The village proper was more or less level, and thus had many wooden structures, certainly more now than Flint ever remembered. As he came around a bend in the road, bringing him within sight of the village, he was again sur prised at the extent of the changes in Hillhome.
The great wagon yard and forge seemed to serve as a cen tral gathering place for work on the heavy, iron-wheeled freight wagons. The trade route ran east and west, straight through Hillhome on the Passroad. His view of the yard was blocked by a high stone fence. New buildings stood crowded together along the Passroad, extending the town past the brewery building, which Flint remembered as once marking the town's western border. Off Main Street, there were still the neat, stone houses with yards; narrow, smooth streets; little shops. But the pace of life seemed frantic.
That busyness nettled Flint, for reasons he could not even explain to himself. He had intended to explore Hillhome, to see the new sights, but instead he found himself resenting the changes and heading toward the safety of Moldoon's once again to enjoy the comfortable familiarity of the place.
"Welcome, my friend!" Moldoon greeted the dwarf pleas antly, wiping his hands on his apron front before he took
Flint's arm and drew him forward. At this time of day, the place was virtually empty, just a table of three humans in the center of the room before the fire, and a pair of derro drink ing quietly at another.
"Have you a glass of milk for an old dwarf's touchy stom ach?" Flint asked, spinning a stool at the bar to his height.
He slipped onto it easily, propping his chin up in his hand.
Moldoon raised his eyebrows and grinned knowingly.
"Don't you mean a touchy old dwarf's stomach?" He reached under the bar for a frosty pewter pitcher and poured Flint a mug of the creamy liquid. Flint tossed back half of it in one gulp.
"I heard your family got together last night," said the bar tender, topping Flint's glass again. "You cost me half my cus tomers!"
The dwarf smiled wryly, shuffling the mug between his hands on the bar. Then he remembered the one family mem ber who had remained at Moldoon's rather than greet his uncle. "Not Basalt," he said to the barkeep. "He didn't seem any too glad to see me… when he finally got home."
Moldoon sighed as he filled two mugs with ale. "Aylmar's death really hit him hard, Flint. I don't think it's got any thing to do with you. He blames himself — he was his father's apprentice. But he was here, not at home, when Aylmar went off to the wagon camp."
"I know how he feels," grumbled Flint into the last of his milk.
"Barkeep, do we have to wait all day?" A scruffy-looking derro at the table behind Flint waved two empty mugs over his greasy yellow head, smacking his lips and glaring at
Moldoon.
Moldoon held up the overflowing mugs in his hands, splitting an apologetic look between the derro and Flint.
"Right away," he called sheepishly, muttering, "Be back in a moment," to Flint before hurrying to the table.
"Wagondrivers," he breathed as he returned to the bar.
The dwarf stared as his old friend absently popped two steel pieces into his cash box.
"For two mugs?" Flint asked in amazement.
Moldoon nodded, looking both incredulous and a bit ashamed. "That's the price to them anyway. Apparently they don't get much good ale in Thorbardin, so most of the crews load up on it late in the afternoon before their night time run." He mopped at a sweat ring on the bar. "Business has never been better — for every business in town. Most of us merchants think the return is worth putting up with a few rowdies, now and then." With that, Moldoon excused him self and shuffled into the kitchen to settle a dispute with the village butcher, who had called angrily from the back door.
Flint walked around the end of the bar and helped himself to a mug of ale. He dropped one steel piece onto the bar.
Suddenly cold, he shivered and headed for the fire, desper ate to return some warmth to his old bones.
When the fire failed to lift his spirit, Flint pulled from his belt pouch his sharp whittling knife and a small, rough piece of wood he'd been saving. Sometimes, when ale failed to ease his mind, only carving would help. He would forget everything except the feel of the wood in his hands as he worked life into it. Think of the wood, he told himself as he sat in front of the fire.
Like most dwarves, Flint was not much given to express ing his feelings. Not like his emotional friend Tanis, who was always tormenting himself about something. For Flint, things either were or they weren't, and there was no point worrying either way. But every now and then something could get under his skin, like the uncomfortable feelings he'd had since returning to Hillhome. Flint shivered in wardly and drew his mind back to the wood. He stayed the afternoon at Moldoon's, slowly, painstakingly shaping his lifeless piece of lumber into the delicate likeness of a hum mingbird. Moldoon refilled his mug now and then, and soon all was forgotten in the joy of his creation.
The tavern filled steadily with more hill dwarves, and more wagondrivers replaced the previous group. Flint scarcely noticed much beyond his sphere, though, so en grossed was he in the finishing details of his bird.
"So, it's good old Uncle Flint."
Flint nearly sliced off one of the hummingbird's intri cately detailed wings. The sarcastic voice at his shoulder sounded like animated ice. Basalt. Flint slowly looked up.
His nephew loomed, glaring at him with a humorless half smile on his red-bearded jaw. "It's a bit early for drink, isn't it?" Hint asked, wishing he could bite his tongue off the sec ond the patronizing words left his mouth.
Basalt eyed Flint's own mug. "That's not milk you're drinking, either."
Flint set down his tools and sighed, swallowing the irrita tion he felt because of his ruined good mood. "Look, pup,
I've always had a soft spot for you." Flint eyed him squarely now. "But if you keep using that tone of voice with me, I'm going to forget you're family."
Basalt shrugged, taking an empty chair near his uncle's. "I thought you already had."
Flint had never struck someone for telling the truth, and he was not of a mind to start now. Instead, he grabbed Ba salt by the shoulders and shook him, hard.
"Look, I feel terrible about your father," he began, search ing his nephew's freckled face. "I'm not one for wishing, but
I'd give anything to have been here, anything to have known. But I wasn't and I didn't, and that's what is, Bas."
Trying hard to look unperturbed, Basalt rolled his eyes in disbelief and looked away. "Don't call me that," he whis pered, referring to the affectionate nickname Flint had let slip.
Flint had seldom seen such suffering as he noted in his nephew's face, and he had felt it only once: after his own fa ther's death. "Aylmar was my big brother — my friend — just like you and I were before I left."
"You're nothing like my father."
Flint ran a hand through his hair. "Nor would I try to be. I just wanted you to know I feel his loss, too."
"Sorry, old man. No consolation." Basalt turned his back on his uncle.
Flint was getting angry. "I'm still young enough to whip the smartmouthedness out of you, harrn."
But Flint could see by his nephew's reaction that he no longer heard him. Basalt strutted before his uncle, wearing a patronizing smirk. "I can't blame you for coming back now, you know, when there's real money to be made." He did not even try to keep the bitterness out of his voice.
It was Flint's turn to poke at his nephew, his thick index finger within an inch of Basalt's bulbous Fireforge nose.
"I've had about all I'll take from you today. You want some one to be angry at, and you've chosen me, when the two people you're really hopping mad at are your father and yourself!"