"No, no — " said Kronin. His ears twitched again. He turned to face the cave behind them. "I think it came from in there."
Talorin directed his attention to the cave as well. He leaned toward it to listen better, dropping his pebbles. "You're right! Hmm! Someone's an awfully loud snorer!"
The two kender stared at each other a moment. Their eyes lit up with recognition. Kronin resumed picking the lock more feverishly than ever. Talorin was almost giddy with excitement. "Hold still, will you!" said Kronin.
"Oh, this will be a good one!"
The dogs soon came to the cave and barked furiously at its dark entrance, refusing, however, to go in.
"At last!" shouted Toede, pulling up on the reins of Galiot and stopping behind his dogs. He slid off. "They're trapped!"
"I hope so, sire — " groaned Groag.
"Oh, they're in there, all right," said Toede. He stuck out his hand for his bow and arrow.
"Yes, but every time — "
"Come, come! Be quick about it!" shouted Toede, snapping his fingers impatiently.
Groag handed the weapons over. "They've been very sneaky so far — "
"That's right! Very sneaky, indeed!" said Toede, nocking his arrow. "And look where it's gotten them! They're doomed!"
"All the same, my lord, I would proceed carefully — "
"Bah! You just don't like seeing me outwit a kender," came back Toede, turning his back on Groag and peering eagerly into the darkness of the cave.
"You're wrong, my lord," said Groag, sliding his bulk clumsily off his pony. "Nothing would please me more. But — "
"Never mind 'but', " said Toede, turning back. "Just follow your orders. Stay by the trees and watch the mounts and dogs. I'll leave you the slaves and the two rearguards. If Kronin and that other pointy eared pipsqueak should sneak by us, kill them at once! Understand?"
"Yes, sire," said Groag, grateful at least for the respite.
"The rest of you follow me!"
While four of the hobgoblins eagerly dismounted, Groag retreated back across the clearing to the trees with the slaves, dogs, ponies, and the two rearguards. Toede peered once more into the cave, but this time more tentatively. His faithful attendant had given him second thoughts. "Damn that Groag," he muttered. "Always ruining my fun! Well, not this time!" Bow and arrow nocked at the ready, Toede padded stealthily into the cave, followed closely by his guards. Soon they disappeared in the blackness.
There was a moment or so when nothing much happened, except that the dogs kept barking and yanking at their leashes, pulling some of the exhausted slaves from the trees into the clearing. Groag himself settled against a tree and sat down on a bed of pine needles. He gently fingered the tatters of his robe and sighed.
Suddenly, several prolonged hobgoblin screeches echoed from the cave. They were followed almost immediately by none other than Toede himself and his four guards, all squealing like pigs at the top of their lungs and bolting out of the cave as fast as their fat, armor-clad bodies would carry them.
"My lord, what happened?" called Groag, jumping to his feet.
The answer came quickly enough. Out of the cave emerged a huge, very angry, reptilian head. Right between its flaring nostrils was stuck Toede's puny arrow. The emerging head was quickly shown to be attached to a long, thick serpentine neck that slid out and out until the entirety of an enormous green dragon stood before the cave.
"Attack! Attaaaack!" screamed Toede, his hands flailing the air as he retreated across the open ground, his bodyguards clanking after him. Meanwhile, the dogs had reversed themselves and were now lunging in the opposite direction, yelping and dragging some of the slaves with them back into the forest.
The dragon sat back on its haunches before its cave, its head soaring above the surrounding pine trees, its leathern wings opening like two green sails of a great ship. Around the dragon's thick rear ankle, looking like nothing more than a bracelet and charm, were attached the chain and deer carcass.
"Attaaaack!" screamed Toede, continuing his dash toward the forest.
The two hobgoblins who had remained with Groag stepped forward uneasily, their little pig eyes widening, their spears trembling. "Kill it! Kill it!" Groag squealed. "Protect your master!"
The two seemed inclined to head for the rear, but they were pressed forward by Toede. Planted behind them, he was grabbing at the arms of the other fleeing hobgoblin guards, trying to spin them around. "Where are you going, you cowards? Stop! Stop!"
By now most of the guards, dogs, and slaves — with Galiot leading the way — had scattered into the woods.
The dragon kept its glare fixed on the fat hobgoblin Highlord who stood at the edge of the forest, jumping up and down, waving his fists, and barking orders at the two quivering guards he had pushed into the clearing. Groag was frozen to his spot.
"Get him! You idiots! What are you waiting for?" Toede shrieked.
At last the angry dragon, tired of the squealing, opened its great maw, rolled its pink tongue out of the way, and released a great, thunderous discharge of flame that caught Toede right in the middle of one of his jumps. The flames passed right over the heads of the two hobgoblins edging their way backward. Tossing their spears in the air, they fled in opposite directions.
The dragon's flames were so loud that they drowned out Toede's squeals.
Groag, standing several paces away from Toede, could only watch in horror, his torn robes slowly being singed. And when at long last the flames stopped, all he could see remaining of his master was his red-hot, glowing armor, partly melted, lying on the ground.
The dragon roared victoriously, causing pine needles to rain from the trees. Then, using a front claw, the dragon swatted the irritating arrow from between its nostrils and slowly crawled back into its cave, the deer-carcass bracelet disappearing with it, followed by the dragon's own tapering, spiked tail.
In the ensuing silence, Groag, pine needles covering his head and shoulders, stood alone, gawking at where Toede had been ranting only moments before. After a moment more, he was finally able to move his legs a bit. About to slink back into the forest, he heard an odd sound — a sort of high-pitched, squeaky laugh ter. He stopped and looked to see where it was coming from.
His eyes fell upon two small beings perched on the rocky hill, just over the entrance to the cave. So hard were they laughing that they had fallen right over onto their backs and were holding their aching stomachs…
And that, more or less, was the tale that was told in the tavern and came to be retold over and over throughout Krynn.
When the hooded stranger had finished speaking, the other patrons looked first at him, then at Talorin, who was smiling proudly from pointy ear to pointy ear. "Kender can sneak up on any sleeping dragon," he added unnecessarily.
Old Pug scratched his curly hair. "Well, I'll be," he said. "So it's true about Kronin."
Another patron, the lanky human, patted the proud kender on the back.
"And now, kind stranger," continued Talorin expansively, "perhaps you would like to offer thanks for your liberation. I would be most happy to relay your gratitude to the great Kronin himself."
"Gratitude?" grumbled the hooded stranger. "Gratitude? For my liberation?"
"Why, of course. Everyone knows Toede was a horrible tyrant, and ever since that day — "
"Ever since that day," broke in the stranger, "I have sure enough been free — but free to what? To wander aimlessly? To go hungry? To find no shelter? Gratitude, you say? Look! Look upon my gratitude!" And, with that, the stranger tossed back his hood. The once elegant and haughty, once well-fed minion of the Highlord was now gaunt-faced and clothed in rags.