It turned out that Marchan ended up doing work on a number of different halls in the city. Each one promised greater payment until he was able to buy a boat. No one really wanted to let him take one he merely rented. As it was, convincing some sailors to come with them was not very expensive too. To finally convince them, he promised to give them the boat when he was done with it.

They sailed one fine day in late spring and discovered that not one of the three companions could get their sea legs. While the sailors climbed the sheets up to the lookout, Trevor watched them and then had to hold his stomach. When a slight cross breeze, slight even by his own definition, came by, Marchan was sure his stomach was going to turn inside out. Canod spent the whole trip in a hammock below deck. He could not trust his legs at all.

Once they did reach the landing pier across the bay, after two days under way, Canod had to be carried by two of the sailors, the second mate and the bosun, who looked like men pitying a poor lost blind soul. They had been on the water all their lives, though never near this particular location. Too many questions, that no one really needed to know the answers to, were associated with this area. Trevor, Marchan and the boat's captain made up the rest of the landing party.

Once on solid ground, Marchan felt his stomach acting normal again. Trevor looked okay, as long as he kept his eyes away from the water. He looked at Marchan and said, 'Let's not do that again.'

Marchan smiled and approached Canod where the sailors had put him on a rock. 'Are you well?' he asked.

'No, master Marchan,' Caond's voice was weak. 'I am just going to die. The world has given up on me. I can still feel the rocking, even as I sit on this rock.'

'So do I,' said Marchan. Just then their captain looked startled. 'Why it's an earthquake,' he exclaimed. 'The rocking you feel is the earth quaking. Look to the ship!'

Marchan looked over and saw that the little sail boat was suddenly rocking like it never had out at sea. The sailors still aboard tried to fend off the ancient pier with spars or whatever they could reach. The rocking continued for a few more minutes as the port side of the boat scrapped against the pier despite their work. When the rocking stopped on land, the water continued to rock, though not quite as roughly. The sailors were finally able to push completely off the pier as the landing party looked on. No one dared breathe as they a larger wave come crashing toward them. Those on the land picked up everything they could find and started running inland, looking for some higher land. Trevor carried Canod over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes.

The water crashed against the pier and carried inland, just as the landing party found a stair leading up to a higher road. They bound up it two or three steps at a time. Marchan could not run as fast as the Men, even Trevor carrying Canod. The water crashed up the hillside around them and Marchan felt himself carried up the stairs even faster than he had been running. Then the water turned. He grabbed at the stairs, still in reach, and held fast as the water receded back out into the bay. He looked down. The sailing boat he had bought was sitting high and dry on top of the roadway they had run along, caught by the very rock that Canod had been sitting on.

The captain with his second mate and bosun came back down the stairs, treading carefully as they were now very slippery. They looked at the sailing boat and shook their heads. 'That's going to be a lot of work getting out of there,' the second mate said.

'Aye,' said the captain, giving the second mate a meaningful look. 'But we're lucky it weren't smashed to pieces.'

The second mate noticed the look and then brought his knuckles to his forehead and said, 'Aye, Aye, Cap'n.' Marchan noticed that his voice changed too, sounding raspier. He shook his head and carefully climbed up to Trevor and Canod where Trevor lay gasping for air.

'That was unexpected,' Marchan said and lay down beside Trevor. Canod sat up and tried standing, when an aftershock hit them. It bowled him over and he landed on Trevor who completely lost his breath.

After the second and third aftershock, the ground became quiet. They could hear the men below them working to lift stores and spars out of the boat so as to lighten it so they could get it back in the water. The Captain was certainly efficient.

The three adventurers made plans. Trevor and Canod agreed they had no interest in returning the way they had come, and Marchan hoped he would be able to remain with the dwarves here, assuming they could find any, so they agreed that the boat was now owned by the sailors who were working to free it.

Trevor went down the stairs to deliver that news. The sailors cheered and set to work again harder then before. Trevor gathered their remaining belongings that had been unloaded and with the Captain's help brought them back up to his companions.

'Thank you, Captain for your work,' Marchan said to him. 'I hope that we will see each other again.'

'If there are indeed many of your kind here, I hope we will see one another as well,' said the Captain. 'If not, I'm sorry to say that I have no desired to come anywhere near here.'

'I can't say that I blame you,' Marchan said. 'Well, have a good sail back across the bay and may your hold be often filled with merchandise.'

'Why thank you master Marchan, and may you find your relatives. Master Trevor, Master Canod, may your return journey around the bay be better than your journey here,' and he turned and carefully returned to his boat.

The three adventurers hoisted their bags and started up the road. It was a wide road and the nicest they had been on since leaving the kingdom that Trevor and Marchan had been born in. It felt quite civilized and they were sure they would soon meet someone on the road, but it remained empty. They climbed up hills, crossed bridges, and met no one in the next two hours that they hiked before the sun started to set across the bay. They looked out and could see their little sailing boat making its way back across: a dark shadow against the brilliance of the reflecting water. Marchan rose his hand to wave. He had no idea if they could see him, but was sure they could when the boat suddenly tacked and then tacked again.

They made camp right beside the road. The land was quiet. They heard no sounds of wild life, not even insects. It was very eerie. They found a small, dead tree and chopped it up for firewood. The fire helped ease the eeriness, but they had trouble sleeping just the same.

After a restless night, Marchan heard Trevor and Canod get up. He sat up and looked around. Everything in sight of their spot by the side of the road was barren and empty. They all stood and looked at each other. There was no water anywhere to drink. The little they had left that they filled before boarding the boat was all they had until they found more water. They thought back over everything they saw before they landed. They had not noticed any sign of water, no rivers or brooks passing out into the bay. Marchan packed up his things and they started out. The thought of something to drink tormented him with each step. He wondered how long someone could walk without drinking. They did have some food. And it wasn't so dried out that it did not refresh some, but Marchan thought of how long that would last. They needed to find either a water source or their destination soon. He started to feel fatigue. They walked mostly silently. Only once in a while stopping to decide which path to take, not that it wasn't hard to follow the main path. It was a wide road leading up the hill. It seemed to have fallen into disuse, however. Marchan noticed that there were stones on the path, bits of wall here and there had chipped and fallen. He felt chilled, however, that he saw nothing living. Not even plants grew where once there might have been a green grassy bank beside the road.

They passed what might have once been an orchard, only dark stumps remained. They stopped to look at to see if there was a well, but found only a small depression in the ground that might have been a filled in well with no indication of how deep they would have to dig, so they continued walking.

.

Hour after hour went by, they tried to ration the water, but it still didn't last them until they reached a huge rock wall that the road led directly up to. At the top of the wall, they could see something that looked unnatural, but it was too far to see clearly. At the bottom of the wall, where the road led up to it, lay a pile of rubble. They continued walking, cautiously now, across the space, unsure what they would find.

'I'm starting to think that you're not going to be getting a home coming celebration today, Marchan,' said Trevor, trying to lighten their mood.

Marchan and Canod grunted. They could feel the tension of the day and the eeriness of the empty landscape closing in on them. They felt like insects under the wall as it rose above them on their approach. The top of the wall was so far above them that a man standing there would have been but a small speck. They knew they had reached a gate of the Dwarves' home, but it seemed abandoned. Nothing suggested that anyone had been here for many years. They approached the rubble that lay on the road. It looked like smashed statues and other works of art that had been thrown from a great height onto the road. They looked up and could barely make out, that at the top of the cliff was something like a lookout tower. Among the rubble, Marchan noticed bits of skulls and bones, stripped by the wind and rain.

Marchan explored around the base of the wall. The wall was very forbidding and none of the three wanted to risk entry just yet. Canod sat on some of the rubble and stared at it. No one much spoke.

'Look at this,' Canod finally said after several minutes. 'These bones are broken, like someone had fallen. Do you suppose they were thrown down from up there?'

'That's what I'm afraid of,' replied Trevor from nearby. 'I don't think that dwarves are today in command of this place. They would have cleaned up the bodies here long ago, and most likely cleaned away this rubble.'

'Most likely,' said Marchan. 'That leaves us the question of whether there are any left here, possibly as prisoners, and where the survivors went'

'I think my king is going to want to know about this. The great enemy, Kloris, has wanted the destruction of the northern peoples. The dwarves protecting this location were a great bulwark against him bringing shiploads of peoples north into the bay, and then north of the mountains through the trackless plains there and right into the heart of our kingdom.

'Knowing where they've gone will be useful, but even more important will be just the knowledge we have now.'

'Shall we stay out then?' Canod asked. 'It does not look like anyone has seen us yet. We might be able to get away. Go south around the bay and back to your kingdom.'

'No,' Marchan said. 'We've come this far. We have to go in.'

'Do you think we'll really find anything?' Trevor said. 'I wish we could send a message somehow and then go.'

'We don't really know anything yet,' said Marchan.

'Then let's go in,' said Trevor. 'Just let's be careful. Getting the news back is more important than our lives.'

'Yes,' said Canod, 'let's all be careful.'

They walked up to the gate and slowly walked inside.

******************************************************

Dana's wedding day came too quickly. It seemed the whole city wanted to be present. It was not everyday that two great dukedom's were to be conjoined. A duke's heir marrying a reigning duchess was new. And such a duchess! The whole city spent so much time telling each other that she was the most beautiful woman in the world, and to have spent 13 years in poverty and obscurity, with her inheritance taken from her! The story was just too much, and let's have some tea.

The king himself insisted on being allowed to walk her down the aisle. He was so old that he had trouble walking, but carried himself with royal majesty just the same. The sight of all those dukes, duchesses, earls, counts, countesses, marquises, viscounts, barons, and baronesses in all their finery and gold took Dana's breath away. The king steadied her as she entered the great hall and everyone in the hall gasped. She righted herself and slowly made her way down the aisle, seeing Richard and his best man at the end of it. Everyone else just dropped out of her vision. Richard himself seemed awed and did not take his eyes off her all the way down the aisle.

When they got to a place the king took to be an appropriate stopping place, he slowed and called out with a steady voice that once must have been very powerful, 'I bless this union, with all my heart. Come take the hand of your wife.'

Richard stepped forward and Dana saw that his knees nearly buckled. His best man gave him a steady arm and he approached with a grin that looked like he would break his face. He replied to the king, 'I thank you for your blessing and your heart. I give you my allegiance and accept this hand from yours.'

The wedding went off without another hitch and when they had finished the knot tying ceremony, they walked together up the aisle and out of the hall. The crowds outside cheered they entered their carriage and it carried them off to their honeymoon.