"Supper." 

Mevner had been dreaming of food. He could even smell it. Mouthwateringly delicious food.

"Wake up, friend, you must be hungry."

He shook himself out of sleep. The gnome was back and had built a small fire with a cast iron cauldron simmering on it. He was stirring a stew with the warm scent of roasted mushrooms. The sun was setting in the west and the forest was alive with chirping crickets and the fireflies of summer's end.

Next to the gnome was a large duffle bag or from Mevner's perspective, a small pouch. Mevner pushed himself up on his elbows and gestured a crooked hand at the bag. 

"Ah, yes, well, sadly, everything you said was true. These are Melock's ashes or at least as much as I could gather. There really wasn't much left. I've seen this kind of magic before. Back in my days of adventure, when we defeated the Necromancer and Melock kept his accursed gauntlets. You didn't say if you knew who did this?"

"Re-gh-wha-ing," said a still much too swollen to speak tongue. 

"Redwing? A young boy, named Nicholas?" The gnome rubbed his chin through his whiskers. "Ah, but I suppose that was 40 odd years ago. Sorry I haven't seen you in so long old friend." He patted the sack of ashes. 

"It is, as I mentioned before, my two-hundredth and ninety-second birthday. I hadn't planned for any company, let alone a visitation. Melock would want us to celebrate his life. And mine." 

He filled a small bowl full of stew. 

"The biggest size I have I'm afraid." 

Mevner leaned forward, put the whole thing in his mouth, swallowed, and spat out the bowl. His neck and back were near unmoveable, but hunger was stronger. The gnome filled his own bowl. Then Mevner's again, five more times. 

"Now, if you're wondering how I know it wasn't you who killed my old friend here. You aren't wearing the gauntlets and neither was he. You certainly took that ring off his dead body, that's the only way he'd ever part with it. So, whoever killed Melock cursed you too. It's probably this Redwing. He wasn't bright enough to take the ring though. I bet Melock never told him what it does. But he told you, didn't he?"

Mevner nodded. 

"That's about the same as him wanting you to have it. Did he tell you how he got it?"

After Mevner shook his head in the negative, the gnome opened a little bottle of wine, poured half of it in Mevner's bowl, and lit a pipe. He took a swig from the bottle, exhaled a purple plume, and elbowed the sack. 

"Old friend, I'm glad to tell this story to my new friend here. Any student of your's is wise enough to learn a thing or two from me, I'll wager." 

He took another long toke and began.

"I'd say it was a century and a quarter ago, putting yours truly, Mr. Grimble, at a spry 167 years young. We'd been traveling in the company of a rather treasure obsessed group. A young rogue named Sabastian de Martín had made the acquaintance of Melock and shadily acquired a detailed map of Luhng island. 

"I'm sure you're used to Melock's endless list of oddball associates." He elbowed the bag of ashes again. "Guess I'm one of those, eh, old friend?"

Mevner indeed understood. His twenty-year apprenticeship was full of characters. He leaned up and gestured at his chest. 

"Mvvv-nirrr." 

"Mevner, eh? Nice to meet ya." 

Grimble reached out and shook a twisted thumb before continuing. 

"Anyway, this de Martín fellow was quick on his feet, nimble as anything, could sneak up on an elf. His map included more than a few dangerous shortcuts and eventually led to a mammoth treasure vault built inside of a dormant volcano. He, of course, failed to mention to us that it was the property of a dragon and the moderately sized army of pirates and goons that served him. 

"At the time, Melock was palling around with a couple of twin brothers called Hansel and Franzig Anvilmaker. You can imagine their family trade? I'll spare you the details of their ridiculously oversized weapons of choice. 

"Anyway, Melock had saved their village and their father, who had seven additional sons to spare, sent the Anvil twins with Melock on the condition that they sent back 75% of their loot to help sustain their large family and generational metal works business. 

"Needless to say they respected the old man. We all did." He smiled at the bag of ash and relit his pipe. 

"Our unlucky sixth member was a nun of sorts, a real religious fanatic. She was on some kind of personal crusade to fight evil. Sister John Cherrycoke Murphy. She was young and beautiful and as tough as any member of the group. She'd been a child bride to a brutish nobleman called Lord John Murphy and when he died not two years later, she kept his name. She was put into a nunnery for a time after that. I doubt she was even twenty when she joined us. We all called her Sister Murphy. 

"That is, of course, for you, old friend." He addressed the master's remains again. "You called her Melody."

He leaned over and poured Mevner a swig from his bottle and took one himself.

"Between you and me, I think they had a thing, not that I have any proof, mind you, just a kind of gut notion.

"Anyway, Sister Murphy came on the scene when we battled the Necromancer. As you might imagine she wasn't a fan. After his defeat, she used to wear the very gauntlets that cursed you. Sister Murphy tried to be so pious, she longed to be as lawfully good as Melock. She loved him, you could see it in her eyes. She struggled, trying to make things right in a world full of wrongs.

"Sister Murphy wore heavy armor; ramming her bare feet into metal boots. She must've been in pain with every step, repaying some masochistic dogmatic penance to the demons of her past, I suspect. She carried a brass morningstar and used it to knock the evil out of wrongdoers. Behind her ascetic self-discipline, she was a wild woman and it came out in battle. 

"The newest member of the group was Øregård, he was a real..." 

Mevner lifted his head off the moss he lay on and smiled. 

"Ah, so you know Øregård, then you've been to the lighthouse?"

A bigger smile.

"And you know about Luhng and his island?"

More smiles.

"But you don't know the connection to the ring and you've never heard of me?"

Mevner bobbled his head like he had an idea, but he didn't know the specifics. He was clearly in a lot of pain and the details of the story helped him focus on something else. Mr. Grimble continued.

"Well, it was early on after Melock began teleporting to other worlds and times. It was messing with his sense of reality and to make matters worse he accidentally liberated the Necromancer and then brought Øregård here for the express purpose of defeating him. 

"What you don't probably know, is that Øregård resented Melock for taking him from his home and dragging him into his battles. Don't get me wrong, Øregård lives for the fight. He's a natural born killer, a real murder machine. But Melock was taming him, attempting to show him the error of his war obsessed ways."

The gnome finished the first bottle, opened a second, and again poured Mevner half, this time directly into his mouth. Then he sat back down next to him on the moss at the base of his tree. 

"You see this particular task wasn't one for nervous types or those faint of heart. And this particular crew was about as tough as they come. Before you start wondering what a little fella like me was doing with these warriors, I should tell you I practice a craft of my own. Like you, I know a few things about magic. My true calling, however, is that of a tinkerer. A builder. A maker of things." 

He smiled at the crippled wizard looking over his damaged body. 

"On the journey that led us beyond these woods, to the shore, and through the decimated remains of the seaside city, I mostly traveled in Øregård's pocket. Our mutual friend carried my materials. The big ox was good at that. 

"When I made his charming acquaintance he was wearing the battle armor of his people. It was made of metal alloys the likes of which I'd never seen before. His armor was damaged and no blacksmith in the land was strong enough to forge it back together. It was Melock and myself who fired a forge with atomic fusion and repaired the holes in his wildly advanced plating. We were also able to sharpen that wicked jagged blade he uses as a sword. 

"The big green bugger was pleased as punch." Grimble chuckled to himself. "The secret weapons and machines he told me about in return inspired my work for years to come."

Grimble looked Mevner in the eye. "Never told you those stories did he?" 

Mevner's blank expression confirmed he hadn't.

"Well, he is more scholarly now, bookish even. I bet that's the Øregård you know?"

A nod confirmed it true. 

"On Øregård's back was my machine, folded into a box and waiting to come to life and be guided by my hand. A metal soldier that I alone controlled." 

He blew out smoke that drifted up into the leafy canopy of the forest. He reached into his jacket pocket, pulled out a small bag, untied it, and produced an almost glowing blue sapphire. 

"What I got from Luhng; the Animator Stone."