Dwarven Nations - Hammer And Axe Part 7

Have them wait byre white I inform the Council:'

The constable entered a plain wooden door, leaving the companions and their guards standing in a dark, smelly hallway A tinker lay in a corner, snoring noisily, obviously having taken too much wine. The guards wiped pumpkin rind off their uniforms and grimly divested themselves of carrot tops and other garbage that clung to them. Gilthanas dabbed at the blood on his face. Sturm tried to clean his cloak as best he could.

The constable returned, beckoning from the doorway.

"Bring them along:"

As the guards shoved their prisoners forward, Tanis managed to get near Sturm.

"Who's in charge here?" he whispered.

"If we are fortunate, the Lord is still in control of the city;" the knight replied softly. "The Tarsian lords always had the reputation for being n.o.ble and honorable:' He shrugged. "Besides, what charges do they have against us? We've done nothing. At the worst, an armed escort will make us leave the city."

Tanis shook his head dubiously as he entered the court room. It took some time for his eyes to adjust to tile dimness of the dingy chambers that smelled even worse than the hallway. Two of the Tarsian council members held) oranges studded with cloves up to their noses.

The six members of the council were seated at the bench, which stood upon a tall platform, three upon either side of their Lard, whose tall chair sat in the center. The Load glanced up as they entered. His eyebrows raised slightly at the sight of Sturm, and it seemed to Tanis that his face softened. The Lord even nodded in a gesture of polite greeting to the knight. Tanis's hopes rose. The companions walked forward to stand before the bench. There were no chairs.

Supplicants or prisoners before the council stand to present their cases.

"What is the charge against these men?" the lord asked.

The constable gave the companions a baleful glance.

"Inciting a riot, milord;' he said.

"Riot!" Flint exploded. "We had nothing to do with any riot! It oral that rattle-brained=

A figure in long robes crept forward from the shadows to whisper in his Lordship's ear. None of the companions had noticed the figure as they entered.

They noticed it now.

Flint coughed and fell silent, giving Tanis a meaningful, grim loo k from beneath his thick, white eyebrows. The dwarf shook his head, his shoulders slumped. Tanis, sighed wearily. Gilthanas wiped) blood from his cut with a shaking hand, his elven features pale with hatred. Only Sturm stood outwardly calm and unmoved as he looked upon the twisted half-man, half-reptilian face of a draconian.

The companions remaining in the Inn sat together in Elistan's room for at least an hour after the others were taken away by the guards. Caramon remained on guard near the door, his sword drawn. Riverwind kept watch out the window. In the distance, they could hear the sounds of the angry mob and looked at each other with tense, strained faces. Then the noise faded. No one disturbed them.

The Inn was deathly quiet.

The morning wore on without incident. The pale, cold sun climbed in the sky, doing little to warm the winter day. Caramon sheathed his sword and yawned. Tika dragged a chair over to sit beside him. Riverwind went to stand watchfully near Goldmoon, who was talking quietly to Elistan, making plans for the refugees.

Only Laurana remained standing by the window, though there was nothing to see.

The guards had apparently grown tired of marching up and down the street and now huddled in doorways, trying to keep warm. Behind her, she could hear Tika and Caramon laugh softly together. Laurana glanced around at them. Talking too quietly to be heard, Caramon appeared to be describing a battle. Tika listened intently, her eyes gleaming with admiration.

The young barmaid had received a great deal of practice in fighting on their journey south to find the Hammer of Kharas and, though she would never be truly skilled with a sword, she had developed shield-bashing into an art. She wore her armor casually now. It was still mismatched, but she kept adding to it, scrounging pieces left on battlefields. The sunlight glinted on her chainmail vest, glistened in her red hair. Caramon's face was animated and relaxed as he talked with the young woman. They did not touch-not with the golden ayes of Caramon's twin on them-but they leaned very near each other.

Laurana sighed and turned away, feeling very lonely andthinking of Raistlin's wards-very frightened.

She heard her sigh echoed, but it was not a sigh of regret. It was a sigh of irritation. Turning slightly, she looked dawn at Raistlin. The mage had closed the spellbook he was trying to read, and moved into the little bit of sunlight that came through the gla.s.s. He had to study his spellbook daily. It is the curse of the magi that they must commit their spells to memory time and again, for the words of magic flicker and die like sparks from a fire. Each spell cast saps the mage's strength, leaving him physically weakened until he is finally exhausted and cannot work any magic at all without rest.

Raistlin's strength had been growing since the companions' meeting in Solace, as had his power. He had mastered several new spells taught to him by Fizban, the b.u.mbling old magician who had died in Pax Tharkas. As his power grew, so did the misgivings of his companions. No one had any overt cause to mistrust him-indeed, his magic had saved their lives several times. But there was something disquieting about him-secret, silent, self-contained, and solitary as an oyster.

Absently caressing the night-blue cover of the strange spellbook he had acquired in Xak Tsaroth, Raistlin stared into the street. His golden eyes with their dark, hourgla.s.s-shaped pupils glittered coldly.

Although Laurana disliked speaking to the mage, she had to know! What had he meant-along farewell?

'What do you see when you look far away like that?" she asked softly, sitting down next to him, feeling a sudden weakness of fear sweep over her.

"What do I see?" he repeated softly. There was great pain and sadness in his voice, not the bitterness she was accustomed to hearing. "I see time as it affects all things. Human flesh withers and dies before my eyes. Flowers bloom, only to fade. Trees drop green leaves, never to regain them. In my sight, it is always winter, always night."

"And-this was dome to you in the Towers of High Sorcery?" Laurana asked; shocked beyond measure. "Why? To what end?'.

Raistlin smiled his rare and twisted smile. "To remind me of my own mortality.

To teach me compa.s.sion:' His voice sank. "I was proud and arrogant in my youth.

The youngest to take the Test, I was going to show them all!" His frail fist clenched. "Oh, I showed them. They shattered my body and devoured my mind until by the end I was capable of-" He stopped abruptly, his eyes shifting to Caramon.

"Of what?" Laurana asked, fearing to know, yet fascinated.

"Nothing;' Raistlin whispered, lowering his eyes. "I am forbidden to speak of it:'

Laurana saw his hands tremble. Sweat beaded on his forehead. His breath wheezed and he began to cough. Feeling guilty for having inadvertently caused such anguish, she flushed and shank her head, biting her lip. "I-I'm sorry to have given you pain. I didn't mean to:' Confused, she looked dawn, letting her hair fall forward to hide her face-a girlish habit.

Raistlin leaned Toward almost unconsciously, his hand stretching out, trembling, to touch the wondrous hair that seemed possessed of a life of its own, so vibrant and luxuriant was it. Then, seeing before his eyes his own dying flesh, he withdrew his hand quickly and sank back in his chair, a bitter smile on his lips. For what Laurana did not know, could not know, was that, in looking at her, Raistlin saw the only beauty he would ever see in his lifetime, Young, by elven standards, she was untouched by death or decay, even in the mage's cursed vision.

Laurana saw nothing of this. She was aware only that he moved slightly. She almost got up and left, but she felt drawn to him now, and he still had not answered her question, "I-I meant-can you see the future'! Tanis told me your mother was-what do they call it-prescient? I know that Tanis comes to you for advice. . . :'

Raistlin regarded Laurana thoughtfully. "The half-elf comes to me for advice, not because I can see the future. I can't. I am no seer. He comes because I am able to think, which is something most of these other fools seem incapable of doing:"

"But-what you said. Same of us may not see each other again:" Laurana looked up at him earnestly. "You must have foreseen something! What-I must know! Was it .

. . Tanis?"

Raistlin pondered. When he spoke, it was more to himself thorn to Laurana. "I don't know;' he whispered. "I don't even know why I said that. It's just that- for an instant-I knew-" He seemed to struggle to remember, then suddenly shrugged.

"Knew what?" Laurana persisted.

"Nothing. My overwrought imagination as the knight would say if he were here. So Tanis told you about my mother;" he said, changing the subject abruptly.

Laurana, disappointed but hoping to find out more if she kept talking to him, nodded her head. "He said she had the gift of foresight. She could look into the future and see images of what would come to pa.s.s:'

"That is true," Raistlin whispered, then smiled sardonically. "Much good it did her. The first man she married was a handsome warrior tram the northland. Their pa.s.sion died within months, and after that they made life miserable for each other. My mother was fragile of health and given to slipping into strange trances from which she might not wake for hours. They were poor, living off what her husband could earn with his sword. Though he was clearly of n.o.ble blood, he never spoke of his family. I do not believe he even told her his real name:'

Raistlin's eyes narrowed, "He told Kitiara, though. I'm sure of it. That is why she traveled north, to find his family."

"Kitiara . .. . " Laurana said in a strained voice. She touched the name .as one touches an aching tooth, eager to understand more of this human woman Tanis loved. "Then, that man-the n.o.ble warrior-was Kitiara's father?" she said in a husky voice.

Raistlin regarded her with a penetrating gaze. "Yes;' he whispered. "She is my elder half-sister. Older than Caramon and I by about eight years. She is very much like her father, I believe. As beautiful as he was handsome. Resolute and impetuous, warlike, strong and fearless. Her father taught her the only thing he knew-the art of warfare. He began going on longer and Longer trips, and one day vanished completely. My mother convinced the Highseekers to declare him legally dead. She then remarried the man who became our father. He was a simple man, a woodcutter by trade. Once again, her farsight did not serve her:"

'"Why" Laurana asked gently, caught up in the story, amazed that the usually taciturn sage was so voluble, not knowing that he was drawing more out of her simply by watching her expressive face than he was giving in return.

"The birth of my brother and I for one thing;' Raistlin said.

Then, overcome by a fit of coughing, he stopped talking and motioned to his brother, "Caramon! It is time for my drink;" he said in the hissing, whsiper that pierced through the loudest talk. "Or have you forgotten me in the pleasure of other company?"

Caramon fell silent in mid-laugh ' No, Raist;' he said guiltily, hurriedly rising from his seat to hang a kettle of water over the fire. Tika, subdued, lowered her head, unwilling to meet the mage's gaze.

After staring at her a moment" Raistlin turned back to Laurana, who had watched all this with a cold feeling in the pit of her stomach. He began to speak again as if there had been no interruption. "My mother never really recovered from the childbirth. The midwife gave me up for dead, and I would have died, too, if it hadn't been for Kitiara. Her first battle, she used to say, was against death with me as the prize. She raised us. My mother was incapable of taking care of children, and my father was forced to work day and night simply to keep us fed.

He died in an accident when Caramon and I were in our teens. My mother went into one of her trances that day"-Raistlin's voice dropped-"and never came out. She died of starvation:'

"How awful!" Laurana murmured, shivering.

Raistlin did not speak for long moments; his strange eyes staring out into the chill, gray winter sky. Then his mouth twisted. "It taught me a valuable lesson- learn to control the power. Never let it control you!"