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Message: <blockquote data-quote="GodOfCheese" data-source="post: 4770401" data-attributes="member: 19170">HeeganJo gave Finnord several names.  The barkeep shook his head several times before pointing.  The dwarf’s name was Heegan, and he was sitting at a tiny table away from the tap.  He didn’t sing.  He didn’t even seem aware of anything outside his beer.  The other patrons seemed to be keeping their distance from him, lest his misery infect them.Unfortunately he didn’t seem to know anything of investigative value either.  The mill had closed not but three days ago and with luck would reopen tomorrow morning.  He feared the mill would stay closed if it couldn’t keep up with the rate of incoming timber.  Although this was the third incident this summer, he wasn’t aware of any pattern in the hauntings.  It was Dorin’s impression that the dwarf was uncomfortably sober and probably couldn’t afford to drink enough.  But there was that feeling again, of being watched.  He fought the urge to look out into the crowd.  It never works, remember?  Just be aware of it and focus on the task at hand.  If it makes a difference, it’s better to trick the watcher into showing himself than to give yourself away trying to find him.“So what happens?”  Wik asked curiously.  To reach the table, she was standing on a chair not meant for someone of her small gnomish stature.  “You know.  When it happens?”The dwarf took an over-long drink.  Stalling, thought Dorin.  “I was there last time.  We were using the cut-off blade first, which isn’t usual because it’s dangerous.”  He paused to drink again.Before Dorin could prompt him to move forward with the story, Wik took the bait.  “Dangerous, how?”“We usually rip the logs and then cut off the ends*.  But sometimes we have to cut off the ends first, usually because something’s wrong with the wood.”  He shrugged—a human expression borrowed by dwarves that shows off their enormous shoulders.  “When the wood is wrong, the cut can go wrong.  Pieces fly out very fast, and men can die from it.“So we cut off the ends when we see problems that will affect the rip-cut.”  He held his left hand, fingers straight up, and hit his right against it, fingers held horizontally.  When his right hand reached his left, he folded his fingers in as if they were being sliced off.“So what happened?” Dorin prompted.  Heegan squinted at Dorin and huffed.  “The wood started to bleed is what happened.”“Bleed, how?” Wik followed up.  “Like, tree sap shooting out, or…?”“Like, blood!” the Dwarf replied loudly, his voice sharp with frustration.  He pinched at a scab on the back of his hand for emphasis.  “Like this stuff.  I know trees, and this was not sap!”  He wiped the back of his hand on his shirt and stared at them.Dorin noted that the other patrons were subtly shifting away.  Wik watched Heegan in rapt fascination.  “Tell me more!” she pleaded excitedly, drawing a look of surprise from Dorin.“I knew something was amiss when we started crosscutting.  It was the way the blade shrieked when it went in.”  He must have noticed the blank looks from his three listeners.  “We have the best blades in Millington,” he added with guarded pride.  “…and we keep them clean and well-oiled.  They just don’t make that sound unless something’s wrong.“But the blade was lined up just right.  It was the timber.  The wood was screaming at us, I know now.“Then, when we were about half way through the rip cut, there was blood all down the line where the blade had been.  When we see blood, everyone checks to make sure he still has all his fingers.  But nobody was hurt then.”He looked to his drink, but didn’t touch it.  “We… we thought it was sap then too at first.”  Heegan continued to face his mug, but his eyes weren’t focused on it.  “But it pumped and ran when we kept cutting.  Sap doesn’t do that.  It was red, too, when we saw it later in the light.  Too red for a log that’s spent weeks in riverwater.”Dorin thought of a few questions, but then reconsidered.  His answers are disorganized, he thought.  Humor him and it may make more sense.The dwarf’s fingers turned the mug idly by its rim now as he spoke.  “It… it was slick.  Some of the guys slipped in it before we realized.  We sprinkled sawdust on it.  That helped at first, but it was still coming.“After a minute or so, the blood got sticky like glue.  It drew sawdust and gummed up the blade.”  Then, hastily: “Hey, even our blade gets gummed up sometimes.”Wik hadn’t blinked yet, or so it seemed to Dorin.  “So what did you do?” she added.“We did what we always do,” Heegan replied calmly.  “We cleaned it.”Dorin squinted.  The smoke was starting to get to him.  “It didn’t occur to you to call the guard?”Heegan squinted back at him, and then just shook his head.  “We didn’t know it was blood yet.  We thought we were just unlucky.“But everyone who tried to clean the blade was cut that night,” he continued.  “…and badly, too.  It was like a curse!”Dorin tilted his head to view Heegan from a slightly different angle, growing increasingly interested.  “Sounds intriguing, but I still don’t understand why you’d close the mill over this.”Heegan drank, or pretended to do so.  “The wood didn’t stop bleeding.”Wik’s eyes actually managed to get bigger.  “No!”The dwarf nodded.  “It’s true,” he said.  “When we pulled the half-cut rounds out, they dripped.  But when we set them down, they made a pool.  Most of the wood we cut was soaked in blood by the time we saw it.  It’s ruined.“By this time we knew it was the haunting.  Eyleck went for the Clan Elders.  We had to give it up.”“Why?” Dorin asked, appearing confused.  “Yes, I know it ruined what you’d already cut, but what --other than the expense-- stopped you from throwing out that wood and starting over?”Heegan nodded solemly.  “The elders said that all the wood we cut would bleed until at least the next morning.  So we cleaned up and went home.  Or here.”  He saluted with his dry-looking mug.“And it’s been three days?” Jo asked bluntly.The Dwarf nodded, his jaw set firmly before he spoke.  “Still bleeding, last time we checked.”Dorin rubbed his bare jaw, considering.  Wik, on the other hand, was bent at the waist, leaning over the table.  Her eyes were white with enthusiasm.  “Didn’t Moradin’s clergy do anything to help you?”  Her little elbows supported her as she stood upon her chair, but it didn’t stop her hands from waving outward, like a shrug: a faux gesture of hopelessness.  Dorin stopped moving.  She already knows the answer.Jo said nothing.Heegan put the mug down firmly enough to draw the attention of a few patrons.  The mug did not break, but nor was anyone surprised.  Dwarves are not known for their gentleness with drinkware, and no barkeep would assume otherwise.  “Bah!” he exclaimed, and raised his arms flamboyantly over his head.  “By the time they got there, there was nothing they could do!”  He growled briefly, looking out into the crowd.  “Maybe if they had been there before it started, but we didn’t know when it was going to happen again!”  The dwarf’s eyes fell upon the table as he scowled.  “And they can’t be there all the time, waiting for the next time.  We’re done for… obviously being punished, but for what?  We’ve done nothing wrong!”The four of them were silent for a time, and Heegan continued to stare at the wooden surface before him.  Wik never looked away.Presently, the dwarf looked up at her and his eyes searched her momentarily.“Can you help us, good gnome?” He asked hesitantly.  “You and your minions?”Wik smiled a huge, twinkling smile.---* If you know something of medieval log mills and feel like Heegan is utterly ignorant of how logs are really milled, I must apologize on his behalf, since I am utterly ignorant of how logs are really milled.  Corrective comments appreciated <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":-)" title="Smile    :-)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":-)" /></blockquote>

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