Chapter 2 - "Spock ears?"

In which Keyleth meets strange new people

It had been hard enough being forced to sit in Jeep, but getting out was another matter entirely. Ben had told her to “pull the handle” but it did nothing. After what seemed like forever, the man just got out of Jeep, walked around and opened Jeep’s side again. 

Keyleth was wondering how the beast was coping what with its sides and rear constantly being opened and having items, and people, being contained inside. It was bound to be an unpleasant experience. She eventually got out of the poor creature and stroked what appeared to be its snout.

“What are you doing?” Ben asked, growing more impatient with her. In the better light, she could make out his features. His skin was dark, sort of tanned and seemed to have patches of scales on it, similar to that of a Tiefling or Dragonborn. His hair was black, but seemed to have a hint of blue in it. His eyes didn’t seem to look like his own, but she put that down to the bump on the head she had got from the fall when she arrived in this strange place.

“I’m comforting Jeep... You put the poor thing through so much,” she told him sternly.

“It’s a car, not an animal. Y’know, transport? Everyone has one!” He snapped. “Do you live under a sodding rock or something?”

Alarmed at the sudden outburst, Keyleth merely shook her head. Ben sighed again, rubbing his temples as he walked away, the half-elf following cautiously. As he tall man opened the door to the left cabin, Keyleth winced as her sensitive ears were assaulted with a multitude of sounds; humming, buzzing, lots of people talking and laughing all at once. Sounds that kept on changing in rapid succession. She took a step back, forgetting about the stairs she had climbed no more than 5 seconds ago and she once again ended up in a tangled heap. Today was not a good day in terms of being elegant.

“What are you doing down there?” Ben asked, looking irritated. “Alec, turn the TV off and hand me the phone.”

“It’s my night off, get the phone yourself!” An irritated male voice shouted. Suddenly the changing sounds disappeared and Keyleth got up and dusted herself down, making her way back up and into the cabin.

It wasn’t the biggest house she’d ever been in but there were three doorways indicating that there were more rooms. The inside was mostly wood and was brightly lit from strange spherical candles that hung from the ceiling. All around were shiny contraptions. Through the only open door, Keyleth could see a large white box, a shiny silver bowl and a black metal cube with circles on it.

In the room Keyleth was in there was small table with four chairs, several cabinets and drawers and two long chairs parallel to each other, both covered in a dingy green cloth. Reclining lazily on one of the chairs was a man, one or two years older than Keyleth. 

The first thing she noticed about him was that once he had stopped scowling at Ben he was very handsome. His rugged features were enhanced by the light brown stubble that matched his hair. There seemed to be a feline-like quality to the way he yawned, stretching as he rose from the chair. He was more than a head taller than Keyleth, but not as tall as Ben was. He wasn’t overly muscular like most of the human males she had encountered, but the shirt he was wearing clung to the lean muscles he did have in a way that made the girl struggle to tear her gaze from him.

“Who’s this then?” said the man she presumed was Alec, seeing as there were no other men in the cabin. His pale blue gaze twinkling in a mixture of humour and a look drunken men in The Lost Mug Inn gave her back at home. Except this man was sober. “Finally found yourself a bit of skirt, Benny-boy?”

“She’s not a ‘bit of skirt’. I caught her hunting, which reminds me. I need to confiscate your weapons, Miss Uther... Urtha... How do you pronounce it?” Keyleth groaned as she handed her knives, bow and quiver over to him.

“Urthadar. Keyleth Urthadar.” She told him. It wasn’t that difficult to pronounce. Alec scoffed and she glared at him. “Something amusing?”

“Sounds like something out of that Lord of the Rings film... You look like one of them too. Ben, she’s just some nerd playing dress-up.” He took a few steps towards her until he was a little too close to her. “Just a harmless girl who would look great in my bed.” He smirked and tucked a bit of her jet black hair behind her ear, but then frowned when Keyleth shoved his hand away. The frown was followed by a chuckle when he inspected her ear. “Check out the Spock ears, Benny.”

“Spock ears? What do you mean-“ Keyleth frowned as Ben looked at her ear also. She quickly covered her ear and glared at them both.

“You both look as if you’ve never seen a half-elf before.” There was a pause and the two men suddenly started laughing. “What is so funny?”

“An elf?” Alec asked, the young man’s voice rising in pitch. “That is pure gold. Are you one of Santa’s little helpers?” He stopped laughing after a while and smirked again. Keyleth felt her cheeks grow hotter at the way he was staring at her, on top of the embarrassment and confusion she was feeling. “Then again, Santa’s a lucky guy if he gets your ‘help’, if you know what I mean.”

“No, I do not know what you mean, and who is this Santa you speak of?” Keyleth was getting more and more confused. Ben eventually calmed down and picked up a small shiny object and started pressing buttons on it.

“Fun and games aside, I need your contact details so that I can get you back home.” He gave her a strange looking cylinder that seemed to be some sort of quill and a piece of parchment cover in lines before nodding at a chain. She sat down and looked up at him, confused. “Go on, write down your name, home address, mobile number and home number.”

“What’s a ‘home number’? Or a ‘mobile number’?” She asked. Alec laughed again.

“Is this girl serious? She’s got to be pulling your leg, mate.” He sat down next to Keyleth. Looking at her closely, his expression became more serious. “Look, love, just write down your name... Simple enough, yeah?” The girl nodded and wrote her name slowly and carefully, making sure that it was legible. Then she handed it to Alec who read it. “’Keyleth’? Pretty name...” He held out his hand, smiling when she grabbed it and shook it firmly. “Alec...” The seriousness faded. “If I’m lucky you’ll be screaming it later.”

“Why on Arlos would I be doing that?” Alec furrowed his brow slightly before shaking his head and taking the paper to Ben.

“Do you think she’s making all this ‘What’s a mobile number?’ stuff up?” Alec lowered his voice, thinking that Keyleth wouldn’t be able to hear him. How wrong he was. She could hear everything that the two men were discussing.

“Dunno... But she’s been like it since I met her. She thought the jeep was some sort of animal.” Ben told the shorter man, who snorted with laughter. Then an idea came to Alec when he remembered something the girl had mentioned before.

“Grim mentioned a place called ‘Arlos’ once, remember? Do you think I should go get him? See if he knows what the Hell she’s on about?” He jumped when he heard a scream. He looked over at where Keyleth once was, then to where she was now, hiding behind the chair.

She had been inspecting a long grey device and had pressed the red button, when the black box next to the chair illuminated to reveal tiny people inside. Her eyes widened in horror.

“You’ve trapped these people inside the box! Are you warlocks? Are you going to trap me in there too?” Her voice was rising in volume and Ben sighed, taking the device from her and pressing the button. The box went black, but the half-elf still remained where she was, frozen in fear. 

“Alec, go get Grim. Now.” Alec nodded and left the cabin. The tall man grabbed her arm and sat her back down on the long chair. Keyleth frown when he pressed buttons on the black object he had earlier. Then he started talking to a voice that sounded trapped, going through the door marked ‘Ben’. After 5 minutes, he re-entered the room Keyleth was in, seething with anger.

“OK, this isn’t funny anymore. I don’t appreciate these games and I want them to stop immediately. I’ve just been on the phone to the police and the name Keyleth Urthadar isn’t real. What’s your real name and what’s going  on?” Ben snapped.

“That is my real name and I do not know what you are talking about.” There was an innocent confusion in her voice that made Ben think she was telling the truth. “Who is this Grim you sent Alec to retrieve?”

“Look, Alec is just going to get our colleague. You mentioned a place called Arlos earlier and so has Grim. Maybe he can help us all out a bit, yeah?” The girl nodded, shyly. She was unsure of what to add.

Suddenly, Alec walking in, a short grumpy looking man not far behind. He was a lot shorter than everybody else in the room and a lot wider too. His long ginger hair and matching beard were braided. Keyleth knew the man as soon as she looked at him.

This man was a dwarf. And no ordinary dwarf at that. Standing before her, in a black shirt that read ‘Alestorm’, was Fargrim Greyspear, the missing dwarf fighter of Nodnol.

Author's Note

Please read and review