Kender, Gully Dwarves And Gnomes t1-2 Read online

  Tanin, Palin, Sturm, and the dwarf were ferried across the water from the MIRACLE by a party of gnomes in a dinghy. Bringing along the dinghy had been the dwarf's idea, and the gnomes were enchanted with something so practical and simple. The gnomes had themselves designed a lifeboat to be attached to Miracle. Roughly the same weight and dimensions as the ship, the lifeboat had been left behind, to be studied by a committee.

  As the boat drew nearer shore, surging forward with the waves and the incoming tide, the brothers could see the welcoming party. The rising sun glinted off spears and shields carried by a crowd of men who were awaiting their arrival on the beach. Tall and muscular, the men wore little clothing in the balmy clime of the island. Their skin was a rich, glistening brown, their bodies adorned with bright beads and feathers, their faces were stem and resolute. The shields they carried were made of wood and painted with garish designs, the spears were handmade as well — wooden with stone tips.

  "Honed nice and sharp, you can believe me," said Sturm gloomily. "They'll go through flesh like a knife through butter."

  "We're outnumbered at least twenty to one," Tanin pointed out to Dougan, who was sitting in the prow of the boat, fingering a battle-ax that was nearly the size of the dwarf.

  "Bah! Primitives!" said Dougan contemptuously, though Palin noted the dwarf's face was a bit pale. "First sight of steel, they'll bow down and worship us as gods."

  The «gods'» arrival on the beach was something less than majestic. Tanin and Sturm did look quite magnificent in their bright steel armor of elven make and design — a gift from Porthios and Alhana of the United Elven Kingdoms. Their breastplates glittered in the morning sun, their helms gleamed brightly. Climbing out of the boat, they sank to their shins in the sand and, within minutes, were both firmly mired.

  Dougan, dressed in his suit of red velvet, demanded that the gnomes take him clear into shore so he would not ruinhis clothes. The dwarf had added to his costume a wide brimmed hat decorated with a white plume that fluttered in the ocean breeze, and he was truly a wonderful sight, standing proudly in the prow of the boat with his axe at his side, glaring sternly at the warriors drawn up in battle formation on the beach. The gnomes obeyed his injunction to the letter, running the boat aground on the beach with such force that Dougan tumbled out head first, narrowly missing slicing himself in two with his great battle-ax.

  Palin had often imagined his first battle — fighting at the side of his brothers, combining steel and magic. He had spent the journey into shore committing the few spells he knew to memory. As he drew toward shore, his pulse raced with what he told himself was excitement, not fear. He was prepared for almost any eventuality… with the exception of helping a cursing, sputtering, irate dwarf to his feet; trying to dislodge his brothers from the sand; and facing an army of silent, grim, half-naked men.

  "Why don't they attack us?" Sturm muttered, floundering about in the water, trying to keep his balance. "They could cut us to ribbons!"

  "Maybe they have a law prohibiting them from harming idiots!" snapped Tanin irritably.

  Dougan had managed, with Palin's help, to stagger to his feet. Shaking his fist, he sent the gnomes on their way back to the ship with a parting curse, then turned and, with as much dignity as he could bluster, stomped across the beach toward the warriors. Tanin and Sturm followed more slowly, hands on the hilts of their swords. Palin came after his brothers more slowly still, his white robes wet and bedraggled, the hem caked with sand.

  The warriors waited for them in silence, unmoving, their faces expressionless as they watched the strangers approach. But Palin noticed, as he drew near, that occasionally one of the men would glance uneasily back into the nearby jungle. Observing this happening more than once, Palin turned his attention to the trees. After watching and listening intently for a moment, he drew nearer Tanin.

  "There's something in the jungle," he said in an undertone.

  "I wouldn't doubt it," Tanin growled. "Probably another fifty or so warriors."

  "I don't know," Palin said thoughtfully, shaking his head. "The warriors appear to be nervous about it, maybe even — »

  "Shush!" Tanin ordered sharply. "This is no time to talk, Palin! Now keep behind Sturm and me, like you're supposed to!"

  "But — " Palin began.

  Tanin flashed him a look of anger, meant to remind the young man who was in charge. With a sigh, Palin took up his position behind his brothers. But his eyes went to the jungle, and he again noticed that more than one of the warriors allowed his gaze as well to stray in that direction.

  "Hail!" cried Dougan, stumping through the sand to stand in front of a warrior who, by standing out slightly in front of his fellows, appeared to be the chief. "Us gods!" proclaimed the dwarf, thumping himself on the chest. "Come from Land of Rising Sun to Give Greeting to our Subjects on Isle of Gargath."

  "You're a dwarf," said the warrior glumly, speaking excellent Common. "You've come from Ansalon and you're probably after the Graygem."

  "Well… uh… now…" Dougan appeared flustered. "That's… uh… a good guess, lad. We are, as it happens, mildly interested in… uh… the Gray-gem. If you'd be so good as to tell us where we might find it — »

  "You can't have it," said the warrior, his voice still depressed sounding. He raised his spear. "We're here to stop you."

  The warriors behind him nodded unenthusiastically, fumbling with their spears and clumsily falling into some sort of ragged battle formation. Again, Palin noticed many of them looking into the jungle with that same nervous, preoccupied expression.

  "Well, we're going to take it!" Tanin shouted fiercely, apparently trying to drum up some enthusiasm for the battle. "You'll have to fight us to stop us."

  "I guess we will," mumbled the chief, hefting his spear in half-hearted fashion.

  Somewhat confused, Tanin and Sturm nevertheless drew their swords, as Dougan, his face grim, lifted his axe. The words to a spell chant were on Palin's lips, the Staff of Magius seemed to tremble with eagerness in his hand. But Palin hesitated. From all he'd heard, battles weren't supposed to be like this! Where was the hot blood? the ferocious hatred? the bitter determination to die where one stood rather than give an inch of ground?

  The warriors shuffled forward, prodding each other along. Tanin closed on them, his sword flashing in the sun, Sturm at his back. Suddenly, a cry came from the jungle. There was movement and a rustling sound, more cries, and then a yelp of pain. A small figure dashed out of the trees, running headlong across the sand.

  "Wait!" Palin yelled, running forward to stop his brothers. "It's a child!"

  The warriors turned at the sound. "Damn!" muttered the chief, tossing his shield and spear into the sand in disgust. The child — a little girl of about five — ran to the warrior and threw her arms around his legs. At that moment, another child, older than the first, came running out of the woods in pursuit.

  "I thought I told you to keep her with you!" the chief said to older child, a boy, who came dashing up.

  "She bit me!" said the boy accusingly, exhibiting bloody marks on his arm.

  "You're not going to hurt my daddy, are you?" the little girl asked Tanin, glaring at him with dark eyes.

  "N-no," stuttered Tanin, taken aback. He lowered his sword. "We're just" — he shrugged, flushing scarlet — "talking. You know, man-talk."

  "Bless my beard!" exclaimed the dwarf in awe. More children were running from the jungle — children of all ages from toddlers who could barely make their way across the sand to older boys and girls of about ten or eleven. The air was filled with their shrill voices.

  "I'm bored. Can we go home?"

  "Lemme hold the spear!"

  "No, it's my turn! Dad told me — »

  "Apu said a bad word!"

  "Did not!"

  "Did so!"

  "Look, Daddy! That short, fat man with the hair on his face! Isn't he ugly?"

  Glancing at the strangers in deep embarrassment, the warriors turned from their battle f
ormation to argue with their children.

  "Listen, Blossom, Daddy's just going to be a little longer. You go back and play — »

  "Apu, take your brothers back with you and DON'T let me hear you using language like that or I'll — »

  "No, dear, Daddy needs the spear right now. You can carry it on the way home — »

  "Halt!" roared the dwarf. Dougan's thunderous shout cut through the confusion, silencing warrior and child alike.

  "Look," said Tanin, sheathing his sword, his own face flushed with embarrassment, "we don't want to fight you, especially in front of your kids…"

  "I know," the chief said, chagrined. "It's always like that. We haven't had a good battle in two years! Have you ever" — he gave Tanin a pained look — "tried to fight with a toddler underfoot?"

  Profoundly perplexed, Tanin shook his head.

  "Takes all the fun out of it," added another warrior as one child swarmed up his back and another bashed him in the shins with his shield.

  "Leave them at home with their mothers, then, where they belong," said Dougan gruffly.

  The warriors' expression grew grimmer still. At the mention of their mothers, several of the children began to cry. The whole group began to turn away from the beach.

  "We can't," muttered a warrior.

  "Why not?" demanded Dougan.

  "Because their mothers are gone!"

  "It all started two years ago," said the chief, walking with Dougan and the brothers back to the village. "Lord Gargath sent a messenger to our village, demanding ten maidens be paid him in tribute or he'd unleash the power of the Graygem." The warrior's eyes went to the volcano in the distance, its jagged top barely visible amid the shifting gray clouds that surrounded it. Forked lightning streaked from the cloud, thunder rumbled. The chief shivered and shook his head. "What could we do? We paid him his tribute. But it didn't stop there. The next month, here came the messenger again. Ten more maidens, and more the month following. Soon, we ran out of maidens, and then the Lord demanded our wives. Then he sent for our mothers! Now" — the chief sighed — "there isn't a woman left in the village!"

  "All of them!" Sturm gaped. "He's taken all of them!"

  The chief nodded in despair, the child in his arms wailed in grief. "And not only us. It happened to every tribe on the island. We used to be a fierce, proud people," the chief added, his dark eyes flashing. "Our tribes were constantly at war. To win honor and glory in battle was what we lived for, to die fighting was the noblest death a man could find! Now, we lead lives of drudgery — »

  "Our hands in dishwater instead of blood," said another. "Mending clothes instead of cracking skulls."

  "To say nothing of what else we're missing, without the women," added a third with a meaningful look.

  "Well, why don't you go get them back!" Tanin demanded.

  The warriors, to a man, looked at him with undisguised horror, many glancing over their shoulders at the smoking volcano, expressions of terror on their faces, as if fearing they might be overheard.

  "Attack the powerful Lord Gargath?" asked the chief in what was practically a whisper. "Face the wrath of the Graygem's master? No!" He shuddered, holding his child close. "At least now our children have one parent."

  "But if all the tribes fought together," Sturm argued, "that would be, how many men? Hundreds? Thousands?"

  "If there were millions, we would not go up against the Master of the Graygem," said the chief.

  "Well, then," said Dougan sharply, "why did you try to stop us back there on the beach? Seems to me you would be only too glad to rid yourselves of the thing!"

  "Lord Gargath ordered us to fight any who tried to take it," said the chief simply.

  Reaching their village — a scattering of thatched huts that had seen better days — the warriors dispersed, some taking children to bed, others hurrying to look into steaming pots, still others heading for a stream with baskets loaded with clothes.

  "Dougan," said Tanin, watching all this in astonishment almost too great for words, "this doesn't make any sense! What's going on?"

  "The power of the Graygem, lad," said the dwarf solemnly. "They're deep under its spell and can no longer see anything rationally. I'll lay ten to one that it's the Graygem keeping them from attacking Lord Gargath. But us, now" — the dwarf looked at the brothers cunningly — "we're not under its spell — »

  "Not yet," mentioned Palin.

  " — and therefore we stand a chance of defeating him! After all, how powerful can he be?"

  "Oh, he could have an army of a couple thousand men or so," said Sturm.

  "No, no," said Dougan hastily. "If he did, he would have just sent the army to attack the villages, kill the men, and carry off the women. Lord Gargath is using the power of the Graygem because that's all he's got! We must act quickly, though, lads, because its power will grow on us the longer we stay near its influence."

  Tanin frowned, considering. "How do we get the Graygem, then?" he asked abruptly. "And what do we do with it after we've got it? It seems to me, we'll be in worse danger than ever!"

  "Ah, leave that to me!" said Dougan, rubbing his hands. "Just help me to get it, lads."

  Tanin kept on frowning.

  "And think of the women — poor things," the dwarf continued sadly, "held in thrall by this wicked lord, forced to submit to his evil will. They'll undoubtedly be grateful to the brave men who rescue them…"

  "He's right," said Sturm in sudden resolve. "It is our duty, Tanin, as future Knights of Solamnia, to rescue the women."

  "What do you say, Little Brother?" asked Tanin.

  "It is my duty as a mage of the White Robes to help these people," Palin said, feeling extremely self-righteous. "ALL these people," he added.

  "Plus it's a matter of honor, lad," Dougan said solemnly. "You DID lose the bet. And it will be a few days before the gnomes have the ship repaired…"

  "And the women will probably be VERY grateful!" struck in Sturm.

  "All right, we'll go!" said Tanin. "Though I'd rather face a dragon than fight the power of some sort of weird rock — »

  "Ha, ha, dragon!" repeated the dwarf, with a sickly grin that Tanin was too preoccupied to notice.

  The brothers and the dwarf walked up to the chief, who was hanging laundry out to dry and keeping an anxious eye on the stew pot to see that it didn't boil over.

  "Listen to me, men!" Tanin called loudly, motioning the warriors of the village to gather around him. "My brothers and the dwarf and I are going to go to the castle of this Lord Gargath to take the Graygem. Would any of you like to come along?"

  Glancing at each other, the warriors shook their heads.

  "Well, then," Tanin continued in exasperation, "will any of you go with us as our guide? You can come back when we reach the castle."

  Again, the warriors shook their heads.

  "Then we'll go alone!" Tanin said fiercely. "And we will return with the Graygem or leave our lives in that castle!"

  Spinning on his heel, the big man stalked out of the camp, his brothers and the dwarf marching behind. As they left, however, they encountered dark looks from the warriors and heard muttered comments. More than a few shook their fists at them.

  "They certainly don't look pleased," Tanin muttered. "Especially since we're the ones facing all the danger. What is it they're saying?"

  "I think it's just occurred to them that the women will probably be very grateful," Dougan answered in a low voice.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  A Matter of Honor

  Sturm later maintained that Tanin should have realized what was going on and kept the dwarf out of the game that night. Tanin retorted that Sturm should stay out of it since he slept through the whole thing. But Palin reminded them both that they were all under the influence of the Graygem at the time, so it probably wouldn't have made any difference anyway.

  They had walked all day, moving easily through the thick jungle, following a trail that had obviously been there for years. The major pro
blem was the heat, which was intense. Sturm and Tanin soon took off their armor and packed it away and finally convinced Palin to strip off his white robes, though he protested long against wandering the wilderness clad only in his undergarments.

  "Look," said Tanin, finally, after Palin was on the verge of collapse, his robes dripping with sweat, "there aren't any women around, that much we know. Hang your spell bags around your waist. We can always get dressed again before we reach the next village." Palin reluctantly agreed and, other than taking some ribbing from Sturm about his skinny legs, was thankful he did so. The jungle grew steamier as the sun rose higher. Intermittent rain showers cooled the brothers and the dwarf occasionally, but in the end served only to increase the humidity.

  Dougan, however, steadfastly refused to shed so much as his broad-brimmed hat, maintaining that the heat was nothing to a dwarf and ridiculing the humans for their weakness. This he did with perspiration streaming down his face until it dripped off the ends of his moustaches. He marched along with a defiant air, as if daring one of them to say something, and often grumbled that they were slowing him down. Yet Palin saw Dougan more than once, when he thought no one was looking, slump down on a rock, fan himself with his hat, and mop his face with his beard.

  By the time they arrived at the next village, which was about a day's walk through the jungle, all of them — even the dwarf — were so limp and tired that they barely had the strength to put their clothes and their armor back on in order to make an impressive show. Word of their coming must have traveled in some mysterious way (Palin thought he knew, then, the reason for the strange drum beats they'd been hearing), for they were met by the men of the village and the children. The men regarded them coldly (though more than a few eyes flashed at the sight of the elven armor), gave them food and drink, and indicated a hut where they could spend the night. Tanin made a stirring speech about storming Gargath Castle and asked for volunteers.

  The only response was dark looks, shuffling feet, and a muttered comment, "I can't, I got a chicken stewing…"