Dwalin and the Pearl

Chapter 2

"Brother," Nori flung the word over his shoulder as he hurried over to a grubby little dwarf. He shook his head disapprovingly and began unthreading the chain that bound them all together by passing through the ring on a leather belt they each wore. "Crazy kid. Shouldn't leave home. Where's Dori?"

The brother, who looked a mere stripling, turned red in the face and pushed his brother's hands away. "I don't need your help, Nori. I could have gotten myself free. I was - I was biding my time to make a run for it."

Curse these cursed bastards, they couldn't be content with just stealing some gold. They had to start into the slaving business, too. It was a good thing they were dead, because I was tempted to kill them all over again.

"Let him help you, lad," I ordered. "Nobody enslaves a dwarf."

The weedy youngster glared at me. "I'm not a slave, I'm a worker! I signed a contract, see?" He plunged his hand into a pocket and pulled out a sheaf of papers, a broken quill pen, and a small book. He selected one of the documents and waved it at me.

I raised a skeptical eyebrow. What with my arms being full of woman, I couldn't take a look at the contract. I didn't need to. Promises on paper are only as good as the people who sign their names to them, and there was nothing good about these men. Honest merchants don't put chains on the hired help. Clearly, Nori's little brother should have stayed at home.

The lad rounded upon his brother. "And I could so get free any time I wanted, Nori. I'm not as dumb as you think. See?" He produced a small, needle-like tool from another pocket.

The woman jerked her head up from my shoulder. "What's that?" she asked Ori.

"Nori's lock-pick," said the lad.

"Not mine," Nori said quickly. "Never saw it before. Nope."

"Can you use it to undo these shackles?" She moved her legs, which almost made me drop her. I growled. Carrying her wasn't so bad, but I couldn't hold her if she wriggled around.

"I don't know how to use it," Ori confessed with a blush. He looked at her, all pink and gold, and then at me. "Are you his wife?"

Shock almost made me drop her again. She hung on tight, locking her arms around my neck, pressing so hard against me that I could smell the scent of her flesh, spicy and musky. I spluttered, "No, she's not!"

She growled at me, then smiled at the lad. "Certainly not, Ori-it is Ori, isn't it? It's just that I'm chained and can't move or stand without help. If you could unlock the fetters, I wouldn't need to be carried."

"Well-" Ori said doubtfully.

Impatiently, she stuck out one hand for the lock pick. "Give it to me."

He did. Bossiness seemed to work for her, I reflected sourly. She probably had had a lot of practice at it.

Riki bustled up with a blanket. "Best I could do on short notice, Dwalin."

"Fine. Spread it out over there. Nori, unshackle her." I set her down on the blanket, and Nori knelt in front of her to work on the padlock securing her ankles. I kept an eye on him, just to make sure he didn't try anything funny. Not that there was anything he could have done, but it seemed safer to stick close.

I shouted a few orders to the other members of the team. The slaves (or employees with contracts, or however they saw themselves) had to be released and fed, their packs gone through, the dead bodies moved off the road, and some sort of arrangements for the night had to be made.

"Are you Dwalin? Dwalin son of Fundin? I've read about you," young Ori said excitedly.

"Read about me?" I echoed. "Who the hell would write about me?"

"The history of the Battle of Azanulbizar, written in the year T.A. 2933 by the scholar Balder of the House of Durin, is generally held to be the most accurate report of that battle to date," Ori said in a lecturing tone. "Is it true that-"

"Yeah, yeah, if Balder wrote it, it's Mahal's honest truth," I said, cutting him short. These scholars will talk your ear off if you give them a chance, and your only hope is to shut them up as quickly as possible.

Now that Ori had reminded me, I guess someone had written about me. Balder pestered me for months about his history-if he wasn't telling me about the heroic deeds of some dwarf or other at that hellish battle, he was asking me what deeds I'd done. Damned if I can remember much except the fact that I'd lived through it, which was probably a mistake anyway. But I'd been young, and hadn't had sense enough to die heroically when I had the chance.

The woman was looking at me thoughtfully. "So you're Dwalin."

I couldn't think of a snappy comeback to that one, so I didn't even try. By that time, Nori had managed to free the woman's legs and was working on one wrist. Her ankles were red and raw from the shackles. Seeing the wounds, Riki had clucked his tongue and gone off to find some kind of liniment. It might be meant for animals, but it was the best we had to offer. Too bad we didn't have my cousin Oin the physician with us, but he hardly ever left the Blue Mountains.

The two non-dwarf bearers in the caravan turned out to be Dunlendings who just wanted to return to their homes, so we gave them water and a small amount of food before they left. Riki and some of the others had sorted out the packs and other valuables, and had managed to unearth a heavy woolen robe for the woman to wear. No decent boots, though. Her feet were too small.

The eager young Ori had finally given up on getting me to talk history with him, and had begun to watch his older brother Nori manipulate the lock pick. Evidently we had a master thief in our midst. I didn't know whether to be happy about that or not.

"Are you sure you aren't married to Dwalin, ma'am?" Ori asked her. "You go together so well, you know-like, he's Dvalin and you're the sun."

I didn't much like the sound of this conversation. "What's that, now?"

But the woman didn't seem to mind. She laughed and patted Ori's arm, which made the chain on her still-shackled wrist jingle a bit. "Have you been drinking poetic mead, Ori? That's quite an imagination you've got there. But no, Dwalin and I are not married, we're not going to get married, and I certainly refuse to be the sun. At least not in that particular story."

"But your hair is golden like the sun," the youngster said. "And you looked like-"

"Ah ha ha ha ha ha," she interrupted him. She bared her teeth in a ferocious grin. "No."

"Oh." Ori looked abashed.

I had a feeling it was going to be a long trip to Bree.