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G’HOME GNOME

They left Elderew the next morning shortly after daybreak. Mist hung across the lake country like a shroud, and the dawn air was damp and still. It was the kind of day in which ghosts and goblins came to life. The River Master was there to see them off and looked to be neither. Questor had summoned him, and he appeared without complaint. He could not have slept, for the festivities had barely ended, but he looked fresh and alert. Ben extended his thanks on behalf of the company for the hospitality they had been shown, and the River Master, his grainy, chiseled face still as expressionless as flat stone, bowed briefly in acknowledgment. Ben glanced about several times for Willow, but she was nowhere to be seen. He considered again her request that she be allowed to accompany him back to Sterling Silver. Part of him wanted her with him; part of him would not allow it. Indecision gave way to expediency; time ran out on the debate. He left without speaking of it to her father. The company rode north for the remainder of the day, passing out of the lake country and its mists into the gray, open expanse of the western end of the Greensward and from there to the forested hills surrounding Sterling Silver. Sunlight barely pierced a clouded sky that stretched above them the whole of the journey back, and there was the smell of rain in the air. It was nightfall when they stepped once more from the lake skimmer and walked the final few yards to the gates of the castle. A smattering of raindrops was just beginning to fall.

It rained all that night. The rain was steady and hard and it blotted out the entire world beyond the immediate walls. That was perfectly all right with Ben. He fished out the bottle of Glenlivet he had been saving for a special occasion, gathered Questor, Abernathy, and the two kobolds at the table in the dining hall, and proceeded to get roaring drunk. He got drunk alone. The other four sipped gingerly from their tumblers as he consumed nearly the whole of the bottle by himself. He talked to them as he drank about life in his world, about Chicago and its people, about his friends and family, about anything and everything but Landover. They responded politely, but he had no memory later of what they said and frankly didn’t care. When the scotch was gone and there was no longer anything left to talk about, he rose to his feet and stumbled off to bed.

Questor and Abernathy were both at his bedside when he awoke the next morning. He felt like hell. It was still raining.

“Good morning, High Lord,” they greeted together, faces somber. They had the look of pallbearers at a funeral.

“Come back when I’m dead,” he ordered, rolled over and went back to sleep.

He came awake a second time at noon. This time there was no one there. The rain had stopped, and the sun was sending a few faint streamers of light earthward through a veil of mist. Ben pushed himself into a sitting position and stared into space. His head throbbed and his mouth tasted of cotton. He was so angry with himself that he could barely keep from screaming.

He washed, dressed and trooped down the castle stairs to the great hall. He took his time, studying the stone walls, the tarnished silver trappings, the worn tapestries and drapes. He felt the warmth of the castle reaching out to him, a comforting mother’s touch. It had been a long time since he had felt that touch. His hands brushed the stone in response.

Questor, Abernathy, and the kobolds were all gathered in the great hall, engaged in various make-work tasks. All looked up quickly as he entered. Ben came up to them and stopped.

“I’m sorry about last night,” he apologized immediately. “I guess that was just something that I had to get out of my system. I hope you all rested well, because we have a great deal of work to do.”

Questor glanced at the others, then back to Ben. “Where are we going now, High Lord?” he asked.

Ben smiled. “We’re going to school, Questor.”

The lessons began that afternoon. Ben was the student; Questor, Abernathy, Bunion, and Parsnip were his teachers. Ben had thought it all through—much of it in fits and starts while in various stages of inebriation and repentance—but carefully. He had spent most of his time since his arrival in Landover running about pointlessly. Questor might argue that the visits to the Greensward and Elderew had served a good purpose—and perhaps they had. But the bottom line was that he was floundering. He was a stranger in a land he had never dreamed could exist. He was trying to govern countries he had not even seen. He was trying to bargain with rulers and headmen he knew nothing about. However competent, hard-working, and well-intentioned he might be, he could not expect to assimilate as rapidly as he was trying to. There were lessons to be learned, and it was time that he learned them.

He began with Sterling Silver. He took the remainder of the afternoon and toured the castle from cellar to turret, Questor and Abernathy at his side. He had the scribe relate the history of the castle and her Kings from as far back as his records and memory would record. He had the wizard fill in the gaps. He learned everything he could of what had transpired in and about those halls and chambers, towers and parapets, grounds and lakes. He used eyes and nose and touch to ingest her life, and he made himself feel as one with her.

He ate dinner late that night in the great hall and spent the dinner hour and two hours after with Parsnip learning to recognize the consumables and poisons of the valley. Questor stayed with him, interpreting everything Parsnip said.

The next day he used the Landsview. He took Questor with him the first several times out, traversing the valley from one end to the other, studying the geography, the provinces, the towns, the fortresses and castles, and the people who inhabited them all. By midafternoon, he was making the trip alone, feeling more comfortable with the magic, learning to expand the vast range of the Landsview to suit his needs, and replaying in his mind the bits and pieces of information imparted to him by the wizard.

He went out by Landsview again the following day, and each day after that, his attention focused now on the history of the valley, matching events with places and people. Questor was his teacher once again, and the wizard proved infinitely patient. It was difficult for Ben to match dates and times to places and things where he had so little previous background in either. Questor was forced to repeat the lessons over and over. But Ben had a good memory and he was determined. By the end of the first week of lessons, he had a decent working knowledge of Landover.

He engaged in outings closer to Sterling Silver as well, journeys made afoot and not through the magic of the Landsview. Bunion was his guide and mentor on these excursions. The kobold took him from the valley into the forests and hills about the castle to study more closely the life forms that inhabited the region. They tracked down a timber wolf, hunted to his lair a cave wight, and uncovered a pair of bog wumps. They unearthed tunnel rats, snakes, and reptiles of various forms, treed a variety of cats, and spied upon the distant, rock-sheltered eyries of hunting birds. They studied the plant life. Questor went with them on the first outing to interpret; after that, he was left behind. Ben and the kobold found that they could communicate well enough on their own.

Ten days later, Ben used the Landsview to seek out Strabo. He went alone. He intended this outing to be a measure of his progress in learning to control the magic. He had thought at first to seek out Willow, but it would be as if he were spying on her and he did not want that. So he settled on the dragon instead. The dragon terrified him, and he wanted to see how he could handle his fear. He searched most of the day before finding the monster engaged in devouring half a dozen cattle at the north end of the Greensward, gnawing and crunching on carcasses shredded and broken almost beyond recognition. The dragon seemed to sense his presence as he brought himself to within a dozen yards of the feast. The crusted snout raised and jagged, blackened teeth snapped at the air before him. Ben held his ground for a long five count, then pulled quickly away, satisfied.

He wanted to make a foray alone into the forests about Sterling Silver to test what he had learned from Bunion, but Questor put his foot down. They compromised on a daytime hike in which Bunion would trail and not interfere if Ben was not threatened. Ben trooped out at dawn, trooped back again at dusk and never saw Bunion once. He also never saw the cave wight and the tree adder that the kobold dispatched as they were about to make a meal of him. He consoled himself with the knowledge that, while he had seen neither of these, he had seen and avoided several bog wumps, wolves, other wights and reptiles, and a big cat, all of whom would have made a meal of him just as quickly.

Two weeks later, he could recite from memory recent history, geographical landmarks and routes to and from the same, consumables and poisons, the creatures inhabiting the valley, the workings of the social orders that dominated the major races, and the rules that any manual of basic survival in Landover would include. He was still working on the Landsview. He had not yet developed his confidence in its magic to undergo the final test that he had set for himself—a search for the witch Nightshade in the hollows of the Deep Fell. Nightshade never ventured out of the oppressively dark confines of the Deep Fell, and he did not yet trust himself to attempt an intrusion.

He was still wrestling with his uncertainty when a more immediate problem appeared at the castle gates.

“You have visitors, High Lord,” Abernathy announced.

Ben was bent over a worktable in one of the lower sitting rooms, perusing ancient maps of the valley. He looked up in surprise, seeing first the scribe and then Questor a few discreet steps behind him.

“Visitors?” he repeated.

“Gnomes, High Lord,” Questor advised him.

“G’home Gnomes,” Abernathy added, and there was a hint of disdain in his voice.

Ben stared at them. He shoved back the maps. “What in the world are G’home Gnomes?” His lessons with Questor had never gotten this far.

“A rather pathetic species of gnome, I am afraid,” Questor replied.

“A rather worthless species, you mean,” Abernathy corrected coldly.

“That is not necessarily so.”

“It is definitely so.”

“I am sorry to say that you reflect only your own prejudices, Abernathy.”

“I reflect a well-reasoned opinion, Questor Thews.”

“What is this—Laurel and Hardy?” Ben broke in. They stared back at him blankly. “Never mind,” he told them, impatiently brushing the reference aside with a wave of one hand. “Just tell me what G’home Gnomes are.”

“They are a tribe of gnomes living in the foothills north below the high peaks of Melchor,” Questor answered, his owlish face shoving forward past Abernathy. “They are burrow people; they inhabit tunnels and dens they dig out of the earth. Most of the time they stay in the ground …”

“Where they ought to stay,” Abernathy interjected.

“… but now and again they forage the surrounding countryside.” He gave Abernathy a withering glance. “Do you mind?” His eyes shifted back to Ben. “They are not well liked. They tend to appropriate things that do not belong to them and give back nothing in exchange. Their burrowing can be a nuisance when it encroaches on pastureland or grain fields. They are extremely territorial and, once settled in, will not move. It doesn’t matter who owns the land they have settled on—once there, they stay.”

“You have not told him the worst!” Abernathy insisted.

“Why not tell him yourself,” Questor huffed, stepping back.

“They eat dogs, High Lord!” Abernathy snapped, unable to contain himself any longer. His muzzle drew back to reveal his teeth. “They are cannibals!”

“Unfortunately, true.” Questor shoved forward once more, crowding Abernathy aside with his shoulder. “They eat cats as well, however, and I have never heard you complain about that!”

Ben grimaced. “Terrific. What about the name?”

“An abbreviation, High Lord,” Questor said. “The gnomes became so vexatious with their burrowing and their thieving that everyone began to express openly their wish that they would simply ‘go home’ to wherever it was they had come from. After a while, the admonishment ‘go home, gnomes’ became the nickname by which they were known—G’home Gnomes.”

Ben shook his head in disbelief. “Now there’s a story right out of the brothers Grimm. The G’home Gnomes. Well, what brings these gnomes to us?”

“They will speak of that only with you, High Lord. Will you see them?”

Abernathy looked very much as if he wanted to bite Questor, but he managed to refrain from doing so, his shaggy muzzle frozen in a half-snarl. Questor rocked back on his heels, eyes fixed on Ben expectantly.

“The royal appointment calendar isn’t exactly bulging at the seams,” Ben answered, looking first at Abernathy, then at Questor. “I can’t see where meeting someone who has taken the trouble to come all this way can hurt anything.”

“I trust you will remember later that it was you who said that, High Lord.” Abernathy sniffed. “There are two of them waiting. Shall I show both in?”

Ben had to fight to keep from grinning. “Please do.”

Abernathy left and was back a few moments later with the G’home Gnomes.

“Fillip and Sot, High Lord,” Abernathy announced, teeth showing.

The gnomes came forward and bowed so low their heads touched the castle stone. They were the most miserable-looking creatures Ben had ever seen. They were barely four feet tall, their bodies stout and covered with hair, their faces ferretlike and bearded from neck to nose. They wore clothes that the lowliest bum would have refused, and they looked as if they hadn’t bathed since birth. Dust coated their bodies and clothing; dirt and grime were caked in the seams of their skin and under fingernails that looked dangerously diseased. Tiny, pointed ears jutted from either side of skull caps with red feathers stuck in the bands, and toes with curled nails peeked out from the ends of ruined boots.

“Great High Lord,” one addressed him.

“Mighty High Lord,” the other added.

They took their heads off the floor and faced him, eyes squinting. They looked like moles come to the surface for a glimpse of daylight.

“I am Fillip,” one said.

“I am Sot,” the other said.

“We have come to offer our pledge of fealty to the High Lord of Landover on behalf of all of the G’home Gnomes,” Fillip said.

“We have come to offer felicitations,” Sot said.

“We wish you long life and health,” Fillip said.

“We wish you many children,” Sot said.

“We extend to you our skills and our experience to be used in whatever manner you may choose,” Fillip said.

“We extend to you our services,” Sot said.

“But first we have a small problem,” Fillip said.

“We do,” Sot agreed.

They waited, their presentation apparently finished. Ben wondered if they had simply run out of gas. “What sort of problem do you have?” he asked solicitously.

They glanced at each other. Sharp mole faces crinkled and tiny, pointed teeth showed liked daggers.

“Trolls,” Fillip said.

“Crag Trolls,” Sot said.

Again they waited. Ben cleared his throat. “What about them?” Whereas he had known nothing of the G’home Gnomes, he did know something of the Crag Trolls.

“They have taken our people,” Fillip said.

“Not all of our people, but a rather substantial number,” Sot corrected.

“They missed us,” Fillip said.

“We were away,” Sot said.

“They raided our burrows and dens, and they carried our people off with them,” Fillip said.

“They seized everyone they found,” Sot said.

“They took them to Melchor to work the mines and the furnaces,” Fillip said.

“They took them to the fires,” Sot grieved.

Ben was beginning to get the picture. The Crag Trolls were a rather primitive race of beings living in the mountains of Melchor. Their primary business was mining ores from the rock and converting them in their furnaces to weapons and armor which they sold to the other inhabitants of the valley. The Crag Trolls were a reclusive and unfriendly bunch, but they seldom provoked trouble with their neighbors and had never used slave labor.

He glanced past the gnomes to Questor and Abernathy. The wizard shrugged and the scribe gave him one of his patented ‘I told you so’ looks.

“Why did the Crag Trolls seize your people?” Ben asked the gnomes.

Fillip and Sot glanced at each other thoughtfully, then shook their heads.

“We do not know, great High Lord,” Fillip said.

“We do not,” Sot said.

They were without doubt the worst liars Ben had ever encountered. Nevertheless, he decided to be tactful. “Why do you think the Crag Trolls seized your people?” he pressed.

“That would be difficult to say,” Fillip said.

“Very difficult,” Sot agreed.

“There could be any number of reasons,” Fillip said.

“Any number,” Sot echoed.

“It is possible, I suppose, that in foraging we might have appropriated property which the trolls felt belonged to them,” Fillip speculated.

“It is possible that we might have claimed property we believed abandoned but which, in truth, still belonged to them,” Sot added.

“Mistakes of that sort sometimes do happen,” Fillip said.

“Sometimes,” Sot said.

Ben nodded. He didn’t believe for a minute that any foraging from the Crag Trolls had been anything short of deliberate. The only mistake had been in the gnomes’ belief that they could get away with it.

“If a mistake of this sort were to happen,” Ben observed carefully, “wouldn’t the Crag Trolls simply have asked for the missing property back?”

The gnomes looked decidedly uncomfortable. Neither said anything.

Ben frowned. “What sort of property might have been misappropriated, do you think?” he asked them.

Fillip glanced down at his boots, and the toes wriggled uneasily. Sot’s ferret features twisted about and looked as if they might like to disappear into his fur.

“The trolls like to keep pets,” Fillip said finally.

“The trolls are very fond of pets,” Sot added.

“They like the furry tree sloths most of all,” Fillip said.

“They give them to their children to play with,” Sot said.

“How can one tell wild furry tree sloths from pet furry tree sloths?” Fillip queried.

“How can one know which is which?” Sot queried.

A terrible suspicion crossed Ben’s mind. “You can always give back misappropriated pets, can’t you?” he asked them.

“Not always,” Fillip said, somehow managing to look mortified.

“No, not always,” Sot agreed.

Ben caught a glimpse of Abernathy out of the corner of his eye. His scribe’s hackles were raised up like the spikes of a cornered porcupine.

He looked back at the gnomes. “You ate those tree sloths, didn’t you?” he demanded.

Neither said a word. They looked down at their boots. They looked aside at the walls. They looked everywhere but at Ben. Abernathy gave a low, menacing growl, and Questor hushed him into silence.

“Wait outside, please,” Ben told the gnomes.

Fillip and Sot turned about quickly and scurried from the room, small rodent bodies swaying awkwardly with the movement. Fillip glanced back once as if he might say something more, then reconsidered and hurried out. Questor followed them to the door and closed it tightly behind them.

Ben looked at his aides. “Well, what do you think?”

Questor shrugged. “I think it is easier to catch and devour a tame furry tree sloth than a wild one.”

“I think someone should eat a few of them and see how they like it!” Abernathy snapped.

“Would such a meal interest you?” Questor asked.

Ben stepped forward impatiently. “I’m not asking what you think about what they did. I’m asking what you think about helping them.”

Abernathy was appalled. His ears flattened back and his glasses slipped askew on his nose. “I would sooner bed down with fleas, High Lord! I would sooner share lodgings with cats!”

“What about the fact that the trolls have forced these people into slavery?” Ben pressed.

“It seems clear to me that they brought it on themselves!” his scribe answered stiffly. “In any case, you have far more important concerns than the G’home Gnomes!”

Ben frowned. “Do I?”

“High Lord,” Questor interrupted and stepped forward. “The Melchor is dangerous country and the Crag Trolls have never been the most loyal of the King’s subjects. They are a tribal people, very primitive, very unreceptive to intervention from anyone not of their own country. The old King kept them in line primarily by staying out of their business. When he had to intervene, he did so with an army to stand behind him.”

“And I have no army to stand behind me, do I?” Ben finished. “I don’t even have the services of the Paladin.”

“High Lord, the G’home Gnomes have been nothing but trouble for as long as anyone can remember!” Abernathy stepped over to join Questor. “They are a nuisance wherever they go! They are cannibals and thieves! Why would you even consider helping them in this dispute?”

Questor nodded in agreement. “Perhaps this kind of request is one best refused, High Lord.”

“No, Questor,” Ben replied at once. “This is exactly the kind of request that I cannot refuse.” He looked at the wizard and the scribe in turn and shook his head. “You don’t understand, do you? I came into Landover to be King. I cannot pick and choose when I will be King and over whom. I am King now and always and for everyone who needs me. That is the way it works with monarchies. I know that much from the history of my own world. A King must proclaim and administer the laws of the Kingdom fairly and equally to all of his subjects. There can be no favorites; there can be no exceptions. What I would do for the Lords of the Greensward and the sprites and nymphs of Elderew I must do for the G’home Gnomes. If I back away once, I set a precedent for doing so the next time and the time after that and so on any time it seems convenient.”

“But you have no support in this, High Lord,” Questor argued.

“Perhaps not. But if I am successful in helping the gnomes, then I might have that support the next time out. The gnomes have given their pledge, which is one pledge more than I had before they made the journey here. They deserve something for that. Maybe the others will pledge as well if they see that the throne can be of use even to the G’home Gnomes. Maybe they will reconsider their position.”

“Maybe cows will fly over the castle,” Abernathy grumbled.

“Maybe,” Ben agreed. “I’ve seen stranger things since I arrived.”

They stared at each other wordlessly for a moment.

“I do not care for this idea at all,” Questor said, his owlish face lined with doubt.

“Nor I,” Abernathy echoed.

“Then we agree,” Ben concluded. “I don’t like it either. But we are going anyway. We are going because that’s what we have to do. School’s out, as the saying goes. It’s time to face life in the real world again. Now let’s have the gnomes back in here.”

Questor and Abernathy bowed in acknowledgment and left the room muttering to themselves.

The G’home Gnomes returned with protestations of good intent spilling forth. The furry tree sloths were a favorite food of their people, Fillip insisted. Yes, the furry tree sloths were quite delicious, Sot agreed. Ben cut them short. Their request would be granted, he told them. He would go with them to the Melchor to see what could be done to gain the release of those taken by the Crag Trolls. They would depart Sterling Silver at dawn. Fillip and Sot stared at him, then fell to their knees before him, groveling in a most disgusting manner. Ben had them removed at once.

He went up to the Landsview alone that evening after dinner. The gnomes had been sequestered in their rooms by Abernathy (who refused to trust them anywhere else in the castle), and the others were occupied with preparations for the journey north. Ben had time to use as he chose. He decided to take a quick peek into the lake country.

The night was misted and dark, no different from dozens of others, seven of Landover’s brightly colored moons faintly visible over the line of the horizon, stars a distant sprinkling of street lights through a midnight fog. The Landsview took him instantly to the lake country, and he descended slowly into Elderew. The city was bright with torchlight atop treelanes and along roadways, and her people were still abroad. The sound of laughter and light conversation made him feel uneasy somehow—more an intruder than he already was. He slipped over the amphitheater, down across the city dwellings and shops, past the cottage that had been his lodging, and into the deep woods. He found the old pines where Willow’s mother had danced. They were deserted. The tree into which Willow had transformed herself was gone. Willow was nowhere to be found.

He let himself remain in the deep woods for a time, thinking of Annie. He could not explain why, but he needed to think of her. He needed to be with her, too, but he knew that Annie was gone and it was pointless to dwell on it. He felt alone, a traveler come far from home and friends. He was adrift. He felt that he had cut himself off from everything, and that his reasons for doing so were proving to be poor ones. He needed someone to tell him that it would all work out, that he was doing the right thing, that there were better times ahead.

There was no one to do that, however. There was only himself.

Midnight came and went before Ben finally refocussed on Sterling Silver. He took his hands reluctantly from the railing of the Landsview and he was home again.