She shook her head, her expression suddenly grave, solemn. “Do you know, I think they did it on purpose. I think they knew magic like that would frighten my people. I think they meant to frighten them!”
“Don’t be ridiculous. Why would they want to frighten you when they’re trying to save you? And never mind that now anyway. What did Alake tell you? Whatever she said, I didn’t try to take advantage of her.”
“Oh, I know that.” Grundle waved a deprecating hand. “I was just teasing. I have to admit …” she added grudgingly.
“You treated Alake better than I expected you to. I guess I misjudged you. I’m sorry.”
“What did she tell you?” Haplo asked for the third time, “That you two were going to be married. Not now. Alake’s not a fool. She knows that this crisis is no time for her to bring up matrimony. But when the sun-chasers take us all to a new realm—if that ever happens, which now I’m beginning to doubt—then she figures you’ll both be free to get married and start a new life together.”
So, Haplo said to himself bitterly, here I’ve been thinking all along that she’d come to her senses. All she’s been doing, apparently, is entrenching herself deeper in her fantasies. “Do you love her?” Grundle askd.
Haplo turned, frowning, thinking the dwarf was teasing him again. He saw, instead, that she was very much in earnest. “No, I don’t.”
“I didn’t think so.” Grundle gave a small sigh. “Why don’t you just tell her?”
“I don’t want to hurt her.”
“Funny,” said the dwarf, studying him shrewdly, “I’d have said you were the kind of man who didn’t much care whether he hurt other people or not. What’s your real reason?”
Haplo squatted down on his haunches, eyes level with the dwarf maid. “Let’s say that it wouldn’t be in anybody’s best interests if I did anything to upset Alake. Would it?” Grundle shook her head. “No, I guess you’re right.” He breathed a sigh, stood up. “Listen, the shouting’s stopped. I’d say the meeting’s broken up.”
Grundle clambered hastily to her feet. “That means I better get going. If I’m caught missing, Hartmut’s the one who’ll end up in trouble. I hope my parents settled everything with the humans. Deep down, you know, my father really respects Dumaka and Delu. It’s just that the snakes frightened him so badly.”
She started to dart out the door. Haplo caught hold of her, pulled her back.
Yngvar was stumping past, his face a sullen red in the firelight, arms swinging wildly as he muttered to himself. His wife tromped along at his side, her lips pressed together tightly, too angry to speak.
“I don’t think they resolved anything,” said Haplo.
Grundle shook her head. “Alake’s right. The One sent you to us. I will ask the One to help you.”
“The same One whose oath I swore?” asked Haplo.
“What else?” said Grundle, looking at him in astonishment. “The One who guides the waves, of course.”
The dwarf dashed out the door, her short legs pumping as she ran off into the night. He watched the small figure bob among the campfires, saw that she would easily outdistance her parents. Yngvar’s anger carried him along at a swift pace, but Haplo guessed the rotund king would soon get winded. Grundle would reach the cave in plenty of time to replace the sack of potatoes with her own stout body, save lover Hartmut from having his beard cut off or whatever form of punishment was measured out to guards derelict in their duties.
Haplo turned from the door, flung himself on his pallet, stared into the darkness. He thought about the dwarves and their reliance on this One, wondered if he could somehow use this to his advantage.
“The One who guides the waves’!” he repeated, amused.
He closed his eyes, relaxed. Sleep began to sever the ties that bound brain to body, snipping them one by one to let the mind drift free until dawn would catch it, drag it back. But before the last cord was cut, Haplo heard an echo of Grundle’s words in his mind. But it wasn’t the dwarf’s voice that spoke them. The words seemed, in fact, to come to him out of a very bright white light, and they were slightly different.