Dragons of a Fallen Sun

by Margaret Weis

  He saw Chaos, the Father of All and of Nothing, a fearsome giant with beard and hair of flame, standing taller than the tallest mountain, the top of his head brushing eternity, his feet extending to the deepest part of the Abyss. Chaos had just smashed his foot down on the ground, presumably killing Tasslehoff but inflicting his death blow upon himself, for Usha would catch a drop of his blood in the Chaos jewel and banish him.

  The spinning continued, carrying Palin on past that moment into …

  Blackness. Utter darkness. A darkness so vast and deep that Palin feared he’d been struck blind. And then he saw light behind him, blazing firelight.

  He glanced back into fire, looked ahead into darkness. Looked into nothing.

  Panic-stricken, he closed his eyes. “Go back beyond the Chaos War!” he said, half-suffocated with fear. “Go back to my childhood! Go back to my father’s childhood! Go back to Istar! Go back to the Kingpriest! Go back to Huma! Go back … go back …”

  He opened his eyes.

  Darkness, emptiness, nothing.

  He took another step and realized that he had taken a step too far. He had stepped off the precipice.

  He screamed, but no sound came from his throat. Time’s rushing wind carried it away from. He experienced the sickening sensation of falling that one feels in a dream. His stomach dropped. Cold sweat bathed him. He tried desperately to wake himself, but then came the horrible knowledge that he would never wake.

  Fear seized him, paralyzed him. He was falling, and he would continue to fall and fall and keep falling into time’s well of darkness.

  Time’s empty well.

  Having been the one using the device to travel back through time, Tasslehoff had never actually seen what happened to himself when he used it. He had always rather regretted this and had once tried to go back to watch himself going back, but that hadn’t worked. He was extremely gratified, therefore, to watch Palin using the device and quite charmed to see the mage disappear before his very eyes.

  All that was interesting and exciting, but it lasted only a few moments. Then Palin was gone, and Tasslehoff and Jenna were alone in the Majere’s kitchen.

  “We didn’t explode,” Tas observed.

  “No, we didn’t,” Jenna agreed. “Disappointed?”

  “A little. I’ve never seen anything explode before, not counting the time Fizban tried to boil water to cook an egg. Speaking of eggs, would you like something to eat while we wait? I could heat up some oatmeal.” Tas felt it incumbent upon himself to act as host in Usha’s and Palin’s absence.

  “Thank you,” Jenna replied, glancing at the remains of the congealed oatmeal in the pot and making a slight grimace, “but I think not. If you could find some brandy, now, I believe I could use a drink—”

  Palin materialized in the room. He was ashen, disheveled, and he clutched the device in a hand that shook so he could barely hold it.

  “Palin!” Jenna cried, rising from her chair in amazement and consternation. “Are you hurt?”

  He stared at her wildly, without recognition. Then he shuddered, gave a gasping sigh of relief. Staggering, he very nearly fell. His hand went limp. The device tumbled to the floor and bounced away in a flash of jewels. Tas chased after it, caught it before it rolled into the fireplace.

  “Palin, what went wrong?” Jenna ran to him. “What happened? Tas, help me!”

  Palin started to crumple. Between the two of them, Tas and Jenna eased the mage to the floor.

  “Go fetch blankets,” Jenna ordered.

  Tasslehoff dashed out of the kitchen, pausing only a moment to deposit the device in a pocket. He returned moments later, tottering under a load of several blankets, three pillows, and a feather mattress that he had dragged off the master bed.

  Palin lay on the floor, his eyes closed. He was too weak to move or speak. Jenna put her hand on his wrist, felt his pulse racing. His breathing was rapid, rasping, his body chilled. He was shivering so that his teeth clicked together. She wrapped two of the blankets snugly around him.

  “Palin!” she called urgently.

  He opened his eyes, stared at her. “Darkness. All darkness.”

  “Palin, what do you mean? What did you see in the past?”

  He grasped her hand, hard, hurting her. He held fast to her as if he were being swept away by a raging river and she was his only salvation.

  “There is no past!” he whispered through pallid lips. He sank back, exhausted.

  “Darkness,” he murmured. “Only darkness.”

  Jenna sat back on her heels, frowning.

  “That doesn’t make any sense. Brandy,” she said to Tas.

  She held the flask to Palin’s lips. He drank a little, and some color came to his pale cheeks. The shivering eased. Jenna took a swallow of the brandy herself, then handed the flask to the kender. Tas helped himself, just to be sociable.

  “Put it back on the table,” Jenna ordered.

  Tas removed the flask from his pocket and, after several more sociable gulps, he placed it on the table.

  The kender looked down at Palin in remorseful concern. “What’s wrong? Was this my fault? I didn’t mean it, if it was.”

  Palin’s eyes flared open again. “Your fault!” he cried hoarsely. Flinging off the blankets, he sat up. “Yes, it’s your fault!”

  “Palin, keep calm,” Jenna said, alarmed. “You’ll make yourself ill again. Tell me what you saw.”

  “I’ll tell you what I saw, Jenna.” Palin said, his voice hollow. “I saw nothing. Nothing!”

  “I don’t understand,” Jenna said.

  “I don’t either.” Palin sighed, concentrated, tried to order his thoughts. “I traveled back in time and as I did so, time unrolled before me, like a vast parchment. I saw all that has passed in the Fifth Age. I saw the coming of the great dragons. I saw the dragon purge. I saw the building of this Citadel. I saw the raising of the shield over Silvanesti. I saw the dedication of the Tomb of the Last Heroes. I saw the defeat of Chaos, and that is where it all ends. Or begins.”

  “Ends? Begins?” Jenna repeated, baffled. “But that can’t be, Palin. What of the Fourth Age? What of the War of the Lance? What of the Cataclysm?”

  “Gone. All of it. I stood amidst the ether and saw the battle with Chaos, but when I tried to see beyond, when I looked into the past, I saw only darkness. I took a step and …” He shuddered. “I fell into the darkness. A void where no light shines, no light has ever shone. Darkness that is eternal, everlasting. I had the feeling that I was falling through centuries of time and that I would continue to fall until death took me, and then my corpse would keep falling.…”

  “If that is true, what does it mean?” Jenna pondered.

  “I’ll tell you what it means,” Palin said raggedly. He pointed at Tasslehoff. “This is Tas’s fault. Everything that has happened is his fault.”

  “Why? What does he have to do with it?”

  “Because he’s not dead!” Palin said, hissing the words through clenched teeth. “He changed time by not dying! The future he saw was the future that happened because he died and by his death, we were able to defeat Chaos. But he’s not dead! We didn’t defeat Chaos. The Father of All and Nothing banished his children, the gods, and these past forty years of death and turmoil have been the result!”

  Jenna looked at Tas. Palin was looking at Tas, this time as if he’d grown five heads, wings and a tail.

  “Let’s all have another drink of brandy,” Tas suggested, taking his own advice. “Just to make us feel better. Clear our heads,” he added pointedly.

  “You could be right, Palin,” Jenna said thoughtfully.

  “I know I’m right!” he said grimly.

  “And we all know that two rights make a wrong,” Tas observed helpfully. “Would anyone like oatmeal?”

  “What other explanation could there be?” Palin continued, ignoring the kender.

  “I’m not sure,” said Tas, backing up a few steps toward the kitchen door, “but if you give me a
moment, I’ll bet I could think of several.”

  Palin threw off the blanket and rose to his feet. “We have to send Tas back to die.”

  “Palin, I’m not so sure …” Jenna began, but he wasn’t listening to her.

  “Where’s the device?” he demanded feverishly. “What happened to it?”

  “While it is true,” Tas said, “that I had promised Fizban I would go back in time for the giant to step on me, the more I think about that part of it, the less I like it. For while being stepped on by a giant might be extremely interesting, it would be interesting for only a few seconds at most, and then as you said I would be dead.”

  Tas bumped up against the kitchen door.

  “And while I’ve never been dead,” he continued, “I’ve seen people being dead before, and I must say that it looks like about the most uninteresting thing that could happen to a person.”

  “Where is the device?” Palin demanded.

  “It rolled into the ashes!” Tas cried and pointed at the fireplace. He took another gulp of brandy.

  “I’ll look,” Jenna offered. Seizing the poker, she began to sift through the ashes.

  Palin peered over her shoulder. “We must find it!”

  Tasslehoff put his hand in his pocket and, taking hold of the Device of Time Journeying, he began to turn it and twist it and slide it, all the while speaking the rhyme under his breath.

  “ ‘Thy time is thy own, though across it you travel …’ ”

  “Are you sure it went under here, Tas?” Jenna asked. “Because I can’t see anything except cinders—”

  Tas spoke faster, his nimble fingers working swiftly.

  “ ‘Whirling across forever. Obstruct not its flow,’ ” he whispered.

  This was going to be the tricky part.

  Palin’s head jerked up. Turning around, he made a diving leap for the kender.

  Tas whipped the device out of his pocket and held it up. “Destiny be over your own head!” he cried, and he was pleased to realize, as time rolled up the kitchen, the brandy flask, and him along with it, that he had just made a very pithy remark.

  “The little weasel,” said Jenna, looking at the empty place on the floor where the kender had once been standing. “So he had the device all along.”

  “My gods!” Palin gasped. “What have I done?”

  “Scared the oatmeal out of him, unless I’m much mistaken,” Jenna returned. “Which is quite an accomplishment, considering he’s a kender. I don’t blame him,” she added, scrubbing her soot-covered hands vigorously on a towel. “If you had shouted at me like that, I would have run, too.”

  “I’m not a monster,” Palin said, exasperated. “I am scared! I don’t mind admitting it.” He pressed his hand over his heart. “The fear is here, worse than anything I’ve ever known, even during the dark days of my captivity. Something strange and terrible has happened to the world, Jenna, and I don’t understand what!” His fists clenched. “The kender is the cause. I’m sure of it!”

  “If so, we better find him,” said Jenna practically. “Where do you think he would have gone? Not back in time?”

  “If he has, we’ll never locate him. But I don’t think he would,” Palin said, pondering. “He wouldn’t go back because if he did, he’d wind up exactly where he doesn’t want to be—dead. I believe he’s still in the present. Then where would he go?”

  “To someone who would protect him from you,” said Jenna bluntly.

  “Goldmoon,” said Palin. “He talked about wanting to see her only moments before he left. Or Laurana. He’s already been to see Laurana. Knowing Tas, though, he’d want some new adventure. I will travel to the Citadel of Light. I would like to discuss what I have seen with Goldmoon anyhow.”

  “I’ll loan you one of my magical rings to speed you across the miles,” Jenna said, tugging the ring off her finger. “Meanwhile, I will send a message to Laurana, warning her to watch for the kender and if he shows up on her doorstep, to hang onto him.”

  Palin accepted the ring. “Warn her to be cautious of what she says and does,” he added, his expression troubled. “I believe that there may be a traitor in her household. Either that or the Neraka Knights have found some way to spy on her. Will you …” He paused, swallowed. “Will you stop by the Inn and tell Usha … tell her …”

  “I’ll tell her you’re not a monster,” said Jenna, patting his arm with a smile. She looked at him intently, frowning in anxiety. “Are you certain you are well enough for this?”

  “I was not injured. Only shocked. I can’t say that’s wearing off, but I’ll be well enough to make the journey.” He looked curiously at the ring. “How does this work?”

  “Not all that well anymore,” Jenna wryly. “It will take you two or three jumps to reach your destination. Place the ring on the middle finger of your left hand. That’s close enough,” she added, seeing Palin struggle to ease it over a swollen joint. “Put your right hand over the ring and conjure up the image of where you want to be. Keep that image in your mind, repeat it to yourself over and over again. I want that ring back, by the way.”

  “Certainly.” He smiled at her wanly. “Farewell, Jenna. Thank you for your help. I’ll keep you informed.”

  He placed his hand over the ring and began to picture in his mind the crytal rainbow domes of the Citadel of Light.

  “Palin,” Jenna said suddenly, “I haven’t been entirely honest with you. I may have an idea where to find Dalamar.”

  “Good,” Palin replied. “My father was right. We need him.”

  23

  The Hedge Maze

  he gnome was lost in the hedge maze.

  This was nothing unusual. The gnome was frequently lost in the hedge maze. In fact, whenever anyone in the Citadel of Light wanted the gnome (which wasn’t often) and asked where he was, the response was invariably, “Lost in the hedge maze.”

  The gnome did not wander the hedge maze aimlessly. Far from it. He entered the hedge maze daily with a set purpose, a mission, and that was to make a map of the maze. The gnome, who belonged to the Guild of PuzzlesRiddlesEnigmasRebusLogogriphsMonogramsAnagramsAcrosticsCrosswordsMazesLabyrinthsParadoxesScrabbleFeminineLogicandPoliticians, otherwise known as P3 for short, knew of a certainty that if he could map the hedge maze, he would find in that map the key to the Great Mysteries of Life, among these being: Why Is It That When You Wash Two Socks You Only End Up With One? Is There Life After Death? and Where Did The Other Sock Go? The gnome was convinced that if you found the answer to the second question you would also find the answer to the third.

  In vain the mystics of the Citadel attempted to explain to him that the hedge maze was magical. Those who entered it with minds troubled or sad found their cares eased, their burdens lifted. Those who entered it seeking solitude and peace were not disturbed, no matter how many other people walked the fragrant hedgerows at the same moment. Those who entered seeking a solution to a problem found that their thoughts grew centered, their minds cleared of clutter. Those who entered on their mystical journey to climb the Silver Stair that stood in the center of the maze found that they did not journey through a maze of shrubbery, but through the maze of their hearts.

  Those who entered the hedge maze with the firm resolve to map out the hedge maze, to try to define it in terms of X number of rows and left and right turnings and longitudes and latitudes and degrees of angles and radiuses and circumferences discovered that here mathematics need not apply. The hedge maze shifted beneath the compass, skittered out from underneath the ruler, defied all calculation.

  The gnome, whose name (the short version) was Conundrum, refused to listen. He entered the hedge maze every day, convinced that this would be the day he solved the mystery. This would be the day he would achieve his Life Quest and produce the definitive map of the hedge maze, a map he would then copy and sell to tour groups.

  With one quill pen stuck behind his ear and another through the bosom of his robe, rather as if he’d been stabbed, the gnome would
enter the hedge maze in the morning and work feverishly all during the hours of sunlight. He would measure and count his steps, note down the elevation of the hedge at Point A, indicate where Point A converged with Point B, and cover himself in ink and perspiration. He would emerge at the end of the day glowing with pride, with bits of the hedge stuck in his hair and beard, and produce for the edification of any poor unfortunate he could coerce into viewing his project an ink-spattered and sweat-stained map of the hedge maze.

  He would then spend the night copying the map so that it was perfect, absolutely perfect, not a twig missing. Next morning he would take the map into the hedge maze and become immediately and hopelessly lost. He would manage to find his way out about noontime, which just gave him daylight enough to redraw his map—and so forth and so on daily for about a year now.

  On this day Conundrum had worked his way through the hedge maze to about the halfway point. He was down on his knees, tape in hand, measuring the angle between a zig and a zag when he noted a foot blocking his way. The foot was encased in a boot that was attached to a leg that was attached—on looking up—to a kender.

  “Excuse me,” said the kender politely, “but I’m lost and I was wondering—”

  “Lost! Lost!” Conundrum scrambled to his feet, overturning his ink jar, which left a large purple stain on the grassy path. Sobbing, the gnome flung his arms around the kender. “How gratifying! I’m so glad! So glad! You can’t know!”

  “There, there,” said the kender, patting the gnome on the back. “I’m certain that whatever it is, it will be all right. Have you a hankie? Here, borrow mine. Actually, it’s Palin’s, but I don’t suppose he’d care.”

  “Thank you,” said the gnome, blowing his nose.

  Generally gnomes talk extremely fast and mash all their words together, one on top of the other, in the belief that if you don’t reach the end of a sentence quickly you might never reach it all. Conundrum had lived among humans long enough to have learned to slow his speech pattern. He now talked very slowly and haltingly, which led other gnomes he encountered to consider him quite stupid.

  “I’m sorry I fell apart like that.” The gnome sniffed. “It’s just, I’ve been working so long, and no one has been kind enough to get lost before …” He started to weep again.