Arrival

From the south a damp wind blew, bringing with it many strange, old, disturbing scents, smells not quite so fresh as even a bright autumn morning could make things, but filled with unknown terrors and sudden danger. There was a strong odor of man, I which pulled Bear from his fretful sleep. He became alert, rising up on his haunches to test the direction and rumbling deep in his throat to warn his friends. Otter slept on, turning one ear back at the big animal’s note of caution, then twisting more closely into a ball of gray fur, falling back into the soft, running tug of clear water where he darted in his dream. Dwarf peeped out from beneath his hat, squinting to see the position of the sun, looking at Bear, back to the overcast sky, then to Otter, now diving deep into a school of trout and almost on the point of racing a large, dark-brown-colored tarnfin.

Dwarf kicked Otter hurriedly in rising, and stood close to Bear, who had tested all four directions and could make nothing out of the man scent except that they were surrounded, for the lingering wind told him the message from all sides. It was not immediately near them, but it was not so far away.

“What is it, Bear?”

“Man.”

“Are they near us?”

“I shouldn’t say too far. I can’t hear anything, though.”

Otter, sullenly rubbing his eyes and trying his whiskers, grumped, “I knew I should have listened to my own better judgment. Not only am I dragged bodily away from my river by an overpuffed knot of a lumpheaded dwarf, carted across all sorts of boundaries that should better be left uncrossed, plumped down square in the middle of a nest of men, but I get kicked for my breakfast.” Otter toppled back ward, covering his eyes with his paws.

“Shhhh,” hissed Bear, rising up to his full height, ears back, nose searching, great brown hackles bristling upon his neck.

Seeing Bear upright and aroused, Otter forgot all else and darted beneath the huge animal’s shadow, crouched and whistling low in his throat. Dwarf brandished his rune-covered walking stick, but also moved closer to Bear.

“The scent is growing stronger. There are many of them.”

Otter caught the strong man scent now, powerful and disgusting, and every time the wind caught its breath it grew stronger, as if a great horde of Mankind was approaching.

Dwarf carefully studied the countryside in the growing gray light, and exclaimed, “This is a piece of luck I hadn’t counted on. Quickly, you two. We’re not far from friends and food, and a place where we may make what plans we must.”

Broco moved quickly out of the alder thicket where they had passed the night, out and down the riverbed for a few minutes, until they came to a broad meadow that seemed to make a wide roadway toward the rising sun.

“We’ll follow along the edge of the trees there to avoid anyone who might be about until we reach the Galant Road. That was built in my time here. We’ve landed only a few leagues from where some of my kin dwell. Hurry along now. I have no desire at the moment to explain to anyone the presence of a dwarf and his traveling companions.”

The three friends moved silently off and were quickly swallowed by the shadows of the trees, passing quietly, almost no more than the wind rustling across the sun.