Brothers in Arms

by Margaret Weis

  The war-mage turned and pointed to the opposite end of the field, a part far away from where the soldiers were lunging and yelling.

  “Now, Red, what’s one of your best spells, aside from sleep?” Horkin rolled his eyes.

  Raistlin ignored the comment. “I am proficient in the launching of incendiary projectiles, sir.”

  “Incendi-whats?” Horkin looked bemused. He patted Raistlin on the shoulder. “You can speak Common, Red. We’re all friends here.”

  Raistlin gave a deep sigh. “Magical bolts, sir.”

  “Ah, good.” Horkin nodded. “Launch one of your bolts at the fence post on the far end of the field there. Do you see it?”

  Raistlin put his left hand into the pouch he wore on the side of his belt, brought forth the small patch of fur—the spell component he would need to cast the spell. Locating the distant fence post, he withdrew into himself, seeking the words that would form the incantation necessary to produce a fiery bolt made of magic.

  The next moment, he was on the ground, doubled over on his hands and knees, gasping for breath. Horkin stood over him with a dowel, which had just whacked Raistlin in the stomach.

  Shocked by the painful and unexpected blow, Raistlin stared in blank astonishment, gasping for air and trying to calm his pounding heart.

  Horkin stood over him, waiting, not offering to help. Eventually, Raistlin regained his feet.

  “Why did you do that?” he demanded, shaking with anger. “Why did you strike me?”

  “Why did you strike me, sir?” Horkin said sternly.

  Raistlin, too furious to repeat the words, glared grimly at Horkin.

  The war-mage lifted the dowel rod, used it this time as a pointer.

  “Now you see the danger, Red. Do you think the enemy’s going to stand there and wait while you go into a trance and sing ‘la-de-da’ and wiggle your fingers in the air and rub some fur on your cheek? Hell, no! You planned on casting the most powerful, the most perfect magical bolt that ever was, didn’t you? You were gonna split that post in half, weren’t you, Red? In reality, you cast nothing. In reality, you would have been dead, ’cause the enemy wouldn’t be using a dowel rod. He’d be yanking his sword out of your scrawny belly.

  “Lesson Number Two, Red—don’t take too long to cast a spell. Speed is the name of the game. Oh, and Lesson Number Three—don’t try to cast a complicated spell when there’s an adversary breathing down your neck.”

  “I did not know you were an adversary, sir,” Raistlin said coldly.

  “Lesson Number Four, Red,” Horkin said with a gape-toothed grin. “Get to know your comrades well before you trust your life to them.”

  Raistlin’s stomach was sore, breathing was painful. He wondered if Horkin had cracked a rib, considered it likely.

  “Try for the post again, Red,” Horkin ordered. “Or if you can’t manage to hit the post, somewhere in the general vicinity will be fine. Don’t take all day.”

  Grimly, Raistlin clutched the bit of fur and tried to gather the words hastily in his mind.

  Horkin lifted the other dowel rod, jabbed at Raistlin. The latter continued with his spell-casting, but then he saw, to his astonishment, a flicker of flame burst out of the base of the rod. The flame sizzled along the rod toward Raistlin, who tried desperately to ignore it. The flame neared the end of the rod.

  His spell was almost complete. He was about to cast it when bright, blinding light flared. A loud bang nearly deafened him.

  He flung up his arm to shield his face from the blast, only to see, out of the corner of his eye, Horkin swinging the other dowel rod. He struck Raistlin on the back, sent him sprawling facefirst into the mud.

  Slowly, painfully, Raistlin picked himself up. His knees were scraped and bruised, his hands scratched. He wiped mud from his face and looked at Horkin, who was rocking back on his heels, mightily pleased with himself.

  “Lesson Five, Red,” said Horkin. “Never turn your back on an enemy.”

  Raistlin wiped mud and blood from his hands. He inspected the scratches, removed a small sharp pebble that had lodged beneath the skin.

  “I believed that you skipped Lesson One, sir,” Raistlin said, barely keeping his anger in check.

  “Did I? Perhaps I did. Think about it,” said Horkin.

  Raistlin didn’t want to think about it. He wanted to escape this crazed fool. There was no doubt in Raistlin’s mind that Horkin was mentally deranged. Raistlin wanted to go back to a warm fire and dry clothes. He was certain he would catch his death out here in the wet. He would go find Caramon. Find Caramon and tell Caramon what this fiend had done to him. He had never seen Horkin cast the spell that blinded him.

  Raistlin forgot his pain, forgot his discomfort. The spell! What was that spell? Raistlin didn’t recognize it. He had no idea how it was cast. He had not seen Horkin reach for any spell components. He had not heard Horkin utter a word, recite any incantations.

  “How did you do that spell, sir?” Raistlin asked.

  Horkin’s grin widened. “Well, now, so maybe there is a bit of magic you can learn from the sorry old mage who never took his Test. Stick with me this campaign season, Red, and I’ll teach you all sorts of tricks. I’m not the last surviving mage in this gods-forsaken regiment because I was the best.” He winked. “Just the smartest.”

  Raistlin had taken enough abuse. He started to turn away, when he felt Horkin’s heavy hand upon his shoulder. Raistlin whipped around, anger cracking.

  “By the gods, if you hit me again—”

  “Simmer down, Red. I want you to look at something.”

  Horkin pointed to the training field. The recruits had been given leave to take a break, the men gathering around a water barrel. How they could possibly want more water was beyond Raistlin. The rain was falling harder. His robes were so wet that water ran in a steady trickle down his bare back. The recruits seemed to be in excellent humor, however, laughing and talking despite the rain.

  Caramon demonstrated his sword technique, lunging out and falling back with such energy that he very nearly skewered Scrounger, who held his shield over his head, using it as a canopy to protect him from the rain. Horkin’s expression altered, his bantering tone changed.

  “We’re an infantry regiment, Red. We fight. We die. Someday those men over there are going to be depending on you in battle. If you fail, you not only fail yourself, you fail your comrades. And if you fail them, they’ll die. I’m here to teach you how to fight. If you’re not here to learn how to fight, then just what the hell are you here for?”

  Raistlin stood in silence, the rain thudding onto his wet robes, drumming on his head. Water dripped from his hair, hair that was prematurely white, a result of the terrors of the Test he’d undergone. Water ran down his hands, slender hands with long, nimble fingers, hands that shone with the sheen of gold, another mark of the Test. Yes, he had passed, but just barely. Though he could not remember all that had happened, he knew in his heart that he had come close to failing. He looked through the rain’s gray curtain at Caramon, at Scrounger and the others whose names he did not know yet. His comrades.

  Raistlin felt humbled. He regarded Horkin with new respect, realizing he had learned more from this man—this uneducated, low-level magic-user, whose kind is generally seen at fairs, pulling coins from their noses—than he had learned in all his years of schooling.

  “I offer my apologies, sir,” Raistlin said quietly. He lifted his head, blinked the rainwater from his eyes. “I believe that you have a great deal to teach me.”

  Horkin smiled, a warm smile. His hand exerted friendly pressure on Raistlin’s shoulder, and Raistlin did not flinch away from the touch.

  “We might make a soldier of you yet, Red. That was Lesson Number One. You ready to continue?”

  Raistlin’s gaze shifted to the dowel rods. He straightened his thin shoulders. “Yes, sir.”

  Horkin saw the look. Laughing, he tossed the dowel rods to the ground. “I don’t think we’ll be needing thes
e anymore.” He regarded Raistlin thoughtfully, then suddenly reached out and plucked the bit of fur, which Raistlin was still holding, from his hand.

  “Now cast the spell.”

  “But I can’t, sir,” Raistlin protested. “I don’t have another piece of fur, and that is the prescribed spell component.”

  Horkin shook his head. “Tsk, tsk. You’re standing in the middle of a battle, being pushed and shoved from all directions, arrows whizzing over your head, men yelling and screaming. Someone jostles you, and down goes that bit of fur into the muck and blood, trampled beneath stomping feet. And you can’t cast the spell without it.” He shook his head again, sighed. “I guess you’re dead.”

  Raistlin pondered. “I could try to find another bit of fur. Some soldier’s fur cloak, perhaps.”

  Horkin pursed his lips. “The time is midsummer, you fight beneath the blazing sun. It’s hot enough to roast a kender with your shield as a skillet. I don’t think many soldiers are going to be wearing their fur cloaks into battle, Red.”

  “Then what do I do, sir?” Raistlin demanded, exasperated.

  “You cast the spell without the fur,” said Horkin.

  “But it can’t be done. …”

  “It can, Red. I know because I’ve done it myself. I’ve always speculated,” Horkin continued, musing, “that the old magi put that requirement in there as a bit of a wheeze. Or perhaps to give the fur trade in Palanthas a boost.”

  Raistlin was skeptical. “I’ve never seen the spell done without the component, sir.”

  “Well, now,” said Horkin, “you’re about to.”

  He lifted his right hand, muttered several words of magic, all the while twitching the fingers of his left hand in a complex pattern. Within seconds, a bolt of magic flame crackled from his fingers, flared across the field, and struck the fence post, setting it ablaze.

  Raistlin gasped, amazed. “I did not think it possible! How did you manage to cast it without the fur?”

  “I play a little trick on myself. That scene I described to you really happened to me once. An enemy arrow took the fur from my hand just as I was about to cast my spell.” Horkin held out his hand, exhibited a long, jagged white scar, which ran across his palm. “I was scared and I was desperate and I was mad. ‘It’s just a stupid piece of fur,’ I said to myself. ‘I don’t need it. By the gods, I can cast this spell without it!’ ” He shrugged. “And I did. Nothing has ever smelled quite so fine to me as burnt hobgoblin did that day. Now, you try it.”

  Raistlin peered across the field, and tried to mentally trick himself into believing that the fur was in his hand. He spoke the words, made the symbol.

  Nothing happened.

  “I don’t know how you do it, sir,” said Raistlin, chagrined, “but the rules of magic state—”

  “Rules!” Horkin snorted. “Does the magic control you, Red? Or do you control the magic?”

  Raistlin blinked, startled.

  “Maybe I’ve misjudged you, Red,” Horkin continued, a shrewd glint in his eyes, “but it’s my guess that you’ve broken one or two rules before in your life.” He tapped Raistlin’s hand, tapped the golden skin that covered it. “If you never break rules, you’re never punished. And it looks to me as if you’ve taken some punishment in your life.”

  Horkin nodded to himself, said softly, “Try it.”

  I control the magic, said Raistlin inwardly. I control the magic.

  He raised his hand. Magic flared from his fingers, shot across the field. A second fence post burst into flame.

  “That was fast!” Raistlin said, exhilarated.

  Horkin nodded approvingly. “I’ve never seen it faster.”

  The recruits ended their practice for the day. They quick-marched down the road, chanting a cadence to keep in step.

  “They’re headed back for dinner,” said Horkin. “We better go, too, otherwise there won’t be any food left. You hungry, Red?”

  To his vast astonishment, Raistlin—customarily a picky eater—was so hungry that even the thought of the tasteless stew served up by the camp cook was tantalizing. The two walked back across the muddy field, heading for the barracks.

  “Begging your pardon, sir, but you didn’t tell me the spell you used to distract me.”

  “You’re right, Red,” Horkin agreed. “I didn’t.”

  Raistlin waited, but the mage just grinned to himself and said nothing.

  “It must be a very complex spell,” Raistlin observed. “The flame crawled along the wood rod, exploded when it reached the end. I’ve never heard of a spell like it. Is it one of your own magicks, sir?”

  “You could say that, Red,” said Horkin solemnly. He glanced sidelong at Raistlin. “I’m not sure you’re ready for it.”

  Laughter, joyous laughter—laughter at himself of all things!—bubbled in Raistlin’s throat. He forced himself to swallow the laugh, not wanting to disturb the mood, not just yet. He couldn’t believe it, couldn’t understand it. He had been beaten, mauled, mistreated, duped. He was covered with mud, soaked to the skin, and he’d never felt so good in his life.

  “I believe that I am ready, sir,” he said respectfully, and he meant it.

  “Flash powder.” Horkin cracked the two dowel rods together liked drumsticks, keeping his own cadence. “It wasn’t a spell at all. You didn’t know that, though, did you, Red? Fooled you completely, didn’t I?”

  “Yes, sir, you did,” said Raistlin.

  15

  THE RAIN FELL IN SANCTION, FELL ON THE HOT LAVA FLOWING SLUGGISHLY and incessantly from the Lords of Doom, splashed with a hissing sound on the molten rock, and turned to steam. The steam coiled into the air, roiled around the ground; a thick fog hid the bridge guards from each other’s sight, though they stood no more than ten paces from one another.

  No training exercises this day. The men could not have seen their commanders, could not have seen each other. Ariakas had put them to work filling in the old latrines, digging new ones—a task where the less seen the better. The men would grumble, but it was a soldier’s lot in life to grumble.

  Ariakas sat in his command tent, writing out dispatches by the light burning from a wick set in a dish of tallow. Water leaked through the tent roof, dripped monotonously into an upended helm he’d placed under the drip to keep it from spreading over the tent floor. He wondered why he bothered. Due to the fog, his tent was almost as wet inside as out. The fog crept inside, licked its gray tongue over his armor, over the tent posts, over his chair and the table, left them glistening in the lamplight.

  Everything was wet, damp, and gray. He could not tell what time of day it was, time had been swallowed up by the fog. Outside, he could hear the crunch of booted feet passing, men coming and going, cursing the rain and the fog and each other.

  Ariakas paid them no attention, continued to work. He could have left this dripping tent, returned to the warmth of his office in the Temple of Luerkhisis. He might now be seated at his desk with a cup of hot mulled wine. He put the thought from his mind. Rarely did soldiers fight battles in warm, cozy rooms. They fought in the rain and the mud and the fog. Ariakas was training himself as much as his men, toughening himself to endure the rigors of campaign life.

  “My lord.” One of his aides knocked on the tent post.

  “Yes, what is it?” Ariakas did not look up from his writing.

  “That woman is back, my lord.”

  “What woman?” Ariakas was irritated at the interruption. These orders had to be clear and precise and detailed. He could not afford any mistakes. Not on this mission.

  “The warrior woman, my lord,” said his aide. “She asks to see you.”

  “Kitiara!” Ariakas looked up, laid down his pen. His work was not forgotten, but it could wait.

  Kitiara. She had been on his mind ever since she’d left on her journey well over a month ago. He was pleased she had returned alive, though not particularly surprised, despite the fact that four others he’d sent to accomplish the same mission had
either died or deserted. Kitiara was different, out of the ordinary. There was a sense of destiny about her, or so it seemed to him. He was gratified to find that he had been right.

  Of course, she’d failed in her mission. That was only to be expected. The task on which he’d sent her had been impossible to achieve. He’d agreed to it merely to humor his Dark Queen. Perhaps now Takhisis would listen to him. Ariakas looked forward to hearing Kit’s excuses. He considered it impressive that she’d had the courage to come back.

  “Send her in at once,” said Ariakas.

  “Yes, my lord. She has a red-robed human magic-user with her, my lord,” the aide added.

  “She has what?” Ariakas was baffled. What would Kitiara be doing in the company of a red-robed wizard? And how dare she bring one into his camp? Who could it be? That half-brother of hers? After their first meeting, Ariakas had questioned Balif about Kitiara. The general knew that she had twin half-brothers, one of whom was a dolt and the other a young wizard, a Red Robe at that.

  “He’s a strange-looking cove, that one, my lord,” said the aide, lowering his voice. “Red from head to toe. And something dangerous about him. The guards would have never permitted him to enter camp—in fact they wanted to slay him on the spot—but the woman protected him, insisted that she was acting on your orders.”

  Red … from head to toe …

  “By our Queen!” Ariakas exclaimed, rising to his feet as the truth hit him a stunning blow. “Send them both to me at once!”

  “Both of them, my lord.”

  “Both! Immediately!”

  The aide departed.

  Some time passed—the guards must have been holding the two down by the bridge. Then Kitiara entered the tent, ducking beneath the dripping flap. She smiled to see him, a smile that was wider on one side of her mouth than the other, a smile that showed a flash of white teeth on only one side. A crooked smile, as he had noticed the first time he’d seen her. A mocking smile, as if she were laughing at fate, daring it to do its damnedest. Her dark eyes met his. She informed him of her triumph in that one single glance.