by Helen Gosney
“What’s wrong, lady? There’s nothing here to…” Rowan’s voice trailed off as he heard rustlings and twig snappings. A tiny dwarf girl, little more than a toddler, appeared a short way down the track in front of him.
Her little face lit up at the sight of him.
“Ro… Ro, I found a puppy!” she cried happily.
No! No, no, no, no! He thought in sudden dread. She couldn’t have…
“Look, Ro! Thalla found a puppy!”
She held out a tiny scrap of brindled brown and grey fur for him to see as the worral’s growl deepened. Rowan grabbed at its scruff with both hands, knowing it was madness but unable to really do much else. The worral could do dreadful damage to Rowan, but she could kill Thalla with a single crushing bite. If he couldn’t hold her he still had his hunting knife, but he hoped desperately that he wouldn’t have to use it. If he could manage to kill her he’d have to find and kill all of her newborn pups too. The worral became rigid under his hands but she didn’t try to bite him. Thank the Gods for that, he thought fervently, but what the hell do I do now? The creature hadn’t stopped her deep bloodcurdling growl, but Rowan knew if she hadn’t tried to attack immediately there was a chance that she might not attack at all. Perhaps not a very good chance, but still… She wouldn’t leave her pup though.
“Thalla, love… just put the puppy down please, sweetheart. Just put him down there very carefully and walk away from him…”
Thalla’s face fell.
“But, Ro… I found him, he was lost.”
“No, Thalla… his Ma just left him for a little while so she could have her supper. Do you see this big… er… doggy that’s here with me?” This very bloody strong doggy that could kill us both if we’re not extremely careful, he thought.
Thalla looked at the creature that Rowan was holding onto so firmly. To her it looked enormous. She nodded slowly, her eyes like saucers in her little face.
“Thalla, love… This is the puppy’s Ma. She… she doesn’t like you touching her baby. That’s why she’s growling like that. Now, don’t squash him and don’t drop him whatever you do,” Rowan said as calmly as he could, “Thalla, please listen to me really hard. ‘Tis very, very important. You must put the puppy down very, very carefully and then I want you to walk over to that big rock there for me… aye, that really big one over there. But you mustn’t run, Thalla, just walk, and then I want you to climb up onto the rock... Do you think you can do all that, love?” He was relieved when Thalla nodded at him again. “Good lass. Just get up as high as you can on the rock and wait up there while the doggy gets her baby. Put him down now, sweetheart, very gently, good lass, now walk over to the rock and get up as high as you can. I’ve got the doggy, you don’t need to run,” but he could feel his hands starting to cramp against the worral’s relentless forward pressure, “Just walk, love. That’s the way, good lass. Now, up you go, as high as you can. See if you can get up higher than my head, Thalla.”
Thalla carefully did as Rowan said. The worral’s growl rose to a horrible shriek and the little lass scuttled up the rock as if she’d had a fire lit underneath her.
“Ro…” she said, her bottom lip quivering and her eyes filled with tears, “Ro, I don’t like that doggy. It’s a bad doggy.”
“No, Thalla love. She’s just worried about her baby, that’s all. She didn’t know you wouldn’t hurt him. She didn’t mean to frighten you.” Like hell she didn’t, he thought. He could feel the incredible strength of the worral as she strained harder against his hold and he knew he couldn’t hold her for much longer. He was surprised she hadn’t already savaged his hands or his legs, and he wouldn’t have blamed her if she had. “Don’t come down until I tell you, sweetheart, just stay up there. ‘Tis all right, it won’t be long now.”
Thalla nodded doubtfully, but she knew Ro wouldn’t lie to her.
“Now, my lady worral… please, please don’t bite Thalla or me,” Rowan whispered as he let the creature go and slipped his hunting knife into his less cramped left hand.
The worral shot forward, desperate now for her tiny pup. It was very young, its eyes not properly opened yet. She sniffed at it carefully and licked it very thoroughly indeed, all the while looking at Rowan in a reproachful sort of way.
He kept talking softly, hoping to calm Thalla and the worral and himself down a bit more.
“’Tis all right, lady,” he said, “Your baby’s all right, and look what a fine pup he is too. But little Thalla’s only a baby as well, she didn’t know she was doing wrong…” he looked up at the poor little lass perched on top of her rock, hoping it’d be high enough if the worral decided to attack after all.
“It’s all right, Thalla… you’re a very brave lass. Just stay up there and the doggy’ll take her baby and go in a minute. Then we’ll go home.” Bloody Hells, I hope we will, he thought.
The worral brought her pup over to Rowan and rubbed herself against his knees a couple of times in her strange catlike way. She put the pup down carefully and turned and shrieked again at Thalla; then she gently picked up her pup in her terrible jaws and disappeared into the undergrowth.
Rowan heard a rustle behind him and spun around, hunting knife at the ready.
A dwarf emerged from the bushes, his hands slowly releasing the tension in his drawn bow.
“Crann! You’ve just frightened me out of six month’s growth!” Rowan said.
“You’ve just done the same to me, Rowan. I came back to hurry you along a bit… and I could hear your voice but I couldn’t quite make out the words, and I thought what’s this daft bugger doing standing in the middle of the forest talking to himself when it’s getting on for suppertime? And… and then I saw the worral,” Crann said slowly, still shocked at what he’d just witnessed, “Anyway, I could see you were all right, but then I saw you grab her and I heard her scream. I truly thought you’d gone completely daft, but I couldn’t get a clear shot at her…” he swallowed hard, “And then I saw Thalla scrambling up onto the top of that bloody big rock. Where the hell did she come from? And what the hell is she doing out here? With a bloody worral?”
Rowan shook his head as he plucked the little lass from her rock. She snuggled into his arms and scrubbed at her wet cheeks with a grimy little hand as he kissed the top of her head.
“’Tis all right, sweetheart, I’ve got you, and the doggy’s gone now…” he said softly. He looked at Crann again.
“I don’t know what she’s doing here, Crann, apart from finding worral pups and terrifying me, but she’s all right. Just a bad fright, is all, poor brave little lass. But I’m glad you didn’t kill the worral… the poor creature was only worried for her baby, like we were worried for Thalla.”
“Aye, ‘tis true,” said the pragmatic dwarf, “The little lass didn’t know the danger, but she surely will now.
“The worral will move her pups now, she won’t be a danger to anyone,” Rowan said as they headed for home.
Little Thalla snuggled a bit more closely against him and said shakily, “Was that Rasa, Ro?”
“’Twas a worral, sweetheart. She was extra fierce just now because she thought you were going to take her baby away, but they’re always very fierce anyway. You mustn’t ever go near them, Thalla love.” Rowan held her close as she huddled against him and turned to Crann as a thought struck him.
“What the hell’s a ‘Rasa’, Crann?” he asked. His Dwar was pretty good, but he’d never heard that particular word.
The dwarf laughed.
“A bogey to frighten the little ones! ‘Tis said that Rasa the direwolf guards the Gods. Or, er, the way to the Gods, or something like that,” Crann laughed again, “’Tis said to be bigger and fiercer than any wolf you’ve ever seen, but she’d be a poor bloody toothless old thing by now, I’d have thought. The tale’s been around since Beldar was a boy.”
“Has it?” Rowan was intrigued. “I’ve not heard of it before…”
“Well, you’ve been safely tucked away in the trees, h
aven’t you? And I doubt the Guard go around telling you scary bedtime stories.”
“No, not exactly. But there were a couple of g’Farrien families at home, and we all played together when we were growing up, and told each other scary stories. Damned good at wrestling, they were…”
“Ha! All dwarves are good at wrestling! Got the build for it,” Crann smiled at the young man who nobody’d quite believed could really be the new Champion until they’d seen him dancing with his sabre. He was very, very good with a bow too, as he’d proved on many hunts and he’d quietly won every knife-throwing contest the dwarves had had since he’d been staying with them. “But, well, I’m sorry to say it, but the g’Farrien aren’t generally the brightest lamps in the mine, if you know what I mean.”
Rowan managed to keep a straight face. Every dwarf he’d ever met was disparaging about his kinsmen of other clans, but they generally didn’t take it well if anyone else was.
“They’d probably say the same about the g’Hakken. Of course they’d be mistaken, I know.”
“Ha! Cheeky bugger! Well, ‘tis rude to say it of them, I suppose, but ‘tis true all the same.”
They walked a bit further before Rowan spoke again.
“But what about this… this direwolf, Crann? Rasa, you said?” he wanted to know. Any creature he hadn’t seen or heard of always interested him.
“Aye, Rasa. She guards the Gods, they say, though why the hell they’d need to be guarded I don’t know. Surely they can look after themselves with the thunderbolts and smiting and such,” Crann shrugged. “’Tis only an old wives’ tale, laddie, told to keep the youngsters in line.”
“Wouldn’t have worked with Glyn and Rose and me,” Rowan grinned happily, “We’d have been off looking for her, just to see what she was like.”
“Daft buggers. You’d have to go and find the Gods to do that.”
“Mmm, I suppose so. Well, I’m not planning on doing that any time soon, not even to see if Rasa’s had some baby direwolves by now,” Rowan said, his face serious for a moment, “We foresters work on the theory that the Gods should leave us alone to get on with our own business, and we’ll leave them alone to get on with theirs.”
Crann laughed again.
“A good theory, laddie,” he said, “We g’Hakken think much the same.”
And again Rowan headed off for something to eat and gave the conversation no more thought until circumstances reminded him of it many years later.
**********
“Toren’s coming over to have a look at you today, Rowan,” Finn said cheerily as they finished breakfast.
“Toren? Who’s Toren? Another Smith?”
Finn laughed.
“No, lad. Toren’s the clan tattooist, among other things. He’s been off selling some ponies, but he’s back now and he’ll do your Champions’ Tattoo for you.”
“I’d forgotten about that, with one thing and another,” Rowan admitted, “But isn’t it supposed to be on the left side of my chest?”
“Aye, it is.” Finn considered it. “Over your heart, about where your clan tattoo is.”
Rowan frowned for a moment, then he grinned at Finn.
“He’ll just have to put it somewhere else then, Finn. What do you think about the other side of my chest? Or on my back somewhere?”
Finn shrugged.
“Why not? If the Trophy organisers don’t like it, that’s their problem.”
“Aye, that’s what I think too,” Rowan laughed, “’Tis my body after all, not theirs.”
Toren agreed when he came and joined them a little while later.
“I suppose the new one had better go on the front, but … they shouldn’t be squashed up together, ‘twould spoil them both… hmm…” the dwarf frowned thoughtfully as he looked at Rowan’s strong lean torso, “Aye, the other side, I think, about… here.”
“Have you ever seen the Champions’ Tattoo, Rowan?” Finn asked him.
Rowan nodded.
“Aye, I saw Captain Johan’s, at the competition…”
It had been a stunningly simple but magnificent thing, a single sabre, unmistakeably g’Hakken, surrounded by a wreath of oak leaves tattooed over Johan’s heart. There’d been something about it though…
“But why was the sabre angled like that? It seemed… strange…” Rowan said slowly.
Both dwarves laughed.
“’Tis like that so a second sabre can be added later, when the Champion wins it a second time.” Finn grinned at him.
“But nobody’s ever won it a second time,” Rowan said, puzzled.
“No, they haven’t! Seems ‘tis much harder to do than the original organisers thought,” Toren laughed again, “Still, we live in hope, lad. We live in hope.”
He examined Rowan’s clan tattoo more closely.
“‘Tis a fine tattoo, lad, as good as I could do myself. A Forest Giant, you say?” at Rowan’s nod, Toren laughed. “You’re a damned forest giant yourself, lad! Er… no offence meant to you or your kin, mind.”
Rowan smiled at Toren. The dwarf was just under four and a half feet tall and he himself stood at over six feet.
“None taken, Toren,” he grinned, “But I have to tell you that most of my kin are a good five or six inches taller than me. I might grow another inch or so, but I take after my mother’s northern kin and we’re all considered to be, um… well, not tall.”
“Good Gods!” was all Toren could say for a moment. Rowan was the first Siannen he’d actually met, and he certainly wasn’t ‘not tall’.
“’Tis true, Toren. I met them after Rowan won the Trophy. They truly are big tall buggers like damned trees themselves,” Finn said with a laugh, “Mind you, Rowan, I’m starting to think that young Owen might have the right of it…”
Rowan raised an eyebrow at him.
“What do you mean?” he said.
“Well, he thinks that you foresters must just be a taller race of dwarves…” Finn grinned at Rowan’s look of astonishment.
“Good Gods, Finn, what the hell have you been drinking?” Rowan managed.
“Just water so far today, lad, as you well know,” Finn said virtuously, “But just look at how well you’ve fitted in here, lad…Most men, well… let’s say they find it difficult. Johan did his best, but he’s a city lad, and the other Champions over the years…” Finn shook his head.
“That only proves they didn’t have any damned manners, and didn’t make much of an effort either,” Rowan said, still mystified.
“Bear with me, lad,” Finn continued with his theory, “Now, I’ve met your kin, and they’re just like you are, even if most are bloody tall big buggers. They say what they mean and mean what they say, just like us dwarfs; they don’t suffer fools gladly or any other way, which is just how it should be; a lot of Siannen words aren’t all that different to Dwar, and the same with the runes; you braid your hair and we braid our beards…” he looked at the splendid Forest Giant tattooed over Rowan’s heart, “And we both bear clan tattoos and damned good ones at that; we’re all bloody good with an axe, and…er…”
“We’re all handsome, brave and charming,” Rowan laughed, “Modest, too.”
“Aye, that too,” Finn chuckled.
“Well, Finn, I’d be truly honoured to be a dwarf, but I think I’ve missed out,” Rowan said, shaking his head.
The two dwarfs looked at each other and smiled.
“Ah, well, maybe not,” Finn said, “We’ve all been talking about this and, well… to put it bluntly, we’d like you to be g’Hakken, Rowan. If you agree, Toren can put the clan mark on your back and when you can finally grow a decent beard you can braid it, like this…” he stroked his own magnificent beard proudly.
Rowan was stunned and said so.
“I’m… I’m honoured, Finn. More than honoured. I don’t know what to say…”
“Just say aye or nay, lad. ‘Tis simple.”
“Aye, Finn. Aye. Thank you, I’m… I might have trouble with the beard though. The
Guard frowns on beards.”
Finn and Toren were shocked to the core.
“No!” they said together.
“Bloody barbarians!” Finn added. “Sorry, no offence meant to you or your kin, Rowan.”
Rowan smiled at both dwarfs.
“None taken, Finn. I’m the only one of my kin in the Guard. But beards aren’t completely banned, just frowned on and complained about… a bit like my braid, really.” He knew the Guard simply wouldn’t allow a magnificent, waistlength beard like Finn and Toren had, but a short one was permissible so long as it wasn’t permanent. He thought about it for a while. “I think I might test their patience too much with both a beard and a braid, but I could grow a beard every so often, if that’d be all right. Braiding it might be another matter though. Maybe I could just put in a single narrow braid, like these…” he indicated the two narrow braids woven close to his head at the temples, “What would that signify?”
Both dwarfs looked pleased at Rowan’s efforts to find a solution to the problem. Obviously, if the Guard were so inflexible, there’d have to be compromises. Certainly Rowan couldn’t be expected to cut his braid, he was a forester first after all; he’d trim his hair, but never cut it short.
“It means that you’re a young lad, new to the beard and the tattoo, Rowan,” Toren said, “’Twould be perfect. ‘Tis a good solution.”
“Thank you, Toren, thank you Finn. And my thanks to all of the clan,” Rowan said slowly, “I’m… I’m overwhelmed, truly.” And he was. He knew what a very rare thing this was, particularly with the g’Hakken.
“And not only that, Rowan lad, but you’re now the tallest dwarf in the world,” Finn laughed, pleased that his idea had been so well received. The rest of the clan had been surprised, but enthusiastic when he’d suggested it to them. They were happy to have Rowan living in their village as one of them and they’d be happier still to have him as a member of their clan. In their eyes, he had the heart and spirit of the dwarves within him.