Free The Complete Compleat Enchanter by Fletcher Pratt, L. Sprague deCamp Page B

have to carry the chest. When the chariot had been parked at the edge of a snowdrift, Skrymir took that bulky object under one arm and led the way up the stony slope to the cave mouth.
    “Could you get us fire?” Thor asked Skrymir.
    “Sure thing, buddy.” Skrymir strode down to a clump of small trees, pulled up a couple by the roots, and breaking them across his knee laid them for burning.
    Shea put his head into the cave. At first he was conscious of nothing but the rocky gloom. Then he sniffed. He hadn’t been able to smell anything—not even Skrymir—for some hours, but now an odor pricked through the veil of his cold. A familiar odor—chlorine gas! What—
    “Hey, you,” roared Skrymir behind him. Shea jumped a foot. “Get the hell outta my way.”
    Shea got. Skrymir put his head down and whistled. At least he did what would have been called a whistle in a human being. From his lips it sounded more like an air-raid warning.
    A little man about three feet tall, with a beard that made him look like a miniature Santa Claus, appeared at the mouth of the cave. He had a pointed hood, and the tail of his beard was tucked into his belt.
    “Hey, you,” said Skrymir. “Let’s have some fire. Make it snappy.” He pointed to the pile of logs and brush in front of the cave mouth.
    “Yes, sir,” said the dwarf. He toddled over to the pile and produced a coppery-looking bar out of his jacket. Shea watched the process with interest, but just then Loki tucked an icicle down his back, and when Shea had extracted it the fire was already burning with a hiss of damp wood.
    The dwarf spoke up in a little chirping voice. “You are not planning to camp here, are you?”
    “Yeah,” replied Skrymir. “Now beat it.”
    “Oh, but you must not—”
    “Shut up!” bellowed the giant. “We camp where we damn please.”
    “Yessir. Thank you, sir. Anything else, sir?”
    “Naw. Go on, beat it, before I step on you.”
    The dwarf vanished into the cave. They got their belongings out and disposed themselves around the fire, which took a long time to grow. The setting sun broke through the clouds for a minute and smeared them with streaks of lurid vermilion. To Shea’s imagination, the clouds took on the form of apocalyptic monsters. Far in the distance he heard the cry of a wolf.
    Thjalfi looked up suddenly, frowning. “What’s that noise?”
    “What noise?” said Thor. Then he jumped up—he had been sitting with his back to the cave mouth—and spun around. “Hai, Clever One, our cave is already not untenanted!” He backed away slowly. From the depths of the cave there came a hiss like that of a steam pipe leak, followed by a harsh, metallic cry.
    “A dragon!” cried Thjalfi. A puff of yellow gas from the cave set them all coughing. A scrape of scales, a rattle of loose stones, and in the dark a pair of yellow eyes the size of dinner plates caught the reflection of the fire.
    Æsir, giant, and Thjalfi shouted incoherently, grabbing for whatever might serve as a weapon.
    “Here, I cad take care of hib!” cried Shea, forgetting his previous reasoning. He pulled out the revolver. As the great snakelike head came into view in the firelight, he aimed at one of the eyes and pulled the trigger.
    The hammer clicked harmlessly. He tried again and again, click, click. The jaws came open with a reek of chlorine.
    Harold Shea stumbled back. There was a flash of movement past his head. The butt end of a young tree, wielded by Skrymir, swished down on the beast’s head.
    The eyes rolled. The head half-turned toward the giant. Thor leaped in with a roaring yell, and let fly a right hook that would have demolished Joe Louis. There was a crunch of snapping bones; the fist sank right into the reptile’s face. With a scream like that of a disemboweled horse the head vanished into the cave.
    Thjalfi helped Shea up. “Now maybe ye can see,” remarked the servant of gods, “why Skrymir would as lief not take chances with the Lord of