" . . . and it's doubly stupid when you consider the mineral wealth of the Troll Lands. I mean, we're reknowned for our silver, but that we just find digging out our homes and we don't burrow any deeper than a hundred feet or so. I mean, you could be mining there. And you aren't because my ten times great grandfather ate your eight times great uncle. Can't we move past that? I didn't even know my ten times great grandfather. Maybe he was a bastard and I would have hated him, too!" Hodr continued, waving a mead horn.

"Enough, enough . . ." the Dwarf King, Throgg Helmsplitter, sighed waving his hand.

The Dwarf King had that haggard look of anyone who tried to stand up to Hodr's blunt-impact charisma. Hodr somehow managed to convey to anyone he spoke with that other beings warred and argued because they were stupid, but you would obviously come to a reasonable conclusion because you were awesome. And after you were done being so incredibly awesome, everybody could go out for a drink!

"I will concede that perhaps it would be a good idea to open up relations with the Troll Lands," Throgg said. "Our own lands and the earth beneath the Elf Lands are tapped dry."

"You mines underneaths de Elf Lands?" Skwisgaar said, looking up from his own drinking horn. "Does de Elfs know you does dat?"

Throgg looked over at the first elf to walk through his kingdom since the Second Age.

"I am surprised you care, Elf. You have obviously betrayed your own kind for trolls."

Skwisgaar straightened, inflating with anger.

"Traitors cause wars," Hodr cut in. "Skwisgaar is trying to prevent one. That makes him a diplomat, not a traitor."

Skwisgaar shut his mouth with a snap. Him? A diplomat?

"The same position, wrapped in prettier words," Throgg sneered.

"Words are important," Hodr said. "They make the difference between a death and a murder."

"You are a very odd troll," the Dwarf King declared.

"I've been told. So! Precisely what did you want from the spellsingers? They are the reason we were received so graciously."

The assembled dwarves exchanged uneasy glances.

"Ah . . . . it . . . . . well . . . . it's a bit delicate," Throgg admitted.

"Well, we're all lads here, aren't we?"

"No. No we aren't," said a Royal Advisor tartly.

"And therein lies the problem," Throgg sighed.

"What dey talks about?" Toki whispered to Skwisgaar.

"I t'ought joos was comso-politician troll what knows all abouts ot'er species," the elf sneered. "Male and female dwarfs all looks alikes. Half of de ones in dis rooms coulds be ladies."

Toki looked around at the bearded, chain-mail wearing dwarves in the room.

Throgg gestured Hodr forward. After a moment, the Troll King leaned in, one large ear cocked towards the dwarf's mouth. The Dwarf King whispered a few sentences to his fellow monarch.

"Oh. Oh, I see," Hodr said, sitting back in his chair. "It's a fertility issue."

Every dwarf in the room turned red and squirmed.

"It's nothing to be ashamed of! The fairies are having the same problem," Hodr said quickly. "The Trolls aren't but we always have had a fairly aggressive view on cross-breeding, though it's mostly with humans these days. Good old hybrid vigor . . ."

"I – I – I think you misunderstand . . ." Throgg stammered.

He gestured the troll forward again and whispered one very firm sentence. Hodr sat back.

"Ah."

"Yes."

"Really."

"Yes."

"Hmmm. I – I s-see." The Troll King's attempts to maintain his dignity dissolved in a fit of giggles.

"They – they – they haven't h-had any children in the – in the last century b-because no one's having sex," Hodr told the spellsingers.

After a moment, Toki burst into hysterical laughter. The two trolls rocked with amusement. The dwarves in the room looked like they'd like to wipe the smiles off of Toki and Hodr's faces with a mace if necessary.

"We aren't animals!" a different advisor snapped. "We are dwarves! An ancient race of craftsman. We have dignity and honor! We don't run around thinking about . . . . thingie . . . all day!"

"Joo goings to be a extinct races if joo don'ts gets to boning again!" Toki declared.

This set Hodr off on another fit of laughter, which started the troll spellsinger up again. Toki's amusement trailed off when he realized Skwisgaar wasn't laughing.

"Wh-what's de matter, Skwisgaar? Joo don't think it ams funny?"

"No," Skwisgaar sighed. "'Cause de same t'ing am happenings to de elves."

The two trolls sobered.

"Really?" Hodr asked.

"Ja. Everyone's ams all 'Oh, we ams elves, we gots mores dignity dan t'rashing around nakeds on each ot'ers.' Ands 'onlies animals wantses to fuck' and wants to focus on arts and music. I fuckings loves music, but dere ams mores to lifes!"

"How can they not have sex anymore?" Hodr wondered, his amusement turning to mild horror.

"Elves ain'ts as bad as what's de Dwarfs ams, buts it ams gettings dere. Dey don'ts wants to be undignified – evens to fuck. Or to haves kids; gives it anot'er hundred years. Elfs be trying to figure outs why they dies outs."

"Wowee . . ." Toki muttered. "Is dat why joo fucks any human dat moves?"

"Gots to be some elf whats ain't afraid to spreads his genes."

"Hmmm. Dat explains why de Elf Queen was beggings for a fuck."

Skwisgaar sighed. Part of him – the long, socially ingrained view on noble women part – wanted to snap at Toki that an elf queen would never want to be fucked good and hard. Another, much more realistic part of him pointed out that most elves would agree that a classically trained elven spellsinger of noble birth wouldn't want to get drunk and have crazy amounts of sex with human women.

"So you'll agree to help us, then?" Throgg asked.

"Yuh. What's de fuck. Dere am lotses of songs about fucking."