“I demand the right to represent my people,” Tasslehoff said proudly, “and take my place on the advisory council.”
Flipping his tassle of brown hair over his shoulder, the kender came to stand right in front of the dragon orb. Looking up, he could see the Whitestone towering over it and over him. Tas stared at the stone, shivering, then quickly turned his gaze from the rock to Gunthar and the Speaker of the Suns.
And then Tasslehoff knew what he had to do. He began to shake with fear. He—Tasslehoff Burrfoot—who’d never been afraid of anything in his life! He’d faced dragons without trembling, but the knowledge of what he was going to do now appalled him. His hands felt as if he’d been making snowballs without gloves on. His tongue seemed to belong in some larger person’s mouth. But Tas was resolute. He just had to keep them talking, keep them from guessing what he planned.
“You’ve never taken us kenders very seriously, you know,” Tas began, his voice sounding too loud and shrill in his own ears, “and I can’t say I blame you much. We don’t have a strong sense of responsibility, I guess, and we are probably too curious for own good—but, I ask you, how are you going to find out anything if you’re not curious?”
Tas could see the Speaker’s face turn to steel, even Lord Gunthar was scowling. The kender edged nearer the dragon orb.
“We cause lots of trouble, I suppose, without meaning to, and occasionally some of us do happen to acquire certain things which aren’t ours. But one thing the kender know is—”
Tasslehoff broke into a run. Quick and lithe as a mouse, he slipped easily through the hands that tried to catch him, reaching the dragon orb within a matter of seconds. Faces blurred around him, mouths opened, shrieking and yelling at him. But they were too late.
In one swift, smooth movement, Tasslehoff hurled the dragon orb at the huge, gleaming Whitestone.
The round, gleaming crystal—its insides swirling in agitation—hung suspended in the air for long, long seconds. Tas wondered if the orb had the power to halt its flight. But it was just a fevered impression in the kender’s mind.
The dragon orb struck the rock and shattered, bursting into a thousand sparkling pieces. For an instant, a ball of milky white smoke hung in the air, as if trying desperately to hold itself together. Then the warm, springlike breeze of the glade caught it and swept it apart.
There was intense, awful silence.
The kender stood, looking calmly down at the shattered dragon orb.
“We know,” he said in a small voice that dropped into the dreadful silence like a tiny drop of rain, “we should be fighting dragons. Not each other.”
No one moved. No one spoke. Then there was a thump.
Gnosh had fainted.
The silence broke—almost as shattering as the breaking of the orb. Lord Gunthar and the Speaker both lunged at Tas. One caught hold of the kender’s left shoulder, one his right.
“What have you done?” Lord Gunthar’s face was livid, his eyes wild as he gripped the kender with trembling hands.
“You have brought death upon us all!” The Speaker’s fingers bit into Tas’s flesh like the claws of a predatory bird. “You have destroyed our only hope!”
“And for that, he himself will be the first to die!”
Porthios–tall, grim-faced elflord—loomed above the cowering kender, his sword glistening in his hand. The kender stood his ground between the elven king and the knight, his small face pale, his expression defiant. He had known when he committed his crime that death would be the penalty.
Tanis will be unhappy over what I’ve done, Tas thought sadly. But at least he’ll hear that I died bravely.
“Now, now, now …” said a sleepy voice. “No one’s going to die! At least not at this moment. Quit waving that sword around, Porthios! Someone’ll get hurt.”
Tas peered out from under a heaving sea of arms and shining armor to see Fizban, yawning, step over the inert body of the gnome and totter toward them. Elves and humans made way for him to pass, as if compelled to do so by an unseen force.
Porthios whirled to face Fizban, so angry that saliva bubbled on his lips and his speech was nearly incoherent.
“Beware, old man, or you will share in the punishment!”
“I said quit waving that sword around,” Fizban snapped irritably, wiggling a finger at the sword.
Porthios dropped his weapon with a wild cry. Clutching his stinging, burning hand, he stared down at the sword in astonishment—the hilt had grown thorns! Fizban came to stand next to the elflord and regarded him angrily.
“You’re a fine young man, but you should have been taught some respect for your elders. I said to put that sword down and I meant it! Maybe you’ll believe me next time!” Fizban’s baleful gaze switched to the Speaker. “And you, Solostaran, were a good man about two hundred years ago. Managed to raise three fine children—three fine children, I said. Don’t give me any of this nonsense about not having a daughter. You have one, and a fine girl she is. More sense than her father. Must take after her mother’s side. Where was I? Oh, yes. You brought up Tanis Half-Elven, too. You know, Solostaran, between the four of these young people, we might save this world yet.
“Now I want everyone to take his seat. Yes, you, too, Lord Gunthar. Come along, Solostaran, I’ll help. We old men have to stick together. Too bad you’re such a damn fool.”
Muttering into his beard, Fizban led the astounded Speaker to his chair. Porthios, his face twisted in pain, stumbled back to his seat with the help of his warriors.
Slowly the assembled elves and knights sat down, murmuring among themselves—all casting dark looks at the shattered dragon orb that lay beneath the Whitestone.
Fizban settled the Speaker in his seat, glowered at Lord Quinath, who thought he had something to say but quickly decided he didn’t. Satisfied, the old mage came back to the front of the Whitestone where Tas stood, shaken and confused.
“You,” Fizban looked at the kender as if he’d never seen him before, “go and attend to that poor chap.” He waved a hand at the gnome, who was still out cold.
Feeling his knees tremble, Tasslehoff walked slowly over to Gnosh and knelt down beside him, glad to look at something other than the angry, fear-filled faces.
“Gnosh,” he whispered miserably, patting the gnome on the cheek, “I’m sorry. I truly am. I mean about your Life Quest and your father’s soul and everything. But there just didn’t seem to be anything else to do.”
Fizban turned around slowly and faced the assembled group, pushing his hat back on his head. “Yes, I’m going to lecture you. You deserve it, every one of you—so don’t sit there looking self-righteous. That kender”—he pointed at Tasslehoff, who cringed—“has more brains beneath that ridiculous topknot of his than the lot of you have put together. Do you know what would have happened to you if the kender hadn’t had the guts to do what he did? Do you? Well, I’ll tell you. Just let me find a seat here.…” Fizban peered around vaguely. “Ah, yes, there …” Nodding in satisfaction, the old mage toddled over and sat down on the ground, leaning his back against the sacred Whitestone!
The assembled knights gasped in horror. Gunthar leaped to his feet, appalled at this sacrilege.
“No mortal can touch the Whitestone!” he yelled, striding forward.
Fizban slowly turned his head to regard the furious knight. “One more word,” the old mage said solemnly, “and I’ll make your moustaches fall off. Now sit down and shut up!”
Sputtering, Gunthar was brought up short by an imperious gesture from the old man. The knight could do nothing but return to his seat.
“Where was I before I was interrupted?” Fizban scowled. Glancing around, his gaze fell on the broken pieces of the orb. “Oh, yes. I was about to tell you a story. One of you would have won the orb, of course. And you would have taken it—either to keep it ‘safe’ or to ‘save the world.’ And, yes, it is capable of saving the world, but only if you know how to use it. Who of you has this knowledge? Who has the stren
gth? The orb was created by the greatest, most powerful mages of old. All the most powerful—do you understand? It was created by those of the White Robes and those of the Black Robes. It has the essence of both evil and good. The Red Robes brought both essences together and bound them with their force. Few there are now with the power and strength to understand the orb, to fathom its secrets, and to gain mastery over it. Few indeed”—Fizban’s eyes gleamed—“and none who sit here!”
Silence had fallen now, a profound silence as they listened to the old mage, whose voice was strong and carried above the rising wind that was blowing the storm clouds from the sky.
“One of you would have taken the orb and used it, and you would have found that you had hurled yourself upon disaster. You would have been broken as surely as the kender broke the orb. As for hope being shattered, I tell you that hope was lost for a time, but now it has been new born—”
A sudden gust of wind caught the old mage’s hat, blowing it off his head and tossing it playfully away from him. Snarling in irritation, Fizban crawled forward to pick it up.
Just as the mage leaned over, the sun broke through the clouds. There was a blazing flash of silver, followed by a splintering, deafening crack as though the land itself had split apart.
Half-blinded by the flaring light, people blinked and gazed in fear and awe at the terrifying sight before their eyes.
The Whitestone had been split asunder.
The old magician lay sprawled at its base, his hat clutched in his hand, his other arm flung over his head in terror. Above him, piercing the rock where he had been sitting, was a long weapon made of gleaming silver. It had been thrown by the silver arm of a black man, who walked over to stand beside it. Accompanying him were three people: an elven woman dressed in leather armor, an old, white-bearded dwarf, and Elistan.
Amid the stunned silence of the crowd, the black man reached out and lifted the weapon from the splintered remains of the rock. He held it high above his head, and the silver barbed point glittered brightly in the rays of the midday sun.
“I am Theros Ironfeld,” the man called out in a deep voice, “and for the last month I have been forging these!” He shook the weapon in his hand. “I have taken molten silver from the well hidden deep within the heart of the Monument of the Silver Dragon. With the silver arm given me by the gods, I have forged the weapon as legend foretold. And this I bring to you—to all the people of Krynn—that we may join together and defeat the great evil that threatens to engulf us in darkness forever.
“I bring you—the Dragonlance!”
With that, Theros thrust the weapon deep into the ground. It stood, straight and shining, amid the broken pieces of the dragon orb.
7
An unexpected journey.
And now my task is finished,” Laurana said. “I am free to leave.”
“Yes,” Elistan said slowly, “and I know why you leave”—Laurana flushed and lowered her eyes—“but where will you go?”
“Silvanesti,” she replied. “The last place I saw him.”
“Only in a dream—”
“No, that was more than a dream,” Laurana replied, shuddering. “It was real. He was there. He is alive and I must find him.”
“Surely, my dear, you should stay here, then,” Elistan suggested. “You say that in the dream he had found a dragon orb. If he has it, he will come to Sancrist.”
Laurana did not answer. Unhappy and irresolute, she stared out the window of Lord Gunthar’s castle where she, Elistan, Flint, and Tasslehoff were staying as his guests.
She should have been with the elves. Before they left Whitestone Glade, her father had asked her to come back with them to Southern Ergoth. But Laurana refused. Although she did not say it, she knew she would never live among her people again.
Her father had not pressed her, and—in his eyes—she saw that he heard her unspoken words. Elves aged by years, not by days, as did humans. For her father, it seemed as if time had accelerated and he was changing even as she watched. She felt as though she were seeing him through Raistlin’s hourglass eyes, and the thought was terrifying. Yet the news she brought him only increased his bitter unhappiness.
Gilthanas had not returned. Nor could Laurana tell her father where his beloved son had gone, for the journey he and Silvara made was dark and fraught with peril. Laurana told her father only that Gilthanas was not dead.
“You know where he is?” the Speaker asked after a pause.
“I do,” Laurana answered, “or rather—I know where he goes.”
“And you cannot speak of this, even to me, his father?”
Laurana shook her head steadfastly. “No, Speaker, I cannot. Forgive me, but we agreed when the decision was made to undertake this desperate action that those of us who knew would tell no one. No one,” she repeated.
“So you do not trust me—”
Laurana sighed. Her eyes went to the shattered Whitestone. “Father,” she said, “you nearly went to war … with the only people who can help save us.…”
Her father had not replied, but—in his cool farewell and in the way he leaned upon the arm of his elder child—he made it clear to Laurana that he now had only one child.
Theros went with the elves. Following his dramatic presentation of the dragonlance, the Council of Whitestone had voted unanimously to make more of these weapons and unite all races in the fight against the dragonarmies.
“At present,” Theros announced, “we have only those few lances I was able to forge by myself within a month’s time, and I bring several ancient lances the silver dragons hid at the time the dragons were banished from the world. But we’ll need more, many more. I need men to help me!”
The elves agreed to provide men to help make the dragonlances, but whether or not they would help fight—
“That remains a matter we must discuss,” the Speaker said.
“Don’t discuss it too long,” Flint Fireforge snapped, “or you might find yourself discussing it with a Dragon Highlord.”
“The elves keep their own counsel and ask for no advice from dwarves,” the Speaker replied coldly. “Besides, we do not even know if these lances work! The legend said they were to be forged by one of the Silver Arm, that is certain. But it also says that the Hammer of Kharas was needed in the forging. Where is the Hammer now?” he asked Theros.
“The Hammer could not be brought here in time, even if it could be kept from the dragonarmies. The Hammer of Kharas was required in days of old, because man’s skill was not sufficient by itself to produce the lances. Mine is,” he added proudly. “You saw what the lance did to that rock.”
“We shall see what it does to dragons,” the Speaker said, and the Second Council of Whitestone drew to a close. Gunthar proposed at the last that the lances Theros had brought with him be sent to the knights in Palanthas.
These thoughts passed through Laurana’s mind as she stared out across the bleak winter landscape. It would be snowing in the valley soon, Lord Gunthar said.
I cannot stay here, Laurana thought, pressing her face against the chill glass. I shall go mad.
“I’ve studied Gunthar’s maps,” she murmured, almost speaking to herself, “and I’ve seen the location of the dragonarmies. Tanis will never reach Sancrist. And if he does have the orb, he may not know the danger it poses. I must warn him.”
“My dear, you’re not talking sensibly,” Elistan said mildly. “If Tanis cannot reach Sancrist safely, how will you reach him? Think logically, Laurana—”
“I don’t want to think logically!” Laurana cried, stomping her foot and glaring angrily at the cleric. “I’m sick of being sensible! I’m tired of this whole war. I’ve done my part—more than my part. I just want to find Tanis!”
Seeing Elistan’s sympathetic face, Laurana sighed. “I’m sorry, my dear friend. I know what you say is true,” she said, ashamed. “But I can’t stay here and do nothing!”
Though Laurana didn’t mention it, she had another concern. That hum
an woman, that Kitiara. Where was she? Were they together as she had seen in the dream? Laurana realized now, suddenly, that the remembered image of Kitiara standing with Tanis’s arm around her was more disturbing than the image she had seen of her own death.
At that moment, Lord Gunthar suddenly entered the room.
“Oh!” he said, startled, seeing Elistan and Laurana. “I’m sorry, I hope I am not disturbing—”
“Please, no, come in,” Laurana said quickly.
“Thank you,” Gunthar said, stepping inside and carefully shutting the door, first glancing down the hallway to make certain no one was near. He joined them at the window. “Actually I needed to talk to you both, anyway. I sent Wills looking for you. This is best, however. No one knows we’re speaking.”
More intrigue, Laurana thought wearily. Throughout their journey to Gunthar’s castle, she had heard about nothing but the political infighting that was destroying the Knighthood.
Shocked and outraged at Gunthar’s story of Sturm’s trial, Laurana had gone before a Council of Knights to speak in Sturm’s defense. Although the appearance of a woman at a Council was unheard of, the knights were impressed by this vibrant, beautiful young woman’s eloquent speech on Sturm’s behalf. The fact that Laurana was a member of the royal elven household, and that she had brought the dragonlances, also spoke highly in her favor.
Even Derek’s faction—those that remained—were hard-pressed to fault her. But the knights had been unable to reach a decision. The man appointed to stand in Lord Alfred’s place was strongly in Derek’s tent—as the phrase went—and Lord Michael had vacillated to such a degree that Gunthar had been forced to throw the matter to an open vote. The knights demanded a period of reflection and the meeting was adjourned. They had reconvened this afternoon. Apparently, Gunthar had just come from this meeting.
Laurana knew, from the look on Gunthar’s face, that things had gone favorably. But if so, why the maneuvering?
“Sturm’s been pardoned?” she asked.
Gunthar grinned and rubbed his hands together. “Not pardoned, my dear. That would have implied his guilt. No. He has been completely vindicated! I pushed for that. Pardon would not have suited us at all. His knighthood is granted. He has his command officially bestowed upon him. And Derek is in serious trouble!”
Dragons of Winter Night Page 35
