Chapter 20: Chapter Thirteen – A Chance to Escape

Once the bard was left alone, the Trollop’s challenges to his beliefs began to chase away any fears of her returning to kill him in some cruel and horrible way. He was far too irritated to worry about his inevitable death.

For more than a few minutes, the bard sat in the cold filthy mud going over his conversation with the huge woman. He tended to replay such things over in his head while trying to figure out what he could have said in a better way. However, as he was beating himself up, he slowly became distracted by his surroundings.

In truth, the Trollop’s den was more like an enormous room dug into the mud. Water dripped from the ceiling, and bare roots stuck out from high above his head and from every wall. Many bugs scurried about here and there, and all manner of bones were strewn upon the muddy floor. To the bard’s horror, some were even the bones of men, and the sight of them caused a small bit of his fear to return.

No furnishings decorated the walls, save the sconce that held the red-flamed torch. There were neither chairs, nor a table, nor even a bed. It was just a damp slimy hole with no comforts at all.

This realization made a sliver of sympathy pass through his heart. “This is her home?” he asked himself with a hint of pity, but he quickly pushed this feeling away, and with it gone, he suddenly awoke to his opportunity.

“You fool!” Curesoon whispered to himself. “Surely, now’s my time to escape!”

As he started for the only visible exit, he abruptly stopped. “My swords! My lute! My pack!” With that, he began to glance about the earthen chamber.

First, he found his lute, but it was broken in several pieces, and so he left it where it lay. Clinching his teeth with a mix of despair and anger, he continued to search for his other possessions.

Next, he stumbled over his pack, and though it was caked in foul-smelling mud, it seemed undamaged. Slinging it over his shoulders, he looked about for his swords. However, the light from the strange torch was so faint that he could not discern his mud-covered weapons against the muck of the floor. With growing desperation, the bard fell onto his knees and began to search with frantic hands.

“I can’t return to my father’s hall without my family’s most prized heirloom! But then, what if she left them out in the swamp where she caught me? I’m searching in vain if that be the case,” he groaned miserably, but his hope that they were there would not let him give up the search so quickly, and so, after what felt like hours, he was overjoyed when his cold numb fingers touched something smooth and hard.

It was both swords still in their scabbards upon his belt!

Immediately, Curesoon leapt to his feet, fastened his belt around his waist, and made for the exit anew, but when he came to it, he paused and peered into the utter darkness of the long muddy passage.

He could see no way out, for the way was not straight. Moreover, he could not take the red-flamed torch to light his way because it was far too high for him to reach, and the wall was to muddy to climb, and any root he tried to pull himself up on only broke when he put his weight upon it.

“Broken strings!” he cursed, but this only made him miss his lute all the more.

There was nothing for it but to feel his way along, and so after taking a deep shuddering breath, Curesoon started up the tunnel by feeling his way along the dirt wall.

When he had almost given up hope that the tunnel would ever end, the bard began to see light ahead of him, and when he turned the corner, he thought the sun was suddenly shining directly into his face. It was wonderful!

Squinting his blue eyes, Curesoon came out of Baleful’s den. Though the bog of Miremurk was full of shadows, to the bard it was now like a sun-soaked meadow, for his long stay in the blackness of the Trollop’s hole had made him temporarily sensitive to even the smallest amounts of light. He stood for a long moment waiting for them to adjust, but he quickly forgot the fading glare of the wood, for now he had a new difficulty.

“Which way to the road?” Curesoon mused aloud, but before he could answer himself, a little man came from among the trees on the bard’s right. He was hugging a bundle of sticks in his thin arms, and as he strolled past, he did not notice the bard standing just inside the yawning mouth of the Trollop’s den.

He was truly a strange looking man. In stature, he was less than four feet tall, and his legs and arms were thin and spindly. His torso, on the other hand, did not fit well with his gangly limbs, for his chest was short and thick.

His aged face was thin with high cheekbones, and like an unchanging oak, he seemed to bear a permanent ill-tempered expression. A straggly beard of long gray hair hung from his chin and dangled down past his belt.

He looked out from behind a pair of small oval-shaped spectacles, and their frames were made of smoothly carved wood. The lenses were so thick that they made his eyes look huge, and thus it was easy to see that they were greenish hazel in color like the forest in late spring when autumn approaches.

Upon his person, he wore a greenish-gray jacket, and the ruffled cuffs of his tan colored shirt peeked out from its sleeves. Wine-colored trousers came down just past his knees, and on his feet, he wore loose pale-gray stockings. Over these, he marched dutifully in a pair of old leather shoes with ornate wooden buckles. The toes of these shoes turned upward and tapered to long curled points.

His head was covered by a pointed wine-red biggin – a hood-like cap that was often worn by commoners. The corners of this cap hung down so that they covered most of his large ears, and from these flap-like sides, two untied straps dangled.

It was clear that the small man had not noticed Curesoon. He wordlessly turned his back to the taller man and was about to place his sticks under a pile of gray logs.

In that moment, Curesoon recognized him.

“Tippleglee!” the bard cried with total amazement. He was overjoyed to find someone other than the Trollop, and what’s more, someone he actually knew.

The small man almost jumped out of his skin, and in doing so, he flung the bundle of sticks scattering them all around himself.

“What ever are you doing here?!?” Curesoon asked with unrestrained joy.

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He was far too happy to notice the fright he had given his old acquaintance. He threw his arms around Tippleglee giving him a hardy embrace.

“Hammers and pegs!” the little man cursed while quickly shoving the bard away. “How do I know you, man?!?”

“It is I, Curesoon,” the bard replied. “When I was a boy, my father and I were your lord’s guests in the castle of Blackthorn.”

Tippleglee eyed him skeptically and then growled with little enthusiasm. “You’ve grown.”

The bard laughed and then asked his question again seeing the man acted as though he had not heard it the first time. “But what are you doing here in such a vile place?”

Tippleglee glanced at the curious expression upon the younger man’s face and then grumbled his answer. “After Sir Beset died, there was nothing in Blackthorn for me, so I returned here, and then that brutish Trollop trapped me and made me her slave.”

“You ‘returned here?’” Curesoon echoed with a confused expression. “Why here?”

The old man bent down and began gathering the kindling he had dropped. It was obvious that he did not wish to explain any further, so the bard let the other man go without giving him an answer.

Mindlessly, Curesoon began to help Tippleglee pick up the sticks, but, after a moment of silent toil, he came to himself.

“What’re we doing?!? Come and help me find my way out of this filthy bog so we can escape together.”

A bewildered look passed over Tippleglee’s normally sour face. “If I cannot escape myself, then how am I going to help you?!? Aside from that, don’t you have two swords?” Tippleglee argued pointing to the weapons that hung from Curesoon’s belt. “Why don’t you wield them to save yourself and me also?”

The bard touched the shamrock pommel on the hilt of his family’s sword but did not take it from its scabbard. “I’m not worthy, and anyway, when I struck the Trollop before; it had no effect at all.”

“You struck her?!?” Tippleglee gasped.

“On her nose,” Curesoon admitted with a depressed sigh.

The little man scoffed. “You’re more foolish than I thought! Hammer and Pegs! I’m surprised she hasn’t murdered you yet.”

Shaking his head with disbelief, Tippleglee took off his wooden spectacles and wiped away the sweat that had appeared while he had been gathering up his kindling.

“At any rate,” the little man continued. “What does worthiness matter when your freedom beckons? Especially seeing you struck her. Oh! She’ll have her revenge for that trespass. I can guarantee you that!” he grumbled while rolling his hazel eyes.

With his glasses removed, their true size could be seen, and they were very small and squinty.

Curesoon began to answer with a downcast gaze, but the giantess suddenly returned with a large rusty iron cauldron in her arms.

“Ah, good!” Baleful growled. “You’ve met my pet, Grumbles.”

“Grumbles?” the bard echoed shooting a puzzled look at Tippleglee.

The Trollop guessed his question. “That’s the name I call ‘im by. ‘E’s wiser than you; wouldn’t ever give me ‘is name.”

With an evil chuckle, Baleful stooped down and plunged the rusty vessel into the stagnant pool that lay just outside her den. When the cauldron was mostly full, she lifted it out of the putrid water with a groan and set it upon a pile of gray logs. Having done all this, the Trollop stomped away again.

Without a command from his master, Tippleglee went to work. He took the kindling he had gathered for the second time and stuffed it under the firewood. Then, he produced a small wooden box from his pocket, and from it, he took out some fine wood shavings for tinder.

Next, he brought out a small strange contraption made of wood. Curesoon had never seen its like. It consisted of a wooden wheel with a small crank. The wheel was fastened to a block of willow.

The little old man took the tinder and placed it in a small depression on the piece of willow, and then he began to crank the wheel. It spun rapidly against the block, and soon the friction it made produced a wisp of smoke. Tippleglee blew on the tinder, and seconds later, a small flame sprang to life.

After placing the tinder under the kindling, only a few more minutes passed until the bright amber glow of a fire crackled under the pot.

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