, cleaning, polishing and taking out the slop. Life itself wasn't all bad however, after all he had his own straw mattress to sleep on in the workshop, and there was all the stale bread he could eat, and only very rarely did he get turned into something unpleasant when Spindlecroft was angry with him. But his job also meant that he had responsibilities. His master would very often expect him to obtain the ingredients that were needed to prepare a spell. And of course they had to be precise ingredients, one couldn't afford to cut any corners where that was concerned, or the spell may not work. At the present time Spindlecroft was engaged in preparing a most difficult and altogether precarious spell, one that if worked would save them all from the ravages of the Cosmic Worm, (a huge creature that could devour entire towns). This meant that Tarmy needed to be on the ball, or they would all perish. There couldn't afford to be any distractions, distractions like a treasure-map turning up for instance. What was a lad supposed to do...?