The Rose and the Skull

14

Giles Gorstead stumbled sleepily to the front door of his small cottage. His nightshirt was still twisted and wrinkled from bed, and his disheveled brown hair looked like a bird had been nesting in it. Without even thinking, only angry at the disturbance of his sleep, he yanked open the door and stared out into the night. What confronted him brought him sharply awake. Quickly, he swung the door almost shut and peered out through the crack.

"What do you want?" he asked sharply. "This ain't no inn, if that's what you're looking for. Inn's up the road."

"I am sssssearching for gully dwarvessss," answered the heavily robed figure standing on his porch. Black robes covered every inch of the stranger's body, and his face was lost in the shadow of an enormous cowl.

Giles shuddered, but he said angrily, albeit with a slightly higher pitch to his voice, "We've got no gully dwarves here. Good night." He slammed the door and shot home the bolt.

"There are three of them," the voice hissed from behind the door. "I tracked them to this place, but I've lost their footprints in the fresh snow."

"Well, they're not here!" Giles shouted. "Good night."

"They sssstole ssssomething from me, an item of great value," the stranger continued. "I would pay dearly to have it, and the thievessss, returned to me."

"Well, if I see any, I'll be sure and let you know. Good night!" he shouted as he dashed across the room and snatched the poker from the fireplace.

He returned to the door and listened but heard no other sound. Slowly, he eased to the window and peered from behind the curtain. Krynn's new white moon shed a ghastly pallor over the new-fallen snow, illuminating the night as though it were day. The front yard and the porch were empty. No footprints marred the snow. Giles shuddered and made a sign to ward away evil.

He spent the remainder of the night beside the window, watching for any sign of the stranger, but the porch, the yard, and the road beyond remained empty, as desolate as a ghost town. He dragged a quilt from the bed and huddled by the window, awaiting the sun, while he grasped the iron poker so tightly his knuckles turned white.

When the late autumn sun finally arose behind a thick blanket of snowy clouds, the light found him asleep, his cheek pressed against the sill. He blinked, then winced as he withdrew his face from the hard, cold wooden frame of the window. A deep red indentation creased his face. He found his fingers so stiff from gripping the poker, he almost couldn't open them.

The fire on the hearth had burned low during the night, so by the time he woke, the room was freezing. He tossed a few chips on the fire and stirred the coals to get the fire going, then took a kettle from the mantle, and breaking the crust of ice on the bucket beside the door, filled it with water. He then hung it from a rack over the fire.

While he waited for the water to boil, he pulled on a pair of heavy boots and slung a thick woolen cloak over his shoulders. From a barrel in the corner he filled a basket with corn, then stepped outside into the snow. Looking up, he noticed the sky was darkening, and he guessed that before the day was done, the snow would change to rain. Elsewhere on the island, in the courtyard of Castle uth Wistan, the citizens of Sancrist and all Krynn were paying their respects to Gunthar.

Shivering with the cold, Giles Gorstead hurried across the porch and down the steps. He made his way around the cottage to the back, noticing as he passed that the snow on the windward side of the building had drifted almost to the lower windows, but the snow in the back was not as deep because of the protection afforded by a number of tall oak trees. Their spreading branches shaded and sheltered almost the entire ground between the cottage and the barn. His boots crunched in the snow as he walked, sounding unusually loud in the silence of the forest.

As he neared the chicken coop, Giles began to cluck his tongue and toss handfuls of corn on the snow-covered ground. He spread the corn evenly, with a practiced swing of his arm, all the time calling, "Here chick-chick-chickchick." Usually, the hens came rushing out at the first sound of his voice, but this morning they seemed slow. Perhaps it was the cold which made them sluggish, for he heard only a few rustling noises from the henhouse.

Then, something fell from the sky, grazing his forehead. It landed like a brick in the snow. Giles crouched warily, staring all about, ready to dodge the next missile. "Come out, you coward!" he shouted, sure that his assailant was the mysterious visitor from the night before.

When no one answered, and no other missiles followed, he glanced down at the thing that had nearly brained him. It was a very dead, very frozen chicken-one of his own. He picked it up and examined it for a moment before another thump caught his attention. About a stone's throw away, another frozen chicken lay in the snow.

Mightily puzzled, Giles glanced up, and to his horror saw dozens and dozens of his chickens lining the lower branches of the trees. Every single one seemed frozen solid to its perch. Giles couldn't imagine why they'd taken to the trees, when he had seen them safely in their coop only yesterday evening. He wondered how many, if any, were still in the coop. He crossed the yard and ducked through the low doorway, dropping his egg-and-feed basket outside as he entered.

It took a few moments for his eyes to adjust to the darkness. Dim light filtered through cracks in the wooden walls, poorly illuminating the confines of the low-roofed building, but even in that near-darkness, he saw that the roosts were empty. Near the door, shelves with dozens of round nests of hay lined the walls, but these too were empty. A few feathers littered the floor, but otherwise the place seemed deserted.

Even more baffled than before, Giles turned to leave, but at that moment, a ripping snore sounded from a dark corner of the coop.

"Who's there?" he shouted.

A startled snort answered him, then a burst of hurried whispers. "Speak up! Who's there?" he demanded.

"Nobody," someone answered.

Another voice added, "Nope, nobody here."

"Somebody's there!" he shouted. "Come out into the light so I can see you."

Slowly, three squat figures emerged from the shadows. One wore a ragged flat cap, which seemed made of ratskins poorly sewn together. White flecks littered his scraggly beard, probably pieces of eggshell, Giles noticed with growing rage. The shortest of the three stumbled over some kind of sack dangling from her shoulder; a chicken foot protruded from the loose flap of the bag. The third and tallest of the three had a mass of chicken feathers stuck to his chin, like some kind of ridiculous white beard.

"Gully dwarves!" Giles screeched. Millisant stuck her nose out from under Glabella's skirt and yawned. "And a big dog!" Giles exclaimed. "You… you… you…" His face deepened to scarlet, and the veins of his neck stood out like cords.

"Nobody here," the tall one said sleepily.

"Who's going to pay for my flock? All my chickens, lost!" he cried as he tore at his hair.

"We only eat two," Uhoh said, "and two eggs."

"Not more than two," Glabella added as she patted her round belly. Lumpo belched, smiling through his feathery beard.

Giles looked round for some kind of weapon, anything, a bucket, a hoe handle, just something to beat the three gully dwarves to death. Finding no suitable bludgeon, he decided to strangle them instead, and he even took a couple of steps toward them before realizing that here were three gully dwarves nicely trapped inside his chicken coop. Like a bolt out of the blue, a plan to recover his losses struck him, stunning him with its brilliance.

He stopped, and seeing his hands extended threateningly toward the gully dwarves, as though he were already wringing their miserable necks, he quickly tucked them into his pockets. He attempted a pleasant, nonthreatening smile, but it looked more like the grin of the cat who ate the bird. Uhoh had already taken a step back, and seeing that smile, he took another.

"It's all right," Giles said. "What's a couple of chickens?"

"Dinner," Lumpo commented.

Giles Gorstead ground his teeth, but he continued as he backed towards the door, "It'll be raining before long. Why don't you three stay here for the day, where it's nice and warm and dry. You can have all the chickens you want."

Uhoh frowned, but Glabella smiled and said, "You nice man. We stay."

"That's right," Giles said. "I'm a nice man." He ducked through he door, then poked his head back inside. "Don't go anywhere. I'm just going to get your breakfast. Breakfast in bed." He vanished.

"See there. I told you this good inn," Glabella said to Uhoh.

Outside, Giles hurried across the yard to the barn. As the day began to warm, and the snow changed to sleet, more chickens in the trees started to thaw and drop to the ground, like some horrible harvest of fruit grown ripe. Giles almost screamed in rage as he saw them littering the snow, but he continued on his way. In the barn, he grabbed a hammer, some nails, and a couple of boards from the scrap lumber pile. Wanting to be milked, his cows mooed sadly at him from their stalls, but for the moment he ignored them. He shuffled back across the yard to the chicken coop, the load held tightly in his arms, until he reached the door. He dropped the things in the slushy snow and poked his head back inside. Again, the darkness was blinding. He couldn't see the gully dwarves, but he said, "Only a moment longer."

Quickly, he shut the door and slid a wooden bar into place. Then, just to be sure, he nailed two boards, one at the top of the door and one at the bottom, to prevent his captives from slipping through the cracks.

As he worked, he shouted, "This is to make sure no foxes or wolves get in while I'm away. Have to run to market to get bacon. Back in a jiffy!" He tossed aside the hammer and dashed away. Once on the road, he ran through the falling sleet toward town.

Before long, the road became icy and slick. Giles was still wearing his pajamas, with only his heavy boots and woolen cloak to protect him against the cold. More than once, he slipped and fell before finally reaching the Oxen Yoke, the town's only inn. Despite the early hour, wood smoke rose from its single chimney, and a wan yellow light glowed in the window, proclaiming the tap and common room open for business. Giles crashed through the door, wind and sleet blowing in with him. The barkeep glared at him with raised eyebrows.

"Have you seen a certain stranger, robed all in black?" Giles panted without even saying hello.

He wasn't concerned with formalities at the moment, and in truth he didn't care much for the barkeep anyway. He suspected the man watered the beer. With a shaky finger, the barkeep pointed at a dark corner beside the fireplace.

Pushing aside the long sausages which dangled like Yuletide ornaments from the low rafters, Giles made his way across the common room, until he stood before the table indicated by the barkeep. At his approach, a shadow detached itself from the deeper shadows of the corner and leaned forward into the light glowing from the hearth.

"I've got them," Giles said, still gasping for air.

The robed figure stiffened. "Where?"

"At my place," he said.

The stranger leaped to his feet. "Ssssshow me," he whispered excitedly.

"First, the reward you promised," Giles demanded. He didn't trust strangers, least of all those who took such care to hide their features.

An angry hiss answered him. The stranger seemed to hesitate. "When I have them, you will be paid, but I must ssssee them firssst," he said at last.

"And if they don't have your property?" Giles asked.

"What?"

"The thing they stole from you?"

"Oh, that. Do not worry. They cannot have ssssold it yet. But if they have, you will sssstill get your reward," the stranger said.

"Very well then." Hesitating a moment, Giles said, "Follow me."

Together, they exited the inn and made their way through the increasingly wet weather to the farm. Along the way, Giles was disconcerted by the fact that no matter how slowly he walked, the stranger seemed always to struggle behind him. It was as though the fellow wished never to have his back to Giles. Only the promise of a handsome reward kept him from confronting the mysterious man. With the complete loss of his flock of chickens, he needed every silver piece and steel coin he could scrape together just to survive the winter.

They reached the cottage just as the sleet gave over to rain. As they crossed the yard to the coop, the stranger seemed very much amused by the sight of dozens of frozen chickens carpeting the ground. He hissed and giggled inside his cowl. When he saw the door to the coop nailed shut, he laughed even harder. "Sssso that issss why you ssssought me out," he said. "If you'll pardon my expresssssion, you wissshh to 'recoup' your lossssessss."

"Yes, yes, very funny," Giles snarled as he used the hammer to pry the boards loose from the door. "You'd just better be ready with that reward. Don't you try to cheat me, or I'll nail you up in there with them." He knocked the wooden bar free and snatched open the door.

"Breakfast is served!" he shouted as he motioned the stranger inside. Slowly, with seeming trepidation, the stranger approached the low door, his feet squelching in the slushy snow on the ground. Without removing his cowl, he ducked inside.

The rain beat down on Giles's unprotected head as he waited outside the coop. Some forgotten motherly part of his mind told him that he would catch his death out here, but he only ground his teeth and glanced at his dead chickens to remind himself of his purpose. Somebody had to pay, that's all he was sure of.

All of a sudden, the stranger stepped out of the coop. He turned to face Giles, his features still hidden by the cowl, his hands wrapped in the fold of his voluminous sleeves.

"There issss no one in there," he hissed angrily.

"What? Impossible!" Giles shrieked as he threw down his hammer and ducked into the coop. Again, it took a few moments for his eyes to adjust to the darkness. Meanwhile, he shouted, "Where are you, you miserable little rats?" Silence answered him.

He thrashed about the interior of the coop, tossing aside nests and shelves and bales of hay in his fury. "They can't have escaped!" he cried. "It's impossible. There is no way out. This coop is as tight as a ship. Not even a weasel can get in here when it is shut up!"

Exhausted by emotion and exposure, Giles shuffled wearily back to the open doorway. Outside, the stranger stood impassively in the rain. "I don't understand," Giles complained as he sank to the floor, his face in his hands. "I just don't understand."

A strange pattern of ice on the floor caught his attention. It was a footprint, a slushy footprint. A slushy three-toed, reptilian footprint. Giles jerked and fell over backwards, as though struck a blow by some invisible weapon.

"Draconian!" he gasped.

"Ah, now that isssss unfortunate. And after all the care I took to concccceal my identity," the stranger lamented as he pushed back his cowl. A long reptilian snout emerged, surmounted by a wide, heavy brow overshadowing dark, beetling eyes. Long bronze horns swept back from his low, crested forehead. A narrow forked tongue as red as blood slithered out from between two long fangish teeth and flickered in the air.

"What do you want with three gully dwarves?" Giles asked.

"Three? I only want the one. The otherssss, they are nothing, but the one, I would have paid handsssomely for the one. Now, you mussst pay," the draconian said.

"Wait!" Giles shrieked.

The draconian took a few steps back, then planted his feet in the mud. "Sssssomebody mussssst pay," he hissed as he drew a wand from his robes. He pointed it at the coop.

"No, wait!" Giles screamed.

The draconian spoke a single word, and a tiny ball of light streaked from the wand and into the coop, where it struck Giles squarely in the chest and exploded with flame. The roof of the coop sailed high into the air as the walls burst outward. For a few moments, a living ball of fire writhed on the floor, screaming hideously, before it grew still.

Satisfied, the draconian pulled his hood back over his head, turned, and stalked away. Moments after he vanished around the corner of the cottage, the barn door opened and Lumpo appeared, a metal pail dangling from his hand.

"Look. The inn is on fire!" he said. He lifted the pail to his lips and drank deeply. When he finally lowered it, creamy milk flowed in runnels to the tip of his scraggly beard. He smacked his lips and sighed contentedly. Millisant trotted out, and seeing the lowered bucket, stuck her head into it and lapped greedily. Lumpo seemed not to notice.

Uhoh stepped out from behind him and gazed at the roaring flames that was once the chicken coop. "It a good thing we get out before he nail door shut," he commented as he squeezed milk from his beard. "That two times we nearly killed already. We not listen to Glabella no more."

"What I do?" Glabella shouted from inside the barn.

"You no have luck picking inn. Slagd find us in Pig Mud Inn yesterday, nearly catch me. Lucky I got lots of nice pig mud on me, slip away like worm," he laughed, wriggling in imitation of his narrow escape the day before. "Now Chicken Inn burn down. Lucky I decide to milk nice cow for breakfast, before it go bang!"

"I say we milk cow!" Lumpo argued. "Me got lots of luck that way."

He sniffed the air. "I be glad when nice man get back with bacon," he commented.

"You eat too much," Uhoh said.

"Do not!" Lumpo protested.

"You eat two chickens last night. Now you hungry again," Uhoh accused as he turned and entered the barn.

"Do not! I only eat two chickens," Lumpo said as he followed Uhoh.

"Ha! I see you eat two chickens. You not deny it."

"Two chickens? I only eat two, not more than two."

Slowly, the barn door closed as the burning ruin of the chicken coop spit and hissed in the rain.