were not known to possess any curative powers, they did
have certain potent and intoxicating effects.
Jastom had no idea how the dwarves brewed the stuff.
From what little he had managed to get out of Grimm, it
was all terribly secret, the recipe passed down from
generation to generation with ancient ceremony and
solemn oaths to guard the formula. But whatever was in it,
it certainly worked. Laborers threw down their shovels,
goodwives their brooms, and all joined what was rapidly
becoming an impromptu festival. Respected city elders
turned cartwheels about the square, and parents leapt into
piles of straw hand-in-hand with their laughing children.
For now, all thoughts of the war, of worry and of sickness,
were altogether missing from the town of Faxfail.
But it couldn’t last.
“They won’t feel so terribly well tomorrow, once the
dwarf spirits wear off,” Grimm observed dourly.
“But today they do, and by tomorrow we’ll be
somewhere else,” Jastom said, patting the nearly-bursting
purse at his belt.
He slammed shut the wagon’s side panel and leapt up
onto the high bench. Grimm clambered up after him. At a
flick of the reins, the ponies started forward, and the
wagon rattled slowly out of the rollicking town square.
Jastom did not notice as three men – one with a sword
at his hip and the other two clad in heavy black robes
despite the day’s warmth – stepped from a dim alleyway
and began to thread their way through the spontaneous
celebration, following in the wagon’s wake.
*****
Jastom whistled a cheerful, tuneless melody as the
wagon jounced down the red dirt road, leaving the town of
Faxfail far behind.
The road wound its way across a broad vale. To the
north and south hulked two slate-gray peaks that looked
like ancient fortresses built by long-vanished giants. The
sky above was clear as a sapphire, and a fair wind, clean
with the hint of mountain heights, hissed through the
rippling fields of green-gold grass. Sunflowers nodded like old good-
wives to each other, and larks darted by upon the air, trilling their glad
melodies.
“You seem to be in an awfully fine mood, considering,” Grimm
noted in his rumbling voice.
“Considering what, Grimm?” Jastom asked gaily, resuming his
whistling.
“Considering that cloud of dust that’s following on the road behind
us,” the dwarf replied.
Jastom’s whistling died.
“What?”
He cast a hurried look over his shoulder. Sure enough, a thick plume
of ruddy dust was rising from the road perhaps a half mile back. Even as
Jastom watched, he saw the shapes of three dark horsemen appear amidst
the blood-colored cloud. No . . . one horseman and two figures running
along on either side. The sound of pounding hoofbeats rumbled faintly on
the air like the sound of a distant storm.
Jastom swore loudly. “This is impossible,” he said incredulously.
“The townsfolk couldn’t have sobered up this soon. They can’t have
figured out that we’ve swindled them. Not yet.”
“Is that so?” Grimm grunted. “Well, they’re riding mighty fast and
hard for drunken men.”
“Maybe they’re not after us,” Jastom snapped. But an uncomfortable
image of a noose slipping over his neck went through his mind. Swearing
again, he slapped the reins, urging the ponies into a canter. The box-
shaped wagon was heavy, and they had just begun to ascend a low hill.
The ponies couldn’t go much faster. Jastom glanced wildly over his
shoulder again. The horseman had closed the gap to half of what it had
been only a few moments before. He saw now that two of them – the ones
running – wore heavy black robes. Sunlight glinted dully from the sword
that the third rider had drawn.
Jastom considered jumping from the wagon but promptly discarded the
idea. If the fall didn’t kill them, the strangers would simply cut him and
the dwarf down like a mismatched pair of weeds. Besides, everything
Jastom and Grimm owned was in the wagon. Their entire livelihood de
pended upon it. Jastom couldn’t abandon it, no matter the consequences.
He flicked the reins harder. The ponies strained valiantly against their
harnesses, their nostrils flaring with effort.
It wasn’t enough.
With a sound like a breaking storm, the horseman rode up alongside