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The aroma of roasting meat lulled Logan away from the dream he was enjoying. As a child, he was running through fields of golden grass, laughing while he playfully hid from his mother. “Where did my little bean go? Hmmm… now where could he be?” She teased, knowing he could hear her and also exactly where he was hidden. He bent over, trying to hold back his giggles with tiny hands.
Stirring on his side in the dirt, he still wore a smile as the feel of it swirled on the edge of his thoughts. The mouthwatering aroma of food pulled Logan from his slumber. Something was roasting in the nearby crackling fire. Mother must have dinner almost ready, he thought.
The feel of rope binding his wrists snapped him out of the fantasy like the sharp backhand of reality. Logan’s mother was dead, and he did not know where he was or why he was tied up. Trying to remain as still as possible, he craned his neck to look around from under the wool blanket someone had laid over him.
A fire was crackling not too far from him, and something did smell wonderful as it cooked. At least that part was not a dream. He could make out that he was no longer in the tight tunnels, as the cavern seemed to open high above again, feeling more familiar, like the area back home, except a little more devoid of plant life.
“I see you’re awake,” a familiar voice noted.
Firm hands shifted Logan’s bound body into a sitting position facing the fire, and then his captor walked to the opposite side, turning the skewered meat over the flames as their light danced across his face.
“Was it all a bad dream?” Logan asked, hoping the entire surreal experience was something his mind had conjured up.
“I’m afraid not, big brother, though I wish that were the case,” Corbin replied with an unfamiliar edge of spite lacing his tone.
“I suppose it couldn’t be. If it were a dream, Elise would be the one here cooking for me,” Logan joked, still unsure what to make of the situation.
“I’m here to take you back home,” Corbin said, devoid of emotion.
“That’s great for you, but I’m not going,” Logan said as casually as he could, shifting his arms to try and get some blood circulating into his hands.
“Well, I could always put you back where I found you in the Morpheus Embrace,” Corbin offered, though they both knew it to be an empty threat.
“Oh, you’re a regular riot today. Why am I tied up?”
“Sorry,” Corbin said, though he was not sorry in the least. “I cannot risk you running off. There’s too much at stake. Besides, what were you thinking, leaving the palace in the first place?”
“What was I thinking? Oh, just that dying was not a position I would like to be in. Hmmm…or maybe I was thinking I would not even be in this mess if my fool of a brother hadn’t dragged me to Fal in the first place. Oh, Logan, we have to go warn them. Why, so they could throw me over the wall?” Logan snapped.
“What did you expect them to do, throw you a parade for stabbing that poor gnome to death?” Corbin yelled back, determined not to back down from his brother for once.
“You really are something, you know that? Always flapping your gums when you don’t have a clue what you’re talking about!” Logan gritted his teeth, wishing he could snap the rope and give the little brat a once over.
“Oh yeah, it’s always everyone else’s fault but your own, same old nonsense. The world’s out to get my big brother, he never deserves it,” Corbin said sarcastically, while turning the spit over the fire again.
“Well, I never deserve to get caught, if that’s what you mean,” Logan mumbled under his breath.
“What did you say?” Corbin demanded.
“I said, you can take that spear of yours and stick it up your—” “They are going to excommunicate Riverbell from New Fal,” Corbin flatly cut him off.
Logan’s mouth hung open for a moment, then he clamped it shut and stared in disbelief at his brother. “That’s just…that’s…insane. Why would they?” His typical bravado was momentarily stemmed as he tried to wrap his mind around the concept.
“The council is saying you killed that gnome because he found out about some conspiracy of Riverbell to overthrow the government. Some are saying the attack on the capitol was actually riled up by our people, and if you do not go back, the kingdom will cut ties with Riverbell permanently.”
“Those dirty bastards,” Logan growled.
“Yep, there you go again, blaming everyone else but yourself.” Corbin shook his head, disgusted and annoyed.
“Corbin, you don’t understand. This all has to be that sneaky snake Fafnir’s doing. We need to—” Logan tried to tell his brother all he had witnessed but again was sharply cut off by Corbin’s indignant attitude.
“We? There is no we anymore, there is just me. Me and my people of Riverbell. All my life, you have never once had a single nice thing to say about our goodly village. It’s always been about juvenile dreams of making a name for yourself in the capitol…having a ‘real life.’ In just two days, you sat at the center of two murders. That’s one for one. So tell me something, big brother, how is the real life treating you?” Corbin’s words stung like thorns, and Logan wilted under the look of hatred in his eyes.
“Corbin, if you just listen to me, I can explain,” Logan said softly.
“No. I’m done listening to your false words. I’ve been listening to them all my life. It’s nothing but a pack of lies, all of it—just excuses to justify why you are so selfish. You are going to sit there and blame goodly Magistrate Fafnir for all of your problems? An honorable lord, probably the next to sit with the Twelve, is somehow the reason you stabbed that gnome to death? Fafnir, who has been nothing but kind to our people in this time of need, bringing gifts and encouragement to Elise and I. This is where you dare to lay blame?”
Logan had never seen Corbin like this before. Something had changed in him. He was normally a calm, reserved man, but now he was really getting worked up and sounded like an entirely different person.
“Listen to reason, man,” Logan said.
“Just shut your mouth. In the morning I’m taking you back to New Fal, and just in time too, with only eight days to spare.”
“So that’s it then, going to toss your brother to the wolves just like that? My life is that insignificant to you, eh?” Logan said somberly, seeing even now, reunited with his brother out here in the wildlands, that he was still truly going to be alone for the rest of his life.
“Oh please. When we get back to Fal, you will be interrogated in front of the entire Council. Arch Councilor Zacharia has promised to see the truth, and Riverbell will be freed from suspicion.” Corbin waved away the notion that he was somehow abandoning his brother by bringing him to justice.
“You will excuse me if I do not share your blind faith in the system,” Logan snorted derisively.
“Well, either way you are going back,” Corbin flatly stated, biting off a hunk of the cooked meat.
“Yeah, probably not,” Logan said.
“Didn’t I just tell you to shut your mouth?” Corbin snapped back, just as a tiny frying pan let out a gong, batting across the back of his skull. Corbin spit his food out into the fire, eyes bulging from their sockets as his body slumped sideways.
Bipp hopped up, down, and side to side, doing a happy dance, turning to shake his rump, which to Corbin looked like six gnome arses waggling at him as the cavern blurred.
“Geez, did you have to hit him so hard?” Logan asked, concerned even though he could not help laughing.
“That’s a strange thing to be worried about when you’re being rescued, ain’t it?” Bipp said, smoothing back his wild mane of silver hair, curious at the ways of humans.
“He’s my brother,” Logan explained, turning about so the gnome could untie his hands.
“Oh…strange family customs your people have,” Bipp said as he pulled the tight knots loose.
“It’s a long story. Grab my pack. We have to get out of here quickly,
” Logan urged, rubbing the sore, burning skin around his wrists.
Bipp ran back around the fire, hopping over Corbin’s prone, groaning body. Snatching the pack, he gave the man another loud thwack on the head for good measure.
“Would ya stop that already?” Logan scolded.
“Yeah, yeah, geez, that’s some gratitude you’re giving me,” Bipp whined, handing him the pack.
“I am eternally grateful to you, Bipp. I guess now we are even, eh?” Logan said and then turned to his brother. “Go home, Corbin. Forget about me. Tell the Council I died in a rockslide or something.”
He nodded his farewell, and the companions headed away from the campfire.
“How in the blazes did you find me anyhow?” he asked Bipp.
“Well, that’s a long story. You see…,” The gnome began recounting his tale.
Corbin tried to watch in a daze as the two moved off into the distance, bickering with each other like an old married couple. “I guess the gnome can be sneaky after all,” he muttered to himself, just before losing consciousness.