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Summoning another gold coin into her hand without revealing where it came from, Gwen placed it down on the counter. “Will this do?”
Judging by the look on the woman’s face, yes—yes, it would very much do.
“Are—are you sure, lass?” the woman stammered.
“I am.” Gwen smiled gently. “I don’t have much use for it.” She picked up the handle of the wicker basket. “Mind if I take this too?”
“Of—of course.” The storekeeper chuckled. “For this, you could have the whole damn shop if you wanted it.” The woman picked up the gold coin and tossed it in her palm, testing the weight. “And I mean the building.”
Oh. Huh. Well, all right then. She must have given Walter a lot more than she had figured. He deserved it. And so did the lovely shopkeeper. “Thank you. Well, have a wonderful day.” She headed for the door.
“You—you too.” The woman laughed again in disbelief, as if it were her lucky day. And maybe it was. Gwen had never even so much as won five dollars on a scratch ticket. She couldn’t imagine what it’d be like for who-knows-how-much to just land in her lap like that.
Gwen felt a little bit like a fairy godmother as she walked out of the store and looked down at Eod. “Don’t worry, I got you some snacks.”
“Food! Food food food food—” Eod was up and sniffing the basket, tail wagging excitedly.
Gwen laughed and had to pick the basket up to keep the dog from just grabbing an entire cured sausage and eating it whole. “Easy there!” She ripped off a chunk of bread and fed it to him. “All right. We’ll save the rest for later.”
“But I want it noooooooooow—” the dog whined.
She sighed and gave him a chunk of the sausage. “Fine. But that’s it. We need to find Bert and his friends.
“Metal straw man?” Eod tilted his head.
“Yeah, him.”
Eod sniffed the ground. “This way!” He took off jogging to the right down the dirt street, confirming Gwen’s suspicion that the dog would be able to help her find them.
She came across them just a few minutes later. They had a cart hitched to a horse. Bert was in the driver’s seat, and his two friends—the cyclops and the pointy-toothed lady—were sitting on the back.
“There’s our hero!” Bert waved at her, his leather glove for a hand was overstuffed with straw.
“I’m not—” She sighed. It wasn’t worth arguing about. She figured she’d lose that battle every single time she tried to wage it. “Hi.” She smiled faintly at Bert’s two friends. “I’m Gwen. Nice to meet you.”
“We’ve heard all about you,” the woman said with a smirk. She blinked—and she blinked like an alligator. There was a film that came up over her eyes. It was a little…unsettling, but sure. Whatever. Gwen had seen a lot scarier things in Avalon than a crocodile woman. It made her pointy teeth make a lot more sense, she supposed. “I’m Lina. This is Mirkon.” She jabbed a thumb toward the cyclops. “And you already know Bert.”
Eod jumped up onto the cart without any hesitation. “I’M DOG!”
Gwen couldn’t help but laugh as Eod licked Lina’s face, his tail wagging furiously. “And this is Eod. He would like you all to know that he’s a dog.”
“I hadn’t noticed.” Lina laughed. She didn’t seem to mind, as she reached up and started petting Eod. “Hello, friend.” Lina grunted as Eod sat on her lap with all his weight. “Oh, all right then. Make yourself right at home.”
“He does that, sorry.” Gwen smiled, placing the basket of food on the back of the cart.
“I might lose feeling in my feet, but I don’t mind. Reminds me of the pup I grew up with. Never knew his own size.” Lina kept scratching Eod’s neck, much to the dog’s delight.
“Can we get to the matter at hand?” Bert shook his rusted pumpkin for a head. “We have business to attend to.” He swiveled in his seat to turn toward the back of the cart. “And a world to save.”
“I have one goal—to stop this war between Grinn and Mordred. I can’t let them kill each other. I just can’t.” Gwen sighed. “I’ve been trying to figure out where Grinn’s gone to, but I have no clue where to start looking.”
“Well, it’s a good thing we know exactly where he is,” Mirkon said with a prideful grin.
“Uh huh.” Gwen arched an eyebrow. “I don’t want to sound skeptical, but I’m skeptical. How?”
“I run a network of spies.” Bert almost sounded smug before his tone turned serious. “The fact of the matter is—if those two idiots set fire to this world or put all the magic of the world back into an Iron Crystal, we all suffer. We—the normal folk of Avalon—are getting really tired of being subject to the power-hungry whims of elementals.”
“Normal. Says a man with a pumpkin for a head. Who has a cyclops and a crocodile lady for friends.”
