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Old 10-07-2003, 01:25 PM   #83
Ealasaide
Shadow of Tyrn Gorthad
 
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Sting

Kaldir

"Like I said, I got family visiting," said Barrold warily. "What it to you?"

"What's it to me?" echoed Kaldir mildly. "Nothing at all." His pale blue eyes watched Ferney's every gesture. The man seemed nervous, not skittish per se, just edgy or rather more edgy than usual. "They boss you around then, do they?" he asked.

"Who?" asked Barrold. "My family? Yeah. Always telling me what to do." He cast a sideways glance at the bounty hunter. "Be glad when they're gone," he muttered and spat again, this time at a flat stone in the path. He missed.

"How glad?" asked Kaldir, his voice taking on a slightly harder edge.

Barrold hesitated again. His eyes narrowed shrewdly. To Kaldir, he seemed to be mentally weighing his options. For a fleeting instant, Kaldir thought the man might actually sell Naiore out, but the moment passed. Barrold guffawed loudly.

"I thought you weren't interested in my family!" he snorted. "What's they ever done to you?"

More than you could even imagine, thought Kaldir to himself, but he said nothing. The eyelashes of his left eye flickered slightly as a stab of remembered pain passed through his shattered cheekbone. He let a grim smile touch the unscarred side of his face. From the corner of his eye, he caught a small shadow moving behind them to the side of the road. He had noticed it once before as he was leaving Bree, but had written it off as probably nothing more than a stray dog. But the movement now seemed intentionally stealthy. It would bear watching. Whoever it was, he was too small to be anything other than a hobbit or a child.

"You know your friends are wondering why you cut them out," Kaldir said to Barrold after a moment, changing the subject. It wouldn't do to have the shadow that followed them knowing too much about his business. For all he knew, it could be a spy of Naiore herself, keeping an eye on Ferney to make sure he did what he was told.

"Friends? What friends?" demanded Barrold. "Cut 'em out of what?"

Kaldir shrugged. "I couldn't tell you their names, but I believe they are a pickpocket and a bully by avocation. It seems to me they were upset about a horse."

"Vicious brute," muttered Barrold. "They didn't get cut out of nothing." Kaldir noticed that while Barrold tried to seem unconcerned, he cast a nervous glance over his shoulder toward the Barrow Downs at the mention of the horse, confirming for Kaldir his suspicion that Barrold had indeed ditched the stolen animal.

By then, the lights of Bree had come back into view. Kaldir decided that he had learned all that he could from speaking with Barrold Ferney. Now all he needed to do was watch the man. Barrold Ferney would lead him to Naiore. If she wasn't holed up in Ferney's own house, she would be somewhere nearby. As the two of them approached the gate and gatekeeper's lantern bobbed into view, Kaldir edged off the road. He took his leave of Barrold Ferney with a wave of his hand, which Barrold acknowledged with a nod and a large blob of spittle launched in Kaldir's general direction. It missed its mark, which made Kaldir smile again to himself. Barrold was no mental giant, but he was smart enough to know how to miss on purpose.

Once Barrold Ferney had re-entered Bree through the gate and disappeared, Kaldir turned and looked for the owner of the shadow. The moon had again gone behind a cloud, so it was a moment before his eyes made out the small dark shape against the craggy landscape. Kaldir walked straight toward it. There was a fraction of a second in which the shadow was motionless, then it leaped straight up in the air in alarm. Whoever it was hit the ground running and scurried frantically away into the darkness. Briefly, Kaldir considered giving chase, then thought the better of it. He had already been away from his prisoners, Benia and Gilly, too long. Knowing them, they would be leading him on a merry chase again if he left them too long to their own devices. He would check on them and get them ready to travel, then find Barrold Ferney again. Having known Ferney as long as he had, Kaldir knew most of Ferney's haunts. He would not be difficult to trace.

The problem would lie in locating Naiore before Amandur and his bunch found her. He had seen them and their horses in the vicinity of the Prancing Pony. They, too, were close on her trail.

Last edited by piosenniel; 03-12-2004 at 03:42 PM.
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