Part One: A Shadow of the Past

Episode 2: A Hat and Some Large Teeth

Under the towering peaks known as the Spine of the Country, the four unlikely companions worked their way north. After four days in the dry country, they came upon a valley, and a clan of the Muttheow, scratching out a hard existence with their goats at the rocky mountain's foot.

Here the people said that the Nami had come, some time past, but had not wanted to stay, thinking the valley was poor and there was not room enough for them and the clan that was there. The people speak at great length about how poor their valley is, and how wise the Nami were that they had gone on to a greener pasture. Then they said that Uri had followed, a day or two after, and had gone on after his kinsfolk.

Heartened, the party hurried on to the next clan, two days along at the foot of a great mountain the Muttheow had called the River Mother, until they came to a second clan in a valley below the headwaters of the Asalath. Here, they heard the same tale, that the valley was too poor to support so many people, and the Nami had gone on to somewhere folk were more wealthy. This clan, having all the water of the Asalath and the plants that grew nearby, seemed far more at ease than their kinfolk to the south, but they protested their poverty with, if anything, more vehemence. However, they had not seen Uri or anyone like him, and felt certain they would have if he had passed their way.

Asta then went out on the plain, and searched through her jewel back along the way they had come, and lo and behold she saw lying trampled in the grass a blue tam, with piles of horse dung nearby. They hurried back to the spot, and finding it, Ynada's wolf Huggah took up the scent, and lead them away from the mountains, into the heart of the dry plateau. They came to a ford over the Asalath, and found the trail again on the other side.

A day later a pair of riders appeared in the distance, and rode swiftly to meet them. "Who passes in the realm of the Morhirrim?" they demanded. "We are seeking the kinsman of this woman, who is lost," Shade said. After a time, the riders revealed that they had indeed seen Uri, but had taken him prisoner. Uri, they said, had married Wensli, the daughter of one of their kinsmen, and while she was with child he took her down from the plateau, and never returned the child of their blood. Sheno explained that Uri's son had died with his mother in the birthing. The riders replied, "That is what Uri said also, but if it is true it is still his fault, since we might have saved mother and child had they been born here. We told him he must bring back another son of his in ransom."

"He had no other children," said Sheno.

"That is what Uri said also, so we told him to bring some other to take the child's place."

The riders agreed to take the group to speak to their chief. Sheno argues long with the Morhirrim chief, but a very old man, the father of Wensli, protests fiercely. Shade goes out of the village. Knowing that the Morhirrim give their dead to the vultures, she hopes to find one whose ghost is nearby, and, after a short search, she feels the presence of one. She speaks to him, and discovers he was a kinsman of Wensli who died in a fall from his horse, and he recalls Wensli's departure with Uri. In his memory, it was indeed Wensli's insistence that they travel to the Water Gap and Uri's kin when she was near to giving birth.

Shade returns to the clan, and tells what she has learned, but this only serves to enrage Wensli's father further—he accuses Shade of hunting the spirits of their dead for necromantic purposes.

Before things can get any worse, Asta feels her jewel jumping and twitching under her shirt. Thinking of how it had throbbed when first the demons approached, she steps out of the tent to see what there is to see. There is nothing about on the dry plain, no one in sight but the Morhirrim and a vulture flying high above—except that it can't be a vulture because it has a neck like a goose, but it can't be a goose either because the tail is too long, and moreover it is too large, too large and growing larger, because it is stooping on them and it is not a bird at all but a dragon.

Asta screams an alarm, and the Morhirrim leap to their weapons, but there is little they can do. Its great tail scatters their tents like leaves, its claws greater than any sword cleaves people in half, and its breath, death (apologies to Smaug). Asta and Shade know there is no hope in battle, and so instead flee, with their companions, to the tent where Uri is chained to the main tent pole. They split the pole, collapsing the tent on their heads, and hope to hide themselvs. Outside, they see the dragon bears a rider on its back, a great knight in black, with a skull-shaped helm, who dims the sun, and shoots barbed darts at any who manage to approach the dragon. Uri, however, has a talent of his own, and seeing a small cloud in the sky, he calls it down to them. Under the cover of the fog thus made, the fellowship flees, and escapes the mayhem.

Heading south across the plateau, they hear the clatter of pots and pans, and soon see the Tinker, coming their way. He quickly cuts off Uri's chains, and listens to the full tale of their adventures. He says that the creature on the dragon can only be Skornheg, Lord of Dragons, sixth of the nine Demon Knights of Glauroth, and if that is true, then the two earlier must be Rag and Strag, the least of their bretheren. He says it appears they are wearing Helms of Awe, evil devices wrought of iron and souls, and they must need these to bring themselves back into corporeal form after the defeat of Glauroth long ago. This suggests that they have not succeeded in gaining access to Luz, the fortress of Glauroth at the Mouth of Sorrow, for if they had control of that cursed place they would not need the helms.

"Why are they following us?" Sheno asks.

"Probably looking for this," Uri says, and shows the ring upon his hand. "I took it from the dead man at the foot of the pass, and put it on my finger when the Morhirrim came, and now I cannot remove it."

The Tinker does not know what the ring might be, but if the Demon Knights want it, then surely it is a thing of power and they must keep it from them. He says there is one who will know what it is, Fingerless Eyre, the oracle in the Tower of Shame, and he suggests that the companions head that way with all haste. "But go quietly, and by cover of darkness when you can, for the demons will be searching for you. If it is, as I believe, a thing of power, then the slaying of Strag has probably convinced them that you have it, Shade. They will not rest until you are found."

"What will you do?" Asta asks.

"I must go and see Gnone, the head of my order. He is both wise, and powerful. He will know what to do." (Anyone care to wager when Tinker will be seen again?)

TO BE CONTINUED