The Rose and the Skull

by Jeff Crook

  His table stood upon a raised dais at the front of the hall, beneath the great tapestry. To his right and left sat Knights of some renown, those who had attained the highest rank—the Order of the Rose, and the leaders of the orders of the Crown and Sword. To the left and right of this main table were two other tables, both very long. The table to the right was occupied by Knights of the Order of the Crown, while at the table to the left sat the Knights of the Order of the Sword. Opposite Gunthar's table stood a fourth table. It was unoccupied, though places had been set for twelve. The four tables formed a great square, and the floor in the middle seethed and boiled with gully dwarves and large gray hounds of the kind used to hunt boar and deer.

  "And so the old man said," Gunthar continued, chuckling to himself, " 'Bring me the good ale, from the barrel beneath the cellar stairs.' Well, you can imagine my surprise! I mean, how on Krynn could he have known about the barrel beneath the stairs? Of course, you've probably all heard that Fizban was really Paladine, so it is perfectly obvious now how he knew about the barrel beneath the stairs, but at the time I was very much taken aback. And of course, he had a kender with him… ."

  Gunthar laughed at the memory for a long time. His eyes seemed to get lost in the smoky shadows of the ceiling. He didn't finish his tale, at least not out loud, although it appeared from the smiles that occasionally danced across his thin lips that he was telling it to himself.

  But no one of any real importance was listening. While the Knights caroused and the hounds cracked bones, gully dwarves licked spilled wine from the flagstones and Gunthar silently reminisced, a lone gully dwarf stood on the floor before Gunthar's table, apparently enraptured. It was almost as though he really understood what the old man had been saying. Gully dwarves were the lowest of all creation, despised by nearly every race upon Krynn. As a people, they were universally filthy, stupid, greedy, and malicious—traits they themselves took pride in and cultivated. Most people, in fact, would rather their homes be infested with plague-carrying rats than gully dwarves. But Gunthar seemed to tolerate them well enough, and they did provide a few moments of diversion for the Knights gathered to feast in Gunthar's hall.

  It was highly unlikely that this particular gully dwarf had the slightest conception of what Gunthar was saying. More likely, he had eaten something that didn't agree with him (another rare occurrence in gully dwarf annals!) and was simply waiting for it to pass, and the smile on his face was like the smile of a human baby under similar distress. It just so happened that he was facing Lord Gunthar when the attack overtook him, and thus the source of confusion. Or if he did understand a word or two, his attention was probably caught by the mention of ale and food, and he was only waiting to hear these words again.

  In any case, as the old man resumed his seat, like his image reflected in a carnival mirror the gully dwarf sank to the floor in front of him. His baggy clothes collapsed around him, until he looked like a half-empty sack of potatoes topped by a small dirty face with a bulbous nose and big, watery, and rather mousy eyes. Atop his head, he wore a ragged fur cap of rat hides loosely stitched. His own hair stuck out through the holes in the cap, which gave him the look of someone who has just woken up.

  As Gunthar finished, a cloud of quiet sadness darkened his eyes. His gaze strayed to the window that overlooked the courtyard to the east, and he sighed deeply, shaking his head.

  "I agree, milord," said the Knight to Gunthar's right, mistaking the cause of the old man's sudden sadness. "These young Knights have no respect for the old tales or the old ways."

  Gunthar started from his reverie. "What's that, Liam?" he asked.

  "I was mentioning the lack of respect of the younger generation for the tales of the old days," the Knight said, his face stern as he eyed the other Knights.

  "They'd like to be making their own tales, my friend," Gunthar said, "not listening to the rehashing of all our old adventures."

  "But don't we pull lessons from the past and apply their wisdom to the future?" Liam asked his elderly master. "How can they expect to triumph on the battlefield if they don't listen to and learn from those who fought before them?"

  "The old orders are passing away, Liam. Things aren't as they were when I was young, or even when you were young. The old lessons no longer apply. As Sturm taught us, rules and measures are fleeting. They must change with time or become useless and burdensome. For the Knight, the only thing that remains constant through all that change is his honor." Gunthar smiled. "Or her honor," he amended as he glanced around the room. Of those Knights gathered at this feast, almost half their number were women. A few sat at Gunthar's own table.

  "Yes, milord," Liam acquiesced as he lifted a cup of wine to his lips.

  "And who knows, perhaps one day even these ragged creatures," Gunthar continued, indicating with a wave of his hand the score or more gully dwarves moiling on the floor with the dogs, "perhaps even they will take their place at this table."

  Liam choked and set down his cup.

  "Or even kender. Paladine forgive us if we do." Gunthar laughed.

  Liam's face grew pale. "Milord?" he gasped.

  Gunthar laughed and placed his hand on the shoulder of his friend and fellow Knight. "Oh, don't worry Liam. Such changes are not in my destiny to make. Perhaps, when I am gone and you take my seat at this table, circumstances will dictate that you implement such a drastic change to our ancient order. Or perhaps the one who succeeds you will do it. Who knows? I merely speculate.

  Stranger things have happened."

  "Yes, milord Gunthar," Liam said.

  "Now, mark that little one there on the floor," Gunthar said good-naturedly as he speared a hunk of roast with his fork and used it to point at the gully dwarf sitting on the floor before their table. "He's not like the others of his kind. If ever there was Knightly material among the Aghar, he is it. Watch how he follows my every word."

  "I think he is more interested in your food, milord," Liam said, noticing how the gully dwarf's mouth had dropped open at the sight of a piece of meat being waved at him. A long string of drool dribbled down his chin and rolled off the thistley mass of his beard and onto his shirt, joining the stains of a thousand others there.

  "Nonsense. He understands every word I say. Don't you, my boy?" Gunthar finished by shouting.

  The gully dwarf nodded vigorously, upsetting his ratskin cap. It dropped down over his eyes. With a snarl, he grabbed it and bit it, rolling over backwards, tumbling a large dog, which then fell on top of him. A second gully dwarf, thinking the first had caught something tasty, leaped in for a bite. Both vanished in a swirl of gray-furred bodies and filthy, baggy clothes. Gunthar roared with laughter.

  "As you say, milord," Liam said.

  "Why so formal this eventide, Liam? Whatever is the matter with you?" Gunthar asked.

  "May I be frank?" Liam asked.

  "Be whoever you like. This is supposed to be a festive occasion," Gunthar joked.

  Liam returned his master's attempt at jocularity with a hard stare. The old man's smile faded. Liam then said, "Milord is too lenient with these younger Knights. Listen how they carouse, like common adventurers in some seedy wilderness alehouse. One can hardly hear oneself think in here. They have no respect for your lordship or your house, and milord does nothing when they trample his hospitality. They assault the servants in word and deed, and milord does nothing. We gather here to feast for the slightest of reasons, while the Knighthood deteriorates."

  "Well, I just thought…" Gunthar began, but Liam continued.

  "Our numbers dwindle, and we replace our losses, out of necessity, under less strict guidelines. This rabble is the result. And rather than using the old Measure to enforce some sort of discipline, milord allows them a free rein," he said.

  Gunthar rose from his seat, and though old, his stature was nonetheless dominating. Some parts of the room grew quiet, sensing the sudden tension. The small gully dwarf crawled from beneath a pile of dogs and other gully dwarfs, his rat-skin
cap intact but sporting a few new holes. He resumed his seat on the floor before the table, his little black eyes fixed expectantly upon his master.

  Gunthar turned to the others at his own table. "Is this true? Do others feel that I am too lenient?" he asked, not in a loud voice, so the others would not hear.

  No one responded. Most seemed absorbed in fiddling with the food on their plates. Only two seemed confident enough to return their master's gaze—a female Knight with fiery locks sitting at the left end of the table, and a balding male Knight sitting to Liam's right.

  "Lady Meredith, is this how you feel?" Gunthar asked the first.

  She opened her mouth to respond but then shut it and merely nodded, turning her attention to the servant refilling her cup.

  "Quintayne?" Gunthar then said, turning.

  The balding Knight nervously smoothed the wisps of hair still covering his pate. "Out of respect for your lordship…" he began. "Well, we thought it best to… um… well, we thought we could… um… "

  "We did not feel it was our place to tell your lordship how to maintain the affairs of his own house," Liam finished.

  "Until now," Gunthar said. He slowly resumed his seat.

  "I am sorry, milord," Liam said in a low voice.

  "Yes, yes, I know Liam. No need to apologize," Gunthar sighed. "Perhaps I am a bit too lenient, but it is only because they are so young. Unlike most of us, who knew from the day we were born that we would become Knights, most of these young people never dreamed that they could one day join our ranks. While we were born and bred with discipline every moment of our lives, they are the children of war and know only the civilian's code of survival. I think if we treat them too harshly, many would leave us.

  "A time will come, soon I think, when they shall be forced to learn the hard measures of discipline. We live in relative peace now, but as you all know, in war the only thing that sets us above the rest is the discipline among our ranks on the battlefield. We fight not as a body of individual soldiers but as a single unit, and only our unquestioning devotion to our duty, as defined by the Rule and the Measure, makes this possible."

  "This is what we fear most, milord," Liam said fervently, his dark eyes flashing. "When the time comes that they must submit to discipline and direction, they will be unable to do so. Better to teach them now, in peace, than in the fires of war, where one mistake can mean disaster."

  "They shall learn their lessons hard or not at all," Gunthar patiently argued. "That is the way of the younger generation. But they'll learn the Measure and the reason for it in practice, not in books or lectures from boring old men. Those who survive will be the better for it."

  "But how many will die, how many battles will be lost before they learn?" Liam protested.

  "You only have to win one battle to win the war, Liam," Gunthar said, "the last one."

  Liam looked away lest his anger get the better of him. None of the other Knights turned his way; most picked at their food or pretended to sip at their wine. A few of the Knights at the other tables had grown quiet and were trying to listen to the dispute between their elders. The tension at the head table had even been noticed by the gully dwarves and hounds, who pricked up their ears and waited for something to happen.

  For the moment they waited in vain. While Liam collected himself, the female Knight at the end of Gunthar's table said, "Milord Gunthar, we have feasted here three times this month, each time under the nominal excuse of discussing some aspect of your revisions to the Measure of Knightly Conduct. If we only knew why you have called us here tonight, perhaps it would set some hearts at ease."

  "At ease, Lady Meredith? What do you fear?" Gunthar asked.

  "Milord, we waste away with luxury and feasting," Quintayne responded before she could answer. "We want fighting and adventure, not more meat and wine." From those younger Knights listening there came many an "Aye!" and an occasional "More meat and wine!"

  Meredith scowled at her fellow Knight, but she said, "Sir Quintayne is right. There are many Knights here still in need of their quests. We wonder when these will be assigned."

  "Yes, yes, I know. We will get around to that when time allows," Gunthar said.

  "When time allows!" Liam whispered incredulously.

  "There is still much to do here. We can't be sending our forces all over creation fulfilling quests, not while danger lurks at our back door," Gunthar said.

  "Danger?" Liam asked.

  "Have you forgotten Pyrothraxus? The dragon who holds all the northern half of our island, including the homeland of the gnomes? As the wise man said, it is never good to leave a live dragon out of your calculations."

  "If you are so worried about the gnomes, we should send some knights to try and rescue them," Meredith suggested.

  "Or we could send someone to rescue the dragon from the gnomes," Quintayne said. Gunthar snorted, and there were chuckles all around.

  "We shouldn't stir up the anger of the dragon," Liam chided the others. "He's left us alone for the most part, and we are not yet strong enough to challenge him. No need to bring his anger down upon us now."

  "Liam is right. For the moment, we watch and defend, and spend our time fortifying and garrisoning our northern castles," Gunthar said.

  "Garrisoning? With whom?" Meredith asked. "Our numbers are slow to rebuild, even with the relaxation of our admission standards."

  "That is why I have called you all here tonight, to discuss revisions to the Measure concerning the admission of Knights into our order," Gunthar said. Liam groaned, as did many of the others.

  Twice already this month, Gunthar had summoned them from their castles all across the Isle of Sancrist to feast and discuss this very same topic. Nothing had been settled then, and most doubted anything would be settled now. In truth, the majority of Knights in attendance this evening didn't care. The reputation of Gunthar's table was known throughout Krynn. No one turned down an invitation to dine there. So what if it meant listening to the old man babble for a while? They received a hearty meal in the bargain, not to mention all the wine and ale they could drink. It had been this way for going on two years now, and the younger Knights hoped it would go on for quite a few more. The older Knights were a different story altogether. They began to whisper to one another, pausing occasionally to turn worried glances upon their Grand Master.

  "Now, before you start complaining, let me say that what I shall propose tonight is not without precedent. I am but building upon what has gone before us. I'll not say any more about it until after supper, when the Grand Chapter is convened. So enjoy your meat, and there is plenty of wine to go round."

  A cheer went up from the tables of the younger Knights. "Well, at least they heard me say that," Gunthar said in Liam's ear. Liam chuckled, despite himself.

  "Don't be angry with me, my old friend," Gunthar continued privately to Liam. "I need you beside me. I need your strength of will and purpose to help me muddle through. My revisions to the Measure of Knightly Conduct will be my parting gift to the order, but it consumes so much of my time and energy. Without your help in the mundane affairs of the Knighthood, I simply could not manage. I could not have chosen a better protege, student, or friend."

  Liam's face softened at these words. Gunthar studied his friend's face, seeing with fatherly eyes the young Knight of twenty years before, though of late strands of gray frosted his temples. Proud chin, stern brow, dark and brooding eyes, Liam was ever, from then to now, the picture of seriousness. Some of the younger Knights called him "Old Stone Face," for even when angry, his features remained like carved marble. Only the flaring of his nostrils and the quivering of his long, black Solamnic mustaches betrayed his feelings, whether of mirth or of rage. Gunthar knew that Liam's cold manner, considered aloof by most, was but his way of showing his great love for the Knighthood. Still, he hoped that someday Liam would learn compassion, that he'd learn to see things from both sides and not see the world always in black and white.

  "You are stubborn, my fri
end, stubborn and rigid as an elven prince," Gunthar continued. "You love the Knighthood so much you don't want to see it change. But without change, a living thing stagnates and dies. The Knighthood is a living thing, like an ancient tree of the forest, greater than both of us, older, grander. As long as we let it live and breath and grow, it will go on when we are gone. We each have the power to destroy it, by strangling it with our love for it. That is what happened in the past, in the days before the War of the Lance. Great men with the best of intentions tried to strengthen the order by making it more and more rigid. It took a lowly Knight, Sturm Brightblade, and his sacrifice at the High Clerist's Tower, to show us that without the Oath, Est Solarus oth Mithas—my honor is my life— the Measure is meaningless."

  "I've heard all this before, milord," Liam said, smiling patiently.

  "Well, hear it again, and understand it better, Liam. If I teach you nothing else, I hope I teach you this. An honorable Knight does the right thing, even without the Measure. The Measure is this," he said as he snapped his fingers. "It is nothing, without honor.

  "These young Knights were admitted based upon their innate sense of honor. For most of them, it wasn't something they were taught, like we were. They learned it on their own, much as Sturm did. Granted, they are undisciplined, but they are not a rabble. When the time comes, their honor will stand them in good stead. You must learn to trust the younger generation and have hope in them, for they are not entirely hopeless."

  Liam's eyebrows raised at these words. He turned to look at the carousing horde filling Gunthar's tables, their chins dripping with gravy and their cups more often raised for refilling than in toast. They shouted, laughed, jostled each other in friendly roughhousing, tossed bones and scraps to the gully dwarves and hounds, and laid wagers on who would get which bone and how long he would keep it. Many were Solamnic by birth, once a concrete requirement for entrance into the Knighthood, but now no longer; a growing number of non-Solamnics were filling the ranks, from Abanasinia, Northern Ergoth, the lands around Balifor, Kalaman, Tarsis, even in one case, a barbarian of Estwilde. Many had fled the coming of the great dragons and the destruction these powerful new dragons were causing to the lands of Krynn. Most had been children during the Chaos War, and they were marked by it, having been forced to grow up too soon. One noticed it most in their eyes; at one moment joyful, filled with mirth and good humor, the next quiet and resigned. They lived for the moment, knowing the moments could be few.