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"Uh uh," Pikel said stubbornly, sta Ivan’s way into the enchanted tree

"What are ye saying?" Ivan shot back "Ye openin’ the door just to keep it blocked, ye dopey fool?"

Pikel pointed past his brother to the bear, which was sitting and watching, its expression forlorn

"Ye ain’t takin’ the bear!" Ivan bellowed, and he ca his finger and shifting to fully block the way

Nose to nose, Ivan glowered at his brother, but he heard the bear growling behind hiht wouldn’t be even

"Ye can’t be taking hiht be breakin’ up his bear fa that!"

"Oooo," said Pikel, seehtened

He came forward and whispered into Ivan’s ear

"How do ye know he ain’t got no family?" Ivan roared in protest, and Pikel whispered some more

"He telled ye?" Ivan bellowed in disbelief "The stupid bear telled ye? And ye’re believing hiht be telling ye that just to get away from his cow or his doe or hisbearess, or whatever they’re calling a she-bear?"

"Bearess, hee hee hee," said Pikel, and giggling, he whispered some more

"He’s a she-bear?" Ivan asked, and he glanced back "How’re ye knowin’ it’s aneverme It ain’t no matter, anyway He-bear or she-bear, hesheit, ain’t goin’"

Pikel’s face see pressed forward in a round He wasn’t about to do this strange tree-walking, unsettling under the best of conditions, with a wild bear beside him

"Nope, it ain’t," he said calmly "And e’re missin’ Bruenor’s coronation, ye can tell Cadderly why And when the winter’s finding us out here, and yer friend’s gone to sleep, ye watch me skin her for some warm blankets! And when"

Pikel’s low moan stopped his fiery brother’s tirade, for Ivan surely recognized the defeat in Pikel’s tone

The green-bearded Bouldershoulder walked past Ivan and over to his bear He spent a long while groo and pulling ticks, and gently placing the insects down on the ground

Of course, whenever he put down a bloated one, Ivanit between stubby fingers

A few h Pikel reht the creature was quite sad, Ivan frankly saw no difference The bear was going on its way, and any ould have likely been good enough for the bear

Pikel walked past Ivan again He took up his nealking stick and knocked three times on the trunk, then bowed low and reverently as he asked the tree’s per, of course, but apparently his brother did, for Pikel half-turned and held his ar the yellow-bearded brother to lead the way

Ivan deferred and responded by ain and ain and ain, still with complete calm, and motioned for Ivan to lead

Ivan started to , and shoved his brother through instead, then turned and charged the tree

To smack face-first into the solid trunk

With his pale, almost translucent skin, and blue eyes so rich in hue they seemed to reflect the colors around hih not very tall, he was lean and see pointed ears That was all an errant vision, though, for the elf warrior was a formidable force indeed and certainly would be seen as no tiny thing to any ene the bite of his fiercely-sharp, slender sword

Crouching in the high, windblown pass, a day’s flight fron clearly enough Ores had been through Many orcs, and not too long ago Normally that wouldn’t have concerned Tarathiel too much-ores were a common nuisance in the wilds of the valley between the Spine of the World and the Rauvin Mountains- but Tarathiel had tracked the band, and he knew from whence they’d had come They’d come out of the Moonwood, out of his beloved forest honashed his teeth together He and his clan had failed, and miserably, in the defense of their forest hoh to chase theht mean for the near future Would the lack of defense proly brutes to return?

"If they do, then ill slaughter the to speak to his asus snorted in reply, almost as if he’d understood He threw his head about and tucked his white-feathered wings in tighter over his back

Tarathiel smiled at the beautiful creature, one of a pair he had rescued a few years earlier from these saiants Tarathiel had found the felled pair, smashed down by thrown boulders into a rocky dell He could tell froiven birth, and so he had spent the better part of a tenday searching the area before finding the pair of foals That pair had done well in the Moonwood, growing strong and straight under the guidance -not the ownership-of Tarathiel’s small clan This one, which he had naes in his white hair all along his long, glistening mane, welcomed him as a rider Tarathiel had na white hter color red, a yellowish pink hue Both pegasi were about the saht, sixteen hands, and both ell-s and wide, solid hooves

"Let us go and find these orcs and show the a wink at his ain, pawed the ground

They were up in the air soon after, Sunset’s huge, powerful wings driving hard or spreading wide to catch the updrafts off the mountain cliffs They soon spotted the orc band, a score of the creatures, trudging along a trail higher up in the mountains

So attuned were uide Sunset with just his legs, swooping the pegasus down froh the air some fifty yards above the orcs The elf’s boorked furiously, firing arrow after arron at the orcs

They scraot hurl by diving frantically behind rocks or over ridges than felt the sting of his arrows He went up and around the bend and flew on for soive the orcs tier had passed And he wanted to coasus cliher into the sky, then banked a sharp turnabout and went into a powerful dive, wings working hard They came around the comer much lower, just above the reach of the orcs had any been carrying a pole arht, Tarathiel’s bow rang true, plugging one unfortunate orc right in the chest, throwing it back and to the ground

Sunset soared past, a host of thrownharmlessly into the air behind them

Tarathiel didn’t push his luck for a third run He banked to the southeast and set off fro fast for home

"Hoas I to know yer stupid spell had run out?" Ivan bellowed against his brother’s continuing laughter The yellow-bearded dwarf rubbed some blood off his scraped nose "I didn’t see no stupid door when ye said there was a door, so how’ when the door that ain’t there anyway ain’t there no hter

Ivan stepped forward and launched a punch, but Pikel kneas co his cooking pot hel! And Ivan was hopping about in pain once more