Conundrum

Chapter
30

Sir Grumdish flipped open the belly visor on his suit of mechanical armor and peered out at the massive heap of rubble piled up against the wall of the cavern. He glanced at Sir Tanar, who stood nearby, calmly waiting with his hands folded into the sleeves of his long gray robes. The wizard’s narrow, craggy face was unreadable, as if it had been carved from marble. Growling in frustration, Sir Grumdish focused his gaze on the pile of rubble once more.

“You say that’s the way to the dragon?” he asked with obvious suspicion.

“No doubt about it,” Sir Tanar answered. “Of course, if you are afraid…”

“Balderdash!” Sir Grumdish snorted. “I was just wondering what the point was of bringing me here. The entrance is sealed.”

“Yes, but your armor is more powerful than a human knight, correct?” the Thorn Knight prodded, his face still inscrutable.

“As strong as three men,” the gnome bragged.

“Well, there is a crevice between two of those boulders on the left there. I crawled through it yesterday. A couple of strong men might move those boulders enough for a knight in armor to pass. Anyway, that’s what I thought,” Sir Tanar said noncommittally.

“And did you see this dragon in its lair?” Sir Grumdish shrewdly guessed, catching the Thorn Knight off guard. Sir Tanar was still in the habit of thinking gnomes silly tinkerers. For a moment, his careful mask cracked, and he stared at the gnome in undisguised loathing. Sir Grumdish laughed.

“Well, so long as we really understand each other,” the gnome said. “You want me to slay this dragon so you can grab the choicest items of treasure. If I happen to be slain in the process, all the better for you.”

Sir Tanar smiled and said in a conciliatory voice, “I see I cannot fool you.”

“I do not begrudge you,” Sir Grumdish said as he snapped shut his visor. “It is no less than I expected of you. I just didn’t know that you were aware of my Life Quest. If I could only slay a dragon, the Knights of Solamnia could no longer refuse my application. Well, let’s take a look at this crevice anyway. Probably you are only wasting my time.”

He strode clankingly toward the rubble pile. Sir Tanar dropped in behind, an evil twinkle shining in his black eyes.

After walking up and down before the heap of stones for several minutes, Sir Grumdish stopped and placed his gauntleted fists on his armored hips. The belly visor swung open once more.

“It has possibilities,” he said. “One need only look at it as an architectural puzzle, and one sees that the structure of the pile has several fundamental instabilities. The giants who built it obviously knew little of masonry, while I know quite a bit about the craft, it being in the family, so to say. My mother and sisters are all members of the Masons and Stonecutters Guild back in Mount Nevermind. With a proper fulcrum, a strong enough lever, and several proper steam engines, this pile could be brought down entirely.” He clanked a few steps closer and leaned back to get a better look at the entire problem. “Of course, we don’t want to bring down the entire pile. That might let the dragon out. We just need a large enough space for me to fit through.”

Saying this, he approached a large boulder lying near the crevice and set his gauntleted hands against it. Machinery began to whine complainingly deep within Sir Grumdish’s mechanical armor, but the boulder did not budge. Metal creaked and groaned under the stress. A thin stream of smoke coiled from the left ear hole of his polished helm, and a smell of hot steel permeated the air. The whining had grown to a full-throated scream of stripping gears and bending rods when, without warning, there was a crack of stone from high above.

Sir Tanar leaped back and turned to run, shielding his head with his arms, as the entire pile of rubble came roaring down in an unstoppable landslide. Choking dust filled the air, and stones crashed around him, pelting his back and legs. Dodging into the dark doorway of a nearby building, he narrowly avoided being crushed by a boulder three times his size. Here he hid, cowering in the dark, until the last echoes of the slide faded into nothingness. Then he crept out to survey the damage.

“Damn gnomes!” he swore, mouth agape.

Sir Grumdish was nowhere to be seen. A pile of rubble now covered the place where he had been pushing against the boulder. Sir Tanar did not pause to mourn, unless it was to curse his own luck. With gnomes, nothing seemed to work as planned. Sir Grumdish was only supposed to open a way large enough for him to pass in armor. Instead, the entrance to Charynsanth’s lair now lay wide open, and his offering to the dragon was now dead underneath a dozen tons of stone. His plans had all gone to rot.

Not that it really mattered. He would just have to find a way to placate the dragon without the sacrifice of Sir Grumdish. In fact, this might even be better. He had intended to tell Charynsanth of the underwater passage that the Indestructible had used to escape her. Now he could keep that little bolt hole a secret. He might need it, once she had helped him gain control of the Indestructible. Yes, once he thought about it, this was infinitely better. He had one less gnome to deal with. If he did things right, he might not need the dragon after all.

But of course, by the time he realized this, it was too late. Charynsanth was coming. The ground began to tremble beneath his feet, and the last loose stones, released by the shaking, rattled down the face of the landslide. He had two choices now, and neither of them seemed exactly safe. Red dragons were notoriously unpredictable. She might rush out and, seeing him, flame him without a second thought. But if he hid and revealed himself only after she emerged from the tunnel, he might surprise her, and then she might flame him without a second thought.

Finally, he decided that the wisest course would be to stand his ground and show no fear. It had worked at their first meeting. He mustn’t show weakness now, he concluded, so he folded his hands into the sleeves of his robes and waited.

This was not so simple a task as it might sound. To stand before an open tunnel from which an angry red dragon was about to emerge was a trial of the spirit. He trembled, sweated, and changed his mind a dozen times, even before the dragonfear struck him like a hammer blow to the chest. Then he heard the roar of Charynsanth, nearly blowing his robes off. Sir Tanar’s light gray wizard’s robes began to darken with moisture.

Finally, she appeared, her long serpentine neck writhing cautiously from the shadows. “Well, wizard, I see you were as good as your word. Except for the promised morsel. Where is it? Your kender only whetted my appetite.”

“Unfortunately, he was buried while opening your door,” the Thorn Knight answered, but this time his voice quavered with fear. He swore under his breath and tried to get a rein on his emotions.

“A shame,” the dragon purred. “I do so want to trust you, but until then…" her voice trailed off in a bubbling snarl.

Sir Tanar staggered and stumbled over a rock, then scrambled to his feet, yawning uncontrollably. He shook the cobwebs from his mind, fighting off a sudden and powerful urge to sleep. His wizardry instincts screamed sleep spell! She was trying to ensorcell him.

Casting aside all his plans and schemes, Sir Tanar turned and fled down the rubble-strewn avenue. He had no power to fight this dragon, not even with the aid of the magical communication device-not out in the open anyway, where she could breathe her fire on him and use her natural armaments of claw and tooth, tail and wing. He needed cover from which to cast his spells.

Long used to athletic endeavors, Sir Tanar’s long legs served him well, as did the fear pumping through his veins. He dashed down the avenue, hurtling stones and dodging boulders like a Palanthian steeplechase runner. Seeing what appeared to be a dark alley-although in this place of monumental construction it was probably nothing more than a space between two buildings-he skittered to a stop and dove inside without looking back to see if the dragon was following.

He ran to the end of the alley without coming upon any crossways. The alley itself was far too small for the dragon to enter, so for the moment he felt safe. Dragging out the small flat box, he set it on the ground, then knelt before it and opened it. He lifted the magical silver plate from its place, feeling its magic surge through him, giving him new strength and confidence. The words to a protection spell came to mind, and he opened his mouth to speak them.

But he never finished his incantation. A pillar of flame descended upon him from above, burning away robe, flesh, bone, wishes, desires, and regrets in one white hot instant. The flames splashed against the walls of the surrounding buildings, melting stone like candle wax. It flowed down the sides of the buildings and pooled in the alley, a little flame leaping up as it consumed the box. The silver plate, being magical, withstood the heat, but the molten stone flowed round it, encased it, then cooled and hardened.

But by that time, Charynsanth had already gone, knowing now where the gnome ship lay. There was only one place it could be. The little pool at the low end of the city.