[Hilde Bracegirdle]

Carl

Before Carl had gone more than a dozen paces, Kwell called out to him. And turning around the hobbit saw that the boy’s outstretched hands held Hamin’s sword by the hilt. “Take it,” Kwell shouted, his voice muted by the wind. “It’s too awkward for me, but someone else will trade you for it.” Carl knew that the thing would be cumbersome to carry, but responding to the young man’s attempt to better equip him, he jogged back. Taking the weapon with thanks, he paused a moment, suddenly thinking himself cruel to send him off alone. But it was a short lived notion, for in a flash he had dismissed the thought as sentimental. No, Kwell would be better off without him. If the lad wanted company, let him station himself with Lindir or one of the bigger folk who had a chance at defending him.

Parting ways, Carl retraced his steps hunting for arrows. The precious few he found he picked up, trying not to think of their uselessness in the gale. Working his way toward the earthworks, he hoped to find them more readily. But rather than coming across a bountiful crop of arrows, the hobbit found a riderless horse near the collapsed tunnel’s edge, and cautiously crept toward the beast. By all it trappings, it was a slaver’s mount, with quite outlandish gear. And Carl thought that if by chance he could manage to win the horse’s confidence, it would serve to provide a bit of cover for him out on the plain.

Carl looked about him, for a sign of the horse’s master. And the wind, which had been growing more erratic, lulled a moment. In a glance Carl saw that the horse was alone on the littered field, quite the picture of patient misery. Speaking soothingly and confidently to the creature, who tossed his head at the approaching hobbit, Carl pulled off his handkerchief, and wiping the dust from the horse’s face, took the reins loosely, quickly discovering that the horse was surprisingly good tempered. It did not take much coaxing for him to be led along the rim of tunnel.

As the wind shifted Carl saw the crumbled heaps of fallen men before him. Noting that they were slavers, he gave them wide berth and had almost passed them by, when a flash of light lit their clothing bright orange, and a pained wailing carried by the wind soon followed. A chill ran down Carl’s spine, and the horse suddenly reared up. And as the hobbit struggled to calm the animal, whose body and sharp hooves rose over him, he spied an archer half hidden behind one of the corpses, taking aim at him from the other side. “Whoa, Whoa there Dirand!” He shouted at the top of his voice. “Take care, over there! It’s just Carl you’re looking to drop!”

Grim and graying, the fellow slowly stood up muttering. “Whoa yourself! What were you thinking? You ought not hide behind the enemy’s horse if you’re not one of them!” He stalked over, quickly catching the horse’s bridle.

"Well, at least your hearing is sound!" Carl returned. "But what was that flash? Did you see it?"

"Aye, a burst of fire, from over that way," Durand said, nodding toward the back of the camp.

“It weren’t no firecracker, I’ll be bound. Must mean trouble,” Carl said.

Just then yet another archer appeared climbing over the rim of the collapsed tunnel, for he also had emptied his quiver and had sought to replenish his stock from the spend arrows lying around the trench and tunnel. After the two men exchanged a few words in a foreign tongue, the old man seemed reluctant to look back at the hobbit. And Carl was suddenly filled with foreboding as he saw the other archer weighing something in his mind. A hand came to rest on the hobbit’s shoulder. “I’m afraid I’ve bad news for you,” the younger of the two told him softly, so that the hobbit could barely hear him. “We saw your friend with the orange bearded one, carried off by Khamir and Adnan a little while ago. He was in poor shape by the look of things.”

“Not dead though, I’ll wager,” Dirand quickly added, seeing Carl’s stunned expression. “I don’t think they’d bother to move him if he were.”

But the hobbit’s mind had gone numb as the news sank in. “Where did go with him?” he asked. But before he had his answer the three heard the thunder of hooves break out at the back of the camp.

“I think they were taking him toward the shelter over there,” Dirand said frowning, for all three realized that this lay nearby the location now under attack. And the younger of the two archers, not hesitating, immediately sprinted off toward the fray leaving the two others by the side of the tunnel.

Carl handed the old man Hamin’s sword, which until now had been trailing in the dust behind him. Turning his attention back to the horse, he rapidly shortened the stirrup beside him. “What do you want me to do with this?” the man said.

“Use it well,” Carl said. “We are going to ride this horse and fight like we never fought before. Have you ever used a sword?”

“Wait… no! And I volunteered for archery not horses. I don’t know anything about horses… or swords!”

“Don’t worry about the horse,” Carl said moving to the other stirrup. “I’ll do the steering; you just swing that sword with all your strength.”

“But it’s a slaver’s horse!”

“It’s not his fault, you know. And that’s a slaver’s sword as well.”

“You missed my point…”

But Carl had already scrabbled up onto the horse’s back. “Are you coming or not?” he asked as the horse shuffled sideways under him.


“Aye, I’ll come, I’ll come,” the old man said, “Though I think it foolhardy.”

As soon as Dirand, had found his way onto the horse, it lurched forward, and the grizzled man grabbed Carl to keep from falling off. Together they rode into the wind.