text: Maron Makes his Escape. Battle at the Swindle. Breakfast. Rounding from the back, Maron tightened a rope and secured it to an anchor in the wagon. Huddled in Taika Maru’s cage, Elina Hogsbreath cradled Benzie’s limp, unconscious body and contemptuously glared at Maron. “You should get used to that cat shelter ,” Maron smiled slyly, lifting a trunk from the ground and sliding it onto the wagon. Resting against it, he gestured to the inn. “Think of it as your home away from home.” Elina scowled, “This ain’t over, scoundrel .” “ Scoundrel ,” Pip repeated with a whistle and ruffled her feathers in her cage above them. She cawed, adding, “ Maron Maloney. ” “Quiet your beak ,” Maron hissed, pointing a dangerous finger at the cockatoo. Lifting the side-load gate, Maron locked it in place, and said, “We’re leaving now, well before dawn, before anyone can ask too many questions.” Bending over, Maron arrested Taika by her arm and gruffly lifted her from the ground. Weak, unable to resist, Taika groaned from the pain. Maron had dressed her in one of his nightshirts and shackled her wrists. Taking her by her shoulders, Maron led her around the front of the cart; Kimchi followed obediently at his feet. “Come now, my dear,” he said malevolently. “You’ve served me so faithfully, for how many years? Five? You can ride with me , up front, and we’ll, er, talk about your future .” Elina wrapped her arms around Benzie. She tearfully glanced at the inn, her home for nearly fifty years, and her heart sank. As Maron Maloney helped Taika into the pilot chair, Kimchi growled at his feet. “Nah, I shoulda listened to myself,” a voice behind him admitted. “Somethin’ wasn’t right. I knew it. But that’s on me.” Stepping off the pilot’s stoop, Maron turned to find a halfling walking up from the road. As he neared, he planted his arrows tip-first into the grassy yard, spaced out around him. “Master Muckwalker,” Maron Maloney acknowledged, reaching into his cape to withdraw his silvery Elvish longsword. When hearing the exchange, Elina was about to spin around just as a freckled, smiling halfling appeared at her cage. Standing on the wagon wheel, she was dressed in an emerald-colored blouse, leggings, and brown leather bracers, and her hair was bundled into a single afro-puff ponytail atop her head. “Merry Evenin’!” “Ginny!” Elina breathed. “Here,” Ginny Greenhill said, handing Elina a flower bulb with droopy orange leaves. “Crown Imperial.” The flower reeked like a potent dead skunk, and when Elina brought it under his nose, Benzie stirred awake. “Benzie, shush , you’re safe!” whispered Elina, calming him down. As Ginny worked the lock with a pair of steel picks, Barty issued a low, threatening growl at her from his cage. Momentarily turning her head, Ginny gasped and said, “Why, aren’t you the cutest ?!” His sword at the ready, Maron Maloney’s attention was fully on Kindle. Kimchi sheltered behind Maron’s legs, arching her back and hissing at Kindle’s approach. Maron asked, hesitantly, “So what can I do you for, ranger?” “You’re gonna surrender,” Kindle said, sticking another arrow into the earth. “Your prisoners, your animals, you .” Maron chuckled, standing squarely and clasping his sword arm’s wrist. “And if I don’t?” Kindle emptied his quiver and removed it from his shoulders to throw it to the ground. “Seems we’re at an impasse,” Maron sneered. Kindle shrugged and said, “I’m done talkin’,” and bit down on a single arrow he placed between his teeth. Maron yelled, lifted his weapon, and charged. Rushing forward, Kindle Muckwalker raised his shortbow to make it seem he was preparing to fire. Maron, assuming Kindle’s firing arc, kept his sword high, anticipating where to swing. Suddenly, Kindle surprised Maron by not using his bow. Instead, Kindle threw himself on the ground to slide on his thigh across the damp grass and passed between Maron’s legs. Maron twisted to wildly backhand his blade while Kindle, far below Maron’s arc, took the arrow out of his mouth and plunged it into the meat of Maron’s calf. “Arghk!” Maron screamed. Instinctively, he leaned forward to reach the bolt lodged in his leg. Taking advantage of Maron’s unguarded lean, Kindle gripped the end of his bow and swung it like a bat, slapping Maron across the jaw. A trail of blood was drawn from Maron’s mouth as he stumbled backward. “You-” Maron raged just as Kindle swung again to belt him in the gut. Furious, Maron righted himself and dual-gripped the pommel, sending his sword careening down on Kindle. But before he could complete his swing, Maron’s weapon was parried at the sword’s ricasso , the unsharpened portion of the blade above the hilt. “Hey!” Ginny grinned in greeting, blocking Maron’s attack with her quarterstaff. Seething, Maron brought his sword around for another strike as Ginny deftly positioned herself between Maron and Kindle. She expertly blunted his second swing, deflecting the sword to her left. “To my back!” Kindle yelled, thrusting his back against hers. Mirroring each other’s steps, Ginny and Kindle circled around Maron, and as Maron would swing, Ginny would block and used the sword’s momentum to push it away. Behind her and matching her pace, Kindle busily yanked two arrows out of the lawn as they went by. “Damned smallfoot !” Maron railed and furiously brought his sword down to cleave her. Bracing, Ginny threw her leg back and repelled his blow by once again blunting the ricasso. Nocking both arrows into his drawstring, Kindle shouted, “ Down! ” Ginny took to all fours, and Kindle, launching against her back, leaped into the air. Shocked, Maron pulled back while Kindle, suspended at the apex of his flight, loosed both arrows to pierce Maron in his right and left shoulders. Kindle landed and rolled, positioning himself to flank Maron. Maron gasped, wobbled, and limped. He glanced down at the blood-soaked nightshirt and soiled cape. With the halfling-sized arrows sticking out of his shoulders, he couldn’t physically lift his weapon, so he lunged his sword at Ginny, who lay prone on the ground. “ Déntra implicare detineo ,” Ginny barked, calling nature to her aid. Roots from the Swindle’s old oak tree erupted from the earth under Maron’s feet, crawled up his body, bound his legs, and wrapped his torso to squeeze his arms. Released from Maron’s grip, Ithandril fell to his feet, defeated. Struggling, fighting to breathe, Maron tore away the roots strangling his neck and gasped, “ Gaseous Forma! ” And instantly, his body dissolved into a roiling green cloud of noxious gas. The three arrows and roots fell harmlessly to the ground. “Wait here!” “Elina, wait!” Benzie shouted as she climbed off the wagon. “Ginny said to stay put!” “I have to help these people !” Elina cried, wrapping her hair back behind her head. Rushing out from behind the wagon, Elina sprinted for the Swindle’s back porch and bounded up the stairs. Dashing into her kitchen, she grasped the bowl on the floor and filled it with the counter reagent from her cauldron. Taking the bowl to her cutting board, she concentrated to force her will into the magic circle, and breathlessly whispered, “ For the benefit of one forcibly changed! ” Meanwhile, outside, Maron’s body reconstituted from the green gas near the road. He rolled his cape around his wounded shoulders and cried, “ Fools !” Orienting himself to Maron’s new position, Kindle dragged himself to his feet and ran across the yard to pull two more of his arrows out of the ground. Extracting the jade peryton figurine from his cape, Maron tossed it into the air and commanded, “ Animatus Figura! ” Roaring into existence, the monstrous jade peryton screeched, flapped, and extended its talons at Kindle. Fanned by the peryton’s wings, it kicked up a cloud of debris that pelted Kindle as he aimed his bow. “Ginny!” Kindle urgently cried, releasing an arrow at the peryton. Connecting, it smashed into pieces. Kindle nervously glanced behind him while nocking another arrow. “Benzie, throw me the cage, now!” Ginny cried alongside the wagon. “Got it!” Benzie cried, shoving Barty’s cage from the wagon to land on the grass. The honey badger whirled and hissed, righting itself onto its feet. Closing her eyes to imagine the impossible , she placed two fingers on her temple, focused on Barty, and shouted, “ Dilata Obiectum! ” Suddenly, Barty shimmered and enlarged into a giant honey badger; the metal cage exploded around him. Barty was as big as Maron’s wagon, and the honey badger snarled, crouched, and dug at the ground to lumber thunderously forward, its legs pounding against the grass before launching itself over Kindle to throw its body into the jade peryton. Snarling, Barty met the peryton’s antlers and pushed the creature back. The bird’s talons dragged across the earth, and the force of their conflict ripped the ground. The honey badger frantically clawed at the jade peryton as it howled and screeched, flapped, and bellowed. “Gods,” Maron breathed, releasing control of the wondrous figurine to dive out of the raging behemoth's path. Fighting in the street, Barty lunged for the peryton’s throat and struck it so hard the peryton was forced onto its back. Climbing on top of it, the honey badger frenzied, and chipped away at its jade skin with its gargantuan claws. Elina arrived back at the wagon with a bowl of her reagent and a handful of blankets; red soupy hot liquid slopped over the edges of the bowl and her hands. “Benzie!” she yelled, setting everything on the ground. “Did you see that?!” Benzie exclaimed, one hand on his head and the other pointing to the road. “Not now!” she cried. “The critters. Take ‘em out of their cages, one by one. Hand’em to me!” With the battling colossuses raging behind him, Maron Maloney struggled to his feet. Bleeding from his shoulders and limping from the gaping wound in his calf, Maron outstretched his right fist to manifest four green-glowing, mystical arrows; they hovered at his knees, two on either side. Flailing his outstretched palm, he growled, “ Solutam! ” The magicked arrows darted out from his legs - two struck Kindle, and the other two hit Ginny - their impacts blowing Ginny clean to the ground and sending Kindle sprawling to his back. Sized for Man, Maron’s arrows appeared as fletched javelins jutting out of their small bodies until their energy dissipated and the missiles disappeared. Kindle lay stunned on his back, and Ginny groaned and stirred on her belly near the wagon. “You think I’m going to kill you,” Maron menaced, ripping off his cape and hobbling toward Kindle. “But I’m not .” Stumbling, he fiercely scooped up his silver sword from the grass and balanced it in his hand. Reeling from his wounds, Kindle desperately inched to his shortbow. Grasping it, he threw it to his feet, balanced its grip against his toes, and pulled back the drawstring. “First, I’m going to turn you and your friend into something smaller than a halfling,” Maron promised, “a mouse, perhaps, or maybe a helpless finch, and then I’m going to feed you both to my cat .” Grunting, Kindle nocked an arrow, rolled on his back, aimed the bow with his feet, and released the bowstring, firing the weapon like a ballista. Thwap! The arrow sunk deep into Maron’s left leg. “Arraghh!” Maron screamed, collapsing to his right knee before Kindle. Sneering, Maron extended his arm with crazed, bloodshot eyes, and shouted, “ Ignitus Ful- ” Suddenly, the business end of a garden shovel crashed into the back of Maron’s skull, wielded by an elderly, naked woman. “You ... ate ... my ... husband !” she shrieked, lording over Maron as he fell to the grass. * * * Dawn broke, and all gathered around the warm fire. All, that is, except for Maron Maloney, who remained seated against a pine tree with his hands tied behind his back and a gag in his mouth. Elina prepared citrusy sweet bread called a barmbrack . Baked in bundt pans, the cakes were round with a hole in the middle. Sliced, they were piping hot to the touch, smelled of cinnamon and nutmeg, had chunks of dried orange and raisins, and were drizzled with a sugary syrup - Elina’s special touch. With it, she served a black Ceylon tea richly infused with chestnut and hazelnuts. Ginny Greenwood was a skilled naturalist healer. Using clean water and dressings, natural oils, common forest plants, and herbs, she tended to Benzie’s and Kindle’s wounds. She even applied compresses to Maron’s while he was unconscious for, regardless of his actions, ignoring suffering wasn’t how halflings treated anyone. Covered in a blanket, Mrs. Featherby remained quiet and solemn, shaking from her trauma, hunched near the fire, but she’d occasionally return a friendly glance or a happened-upon smile. Pan and Sid were two teenage friends who ate more than their fair share of the barmbrack and playfully told jokes to lighten the mood and recounted what they remembered of their ordeal to Kindle, Ginny, and Elina. The two-headed death dog, Pica and Pika, ended up being twins, aged eight. They didn’t recall their experience in Maron’s captivity, and last remembered playing near their home. They were troubled and missed their parents very much. Ginny sat between them to distract them both with kindness. Ammon was a tall, well-built, muscular man, bald, with a bristling beard, who said he was tricked by Maron to engage in a drinking game. Next he knew, he was pulling his wagon as a horse. It’d been two years since his change, and he was still weak and unable to walk. Barty was a young man in his early twenties with premature-greying black hair. He was feisty and animated, bantering back and forth with the teenagers. Months ago, he was walking alone one night in the rain. Maron’s cart rolled by on the road, and Maron offered him a lift to the nearest town. Apparently, he never made it. The cockatoo, Pip, was a charming old man with a gregarious personality and soothing, grandfatherly voice. He sat beside Mrs. Featherby to keep her company. Jacob Barkfoot shivered under his blanket, and Elina would spend a few minutes with him, reassuring him that he was alright. He recounted his ordeal of becoming the platypus by the wagon, but couldn’t remember anything else from the experience. Jacob was so glad to be who he was, and where he was, that he swore to curb his excess to Elina, and promised he’d spend less time at her tavern and more time with his wife and kids. Unshackled, Taika sat beside Benzie, still dressed in Maron’s nightshirt. She was relaxed, no longer in pain, and could somewhat walk with assistance. A native to the plains of Shae Tahrane to the south, her skin was smooth, black, and flawless, and her eyes were bright orange. “I am sorry you were hurt,” Taika said in a thickly-accented Common to Benzie. A dressing of cotton gauze circled his forehead, and he grinned at her. “When we met, you listened ; your eye open to possibility . This is why.” Benzie shrugged, grinning gleefully. “Nope! Nobody’s ever told me that I lack imagination.” “Take it from me,” Elina smiled at him from across the fire. “I work hard to make this old house hum, an’ I don’t know how I did it without ya, but you’ve reminded me that there’s more t’life than work. I reckon the mind needs t’play a bit, dream, imagine . Thank you, Benzie, for showin’ me what I shouldn’t ‘a ever forgotten in the first place.” “Aww,” Benzie blushed, sitting up straighter. “Where is Kimchi?” Taika asked, and everyone glanced around the back of the Swindle. There was no sign of the orange cat anywhere. Eventually, the rangers rose and announced they would take Maron to Gaelwyn authorities at Mossyrock. No doubt Maron had a price on his head in Mumling or Nodderton. They’d also find assistance to help relocate everyone to their respective homes if, in the meantime, Elina could so graciously keep them housed at the inn. They’d return in a week. “It would be my pleasure,” Elina said comfortingly, refilling everyone’s breakfast tea. “Everyone can stay for as long as y’ like.” Saying their farewells, Ginny and Kindle walked from the fire and back around Maron’s wagon to head toward the pine tree they left him at. “Shoulda listened to myself,” Kindle whispered, shaking his head and staring at the ground. “All coulda gone real bad.” Ginny rested her arm on his shoulder. “You did alright. You also had the wherewithal to find me first and not just react on your own. The Council will be impressed.” Kindle grunted. “Probably with you more than me, I-” Cutting himself off, Kindle stopped in mid-sentence and held Ginny back with a restraining arm. In front of them, Kindle saw Maron released from his bonds and standing motionless near the pine tree, whereas sitting atop his head was the flumph , its blue tendrils wrapped around Maron’s neck. Its body was a red-toned color, and its eye stalks writhed in elation as it consumed Maron Maloney’s psyche. As Maron’s body was controlled by the flumph , it slowly turned, took a haggard step forward, then turned again, and then another shambling step forward, leading Maron away into the dark and deep forest behind the Swindle so that the flumph might explore the countryside.