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“True, it’s a poor jest.”
“What were you doing with these wretched elves?”
Naf began to fill the sacks with food. Sides of meat wrapped in paper, flat loaves of bread, a pot of cheese, dried fruit and nuts disappeared into the sacks. “I didn’t know the kind of robbers they were when I joined them. After I split from Hross, I went south to seek a fortune, and word was going around about an attack on the Golden Road. I thought I’d try for the loot, but all they got was a caravan on its way back. We missed the sack.”
“I was there. They didn’t sack the dwarves.”
“I’m happy for the dwarves. They dealt honestly.”
“We were attacked by someone with a strange standard. A figure of a man inside a circle.”
Naf paused. “The Andam were involved? If I’d—”
“Andam?” Auron asked.
“It translates into Parl as ‘true.’ I think they’re lieges of some barbarian king. Hross was disgusted with the dwarves and wanted to go north and join them. That’s one of the reasons we parted.”
“You fear them?”
“They have some unusual beliefs. I don’t mean unusual in the humorous sense, here.”
“They fought well,” Auron said, remembering the horsemen.
“Good thing you won. They don’t take prisoners. Well, women, they take. One of their practices is that the man who fathers the most children is held in high regard. They don’t much care how the babies get started, as long as they do.”
“These waste elves were not kind to their captives.”
“I had nothing to do with that.”
“You did nothing to stop it, either.”
“Why should a drake care? You’d eat them, given the chance.”
Auron snorted. “If I were hungry, and there was no easier meal, yes. But I wouldn’t kill six if one would fill my belly. Nor would I torture them first.”
Naf nodded. “Are you hungry now?”
“I’ve had my fill.”
“I’ll show you something, drake. I’d like to part on better terms than before,” he said, and went to a small tent. He rolled out a wine barrel, still wrapped in cargo netting. He found a mallet and pounded the edge into the top of the barrel. He lifted out the lid and said something in a foreign tongue. A pair of hands wrapped themselves around his neck, and he pulled out a girl-child. Her skin was stained purple with wine, and she squinted in the sun as she trembled in Naf’s arms.
“Auron, this is Hieba. I’ve been watching her since we hit the caravan. I hid her from those bastards this past week. You solved my problem of what to do with her.”
Auron flicked out his tongue. The dark-haired girl smelled of wine. “You will take her out of the desert?”
“No, I’m going to ask you to do that. Some of the elves might work up the courage to come back. They’d certainly follow my trail; I’m not skilled enough to hide it from a waste elf. I’ve got a chance in ten of getting out of the drylands alive. She has better odds with you.”
“Me, look after a human child? I go to the mountains to seek an ancestor.”
“NooMoahk?” Naf said. “He’s long dead. Years, or so I’ve heard.”
“That’s been said before, and those who believed it were wrong. They died for their bad guess.”
The girl babbled something to Naf, but he showed no more signs of understanding than Auron did.
“Is she weaned?” Auron asked. He knew hominid children drank from their mother’s breasts—and not much else.
“She’s four or so, and drinking goat milk. I know no more about children than you, save what I remember from being one.”
