D & D - Tale of the Comet Page 5

Khramil shrugged. "Again, I accuse no one. But will any of them uphold the claim of dwarves against humans, save that the dwarven claim is forged of the best iron, and bound with shackles of sword-fit steel?"

  This was an ornate way of saying that dwarves had been robbed blind before and would be again, unless Chakfor and Ithun gave the Stonebreakers a firm claim to all the metal ore deposits down to the shores of Paradise Lake.

  They had slept, the night of the disturbance, in a valley close enough that they should have heard the uproar. But through one of those tricks of the landscape that channel sound unexpectedly, they heard nothing, and slept until their normal rising time.

  The spectacle now spread before them as dawn turned to day was both more mysterious, and less welcome, than an outcropping of tin or copper. They walked down to the overturned wagon, and around it, searching for bodies, and finding none.

  At last, Chakfor concluded, "Something must've scared them into running off, or else made away with them so as to leave not a body behind."

  "Not quite," Ithun said, pointing uphill. They had passed, unseeing, by the dead bandit.

  Chakfor knelt by the body. "Easy to see what killed him. What, or who, knocked him over, it didn't leave a mark."

  "Could have been an accident," Ithun said.

  "Maybe," Chakfor said, half to himself. He had just noticed odd glints on the ground, and in the bark of the nearest tree. Then he saw the fallen sword hilt, and several larger pieces of the blade.

  By the time Chakfor had gathered every bit of metal he could find, the sun was beginning to burn off the mist, and Ithun swore he heard horses on the road. As Ithun's woods-wise ears made it likely he told the truth, Chakfor was willing to snatch up his booty and follow his clansman to a likely hiding place.

  The sword he had found was made of cheap steel that had been at one and the same time heated, and shattered. It was the last that had Chakfor musing aloud.

  "Now, I can see having this come about, if you heated the sword in a forge, then struck it with a dwarf-forged axe. More likely, three or four together. But where's the forge? Where's the footprints of the smiths with the axes?"

  Ithun had been studying the hilt, and now raised his head with a sour look. "There's charred flesh—human flesh—on that hilt. Someone was holding it when it was destroyed."

  "Somebody's about with an ugly temper, and an uglier weapon," Chakfor said.

  "What about magic?"

  "A fire spell? Never seen or heard of one that could do that."

  "Or perhaps—?" Ithun pointed at the sky.

  "Still a guess, but one thing's for certain: we're homeward bound, as of now. When the sky starts to fall, and swords are ripped to bits, the best place for a dwarf's at home ... in a deep, snug cave."

  Hellandros, from his perch on a boulder with his back set against a rock wall, had a good view of the town of Aston Point, the trail to the temple, and the Fire to Come. Indeed, the fire was bright enough to have let him read a spellbook written in the most minuscule script of Archaic Dewabian. It let him see too much for his peace of mind.

  The town's streets boiled with people. Some walked as if they were about their ordinary business, others hurried, without seeming to know where they were going, or why, and still others stood gaping at the sky. From the thud of drums, blare of horns, and raucous singing, a good many more folk were inside, reveling as though this was their last night alive. Hellandros wondered if these folk might have the right of it.

  Never a soldier himself, he had listened to the retired sell-swords in his village. His school of wizardry also had an extensive

  collection of military works through which a scholarly apprentice could browse in the five minutes a day he was allowed to amuse himself. He clearly remembered a one-eyed sellsword's words to a boy heating spiced wine for him:

  "When I saw that stone just grow and grow, never movin' side to side, 1 knew it was for hittin' right where I stood. So I threw m'self down, and it went over me, but broke up, and a piece took my eye. Better'n bein' squashed like a bug, tho."

  The comet that was the Fire to Come reminded Hellandros of the stone in the tale. It now showed almost a round disc, not as large as either moon but growing from hour to hour. It was still a disc of swirling flame, in more colors than should exist on a lawful plane, surrounded by trails of less eye-searing light. The tail now showed mostly tame yellows and blues, with the odd streak of crimson.

  It was as if a piece of primordial chaos was hurtling toward them, for some purpose known only to the gods, if even to them.

  Hellandros wondered if any of the most potent wizards had attempted to send their spells toward the dome of the sky, to discover the nature of the Fire to Come. He doubted that they would have succeeded, and hoped that they had not drawn upon themselves the wrath of those who had sent the comet.

  Meanwhile, he, Hellandros, Son of the Grove, would draw upon himself the wrath of his companions if he did not pick up his staff and put his feet on the trail again. M'lenda had now been missing long enough to have left the town. She might, like many others, have gone to the meeting called at the temple for tonight, to be addressed—so rumor held—by Aston Tanak himself. Wherever she had gone, she had not left any word of her intentions. The new friends from Fairy Rose began to worry about her immediately, though none of them understood precisely why. The same comet-madness, Hellandros was beginning to think, that made M'lenda wander off in the first place.

  Still, the feeling that something unkind had befallen the girl was difficult to shake.

  Even if M'lenda had not left early for the meeting, the temple was a likely place to find Asrienda. This other half-elven girl, who lived at the Fox and Feather, was on good terms with Drenin Longstaff, and could guide a blind cripple to the druid's grove if one were to ask her.

  Hellandros had left suitably cryptic messages for his companions, and put his feet on the temple trail. Halfway along, winded and aching from the slope, he had to rest. He found a place where he could sit with his back to hard rock, and laid his staff across his knees. He had seen too many folk about who looked the sort to slit a purse, or even a throat.

  The sight of the comet blazing in the sky at last made him afraid. Or, rather, it made fear hold him over an abyss of dishonor, into which he might fall, seeking safety.

  All he had to do to escape was keep walking when he reached the meeting. Forget Asrienda, forget M'lenda, let Elda and Brinus slaughter their fellow-adventurers, and hope that Fedor Ohlt found Seldra Boatwright, and won her agreement to build the mightiest ship ever seen on Paradise Lake.

  Or let everyone where the comet fell meet whatever fate the gods decreed for them. He would avoid it, live to learn its secrets, and be exalted among wizards to his dying day, and for generations beyond that. . . .

  He might also live as long with the memories of failing his friends. Moreover, the comet might not fall upon Aston Point, leaving his friends alive to ask questions for which there could be no easy answer.

  He rose, leaning briefly on his staff until his feet again moved by his brain's command, then he started down the slope to the trail.

  As he reached the trail some ten or more soldiers marched past, not keeping in step, but moving briskly, hands close to sword hilts, and eyes searching all around them. Not much to Hellandros's surprise, Torgia Mel was sending some of her people to the meeting, to help the weak and deter the unlawful.

  Hellandros laughed softly. That was one bit of safety he would accept without shame.

  • • •

  The Grinning Gar was not the sort of place that Fedor Ohlt had frequented in the years since he came ashore for good. With a home and family to return to every night when they blew out the lamps in the shiphouse, he had little time, and less money, to spend in taverns.

  He had gone back to those shadowy haunts a few times after his wife and daughter died. It would have been more than a few times, if he had not realized that the wine would soon rule him, rather than ease him.
<
br />   Still, he remembered to dress plainly, with a weapon in clear sight, and look like one neither afraid of a fight, nor seeking one. Tavern brawlers sought easy marks, and to look anything but easy was usually enough.

  Besides, Ohlt was taking additional protection in the form of the Ha-Gelhers. They had been surprised, then indignant at being asked to visit such a place. They were proud of their blood, after all, and did not care to have it poisoned by the vile smoke, and worse wine, of such a place.

  Then Elda's eyes widened. They were large, green, and extraordinarily compelling eyes. Ohlt hoped that they would never turn his way. Elda, who thought she was irresistible, would learn otherwise with Ohlt, and might not take the disappointment well.

  "A sailors' tavern," she said musingly. "I've never been to one. Do the sailors come ashore wanting a woman as much as the tales say?"

  Ohlt started to reply, "That depends on the—"

  Brinus interrupted. "Sisterling, have you gone mad?"

  "If I have, you know why."

  "Yes, and it does you no more honor than it ever did."

  Elda looked ready to draw her rapier, which made Ohlt remember that he had planned to ask her if she had some more practical weapon, useful against armored or non-human opponents. Brinus took a step back, face working as if he had tasted

  something sour.

  Ohlt resisted the urge to turn Elda over his knee. She was too big, for one point, and for another she would either kill him or kiss him for it. He did not know which he feared more.

  Time for diplomacy.

  "It does depend on the sailor," Ohlt said. "But it will not just be sailors tonight. It will be everybody Cumbry Stoos thinks the place will hold without the floors collapsing. Until the drink runs out, or someone sets the Gar on fire.

  "Some will be looking for a fight, and many such men take an armed woman as a challenge. Others will be looking for a woman, in truth." Ohlt lowered his voice. "But they will be thinking that tonight's woman will be their last ever, and will not be too careful how they find her. How many blood-feuds can we have on our hands at once, before we have to leave Aston Point?"

  Elda cocked her head to one side. It was another of those roguish gestures that could draw a man in. Rather like a frog drawing in an insect on its tongue, Ohlt thought.

  "That is the truth?" Elda asked. "And brother, I was not asking you."

  "Elda, if you don't know my opinions now, you are deaf as well as—ah—"

  "Lively of loins," Ohlt said.

  Elda let out a shriek of laughter that sent gulls spiraling up from nearby rooftops. Even Brinus smiled.

  "You should turn minstrel, and leave carpentry to those who have no art in their tongues," Elda said, slapping him on the shoulder. "Very well. I will be so guarded and withdrawn that none save Brinus will recognize me.

  "For I do have my own notions of honor, and one of them is that when I invite a man, what I promise, I will give. So be warned, Fedor Ohlt."

  Brinus looked at the heavens, but the patience he had doubtless begged of the gods so many other times did not rain down this time either.

  • • •

  Hellandros's legs carried him well enough on the trail, as long as he thought out each set of ten steps beforehand, then took them, then halted for breath. The light of the comet eased the burden of the dimming night sight that comes with the years, so he had no roots or fallen branches snagging his ankles or staff.

  He still found many men, some women, and even a few older children passing him. He halted once to drink from his water bottle, and as he unstoppered it four elves trotted past, headed downhill with rolls of hide slung across their backs.

  They were out of easy hearing before he thought to call after them to ask if they had seen Asrienda, let alone ask about M'lenda. It had occurred to Hellandros that M'lenda might have already slipped off to the elven settlement, where she had said she had kin.

  If no harm came to her or her companions from yielding to that impulse, Hellandros had no further quarrel with her. Sixty is an age at which only a fool cannot tell the vital from the trivial, and Hellandros had not been called a fool in many years.

  The trail grew still steeper, and began to wind upward across the face of the hill on which the temple stood. The wretched huts of the monks sprouted to either side of the temple building.

  The trail ended before Hellandros's strength did. At last he reached level ground, and saw torchlight glinting on the armor of both soldiers and armed visitors, while more torches glowed around the stage in front of the temple. To the wizard, the torches hardly seemed necessary, but he appreciated the monks' wish to shed some familiar light on the folk who had come to hear Aston Tanak.

  The comet had definitely grown larger, since Hellandros at last had a clear view of it. Was it only imagination, or did he hear a faint hiss now, even above the rumble of the crowd, as the comet clove a path through the ether?

  No, that was just the monks, or their lay servants, lighting another batch of torches. At this pace, the only way to make the hilltop brighter would be to set the stage on fire.

  Hellandros looked up again, and this time he was sure his imagination was not jesting. He would swear that there was now a darker core within the fiery disc of the oncoming comet. Had something there burned out, until it was like a coal on the hearth?

  Or was it made of some substance that would not burn, even in the heart of the fires of chaos?

  The Grinning Gar was not quite as crammed as Ohlt had expected, probably because so many people were going up to the temple to hear Aston Tanak. It was the first time in some years that the old monk was to speak in public, and Ohlt had heard loud doubts that Tanak was fit to appear. Those not at the temple or the tavern were out in the streets, or on decks or rooftops, gazing at the comet.

  Some of the rougher sort had doubtless also gone out to carry on their brawls with more room and fewer onlookers. Cumbry Stoos was no more honest than the law made him, but he did not like blood or corpses on his floor, and while his furniture and tableware were of the cheapest quality, if you smashed it, you had to pay. The alternative was being barred from the Grinning Gar, which was a price few serious drinkers in Aston Point were willing to contemplate.

  Ohlt had not lost the gift of studying a tavern without appearing to challenge anyone looking for trouble. The Ha-Gelhers were supposed to come in a few minutes behind him, so he did not expect to see them. Of the several auburn-haired women in sight, none was M'lenda, or even half-elven.

  One of the small alcoves in the wall that held tables for two or four also held Seldra Boatwright. Ohlt maneuvered toward her table with the care of a steersman guiding a deep-draft ship through a gap in a reef.

  He was particularly careful not to jostle Nai K'del. Mongo was glowering from one of the alcoves, clearly on his fourth or fifth mug of the evening. Even if jostling Nai didn't bring down her lover's wrath, it would still rile everyone who saw his drink spilled, and everyone on whom they were spilled.

  At the bottom of the steps up to the alcove, Fedor Ohlt bowed, and said, "Seldra Boatwright?"

  "If you are Fedor Ohlt, the answer is yes." she said. "Or perhaps not. Rumor said that you were handsome. It seems to have lied."

  "Rumor said that you had a forthright tongue. It seems to have told the truth," Ohlt said with a grin.

  "By all means, then, sit down," she laughed, raising both hands and clapping them together over her head. "Nai! A jug this time—the Klostrian—and another mug."

  Ohlt had time while the order was filled to study his companion. Seldra must have been a striking woman in her younger days, and was still handsome. She had the build of one who lived by wits and speed. Ohlt was quite sure that she had good reason not to talk about how she had come to retire from adventuring to live alone in a house that she could never have afforded on the earnings of her modest boatyard.

  "To rumor!" Seldra said, and they clinked mugs. "Has it told the truth: that you know wood, or ships, or both?"


  "Both, is the truth, but I'm more interested in the wood, for now," he told her. "Aston Point's never going back to its old size, I think. That means a bigger port, and more ships. Why shouldn't we build a few of our own?"

  "Kunrel the carpenter's fond of doing all the woodworking around here, and supplying all the lumber."

  Ohlt couldn't tell if Seldra meant to discourage or inform him. He shrugged, and said, "I won't deal with you or anyone else behind his back. He need not fear that. Indeed, I was thinking of offering him a share of a timber-cutting enterprise that will give both his yard, and our shiphouse, more and cheaper wood."

  That was true enough; Ohlt had been thinking of such a proposal for at least three heartbeats.

  "I notice that you're using the word 'we' on very short acquaintance," Seldra said.

  "I wouldn't expect you to divide the present repair work," Ohlt said, refilling his mug. "I was only suggesting that, if we can work out a way to open a proper yard and shiphouse, we share the costs, and the profits."

  Seldra made a musing noise, rather like a kettle beginning to boil. "I would rather wait until we see how much of our new prosperity survives the comet."

  Ohlt mentally amended that to "and how many of us." Whether the comet struck or not, where it struck, and whatever happened after it either struck or missed, a good many folk were going to be disappointed, even wrathful. All the different factions would surely come to blows. The brawls the town had seen already would be as nothing to what came then. Many would die. Many more would leave Aston Point, enraged and miserable, calling down curses on the town.

  "Well, I suggest a middle way. 1 have a pair of friends, from aboard Fairy Rose, who are looking for work here. They've offered to handle the timber-cutting side of it. Why don't you meet them, have a few drinks with them out of my purse, and see what you think?"

  "If they're good drinking companions, I won't think less of them, you can be sure of that."

  The Ha-Gelher siblings had only promised to guard the timber-cutting operations and shipyard, and Elda was firm about this being work below their station. Ohlt doubted that he could promise their services without some danger that they would grow bored, or frustrated, and simply depart.