Dragonlance 17 - Dragons Of A Vanished Moon (25 page)

breath, laid waste to entire tracts of forest land.

These dragon scouts saw the large gathering of people in the desert but had no idea they were Qualinesti. The scouts thought them the barbarians, the Plainspeople, fleeing the onslaught of the dragon overlord Sable. General Dogah wondered

what to do about this migration. He had no orders concerning

the Plainspeople. His forces were limited, his hold on Silvanost tenuous at best. He did not want to start war on another front. He dispatched a courier on dragonback with an urgent message for Mina, telling her about the situation and asking for orders.

The courier had some difficulty locating Mina, for he flew first

to Solanthus, only to find that her army had left there and was on the march for Sanction.

After another day's flying, the courier located her. He sped back with this reply, short and terse.

General Dogah

These are not Plainspeople. They are Qualinesti exiles. Destroy them.

In the name of the One God,

Mina

Dogah sent off his dragonriders to do just that, only to find, in the interim, that the Qualinesti had disappeared. No trace of them could be found anywhere. He received this report with a bitter curse, for he knew what it meant. The Qualinesti had managed

to escape into the forests of Silvanesti and were now beyond his reach.

Here were yet more elves to attack his patrols and fire flaming arrows at his supply ships. To add to his woes, the dragons began bringing reports that the ogres, long enraged at the Knights for stealing their land, were massing on the northern Silvanesti border that adjoined Blode, undoubtedly hoping to seize some elven land in return.

And to make matters worse, Dogah was having morale trouble. So long as Mina had been around to enchant them and entrance them, the soldiers were committed to her cause, dedicated

and enthusiastic followers. But Mina had been gone many long weeks now. The soldiers and the Knights who commanded them were isolated in the middle of a strange and unfriendly realm, where enemies lurked in every shadow—and Silvanesti was a land of shadows. Arrows came out of the skies to slay them. Even the vegetation seemed intent on trying to kill them. Tree roots tripped them, dead limbs dropped on their heads, forests lured them into tangles from which few ever returned.

Not a single supply ship had sailed down the river in the past week. The elves set fire to those that made the attempt. The soldiers

had no food other than what the elves ate, and no human could subsist on leaves and grass for long. The meat-hungry humans dared not enter the woods to hunt, for, as they soon discovered, every creature in the forest was a spy for the elves.

The elves of the city of Silvanost, seemingly cowed by the might of the Dark Knights, were growing bolder. None of Dogah's men dared venture into the city alone lest they risk being found dead in an alley. The men began to grouse and grumble.

Dogah issued orders to torture more elves, but such entertainment

could keep his troops occupied for only so long. He was fortunate in that there were no desertions. This was not due to loyalty, as he well knew, but to the fact that the men were too terrified

of the elves and the forest that sheltered them to flee.

Now, with the knowledge that a thousand more elves had joined those already in the forest, the mutinous rumblings grew loud as thunder, so that Dogah could not remain deaf to them. He himself began to doubt. When he could not see himself

reassuringly reflected in her amber eyes, his trust in Mina started to wane.

He dispatched another urgent message to Mina, telling her that the Qualinesti had escaped his best efforts to destroy them, that morale was in the privies, and that unless something happened

to change the situation, he would have no choice but to pull out of Silvanesti or face mutiny.

Dark-bearded and, these days, dark-faced and gloomy, the short, stocky Dogah sat alone (he had very little trust even in his own bodyguards these days) in his quarters, drank elven wine that he wished mightily was a liquor far stronger, and waited for Mina's reply.

The Qualinesti entered the forest to be coolly welcomed by their long-estranged cousins, the Silvanesti. A polite cousinly kiss of greeting was exchanged, and then spears and arrows were thrust into Qualinesti hands. If they were going to relocate to Silvanesti,

they had better be prepared to fight for it.

The Qualinesti were only too happy to oblige. They saw this

as a chance to avenge themselves on those who had seized their own realm and were now laying waste to it.

"When do we attack?" they demanded eagerly.

"Any day now," was the response from the Silvanesti. "We are waiting for the right time."

"Waiting for the right time?" the Lioness asked her husband.

"For what 'right time' do we wait? I have talked to the scouts and spies. We outnumber the Dark Knights who are bottled up in Silvanost. Their morale sinks faster than a ship-wrecked

dwarf in full battle armor. Now is the opportune time to attack them!"

The two spoke in the shelter that had been provided for them—a hutch made of woven willow branches on the side of a bubbling stream. The space was small and cramped, but they were luckier than most of the elves, for they had a place of their own (due to Gilthas's royal rank) and some privacy. Most of the elves slept in the boughs of living trees or the hollowed-out boles of dead ones, inside caves or simply lying in the grass under the stars. The Qualinesti had no complaints. After their trek through the desert, they asked for nothing more than to sleep on crisp-smelling pine needles, lulled by the gentle murmur of the falling rain.

"You tell me nothing that I don't already know," said Gilthas morosely. He had taken to wearing clothing more typical of his people—the long, belted tunic, woollen shirt, and stockings in woodland colors. But he had folded neatly and put away safely the coverings of the desert.

"There are problems, however. The Silvanesti are spread out all over the land. Some are stationed along the river to disrupt the Dark Knights' supply lines. Others hide near the city of

Silvanost, to make certain that any patrol that has nerve enough to leave the city does not return intact. Still others are scattered along the borders . . ."

"The wind, the hawk, the squirrel carry messages," returned the Lioness. "If the orders were sent now, most of the Silvanesti could be gathered outside Silvanost in a week's time. Days go

by, and the orders are not given. We must skulk about in the forest and wait. Wait for what?"

Gilthas knew, but he could not answer. He kept silent, was forced let his wife fume.

"We know what will happen if the opportunity is missed! Thus did the Dark Knights take over our homeland during the Chaos War. The same will be true of the Silvanesti, if we don't act now. Is it your cousin, Silvanoshei, who holds back? He is young. Probably he doesn't understand. You must speak to him, Gilthas, explain to him—"

She knew her husband well. At the look on her face, the words clotted on her tongue.

The Lioness eyed him narrowly. "What is it, Gilthas? What's wrong? Something about Silvanoshei, isn't it?"

Gilthas looked at her ruefully. "Am I so transparent? Kings should be cloaked in inscrutability and mystery."

"My husband," said the Lioness, unable to keep from laughing,

"you are inscrutable and mysterious as a crystal goblet. The truth inside you is plain for all the world to see."

"The truth ..." Gilthas made a wry face. "The truth is, my dear, that Silvanoshei could not lead his people in a three-legged race, much less lead them to war. He is nowhere near here, nowhere near Silvanesti. I promised Alhana I would say nothing, but now a fortnight has passed and it seems to me that the time for lying has come to an end. Although"—Gilthas shook his head—"I fear that the truth will do more harm than good. The Silvanesti follow Alhana now only because she speaks in the name of her son. Some still view her with suspicion,

see her as a 'dark elf.' If they find out the truth, that she has been lying to them, I fear they will never believe her again, never listen to her."

The Lioness looked into her husband's eyes. "That leaves you, Gilthas."

Now it was his turn to laugh. "I am everything that they despise, my dear. A Qualinesti with human blood thrown in. They will not follow me."

"Then you must persuade Alhana to tell her people the truth."

"I don't believe she can. She has told the lie so long that, for her, the lie has become the truth."

"So what do we do?" the Lioness demanded. "Live here in the forest until we take root along with the trees? We Qualinesti could attack the Dark Knights—"

"No, my dear," said Gilthas firmly. "The Silvanesti have permitted us to enter their homeland, that much is true, but they view us with suspicion, nonetheless. There are those who think we are here to usurp their homeland. For the Qualinesti to attack Silvanost—"

"The Qualinesti are not attacking Silvanost. The Qualinesti are attacking the Dark Knights in Silvanost," argued the Lioness.

"That is not how the Silvanesti will view it. You know that as well as I do."

"So we sit and do nothing."

"I do not know what else we can do," said Gilthas somberly. "The one person who could have united and rallied his people has been lured away. Now the only people left to lead the elves are a dark elf queen and a half-human king."

"Yet sooner or later someone must take the lead," the Lioness said. "We must follow someone."

"And where would that someone lead them?" Gilthas asked somberly, "except to our own destruction."

General Dogah drank his way through several barrels of wine. His problems increased daily. Six soldiers ordered to stand guard on the battlements refused to obey. Their officer threatened them with the lash. They attacked him, beat him severely, and ran off, hoping to lose themselves in the streets of Silvanost. Dogah sent his troops after the deserters, intending to string them up to serve as examples to the rest.

The elves saved him the cost of rope. The bodies of the six were delivered to the castle. Each had died in some gruesome, grotesque manner. A note found on one, scrawled in Common, read, A gift for the One God.

That night, Dogah sent another messenger to Mina, pleading for either reinforcements or permission to withdraw. Although, he thought glumly, he had no idea where he would withdraw to. Everywhere he looked, he saw enemies.

Two days later, the messenger finally returned.

General Dogah

Hold your ground. Help is on the way.

In the name of the One God.

Mina

That wasn't much comfort.

Every day, Dogah cautiously mounted the walls of Silvanost, peered out to the north, the south, the east, and the west. The elves were out there. They had him surrounded. Every day, he expected the elves to attack.

Days passed, and the elves did nothing.

5

The Hedge Maze

Tasslehoff Burrfoot was, at that moment in time feeling extremely put-out, put-upon, dizzy, and sick to his stomach. Of the three feelings, the dizzy feeling predominated,

so that he was finding it hard to think clearly. Plain, wooden floors and good, hard ground had once seemed mundane

objects as far as he was concerned, but now Tasslehoff thought fondly, wistfully, longingly of ground or floor or any solid surface beneath his feet.

He also thought longingly of his feet returning to their proper place as feet and not thinking themselves his head, which they were continually doing, for he always looked for them below and found them above. The only good thing to happen to Tasslehoff was that Conundrum had screamed himself hoarse and could now make only feeble croaking sounds.

Tas blamed everything on the Device of Time Journeying. He wondered sadly if this whirling and turning and dropping in on various points of time was going to go on eternally, and

he was a bit daunted at the prospect. Then it occurred to him that sooner or later, the device was bound to land him back in the time where he'd be stepped on by Chaos. All in all, not a bright prospect.

Such thoughts ran through his head, which was constantly whirling and twirling through time. He thought them through as best he could, given the dizzy feeling, and suddenly a fresh thought popped in. Perhaps the owner of the voice that he heard in his ear and the hand that he felt on his shoulder could do

something about this endless whirling. He made up his mind that the moment they landed again, he would do everything in his power to see the hand's owner.

Which he did. The very minute he felt firm ground (blessed ground!) beneath his feet, he stumbled around (rather wobbly) to look behind him.

He saw Conundrum and Conundrum's hand, but that was the wrong hand. No one else was about, and Tas immediately knew why. He and the gnome were standing in what appeared to be a field blackened by fire. Some distance away, crystal buildings caught the last glow of evening, glimmered orange or purple or gold as the dying rays of the sun painted them. The air was still tainted with the smell of burning, although the fire that had consumed the vegetation had been put out some time ago. He could hear voices, but they were far distant. From somewhere came the sweet and piercing music of a flute.

Tasslehoff had the vague notion that he'd been here before. Or maybe he'd been here after before. What with all the time jumping, he wasn't certain about anything anymore. The place looked familiar, and he was about to set off in search of

someone who could tell him where he was, when Conundrum gave a wheezing gasp.

"The Hedge Maze!"

Tas looked down and looked sideways, and he realized that Conundrum was right. They were standing in what remained of the Hedge Maze after the red dragons had destroyed it with their fiery breath. The walls of leaves were burnt down to the ground.

The paths that wound and twisted between them—leading those who walked the paths deeper into the maze—were laid bare. The maze was a maze no longer. Tas could see the pattern clearly, the white paths standing out starkly against the black. He could see every twist, every turning, every whorl, every jog, every dead end. He saw the way to the heart of the Hedge Maze and he saw the way out. The silver stair stood naked, exposed. He could see plainly now that it led up and up to nowhere, and with a queasy flutter of the stomach, he remembered his leap off the top and his dive into the smoke and the flame.