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CHAPTER 16.

Recounts and Mind-Reading

Hiid stared transfixed at the flower, her hair standing on end in genuine fright.

But... but... butbutbut... This was not... this was not possible! It had been a DREAM! Nought... nought was supposed to materialize out of it!

She turned it over and around in her hands. It glistened faintly, but the petals -- or whatever the raggedly out-jutting protrusions were pretending to be -- had transformed from their erewhile waxen appearance into such hard flakes that it really looked like a fossilized cone with glitter poured on. It was as weightless as a quarter of a ping-pong ball, but many a substance was illogical like that here. The bleeding heck; the tail-feathers of gho'ockolhintd were about twenty kilos apiece. Hence, one would just make a complete idiot of himself by claiming that something was as light as feather.

She massaged at the bridge of her nose, pressing her eyes shut for a while. It... Could it just have been there all the time? Perchance gotten stuck to her hair whilst she had tumbled through the earthen passage into the grave? She could have absently fingered it, or seen it as a reflection on one of the crypt's walls, and thence had a memory of it which had then wormed its way into the dream and...

Then she glanced down at her outfit. Oh indeedy, that would be such a passable answer, considering that someone had attired her with a clean shift and a jolly pair of green-yellow-pink-striped stockings with little beetle figures sewn into rows. Their fashion disaster force could have annihilated a small planet. So, absolutely a cone of this size would have gone completely unnoticed whilst they had pulled the previous garment over her head.

And it was also oh-so very realistic to believe it had just popped into existence out of nowhere while she had been slee- er... um... been flattered by a randy ghost in some other... dimension?

Enkev was not stupid. In the course of her fifty-five to sixty years -- well, she could not be assured of her true age any more because of the more than probable time frame disparities between Iota Sphere and Rha-kan'Ocka, so she presumed she might be somewhere in-between those values -- she had heard and read about Himalaya's worth of contemporary science theories. Id est, mallard-brained balderdash, which she had hitherto only sniggered at.

Here, however, you might actually be able to apply some of them into everyday practice. It had already become clear that these folks did not just rot when the Reaper knocked at the front door, but went somewhere. So, when that one holotelly shaman, some fifteen years agone in Sagabreakers, had explained with much falsetto and flinging of his arms how the astral-projected spirit fled into the celestial realms of embodiment of the cosmic radiation, the Great Star-Spirit Ä*Ö=°°, in the Nyght (The y and the capital letter were always important when something was mystic. Like Magyk and Vampyres.) when the quasi-bi-parted proto-soul was most susceptible to the runeous zhazhi-filaments shaped like orthogonal pentagrams of... something... er...

The paragraph dissolved like a vampire in daylight due to the sheer mumbo-jumbo load Hiid's mind had never been able to bear well. Anyway, the basic idea was that mayhap there was a separate dream-world of some sort. What if the zinigh'aldjaatd commonly visited far-off-living relatives and forebears in the small hours? Oh, deary auntie Gurgle'Gargle-Groaargh, how you look so radiant even though you have been dead the past sixty thousand years! Shall we have a cup of spectral tea, or would you like to taste my phantom cakes? I must give you the recipe; the taste will just plain caress your figurative taste buds!

Well, this was mere speculation. Enkev would not ken, since she had ne'er asked. Now she would probably have to.

She gazed at the cone again with unease. The wind went waaaaaailwailwailwail mooaaaaan outside, and the wooden bits of the house creaked ominously. Uff... this was indeed more than just a teensy dilemma. Lhietd seemed the sort of a man... er, elvish specter who scarcely gave up just akin to that. If he was going to reappear in her dream the forthcoming night, she would need to teach him to play chess or something and make him sit on an ice cube whilst doing so. Imaginary or nay, Hiid would most certainly NOT throw herself into snogfests or worse with some inane ghost ever again, even if he might be a wee bit of a tragic character. Fie and blazes, he must have had enough mistresses in his time, if the legend of him and his itchy manbits lived even in the folksongs of today.

That slurping had already been way over the brim, even though... um, it had actually felt... umh... by Dthg'aar's firehammer, the length of that tongue and the way he kissed...

Um.

Anyway... did not this, overall, stink of something akin to necrophilia? Well, spectrophilia the very least, since he was not an actual flesh-and-blood being any more. Furthermore, the king seemed like, what, over eight feet tall! Even if he had been a ruddy living wight, the mere size difference... er... um... those abs... and all the raw, unadulterated power... Um... the way those hardened muscles and sinews strained by the tiniest movement...

She slapped herself on the forehead. Egads, what was the matter with her? She would need to get rid of these ridiculous 'um'-episodes; this was not rational thinking at all! Alright, alright, Lhietd might be a fine body of a man, very much so, but Enkev truly had no special feelings for him. She did not hold in high regard people who switched girls trice a day-

Er. Was not her favorite mathematician Gesundheit Ø. Gyi?ñhhá Misprint* just alike, and even so she fangirled his intelligence? Grargh, wherefore needed everything to contradict with itself these days? Anyway. This was just some bloke who gabbled like an oversugared Shakesapple play. Probably not a grand intellectual, aside from having devoured a few thesauri.

The mechanic's stomach gave an almighty rumble.

Uf, nay, this would not do. On top of the black hole roiling in her guts, her throat felt as parched as mummified parchment. Wonder whether there was even a water jug on any of the tables here...? Hiid tentatively wriggled up in the darkness. Owowow, a walking-stick would have come in handy right now. And painkillers.

She limped around in the large hall, squinting in the measly light the lantern outside granted, but found nought. Hmmh. Mayhap there were some leftovers in the kitchen. Wonder whether she could slink in without waking up half the house, as it was for aye hyperstuffed with overnight guests from the uncountable offspring families of Ghirn and Guarh. Yet as the inners already moaned stronger than the gale, the options were quite sparse.

She set the cone on her pillow, and limped to the door. Uuuuuurrrrgh, wherefore did the doorhandles always need to be a mile up there, and the doors themselves built akin to a hydrogen bomb -resistant air-raid shelter? Graaaaahhhuuuuugh, ah... now it started creaking open.

She cursed under her breath at the lack of light in the corridor outside. With these superb incoordination skills and the disability to see in the dark, she would more than likely stumble about fifty times ere the kitchen and step on someone. Hiid used the wall as a guide, and thus was recurrently in danger of making precious vases and ornamental platters fall from their stands. Once there was a near hit-and-miss case with a heavy broadsword which started rocking ominously in its rack and fell down with a hideous clang.

The thing was that the house had been widened and elevated considerably in the course of the recent years. Erst with the aid of all sorts of trash materials as more space had been so sorely needed, and then with stronger lumber, which the rebels had recently acquired quite massive loads for reasons unknown to her. Even presently, the southern side was full of scaffolds and ladders and half-laid foundations, as more halls were supposed to be raised there. Since the constructions proceeded so fast, she had a good reason to believe some wizardly abracadabra was involved.

Hence, the G'Uhageid household looked now more like a small mansion than the shabby wee cabin of four years back, even if it was rather lopsided and scarcely followed any uniform architecture.

Halfway through the dark action-adventure route of falling china and blades, Hiid heard footsteps and scraps of whispered conversation approaching her from behind a corner together with a bobbing puddle of light. When the girl herself turned the corner, she nearly crashed against the fast-pacing Granny Ghirn. There was a miffed air about her, and the sight of Hiid hardly improved her mood.

"By the mercy o' heavenlords, what are ye poor wee darlin' sod wanderin' about in the middle o' the deepmost night, an' in that ill fit when you oughts to be sleepin' tight in bed!" Ghirn'ubim-Ach exhaled exasperated, and grabbed Hiid by the crook of her arm. "Come now, ye foolish lass, let's get ye back upstairs. It be bed an' hot drinks to you fer the rest o' the weektide, and none o' 'tis foolish skulkin' about, unless ye wanna catch yersel' but worse a cold! An' nay neither with your bare measly shift on, 'tis nay proper clothin' for a twee lass! May the eternal blights o' the netherpits fall as brimstone rain upon 'tis house if anyone sees you akin to that, shamefully wanderin' about nigh naked!"

Frankly, now that the 'halfling' had been tottering on and about for so long, Granny Ghirn hardly treated Enkev anyhow different from her own grandchildren. Which meant an automatic increase in discipline, workload, and making sure the lass wore a proper dress for aye, such as a virtuous and modest future goodwife would proudly bear. It was none of that overly mawkish blatherskite about a gentle, knitting granny-deary in a rocking-chair and her a ginger cat playing with a ball of yarn that you got shoved against your face in stupid fairy tales. Moreover, Ghirn had given Hiid a few quite a petulant clips on the ear in the course of years for once again breaking up something. Alright, she had probably deserved them. At least they had given her a strong reason to watch her steps more alertly in the future. This time was a bit different, though, due to the aforetold reasons.

"But, Ei wuz hung-ree, an' Ei be fein, verily, tees-" Enkev protested, but got interrupted by Gheldah who had been traipsing a few gaits behind the matron.

"Sis, did ye nay wost or recall however yer sirra jus' spake that he wanted Ghiidgh 'ere before 'is seat as anon as seen fit? Above and beyon', I wanna hark what 'tis all aboot, 'cos I was there mesel'. Wherefore don't ye, 'cause o' ye bein' so pert an' all, fetch 'er 'em m're proper dress, an' we'll nip inne kitchens, since I verily feel also akin to starvin'? By 'em bleedin' rottin' wounds o' Ghi'iden Ghirvh, 'em fault lies verily upon all 'em toilin' an' hardships wi' 'em roots an' brambles; I must ha' lost a good few pounds i' but a smidgen o' hourtides!"

"Aye, as anon as seen fit he tole, nought about draggin' in lads or lasses all crippled who need to stay safe an' sound in bed for nay fewer than three daytides the very least!" Ghirn snapped back, a thick finger aloft as if scolding a three-year-old. "Verily, look a' the hour, me wee sis deary; we'd be all in the vales of dreams if it weren't for the lads all o' a sudden rushin' hither an' pummelin' at the doors so that they nigh got dropped fro' their hinges!"

"Sis, hark ye now, if tis verily be wot goes on i'em lands beyond yon mounts, sirra migh' be gone anew ere 'em first light, or e'en ere 'em forthc'min' morrow, an' mebbe 'tis too late then to-"

Hiid watched wearily from the rootstock levels how the two half-giants argued. Aye, verily, they were like books taken from the opposite ends of a library: Ghirn might have contained pictures of interesting knitting patterns and Gheldah perchance quantum physics. She had beholden them together during a few occasions, and it was to marvel how soon the voices began rising as both were as stubborn as a herd of bulls and always held utterly different opinions. They did not actually shout at one another, and certainly never called each other with rude names, but... you could discern the strain between two personalities that would never really be bosom friends. Even if they both had overstocks of the latter. Besides, there was that already existing tension and irritation caused by some earlier happening Hiid knew nought about.

Hiid hoped that if there was a democratic majority for views, Ghirn might listen. Usually she did not, because she was the sole monocratic unit that voted always for itself.

"Sees ye, Ei ents sick or noot, Ei fein bees, veerfoor doos laird vant ta sees-" Somehow, without meaning it, Hiid managed to knock over the lantern the sisters had been carrying and which Ghirn had absently set on one of the chests of drawers strewn across the corridor. It was probably the fatal combination of a haphazard elbow and an overknockable object placed too close to the edge. The lantern crashed onto the floor with a tinkle of glass, and the light died out. Darkness and the dramatic howling of the wind engulfed everything.

"Oh, can't ye poor sod ever larn not to be an unwieldy wee li'l bumbler of suchkin? 'Tis forthrightly bed wi' ye, I ent beholdin' nay more foolery-" Granny Ghirn groaned, patting at the pockets of her apron, "Oh bugger'm, whence am I to get light in tis mess? Where's me tinderbox e'en? Oh bloody bugger, I forgots it in the pantry, an' that be on the other side o' the bleedin' house! Gheldah, ye sees better in the dark than your poor ole sis wi' your fancy spectacles, woul' you nip into..."

"Nay need fer that now." Gheldah snapped her fingers, and a blue, pulsating orb appeared on the palm of her hand. It splashed the corridor with rather brighter light than the erstwhile stump of a candle inside its sheath ever had. It also brought into better view Granny Ghirn's wide-eyed, shocked expression, as she stared, almost mesmerized, at her younger sister.

"Gheldahsch'ugh-Ach! You can't... you... when... How be tis that you weet-"

"Oh, lang agone, tis be 'em gift o' witchin' i' me blood, e'en if I ne'er tole ye," Gheldah sighed impatiently. "Well, now ye ken. Tis nay be 'em Day o' Reckonin' an' doom o' dooms, sis deary, if I wot a wee smidgen o' tis an' that more than ye, an' sum o' it be 'em ados o' wizzards. Now, Ghiidgh 'ere sais she ent ill, so we're off to plead council wi' sirra, afta we ha' fetched her a dress an' sum repast fer 'em both o' us."

Before Granny Ghirn could protest, the taller woman clasped in turn Enkev by the arm, and started marching her towards the kitchen. The glowing ball kept pulsating on the herbalist's out-held hand, and Hiid felt as if someone had poorly played an even more shoddily tuned violin in her head.

"I be jus' as keen on harkin' wot came to pass inne that tomb o'em kings o' yoretides whither ye so outlandishly vanished. I reckon tis be what sirra wishes to ken, anyhow," she replied to Hiid's disrupted question. Then, in her typical manner, she started bouncing in-between a score of topics so fast that it would have dizzied any even slightly less apt listener.

"Well, I be fain dat 'em netherworldly chill o' ominous callousness seems to ha' waned away fro' ye. By 'em firehammer o' Dthg'aar, tis verily be auld King Lhietd-Lhem'meeschz ye beheld in 'em halls o' those who lang ere 'em dire tides o' ours passed doon into 'em somber dominion o' Tghuonegh'err? Oh aye, and I hafta show ye tis truly outlandish wort I dug out o'..."

Granny Ghirn scurried after the duo, holding her voluminous skirts and puffing slightly. "Gheldah! Tis be my house, an' I ent havin' with this... Halt a wee bit..."

"Aye, these be yer halls, verily 'tis 'em troth, but 'twas sirra who bade me to stay 'ere, an' thusly it be his will that I shoul' use yer chambers akin to me ain, also as I of yer blood be an' run many a chore an' errand fer ye. An' if ye havnae hitherto come to remark upon 'em fact dat I ent 'em wee daftie foolish lass full o' silly youngtime giddiness ye last kenned twelve thousan' yeartides agone, makes ye yer notice now. 'Tis many a water that ha' flown past since."

"Ow, nay so fast, vaits ye a vee bit, me all o'er huuts!" Hiid attempted to cut in, as she was practically forced to run alongside Gheldah's long strides.

"Ach, aye. Forgettin' mesel' 'ere..." The addressed slowed down a little. "By 'em way, ye owe me a washed apron, ye ken that? I patched ye up so much dat ye can scrub off yer ain mess fer dat, hmm?"

"Uf, aye, Ei vill doos tat in eem morrov. Par-doon."

"Meh, reckon dat canna come to pass sumtides to any wight... What was I heedin' here now, forgettin' me ain head..."

"Puffth... O-oh, aye, o' course you can be here as you wish, sis," Ghirn reached them again, "I didn't mean that, but we all shoul' be in bed by now, you tole me yourself you were fatigued beyon' reckonin'! An' the lass here be ill- An' where in the name of Lghouz'schaschuolz an' his heavenly grace larned you the kennings of witching, this be-"

"By 'em blazes o' Dthg'aar an' 'em pus-daimons wrigglin' inne yonpits, I be a potioneer an' ha' done many a healin' i'me fifteen thousan' yeartides o' livin' wi' many a sufferin' an' hardship therein, an' I cannae see aught ill wi' her but a triflin' o' scratches that'll heal up soon enow. An' I ent weary nay more, nay wi' all 'em outlandish goings-ons flappin' aboot hurly-burly akin to 'em skyful o' ruttin' bats matin'!"

Woozily, Enkev listened to the miniature polemy advancing. The sisters had not seen each other in twelve thousand years? Hooboy, and in Iota Sphere relatives pretended you did not exist any more if you forgot them for five years. Oh indeed, one could pass much water in that time, practically become a different person. Egads, and she was less than sixty, and Gheldah thought she had been childish at the age of three thousand?

In the end, Gheldah won with her slightly larger muleheadedness rate, and the fact that Ghirn seemed genuinely taken aback by her hitherto unknown aptitudes. Granny Ghirn went on to a long tirade about how it must have come from Gheldah's mother's side and however she for aye had been so outlandish with her peculiar wee li'l ways and blahblahblah... The rumormill ne'er stopped grinding blethers when it came to Granny Ghirn. Probably even five muzzles would not have helped, since she would have gabbled the torturer to death ere any of them could have been forced in place.

Soon Hiid was limping towards Guarh's rooms, her stomach a bit fuller and a horrible washed-out lilac dress on that had belonged to some kid probably hundreds of years agone. The skull and monster motives sewn onto the canvas clashed magnificently with the lacy frills. Her own had been too grimy, and the wardrobe lad lacked any better change. Unless she wanted to keep stumbling on to hems that were a foot too long.

Quiet conversation was issuing through the black, wooden door carved thick with grimacing, tusky beasts and runes. One of the previous very plausibly shared the same dentist with King Lhietd. Granny Ghirn knocked carefully at the door, and then pushed it open.

Guarh, sitting on a stool near a crackling fire in the hearth, turned his head towards the doorway, and so did Gha'ugonak and two younger men. They shared distinct features with the ghost of King Lhietd, so Hiid assumed that certain genes really were superglued to the G'Uhageid DNA. Or then it was this illogic again about fantasy kings and how their descendants automatically had to appear like clones of their ancestors. Come to think of it, probably the gap-toothed and scarred Guarh had in the past possessed a much handsomer outline too. Now he managed to look mostly like as if a full-laden cart had driven over his face after it had been kicked in a few times.

"Ah. Aye. Enter the halls of mine, if you please, with peace in your hearts." Guarh must have spotted Hiid's awkward mien. "We were merely about to conclude the matters herein in any case. Ach, the tidings, what mysteries have we unearthed, indeed! Finally have we borne them forth, out of their nigh everlasting darkness deep in the abyssal pits of secrets, into the pale light of the noontide where they shall be ultimately unraveled."

The fact that Hiid stared her brows raised at the ole warhorse had nought to do with fear or unease. It was the complex -- Could it be called a dressing-table in the absence of a better word? -- covering a whole wall and by which G'Uhageid sat. Anyhow, it had a humongous mirror in the middle, and umpteen lockers for bottles, brushes, clippers, and who kenned what paraphernalia. Dressed only in his kilt, the gaffer was spreading some kind of strongly fragrant oil into his hair which he must have had at least two meters and so thickly one could have lost several puppies inside. Some of the brushes were scattered across the table in that typical fashion of very recently used items, and a big comb with extra-fine teeth was sitting on his lap.

Alright... Hiid admitted she had wondered about those few occasions the 'Lord' had jumped over the vainness rate of Narcissus in her presence. Fine, he probably was a truly accomplished wizard and whatnot. But even so, all that bragging, and cackling hysterically at his own corny jokes as if they were the most precious gems from the time Humor was first created... There was even that aura in his loping strut that quietly told any by-passers that he was the master-lord of the universe and all others merely lowly earthworms barely fit to lick his holy footprints... This was something one scantly spotted on the erst glance. Nevertheless, when you grew to know him better, you began espying the hints and signs that this chum here was quite swollen around the attic.

Well. Lhietd and this dressing-table explained a lot. And there was no necessity to astonish any more over how his hair for aye remained so sleek and shiny, if he soaked it with fifteen googolplex hair-care products every morrow.

Meanwhile, in the background, Ghirn had increased the volume of her shockedness heap, and was reprimanding the man called Thurgh'i -- which probably was not his whole name since everyone around tended to have sixty bzillion nicknames and shortenings -- about his facial tattoos. They seemed to have been a recent acquisition.

"Dear, have we not counseled over the matter many a tide erenow? He bears the blood of the G'Uhageids within his veins, and thusly shall wear the ancient and honored emblems of the forefathers," Guarh put in calmly. "Ten thousand be the mark of the coming to the royal age, and thereafter shall a man be insightful, strong, and cunning enough to carry the responsibilities of the olden glories and a new blade in his sheath graced with the full set of runes. Thus has spoken the lore of my kin ever since the first dayspring of tides, and thus it shall be evermore unto the breaking of the world."

"Oh, aye, but wee li'l Thurgh'i be such a handsome li'l lad, an' now look'a him..."

Guarh picked up a large towel hanging from a hook on the wall, and wrapped his oiled hair inside akin to a turban. The gook ostensibly had to mature for a while. Then he popped open another bottle, and started spreading the contents onto his very thick chest hair.

"The dignity of bearing a grand responsibility and the symbols of a noble bloodline shall adorn the brow of a warrior ever the more than mere angular cheekbones sculpted into the utmost strength and a jaw that could break iron hills with its mighty edge. Which incidentally do also emanate from my side, and thus are well suited to bear the honored runes."

Yup. Maybe the vainness was tied to the chin and cheekbone model, then, since they, according to all the recent evidence, were walking hand in hand, Hiid mused.

"Also, we must soon arrange a grand feast for his tribute, when the ebbs and floods of our dire tides shall become a tad less stormy. Thurgh'i deserves his honors, as he has with many a feat and bravery gathered a fine name upon himself as the nearmost centuries have thundered past."

"Well... Aye, of course... Tis just a bit breaks my heart to see me wee li'l darlin' lad all grown up an' facin' the grim dangers o' the merciless world..." Almost sadly, Granny Ghirn ruffled the ponytailed hair of Thurgh'i. His expression told he very much would have enjoyed sinking deep into the earth with sheer embarrassment right now. Aaschgh'rd, his brother, was wriggling with barely stifled snickers. He was perhaps a couple of millennia older, dressed much akin to his father, and possessed those very same squiggles around the eyes.

"Shall we depart now unto the first light?" Gha'ugonak asked curtly.

"Ah, indeed. I shall leave you, Thurgh'i and Aaschgh'rd, in charge of the pursuit anew. Take any other apt warriors you see fit, but remember to treasure wariness in your deepmost hearts, and move akin to the twilight shadows in the gathering darkness, never leaving behind so much as of a whisper of a trace! We indeed cannot attack ere the hills of Rha-ghusthav Rhu-bigh'onch, and even this must be conducted with the utmost stealth and cunning. May the light of Phohjn'nha-Ulagh shine its favorable blessings upon ye on your journey fraught with many an illship!"

"So, tis Khran-Av'ees verily be skulkin' in Rha-mahghu'Miankg?" Gheldah inquired when the three other men exited.

"Mmmh?" The line of kings that was not actually broken looked up from his chest hair oiling. Hiid could not trust her eyes any more. Was this how they kept them all gleaming, as Gheldah had described Khran-Av'ees? Where the oil had already dried up on Guarh's chest, the hairs indeed appeared rather puffier and curlier.

No, no, no, he could not be slapping it onto his armhairs now! Enkev really wanted not to ken whither it went next.

"Aye. We had Ahgtd'i, Miimrgh, and a few other lads pursuing steadily this peculiar companionship for a monthtide or two, ere we became anyhow assured of the concealed mysteries within. Of course, there had been rumors... Perchance a decoy in the high palace of Rha-ghi'Leh, tidings about sightings of an odd nature here and there, chiefly in the borderlands and in the less oppressed, western parts of his dominion where a wight can yet nigh freely journey to and fro..." Guarh inattentively lowered the open bottle down onto the table and steepled his fingers.

"Wrought with some measure of craftiness the schemes of this pediculous Khran-Av'ees are, aye, that cunning bastard of dog-breathed pus-daimons in the yonderpits, but nought I would nay be able to behold in their true light. And in the very end, the mures of deceit shall for aye crack open and crumple down into nought but ashes and dust. We shall see what we can do with the matters herein; if all shall come to pass splendidly, Rha-kan'Ocka will be rid of the filthy pest ere Mharasch'ghuol'ghu waxes anew. And yet, hark and lo, however be the tides freighted with such knotty predicaments, that it be hard to fathom whether e'en this solution shall be the right one..."

"Aye, aye, 'cos o'em foreseeings..." Gheldah nodded. "'Tis a mighty a tangle, aye verily."

Hiid had taken one of the seats where she now crouched and attempted deciphering all the haughty words. At least it was a tad easier than with Lhietd. Even when the ghost switched nigher the common speech, the sentences were laden with weird verb forms and rhymes, and just about everything was a metaphor of some kin. What was it with these overlords that they ne'er could speak normally?

Furthermore, the bane called her ignorance in just about anything that went on in the elvenland had grown into such measures that it was time to take a scimitar and truly make salami slices out of it. Mraarh, it would be so much more convenient at least once to comprehend what the townsfolk were blabbering about. Foreseeings? Prophecies? What the bleeding frag was Mharasch'ghuol'ghu? And wherefore did the sun never show up?

"Um, if Ei may asks, vai be Ei heer now? An' par-doon, but coold ye tells me vot be all tees foorseeins an' curses and eem Dusk Ei keeps heerin' aboot? Ei ne'er un-deer-stands vot on goos be-coos Ei do nay kens tees-"

"By 'em fimbulwinter an' thunderblazes o' Rha-a'Gnarrogh'kr, ye nay wost about 'em Curse o' our poor, sodden lands? Wheref're havnae ye said so erenow?" Gheldah sounded almost as shocked as Ghirn whenever she saw muddy footprints on her sparkly floor. "Ach, o' course it be 'em fears o'em elderfolk, I concur therein, but ane shoul' for aye ken 'em affairs o-"

"Nay in me halls! 'Tis an ill omen to speak of it, oh, it'll be an everlastin' damnation and smoldering rain of fire-stones pouring down upon the fruit o' me loins if one shoul' err to..." Granny Ghirn interrupted with genuine dread in her voice.

G'Uhageid walked over to Ghirn, and slipped one comforting arm around her shoulders.

"Ah, but you are wrong there. Perchance the names of certain perpetrators shall nevermore be spoken underneath the grim stormclouds of our birthland, however nought ill shall elsewise fall upon us neither from the wrathful skies nor from the hands of the heavenlords. Tides of numerous and uncountable have I spoken about the somber tragedies and happenstances of yore, and thus shall I not fear to step onto ways of telling and kenning anew. Daunted and timid nay become before that which needs not to be dreaded: it shall but glorify the falsehoods and dangers nonexistent!"

"Aye, but..." Here Ghirn suddenly jumped a little, blushed, and started giggling like a schoolgirl. "Put you yer slippery hands off, ye wayward lad!"

"Mrawahahaharuaaah!"

"Oh, stoppit, you silly thing, nay in front o' my sis!" she tittered, and pinched his wrinkled cheek playfully. "You ent ne'er larnin' one bit, ent you?"

Hiid turned her gaze away, not knowing what to think, and noticed Gheldah was twiddling her thumbs and staring fixedly into the ceiling. More giggling and growly cackling emerged from the corner, and lastly something about Guarh putting his shirt on so as not to catch a cold. She wondered how this worked with the particular that he walked barefoot and -legs most of the year.

"Ah. Now." Guarh returned to his seat, tucking the hem of his shirt into his belt. Indeed, the fashion served to flaunt with gleaming chest hair, as the wide headway of men's 'cold-weather shirts' usually extended down to the midriff. "Let us venture upon entering the topmost subject at erst, and thereafter we can take a by-road, which, alas, potholy and bumpy shall be, back to the matter of the Curse. I do have a smidgen of idle time at hand ere I must take leave to my other errands."

Well, most definitely, Enkev thought, as she peered at the huge pile of assorted trinkets on one side of the dressing-table, whence he was now picking out necklaces and earrings and other gimcracks and inserting them in place one after another. It must take about an hour to put that heap on, and he was not yet even finished with his hairdo. What next? Trimming that thin moustache with a slide ruler? Rubbing wax to his sideburns? Coning those overly thick eyelashes? Braiding his chest hair, perchance?

Guarh fixed Hiid with an intent gaze of his one working eye. As he was not wearing his eyepatch, the milky white one was quite distracting since it kept for aye staring into an utterly different direction. The hit that had blinded it must have damaged the moving muscles. It soon became almost painful to look G'Uhageid straight in the eyes, as your own regard inadvertently wanted to match his by unsuccessfully attempting to go wall-eyed.

"The tidings were that you, for reasons unreckoned, vanished into the houses of the dead in the glen of khunijnhgaaidenhgha'utd, and furthermore stood before one of the lords of the elderdays, arisen forth from the dark plains of Tghuonegh'lchach? Alas for all this ill fortune, for I had not beholden the dangers within and remained woefully ignorant of the existence of such a site in the erst place. Hrhmh, that bechances oft when you are rushing after too many an escaping, loose thread in this tapestry of dire tides at the same time... Anyhow... Would you thus mind giving me a record of your mischance?"

So Hiid told, with much accenting and misplaced words and frequent help from Gheldah and Granny Ghirn, as it oftentimes occurred that she did not even understand what Guarh meant with his turgid phraseology. She carefully cut off the bawdy bits, making the story sound much more solemn and formal. When the topic about the bodies nailed to the walls surfaced, Guarh explained that they had obviously been graverobbers whom Lhietd's wrath had thus condemned. It was akin to a minor sacrilege to claim your own something that had been laid to rest together with the departed, but perchance the noblemen also guarded more covetously their oldenday glories. Allegedly in the far-off southlands nought remained for long beneath the barrows, but became traded to spirits and interesting glow-in-the-dark mushrooms, ere the ghost had even had time to drowsily look at who had trampled his carefully manicured lawn and yoinked the birdbath. However, once the ancient elf inquired what Lhietd's copious statements actually contained, Hiid's train of thought trainwrecked completely.

"Alas for that. Hmmh..." G'Uhageid fingered at his chin. "And so many a tide have I endeavored to find a way to seek council with my forebears, yet there ne'er appears to have been a route into the outer plains of Tghuonegh'err's dominion. Thereupon, I would have wished to hear whatever he had on his nigh all-seeing mind, as does our bygone blood follow the wyrd of the younger kin, even if from their nameless abysses dark and afar. Hmm, I wonder whether I might venture upon to..."

He peered at the girl with a broody side-glance, as if weighing whether she was worth the trouble. Meanwhile Hiid was drowning in question marks.

"Now... perchance I shall try this. This be a means wherewithal I can hold the tapestry of one's thoughts on the palms of mine, and behold whence and whither the threads journey- "

"Nay, dear, don't do it, it'll strip you of your strength and put you into a terrible misery! Don't ye hark back to when you-" Granny Ghirn cut in once more. Sitting on the very edge of her chair, she had seemed nought but a twanging bundle of nerves all the time. Either she was beyond horrified of talking about the ongoing subjects, or then her qualms emanated from that Khran-Av'ees case. Whatever was going on there, then.

"Fear not, my sweet, this be nought akin to the feeble erst steps anymore. I have latterly devised schemes wherewith I shall neither suffer from lapses of strength nor wrenches as if stabbed by the poisoned trident of Vhe-dt'echinech. With this shield in my right hand, I have with satisfactory success entered the hearts of men without the yoke of agony being forced upon my shoulders." He beckoned at Hiid. "Now, if you would bring your chair closer and set yourself here right before me."

The mechanic hesitated. The morsel of the sentences she had comprehended sounded very nastily like mind-reading, which she had not believed even possible hitherto. Aye, well, another mental adjustment was needed, then. However, this thing about sitting that near to him... Concerning the demeanor of Lhietd, she was alltoo afraid of sly, groping hands that just appeared out of nowhere. Erkbrrrrht. Nonetheless, Granny Ghirn was gawking at him a few meters off, so he probably would not dare engage in any shady undertakings, hmm? She would flay him alive for sure if he did.

But reading her mind... It was a very personal place which she did not readily share with anyone. Especially now that she had edited all the PG-13 material out of the events. Personally she doubted there would be aught even marginally interesting in Lhietd's tirades. In all probability, everything would be in the class of 'oh how thy silky hips shine in the liquid silver of the moonlight'.

"No need to dread old Guarh, lass. I shall nay smite you with fireballs or aught akin." The lopsided grin and his blind eye staring now somewhere in the ceiling hardly aided the matters, however.

Erm... mayhap he was not evil, but really creepy nonetheless...

"It shall be more effortless if you hark well back to the events and bring them to the courtyards of your heart. And I shall take the oath nay to roam into ways that will ne'er belong to me beneath the light of our hidden stars."

Yet, if this was important to the rebellion... Grargh, why could not someone else have fallen into that dratted hole instead, and she could have remained ah-so wonderfully normal and just repaired clocks in the workshop? It was enough excitement to look for a lost screw by crawling under the table.

Awkwardly, she hauled the chair in front of G'Uhageid and tried to tidy up her mind of all the debris not related to the grave incident. At least she was good in concentrating on one and a single topic when she wanted to. Could she somehow make it appear a bit cleaner...?

When Hiid had set herself on the right spot, which was all too close in her opinion, Guarh placed his fingertips on her temples and closed his eyes. His skin felt like sweaty rhino hide. There and then, the familiar screeching at the edge of her consciousness surged up, and a weird tingling sensation spread out from her forehead down to the neckline. She concentrated hard on the events, yet kept her eyes open just in case. Just in case. Guarh's magic did not seem affecting her thoughts anyhow, except for the chittering. No fleeting flashes of bygone memories rushing through her awareness as it was for aye in stupid holomovies.

A few minutes crawled past as fast as decapitated slugs, during which it seemed Guarh first sought for something, and then set onto reading the bits he had considered interesting. His face, aside from some weensy movements around the eyebrows, remained quite impassive. Unto the second the sides of his mouth started suddenly twitching, that was. A few more jiffies of this stifled laughing went by. Then he let go of her temples and fell back in his seat, shaking all over with hysteric mirth.

"RUAAAHHHAAHHAHAHAH rohohohohoruaaah GRAAAHHAHAAHAAHOOH ruahahahahorhorhohyyyaah splurrrt ruaah BWAHAHAHAHAHAHURRRH snorrrrrrrt gnorrrrrrf BLUARRRHAHAHAHAH BRYLLLGRAAGHAHOHOHOUUUH sniiooorrrrrrt GROAAHHHAHAAHH..." the rumbling cackle avalanched through the chamber. Guarh was rocking back and forth in his chair, holding his ribs and gasping for air between the atrocious growls and snorts of glee. Midway through, Gheldah burst out laughing also, but this must have been due to the combination of Hiid's stupefied expression and the sheer ludicrousness of Guarh's mirth. Ghirn was equally shaking in her chair, both hands clasped over her mouth.

"Vat vas so funnee teer?" Hiid asked when the thunder had died down a little. G'Uhageid was actually wiping tears off the crinkled corners of his eyes.

Through repeated snorts and guffaws he told what Lhietd had wanted from Hiid whose visage turned into a deeper shade of red by the second. The sisters very soon exploded with almost equal kinds of hysterical horse-laughs as the man initially had.

"Ruaahahahaha... Aaahhahah, oh, poor ole King Lhietd the Lustful's kingly skills in swordplay had gone a wee bit rusty in the course of the yeartides, and he but desired to warm them up anew with our lass here. Ah, plainly a living lass would really have heated up pleasantly his poor mighty blade of yore, bitten by the everlasting coldness of the Underworld, ruaaahahahahahah groaaaHAHAHAHUOUOUaha snerrrrrrrk..." He decided to add even more effect to the lampoon with a careful selection of expressive hand-movements.

Gheldah and Granny Ghirn were rolling. Hiid attempted to draw her mouth into some kind of half-grimace, but she failed to discern what was so amusing about the occasion. She had been so terrified by the ghost that it had been a miracle she had found even that much courage to resist Lhietd and plead he would let her go. Obviously these people shared a different kind of view on what was humorous. Granny Ghirn and her usual, strict no-naughty-jokes-agenda... Bah. People were sometimes just so two-faced.

Not that she was any better, though... Well... not any better at all, but perhaps worse. It occurred to her there that in different circumstances, and if it had come to pass to someone else, she would perchance have cackled just as much at the whole case.

"Oh, and ole Lhiekghi'oichnj seems to bear the same fondness for bonny petite lasses as most of my kin. Aaahhhahahruaah, must have been the highmost paradise for him to meet an ample-hipped little lady three feet shorter than him, bwaahhahohohohuhuhhooh snorrrrrtblorrrrt RRRUAHAAHAHAAH..."

Thereafter, Guarh's wrinkled countenance however gradually drew itself into a more severe frown. The mad eye rolled moodily inward to focus on the bridge of his nose, making him look positively insane.

"Yet there were many a matter of a much more grim stature therein, true tidings of concern woven into his speech..." The gaffer straightened up in his seat, pushing his down-slipped sleeves up his arms so sinewy they looked like as if bundled up from gnarly tree-roots. He might have looked a tiny bit stately if seen from afar and through thick fog, but close-up, he really matched just about every synonym for orcish and ugly. Even so, it struck the mechanic that she preferred beholding even him to Legless Bigfigleaf, since you could at least inspect Guarh in a kind of morbid curiosity instead of getting utterly bored with a figure that had nought to look at due to its downright flawlessness. Besides, Aaschgh'rd was just rowwwr and yummm with his forested abs and big, bearded chin and bulging kil... Fie and blazes, now it was starting anew! Had that dream seriously mangled her attraction factors for forever, or was she merely suffering from a temporal overdose of estrogen?

"May I look anew, as I was thusly smitten down nigh helpless with sudden mirth by this unforeseen twist?"

Hiid nodded reluctantly after Gheldah had 'translated' that bit. How was it that he could make even such simple sentences sound so bleeding pompous?

Guarh's sandpaper fingers were soon in place again, and the absence of sound began its skulking-about. Well, more or less, as the wind went waily-waily-waily-moooaaaan behind the windows. It took a while longer this time ere the elf's cakehole spasmed again. Finally he collapsed into an almost worse a cacklefest, coughing out every now and then something nigh incoherent about fig-leafs and never-ending eagerness.

Enkev blanched this time instead of the hitherto frequent blushings. Oh no. OH NO. No, no, no. He had somehow dug into that bleeding dream, which nobody was ever supposed to ken about. This was something she also never ever wanted Granny Ghirn's ears to reach, for the rumormill would be literally smoking under the speed and load.

"Look, dids nay ye pro-mees me nay ta goos in-seid me pri... praiv... um, me ain thooghts, an' tis be ane ov eem! I nay kens hov tis gots into me dreem, but Ei doos nay vant it ta bee-com eem talk ov ev'ryane. Prithee nay tells aboot tis fur-theer, 'tis verily emb... em... embar-rass-eeng. Ei ne'er vanteds noot ov tis ta happen, ye kens. Ei ne'er askeds ane bit ov eet, e'en if eet be me to bleim ont... int- upon partly tat Ei inseid eem grave fellds."

But Gheldah was one of those annoyingly sharp persons that would find the needle in the haystack by quickly building up a large magnet instead of plunging in to look for it manually. She had probably guessed exactly by now what Hiid had beholden during the lapsed hours.

"Lhietd was i' yer dream?" she retorted, "How-"

Guarh straightened up and flung his arms into the air. "Ah, may peace rest upon this hall and your mind anew... Er, what were you cleped, lass?"

"She'd be Ghiidgh," Gheldah supplied the entirely wrong pronunciation.

"Aye, Ghiidgh. I have no need to hazard myself into further undertakings, as I deem I garnered everything I ever desired to ken. And perchance e'en a wee bit too m-much-ch-ch... snffffbrrlft..." His voice broke, and he had to stuff his knuckles into his mouth so as not to break into hysterics anew. "Krhhhm. Ahem. I sh-shahaha-sh... shall be as if I never upon this land and beneath our cloud-enshrouded stars harked the... em-krhmh, further bits barren of noteworthy purpose. Yet I hardly could expect this... Was not I meant to be the one who..." The harsh edge returned to his voice, as did crawl back the finger-steeple he seemed so fond of. "Hmmh... however can this be thusly..."

All the scheming holocartoon villains for aye used that gesture, Hiid snorted inwardly. Guarh might have made an excellent dark lord, if he had not, well, been on the good side of the forc... wossname. His actual saintliness could be much debated upon, though. He had just thoroughly abashed Hiid in front of his wife and sister-in-law with all those lewd talks, and did not seem to even understand he might have hurt anyone's feelings.

"Hoi! Did ye nay hark me erenow? However did Lhietd get i' yer nightly beholdings? I ha' ne'er harked aught alike i' me tides o' life!" Gheldah stood up and trotted over to Hiid. "How di' 'e come to emerge? Did he linger for langer tides, or did ye jus' keep runnin' away hither an' thither akin to 'em startled red-bellied fangrat an' tryin' to avoid his hoggish hunger fer a bonny ride?"

Hiid groaned mentally. Oh aye, there was one of those über-geeky persons that would not rest unto they discovered what the question to the answer '42' was. She recognized well this type, as she was one alike herself.

"Ei tells ye aftavards, but nay nou, prithee? 'Tis a wee bit embar-ras-eeng."

"Yet howe'er be tis... Cannae 'em Khalm'anch Vghaekg touch ye me'rly in 'eir earthen halls that-"

"Ah, but this hardly is so trivial. I deem King Lhietd drank that much of her force of life that he could thuswise reach her even from beyond the many a nigh impenetrable obstacle in-between the plains of living and the netherworlds," Guarh cut in. "And King Lhietd, whilst largely and sometimes only remembered for his achievements in the lore of worldly pleasures, was leagues ahead of the wizards of his days, even mightier than his famed brother, who slew many a fell beast and garnered upon himself a grand name through his many a majestic skill in spellweaving and sagely kenning. Lhietd... well, so powerful was he and yet be, that reaching the halfl... er, Grrh- Ghiidgh through the tides and nameless plains might have been akin to wending his way through a veil of thin mist. Did he nay recount however he, in his dark chambers beneath yon mountains, sorely missed the golden eras of the elderdays and the sweet warmth of the noonlight? I would not astonish wherefore he thusly grasped the harnesses of this rare chance and trailed to find her anew in-between the worlds, even if it be on the plane of untruths and flighty fantasies? And..." G'Uhageid suddenly grinned roguishly, "Ole King Lhietd ne'er gave up on a tricksy case, nay, it was but laying a challenging quest before his feet, and oh, challenges enjoyed he unto the utmost... hrraahahahahuhuhuh..."

"So, Ei can nay e'en gets him oot o' me heid?" Hiid asked, stupefied.

"Ah, but this be beyond my kenning. It may be that when your life-force fades away from him, he nay more may be able to break through the uncountable strongholds enveloping the plains of the netherworlds. Yet, perchance he needs not to rely even on this, but is freighted with enow power as-is, in which case... Well... if you do nay wish to engage into some rather splendid swordplay with him, in which he undoubtedly would be masterly, as he must have honed his favored art into its utmost finesse ever kenned on the plains of Rha-kan'Ocka, then... hrrmhraahahahuuh... ahum, intrigue him elsewise. He was a great worshipper of knowledge in all the higher arts, and thus were the grand wells of his savvy nigh bottomless, even though... Alas, it be anew beyond my kenning what he is allowed to pass on into the realms of the living, whilst bound to the laws of Tghuonegh'err himself. Hrrhmh. Now, I indeed would have wished for a chance akin to this to fall upon me. However, I can neither channel through your dreams nor ask you to deliver my messages to this forefather of mine. My quests to seek for the troths be my own, verily; thereupon I cannot confide them to none else but myself."

"But... butbutbut... but... tis cannay stay akin ta tis... eet cannay..." Enkev stuttered, staring with wide-eyed horror at the floor planks. Logic, Reason, and Rationality were all groaning in the utmost agony. That... that creep remaining mayhap for aye in her dreams? No. Nononononono. NO, no, no!

Engage into swordplay... oh, how subtle, indeed. Brrrht, and that one-eyed scarecrow was talking about... hrrmh... goings-ons as if they were the greatest fruit the enlightened civilizations of all the galaxies bundled up together had ever put forth! Had the line of kings mayhap broken up because there had been one less prurient individual somewhere in the middle?

Liked challenge... mind-reading... Blaaargh, was she not safe even in her own head any more? This whole affair reeked so much of Serenity Sakura Angel-Glitterblossom Evanescence-Raven MyImmortal that next it would be finding a pink, rainbow-winged unicorn which pooed stardust waiting for her on a nearby meadow. Oh, the horror scenarios! Aaaargh! Would mayhap a tinfoil hat or something help? A spell? Sleeping pills for dreamless slumber? Or should she just keep gulping down dhulisch'uoniz such enormous amounts that she would ne'er fall asleep again...? Obviously her visage expressed such mortal terror in the face of becoming an overperfect fanfiction self-insert that Gheldah placed one big hand on her shoulder.

"Ach, mebbe it ent that dreadful as ye so darkly deems? Perchance he ca' aid ye wi' yer speech or summat o' suchkin? Ask 'im, that doesnay costs ye aught. An' ye fer sure donnae need to burnish 'is scimitar if ye thusly nay wilt, 'tis but 'em very right o' ye to order wot be sacred an' settled i'yer ain heart o' hearts."

Right... If Hiid attempted explaining them that on top of her mind had just been the worry of becoming too perfect and having to sidle through every stinking cliché known in the history of fantasy novels, they would not understand a word. Besides, now Logic, Reason, and Rationality being wrung the mental torture rack whimpered that she should be concerned over much more sensible things in the first place. They were in the middle of a war, people died, and some complete nutcase lolled on the throne, demanding widows and orphans and bunnies to be thrown into the piranha pool... or something...

"Urhm. Aye... Ei reckons Ei cans deal vit it..." she grumbled. "But prit-hee doos ye nay tell tis to no-van, 'tis all so bleedin' foolish. Nov, if tis bees over, can Ei asks vot tis Dusk an' akin be?"

Gheldah glanced at Granny Ghirn, who shrugged with a soupçon of unease.

"Well, whence to start unravelin' 'em whole tangled affair..."

---------------------

*Footnotes:

Many readers of scientific magazines commonly think the surname Gyi?ñhhá has some kind of typographic error in it, when they for the first time stumble upon it. However, the name, when articulated correctly, sounds as if it had a question inside. Hence the somewhat confusing typographical guise. The aforementioned mistake happens so frequently, that these days people oftentimes refer to the mathematician as Gesundheit Misprint, rather than use his legitimate name.

Description

CHAPTER 16.

Recounts and Mind-Reading

Hiid stared transfixed at the flower, her hair standing on end in genuine fright.

But... but... butbutbut... This was not... this was not possible! It had been a DREAM! Nought... nought was supposed to materialize out of it!

She turned it over and around in her hands. It glistened faintly, but the petals -- or whatever the raggedly out-jutting protrusions were pretending to be -- had transformed from their erewhile waxen appearance into such hard flakes that it really looked like a fossilized cone with glitter poured on. It was as weightless as a quarter of a ping-pong ball, but many a substance was illogical like that here. The bleeding heck; the tail-feathers of gho'ockolhintd were about twenty kilos apiece. Hence, one would just make a complete idiot of himself by claiming that something was as light as feather.

She massaged at the bridge of her nose, pressing her eyes shut for a while. It... Could it just have been there all the time? Perchance gotten stuck to her hair whilst she had tumbled through the earthen passage into the grave? She could have absently fingered it, or seen it as a reflection on one of the crypt's walls, and thence had a memory of it which had then wormed its way into the dream and...

Then she glanced down at her outfit. Oh indeedy, that would be such a passable answer, considering that someone had attired her with a clean shift and a jolly pair of green-yellow-pink-striped stockings with little beetle figures sewn into rows. Their fashion disaster force could have annihilated a small planet. So, absolutely a cone of this size would have gone completely unnoticed whilst they had pulled the previous garment over her head.

And it was also oh-so very realistic to believe it had just popped into existence out of nowhere while she had been slee- er... um... been flattered by a randy ghost in some other... dimension?

Enkev was not stupid. In the course of her fifty-five to sixty years -- well, she could not be assured of her true age any more because of the more than probable time frame disparities between Iota Sphere and Rha-kan'Ocka, so she presumed she might be somewhere in-between those values -- she had heard and read about Himalaya's worth of contemporary science theories. Id est, mallard-brained balderdash, which she had hitherto only sniggered at.

Here, however, you might actually be able to apply some of them into everyday practice. It had already become clear that these folks did not just rot when the Reaper knocked at the front door, but went somewhere. So, when that one holotelly shaman, some fifteen years agone in Sagabreakers, had explained with much falsetto and flinging of his arms how the astral-projected spirit fled into the celestial realms of embodiment of the cosmic radiation, the Great Star-Spirit Ä*Ö=°°, in the Nyght (The y and the capital letter were always important when something was mystic. Like Magyk and Vampyres.) when the quasi-bi-parted proto-soul was most susceptible to the runeous zhazhi-filaments shaped like orthogonal pentagrams of... something... er...

The paragraph dissolved like a vampire in daylight due to the sheer mumbo-jumbo load Hiid's mind had never been able to bear well. Anyway, the basic idea was that mayhap there was a separate dream-world of some sort. What if the zinigh'aldjaatd commonly visited far-off-living relatives and forebears in the small hours? Oh, deary auntie Gurgle'Gargle-Groaargh, how you look so radiant even though you have been dead the past sixty thousand years! Shall we have a cup of spectral tea, or would you like to taste my phantom cakes? I must give you the recipe; the taste will just plain caress your figurative taste buds!

Well, this was mere speculation. Enkev would not ken, since she had ne'er asked. Now she would probably have to.

She gazed at the cone again with unease. The wind went waaaaaailwailwailwail mooaaaaan outside, and the wooden bits of the house creaked ominously. Uff... this was indeed more than just a teensy dilemma. Lhietd seemed the sort of a man... er, elvish specter who scarcely gave up just akin to that. If he was going to reappear in her dream the forthcoming night, she would need to teach him to play chess or something and make him sit on an ice cube whilst doing so. Imaginary or nay, Hiid would most certainly NOT throw herself into snogfests or worse with some inane ghost ever again, even if he might be a wee bit of a tragic character. Fie and blazes, he must have had enough mistresses in his time, if the legend of him and his itchy manbits lived even in the folksongs of today.

That slurping had already been way over the brim, even though... um, it had actually felt... umh... by Dthg'aar's firehammer, the length of that tongue and the way he kissed...

Um.

Anyway... did not this, overall, stink of something akin to necrophilia? Well, spectrophilia the very least, since he was not an actual flesh-and-blood being any more. Furthermore, the king seemed like, what, over eight feet tall! Even if he had been a ruddy living wight, the mere size difference... er... um... those abs... and all the raw, unadulterated power... Um... the way those hardened muscles and sinews strained by the tiniest movement...

She slapped herself on the forehead. Egads, what was the matter with her? She would need to get rid of these ridiculous 'um'-episodes; this was not rational thinking at all! Alright, alright, Lhietd might be a fine body of a man, very much so, but Enkev truly had no special feelings for him. She did not hold in high regard people who switched girls trice a day-

Er. Was not her favorite mathematician Gesundheit Ø. Gyi?ñhhá Misprint* just alike, and even so she fangirled his intelligence? Grargh, wherefore needed everything to contradict with itself these days? Anyway. This was just some bloke who gabbled like an oversugared Shakesapple play. Probably not a grand intellectual, aside from having devoured a few thesauri.

The mechanic's stomach gave an almighty rumble.

Uf, nay, this would not do. On top of the black hole roiling in her guts, her throat felt as parched as mummified parchment. Wonder whether there was even a water jug on any of the tables here...? Hiid tentatively wriggled up in the darkness. Owowow, a walking-stick would have come in handy right now. And painkillers.

She limped around in the large hall, squinting in the measly light the lantern outside granted, but found nought. Hmmh. Mayhap there were some leftovers in the kitchen. Wonder whether she could slink in without waking up half the house, as it was for aye hyperstuffed with overnight guests from the uncountable offspring families of Ghirn and Guarh. Yet as the inners already moaned stronger than the gale, the options were quite sparse.

She set the cone on her pillow, and limped to the door. Uuuuuurrrrgh, wherefore did the doorhandles always need to be a mile up there, and the doors themselves built akin to a hydrogen bomb -resistant air-raid shelter? Graaaaahhhuuuuugh, ah... now it started creaking open.

She cursed under her breath at the lack of light in the corridor outside. With these superb incoordination skills and the disability to see in the dark, she would more than likely stumble about fifty times ere the kitchen and step on someone. Hiid used the wall as a guide, and thus was recurrently in danger of making precious vases and ornamental platters fall from their stands. Once there was a near hit-and-miss case with a heavy broadsword which started rocking ominously in its rack and fell down with a hideous clang.

The thing was that the house had been widened and elevated considerably in the course of the recent years. Erst with the aid of all sorts of trash materials as more space had been so sorely needed, and then with stronger lumber, which the rebels had recently acquired quite massive loads for reasons unknown to her. Even presently, the southern side was full of scaffolds and ladders and half-laid foundations, as more halls were supposed to be raised there. Since the constructions proceeded so fast, she had a good reason to believe some wizardly abracadabra was involved.

Hence, the G'Uhageid household looked now more like a small mansion than the shabby wee cabin of four years back, even if it was rather lopsided and scarcely followed any uniform architecture.

Halfway through the dark action-adventure route of falling china and blades, Hiid heard footsteps and scraps of whispered conversation approaching her from behind a corner together with a bobbing puddle of light. When the girl herself turned the corner, she nearly crashed against the fast-pacing Granny Ghirn. There was a miffed air about her, and the sight of Hiid hardly improved her mood.

"By the mercy o' heavenlords, what are ye poor wee darlin' sod wanderin' about in the middle o' the deepmost night, an' in that ill fit when you oughts to be sleepin' tight in bed!" Ghirn'ubim-Ach exhaled exasperated, and grabbed Hiid by the crook of her arm. "Come now, ye foolish lass, let's get ye back upstairs. It be bed an' hot drinks to you fer the rest o' the weektide, and none o' 'tis foolish skulkin' about, unless ye wanna catch yersel' but worse a cold! An' nay neither with your bare measly shift on, 'tis nay proper clothin' for a twee lass! May the eternal blights o' the netherpits fall as brimstone rain upon 'tis house if anyone sees you akin to that, shamefully wanderin' about nigh naked!"

Frankly, now that the 'halfling' had been tottering on and about for so long, Granny Ghirn hardly treated Enkev anyhow different from her own grandchildren. Which meant an automatic increase in discipline, workload, and making sure the lass wore a proper dress for aye, such as a virtuous and modest future goodwife would proudly bear. It was none of that overly mawkish blatherskite about a gentle, knitting granny-deary in a rocking-chair and her a ginger cat playing with a ball of yarn that you got shoved against your face in stupid fairy tales. Moreover, Ghirn had given Hiid a few quite a petulant clips on the ear in the course of years for once again breaking up something. Alright, she had probably deserved them. At least they had given her a strong reason to watch her steps more alertly in the future. This time was a bit different, though, due to the aforetold reasons.

"But, Ei wuz hung-ree, an' Ei be fein, verily, tees-" Enkev protested, but got interrupted by Gheldah who had been traipsing a few gaits behind the matron.

"Sis, did ye nay wost or recall however yer sirra jus' spake that he wanted Ghiidgh 'ere before 'is seat as anon as seen fit? Above and beyon', I wanna hark what 'tis all aboot, 'cos I was there mesel'. Wherefore don't ye, 'cause o' ye bein' so pert an' all, fetch 'er 'em m're proper dress, an' we'll nip inne kitchens, since I verily feel also akin to starvin'? By 'em bleedin' rottin' wounds o' Ghi'iden Ghirvh, 'em fault lies verily upon all 'em toilin' an' hardships wi' 'em roots an' brambles; I must ha' lost a good few pounds i' but a smidgen o' hourtides!"

"Aye, as anon as seen fit he tole, nought about draggin' in lads or lasses all crippled who need to stay safe an' sound in bed for nay fewer than three daytides the very least!" Ghirn snapped back, a thick finger aloft as if scolding a three-year-old. "Verily, look a' the hour, me wee sis deary; we'd be all in the vales of dreams if it weren't for the lads all o' a sudden rushin' hither an' pummelin' at the doors so that they nigh got dropped fro' their hinges!"

"Sis, hark ye now, if tis verily be wot goes on i'em lands beyond yon mounts, sirra migh' be gone anew ere 'em first light, or e'en ere 'em forthc'min' morrow, an' mebbe 'tis too late then to-"

Hiid watched wearily from the rootstock levels how the two half-giants argued. Aye, verily, they were like books taken from the opposite ends of a library: Ghirn might have contained pictures of interesting knitting patterns and Gheldah perchance quantum physics. She had beholden them together during a few occasions, and it was to marvel how soon the voices began rising as both were as stubborn as a herd of bulls and always held utterly different opinions. They did not actually shout at one another, and certainly never called each other with rude names, but... you could discern the strain between two personalities that would never really be bosom friends. Even if they both had overstocks of the latter. Besides, there was that already existing tension and irritation caused by some earlier happening Hiid knew nought about.

Hiid hoped that if there was a democratic majority for views, Ghirn might listen. Usually she did not, because she was the sole monocratic unit that voted always for itself.

"Sees ye, Ei ents sick or noot, Ei fein bees, veerfoor doos laird vant ta sees-" Somehow, without meaning it, Hiid managed to knock over the lantern the sisters had been carrying and which Ghirn had absently set on one of the chests of drawers strewn across the corridor. It was probably the fatal combination of a haphazard elbow and an overknockable object placed too close to the edge. The lantern crashed onto the floor with a tinkle of glass, and the light died out. Darkness and the dramatic howling of the wind engulfed everything.

"Oh, can't ye poor sod ever larn not to be an unwieldy wee li'l bumbler of suchkin? 'Tis forthrightly bed wi' ye, I ent beholdin' nay more foolery-" Granny Ghirn groaned, patting at the pockets of her apron, "Oh bugger'm, whence am I to get light in tis mess? Where's me tinderbox e'en? Oh bloody bugger, I forgots it in the pantry, an' that be on the other side o' the bleedin' house! Gheldah, ye sees better in the dark than your poor ole sis wi' your fancy spectacles, woul' you nip into..."

"Nay need fer that now." Gheldah snapped her fingers, and a blue, pulsating orb appeared on the palm of her hand. It splashed the corridor with rather brighter light than the erstwhile stump of a candle inside its sheath ever had. It also brought into better view Granny Ghirn's wide-eyed, shocked expression, as she stared, almost mesmerized, at her younger sister.

"Gheldahsch'ugh-Ach! You can't... you... when... How be tis that you weet-"

"Oh, lang agone, tis be 'em gift o' witchin' i' me blood, e'en if I ne'er tole ye," Gheldah sighed impatiently. "Well, now ye ken. Tis nay be 'em Day o' Reckonin' an' doom o' dooms, sis deary, if I wot a wee smidgen o' tis an' that more than ye, an' sum o' it be 'em ados o' wizzards. Now, Ghiidgh 'ere sais she ent ill, so we're off to plead council wi' sirra, afta we ha' fetched her a dress an' sum repast fer 'em both o' us."

Before Granny Ghirn could protest, the taller woman clasped in turn Enkev by the arm, and started marching her towards the kitchen. The glowing ball kept pulsating on the herbalist's out-held hand, and Hiid felt as if someone had poorly played an even more shoddily tuned violin in her head.

"I be jus' as keen on harkin' wot came to pass inne that tomb o'em kings o' yoretides whither ye so outlandishly vanished. I reckon tis be what sirra wishes to ken, anyhow," she replied to Hiid's disrupted question. Then, in her typical manner, she started bouncing in-between a score of topics so fast that it would have dizzied any even slightly less apt listener.

"Well, I be fain dat 'em netherworldly chill o' ominous callousness seems to ha' waned away fro' ye. By 'em firehammer o' Dthg'aar, tis verily be auld King Lhietd-Lhem'meeschz ye beheld in 'em halls o' those who lang ere 'em dire tides o' ours passed doon into 'em somber dominion o' Tghuonegh'err? Oh aye, and I hafta show ye tis truly outlandish wort I dug out o'..."

Granny Ghirn scurried after the duo, holding her voluminous skirts and puffing slightly. "Gheldah! Tis be my house, an' I ent havin' with this... Halt a wee bit..."

"Aye, these be yer halls, verily 'tis 'em troth, but 'twas sirra who bade me to stay 'ere, an' thusly it be his will that I shoul' use yer chambers akin to me ain, also as I of yer blood be an' run many a chore an' errand fer ye. An' if ye havnae hitherto come to remark upon 'em fact dat I ent 'em wee daftie foolish lass full o' silly youngtime giddiness ye last kenned twelve thousan' yeartides agone, makes ye yer notice now. 'Tis many a water that ha' flown past since."

"Ow, nay so fast, vaits ye a vee bit, me all o'er huuts!" Hiid attempted to cut in, as she was practically forced to run alongside Gheldah's long strides.

"Ach, aye. Forgettin' mesel' 'ere..." The addressed slowed down a little. "By 'em way, ye owe me a washed apron, ye ken that? I patched ye up so much dat ye can scrub off yer ain mess fer dat, hmm?"

"Uf, aye, Ei vill doos tat in eem morrov. Par-doon."

"Meh, reckon dat canna come to pass sumtides to any wight... What was I heedin' here now, forgettin' me ain head..."

"Puffth... O-oh, aye, o' course you can be here as you wish, sis," Ghirn reached them again, "I didn't mean that, but we all shoul' be in bed by now, you tole me yourself you were fatigued beyon' reckonin'! An' the lass here be ill- An' where in the name of Lghouz'schaschuolz an' his heavenly grace larned you the kennings of witching, this be-"

"By 'em blazes o' Dthg'aar an' 'em pus-daimons wrigglin' inne yonpits, I be a potioneer an' ha' done many a healin' i'me fifteen thousan' yeartides o' livin' wi' many a sufferin' an' hardship therein, an' I cannae see aught ill wi' her but a triflin' o' scratches that'll heal up soon enow. An' I ent weary nay more, nay wi' all 'em outlandish goings-ons flappin' aboot hurly-burly akin to 'em skyful o' ruttin' bats matin'!"

Woozily, Enkev listened to the miniature polemy advancing. The sisters had not seen each other in twelve thousand years? Hooboy, and in Iota Sphere relatives pretended you did not exist any more if you forgot them for five years. Oh indeed, one could pass much water in that time, practically become a different person. Egads, and she was less than sixty, and Gheldah thought she had been childish at the age of three thousand?

In the end, Gheldah won with her slightly larger muleheadedness rate, and the fact that Ghirn seemed genuinely taken aback by her hitherto unknown aptitudes. Granny Ghirn went on to a long tirade about how it must have come from Gheldah's mother's side and however she for aye had been so outlandish with her peculiar wee li'l ways and blahblahblah... The rumormill ne'er stopped grinding blethers when it came to Granny Ghirn. Probably even five muzzles would not have helped, since she would have gabbled the torturer to death ere any of them could have been forced in place.

Soon Hiid was limping towards Guarh's rooms, her stomach a bit fuller and a horrible washed-out lilac dress on that had belonged to some kid probably hundreds of years agone. The skull and monster motives sewn onto the canvas clashed magnificently with the lacy frills. Her own had been too grimy, and the wardrobe lad lacked any better change. Unless she wanted to keep stumbling on to hems that were a foot too long.

Quiet conversation was issuing through the black, wooden door carved thick with grimacing, tusky beasts and runes. One of the previous very plausibly shared the same dentist with King Lhietd. Granny Ghirn knocked carefully at the door, and then pushed it open.

Guarh, sitting on a stool near a crackling fire in the hearth, turned his head towards the doorway, and so did Gha'ugonak and two younger men. They shared distinct features with the ghost of King Lhietd, so Hiid assumed that certain genes really were superglued to the G'Uhageid DNA. Or then it was this illogic again about fantasy kings and how their descendants automatically had to appear like clones of their ancestors. Come to think of it, probably the gap-toothed and scarred Guarh had in the past possessed a much handsomer outline too. Now he managed to look mostly like as if a full-laden cart had driven over his face after it had been kicked in a few times.

"Ah. Aye. Enter the halls of mine, if you please, with peace in your hearts." Guarh must have spotted Hiid's awkward mien. "We were merely about to conclude the matters herein in any case. Ach, the tidings, what mysteries have we unearthed, indeed! Finally have we borne them forth, out of their nigh everlasting darkness deep in the abyssal pits of secrets, into the pale light of the noontide where they shall be ultimately unraveled."

The fact that Hiid stared her brows raised at the ole warhorse had nought to do with fear or unease. It was the complex -- Could it be called a dressing-table in the absence of a better word? -- covering a whole wall and by which G'Uhageid sat. Anyhow, it had a humongous mirror in the middle, and umpteen lockers for bottles, brushes, clippers, and who kenned what paraphernalia. Dressed only in his kilt, the gaffer was spreading some kind of strongly fragrant oil into his hair which he must have had at least two meters and so thickly one could have lost several puppies inside. Some of the brushes were scattered across the table in that typical fashion of very recently used items, and a big comb with extra-fine teeth was sitting on his lap.

Alright... Hiid admitted she had wondered about those few occasions the 'Lord' had jumped over the vainness rate of Narcissus in her presence. Fine, he probably was a truly accomplished wizard and whatnot. But even so, all that bragging, and cackling hysterically at his own corny jokes as if they were the most precious gems from the time Humor was first created... There was even that aura in his loping strut that quietly told any by-passers that he was the master-lord of the universe and all others merely lowly earthworms barely fit to lick his holy footprints... This was something one scantly spotted on the erst glance. Nevertheless, when you grew to know him better, you began espying the hints and signs that this chum here was quite swollen around the attic.

Well. Lhietd and this dressing-table explained a lot. And there was no necessity to astonish any more over how his hair for aye remained so sleek and shiny, if he soaked it with fifteen googolplex hair-care products every morrow.

Meanwhile, in the background, Ghirn had increased the volume of her shockedness heap, and was reprimanding the man called Thurgh'i -- which probably was not his whole name since everyone around tended to have sixty bzillion nicknames and shortenings -- about his facial tattoos. They seemed to have been a recent acquisition.

"Dear, have we not counseled over the matter many a tide erenow? He bears the blood of the G'Uhageids within his veins, and thusly shall wear the ancient and honored emblems of the forefathers," Guarh put in calmly. "Ten thousand be the mark of the coming to the royal age, and thereafter shall a man be insightful, strong, and cunning enough to carry the responsibilities of the olden glories and a new blade in his sheath graced with the full set of runes. Thus has spoken the lore of my kin ever since the first dayspring of tides, and thus it shall be evermore unto the breaking of the world."

"Oh, aye, but wee li'l Thurgh'i be such a handsome li'l lad, an' now look'a him..."

Guarh picked up a large towel hanging from a hook on the wall, and wrapped his oiled hair inside akin to a turban. The gook ostensibly had to mature for a while. Then he popped open another bottle, and started spreading the contents onto his very thick chest hair.

"The dignity of bearing a grand responsibility and the symbols of a noble bloodline shall adorn the brow of a warrior ever the more than mere angular cheekbones sculpted into the utmost strength and a jaw that could break iron hills with its mighty edge. Which incidentally do also emanate from my side, and thus are well suited to bear the honored runes."

Yup. Maybe the vainness was tied to the chin and cheekbone model, then, since they, according to all the recent evidence, were walking hand in hand, Hiid mused.

"Also, we must soon arrange a grand feast for his tribute, when the ebbs and floods of our dire tides shall become a tad less stormy. Thurgh'i deserves his honors, as he has with many a feat and bravery gathered a fine name upon himself as the nearmost centuries have thundered past."

"Well... Aye, of course... Tis just a bit breaks my heart to see me wee li'l darlin' lad all grown up an' facin' the grim dangers o' the merciless world..." Almost sadly, Granny Ghirn ruffled the ponytailed hair of Thurgh'i. His expression told he very much would have enjoyed sinking deep into the earth with sheer embarrassment right now. Aaschgh'rd, his brother, was wriggling with barely stifled snickers. He was perhaps a couple of millennia older, dressed much akin to his father, and possessed those very same squiggles around the eyes.

"Shall we depart now unto the first light?" Gha'ugonak asked curtly.

"Ah, indeed. I shall leave you, Thurgh'i and Aaschgh'rd, in charge of the pursuit anew. Take any other apt warriors you see fit, but remember to treasure wariness in your deepmost hearts, and move akin to the twilight shadows in the gathering darkness, never leaving behind so much as of a whisper of a trace! We indeed cannot attack ere the hills of Rha-ghusthav Rhu-bigh'onch, and even this must be conducted with the utmost stealth and cunning. May the light of Phohjn'nha-Ulagh shine its favorable blessings upon ye on your journey fraught with many an illship!"

"So, tis Khran-Av'ees verily be skulkin' in Rha-mahghu'Miankg?" Gheldah inquired when the three other men exited.

"Mmmh?" The line of kings that was not actually broken looked up from his chest hair oiling. Hiid could not trust her eyes any more. Was this how they kept them all gleaming, as Gheldah had described Khran-Av'ees? Where the oil had already dried up on Guarh's chest, the hairs indeed appeared rather puffier and curlier.

No, no, no, he could not be slapping it onto his armhairs now! Enkev really wanted not to ken whither it went next.

"Aye. We had Ahgtd'i, Miimrgh, and a few other lads pursuing steadily this peculiar companionship for a monthtide or two, ere we became anyhow assured of the concealed mysteries within. Of course, there had been rumors... Perchance a decoy in the high palace of Rha-ghi'Leh, tidings about sightings of an odd nature here and there, chiefly in the borderlands and in the less oppressed, western parts of his dominion where a wight can yet nigh freely journey to and fro..." Guarh inattentively lowered the open bottle down onto the table and steepled his fingers.

"Wrought with some measure of craftiness the schemes of this pediculous Khran-Av'ees are, aye, that cunning bastard of dog-breathed pus-daimons in the yonderpits, but nought I would nay be able to behold in their true light. And in the very end, the mures of deceit shall for aye crack open and crumple down into nought but ashes and dust. We shall see what we can do with the matters herein; if all shall come to pass splendidly, Rha-kan'Ocka will be rid of the filthy pest ere Mharasch'ghuol'ghu waxes anew. And yet, hark and lo, however be the tides freighted with such knotty predicaments, that it be hard to fathom whether e'en this solution shall be the right one..."

"Aye, aye, 'cos o'em foreseeings..." Gheldah nodded. "'Tis a mighty a tangle, aye verily."

Hiid had taken one of the seats where she now crouched and attempted deciphering all the haughty words. At least it was a tad easier than with Lhietd. Even when the ghost switched nigher the common speech, the sentences were laden with weird verb forms and rhymes, and just about everything was a metaphor of some kin. What was it with these overlords that they ne'er could speak normally?

Furthermore, the bane called her ignorance in just about anything that went on in the elvenland had grown into such measures that it was time to take a scimitar and truly make salami slices out of it. Mraarh, it would be so much more convenient at least once to comprehend what the townsfolk were blabbering about. Foreseeings? Prophecies? What the bleeding frag was Mharasch'ghuol'ghu? And wherefore did the sun never show up?

"Um, if Ei may asks, vai be Ei heer now? An' par-doon, but coold ye tells me vot be all tees foorseeins an' curses and eem Dusk Ei keeps heerin' aboot? Ei ne'er un-deer-stands vot on goos be-coos Ei do nay kens tees-"

"By 'em fimbulwinter an' thunderblazes o' Rha-a'Gnarrogh'kr, ye nay wost about 'em Curse o' our poor, sodden lands? Wheref're havnae ye said so erenow?" Gheldah sounded almost as shocked as Ghirn whenever she saw muddy footprints on her sparkly floor. "Ach, o' course it be 'em fears o'em elderfolk, I concur therein, but ane shoul' for aye ken 'em affairs o-"

"Nay in me halls! 'Tis an ill omen to speak of it, oh, it'll be an everlastin' damnation and smoldering rain of fire-stones pouring down upon the fruit o' me loins if one shoul' err to..." Granny Ghirn interrupted with genuine dread in her voice.

G'Uhageid walked over to Ghirn, and slipped one comforting arm around her shoulders.

"Ah, but you are wrong there. Perchance the names of certain perpetrators shall nevermore be spoken underneath the grim stormclouds of our birthland, however nought ill shall elsewise fall upon us neither from the wrathful skies nor from the hands of the heavenlords. Tides of numerous and uncountable have I spoken about the somber tragedies and happenstances of yore, and thus shall I not fear to step onto ways of telling and kenning anew. Daunted and timid nay become before that which needs not to be dreaded: it shall but glorify the falsehoods and dangers nonexistent!"

"Aye, but..." Here Ghirn suddenly jumped a little, blushed, and started giggling like a schoolgirl. "Put you yer slippery hands off, ye wayward lad!"

"Mrawahahaharuaaah!"

"Oh, stoppit, you silly thing, nay in front o' my sis!" she tittered, and pinched his wrinkled cheek playfully. "You ent ne'er larnin' one bit, ent you?"

Hiid turned her gaze away, not knowing what to think, and noticed Gheldah was twiddling her thumbs and staring fixedly into the ceiling. More giggling and growly cackling emerged from the corner, and lastly something about Guarh putting his shirt on so as not to catch a cold. She wondered how this worked with the particular that he walked barefoot and -legs most of the year.

"Ah. Now." Guarh returned to his seat, tucking the hem of his shirt into his belt. Indeed, the fashion served to flaunt with gleaming chest hair, as the wide headway of men's 'cold-weather shirts' usually extended down to the midriff. "Let us venture upon entering the topmost subject at erst, and thereafter we can take a by-road, which, alas, potholy and bumpy shall be, back to the matter of the Curse. I do have a smidgen of idle time at hand ere I must take leave to my other errands."

Well, most definitely, Enkev thought, as she peered at the huge pile of assorted trinkets on one side of the dressing-table, whence he was now picking out necklaces and earrings and other gimcracks and inserting them in place one after another. It must take about an hour to put that heap on, and he was not yet even finished with his hairdo. What next? Trimming that thin moustache with a slide ruler? Rubbing wax to his sideburns? Coning those overly thick eyelashes? Braiding his chest hair, perchance?

Guarh fixed Hiid with an intent gaze of his one working eye. As he was not wearing his eyepatch, the milky white one was quite distracting since it kept for aye staring into an utterly different direction. The hit that had blinded it must have damaged the moving muscles. It soon became almost painful to look G'Uhageid straight in the eyes, as your own regard inadvertently wanted to match his by unsuccessfully attempting to go wall-eyed.

"The tidings were that you, for reasons unreckoned, vanished into the houses of the dead in the glen of khunijnhgaaidenhgha'utd, and furthermore stood before one of the lords of the elderdays, arisen forth from the dark plains of Tghuonegh'lchach? Alas for all this ill fortune, for I had not beholden the dangers within and remained woefully ignorant of the existence of such a site in the erst place. Hrhmh, that bechances oft when you are rushing after too many an escaping, loose thread in this tapestry of dire tides at the same time... Anyhow... Would you thus mind giving me a record of your mischance?"

So Hiid told, with much accenting and misplaced words and frequent help from Gheldah and Granny Ghirn, as it oftentimes occurred that she did not even understand what Guarh meant with his turgid phraseology. She carefully cut off the bawdy bits, making the story sound much more solemn and formal. When the topic about the bodies nailed to the walls surfaced, Guarh explained that they had obviously been graverobbers whom Lhietd's wrath had thus condemned. It was akin to a minor sacrilege to claim your own something that had been laid to rest together with the departed, but perchance the noblemen also guarded more covetously their oldenday glories. Allegedly in the far-off southlands nought remained for long beneath the barrows, but became traded to spirits and interesting glow-in-the-dark mushrooms, ere the ghost had even had time to drowsily look at who had trampled his carefully manicured lawn and yoinked the birdbath. However, once the ancient elf inquired what Lhietd's copious statements actually contained, Hiid's train of thought trainwrecked completely.

"Alas for that. Hmmh..." G'Uhageid fingered at his chin. "And so many a tide have I endeavored to find a way to seek council with my forebears, yet there ne'er appears to have been a route into the outer plains of Tghuonegh'err's dominion. Thereupon, I would have wished to hear whatever he had on his nigh all-seeing mind, as does our bygone blood follow the wyrd of the younger kin, even if from their nameless abysses dark and afar. Hmm, I wonder whether I might venture upon to..."

He peered at the girl with a broody side-glance, as if weighing whether she was worth the trouble. Meanwhile Hiid was drowning in question marks.

"Now... perchance I shall try this. This be a means wherewithal I can hold the tapestry of one's thoughts on the palms of mine, and behold whence and whither the threads journey- "

"Nay, dear, don't do it, it'll strip you of your strength and put you into a terrible misery! Don't ye hark back to when you-" Granny Ghirn cut in once more. Sitting on the very edge of her chair, she had seemed nought but a twanging bundle of nerves all the time. Either she was beyond horrified of talking about the ongoing subjects, or then her qualms emanated from that Khran-Av'ees case. Whatever was going on there, then.

"Fear not, my sweet, this be nought akin to the feeble erst steps anymore. I have latterly devised schemes wherewith I shall neither suffer from lapses of strength nor wrenches as if stabbed by the poisoned trident of Vhe-dt'echinech. With this shield in my right hand, I have with satisfactory success entered the hearts of men without the yoke of agony being forced upon my shoulders." He beckoned at Hiid. "Now, if you would bring your chair closer and set yourself here right before me."

The mechanic hesitated. The morsel of the sentences she had comprehended sounded very nastily like mind-reading, which she had not believed even possible hitherto. Aye, well, another mental adjustment was needed, then. However, this thing about sitting that near to him... Concerning the demeanor of Lhietd, she was alltoo afraid of sly, groping hands that just appeared out of nowhere. Erkbrrrrht. Nonetheless, Granny Ghirn was gawking at him a few meters off, so he probably would not dare engage in any shady undertakings, hmm? She would flay him alive for sure if he did.

But reading her mind... It was a very personal place which she did not readily share with anyone. Especially now that she had edited all the PG-13 material out of the events. Personally she doubted there would be aught even marginally interesting in Lhietd's tirades. In all probability, everything would be in the class of 'oh how thy silky hips shine in the liquid silver of the moonlight'.

"No need to dread old Guarh, lass. I shall nay smite you with fireballs or aught akin." The lopsided grin and his blind eye staring now somewhere in the ceiling hardly aided the matters, however.

Erm... mayhap he was not evil, but really creepy nonetheless...

"It shall be more effortless if you hark well back to the events and bring them to the courtyards of your heart. And I shall take the oath nay to roam into ways that will ne'er belong to me beneath the light of our hidden stars."

Yet, if this was important to the rebellion... Grargh, why could not someone else have fallen into that dratted hole instead, and she could have remained ah-so wonderfully normal and just repaired clocks in the workshop? It was enough excitement to look for a lost screw by crawling under the table.

Awkwardly, she hauled the chair in front of G'Uhageid and tried to tidy up her mind of all the debris not related to the grave incident. At least she was good in concentrating on one and a single topic when she wanted to. Could she somehow make it appear a bit cleaner...?

When Hiid had set herself on the right spot, which was all too close in her opinion, Guarh placed his fingertips on her temples and closed his eyes. His skin felt like sweaty rhino hide. There and then, the familiar screeching at the edge of her consciousness surged up, and a weird tingling sensation spread out from her forehead down to the neckline. She concentrated hard on the events, yet kept her eyes open just in case. Just in case. Guarh's magic did not seem affecting her thoughts anyhow, except for the chittering. No fleeting flashes of bygone memories rushing through her awareness as it was for aye in stupid holomovies.

A few minutes crawled past as fast as decapitated slugs, during which it seemed Guarh first sought for something, and then set onto reading the bits he had considered interesting. His face, aside from some weensy movements around the eyebrows, remained quite impassive. Unto the second the sides of his mouth started suddenly twitching, that was. A few more jiffies of this stifled laughing went by. Then he let go of her temples and fell back in his seat, shaking all over with hysteric mirth.

"RUAAAHHHAAHHAHAHAH rohohohohoruaaah GRAAAHHAHAAHAAHOOH ruahahahahorhorhohyyyaah splurrrt ruaah BWAHAHAHAHAHAHURRRH snorrrrrrrt gnorrrrrrf BLUARRRHAHAHAHAH BRYLLLGRAAGHAHOHOHOUUUH sniiooorrrrrrt GROAAHHHAHAAHH..." the rumbling cackle avalanched through the chamber. Guarh was rocking back and forth in his chair, holding his ribs and gasping for air between the atrocious growls and snorts of glee. Midway through, Gheldah burst out laughing also, but this must have been due to the combination of Hiid's stupefied expression and the sheer ludicrousness of Guarh's mirth. Ghirn was equally shaking in her chair, both hands clasped over her mouth.

"Vat vas so funnee teer?" Hiid asked when the thunder had died down a little. G'Uhageid was actually wiping tears off the crinkled corners of his eyes.

Through repeated snorts and guffaws he told what Lhietd had wanted from Hiid whose visage turned into a deeper shade of red by the second. The sisters very soon exploded with almost equal kinds of hysterical horse-laughs as the man initially had.

"Ruaahahahaha... Aaahhahah, oh, poor ole King Lhietd the Lustful's kingly skills in swordplay had gone a wee bit rusty in the course of the yeartides, and he but desired to warm them up anew with our lass here. Ah, plainly a living lass would really have heated up pleasantly his poor mighty blade of yore, bitten by the everlasting coldness of the Underworld, ruaaahahahahahah groaaaHAHAHAHUOUOUaha snerrrrrrrk..." He decided to add even more effect to the lampoon with a careful selection of expressive hand-movements.

Gheldah and Granny Ghirn were rolling. Hiid attempted to draw her mouth into some kind of half-grimace, but she failed to discern what was so amusing about the occasion. She had been so terrified by the ghost that it had been a miracle she had found even that much courage to resist Lhietd and plead he would let her go. Obviously these people shared a different kind of view on what was humorous. Granny Ghirn and her usual, strict no-naughty-jokes-agenda... Bah. People were sometimes just so two-faced.

Not that she was any better, though... Well... not any better at all, but perhaps worse. It occurred to her there that in different circumstances, and if it had come to pass to someone else, she would perchance have cackled just as much at the whole case.

"Oh, and ole Lhiekghi'oichnj seems to bear the same fondness for bonny petite lasses as most of my kin. Aaahhhahahruaah, must have been the highmost paradise for him to meet an ample-hipped little lady three feet shorter than him, bwaahhahohohohuhuhhooh snorrrrrtblorrrrt RRRUAHAAHAHAAH..."

Thereafter, Guarh's wrinkled countenance however gradually drew itself into a more severe frown. The mad eye rolled moodily inward to focus on the bridge of his nose, making him look positively insane.

"Yet there were many a matter of a much more grim stature therein, true tidings of concern woven into his speech..." The gaffer straightened up in his seat, pushing his down-slipped sleeves up his arms so sinewy they looked like as if bundled up from gnarly tree-roots. He might have looked a tiny bit stately if seen from afar and through thick fog, but close-up, he really matched just about every synonym for orcish and ugly. Even so, it struck the mechanic that she preferred beholding even him to Legless Bigfigleaf, since you could at least inspect Guarh in a kind of morbid curiosity instead of getting utterly bored with a figure that had nought to look at due to its downright flawlessness. Besides, Aaschgh'rd was just rowwwr and yummm with his forested abs and big, bearded chin and bulging kil... Fie and blazes, now it was starting anew! Had that dream seriously mangled her attraction factors for forever, or was she merely suffering from a temporal overdose of estrogen?

"May I look anew, as I was thusly smitten down nigh helpless with sudden mirth by this unforeseen twist?"

Hiid nodded reluctantly after Gheldah had 'translated' that bit. How was it that he could make even such simple sentences sound so bleeding pompous?

Guarh's sandpaper fingers were soon in place again, and the absence of sound began its skulking-about. Well, more or less, as the wind went waily-waily-waily-moooaaaan behind the windows. It took a while longer this time ere the elf's cakehole spasmed again. Finally he collapsed into an almost worse a cacklefest, coughing out every now and then something nigh incoherent about fig-leafs and never-ending eagerness.

Enkev blanched this time instead of the hitherto frequent blushings. Oh no. OH NO. No, no, no. He had somehow dug into that bleeding dream, which nobody was ever supposed to ken about. This was something she also never ever wanted Granny Ghirn's ears to reach, for the rumormill would be literally smoking under the speed and load.

"Look, dids nay ye pro-mees me nay ta goos in-seid me pri... praiv... um, me ain thooghts, an' tis be ane ov eem! I nay kens hov tis gots into me dreem, but Ei doos nay vant it ta bee-com eem talk ov ev'ryane. Prithee nay tells aboot tis fur-theer, 'tis verily emb... em... embar-rass-eeng. Ei ne'er vanteds noot ov tis ta happen, ye kens. Ei ne'er askeds ane bit ov eet, e'en if eet be me to bleim ont... int- upon partly tat Ei inseid eem grave fellds."

But Gheldah was one of those annoyingly sharp persons that would find the needle in the haystack by quickly building up a large magnet instead of plunging in to look for it manually. She had probably guessed exactly by now what Hiid had beholden during the lapsed hours.

"Lhietd was i' yer dream?" she retorted, "How-"

Guarh straightened up and flung his arms into the air. "Ah, may peace rest upon this hall and your mind anew... Er, what were you cleped, lass?"

"She'd be Ghiidgh," Gheldah supplied the entirely wrong pronunciation.

"Aye, Ghiidgh. I have no need to hazard myself into further undertakings, as I deem I garnered everything I ever desired to ken. And perchance e'en a wee bit too m-much-ch-ch... snffffbrrlft..." His voice broke, and he had to stuff his knuckles into his mouth so as not to break into hysterics anew. "Krhhhm. Ahem. I sh-shahaha-sh... shall be as if I never upon this land and beneath our cloud-enshrouded stars harked the... em-krhmh, further bits barren of noteworthy purpose. Yet I hardly could expect this... Was not I meant to be the one who..." The harsh edge returned to his voice, as did crawl back the finger-steeple he seemed so fond of. "Hmmh... however can this be thusly..."

All the scheming holocartoon villains for aye used that gesture, Hiid snorted inwardly. Guarh might have made an excellent dark lord, if he had not, well, been on the good side of the forc... wossname. His actual saintliness could be much debated upon, though. He had just thoroughly abashed Hiid in front of his wife and sister-in-law with all those lewd talks, and did not seem to even understand he might have hurt anyone's feelings.

"Hoi! Did ye nay hark me erenow? However did Lhietd get i' yer nightly beholdings? I ha' ne'er harked aught alike i' me tides o' life!" Gheldah stood up and trotted over to Hiid. "How di' 'e come to emerge? Did he linger for langer tides, or did ye jus' keep runnin' away hither an' thither akin to 'em startled red-bellied fangrat an' tryin' to avoid his hoggish hunger fer a bonny ride?"

Hiid groaned mentally. Oh aye, there was one of those über-geeky persons that would not rest unto they discovered what the question to the answer '42' was. She recognized well this type, as she was one alike herself.

"Ei tells ye aftavards, but nay nou, prithee? 'Tis a wee bit embar-ras-eeng."

"Yet howe'er be tis... Cannae 'em Khalm'anch Vghaekg touch ye me'rly in 'eir earthen halls that-"

"Ah, but this hardly is so trivial. I deem King Lhietd drank that much of her force of life that he could thuswise reach her even from beyond the many a nigh impenetrable obstacle in-between the plains of living and the netherworlds," Guarh cut in. "And King Lhietd, whilst largely and sometimes only remembered for his achievements in the lore of worldly pleasures, was leagues ahead of the wizards of his days, even mightier than his famed brother, who slew many a fell beast and garnered upon himself a grand name through his many a majestic skill in spellweaving and sagely kenning. Lhietd... well, so powerful was he and yet be, that reaching the halfl... er, Grrh- Ghiidgh through the tides and nameless plains might have been akin to wending his way through a veil of thin mist. Did he nay recount however he, in his dark chambers beneath yon mountains, sorely missed the golden eras of the elderdays and the sweet warmth of the noonlight? I would not astonish wherefore he thusly grasped the harnesses of this rare chance and trailed to find her anew in-between the worlds, even if it be on the plane of untruths and flighty fantasies? And..." G'Uhageid suddenly grinned roguishly, "Ole King Lhietd ne'er gave up on a tricksy case, nay, it was but laying a challenging quest before his feet, and oh, challenges enjoyed he unto the utmost... hrraahahahahuhuhuh..."

"So, Ei can nay e'en gets him oot o' me heid?" Hiid asked, stupefied.

"Ah, but this be beyond my kenning. It may be that when your life-force fades away from him, he nay more may be able to break through the uncountable strongholds enveloping the plains of the netherworlds. Yet, perchance he needs not to rely even on this, but is freighted with enow power as-is, in which case... Well... if you do nay wish to engage into some rather splendid swordplay with him, in which he undoubtedly would be masterly, as he must have honed his favored art into its utmost finesse ever kenned on the plains of Rha-kan'Ocka, then... hrrmhraahahahuuh... ahum, intrigue him elsewise. He was a great worshipper of knowledge in all the higher arts, and thus were the grand wells of his savvy nigh bottomless, even though... Alas, it be anew beyond my kenning what he is allowed to pass on into the realms of the living, whilst bound to the laws of Tghuonegh'err himself. Hrrhmh. Now, I indeed would have wished for a chance akin to this to fall upon me. However, I can neither channel through your dreams nor ask you to deliver my messages to this forefather of mine. My quests to seek for the troths be my own, verily; thereupon I cannot confide them to none else but myself."

"But... butbutbut... but... tis cannay stay akin ta tis... eet cannay..." Enkev stuttered, staring with wide-eyed horror at the floor planks. Logic, Reason, and Rationality were all groaning in the utmost agony. That... that creep remaining mayhap for aye in her dreams? No. Nononononono. NO, no, no!

Engage into swordplay... oh, how subtle, indeed. Brrrht, and that one-eyed scarecrow was talking about... hrrmh... goings-ons as if they were the greatest fruit the enlightened civilizations of all the galaxies bundled up together had ever put forth! Had the line of kings mayhap broken up because there had been one less prurient individual somewhere in the middle?

Liked challenge... mind-reading... Blaaargh, was she not safe even in her own head any more? This whole affair reeked so much of Serenity Sakura Angel-Glitterblossom Evanescence-Raven MyImmortal that next it would be finding a pink, rainbow-winged unicorn which pooed stardust waiting for her on a nearby meadow. Oh, the horror scenarios! Aaaargh! Would mayhap a tinfoil hat or something help? A spell? Sleeping pills for dreamless slumber? Or should she just keep gulping down dhulisch'uoniz such enormous amounts that she would ne'er fall asleep again...? Obviously her visage expressed such mortal terror in the face of becoming an overperfect fanfiction self-insert that Gheldah placed one big hand on her shoulder.

"Ach, mebbe it ent that dreadful as ye so darkly deems? Perchance he ca' aid ye wi' yer speech or summat o' suchkin? Ask 'im, that doesnay costs ye aught. An' ye fer sure donnae need to burnish 'is scimitar if ye thusly nay wilt, 'tis but 'em very right o' ye to order wot be sacred an' settled i'yer ain heart o' hearts."

Right... If Hiid attempted explaining them that on top of her mind had just been the worry of becoming too perfect and having to sidle through every stinking cliché known in the history of fantasy novels, they would not understand a word. Besides, now Logic, Reason, and Rationality being wrung the mental torture rack whimpered that she should be concerned over much more sensible things in the first place. They were in the middle of a war, people died, and some complete nutcase lolled on the throne, demanding widows and orphans and bunnies to be thrown into the piranha pool... or something...

"Urhm. Aye... Ei reckons Ei cans deal vit it..." she grumbled. "But prit-hee doos ye nay tell tis to no-van, 'tis all so bleedin' foolish. Nov, if tis bees over, can Ei asks vot tis Dusk an' akin be?"

Gheldah glanced at Granny Ghirn, who shrugged with a soupçon of unease.

"Well, whence to start unravelin' 'em whole tangled affair..."

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*Footnotes:

Many readers of scientific magazines commonly think the surname Gyi?ñhhá has some kind of typographic error in it, when they for the first time stumble upon it. However, the name, when articulated correctly, sounds as if it had a question inside. Hence the somewhat confusing typographical guise. The aforementioned mistake happens so frequently, that these days people oftentimes refer to the mathematician as Gesundheit Misprint, rather than use his legitimate name.