'Joel, suppose Bear wasn't crazy? Suppose there is a fourth one? Who could it be?' the girl asked.
'Holly, I haven't a clue,' the bard admitted. 'Let's keep moving.'
By nightfall, they'd reached the foothills of the Desertsmouth Mountains. They were considering where they should make camp for the night when they spotted something glowing softly somewhere to the south. The light was an unnatural violet color.
'It's Giant's Craw,' Holly said excitedly.
'Is that good or bad?' Jas asked.
'It's a rock,' the paladin explained, 'with faerie fire cast on it. It marks the entrance to a valley. Giants used to live there, waylaying caravans, until Lord Randal drove them out. It's supposed to be a lovely valley, teeming with game.'
'Sounds like a good place to find breakfast,' Joel said.
They made their way deeper into the foothills until they'd reached the magical stone. It was a great hexagonal pillar of ebony basalt, as tall as a giant, polished to a smooth finish.
Holly put her back against the west side of the rock and slid down to the ground with a blissful smile. 'This is where I'm sleeping,' she said.
Jas eyed the stone warily. She settled down a few yards away.
Joel took first watch. He sat with his back against the east side of the stone and watched the waning moon rise in the east. It was like a dying ember, and Selune's Tears, the tiny lights that trailed after it, were like sparks. Tomorrow, or perhaps the next night, would mark the new moon, when the Xvimists would have sacrificed Holly, Jas, and him. He wondered if Bear's death would be enough to placate the bloodthirsty god of the priest of Xvim and his Zhent followers, and if they would abandon the hunt now. Joel doubted it, but with their hound dead, the Xvimists and Zhents could be outwitted. At least Joel hoped so.
The bard's thoughts returned uneasily to Bear's claim that he sensed a fourth person traveling with them. Joel puzzled over who it could be. Someone with power. Absolutely no one came to mind. Joel shook his head. Perhaps Jas was right. Bear had been maddened by his transformation and sensed someone who wasn't there.
After turning the watch over to Jas, Joel slept soundly. Holly woke him in the morning by pressing a raspberry to his lips. She and Jas had found a berry patch. The berries were big, sweet, juicy, and full of flavor. In no time at all, the three of them were covered with briar scratches, their fingers and lips stained purple.
'That's what the stone marker means,' Holly joked 'Purple berries here.'
'It must mark something,' Joel said. 'It's not like any other rock near here, and its magic is permanent. We could go exploring,' he suggested.
'It's not on our agenda,' Jas said tersely. 'You're supposed to be making a pilgrimage to the Lost Vale, aren't you?'
'We have to hunt anyway,' Joel pointed out. 'It might as well be here.'
'I suppose a tiny side trip couldn't hurt,' Jas said with a sigh.
They looked down into the valley. Even by the light of day, it had an eerie look to it. Deposits of loose shale covered much of the mountain slopes on either side. Scrub pines grew out of the shale, but many of them were naked of needles and covered with morning glory vines. Where the shale didn't cover the slopes, wildflowers bloomed, carpeting the hills with gold.
They made their way downward, walking among the flowers, sliding on the shale. Birds chirped everywhere, and Holly spotted deer droppings. Jas took to the air to scout for game. Joel followed the paladin as she crept along the valley floor, alert for every sound. A mile into the valley, she shot two large pheasants and scavenged their nest for the eggs. She began to teach Joel how to pluck feathers. Soon the bard was covered with them and Holly was laughing at him.
Somewhere off in the distance, something howled. Quickly a horn answered.
'Beshaba's filthy luck!' Joel cursed. An icy hand seemed to grip his heart.
'Where's Jas?' Holly asked with alarm.
Joel looked up at the sky. The winged woman was making her way toward them at top speed. She landed just in front of them, her face pale with anger. 'Did you hear that?' she demanded.
Joel nodded.
'They're at the stone,' the winged woman reported. 'You're trapped in this valley.'
'What's at the other end of the valley?' Joel asked.
That,' Jas said, pointing to a high-peaked mountain. 'Its lower slopes are either cliff faces or covered with loose shale.'
'They won't be able to charge their horses up the shale slope,' Joel noted.
Jas nodded. 'There's a ledge on the upper slope, blocked by a rock with a narrow opening, like a needle,' she said. 'Unless they can fly, too, they can only come at you one at a time through the rock.
'Get Holly up there first,' Joel ordered. 'I'll see if I can find a way to hold them off.'
'Ill be back,' Jas promised as she took off with the paladin.
Joel considered carefully what spells he should call on Finder for. When he was finished praying, he dragged a deadfall branch along the valley floor until it lay between two boulders. Unless they were prepared to go up a steep shale slope, the Xvimists would have to ride their horses between the boulders over the branch. Quietly Joel began singing a spell over the branch. Jas arrived before he finished. She paced impatiently until he finished.
'Trip spell?' she asked, pointing to the branch.
Joel nodded as he wrapped his arms around her neck.
Jas took off, flying low, until she reached the end of the valley. She struggled to gain altitude until a thermal of air caught her and practically dumped her and her passenger on the mountain slope.
The needle was an excellent defensive position. It was a thin cleft in a wall of rock situated on a smaller peak just in front of the major peak. Except for a stretch of steeply sloped shale, the other sides of the lesser peak were cliffs. The base of the major peak and the saddle that led to it were all cliff faces. The valley below was a gorge, and the only way up out of the gorge was through the needle on the minor peak.
Holly stood just behind the rock needle, her crossbow loaded, her sword drawn.
Joel looked at the ground just behind the needle. It was worn smooth and flat, like a trail cut into the rock. It went down along the saddle to the major peak before it disappeared beneath another shale slide.
'This led somewhere once,' Holly said. 'Did you see any sign of a cave from the air? My people used to use them as crypts.'
Jas shook her head. She began gathering up large rocks in her cloak. 'You don't have to stay, you know,' Joel pointed out.
Jas stood up and looked at Joel. 'Like that old joke about two guys running from a bear.'
Joel grinned.
'What joke?' Holly asked.
'Two guys are running from a bear,' Joel explained. 'One says to the other, 'We'll never outrun this bear.' The other guy says, 'I don't have to outrun the bear'-'
' 'I only have to outrun you,' ' Jas finished.
'That's terrible,' Holly said.
'That's life,' Jas said. She looked at Joel with a grim expression. 'I'll stay until I have no reason to stay,' she said.
Joel nodded. She expected to be the last standing, or flying. When he and Holly had fallen, she would be free to fly away.
It seemed to take forever for the Xvimists to reach the base of the mountain. Joel squinted into the sun. Leading the hunt was the loping figure of a man-beast If it wasn't Bear, it was his twin brother.
'How did he survive?' Holly wondered aloud.
'Maybe he wasn't quite dead and the priest of Xvim healed him when they found him,' Joel suggested. 'Or maybe there was some sort of regeneration spell woven into his transformation,'
'I've got to remember to start cremating the things I kill,' Jas muttered.
Below them, Bear howled, even though his master, the priest of Xvim, rode right behind him.
'He's doing that just to annoy me,' Jas snarled.
They counted fourteen others behind Bear and the priest. One wore robes like a mage, but the rest were
