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Old 10-14-2004, 10:21 AM   #217
Mithadan
Spirit of Mist
 
Join Date: Jul 2000
Location: Tol Eressea
Posts: 3,310
Mithadan is a guest at the Prancing Pony.Mithadan is a guest at the Prancing Pony.
Grrralph wandered through black and empty places as he slumbered. The best efforts of the Itship, which included prodding him with a sword, splashing him with cold water, exposing him to Chrysophylax's heady breath and beating him with clubs, sticks and a mace, failed to rouse him. Ever quick on the uptake, the members of the Itship realized that this was no normal sleep and, grudgingly, dragged him about wherever they went.

Grrralph himself had little awareness of what was happening. Indeed, he had no awareness at all, at least until he began to dream.

He dreamed he was in an Elvenwood musical,
and that he was the star of that musical.
That really blew his mind,
that he, a long-legged, black-cloaked, leaping wraith
was the star of an Elvenwoog musical.

But there he was,
he was taken to a place,
the hall of the Mountain King.
He stood high on the mountain top,
cloaked before the world,
in front of every type of Zerl.

There was black ones, brown ones,
big ones, round ones,
short ones, long ones,
pink ones, fat ones.

Out of the middle,
there came a Zerly.
And she whispered in his ear,
something crazy.
She said:


"Well, what shall we do with him?" And another Zerl approached him and answered, somewhat reluctantly. "I suppose we should should restore him. After all, he did break the curse..."

The first Zerl looked carefully at the wraith, then sniffed. "I suppose he did. What was it? Oh yes:

'You've been traded to me,
for fair compensation.
For a reasonable fee,
you'll join our dark nation.

You'll wear my gear,
cloak, armor and hood,
now don't shed a tear,
but they're with you for good.

They'll weigh on your mind,
they ain't going away soon,
until potion you find,
made from light of the moon.'"

The second Zerl nodded. "Rather nasty, but that Sourone did turn out to be rather a bad egg. So he drank that bottle of moonshine and the curse is broken. I guess we take him back."

And Grrralph thought to himself,

What could this mean?
Am I going crazy or is this just a dream.
Now wait a minute.
I know I'm lying in a field of grass somewhere,
so it's all in my head,
but then he heard the Zerl say


"But what about all the horrible things he did during the War of the Thing?" The second Zerl answered, "Well, he was under the curse and in Sourone's power. And he was traded to Sourone for a minor leaguer and compensation to be named later if I recall."

The first Zerl scowled. "Yeah, we got a musty old Barrow-Wight and some old rusty shields..." The second Zerl nodded. "A deal's a deal. So we restore him?" The first Zerl scowled again. "I guess we do. You're right. A deal's a deal and the curse is broken..."

Grrralph could feel hot flames of fire roaring at his back,
as the Zerl disappeared,
but soon she returned.
In her hand was a bottle of wine
and in the other a glass.
She poured some of the wine into the glass,
and raised it to her lips,
and just before she drank it, she said:


"A deal's a deal. Darned Loyers. I sometimes wish we could just round them all up and.... never mind." She snapped her fingers with a sound like a clap of thunder, and Grrralph fell back into blackness. But even as he lost what little consciousness he had, he heard the Zerl's final words. "It'll take a little while to set in. Just what the world needs. Another..." And he heard no more...
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