Riverwind the Plainsman

by Paul B. Thompson

  “Here you stay. Commander calls, later.” The goblins took up positions around the circular courtyard. Riverwind, Catchflea, and Di An sat down under the hanging pot.

  “What do you make of all this?” Riverwind asked quietly. “Who are these lizard folk?”

  “Mercenaries of some sort, yes. Thouriss and Krago are different. Did you notice how Thouriss is in command, yet he asks Krago questions about the simplest things?”

  “He is a bully,” Di An said flatly. “A big, overgrown bully.”

  After a time, Shanz, the lizard officer, summoned them.

  A table covered by a snow-white cloth was set up amid the stumps of the broken palace columns. Heavy silver candleholders sprouted from the table, the candle flames flickering in the constant breeze off the three waterfalls. Five mismatched place settings of gold and silver were laid. Krago was already there, book open on his lap. His hood was pushed back, revealing a mane of unruly, red-blond hair. He couldn’t have been more than a few years older than Riverwind.

  He looked up briefly when the three approached. “Sit anywhere you like,” he said, waving a hand. “But leave the head of the table for Thouriss.”

  Riverwind and Di An sat on one side, while Catchflea slipped in beside the young cleric. Krago paid them no heed, but remained absorbed in his book.

  Catchflea fidgeted for a time, trying to remain mannered. He glanced at the leather-bound book that so absorbed Krago, but the writing looked like Ergothic and he didn’t understand it. The old man did at last pour himself a goblet of wine. It was dark, heavy, red wine, which only increased his hunger pangs.

  Thouriss swept in, wrapped in a scarlet and silver cape. He flung this off dramatically.

  Without tail or wings, his entire appearance and carriage was more manlike than his tall but slightly stooped officers. This was all the more eerie.

  “I am late,” he said superfluously. “I had to see to the start of a new task.”

  “What task, Commander?” Catchflea inquired politely.

  “I know you were helped by a gully dwarf in your attempt to escape the city. My warriors have begun a search for the one who helped you.”

  Riverwind felt the blood drain from his face. “What do you intend?”

  “He will be executed, of course, as an example.”

  Catchflea said quickly, “You may not catch him.” He fervently hoped Brud had made it safely home to his wife.

  “The lesson must be taught,” Thouriss said. A goblin brought a bowl of steaming water. Thouriss dipped his dusty, taloned fingers in the bowl. “If we don’t seize the actual dwarf, I shall take hostages and hang them instead.”

  Catchflea, Riverwind, and Di An exchanged horrified looks but remained silent. Thouriss finished cleaning his hands and dried them on a towel also carried by his goblin servant. He looked up at them.

  Before the commander could speak, Catchflea interjected a question. “Who are you?” he asked. “You are newcomers to this land, yes?”

  “Not quite. In fact, I was born here,” replied Thouriss.

  “Here?”

  “Xak Tsaroth. Wasn’t I, Krago?”

  “Hmm? Yes, you were.”

  A pair of goblins tramped in, laden with covered trays of food. Riverwind was quite surprised when the cover was whisked away, revealing an excellent haunch of venison, well roasted. Trays on the other end of the table held fruit and vegetables, most raw and unpeeled. Krago marked the page he was reading and shut his book. He took grapes and pears from the tray and cut the latter into neat quarters. Thouriss dragged the venison haunch in front of him and lowered his head to bite.

  “Guests are served first,” said Krago quietly.

  Thouriss froze. He closed his wicked jaws slowly, pulled a knife from his belt, and carved the haunch. He cut slices for Riverwind, Catchflea, and Di An. Krago didn’t eat meat, he explained. Then, for himself, Thouriss cut fist-sized chunks of meat and swallowed them whole, causing large bulges to appear in his neck until the meat passed out of his throat. It was both fascinating and repulsive to witness.

  When the deer’s leg bones were picked clean, Thouriss sat back and folded his hands across his belly. “Tell me,” he said, “how is it you come to be here?”

  Riverwind was ready for this. He said, “We entered a cave in the Forsaken Mountains and got lost. Trying to find our way out, we emerged in the mine below Xak Tsaroth.” It wasn’t a lie, even if he had left out a great deal.

  Thouriss stared at him. His direct gaze discomforted Riverwind. It seemed the commander could sense that his story was not quite right.

  “What is it you are mining for?” asked Catchflea quickly.

  “Cinnabar,” said Krago absently. “An ore of quicksilver.”

  “You are refining quicksilver. For what purpose?”

  “We need it,” Thouriss said. “That is sufficient answer.”

  “Quicksilver is used in the refining of gold,” Di An blurted.

  Krago raised an eyebrow. He said, “Do you know the working of metals?”

  “Some things,” the elf girl said, looking at her plate. “My people know metals.” She popped a grape into her mouth.

  “I have heard this. I wish you were older, that we might talk about the practices of your country,” Krago said.

  Di An was tiring of people mistaking her for a child. “I’m not as young as I look,” she said with some vigor.

  “Oh?” Thouriss said.

  “I am well over two hundred years old,” she said.

  “Extraordinary” said the reptilian commander. “How do you explain your youthful appearance?”

  “There are many like me in my country. We age, but we never grow up.”

  Now Krago was very alert. He leaned far over the table, to get closer to the elf girl. “Arrested development? I would like to hear more of this.”

  “Krago is deeply interested in such matters,” interjected Thouriss. “Growth and aging are his prime areas of study.”

  “Ahem.” Catchflea pointedly cleared his throat. “What is to become of us?”

  “I haven’t decided,” Thouriss said. He scratched one of his metallic fingernails on his silver plate. The resulting screech set Riverwind’s teeth on edge.

  “We are merely travelers,” Riverwind said. “We only want to go our own way.”

  “I will decide,” Thouriss said with sudden irritation. “Do not vex me. It does not serve your cause.”

  “You have no right to keep us here. We are free people.”

  Thouriss smashed a fist on the table. A candlestick toppled and rolled off onto the ground. “I have a right to do anything I please! I command here!” Krago coughed into his water glass. Thouriss stood up in irritation. “Go back to your cell until I send for you. And when I do, you will not know if I am going to free you or have you beheaded!”

  He growled an order in a harsh guttural tongue, and the guards surrounded the table. Riverwind, Catchflea, and Di An went quietly with them.

  Krago rose and circled behind Thouriss. He touched a cool hand to the back of the commander’s heavily muscled neck. “Your blood is racing,” the cleric said soothingly. “You lost your temper for no good reason.”

  “I know. I know.” Thouriss breathed fast through his narrow nostrils.

  “The barbarian was goading you, and you did what he wanted. That is bad, Thouriss. A leader must remain cool under stress.”

  “I know!” Thouriss smote the tabletop again with his fist.

  The thick wood cracked and a sliver pierced the tablecloth, embedding itself in his hand. He held the injured hand up, watching the greenish blood well out of the tiny wound.

  “Krago,” he whimpered, “take it out!”

  “All right, come to my chamber.”

  The powerful commander trailed after the smaller, less imposing human, cradling his injured hand. “I don’t feel like a leader. So many people know so much more than I do,” said Thouriss.

  The cleric resumed walking. “That�
��s only natural. How old are you?”

  The creature counted on his fingers. “Four, no five.”

  “Five months old,” Krago said evenly. “Remarkable. A human at five months is still a mewling thing, unable to walk or talk. In a year, you’ll be wiser and more powerful than any draconian ever created.”

  In Krago’s study, Thouriss held still as the human plucked the splinter out with a pair of forceps. Thouriss put the wound to his lips and licked the few drops of blood away.

  “Does your blood taste like mine?” he asked ingenuously.

  Krago dropped the forceps in a drawer. “I don’t know. I doubt it.”

  “Because you are human and I am not,” Thouriss said. “I could kill the tall human and taste his.”

  “No, that would be frivolous. Besides, civilized creatures don’t eat each other,” said Krago.

  “Why?”

  “It’s not polite.” With a yawn, Krago reached for a thick volume on his shelf and gave it to Thouriss. “Here is a history of the Empire of Ergoth. Read this, and you’ll see how civilized beings behave.”

  Thouriss eyed the book distastefully. “I am a warrior. I don’t like to read.”

  “But you must try if you are to grow wiser. And soon you’ll have a companion, someone to talk to about everything you learn. No longer will you be alone.”

  Thouriss’s slit eyes widened. “Tell me her name again?”

  “Lyrexis. Your mate’s name will be Lyrexis.”

  Chapter 19

  Cinnabar

  “I have an idea that our captor is a child,” Riverwind noted. Neither the old man nor the elf girl understood. “He has the mind and moods of a child. Krago is some kind of mentor.”

  “Ah!” Catchflea said. “I begin to see!”

  “I don’t,” Di An complained.

  “The reason Thouriss acts the way he does—asking questions about ordinary things, growing angry when questioned; these are the reactions of a child, yes?”

  “If you say so. But what does it mean?”

  Riverwind surveyed their barren cell. The torchlight from outside was fitful at best. “I’m not sure. Something strange is going on in this place. The lizard folk and their goblin soldiers are not here to build homes and grow crops. But what is their purpose?” Riverwind sat down with his back to the wall. “Catchflea, do you have your acorns?”

  “Yes, the guards didn’t take them.”

  “Consult them. See if you can discover what’s brewing here.”

  The old man performed his ritual. He shook the gourd and dumped the nuts on the dusty stone floor. “Ha!”

  Di An peered over Catchflea’s shoulder. “What do you see?”

  The old man’s face was clouded with strain. “Darkness. Death. The acorns show death marching across the land.”

  Riverwind leaned forward. “Our deaths?”

  “I’m not certain.” The soothsayer peered closely at the acorns, touching them with one finger.

  Riverwind said. “Ask about Krago and his purpose.”

  Round and round went the acorns in the gourd. “Ha!” Catchflea exclaimed. He perused the formation of the nuts. “I do not understand,” he said, frowning. “Very strange!”

  “What?”

  “Here it calls him midwife. Why should it say that?”

  “A midwife assists at a birth,” Di An offered.

  “This one shows him standing in darkness with liquid silver beads running from his cupped hands.”

  “Quicksilver,” Di An suggested.

  “And this! This is the strangest answer of all.” To Riverwind it was just an acorn, lying almost vertically on its knobby cap. “A seed planted in blood. That’s what I see. A seed planted in blood.”

  The three huddled together as the cold from the bare stone floor seeped through their clothes. No one could make much sense of Catchflea’s augury. They passed a few moments, each with his own thoughts. Riverwind finally said, “We must stop them.”

  “How can we? They are many and strong,” said Di An.

  “I don’t know. But if we don’t, the spreading darkness and death Catchflea saw will surely be visited on our homes and families.”

  “It seems a certainty,” the old man said, his voice pained.

  “Perhaps we can enlist the Aghar in our cause …”

  The cell door flew open without preamble. Two goblins bulked large in the opening, “Come with us, girl,” said one.

  Di An clutched Riverwind’s arm. “What do you want with me?”

  “Master Krago wants to speak with you.”

  “I don’t want to go!” she hissed in the plainsman’s ear.

  Riverwind laid his hand over hers. “Be brave,” he said.

  “Come, girl,” one of the goblins rumbled.

  Di An walked slowly to the door. The guards bore one feeble lantern. Di An cast a glance at the pale faces of her friends.

  “Good-bye, giant. And you, too, old giant,” she said, her voice carrying finality.

  Di An was taken to the ruined palace, but not through the columned facade where they’d first met Thouriss. Her guards took her nearly to the base of the East Falls. There, amid the tumult and the spray, she spied a door in the palace wall, artfully painted to resemble a crack in the stone blocks. The goblins pushed her into the opening and took up positions outside.

  It was close and warm inside, but Di An still shivered. She was in a dark foyer. Ahead, a warm orange light cut across the shallow corridor. She walked slowly toward the light.

  The place smelled strongly of snakes. She soon saw why: the corridor was lined with a series of open-ended cells, which a small contingent of lizard men occupied. It was supper time for them. Folding leather tables groaned under the weight of deer haunches, sides of beef and pork, and whole chickens. The lizard men ate their meat raw, with much cracking of bones and tearing of pale, bloodless flesh. Di An hurried by them. A slit eye or two glanced her way, but mostly they ignored her.

  The passage ended on a right turn. Water trickled down the wall, leaking in from the waterfall outside. Di An quickened her pace. Before she knew it, she was running, not knowing where she was going or why she ran. There was a new smell in the air—a familiar one. Hot metal.

  The corridor abruptly ended where the way was blocked by a massive fill of loose rock and broken stone. To the right was a narrow door, a strip of carpet nailed over it. Di An cautiously drew the carpet aside.

  “Come in,” Krago said. He was sitting in a heavy wooden chair, books and parchments strewn around him. At his left, a furnace gave off a steady, dull roar. A gang of gully dwarves labored over it, feeding coal to the fire and pumping large leather bellows. Other Aghar pounded pestles in a giant mortar. Red dust clung to their faces and hands. Two dumpy females scooped up red rocks and tossed them in the mortar. Krago was refining cinnabar.

  “Come over here,” the human said. Di An approached. The room was divided by a high bookcase, fully seven feet tall and at least thirty feet long. The shelves were crammed with books, scrolls, lumps of stone, beakers, vials, pots, and retorts.

  In the near corner stood a glazed stone vat. As Di An crossed over to Krago’s chair, a squat gully dwarf waddled in front of her. The gully dwarf carried a pot brimming with liquid silver on his head. He climbed a short ladder set beside the vat and emptied the quicksilver into it. From the sound it made, Di An guessed the vat was almost full.

  “You are extracting quicksilver,” she said.

  “Eh, yes, I am. Though I’m down to the last of my ore. I need at least a hundredweight more.” Krago scribbled something on a vellum page with a quill. He put down the quill. “Come this way.”

  The bookcase turned at right angles, making a smaller private area off the main room. The bookcase also enclosed a sizable area. Di An wondered what went on behind the wooden wall.

  “Here we are. Sit.” Di An perched on a folding stool. Krago dropped onto a hard-looking frame bed. He focused his attention on the elf girl, shutting out t
he sounds from the furnace area.

  “I’m very interested in this condition of yours,” the cleric began. “You really haven’t aged outwardly since you were, what, twelve? Thirteen?”

  “By human terms, yes,” Di An said.

  “And this happens to others in your country?”

  “More and more often.”

  “Interesting.” Krago still believed Di An’s homeland to be Silvanesti. “Do the wise men of your country know why this condition occurs?” he asked, leaning toward her and resting his hands on his knees.

  “It is a matter of dispute,” she replied. “The commonest answer is that smoke and fumes from our foundries collect in the—” She started to say “cave” and checked herself. “In the air and affect our mothers when they are with child.”

  “Metallic vapors poisoning the unborn,” Krago mused, nodding. “This might have some bearing on my own experiments. Hmm.” He searched for a pen and something to write on. “What sort of metals do your people work?” asked Krago, rummaging through his shabby robe.

  “All kinds. Iron, copper, lead, silver, gold, tin.”

  “Not quicksilver?” He paused in his probings.

  “There is little use for it. Besides, it is too dangerous to mine,” she said. She thought about the gully dwarves covered in dust. “Haven’t you seen the sickness in the gullies?”

  “Oh, I don’t pay much attention to them. Thouriss handles the workers. I merely choose the tasks they are to do.”

  Krago seemed mild enough, so Di An essayed a question of her own. “What are you using all the quicksilver for? Are you minting gold?”

  He laughed. “Nothing so mundane! No, the liquid metal is essential for my work, that’s all. But to return to you; this perpetual youth of yours, this is a valuable thing.”

  “I call it a curse.”

  Krago’s brows went up. “Why?”

  She looked away from him. “To remain a child by size and temperament? Never to grow? Never to know the love of a mate?” Her gaze came back to him. “I call it a curse.”

  “Many humans would give much to live for hundreds of years, even in the body of a child,” Krago said. “So much time for research. Time to see the fruition of decades of work.” His eyes were distant.