‘Grock knows what he’s doing, that’s for sure,’ Skell agreed. He looked around. ‘Where is he, by the way?’
‘He told Omago that he was going to see if he could find a more open way for us to follow on up to the top. I take it that he doesn’t particularly like bushes.’
‘I’m not all that fond of them myself.’
‘They provide a good place to hide if you want to ambush an enemy,’ Keselo said, ‘but that’s about all they’re good for.’
‘Which side is Grock looking at?’
‘He jumped across the creek and went up toward the wall of the gorge on the other side. I don’t really think he’ll have much luck, though. There seems to be a lot of loose stones at the foot of that wall over there.’
‘He might get lucky,’ Skell said. ‘We can hope, I guess. My hands are starting to get just a little tender from all this going hand over hand up that rope of his.’
‘I think he’s coming back right now, Captain Skell,’ Keselo said, shading his eyes. ‘He’s running!’ the young Trog exclaimed. ‘If he happens to trip and fall, he’ll bounce most of the way down to the river!’
Skell glared up the steep slope. ‘That idiot!’ he exclaimed. ‘Grock!’ he shouted. ‘Slow down! You’ll break your neck!’
‘I just found gold, Cap’n!’ Grock shouted back. ‘Gold! There’s tons of it up there in that rock wall!’
‘Stay right where you are!’ Skell commanded. ‘I’m coming up!’ He motioned to Keselo. ‘Let’s go up and have a look,’ he said.
‘Aye, Cap’n,’ Keselo replied in a fair imitation of an ordinary Maag seaman’s customary response.
They both pushed their way through the dense brush, waded across the brook and went up the other side.
Grock was trembling violently, and he was licking a dark stone with his tongue.
‘Let me have a look,’ Skell told him.
‘Aye,’ Grock replied, handing Skell the dark-colored rock fragment. ‘It’s right here, Cap’n,’ he said pointing at a gleaming yellow fleck in the surface of the rock. ‘I’d a-walked right on past it, but a little gust of wind set one of them fir-trees t’ wavin’ back and forth, and the sunlight came a flashin’ off this speck like you wouldn’t believe. Then I backed off just a bit and took a good look. That rock wall up there’s got bright yellow specks flashin’ all over it. It might take a bit of work t’ chop all of them outta that wall, but it’d shore be worth the trouble.’
Skell hadn’t realized that he’d been holding his breath, and he let it out almost explosively.
‘Ah - Captain Skell,’ the young Trog said. ‘I think that maybe we should have Rabbit take a look at this. He knows more about metal than anybody I’ve ever met, so I’m sure he’ll be able to tell us if this is really gold.’
‘What else could it be?’ Grock demanded. ‘It’s yellow, and that means gold, doesn’t it?’
‘Rabbit!’ Skell bellowed. ‘I need you! Come here!’
The small, wiry smith from the Seagull came running up the steep slope. ‘Have we got trouble of some kind?’ he asked.
‘Maybe,’ Skell replied, ‘or maybe not.’ He held out the stone Grock had given him. ‘Take a look at this and tell us what you think. Is that yellow speck gold, maybe? Or is it something else?’
‘It’s easy enough to verify,’ Rabbit said. He took his knife out of its sheath and lightly flicked the point across the yellow spot, sending out a bright spark. ‘I’m sorry, Cap’n Skell, but it’s not gold. It’s pretty enough, I guess, but gold doesn’t spark like that when you scrape it with a knife. I’ve heard about this, but it’s the first time I’ve ever seen any of it.’
‘Are you absolutely certain sure?’ Grock asked with a note of bitter disappointment in his voice.
‘There’s a quick way to find out,’ Rabbit said. ‘Has anybody got a gold coin in his purse?’
Keselo handed the little smith a fair-sized coin.
Rabbit flicked the point of his knife across the edge of the coin. ‘No sparks, Cap’n Skell,’ Rabbit pointed out. ‘From what I’ve heard, that yellow fleck Grock found is a kind of iron ore that’s been contaminated with something that’s got a yellow cast to it. There’s a story that’s been going around Weros for years about a fellow who found a large deposit of this particular ore. He spent about ten years hacking it out of a stone face, and he was absolutely positive that he was getting richer every day. When he finally found out that it wasn’t really gold, he went down to the bay and drowned himself.’
Skell gave the young Trog Keselo a hard look. ‘You knew right off that this wasn’t gold, didn’t you?’
‘I was fairly sure that it wasn’t, Captain Skell,’ Keselo admitted. ‘But I thought that Rabbit here was the man best qualified to decide one way or the other. I think this is what’s called “iron pyrite”. It’s basically iron, but it’s been contaminated with sulphur. I’ve heard that people in some places use it instead of flint when they want to start a fire.’
‘It’s worthless, then?’ Skell asked, growing even more disappointed.
‘Maybe not completely worthless. It is basically iron, and iron’s worth something, and you can start fires with it.’
‘Oh, well,’ Skell sighed. ‘I guess we’ll have to go back to doing honest work, then. I’m sorry, Grock, but it looks to me like we didn’t get rich today.’
As they started back down the hill to the brook, Skell seemed to feel a slight prickly sensation on the back of his neck, and he looked around sharply. He was almost positive that somebody was watching them, but there was nobody out in plain sight, so he shrugged it off.
‘They aren’t the brightest animals in the world,’ Nanton admitted to Longbow as the pair of them followed the steep, twisting stream-bed up into the mountains with Skell close behind them, ‘but they’re very affectionate, and their wool’s quite valuable.’
‘Doesn’t it get just a bit boring sitting on a hill and spending whole days watching them eat grass?’
‘Boring’s the pleasant part of the life of a shepherd, Longbow,’ Nanton replied. ‘It’s when things get un-boring that I start to wish that I’d gone into a different line of work. Dealing with a pack of hungry wolves can get very exciting.’