-Chapter Ten:

"Are you friends?" the voice repeated.

"Depends on whether you're a friend," Hrimfaxi said, slightly nervous as she tried to get her eyes to adjust to the semi-darkness.

"Are you orcs?"

"No...are you?"

"No."

"Alrighty then," broke in Rurik. "Then we can make an intelligent guess that we are both on the same side then."

Hrimfaxi snorted at the pompous dwarf. Her eyes had adjusted and against the wall, chained by his wrists, was an older elven man, dressed in what looked like a tattered and dirty uniform. His slim face was gaunt...but his green eyes still held a sort of light.

"Who are you?" she suddenly asked, wanting to know who this confident- looking prisoner was.

"Just a poor military elf, prisoner of these orcs for eight years."

"Eight years?" gasped Cleon, he with Felosial and Eldon had filed in through the broken door. The small prison cell barely was able to fit all of them.

"More or less. I kind of lost track."

Cleon was staring at the captive elf. Staring straight into his eyes...something Hrimfaxi had never seen the boy do. But Cleon seemed to be concentrating on some thought so hard he had forgotten to be shy.

"And what are your names?" the elf asked.

"Just call me Eldon your Rescuer," Eldon said as he knelt down beside the elf and took out his thieves' tools. Greasing the pick heavily he thrust it into the lock and concentrated while pushing it back and forth.

"I'm Hrimfaxi...and this boy is my indentured servant, Cleon."

"Rurik, cleric of Moradin at your service."

"Felosial."

"Nice to meet all of you," the elf said a bit dryly. "My name is Relcunalyn."

No one said anything as Eldon muttered to himself...spreading out more tools.

Hrimfaxi turned to the halfling impatiently, "Can't you go any faster?" I don't want those guards of Swill to get suspicious...we might lose our chance to surprise them!"

"Why don't you be the first bard to take a vow of silence?" Eldon spat back, calmly rattling his lock-pick. "This lock is of amazingly good make. I'd never suspect it of an orc."

"Eldon's going as fast as he can," Felosial broke in before the halfing and centaur started fighting. "But Hrim's right. We need to catch those guards before they return and tell Lord Swill that something must have gone wrong."

"Swill?" Relcunalyn's head jerked up.

"Yeah," replied Rurik. "He's the 'king' of this city."

"He's still ruling?"

"Yep, and not very successfully either, has the whole village afraid of him and the nearby provinces stirring with rebellion."

"I had hoped by now his reign had gone to someone else."

"Who? He has no heirs and no relatives...and no one has offered to succeed him seeing how bad of condition this place is in."

"Are the taxes still as bad as they were eight years ago?"

"We don't know pal," Eldon said, making the last adjustments to open the lock. "We're visitors...all of us."

"Then what are you doing down here?"

"We were hired by Lord Swill to rescue the little prince who was supposedly kept captive down here-"

"But now we find," broke in Hrimfaxi. "That it was all a plan...Lord Swill told the orcs we were coming and paid them to try and kill us!" She stamped her hoof down hard, making loose pebbles jump up from the ground momentarily.

"He said the little prince was down here?" Relcunalyn asked, straightening up.

"Why? Are you gonna tell us that you are the 'little prince?" asked Rurik, bursting into chuckles at his joke; he was the only one laughing.

"No," said the elven prisoner. "But I used to know the little prince...so he's not dead?

"According to this letter he's not," Eldon said, pausing in his work to show the elf the king's letter to the orcs. "It came with this bag of gold in it; a bribe from the king."

"Hey!" Rurik broke in. "How come you didn't tell us that you had found some gold?"

Eldon gave a good-natured shrug.

"But I bet telling us the little prince was alive was only to get us to come down here. The boy's probably dead."

Relcunalyn scanned the paper with intent emerald eyes. He looked up at Cleon. "It says here that Lord Swill wanted the orcs to take the boy-"

"-to take all the valuables we had straight to him." Felosial broke in desperately.

Relcunalyn caught on. "Right."

Cleon's eyes shifted from the two elves. Hrimfaxi wondered nervously if the boy might be more intelligent than he looked.

"Here, foal," she suddenly ordered. "Take my spear and clean it." She tossed the large wooden -and bloody- pole to him.

"But you're gonna use it soon...against those guards...right?" he protested. "Why should I clean it now when it'll just get dirty again?"

"Don't back talk!" the centaur snapped. "And go outside to do it!"