The Dragon's Dagger

Mickey's salve worked wonderfully, and most of the pain was gone from Gary's side when he awakened the next morning, despite the fact that moisture hung thick in the air, grayed by a solid curtain of heavy clouds. There remained some uncomfortable pulling in the scar tissue when Gary stood up and stretched, and a soreness when Geno and Baron Pwyll began strapping on the armor, but it was nothing too bad.

Gary spent most of the minutes looking over to the spear, lying prone on the grassy field. There had been no mental contact, at least none that Gary could consciously sense, since he had awakened. It seemed to him that the spear was brooding - he got the feeling, too, that it didn't like the fact that he was donning its complementary armor - and he feared that he might have to find himself another weapon.

Even more worrisome to Gary was the fact that Kelsey, who also had labeled him a coward, was giving him the proverbial cold shoulder. The elf looked his way several times while the armor was being put on, always locked gazes with Gary for just an instant, and then his golden eyes would narrow and he would brusquely turn away.

Not that Gary was overly thrilled with Kelsey at that time, either. He kept seeing images of the man stumbling into the room at the Snoozing Sprite, an elfish arrow dug into his back. Gary understood the necessity of fighting, understood the grim consequences of not winning, but it seemed to him as though Kelsey could have achieved the same margin of victory by shooting the man in the leg instead, or in the shoulder, perhaps. Gary knew well how marvelous a shot the elf was with that deadly bow; if the arrow was sticking through the man's heart, it was only because that was exactly where Kelsey had meant it to be.

The armor was on, then, and Gary worked his arms about in circles, stretching this way and that to try to better the fit. Kelsey walked by him, on his way to the horses, again throwing an angry, dangerous glare Gary's way.

"Did you have to kill them?" Gary asked reflexively, grabbing at something, some accusation, with which to shoot back at the judgmental elf.

"Of what do you speak?" Kelsey replied to him, seeming honestly confused. Mickey and Gerbil, over by the gnome's quadricycle, and Pwyll and Geno, already readying their mounts, paused and looked Gary's way. "The men back at the inn," Gary pressed, trying to ignore the elf's cavalier attitude about it all and the continuing concerned stares of his other companions. "You shot to kill."

"Perhaps we should have stopped to reason with them," Kelsey said sarcastically, coming up to stand right before Gary.

"You didn't have to kill them," Gary said sternly.

"They came at us," Kelsey pointedly reminded him, and the elf snorted derisively and turned away, as though he felt that the conversation wasn't worth continuing.

"I am not a coward!" Gary growled at his back. Gary never considered his next move, never took a moment to think things through. He slammed his hands against Kel-sey's back and shoved as hard as he could.

Kelsey flew several feet, diving headlong. He was agile enough to tuck his shoulder, and wise enough not to fight against the undeniable momentum, and he rolled right back to his feet, spinning as he went so that he came up facing Gary. In the blink of an eye, Kelsey's sword came out and he rushed Gary's way, launching a swing.

Gary hardly flinched, reminding himself that Kelsey would not kill him. He instinctively brought his arm up to block, caught the sword on his forearm as it whipped to a stop barely inches from his neck. The two stared unblink-ingly for several moments. Gary realized a throbbing ache in his arm, believed that he might be bleeding under the armor, but he did not relent his hold, even growled and pushed the weapon farther from him.

"I am not a coward," he said again.

"But are you a fool?" Kelsey asked dangerously and Gary heard Mickey suck in air and hold his breath.

Gary didn't blink, didn't flinch at all, just held the pose, and the weapon, as the long seconds slipped past.

"You fled," Kelsey remarked at length.

"Wasn't it Kelsey who led the flight from Geldion in Dilnamarra?" Gary replied coyly.

"I made no challenge of honor!" the elf snarled, snapping his sword away and slipping it into its scabbard so quickly that Gary could hardly follow the movement.

"To hell with your challenge," Gary replied without hesitation. "I had to get my friends out of there. Their lives were worth more to me than any false conceptions of honor. Brand me a coward if you choose, Kelsenellenenen ... whatever the hell your name is, but you know better." Kelsey's visage softened somewhat for just a moment. The elf seemed to realize his slip, though, and his scowl returned as he turned away to go to his horse.

Gary only then realized that he was trembling - with anger and not with fear.

"I am waiting, young sprout," came a call in his head, slightly reluctant perhaps, but Gary realized then that his bold words had deflected more than Kelsey's outrage. He went over and roughly grabbed up the spear, and, under the continuing gazes of his surprised friends, walked steadily to his horse. He hoisted Mickey up first, then moved to put his foot in the stirrup.

The white steed shied away and Gary understood that it was smart enough to react to Kelsey's emotions. "Tell the stupid horse to behave," Gary demanded of the elf. Kelsey scowled at him and said nothing, but the horse did not shy away when Gary took hold of it a second time.

At Geno's insistence, they rode out at a leisurely pace. Kelsey didn't offer much argument against that, since he wanted to learn much more about what Robert had been up to before they ever got near the Giant's Thumb. They kept mostly to the south, skirting the towering rocky peaks of Dvergamal, and only occasionally skipping away from the mountains' protective shadow to ride up to lonely groupings of farmhouses and see what they might learn.

For the most part, the group remained quiet, each caught in his own private swirl of worries and contemplations. Gerbil did not even know if Gondabuggan had survived, Baron Pwyll felt that he surely would not, and Kelsey's fair features were clouded by the weight of tremendous responsibility. Geno kept looking every which way, as though he expected the dragon, or something else, to spring out at him at any moment, and in watching the dwarf, Gary recognized that Geno's insistence that they ride more slowly had nothing to do with a sore backside.

For Gary Leger, the enormity of the situation around him, the incredible danger, far beyond anything he had ever experienced in his own world, kept his mind more than occupied. Again there was that strange sense of calm accompanying it all, though, that feeling that he was part of something bigger, the feeling that his actions, whatever the personal cost, held a profound effect on something more important than his own mortality.

More important than his own mortality!

But it was true; Gary knew that to be truly how he felt. He wondered how many people of his world had ever experienced this sensation. He thought of the war raging back home, of the fanatical, suicidal people facing off against the United States-led coalition. Were they really so altruistic, so believing in their religion, that they were not afraid of death itself?

The thought sent a shudder along Gary's spine. He feared people so fanatical. But also, Gary envied them, for their purpose in life, however Gary might judge the merits of their religion and loyalties, was larger than his own, was larger than the next fifty or sixty years, or however long he had left to live.

An inevitable smile cut through the trepidation, and Gary glanced around at his five companions. He saw Ger-bil sitting low, casually pumping the wondrous quadricy-cle, and felt sympathy for the gnome, and prayed that Gerbil's fears for his homeland would not come to pass. He noticed Geno, glancing about again, and knew that the dwarf was up to something. He felt for Kelsey, so noble and proud, and inadvertently the cause of this terrible strife.

Gary's gaze lingered long on Mickey. The leprechaun sat before him on his horse, resting easily against the beast's high-held neck and holding his pipe (though it was not lit) between his teeth. Gary had seen this same faraway look in Mickey's gray eyes before, a sadness and a longing.

"What are you thinking?" he eventually asked the sprite.

"Of long ago," Mickey answered quietly. "When all the goodly races were as one. Maybe there's not enough true evil in the world today, lad." Gary thought the comment odd, especially considering the company Mickey was now keeping: two men, an elf, a dwarf, and a gnome, all riding side by side towards a common goal. "It would seem as if they're united again," Gary remarked. Mickey shrugged and made no comment.

"Why did you bring me here?" Gary asked bluntly, and for the first time in the talk, the leprechaun looked directly at the young man. "I need to know," Gary explained.

Mickey's huge smile erupted. "I needed a body to carry around that armor," the leprechaun remarked coyly. "Couldn't be leaving it in a bush, and wouldn't want to sack it and lift it over me shoulder!"

"No," Gary said seriously, somberly. "It's more than that."

"Well, ye've fought the dragon once already ..."

"And more than Robert," Gary interrupted. "I might help against the dragon, but not enough to make it worth your while to pluck me from my own world."

"Ye don't want to be here?" Mickey asked evenly.

"I didn't say that," Gary quickly replied, refusing to let the tricky leprechaun deflect the conversation.

Mickey let out a deep sigh and clasped his hands behind his hairy head, the tip of his tam-o'-shanter dipping low over his sparkling gray eyes. He looked away from Gary and off into empty air. Gary waited patiently, understanding that the leprechaun had something to say, was just trying to weigh every word carefully.

"Ye know it's more than the dragon," Mickey began. He motioned for Gary to slow the horse, to put some ground between them and the others. "Ye knew last time ye came here that bad things been brewing between Connacht and Dilnamarra."

Gary nodded, remembering the confrontation between Baron Pwyll and Prince Geldion when they had first gone for the armor, a time that seemed like several years before to Gary (and from his perspective, it was!).

"And so goes Dilnamarra, so goes Braemar," Mickey went on. "And Drochit as well, and a dozen other hamlets that have so far resisted King Kinnemore's greedy hands."

"Kinnemore is Ceridwen's puppet," Gary remarked. He had heard this much before.

Mickey nodded. "Aye, and with the witch stuck to her island, and Robert flying free, she's been forced to play out her hand, to take the aces outa her sleeves," the leprechaun explained, in language that he knew Gary would fully comprehend. "That's why Ceridwen went for the armor, and went for Pwyll when the armor could not be found. And she'll be going for more before all's ended, lad, and so'll greedy Robert."

Gary sat back in his saddle. He had suspected those very things, of course, both from Robert's reported raids and the actions of stubborn Prince Geldion. But to hear Mickey put it so plainly nearly overwhelmed the young man. There was a tug-of-war going on here, between Ceridwen with her puppet king and the dragon, and all the commonfolk of Faerie, and the dwarfs and gnomes and Tylwyth Teg, and even the leprechauns, were caught squarely in the middle of it.

'That's why Geno's coming along," Mickey remarked, easily understanding the train of Gary's thoughts. "And Gerbil, too, though the little one hasn't figured it all out yet. Yerself played a part in bringing it to this point, lad, and so there might be things that only yerself can do. I thinked it proper and right that ye should get to help in finishing the tale."

Gary wasn't so sure that he liked where this particular tale might be headed, for his own sake and for the sake of Faerie's goodly folk, but he nodded his appreciation to Mickey, for he did indeed want, and need, to be an active participant in the writing of the tale.

The armored captain fidgeted impatiently atop his armored warhorse, looking to his lightly clothed servant and the great black bird perched upon the man's upheld arm. With a squawk to cut the morning air, the crow lifted off and flew away furiously, swiftly becoming a black speck among the ominous gray of the heavy sky.

"What did the damned bird say?" the captain demanded, obviously not thrilled in dealing with supernatural creatures. By the edicts of his own dear King, magic had been declared demonic and outlawed, and here they were, the army of Connacht, talking to birds!

"We must not be straight for Braemar," the servant informed the captain. "The outlaw Pwyll and his renegade band, along with the stolen artifacts, are making south along the mountain line. We need veer to the east and intercept them. King Kinnemore has declared that they must not make the Crahgs."

The large and straight-backed captain scowled. The outlaw Pwyll, he thought, and the notion didn't sit well with him. He and many of his soldiers had gone to Connacht from Dilnamarra, and they had never known Baron Pwyll, for all his bluster and love of comfort, to be anything short of generous.

But Kinnemore was King, this lowly captain's King, and to this man's sensibilities, that placed Kinnemore just one rung on the hierarchical ladder below God himself.

"What of Prince Geldion?" the captain asked.

"The Prince and his force are riding west of the outlaws," the servant explained. "We will join on the field."

The captain nodded and motioned for his sergeants to get the force moving once more. He didn't like dealing with supernatural creatures on a superstitious level, but in all practicality, the information being passed between the crows was proving invaluable to the mission, and thus, to the King.

"Friends of yours?" Gerbil asked Geno when the party had broken for a midday meal. The gnome motioned across the camp, beyond the tethered horses and the parked quadricycle, to the foothills, where a group of dwarfs fully arrayed for battle were marching in a single line along a narrow trail, just under the low-riding layer of thick gray clouds. Gary and Pwyll turned in unison with Geno to regard the dwarfs, noticed Kelsey crouching behind a stone, bow in hand. Mickey was nowhere to be seen, but Gary knew the leprechaun well enough to realize that he had certainly spotted the dwarfish marchers.

"Better go to them," Geno remarked dryly. "Before the elf gets himself clobbered." He jumped up and brushed the biscuit crumbs off him, then spotted a large one that had fallen to the ground and greedily scooped it up, along with a good measure of dirt, and stuffed it into his mouth. It struck Gary as more than a little curious that Geno did not seem the least bit surprised by the appearance of the dwarfs.

"Put the puny bow away!" they heard Geno rumble at Kelsey, and he kicked a stone the prone elf's way as he ambled past. He and the dwarfs exchanged signals of greeting, and then they all disappeared over a ridge.

Kelsey came back to the group, then, obviously fearful, and Mickey came in right behind him. "What is it?" the leprechaun asked as soon as he saw the elf's darting eyes.

"We may have just lost Geno's aid," Kelsey replied. "Or worse." The way he kept glancing about revealed to Gary, and to fearful Pwyll, that Kelsey almost expected the dwarfish band to attack. In an instant, the Baron's eyes went this way and that, more anxiously than Kelsey's.

"The dwarfs're not our enemies," Mickey offered calmly to Kelsey, and to nervous Pwyll. "Ye'll know that soon, me friend. The dwarfs're not our enemies, and Geno's not for leaving."

"What do you know?" Kelsey demanded.

Mickey nodded to the ridge, to where Geno had just reappeared, stomping his way back to the campsite. Kelsey nodded, too, calmed by the sight, and Pwyll let out a profound sigh of relief. Gary tossed the man a curious glance, and wondered, and not for the first time, how Pwyll had ever become a Baron.

"They are out searching for the dragon?" Kelsey reasoned hopefully.

"Dwarfs are too smart to go out looking for dragons," Geno grumbled back. "What about you?" Gary remarked, seeing the obvious fault in Geno's logic. Hadn't Geno, after all, already accompanied them once to Robert's lair?

"Shut your mouth!" came the predictable response.

Gary did.

"Then why?" Kelsey asked, and it seemed to Gary as if the elf already knew, had known all along.

"I learned it in Braemar," Geno replied. "From friends at the Snoozing Sprite."

"Learned what?" piped in Gerbil, stroking his orange-and-white beard and appearing more openly anxious than he had previously let on.

"Oh, it is King Kinnemore!" Baron Pwyll, knowledgeable in the politics of the land, wailed. He threw up his hands and verily danced in circles, crying that they were all doomed.

Geno nodded grimly. "A force rides from the southwest," he confirmed. "Five hundred strong by some reports, larger than that by others." Gary could understand that, knew how badly Ceridwen, and thus the King in Connacht, wanted to get her hands on the armor and spear of Cedric Donigarten. "Why are the dwarfs out?" he had to ask, somewhat confused by where Geno's folk fit into all of this. "Do they care that much for us? For him?" Gary added, pointing to Baron Pwyll.

"They care that little for Ceridwen's king puppet," Geno corrected. Gary looked to Mickey, who only shrugged and nodded, seeming not surprised in the least by the sudden turn of events. More than ever, Gary Leger understood why Mickey had brought him back to Faerie, and though he was terribly afraid, more than ever did Gary Leger appreciate the leprechaun's choice.

He had helped to bring things to this point, for better or for worse, as Mickey had said. He felt duty-bound now to finish the tale.

For better or for worse.

"Lord Duncan Drochit and Badenoch of Braemar should be told," Kelsey reasoned. "If so large a force is coming this way, then they'll likely not stop at catching Baron Pwyll and retrieving the artifacts."

Baron Pwyll let out another of his increasingly annoying whines.

Geno nodded grimly to Kelsey and pointed back to the north, where a cloud of dust was just beginning to climb into the midday air.

"The King has come!" Pwyll cried out. "Oh, woe ..." "Shut your mouth," Geno barked at him. "Badenoch and Drochit," Kelsey reasoned. "With the combined militia of the two towns."

"Still not a third of what Connacht has sent," Geno replied grimly.

"Riding plowhorses and carrying wood axes and hay forks."

Gary looked at his own armor, his own mighty weapon, and could well imagine what those poorly outfitted common farmers might soon meet in the field.

Baron Pwyll continued to wail; a shudder ran along Gary Leger's spine.