Slathbog's Gold - Forman Mark L. Страница 9

“Why?” Alex questioned.

“I’m not sure I can say,” answered Andy. “It might have something to do with magic, or maybe it was your fate to see the sign when you did. Whatever the reason, I’m sure it was good fortune that you saw it.”

Alex thought about Andy’s answer, but he wasn’t sure what to think. He shook his head and pushed Andy’s explanation to the back of his mind for now, more worried at the moment about Thrang and the money they’d spent. He told Andy his feelings but he just smiled at Alex’s concern.

“I guess you don’t know much about dwarfs,” said Andy as they started walking again.

“No, I don’t,” Alex admitted.

“I know a little, and I’ll tell you this,” said Andy, catching a package as it slipped out from under Alex’s arm. “Dwarfs are careful with their money. They’re not cheap or miserly or anything like that, but they’re careful just the same.”

“And we’re spending Thrang’s money quickly,” said Alex.

“What you need to understand is this,” Andy continued, taking no notice of Alex’s comment. “If a dwarf offers to stand good for you, he expects you to spend freely.”

“I don’t understand,” said Alex, trapping a package under his chin.

“Once he’s offered to stand good for you, he’ll expect you to take advantage of his offer,” Andy explained. “It would be an insult to him if you didn’t buy everything you needed—and the best of everything you needed at that.”

“An insult?” Alex wondered out loud as they entered another shop. “I would insult Thrang if I didn’t spend as much of his money as I could?”

“You’re not spending as much as you could,” Andy laughed, piling Alex’s packages in the corner of the shop. “You’re not spending like there’s no tomorrow, or buying more than you need. You’re just spending as much as you need on what you need.”

“But it seems to be a lot.”

“And it is,” Andy agreed. “But if you don’t have the best of everything you need, Thrang will take it as an insult.”

“But can he afford what I need?”

“As long as you spend it on what you need, Thrang would happily let you spend all the gold in his bag—down to the very last coin,” Andy replied. “And between you and me, I don’t think we could spend everything in Thrang’s bag in a lifetime of trying.”

“That’s crazy,” said Alex, stacking packages on top of the pile Andy had made.

“It may sound crazy to you and me, but that’s how dwarfs are,” Andy replied, turning to look for the shopkeeper.

Alex thought about what Andy had said, but it still didn’t sound right. Thrang had been extremely generous, and Alex couldn’t help feeling he was taking advantage of the dwarf.

Knowing that every gold coin was worth thirteen silver coins didn’t help at all.

“What will it be then, gentlemen?” asked a round shopkeeper in square glasses. “Something in a deluxe model with a pool? Or maybe a nice garden?”

“Nothing so grand, master bag maker,” replied Andy. “My friend needs a top quality bag, but hardly a pool or a garden.”

“Ah, yes,” the shopkeeper said, looking at Alex. “Something in a three- or four-room model I should think. That’s always the best place to start. You can add on later as you need to.”

“Okay,” said Alex slowly.

“Sorry, Alex,” said Andy, noticing the confused look on Alex’s face. “You’ve never seen a magic bag before, have you?”

Alex shook his head.

“Do you have a demonstration model that my friend and I can look at?” Andy asked the shopkeeper.

“Oh, yes,” the shopkeeper replied. “I have a lovely four-room model that you can look at right over here.”

Alex and Andy followed the shopkeeper to the back of the shop. On a table was a leather bag with a long strap attached to it and silver fastenings at the top. The bag was about twice as long as it was wide, and Alex thought it looked like a postman’s bag.

“Standard passwords,” said the shopkeeper, nodding to Andy, before leaving to help another customer.

“Right,” said Andy. He turned to Alex. “All you have to do is pick up the bag, open it, and say ‘enter.’”

“What?” Alex asked.

“Just do it,” Andy laughed. “It will be all right.”

Alex hesitated for a moment before reaching for the bag. The leather was soft and flexible, but the bag appeared to be empty. He was sure this must be some kind of joke, but he couldn’t see what the joke was.

“Go on,” urged Andy. “I’ll be right behind you.”

“Enter.”

Everything went dark. Alex felt like he was dropping from a high place and spinning slightly as he fell. Then, as quickly as the feeling started, he felt himself come to a sudden stop. He could feel a stone floor under his feet, but everything was still dark.

“Lights,” Andy’s voice said from the darkness next to him.

Several lamps sprang to life, and Alex could see he was standing in a large square room made of stone. The room was empty except for a doorway in one wall.

“Sorry about that,” said Andy, moving toward the doorway. “I thought the lamps would be burning. If I’d known they were out, I would have come first.”

“Where . . . where are we?”

“In the bag,” Andy replied happily. “Let’s see the other rooms.”

“Wait. What do you mean, in the bag?”

“We’re in the leather bag on the table,” said Andy, as if there was nothing strange about his answer. “It’s a magic bag after all. What did you expect?”

“I . . . I don’t know,” said Alex.

“I’ll try to explain,” said Andy, motioning for Alex to follow him into the next room. “You can tell by how much gear you already have that we will have a lot of things to carry with us on this adventure. But there are only eight of us to carry it all, right?”

“Right,” Alex answered.

“And we’d need a lot of horses to carry all of our gear and supplies if we were going to carry it the normal way,” Andy continued.

“Yes, I suppose so,” Alex agreed.

“That would attract a lot of attention, wouldn’t it?”

“I suppose it would.”

“So instead of all that extra attention and the extra work of taking care of so many horses, we use magic bags,” Andy concluded with a smile.

“I still don’t understand,” said Alex.

“What’s not to understand? A magic bag lets you carry all your gear in a very small space. And believe me, it makes life a lot easier.”

“I’m sure it does, but how does it work?” Alex questioned.

“It’s magic,” laughed Andy. “It’s like Arconn always says, ‘If you’re willing to accept the fact that there’s magic involved, everything else is easy.’”

Alex had never really thought about magic, or at least not real magic, and he wasn’t sure how he felt about it. He had seen the table at Mr. Clutter’s move and change shape, but that wasn’t really the same as this, was it? Looking around the stone room, however, he had to believe there was magic.

“Not a bad size,” said Andy as they walked around the different rooms. “If we have one room modified to expand as needed, and add a little furniture, you should be good to go.”

“Expand as needed?” Alex asked.

“If we manage to get the hoard from Slathbog, your share wouldn’t fit into just these four rooms,” Andy answered with a laugh. “If half the tales of Slathbog’s treasure are true, you’ll need twice as much space just to get started.”

“And magic can make one of the rooms bigger as it fills up?” Alex asked, trying hard to understand.

“Exactly,” said Andy. “You can use the other rooms to keep your things in. You’ll probably collect a lot of things as we travel.”

“Okay,” said Alex, still a little unsure about how the magic bag worked.

“Don’t worry,” said Andy. “We’ll get you set up, and I’ll show you how to work the bag until you get the hang of it.”

“Does everybody in our group have a magic bag?”

“Of course. Most adventurers do. I have a five-room bag that my father gave me. I’ll have to show it to you sometime. Of course you should be careful who you show your bag to,” Andy cautioned. “And you shouldn’t share your passwords with anybody, not if you can help it. Well, except your heir, of course.”