Canker Gnomes

“Canker gnomes” is the derisive name given to gnome clans who scavenge in the slums and on the outskirts of human cities. Most citizens regard canker gnomes as nuisances, thieves, and worse—and many of them are. Still, they are valued for taking on vital jobs that others often won’t: collecting garbage, maintaining sewers, carting away corpses, and the like. In the process, canker gnome enclaves become clearinghouses for what the city throws away, with members of the clan serving as particularly resourceful fences, pawnbrokers, and information brokers. Local wags whisper that this is the unspoken reason why municipal rulers tolerate the noxious demihumans—they’re good people to know…and they know too much to move against.

The rumormongers are somewhat off the mark, however. The truth is in the name “canker”—many canker gnomes are actually cancer mages (Book of Vile Darkness). Their ability to cure disease—and more importantly, their ability to spread plague in their thirst for vengeance—is the real reason human rulers don’t summarily evict them.

Most canker gnomes roam the city in pairs, often directing simple carts or barrows with solid wheels taller than the gnomes themselves. Terriers, dire rats, and giant beetles occasionally serve as animal companions or mounts. Canker gnomes exhibit little of the usual gnomish fondness for contraptions and machinery. Instead they devote their ingenuity and alchemy to thwarting any otyughs, gibbering mothers, and shambling mounds their work may bring them into contact with.

Canker gnomes and wererats share similar territory. They also positively loathe one another, doing whatever is necessary to drive the other out of the middens and trash heaps they share. A canker gnome who contracts lycanthropy can expect the death sentence from his clan.