“Where did he go?” Ares asked as his eyes scanned the area nearby. He had stopped seeing movement roughly about this area as though the dwarf had disappeared into thin air.

“His scent lingers, but I cannot sense him nearby,” Zika admitted. She crouched down onto all fours and then began to crawl about the area, her body moving like a komodo dragon trying to find it’s prey.

“He couldn’t have gotten far,” Ares said as he scanned the horizon. “This could be a situation with a cloak…” Ares thought about a pair of short folk that hit themselves with such a cloak against an approaching army within another story.

“We have no business with the dwarves, shouldn’t we continue on?” Torak asked.

Ares threw a look back towards the older oxfolk. “Speak for yourself,” Ares grinned wide, “I have plenty business with those of the dwarven persuasion.” Even now Ares’ heart thundered with excitement, he could feel the tingle between his fingers.

“Master dwarf, please come out, we bear no ill will against you!” Ares exclaimed but nothing happened. “I assure you, as I am King Ares, Master of Waters, Kin of all Riveans, no harm shall come to you!”

Still there was nothing but silence… and the sniffing of the Reptai woman.

“He does not wish to be spoken to,” Torak shrugged. “Let us leave the dwarf to his business.”

Ares wondered if he couldn’t reveal the dwarf in some water. He raised a hand and then stared at the landscape ahead of him, wondering if he could…

He shifted away the nearby land, trying to shift away whatever cloak the being also held. However he only shifted the earth about, as there was still a small area in which the surrounding land did not shift away, but instead the area began to shift colour quickly into the new colour of the lighter earth beneath.

Ares stepped over towards the dwarf and then looked back to his allies. Beor shrugged at him, though Uta seemed to hold a child-like wonder within his eyes.

“Uhm, master dwarf… we know you’re here.”

Still there was no movement.

“Poke him,” Uta suggested with a wild grin.

“I’m not going to poke him,” Ares said as he looked back to Uta. He raised a hand and then splashed the area with water. “Please master dwarf, won’t you reveal yourself? We know you’re here, look.” Ares kept shooting out water against the area.

Finally the dwarf then bolted up, a raised fist that was curled as though it held his entire rage, but that was not so as he was shouting and cursing, or at the very least Ares assumed it was cursing, right at the King. Eventually though Ares’ ears became acclimated to the sounds and he understood exactly what the dwarf was saying.

“Ya fakken elf fakken gem spendin’ heathan!” he exclaimed but he continued with far more creative curses until he was finally done.

The dwarf was short, with a square body that seemed as though he had been made out of a small plinth, so was his face, and his beard, and his nose, which reminded him of Emerli’s nose with the way it was flat and broad. He was completely red too, but Ares doubted that was his natural complexion.

“I assure you I am no elf fucker,” Ares said with a smile.

The dwarf pulled back in alarm, reaching down for the axe at his side. Orndu grabbed onto his spear and was about to step forward until Ares raised a hand at him to stay put.

The dwarf glanced about and then his eyes fell across everyone. “So what business do you have with me?” he finally asked.

“I just wanted to say hello and ask you what was up.”

“The sky is up, what manner of question is that?”

Ares noted the lack of an accent on the dwarf and he frowned. The world came crashing down as he realised that dwarves apparently did not hold such an inflection in their voice and the disappointment was too immense for him to reply back right away.

“It’s a… it’s more of a…” Ares forgot the word. “It is merely asking something how they are and what they are doing.”

“I have been better and what I am doing is none of your business.”

“Well, uh, I suppose that’s true. Do you need any help with your business? It’s dangerous to travel the plains alone, master dwarf, we would be willing to share our food with you.”

“I don’t need any help, I am perfectly capable of handling my business by myself.”

“I meant no disrespect,” Ares then reached into his cloak as though he was reaching for something and then summoned some flat breads. “Here you are, they are good to eat. Would you like some drake meat soup with that?”

The dwarf eyed the flat bread suspiciously, but the moment Ares mentioned drake meat soup, his eyes flashed with great wonder. “Drake meat?” he asked barely above a whisper.

“Drake meat,” Ares nodded. “We had slain quite a few on Dragon’s Spine.”

“Dragon’s Spine?” the dwarf furrowed his face in the same way a beaver would burrow into a hole, going deep into thought. “Oh, Dragon’s Spine was it? The unconquerable mountain?”

“Seemed pretty conquerable to me,” Ares grinned. “I conquered it. Well, we Riveans did.”

“You conquered Dragon’s Spine? Even against the Light Lord?”

“Oh, so you’ve heard of Peros have you?”

“They say he would awaken in a few hundred years, then had he awoken?”

“Yeah, he’s awake now. We had a bit of a chat.”

“You spoke with Peros?”

“Yes, yes I did.”

The dwarf raised his brow increduously and then nodded. “Right, sir… King Ares was it?”

“That’s right, King Ares.”

“What kind of King are you?”

“Why don’t we speak over some food? I think it’d be best.”

“Let us.”

Then the group made camp. Ares shifted the earth in a similar manner as he used to, but kept the area quite casual since they would be moving onward from the place after lunch. Ezak put on the food, but Ares summoned the food that they had already prepared before.

“I’ll keep an eye on the food as we eat, I’ll store it all for later,” Ares said.

Ezak nodded as they all sat to eat, Orndu taking first watch.

The dwarf waited until Ares had taken the first bite before he began to examine the food curiously, wondering what it was, how it had been made, and then if it was truly indeed drake meat.

Ares then began to regale the tale of how he came to become King, leaving out some bits that were not needed or he wished to keep a secret, starting with how he met the catfolk, then how he became chieftain, and so on until he was finally done, mentioning how he had just subjugated the buffalofolk nearby, motioning his head to Uta.

“I do not believe you are lying to me,” the dwarf said, “but it is unbelievable.”

Ares nodded his head. “Yeah I get that a lot,” he said as he sipped the last bit of his soup, which had grown quite cold now, yet the flavour was still strong at the bottom.

“You’re a rather weird sort of man,” the dwarf said as he eyed Ares up. “A phoenix, you say?”

“You know, I get that a lot too.” Ares laughed and then threw a wink towards his own group before taking a long sip of cold ox milk. Then he shifted his hand into flames which then went to lick the bottom of the bowl in order to warm the milk up.

The dwarf’s eyes went wide, the flickering white within those dark pupils illuminated out a great wonder. “You are a phoenix…” he whispered. “The fire-birds of old, of my great, great, great-grandfather’s time.”

Ares flashed an innocent enough smile towards the dwarf who made a face of someone who needed to go into deep thought and so Ares left the dwarf be, instead throwing a look to his own people. All of them seemed to be fine, but Zika was looking especially tense. Her eyes were narrowed suspiciously at the dwarf and she held a look as though she wanted to eat the dwarf.

“Are you alright?” Ares asked as he leaned in to whisper at her.

“The earth-born are not allies to our peoples,” she said. “They have long kept our artifacts.”

The dwarf snapped back to attention and narrowed his eyes. “Lies. We had found many weapons and had restored them and the Reptai accused us of stealing them. We did the work on the weapons and so have kept them since.”

Ares glanced between the pair. “Well, we can discuss that at another time.” Ares wondered if perhaps the claim to the weapons could fall to Ares if the Reptai assimilated into his Kingdom. “We are all friends here, around this camp, sharing the same food.” Ares glanced between the pair, his eyes resolute on the matter.

Zika bowed her head. “It is not a matter of mine any longer,” she said.

Ares raised his brows in surprise. Did she think that because she was becoming Rivean and so had given up the claim to the other Reptai? Ares smiled as a giddiness flowed through his body, a warm gentle current that relaxed him and filled him with deep pride. He smiled as he looked to Torak and then raised his brows knowingly and Torak returned a nod of his head, understanding the sentiment.

With the food done, Ares turned to face the dwarf.

“So master dwarf, would you like for us to assist you in your business?”

The dwarf looked up at Ares, threw a suspicious glance to Zika, and then his eyes fell back to Ares. He sighed and bowed his head, finally relenting.

“It would be a pleasure,” the dwarf said with a nod, brushing a thick hand through his head.

Ares smiled even wider. “Wonderful, shall we be off soon?” Ares asked as he then shifted the cooked stew away before then shifting away the pot as well.

The dwarf hopped onto his strong legs and nodded. “My dwarven legs can march for an entire day, will you manage to keep up?”

“It’s not a matter of keeping up,” Ares chuckled.

The dwarf raised his brow. “Is that a short joke?”

“I wouldn’t be so uncouth, but perhaps it was. The weather is rather fine up here after all.”

The dwarf just nodded and then began to march off with the others soon following him. It was going to become dark soon, but the dwarf seemed to want to make up the ground that he had lost. The dwarf muttered as he marched forward, speaking to no one in particular, perhaps not even himself. He was regaling Ares’ tale to himself.

“Rivee, he says. Peros, he says. Xan, he says. Aya, this is some trouble…”