Johauna stepped forward, preparing to brush aside the creature with her boot. “It’s just a bat,” she said in relief to Karleah, behind her. She extended her leg to kick the tiny, squawking animal out of harm’s way.
“Wait! Jo!” Karleah croaked in sudden fear.
Something hard and heavy crashed against Jo’s shoulder. The squire lost her balance. “What the—!” She fell to the cavern floor, only just glimpsing the massive object that struck her. Where the bat had once been, a seething lump of metamorphosing flesh now lay.
Convulsing. Transforming.
The Penhaligon Trilogy
D. J. Heinrich
Book One
The Tainted Sword
Book Two
The Dragon’s Tomb
Book Three
The Fall of Magic
October 1993
THE DRAGON’S TOMB
€‘1993 TSR, Inc.
All Rights Reserved.
All characters in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
This book is protected under the copyright laws of the United States of America. Any reproduction or other unauthorized use of the material or artwork herein is prohibited without the express written permission of TSR, Inc.
Random House and its affiliate companies have worldwide distribution rights in the book trade for English language products of TSR, Inc.
Distributed to the book and hobby trade in the United Kingdom by TSR Ltd. Distributed to the toy and hobby trade by regional distributors.
Cover art by John and Laura Lakey. Color map by Robin Raab.
DUNGEONS & DRAGONS, D&D, and the TSR logo are trademarks owned by TSR, Inc.
First Printing: April 1993
Printed in the United States of America
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 92-61085
9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
ISBN: 1-56076-592-5
TSR, Inc.
P.O. Box 756 Lake Geneva, W1 53147 United States of America
For Lyle Graybow and Karl Kunze—
two fine men who died before their time.
They will be sorely missed.
Contents
Prologue
Chapter I
Chapter II
Chapter III
Chapter IV
Chapter V
Chapter VI
Chapter VII
Chapter VIII
Chapter IX
Chapter X
Chapter XI
Chapter XII
Chapter XIII
Chapter XIV
Chapter XV
Chapter XVI
Epilogue
Prologue
e came, just as I knew he would Just as I knew he must. Humans are that way. Predictable. Idealistic. Bound by honor and vow and silly passion. Knights of the Three Suns, particularly, are that way. It makes them easy bait, as easy to kill as horses in a corral—and I’ve killed enough of those in my time to know.
But, truth be told, Fain Flinn was different. Flinn the Mighty, they called him, and for good reason. The first time I fought him, I discovered he couldn’t be as easily slain as all the others. It was that damned great sword of his, that Wyrmblight. We could, neither of us, kill the other, and that sword mocked us all the while.
Yes, it was Flinn who shamed me—Verdilith the Great Green, scourge of Penhaligon—Flinn who shamed me into winning through subversion what I could not through battle. So I shed my lovely green scales and took human form. I insinuated myself into Baroness Penhaligon s good graces, even seduced Flinn’s loving wife Yvaughan out from under him. . . . And, when all was in place, I turned a fellow knight against him, made him accuse the good Flinn of dishonor.
I brought Flinn the Mighty to his knees.
It all worked too well. Flinn was stripped of title and honor, cast out of the fellowship of knights—out even of the Castle of the Three Suns. He became Flinn the Fallen, Flinn the Fool. And I became Yvaughan’s loving husband. Thoughts of her still make my teeth itch. I’d even conceived a son by her, a glorious heir to my power.
But then that slip of a girl came along. She sought for Flinn the Mighty, and found him a hermit in a hovel. Until that time, I’d used abelaat stones to spy on him, to feed thoughts of despair and decay into his mind. I’d learned that prostrating and dominating my foe were far more enjoyable than killing him outright. But the girl, the clumsy bitch of a girl, got herself bit by an abelaat—one of Teryl Aurochs stray beasts from the infernal realms. The poison of the creature’s fangs ran in her blood, blocking my eyes from Flinn, blocking my words from reaching his despoiled brain.
And she began to change him, as women always do to men. She reminded him of his honor, his glory, his nemesis, the Great Green! I should have known she would prove even more dangerous than he—unpredictable, naive, irrational in her love of Flinn the Fool. Before I could blink, Flinn had returned to flush me from the castle, to drive the mage Auroch away, to regain his honor and title. And he once again bore Wyrmblight!
The game was up. I was done with toying. I knew Flinn the Fool would make an idiotic attempt to hunt me down, to slay me. And, poetic soul that I am, I met him in the field where first we fought.
And I killed him.
I killed him despite the fact that my magic had failed me, despite the fact that he used the girls blink-dogs tail to strike at my flanks, despite the fact that he lanced my side and slashed my wings and ruined my arm. I killed him.
My poor arm. Of all my wounds, it pains me most. I change forms from dragon to mist to man to mouse, but always the pain follows me. I feel the urging of my flesh to split apart, to cease its struggle against death and be done. I feel the urging of my mind to dissipate on the wind, or spiral into some interior hell. I am morbidly wounded, insane with agony. Only hatred gives form to my mind. Hatred and the phrase that repeats with the pounding of my heart.
Flinn is dead.
I half expected to feel some sorrow at his parting, but I do not. He was dangerous, yes, but never a truly worthy adversary, never a creature worth engaging for the witty repartee. He was human, after all.
No. It was not Flinn who was my truest foe. It was Wyrmblight, a sword forged to slay me. Even now it resonates with that desire. I feel it in my wounds. I feel it in my aching mind, my still-beating heart. The bitch has it, I know—Jo is her name, like the name of a fisherman or a joiner. The blade is taller than she is, and yet she pretends she’ll bring it against me. She and her comrades—that feeble crone mage and her brainless lackey, and the old mercenary Braddoc, one-time friend of the Fool. These dragon hunters offend me. The baroness sends greater forces against Greasetongue, the ore. In a single puff they would be gone.
Except for Wyrmblight.
Just as it shamed me the first time, it has shamed me again. Try as I might, I could not break that cursed, blessed steel, and my roiling plumes of green poison would not pass it. Worst of all, these wounds that Wyrmblight has cleaved will not heal.
So I wait in this lair of mine, wait for Jo and her pack of misfits to stumble in and kill me, as they must try to do. For they are human. If I cannot destroy them when they arrive, cannot snap the cursed Wyrmblight in two, I shall withdraw and again win by deceit what I cannot by war.
But I will kill them. They have angered me, and I will kill them. I will break the hated Wyrmblight just as I broke its bearer.
Chapter I
Gritty ash from the still-smoldering funeral pyre whirled up in the midmorning breeze and stung Johauna Menhir’s gray eyes. She blinked the tears back. Rubbing her swollen eyel
ids with the back of one grimy hand, Jo whispered, “No more.” Her lips, dried out from more than four days’ exposure to the late winter winds, split in a sudden grimace. “No more,” she repeated hoarsely. “I’ll cry no more for you, Fain Flinn.” She shook her head sadly.
The wind shifted, and with it came a sudden hint of spring. The barren trees surrounding the tiny glade swayed gently, and for the first time Jo saw that the branches were about to burst with green. It was as if the world was oblivious to the death of Flinn, oblivious to the sacrifice he had made. It was as though the forest had already forgotten the titanic battle waged here between man and dragon. The hushed trickle of spring runoff filled Jo’s reddened ears, and a crow circled lazily overhead.
Her hands gripped the great sword she held, a six-foot weapon fully an inch taller than she. “Wyrmblight,” she murmured, as though to comfort herself with the name. The famed sword shone silver-white beneath the pale sky, untouched by the black taint that had covered it before. The four ancient sigils on one flat of the blade glinted brightly: Honor, Courage, Faith, and Glory. The four points of the Quadrivial. Flinn had attained the four points, but it had cost him his life. And now the sword was hers—her only physical reminder of the man who had sheltered her and taught her so much of life.
Jo’s memories grew bitter, and the corners of her mouth tugged downward. A crack in her lips opened and bled a little. She stared at the fourth and brightest rune. “Glory,” she spat. “If you hadn’t sought glory, you wouldn’t have fought Verdilith alone.” No, that’s not true, her mind whispered. Flinn went alone so we wouldn’t be killed. He knew he was going to his doom; he wouldn’t let us die, too. Her eyes wandered to the still-smoldering pyre.
“Oh, Flinn,” Johauna whispered in a voice that broke, “why didn’t you let me come with you? Why?” A thread of anger wound through the pain-filled words. “I was your squire! If I couldn’t save you, I could have at least died with you!” One hand curled into an angry fist, and Jo stared unblinking at the pile of ashes. She ground her teeth, unable to voice the emotions welling inside her.
Wyrmblight glittered cold and lifeless in the young woman’s hands. The warmth it had generated in its master’s grip was absent for her, and she wondered if it always would be. For four days and nights Jo had stood vigil over Flinn’s body; then she and the others had lit the pyre, and she guarded it during the day it took to burn. So cold and bitter had been the blade during winter’s last throes that Jo had developed chilblains on her hands. But she hadn’t noticed them then, and she ignored them now as she cradled the sword of elven silver and dwarven steel to her chest. “Oh, Flinn,” Johauna whispered, “why did you have to die?”
Jo’s gaze fell one last time to the ashes before her, the ghostly image of a man’s body seeming to take shape amid the charred remains of oak and elm. Jo blinked once, and the form was gone. The embers had finally died out in this tiny glade in the Wulfholde Hills. All that remained of the finest knight the lands of Penhaligon had ever known was ash and distorted bone.
Flinn the Mighty was no more.
The squire’s hand fell to her belt where a small, beaded leather bag hung—the one other possession of Flinn’s. The pouch carried the abelaat crystals they had used for scrying. Three of the stones were orange in hue, created from the abelaat’s own blood, but the other four were deeply red, formed from Jo’s blood. A twinge of pain gripped Jo’s shoulder as she remembered the eight-fanged creature biting into the joint, its poisonous saliva turning to stone in her wounds.
Jo touched the beaded bag. “Do I dare?” she whispered, unsure of her ability to control the crystals. When the stones were heated, they could be used to see or contact whomever the bearer wished. Some said they could even contact the dead.
The squire rubbed her tired eyes once again. “No, I can’t,” she murmured to the ashes. “Not now, anyway. I’d need Karleah’s help.” Jo looked behind her to the trail that led through the woods to her companions. The trampled snow had melted, leaving the brown richness of earth and a tinge of green. She blinked. Always before, spring had filled her with hope, but now she felt only empty.
They’re waiting for me.
She blinked again and realized she didn’t care. They’re waiting for me, she repeated to herself, and I must go. Reluctantly, Johauna turned back to the remnant of the pyre. She held Wyrmblight before her, crosswise, and bowed low, her movements trembling and weary.
“Farewell, Fain Flinn, my lord—” Jo’s voice faltered and could not continue, though her thoughts ended with “—my love.” Jo closed her eyes wearily, then bit her cracked lips in sudden determination. “I will avenge your death, Flinn! Verdilith will die, and Wyrmblight will deliver the death blow,” she said grimly. Jo clenched the sword again, this time drawing blood from her palms. She turned and hurried down the path, refusing to look back.
But she didn’t need to look back to remember. The trail evoked the memory of the first time Jo had traversed it. Less than a week earlier she had stumbled through these woods, seeking Flinn and praying he was still alive after his attack on Verdilith, the green dragon. Jo had followed the path of blood, muddied snow, and broken branches all the way to the tiny glade she had just left—the glade where Flinn had died. Now the trail was brown and pungent with raw earth, and clumps of green lined its edges. It showed no evidence of Flinn’s passing, as if it, too, had forgotten.
Suddenly Jo dropped Wyrmblight and fell to her knees. Cold mud clung to her legs, but she didn’t care. Her arms crossed in a ragged embrace as she doubled over in pain. “Flinn! Flinn!” Johauna rasped, remembering how she had found his battered body, lying facedown in the trampled snow. She had turned him over, fearing the worst, but Flinn had been alive then, and for one precious moment Johauna had believed he would live.
But he didn’t. He didn’t live. Jo pressed her face between her hands, determined not to give in to the despair and grief and anger that threatened to engulf her.
“How am I to live without you, Flinn?” Jo whispered, finally giving voice to the fear that had haunted her ever since Flinn had died in her arms. Who else will believe in me, teach me? Who else will have hopes and dreams for me, will have pride in me? Who else will love me? Jo wondered, her anger growing. Each day since Flinn s death, she had held her grief at bay. First she had stood vigil at the pyre, guarding his body for four days and nights from the wolves. Then she had waited the long hours it had taken for Flinn and the pyre to burn, not ceasing her vigil until the last ember died.
But now, there was nothing to stop her grief.
Jo doubled over and beat her clenched fists against the ground. Chunks of ice and rock bit into her skin, already fragile and damaged; chilblains opened and pus mingled with the blood of fresh cuts. “Why? Why? Why?” Bitter tears flowed from her unseeing eyes, and roaring filled her ears.
Jo paused and held out her hands before her, palms upward. Her hands were raw, the skin battered away. “Oh, Flinn,” she murmured hoarsely, “let me join you.” Jo looked past her hands to Wyrmblight, shining bright on the ground where she had dropped it. Catching a small, fearful breath, she placed her wrists to the sword s finely honed edge. The thin, razor-sharp edge of silvern steel stroked her skin.
A strange heat suddenly radiated from the sword.
Jo closed her eyes and slid her wrists against Wyrmblight s edge. She felt the fragile skin give way, and blood run in a sluggish stream from her veins, hot tears for the ground. Jo looked down at the stain of red on the white blade. A single tear escaped her eyes and splashed on the sword, hissing when it hit.
The young woman blinked, dizzy, vaguely wondering what she was doing. She raised her wrists from the edge of Wyrmblight and looked at the ragged wounds. Blood spilled forth and dripped onto the sword, splashing onto the sigils and hissing. One of the four sigils on the flat of the blade began to glow, and intense heat emanated from it. For a moment Jo was mesmerized by the pure white beauty of the glowing sigil; then she noticed that the
blood on Wyrmblight had disappeared. Her eyes traveled from the sword to her bleeding hands and wrists. As she looked, a waving thread of white light stretched from the sigil. The light circled one wrist. Jo watched, speechless, as the white light took on the hue of blood and stitched itself about the gash. As it reached the opposite end of the laceration, the light gradually became pure white.
Jo blinked. “Flinn . . . ?” she whispered. The thread of light wove between her fingers, turned pink and paused, then encircled her other bleeding wrist. Jo held up her left hand and gasped. It was healed, completely healed. Only a tiny scar remained. She held up her other hand and it, too, was healed.
The waving thread of light retreated back to the third sigil. Jo reached out with her finger and tentatively touched it, marveling that she could despite its heat. “Faith,” she murmured. She shut her eyes briefly, then stared above her at the surrounding trees. “Oh, Flinn!” she shouted. “You were the only one who ever had faith in me!”
The light from the sigil shot out and enveloped Jo. At first she was aware only of its warmth. Then, little by litde, she felt the sorrow in her heart ease and become bearable.
The pain and grief still remained, but somehow she had gained the strength to bear them. Her mind was clearer, and the horror of the past week receded.
The words have faith in yourself rang inside Jo’s mind. She thought it came from the light surrounding her. Have faith, Johauna Menhir. Slowly the light withdrew from Jos body, leaving behind an unexpected calm, however small. Jo watched the light retreat inside Wyrmblight. Suddenly the warmth and glow were gone—Wyrmblight lay cold and lifeless once more in the trampled mud and snow. Jo stared in awe at the white blade, the words have faith ringing in her ears.
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