Paul Kemp: Realms of War

He hurled the marble at the jaguar, yelling a shatter-shout at it for good measure.

Suddenly, he was flying backward through the air, propelled by a tremendous blast. He slammed into the wall of a hill-house and slid to the ground, ears ringing. A villager ran past, screaming, but Weasel couldn't hear her. The spot where the were-jaguar had crouched was a smoking crater in the ground. A tuft of its tail-all that remained of the beast-landed on the ground nearby.

"Some marbles," Weasel croaked, barely able to hear his own voice. "A kid could lose a finger, playing with those."

He realized he still held the pouch in his hand-and that Malar's beasts and clerics were still attacking. A Ghostwise, wearing bloodied spike gauntlets on each hand, chased after a soldier. Weasel sprang to his feet and hurled a marble at him. A shatter-shout triggered the marble, and the Ghostwise disappeared in a terrific blast. Weasel whirled and threw again, and another enemy vanished in an explosion that left Weasel reeling.

A hand tapped his shoulder, startling him-a soldier from his squad. Chucklebelly held out a hand and shouted something Weasel couldn't hear, but Weasel guessed what was being asked by the sling in Chucklebelly's hand. Weasel held out the pouch; Chucklebelly plunged his hand into it. Armed with the marbles, the halfling scrambled atop the hill-house.

Weasel, realizing the marbles would remain inert without his shatter-shout, clambered up there too. Chucklebelly's first two shots went beyond the range of Weasel's shatter-shout, but after Weasel's frantic explanation, they became an efficient team. Chucklebelly's sling whirred, released, whirred, released-while Weasel turned this way and that, shouting as each marble struck. Too soon, they were down to their last marble. But it didn't matter. Malar's clerics were beaten; those that hadn't been blown to pieces were fading back into the jungle.

Days later-when the wounded, including Weasel, had been tended at the healing house and the dead buried-Warchief Chand himself came to the village to congratulate Sergeant Headsuplads on the initiative his soldiers had shown. Both Chucklebelly and Weasel were presented with a red cock feather. As the warchief tucked this into the buttonhole of Weasel's vest, Chand leaned close and spoke in a low murmur. "One day you'll have to tell me, soldier, how you knew the command word of a weapon crafted by human wizards-a weapon that was supposed to be stored securely in a locked strongbox." Warchief Chand straightened and spoke a little louder. "That's quite the initiative you showed. I'll have to tell Sergeant Hewn to keep an eye on you."

Weasel-who a moment ago had been contemplating easing a hand into the warchief's vest pocket, just to see if he could get away with filching whatever was inside it-tugged his beardlocks nervously. "Yes, Sir, Warchief!"

When the brief ceremony was over, Headsuplads, exuding a near-visible glow of pride at having the foresight to take on a spriggan as a scout, clapped a hand on Weasel's and Chucklebelly's shoulders, dragged them off to the mess, and bought them the first of many ales. There, Weasel toasted the sergeant and capered a jest at his expense. He turned to Chucklebelly-who liked to joke he drank his belly so big on purpose, so he could keep extra sling stones tucked inside its folds. This, he boasted, gave him the "last laugh" when an enemy thought him unarmed. Weasel used a fast-hand trick to "pull" the last blast marble from Chucklebelly's folds. The others all dived for cover when Weasel fumble-dropped it at the sergeant's feet. Afterward, even Headsuplads had laughed when Weasel explained that it wouldn't explode unless he shattered it.

Later that night, Weasel staggered back to the hill-house where his patrol was billeted, drunk as a halfling with a full cheese in his belly. On the way, he spotted Puffpipe sitting on a door stoop. The halfling's head was down; his pipe lay on the stoop beside him, unlit. He was either staring at some shy;thing in his lap or he was asleep. Weasel staggered over, gave his shoulder a punch, and held out the mug of ale he'd just realized he was carrying. "Hey Puffpipe, want a quaff?"

Puffpipe shook his head. "She died," he whispered. "Earlier today. They couldn't heal her."

Weasel took a sloppy pull of his ale and wiped his mouth with the back of a hand. "Who are you-" Then he saw the cornucopia Puffpipe held in his lap. The wicker was torn, stained with dried blood.

"Oh." The pride drained out of Weasel in a rush. He set the ale mug on a window ledge and fell into a squat beside Puffpipe. He drummed his fingers against his thighs, for once, not quite knowing what to say. Flames flickered; he balled his fists, extinguishing them.

Puffpipe looked up. Tears glinted in the moonlight. "Willametta was too weak to heal herself. And the other clerics couldn't… " He sighed. A tear dripped from his jowly chin. "She was the reason I was fighting." He waved a hand. "This village. But now…"

Weasel squeezed his fists tighter. "Now you're gonna quit?" he guessed.

Puffpipe's jaw clenched. "No. Now I've even more reason to fight." One hand groped for his pipe; the stem trembled as he tamped tobacco into it. Weasel leaned forward and offered him a light.

Puffpipe sucked on the stem and exhaled a long, sad stream of smoke. Tear-puffy eyes met Weasels. "Why are you in uniform?" he asked. "Did you… lose someone?"

Weasel bit back the retort that he wasn't in uniform-the trousers, armor vest, and helmet he'd been issued were too loose when in spriggan form, too tight when he enlarged. He wore his own clothes, instead. He glanced down at the feather in his vest. "I was doing it for the reward. But after today… " His gaze drifted to the blood-splattered wall beside Puffpipe.

The halfling nodded and took a deep draw on his pipe. Its ruddy glow illuminated his face. "You're one of us."

Weasel blinked in surprise. That hadn't been what he'd meant. His ale-bleary thinking had been more along the lines of his having blown his one chance at getting rich-that perhaps it was time to finally leave "this hin's army." To gather up all the swag he'd been able to filch and move along. But his feet weren't following orders. Instead of marching him smartly along the trail that led to the spriggans' highsummer Gather, they'd meandered him back to his billet.

Weasel stood, fumbled the feather out of his buttonhole, and handed it to Puffpipe.

The halfling looked up, startled. "What… But I didn't… "

"It's for Willametta. She should have something pretty on her grave."

The Year of Monstrous Appetites (-65 DR)

Weasel tore his way through the thick undergrowth, cursing each vine and fern and bush that got in his way. The Gloomthicket was tougher than any obstacle course he'd ever run in training. He leaped over logs, crawled through thorn bushes, ran teetering along fallen tree trunks, and scrambled up and down boulder-strewn slopes. He changed size more times than he could count, enlarging when he needed to make a leap, resuming his normal size in tight-squeeze spots.

All the while, he heard Malar's Hunt braying in pursuit. By the sound of it, they were sticking to animal form, to follow his scent. That meant they had to move along the ground. By climbing a tree and moving through branches, Weasel might have been able to lose them.

Unfortunately, he couldn't. Not with a broken finger.

Still, he managed a trick or two to slow them down.

He spotted sparks inside a hole in the ground: the underground den of a pair of shocker lizards. He laid a false scent-trail into it, first forcing the electric-sparking creatures deeper into their tunnel with a dose of magical fear, then backing out again. He backtracked away from the den to a stream he'd crossed earlier and waded up it, grinning at his trick. The shocker lizards were small, but they'd be defending their eggs; with luck, they'd combine their attacks to deliver a lethal shock to the first wolf that nosed into their hole.