Canticle (Forgotten Realms: The Cleric Quintet, #1)

by R.A. Salvatore

Pikel was a bit more round-shouldered, an attribute exaggerated by his loose-fitting, drooping robes. His beard was green that tenday, for he had dyed it in honor of the visiting druids. Pikel liked druids, a fact that made his brother roll his eyes and blush. It wasn’t usual that a dwarf would get on well with woodland folk, but Pikel was far from usual. Rather than let his beard hang loose to his toes, as did Ivan, he parted it in the middle and pulled it back over his huge ears, braiding it together with his hair to hang halfway down his back. It looked rather silly to Ivan, but Pikel, the library’s cook, thought it practical for keeping his beard out of the soup. Besides, Pikel didn’t wear the boots common to his race; he wore sandals—a gift from the druids—and his long beard tickled his free-wiggling, gnarly toes.