Dwalin and the Pearl

Chapter 1

 “You will do this, Dwalin,” said Aunt Nott firmly. She glared at me, her white eyebrows bristling.

 When Aunt Nott glares at you, and you are her least-favorite nephew (which I was, at that particular moment in time), it’s certain you’ll soon find yourself doing whatever she wants. No ifs, ands or buts. So I held my tongue and nodded.

 Aunt Nott is the head of our household in the Blue Mountains. It’s a big household, full to bursting with proud sons, grandsons, nephews and cousins of the House of Durin, and she rules us all with an iron skillet and a fist that is at least as hard. I’ll tell you a secret: Dwarves may bow to their king, but we all know where the real power lies under the mountain.

 I didn’t want to leave the Blue Mountains. I was happy in Aunt Nott’s bachelor quarters, drinking with my cousins and pursuing some quiet amusements in the off hours. Unfortunately, our most recent amusement had not been quiet enough. Someone had complained about it to Aunt Nott, and although several participants had gotten off lightly (or eluded capture by the enraged dwarves who were the butt of that particular joke), she decided to make an example of me.

 “A considerable quantity of gold was stolen from our treasury in Dunland. My intelligence sources say the thieves plan to move it north through Eriador to Bree. You will intercept the caravan and retrieve our gold, then bring it to me at Bree.”

 There was no sense in asking how Aunt Nott knew all this. She had her ways. The only mystery was how the gold had come to be stolen in the first place. However, since it wasn’t my gold and (considering Aunt Nott’s mood) wouldn’t ever be my gold, I wasn’t even tempted to ask.

 “If they’re going to Bree, why not let them bring it all the way, and reclaim it there?” It was a sensible question, I thought. Why risk a pitched battle on the caravan route, when a little subtle skullduggery in town would get us the gold with less trouble? In that case, of course, I would be off the hook. I’m not known for my stealthy qualities.

Aunt Nott brought her fist down on the solid oak table with a crash. “Because I don’t want any trouble with Men! The last thing I want is rumors of dwarven gold floating around Bree. Get the treasure back before it gets to a town where the walls have ears and tongues run on wheels.”

“There will still be rumors, if it’s known that a caravan has set out—“

“Just do it, Dwalin.”

 So that’s how I ended up a few days later in the wilds of Dunland, a Mahal-forsaken place if ever there was one, freezing my hindquarters off and skulking behind a large boulder as a caravan with stolen gold was about to pass by. If you’ve never been there, Dunland is a rock-strewn and mostly uninhabited plain covered with rough dun-colored grass, pale and yellow-brown as far as the eye can see. Get it? Dun. Land. Other than the grass, the only vegetation is a species of thorn bush with wicked, inch-long thorns. Not exactly the vacation spot of the Valar.

 The caravan hove into view, led by two Men on horseback. Behind them, a pair of oxen pulled a closed cart like a windowless wooden box set on wheels. Then came three pack-mules followed by a half dozen shambling figures, laden as heavily as the animals.

 The pack train was escorted by an armed guard, a Dunlending with an evil squint and several well-polished swords thrust into his waist sash. A weakness, I was happy to note—it takes a lot of vanity or carelessness to carry swords around unsheathed. While his weapons were too shiny-looking for negligence, it seemed very likely that here was a vain man. Vain men are usually too sure of their own abilities, which means they aren’t on the alert for danger. That meant Plan A: Take him by surprise.

 I gave a low whistle, like a thrush—well, like a bird, anyway—to let the team know that the fun was about to begin.

 My team was hiding behind the rocks that reared up on either side of the caravan route. The road ran through a natural arrangement of boulders that formed a kind of gully—not high enough to constitute a canyon, you understand, but enough to serve as a trap for an unwary collection of mules and carts.