Scatterstone - Part 2
Feb. 2nd, 2013 04:11 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bloodyrosemccoyFirst, if you haven't read it yet, enjoy Part 1
I'd just like to say that this may be the first time the traditional Big Dumb Jock Rival has ever made fun of Our Hero for not being as big a reader as he himself is. Somebody ought to write that down.
Remember, kids, before inciting a mob, you should always make sure you have all the facts.
---
Each evening before sundown the Blue Star Caravan drew their wagons into a circle to make camp. The men slept in tents outside the circle; the women and the children camped within. Before the sun set the two camps intermingled; the women would cook and then leave the inner circle to eat dinner with their husbands, fathers, and brothers.
It was Nolly's cooking aptitude that warmed the Fyan to her. That first night they'd been suspicious and close. Every time she tried to join a group around one of the campfires for supper, they would make it clear that she was not welcome. One, a woman named Fazhula, had even suggested that Zeia had gone too far agreeing to let the hobbit join their caravan.
At this, Nolly folded her arms and stomped back to the inner circle to make her own supper with the little mess kit no hobbit would be caught traveling without. The smell of the resulting stew wafted through the camp, and more than a few heads turned to see where the rich, delicious scent was coming from. Nolly ate it with exaggerated relish, mopping up every bit of gravy with bread and smiling as though it was the finest meal she'd ever tasted.
The next night she used her sling to fell a partridge, and shared the resulting meal with some of the children who'd been longingly eyeing it. And the night after that, she took down a pair of birds, and there was even more stew to share. After that, she and her cooking were welcome at most campfires.
Evening became the time Nolly liked best. She'd sit with Ivan and Zeia, feet to the fire, exchanging stories and songs, just as she and her friends did back home. Zeia's teacher, Zorna, would sometimes bring out a curious stringed instrument, and they taught Nolly the words to some of their songs. Nolly told them a few of the escapades she and Largo had orchestrated--the time they collected thirty footballs and rolled them one by one onto the field during a match between two districts, the long campaign to convince Largo's sister Tink that her dolls were alive, and the Great Snowball War were particular favorites.
But the instant the last rays of the sun disappeared over the horizon, the camps separated. The peculiar rules of interaction between Fyan men and women decreed it was so, and Nolly had to abide by that law.
But she did not go all the way into the women's camp. Instead, she, was relegated to the place in-between, the circle of wagons itself, sleeping in the bunk wedged into Zeia and Ivan's wagon among the boxes of goods to trade. It must be impossibly cramped for a human, but Nolly found it nice and big for her needs.
The first few nights saw her content to fall onto that tiny bunk after finishing the evening meal. But the sounds of fiddle, flute, and drum that had danced through her dreams intrigued her, and as she got used to the long days on the road she resolved to stay awake enough to see what sort of festivities accompanied the music.
This proved more difficult than she'd first expected. The night she decided not to retire as usual, she did notice the women looking slightly restless. Shrugging, she approached a small group that was watching her covertly.
"Which of you plays that flute so well?" she asked. "I've got a whistle in my pack. Will you teach me? "
"Teach you?" cried Fazhula.
"Fazhula," snapped Yeleni. She had a pipe; she had smoked with Nolly last night. She turned now and cleared her throat. "Zeia?"
The younger woman turned from a conversation with Zorna. Seeing Nolly, she hurried over. "Did you need something?"
Nolly smiled uncertainly and shook her head. "I was just going to stay up with you all for a while. I've heard the music. I wanted to join in."
Her heart sank to see the look on Zeia's face. She'd learned to recognize it.
"No?" she asked.
The others shook their heads--Yeleni regretfully, Fazhula much more vigorously.
"I'm sorry," Zeia said.
Nolly took her offered hand. "But why?"
"I'm afraid this is not for outsiders." Zeia steered Nolly toward the wagon. The hobbit twisted to glance back. With the outsider leaving, the women had grown more purposeful, moving into a circle. Fazhula was drawing out a flute from her pack. The others were taking out the practice wands they always carried.
"But you let us watch the wand dances at the carnivals," she protested.
"But not the rehearsals. Those are in Real Time."
"Oh." Nolly was still getting used to the distinction the Fyan made between Carnival Time and what they called Real Time. Zeia, Ivan, and a few of the others had tried to explain it to her, but the concept was difficult to grasp, so she had to rely on them to steer her over the pitfalls one at a time.
But as she crawled into the bed and heard the music begin, it only made her more curious.
After trying unsuccessfully to fall asleep, she finally gave up. There was a curtain covering the door's tiny window. Fetching a box, she climbed up to put her eye to a tiny hole in it.
The Fyan women were dancing.
They didn't wear the flashing, colorful costumes she knew from Carnival Time, nor did they wield their trademark jeweled dancing wands. They used wooden batons with cord-wrapped ends--unassuming practice items. But as they swirled through their complex choreography, the plain batons displayed an elegance of their own. And without all the glitter of the show pieces, without the ringing of the tiny bells they wore around waist and ankles, without the flickering silks, Nolly began to see a pattern in the dance. Something about it teased her mind, fluttering just out of reach.
There seemed to be far more dancers than the performers she'd seen at the carnival, too. Nearly everyone participated; traders and drivers produced their own plain batons to join in. The little girls had lighter-colored batons of their own to practice with. Even Zeia, an herbalist's apprentice rather than a dancer, joined, her face set into solemn meditation. Only the musicians stayed along the side.
Nolly watched until her feet cramped from standing on tiptoes. Finally, the dancers slowed and began to drift away, to lie in bedrolls or return to tents. To her surprise, a few of them moved toward the wagon circle to enter their own vehicles, or to slip into tents in the no-man's land in between men's and women's camps. It was puzzling until she saw a very unfeminine hand holding one of the tent-flaps open for Yeleni.
Ah, she thought. So that's where the married couples go. She'd wondered about that.
The music was still playing quietly for the last few dancers. Nolly slipped back into bed.
The dance moved through her dreams; that strange pattern called to her. She followed it, trying to mimic the movements with her own imaginary wands. But her dreams blurred, and a moment later she realized she was in the common room of the Toadstool, and the dance had become a partner dance.
For a partner dance, she needed a partner. Fortunately, her dream supplied a good one.
"Hullo, Largo," she said.
Largo stumbled. The abstracted look evaporated from his face.
"Nolly!" He blinked. "What--oh. It's a dream."
Nolly laughed. "Well, of course it is!"
"Well, then." He grinned. "Hullo, Nolly! I've missed you."
A sudden spasm of homesickness surprised her. "Oh, I miss you, too!" Impulsively she caught his elbows. She'd hugged him before, but even in her own dreams she was newly shy.
He looked surprised and pleased. "When are you coming back?"
The vague guilt that had been floating about her like a fog since beginning this venture suddenly coalesced on him. For a moment she looked at him, tongue-tied.
Noticing her look, Largo stopped dancing completely. "What is it?"
"I'm sorry," she said, her voice coming out embarrassingly tentative. "I think that may be a while."
The tavern was fading around them. They stood together in an amber dreamscape, the only two people in the universe.
Largo shook his head, dismayed. "I don't understand."
Now he was fading. She had to tell him quickly.
"I'm not in Weston," she burst out before she could stop herself. "I'm with the Fyan. I'm off to their winterfair."
He was almost gone now, wavering like a last wisp of ghost. When he spoke, she couldn't quite make out what he said.
"I will come back!" She fought to hold him before her. "I will! But I just had to ... get away."
Her eyes opened. A sliver of moonlight peeked through the hole in the wagon curtain. Largo was gone.
"I'm sorry," she finished.
She rolled over, clutching a pillow to her and gazing at the wood of the wagon wall.
"What are you doing, Nolly Fine?" she whispered. "Do you really want to see the world this way?"
Yes, her own voice answered. You've wanted this ever since the storyteller described the Sea. Water that spreads to the horizon like a great plain, fish the size of bulls, ships that billow with white sails like thunderheads, pearls and something called sea foam and great cresting green waves. Since he described the city of Chadrafun with its golden domes, mosaic fountains, and gardens of gigantic flowers.
She just had never accounted for the parts of the story where the traveler might long for her own familiar bed and some of her mother's griddle cakes.
The music had faded outside. It could not carry her back to her dreams. So, falling back on a trick she'd used since she was a child, she closed her eyes and tried to imagine the sound of the sea. Soon I'll know what it really sounds like, she thought, drifting on imagined waves. Soon.
#
As dreams went, it hadn't been very dreamlike. Largo had never had a dream acknowledge that it was a dream before, for one thing. And it seemed to follow a surprisingly clear line of reason. He didn't lose his pants, none of his teeth fell out, and nobody thrust a pen at him screaming that the world would end unless he could write a five-paragraph essay arguing in favor of postponing the apocalypse, and spelling and penmanship counted--none of his usual nightmares applied. And since Nolly didn't lose any of her clothes, it wasn’t one of his better dreams, either.
Perhaps that undreamish quality was why what she'd said at the end--something about being with the Fyan and needing to get away--unsettled him so deeply. Usually when his mother sent him into town to pick up something from his father's general store he enjoyed the walk. Today even the promise that she would bake a pie if he fetched some sugar wasn't enough to hold his attention, and he barely noticed the crisp breeze or the slight gilding on the aspens and birches. His attention was turned inward to worry at the vague emotions still with him.
It was enough that, when he saw Derric Goodhollow's cart parked in front of the Celadon Toadstool, his steps slowed. Derric was from Weston. He'd have already been in Blackstone's General Store to trade goods and gossip, and was probably relaxing with a half-pint at the inn now.
The prospect of news of Nolly nearly pulled him to the inn first, but the prospect of pie had come first. He'd pick up the sugar, then he could stop in at the Toadstool and--
The round windows of the store were dark. Puzzled, Largo tried the door. Locked.
Why would his dad close this early?
He stood dithering for a moment. He could let himself in with his own key and get what he needed, but the question of just why that was necessary was another matter.
It shouldn't have been a bad sign. A closed shop could mean any number of things. There was no reason for him to suddenly feel as though he'd plunged back into a vaguely sinister dream.
He spun toward the inn again, half-wanting to charge inside and ask if anyone'd seen his dad. But Glodho was there, hands on his hips as he eyed the cart.
Largo tried to stroll past him without catching his eye. He might as well have tried to walk on water--Glodho had a talent for sensing people who didn't want to talk.
He swung around easily. A second's calculation passed over his face--then he gave Largo his customary lazy smile.
"Hey, Largo." He hooked a thumb back at the cart. "This fella's from Weston, right?"
"So he is," Largo said.
"Good." Glodho crossed his arms thoughtfully. "Maybe I can send my invitation with him." His grin widened. "Not that I figure Nolly needs reminding. She'll be back in time for my birthday. Knows I've got something to ask her. Practically said she'd accept."
"Accept the party invitation? Who'd turn down a party?" Largo knew that wasn't what he meant--he'd certainly dropped enough smug hints over the past few days. But Largo also knew Nolly.
It occurred to him that he was more unnerved by a dreamed suggestion that Nolly had gone swanning off with heathen bigfolk than by Glodho's broad implications that she would agree to be Mistress Glodho Brockwood. The thought threatened to crack a smile out of him even as Glodho snorted.
"You'll see," he said. "You're invited too, you know. I'd send you an invitation, but that's just a waste of ink and paper, isn't it?"
"I find it doesn't slow me down much," Largo said. He couldn't resist adding, "Usually Nolly reads me anything important."
"And what would you boys know about Nolly?"
Glodho bit back his retort. Linus Blackstone was in the doorway of the Toadstool. His brow was furrowed. He was absently toying with the buttons on his vest, but his eyes were sharply focused on Largo.
Largo's heart sputtered. "What's the matter, Dad?"
"Come inside," Linus said.
The tavern was crowded, but the usual merry banter and gossip was absent. Everyone was seated about the big central table, talking softly and urgently. Largo saw Derric among them, tracing the worn grain on the tabletop, his half-pint forgotten at his elbow.
"What is this?" Glodho demanded.
"Derric brought us some bad news," Linus said. "Seems Nolly Fine never made it to Weston."
#
The family would have to go without pie. There were things to be done at the Toadstool, like answering questions--upon learning that his daughter had vanished, Alder Fine went straight to Largo for answers. But Largo couldn't give him any--all he had to go on was a dreamed conversation with her, after all. When it became clear that he had little information to offer, he was left to stew over a stein as the others pieced together the story of her disappearance.
Fractured conversations jangled around him. Some were calling for the formation of a search party--she might have gotten lost. Raolo Fine was loudly declaring a one-hobbit war on the mountain trolls for stealing his sister. A few of the ones inclined to listen to him were trying to recall whether troll victims taken during the waxing gibbous moon were enslaved or eaten, and thus how much of an effort should be made to look for her. But it was Glodho who suggested the Fyan.
"I've heard stories," he said loudly. Something wounded and furious blazed in his eyes. His large fist was wrapped incongruously around a slender bundle he'd had stashed in his bag. "They try to pass for simple traders, and they fool even the best among villages, but they really do dark arts, and they do it at terrible prices. I didn't believe it before, but now I do--it's all black magic that demands blood and sacrifice and the defiling of maidens! And where do you think they get the maidens?"
Largo sat up straighter. He hadn't thought of that. He wouldn't put it past Nolly to join a Fyan caravan willingly. But--unwillingly? She had said something in his dream about getting away.
He didn't even notice that he'd stopped trying to convince himself that his dream wasn't real.
"We have to go after her," he said.
He'd spoken into a dramatic pause in Glodho's speech. Heads turned toward him.
"And so we shall!"
Raolo leaped onto a chair. "We'll take the battle to the trolls. The Fyan have never given us such grief before, but the trolls--well, we know what they're like." He raised a fist. "They've come too close to our borders for the last time. Round up the patrolmen and the hunters! We shall go tonight! We'll rescue my sister and drive them back to their mountains where they belong!"
A cheer rose. Glodho's voice was loudest--he looked obscurely relieved. He stashed the bundle away again.
"No!" cried Largo. "You'll find no trolls! They didn't take her! You must go south!"
The crowd was eager to start. Already some were rushing off to find weapons, or at least farm tools with pointy bits. Raolo was calling for a map. Glodho was hollering for some more beer to fortify the brave search party.
"Wait!" Largo cried.
A hand fell on his shoulder.
"Largo," said Linus solemnly. "I know you must be worried about her. But the patrolmen are trained for this sort of thing, and the hunters know their weapons. They'll bring her back. I know it's difficult, but we'll just have to wait till they do."
Largo stared at him, uncertain how to answer. He couldn't deny that he'd be less than useful fighting trolls--he could likely be bested by a reasonably ferocious rooster. But then he'd be no use against the Fyan, either--and the ones who might be able to were boldly going off in the wrong direction!
All he could do was hope Glodho was wrong, and that Nolly was in no danger.
Linus read only the distress on his son's face. He elected to fix it in true hobbit fashion.
"Come on," he said. "If I'm not mistaken, your mother sent you down here to fetch something. Let's stop by the store and get it. I'm sure she means to make something delicious, and good food makes everything better."
Largo hoped he was right.
#
---
On to Part 3!
I'd just like to say that this may be the first time the traditional Big Dumb Jock Rival has ever made fun of Our Hero for not being as big a reader as he himself is. Somebody ought to write that down.
Remember, kids, before inciting a mob, you should always make sure you have all the facts.
---
Each evening before sundown the Blue Star Caravan drew their wagons into a circle to make camp. The men slept in tents outside the circle; the women and the children camped within. Before the sun set the two camps intermingled; the women would cook and then leave the inner circle to eat dinner with their husbands, fathers, and brothers.
It was Nolly's cooking aptitude that warmed the Fyan to her. That first night they'd been suspicious and close. Every time she tried to join a group around one of the campfires for supper, they would make it clear that she was not welcome. One, a woman named Fazhula, had even suggested that Zeia had gone too far agreeing to let the hobbit join their caravan.
At this, Nolly folded her arms and stomped back to the inner circle to make her own supper with the little mess kit no hobbit would be caught traveling without. The smell of the resulting stew wafted through the camp, and more than a few heads turned to see where the rich, delicious scent was coming from. Nolly ate it with exaggerated relish, mopping up every bit of gravy with bread and smiling as though it was the finest meal she'd ever tasted.
The next night she used her sling to fell a partridge, and shared the resulting meal with some of the children who'd been longingly eyeing it. And the night after that, she took down a pair of birds, and there was even more stew to share. After that, she and her cooking were welcome at most campfires.
Evening became the time Nolly liked best. She'd sit with Ivan and Zeia, feet to the fire, exchanging stories and songs, just as she and her friends did back home. Zeia's teacher, Zorna, would sometimes bring out a curious stringed instrument, and they taught Nolly the words to some of their songs. Nolly told them a few of the escapades she and Largo had orchestrated--the time they collected thirty footballs and rolled them one by one onto the field during a match between two districts, the long campaign to convince Largo's sister Tink that her dolls were alive, and the Great Snowball War were particular favorites.
But the instant the last rays of the sun disappeared over the horizon, the camps separated. The peculiar rules of interaction between Fyan men and women decreed it was so, and Nolly had to abide by that law.
But she did not go all the way into the women's camp. Instead, she, was relegated to the place in-between, the circle of wagons itself, sleeping in the bunk wedged into Zeia and Ivan's wagon among the boxes of goods to trade. It must be impossibly cramped for a human, but Nolly found it nice and big for her needs.
The first few nights saw her content to fall onto that tiny bunk after finishing the evening meal. But the sounds of fiddle, flute, and drum that had danced through her dreams intrigued her, and as she got used to the long days on the road she resolved to stay awake enough to see what sort of festivities accompanied the music.
This proved more difficult than she'd first expected. The night she decided not to retire as usual, she did notice the women looking slightly restless. Shrugging, she approached a small group that was watching her covertly.
"Which of you plays that flute so well?" she asked. "I've got a whistle in my pack. Will you teach me? "
"Teach you?" cried Fazhula.
"Fazhula," snapped Yeleni. She had a pipe; she had smoked with Nolly last night. She turned now and cleared her throat. "Zeia?"
The younger woman turned from a conversation with Zorna. Seeing Nolly, she hurried over. "Did you need something?"
Nolly smiled uncertainly and shook her head. "I was just going to stay up with you all for a while. I've heard the music. I wanted to join in."
Her heart sank to see the look on Zeia's face. She'd learned to recognize it.
"No?" she asked.
The others shook their heads--Yeleni regretfully, Fazhula much more vigorously.
"I'm sorry," Zeia said.
Nolly took her offered hand. "But why?"
"I'm afraid this is not for outsiders." Zeia steered Nolly toward the wagon. The hobbit twisted to glance back. With the outsider leaving, the women had grown more purposeful, moving into a circle. Fazhula was drawing out a flute from her pack. The others were taking out the practice wands they always carried.
"But you let us watch the wand dances at the carnivals," she protested.
"But not the rehearsals. Those are in Real Time."
"Oh." Nolly was still getting used to the distinction the Fyan made between Carnival Time and what they called Real Time. Zeia, Ivan, and a few of the others had tried to explain it to her, but the concept was difficult to grasp, so she had to rely on them to steer her over the pitfalls one at a time.
But as she crawled into the bed and heard the music begin, it only made her more curious.
After trying unsuccessfully to fall asleep, she finally gave up. There was a curtain covering the door's tiny window. Fetching a box, she climbed up to put her eye to a tiny hole in it.
The Fyan women were dancing.
They didn't wear the flashing, colorful costumes she knew from Carnival Time, nor did they wield their trademark jeweled dancing wands. They used wooden batons with cord-wrapped ends--unassuming practice items. But as they swirled through their complex choreography, the plain batons displayed an elegance of their own. And without all the glitter of the show pieces, without the ringing of the tiny bells they wore around waist and ankles, without the flickering silks, Nolly began to see a pattern in the dance. Something about it teased her mind, fluttering just out of reach.
There seemed to be far more dancers than the performers she'd seen at the carnival, too. Nearly everyone participated; traders and drivers produced their own plain batons to join in. The little girls had lighter-colored batons of their own to practice with. Even Zeia, an herbalist's apprentice rather than a dancer, joined, her face set into solemn meditation. Only the musicians stayed along the side.
Nolly watched until her feet cramped from standing on tiptoes. Finally, the dancers slowed and began to drift away, to lie in bedrolls or return to tents. To her surprise, a few of them moved toward the wagon circle to enter their own vehicles, or to slip into tents in the no-man's land in between men's and women's camps. It was puzzling until she saw a very unfeminine hand holding one of the tent-flaps open for Yeleni.
Ah, she thought. So that's where the married couples go. She'd wondered about that.
The music was still playing quietly for the last few dancers. Nolly slipped back into bed.
The dance moved through her dreams; that strange pattern called to her. She followed it, trying to mimic the movements with her own imaginary wands. But her dreams blurred, and a moment later she realized she was in the common room of the Toadstool, and the dance had become a partner dance.
For a partner dance, she needed a partner. Fortunately, her dream supplied a good one.
"Hullo, Largo," she said.
Largo stumbled. The abstracted look evaporated from his face.
"Nolly!" He blinked. "What--oh. It's a dream."
Nolly laughed. "Well, of course it is!"
"Well, then." He grinned. "Hullo, Nolly! I've missed you."
A sudden spasm of homesickness surprised her. "Oh, I miss you, too!" Impulsively she caught his elbows. She'd hugged him before, but even in her own dreams she was newly shy.
He looked surprised and pleased. "When are you coming back?"
The vague guilt that had been floating about her like a fog since beginning this venture suddenly coalesced on him. For a moment she looked at him, tongue-tied.
Noticing her look, Largo stopped dancing completely. "What is it?"
"I'm sorry," she said, her voice coming out embarrassingly tentative. "I think that may be a while."
The tavern was fading around them. They stood together in an amber dreamscape, the only two people in the universe.
Largo shook his head, dismayed. "I don't understand."
Now he was fading. She had to tell him quickly.
"I'm not in Weston," she burst out before she could stop herself. "I'm with the Fyan. I'm off to their winterfair."
He was almost gone now, wavering like a last wisp of ghost. When he spoke, she couldn't quite make out what he said.
"I will come back!" She fought to hold him before her. "I will! But I just had to ... get away."
Her eyes opened. A sliver of moonlight peeked through the hole in the wagon curtain. Largo was gone.
"I'm sorry," she finished.
She rolled over, clutching a pillow to her and gazing at the wood of the wagon wall.
"What are you doing, Nolly Fine?" she whispered. "Do you really want to see the world this way?"
Yes, her own voice answered. You've wanted this ever since the storyteller described the Sea. Water that spreads to the horizon like a great plain, fish the size of bulls, ships that billow with white sails like thunderheads, pearls and something called sea foam and great cresting green waves. Since he described the city of Chadrafun with its golden domes, mosaic fountains, and gardens of gigantic flowers.
She just had never accounted for the parts of the story where the traveler might long for her own familiar bed and some of her mother's griddle cakes.
The music had faded outside. It could not carry her back to her dreams. So, falling back on a trick she'd used since she was a child, she closed her eyes and tried to imagine the sound of the sea. Soon I'll know what it really sounds like, she thought, drifting on imagined waves. Soon.
#
As dreams went, it hadn't been very dreamlike. Largo had never had a dream acknowledge that it was a dream before, for one thing. And it seemed to follow a surprisingly clear line of reason. He didn't lose his pants, none of his teeth fell out, and nobody thrust a pen at him screaming that the world would end unless he could write a five-paragraph essay arguing in favor of postponing the apocalypse, and spelling and penmanship counted--none of his usual nightmares applied. And since Nolly didn't lose any of her clothes, it wasn’t one of his better dreams, either.
Perhaps that undreamish quality was why what she'd said at the end--something about being with the Fyan and needing to get away--unsettled him so deeply. Usually when his mother sent him into town to pick up something from his father's general store he enjoyed the walk. Today even the promise that she would bake a pie if he fetched some sugar wasn't enough to hold his attention, and he barely noticed the crisp breeze or the slight gilding on the aspens and birches. His attention was turned inward to worry at the vague emotions still with him.
It was enough that, when he saw Derric Goodhollow's cart parked in front of the Celadon Toadstool, his steps slowed. Derric was from Weston. He'd have already been in Blackstone's General Store to trade goods and gossip, and was probably relaxing with a half-pint at the inn now.
The prospect of news of Nolly nearly pulled him to the inn first, but the prospect of pie had come first. He'd pick up the sugar, then he could stop in at the Toadstool and--
The round windows of the store were dark. Puzzled, Largo tried the door. Locked.
Why would his dad close this early?
He stood dithering for a moment. He could let himself in with his own key and get what he needed, but the question of just why that was necessary was another matter.
It shouldn't have been a bad sign. A closed shop could mean any number of things. There was no reason for him to suddenly feel as though he'd plunged back into a vaguely sinister dream.
He spun toward the inn again, half-wanting to charge inside and ask if anyone'd seen his dad. But Glodho was there, hands on his hips as he eyed the cart.
Largo tried to stroll past him without catching his eye. He might as well have tried to walk on water--Glodho had a talent for sensing people who didn't want to talk.
He swung around easily. A second's calculation passed over his face--then he gave Largo his customary lazy smile.
"Hey, Largo." He hooked a thumb back at the cart. "This fella's from Weston, right?"
"So he is," Largo said.
"Good." Glodho crossed his arms thoughtfully. "Maybe I can send my invitation with him." His grin widened. "Not that I figure Nolly needs reminding. She'll be back in time for my birthday. Knows I've got something to ask her. Practically said she'd accept."
"Accept the party invitation? Who'd turn down a party?" Largo knew that wasn't what he meant--he'd certainly dropped enough smug hints over the past few days. But Largo also knew Nolly.
It occurred to him that he was more unnerved by a dreamed suggestion that Nolly had gone swanning off with heathen bigfolk than by Glodho's broad implications that she would agree to be Mistress Glodho Brockwood. The thought threatened to crack a smile out of him even as Glodho snorted.
"You'll see," he said. "You're invited too, you know. I'd send you an invitation, but that's just a waste of ink and paper, isn't it?"
"I find it doesn't slow me down much," Largo said. He couldn't resist adding, "Usually Nolly reads me anything important."
"And what would you boys know about Nolly?"
Glodho bit back his retort. Linus Blackstone was in the doorway of the Toadstool. His brow was furrowed. He was absently toying with the buttons on his vest, but his eyes were sharply focused on Largo.
Largo's heart sputtered. "What's the matter, Dad?"
"Come inside," Linus said.
The tavern was crowded, but the usual merry banter and gossip was absent. Everyone was seated about the big central table, talking softly and urgently. Largo saw Derric among them, tracing the worn grain on the tabletop, his half-pint forgotten at his elbow.
"What is this?" Glodho demanded.
"Derric brought us some bad news," Linus said. "Seems Nolly Fine never made it to Weston."
#
The family would have to go without pie. There were things to be done at the Toadstool, like answering questions--upon learning that his daughter had vanished, Alder Fine went straight to Largo for answers. But Largo couldn't give him any--all he had to go on was a dreamed conversation with her, after all. When it became clear that he had little information to offer, he was left to stew over a stein as the others pieced together the story of her disappearance.
Fractured conversations jangled around him. Some were calling for the formation of a search party--she might have gotten lost. Raolo Fine was loudly declaring a one-hobbit war on the mountain trolls for stealing his sister. A few of the ones inclined to listen to him were trying to recall whether troll victims taken during the waxing gibbous moon were enslaved or eaten, and thus how much of an effort should be made to look for her. But it was Glodho who suggested the Fyan.
"I've heard stories," he said loudly. Something wounded and furious blazed in his eyes. His large fist was wrapped incongruously around a slender bundle he'd had stashed in his bag. "They try to pass for simple traders, and they fool even the best among villages, but they really do dark arts, and they do it at terrible prices. I didn't believe it before, but now I do--it's all black magic that demands blood and sacrifice and the defiling of maidens! And where do you think they get the maidens?"
Largo sat up straighter. He hadn't thought of that. He wouldn't put it past Nolly to join a Fyan caravan willingly. But--unwillingly? She had said something in his dream about getting away.
He didn't even notice that he'd stopped trying to convince himself that his dream wasn't real.
"We have to go after her," he said.
He'd spoken into a dramatic pause in Glodho's speech. Heads turned toward him.
"And so we shall!"
Raolo leaped onto a chair. "We'll take the battle to the trolls. The Fyan have never given us such grief before, but the trolls--well, we know what they're like." He raised a fist. "They've come too close to our borders for the last time. Round up the patrolmen and the hunters! We shall go tonight! We'll rescue my sister and drive them back to their mountains where they belong!"
A cheer rose. Glodho's voice was loudest--he looked obscurely relieved. He stashed the bundle away again.
"No!" cried Largo. "You'll find no trolls! They didn't take her! You must go south!"
The crowd was eager to start. Already some were rushing off to find weapons, or at least farm tools with pointy bits. Raolo was calling for a map. Glodho was hollering for some more beer to fortify the brave search party.
"Wait!" Largo cried.
A hand fell on his shoulder.
"Largo," said Linus solemnly. "I know you must be worried about her. But the patrolmen are trained for this sort of thing, and the hunters know their weapons. They'll bring her back. I know it's difficult, but we'll just have to wait till they do."
Largo stared at him, uncertain how to answer. He couldn't deny that he'd be less than useful fighting trolls--he could likely be bested by a reasonably ferocious rooster. But then he'd be no use against the Fyan, either--and the ones who might be able to were boldly going off in the wrong direction!
All he could do was hope Glodho was wrong, and that Nolly was in no danger.
Linus read only the distress on his son's face. He elected to fix it in true hobbit fashion.
"Come on," he said. "If I'm not mistaken, your mother sent you down here to fetch something. Let's stop by the store and get it. I'm sure she means to make something delicious, and good food makes everything better."
Largo hoped he was right.
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On to Part 3!
