Chapter I: Part 1

16 Years Later...

The band continued its slow jam.  She thought they sounded like water and heartbeats.

***

“Lord Killington?” 

Even sitting down she could tell he was easily the biggest man in the tavern.  Perhaps the biggest man she’d ever seen.  His long dark hair with subtle strands of silvery-grey was pulled back in a somewhat unkempt ponytail.  Curly wisps fell in front of his face.  His beard had been tended to recently – but not too recently.  His gentle, languid smile seemed out of place in his otherwise rugged features - his head was huge!  His eyes were grave, dark, almost black, underlined by deep purple semicircles – a trait of the farming peoples from the Great Cornucopia of the Southlands.  His sweet smile and grim gaze, conflicting as they were, were upstaged however by a long nose showing a history of several breaks. Intimidating features aside his smile and frequent bursts of laughter were disarming and even calming, revealing an undeniable and simple delight in drinking and singing and joking with the other patrons. 

And he smelled better than she anticipated. 

When she had entered the tavern a few minutes earlier and saw him from across the room he had given the appearance of being a bit boorish.  Despite his laugh being somewhat infectious he bellowed too loudly drawing all the attention in the room to him.  He backslapped aggressively and spilled almost as much beer as he bought for both himself and the others in the tavern. 

Maybe he doesn’t know his own strength when he is drunk? 

On the other hand – is he even drunk? How much must a man that big drink in order to get drunk?  Gallons? 

Not only was his head huge, but all of him. 

He must be part giant.

But now, standing next to him, she could see that the bearskin cloak she assumed would reek, was oiled to a lustrous shine, clean, but for some recent beer spillage.  His almost neat beard was free of food bits.  His hair too possessed and impressive sheen and like his beard, was thankfully lice-free - loose and messy, but oiled, clean and he smelled like…

Peppermint?

 “Some call me Lord,” he interrupted her inventory of his appearance.  “But I prefer just, Rocco, my pretty little Valkyrie.”

“Rocco the Rotten!”  Someone shouted from a back table.  Rocco pounded the bar with a fist the size of a small pumpkin and shouted, “That fool of a dwarf in the back is still talking!  He obviously needs to drink more!  Eau de Vie for that poor bastard until he passes out or starts telling the story again about the wife that left him!”

“She wasn’t my wife!  She didn’t leave me!  They kicked me out of the kingdom!”

“Well then Dudley, I guess you will have to tell the story again ‘cuz my head full of rocks just can’t remember the details!”  He turned to her and said quietly, “It’s truly a heartbreaking story – I shouldn’t joke about it.”  He then downed a small glass of light brown liquid and slammed it back on the polished wooden bar.  He followed the shot with another gulp of ale from a large, dented, titanic, tin mug, which easily held two pints – in fact, it would have served as a small pitcher for most people. 

Various patrons laughed and toasted the jovial Lord or the unseen dwarf in the back of the room.  Or both.  In truth it was hard to tell.  It seemed that most everyone was drunk.

Maybe that’s why no one has paid me any mind?

She had expected that her entrance would be remarked.  The large hall was full of mostly farmers, artisans and merchants in simple dress appropriate for a cool autumn night.  As far as she could tell she was the only one in the room wearing armor – although she spied a few blades and improvised weapons on belts and under chairs.  Even Lord Killington wore no armor. His heavy fur cloak and leather leggings and vest were hardly the dress of someone who worked the fields and suggested not only wealth but someone who was used to having to protect himself, but still, she assumed that an elfkin arriving in a full suit of field armor with ornate copper etchings and trim, a Mithril breastplate … that all this might garner her unwanted attention.  Yet everyone seemed more interested in drinking and laughing and some musicians meandering onto the tavern’s uncommonly large stage.

Then again, I’m hardly the first elven knight or decorated warrior that these folk have seen.  They have seen so much … and accomplished so much.

And drink so much.

 “I never wanted to be Lord of anything.”  Lord Killington said.  “I just wanted to be a farmer.”  He sipped some more ale.  “You’re new here aren’t you, Valkyrie?”  And again, his smile. 

She couldn’t resist smiling back and let out a quiet laugh. Comparing her to a Valkyrie wasn’t exactly an exaggeration.  She had the fair skin, green eyes and golden hair of her Elven father as well as lips a rich, rose red like her forest family.  She had some of her mother’s height and build, a formidable witch from the Copper Hills who was also known to wield a sword when spell-craft alone wasn’t enough to protect her mining clan from orcs and goblins.  In finer countries her mother would have been called a princess.  In the Hills she was called First Sister. It was she who struck an alliance with her Father’s elven clan to rid the woods that bordered both their lands of a stubborn goblin muster.  It was a successful alliance that resulted in peace for all involved and twins, a son and a daughter, for the peacemakers. 

It was not her striking looks and uncommon size for an elfkin alone that recalled the warrior angels of the North.  She was standing before Rocco in exquisitely crafted armor; its plates and buckles all shining more brightly than anything else in the bar; she wore a cloak as light in weight as it was in color, an elven weave to anyone who knew how to spot such things; warmer and stronger than its delicate appearance suggested.  It gently flowed behind her, almost as if alive, not unlike a curious cat’s tail.  She grasped the hilt of her longsword on her left hip with her left hand, not a threatening sign, but rather out of necessity to keep its sheathed blade steady as she had maneuvered through the crowded, smoky hall. The green jewel in its pommel sparkled under the bar’s lanterns and torches.  All together she must have appeared an elven paladin sent form the heavens by Elle herself.  When in truth, the flickering firelight in the tavern hid well the fact that she was mud and dust covered, saddle sore, exhausted, and suspected she hardly smelled like peppermint.

 “No Lord, I am indeed not from around here.  In fact I have ridden quite far to find you.”

“Well good for you my persistent knight.  Your journey’s done!   Now, sit, have a drink, have a smoke, relax and tell me why you’ve come so far.  And please, don’t call me ‘Lord’.  My name is Rocco - ”

“The Rotten-” came the voice form the back of the hall again.

“How can he even hear me from back there?”  He asked her, appearing to be genuinely perplexed, and then without waiting for an answer turned around towards the back of the tavern and shouted, “It’s sounding like I need to come back there and remind y’again why they call me ‘Rotten’!”  He returned his attention to her.  “I’m really not so rotten anymore.” He finished the ale in his tin mug and tapped it on the table indicating he wanted it filled again. “Nor was I ever quite as rotten as they think – you’re looking at a victim of pernicious propaganda.  But you didn’t come all this way to learn about a keep keeper’s nickname now did you my little Valkyrie?”

She suppressed a laugh but smiled almost involuntarily when he said “little Valkyrie.”  She was confident he was not mocking her.  Everyone must have seemed “little” to him.  And his eyes, somber a few minutes ago, now shown with a playful curiosity.  He was intrigued and perhaps impressed by an elven knight showing up in his keep.  “No, Lord - I mean, Rocco.  No, I came-”

“-for the music.”  He interrupted her and motioned for her to turn around and look at the stage where the musicians were now setting up instruments and tuning.

“You’ll want some Eau de Vie for this …  Neen!  Une carafe d’Eau tout de suite! …  and here, smoke some of this Olferb, it’ll do you just right for what comes next.”

 “But Olferb-” she began to protest, however his hands had already gently turned her towards the stage and offered her a hastily rolled cigarette that emitted the sweet aroma of Olferb as well as the  pungent, bitter scent of Halfling-leaf.  “You have mixed it with tobacco!  Olferb is a sacred, magical plant--”

“Valkyrie, to your people every plant is magical and sacred. That must mean tobacco too, no?”

She stared at him with her mouth slightly open, shocked at how rude –

“Lady Knight, I do not mean to offend.”  He reacted to her shocked expression almost instantly and his smile faded replaced by an earnest expression.  He continued to appeal to her. “I have smoked Olferb with several of your kind and I know its place in your culture is very reserved.  But your folk live for centuries, and enviably, almost always in peace.  We, our lives are short, and these days we are surrounded by war.  Only through an uncommon supply of bravery and luck has this keep and its surrounding townsfolk managed to survive, intact, and out of the way of the warring princelings who have ravaged the Northlands for over four of our generations.  We have had five harvests now without a hint of an ascending or retreating army looking to burn or steal our crops.  This year, next month, will be our sixth if the Gods bless us.  Tonight we have the luxury of music and each other’s company, song and drink, and indeed, the ‘fherb.  Your sacred herb relieves the aches and pains of working the fields; it brings an easy smile to our faces in hard times.  It softens our souls and sweetens our dreams.  And what it does for the music … oh I haven’t the words my lady knight.   So, I ask you, who claims to have traveled so far to see me, to respect the customs of my compatriots here, and, even if only ever just this once, please, sit with us, listen to our songs, drink our drink, and share a smoke with us.”

He held the cigarette out to her.  She was no longer in her family’s forest. Her father had warned her that the ways of mortal men may surprise, shock or confound her.  She had left the forest only rarely during her life and seldom without being part of a host of elven knights who seldom tarried with the common people of the Northlands.  As a result, admittedly, she knew little of the day to day lives of freefolk. 

“Are you trying to cast a spell on me?  I warn you, such charms do not work on elves.”

“My lady knight, ma petite Valkyrie.  I am no wizard.  That would be my big brother.”

“Big … brother?”

He lowered his voice to a whisper, “He’s not really bigger than me, just older.”  And with a wink he handed her the cigarette again.

The intentions of most mortals were transparent to her.  She could read malice or goodwill in most men’s eyes and he was hiding nothing and meant no ill will at all.  It surprised and warmed her that by all accounts he was as sincere as he was silly.  With surprisingly little hesitation she took the cigarette from him and inhaled.  She winced a bit at the Halfling leaf; she had never had a taste for its harsh and bitter sting.  And she was accustomed to smoking Olferb through a water pipe.  She exhaled with a violent cough, losing the hit, and everyone around her either laughed or shushed her.  Rocco nodded to the chandeliers.  The candles and lanterns and torches in the tavern were all dimming while the stage was illuminating.  She saw no obvious cause for the dimming flames all around her, nor a source for the stage light.

“Magic.”  She whispered to herself.  And then grinned.  She hadn’t meant to speak aloud.

The Olferb…  Maybe I shouldn’t smoke any more.

She took another drag. 

A monstrous hand took the spliff from her after she finished her second hit and another bear paw reached in front of her with a glass full of a light amber liquid which was not mead and had several small blocks of ice floating in it.

“Eau de Vie,  I presume?”

 “Yes my Valkyrie – have you never tried it?  No, I suppose not. It’s always been a puzzler to me that despite all the magic your people possess, and the renowned artistic skills of the elves, from bow-making to sword-smithing, you have never had the desire to explore the mysteries of distillation.” 

“We favor mead.”

“We serve mead to our children my innocent angel.”

The band of musicians was still tuning their instruments – tones and scales and modulations she was unaccustomed too.  Or was it just the Olferb?  She sipped the Eau de Vie and her eyes opened right quick.

“It tastes like fire,” she said, turning and smiling at Rocco.

“Ain’t it nice?”

“I’ve never drunk fire before.”

“Well drink up all you’d like now, Valkyrie.  We won’t let you burn yourself.”

She smiled at him and raised the small glass to her mouth again, drinking more deeply this time.

“I like fire.”  She said after perhaps drinking a little too much.

“You’ll get along well with my brother then.”

She watched Rocco turn and smiled at Neen, the barmaid, who closed her eyes, slowly shaking her head at Rocco.  She had tresses as golden as her own worn in two loose braids.  Small red bows tied on their ends.  Neen leaned around behind him and whispered, something into Rocco’s ears.

“I don’t see Billy anywhere.”  He replied.

Neen raised a thin fair eyebrow and gave him an exaggerated, stern look while mouthing, “I’m watching you.”  Rocco winked back and then turned his attention towards the stage.

The amber liquid in the goblet smelled like hunger, a relentless burning in the pit of one’s stomach desperate to be sated.  She exhaled yet another Olferb hit she had barely remembered taking.

When did this get back in my hand?

Holding the cigarette in one hand, she turned around and made a small toast to Rocco with the glass in the other.  Rocco now had both his hands on her shoulders.  He had at some point rolled his own cigarette which he held between two of his fingers on his left hand, either digit being almost as large as her forearm.

How did he roll another one so fast?

She did not feel threatened but rather, held.  Rocco the Rotten, the Lord of Killington and Master of the Keep whom she had travelled several weeks through civil-war torn and beast infested lands to find, had, after nary a hello, offered her smoke, drink and music.  She somehow felt at home in a stranger’s tavern, bellied up to the bar somewhat involuntarily, and riding high.  Her only fear at this moment was that after she revealed to Rocco her reason for her seeking him out, he might decide against continuing to be such a gracious host.

The band of musicians were teasing each other with rapid fire bursts of notes and beats as they warmed up, often exaggerating the already awkward semi-tones of strings and skins still in need of tuning.  Elven music was simpler, slower, more singular; melody over harmony; lone voices meandering for decades. 

A Halfling appeared to be the bandleader, which was not an uncommon occupation for Halflings in the North.  Shirefolk were being perpetually displaced by the wars in the Northlands and unlike their staid farming cousins in the Southlands, here in the North Halflings often wandered in caravans seeking safe havens with those races of freefolk who had richer traditions of war.  Haflings didn’t even have a god of war to whom they could pray for help – their pantheon possessed no such hero.  Instead, with their farmlands seized in almost every shire in the Northlands during the last century of fighting, Northland Halflings found that their proclivity for deceptively dexterous feats (they seemed far too small to possess such speed and not nearly strong enough to perform the acrobatics that apparently came naturally to them) made them popular entertainers. 

Halfling caravans were known to set up small carnivals offering an assortment of arts and vices to the war-weary, an opportunity for work-a-day farmers, smiths and merchants to take their minds off of their daily troubles (and perhaps for Halflings to take a few coins from their purses).  Acrobatics, clownery and games of chance were all common.  But if a very clever gnome or two were part of the travelling show then one might have the opportunity to behold an “Immaculate Contraption.”  These theaters built into a wagon (or sometimes several wagons hitched together) were so cleverly constructed that marionettes and costumed Halflings acted together seamlessly against moving backdrops and sets which transformed themselves from one story to another; a dungeon prison-cell unfolding into a palace’s ballroom with nary a stagehand in sight.  Furniture and characters appeared through trap doors while elsewhere on the stage shutters and shingles flipped back and forth and up and down revealing new scenes.  Those familiar with the craftsmanship of gnomes could hear the clicking and whirring of the many gears and levers all intricately combined, collapsing a table to the stage floor and then resurrecting it as a king’s throne.  Curtains with scenery painted on them were lowered and raised on cue to reveal sunsets one moment and starry nights the next.  Characters would fly off the stage and into the audience with no pulleys to be seen and all of this was accompanied by mesmerizing fire and light shows.  One Immaculate Contraption, very popular around Hell’s Eve, had a mechanical skeleton so realistic that in several towns local wizards were asked to come down and verify that the Halflings weren’t using a genuine undead creature. 

Despite the impressive array of entertainments that Halflings had mastered as their shires were stolen or destroyed - collateral damage of the humans’ war - their proclivity for petty thievery also meant they would wear thin their welcome quickly in most places, which was, in part, why they built their theaters on wagons.

In truth, Halflings had no greater disposition towards thievery than any of the other free-folk but they were not a martial people and as most any halfling in the North would tell you, sometimes surviving a war meant finding creative ways to acquire one’s needs - and perhaps just a little bit more as well.

The Halfling leading the band wore skin tight black leather pants and an unbuttoned silvery shirt that reflected the shifting colors from a ball of soft light which encompassed him.  He turned away from the rest of the band, apparently having finished tuning the long-necked lute that he wore over his shoulder, and faced the audience. In front of him was a small pole, not unlike a short coat rack, but at its top, just in front of the Halfling’s mouth, was a tiny tin cone with its pointy-end towards the three-foot tall man and the cone’s open end towards the crowd.  As he moved his mouth close to the cone the rest of the band began to play in harmony together. Their individual assays at tuning and warming up - one player’s scales climbing over another’s - all effortlessly transformed into a warm low-pitched melody with a gentle relaxing rhythm, soft as drizzling rain on a roof but strong and constant like a horse’s gallop.  There were woodwind instruments, and some sort of metal horns.  A tall, thin man slid a glass bottle up and down a thick single string attached to a device that looked like it was made of a broomstick and a hollowed out gourd.  With his other hand, the man slid a bow on the string releasing low vibrations, almost inaudible – felt more than heard.

“Well, we made it to Saturday night folks,” the halfling said smiling.  But what she expected to be a small barely perceptible voice was instead easily heard over the still murmuring crowd. The source of the Halfling’s unexpectedly powerful (and surprisingly baritone) voice seemed to be not his mouth but the entire stage itself.  Rocco must have noticed her confusion as she turned her head back and forth obviously puzzled by the Halfling’s magical mouth.

“Do you see the small cones on the tops of the poles on the stage, in front of the performers?”  He whispered.  “Like, the cone he just spoke into?”

“Yes,” she whispered back turning her head around to see his face, the color of which appeared to change with the rotating colors of the stage lights.  “Your face is green.”

“I’m sure it is Valkyrie.  But turn and look at the sides of the stage - you see a column of much larger cones on either side, yes?”

She turned and noticed the peculiar columns of cones for the first time.  She nodded.

“Our little village is blessed with a wizard or two and a gnome or three who are all quite creative and enormously fond of music.  They devised this system to amplify the music and voices of the performers.  Sammy speaks into the small cone with his usual voice, but a grand voice comes out of the big cones.  The instruments too benefit from this magic and ingenuity.  There is no other place like this in the Northland where one can hear music in such detail – every nuance of the performance, the quietest plink of a high lute string, the whisper of a bard delivering the dying words of a wronged princess in an epic poem … all of it, richer and more powerful than anything one might hear from the stages of the grandest theaters in the old capitals.  Right here in this dingy old keep.  Listen.”

“The Olferb doesn’t hurt either.”

Rocco chuckled quietly noticing her dilated eyes and growing childlike grin.  “Shhhh … listen.”

Huh.  He’s better spoken than I thought he’d be.  Such a passion for music.  Ar-Raguel never mentioned that.  Magical cones of music making … Magicones?

The band continued its slow jam.  She thought they sounded like water and heartbeats.

“And even though there’s more than a few of you out there who have hardly earned your pints tonight,” Sammy continued, eliciting a few jeers from the crowd.  “Most of ya’ deserve twice what ya’ got.”

“I’ll give you twice what you deserve, Sammy!”  Came a threat in jest from the audience.

“That’s exactly what your wife told me this afternoon, Alexi,” the halfling responded without a moment’s pause.  There was a good deal of laughter and a few patrons pulled a man who must have been Alexi back into his seat. 

“Now, now.  It’s too early to get rowdy.  Think of our poor proprietress Billy.  If we start busting up her place now, she’ll never save enough coin to pay off that bounty on her head!”

“You’re cut off Sam!”  Neen shouted from behind the bar while raising both her middle fingers at him.  “That’s my boss you’re talking about!”

Are they really going to wreck the place later?  Is that normal?

“Cut off?  Well then it’s a good thing I brought my own,” Sammy said while pulling a silver flask from seemingly out of nowhere.  He took a swig and looked over in Rocco’s direction.  “My Gods, it would seem we have an angel among us tonight.”  He gestured towards her while playing a quick elven melody that the elfkin recognized immediately, “Out of the Woods.”  The rest of the band followed the Halfling’s lead.  They played a more energetic variation of the song than she was accustomed to. Traditionally the song was quite melancholy as it told the sad story of an elf who fell in love with a human – a cautionary tale of how ephemeral love and life were outside sylvan woods. 

Sammy must have known the song well enough. “It’s good to get out of the woods once in a while my elven princess.”  He said to her from the stage.  “But be careful what company you seek!  It looks like you’ve already fallen in with our fearless leader, Rocco O’Dale, Lord of Killington Keep, known to his enemies as Rocco--”

“The Rotten!”  She shouted instinctively and then covered her mouth in embarrassment and turned apologetically to Rocco who smiled yet again and exhaled a blue cloud of smoke which enveloped her head.  “No worries warrior-kin. Now you’re getting the hang of spending a night at the Keep.”

“Such a generous Lord we have.  How about a round for the crowd, ‘ey Rocco?”  Sammy called from the stage. 

The audience erupted in cheers and chants of “Roc-co! Roc-co!”

Rocco dropped his head down, resigned, and raised his right hand in the air while making a circling motion indicating to Neen to serve up a pint to everyone in the bar.  The cheers grew almost uncomfortably loud and the chanting and whistling hurt her ears. 

“You’re gonna’ have to pay your tab someday, Rocco.”  Neen joked as she tapped a fresh keg.

“I know the owner pretty well.”  He chuckled as he raised his head.  “I’ll work something out.” 

The crowd rushed the bar and Neen slid one mug of ale after another towards thirsty patrons.  Rocco was occupied laughing and chatting with grateful well-wishers and the band changed songs seamlessly again.  Some sort of drinking and dancing jig.  She watched as Sammy played his lute meticulously and danced with the grace and ease of someone with legs twice as long.  As people picked up their pints many took to an open space in front of the stage to dance and spill their beer along with the music.  After a few minutes the band brought the piece to an end.  There was a good deal of applause as most people seated themselves again and Neen appeared to be serving the last few drinks of Rocco’s promised round.

“Indeed, a generous Lord we have.” Said a panting Sammy who next produced a handkerchief from out of thin air and wiped his sweating brow.  “But not all Lords are so kind, and I hope this next song will be a reminder for all aspiring nobility to remember the power of the wee folk…”

She may not have spent much time in the land of freefolk, but Halflings and elves were always on good terms and more than once her woods had sheltered a halfling caravan caught between warring princelings. Still, she always found it remarkable how aptly named the race was.  They were indeed about half the height of an average man, perhaps three feet, but also half in every detail.  Unlike dwarves’ stocky build or the elven exoticism of gnomes, Halflings looked exactly like their human counterparts, but half their size in all things and all in perfect proportion.   

Not all things.

Sammy however had a human sized voice. A baritone that he effortlessly lifted to a falsetto as he began to sing some plaintive lyrics over a simple repetitive melody with an accompaniment from the band in a style that she had never heard before.

Well I hear there’s a prince in town

With pockets full of gold…

That’s right a new prince in town

And his pockets is lined with gold

And since I ain’t even got a piece of copper

You know I had to hit the road

Behind Sammy, the tall thin man with the one stringed instrument in the back had stopped using a bow and was now plucking the string and changing its pitch by precisely sliding the glass bottle along it.  Sammy may have been the voice to this body of music but the tall man plucking and sliding was the heartbeat.  Next to him a gnome sat high in a chair with both his feet and his hands playing a simple steady heavy beat on drums set up low and high all around him.  She had never seen anyone play drums with their feet before.

Sammy continued his tale of the prince with pockets full of gold.

I packed up my pony

And galloped off to his castle

I packed everything I had on my pony

And galloped to his castle

And when I got there that prince he said, “Son look at yourself!”

You’re barely, half a vassal

His voice exploded with the last few words, and he shook his head slowly back and forth as he stepped back from the magicone.  His face was red and he was covered in sweat again.  He was shouting:  “Oh no! Oh no you didn’t just say that princey-prince.”

She could hear his voice even unaided because he screamed loud enough to be heard over the crowd and across the tavern.  The crowd appeared to empathize and chanted and shouted with him while he played a series of rapid fire notes on his lute, so fast, but so fluid.  He seemed to be communicating in some manner with another band-member who answered Sammy’s lute with similar but unique flurries and scales pouring forth from some sort of bronze metal instruments that produced low notes that tickled her stomach as well as smooth, full, high tones that sounded more human than metallic.

After a dozen or so bars of music like this Sammy came back to the magicone energetic, ecstatic.  He took the opening lines of the next verse in a loud shriek, resolving into a furious falsetto before slipping back into his low-baritone.

Half a vassal?! Half a man?!

I won’t take such abuse

I ain’t no half a man.

Prince!  I won’t take such abuse!

And that charmin’ darlin’ prince, he looks at me and he says,

Son watch your mouth! Cuz I won’t use half a noose.

The crowd exploded into boos and hisses at the mention of the noose.  She heard people in the audience make reference to several princelings notorious for their tyranny.  Sammy once again let loose an explosion of notes on his lute as he jerked around the stage pretending to be swinging from a gallows’ pole.  Someone in the audience made a crude noose from a rope – farmers and laborers made up most of the tavern’s crowd and many had tools and field implements with them having come to the bar straight from the fields.  The “hangman” stepped up to the front of the stage with the noose open wide, held it a few feet in front of Sammy as the Halfling played and then shook his head as he tightened up the noose finally shaking his head in the affirmative when the noose was about half its original size.   Someone else placed a bottle of wine next to the base of Sammy’s magicone stand.

Sammy’s fast and furious notes began to give way to slower, sadder notes that lasted longer, their sound sustained by Sammy’s repeatedly rubbing the string into the fretboard, the friction resulting in a persistent tone she had never heard a lute issue before.  The energy, the mood of the song shifted in just a few seconds.  Sammy’s voice went from pissed back to plaintive in a few heartbeats:

I lowered my head and said please master Lord

I don’t look like much but what I got is yours

Oh please master Lord,

I ain’t got much but all my work is yours

I come a long, long way

So please don’t close your castle’s doors

Again Sammy backed away from the magicone and this time the metal horn with the human voice soared alone as the Halfling reached down and grabbed the bottle at his feet.   Sammy took a long drink until he had emptied the bottle – holding it upside down for the audience to see.  Then much to her surprise, he walked over to the wall at the side of the stage and smashed the bottle against it.  The crowd cheered loudly and Sammy revealed that he still held the neck of the bottle which he slipped over the ring-finger of his left hand.  He pressed the glass neck against the strings rather than his fingertips and as he slid the glass up and down the strings he wrenched from his instrument yet another new sound for her.  A vibrating, steady, high-pitched wailing that sounded otherworldly - demonic even - resonated form the lute which she noticed now was not made entirely of wood but appeared to be at least partly made of some sort of metal.  The strings too appeared to have a glint to them and the cries that the glass and steel together made gave her shivers.

What sorcery is this?

Sammy’s playing slowed and relaxed after a bit and he approached the magicone again.

“Imagine that prince thinking about turning me away?” He spoke to the audience as the other band members played lightly behind him.  “As if I’m not good enough for his castle.  Shows you what princes know.  I mean any one of us here knows that a castle is just like a woman.  With enough lies or money, you can always get inside.”

That’s terrible.

As she thought the words the crowd again began booing but this time they were not expressing their shared distaste for a murderous despot. They were deriding the diminutive bard.  Women were shouting vicious things at him using phrases both new and somewhat incomprehensible to her.  A few threw mugs.

Sammy stepped up to the magicone despite the brief hail of pebbles, mugs and bits of food.  He called to Neen behind the bar, “Oh Neen don’t shake your head at me like that, cuz you know it’s true more than most!” 

Neen scowled, picked up a shot-glass and hurled it at Sammy on the stage with alarming accuracy.  Sammy had to raise his lute to protect himself and deflect the missile.

“Oh bother, she could have hit me if she wanted to.  Billy would never allow one of her protégés to miss such a simple shot.  Deep down Neen loves me like a brother.  Not her own brother mind you…”

“I’m gonna’ kill him.”  Neen said to Rocco.

“Many have tried.”  Rocco replied.  He appeared surprisingly calm given the scene before them.

“Is this normal?”  She asked Neen and Rocco.

“Huh? Oh, quite.”  Rocco said. 

“Some of them throwing mugs have shared a bed with Sammy.”  Neen answered.

“Present company excluded?” Rocco asked winking at Neen.  She turned away rather than dignifying the question with an answer.  Rocco was still smoking an Olferb cigarette. 

Wait, so am I.

Sammy smiled and waited out the rash of insults and objects hurled at him.  “You fickle people.  Now are you all gonna’ let me finish my story or you gonna’ all keep hatin’ on me for speakin’ the truth?”

“Preach little brother!”  Came a voice.

“Save my soul Sammy!” Came another.

“Wait, aren’t they angry with him?”  She asked Rocco.

“They were,” he answered exhaling.  “But now he’s gonna’ remind them who the real enemy is.” 

Sammy was remarkably handsome.  He had long blond hair tied back in a braided ponytail and cobalt blue eyes in the center of an almost feline face.  The lights on the stage shifted and focused almost entirely on him now as he brought his lips close to the cone.  The band’s instruments were all barely murmuring and Sammy whispered, almost hissed:

Now that prince he said, “Take this half man away

And put him in my kitchen.”

He was more talking than singing:

That charmin darlin’ Prince

He put me to work in his goddamned kitchen

But that’s where all the other vassals showed me

His prized chalice…

The band stopped.  All but the gnome who gently made a rolling, tapping sound on a drum that sounded as if it were full of sand or shells.  Sammy smirked and shook his head.  He raised his voice as he continued his tale.

“His prized chalice!” He shouted again as the gnome followed his words immediately with a powerful hit on one of his foot-drums.  “The one he drank from every night [the gnome kicked the drum loudly again - boom]… gold plated [boom – boom] … jewel encrusted [boom – boom – boom]… stamped with his sigil [boom – boom – boom - boom] … yeah that one…”  The gnome was drumming wildly now; all his limbs a-flailing and creating a rhythmic racket that shook the floor of the tavern.  Sammy snapped his arm out horizontally and the gnome ceased his wild drumming in an instant while the rest of the band picked up the melody line from where they had left off but so much more loudly while Sammy screamed now as much as he sang:

Yeah, the rest of the vassals all showed me

That that chalice was the best damn pot to piss in.

The band played a few last blaring notes, a descending scale that aurally described an exhausted collapse.

She sat with her mouth slightly open, her breath taken away.  Again people rushed up to the bar and the tavern exploded with the noise of a hundred singing and screaming voices rather than just one – a joyful noise.  A smile grew across her face.  She turned to Rocco and said, “I need another cigarette.”

one man's chalice is another man's chamber-pot

original image (uncredited clip art) @ http://infohost.nmt.edu/~armiller/illusion/cupface.htm
manipulation by the author