Anyway, this one explains more about Ember. It's got a little bit less humor (or else just a different kind of humor) than the others. I hope you like it.
Cheers from Fantysm!
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Trademeet was quite loud for a town of its size, and it soon became louder. A dwarf with purple tattoos on her face and dark brown plaits in her hair entered the tavern, followed by another dwarf wearing a spiky helmet. After them, a grey-bearded dwarf with a menacing look on his face and a green-haired, grey-eyed, sour-looking dwarf stomped in. Two red-headed dwarves and a slender blonde dwarf brought up the rear. The seven seated themselves around a table, the grey-bearded one immediately calling for drinks.
"Well, it is here I must leave you. I must go to my home and see what needs doing so badly they've called me away from my profession," Ember, the blonde one, said to the party.
The rest of the Dwarven Horde was not listening. The purple-tattooed one, called Mauri, was blushing while talking animatedly with Kagain, the one with the spiky helmet. Korgan, the one who had called for drinks, was engaged in a drinking contest with Unger, one of the red-heads. The green-haired one had a dagger out and was scratching rude messages into the wood of the table-top. Only Yeslick, the second red-head, was listening to her.
"I can help ye," he offered.
Ember glanced at the Horde again, then nodded warily. "Alright."
The pair of them stepped outside. It was a crisp but sunny day, and altogether it was a pleasant walk across the square to Ember's house. Ember and Yeslick stopped in front of the door.
"Oh, hold on," she said, reached into her belt pouch and extracting a large tarantula. She put the spider on her shoulder, where it clicked its mandibles happily and settled in. Yeslick stared at it, wide-eyed. Ember noticed.
"Don't worry about him," she advised. "This is Oscar, my familiar."
"Your . . . familiar?" Yeslick said faintly.
She nodded. "Yep. Oscar's a sweetie, really. He sleeps most of the time, but he's awake today. Aren't you, Oscar?" She stroked the spider's stomach and it chirped in pleasure. "Shall we go in?"
Yeslick followed Ember inside and was immediately blasted with a group of chattering people. He looked around in amazement. There were some dwarves present, but also some shorter, thinner people with large noses. The majority of the group looked to be somewhere in between.
"Oh, Ember! We're so glad you've come home!"
"Hey, cousin! Who's this? Is he your boyfriend? Ember's got a boyfriend, Ember's got a boyfriend . . ."
"Where have you been, dear?"
"It's great to see you, sis!"
"Killed any big monsters, Great-Aunt Ember? Have ya, have ya?"
"Did you get me anything?"
Finally, the talk died down and Ember spoke. "Everyone, I'd like to you meet Yeslick. He's a friend of mine, and I expect you to treat him as such. Now, down to business. Why have you asked me to come home? Is something wrong?"
"Ah . . . no," an older woman said. She seemed to be Ember's mother. "We need you to babysit."
Ember's eyes grew wide in horror. "You can't mean . . . oh, no."
The crowd parted and a small gnomish boy emerged from around the thigh area of the group. He had the same blonde curls as Ember, but his eyes were bright, shiny blue instead of green. Yeslick didn't know what Ember was so worried about; he appeared to be a pretty nice kid.
"I'm afraid so," the woman said, sighing heavily. "You've got to babysit him for the day. It's only for today, dear. Please, we need this favor."
"Alright," Ember said resignedly. She held out her hand to the little boy. "C'mon, Seth."
He took her hand docilely and she led him out of the house.
"What's so bad about this lad?" Yeslick asked quietly as Seth skipped in front of them, his flyaway curls bouncing.
Ember swallowed hard and cleared her throat. "Well, you see, Seth . . . he's incredibly smart for his age, and curious about everything. That can be a dangerous combination. Seth, don't touch that!" The little gnome had just spotted a dead mouse in the courtyard and had gone over to examine it more closely. Ember hurried over to the boy and steered him away from the decomposing animal.
"Seth, this is Yeslick," she said. "Yeslick, this is my nephew, Seth."
Yeslick was slightly confused as to how her nephew could be a gnome when she herself was a dwarf, but he wisely said nothing, instead smiling in what he hoped was a kind way at the little boy.
"Have you ever seen a real dwarf before? One that wasn't related to you?" Ember asked Seth in a strained, bright voice.
"No," Seth said, fixing his unblinking blue stare on Yeslick. "But I seen a dragon. And I killed a bunny once."
Ember gasped. "Seth! Why would you kill a defenseless little rabbit?"
"It had sharp teeth, Aunt Ember," he said. "And it talked."
"Oh, it talked, did it?" Ember looked over Seth's head at Yeslick and hid a smile.
"Uh-huh."
"What did it say?"
"It said it was gonna be king of Toril 'cause it was a Ball-something."
"Well," Ember sighed heavily. "Go on and play, Seth. Stay where I can see you. Yeslick and I will be sitting on this bench." Seth wandered away as the two dwarves sat down.
Ember shook her head and put her face in her hands. "I try," she said through her fingers. "The gods know I try."
Yeslick wasn't quite sure how to answer this, so he tried a question of his own. "Ah . . . how is it that your nephew is a gnome and you . . . um . . . you aren't?"
Ember took her head out of her hands to stare at him incredulously. "You mean, all this time you didn't know?"
"Uh . . . what?" Yeslick was quite sure he was making himself look like an utter moron, but he didn't know what else to say.
"My family's been intermarrying for generations, Yeslick. I don't even know if I'm half and half; or if I'm more gnome than dwarf, or more dwarf than gnome," Ember explained. "Suffice to say, I'm part gnome and part dwarf. Although there might even be a little halfling sprinkled in there somewhere along the line."
Yeslick was stunned by this revelation. "Ah . . . no. No, I didn't know that."
"Oh. Well, that's fine. As long as you don't have any problems with it."
"Nah. Gnomes are alright little buggers, as long as you stop their stories before they start."
Ember chuckled. "You're right about that. My relatives can be long-winded, to say --- SETH! What are you doing?!" The sorceress sprang up to drag Seth away from the new entertainment he had found --- jumping in mud puddles.
She brought him back over to the fountain, muttering to herself. "A simple cantrip will clean you up," she said, casting the spell over her nephew. The muddy spots and water-stains on his skin and clothes vanished as if they had never been there.
"Now don't get into any more trouble, alright?" Ember scolded. Seth nodded mutely then waited for Ember to turn away before immediately climbing the statues of the Heroes of Trademeet. The statue of a young knight seemed to frown at the little gnome as he scaled the statue's armored stone leg.
"Seth, how much candy have you eaten today?" Ember asked, exasperated. She craned her neck to look up at him.
"Mama let me have a cupcake for breakfast, Aunt Ember," he replied. "And candied turnips."
"Oh, yuck," she murmured under her breath. Yeslick grinned. It seemed that Ember had not inherited the usual gnomish love of root vegetables.
"If you come down from there I'll tell you a story," Ember said. "I'll tell you about how my friends and I defeated a big group of undead."
"What's undead?"
"If you come down, I'll tell you. Come down, Seth. Don't hurt yourself."
Seth replied by sticking out his tongue. Yeslick snickered, then went into a coughing fit as Ember glared at him.
"I'll give you money?" Ember bribed him.
Seth paused in his ascent. "How much?"
"Five gold."
"Wow!" Seth climbed down the statues as fast as he could and held out his hand, blue eyes shining in anticipation. Five round gold discs were deposited into the tiny palm, and Seth ran off to spend it at once. Yeslick and Ember stood up slowly to follow the rambunctious six-year-old.
"See, Yeslick," Ember began. "This is why I never married and had children of my own. I have my hands full already with my sister's son."
"I . . . see," Yeslick said.
"Ah, but Seth can be a real sweetheart sometimes," Ember said, smiling fondly at her nephew, who was currently jumping up and down in front of a stall in the market that sold all sorts of pastries and confections. He looked over and waved cheerfully before accepting two cubes of fudge. Ember waved back.
"He is . . . bearable, I suppose," Yeslick agreed, not really understanding what she meant. From what he had seen, Seth was no sweetheart.
Seth bounded over and handed one of the fudge cubes to Ember. "I got you some fudge, Aunt Ember," he said, beaming, before attacking his own. Smears of chocolate covered his face and hands, which Ember soon cleaned off.
After they finished their snack, Ember picked up Seth and put him on her back, his small arms twined around her neck. She looked at Yeslick. "Well, I suppose I'll be going now. Perhaps I'll come back to the tavern tonight, perhaps not, but as for now, I'm spending some quality time with my nephew." And she trotted off, Seth perched on her back, calling 'Faster, Aunt Ember, faster!'
Yeslick watched them go, then turned and headed back to Trademeet's tavern. He had a lot to think about.
