one more tale

Once there were two knights and they roamed all over the land doing good deeds for some and bad deeds to others as befitted their needs and humor.  In fact, they knew no master but their own wills.

One summer day, they were riding along and entertaining each other with tall tales of former exploits.  One said to the other, "Aye, Colum, do you not remember?  I had the dragon below my boot and he begged my mercy to let him go or kill him quickly, through the heart.  That was when I got my fine shield, from his hoard."

"Oh, you are a sly liar, Arne," said his companion, "But I know you lifted that shield from the drunken soldier of the Empress' Army in the Tavern of the Green Horse, and I had drugged him first and deserved first choice of his goods, you rascal."

"My dear Colum, would you doubt the word of your constant guide and follower?  Truly, you cut me to the core."  He had a face of wounded soul and his friend a face of ruffled pride, but within moments their merriment burst through like water from behind the ice dams in spring.

On they traveled on their lazy mounts, whose ragged tails swatted uselessly at flies and other things that bite and sting.  Their jocularity rolled before them like a king's carpet and sank into the dry, yellow dust like the few precious drops of rain in a drought-stricken land, or like a child's angry tears on a dry bit of bread.  They had no cares or worries, and all was well in their simple world.

As the day stretched towards evening, they realized they were still a long way off from the next village, and, for reasons too numerous and complex to mention at this time, could not return to where they had come from.  One turned to the other with the furrowed brow of one put out and asked his plan for the night.  The other also brooded but said he knew how to build a fire and light it with magic rocks he had stolen from a wizard.  His companion opened his mouth to scoff, but their talk was interrupted by a scream.

A child had been caught by a wolf!  There he was, the great, hairy bastard, trotting jauntily over the fields with the babe caught by its shirt in his slavering, foul-breathed mouth.  All jokes were laid aside as the sense of indignation rose and the two knights spurred their steeds to action, a chase over the spongy grass.  The wolf did not seem to stretch his legs or hurry his pace, and yet he stayed far ahead for many long minutes.  But finally, the knights drew near to his tail and one slashed with his sword and the other poked with his lance.  The wolf jumped as if he were a sleeping donkey, bitten by a famished fly, and with a grunt, dropped the child on the ground.  Then he galloped off with sharp barks that almost sounded like laughing.

The two knights felt heroic.  One scooped up the child with his mighty arm and set him on the saddle before him.  The other asked with a bright and confident voice where the youth's home was.  The little one pointed with a shaking finger over the darkening fields, ever softer and purpler in the falling cloak of night.  Off they went, but at a gentle pace, so as not to jar the child more than what he had already suffered.

The sky was red behind them and black before them and their horses trotted briskly and at every turn they tried to break into a run.  The child kept his arm pointing like a compass needle, drawing them around the hills and mounds of rocks, that the old ones said were the stone houses of the dead.  Soon the little star of a hearth beckoned them and a mother's wailing called them, and when they rode up with the child the shouts of joy warmed their hearts and bowls of stew and mugs of beer warmed their stomachs, and that night soft, thick blankets warmed their feet.  In the early morning they set off with blessings and waving arms and returned to the road.  As the sun rose higher they slaked their thirst with their water pouches, soon emptied.  "Come, dear companion," said one to the other, "Let me wet my tongue tip with just a drop of your water.  I swear on my sword I will refill your pouch from the cleanest flowing fountain in the next town."

"Nay, good friend," answered the other, "For I was about to say the same to you."

"Let me at least try to squeeze a drop from your pouch.  You are never so careful as I to pull the last bit from the depths, be it water or-" and his friend elbowed his ribs sharply as he passed the leather bag.  "You scoundrel!" cried the thirsty one, "You took more beer from them!  And after their kindness to us last night?"

"Kindness?  It's a just reward for chasing a wolf like the one we saw yestere'en.  And they had children a-plenty, if you bothered to notice, and they would hardly miss that scrawny one.  Truly, the kindness was on our part."

"You are a greedy rogue, and I wonder that I should continue in your company," said the other grimly.  But then a smile lit his countenance and he held up his large pouch.  It jiggled and squawked.  Like chickens.

"Ah, good companion!" cried the beer thief, "Who would be my friend if you were not?  To whom would I be friend if not to you?  For we are of one soul as much as can be."

The two knights went on down the road with their mounts' swishing tails behind them and the echo of their laughter too, and then that echo came back like the laughing bark of a great wolf.  The two friends turned as one in surprise and saw nothing behind them but the last pile of rocks, gray like a wolf's hair and bristly like his coat.