Late that afternoon they stopped, again choosing low ground. Halmarain lit a fire and Ripple cooked two rabbits Trap had killed with stones from his hoopak. While the tired ponies grazed and Halmarain watched the fire, Trap and Ripple walked up the slope to find a good place to keep watch.

"Stay low, " Halmarain called to them.

"As if we didn't ride over this ridge less than an hour ago, " Trap complained.

They stayed low when they reached the top of the slope, looking around without much interest. They had seen enough grassland to last them for a while.

"What's that?" Ripple crouched as she pointed out movement to the northeast.

"It looks like the dwarves who have been following us, " Trap said. "And would you believe it, they are ahead of us again!"

"What sort of creatures live in ruins?" Trap asked. He turned in the saddle, looking back over his shoulder at Halmarain, and waited for an answer.

"Things you don't want to know anything about," she said, but the interested gleam in the kender's eye caused her to amend her answer. "Things I don't want to know anything about. Things that might endanger Beglug."

"Something else we don't get to see," Trap mumbled, turning back to watch the trail ahead of them. He turned in the saddle again, his eyebrows down, his voice harsh in the way of angry kender.

"We haven't had much fun on this whole trip," he said. "When we find this new wizard, I want to see some magic, and if I don't…" He let the threat lie, not sure what he would do.

"And so will Ripple," he warned.

Trap felt used and abused. They were just passing the ruins of Pey in the distance and he wanted to explore.

The little wizard had heard of Pey, knew it's location and knew that they were close. Since they had seen the dwarves on the horizon, she had insisted they travel by night except through the area near the ruins. For some reason she refused to explain to the kender, she seemed to be terrified of getting close to Pey.

They were riding through the night again.

Trap could see only one advantage to night travel; Beglug slept in the saddle and didn't torment the pack pony. The little merchesti was becoming meaner every day. Just before they broke camp he had used his newest tree limb to swat Umpth, chasing the gully dwarf around the camp.

The two kender and Grod caught the infant fiend and took his switch away, but the merchesti's squeals and squalls of frustration were so loud he could be heard for miles.

"Give it back to him," Halmarain had said with a sigh. She had used all her calming spells on him, but her magic had less and less effect on him as he grew. She was studying to relearn the spells. Before long they'd only give them a brief respite from his caterwauling.

"Why don't you just turn him into a frog or something until we reach the wizard?" Ripple asked. "We could put him in a sack and he'd be easier to manage." Since the kender girl loved the ponies, and Beglug tormented them at every opportunity, she had developed an active dislike of the merchesti.

"Because I don't know how," Halmarain muttered. "If I did, we would have had a lot less trouble on the journey."

"No can make frog?" Grod demanded.

Trap stared at the little wizard for a moment and then started to laugh. He laughed until he couldn't stand up and so he sat on the ground. Ripple stared at him in confusion, but she soon started to giggle, infected by his mood.

"What's the matter with you two?" Halmarain demanded. "Along comes a wizard and sits on a log," Trap gasped.

Ripple instantly caught on. "And threatens to turn us all into frogs," she added.

Grod laughed and started to clap.

"I don't need any of that," Halmarain shouted.

"She huffs and she puffs and fills us with fear," Trap giggled.

"But her spells and her threats never appear, Ripple capped him, with a sly look at the tiny wizard.

"Grod make one!" the gully dwarf shouted at the ken-der, jumping up and down with excitement. When he had their attention, he puffed himself up with a huge in-drawn breath and clasped his hands behind his back.

"No more have to wash!" he said and waited expectantly.

"By golly and gosh," Trap obligingly did the capping.

"Are you finished?" Halmarain asked quietly. She had just lost her major weapon against the dirt on the gully dwarves.

Since he still did not know their destination, Trap had begun the next leg of their journey on an angle that would take them past the last mountains in the next chain, approximately twenty five miles to the east.

"No, we should go directly east from Pey," the little wizard told him when she realized they were on a north-easterly course. We want to reach the mountains about ten miles south of Castle Kurst. Then the dwarf necklace will come in handy."

"You mean we're nearly there?" Trap could hardly believe it. "We'll find this new wizard and see some magic?" The kender referred to the magic-user at the end of the trail as the "new" one since finding him was their newest goal.

"I don't promise you anything," Halmarain said quietly. "Remember, I don't know Chalmis Rosterig. All I'm sure of is that he is a wizard of great power."

"Hey! Great! Now we know his name and we'll soon be there."

Having a name seemed to make the wizard more real. Trap urged his pony forward, anxious to reach their destination. The wizard's chambers would be full of all sorts of things to see and touch, and he might be able to talk Chalmis Rosterig into showing them some fun magic.

They rode through the night and dawn found them in the middle of the hill country between the ruins of Pey and the westernmost spur of the Khalkist Mountains. They made camp and slept through most of the day, but during the late afternoon they were awakened by the scream of one of the ponies. As usual, Trap woke rising, his hoopak in his hand. His first thought was that the dwarves or the kobolds might be attacking. He was stunned and disgusted to see Beglug squatting on the ground, just out of reach of Halmarain's mount. It was on the ground, its legs thrashing. Even as the kender stared, the kicks weakened and the animal died. The little merchesti had bitten out its throat.

"Oh! No! No, no." Ripple rushed forward, stopped a few feet away and sobbed. The kender girl loved the ponies and begrudged no work in rubbing them down, combing their manes and tails and brushing their hides.

"Beglug! Bad! Bad!" Trap yelled at the little creature, still too shocked to say more.

Halmarain rushed over, muttered a spell, and the evil glow in the merchesti's eyes died out. He hummed his calm little sounds and stood. When Halmarain told him to, he wandered back to the fire to curl up and sleep again.

"I told you that monster was evil," the little wizard said, staring at her dead pony.

"No good make Lava Belly sleep," Umpth said, staring at the dead animal. "Him eat pony now, no bad two days maybe."

"He will not eat that animal!" Halmarain snapped. "The last thing we need is for him to develop a taste for our mounts."

"No make good magic," Grod said as he too stared at the carcass. "Too heavy. No can carry."

They cooked a quick meal, loaded the surviving animals, and broke camp. Halmarain rode the pack animal and they divided the supplies between them, loading a few on the backs of her mount, and those ridden by the Aghar and the kender.

At dawn of the second day, they found a deep gully where they would not be seen and made camp. Not two miles ahead was the foot of the first mountain in the range.

"When we finish eating can we go visit the wizard?" Ripple asked. She was as happy as her brother to have the boring trip behind them.

"That would be nice," the little wizard agreed with a despondent sigh.