CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Tom sat on the cell floor with his knees up and his elbows on his knees and his chin resting on his elbows. He could see the hairy dwarf through the tear in the sack. The hairy dwarf sat on the bench with his feet out, wiggling furiously as though he was nervous and excited. He looked at Tom and said, ‘Why are you looking at me?’

Tom looked away.

‘I could see your beady eye through the bag.’

The dwarf crossed his arms. He seemed extremely pleased with himself.

‘The Emperor is going to pay me and Grubby and Fox a million rizers, then do you know what the Emperor is going to do?’

The dwarf waited but Tom didn’t answer. He sat there on the hard stone floor with the hessian sack making him look like a weird little ghost.

‘He is going to kill you.’

Tom had to admit to himself: those words drilled. He had suspected that he was being delivered to the Emperor for some terrible purpose. But hearing the words, that he was being delivered to be killed, was another level of nasty.

Floating down from above came the sound of a door scraping on stone, A moment later there was the little bang bang of boots as well as the whispery sound of light feet. Tom already knew that this wasn’t Fox, whose jaunty boots jangled, like the rhythm of Irish dancers.

The hairy dwarf stood from the guards' bench, and he pulled out a knife and he mumbled something that sounded like ‘This better not be a trick.’

Grubby came into view with his right arm trailing behind at an angle. He was holding the hand of someone much taller.

The lady that came into view was hardly older than Jane. She was slender and barefooted, and she wore a yellow dress that flowed from her shoulders in waves that broke across her hips. She had rosy cheeks and pretty green eyes. Yet she looked sad. There was duty in the way she held the dwarves hand, like she had been ordered to do it.

When she saw the hairy dwarf with his knife and his scowling face, she dropped her head onto an angle and smiled sadly, as though she was expecting something like this.

‘What are you doing with the knife?’ said Grubby.

The hairy dwarf (so full of earlier talk) stared at the lady, and he didn’t seem to be capable of speech. He opened his mouth, cleared his throat, brought a sleeve up across his nose.

Tom called out loudly:

‘Hello.’

As soon as he had seen Grubby and the lady appear at the bottom of the stairs, Tom had taken the sack from his head. He called ‘Hello,’ while looking straight at the lady. She looked right back at him.

After a second of thought the lady gasped and put her hand over her mouth. Her eyes expanded like bubbles.

Tom said, ‘I am Elion … returned.’

The hairy dwarf ran at the prison bars, his eyes turned in across his fat nose, and his right hand up with the knife coming, blade out. He roared, something huge and unintelligible. Tom took a step away from the iron bars and the dwarf slammed into them, grabbing a bar with his left hand, stabbing with the knife with his right. His little arm reached and reached, and he squeezed his chest against the gap between the iron bars, trying to get into the cell. The little fellow had lost his mind and Tom was afraid for a moment that the dwarf was actually going to slip through the bars. He took another step away.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

‘Traitor … you dirty stinking traitor,’ screamed the hairy dwarf.

Grubby dropped the lady’s hand and ran at the bars, his legs swinging like little scissors. For a brief second the lady and Tom were looking into each other's eyes, and in that instant the lady mouthed, ‘I will go get help.’

Immediately the woman turned to run, only she took two steps then stopped, and her head went back, and her mouth opened, and her eyes widened.

Emerging from the flickering darkness at the end of the corridor was Silas Fox, his thin lips smirking. In his left hand he held a short bow, and in his right there was an arrow, which he now strung.

The dwarves' spider senses picked up that something was going wrong behind them. They turned simultaneously, and immediately the hairy dwarf was talking:

‘We are still on the job at least … we didn’t know about the girl … ’

Only, before the dwarf could say another word an arrow whistled and thwacked and the dwarf fell, his little legs collapsing like jelly. Grubby immediately began to scream in a voice far higher and shriller than his talking voice.

Fox, holding the short bow with a now vibrating string, wrinkled his nose as though some unpleasant odour had come his way. He sucked in his cheeks, and in a move so swift it had the appearance of magic he knocked another arrow against the bow string, and that arrow flew into Grubby’s throat. Grubby pitched forward and fell to the floor beside his hairy little mate. Blood slowly leaked away from the two bodies.

The orange hat on Fox's head fell to a jaunty angle.

The lady lady put a hand over her mouth as she stared at the dwarves laying dead on the floor.

Tom could almost hear her fear, that she must be next. As a distraction he began to clap his hands, at first slowly, then with increasing vigour, as though clapping some wonderful speech, or a wonderful feat on the sporting field, or someone's exceptional achievement.

‘Please … can I leave?’ said the lady.

Fox turned to her.

‘No my dear ... you can't leave.'

‘How did you know I was here?’

‘Your master belled me … told me that a dwarf had come and taken his prettiest girl.’

‘I didn't know about Elion ... I thought it was just two dwarves.’

‘But now you do know about Elion, and that is a problem.’

‘I promise won’t tell anyone.’

‘We both know that that promise is worthless.’

‘Are you going to kill me?’

‘Probably.’

The lady made a sound like the squeak of a mouse.

‘What is your name?’ asked Fox.

‘Peta.’

‘Tell me Peta … do you know of any way I could save your life?'

Fox took an arrow out of the quiver on his back.

Watching the arrow, watching it's nock find the string, watching the string being pulled back: Peta's eyes expanded like green bubbles.

Tom spoke quickly, voice shrill.

‘Lock her in the cage with me.’

A single eye lowered over the shaft of the arrow, Fox thought about Tom’s suggestion. He spoke to Peta:

‘Who will miss you tonight?’

‘The master.’

‘Who else?’

‘My sister and my friend, but they will think I have been delayed by the dwarves.’

‘How soon until your sister and your friend come looking for you?’

‘Tomorrow morning.’

Tom gripped the iron bars and swallowed and tried to breathe normally. It was his fault that Peta was in danger. He had shown her his face.

After a moment Fox said, ‘Slowly move past me, Peta, and sit on the guard bench. I am going to unlock the cell.’

Peta tip-toed past the iron sharp arrow head to the guards bench. She held her yellow dress against her thighs and sat. Her bubble green eyes were soft with tears.

Fox loosened the string and placed the arrow back in the quiver.

‘Step away from the door.’

Tom took three steps back.

With a flick of his fingers Fox gestured for Peta to enter the cell.

‘It’s okay,’ said Tom when Peta came into the cell with tears spilling from her eyes.

‘Okay, Elion, you can now leave the cell.’

Tom raised his eyebrows.

'Come,' said Fox. 'You can't stay in there with her.'

With the sack held in his left hand Tom stepped out of the cell.

‘What are we doing?’

‘We are leaving,’ said Fox.

He secured the cell, the key grating in the lock.

Through the bars Peta still cried, shaking slightly, but now with the understanding that Elion had just saved her life.