Desperately he clung with one hand to the root, groping for any sort of hold with the other. Perian grabbed him by the shoulders just as the monster reared again, and both of them flew off the ledge and out into space. The remaining tentacle around Flint's foot tightened, then snapped in two. Still clutching each other, Flint and Perian bounced and skidded down the length of the beast's segmented back, finally crashing onto a pile of bones on the ground.
Flint groaned as he scrambled to his feet. He seemed un hurt, but his foot, with the fragments of tentacle still wrapped around the boot, seemed to be growing numb.
He glanced around and saw that they were in a cul-de sac. He could not see how far that cavern extended, but it was the only direction out.
"Quick, we need a weapon of some sort," Flint shouted to the prone frawl. "Don't you have a knife — some weapon?" he gasped.
"I did," she said in a small voice. "But I dropped it."
"You dropped it?" he groaned in disbelief.
"It must have slipped out as I was falling down the chute," she retorted defensively, struggling to her feet.
"Maybe we can find it down here, or anything else. We haven't got much — " Flint's gaze shot up to the wall where the carrion crawler should have been, but the monster had already turned around and was moving toward them
"— time! Come on!" He grabbed Perian by the wrist and jerked her into motion.
Scanning the floor as they ran, Flint's eye caught the glint of metal among the rocks and scattered bones littering the carrion crawler's lair. With a kick he churned up a rusty but still solid blade about ten inches long. With his free hand, he snatched it on the run.
"It's gaining!" shrieked Perian. "How fast can that thing move?"
"Faster than us," Flint snorted, glancing backward at their pursuer. He was horrified to see the creature a scant ten feet behind, and charging fast! In spite of its bulk, the beast moved with alarming grace and fluidity, its numerous legs rippling along its flanks. Then, as Flint watched horrified, the whiplike tentacles shot out and wrapped around Per ian's throat from behind, jerking her to a dead stop.
"Gods!" swore the dwarf, skidding into the cavern wall.
"Let her go, you stinking worm!" Brandishing the rusty blade, he spun around and stumbled toward the retreating monstrosity. With one hand he grabbed a fistful of Perian's jacket and with the other he slashed across the dripping, rubbery tentacles. Gobs of venom and thick, blue blood hissed through the air, thrown from the thrashing limb. It took a third lightning cut by the tarnished knife before the frawl was released. Flint flung the paralyzed but still con scious mountain dwarf over his shoulder and retreated, moving backward to keep his face toward the beast. It seemed momentarily stunned by its injury, though Flint knew it had too little brain to yield to any opponent.
But for the moment, it had something else to think about.
Food, in the form of its own tentacles, had fallen at its feet.
Flint gazed in disbelief as the horror gulped down the grisly bounty of itself. The hill dwarf turned and bolted once more into the cavern, only too aware that so far only luck was keeping him alive.
This might be the last thing I ever do, Flint caught himself thinking as he raced through the darkness. And I'm not do ing it very well, he added as his benumbed ankle crumpled beneath the combined weight of him and Perian. Frantically he pulled himself up on the wall and, dragging both Perian and his own foot, continued deeper into the lair of the crea ture.
Or he would have, had the cavern not abruptly narrowed to a point and then stopped completely. His escape route blocked by solid rock, Flint dropped Perian to the floor. Her eyes, peering helplessly at him, were filled with unaccus tomed terror. Flint looked away, then readied the humble blade he'd picked up. With a rueful chuckle he said aloud, "I'm naming you Happenstance, little knife, for whatever it's worth. You stand between us and perdition. I hope you're up to it."
As he turned to face the approaching carrion crawler, a flash of light from a fissure in the wall caught Flint's eye.
With no hesitation, he hefted Perian's limp form and crammed her head first into the crack in the rock, wherever it led. He pushed her forward as far as possible, but then she wedged in and Flint could not budge her. "Forgive me, Per ian," he muttered as he put his shoulder to her ample seat and heaved with all his might. The frawl inched forward, and then suddenly, as if something ahead was tugging on the other end, she zipped forward and out of sight. Startled,
Flint tried to twist his neck up for a look through the hole, but a pair of hands grabbed him by the red trim on his tunic and dragged him, too, through the breach in the wall.
Flint crawled to his knees and saw Perian laying on the ground before him. He looked up.
Sporting an idiotic grin and a self-important posture was the filthiest pot-bellied creature the hill dwarf had seen in a long time.
"I'll be hanged!" Flint exclaimed. "A gully dwarf!"
"What you doing there? Monster get you," the gully dwarf said simply, scolding them with a click of his tongue.
"No kidding," chuckled Flint. "Where are we now?"
The gully dwarf beamed proudly. "You in Mudhole!"
Chapter 11
Mudhole
When He created the world, Reorx the Forge, a god of neutrality who strove for balance between good and evil, needed men to help Him with His work in this new land. For many years the humans worked happily under the loving guidance of Reorx, the master of creation and invention.
But the men became proud of their skills, as men will, and they used them for their own ends. Early in the Age of Light, four thousand years before the Cataclysm forever altered the face of Krynn, Reorx became angered by this and trans formed some men into a new race. He took from them the crafts He, upon the anvil of His immortal forge, had taught, leaving only their burning desire to tinker and build, invent and construct. He made the stature of this new race, known as gnomes, as small as their goals.
The evil Hiddukel, the patron god of greedy men, was pleased by this because He knew the forging god had worked long and hard to make order out of chaos, and now the balance of god and evil was not being maintained. Hid dukel went to another of the neutral gods, Chislev, and, seeking to make mischief, He convinced Him that neutrality could not be maintained since evil was losing position.
Their only hope, He said, was for neutrality to seize control.
To that end, Hiddukel persuaded Chislev, who in turn per suaded His fellow neutral god, Reorx, to forge a gem that would anchor neutrality to the world of Krynn. A large, clear gray stone of many facets, it was designed to hold and radiate the essence of Lunitari, the red moon of neutral magic. And on that same moon it was placed.
Reorx, although still angry at the gnomes, loved them and could see how they might yet serve Him. He presented to them a plan for a Great Invention that would be powered by a magical stone: the gray gemstone. As only the gnomes could, they built a mechanical ladder that lifted itself into the sky and to the red moon itself. With a magical net given to him by Reorx, a gnome appointed by Reorx climbed to the top of the ladder and captured the Graygem for the
Great Invention. But when he returned to Krynn and opened the net, the stone leaped into the air and floated quickly off to the west. Fascinated, most of the gnomes packed up their belongings and followed it to their western shores and beyond. The gem's passing caused new animals and plants to spring up and old ones to alter form overnight.