The Fire Rose

I

His wounds still pained him, but Golgren didn’t let it show. Several months had passed since he had led his warriors against the unthinkable: an army of the undead-or, as the ogres called them, f’hanos-bent on the destruction of Garantha, the great capital of his precious Golthuu. Many warriors had perished, and Golgren had nearly died himself. But the threat had been overcome, with the Grand Khan-the Grand Lord at that point-being hailed by his people as Kala i iF’hanosi il aF’hanariFaluum iGolgreni, or the “Final Death of the Undead That is Golgren.”

But the half-breed master of the ogre race had not been entirely responsible for that victory, just as the danger that day had not come from a single source. Much magic had been involved. A great part of the magic, originated from the Ogre Titans. Indeed the damage to Garantha could be traced-at least by Golgren-to the spell the Titans had cast creating a massive quake beyond the capital.

Golgren rose from the wide, lush bed in his personal chambers. Countless silken pillows of many colors filled the bed, and elegant draperies flanked the structure. All were spoils of the conquest of Silvanesti far to the south-a conquest made in conjunction with his current bitter enemies, the Uruv Suurt. Those horned warriors had taken the bulk of Silvanesti as their prize, turning it into the imperial colony of Ambeon.

Golgren was an unlikely looking ruler of the ogre race. He was no taller than a minotaur and more sleek of form than most of his kind. His features could have been called brutally handsome, for there was much in them that spoke of his mother’s people: the very elves he had helped enslave and scatter. From his mother he had inherited his almond-shaped, emerald eyes and his more pronounced-yet narrow-nose. His jaw was strong, but less so than with most ogres. The tusks that he had grown up with had long been filed to mere nubs, adding to his more elf look.

His dark mane of hair was always kept groomed, and he wore garments befitting a noble of the elf or human races. The Grand Khan did not believe it was any insult to his people, but rather an attempt to resurrect the ancient golden era when his kind had been the most beautiful of creatures. The era when elves, dwarves, and humans had all but looked to the ogres as gods.

Golgren was dressed for war. Each day new reports confirmed that his great kingdom was under threat. As Golgren forced his weary body to move, he confronted in a nearby long, crystalline mirror-yet again, a treasure from what was Uruv Suurt-held Ambeon-a figure already clad in a shining breastplate and a kilt, with sandaled feet. A green and brown cloak lay loosely spread over one side of the bed. On a moon-shaped marble table sat a helmet whose crest was shaped like a griffon, the patron beast of Garantha.

Each night, Golgren slept ready to be summoned to battle. He had no choice. With the culmination of his dreams had also come the advent of his eternal nightmares.

“My lord,” came a musical, feminine voice speaking in the Common tongue. “I did not hear you rise. Please forgive me.”

“Ah, my Idaria,” he responded without even glancing in her direction. “Do I not always?”

Golgren had also spoken in Common for, as part of the transformation and uplifting of his realm, the Grand Khan insisted on all his subjects knowing and speaking Common. It was the accepted tongue of commerce and negotiation among the humans, elves, and other so-called civilized peoples. And Golgren was determined to prove his people were every bit as civilized, even if most of the other races were enemies.

A slim, but still well-shaped form clad in the tatters of a green elven gown slipped up behind the Grand Khan. The elf maiden looked years younger than Golgren-who himself was in the prime of ogre life-but she was, by his estimate, at least twice his age, if not much older. Though a slave, the silver-tressed elf looked well-Golgren desired his personal servant to always look beautiful and fit. Her gown, fashioned according to his orders to make her all the more appealing, revealed the beauty of her skin and body. Her ivory color was a sign of health among the elves, and her eyes were a bright, crystalline blue. She wore sandals that would have fit an ogre child of perhaps four years of age, and moved with an astonishing grace he could never match, even though she wore severed bracelets of chains on both her ankles and wrists.

That chains were no longer attached to those bracelets was a sign of the level of trust that had grown between the Grand Khan and his personal servant. The elf woman-already freed of her bonds by another-had, of her own volition, rejected freedom in order to help her wounded and battered master from the battlefield, and had cared for him loyally since. She had been given ample opportunity to flee or escape, but had never done so.

Golgren boasted to his followers that she adored him even more than they did. But there were other reasons he knew for her dedication that he admitted only to himself. After all, he still held in his hand the future of many of her people, kept secure-if captive-in a special pen at one end of the capital. He had once promised to release them after his ascension to Grand Khan, but circumstances had forced him to delay their release. He might yet keep that promise, if it suited him.

Also-though he preferred not to think of the disturbing possibility-he suspected Idaria of ties to the world beyond Golthuu. He believed she might be a spy.

As to whom she spied for, that was another question. The Knights of Solamnia, the regal knighthood that ruled the realm to the west named for them, were one possibility. Once, Golgren had hoped to make peace overtures to the Solamnians, using the liberation of the elf slaves as a goodwill offering. He still hoped to join with the Solamnians, for they presented the best hope for an ally he might play off against the Uruv Suurt.

However, Idaria had shown no interest in the lone knight of the sword who had come to Golgren as an emissary. She could have fled with the knight, rather than stay with her enslaver. Yet she lingered. That made Golgren wonder whether she was working for the bands of elves who had the desperate dream of recovering Ambeon for their own occupation. Or perhaps she followed the orders of another human faction bordering his domain: the black-armored knights of Neraka-once fanatic allies of the goddess Takhisis, and a political power in their own right.

Or perhaps she served someone whose identity he did not yet know.

“It is not yet morn,” the elf whispered behind him. Elves were tall, but still she had to reach up to touch his shoulders. “Why do you not sleep a little longer? You are in great need of it, my lord. There has been so much burden on you.”

“I sleep enough. Bring me wine.”

As Idaria moved to obey, Golgren took the moment to stretch his stiff bones. Even the elf’s knowledgeable nurturing of his injuries had only been able to do so much to help him recover. And he was not about to turn to the Titans for some potion.

The blue-tinted sorcerers had been very quiet of late, far too submissive for the Grand Khan’s taste. Their new leader, Safrag, had come to Golgren early on after the devastation. He had thrown the blame on whatever mysterious force had resurrected the dead, and the inadequacies-not exactly the way Safrag had phrased it, but the tone was there-of the Titans’ late creator, Dauroth. Dauroth, to hear his successor describe things, had struggled hard with his followers to stave off the mysterious earthquake. The first and eldest of the Titans had perished when consumed by the very spell that had saved the Grand Khan and Garantha. That was good, at least.

Safrag, ever bowing, had sworn that the Titans would work hard to discover who was behind the sinister plot against their race. He had since only appeared before Golgren twice. Both of those brief appearances had been at Golgren’s command and were more for him to keep his eye on what the sorcerers themselves were up to, rather than for any important business.

In both cases the ogre leader had learned very little about the mysterious activities of the Titans.

But from other sources …

Idaria brought him a silver goblet filled with sweet red wine-some of the last of his rare elf reserves. Soon, Golgren would have to resort to the brackish, thick brews of his own kind, or find a way to steal or trade for some of the better Solamnic fare, the most reasonable substitute.

The Grand Khan downed a good portion of the wine before stiffening.

“Tyranos,” he half growled.

A shadow detached itself from one corner, coalescing into a mountain of a man, a lion-faced human nearly as tall as the ogre was and far broader of shoulder. His golden brown hair hung like a mane around his broad face. He wore a sardonic grin.

One of the human’s hands turned downward. From it grew a short staff that barely touched the ancient marble floor. Out of the top of the staff sprouted a five-sided crystal the size of a fist, which radiated a silver glow.

Although clearly a wizard, the leonine Tyranos did not wear the white, red, or black robes of the three established orders. Rather, his voluminous robe was a deep, rich brown color. Some might have taken him for a sorcerer, for sorcerers utilized a different magic. But all that Golgren had witnessed thus far indicated otherwise. Still, a wizard who did not belong to one of the three orders was a renegade, someone feared and despised by the others.

That fate did not seem to bother the powerfully built human, who looked more like a fighter than a spellcaster. The wizard bowed his head to Golgren and flashed a grin at the female slave.

“Have I intruded?” he asked teasingly.

The Grand Khan ignored the remark. “I have no patience. What is it you interrupt me with, human?”

Tyranos’s grin faded. “Oh, merely the impending destruction of all you hold dear. The usual thing.”

They were an uneasy alliance, the wizard and the ogre leader. Golgren relied on Tyranos to help him monitor the Titans and other problems. As for Tyranos, his motives were murky. But he did share the same obsession with the Grand Khan and the Titans.

The legacy of the High Ogres.

The lord of Golthuu purposely turned from the wizard, his eyes sweeping across his personal chambers. Although they had been repaired as best as possible, there were visible fault lines in the sealed stone walls and the marble floor. The fluted columns were likewise adorned with sealed cracks; some of them had needed rebuilding after falling into crumbling ruin. Great, colorful tapestries of elven tree homes and mythic beasts covered other damaged parts of the walls.

The chamber-the entire palace of the Grand Khan, in fact-had once been the residence of the great High Ogre leaders. Indeed, in the halls and corridors beyond could be seen extravagantly carved reliefs of the ancestors of those who populated the land. More fair of face than elves, the High Ogres had also been far more powerful. Their influence had spread throughout the continent of Ansalon to other parts of Krynn. They had wielded magic in a manner unseen in the modern age, and all other races had bowed to their superiority.

But the grandeur they had created eventually dissipated. Ogres believed that their ancestors had been betrayed by the lesser races and somehow had degenerated over the generations until they arrived at their present form. The legend as the outside world saw it-as even Golgren believed-was that the High Ogres had become so arrogant the gods had punished them.

But the Grand Khan believed that a rebirth of that golden age was destined, and he shared his belief with the Titans. However, Golgren and the mysterious sorcerers very much disagreed about the means of reaching that new golden age.

“It is the Titans?” he asked Tyranos.

“I’d venture to say that a breath is not drawn in Kern and Blode-pardon, in all Golthuu-that they don’t try to influence. As to actual evidence, that’s always another story, eh?”

The half-breed turned to the wizard. “So? If it’s the usual story, why is the news of such import that you must disturb me?”

The leonine human glanced pointedly at Idaria. Golgren generally did not dismiss his favored slave, even when talking with Tyranos. She already knew many secrets that existed only between them. The wizard had never protested before, though his reasons for trusting her were certainly not those of his partner.

“The Knights of Neraka have sent scouts over the border. And when I say scouts, I mean more than a dozen hardy warriors.”

“Hmmm.” Golgren understood the significance of Tyranos’s visit. “Soon they will move in force.”

“Yes. And as chance would certainly not have it, the empire appears to have crossed your southern border almost at the same time. Your good friend Faros yearns for your other hand, I suppose.”

Golgren winced, and his good hand attempted to reach for his shadow limb. But the Grand Khan showed no other emotions. Indeed, all that he had suspected was beginning to come to pass. He looked at the elf. “What say you, my Idaria?”

She bowed low, her movements as graceful as the wind. “My lord, I am concerned only about your well-being.”

“You hear that, Tyranos? She speaks the truth. Part of the truth, at least.” Before Idaria could protest, Golgren waved her silent. “So … The Black Shells to one side, the Uruv Suurt to another. It comes as no surprise, wizard.”

Tyranos’s heavy brow arched. “How about the fact that some of your own armies have gone missing?”

Golgren couldn’t disguise his astonishment. “Speak clearly!”

The wizard chuckled. “As to that, it would be best if you spoke with Khleeg,” he answered, referring to the Grand Khan’s trusted second in command. “He should be getting the information that I already know very soon.”

How the human knew such things before anyone else irritated Golgren, but he let the wizard’s arrogance pass. Yes, he’d speak to Khleeg. Striding to the great brass door, he swung it open fast enough to send the guards outside jumping to attention.

“Khleeg! Send Khleeg to me!”

One of the ogre warriors rushed off. Golgren shut the door again and returned to his magical visitor. The guards would not have heard the wizard’s deep voice. Not only were the walls and the door intentionally thick, but Tyranos usually masked the area with magic when speaking with the Grand Khan.

“There is more?” Golgren asked.

Tyranos’s eyes flickered ever so briefly over to Idaria and back to Golgren “Only … Have you seen any more winged spies of late?”

“Other than your pet?”

“Chasm only watches on those occasions when I am not available. But speaking of gargoyles, yes. Let’s refer to those in particular. Any of the winged spies?”

Golgren growled, but more at himself than at the human. “No. Not since …”

“Not since the battle. Not since you proclaimed yourself Grand Khan.” Tyranos nodded to himself. “As I thought.”

“That means something to you?”

The wizard suddenly swept up the hand that held the short staff. “I’ll let you know.”

And with that, Tyranos turned to shadow and vanished.

Unimpressed by the grand exit but annoyed by its suddenness, Golgren faced his slave. “My Idaria, have you seen any gargoyles? Seen them, and failed to mention their presence?”

“No, my lord.” Her expression was all innocence.

The Grand Khan turned from her. He fought off his swelling impatience for Khleeg’s arrival by striding to the chamber’s balcony. The first hint of daylight had just begun to spread over the capital. As Golgren stepped out onto the balcony, his sandaled feet trod upon a huge, stylized griffon crafted in mosaic on the floor. The vertical columns of the stone rail were carved to resemble the same beast.

Well familiar with his moods, Idaria did not follow her master out onto the balcony. She hung back, watching and waiting. Her gaze was no longer that of merely a servant, but had narrowed, as though in deep speculation.

Golgren moved to the rail. His first glance at what lay beyond was cursory, for he didn’t really expect to see any sign, however slight, of one of the mysterious, leathery sentinels who had in the past spied upon him from one distant rooftop or another.

The sky was empty of any creature save one of the fearsome, dark red predators of the type that Golgren’s predecessor, Zharang, had kept as pets. The vulturelike creature was likely stalking simple fare, rather than the severed fingers of punished subjects that Zharang had liked to feed his birds. Golgren had noticed more than a few foreign birds about his city, especially since he had made Idaria his foremost slave. Birds that would have been more at home in the forests of lost Silvanost, he reflected.

Both the bird and the gargoyles were forgotten as the conqueror of Kern and Blode drank in a full sweeping view of the capital of his new kingdom, Garantha-called Kernen by ignorant outsiders.

In the prime of its existence as one of the greatest centers of High Ogre civilization, Garantha had offered to the world tall, shining towers and obelisks, a great zoo featuring exotic animals from all over the world, and a market where one could find rare and valuable items brought from the farthest reaches. The outer walls had held gargantuan reliefs of Garantha’s many treasures and triumphs. Inside those walls had been a pristine city teeming with the beautiful, blue-skinned masters of Krynn.

But centuries of neglect had left the walls crumbling, even gone, in many places. The great towers had collapsed; the zoo was but a shell of a memory. And the monstrous descendants of the High Ogres had lived like animals themselves in hovels that had once been the grand estates of their forebears. There had been attempts, especially in the past generation or two, to patch up the capital. But although the Grand Khans before Golgren had played at imitating the High Ogres, they had looked more like swine clad in fine garments. Their notions of repair and revival had been just as pathetic as their attempted playacting.

Golgren had changed all that. As he gazed over his city, he saw many at work on rebuilding the towers, clearing streets of refuse, and making the grand walls surrounding the capital whole again. Farther east, construction had nearly finished on one of the Grand Khan’s personal projects: an oval tower ten stories high with twelve windows-almond-shaped like the eyes of Golgren-all covering the side facing the setting sun. The twelve windows marked even intervals once the sun began its descent. On the other side, where the sun first glimmered, there were no windows at all. In the Common tongue, the structure was called the “House of Night.”

To ogres, the hot, stifling day-so savage in the height of summer-was called iSirriti Siroth or the “Sirrion’s Burning.” The ogres believed that the god of fire, Sirrion, sought to devour the land of the High Ogres and that was why few places in all of Ansalon were as desolate as Golthuu. Ogres paid great homage to no particular god-though, like the minotaurs, they honored Sargonnas the Warrior-but if there was a deity that they feared, it was Sirrion.

Golgren himself had no fear of any god. Sirrion was one of the neutral deities and, therefore, of little consequence to him. The Grand Khan naturally respected Sargonnas and Kiri-Jolith, the former’s rival for the Uruv Suurt and one of the chief patrons of the Knights of Solamnia. Golgren had hoped the bison-headed Kiri-Jolith would look with favor on his plan to deal with the Solamnians, but such apparently was not the case.

And with no alliance imminent, Golgren’s adversaries had apparently teamed up against him.

The Knights of Neraka and the Uruv Suurt.

He heard the door open and Idaria murmuring. Golgren started to turn, when his eye caught sight of something glittering atop the House of Night.

The ogre leader stumbled back in surprise.

A golden figure stood atop the oval tower. Tall and gleaming, the figure had no face, yet somehow Golgren knew that it stared into his eyes.

“My lord!” grunted a throaty voice.

Golgren instinctively looked to the speaker, a heavyset but muscular ogre with a face ugly even by his people’s standards. The ogre’s left eye appeared to be constantly squinting, and the upper half of one of his tusks was missing. His flesh was a sickly, mottled brown, and it was clear that he was not of the same hearty stock as either Golgren or the lankier guard who stood several paces behind.

Khleeg was a Blodian ogre, and in other generations his kind would have been at constant war with their cousins from Kern. But Golgren had recruited Khleeg and countless others like him to his cause, creating the first true alliance of ogrekind since the days of the ancients.

Almost as soon as he turned to greet Khleeg, Golgren cursed and glanced back at the House of Night. But he was too late. Of the golden figure, there was no sign.

“My lord!” Khleeg repeated, his expression concerned. Cradling his helmet in the crook of his arm, the ogre strode anxiously to his master. “You are-”

Golgren let out a snarl and swung at his second in command with his maimed arm. Only because there was no longer a hand attached to the limb did he keep from striking the other ogre across the jaw.

The Grand Khan immediately recovered. Khleeg, almost as well-versed in the moods of his leader as Idaria, pretended the attack had never taken place. Since the struggle against the f’hanos, Golgren had displayed bouts of fury that had been uncommon before.

Although Khleeg stood at attention, there was still something in the corner of his eye that made Golgren ask suspiciously, “There is something wrong with me?”

The ogre commander went down on one knee. “My head is yours, my lord,” Khleeg responded, his Common much improved. Very little Ogre was spoken among those of Golgren’s inner circle. Words and the occasional phrase were allowed, but no conversation or prolonged discussion was permitted. Indeed, Golgren considered the current Ogre tongue a mongrel language that needed to be put down. “I speak only as I see!”

“Khleeg’s head is his still. Speak.” Golgren waited for the other to tell him that he had seen the golden figure too.

But, instead, Khleeg muttered, “Your face, my lord! It is red like flame … was red like flame. No more …”

Frowning, Golgren looked past him to Idaria. Her eyes wide, she nodded.

“Stand aside!” The Grand Khan charged back into his chamber, heading directly for the mirror. Crystalline dryads sculpted into the ivory frame seemed to mock him as he stared at himself.

There was no sign of any redness. He spun about. Khleeg stood near the balcony, silent and loyal.

“Not any more,” Golgren said.

“No, my lord. But I saw it. There was a”-Khleeg frowned and with an apologetic look, finished-“vrakuli?”

The word was a Blodian term for gargoyle meaning “winged vermin.” Khleeg was the only one other than Idaria and Tyranos who knew-thanks to his lord-of the spying creatures. He did not know of the wizard’s existence, though. That was something with which even Khleeg could not be trusted.

“Yes,” Golgren finally answered. “A voru tzyn,” he added, using the more universal ogre name for the creatures. “A gargoyle.”

“Gargoyle” muttered Khleeg, memorizing the Common word. The officer beat a fist on his breastplate. “I find Wargroch! Send him with warriors to search the roofs-”

“It is gone. The warriors will not search. They have other tasks, yes? And you have other reasons for coming, Khleeg.”

The other ogre nodded. “My lord, Zhulom’s hand cannot be found.”

He did not refer to a missing appendage, as in the case of his master, but rather the formal term that Golgren had chosen to mark the ogre equivalent of an Uruv Suurt legion. Each hand consisted of roughly twelve hundred warriors divided into groups of five, as in five fingers. It was Golgren’s latest attempt to organize the ogre might into disciplined units.

But one did not lose an entire hand, not even in the wastelands of southern Golthuu. More importantly, the fact that it was the warlord Zhulom’s particular hand bothered the Grand Khan. Zhulom was an ambitious commander who had readily sided with the half-breed early on. But ambition, as Golgren well understood, did not suddenly vanish merely because one’s patron had become supreme ruler. Already so close to the throne, the former warlord might be enticed by the notion of taking the final step and seizing it from his slighter, maimed lord. Golgren had already executed one warlord since the battle, a Blodian who had thought the Grand Khan’s injuries a good enough reason to try a coup.

Golgren suddenly recalled something else about Zhulom’s force: The commander of one of its five fingers was Atolgus, a young chieftain raised up by the Grand Khan. Commander Atolgus had brought the Solamnic knight to Golgren, stirring hopes of a pact between the knights and ogres. And although that effort had failed, Atolgus had proven very loyal. The Grand Khan had intended the chieftain for greater things.

If Zhulom had turned renegade, Atolgus and the other young leaders Golgren had been keeping a fond eye on were likely dead.

“Vaduk and Carku are very loyal,” he said to Khleeg. “They are nearest. They will hunt Zhulom.”

The officer grinned, revealing sharp, yellowed teeth. “Send word. F’han to Zhulom! Death!”

“Zhulom’s head. Bring it to me.”

Khleeg beat his chest again. “Aye, my lord.”

As the officer rushed off to send the orders, Golgren glanced at Idaria. She said nothing, but both knew what subject crossed the Grand Khan’s thoughts.

“I do not think him dead, my lord,” the elf woman solemnly proclaimed, referring not to Atolgus or any of the other ogres involved in the missing hand. “I think he was called.”

“Sir Stefan Rennert of the Knights of Solamnia walks into the wild as the earth quakes and f’hanos surround him, and yet he is not dead, you say.” The Grand Khan bared his teeth, an act that made him look far more ogreish. “May whatever god has taken him return him to me. For I will have much need of him very soon.” His brow suddenly furrowed as he considered another possibility. “Whatever god … or Titan.”