The gully dwarves' wagon wheel interrupted Halmarain as it came hurtling along the stream bank from the direction of the road. The wheel nearly ran her down. Umpth and Grod followed it.
"Pony come," Umpth said.
"I keep away with magic," Grod said. "Find good magic." He waved a dead squirrel at them. By the flatness of the upper body, the little animal lost its life to a wagon wheel, one attached to a fully loaded cart.
"Beglug!" Ripple said, leaping to her feet, the argument forgotten.
"Repack your pouches, I'll take him into the woods," Halmarain said, dashing away.
The kender stuffed their belongings back in their pouches and retied the fasteners. They gave Umpth the pack that held Beglug's extra clothing and were standing by the stream, watching when six dwarves came in sight and slowed their mounts. They pointed at the woods and the stream. Clearly they also wanted to escape the heat of the road.
Grod stood waving his dead squirrel about as if he were warding off bad luck. The two kender, delighted at the prospect of meeting new people, rushed to the eaves of the copse by the road.
"Hello!" Trap called out. "This is a great place. It's cooler under the trees and the water in the stream is cold. Come and join us."
The two kender stood smiling at the six dwarves, Nei-dar by the fashion of their armor and clothing. They rode tough little hill ponies.
"A kender," said one of the dwarves. "It could be the one with that outlaw band."
"Oh, we're not outlaws, we're just traveling with a wiz-"
"A wizzy-waddle bunch of ponies, a couple of Aghar and some Neidar," Ripple said quickly, covering her brother's slip of the tongue. "The others are gathering firewood."
"Firewood? In this heat?" the dwarf leader said suspiciously. "Are you sure you're not with that outlaw band?"
"We've heard there is a kender outlaw," Ripple said, but only one kender outlaw and as you see there are two of us."
"Outlaw, him dead," Grod said. "Make good tale, that."
Chapter 15
The six dwarves were adult males, but still young, Trap decided, since they had no gray in their beards. They carried heavy axes and crossbows. The ponies smelled water and strained at the reins. The dwarves muttered together and one dismounted, carrying his axe as he stepped into the shadows. His belt bristled with knives and two large bovine horns rose from his helmet. His headgear would serve as a deadly weapon if he butted an enemy with it.
Still half blinded by the sun, he nearly collided with Grod.
The gully dwarf apparently thought the new arrival was about to attack him and leaped away and shook his dead squirrel at the Neidar.
"Make you frog," Grod warned. The gully dwarf's dodge had taken him into an area where the shade was speckled with shafts of sunlight. He had removed his helmet because of the heat, and a shaft of light struck his blond head, making it glow. Another shaft illuminated the dead squirrel. With the rest of his body in deep shade, his head and the little carcass seemed to be floating in the air.
The dwarf glared at Grod for a moment and lowered his weapon. "It's an Aghar," he shouted back to his friends. The simple statement carried the implication that no self-respecting band of outlaws would have gully dwarves as members. The rest of the party rode into the shade of the trees and dismounted. The last three dwarves led ponies loaded with boxes and bundles.
"It's cooler here, but there's nothing to do," Trap said, following the dwarves to the stream. He reached for the reins of another pack pony, but the dwarf kept a tight hold on the leather lead. "I couldn't even find a bird's nest, so it will be nice to have someone to talk to. Is this your crossbow?" he asked, reaching for the weapon.
"Keep your thieving hands off that," the dwarf snarled.
Trap stood back, his smile faltering. "I wouldn't hurt it," he said. "I wouldn't take it. You're thinking of that other Trapspringer people keep talking about."
"Well if there's another, so be it, but this one-" the dwarf shook a finger in the kender's face, "-had better keep his hands in his pockets!"
The kender did his best to oblige. Since he had no pockets, he slid his hands into his pouches and fingered the items there. He had to admit some of them were probably more interesting than the possessions of the dwarves, though he would have enjoyed taking an inventory of their belongings.
Halmarain appeared, leading Beglug, who stared at the new arrivals. By his meek manner, the little wizard had put a calming spell on the little fiend to keep him out of trouble. He wore his second set of clothing, boots, beard, wig, and helmet. He gazed at the travelers with a mild interest before curling up at the base of a tree to sleep.
"Good journey to you and a warm dry hall at the end of your wandering," the little wizard said, speaking to the largest of the dwarves. Her greeting was an ancient Neidar tradition, one seldom heard since the Cataclysm.
"A good journey to you, my child," the dwarf replied, bowing. "Tolem Garthwar, at your service. With your permission we will share the shade of this wood and water our beasts."
Tolem's eyes searched the wood, taking in the six travelers. He had first looked toward Beglug, whose beard was streaked with gray. He appeared to be the elder, which should have made him the spokesman for the young female. Tolem ignored the kender and the gully dwarves as if they were unworthy of his time. Halmarain's small size and her delicate features gave her the appearance of a dwarf child, as did her voice. Even though she tried to make it sound deeper, it was still high and delicate, particularly for a dwarf. Tolem's expression demanded an explanation for why Beglug had ignored him.
Halmarain looked in the merchesti's direction and back at Tolem Garthwar. She raised one small finger to her temple and shook her head.
"An old wound," she said. "A blow from a goblin's club addled his brains. I fear my father's father will never be right again," she told him with a sigh. "If I can just get him to our people in the hills below Palanthus, they will help care for him. It's a hard journey, even with these friends to help."
Tolem nodded sympathetically.
"It is a serious matter for one so young to be traveling alone, my lady," he remarked. "We journey south for a time-on an errand of great importance, but…"
"Oh, I'm not alone," Halmarain hastily reminded him in an effort to forestall any offer of help. "The kender and the gully dwarves are loyal friends. They will see me to the end of my journey."
While Halmarain had been dressing the merchesti, the dwarves had watered their animals. They had removed the packs and saddles and tethered their mounts to graze along with the other ponies. Their chores finished, they gathered beneath the deep shade of a large tree and sat on the ground in a semicircle.
Halmarain took the two kender aside, well away from the dwarves. "You touch one thing belonging to those dwarves and you'll end you lives as a pair of rabbits."
Trap scowled. He had expected the dwarves to doze in the heat and had already planned a pleasant afternoon learning about the traveling gear of the strangers. The little wizard read his expression correctly. She took a deep breath and muttered a spell.
The kender found his arms close to his body, and he was unable to move more than the tips of his fingers.
"What did you do?" Ripple was looking down at her own hands, her arms similarly trapped.
"I used a binding spell," the little wizard said. "Do you want to stay that way for the rest of the day, or do you promise not to touch anything that belongs to the dwarves?"
The two kender promised, reluctantly, because when they gave their word they would be bound by it as long as they remembered it, and both knew the little wizard would keep their memories fresh. Halmarain released them but took care to see that Trap and Ripple stayed well away from the dwarves. They sat on the opposite side of the circle, too far for their exploring fingers to reach into packs or pockets.
The dwarves' original dislike of the kender evaporated when Halmarain and Ripple brought out a ham and some day old bread and offered it around. They
had brought the food from Deepdel. The dwarves supplied the drink: dwarf mead, strong and heady. When they had filled their stomachs one of them leaned forward, gazing at Grod.
"Did you say you had a tale about a dead outlaw?"
"Trap have tale," Grod answered.
Bored, and with nothing to explore, Trap let his mind wander into another tale of the kender outlaw. Still slightly tiffed at Halmarain's earlier accusations, he wove a red-robed wizard turned renegade into his story. His tale stretched out through the hot afternoon as he made sly digs at Halmarain and received angry glares in return.
Since she was sitting with her back to the tree where Beglug slept, she was not aware that he had awakened. He sat watching the dwarves as they passed earthen jugs around the circle. After several minutes he crept forward. He picked up one of the crocks that a dwarf and placed in the stream to cool and took it back to his tree.
Trap nearly lost the thread of his story as he watched the merchesti down the contents of the jug in one long gurgle. Then Beglug ate the jug.
The kender's story suddenly included a group of stone golems that made loud and crashing noises as he tried to cover the sound of Beglug's crunching. The little fiend was looking around for something else to snack on when Halmarain noticed him. She turned so the dwarves would not see her weaving a spell and in seconds Beglug curled up and went back to sleep.
The gully dwarves wandered around the area, so only Ripple, Halmarain, and the travelers heard how the imaginary Trapspringer met his fate in a ball of fire.
"A good tale, that," Tolem congratulated the kender. "The worst heat of the day has passed, so we'll be on our way."
As the dwarves rose and began to load their ponies, Halmarain and the kender discovered that Beglug was missing. The calming spell had worn away. They found him upstream, poking a stick into the hole of an unoffending mole.
"My calming spells don't seem to be strong enough," Halmarain said as they returned to the stream to saddle their own mounts. "I'll need to work on a stronger one."
By the time they returned, the dwarves had continued their journey. They had taken Halmarain's pony and had left a raw-boned, sickly looking animal in its place.
The little wizard glared at the dispirited animal and out toward the road. "I should have let you and Ripple steal them blind," she said.
"Stop saying that! We don't steal," Trap objected. "How many times do I have to say it? Just because people are careless with their belongings, or they reach for their own pouches and we happened to be next to them and they put their-"
"I don't want to hear it," Halmarain snapped.
Chapter 16
The afternoon cooled and Halmarain was impatient to continue their journey. Since the kender had totally explored the small copse they had no objections and quickly saddled their ponies. The old pony, left them by the dwarves, seemed relieved to be carrying a lighter load.
The gully dwarves still had not learned to control their own mounts, but they had a talent for making useful items out of any material at hand. Umpth had found a length of rope he insisted had been left behind by the dwarves. He fashioned it into a series of three loops and attached it to the left stirrup of Halmarain's saddle. With a practicality belied by their otherwise childish behavior, he had even tied a short length of rope to the bottom loop. The little wizard used the loops to climb into the saddle. When she mounted she could pull her makeshift ladder up behind her and keep it from snagging on weeds and bushes on the trail.
"I guess Aghar have their uses after all," she admitted after she tested her new method of mounting her pony.
Trap was ready to lead the way and Halmarain kept the leads of Beglug's mount and the pack animal tied to the back of her saddle. Ripple brought up the rear leading Grod's and Umpth's mounts. The Aghar's wagon wheel, again set in it's travois-like frame, rolled along behind Umpth.
The road that ran north between the village of Deepdel and the fortress of Ironrock curved to skirt the foothills. The stand of woods where they had taken shelter from the midday sun gave way to gentle brush-covered slopes that rose to meet the mountain range beyond.
Before they began their journey Trap, Ripple, and Halmarain sat their mounts in a row, taking another look at one of Trap's maps.
"You'd think with all the pains the cartographer took with that picture, he would have added some practical detail," the wizard said with a snort. "He didn't even show Deepdel or the road to Ironrock."
"Still, it's a beautiful map," Trap said, defending his ill-gotten possession. He carefully rolled it, tucked it back into a pouch, and was just urging his pony forward when Umpth gave a hoot.
"Dwarves come back," the gully dwarf announced.
Trap looked back over his shoulder to see the dwarves galloping up the road. The kender stood up in his saddle. He was about to wave when Halmarain reached over and slapped his hand down.
"What did you take from them?" she asked, her eyes blazing in anger.
"Nothing!" Trap retorted. "You know that! You put a spell on us until we promised we wouldn't."
"Not soon enough, apparently," she spat out the words as she looked back at the road. "They're riding like they're chasing someone or being chased, and there's no one behind them. Get us out of here before they find us." "Wizard fuss again," Umpth muttered.
"Not really fussing, she's just tired," Trap said, giving Halmarain the benefit of the doubt. "She'll apologize when she's in a better mood, but I know what you mean, she does get-"
"Enough of that," Halmarain practically growled. "Let's go."
"They've probably discovered they took the wrong pony and they're bringing it back," Ripple suggested.
"Tell another one," Halmarain said. She picked up her own reins, turned, and raced back into the small wood. Behind her, Beglug's mount and the pack animal followed on their leads.
"Trap tell one," Grod said as Ripple followed the wizard. "Him tell good tales."
The kender didn't answer the dwarves. Ripple's attention was on her route, not because of the ponies, but to protect the wagon wheel that bounced along behind Umpth. Since Halmarain had taken the lead, Trap rode beside his sister.
"I didn't get near their packs," he told Ripple with a sigh. "I would have enjoyed seeing what was in them, but I didn't get a chance."
"Neither did I," she replied. "They couldn't be after us. I wish she wouldn't be so suspicious." Ripple threw an angry look at the departing Halmarain.
"They probably want to return the pony," Trap said, agreeing with the suggestion Ripple had made earlier.
"They can't trade it for their animal if Halmarain keeps running away," Ripple said. "And if we don't hurry, we'll lose her."
Trap was forced to agree. The sun, still hot on their backs since Halmarain was leading them east into the hills, was dipping toward the horizon. In minutes the road was left behind and they were working their way between the foothills. Halmarain had been riding furiously, anxious to lose the dwarves. The kender galloped after her, keeping her in sight until she suddenly changed course, traveling south. "Hurry, she's gone behind that hill," Ripple said.
"She could wait for us," Trap complained. He had not seen the dwarves turn off into the copse. They might have been hurrying up the road for some reason that had nothing to do with the kender and their party. Tolem's group could have lost something on their way south and they could be returning to find it. As far as the kender knew, they had not left anything behind in the copse except a length of rope. The kender had been bored and they had been looking for any diversion. They would have noticed.
Trap fell back as Ripple followed the wizard. He was sure the dwarves were not after them. As his sister led the mounts of the gully dwarves around the base of the hill behind which Halmarain had disappeared, Trap decided to put the wizard's doubts to rest. He dismounted, tied his pony to some high brush to keep it out of the sight, then walked back up to the top of the nearest knoll.
He stood watching, fully expecting to see the
dwarves race by the woods and on up the road, but they had disappeared. In minutes he saw them again. They came out of the woods, traveling east. They moved more slowly, watching the ground as they followed the trail left by Trap and his companions.
One of the dwarves looked ahead, spotted the kender on the hillside, and shouted. The rest gave up their inspection of the trail and galloped toward Trap.
"Hello again," he called as they rode up. "I thought you were on the way to Deepdel. Did you come back to return our pony and get yours?"
"Thieving kender!" the leader shouted. "I'll have your head off your shoulders quick enough."
"But why? I don't know why you're so angry, because you were the one that left your pony. We didn't keep your animal on purpose and you took one of ours," Trap said, trying to be patient and understanding. He was getting tired of the accusations made against him, but he was willing to be reasonable.
"And we don't have any of your belongings. Here, I'll show you if you like," Trap said, opening the first of his pouches and reaching inside. He was not adverse to displaying his belongings. They were fun to look at and he would enjoy telling any tales that accompanied them. Perhaps he could even trade for something new and more interesting.
As he reached into the pouch, he felt an object he could not identify and pulled it out. He stood a moment gazing down on a gold ring he could not identify, until he remembered it had come from the wizard's chest beneath Orander's bed. He had intended to put it back, but in their hurry to leave he had forgotten it. To keep it from getting lost, he slipped it on his finger and held up his hand for the dwarves to see.
"This isn't yours, it belongs to a-" Just in time he remembered not to say wizard. "To a friend of mine," he said, taking a step forward, intending to show the dwarves the ring.
The step should have moved him forward approximately two feet. He heard the wind singing in his ears and he found himself standing fifty feet farther down the hillside. He gazed around him, wondering what had happened.
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