5.
A week after leaving the wreck, the company finally straggled into the small village, no more than a dozen houses and other outbuildings on either side of the road. “Finally!” Yerzle gasped, as he climbed out of his makeshift harness and dropped it to the ground. Beside him, Dozer merely grunted as he did the same.
“Nothing!” the elephant snapped, slamming the small, leatherbound volume closed. “It’s totally not a journal of my descent into madness, that’s for sure!”
“That’s good to know,” she said, rolling her eyes as she walked past the bath chair. “You don’t have to show it to me, I was just curious.”
After she passed, Stillwell opened the book once more, angrily scribbled something more, then closed it again and tucked it behind his back in the chair. “It’s also not an enemies list!” he called out.
Rubbing his shoulder where the abrasions from the harness had been worst, Yerzle walked a ways down the road into the village. “There doesn’t seem to be anybody out,” he said, puzzled. He turned to look for Sashi. “There were definitely folks out and about when we found the place, weren’t there?”
“Yes. Do you think there are fields on the other side of town that they might be working in?”
“Everyone?”
“Unlikely,” Sashi admitted. “There should be old women and young children, at least. Maybe a crippled beggar, or a hunchback. Something.”
“I’ll go check things out, but someone should stay here with Stillwell. Anyone want to volunteer?”
“I can take care of myself!” Stillwell shouted. “If anyone causes me trouble, I’ll throw empty rum bottles at ‘em!”
“I’ll stay with the lad,” Dozer said, mopping his brow. “I’m tired of walkin, anyway.”
“Fine, then. The three of us will look through the village and find out what we can.” He turned first to Portia, then to Sashi. “Ready?” They moved forward, and after two dozen paces approached what approximated the center of town.
“There’s a smith,” Portia said, pointing to one of the buildings. Its wide front door was ajar, and they could see an anvil and bellows in the half-light within. “And there’s a mill.” They traveled farther up the road and came to a cross street. The new road ended where they stood, and led off to the north-east, past what they took to be farm fields.
“Empty,” Yerzle said. “Where is everybody?”
“Hiding from you bandits,” said a voice from behind.
By the time Dozer caught up, panting and puffing, the high-pitched shrieking had ended. Portia and Sashi had their swords drawn and faced two newcomers, a donkey with what looked like a cooking pot on his head, and an enormous rabbit with an equally enormous hammer. Yerzle lay on his back between the two pairs. “What’s goin on?” the boar asked, hefting his axe. “Who was doin that screamin?”
“Don’t look at me,” Portia said, brandishing her sword at the strangers. “They came out of nowhere and surprised us!” Sashi silently pointed at the prostrate Yerzle.
“Nowhere?” the donkey asked indignantly. “We live here! You’re the ones who came out of nowhere!” Dozer saw that he carried a hatchet, and besides his cookpot-helmet was wrapped in a bolster and had what appeared to be a serving tray strapped across his chest with several loops of cord.
“You’re bandits!” said the rabbit, and Dozer realized with a start that she was a woman. A very large woman, taller than any of them except Stillwell, with powerful arms to wield the hammer she carried. “You’re with the other bandits, and we’re not going to give you anything! Get out of our village!”
“We ain’t bandits,” Dozer said, watching the rabbit’s hammer warily. “We come from a shipwreck, down the coast.”
“That’s what the other one said,” the donkey replied, his black-tipped ears skeptically lying flat. “But at least he said straight out that he was a bandit. He called himself ‘the Scourge of the Greensward’ and ‘the Terror of the Borderlands’. That gave us something to work with.”
“Rendtooth,” Yerzle said, sitting up. “He claims he’s a bandit lord, and attacked our caravan several months ago, but none of us could remember him.”
“Rendtooth?” Portia said, incredulous. “He was on that ship? As crew?” Yerzle climbed to his feet, looked around at the drawn weapons, and stepped behind Portia, who shot him an exasperated look.
“As a captive,” Sashi said. “We met him in the hold. He must have fled the ship after we ran aground.” He addressed the donkey. “Stocky hyena fellow, with a prominent fang on the left side?”
“That’s him.” The donkey’s eyes narrowed. “You know him, but you’re not bandits? We’re supposed to believe that?”
“It’s the truth,” Yerzle said from behind Portia, and told the two villagers their tale of sea-adventure, shipwreck, and capture, wrapping up with the escape from the slavers and flight to the shore.
The rabbit lowered her hammer and leaned against it while she eyed them all critically. Hard muscle stood out beneath her brown fur. “Maybe,” she said. “Maybe not.”
“I believe you,” said the donkey. “And what are we going to do, Szera? Fight them all? In the whole village, we’re the only two who came out, so I think that if they wanted to, they could take care of us in short order.”
“Speak for yourself,” she told him, but did not object as he took a step forward.
“I’m Gustaf,” he said. “Welcome to Jorke End. We have something of a bandit problem.”
“So I’ve heard,” said Portia, sheathing her sword. “Is it just Rendtooth, or does he have a gang?” Sashi and Dozer followed her example, and stood down.
“A few layabouts in town took up with him,” Szera said. “Good riddance to them, mostly, even if one is my cousin. On the other hand, as long as they’re prowling about, we can’t get things back to normal.”
Yerzle exchanged glances with the others. “We might be able to help you with that,” he said. “In exchange for that, we could use some help of our own.”
“Mercenaries!” Szera huffed. “You’ll still rob us, only now we’ll have to thank you for it!”
“Calm down, Szera,” Gustaf told her. “What is it you need?”
“A place to rest up for a few days and get our friend Stillwell healed up fully, then some food and directions when we’re done,” Yerzle said. “We’re headed for Farien.” “We can do that. You can stay in the loft above the smithy. Let’s get your friend into town, then we can figure out where to go from there.”
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