by Jean Rabe
The gray man giggled and stretched his fingers toward Huma’s lance, felt the intense vibrations of energy the weapon loosed into the air. “I saw how the lance burned Khellendros,” he whispered. “It will not burn me. I am not so evil as the overlord. No, not evil. Not at all. I just want to return home. Pity that the humans who once wielded this magnificent weapon could not feel this power.” He edged his hands closer to the lance handle. “Pity. Such a... argh!” The surge of power scalded him as if he’d thrust his hands in boiling oil. Waves of energy crashed into his tiny form, jarring him, sending him reeling and writhing to the cavern floor.
Through a haze, the dark huldrefolk shuddered uncontrollably and glanced at his seared skin. “Khellendros... cast a spell on the items... warded them. He did not trust me.” He gasped for breath, then mercifully lost consciousness.
Overhead, Khellendros banked toward the southeast, toward Malystryx’s realm. The first rays of the setting sun painted his desert a pale red. “No,” Khellendros murmured softly. “The faerie is far less of a threat.”
*
The ground was cracked like a dry riverbed: flat, desolate, and warm beneath the claws of the five dragons gathered in a circle atop it.
Gellidus, the white dragon overlord, did his best to veil his discomfort at his hot surroundings and stared straight ahead at the distant mountain, the Peak of Malys, ringed by glowing volcanoes. Called Frost by men, ruler of ice-covered Southern Ergoth, he presented a stark contrast to Malystryx. Frost’s scales were small and glistening, white as snow. His crest looked like a halo of inverted icicles, and his tail was short and thick compared to the other dragons.
The red overlord was easily twice Frost’s size, with shield-shaped scales the hue of freshly drawn blood. Massive twin horns curled into the air, and twin streams of smoke spiraled from her cavernous nostrils. She glanced briefly at Frost. Then her dark eyes drifted skyward, following Khellendros. To her right was a lean red dragon, who, curled like a cat, looked slightly smaller than the white overlord.
Khellendros landed nearly a mile away from the circle and took in the other two dragons with his stare as he approached. Beryllinthranox, the Green Peril, sat opposite Malys. She was the color of the forest she ruled – the lands once held by the proud Qualinesti. Beryl’s narrowed eyes were intent. Perhaps she was trying to gauge the others’ reactions to Khellendros. Her serpentine tail, extended straight behind her, undulated slowly. Beryl gave the blue overlord a perfunctory nod, then turned to the Black.
Between Beryl and Gellidus sprawled Onysablet. Acid dripped from the black dragon’s equine-shaped leathery jowls, forming a bubbling pond between her claws. Unblinking eyes that gleamed like twin pools of oil, so dark that irises could not be distinguished from pupils, were fixed on Malys. Her thick, glossy horns swept forward from her narrow head.
Beryl was regaling the Black with tales of her domination over the elves, but Sable showed bare interest. Malys held most of her attention.
Khellendros took a position between Beryl and the smaller Red, Malys’s lieutenant, Ferno, sitting back on his great haunches. Malys was the only dragon larger than he, and he was careful, for propriety’s sake, to keep his head lower than hers. Too, he kept his wounded claw flat against the earth, not wanting the other dragons to question him about his injury. He nodded to Malys. He was the Red’s acknowledged consort, openly favored by her. But the Red’s continued glances toward Frost hinted that Malys was sharing her ambitious affections.
Malystryx returned Khellendros’s nod. “We can begin now,” she said, her voice resonant and booming across the arid land. The noise touched the Peak of Malys and echoed hauntingly. “We are the most powerful of dragons, and none dare stand up to us.”
“We crush our opposition,” Beryl hissed. “We dominate the land – and those who live upon it.”
“None challenge us,” Sable said. She drew a talon through the pool of acid in front of her, as the liquid trailing from it sizzled and popped over the barren ground. “None dare, because none can.”
“Those few who try,” Frost added, “meet death quickly.”
Khellendros remained silent, listening to the overlords’ boasts, and watched Gellidus squirm almost imperceptibly in the heat.
“Yet our power is nothing,” Malys interrupted. She craned her neck toward the sky so that she towered above the others, who listened to her remark with wide eyes. “Our power is nothing compared to what it will be when Takhisis returns.”
“Yes, Takhisis is coming!” Frost cried.
“But when?” That was Sable.
“Before the year ends,” Malys answered. She brought her head lower, making sure that Khellendros kept his lower still.
“And how do you know this?” Beryl’s voice was laced with venom. “What great knowledge do you have of the gods?”
Malys’s immense jowls edged upward in the approximation of a smile. Ferno uncurled himself and stood, his eyes boring into the green dragon who dared ask such a question.
“Malys knows,” Frost offered. “Malys told us how to gain power, before the Dragon Purge. Malys directed us to grab territory. Because of her we are overlords. If any among us would know of Takhisis’s return, it would have to be Malystryx.”
The Green cocked her head to the side. “I am an overlord because of my own ambition and power. What power, Malystryx, do you have that I do not? What power allows you to know of Takhisis’s return?”
Malys regarded the Green for several silent moments. “Perhaps rebirth would be a better term,” the Red purred.
Khellendros remained quiet, noticing that Frost and Ferno had moved closer to the great Red and that Sable was carefully watching Beryl.
“Rebirth?” the Green hissed.
Flames flickered about Malys’s nostrils. “It is a new Takhisis who will appear on Krynn, Beryllinthranox. That Takhisis will be me.”
“Blasphemy!” Beryl shouted.
“There is no blasphemy when there are no gods,” the Red sharply returned.
The Green arched her back. “And without the gods, we bow to no one, serve no one. We are our own masters – Krynn’s masters. Only gods are worthy of our deference. And you, Malystryx, are not a god.”
“Your gods left this world. Even Takhisis vanished.” The air grew warmer as Malys continued, and the flames about her nostrils rose higher. “As you say, Beryl, we are the masters now. We are the most powerful beings on Krynn – and I am first among us.”
“You are mighty, I will grant you that. Alone, none of us could stand up to you. But you are not a god.”
“I am not yet a god.”
“Not ever.”
“No, Beryl?”
Sable moved closer to Frost. The two had broken the circle, formed a line with Malys and her lieutenant, all facing Beryl, who was looking at Khellendros out of the corner of her narrowing eye.
Beryl wants to know where I stand, the Storm mused. The Green recognizes my strength and is looking for support. Malys is also waiting. She has been devoting her time to forming alliances, with the White and the Black. She is more clever and calculating than I thought. Paired with others, she cannot be challenged.
Khellendros cast a sidelong glance at Beryl, then moved to join the line, taking up a position next to Ferno and dwarfing the smaller red dragon.
“I will ascend to godhood before the year is out,” Malys hissed at the Green. “I will ascend with the heavens – and my allies – as my witnesses. Where do you stand?”
Beryl dug her claws into the baked ground, glanced for a moment at the myriad cracks she had added to the land, then tilted her head to meet the Red’s stare. “I stand with you,” she said finally.
“Then you may live,” Malys said.
Chapter 3
A DARK DOMAIN
“Decent people used to live here.” Rig sat heavily on a rotting willow log and swatted at the mosquitos swarming around his face. His dark skin glistened with sweat.
“How would you kno
w?” Jasper asked.
“Years ago Shaon and I stopped here for a few days.” He smiled wistfully at the memory and swept his hand to indicate the small clearing they’d selected for a campsite. “This was once a town, here on the banks of the River Toranth. S’funny. I don’t remember the name of the place, but the people were friendly enough, real hard-working folk. Supplies were cheap. The food was warm – and good.” He took in a deep breath, let it out slowly. “Shaon and I spent an evening on the docks, which would have been somewhere over by that cypress. There was this old man; I think he passed for their barge master. Talked all night with him and watched the sun come up. He shared his flagon of Stone Rose Ale. Never tasted anything quite like it. Maybe never will again.”
The mariner scowled as he gazed over what was left of the place. Bits and pieces of wood were scattered here and there, poking out from under round, leafy buttonbushes and gaps in the thick sawgrass. A painted sign, so badly faded that “boiled oyst” were the only legible words, was wedged into a pale strangler fig.
Onysablet’s swamp had swallowed the town, as it had swallowed everything else as far as the eye could see. Parts of what had once been New Sea were choked marshes, stretching to the north. The water was so thick with vegetation it looked like an olive plain. In many places it was difficult to tell where the land ended and the water began.
Several days ago Silvara and Sunrise had deposited the travelers on the shore of the New Swamp, after flying across the navigable part of New Sea. Though the ride was unsettling, the mariner wished the dragons could have taken them farther. But the Silver and Gold had no desire to encroach on Sable’s realm. So Silvara and Sunrise left to take Gilthanas and Ulin to the Tower of Wayreth. Rig hoped the two sorcerers could pool their wits with Palin to discover Dhamon’s whereabouts.
“I’m hungry.” Jasper sat next to the mariner and gently deposited a leather sack between his legs. It contained the Fist of E’li, of which Jasper had volunteered to be the caretaker. The dwarf was still favoring his side, his breath was raspy, and he was also hungry. He patted his stomach, offered Rig a weak smile, then batted away a thumb-sized black bug that was inching too close for comfort. The dwarf pointed a stubby finger toward what he could see of the sun between breaks in the tree trunks. “It’s getting on toward dinner time.”
“Your belly’ll be filled soon enough,” Rig said. “Feril shouldn’t be gone too much longer. And I hope she brings back something other than a fat lizard this time. I hate lizard meat.”
The dwarf chuckled, patting his stomach again. “Groller and Fury went with her. Maybe the wolf will spook out a boar. Groller likes roast pig. So do I.”
“You shouldn’t be so particular, Rig Mer-Krel and Master Fireforge,” Fiona called over. “You should be appreciative of any fresh meat.” The Knight of Solamnia was busy picking through the more intact remnants of the town. She brushed back the leaves of a massive bladderwort, lifted up a decaying chair back and shook her head. Retrieving a moldy doll, she held it up, looked into its absent eyes, then carefully replaced it on the ground.
Fiona’s face and arms were gleaming with sweat, her red curls plastered against her high forehead, the rest of it piled in ringlets atop her head and held in place with an ivory comb borrowed from Usha. She’d taken off her metal arm and leg plates yesterday as well as her helmet, and was toting them around in a canvas sack. Though they were cumbersome and heavy, she refused to leave them behind. Neither would she completely surrender to the heat and take off her silver breastplate with its Knight of the Crown etching. “Even lizard is more nourishing than the usual rations,” she observed. “We have to preserve our strength.”
“The rations are a little more tasty as far as I’m concerned,” Rig muttered half under his breath. “Though not by much. Lizard. Yuck.” He kept his eyes on the Solamnic as she continued rummaging, moving farther away from them. “By the way, it’s just Rig, remember?”
“And Jasper,” added the dwarf. “Nobody calls me Master Fireforge. I don’t think anybody even called my Uncle Flint that.”
Fiona glanced over her shoulder, smiled, and resumed her search.
“Keep poking around all you want, but you’re not going to find anything worthwhile,” Rig called to her, “When the black dragon moved in, most of the sensible people picked up what they could – their children, valuables, mementos – and moved out.”
“I’m just browsing while we wait for dinner. Something to do. I just can’t sit around.”
“You like her, don’t you?” Jasper winked at Rig, keeping his voice low. “You’ve been watching her like a hawk since Schallsea.”
The mariner grunted in reply.
“Hmmm, there’s something here,” Fiona said. “Something solid under this mud.”
“She’s got spunk.” The dwarf nudged Rig. “She’s lovely for a human, polite, brave too, according to Ulin. He said she didn’t run when Frost attacked them in Southern Ergoth. Stood her ground and was ready to fight, even though it looked like certain death. She can handle that sword she totes, and...”
“And she’s a knight,” Rig said in a voice the dwarf had to strain to hear. “Dhamon was a knight, is a knight, of Takhisis. I’ve had my fill of knights. All their talk of honor. Just a shallow word.”
“I’m betting there’s nothing shallow about her.”
“Look at this!” Fiona’s arms were buried halfway to her elbows in muck. She tugged at a small wooden chest. The ground grudgingly released it with a loud slurp. She grinned and held it up for them to see. A cloud of mosquitos immediately formed around her.
Fiona batted the insects away and carried the chest toward Rig and Jasper. Banded in thin iron, a tiny lock dangling from its front, the chest was thickly rusted and covered with slime.
Jasper wriggled his nose, but Rig was instantly interested. Fiona placed it on the ground in front of them, knelt, and drew her sword. “I’m going to need a bath after this,” she said. Muck dripped from her arms and fingers onto the pommel of her sword. She thrust the tip at the small lock, which quickly gave way.
Rig reached for the chest, but she stayed his hand with a wry smile. “Ladies first. Besides, I went to all the trouble of digging it up. I’m hoping there’s a book or papers inside, something that might tell me more about the inhabitants of this place. Maybe some information about the dragon.” She eased the lid open and frowned. Brackish water had seeped in, filling it to the brim and ruining the velvet lining. She drained it out and let out a deep sigh, holding up a long strand of large pearls. She scowled and dropped the necklace back in the chest, where a matching bracelet and earrings rested.
“Careful! That’s valuable!” Rig said.
Fiona shrugged. “Riches never much interested me, Rig Mer-Krel. Any coins I earned, I gave to the Order.”
“Then I’ll hang onto those,” the mariner advised, as he snatched up the pearls. “We’re probably gonna need money – more than we’ve got – before this is all done. Clothes. We’re wearing all we have, and they won’t last forever either.”
“Food,” the dwarf offered.
“Renting a ship to get to Dimernesti – provided we can figure out where Dimernesti is,” Rig continued.
“And that’s provided we can make it through this swamp,” Jasper added as he looked up at the giant trees draped with moss and vines. “Provided the black dragon doesn’t find us and...”
“I wonder if there’s more treasure,” the mariner speculated aloud as he pushed himself off the log and tucked the pearls in his pants pocket. “No way to tell unless we look. I might as well do a little digging myself. Dinner’s not here yet.” He took off his shirt and arranged it on the lowest branch of a palm-leaved sweetbay tree. Leaning his sword against the trunk, he started scooping through the muck near where Fiona had discovered the chest. “Join us, Jasper?”
The dwarf shook his head. He stared into the sack, fixated by the Fist of E’li. “Wonder how much longer Feril will be?”
*
The Kagonesti breathed deep, inhaling the intoxicating scents of the swamp as she strolled farther away from where she’d left Rig, Jasper, and Fiona. She moved barefoot – agile as a cat – through the dense foliage, never tripping among the thick roots or making the branches rustle, pausing only to smell a large orchid or watch a lazy insect. Her short leather tunic, fashioned from a garment Ulin had surrendered to her, didn’t hinder her movements.
The half-ogre, who followed a few yards behind, picked up all the scents as well, though he did not appreciate them as much. Nor was he fond of the branches that tried to snag his long brown hair and claw at his broad face.
Deprived of his hearing, Groller knew his other senses were far more acute. Rotting vegetation, wet earth, the cloying fragrance of the dark red blooms of the water hickories, the sweet scent of the tiny white flowers that hung from the veils of lianas; he noticed them all. There was a dead animal nearby, the acrid odor of its decaying flesh unmistakable.
He could not smell the snakes that were wrapped like ribbons around the low branches of practically every tree, nor could he smell the small broad-tailed lizards and shrews that scampered about the soddened ground. Their scents were overpowered by the loam. But he could smell Fury, his loyal wolf companion. The red-haired wolf was trailing behind him, ears standing straight up and head twisting from side to side, panting from the heat. The wolf was listening, as Feril was listening, as the half-ogre could not.
Groller wondered what this place sounded like. He tried to imagine the sounds of the birds and insects. He remembered them from years ago, but the memory was elusive. Perhaps later he would ask Feril to describe the forest sounds.
Feril was so caught up in this place, Groller thought. And she was “talking” to many of the snakes and lizards she passed – all of them too small for dinner. The half-ogre suspected she was immersing herself in the swamp as a way to forget what had happened to Goldmoon at the hands of Dhamon Grimwulf. She was sad, Groller knew, confused and out of her element except in places like this – the wilderness. She was more relaxed here, seemingly content. How much longer would she stay one of the companions? he wondered. How long would it be before she decided to leave their fractious company in favor of an appealing forest?
