Dan Parkinson - Hammer and Axe

“Where?” Willow stared at the creature. “What people? What mesa?”

“The one above the cliffs.” The small one pointed westward. “There are people up there making ice and setting fires and doing all sorts of things. What do you intend to do about it?”

“I don’t intend to do anything about it, as far as I know,” Willow admitted. “Why should I?”

“You’re a dwarf, aren’t you? Don’t dwarves frown on humans coming into dwarf territory to perform magic?”

“Magic?” Willow shuddered. “They’re making magic?”

“They certainly are. That’s why Cawe came down from the peaks. His whole family is upset about it, you know. Magic isn’t good for raptors.”

“Is that what he . . . what your bird is? A raptor? I’ve never seen one.”

“Most people haven’t. Except me, I guess. I’ve seen several of them. Lately I’ve been living with them. But Cawe isn’t my bird. He’s his own bird. I just came along for the ride.”

“Oh, you did,” Willow muttered. “Then how about answering my question.”

“What question?”

“The one you didn’t answer. Who are you?”

“Oh! I guess I didn’t tell you, did I? I’m Shill. Actually, my name is Shillitec Medina Quickfoot, but Shill will do. How do you do?”

“How do I do what?”

“I don’t know. It’s just something people ask when they make themselves acquainted . . . isn’t it? Or has all that changed?”

The firelight was brighter now, and Willow’s eyes widened as she suddenly realized what kind of creature she was talking to. “You’re a kender!” she said.

“Of course I am,” the small one said. “Or at least I used to be, before that dumb Jass Bellbrush said I was for the birds. That was when I went to live with the raptors, and if what’s-his-name wants me to come back, he’ll have to find me first. But I am a kender, always have been, always will be.”

“But I’ve seen kender.” Willow stared. “You don’t look like the kender I’ve seen. You look like . . . like a girl!”

“Well, I should hope so!” Shill straightened, smoothing back thick, dark hair. “Because that’s what I am.” She looked around, spotted Willow’s pack, and stepped up to it, squatting to look inside. “Do you have anything to , eat in here? I’m hungry.”

“Help yourself . . .” Willow started to say, then stopped, remembering what she had heard about kender. “No, don’t help yourself. I’ll get you something.” Quickly she went to the pack, brushing the kender aside.

“What do you eat?”

“Probably anything,” Shill said.

Pulling a wrapped rabbit-haunch from the pack, Willow glanced up, directly into the fierce, curious eye of the giant bird, which had stepped nearer and leaned for a look. Startled, Willow scooted back, reaching for her axe. “How about him?” she asked the kender girl. “What . . . what does he eat?”

“About twice a month,” Shill said casually. “Don’t worry about Cawe. He gets his own food.”

Willow stared at the huge bird’s head with its great, curved beak and glaring eyes. “I’ll just bet he does,” she said.

Shill was looking eastward, where dim light grew above the peaks. “It will be morning, soon,” she said. “Cawe can take us over to the mesa where those people are, then you can decide what you are going to do about them.”

For almost fifty years, the Great Road of Passage had been in use. Starting in the plains south of the human city of Xak Tsaroth, the road led westward toward the foothills of the Kharolis Mountains, then curved northwestward where it entered the dwarven lands. At a stone bridge of dwarven construction—no human of the time could have managed such a task—the road crossed the Great Gorge west of the broken lands, beneath the eastern , shoulder of the massive peak called Sky’s End. There it turned north, skirting the rock-falls below the ruins of what had once been a Daewar fortress, curved long miles around the base of Sky’s End climbing toward a high pass, and from there led directly into the mountain fastness of the old dwarven realm of Kal-Thax. It was a mighty road carved into the very stone of the slopes. It wound northward, avoiding the dwarven settlements in the valleys and the meadows, to emerge finally at the northern border at the huge rift known as Tharkas Pass. Beyond there were realms of humans and others.

The road was the result of the first treaty ever struck between the dwarves of Thorbardin, fortress heart of Kal-Thax, and the humans of the southern plains. Willen Ironmaul, chieftain of the Hylar of Thorbardin, and a knight called Lord Charon had agreed that only by such means—a secured way of passage through the wilds of the dwarven ranges—could both of their realms be free of the hordes of refugees and migrants who were at the time a nuisance to the plains people and a serious threat to the mountain-dwelling dwarves.

The road carefully avoided the city of Xak Tsaroth, and at its plains end was guarded by knights of Eastern Ergoth, protecting those who traveled it against both the depredations of slavers and brigands raiding out of that great city, and the harassment of tariff collectors and armed bullies employed by the overlords of the city. More and more, as the years went by, the knightly orders of human Ergoth were becoming disenchanted with the sprawling, festering city which once had been their primary base. Some among them readily admitted to disenchantment with Ergoth itself.

Nearing the Gorge though, the Road of Passage crossed into dwarven lands. From there to Tharkas Pass, it was patrolled by troops of dwarves answering to the Thanes of Thorbardin. Here the purpose of the patrols was different. The dwarves were not there to protect the travelers. Those who came this way were mostly humans, but of many tribes and with many purposes. There were others, too, sometimes—ogres, though infrequently, and now and then a few kender or a band of wandering elves. On one occasion an entire colony of gnomes had spent nearly a month in the Falconhead Tunnel, before determined dwarves evicted them. The gnomes, it seemed, had somehow gotten stuck in the tunnel, then disagreed among themselves about how to get out and had appointed committees to resolve the issue—a process that, among gnomes, could take years. So a dwarven patrol had expedited their removal.

For the dwarves, the main reason for patrolling the road was to make sure that those who traveled the road stayed on the road and did not stray into dwarven habitat. In Kal-Thax, long ago, the dwarves had forbidden humans or anyone else to settle in and take root. Kal-Thax was for dwarves, and only for dwarves, and the dwarves liked it that way.

Further, in the past few centuries, the dwarves had learned that where humans were, magic would come to be also. Even more than among the elves, there were humans who were fascinated by magic, who grasped it and used it, who practiced it as a dwarf might practice stonemasonry or carpentry.

The dwarves who patrolled the Road of Passage had an excellent record of keeping travelers contained and moving. In fifty years, no more than a handful of humans and one or two ogres had managed to escape from the road and avoid patrols. The exception to the record was kender. The wandering little people were, simply, uncontainable. A kender went where whim directed, and no patrol captain had ever found a way to keep kender on the road if they decided to take off in some other direction. The dwarves had long since stopped trying to keep kender out of Kal-Thax. It wasn’t worth the effort, and aside from being casual thieves and general nuisances, kender were not a threat.

More than any other race, the dwarves agreed, human settlements and humans on the loose must not be tolerated in the realm governed by the thanes of Thorbardin.