"If you don't mind, I'm bargaining for our lives," Toede shot back.
"Go right ahead. You're doing a good job so far."
Toede moved his wish of departure up to ten minutes before the gnolls had arrived and said to Charka, "Charka not want to kill humans. Humans powerful wizards."
"Hur?"
"Wizards," said Toede, grasping for synonyms. "Magic-users. Magicians. Thaumaturges. Juju priests. Charlatans. Shamani…"
Something sunk into the gnoll's skull. "Juju? Humans have great juju?"
"Moby juju," nodded Toede. "Humans seek more juju in forest of stone. Angry if gnolls disturb them."
Charka rocked back on his heels for a moment, deep in thought. Toede could almost see the steam leaking out of his pointed ears from the stress the thought process was placing on his brain.
"Human in forest of stone… humans must die. Humans have great juju… humans kill gnolls." Toede saw the coin mentally flip. Charka smiled. "Charka think you lie, King of Little Dry Frogs. If humans have big juju, humans attack gnolls first."
"Incredible logic," noted Toede for Groag's benefit. To Charka he said, "Humans not care about gnolls. Humans care about forest of stone. Gnolls attack humans, humans care about gnolls. Humans kill gnolls."
There was another pause as Charka digested this last bit of information, pondering for a good two minutes. Toede imagined the two parts of that gnollish brain swatting the concept between them: sacred tradition versus a palpable fear of possible death. Then Charka leaned close to Toede and snarled. "Prove."
"Prove?" said Toede, surprised.
"Prove humans have great juju. Prove humans worthy to be in forest of stone." Charka shot a glance at the other gnolls. Toede saw they were nodding back, stern-faced.
Toede held his hands out, empty palms upward, "Well, gee, guys, I didn't pack anything with me…"
Several of the gnolls brought their spears around, but when Charka chopped the air they lowered them. They kept the spears pegged on Groag, however, Toede noted. Charka gave his "confused-dog" look, and Toede didn't wait for the "Hur."
Toede stepped forward a half pace and thumped himself on the chest. "King of Little Dry Frogs get proof. Get moby juju from human chief." As an afterthought, he put in, "From human chief Renders."
Charka was impressed by the name, at least. "Human chief name is Boils Flesh?"
"Great chief of juju, Boils Flesh." Toede nodded. "King of Little Dry Frogs go to Great Chief Boils Flesh, bring moby juju for Charka."
"When did we stop speaking a common language in this conversation?" muttered Groag, earning himself another mild poke with a spear.
Charka thought for a moment. Toede sighed deeply and added, "Or…" He paused for effect. "Charka kill King of Little Dry Frogs, and Great Chief Boils Flesh turn Charka to chutney." Toede was unsure if "chutney" was part of gnoll cuisine, but Charka got the point.
"What if King of Little Dry Frogs go warn Great Chief Boils Flesh, so humans attack Charka here, eh?" asked Charka. "What if, "the gnoll added, "King of Little Dry Frogs just fly away?"
Toede smiled. "Charka keep friend of King of Little Dry Frogs as hostage. Kill hostage if King of Little Dry Frogs not bring moby juju back."
"No, you don't, damn you!" shouted Groag, rising to his feet in one motion and trying to charge Toede. "You're going run off on me… oof!" One of the gnolls had grabbed Groag around the waist and flung him full-force into the oak trunk. Groag hit the tree and slumped to the ground, silent.
Charka turned to Toede and said "Hur?"
Toede smiled reassuringly. "King of Little Dry Frogs' friend thinks he should go to Forest of Stone, talk to Great Chief Boils Flesh, risk anger of Boils Flesh instead."
Charka was impressed. "King of Little Dry Frogs' friend loyal."
'That he is," said Toede, smiling. "That he is." Then he added, "And by the way, my friend is carrying all my money. Could you fetch that pouch of coins for me?"
In the end, the gnolls gave Toede the pouch and one of the horses. Charka told him (in his unique, preposition-less way) to return by dawn or else Groag would be killed. Charka went into some detail over the nature of gnoll ritual slayings, which impressed even Toede. It was surprising what a culture could come up with without the benefit of fire, cold steel, lead weights, or kender poetry.
Toede rode out from the gnoll encampment like a flying mammal escaping the Abyss, though as soon as he knew the flying hooves of his mount to be out of earshot, he slowed to a comfortable canter. Of course, dawn would come, he would be nowhere to be found, and Groag would regrettably perish. Regrettably, after a great deal of suffering and torture. Then the gnolls would move on to the human encampment in the gnolls' sacred rock garden, and, regrettably, rampage through them with a minimum amount of mercy.
All of this was regrettable in that Toede couldn't hang about to watch.
There was an off chance that Groag could convince Charka of Toede's escape earlier than dawn, but it was an off-off chance. Toede chuckled as he played out the possible conversation aloud.
"But I tell you he won't be coming back!" Toede imitated his subaltern's whiny voice.
"Too bad," replied Toede-as-Charka. "Charka start skinning you now. Hold hostage down, boys. Charka get rusty knife."
All in all, a win/win situation. Transportation, money, and elimination of all witnesses, without so much as bloodying his own hands. Earlier, Toede had spotted a western path that broke from the main route, not as well traveled, but still serviceable. That western path promised relief from gnolls, scholars, kender, assassins, Hopsloth, and Groag. All in all, a good day.
Except for a grumbling in his stomach, but that was brought on more by Groag's cooking than anything else. There was still some jerky in the saddlebags. He could probably find some farmstead or army post long before he hit Balifor, someplace where a few coins would wangle a hot meal and a decent bath.
These assurances did nothing for the present state of his stomach however. Toede leaned back and rummaged through the left saddlebag, looking for the jerky.
Instead, his fingers closed around a disk hanging from a chain.
He hauled it out to examine it, even though in the pit of his stomach he knew what it was the moment he touched it, and a sympathetic pain shot up from his belly, stabbing at his heart.
The disk had an engraved picture of Hopsloth on one side. On the other was a deep, crudely etched T, some lighter, spidery writing, and numbers.
It was the holy symbol he had pulled from the assassin in the Jetties back during his first reincarnation.
When, exactly, Toede had lost the device was unknown to the highmaster. Probably when we were jumping around trying to avoid being toasted by Gildentongue, he thought. But how would Groag have found it? Either in the heat of the battle, or perhaps in the burned debris afterward. More likely one of the scholars had found it near his smoking body.
Then why did the device have the hand-drawn T?
Toede held it up to the russet moonlight, tilting it to catch the faint illumination. To the lower left-hand side of the T was the date, about six months ago, give or take. And in the right-hand corner, more faintly inscribed in Groag's spidery hand, were the words: DIED NOBLY.
Live nobly, the shadowy figures had said, the mountain-high being and sea-wide creature. Well, if he needed proof when they came calling, perhaps this was it. Somebody had certainly mourned his passing this time, unlike the previous occasion with its festivals and general relief. He pictured Groag laid up in a cot with the scholars bustling around him, turning the disk over and over in his hands, finally inscribing it as a small memento to crystalize his feelings of regret and loss.
Groag would probably be telling the shadowy beings about these very feelings firsthand by the end of the day tomorrow, tops, after the flesh had been scoured away from his quivering form (Charka had been very explicit, and though gnollish vocabulary was limited, on the matter of death it was quite expansive). Of course, between now and then Groag might quite possibly change his opinion of Toede.