Chapter VI:
The Riders of Roi-Tan

...For three days Arrowroot, Gimlet, and Legolam hunted the band of narcs, pausing in their relentless chase only for food, drink, sleep, a few hands of pinochle, and a couple of sight-seeing detours. Tirelessly, the Ranger, dwarf, and elf pushed on after the captors of Moxie and Pepsi, often making a long march of up to three hundred yards before collapsing with apathy. Many times Stomper lost the scent, which was rather difficult since narcs are fond of collecting their droppings along the way into great, pungent mounds. These they carefully sculpted and molded into fearsome shapes as mute warning to any who might dare challenge their power.

But the narc mounds were growing fewer, indicating either that they had quickened their pace or had run out of roughage. In any case the trail grew fainter and the tall Ranger had to use his every skill to follow the barest traces of the company's passing, a worn ventilated shoe, a pair of loaded dice, and farther on, a pair of ventilated narcs...


...The sheep-lords loomed larger and the fierce war-bleats of their mounts could now be heard. Tall and blond were the Roi-Tanners, wearers of helmets topped with cruel-looking spikes and small toothbrush mustaches. The wanderers saw too that they wore long boots and short leathern pants with suspenders and held long spikes that looked like lead-weighted dust-mops.

"They are savage of visage," said Legolam.

"Aye," said Stomper, peeking through his fingers. "Proud and willful are the men of Roi-Tan, and they value highly land and power. But these lands are often those of their neighbors, and they are hence mickle unpopular. Though ignorant of letters, they are find of song and dance and premeditated homicide. But warfare is not their only craft, for they run summer camps for their neighbors handsomely fitted out with the most modern oven and shower facilities."

"Then these rascals cannot be all bad," said Legolam hopefully. Just then they saw a hundred blades flash from a hundred sheaths.

"Bets?" said Gimlet...

...The leader, shorter than the others by a head, looked at them suspiciously through twin monocles and brandished a battlemop. It was then that the company realized that the leader was a woman, a woman whose ample breastplate hinted at a figure of some heft.

"Vere ist you going und vat are you doing here vhen you are not to being here in der first place vhere you ist?" the leader demanded in rather garbled everybody-talk.

Stomper stepped forward and bowed low, falling on one knee and pulling his forelock. Then he kissed the ground at the sheep-lord's feet. He buffed her boots for good measure.

"Hail and greeting, O Lady," lisped Stomper, the butter in his mouth freezing solid. "We are wayfarers in your land searching for friends taken by the foul narcs of Sorhed and Serutan. Perhaps you have espied them. They are three feet tall with hairy feet and little tails, probably dressed in elvin cloaks and headed for Fordor to destroy Sorhed's threat to Lower Middle Earth."

The captain of the sheepmen stared at the Ranger dumbly, then, turning to her own company, beckoned a rider.

"Medic! Hurry up, I haf vork for you. Und he ist der delirious also!"

"Nay, beautiful Lady," said Stomper, "they of whom I speak are boggies, or in the tongue of the elves, hoipolloi. I am their guide, who am called Stomper by some, though I have many names."

"I bet you do," agreed the leader, tossing her golden braids. "Medic! Vhere ist you?"

Finally Arrowroot's explanations were accepted, and introductions were made all around.

"I ist Eorache, daughter of Eorlobe, Captain of der Rubbermark und Thane of Chowder. Dot means you ist nice to me or you ist nothing to nobody no more," said the ruddy faced warrior. Suddenly her face darkened when she espied Gimlet, whom she studied suspiciously.

"Vat ist your name again?"

"Gimlet, son of Groin, Dwarf-lord of Geritol and Royal Inspector of Meats," said the stubby dwarf.

"Dot's funny," she said at last, "you don't look dwarfish!" Then she turned to Stomper, "Und you. Undershirt vas it?"

"Arrowshirt," said Stomper, "Arrowroot of Arrowshirt!"

In a flash he had drawn gleaming Krona from its holster and flailed it about over his head as he cried, "And this is Krona of he who has many names, he who is called Lumbago, the Lodestone, by the elves, Dunderhead, heir to the throne of Twodor and true son of Arrowhead of Araplane, Conqueror of Dozens and seed of Barbisol, Top of the Heap and King of the Mountain."

"Vell la-dee-dah," said Eorache, eyeing the waiting medic...


..."Now," said Karsh, turning back to the boggies, "them bleaters is gonna jump us at dawn, so's I want the lowdown on this Magic Ring right now!" Reaching into a large leather bag, the narc withdrew an armful of shiny instruments and arrayed them on the ground in front of Pepsi and Moxie. There before them were a large bullwhip, a thumbscrew, a cat-o'-nine tails, a rubber hose, two blackjacks, an assortment of surgical knives, and a portable hibachi with two red-glowing branding irons.

"I got ways t' make ya sing like canaries," he chuckled, stirring the hot coals with his long index finger. "Youse each can have one from column A and two from column B. Har har har!"

"Har har har," said Pepsi.

"Mercy!" yipped Moxie.

"Aw, come on, youse guys," said Karsh, selecting an iron with the triple-bar "S" of Sorhed, "let me have a little fun before y'talk."

"No, please!" said Moxie.

"Who wants it first?" laughed the cruel narc.

"Him!" chorused the boggies, indicating each other...


...Moxie and Pepsi looked up with a start toward the green trees. They knew that they had heard a low, rumbling voice, but they saw no one.

"Hulloo?" they said uncertainly.

"Not 'huloo,' ho ho ho!" returned the voice.

The brothers searched the woods for the source of the laugh, but not until a huge green eye winked did they see the huge giant standing against the tall forest right in front of them. Their jaws dropped at the sight of an immense figure, fully eleven feet tall, standing before them with his hands coyly at his sides. He was bright green from head to foot (size fifty-six, triple-Z). A broad, pastel-green smile broke upon its face, and the monster laughed again. As the boggies retrieved their jaws, they noticed that the giant was naked save for a parsley G-string and a few cabbage leaves in his feather-cut locks. In each great hand was a package of frozen stringbeans, and across his chest a green banner proclaimed, Today's Special, Five Cents Off All Creamed Corn.

"No, no," moaned Pepsi, "it....it couldn't be!"

"Ho ho ho, but it is," guffawed the immense figure, half-man, half broccoli. "I am called Birdseye, Lord of the Vee-Ates, oft called the jol--"

"Don't say it!" cried Moxie, holding his furry ears with horror.

"Be not afraid," grinned the affable vegetable. "I want to make peas with you."

"No, no!" moaned Pepsi, nibbling his tieclip in frenzy.

"Come come," said the giant, "lettuce go and meet my subjects who live in the forest. They cannot be beet. Ho ho ho!" The green apparition doubled over at its own bon mot.

"Please, please," pleaded Pepsi, "we can't take it. Not after all we've been through."

"I must insist, my friends," said the giant, "the people of my realm are off to war on the evil Serutan, eater of cellulose and friend of the black weeds who every day strangle us more and more. We know you to be his enemy too, and you must come with us, and help defeat the cabbage-murderer."

"Well, all right," sighed Pepsi, "if we gotta--"

"--we gotta," sighed Moxie.

"Sigh not," reassured the giant as he slung the two boggies over his Kelly green shoulder blades, "being Lord of the Vee-Ates is not easy either, particularly on my celery. Ho!"

The boggies kicked and screamed, attempting a final escape from the towering bore...


...Darkness was falling and the campfires of the Roi-Tanners began flickering. Over the next hill lay the valley of Isinglass, now renamed Serutanland by the scheming Wizard. Dejected, the Ranger shuffled along the resting warriors, hardly hearing their proud song, roared above the clinking of foamy steins:

"Ve is der merry, gay Roi-Tanners,
Who like der boots, salutes und banners,
Ve ride der scheeps in vind und vheather
Mit vhips und spurs und drawers of leather

Ve dance und sing und valse und two-step
Und never ever mach der goose-step.
Peace iss vhat ve vant und do have.
Und a piece of anything you have."

Men frolicked about the fires, laughing and joking. Two blood-slathered contestants hacked at each other with sabers to the gloating cheers of flaxen-haired spectators, and farther on a gathering of warriors bellowed with mirth as they did something unattractive to a dog.

But the scene cheered him not. Heartsick, he walked on into the darkness, saying "Eorache, my Eorache" softly over and over to himself. Tomorrow he would display such acts of valor that she would have to pay attention to him. He leaned against the tree and sighed...


..."Isn't it about time for a deus ex machina?" said Legolam wearily.

Suddenly there was a loud pop and a bright burst of light that momentarily blinded the shocked three. The acrid odor of cheap flash-powder filled the air, and the companions heard a distinct thump followed by a louder oof! Then, through the swirling confetti, they saw a shining figure dressed all in white, brushing the twigs and dirt from his spotless bell-bottoms and gleaming a-go-go boots. Above the white Nehru jacked and cheesy medallion was a neatly trimmed gray beard set off by oversized wrap-around shades. The whole ensemble was topped off by a large white panama with a matching ostrich plume.

"Serutan!" gasped Arrowroot.

"Close, but no cigar," cackled the brilliant figure as he flicked a bit of invisible dust from his tailored shoulder. "Pray try again. It is a sad thing indeed when old pals are recognized not!"

"Goodgulf?!" cried the three.

"None other," said the aged fop. "You seemed astonished that I have reappeared."

"But how did--did you...?" began Legolam.

"We thought the ballhog..." said Gimlet.

The old wizard winked and straightened his vulgar medallion.

"My story is a long one indeed, and I am not the same Goodgulf Grayteeth that you once knew. I have undergone many changes, no thanks to you, I might add."

"Yah, a little Clairol on the temples and a trim," whispered the observant dwarf.

"I heard that!" said Goodgulf, scrathcing a razor-cut sideburn. "Take not too lightly my present form, for my powers are even mightier."

"But how did you--"

"Much have I journeyed since we last met, and much have I seen, and there is much I would tell thee," said Goodgulf.

"Anything but the name of your tailor," said Gimlet. "Where'd you get those duds anyway? I thought Halloween was months off yet."

"A most delightful little boutique in Lornadoon. It's me, don't you think?"

"More than you know," agreed the dwarf...