They heard the Knight Commander before they saw him. His incessant cursing gave him away. Somehow he had made it far enough up the western ridge to escape the worst, and he held on above the cauldron of freezing, roiling death, the adrenaline building a rage in him that mirrored the destruction of the Dragon’s roar itself. The remaining three companions knew that their adventure was not yet over and hastened up the ridge, for the chase was on again.
It was possible that they might defeat the Knight Commander in a battle. He was but one and they were three. But the long spears that Garn and Thrak carried for use against the mammoths were of little help in a close quarters battle, and Finderkeeper had naught but a dagger that he had been holding for his Uncle Both-eragain. The Knight was armored and well-weaponed with longsword and mace. Not to mention that he was enraged… really, really enraged.
There is little to say of the climb and descent that followed. The bright sun shone down on a narrow arm of the Ice Mountain Bay northwest of them as they reached the crest of the last ridge. The glacial fields that had spawned the ice dam lay west and south. They headed toward the bay as the tide turned and the water seeped away from their approach. By the time they had reached the shore many, many hours later, the tide was low and mud flats stretched from edge to edge across the finger of water.
“If we can make it across the flats before the tide turns,” sputtered a weak and weary kender, “maybe the water will cut off our truly dedicated but thoroughly exasperating pursuer.”
“No,” said Thrak. “We stand here.” He turned to Garn. “No matter what befalls, do not venture onto the flats.”
“I know, Father. I know.”
Finderkeeper was befuddled but too tired to want to run across several miles of open mudflats. Besides, he wasn’t sure how soon the tide would be turning anyhow. Drowning did not really sound like an interesting way to die. They said you just drifted off into unconsciousness, but he couldn’t figure out how they would really know that. Didn’t only dead people really know, one way or the other?
“Maybe if we just give him the magic thing,” he volunteered weakly, taking the small carved item out of the scroll case in which he had put it for safekeeping.
“Too late,” said Thrak, and then the Knight Commander was upon them.
Like the onslaught they had just witnessed at dawn, the Commander rushed at them without subtlety or tactics, but with amazing brute force. Both Thrak and Garn managed to stab at him as he charged at the group, but the force of his rush was so great that he struck the spear out of Garn’s hands before it had penetrated the leather joint in his armor. Thrak held on to his weapon, driving his spear into the upper arm of the Commander, but it slashed through muscle without striking bone, and tore out the side. There was no chance to regroup before the roaring maniac was atop them.
Thrak did his best to shield Garn from immediate harm, but not so much as to diminish the boy’s honor in this, his only battle. Finderkeeper drew Uncle Botheragain’s dagger, but found no opening. As quick as the hands of a kender are, he was no match for a fully armored and well-muscled human. Trying to keep his wits about him, Finderkeeper stabbed at the Knight’s boots, but the leather was sturdy and thick, and Uncle Botheragain’s blade was really not up to the task.
Suddenly, the tidal bore-a small, perhaps twelve inch inch high, wall of water that marked the turning of the tide-could be seen entering the narrow bay at its seaward end.
“Quickly!” said Gam, grabbing the kender. “Give me the scrollcase!”
Finderkeeper did as he was told. “But it doesn’t-”
Before he could say more, Garn grabbed the scroll-case and held it up. “You want the magic?” he cried hoarsely at the top of his lungs. “Then get it before the sea takes it!” He flung the scroll case out onto the mudflats, where it landed and rolled to a stop about forty feet offshore.
Perhaps Garn hoped that the Knight Commander would go after the magic and they would escape. Perhaps Garn knew only that he would be able by this maneuver to avenge his own death.
Vern Hasterck looked at the scrollcase and the approaching tidal bore. He looked at the three staggering defenders. There was enough time.
Focusing his remaining strength, the Knight Commander feinted back to gain room to swing. With a bellowing roar, he slashed in a wide, horizontal arc. He deliberately swung just over the boy’s head, overbearing Garn’s hasty effort to parry with his spearshaft, so that the boy could see his father die first. He need not have bothered, for Thrak threw himself into the slashing blade in a desperate attempt to purchase his son’s life at the cost of his own, with a final thrust of his hunting knife at the head of their berserk attacker. His blade glanced noisily off the helm of the Knight, gouging the thick metal with its force but causing little real damage.
Finderkeeper followed Thrak’s lead. Too short to reach the head or heart, he stepped into the stride of the rampaging Knight in an attempt to cripple his enemy’s mobility with a thrust into the crease of his leg-armor. But Hasterck recognized the gambit and let the force of his arcing blow against Thrak carry his left leg up and into the side of the closing kender. Finderkeeper went down, falling hard onto the smooth stone pebbles and rocks on the shore of the bay. Although, in any other situation, Finderkeeper would have taken a moment to pick out several of the best weathered rocks for his pouch, in this particular situation he grabbed the armored leg that had connected with his ribcage and held on for dear life. Even Finderkeeper’s full weight and strength did not slow the rampaging warrior.
Hasterck reversed his sword stroke and lunged at Garn, aiming lower this time. Before the boy’s body had even fallen to the blood-soaked beach, Hasterck dropped his sword and reached down for the kender. Finderkeeper spit in the Knight’s face. Uncle Bothera-gain had taught him that, when he was but a wee one back in Kendermore, but he had never had much use for spitting, until this particular instance.
Putting one hand on the kender’s chin and wrapping the other around Finderkeeper’s tangled topknot, Hasterck gave a sudden twist. Finderkeeper’s last thought was that the sound of splintering bone, combined with a sudden subsiding of all pain, was really quite interesting. Then, the kender thought no more.
Before Finderkeeper’s limp body once again hit the smooth stones he would never finger, Hasterck sprinted onto the mudflats to retrieve the scroll case.
The mud was soft and sucked at his legs during his rapid strides, but his momentum carried him out to the scrollcase. He stopped to pick it up. Immediately he sank in the soft saltwater mud to mid-thigh, the mud releasing a flood of water as he sank. It was only then he realized that as the mud released water, it gripped his legs in a viselike hold. He did not sink further, but he could not free himself. As if held by stone, his legs would not move-not an inch, not at all. He grabbed his dagger and cut at the bindings to his leg armor, feeling certain that cutting away the inflexible and weighty material would allow him to move. It was to no avail.
He tried not to panic. Grab the scrollcase so the magic does not flow away when the tidal bore hits, he thought. Remove the armor, so when the water comes, you can just float away to safety.
It was a plan. It should work. He grabbed the scroll-case, his prize, as the tidal bore broke over his waist with the stabbing feel of a thousand icy, vengeful knives. He waited as the shock subsided. Certainly the mud, infused now with water, would loosen around his legs. It would be unpleasant, even dangerous, but he could still float away.
But the mud did not loosen. It gripped him tighter. Soon he could not feel his legs, whether from the death grip of the accursed mud or the numbing coldness of the water of Ice Mountain Bay he did not know. The tide was quickly moving up his body. The cold was so great that he was unsure if his chest would refuse to take breath even before his head was covered by the water.