by Tom Liberman
“I understand,” said Jon sipping his beer slowly in the hopes of retaining a clear head for the morning. “Thank you, Vispsanius,” he said with a broad smile. “I appreciate all your help and I’ll take your message back to my father. I’m sure that he will be pleased with the alliance of our nations.”
“I hope so,” said Vipsanius with a smile on his craggy face, “I hope you don’t mind, but your old gray cloak took rather a beating during our time underground and I had some of the girls make a new one for you,” he continued, making a motion with his head. At this signal, Odellius, also seated at the table and had shown less restraint with the beer than Jon, pulled out a cloth-wrapped package from under the table and at the same moment a hush came over the room.
Jon opened the package carefully, with a rather goofy half-grin on his face, pulled out a supple cloth jerkin, and spread it open on the table. His eye came quickly to the shoulder where a symbol of four outward-facing horseshoes surrounded a sprig of mistletoe. Many of those in attendance gasped and the gathered people began to talk excitedly back and forth among themselves. Jon looked at the symbol for a long moment before understanding came to him, “Does this mean?”
“Yes, Sir Jon Gray,” said the First Rider with a smile. “You are now a knight of Elekargul with the name of Gray. In the future when a stranger comes to Elekargul and proves themselves as true friends of the nation they may, if they wish, take the knightly name of Gray to commemorate you and your visit.”
Jon sat in his chair for a while, gulped a few times, and proved unable to make any words come out of his mouth.
“I think the lad is crying,” said Odellius suddenly and smacked him on the back so hard that Jon almost fell out of his chair, although the blow seemed to force out the words Jon couldn’t manage a moment before. “Thank you First Rider,” he said, “this is truly an honor I did not expect. I hope … I hope that I can live up to this … wonderful honor. Maybe someday, if circumstance allow me the pleasure, I might return to Elekargul, to see you all again.”
“We’ll be waiting,” said Vipsanius with a nod of his head. “You take good care of him, Sorus; I suspect Jon’s adventures are just beginning and it gives me great hope that a knight of Elekargul rides with him.”
“I will, First Rider Vispsanius,” said Sorus with steady eyes as he moved over to stand behind Jon’s chair, “I will.”
At another table young Rhia Quick firmed her own little jaw, which showed no signs of the Purple Face disease, and muttered, “I’ll follow Jon to Tanelorn, I’ll be a gray knight just like him.”
“What was that?” said Shia glancing over at her little sister.
“Nothing,” said the younger girl and put her hands demurely in her lap, “nothing at all.”
Epilog
Far away in Darag’dal the ancient cathedral stood as before, and the decayed skeletal figure that sat upon the throne in the center of the floor still made no movements. Standing next to the ancient lord of all the dragon children stood Usharra; he held the claw of the Great Toxic Dragon in one hand and spoke with a tall dragon child in hushed tones. A pair of large red bat wings furled on the creature’s back and a dozen spikey protrusions emanated from its face. The creature nodded his head, with closed eyes, as the priest spoke at great length but refrained from making any comment for a long time. As Usharra’s story slowly wound down the dragon child opened its eyes with a languid motion and stared fixedly at the priest. Then it looked at the figure on the throne and nodded its head as its wings slowly unfurled, “What tribes of our people are located in the north, near Tanelorn?”
