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It was late in the afternoon by the time Nima Greenleaf and Johannes Bruckner, newly enlisted scouts of Sevahr, set off, replete with provisions and supplies from General Aleksander’s quartermaster.  Both were in high spirits as they turned their backs to Emmenia. The fresh spring air was invigorating, a welcome change from their stifled prison cells, and the noxious odor of the corpse-strewn city. They strode through the North gates as if they owned them. A group of soldiers hailed them, but hurried them along upon seeing the emblems given them by Toril.

Cool air, blown across the water of the Bay of Flaking Fire greeted their faces beyond the city gates, blowing their hair and tugging at their cloaks, as they walked a safe quarter-mile from the main road. They kept the road in view at all times, but avoided it for the tales of banditry rife upon the travelled ways of late.  The raven leapt from Nima's shoulder as you got clear of the city, and with powerful strokes of its wings ascended into the heavens, soaring far ahead, before circling back, then ranging out into wider scouting rings.

The landscape around them was beautiful; the rolling hills were dotted with oak and ash, sycamore, and cherry trees.  A group of cotton-tail deer burst out of a grove of birch trees, racing past the travelling companions who seem content to travel in silence for a time. They keep a fairly brisk pace, soon leaving the city a distant speck in the Southern horizon, as they head north, following the instructions sketched out on the map by the quartermaster. As the afternoon wanes away, the two exchange some small discussion, touching upon such things as the weather, and the way before them, and whether they should stop and eat now, and such stuff as that. More serious conversation was deferred, as if by unspoken agreement.  

Around sunset, and perhaps eight or nine miles into their journey, Nima’s raven came diving out of the sky, letting out a series of loud caws, before alighting on Nima's shoulder.  It's talons dug uncomfortable into Nima's skin, and it appeared highly agitated.  

A stone’s throw ahead and to the right, Bruckner detected the sound of footfalls, and perhaps a faint howl to the immediate North, however, he could see nothing.  

Now the thudding sound of some heavy feet were unmistakable. The creatures whose feet these were came over the crest of a small hill, three animal-things standing upright, bearing jagged weapons, silhouetted against the moon. Their faces were twisting lupine snarls, made terrible by their subtle resemblance to the faces of men. More awful than their yellow fangs and twitching lips were their eyes, for one thought they could almost detect the light of reason in them, however dimly. No intelligence guided them now, however, but bestial rage and a lust after violence. The foremost beast, who was larger than the others, howled with an inhuman savagery, and the three monsters charged down the hill towards the travelers.

The gnolls, for that is what these beasts were called—hideous hyena-headed humanoids, wielding bows and battle-axes—charged down the hill as Bruckner’s sword leapt ringing from its sheath, and Nima readied her crossbow. They stand side by side. Nima drops to one knee, firing her bolt at the foremost foe. It whirs over his head and is lost in the darkness beyond. Nima cursed, and set to cranking the crossbow’s windlass. Bruckner interposed his sword and shield between her and the oncoming beast-men.

The gnolls approached in a triangular pattern, one flanking on the right, the other ranging left, and the larger chieftain bringing up the middle. A pair of withered human heads hung from his belt by a knotted rope of hair, their features are shrunken and fixed in frozen screams.  Rust-colored blood clotted the notches of their axe-heads; they panted and snarled and screamed with their own madness.  The chieftain drew his bow out, and notched an arrow.

The front left gnoll stood fifteen feet from Bruckner, and the front right is 25 feet from Bruckner; the reverse numbers apply to Nima.  The chief is about forty feet from the two of you, in more or less a straight line.

Bruckner breathed slowly, taking in the field, and the movement of their foes. All was sudden violence, a trial by lightning. The gnolls spread out before them, drawing up in a semi-circle. Even a brave man might have shuddered at the sight of those yellow-fanged lupine faces, lit up in in moments of jagged white. Bruckner whispered a prayer, swifter than a thunderbolt, to Blessed Talis. His lips traced the words of the litany of the Swordsman, the prayer of Eleam’s faithful.

Nima sprang up from behind the cover of Bruckner’s shield, releasing a bolt with a 'thwip!'

The bolt bloomed out of the rightmost gnoll’s shoulder, bringing him momentarily to a knee.  He howled, and the others roared in shared fury at his injury.  The leader drew his bow back and releases an arrow aimed at Bruckner's head, but it goes high, arcing over the swordsman’s head. The leftmost gnoll sprang at Bruckner, swinging mightily with his battleaxe!

Bruckner lifted his shield, deftly deflecting the blow. As the gnoll’s axe slid off the steel plate, Bruckner struck with his own sword. With a roar, he swung the black blade out in a mighty arcing cut. The obsidian-dark weapon gleamed in the moonlight, catching the gnoll in the collarbone. The sinews of its neck split, and the bone gave way before the adamantine’s razor’d edge. Blood sprayed from the wound, and the gnoll foamed and gnashed, and the wind ate up his roaring and weeping. Then the beast-man died, falling from Bruckner’s sword to the cold earth.

Behind him, Nima fired off another bolt at the gnoll she had struck, but it ricocheted off of a makeshift shield.  It seemed that the bolt in his shoulder proved a strong incentive to covering himself from attacks.  Leaping to close the distance between them, the monster lashed out at Nima with his axe, striking her leg, and cutting deep. She gasped, dropping her crossbow.

The chief of the gnolls shot another arrow at Bruckner as lightning struck in the distance, off towards the bay.  Bruckner struck the missile away with his shield as the rain was loosed from the heavens.  Nima struggled to stay standing as her blood flowed into the ground, mixing with the rainwater.  

Spotting his companion in the brief noon of a jagged knife of lightning, Bruckner pivoted, and raced towards her. He stepped deftly between Nima and the beast as he raised his axe, ready to finish the weakened elf-maid. Pale fire veined the velvet sky as Bruckner stabbed his sword up through the throat of the gnoll.  The axe slipped from the monster’s fingers, thudding dully into the mud alongside its master.  

Breathing a swift word of thanks, Nima fetched up her crossbow and wildly worked the mechanism behind the cover of Bruckner’s shield.

“Now!”

She cried out, and Bruckner sprang aside, Nima loosing her bolt to land with a thud in the stomach of the remaining foe. He grunted roughly and raised his own bow in retaliation, sending an arrow at Nima, which she ducked under. 

Distracted by Nima, as the beast was, he was unprepared for Bruckner to close the gap between them with a sudden sprint. The gnoll’s hideous features were captured snarling, as a twisting lance of lightning spanned the sky, illuminating the drenched landscape.  Bruckner's sword sailed downward, laying open the gnoll’s moldy leather armor. Blood flowed from the rent cuirass. The gnoll swung his axe, catching Bruckner in a glancing blow on the ribs.

Nima fired another shot, but the bolt went wide.

Bruckner, wincing from the blow to his side, roared, and slashed out at the wound he had already opened along the gnoll’s chest. The monster leapt forward at the same moment, his axe raised overhead. Bruckner’s swing caught the gnoll under the armpit, and split him like an overripe fruit. The hyena-faced warrior fell dead without a sound, his split body laying against the blood-soaked Earth like an anathema, his still-pulsing organs spilling out of the split bag that was his living flesh only moments before.

The rain was picking up, the weather getting more and more wild. Lightning strikes displayed the carnage in brief, flickering visions. The three gnolls lay dead on the ground. The ground was muck and mud, a morass of water and blood.

Nima fell to a knee, grasping tight around the deep wound in her thigh, trying to staunch the blood, while Bruckner surveyed his own injury. The cut across his ribs was not too deep, though it would need seeing to. Nima's raven cawed from a nearby stand of birch, as though to announce that the immediate danger is past.

Bruckner turned to Nima, ignoring the cut across his ribs for a moment.

"You fought bravely. How is your wound?"

He scanned the area for somewhere to shelter from the rain. 

"You fought not only bravely but effectively,"

Nima responded and added, with a wry smile:

"I suppose the answer to your question depends on what sorts of adventurers we wish to be.  If I had to guess, I would imagine that you are more likely to wish us to be the enduring and silently suffering sort.  So I suppose I will say that my wound is quite fine--nothing wrong at all, really."  

So saying, she attempted to stand, and nearly fell over as she put weight on the injured leg.

"Do you need a potion?"

Bruckner asked, trying to steady Nima.

“Come, we should take cover in that copse. Your bird is there, see?"

“Canary,”

interjected Nima.

“Beg pardon?”

“The raven. I decided to call him Canary.”

Bruckner considered this, then shrugged.

“It is your bird.”

He helped her make their way to the stand of trees where the raven waited.

Nima found it difficult to bear her weight, and nearly fell on the slick turf.  Bruckner, however, bore her up and and helped her along, getting both to the copse of birch trees.  Canary sailed down from an upper branch, alighting on Nima's shoulder.  It cawed, as if in alarm to see the blood on Nima's clothing, and nuzzled its head against her cheek.  The copse was far from dry, though the leaves above provided some little shelter from the elements. Nima sat gingerly, and began binding up the wound. Slowly, she sipped from one of the restorative vials of magical medicine, to aid her body in healing swiftly and fully.

While Nima rested, Bruckner quickly looked over the gnoll corpses in case the beasts carried anything helpful.  He saw nothing to indicate that this was anything other than the normal sort of attack made by such wicked and desperate creatures on a regular basis. Still, it sat uneasily with him that such monsters as these would have ventured so close to a large city like Emennia.  The two hench-gnolls possessed nothing but rusting scimitars and poorly-fashioned iron shields.  Their leather armor was of exceedingly poor make.

When Bruckner examined the nearly bisected corpse of the leader, however, his eye fell upon the bow he was wielding so inaccurately.  It was covered in subtle carvings, some strange symbology etched in lines of crimson and jet.
The quiver of arrows that the beast carried was further evidence that this was no gnoll-made weapon.  Perhaps the creature took it off one of his unfortunate victims, or took it from a small settlement on a raid.  Bruckner also found on the leader a small purse with some two dozen smallish golden coins inside.

Bruckner took the bow and the quiver, along with the purse. Returning to the copse, he counted out half of the coins and handed them to Nima.

"Your part,"

he said. She thanked him, a note of surprise in her voice.

"Can you use the bow? I don't shift with ranged weapons."

He sets the bow and quiver before her, and sets down to cleaning his sword. 

“I'm afraid I'm not large enough to use a bow like that.  Perhaps we should hang onto it, and sell it when we get a chance?"

Bruckner nodded.

“We should make camp here,”

he said. The rain seemed to be increasing, and there appeared to be no better camping spots than this solitary copse of trees anywhere in sight. Nima agreed.

Nima proved the more adept survivalist of the two, having had more experience living out of doors. She guides the swordsman through the construction of a shelter, and teaches him to make a fire during a rainstorm. In her own shelter, she concludes by setting up a small nest of her travelling cloak, for Canary to sleep in.

It took some time, but working together over a hand-drill and fireboard, the adventurers soon had a healthy blaze going. By the time the night was fully dark, the fire was roaring. They fed it up well with wood and then, each one being exhausted from so singular a day, Bruckner and Nima both bedded down and fell swiftly asleep. Both were too tired to think of setting a watch. Soon they were dead to the world.

Bruckner awoke briefly during the night to discover that the rain had stopped you. He built up the fire, then lay back down, his entire body aching from the beating he had taken on the docks, and the fight the night before. Soon he had drifted back to sleep, after ensuring that the fire had enough wood to last through the night. The fire grew swiftly back to a large conflagration as he drifted back to sleep, smiling vaguely at the cheery blaze. For a moment, Bruckner thought perhaps he heard the rustle of wet leaves or the squelch of mud as oblivion took him, but before he could reflect on it further, he was asleep.

Some hours later, Nima awoke from dark dreams. She shivered in the night cold and clutched her cloak about her. She was vaguely aware that the fire was burning quite bright and hot, more than it should have been, it seemed to her. She dimly recalled Bruckner tossing some additional logs onto the fire during the night, but that was some time previous. She sat up before a tall and cheery blaze, and there was Bruckner, fast asleep, clutching his sword, and snoring softly.  Nima’s heart skipped a beat as she spied a very small figure, sitting next to the flames, warming their hands and knees, and tossing new bits of wood every few seconds onto the roaring pile...

Breathing as quietly as a corpse, Nima studied the tiny figure. He had not yet looked her way, or noticed her sitting up. He was humming a little tune as he held warmed himself before the fire. The creature was a gnome, Nima realized. He appeared to have no manifestly evil intentions towards herself or Bruckner, she thought. Indeed, for all the world, it appeared that the little fellow was just passing the time until morning, tossing bits of wood on the fire, warming itself, and humming an off-tune ditty.

Nima rose silently to your feet in a crouching position; the little gnome did not hear her, so intent was he on a new game, one that involved skipping back and forth in front of the dancing flames.

Sneaking through the shadows, Nima wove a circle around the dancing interloper. Snaking an arm out from behind a birch tree, she placed her bundled cloak softly over Bruckner’s face, then kicked him gently in the ribs as she passed. Bruckner woke with a soft

“Oof!”

that was muffled by Nima’s cloak. After a moment’s struggle, he emerged from the cloth draped over him, and was about to demand an explanation, when he saw Nima creeping toward a small figure frolicking before the campfire.

Nima positioned herself in the darkest shadows just beyond the rim of campfire light, waiting for the small, skipping person to turn his back to her. The moment he does, Nima strikes, leaping forward and grabbing the tiny figure with one arm, raising her dagger in the other hand to rest against the throat of her little prisoner.

"I'll have your name and your reason for being here."

Nima hissed in the gnome’s ear. As she did so, Bruckner rose, gripping his sword.

The little fellow squirmed and kicked, and began to yell, loudly:

"Help! Bandits! help! Bandits, and miscreants!  Let me go you turpentine-bellied curmudgeon!  You'll not get away with this, you won't! I'm a citizen, and under the protection of the gods, misguided though they may be!  Help! help! help!  You foul misguided liver-faced pool of malicious insurrection, let me go!"  

He kicked Nima sharply in the shin with his flailing heels, continuing to shout for help in a rather small and silly voice.  He was flailing wildly, and though he had plenty of energy, seemed of little threat.  Canary squawked loudly, woken by all the commotion, and the little gnome continued shouting in his tiny voice.

Bruckner strode up to stand next to Nima and her captive, but did not draw his sword.

"She asked you a question, gnome. Who are you? And why have you helped yourself to our camp?"

The gnome stared up at Bruckner, seemingly shocked into silence, then looked back at Nima.  

"Alright, alright, you brigands",

he panted.  

"No need for all the rough stuff.  Why did I help myself to your camp?  Because it was warm, and I was a-freezing!  Now let me go, you wicked thing!"

he kicked against Nima with all the force of his tiny legs. 

"A lucky thing you found us, then, and not a pack of gnolls. What are you doing wandering in the woods in the dark and cold?"

"What cheek!"

the tiny fellow said, continuing to kick profusely, his tiny legs flailing in the air.  Even by gnome standards, this fellow was very small.

"Why I was wandering to put an end to the evil in these parts!  Surely even so evil a pair as you two have heard of it!  There are devils wanderin' 'bout, and I aim to put a stop to it, I do!"  

He glared at Bruckner, from where he was held fast within Nima’s embrace, with fierce determination.  His eyes were slightly wonky, as though caught in a perpetual cross.  

"Now you!"

he shouted back at Nima.  

"Let me go!"

Nima released the gnome such that his momentum carried him a few feet away from her, then held her dagger aloft, in case he decided to retaliate.

"In return for the hospitality you have stolen from us, you will tell us to what evil you are referring.  And,"

Nima stifled a chuckle,

"how it is, precisely, that you intend to stop it."
The tiny fellow careened forward a bit as Nima suddenly released him onto his windmilling legs. Catching his balance rather comically by flailing his arms, he turned back to glare at Nima.  

"Hmm!"

he sniffed imperiously, then began straightening his tunic and cloak rather deliberately.  He appeared to be a youngish adult gnome, perhaps in his mid 40's, with abundant straw-colored curls, a snub nose, and, bright, albeit slightly crossed eyes.  He wore traveling gear that had evidently seen some time on the road already.  He finished preening himself (which he seemed to be doing with deliberate slowness), then said in a squeaky voice, as though there has been no pause between Nima’s question and his answer,

"Well I thought it should be quite obvious what I was doing!  I'm looking for these devils who've bewitched the King and thrown the region into turmoil!  As for how I'll do it, don't be daft, thickhead!  I'll use my magics!"  

He raised a hand and a jet of fire shot upward from his fingertips.  

Nima turned away from the gnome, saying,

"Use your magics to make your own fire, then, and leave ours be."

She walked a few steps in the direction of the shelter, and then stopped.  

"You mentioned in your ravings that you are under the protection of some gods."  

She turned back towards the gnome.

"What gods would those be?"

At Nima’s question, the gnome brightened, and said enthusiastically:

"All the gods love Tadalac Wishmere, little sister!"  

He leapt into the air, landing on one hand in a silly sort of handstand.  He balanced that way for a moment, seemingly content to ignore Nima’s recommendation that he make his own fire, and looked at Bruckner.  

"You're a quiet one",

he said.  

"But big enough.  Big and quiet."  

He alights back on his feet, a silly grin dawning upon his face.  

"Big and quiet, just like an ox!  I shall call you Ox!"

he began to caper about, singing a song that went like this:

'He always wins, and ne'er looks back,
Tadalac!  Tadalac!...'

and more in that vein.

"Which devils are they, Wishmere?"

Bruckner asked.

"Which devils!?"

Tadalac exclaimed, throwing his head back in laughter.  

"What a question, Ox!  Why do you ask--are some devils amenable to you, and others detestable?  Are not devils devils?"  

His face grew serious, and his laughter died.  

"They are bad devils, swordsman Ox.  From the nine hells, methinks.  They will prove work for your blade aplenty."  

His serious demeanor cracked abruptly into more laughter. He turned a cartwheel, then began dancing a jig, exclaiming:

"Oh yes, Tadalac and his new sidekicks will have their work cut out for them, that they will!"

"Stop prancing about like a Zazarite slaver's monkey. Do you know anything of these devils? Where did you hope to find them?"

Tadalac reluctantly ceased his capering.  

"Ah, Ox has a short temper, and an even shorter sense of taste for good dancing. But it is all the same to me.  The rumors I have heard lead me North, from Emennia.  King Janessin is the key now; he is the only one I know of to have had personal communication with the demons.  So, I seek him.  Information is scarce, but that does not stop Tadalac.  Where does Ox and little sister go?"  

He turned to Nima with wide, serious eyes.  

Bruckner studied the sky; it was nearing dawn. The morning star glinted through a veil of mist, and the dark sky showed hints of gray at the edges.

He began unwrapping some rations for breakfast, then turned to Tadalac.

"You are welcome to some food, if you're hungry. After that...your business is your own, but you cannot travel with us: we move quickly, and we can ill afford to protect you."  

Ignoring Tadalac’s question, Nima listened to Bruckner with a disapproving look on her face. She opened her mouth to speak, but seemed to think better of it, returning instead to the shelter to partake of some of her own rations.

Tadalac turned up his nose to Bruckner:

"I have my own food, Ox.  Besides, oxen food is not for gnomes.  You think too little of Tadalac, though, if you think he would need protecting.  My magics are quite strong, and my knowledge of the gods insures that I have no need of other friends."  

He seemed hurt.

He strode past Bruckner to Nima, and patted her on the leg.  

"Thanks for not stabbing me, little sister.  I'm sorry I stole some of your fire's heat.  If you change your mind, and decide you want Tadalac's help in battle and in all things Divine, I am heading North, following the will of the Gods."  

He began to walk away slowly, northward out of the clearing.

Bruckner finished his breakfast, then packed and began erasing the signs of their camp.

To Nima, he said,

"We should continue our journey."

Nima stood silently until Tadalac was out of earshot, then said to Bruckner that she would be right back, and ran to catch up with Tadalac.  When she was level with him, she walked beside him and said,

"You keep mentioning the gods, but you aren't being very specific.  Tell me now: is it true that there is a Deity whose will you are doing, and who will reward you for your services?"

The little gnome smiled upon seeing Nima, and he listened carefully as she spoke.  When Nima had finished, he replied with unexpected seriousness. The vast majority of his previous flippancy and childishness was gone.  

"Well, little sister, my relationship with the gods is complex.  I study wizardry, you see, and don't do much by way of prayer or service to the gods, but I do know much and more about them.  I've made a lifelong study of the gods, you see, and know what sorts of things they do and don't do, their tastes and discords.  Like that."  

He looks at you curiously.  

"What's your interest?"

"Correct me if I'm wrong, but studying the gods isn't the same as being in their service.  Are you saying that because you have studied what the gods will, you are assuming that what you are doing is in their service?  Which gods have commanded you to root out the evil in this land? You speak of “all the gods.” It was my understanding that the will of the various gods hardly overlaps."

Nima’s face and voice were full of an earnestness that she did not often allow to show, perhaps because they were out of Bruckner’s hearing.

"I don't know that I ever said I was in the service of the gods, my love.  Just that I was under their protection, like all things in the world.  Perhaps that was misleading..."

he shrugged.  

"At any rate, I am in favor of the good, and though I know the habits and demeanors of all the gods, I favor Aurunaur, Virian, Baldric; you know,"

he gave a silly grin.  

"All the bright and shiny ones.  If you seek to know more about them, I can help, to be sure."

Nima frowned, and looked at the ground.  

"Well...I suppose at some point I may desire some further information.  Tell me where you are going, and I can keep an eye out for you if our paths cross again."

Tadalac smiled.

"I'm heading North, as I said, seeking information on King Janessin and these wretched devils and fiends, if that's what they are."  

With amazing dexterity and swiftness, the gnome leapt into the air, and kissed Nima on the cheek. He landed, bowing with a flourish.

"Don't worry little sister!  You will see Tadalac again!"  

With that, the little fellow was off, skipping northward, singing a song made up chiefly of nonsensical words. Nima heading back towards camp, wiping her cheek with her handkerchief.

By the time Nima reached the camp, Bruckner had finished clearing the traces of their camp fire and other signs of their habitation. Nima packed her food parcel swiftly, and the two set off. Bruckner asked Nima,

"What were you speaking about with the gnome?"

“Nothing in particular.  Just asking where he was heading.”

They set off in silence on the same path northward that they had they had walked the day before - a mile or so off the main road. 

The rising sun began to paint the sky with streaks of gold and rosy pink as the travelers warmed to their march.  There was still plenty of distance between them and Mt. Elesborre, so they set off at a brisk pace, encountering no trouble as the day wore on.  The world was alive with sights and sounds for Bruckner, who, despite his months of travel up to now, had not explored any of the Sevahran countryside, being onboard ship for most of the time, disembarking just long enough at each port to get the smell of the cities in his nostrils.  The open land they strode through now was intoxicating; strange animals roamed among the wildest and freest flora that Bruckner had ever seen.  Nima seemed less impressed with the scenery. She had been through these parts before, but more than that: her mind was fixed upon something, and she strode towards the distant peak with grim determination.

The two continued on until the sun began to sink, stopping only briefly at midday to partake of rations and refill their water skins. Fortunately these rolling grazing lands were crisscrossed with streams and rivers, many wending their way towards the sea. The mountain loomed larger than it had at midday, surely, but it still seemed very far away. After consulting, the two judged that they had come some fifteen miles—halfway to the mountain.

Nima scanned the road and the sky as they walked, keeping a keen eye out for any potential danger. Bruckner seemed too caught up in his excitement at finally wandering the wilds that he had so long desired to see, that he wasn't able to properly take stock of anything; he walked, at points, like a man in a dream. Nima, on the other hand, calmly surveyed the traffic crawling like insects across the road in the distance, though it all appeared to be normal; people with carts, moving goods to and fro. Still, she thought the foot traffic was less than might be expected--further evidence, perhaps, of the recent troubled times.  

Soon the sun fell, and the stars reassumed their familiar places. Invigorated by the warmth of the day, and eager to reach their goal, the two pressed forward, agreed to go until they tired.

"How did you end up in that Sevahran prison after all?"   

Bruckner asked Nima as they walked, now at a more leisurely pace. She furrowed her brow.  

"Well...it's a bit of a strange story, but I suppose I can tell you.  I came here by ship.  After the crew and I came to shore, someone, I don't know who, knocked me unconscious.  When I woke up...I was in prison.  Odd story, isn't it?"  

She smirked, then broke into a smile so that Bruckner would know she was teasing.  

Bruckner laughed heartily.

"Very good. But, jesting aside, how did you end up there?" 

Nima hesitated for a moment, and then began to explain, a bit rapidly:

"I offered to help a man who claimed to serve the god Isdurrna; he told me that someone had stolen a precious relic from him, and asked me to steal it back.  I obliged.  It turned out that the person who possessed the relic was the true disciple of Isdurrna; the man I was helping was the thief."

I look at Bruckner, again to assess his reaction to my words.

"Oh! So, you follow Isdurrna? That's a hard path."  

"Is it?  I don't actually serve Isdurrna.  I was hoping to learn more about him from this supposed disciple, but obviously I did not.  No, I offered to help just to be...nice.  Whom do you serve?"

"Eleam, like my father and his father and the whole line of my people." 

"Is Eleam a good deity to serve?  Does he bless you in return?"

"Eleam is strong and courageous. He is the model for any who would take up the arts of battle, and he blesses the brave with divine strength. Those who die bravely, he takes to his hall, to feast at his table and fight in his legion. An excellent fate, if one is chosen for it." 

"Feasts after death, huh?  That sounds...lovely. Well, what do you think--shall we rest for at least a few hours this night, or would you like to push on until morning?"

"Yes, we should find a suitable place to make camp."

The night is very dark, as the moon is hidden behind a bank of clouds, though fortunately it is not raining again.  You are on a fairly open plain, though about a quarter mile to the North there are some small hills that look to offer more protection and possibly a safer place to bed down for the night.

They made the trek to the hills quickly, finding themselves in a lush and rolling landscape, dappled with sycamore trees. They found a clearing by a small stream that looked suitable. Nima slung her pack off of her back, then stopped, her keen eyes noticing paw prints of a familiar, and dangerous shape.

She turned to warn Bruckner, but before she could speak, a howl sounded, very close by. Several sets of eyes appeared on all sides, seeming to glow in the darkness.

A pack of silent, stalking wolves emerged out of the dark woodwork of the night; a soft snarl curled the lip of the foremost beast.

Then many things happened at once. Three wolves charged at Nima, four more at Bruckner. Nima sidestepped the first set of slavering jaws, ripping her dagger from its sheath. She whirled, backing toward a small embankment of packed earth, then she gasped as ironlike jaws clamped around her calf. As the teeth sank in, the wolf yanked downward, attempting to bring the half-elf to the ground.

She slashed downward, feeling the blade drag a shallow channel along the wolf’s back, but it did not relent, then another beast was snapping at her wrist, and she batted at it with her blade furiously, feeling it bite deep into animal flesh. She lost her balance, and the wolves dragged her down to the hard earth.

A dozen feet away, four more wolves were encircling the Cormorantian swordsman. Bruckner waited, then lunged out with a powerful stab at the nearest wolf, but the beast saw it coming and danced out of the blade’s reach. Another wolf leapt at him, snapping at his ankles, but Bruckner kicked out sharply, sending his attacker back with a yelp. Another leapt at him, catching his forearm between its teeth. The fangs held fast, but could not pierce the thick leather bracers Bruckner wore. The youth bashed the wolf’s skull with the pommel of his sword. It dropped limply to the ground, but then Bruckner was bowled over by something leaping on his back, and he crashed forward, onto the body of the prone wolf, and it was all snarls and snaps and hot, stinking breath behind him, a warm nose and cold white fangs on his neck.

Nima was on the ground, bleeding badly from her leg. The wolves were above her, two at least. There was blood on her tongue, and she saw only surging wolf skin, and scraping claws and slavering jaws. She could not see Bruckner a stone’s toss away, as he rolled, attempting to throw off his attackers, or the blood that began to show on his clothing as the wolves scraped and tore and howled. Nima screamed as she was bit, and she stabbed upward with what little remained of her strength. It entered a wolf’s chest, buried to the hilt. The beast died, but another appeared, looming up over its corpse.  The world began losing shape and color as consciousness faded out for a moment. The stars shone far above so intensely, Nima thought. Gleaming so boldly, like the tips of white incisors, and behind, in the dark and unknown spaces of the cosmos, a mighty pair of jaws awaited. She trembled, and tried to pray.

All of a sudden, bright as the sun at noonday, a ball of orange fire, smouldering and huge, 20 feet on a side, erupted from the nearby treeline, smashing down onto the two wolves gathered at Nima’s left. The animal screams from inside the spherical inferno were terrible to hear. The fire burned a mere inches from Nima, the intense heat rousing her slightly from the darkness stealing over her.   The two remaining wolves snarled fearfully, nearly jumping backwards in their haste to get clear of the singed grass and burning bodies of their broodmates.

'Don't worry little sister!'

rang out a small voice, as she saw a very small figure toddling at top speed towards them from the trees.  

'Tadalac is here!'

Bruckner, meanwhile, was beset as well, and in great danger. He had managed to roll clear from the two wolves who had brought him to the ground, and had risen to a knee, then was attacked again, a wolf leaping at him head on, and getting its teeth around his shoulder, near the neck. The youth felt his collarbone break, and gasped, and for a moment he saw only fire. Then he bellowed a war-cry, and, drawing the dirk he kept at his belt with his left hand, Bruckner buried the blade in the wolf’s haunches. It leapt away from him like water from a pot of sizzling oil, Bruckner’s dagger still planted in its side. Before the youth could breathe, another was rushing toward him. He staggered to his feet, when a ball of fire sailed above his head, landing with a great report behind him. He spied the gnome they had met the day before. The tiny wizard’s arm was still raised, traceries of arcane energy creasing the mundane air between his palm and the burning globe of wolf-flesh. Bruckner saw Nima, lit up as at noon by the fire. She managed to sit, and unsling her crossbow from her shoulder.

Bruckner turned then, to meet the oncoming wolf, catching it flush across the neck with his sword as it leapt at him, and opening the arteries.

Nima raised her crossbow, and closed one eye to better see through her failing vision, the dancing lupine forms that waited, slavering, beyond the now-waning heat and light of the sudden fire. She breathed out, waiting until one stood still a moment, then sent a bolt through its salivating mouth. It dropped, choking on blood and bile.

Tadalac was racing down the hill toward the fight as swiftly as his short legs would take him. He swirled his hand in a brief, though ornate motion, muttered a nearly inaudible word, then extended his finger, shooting a line of jagged crystalline light at a wolf approaching Bruckner from the rear. The spell hit the animal in the jaw, and its head exploded in a shard of shattered quartz. Its body dropped, its head of broken crystal fused weirdly to a neck of flesh, the meat and veins and the dark tunnel of its throat visible in geometrical refractions through its now-translucent face.

Two of the remaining wolves broke off and fled, but another lunged at Tadalac, catching his forearm briefly between its jaws. The little gnome grimaced, but no shout of woe escaped him. Instead, a series of sharp, horrid words leapt from his tongue, and he stuck out his tongue. His face tranformed into a terrifying mask of twisting fire and dread potency; the wolf leapt back in mortal terror, and sprinted for the hills beyond.

I will go to one knee, so that I can look Tadalac in the face.

"I owe you thanks and more," I say. "Forgive me for having treated you roughly before. I would be honored to have you journey with us."

Tadalac waved it away, and said,

"none of that now, none of that. You did me no wrong; but quickly we must get your wounds tended, and those of Nima; you are both badly hurt. There will be time for talk when your blood has been stopped from flowing."

He led Bruckner to the small dirt shelf at the edge of the clearing, where Nima still sat, weakly drinking what remained of her curative philter. The elixir had stopped the worst of the bleeding, but her wounds were many, and medicine like that was not so easy to come by.

Tadalac said,

"We should set up camp here; 'twould be too dangerous for you two to try and move in your condition, and further wolves will, I think, be kept away by the smell of their"

he wrinkled his nose,

"toasted cousins.  Come now, sit down."  

Tadalac bustled back to Nima, and pulled out a thin wand of a springy, greenish wood from a small satchel on his waist.  Nima noted that the gnome’s own arm was badly mangled, but he paid it no mind.

"A healer’s wand"

he explained.  

"Never leave home without one."  

He pressed the tip gently against Nima's chest, and muttered something softly; she felt heat entering her body. It was soothing initially, then began to tingle and burn. Soon her flesh was searing, and she gasped.

“Yes, it hurts quite a lot,”

Tadalac said cheerfully. Nima grit her teeth, then cursed in Nevenit, the tongue of her childhood. Then the pain was over, and a feeling of supreme wellness lay upon her.

“Your turn, Ox!”

Tadalac called. Bruckner took a knee so that Tadalac could reach his chest, and the gnome repeated the procedure. Bruckner let out a long low exhale after Tadalac had finished, and nodded tightly in thanks, the color returning to his face.

Tadalac then healed himself, contorting his face into expressions of anguish quite comic to see.

“Ooh! Ah! Oh may the devil thrash you purple, damned wand!”

Tadalac exclaimed as the bones in his arm visibly knit themselves together, and the mutilated flesh resumed its function. The process finished, and he visibly brightened, holding up the wand proudly.

"It's precious, this. But it is beginning to fade. Soon all the power will be gone from it.” He shrugged. “Some rest and food will heal up any small scrapes and bruises; we should save what remains for the next time you two decide to tangle with a pack of fearsome baddies!"

He then settled the two in, rushing to and fro with surprising energy, dragging a heap of sticks together, and a few small logs.  He talked all the while.

"I am just glad that Tadalac found you two; I was staying in this grove myself, but I went up a tree when I spotted the wolf tracks.  Then I heard the commotion, and feared that you or some other unwary travelers had fallen into their den.  Dangerous beasts, those."

He muttered a word, and sent a thin stream of fire shooting from his fingertips to light the heap ablaze.  He turned to Bruckner, and said,

"I will start a small meal; do you have the strength to gather us a bit more wood?"

Nima and Bruckner both noted the seriousness and efficiency of Tadalac's actions, revealing a different side of him than the silly, capricious gnome of the night before.  

Bruckner helped Tadalac gather wood. He asked:

"Where do you come from?"

"Tadalac comes from The Pasabalia Forest, near Erlenna.  I became an adventurer to prove myself to my people.  I,"

he kicked a stick bashfully, and said,

"Well, ox, the truth is, Tadalac is thought to be a little too frivolous, even by the other gnomes."  

He looked to Bruckner as if hoping he would contradict this.  When that was not forthcoming, he heaved a sigh, and said,

"Aye, 'tis Tadalac's great shame; I tried and tried to be more serious, but always the silliness carried me off into jokes and gags, riddles and games.  Why, once I dumped a bucket of maple syrup on the village elder's head!  And always getting in trouble, oh my yes.  All the village said I would amount to nothing."  

He looked a bit sad for a moment, then brightened.  

"But I have been adventuring for three years now, and have seen much and more; I have devoted myself to studying two things: magic, and the doings of the gods.  That way, when I return home, all will say: 'Look how brave and strong and knowledgeable our Tadalac has become!  Surely we were wrong about that one!"  

He smiled widely, and seemed on the verge of doing a small jig, but controlled himself, and picked up another piece of wood.

"It is good: a man ought to try to prove himself. I know nothing of magic, but you are no foolish coward. And courage is all one may ask of a man; the rest is chance or the whims of the Gods." 

"Ah, you do understand Tadalac.  I'm very glad for it.  I too think that courage is the greatest of things one can seek, and knowledge, of course.  Both are grand, in their own way.  Come now, ox, let's go check on little sister.  She took some bad bites."  

He toddled back to the fire, rather comedically burdened with a bundle of smallish sticks, and a thin log about the width of Bruckner's wrist.  

Bruckner followed, carrying a rather larger load.

After depositing the fruits of his scavenging, Tadalac walked up to a wolf carcass. He yanked Nima’s bolt from its throat and held it up like a trophy.

“This one’ll fly again!”

he announced, carrying the bloody shaft to Nima on his open palms like a royal scepter. Then he turned to the wolf and began skinning it with neat, skillful strokes.  

“Have either of you had wolf before?  A bit tough, but surprisingly flavorful."  

One at a time, he carried over small, neatly cut steaks of wolf meat, and arranged them carefully over a small grill made of interlocking thin green branches.  

"This sort of pine is flavorful; the green sticks won't burn too fast, and they give the meat a nice minty flavor!"

he informed them cheerfully, turning a steak with a flick of his knife.

"Here you are, little sister,” he said, handing you a chunk of nicely cooked meat, juices dripping down the length.

The two looked at the meat reluctantly, then tried it.

Tadalac remained standing, watching them eat, rubbing his hands together in joy. However, it tasted terrible, and was almost impossible to chew.  The gnome grinned to see them eating, then took a bite himself. His eyes went wide as bucklers, and he spat the meat out along with a great quantity and spray of spit.  

"By Baldric’s beard, that's foul!" he yelped.

"Spit it out, spit it out!"  

He ran to the others, gathering the pieces of steak he had just cooked, and throwing them as far as he could, in the direction of the tree line. 

"I suppose I must have been thinking of sheep when I said wolves   were tasty."  He gave a wonky, introspective look, as though trying hard to remember.  "Yes, that was it.  I always mix those two up."  

He threw up his hands.  

"Well, Tadalac only has little gnome rations."  

He put on a brave face.  

"You two wait here; I will go and hunt you some proper food"; he turned dramatically and prepared to march into the dark.

"You needn't do that, we've rations.  Please, you've done us enough favors for now."

"Don't worry, mate! You've done enough! Rest!"

At Nima and Bruckner’s protests, Tadalac about-faced, clearly greatly relieved.  He then quickly straightened, and puffed out his chest.  

"Well, if you two get famished in the night, you just tell Tadalac."  

And then he skipped to the fire, dropped down onto his bedroll, and fell promptly asleep.

Elesborre, in search of King Janessin.