The Guided Journey (Book 6) (40 page)

But most of all, he wanted the gnomes to provide a guide that could lead his band across the Dangueax River, on the path to the isolated lake where the fortunes of men and elves and imps and Viathins had been reversed, and now were apparently reversed again.

“What is this place?” Putty asked.  She had resumed her non-yeti shape to speak to him.

“It’s a cave where I camped with elves last year when we were running away from the Uniontown forces,” he said.  He looked at the spot where Canyon had been born, and then at the spot where he and Moorin had laid side-by-side.

“There’s nothing else to see,” he said, turning away from the entry, leaving the others to scratch their heads.

“Stillwater, we’re going to go south by southwest from here, staying in the mountains.  Would you send scouts out in that direction to make sure the paths are safe?” he asked.

“And if you see any gnomes, they will be friends.  Tell me and let me talk to them,” he directed.

“You have plans?” Mulberry asked.  “Who knew?  When did you mean to tell us this?”

“I hate to spoil the surprise,” he grinned at the imp.

“And don’t forget, Stillwater,” he shouted a reminder, “we’ve got three elves running now, so the pace will be fast.”

They started running, Putty yet again a yeti.  The pace was fast, but easy for all of them.  Though they were in the Western Mountains, the terrain was not as rough as the Water Mountains had been, and the flying imps scouted out the best routes, allowing the earthbound runners to make good time.

“So Kestrel,” Wren pulled up almost alongside him to speak as they loped through the mountains.  “What does this ring of mine do, the one that you said came from Kai?”

“I don’t know,” Kestrel admitted.  He had wondered the same thing, then forgotten about the ring as he prepared to depart.

“Did you give me the broken one, and save the good one for your lovely young yeti protégé?” she asked.  “Or did you expect her to always look like the one who got away?”

“I think they both can do the same thing,” Kestrel said, stung by the barb.  “You just haven’t used yours to stop being a monster!” he laughed, then sprinted ahead to avoid Wren’s vicious punch.

They traveled through the mountains for two days, leaving the regenerating Southern Forest behind as they traveled in the direction of the
gnomes.  At noon of the second day, Stillwater’s scouts reported signs of a gnomish patrol on the path ahead.  Kestrel plumed the depths of his memory to find his rudimentary fragments of the language of the gnomes, and he prepared himself to greet his no-longer-so-distant friends.

The meeting began on an unpromising note.  “Let your guards take positions high in the air,” Kestrel insisted to a resistant Stillwater, as they approached the spot where the gnomes were known to be stationed.

“How can we guard you if we are not close enough to protect you?” Stillwater complained.

“I’ll need no protection from the gnomes,” Kestrel said.  “I have their own purple eyes,” he explained as he motioned carelessly towards his face.

“Kestrel-daredevil, you better keep those purple eyes open and watch out for trouble then, because we won’t be close enough to help you if they are not as hospitable as you seem to think,” Stillwater refused to concede the argument.  “Gnomes can be a touchy people.  I don’t know how you managed to work your way into the good graces of two sets of them,” he spoke in a way that clearly showed he resented Kestrel’s unwarranted success in gaining the trust of the reclusive race.

Kestrel’s level of trust proved to be shallower than he had expected.  The imps had flown high above the tree canopy, and the three elves had slowed from a run to a walk, as they traveled in a tight cluster through the forest of the gnomes.

“Look out!” Putienne called, as she spotted a large rock hurtling towards them from the canopy of the tree branches spread overhead.  She dove forward into Kestrel and Wren, spreading her arms wide to grab them as she flew through the air, and changed form at the same time.  Her arms lengthened as they reached, and her skin became hide, so that she turned into a living shield, able to absorb the impact of the first stone thrown with deadly intent by one of the gnomes.

“This is not right!” Kestrel said angrily, upset by the ambush the gnomes had sprung.

He raised a blue dome of protective energy overhead, then struggled out from beneath Putty’s weight, and looked around angrily.

The gnomes were stunned by the unexpecte
d reactions of their targets.  The female elf had changed into a yeti, and then a male elf had raised the energies of some otherworldly being.  No gnomes made any sounds; none moved a muscle for several seconds.

“All at once – bombard them!” the patrol leader ordered, and a heavy hail of stones came raining down upon the three entities who stood safely inside Kestrel’s dome, as heavy stones struck and bounced off his shield, doing no harm, other than where they created a nuisance as some of the spent missiles piled up across the path, falling and tumbling along the dome’s perimeter.

“What is this attack for?” Kestrel thundered in the language of the gnomes.

The rock-throwing ceased, as the gnomes received yet another shock in hearing their own language spoken by one of the intruders.

“Why do you come to our land during this season?” a voice called.

“We know where they all are, Kestrel-friend,” another voice, Stillwater’s voice, called from overhead, speaking in the common language of the elves and the imps.  “Shall we defeat them for you?”