-- How Eurmal stole the Lawstaff. This happened once when Orlanth was away from the tula fighting the Fire Tribe. He had left Elmal in charge of things while he was away and asked Vinga to help guard the stead as he was taking the other Thunder Brothers with him. After a while Barntar and Odayla came to Elmal asking for his ruling about a piece of land. Barntar spoke first;
"Sun Thane, the fire tribe has burnt my fields and nothing will grow
there now. We have rich lands, but Odayla won't let me cut down the trees to make more fields. Must our people starve because he wants to hunt?" Then Odayla spoke;
"Sun Thane, we need large forests to hunt in or the game will go
elsewhere. We don't need more fields, but more hunters would bring in more game." Elmal sat quiet for a while thinking about the problem, then he said.
"This is a difficult matter you bring before me and I am unsure how to
rule. I will get the Lawstaff to help me." He went into Orlanth's stead where he lived when Orlanth was away, to fetch the staff, but when he opened the chest he discovered that it was gone. All he could find was some rat droppings. When Elmal told the Clan what had happened everyone was worried, how could there be justice without the Lawstaff? Vinga said that she would look for it and walked away which made them feel better. Still the problem between Barntar and Odayla remained and had to be resolved, so Elmal made a ruling;
"I must make a decision here, but I do it relucantly. We have enough
grain to spare and we need the forest to hunt in. I rule we leave the forest untouched." Odayla was pleased with the decision, but Barntar was angry and was heard to mutter about "Once of the fire tribe, always of the fire tribe." Shortly afterwards Kesta came to Elmal with a worried frown.
"The rats have gotten into the grain, if we don't do anything soon I
won't be able to make bread. And someone has been drinking the ale." Vinga who had been looking for the lawstaff walked by. She'd found the rat droppings in Orlanth's treasure chest and when she heard this she was worried as she liked the ale. She went to see how much ale was gone and almost stumbled on Eurmal who had curled up in a corner. He was fast asleep and someone had thrown an old blanket over him. When Orlanth went away Eurmal thought he could get away with his tricks easier, so he had sneaked into Orlanth's stead disguised as a mouse and stolen the lawstaff. When he came out he saw Yinkin and panicked. He scambered into the nearest house and hid in the grain. As he was lying there he got hungry so he dropped the staff and started snacking on the grain. Then he got thirsty and crawled out of the grain and into one of the ale kegs and drank it all. Now, this was some of Minlister's best ale so Eurmal got very drunk and very sleepy. He just managed to get out of the keg and turn back into his own form before he fell asleep. When Vinga saw him there she suddenly realized he had a tail! He'd been so drunk he forgot the tail and it was now sticking out from under the blanket. She had no idea what he'd been up to - but as he was always up to something she quickly grabbed the tail and yanked hard. Eurmal yelped and tried to get away, terrified of Vinga who always beat him. He squirmed and changed into a rat, a snake, a bull and a raven, but Vinga had a good grip on his tail and wouldn't let go. She beat him some more and he finally confessed the whole thing. When Elmal learned that the grain risked running out he summoned Barntar and Odayla.
"I made a bad decision earlier" he said. "I didn't know how to rule when
I didn't have the lawstaff, but I've been thinking about this hard." Barntar and Odyla looked at each other, confused. He had made his ruling, how could he make new one?
"I made the ruling without knowing enough, that's why it was a bad one."
He explained about the grain and that he had a new solution.
"I will ask Heler to wash away the burnt soil and water the grain. That
should make the fields good again." Barntar and Odayla were both happy with the wise decision and were sorry they had been angry with eachother. Heler who stood nearby readily agreed to this and left just as Vinga returned. In one hand, hanging by his tail she held Eurmal, in the other the Lawstaff and she kept beating him with it. She went up to Elmal and gave him the staff and he thanked her gravely for the help. When the clan learned what Eurmal had done they got very angry and beat him as he was chased away. Vinga was not surpised when she heard what Elmal had done and said "You brough the lawstaff when you came to us, but you also brought youself." --- Cheers, Bo
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