War of the Twins

The River Flows On...

The dark waters of time swirled about the archmage’s black robes, carrying him and those with him forward through the years.

The sky rained fire, the mountain fell upon the city of Istar, plunging it down, down into the depths of the ground. The sea waters, taking mercy on the terrible destruction, rushed in to fill the void. The great Temple, where the Kingpriest was still waiting for the gods to grant him his demands, vanished from the face of the world. Even those sea elves who ventured into the newly-created Blood Sea of Istar looked in wonder at the place where the Temple had stood. There was nothing there now but a deep black pit. The sea water within was so dark and chill that even these elves, born and bred and living beneath the water, dared not swim near it.

But there were many on Ansalon who envied the inhabitants of Istar. For them at least, death had come swiftly.

For those who survived the immediate destruction on Ansalon, death came slowly, in hideous aspect—starvation, disease, murder...

War.

1

A hoarse, bellowing yell of fear and horror shattered Crysania’s sleep. So sudden and awful was the yell and so deep her sleep that, for a moment, she could not even think what had wakened her. Terrified and confused, she stared around, trying to understand where she was, trying to discover what had frightened her so that she could scarcely breathe.

She was lying on a damp, hard floor. Her body shook convulsively from the chill that penetrated her bones; her teeth chattered from the cold. Holding her breath, she sought to hear something or see something. But the darkness around was thick and impenetrable, the silence was intense.

She let go her breath and tried to draw another, but the darkness seemed to be stealing it away. Panic gripped her. Desperately she tried to structure the darkness, to people it with shapes and forms. But none came to her mind. There was only the darkness and it had no dimension. It was eternal...

Then she heard the yell again and recognized it as what had awakened her. And, though she came near gasping in relief at the sound of another human voice, the fear she heard in that yell echoed in her soul.

Desperately, frantically trying to penetrate the darkness, she forced herself to think, to remember...

There had been singing stones, a chanting voice—Raistlin’s voice—and his arms around her. Then the sensation of stepping into water and being carried into a swift, vast darkness.

Raistlin! Reaching out a trembling hand, Crysania felt nothing near her but damp, chill stone. And then memory returned with horrifying impact. Caramon lunging at his brother with the flashing sword in his hand... Her words as she cast a clerical spell to protect the mage... The sound of a sword clanging on stone.

But that yell—it was Caramon’s voice! What if he...

“Raistlin!” Crysania called fearfully, struggling to her feet. Her voice vanished, disappeared, swallowed up by the darkness. It was such a terrible feeling that she dared not speak again. Clasping her arms about her, shivering in the intense cold, Crysania’s hand went involuntarily to the medallion of Paladine that hung around her neck. The god’s blessing flowed through her.

“Light,” she whispered and, holding the medallion fast, she prayed to the god to light the darkness.

Soft light welled from the medallion between her fingers, pushing back the black velvet that smothered her, letting her breathe. Lifting the chain over her head, Crysania held the medallion aloft. Shining it about her surroundings, she tried to remember the direction from which the yell had come.

She had quick impressions of shattered, blackened furniture, cobwebs, books lying scattered about the floor, bookshelves falling off walls. But these were almost as frightening as the darkness itself; it was the darkness that gave them birth. These objects had more right to this place than she.

And then the yell came again.

Her hand shaking, Crysania turned swiftly toward the sound. The light of the god parted the darkness, bringing two figures into shockingly stark relief. One, dressed in black robes, lay still and silent on the cold floor. Standing above that unmoving figure was a huge man. Dressed in blood-stained golden armor, an iron collar bolted around his neck, he stared into the darkness, his hands outstretched, his mouth open wide, his face white with terror.

The medallion slipped from Crysania’s nerveless hand as she recognized the body lying huddled at the feet of the warrior.

“Raistlin!” she whispered.

Only as she felt the platinum chain slither through her fingers, only as the precious light around her wavered, did she think to catch the medallion as it fell.

She ran across the floor, her world reeling with the light that swung crazily from her hand. Dark shapes scurried from beneath her feet, but Crysania never noticed them. Filled with a fear more suffocating than the darkness, she knelt beside the mage.

He lay face down upon the floor, his hood cast over his head. Gently, Crysania lifted him, turning him over. Fearfully she pushed the hood back from his face and held the glowing medallion above him. Fear chilled her heart.

The mage’s skin was ashen, his lips blue, his eyes closed and sunken into his hollow cheekbones.

“What have you done?” she cried to Caramon, looking up from where she knelt beside the mage’s seemingly lifeless body. “What have you done?” she demanded, her voice breaking in her grief and her fury.

“Crysania?” Caramon whispered hoarsely.

The light from the medallion cast strange shadows over the form of the towering gladiator. His arms still outstretched, his hands grasping feebly at the air, he bent his head toward the sound of her voice. “Crysania?” he repeated again, with a sob. Taking a step toward her, he fell over his brother’s legs and plunged headlong to the floor.

Almost instantly, he was up again, crouched on his hands and knees, his breath coming in quick gasps, his eyes still wide and staring. He reached out his hand.

“Crysania?” He lunged toward the sound of her voice. “Your light! Bring us your light! Quickly!”

“I have a light, Caramon! I—Blessed Paladine!” Crysania murmured, staring at him in the medallion’s soft glow. “You are blind!”

Reaching out her hand, she took hold of his grasping, twitching fingers. At her touch, Caramon sobbed again in relief. His clinging hand closed over hers with crushing strength, and Crysania bit her lip with the pain. But she held onto him firmly with one hand, the medallion with the other.

Rising to her feet, she helped Caramon to his. The warrior’s big body shook, and he clutched at her in desperate terror, his eyes still staring straight ahead, wild, unseeing. Crysania peered into the darkness, searching desperately for a chair, a couch... something.

And then she became aware, suddenly, that the darkness was looking back.

Hurriedly averting her eyes, keeping her gaze carefully within the light of her medallion, she guided Caramon to the only large piece of furniture she saw.

“Here, sit down,” she instructed. “Lean up against this.”

She settled Caramon on the floor, his back against an ornately carved wooden desk that, she thought, seemed vaguely familiar to her. The sight brought a rush of painful, familiar memories—she had seen it somewhere. But she was too worried and preoccupied to give it much thought.

“Caramon?” she asked shakily. “Is Raistlin d—Did you kill—” Her voice broke.

“Raistlin?” Caramon turned his sightless eyes toward the sound of her voice. The expression on his face grew alarmed. He tried to stand. “Raist! Where—”

“No. Sit back!” Crysania ordered in swift anger and fear. Her hand on his shoulder, she shoved him down.

Caramon’s eyes closed, a wry smile twisted his face. For a moment, he looked very like his twin.

“No, I didn’t kill him!” he said bitterly. “How could I? The last thing I heard was you cry out to Paladine, then everything went dark. My muscles wouldn’t move, the sword fell from my hand. And then—”

But Crysania wasn’t listening. Running back to where Raistlin lay a few feet from them, she knelt down beside the mage once again. Holding the medallion near his face, she reached her hand inside the black hood to feel for the lifebeat in his neck. Closing her eyes in relief, she breathed a silent prayer to Paladine.

“He’s alive!” she whispered. “But then, what’s wrong with him?”

“What is wrong with him?” Caramon asked, bitterness and fear still tingling his voice. “I can’t see—”

Flushing almost guiltily, Crysania described the mage’s condition.

Caramon shrugged. “Exhausted by the spell casting,” he said, his voice expressionless. “And, remember, he was weak to begin with, at least so you told me. Sick from the nearness of the gods or some such thing.” His voice sank. “I’ve seen him like that before. The first time he used the dragon orb, he could scarcely move afterward. I held him in my arms—”

He broke off, staring into the darkness, his face calm now, calm and grim. “There’s nothing we can do for him,” he said. “He has to rest.”

After a short pause, Caramon asked quietly, “Lady Crysania, can you heal me?”

Crysania’s skin burned. “I—I’m afraid not,” she replied, distraught. “It—it must have been my spell that blinded you.” Once more, in her memory, she saw the big warrior, the bloodstained sword in his hand, intent on killing his twin, intent on killing her—if she got in his way.

“I’m sorry,” she said softly, feeling so tired and chilled she was almost sick. “But I was desperate and... and afraid. Don’t worry, though,” she added, “the spell is not permanent. It will wear off, in time.”

Caramon sighed. “I understand,” he said. “Is there a light in this room? You said you had one.”

“Yes,” she answered. “I have the medallion—”

“Look around. Tell me where we are. Describe it.”

“But Raistlin—”

“He’ll be all right!” Caramon snapped, his voice harsh and commanding. “Come back here, near me. Do as I say! Our lives—his life—may depend on it! Tell me where we are!”

Looking into the darkness, Crysania felt her fear return. Reluctantly leaving the mage, she came back to sit beside Caramon.

“I—I don’t know,” she faltered, holding the glowing medallion high again. “I can’t see much of anything beyond the medallion’s light. But it seems to be some place I’ve been before, I just can’t place it. There’s furniture lying around, but it’s all broken and charred, as though it had been in a fire. There are lots of books scattered about. There’s a big wooden desk—you’re leaning against it. It seems to be the only piece of furniture not broken. And it seems familiar to me,” she added softly, puzzled. “It’s beautiful, carved with all sorts of strange creatures.”

Caramon felt beneath him with his hand. “Carpet,” he said, “over stone.”

“Yes, the floor is covered with carpet—or was. But it’s torn now, and it looks like something’s eaten it—”

She choked, seeing a dark shape suddenly skitter away from her light.

“What?” Caramon asked sharply.

“What’s been eating the carpet apparently,” Crysania replied with a nervous little laugh. “Rats.” She tried to continue, “There’s a fireplace, but it hasn’t been used in years. It’s all filled with cobwebs. In fact, the place is covered with cobwebs—”

But her voice gave out. Sudden images of spiders dropping from the ceiling and rats running past her feet made her shudder and gather her torn white robes around her. The bare and blackened fireplace reminded her of how cold she was.

Feeling her body tremble, Caramon smiled bleakly and reached out for her hand. Clasping it tightly, he said in a voice that was terrible in its calm, “Lady Crysania, if all we have to face are rats and spiders, we may count ourselves lucky.”

She remembered the shout of sheer terror that had awakened her. Yet he hadn’t been able to see! Swiftly, she glanced about. “What is it? You must have heard or sensed something, yet—”

“Sensed,” Caramon repeated softly. “Yes, I sensed it. There are things in this place, Crysania. Horrible things. I can feel them watching us! I can feel their hatred. Wherever we are, we have intruded upon them. Can’t you feel it, too?”

Crysania stared into the darkness. So it had been looking back at her. Now that Caramon spoke of it, she could sense something out there. Or, as Caramon said, some things!

The longer she looked and concentrated upon them, the more real they became. Although she could not see them, she knew they waited, just beyond the circle of light cast by the medallion. Their hatred was strong, as Caramon had said, and, what was worse, she felt their evil flow chillingly around her. It was like... like...

Crysania caught her breath.

“What?” Caramon cried, starting up.

“Sst,” she hissed, gripping his hand tightly. “Nothing. It’s just—I know where we are!” she said in hushed tones.

He did not answer but turned his sightless eyes toward her.

“The Tower of High Sorcery at Palanthas!” she whispered.

“Where Raistlin lives?” Caramon looked relieved.

“Yes... no.” Crysania shrugged helplessly. “It’s the same room I was in—his study—but it doesn’t look the same. It looks like no one’s lived here for maybe a hundred years or more and—Caramon! That’s it! He said he was taking me to ‘a place and time when there were no clerics!’ That must be after the Cataclysm and before the war. Before—”

“Before he returned to claim this Tower as his own,” Caramon said grimly. “And that means the curse is still upon the Tower, Lady Crysania. That means we are in the one place in Krynn where evil reigns supreme. The one place more feared than any other upon the face of the world. The one place where no mortal dare tread, guarded by the Shoikan Grove and the gods know what else! He has brought us here! We have materialized within its heart!”

Crysania suddenly saw pale faces appear outside the circle of light, as if summoned by Caramon’s voice. Disembodied heads, staring at her with eyes long ago closed in dark and dismal death, they floated in the cold air, their mouths opening wide in anticipation of warm, living blood.

“Caramon, I can see them!” Crysania choked, shrinking close to the big man. “I can see their faces!”

“I felt their hands on me,” Caramon said. Shivering convulsively, feeling her shivering as well, he put his arm about her, drawing her close to him. “They attacked me. Their touch froze my skin. That was when you heard me yell.”

“But why didn’t I see them before? What keeps them from attacking now?”

“You, Lady Crysania,” Caramon said softly. “You are a cleric of Paladine. These are creatures spawned of evil, created by the curse. They do not have the power to harm you.”

Crysania looked at the medallion in her hands. The light welled forth still, but—even as she stared at it—it seemed to dim. Guiltily, she remembered the elven cleric, Loralon. She remembered her refusal to accompany him. His words rang in her mind: You will see only when you are blinded by the darkness...

“I am a cleric, true,” she said softly, trying to keep the despair from her voice, “but my faith is… imperfect. These things sense my doubts, my weakness. Perhaps a cleric as strong as Elistan would have the power to fight them. I don’t think I do.” The glow dimmed further. “My light is failing, Caramon,” she said, after a moment. Looking up, she could see the pallid faces eagerly drift nearer, and she shrank closer to him. “What can we do?”

“What can we do! I have no weapon! I can’t see!” Caramon cried out in agony, clenching his fist.

“Hush!” Crysania ordered, grasping his arm, her eyes on the shimmering figures. “They seem to grow stronger when you talk like that! Perhaps they feed off fear. c hose in he Shoikan Grove do, so Dalamar told me.”

Caramon drew a deep breath. His body glistened with sweat, and he began to shake violently.

“We’ve got to try to wake up Raistlin,” Crysania said.

“No good!” Caramon whispered through chattering teeth. “I know—”

“We have to try!” Crysania said firmly, though she shuddered at the thought of walking even a few feet under that terrible scrutiny.

“Be careful, move slowly,” Caramon advised, letting her go.

Holding the medallion high, her eyes oh the eyes of the darkness, Crysania crept over to Raistlin. She placed one hand oh the mage’s thin, black-robed shoulder. “Raistlin!” she said as loudly as she dared, shaking him. “Raistlin!”

There was ho response. She might as well have tried to rouse a corpse. Thinking of that, she glanced out at the waiting figures. Would they kill him? she wondered. After all, he didn’t exist in this time. The “master of past and present” had hot yet returned to claim his property—this Tower.

Or had he?

Crysania called to the mage again and, as she did so, she kept her eyes oh the undead, who were moving hearer as her light grew weaker.

“Fistandantilus!” she said to Raistlin.

“Yes!” Caramon cried, hearing her and understanding. “They recognize that name. What’s happening? I feel a change... .”

“They’ve stopped!” Crysania said breathlessly. “They’re looking at him how.”

“Get back!” Caramon ordered, rising to a half-crouch. “Keep away from him. Get that light away from him! Let them see him as he exists in their darkness!”

“No!” Crysania retorted angrily. “You’re mad! Once the light’s gone, they’ll devour him—”

“It’s our only chance!”

Lunging for Crysania blindly, Caramon caught her off guard. He grabbed her in his strong arms and yanked her away from Raistlin, hurling her to the floor. Then he fell across her, smashing the breath from her body.

“Caramon!” She gasped for air. “They’ll kill him! No—” Frantically, Crysania struggled against the big warrior, but he held her pinned beneath him.

The medallion was still clutched in her fingers. its light glowed weaker and weaker. Twisting her body, she saw Raistlin, lying in darkness how, outside the circle of her light.

“Raistlin!” she screamed. “No! Let me up, Caramon! They’re going to him... .”

But Caramon held her all the more firmly, pressing her down against the cold floor. His face was anguished, yet grim and determined, his sightless eyes staring down at her. His flesh was cold against her own, his muscles tense and knotted.

She would cast another spell oh him! The words were oh her lips when a shrill cry of pain pierced the darkness.

“Paladine, help me!” Crysania prayed...

Nothing happened.

Weakly, she tried one more time to escape Caramon, but it was hopeless and she knew it. And how, apparently, even her god had abandoned her. Crying out in frustration, cursing Caramon, she could only watch.

The pale, shimmering figures surrounded Raistlin how. She could see him only by the light of the horrid aura their decaying bodies cast. Her throat ached and a low moan escaped her lips as one of the ghastly creatures raised its cold hands and laid them upon his body.

Raistlin screamed. Beneath the black robes, his body jerked in spasms of agony.

Caramon, too, heard his brother’s cry. Crysania could see it reflected in his deathly, pale face.

“Let me up!” she pleaded. But, though cold sweat beaded his forehead, he shook his head resolutely, holding her hands tightly.

Raistlin screamed again. Caramon shuddered, and Crysania felt his muscles grow flaccid. Dropping the medallion, she freed her arms to strike at him with her clenched fists. But as she did so, the medallion’s light vanished, plunging them both into complete darkness. Caramon’s body was suddenly wrenched off hers. His hoarse, agonized scream mingled with the screams of his brother.

Dizzily, her heart racing in terror, Crysania struggled to sit up, her hand pawing the floor frantically for the medallion.

A face came hear hers. She glanced up quickly from her search, thinking it was Caramon... .

It wasn’t. A disembodied head floated hear her.

“No!” she whispered, unable to move, feeling life drain from her hands, her body, her very heart. Fleshless hands grasped her arms, drawing her near; bloodless lips gaped, eager for warmth.

“Paladi—” Crysania tried to pray, but she felt her soul being sucked from her body by the creature’s deadly touch.

Then she heard, dimly and far away, a weak voice chanting words of magic. Light exploded around her. The head so near her own vanished with a shriek, the fleshless hands loosed their grasp. There was an acrid smell of sulphur.

“Shirak.” The explosive light was gone. A soft glow lit the room.

Crysania sat up. “Raistlin!” she whispered thankfully. Staggering to her hands and knees, she crawled forward across the blackened, blasted floor to reach the mage, who lay on his back, breathing heavily. One hand rested on the Staff of Magius. Light radiated from the crystal ball clutched in the golden dragon’s claw atop the staff.

“Raistlin! Are you all right?”

Kneeling beside him, she looked into his thin, pale face as he opened his eyes. Wearily, he nodded. Then, reaching up, he drew her down to him. Embracing her, he stroked her soft, black hair. She could feel his heart beat. The strange warmth of his body drove away the chill.

“Don’t be afraid!” he whispered soothingly, feeling her tremble. “They will not harm us. They have seen me and recognized me. They didn’t hurt you?”

She could not speak but only shook her head. He sighed again. Crysania, her eyes closed, lay in his embrace, lost in comfort.

Then, as his hand went to her hair once more, she felt his body tense. Almost angrily, he grasped her shoulders and pushed her away from him.

“Tell me what happened,” he ordered in a weak voice.

“I woke up here—” Crysania faltered. The horror of her experience and the memory of Raistlin’s warm touch confused and unnerved her. Seeing his eyes grow cold and impatient, however, she made herself continue, keeping her voice steady. “I heard Caramon shout—”

Raistlin’s eyes opened wide. “My brother?” he said, startled. “So the spell brought him, too. I’m amazed I am still alive. Where is he?” Lifting his head weakly, he saw his brother, lying unconscious on the floor. “What’s the matter with him?”

“I—I cast a spell. He’s blind,” Crysania said, flushing. “I didn’t mean to, it was when he was trying to ki—kill you—in Istar, right before the Cataclysm—”

“You blinded him! Paladine... blinded him!” Raistlin laughed. The sound reverberated off the cold stones, and Crysania cringed, feeling a chill of horror. But the laughter caught in Raistlin’s throat. The mage began to choke and gag, gasping for breath.

Crysania watched, helpless, until the spasm passed and Raistlin lay quietly once more. “Go on,” he whispered irritably.

“I heard him yell, but I couldn’t see in the darkness. The medallion gave me light, though, and I found him and I—I knew he was blind. I found you, too. You were unconscious. We couldn’t wake you. Caramon told me to describe where we were and then I saw”—she shuddered—“I saw those… those horrible—”

“Continue,” Raistlin said.

Crysania drew a deep breath, “Then the light from the medallion began to fail—”

Raistlin nodded.

“—and those... things came toward us. I called out to you, using the name Fistandantilus. That made them pause. Then”—Crysania’s voice lost its fear and was edged with anger—“your brother grabbed me and threw me down on the floor, shouting something about ‘let them see him as he exists in their own darkness!’ When Paladine’s light no longer touched you, those creatures—” She shuddered and covered her face with her hands, still hearing Raistlin’s terrible scream echoing in her mind.

“My brother said that?” Raistlin asked softly after a moment.

Crysania moved her hands to look at him, puzzled at his tone of mingled admiration and astonishment. “Yes,” she said coldly after a moment. “Why?”

“He saved our lives,” Raistlin remarked, his voice once more caustic. “The great dolt actually had a good idea. Perhaps you should leave him blind—it aids his thinking”

Raistlin tried to laugh, but it turned to a cough that nearly choked him instead. Crysania started toward him to help him, but he halted her with a fierce look, even as his body twisted in pain. Rolling to his side, he retched.

He fell back weakly, his lips stained with blood, his hands twitching. His breathing was shallow and too fast. Occasionally a coughing spasm wrenched his body.

Crysania stared at him helplessly.

“You told me once that the gods could not heal this malady. But you’re dying, Raistlin! Isn’t there something I can do?” she asked softly, not daring to touch him.

He nodded, but for a minute could neither speak nor move. Finally, with an obvious effort, he lifted a trembling hand from the chill floor and motioned Crysania near. She bent over him. Reaching up, he touched her cheek, drawing her face close to his. His breath was warm against her skin.

“Water!” He gasped inaudibly. She could understand him only by reading the movements of his blood-caked lips. “A potion... will help... .” Feebly, his hand moved to a pocket in his robes. “And... and warmth, fire! I... have not... the strength...”

Crysania nodded, to show she understood.

“Caramon?” His lips formed the words.

“Those—those things attacked him,” she said, glancing over at the big warrior’s motionless body. “I’m not sure if he’s still alive... .”

“We need him! You... must... heal him!” He could not continue but lay panting for air, his eyes closed.

Crysania swallowed, shivering. “Are—are you sure?” she asked hesitantly. “He tried to murder you—”

Raistlin smiled, then shook his head. The black hood rustled gently at the motion. Opening his eyes, he looked up at Crysania and she could see deep within their brown depths. The flame within the mage burned low, giving the eyes a soft warmth much different from the raging fire she had seen before.

“Crysania...” he breathed, “I... am going... to lose consciousness... You... will... be alone... in this place of darkness... My brother... can help... Warmth...” His eyes closed, but his grasp on Crysania’s hand tightened, as though endeavoring to use her lifeforce to cling to reality. With a violent struggle, he opened his eyes again to look directly into hers. “Don’t leave this room!” he mouthed. His eyes rolled back in his head.

You will be alone! Crysania glanced around fearfully, feeling suffocated with terror. Water! Warmth! How could she manage? She couldn’t! Not in this chamber of evil!

“Raistlin!” she begged, grasping his frail hand in both her hands and resting her cheek against it. “Raistlin, please don’t leave me!” she whispered, cringing at the touch of his cold flesh. “I can’t do what you ask! I haven’t the power! I can’t create water out of dust—”

Raistlin’s eyes opened. They were nearly as dark as the room in which he lay. Moving his hand, the hand she held, he traced a line from her eyes down her cheek. Then the hand went limp, his head lolled to one side.

Crysania raised her own hand to her skin in confusion, wondering what he meant by such a strange gesture? It had not been a caress. He was trying to tell her something, that much had been apparent by his insistent gaze. But what? Her skin burned at his touch... bringing back memories...

And then she knew.

I can’t create water out of dust...

“My tears!” she murmured.

2

Sitting alone in the chill chamber, kneeling beside Raistlin’s still body, seeing Caramon lying nearby, pale and lifeless, Crysania suddenly envied both of them fiercely. How easy it would be, she thought, to slip into unconsciousness and let the darkness take me! The evil of the place—which had seemingly fled at the sound of Raistlin’s voice—was returning. She could feel it on her neck like a cold draft. Eyes stared at her from the shadows, eyes that were kept back, apparently, only by the light of the Staff of Magius, which still gleamed. Even unconscious, Raistlin’s hand rested on it.

Crysania lay the archmage’s other hand, the hand she held, gently across his chest. Then she sat back, her lips pressed tightly together, swallowing her tears.

“He’s depending on me,” she said to herself, talking to dispel the sounds of whispering she heard around her. “In his weakness, he is relying on my strength. All my life,” she continued, wiping tears from her eyes and watching the water gleam on her fingers in the staff’s light, “I have prided myself on my strength. Yet, until now, I never knew what true strength was., Her eyes went to Raistlin. “Now, I see it in him! I will not let him down!

“Warmth,” she said, shivering so much that she could barely stand. “He needs warmth. We all do.” She sighed helplessly. “Yet how am I to do that! If we were in Ice Wall Castle, my prayers alone would be enough to keep us warm. Paladine would aid us. But this chill is not the chill of ice or snow.

“It is deeper than that—freezing the spirit more than the blood. Here, in this place of evil, my faith might sustain me, but it will never warm us!”

Thinking of this and glancing around the room dimly seen by the light of the staff, Crysania saw the shadowy forms of tattered curtains hanging from the windows. Made of heavy velvet, they were large enough to cover all of them. Her spirits rose, but sank almost instantly as she realized they were far across the room. Barely visible within the writhing darkness, the windows were outside of the staff’s circle of bright light.

“I’ll have to walk over there,” she said to herself, “in the shadows!” Her heart almost failed her, her strength ebbed. “I will ask Paladine’s help.” But, as she spoke, her gaze went to the medallion lying cold and dark on the floor.

Bending down to pick it up, she hesitated, fearing for a moment to touch it, remembering in sorrow how its light had died at the coming of the evil.

Once again, she thought of Loralon, the great elven cleric who had come to take her away before the Cataclysm. She had refused, choosing instead to risk her life, to hear the words of the Kingpriest—the words that called down the wrath of the gods. Was Paladine angry? Had he abandoned her in his anger, as many believed he had abandoned all of Krynn following the terrible destruction of Istar? Or was his divine guidance simply unable to penetrate the chill layers of evil that shrouded the accursed Tower of High Sorcery?

Confused and frightened, Crysania lifted the medallion. It did not glow. It did nothing. The metal felt cold in her hand. Standing in the center of the room, holding the medallion, her teeth chattering, she willed herself to walk to a window.

“If I don’t,” she muttered through stiff lips, “I’ll die of the cold. We’ll all die,” she added, her gaze going back to the brothers. Raistlin wore his black velvet robes, but she remembered the icy feel of his hand in hers. Caramon was still dressed as he had been for the gladiator games in little more than golden armor and a loincloth.

Lifting her chin, Crysania cast a defiant glance at the unseen, whispering things that lurked around her, then she walked steadfastly out of the circle of magical light shed by Raistlin’s staff.

Almost instantly, the darkness came alive! The whispers grew louder and, in horror, she realized she could understand the words!

There was a touch of chill fingers on her skin. Crysania started in terror and shrank back, only to see nothing there! Nearly sick with fear and the horror of the gruesome love song of the dead, she could not move for a long moment.

“No!” she said angrily. “I will go on! These creatures of evil shall not stop me! I am a cleric of Paladine! Even if my god has abandoned me, I will not abandon my faith!”

Raising her head, Crysania thrust out her hand as though she would actually part the darkness like a curtain. Then she continued to walk to the window. The hiss of whispers sounded around her, she heard eerie laughter, but nothing harmed her, nothing touched her. Finally, after a journey that seemed miles long, she reached the windows.

Clinging to the curtains, shaking, her legs weak, she drew them aside and looked out, hoping to see the lights of the city of Palanthas to comfort her. There are other living beings out there, she said to herself, pressing her face against the glass. I’ll see the lights.

But the prophecy had not yet been fulfilled. Raistlin—as master of the past and the present—had not yet returned with power to claim the Tower as would happen in the future. And so the Tower remained cloaked in impenetrable darkness, as though a perpetual black fog hung about it. If the lights of the beautiful city of Palanthas glowed, she could not see them.

With a bleak sigh, Crysania grasped hold of the cloth and yanked. The rotting fabric gave way almost instantly, nearly burying her in a shroud of velvet brocade as the curtains tumbled down around her. Thankfully, she wrapped the heavy material around her shoulders like a cloak, huddling gratefully in its warmth.

Clumsily tearing down another curtain, she dragged it back across the dark room, hearing it scrape against the floor as it collected broken pieces of furniture on its way.

The staff’s magical light gleamed, guiding her through the darkness. Reaching it finally, she collapsed upon the floor, shaking with exhaustion and the reaction to her terror.

She hadn’t realized until now how tired she was. She had not slept in nights, ever since the storm began in Istar. Now that she was warmer, the thought of wrapping up in the curtain and slipping into oblivion was irresistibly tempting.

“Stop it!” she ordered herself. Forcing herself to stand up, she dragged the curtain over to Caramon and knelt beside him. She covered him with the heavy fabric, pulling it up over his broad shoulders. His chest was still, he was barely breathing. Placing her cold hand on his neck, she felt for the lifebeat. It was slow and irregular. And then she saw marks upon his neck, dead white marks—as of fleshless lips.

The disembodied head floated in Crysania’s memory. Shuddering, she banished it from her thoughts and, wrapped in the curtain, placed her hands upon Caramon’s forehead.

“Paladine,” she prayed softly, “if you have not turned from your cleric in anger, if you will only try to understand that what she does she does to honor you, if you can part this terrible darkness long enough to grant this one prayer—heal this man! If his destiny has not been fulfilled, if there is still something more he must do, grant him health. If not, then gather his soul gently to your arms, Paladine, that he may dwell eternally—”

Crysania could not go on. Her strength gave out. Weary, drained by terror and her own internal struggles, lost and alone in the vast darkness, she let her head sink into her hands and began to cry the bitter sobs of one who sees no hope.

And then she felt a hand touch hers. She started in terror, but this hand was strong and warm. “There now, Tika,” said a deep, sleepy-sounding voice. “It’ll be all right. Don’t cry.”

Lifting her tear-stained face, Crysania saw Caramon’s chest rise and fall with deep breaths. His face lost its deathly pallor, the white marks on his neck faded. Patting her hand soothingly, he smiled.

“It’s jus’ a bad dream, Tika,” he mumbled. “Be all gone... by morning...”

Gathering the curtain up around his neck, snuggling in its warmth, Caramon gave a great, gaping yawn and rolled over onto his side to drift into a deep, peaceful sleep.

Too tired and numb even to offer thanks, Crysania could only sit and watch the big man sleep for a moment. Then a sound caught her ear—the sound of water dripping! Turning, she saw—for the first time—a glass beaker resting on the edge of the desk. The beaker’s long neck was broken and it lay upon its side, its mouth hanging over the edge. It had been empty a long time apparently, its contents spilled one hundred years before. But now it shone with a clear liquid that dripped upon the floor, gently, one drop at a time, each drop sparkling in the light of the staff.

Reaching out her hand, Crysania caught some of the drops in her palm, then lifted her hand hesitantly to her lips.

“Water!” she breathed.

The taste was faintly bitter, almost salty, but it seemed to her the most delicious water she had ever drunk. Forcing her aching body to move, she poured more water into her hand, gulping thirstily. Standing the beaker upright on the desk, she saw the water level rise again, replacing what she had taken.

Now she could thank Paladine with words that rose from the very depths of her being, so deep that she could not speak them. Her fear of the darkness and the creatures in it vanished. Her god had not abandoned her—he was with her still, even though—perhaps—she had disappointed him.

Her fears at ease, she took a final look at Caramon. Seeing him sleeping peacefully, the lines of pain smoothed from his face, she turned from him and walked over to where his brother lay huddled in his robes, his lips blue with cold.

Lying down beside the mage, knowing that the heat of their bodies would warm them both, Crysania wrapped the curtain over them and, resting her head on Raistlin’s shoulder, she closed her eyes and let the darkness enfold her.

3

“She called him ‘Raistlin!’”

“But then—‘Fistandantilus!’”

“How can we be certain? This is not right! He came not through the Grove, as was foretold. He came not with power! And these others? He was supposed to come alone!”

“Yet sense his magic! I dare not defy him... .”

“Not even for such rich reward?”

“The blood smell has driven you mad! If it is he, and he discovers you have feasted on his chosen, he will send you back to the everlasting darkness where you will dream always of warm blood and never taste it!”

“And if it is not, and we fail in our duties to guard this place, then She will come in her wrath and make that fate seem pleasant!”

Silence. Then,

“There is a way we can make certain... .”

“It is dangerous. He is weak, we might kill him.”

“We must know! Better for him to die than for us to fail in our duty to Her Dark Majesty.”

“Yes... His death could be explained. His life... maybe not.”

Cold, searing pain penetrated the layers of unconsciousness like slivers of ice piercing his brain.

Raistlin struggled in their grasp, fighting through the fog of sickness and exhaustion to return for one brief moment to conscious awareness. Opening his eyes, fear nearly suffocated him as he saw two pallid heads floating above him, staring at him with eyes of vast darkness. Their hands were on his chest—it was the touch of those icy fingers that tore through his soul.

Looking into those eyes, the mage knew what they sought and sudden terror seized him. “No,” he spoke without breath, “I will not live that again!”

“You will. We must know!” was all they said.

Anger at this outrage gripped Raistlin. Snarling a bitter curse, he tried to raise his arms from the floor to wrest the ghostly hands from their deadly grip. But it was useless. His muscles refused to respond, a finger twitched, nothing more.

Fury and pain and bitter frustration made him shriek, but it was a sound no one heard—not even himself. The hands tightened their grasp, the pain stabbed him, and he sank—not into darkness—but into remembrance.

There were no windows in the Learning Room where the seven apprentice magic—users worked that morning. No sunlight was admitted, nor was the light of the two moons—silver and red. As for the third moon, the black moon, its presence could be felt here as elsewhere on Krynn without being seen.

The room was lit by thick beeswax candles that stood in silver candleholders on the tables. The candles could thus be easily picked up and carried about to suit the convenience of the apprentices as they went about their studies.

This was the only room in the great castle of Fistandantilus lit by candles. In all others, glass globes with continual light spells cast upon them hovered in the air, shedding magical radiance to lighten the gloom that was perpetual in this dark fortress. The globes were not used in the Learning Room, however, for one very good reason—if brought into this room, their light would instantly fail—a Dispel Magic spell was in constant effect here. Thus the need for candles and the need to keep out any influence that might be gleaned from the sun or the two light shedding moons.

Six of the apprentices sat near each other at one table, some talking together, a few studying in silence. The seventh sat apart, at a table far across the room. Occasionally one of the six would raise his head and cast an uneasy glance at the one who sat apart, then lower his head quickly, for, no matter who looked or at what time, the seventh always seemed to be staring back at them.

The seventh found this amusing, and he indulged in a bitter smile. Raistlin had not found much to smile about during these months he had been living in the castle of Fistandantilus. It had not been an easy time for him. Oh, it had been simple enough to maintain the deception, keeping Fistandantilus from guessing his true identity, concealing his true powers, making it seem as if he were simply one of this group of fools working to gain the favor of the great wizard and thus become his apprentice.

Deception was life’s blood to Raistlin. He even enjoyed his little games of oneupsmanship with the apprentices, always doing things just a little bit better, always keeping them nervous, off guard. He enjoyed his game with Fistandantilus, too. He could sense the archmage watching him.

He knew what the great wizard was thinking—who is this apprentice? Where does he get the power that the archmage could feel burn within the young man but could not define.

Sometimes Raistlin thought he could detect Fistandantilus studying his face, as though thinking it looked familiar...

No, Raistlin enjoyed the game. But it was totally unexpected that he come upon something he had not enjoyed. And that was to be forcibly reminded of the most unhappy time of his life—his old school days.

The Sly One—that had been his nickname among the apprentices at his old Master’s school.

Never liked, never trusted, feared even by his own Master, Raistlin spent a lonely, embittered youth. The only person who ever cared for him had been his twin brother, Caramon, and his love was so patronizing and smothering that Raistlin often found the hatred of his classmates easier to accept.

And now, even though he despised these idiots seeking to please a Master who would—in the end—only murder the one chosen, even though he enjoyed fooling them and taunting them, Raistlin still felt a pang sometimes, in the loneliness of the night, when he heard them together, laughing...

Angrily, he reminded himself that this was all beneath his concern. He had a greater goal to achieve. He had to concentrate, conserve his strength. For today was the day, the day Fistandantilus would choose his apprentice.

You six will leave; Raistlin thought to himself. You will leave hating and despising me, and none of you will ever know that one of you owes me his life!

The door to the Learning Room opened with a creak, sending a jolt of alarm through the six black-robed figures sitting at the table. Raistlin, watching them with a twisted smile, saw the same sneering smile reflected on the wizened, gray face of the man who stood in the doorway.

The wizard’s glittering gaze went to each of the six in turn, causing each to pale and lower his hooded head while hands toyed with spell components or clenched in nervousness.

Finally, Fistandantilus turned his black eyes to the seventh apprentice, who sat apart. Raistlin met his gaze without flinching, his twisted smile twisted further—into mockery. Fistandantilus’s brows contracted. In swift anger, he slammed the door shut. The six apprentices started at the booming sound that shattered the silence.

The wizard walked to the front of the Learning Room, his steps slow and faltering. He leaned upon a staff and his old bones creaked as he lowered himself into a chair. The wizard’s gaze went once more to the six apprentices seated before him and, as he looked at them—at their youthful, healthy bodies one of Fistandantilus’s withered hands raised to caress a pendant he wore on a long, heavy chain around his neck. It was an odd-looking pendant—a single, oval bloodstone set in plain silver.

Often the apprentices discussed this pendant among themselves, wondering what it did. It was the only ornamentation Fistandantilus ever wore, and all knew it must be highly valuable. Even the lowest level apprentice could sense the powerful spells of protection and warding laid upon it, guarding it from every form of magic. What did it do? they whispered, and their speculations ranged from drawing beings from the celestial planes to communicating with Her Dark Majesty herself.

One of their number, of course, could have told them. Raistlin knew what it did. But he kept his knowledge to himself.

Fistandantilus’s gnarled and trembling hand closed over the bloodstone eagerly, as his hungry gaze went from one apprentice to the other. Raistlin could have sworn the wizard licked his lips, and the young mage felt a moment of sudden fear. What if I fail? he asked himself, shuddering.

He is powerful! The most powerful wizard who ever lived! Am I strong enough? What if—

“Begin the test,” Fistandantilus said in a cracked voice, his gaze going to the first of the six.

Firmly, Raistlin banished his fears. This was what he had worked a lifetime to attain. If he failed, he would die. He had faced death before. In fact, it would be like meeting an old friend...

One by one, the young mages rose from their places, opened their spellbooks, and recited their spells. If the Dispel Magic had not been laid upon the Learning Room, it would have been filled with wonderful sights. Fireballs would have exploded within its walls, incinerating all who were within range; phantom dragons would have breathed illusory fire; dread beings would have been dragged shrieking from other planes of existence. But, as it was, the room remained in candlelit calm, silent except for the chantings of the spellcasters and the rustling of the leaves of the spellbooks.

One by one, each mage completed his test, then resumed his seat. All performed remarkably well. This was not unexpected. Fistandantilus permitted only seven of the most skilled of the young male magic-users who had already passed the grueling Test at the Tower of High Sorcery to study further with him. Out of that number, he would choose one to be his assistant.

So they supposed.

The archmage’s hand touched the bloodstone. His gaze went to Raistlin. “Your turn, mage,” he said. There was a flicker in the old eyes. The wrinkles on the wizard’s forehead deepened slightly, as though trying to recall the young man’s face.

Slowly, Raistlin rose to his feet, still smiling the bitter, cynical smile, as if this were all beneath him. Then, with a nonchalant shrug, he slammed shut his spellbook. The other six apprentices exchanged grim glances at this. Fistandantilus frowned, but there was a spark in his dark eyes.

Glibly, sneeringly Raistlin began to recite the complicated spell from memory. The other apprentices stirred at this show of skill, glaring at him with hatred and undisguised envy.

Fistandantilus watched, his frown changing to a look of hunger so malevolent that it nearly broke Raistlin’s concentration.

Forcing himself to keep his mind firmly on his work, the young mage completed the spell, and suddenly the Learning Room was lit by a brilliant flare of multicolored light, its silence shattered by the sound of an explosion!

Fistandantilus started, the grin wiped off his face. The other apprentices gasped.

“How did you break the Dispel Magic spell?” Fistandantilus demanded angrily. “What strange power is this?”

In answer, Raistlin opened his hands. In his palms he held a ball of blue and green flame, blazing with such radiance that no one could look at it directly. Then, with that same, sneering smile, he clapped his hands. The flame vanished.

The Learning Room was silent once more, only now it was the silence of fear as Fistandantilus rose to his feet. His rage shimmering around him like a halo of flame, he advanced upon the seventh apprentice.

Raistlin did not shrink from that anger. He remained standing calmly, coolly watching the wizard’s approach.

“How did you—” Fistandantilus’s voice grated. Then his gaze fell upon the young mage’s slender hands. With a vicious snarl, the wizard reached out and grasped Raistlin’s wrist.

Raistlin gasped in pain, the archmage’s touch was cold as the grave. But he made himself smile still, though he knew his grin must look like a death’s head.

“Flash powder!” Fistandantilus jerked Raistlin forward, holding his hand under the candlelight so that all could see. “A common sleight-of-hand trick, fit only for street illusionists!”

“Thus I earned my living,” Raistlin said through teeth clenched against the pain. “I thought it suitable for use in such a collection of amateurs as you have gathered together, Great One.”

Fistandantilus tightened his grip. Raistlin choked in agony, but he did not struggle or try to withdraw. Nor did he lower his gaze from that of his Master. Though his grip was painful, the wizard’s face was interested, intrigued.

“So you consider yourself better than these?” Fistandantilus asked Raistlin in a soft, almost kindly voice, ignoring the angry mutterings of the apprentices.

Raistlin had to pause to gather the strength to speak through the haze of pain. “You know I am!”

Fistandantilus stared at him, his hand still grasping him by the wrist. Raistlin saw a sudden fear in the old man’s eyes, a fear that was quickly quenched by that look of insatiable hunger. Fistandantilus loosed his hold on Raistlin’s arm. The young mage could not repress a sigh of intense relief as he sank into his chair, rubbing his wrist. The mark of the archmage’s hand could be seen upon it plainly—it had turned his skin icy white.

“Get out!” Fistandantilus snapped. The six mages rose, their black robes rustling about them. Raistlin rose, too. “You stay,” the archmage said coldly.

Raistlin sat back down, still rubbing his injured wrist. Warmth and life were returning to it. As the other young mages filed out, Fistandantilus followed them to the door. Turning back, he faced his new apprentice.

“These others will soon be gone and we shall have the castle to ourselves. Meet me in the secret chambers far below when it is Darkwatch. I am conducting an experiment that will require your... assistance.”

Raistlin watched in a kind of horrible fascination as the old wizard’s hand went to the bloodstone, stroking it lovingly. For a moment, Raistlin could not answer. Then, he smiled sneeringly—only this time it was at himself, for his own fear.

“I will be there, Master,” he said.

Raistlin lay upon the stone slab in the laboratory located far beneath the archmage’s castle. Not even his thick black velvet robes could keep out the chill, and Raistlin shivered uncontrollably. But whether it was from the cold, fear, or excitement, he could not tell.

He could not see Fistandantilus, but he could hear him—the whisper of his robes, the soft thud of the staff upon the floor, the turning of a page in the spellbook. Lying upon the slab, feigning to be helpless under the wizard’s influence, Raistlin tensed. The moment fast approached.

As if in answer, Fistandantilus appeared in his line of vision, leaning over the young mage with that look of eager hunger, the bloodstone pendant swinging from the chain around his neck.

“Yes,” said the wizard, “you are skilled. More skilled and more powerful than any young apprentice I have met in these many, many years.”

“What will you do to me?” Raistlin asked hoarsely. The note of desperation in his voice was not entirely forced. He must know how the pendant worked.

“How can that matter?” Fistandantilus questioned coolly, laying his hand upon the young mage’s chest.

“My... object in coming to you was to learn,” Raistlin said, gritting his teeth and trying not to writhe at the loathsome touch. “I would learn, even to the last!”

“Commendable.” Fistandantilus nodded, his eyes gazing into the darkness, his thoughts abstracted. Probably going over the spell in his mind, Raistlin thought to himself. “I am going to enjoy inhabiting a body and a mind so thirsty for knowledge, as well as one that is innately skilled in the Art. Very well, I will explain. My last lesson, apprentice. Learn it well.

“You cannot know, young man, the horrors of growing old. How well I remember my first life and how well I remember the terrible feeling of anger and frustration I felt when I realized that I—the most powerful magic-user who had ever lived—was .destined to be trapped in a weak and wretched body that was being consumed by age! My mind—my mind was sound! Indeed, I was stronger mentally than I had ever been in my life! But all this power, all this vast knowledge would be wasted, turned to dust! Devoured by worms!

“I wore the Red Robes then.”

“You start. Are you surprised? Taking the Red Robes was a conscious, cold-blooded decision, made after seeing how best I could gain. In neutrality, one learns better, being able to draw from both ends of the spectrum and being beholden to neither. I went to Gilean, God of Neutrality, with my plea to be allowed to remain upon this plane and extend my knowledge. But, in this, the God of the Book could not help me. Humans were his creation, and it was because of my impatient human nature and the knowledge of the shortness of my life that I had pressed on with my studies. I was counseled to accept my fate.”

Fistandantilus shrugged. “I see comprehension in your eyes, apprentice. In a way, I am sorry to destroy you. I think we could have developed a rare understanding. But, to make a long story short, I walked out into the darkness. Cursing the red moon, I asked that I be allowed to look upon the black. The Queen of Darkness heard my prayer and granted my request. Donning the Black Robes, I dedicated myself to her service and, in return, I was taken to her plane of existence. I have seen the future, I have lived the past. She gave me this pendant, so that I am able to choose a new body during my stay in this time. And, when I choose to cross the boundaries of time and enter the future, there is a body prepared and ready to accept my soul.”

Raistlin could not repress a shudder at this. His lip curled in hatred. His was the body the wizard spoke of! Ready and waiting...

But Fistandantilus did not notice. The wizard raised the bloodstone pendant, preparing to cast the spell.

Looking at the pendant as it glistened in the pale light cast by a globe in the center of the laboratory, Raistlin felt his heartbeat quicken. His hands clenched.

With an effort, his voice trembling with excitement that he hoped would be mistaken for terror, he whispered, “Tell me how it works! Tell me what will happen to me!”

Fistandantilus smiled, his hand slowly revolving the bloodstone above Raistlin’s chest. “I will place this upon your breast, right over your heart. And, slowly, you will feel your lifeforce start to ebb from your body. The pain is, I believe, quite excruciating. But it will not last long, apprentice, if you do not struggle against it. Give in and you will quickly lose consciousness. From what I have observed, fighting only prolongs the agony.”

“Are there no words to be spoken?” Raistlin asked, shivering.

“Of course,” Fistandantilus replied coolly, his body bending down near Raistlin’s, his eyes nearly on a level with the young mage’s. Carefully, he placed the bloodstone on Raistlin’s chest. “You are about to hear them... They will be the last sounds you ever hear...”

Raistlin felt his flesh crawl at the touch and for a moment could barely restrain himself from breaking away and fleeing. No, he told himself coldly, clenching his hands, digging his nails into the flesh so that the pain would distract his thoughts from fear, I must hear the words!

Quivering, he forced himself to lie there, but he could not refrain from closing his eyes, blotting out the sight of the evil, wizened face so near his own that he could smell the decaying breath...

“That’s right,” said a soft voice, “relax...” Fistandantilus began to chant.

Concentrating on the complex spell, the wizard closed his own eyes, swaying back and forth as he pressed the bloodstone pendant into Raistlin’s flesh. Fistandantilus did not notice, therefore, that his words were being repeated, murmured feverishly by the intended victim. By the time he realized something was wrong, he had ended the reciting of the spell and was standing, waiting, for the first infusion of new life to warm his ancient bones.

There was nothing.

Alarmed, Fistandantilus opened his eyes. He stared in astonishment at the black-robed young mage lying on the cold stone slab, and then the wizard made a strange, inarticulate sound and staggered backward in a sudden fear he could not hide.

“I see you recognize me at last,” said Raistlin, sitting up. One hand rested upon the stone slab, but the other was in one of the secret pockets of his robes. “So much for the body waiting for you in the future.”

Fistandantilus did not answer. His gaze darted to Raistlin’s pocket, as though he would pierce through the fabric with his black eyes.

Quickly he regained his composure. “Did the great Par-Salian send you back here, little mage?” he asked derisively. But his gaze remained on the mage’s pocket.

Raistlin shook his head as he slid off the stone slab. Keeping one hand in the pocket of his robes, he moved the other to draw back the black hood, allowing Fistandantilus to see his true face, not the illusion he had maintained for these past long months. “I came myself. I am Master of the Tower now.”

“That’s impossible,” the wizard snarled.

Raistlin smiled, but there was no answering smile in his cold eyes, which kept Fistandantilus always in their mirror like gaze. “So you thought. But you made a mistake. You underestimated me. You wrenched part of my lifeforce from me during the Test, in return for protecting me from the drow. You forced me to live a life of constant pain in a shattered body, doomed me to dependence on my brother. You taught me to use the dragon orb and kept me alive when I would have died at the Great Library of Palanthas. During the War of the Lance, you helped me drive the Queen of Darkness back to the Abyss where she was no longer a threat to the world—or to you. Then, when you had gained enough strength in this time, you intended to return to the future and claim my body! You would have become me.”

Raistlin saw Fistandantilus’s eyes narrow, and the young mage tensed, his hand closing over the object he carried in his robes. But the wizard only said mildly, “That is all correct. What do you intend to do about it? Murder me?”

“No,” said Raistlin softly, “I intend to become you!”

“Fool!” Fistandantilus laughed shrilly. Raising a withered hand, he held up the bloodstone pendant. “The only way you could do that is to use this on me! And it is protected against all forms of magic by charms the power of which you have no conception, little mage—”

His voice died away to a whisper, strangled in sudden fear and shock as Raistlin removed his hand from his robe. In his palm lay the bloodstone pendant.

“Protected from all forms of magic,” said the young mage, his grin like that of a skull’s, “but not protected against sleight-of-hand. Not protected against the skills of a common street illusionist...”

Raistlin saw the wizard turn deathly pale. Fistandantilus’s eyes went feverishly to the chain on his neck. Now that the illusion was revealed, he realized he held nothing in his hand.

A rending, cracking sound shattered the silence. The stone floor beneath Raistlin’s feet heaved, sending the young mage stumbling to his knees. Rock blew apart as the foundation of the laboratory broke in half. Above the chaos rose Fistandantilus’s voice, chanting a powerful spell of summoning.

Recognizing it, Raistlin responded, clutching the bloodstone in his hand as he cast a spell of shielding around his body to give himself time to work his magic. Crouched on the floor, he twisted around to see a figure burst through the foundation, its hideous shape and visage something seen only in insane dreams.

“Seize him, hold him!” Fistandantilus shrieked, pointing at Raistlin. The apparition surged across the crumbling floor toward the young mage and reached for him with its writhing coils.

Fear overwhelmed Raistlin as the creature from beyond worked its own horrible magic on him.

The shielding spell crumbled beneath the onslaught. The apparition would devour his soul and feast upon his flesh.

Control! Long hours of study, long-practiced strength and rigorous self-discipline brought the words of the spell Raistlin needed to his mind. Within moments, it was complete. As the young mage began to chant the words of banishment, he felt the ecstasy of his magic flow through his body, delivering him from the fear.

The apparition hesitated.

Fistandantilus, furious, ordered it on.

Raistlin ordered it to halt.

The apparition glared at each, its coils twisting, its very appearance shifting and shimmering in the gusty winds of its creation. Both mages held it in check, watching the other intently, waiting for the eye blink, the lip twitch, the spasmodic jerk of a finger that would prove fatal.

Neither moved, neither seemed likely to move. Raistlin’s endurance was greater, but Fistandantilus’s magic came from ancient sources; he could call upon unseen powers to support him.

Finally, it was the apparition itself who could no longer endure. Caught between two equal, conflicting powers, tugged and pulled in opposite directions, its magical being could be held together no longer. With a brilliant flash, it exploded.

The force hurled both mages backward, slamming them into the walls. A horrible smell filled the chamber, and broken glass fell like rain. The walls of the laboratory were blackened and charred.

Here and there, small fires burned with bright, multicolored flames, casting a lurid glow over the site of the destruction.

Raistlin staggered swiftly to his feet, wiping blood from a cut on his forehead. His enemy was not less quick, both knowing weakness meant death. The two mages faced each other in the flickering light.

“So, it comes to this!” Fistandantilus said in his cracked and ancient voice. “You could have gone on, living a life of ease. I would have spared you the debilities, the indignities of old age. Why rush to your own destruction?”

“You know,” Raistlin said softly, breathing heavily, his strength nearly spent.

Fistandantilus nodded slowly, his eyes on Raistlin. “As I said,” he murmured softly, “it is a pity this must happen. We could have done much together, you and I. Now—”

“Life for one. Death for the other,” Raistlin said. Reaching out his hand, he carefully laid the bloodstone pendant upon the cold slab. Then he heard the words of chanting and raised his voice in an answering chant himself.

The battle lasted long. The two guardians of the Tower, who watched the sight they had conjured up from the memories of the black-robed mage lying within their grasp, were lost in confusion. They had, up to this point, seen everything through Raistlin’s vision. But so close now were the two magic-users that the Tower’s guardians saw the battle through the eyes of both opponents.

Lightning crackled from fingertips, black-robed bodies twisted in pain, screams of agony and fury echoed amidst the crash of rock and timber.

Magical walls of fire thawed walls of ice, hot winds blew with the force of hurricanes. Storms of flame swept the hallways, apparitions sprang from the Abyss at the behest of their masters, elementals shook the very foundations of the castle. The great dark fortress of Fistandantilus began to crack, stones tumbling from the battlements.

And then, with a fearful shriek of rage and pain, one of the black-robed mages collapsed, blood flowing from his mouth.

Which was which? Who had fallen? The guardians sought frantically to tell, but it was impossible.

The other mage, nearly spent, rested a moment, then managed to drag himself across the floor.

His trembling hand reached up to the top of the stone slab, groped about, then found and grasped the bloodstone pendant. With his last strength, the black-robed mage gripped the pendant and crawled back to kneel beside the still-living body of his victim.

The mage on the floor could not speak, but his eyes, as they gazed into the eyes of his murderer, cast a curse of such hideous aspect that the two guardians of the Tower felt even the chill of their tormented existence grow warm by comparison.

The black-robed mage holding the bloodstone hesitated. He was so close to his victim’s mind that he could read the unspoken message of those eyes, and his soul shrank from what it saw. But then his lips tightened. Shaking his hooded head and giving a grim smile of triumph, he carefully and deliberately pressed the pendant down on the black-robed chest of his victim.

The body on the floor writhed in tormented agony, a shrill scream bubbled from his blood-frothed lips. Then, suddenly, the screams ceased. The mage’s skin wrinkled and cracked like dry parchment, his eyes stared sightlessly into the darkness. He slowly withered away.

With a shuddering sigh, the other mage collapsed on top of the body of his victim, he himself weak, wounded, near death. But clutched in his hand was the bloodstone and flowing through his veins was new blood, giving him life that would—in time—fully restore him to health. In his mind was knowledge, memories of hundreds of years of power, spells, visions of wonders and terrors that spanned generations. But there, too, were memories of a twin brother, memories of a shattered body, of a prolonged, painful existence.

As two lives mingled within him, as hundreds of strange, conflicting memories surged through him, the mage reeled at the impact. Crouching beside the corpse of his rival, the black robed mage who had been the victor stared at the bloodstone in his hand. Then he whispered in horror.

“Who am I?”

4

The guardians slid away from Raistlin, staring at him with hollow eyes. Too weak to move, the mage stared back, his own eyes reflecting the darkness.

“I tell you this”—he spoke to them without a voice and was understood—“touch me again, and I will turn you to dust—as I did him!”

“Yes, Master,” the voices whispered as their pale visages faded back into the shadows.

“What—” murmured Crysania sleepily. “Did you say something—” Realizing she had been sleeping with her head upon his shoulder, she flushed in confusion and embarrassment and hurriedly sat up. “Can—can I get you anything—” she asked.

“Hot water”—Raistlin lay back limply—“for... my potion.”

Crysania glanced around, brushing her dark hair out of her eyes. Gray light seeped through the windows. Thin and wispy as a ghost, it brought no comfort. The Staff of Magius cast its light still, keeping away the dark things of the night. But it shed no warmth. Crysania rubbed her aching neck. She was stiff and sore and she knew she must have been asleep for hours. The room was still freezing cold. Bleakly, she looked over at the cold and blackened firegrate.

“There’s wood,” she faltered, her gaze going to the broken furniture lying about, “but I—I have no tinder or flint. I can’t—”

“Wake my brother!” snarled Raistlin, and immediately began to gasp for breath. He tried to say something further, but could do no more than gesture feebly. His eyes glittered with such anger and his face was twisted with such rage that Crysania stared at him in alarm, feeling a chill that was colder than the air around her.

Raistlin closed his eyes wearily and his hand went to his chest. “Please,” he whispered in agony, “the pain...”

“Of course,” Crysania said gently, overwhelmed with shame. What would it be like to live with such pain, day after day? Leaning forward, she drew the curtain from her own shoulders and tucked it carefully around Raistlin. The mage nodded thankfully but could not speak. Then, shivering, Crysania crossed the room to where Caramon lay.

Putting her hand out to touch his shoulder, she hesitated. What if he’s still blind? she thought, or what if he can see and decides... decides to kill Raistlin?

But her hesitation lasted only a moment. Resolutely, she put her hand on his shoulder and shook him. If he does, she said to herself grimly, I will stop him. I did it once, I can do it again.

Even as she touched him, she was aware of the pale guardians, lurking in the darkness, watching her every move.

“Caramon,” she called softly, “Caramon, wake up. Please! We need—”

“What?” Caramon sat up quickly, his hand going reflexively to his sword hilt—that wasn’t there. His eyes focused on Crysania, and she saw with relief tinged with fear that he could see her. He stared at her blankly, however, without recognition, then looked quickly around his surroundings.

Then Crysania saw remembrance in the darkening of his eyes, saw them fill with a haunted pain. She saw remembrance in the clenching of his jaw muscles and the cold gaze he turned upon her. She was about to say something—apologize, explain, rebuke—when his eyes grew suddenly tender as his face softened with concern.

“Lady Crysania,” he said, sitting up and dragging the curtain from his body, “you’re freezing! Here, put this around you.”

Before she could say a word in protest, Caramon wrapped the curtain around her snugly. She noticed as he did so that he looked once at his twin. But his gaze passed quickly over Raistlin, as if he did not exist.

Crysania caught hold of his arm. “Caramon,” she said, “he saved our lives. He cast a spell. Those things out there in the darkness leave us alone because he told them to!”

“Because they recognize one of their own!” Caramon said harshly, lowering his gaze and trying to withdraw his arm from her grasp. But Crysania held him fast, more with her eyes than her cold hand.

“You can kill him now,” she said angrily. “Look, he’s helpless, weak. Of course, if you do, we’ll all die. But you were prepared to do that anyway, weren’t you!”

“I can’t kill him,” Caramon said. His brown eyes were clear and cold, and Crysania—once again—saw a startling resemblance between the twins. “Let’s face it, Revered Daughter, if I tried, you’d only blind me again.”

Caramon brushed her hand from his arm.

“One of us, at least, should see clearly,” he said.

Crysania felt herself flush in shame and anger, hearing Loralon’s words echo in the warrior’s sarcasm. Turning away from her, Caramon stood up quickly.

“I’ll build a fire,” he said in a cold, hard voice, “if those”—he waved a hand—“friends of my brother’s out there will let me.”

“I believe they will,” Crysania said, speaking with equal coolness as she, too, rose to her feet. “They did not hinder me when... when I tore down the curtains.” She could not help a quiver creeping into her voice at the memory of being trapped by those shadows of death.

Caramon glanced around at her and, for the first time, it occurred to Crysania what she must look like. Wrapped in a rotting black velvet curtain, her white robes torn and stained with blood, black with dust and ash from the floor. Involuntarily, her hand went to her hair—once so smooth, carefully braided and coiled. Now it hung about her face in straggling wisps. She could feel the dried tears upon her cheeks, the dirt, the blood...

Self-consciously, she wiped her hand across her face and tried to pat back her hair. Then, realizing how futile and even stupid she must look, and angered still further by Caramon’s pitying expression, she drew herself up with shabby dignity.

“So, I am no longer the marble maiden you first met,” she said haughtily, “just as you are no longer the sodden drunk. It seems we have both learned a thing or two on our journey.”

“I know I have,” Caramon said gravely.

“Have you?” Crysania retorted. “I wonder! Did you learn as I did—that the mages sent me back in time, knowing that I would not return?”

Caramon stared at her. She smiled grimly.

“No. You were unaware of that small fact, or so your brother said. The time device could be used by only one person—the person to whom it was given—you! The mages sent me back in time to die— because they feared me!”

Caramon frowned. He opened his mouth, closed it, then shook his head. “You could have left Istar with that elf who came for you.”

“Would you have gone?” Crysania demanded. “Would you have given up your life in our time if you could help it? No! Am I so different?”

Caramon’s frown deepened and he started to reply, but at that moment, Raistlin coughed. Glancing at the mage, Crysania sighed and said, “You better build the fire, or we’ll all perish anyway.” Turning her back on Caramon, who still stood regarding her silently, she walked over to his brother.

Looking at the frail mage, Crysania wondered if he had heard. She wondered if he were even still conscious.

He was conscious, but if Raistlin was at all aware of what had passed between the other two, he appeared to be too weak to take any interest in it. Pouring some of the water into a cracked bowl, Crysania knelt down beside him. Tearing a piece from the cleanest portion of her robe, she wiped his face; it burned with fever even in the chill room.

Behind her, she heard Caramon gathering up bits of the broken wooden furniture and stacking it in the grate.

“I need something for tinder,” the big man muttered to himself. “Ah, these books—”

At that, Raistlin’s eyes flared open, his head moved and he tried feebly to rise.

“Don’t, Caramon!” Crysania cried, alarmed. Caramon stopped, a book in his hand.

“Dangerous, my brother!” Raistlin gasped weakly. “Spellbooks! Don’t touch them... .”

His voice failed, but the gaze of his glittering eyes was fixed on Caramon with a look of such apparent concern that even Caramon seemed taken aback. Mumbling something unintelligible, the big man dropped the book and began to search about the desk. Crysania saw Raistlin’s eyes close in relief.

“Here’s—Looks like... letters,” Caramon said after a moment of shuffling through paper on the floor. “Would—would these be all right?” he asked gruffly.

Raistlin nodded wordlessly, and, within moments, Crysania heard the crackling of flame. Lacquer-finished, the wood of the broken furniture caught quickly, and soon the fire burned with a bright, cheering light. Glancing into the shadows, Crysania saw the pallid faces withdraw—but they did not leave.

“We must move Raistlin near the fire,” she said, standing up, “and he said something about a potion—”

“Yes,” Caramon answered tonelessly. Coming to stand beside Crysania, he stared down at his brother. Then he shrugged. “Let him magic himself over there if that’s what he wants.”

Crysania’s eyes flashed in anger. She turned to Caramon, scathing words on her lips, but, at a weak gesture from Raistlin, she bit her lower lip and kept silent.

“You pick an inopportune time to grow up, my brother,” the mage whispered.

“Maybe,” said Caramon slowly, his face filled with unutterable sorrow. Shaking his head, he walked back over to stand by the fire. “Maybe it doesn’t matter anymore.”

Crysania, watching Raistlin’s gaze follow his brother, was startled to see him smile a swift, secret smile and nod in satisfaction. Then, as he looked up at her, the smile vanished quickly. Lifting one arm; he motioned her to come near him.

“I can stand,” he breathed, “with your help.”

“Here, you’ll need your staff,” she said, extending her hand for it.

“Don’t touch it!” Raistlin ordered, catching hold of her hand in his. “No,” he repeated more gently, coughing until he could scarcely breathe. “Other hands... touch it... light fails...”

Shivering involuntarily, Crysania cast a swift glance around the room. Raistlin, seeing her, and seeing the shimmering shapes hovering just outside the light of the staff, shook his head. “No, I do not believe they would attack us,” he said softly as Crysania put her arms around him and helped him to rise. “They know who I am.” His lip curled in a sneer at this, and he choked. “They know who I am,” he repeated more firmly, “and they dare not cross me. But—” he coughed again, and leaned heavily upon Crysania, one arm around her shoulder, the other hand clutching his staff—“it will be safer to keep the light of the staff burning.”

The mage staggered as he spoke and nearly fell. Crysania paused to let him catch his breath.

Her own breath was coming more rapidly than normal, revealing the confused tangle of her emotions. Hearing the harsh rattle of Raistlin’s labored breathing, she was consumed with pity for his weakness. Yet, she could feel. the burning heat of the body pressed so near hers. There was the intoxicating scent of his spell components—rose petals, spice—and his black robes were soft to the touch, softer than the curtain around her shoulders. His gaze met hers as they stood there; for a moment, the mirrorlike surface of his eyes cracked and she saw warmth and passion. His arm around her tightened reflexively, drawing her closer without seeming to mean to do so.

Crysania flushed, wanting desperately to both run away and stay forever in that warm embrace.

Quickly, she lowered her gaze, but it was too late. She felt Raistlin stiffen. Angrily, he withdrew his arm. Pushing her aside, he gripped his staff for support.

But he was still too weak. He staggered and started to fall. Crysania moved to help him, but suddenly a huge body interposed itself between her and the mage. Strong arms caught Raistlin up as if he were no more than a child. Caramon carried his brother to a frayed and blackened, heavily cushioned chair he had dragged near the fire.

For a few moments, Crysania could not move from where she stood, leaning against the desk. It was only when she realized that she was alone in the darkness, outside the light of both fire and staff, that she walked hurriedly over near the fire herself.

“Sit down, Lady Crysania,” said Caramon, drawing up another chair and beating the dust and ash off with his hands as best he could.

“Thank you,” she murmured, trying, for some reason, to avoid the big man’s gaze. Sinking down into the chair, she huddled near the blaze, staring fixedly into the flames until she felt she had regained some of her composure.

When she was able to look around, she saw Raistlin lying back in his chair, his eyes closed, his breathing ragged. Caramon was heating water in a battered iron pot that he had dragged, from the looks of it, out of the ashes of the fireplace. He stood before it, staring intently into the water.

The firelight glistened on his golden armor, glowed on his smooth, tan skin. His muscles rippled as he flexed his great arms to keep warm.

He is truly a magnificently built man, Crysania thought, then shuddered. Once again, she could see him entering that room beneath the doomed Temple, the bloody sword in his hand, death in his eyes...

“The water’s ready,” Caramon announced, and Crysania returned to the Tower with a start.

“Let me fix the potion,” she said quickly, thankful for something to do.

Raistlin opened his eyes as she came near him. Looking into them, she saw only a reflection of herself, pale, wan, disheveled. Wordlessly, he held out a small, velvet pouch. As she took it, he gestured to his brother, then sank back, exhausted.

Taking the pouch, Crysania turned to find Caramon watching her, a look of mingled perplexity and sadness giving his face an unaccustomed gravity. But all he said was, “Put a few of the leaves in this cup, then fill it with the hot water.”

“What is it?” Crysania asked curiously. Opening the pouch, her nose wrinkled at the strange, bitter scent of the herbs. Caramon poured the water into the cup she held.

“I don’t know,” he said, shrugging. “Raist always gathered the herbs and mixed them himself. Par-Salian gave the recipe to him after... after the Test, when he was so sick. I know”—he smiled at her—“it smells awful and must taste worse.” His glance went almost fondly to his brother. “But it will help him.” His voice grated harshly. Abruptly, he turned away.

Crysania carried the steaming potion to Raistlin, who clutched at it with trembling hands and eagerly brought the cup to his lips. Sipping at it, he breathed a sigh of relief and, once more, sank back among the cushions of the chair.

An awkward silence fell. Caramon was staring down at the fire once more. Raistlin, too, looked into the flames and drank his potion without comment. Crysania returned to her own chair to do what each of the others must be doing, she realized—trying to sort out thoughts, trying to make some sense of what had happened.

Hours ago, she had been standing in a doomed city, a city destined to die by the wrath of the gods. She had been on the verge of complete mental and physical collapse. She could admit this now, though she could not have then. How fondly she had imagined her soul to be girded round by the steel walls of her faith. Not steel, she saw now, with shame and regret. Not steel, but ice.

The ice had melted in the harsh light of truth, leaving her exposed and vulnerable. If it had not been for Raistlin, she would have perished back there in Istar.

Raistlin... Her face flushed. This was something else she had never thought to contend with—love, passion. She had been betrothed to a young man, years ago, and she had been quite fond of him. But she had not loved him. She had, in fact, never really believed in love—the kind of love that existed in tales told to children. To be that wrapped up in another person seemed a handicap, a weakness to be avoided. She remembered something Tanis Half-Elven had said about his wife, Laurana—what was it? “When she is gone, it is like I’m missing my right arm...”

What romantic twaddle, she had thought at the time. But now she asked herself, did she feel that way about Raistlin? Her thoughts went to the last day in Istar, the terrible storm, the flashing of the lightning, and how she had suddenly found herself in Raistlin’s arms. Her heart contracted with the swift ache of desire as she felt, once again, his strong embrace. But there was also a sharp fear, a strange revulsion. Unwillingly, she remembered the feverish gleam in his eyes, his exultation in the storm—as if he himself had called it down.

It was like the strange smell of the spell components that clung to him—the pleasant smell of roses and spice, but mingled with it—the cloying odor of decaying creatures, the acrid smell of sulphur.

Even as her body longed for his touch, something in her soul shrank away in horror...

Caramon’s stomach rumbled loudly. The sound, in the deathly still chamber, was startling.

Looking up, her thoughts shattered, Crysania saw the big man blush deeply in embarrassment.

Suddenly reminded of her own hunger—she couldn’t remember the last time she had been able to choke down a mouthful of food—Crysania began to laugh.

Caramon looked at her dubiously, perhaps thinking her hysterical. At the puzzled look on the big man’s face, Crysania only laughed harder. It felt good to laugh, in fact. The darkness in the room seemed pushed back, the shadows lifted from her soul. She laughed merrily and, finally, caugh t by the infectious nature of her mirth, Caramon began to laugh, too, though he still shook his head, his face red.

“Thus do the gods remind us we’re human,” Crysania said when she could speak, wiping the tears from her eyes. “Here we are, in the most horrible place imaginable, surrounded by creatures waiting eagerly to devour us whole, and all I can think of right now is how desperately hungry I am!”

“We need food,” said Caramon soberly, suddenly serious. “And decent clothing, if we’re going to be here long.” He looked at his brother. “How long are we going to be here?”

“Not long,” Raistlin replied. He had finished the potion, and his voice was already stronger. Some color had returned to his pale face. “I need time to rest, to recover my strength, and t o complete my studies. This lady”—his glittering gaze went to Crysania, and she shivered at the sudden impersonal tone in his voice—“needs to commune with her god and renew her faith. Then, we will be ready to enter the Portal. At which time, my brother, you may go where you will.”

Crysania felt Caramon’s questioning glance, but she kept her face smooth and expressionless, though Raistlin’s cool, casual mention of entering the dread Portal, of going into the Abyss and facing the Queen of Darkness froze her heart. She refused to meet Caramon’s eyes, therefore, and stared into the fire.

The big man sighed, then he cleared his throat. “Will you send me home?” he asked his twin.

“If that is where you wish to go.”

“Yes,” Caramon said, his voice deep and stern. “I want to go back to Tika and to... talk to Tanis.”

His voice broke. “I’ll have to... to explain, somehow, about Tas dying... back there in Istar... .”

“In the name of the gods, Caramon,” Raistlin snapped, making an irritated motion with his slender hand, “I thought we had seen some glimmer of an adult lurking in that hulking body of yours! You will undoubtedly return to find Tasslehoff sitting in your kitchen, regaling Tika with one stupid story after another, having robbed you blind in the meantime!”

“What?” Caramon’s face grew pale, his eyes widened.

“Listen to me, my brother!” Raistlin hissed, pointing a finger at Caramon. “The kender doomed himself when he disrupted Par-Salian’s spell. There is a very good reason for the prohibition against those of his race and the races of dwarves and gnomes traveling back in time. Since they were created by accident, through a quirk of fate and the god, Reorx’s, carelessness, these races are not within the flow of time, as are humans, elves, and ogres—those races first created by the gods.

“Thus, the kender could have altered time, as he was quick to realize when I inadvertently let slip that fact. I could not allow that to happen! Had he stopped the Cataclysm, as he intended, who knows what might have occurred? Perhaps we might have returned to our own time to find the Queen of Darkness reigning supreme and unchallenged, since the Cataclysm was sent, in part, to prepare the world to face her coming and give it the strength to defy her—”

“So you murdered him!” Caramon interrupted hoarsely.

“I told him to get the device”—Raistlin bit the words—“I taught him how to use it, and I sent him home!”

Caramon blinked. “You did?” he asked suspiciously.

Raistlin sighed and laid his head back into the cushions of the chair. “I did, but I don’t expect you to believe me, my brother.” His hands plucked feebly at the black robes he wore. “Why should you, after all?”

“You know,” said Crysania softly, “I seem to remember, in those last horrible moments before the earthquake struck, seeing Tasslehoff. He... he was with me... in the Sacred Chamber... .”

She saw Raistlin open his eyes a slit. His glittering gaze pierced her heart and startled her, distracting her thoughts for a moment.

“Go on,” Caramon urged.

“I—I remember... he had the magical device. At least I think he did. He said something about it.”

Crysania put her hand to her forehead. “But I can’t think what it was. It—it’s all so dreadful and confused. But—I’m certain he said he had the device!”

Raistlin smiled slightly. “Surely, you will believe Lady Crysania, my brother?” He shrugged. “A cleric of Paladine will not lie.”

“So Tasslehoff’s home? Right now?” Caramon said, trying to assimilate this startling information.

“And, when I go back, I’ll find him—”

“—safe and sound and loaded down with most of your personal possessions,” Raistlin finished wryly. “But, now, we must turn our attention to more pressing matters. You are right, my brother. We need food and warm clothing, and we are not likely to find either here. The time we have come forward to is about one hundred years after the Cataclysm. This Tower’—he waved his hand—“has been deserted all those years. It is now guarded by the creatures of darkness called forth by the curse of the magic-user whose body is still impaled upon the spikes of the gates below us. The Shoikan Grove has grown up around it, and there are none on Krynn who dare enter.

“None except myself, of course. No, no one can get inside. But the guardians will not prevent one of us—you, my brother, for example—from leaving. You will go into Palanthas and buy food and clothing. I could produce it with my magic, but I dare not expend any unnecessary energy between now and when I—that is Crysania and I—enter the Portal.”

Caramon’s eyes widened. His gaze went to the soot blackened window, his thoughts to the horrifying stories of the Shoikan Grove beyond.

“I will give you a charm to guard you, my brother,” Raistlin added in exasperation, seeing the frightened look on Caramon’s face. “A charm will be necessary, in fact, but not to aid your way through the Grove. It is far more dangerous in here. The guardians obey me, but they hunger for your blood. Do not set foot outside this room without me. Remember that. You, too, Lady Crysania”

“Where is this... this Portal?” Caramon asked abruptly.

“In the laboratory, above us, at the top of the Tower,” Raistlin replied. “The Portals were kept in the most secure place the wizards could devise because, as you can imagine, they are extremely dangerous!”

“It’s like wizards to go tampering with what they should best leave alone,” Caramon growled.

“Why in the name of the gods did they create a gateway to the Abyss?”

Placing the tips of his fingers together, Raistlin stared into the fire, speaking to the flames as if they were the only ones with the power to understand him.

“In the hunger for knowledge, many things are created. Some are good, that benefit us all. A sword in your hands, Caramon, champions the cause of righteousness and truth and protects the innocent. But a sword in the hands of, say, our beloved sister, Kitiara, would split the heads of the innocent wide open if it suited her. Is this the fault of the sword’s creator?”

“N—” Caramon began, but his twin ignored him.

“Long ago, during the Age of Dreams, when magic-users were respected and magic flourished upon Krynn, the five Towers of High Sorcery stood as beacons of light in the dark sea of ignorance that was this world. Here, great magics were worked, benefiting all. There were plans for greater still. Who knows but that now we might have been riding on the winds, soaring the skies like dragons. Maybe even leaving this wretched world and inhabiting other worlds, far away... far away...

His voice grew soft and quiet. Caramon and Crysania held very still, spellbound by his tone, caught up in the vision of his magic.

He sighed. “But that was not to be. In their desire to hasten their great works, the wizards decided they needed to communicate directly with each other, from one Tower to another, without the need for cumbersome teleportation spells. And so, the Portals were constructed.”

“They succeeded?” Crysania’s eyes shone with wonder.

“They succeeded!” Raistlin snorted. “Beyond their wildest dreams”—his voice dropped—“their worst nightmares. For the Portals could not only provide movement in one step between any of the far—flung Towers and fortresses of magic—but also into the realms of the gods, as an inept wizard of my own order discovered to his misfortune.”

Raistlin shivered, suddenly, and drew his black robes more tightly around him, huddling close to the fire.

“Tempted by the Queen of Darkness, as only she can tempt mortal man when she chooses”—

Raistlin’s face grew pale—“he used the Portal to enter her realm and gain the prize she offered him nightly, in his dreams.” Raistlin laughed, bitter, mocking laughter. “Fool! What happened to him, no one knows. But he never returned through the Portal. The Queen, however, did. And with her, came legions of dragons—”

“The first Dragon Wars!” Crysania gasped.

“Yes, brought upon us by one of my own kind with no discipline, no self-control. One who allowed himself to be seduced—” Breaking off, Raistlin stared broodingly into the fire.

“But, I never heard that!” Caramon protested. “According to the legends, the dragons came together—”

“Your history is limited to bedtime tales, my brother!” Raistlin said impatiently. “And just proves how little you know of dragons. They are independent creatures, proud, self-centered, and completely incapable of coming together to cook dinner, much less coordinate any sort of war effort. No, the Queen entered the world completely that time, not just the shadow she was during our war with her. She waged war upon the world, and it was only through Huma’s great sacrifice that she was driven back.”

Raistlin paused, hands to his lips, musing. “Some say that Huma did not use the Dragonlance to physically destroy her, as the legend goes. But, rather, the lance had some magical property allowing him to drive her back into the Portal and seal it shut. The fact that he did drive her back proves that—in this world—she is vulnerable.” Raistlin stared fixedly into the flames. “Had there been someone—someone of true power at the Portal when she entered, someone capable of destroying her utterly instead of simply driving her back—then history might well have been rewritten.”

No one spoke. Crysania stared into the flames, seeing, perhaps, the same glorious vision as the archmage. Caramon stared at his twin’s face.

Raistlin’s gaze suddenly left the flames, flashing into focus with a clear, cold intensity. “When I am stronger, tomorrow, I will ascend to the laboratory alone”—his stern glance swept over both Caramon and Crysania—“and begin my preparations. You, lady, had best start communing with your god.”

Crysania swallowed nervously. Shivering, she drew her chair nearer the fire. But suddenly Caramon was on his feet, standing before her. Reaching down, his strong hands gripped her arms, forcing her to look up into his eyes.

“This is madness, lady,” he said, his voice soft and compassionate. “Let me take you from this dark place! You’re frightened—you have reason to be afraid! Maybe not everything Par-Salian said about Raistlin was true. Maybe everything I thought about him wasn’t true, either. Perhaps I’ve misjudged him. But I see this clearly, lady. You’re frightened and I don’t blame you! Let Raistlin do this thing alone! Let him challenge the gods—if that’s what he wants! But you don’t have to go with him! Come home! Let me take you back to our time, away from here.”

Raistlin did not speak, but his thoughts echoed in Crysania’s mind as clearly as if he had. You heard the Kingpriest! You said yourself that you know his mistake! Paladine favors you. Even in this dark place, he grants your prayers. You are his chosen! You will succeed where the Kingpriest failed! Come with me, Crysania. This is our destiny!

“I am frightened,” Crysania said, gently disengaging Caramon’s hands from her arms. “And I am truly touched by your concern. But this fear of mine is a weakness in me that I must combat. With Paladine’s help, I will overcome it—before I enter the Portal with your brother.”

“So be it,” Caramon said heavily, turning away.

Raistlin smiled, a dark, secret smile that was not reflected in either his eyes or his voice.

“And now, Caramon,” he said caustically, “if you are quite through meddling in matters you are completely incapable of comprehending, you had best prepare for your journey. It is midmorning, now. The markets—such as they are in these bleak times—are just opening.” Reaching into a pocket in his black robes, Raistlin withdrew several coins and tossed them at his brother. “That should be sufficient for our needs.”

Caramon caught the coins without thinking. Then he hesitated, staring at his brother with the same look Crysania had seen him wear in the Temple at Istar, and she remembered thinking, what terrible hate... what terrible love!

Finally, Caramon lowered his gaze, stuffing the money into his belt.

“Come here to me, Caramon,” Raistlin said softly.

“Why?” he muttered, suddenly suspicious.

“Well, there is the matter of that iron collar around your neck. Would you walk the streets with the mark of slavery still? And then there is the charm.” Raistlin spoke with infinite patience. Seeing Caramon hesitate still, he added, “I would not advise you leave this room without it. Still, that is your decision—”

Glancing over at the pallid faces, who were still watching intently from the shadows, Caramon came to stand before his brother, his arms crossed before his chest. “Now what?” he growled.

“Kneel down before me.”

Caramon’s eyes flashed with anger. A bitter oath burned on his lips, but, his eyes going furtively to Crysania, he choked back and swallowed his words.

Raistlin’s pale face appeared saddened. He sighed. “I am exhausted, Caramon. I do not have the strength to rise. Please—”

His jaw clenched, Caramon slowly lowered himself, bending knee to floor so that he was level with his frail, black-robed twin.

Raistlin spoke a soft word. The iron collar split apart and fell from Caramon’s neck, landing with a clatter on the floor.

“Come nearer,” Raistlin said.

Swallowing, rubbing his neck, Caramon did as he was told. though he stared at his brother bitterly. “I’m doing this for Crysania,” he said, his voice taut. “If it were just you and me, I’d let you rot in this foul place!”

Reaching out his hands, Raistlin placed them on either side of his twin’s head with a gesture that was tender, almost caressing. “Would you, my brother?” the mage asked so softly it was no more than a breath. “Would you leave me? Back there, in Istar—would you truly have killed me?”

Caramon only stared at him, unable to answer. Then, Raistlin bent forward and kissed his brother on the forehead. Caramon flinched, as though he had been touched with a red-hot iron.

Raistlin released his grip.

Caramon stared at him in anguish. “I don’t know!” he murmured brokenly. “The gods help me—I don’t know!”

With a shuddering sob, he covered his face with his hands. His head sank into his brother’s lap.

Raistlin stroked his brother’s brown, curling hair. “There, now, Caramon,” he said gently. “I have given you the charm. The things of darkness cannot harm you, not so long as I am here.”

5

Caramon stood in the doorway to the study, peering out into the darkness of the corridor beyond—a darkness that was alive with whispers and eyes. Beside him was Raistlin, one hand on his twin’s arm, the Staff of Magius in his other.

“All will be well, my brother,” Raistlin said softly. “Trust me.”

Caramon glanced at his twin out of the corner of his eye. Seeing his look, Raistlin smiled sardonically. “I will send one of these with you,” the mage continued, motioning with his slender hand.

“I’d rather not!” Caramon muttered, scowling as the pair of disembodied eyes nearest him drew nearer still.

“Attend him,” Raistlin commanded the eyes. “He is under my protection. You see me? You know who I am?”

The eyes lowered their gaze in reverence, then fixed their cold and ghastly stare upon Caramon. The big warrior shuddered and cast one final glance at Raistlin, only to see his brothers face turn grim and stern.

“The guardians will guide you safely through the Grove. You may have more to fear, however, once you leave it. Be wary, my brother. This city is not the beautiful, serene place it will become in two hundred years. Now, refugees pack it, living in the gutters, the streets, wherever they can. Carts rumble over the cobblestones every morning, removing the bodies of those who died during the night. There are men out there who will murder you for your boots. Buy a sword, first thing, and carry it openly in your hand.”

“I’ll worry about the town,” Caramon snapped. Turning abruptly, he walked off down the corridor, trying without much success to ignore the pale, glowing eyes that floated near his shoulder.

Raistlin watched until his brother and the guardian had passed beyond the staff’s radius of magical light and were swallowed up by the noisome darkness. Waiting until even the echoes of his brothers heavy footfalls had faded, Raistlin turned.

Lady Crysania sat in her chair, trying without much success to comb her fingers through her tangled hair. Padding softly across the floor to stand near her, unseen, Raistlin reached into one of the pockets of his black robes and drew forth a handful of fine white sand. Coming up behind her, the mage raised his hand and let the sand drift down over the woman’s dark hair.

“Ast tasark simiralan krynawi,” Raistlin whispered, and almost immediately Crysania’s head drooped, her eyes closed, and she drifted into a deep, magical sleep. Moving to stand before her, Raistlin stared at her for long moments.

Though she had washed the stain of tears and blood from her face, the marks of her journey through darkness were still visible in the blue shadows beneath her long lashes, a cut upon her lip, and the pallor of her complexion. Reaching out his hand, Raistlin gently brushed back the hair that fell in dark tendrils across her eyes.

Crysania had cast aside the velvet curtain she had been using as a blanket as the room was warmed by the fire. Her white robes, torn and stained with blood, had come loose around her neck. Raistlin could see the soft curves of her breasts beneath the white cloth rising and falling with her deep, even breathing.

“Were I as other men, she would be mine,” he said softly.

His hand lingered near her face, her dark, crisp hair curling around his fingers.

“But I am not as other men,” Raistlin murmured. Letting her hair fall, he pulled the velvet curtain up around her shoulders and across her slumbering form. Crysania smiled from some sweet dream, perhaps, and nestled more snugly into the chair, resting her cheek upon her hand as she laid her head on the armrest.

Raistlin’s hand brushed against the smooth skin of her face, recalling vivid memories. He began to tremble. He had but to reverse the sleep spell, take her in his arms, hold her as he held her when he cast the magic spell that brought them to this place. They would have an hour alone together before Caramon returned...

“I am not as other men!” Raistlin snarled.

Abruptly walking away, his dour gaze encountered the staring, watchful eyes of the guardians.

“Watch over her while I am gone,” he said to several half seen, hovering spectres lurking in the dark shadows in the corner of the study. “You two,” he ordered the two who been with him when he awakened, “accompany me.”

“Yes, Master,” the two murmured. As the staff’s light fell upon them, the faint outlines of black robes could be seen.

Stepping out into the corridor, Raistlin carefully closed the door to the study behind him. He gripped the staff, spoke a soft word of command, and was instantly taken to the laboratory at the top of the Tower of High Sorcery.

He had not even drawn a breath when, materializing out of the darkness, he was attacked.

Shrieks and howls of outrage screamed around him. Dark shapes darted out of the air, daring the light of the staff as bone white fingers clutched for his throat and grasped his robes, rending the cloth. So swift and sudden was the attack and so awful the sense of hatred that Raistlin very nearly lost control.

But he was in command of himself quickly. Swinging the staff in a wide arc, shouting hoarse words of magic, he drove back the spectres.

“Talk to them!” he commanded the two guardians with him. “Tell them who I am!”

“Fistandantilus,” he heard them say through a roaring in his ears, “... though his time has not yet come as was foretold... some magical experiment...”

Weakened and dizzy, Raistlin staggered to a chair and slumped down into it. Bitterly cursing himself for not being prepared for such an onslaught and cursing the frail body that was, once again, failing him, he wiped blood from a jagged cut upon his face and fought to remain conscious.

This is your doing, my Queen. His thoughts came grimly through a haze of pain. You dare not fight me openly. I am too strong for you on this—my plane—of existence! You have your foothold in this world. Even now, the Temple has appeared in its perverted form in Neraka. You have wakened the evil dragons. They are stealing the eggs of the good dragons. But the door remains closed, the Foundation Stone has been blocked by self-sacrificing love. And that was your mistake. For now, by your entry into our plane, you have made it possible for us to enter yours! I cannot reach you yet... you cannot reach me... . But the time will come... the time will come...

“Are you unwell, Master?” came a frightened voice near him. “I am sorry we could not prevent them from harming you, but you moved too swiftly! Please, forgive us. Let us help—”

“There is nothing you can do!” Raistlin snarled, coughing. He felt the pain in his chest ease.

“Leave me a moment... Let me rest. Drive these others out of here.”

“Yes, Master.”

Closing his eyes, waiting for the horrible dizziness and pain to pass, Raistlin sat for an hour in the darkness, going over his plans in his mind. He needed two weeks of unbroken rest and study to prepare himself. That time he would find here easily enough. Crysania was his—she would follow him willingly, eagerly in fact, calling down the power of Paladine to assist him in opening the Portal and fighting the dread Guardians beyond.

He had the knowledge of Fistandantilus, knowledge accumulated by the mage over the ages. He had his own knowledge, too, plus the strength of his younger body. By the time he was ready to enter, he would be at the height of his powers—the greatest archmage ever to have lived upon Krynn!

The thought comforted him and gave him renewed energy. The dizziness subsided finally, the pain eased. Rising to his feet, he cast a quick glance about the laboratory. He recognized it, of course. It looked exactly the same as when he had entered it in a past that was now two hundred years in the future. Then he had come with power—as foretold. The gates had opened, the evil guardians had greeted him reverently—not attacked him.

As he walked through the laboratory, the Staff of Magius shining to light his way, Raistlin glanced about curiously. He noticed odd, puzzling changes. Everything should have been exactly as it was when he would arrive two hundred years from now. But a beaker now standing intact had been broken when he found it. A spellbook now resting on the large stone table, he had discovered on the floor.

“Do the guardians disturb things?” he asked the two who remained with him. His robes rustled about his ankles as he made his way to the very back of the huge laboratory, back to the Door That Was Never Opened.

“Oh, no, Master,” said one, shocked. “We are not permitted to touch anything.”

Raistlin shrugged. Lots of things could happen in two hundred years to account for such occurrences. “Perhaps an earthquake,” he said to himself, losing interest in the matter as he approached the shadows where the great Portal stood.

Raising the Staff of Magius, he shone its magical light ahead of him. The shadows fled the far corner of the laboratory, the corner where stood the Portal with its platinum carvings of the five dragon heads and its huge silver-steel door that no key upon Krynn could unlock.

Raistlin held the staff high... and gasped.

For long moments he could do nothing but stare, the breath wheezing in his lungs, his thoughts seething and burning. Then, his shrill scream of anger and rage and fury pierced the living fabric of the Towers darkness.

So dreadful was the cry, echoing through the dark corridors of the Tower, that the evil guardians cowered back into their shadows, wondering if perhaps their dread Queen had burst in upon them.

Caramon heard the cry as he entered the door at the bottom of the Tower. Shivering with sudden terror, he dropped the packages he carried and, with trembling hands, lit the torch he had brought. Then, the naked blade of his new sword in his hand, the big warrior raced up the stairs two at a time.

Bursting into the study, he saw Lady Crysania looking around in sleepy fearfulness.

“I heard a scream—” she said, rubbing her eyes and rising to her feet.

“Are you all right?” Caramon gasped, trying to catch his breath.

“Why, yes,” she said, looking startled, as she realized what he was thinking. “It wasn’t me. I must have fallen asleep. It woke me—”

“Where’s Raist?” Caramon demanded.

“Raistlin!” she repeated, alarmed, and started to push her way past Caramon when he caught hold of her.

“This is why you slept,” he said grimly, brushing fine white sand from her hair. “Sleep spell.”

Crysania blinked. “But why—”

“We’ll find out.”

“Warrior,” said a cold voice almost in his ear.

Whirling, Caramon thrust Crysania behind him, raising his sword as a black-robed, spectral figure materialized out of the darkness. “You seek the wizard? He is above, in the laboratory. He is in need of assistance, and we have been commanded not to touch him.”

“I’ll go,” Caramon said, “alone.”

“I’m coming with you,” Crysania said. “I will come with you,” she repeated firmly, in response to Caramon’s frown.

Caramon started to argue, then, remembering that she was a cleric of Paladine and had once before exerted her powers over these creatures of darkness, shrugged and gave in, though with little grace.

“What happened to him, if you were commanded not to touch him?” Caramon asked the spectre gruffly as he and Crysania followed it from the study out into the dark corridor. “Keep close to me,” he muttered to Crysania, but the command was not necessary.

If the darkness had seemed alive before, it throbbed and pulsed and jittered and jabbered with life now as the guardians, upset by the scream, thronged the corridors. Though he was now warmly dressed, having purchased clothes at the marketplace, Caramon shivered convulsively with the chill that flowed from their undead bodies. Beside him, Crysania shook so she could barely walk.

“Let me hold the torch,” she said through clenched teeth. Caramon handed her the torch, then encircled her with his right arm, drawing her near. She clasped her arm about him, both of them finding comfort in the touch of living flesh as they climbed the stairs after the spectre.

“What happened?” he asked again, but the spectre did not answer. It simply pointed up the spiral stairs.

Holding his sword in his left hand, his sword hand, Caramon and Crysania followed the spectre as it flowed up the stairs, the torchlight dancing and wavering.

After what seemed an endless climb, the two reached the top of the Tower of High Sorcery, both of them aching and frightened and chilled to the very heart.

“We must rest,” Caramon said through lips so numb he was practically inaudible. Crysania leaned against him, her eyes closed, her breath coming in labored gasps. Caramon himself did not think he could have climbed another stair, and he was in superb physical condition.

“Where is Raist—Fistandantilus?” Crysania stammered after her breathing had returned somewhat to normal.

“Within.” The spectre pointed again, this time to a closed door and, as it pointed, the door swung silently open.

Cold air flowed from the room in a dark wave, ruffling Caramon’s hair and blowing aside Crysania’s cloak. For a moment Caramon could not move. The sense of evil coming from within that chamber was overwhelming. But Crysania, her hand firmly clasped over the medallion of Paladine, began to walk forward.

Reaching out, Caramon drew her back. “Let me go first.”

Crysania smiled at him wearily. “In any other case but this, warrior,” she said, “I would grant you that privilege. But, here, the medallion I hold is as formidable a weapon as your sword.”

“You have no need for any weapon,” the spectre stated coldly. “The Master commanded us to see that you come to no harm. We will obey his request.”

“What if he’s dead?” Caramon asked harshly, feeling Crysania stiffen in fear beside him.

“If he had died,” the spectre replied, its eyes gleaming, “your warm blood would already be upon our lips. Now enter.”

Hesitantly, Crysania pressed close beside him, Caramon entered the laboratory. Crysania lifted the torch, holding it high, as both paused, looking around.

“There,” Caramon whispered, the innate closeness that existed between the twins leading him to find the dark mass, barely visible on the floor at the back of the laboratory.

Her fears forgotten, Crysania hurried forward, Caramon following more slowly, his eyes warily scanning the darkness.

Raistlin lay on his side, his hood drawn over his face. The Staff of Magius lay some distance from him, its light gone out, as though Raistlin—in bitter anger—had hurled it from him. In its flight, it had, apparently, broken a beaker and knocked a spellbook to the floor.

Handing Caramon the torch, Crysania knelt beside the mage and felt for the lifebeat in his neck. It was weak and irregular, but he lived. She sighed in relief, then shook her head. “He’s all right. But I don’t understand. What happened to him?”

“He is not hurt physically,” the spectre said, hovering near them. “He came to this part of the laboratory as though looking for something. And then he walked over here, muttering about a portal. Holding his staff high, he stood where he lies now, staring straight ahead. Then he screamed, hurled the staff from him, and fell to the floor, cursing in fury until he lost consciousness.”

Puzzled, Caramon held the torch up. “I wonder what could have happened?” he murmured. “Why, there’s nothing here! Nothing but a bare, blank wall!”

6

“How has he been?” Crysania asked softly as she entered the room. Drawing back the white hood from her head, she untied her cloak to allow Caramon to remove it from around her shoulders.

“Restless,” the warrior replied with a glance toward a shadowed corner. “He has been impatient for your return.”

Crysania sighed and bit her lip. “I wish I had better news,” she murmured.

“I’m glad you don’t,” Caramon said grimly, folding Crysania’s cloak over a chair. “Maybe he’ll give up this insane idea and come home.”

“I can’t—” began Crysania, but she was interrupted.

“If you two are quite finished with whatever it is you are doing there in the darkness, perhaps you will come tell me what you discovered, lady.”

Crysania flushed deeply. Casting an irritated glance at Caramon, she hurried across the room to where Raistlin lay on a pallet near the fire.

The mage’s rage had been costly. Caramon had carried him from the laboratory where they’d found him lying before the empty stone wall to the study. Crysania had made up a bed on the floor, then watched, helplessly, as Caramon ministered to his brother as gently as a mother to a sick child. But there was little even the big man could do for his frail twin. Raistlin lay unconscious for over a day, muttering strange words in his sleep. Once he wakened and cried out in terror, but he immediately sank back into whatever darkness he wandered.

Bereft of the light of the staff that even Caramon dared not touch and was forced to leave in the laboratory, he and Crysania sat huddled near Raistlin. They kept the fire burning brightly, but both were always conscious of the presence of the shadows of the guardians of the Tower, waiting, watching.

Finally, Raistlin awoke. With his first breath, he ordered Caramon to prepare his potion and, after drinking this, was able to send one of the guardians to fetch the staff. Then he beckoned to Crysania. “You must go to Astinus,” he whispered.

“Astinus!” Crysania repeated in blank astonishment. “The historian? But why—I don’t understand—”

Raistlin’s eyes glittered, a spot of color burned into his pale cheek with feverish brilliance. “The Portal is not here!” he snarled, grinding his teeth in impotent fury. His hands clenched and almost immediately he began to cough. He glared at Crysania.

“Don’t waste my time with fool questions! Just go!” he commanded in such terrible anger that she shrank away, startled. Raistlin fell back, gasping for breath.

Caramon glanced up at Crysania in concern. She walked to the desk, staring down unseeing at some of the tattered and blackened spellbooks that lay upon it.

“Now wait just a minute, lady,” Caramon said softly, rising and coming to her. “You’re not really considering going? Who is this Astinus anyway? And how do you plan to get through the Grove without a charm?”

“I have a charm,” Crysania murmured, “given to me by your brother when—when we first met. As for Astinus, he is the keeper of the Great Library of Palanthas, the Chronicler of the History of Krynn.”

“He may be that in our time, but he won’t be there now!” Caramon said in exasperation. “Think, lady!”

“I am thinking,” Crysania snapped, glancing at him in anger. “Astinus is known as the Ageless One. He was first to set foot upon Krynn, so the legends say, and he will be the last to leave it.”

Caramon regarded her skeptically.

“He records all history as it passes. He knows everything that has happened in the past and is happening in the present. But”—Crysania glanced at Raistlin with a worried look—“he cannot see into the future. So I’m not certain what help he can be to us.”

Caramon, still dubious and obviously not believing half of this wild tale, had argued long against her going. But Crysania only grew more determined, until, finally, even Caramon realized they had no choice. Raistlin grew worse instead of better. His skin burned with fever, he lapsed into periods of incoherence and, when he was himself, angrily demanded to know why Crysania hadn’t been to see Astinus yet.

So she had braved the terrors of the Grove and the equally appalling terrors of the streets of Palanthas. Now she knelt beside the mage’s bed, her heart aching as she watched him struggle to sit up—with his brother’s help—his glittering gaze fixed eagerly upon her.

“Tell me everything!” he ordered hoarsely. “Exactly as it occurred. Leave out nothing.”

Nodding wordlessly, still shaken by the terrifying walk through the Tower, Crysania tried to force herself to calm down and sort out her thoughts.

“I went to the Great Library and—and asked to see Astinus,” she began, nervously smoothing the folds of the plain, white robe Caramon had brought her to replace the blood-stained gown she had worn. “The Aesthetics refused to admit me, but then I showed them the medallion of Paladine. That threw them into confusion, as you might well imagine.” She smiled. “It has been a hundred years since any sign of the old gods has come, so, finally, one hurried off to report to Astinus.

“After waiting for some time, I was taken to his chamber where he sits all day long and many times far into the night, recording the history of the world.” Crysania paused, suddenly frightened at the intensity of Raistlin’s gaze. It seemed he would snatch the words from her heart, if he could.

Looking away for a moment to compose herself, she continued, her own gaze now on the fire. “I entered the room, and he—he just sat there, writing, ignoring me. Then the Aesthetic who was with me announced my name, ‘Crysania of the House of Tarinius,’ as you told me to tell him. And then—”

She stopped, frowning slightly.

Raistlin stirred. “What?”

“Astinus looked up then,” Crysania said in a puzzled tone, turning to face Raistlin. “He actually ceased writing and laid his pen down. And he said, ‘You!’ in such a thundering voice that I was startled and the Aesthetic with me nearly fainted. But before I could say anything or ask what he meant or even how he knew me, he picked up his pen and—going to the words he had just written—crossed them out!”

“Crossed them out,” Raistlin repeated thoughtfully, his eyes dark and abstracted. “Crossed them out,” he murmured, sinking back down onto his pallet.

Seeing Raistlin absorbed in his thoughts, Crysania kept quiet until he looked up at her again.

“What did he do then?” the mage asked weakly.

“He wrote something down over the place where he had made the error, if that’s what it was. Then he raised his gaze to mine again and I thought he was going to be angry. So did the Aesthetic, for I could feel him shaking. But Astinus was quite calm. He dismissed the Aesthetic and bade me sit down. Then he asked why I had come.

“I told him we were seeking the Portal. I added, as you instructed, that we had received information that led us to believe it was located in the Tower of High Sorcery at Palanthas, but that, upon investigation, we had discovered our information was wrong. The Portal was not there.

“He nodded, as if this did not surprise him. ‘The Portal was moved when the Kingpriest attempted to take over the Tower. For safety’s sake, of course. In time, it may return to the Tower of High Sorcery at Palanthas, but it is not there now.’

“‘Where is it, then?’ I asked.

“For long moments, he did not answer me. And then—” Here Crysania faltered and glanced over at Caramon fearfully, as if warning him to brace himself.

Seeing her look, Raistlin pushed himself up on the pallet. “Tell me!” he demanded harshly.

Crysania drew a deep breath. She would have looked away, but Raistlin caught hold of her wrist and, despite his weakness, held her so firmly, she found she could not break free of his deathlike grip.

“He—he said such information would cost you. Every man has his price, even he.”

“Cost me!” Raistlin repeated inaudibly, his eyes burning.

Crysania tried unsuccessfully to free herself as his grasp tightened painfully.

“What is the cost?” Raistlin demanded.

“He said you would know!” Crysania gasped. “He said you had promised it to him, long ago.”

Raistlin loosed her wrist. Crysania sank back away from him, rubbing her arm, avoiding Caramon’s pitying gaze. Abruptly, the big man rose to his feet and stalked away. Ignoring him, ignoring Crysania, Raistlin sank back onto his frayed pillows, his face pale and drawn, his eyes suddenly dark and shadowed.

Crysania stood up and went to pour herself a glass of water. But her hand shook so she slopped most of it on the desk and was forced to set the pitcher down. Coming up behind her, Caramon poured the water and handed her the glass, a grave expression on his face.

Raising the glass to her lips, Crysania was suddenly aware of Caramon’s gaze going to her wrist.

Looking down, she saw the marks of Raistlin’s hand upon her flesh. Setting the glass back down upon the desk, Crysania quickly drew her robe over her injured arm.

“He’s doesn’t mean to hurt me,” she said softly in answer to Caramon’s stern, unspoken glare. “His pain makes him impatient. What is our suffering, compared to his? Surely you of all people must understand that? He is so caught up in his greater vision that he doesn’t know when he hurts others.”

Turning away, she walked back to where Raistlin lay, staring unseeing into the fire.

“Oh, he knows all right,” Caramon muttered to himself. “I’m just beginning to realize—he’s known all along!”

Astinus of Palanthas, historian of Krynn, sat in his chamber, writing. The hour was late, very late, past Darkwatch, in fact. The Aesthetics had long ago closed and barred the doors to the Great Library. Few were admitted during the day, none at night. But bars and locks were nothing to the man who entered the Library and who now stood, a figure of darkness, before Astinus.

The historian did not glance up. “I was beginning to wonder where you were,” he said, continuing to write.

“I have been unwell,” the figure replied, its black robes rustling. As if reminded, the figure coughed softly.

“I trust you are feeling better?” Astinus still did not raise his head.

“I am returning to health slowly,” the figure replied. “Many things tax my strength.”

“Be seated, then,” Astinus remarked, gesturing with the end of his quill pen to a chair, his gaze still upon his work.

The figure, a twisted smile on its face, padded over to the chair and sat down. There was silence within the chamber for many minutes, broken only by the scratching of Astinus’s pen and the occasional cough of the black-robed intruder.

Finally, Astinus laid the pen down and lifted his gaze to meet that of his visitor. His visitor drew back the black hood from his face. Regarding him silently for long moments, Astinus nodded to himself.

“I do not know this face, Fistandantilus, but I know your eyes. There is something strange in them, however. I see the future in their depths. So you have become master of time, yet you do not return with power, as was foretold.”

“My name is not Fistandantilus, Deathless One. It is Raistlin, and that is sufficient explanation for what has happened.” Raistlin’s smile vanished, his eyes narrowed. “But surely you knew that?”

He gestured. “Surely the final battle between us is recorded—”

“I recorded the name as I recorded the battle,” Astinus said coolly. “Would you care to see the entry... Fistandantilus?” Raistlin frowned, his eyes glittered dangerously. But Astinus remained unperturbed. Leaning back in his chair, he studied the archmage calmly.

“Have you brought what I asked for?”

“I have,” Raistlin replied bitterly. “Its making cost me days of pain and sapped my strength, else I would have come sooner.”

And now, for the first time, a hint of emotion shone on Astinus’s cold and ageless face. Eagerly, he leaned forward, his eyes shining as Raistlin slowly drew aside the folds of his black robes, revealing what seemed an empty, crystal globe hovering within his hollow chest cavity like a clear, crystalline heart.

Even Astinus could not repress a start at this sight, but it was apparently nothing more than an illusion, for, with a gesture, Raistlin sent the globe floating forward. With his other hand, he drew the black fabric back across his thin chest.

As the globe drifted near him, Astinus placed his hands upon it, caressing it lovingly. At his touch, the globe was filled with moonlight—silver, red, even the strange aura of the black moon was visible. Beneath the moons whirled vision after vision.

“You see time passing, even as we sit here,” Raistlin said, his voice tinged with an unconscious pride. “And thus, Astinus, no longer will you have to rely on your unseen messengers from the planes beyond for your knowledge of what happens in the world around you. Your own eyes will be your messengers from this point forward.”

“Yes! Yes!” Astinus breathed, the eyes that looked into the globe glimmering with tears, the hands that rested upon it shaking.

“And now my payment,” Raistlin continued coldly. “Where is the Portal?”

Astinus looked up from the globe. “Can you not guess, Man of the Future and the Past? You have read the histories... .”

Raistlin stared at Astinus without speaking, his face growing pale and chill until it might have been a death mask.

“You are right. I have read the histories. So that is why Fistandantilus went to Zhaman,” the archmage said finally.

Astinus nodded wordlessly.

“Zhaman, the magical fortress, located in the Plains of Dergoth... near Thorbardin—home of the mountain dwarves. And Zhaman is in land controlled by the mountain dwarves,” Raistlin went on, his voice expressionless as though reading from a textbook. “And where, even now, their cousins, the hill dwarves, go—driven by the evil that has consumed the world since the Cataclysm to demand shelter within the ancient mountain home.”

“The Portal is located—”

“—deep within the dungeons of Zhaman,” Raistlin said bitterly. “Here, Fistandantilus fought the Great Dwarven War—”

“Will fight...” Astinus corrected.

“Will fight,” Raistlin murmured, “the war that will encompass his own doom!”

The mage fell silent. Then, abruptly, he rose to his feet and moved to Astinus’s desk. Placing his hands upon the book, he turned it. around to face him. Astinus observed him with cool, detached interest.

“You are right,” Raistlin said, scanning the still-wet writing on the parchment. “I am from the future. I have read the Chronicles, as you penned them. Parts of them, at any rate. I remember reading this entry—one you will write there.” He pointed to a blank space, then recited from memory. “‘As of this date, After Darkwatch falling 30, Fistandantilus brought me the Globe of Present Time Passing.’”

Astinus did not reply. Raistlin’s hand began to shake. “You will write that?” he persisted, anger grating in his voice.

Astinus paused, then acquiesced with a slight shrug of his shoulders.

Raistlin sighed. “So I am doing nothing that has not been done before! “His hand clenched suddenly and, when he spoke again, his voice was tight with the effort it was taking to control himself.

“Lady Crysania came to you, several days ago. She said you were writing as she entered and that, after seeing her, you crossed something out. Show me what that was.”

Astinus frowned.

“Show me!” Raistlin’s voice cracked, it was almost a shriek.

Placing the globe to one side of the table, where it hovered near him, Astinus reluctantly removed his hands from its crystal surface. The light blinked out, the globe grew dark and empty. Reaching around behind him, the historian pulled out a great, leather-bound volume and, without hesitation, found the page requested.

He turned the book so that Raistlin could see.

The archmage read what had been written, then read the correction. When he stood up, his black robes whispering about him as he folded his hands within his sleeves, his face was deathly pale but calm.

“This alters time.”

“This alters nothing,” Astinus said coolly. “She came in his stead, that is all. An even exchange. Time flows on, undisturbed.”

“And carries me with it?”

“Unless you have the power to change the course of rivers by tossing in a pebble,” Astinus remarked wryly.

Raistlin looked at him and smiled, swiftly, briefly. Then he pointed at the globe. “Watch, Astinus,” he whispered, “watch for the pebble! Farewell, Deathless One.”

The room was empty, suddenly, except for Astinus. The historian sat silently, pondering. Then, turning the book back, he read once more what he had been writing when Crysania had entered.

On this date, Afterwatch rising 15, Denubis, a cleric of Paladine, arrived here, having been sent by the great archmage, Fistandantilus, to discover the whereabouts of the Portal. In return for my help. Fistandantilus will make what he has long promised me—the Globe of Present Time Passing...

Denubis’s name had been crossed out, Crysania’s written in.

7

“I’m dead,” said Tasslehoff Burrfoot.

He waited expectantly a moment.

“I’m dead,” he said again. “My, my. This must be the Afterlife.”

Another moment passed.

“Well,” said Tas, “one thing I can say for it—it certainly is dark.”

Still nothing happened. Tas found his interest in being dead beginning to wane. He was, he discovered, lying on his back on something extremely hard and uncomfortable, cold and stony feeling.

“Perhaps I’m laid out on a marble slab, like Huma’s,” he said, trying to drum up some enthusiasm. “Or a hero’s crypt, like where we buried Sturm”

That thought entertained him a while, then, “Ouch!” He pressed his hand to his side, feeling a stabbing pain in his ribs and, at the same time, he noticed another pain in his head. He also came to realize that he was shivering, a sharp rock was poking him in the back, and he had a stiff neck.

“Well, I certainly didn’t expect this,” he snapped irritably. “I mean, by all accounts when you’re dead, you’re not supposed to feel anything.” He said this quite loudly, in case someone was listening. “I said you’re not supposed to feel anything!” he repeated pointedly when the pain did not go away.

“Drat!” muttered Tas. “Maybe it’s some sort of mix-up. Maybe I’m dead and the word just hasn’t gotten around my body yet. I certainly haven’t gone all stiff, and I’m sure that’s supposed to happen. So I’ll just wait.”

Squirming to get comfortable (first removing the rock from beneath his back), Tas folded his hands across his chest and stared up into the thick, impenetrable darkness. After a few minutes of this, he frowned.

“If this is being dead, it sure isn’t all it’s cracked up to be,” he remarked sternly. “Now I’m not only dead, I’m bored, too. Well,” he said after a few more moments of staring into the darkness, “I guess I can’t do much about being dead, but I can do something about being bored. There’s obviously been a mix-up. I’ll just have to go talk to someone about this.”

Sitting up, he started to swing his legs around to jump off the marble slab, only to discover that he was—apparently—lying on a stone floor. “How rude!” he commented indignantly. “Why not just dump me in someone’s root cellar!”

Stumbling to his feet, he took a step forward and bumped into something hard and solid. “A rock,” he said gloomily, running his hands over it. “Humpf! Flint dies and he gets a tree! I die and I get a rock. It’s obvious someone’s done something all wrong.

“Hey!—” he cried, groping around in the darkness. “Is anyone—Well, what do you know? I’ve still got my pouches! They let me bring everything with me, even the magical device. At least that was considerate. Still”—Tas’s lips tightened with firm resolve—“someone better do something about this pain. I simply won’t put up with it.”

Investigating with his hands, since he couldn’t see a thing, Tas ran his fingers curiously over the big rock. It seemed to be covered with carved images—runes, maybe? And that struck him as familiar. The shape of the huge rock, too, was odd.

“It isn’t a rock after all! It’s a table, seemingly,” he said, puzzled. “A rock table carved with runes—” Then his memory returned. “I know!” he shouted triumphantly. “It’s that big stone desk in the laboratory where I went to hunt for Raistlin and Caramon and Crysania, and found that they’d all gone and left me behind. I was standing there when the fiery mountain came down on top of me! In fact, that’s the place where I died!”

He felt his neck. Yes, the iron collar was still there—the collar they had put on him when he was sold as a slave. Continuing to grope around in the darkness, Tas tripped over something. Reaching down, he cut himself on a something sharp.

“Caramon’s sword!” he said, feeling the hilt. “I remember. I found it on the floor. And that means,” said Tas with growing outrage, “that they didn’t even bury me! They just left my body where it was! I’m in the basement of a ruined Temple.” Brooding, he sucked his bleeding finger. A sudden thought occurred to him. “And I suppose they intend for me to walk to wherever it is I’m going in the Afterlife. They don’t even provide transportation! This is really the last straw!”

He raised his voice to a shout. “Look!” he said, shaking his small fist. “I want to talk to whoever’s in charge!”

But there was no sound.

“No light,” Tas grumbled, falling over something else. “Stuck down in the bottom of a ruined temple—dead! Probably at the bottom of the Blood Sea of Istar... . Say,” he said, pausing to think, “maybe I’ll meet some sea elves, like Tanis told me about. But, no, I forgot”—he sighed—“I’m dead, and you can’t, as far as I’m able to understand, meet people after you’re dead. Unless you’re an undead, like Lord Soth.” The kender cheered up considerably. “I wonder how you get that job? I’ll ask. Being a death knight must be quite exciting. But, first, I’ve got to find out where I’m supposed to be and why I’m not there!”

Picking himself up again, Tas managed to make his way to what he figured was probably the front of the room beneath the Temple. He was thinking about the Blood Sea of Istar and wondering why there wasn’t more water about when something else suddenly occurred to him.

“Oh, dear!” he muttered. “The Temple didn’t go into the Blood Sea! It went to Neraka! I was in the Temple, in fact, when I defeated the Queen of Darkness.”

Tas came to a doorway—he could tell by feeling the frame and peered out into the darkness that was so very dark.

“Neraka, huh,” he said, wondering if that was better or worse than being at the bottom of an ocean.

Cautiously, he took a step forward and felt something beneath his foot. Reaching down, his small hand closed over—“A torch! It must have been the one over the doorway. Now, somewhere in here, I’ve got a tinderbox—” Rummaging through several pouches, he came up with it at last.

“Strange,” he said, glancing about the corridor as the torch flared to light. “It looks just like it did when I left it—all broken and crumbled after the earthquake. You’d think the Queen would have tidied up a bit by now. I don’t remember it being in such a mess when I was in it in Neraka. I wonder which is the way out.”

He looked back toward the stairs he had come down in his search for Crysania and Raistlin. Vivid memories of the walls cracking and columns falling came to his mind. “That’s no good, that’s for sure,” he muttered, shaking his head. “Ouch, that hurts.” He put his hand to his forehead. “But that was the only way out, I seem to recall.” He sighed, feeling a bit low for a moment. But his kender cheerfulness soon surfaced. “There sure are a lot of cracks in the walls, though. Perhaps something’s opened up.”

Walking slowly, mindful of the pain in his head and his ribs, Tas stepped out into the corridor. He carefully checked out each wall without seeing anything promising until he reached the very end of the hall. Here he discovered a very large crack in the marble that, unlike the others, made an opening deeper than Tas’s torchlight could illuminate.

No one but a kender could have squeezed into that crack, and, even for Tas, it was a tight fit, forcing him to rearrange all his pouches and slide through sideways.

“All I can say is—being dead is certainly a lot of bother!” he muttered, squeezing through the crack and ripping a hole in his blue leggings.

Matters didn’t improve. One of his pouches got hung up on a rock, and he had to stop and tug at it until it was finally freed. Then the crack got so very narrow he wasn’t at all certain he would make it. Taking off all his pouches, he held them and the torch over his head and, after holding his breath and tearing his shirt, he gave a final wiggle and managed to pop through. By this time, however, he was aching, hot, sweaty, and in a bad mood.

“I always wondered why people objected to dying,” he said, wiping his face. “Now I know!”

Pausing to catch his breath and rearrange his pouches, the kender was immensely cheered to see light at the far end of the crack. Flashing his torch around, he discovered that the crack was getting wider, so—after a moment—he went on his way and soon reached the end—the source of the light.

Reaching the opening, Tas peered out, drew a deep breath, and said, “Now this is more what I had in mind!”

The landscape was certainly like nothing he had ever seen before in his life. It was flat and barren, stretching on and on into a vast, empty sky that was lit with a strange glow, as if the sun had just set or a fire burned in the distance. But the whole sky was that strange color, even above him. And yet, for all the brightness, things around him were very dark. The land seemed to have been cut out of black paper and pasted down over the eerie-looking sky. And the sky itself was empty—no sun, no moons, no stars. Nothing.

Tas took a cautious step or two forward. The ground felt no different from any other ground, even though—as he walked on it—he noticed that it took on the same color as the sky. Looking up, he saw that, in the distance, it turned black again. After a few more steps, he stopped to look behind him at the ruins of the great Temple.

“Great Reorx’s beard!” Tas gasped, nearly dropping his torch.

There was nothing behind him! Wherever it was he had come from was gone! The kender turned around in a complete circle. Nothing ahead of him, nothing behind him, nothing in any direction he looked.

Tasslehoff Burrfoot’s heart sank right down to the bottom of his green shoes and stayed there, refusing to be comforted. This was, without a doubt, the most boring place he’d ever seen in his entire existence)

“This can’t be the Afterlife,” the kender said miserably. “This can’t be right) There must be some mistake. Hey, wait a minute! I’m supposed to meet Flint here! Fizban said so and Fizban may have been a bit muddled about other things, but he didn’t sound muddled about that!

“Let’s see—how did that go? There was a big tree, a beautiful tree, and beneath it sat a grumbling, old dwarf, carving wood and—Hey! There’s the tree) Now, where did that come from?”

The kender blinked in astonishment. Right ahead of him, where nothing had been just a moment before, he now saw a large tree.

“Not exactly my idea of a beautiful tree,” Tas muttered, walking toward it, noticing-as he did so—that the ground had developed a curious habit of trying to slide out from under his feet. “But then, Fizban had odd taste and so, come to think of it, did Flint.”

He drew nearer the tree, which was black—like everything else—and twisted and hunched over like a witch he’d seen once. It had no leaves on it. “That thing’s been dead at least a hundred years!”

Tas sniffed. “If Flint thinks I’m going to spend my After-life sitting under a dead tree with him, he’s got another think coming. I—Hey, Flint!” The kender cried out, coming up to the tree and peering around. “Flint? Where are you? I—Oh, there you are,” he said, seeing a short, bearded figure sitting on the ground on the other side of the tree. “Fizban told me I’d find you here. I’ll bet you’re surprised to see me! I—”

The kender came round the tree, then stopped short. “Say,” he cried angrily, “you’re not Flint! Who—Arack!”

Tas staggered backward as the dwarf who had been the Master of the Games in Istar suddenly turned his head and looked at him with such an evil grin on his twisted face that the kender felt his blood run cold—an unusual sensation; he couldn’t remember ever experiencing it before. But before he had time to enjoy it, the dwarf leaped to his feet and, with a vicious snarl, rushed at the kender.

With a startled yelp, Tas swung his torch to keep Arack back, while with his other hand he fumbled for the small knife he wore in his belt. But, just as he pulled his knife out, Arack vanished.

The tree vanished. Once again, Tas found himself standing smack in the center of nothing beneath that fire-lit sky.

“All right now,” Tas said, a small quiver creeping into his voice, though he tried his best to hide it, “I don’t think this is at all fun. It’s miserable and horrible and, while Fizban didn’t exactly promise the Afterlife would be one endless party, I’m certain he didn’t have anything like this in mind!” The kender slowly turned around, keeping his knife drawn and his torch held out in front of him.

“I know I haven’t been very religious,” Tas added with a snuffle, looking out into the bleak landscape and trying to keep his feet on the weird ground, “but I thought I led a pretty good life. And I did defeat the Queen of Darkness. Of course, I had some help,” he added, thinking that this might be a good time for honesty, “and I am a personal friend of Paladine and—”

“In the name of Her Dark Majesty,” said a soft voice behind him, “what are you doing here?”

Tasslehoff sprang three feet into the air in alarm—a sure sign that the kender was completely unnerved—and whirled around. There—where there hadn’t been anyone standing a moment before—stood a figure that reminded him very much of the cleric of Paladine, Elistan, only this figure wore black clerical robes instead of white and around its neck—instead of the medallion of Paladine—hung the medallion of the Five Headed Dragon.

“Uh, pardon me, sir,” stammered Tas, “but I’m not at all sure what I’m doing here. I’m not at all sure where here is, to be perfectly truthful, and—oh, by the way, my name’s Tasslehoff Burrfoot.” He extended his small hand politely. “What’s yours?”

But the figure, ignoring the kender’s hand, threw back its black cowl and took a step nearer. Tas was considerably startled to see long, iron-gray hair flow out from beneath the cowl, hair so long, in fact, that it would easily have touched the ground if it had not floated around the figure in a weird sort of way, as did the long, gray beard that suddenly seemed to sprout out of the skull-like face.

“S—say, that’s quite... remarkable,” Tas stuttered, his mouth dropping open. “How did you do that? And, I don’t suppose you could tell me, but where did you say I was? You s-see—” The figure took another step nearer and, while Tas certainly wasn’t afraid of him, or it, or whatever it was, the kender found that he didn’t want it or him coming any closer for some reason. “I—I’m dead,”

Tas continued, trying to back up only to find that, for some unaccountable reason, something was blocking him, “and—by the way”—indignation got the better of fear—“are you in charge around here? Because I don’t think this death business is being handled at all well! I hurt!” Tas said, glaring at the figure accusingly. “My head hurts and my ribs. And then I had to walk all this way, coming up out of the basement of the Temple—”

“The basement of the Temple!” The figure stopped now, only inches from Tasslehoff. Its gray hair floated as if stirred by a hot wind. Its eyes, Tas could see now, were the same red color as the sky, its face gray as ash.

“Yes!” Tas gulped. Besides everything else, the figure had a most horrible smell. “I—I was following Lady Crysania and she was following Raistlin and—”

“Raistlin!” The figure spoke the name in a voice that made Tas’s hair literally stand up on his head. “Come with me!”

The figure’s hand—a most peculiar-looking hand—closed over Tasslehoff’s wrist. “Ow!” squeaked Tas, as pain shot through his arm. “You’re hurting—”

But the figure paid no attention. Closing its eyes, as though lost in deep concentration, it gripped the kender tightly, and the ground around Tas suddenly began to shift and heave. The kender gasped in wonder as the landscape itself took on a rapid, fluid motion.

We’re not moving, Tas realized in awe, the ground is!

“Uh,” said Tas in a small voice, “where did you say I was?”

“You are in the Abyss,” said the figure in a sepulchral tone.

“Oh, dear,” Tas said sorrowfully, “I didn’t think I was that bad.” A tear trickled down his nose. “So this is the Abyss, I hope you don’t mind me telling you that I’m frightfully disappointed in it. I always supposed the Abyss would be a fascinating place. But so far it isn’t. Not in the least. It—it’s awful boring and... ugly... and, I really don’t mean to be rude, but there is a most peculiar smell.”

Sniffling, he wiped his nose on his sleeve, too unhappy even to reach for a pocket handkerchief.

“Where did you say we were going?”

“You asked to see the person in charge,” the figure said, and its skeletal hand closed over the medallion it wore around its neck.

The landscape changed. It was every city Tas had ever been in, it seemed, and yet none. It was familiar, yet he didn’t recognize a thing. It was black, flat, and lifeless, yet teeming with life. He couldn’t see or hear anything, yet all around him was sound and motion.

Tasslehoff stared at the figure beside him, at the shifting planes beyond and above and below him, and the kender was stricken dumb. For only the second time in his life (the first had been when he found Fizban alive when the old man was supposed to have been decently dead), Tas couldn’t speak a word.

If every kender on the face of Krynn had been asked to name Places I’d Most Like To Visit; the plane of existence where the Queen of Darkness dwelled would have come in at least third on many lists.

But now, here was Tasslehoff Burrfoot, standing in the waiting room of the great and terrible Queen, standing in one of the most interesting places known to man or kender, and he had never felt unhappier in his life.

First, the room the gray-haired, black-robed cleric told him to stay in was completely empty. There weren’t any tables with interesting little objects on them, there weren’t any chairs (which was why he was standing). There weren’t even any walls! In fact, the only way he knew he was in a room at all was that when the cleric told him to “stay in the waiting room,” Tas suddenly felt he was in a room.

But, as far as he could see, he was standing in the middle of nothing. He wasn’t even certain, at this point, which way was up or which way was down. Both looked alike—an eerie glowing, flame-like color.

He tried to comfort himself by telling himself over and over that he was going to meet the Dark Queen. He recalled stories Tanis told about meeting the Queen in the Temple at Neraka.

“I was surrounded by a great darkness,” Tanis had said, and, even though it was months after the experience, his voice still trembled, “but it seemed more a darkness of my own mind than any actual physical presence. I couldn’t breathe. Then the darkness lifted, and she spoke to me, though she said no word. I heard her in my mind. And I saw her in all her forms—the Five Headed Dragon, the Dark Warrior, the Dark Temptress—for she was not completely in the world yet. She had not yet gained control.”

Tas remembered Tanis shaking his head. “Still, her majesty and might were very great. She is, after all, a goddess—one of the creators of the world. Her dark eyes stared into my soul, and I couldn’t help myself—I sank to my knees and worshipped her...”

And now he, Tasslehoff Burrfoot, was going to meet the Queen as she was in her own plane of existence—strong and powerful. “Perhaps she’ll appear as the Five-Headed Dragon,” Tas said to cheer himself up. But even that wonderful prospect didn’t help, though he had never seen a five-headed anything before, much less a dragon. It was as if all the spirit of adventure and curiosity were oozing out of the kender like blood dripping from a wound.

“I’ll sing a bit,” he said to himself, just to hear the sound of his own voice. “That generally raises my spirits.”

He began to hum the first song that came into his head—a Hymn to the Dawn that Goldmoon had taught him.

Even the night must fail For light sleeps in the eyes And dark becomes dark on dark Until the darkness dies.

Soon the eye resolves Complexities of night Into stillness, where the heart Falls into fabled light.

Tas was just starting in on the second verse when he became aware, to his horror, that his song was echoing back to him only the words were now twisted and terrible...

Even the night must fail When light sleeps in the eyes, When dark becomes dark on dark And into darkness dies.

Soon the eye dissolves, Perplexed by the teasing night, Into a stillness of the heart, A fable of fallen light.

“Stop it,” cried Tas frantically into the eerie, burning silence that resounded with his song. “I didn’t mean to say that! I—”

With startling suddenness, the black-robed cleric materialized in front of Tasslehoff, seeming to coalesce out of the bleak surroundings.

“Her Dark Majesty will see you now,” the cleric said, and, before Tasslehoff could blink, he found himself in another place.

He knew it was another place, not because he had moved a step or even because this place was different from the last place, but that he felt he was someplace else. There was still the same weird glow, the same emptiness, except now he had the impression he wasn’t alone.

The moment he realized this, he saw a black, smooth wooden chair appear—its back to him. Seated in it was a figure dressed in black, a hood pulled up over its head.

Thinking perhaps some mistake had been made and that the cleric had taken him to the wrong place, Tasslehoff—gripping his pouches nervously in his hand—walked cautiously around the chair to see the figure’s face. Or perhaps the chair turned to around to see his face. The kender wasn’t certain.

But, as the chair moved, the figure’s face came into view.

Tasslehoff knew no mistake had been made.

It was not a Five-Headed Dragon he saw. It was not a huge warrior in black, burning armor. It was not even the Dark Temptress, who so haunted Raistlin’s dreams. It was a woman dressed all in black, a tight-fitting hood pulled up over her hair, framing her face in a black oval. Her skin was white and smooth and ageless, her eyes large and dark. Her arms, encased in tight black cloth, rested on the arms of her chair, her white hands curved calmly around the ends of the armrests.

The expression on her face was not horrifying, nor terrifying, nor threatening, nor awe-inspiring; it was, in fact, not even an expression at all. Yet Tas was aware that she was scrutinizing him intensely, delving into his soul, studying parts of him that he wasn’t even aware existed.

“I—I’m Tasslehoff Burrfoot, M—majesty,” said the kender, reflexively stretching out his small hand.

Too late, he realized his offense and started to withdraw his hand and bow, but then he felt the touch of five fingers in his palm. It was a brief touch, but Tas might have grabbed a handful of nettles. Five stinging branches of pain shot through his arm and bored into his heart, making him gasp.

But, as swiftly as they touched him, they were gone. He found himself standing very close to the lovely, pale woman, and so mild was the expression in her eyes that Tas might well have doubted she was the cause of the pain, except that looking down at his palm—he saw a mark there, like a five pointed star.

Tell me your story.

Tas started. The woman’s lips had not moved, but he heard her speak. He realized, also, in sudden fright, that she probably knew more of his story than he did.

Sweating, clutching his pouches nervously, Tasslehoff Burrfoot made history that day—at least as far as kender storytelling was concerned. He told the entire story of his trip to Istar in under five seconds. And every word was true.

“Par-Salian accidentally sent me back in time with my friend Caramon. We were going to kill Fistandantilus only we discovered it was Raistlin so we didn’t. I was going to stop the Cataclysm with a magical device, but Raistlin made me break it. I followed a cleric named Lady Crysania down to a laboratory beneath the Temple of Istar to find Raistlin and make him fix the device. The roof caved in and knocked me out. When I woke up, they had all left me and the Cataclysm struck and now I’m dead and I’ve been sent to the Abyss.”

Tasslehoff drew a deep, quivering breath and mopped his face with the end of his long topknot of hair. Then, realizing his last comment had been less than complimentary, he hastened to add, “Not that I’m complaining, Your Majesty. I’m certain whoever did this must have had quite a good reason. After all, I did break a dragon orb, and I seem to recall once someone said I took something that didn’t belong to me, and... and I wasn’t as respectful of Flint as I should have been, I guess, and once, for a joke, I hid Caramon’s clothes while he was taking a bath and he had to walk into Solace stark naked. But”—Tas could not help a snuffle—“I always helped Fizban find his hat!”

You are not dead, said the voice, nor have you been sent here. You are not, in fact, supposed to be here at all.

At this startling revelation, Tasslehoff looked up directly into the Queen’s dark and shadowy eyes.

“I’m not?” he squeaked, feeling his voice go all queer. “Not dead?” Involuntarily, he put his hand to his head—which still ached. “So that explains it! I just thought someone had botched things up—”

Kender are not allowed here, continued the voice.

“That doesn’t surprise me,” Tas said sadly, feeling much more himself since he wasn’t dead. “There are quite a number of places on Krynn kender aren’t allowed.”

The voice might not have even heard him. When you entered the laboratory of Fistandantilus, you were protected by the magical enchantment he had laid on the place. The rest of Istar was plunged far below the ground at the time the Cataclysm struck. But I was able to save the Temple of the Kingpriest. When I am ready, it will return to the world, as will I, myself.”

“But you won’t win,” said Tas before he thought. “I—I k-know,” he stuttered as the dark-eyed gaze shot right through him. “I was th-there.”

No, you were not there, for that has not happened yet. You see, kender, by disrupting Par-Salian’s spell, you have made it possible to alter time. Fistandantilus—or Raistlin, as you know him—told you this. That was why he sent you to your death or so he supposed. He did not want time altered. The Cataclysm was necessary to him so that he could bring this cleric of Paladine forward to a time when he will have the only true cleric in the land.

It seemed to Tasslehoff that he saw, for the first time, a flicker of dark amusement in the woman’s shadowy eyes, and he shivered without understanding why.

How soon you will come to regret that decision, Fistandantilus, my ambitious friend. But it is too late. Poor, puny mortal. You have made a mistake—a costly mistake. You are locked in your own time loop. You rush forward to your own doom.

“I don’t understand,” cried Tas.

Yes, you do, said the voice calmly. Your coming has shown me the future. You have given me the chance to change it. And, by destroying you, Fistandantilus has destroyed his only chance of breaking free. His body will perish again, as he perished long ago. Only this time, when his soul seeks another body to house it, I will stop him. Thus, the young mage, Raistlin, in the future, will take the Test in the Tower of High Sorcery, and he will die there. He will not live to thwart my plans. One by one, the others will die. For without Raistlin’s help, Goldmoon will not find the blue crystal staff. Thus—the beginning of the end for the world.

“No!” Tas whimpered, horror-stricken. “This—this can’t be! I—I didn’t mean to do this. I—I just wanted to—to go with Caramon on—on this adventure! He—he couldn’t have made it alone. He needed me!”

The kender stared around frantically, seeking some escape. But, though there seemed everywhere to run, there was nowhere to hide. Dropping to his knees before the black clothed woman, Tas stared up at her. “What have I done? What have I done?” he cried frantically.

You have done such that even Paladine might be tempted to turn his back upon you, kender.

“What will you do to me?” Tas sobbed wretchedly. “Where will I go?” He lifted a tear-streaked face. “I don’t suppose you c-could send me back to Caramon? Or back to my own time?”

Your time no longer exists. As for sending you to Caramon, that is quite impossible, as you surely must understand. No, you will remain here, with me, so I may insure that nothing goes wrong.

“Here?” Tas gasped. “How long?”

The woman began to fade before his eyes, shimmering and finally vanishing into the nothingness around him. Not long, I should imagine, kender. Not long at all. Or perhaps always...

“What do you—what does she mean?” Tas turned to face the gray-haired cleric, who had sprung up to fill the void left by Her Dark Majesty. “Not long or always?”

“Though not dead, you are—even now—dying. Your lifeforce is ebbing from you, as it must for any of the living who mistakenly venture down here and who have not the power to fight the evil that devours them from within. When you are dead, the gods will determine your fate.”

“I see,” said Tas, choking back a lump in his throat. He hung his head. “I deserve it, I suppose. Oh, Tanis, I’m sorry! I truly didn’t mean to do it...”

The cleric gripped his arm painfully. The surroundings changed, the ground shifted away beneath his feet. But Tasslehoff never noticed. His eyes filling with tears, he gave himself up to dark despair and hoped death would come quickly.

8

“Here you are,” said the dark cleric.

“Where?” Tas asked listlessly, more out of force of habit than because he cared.

The cleric paused, then shrugged. “I suppose if there were a prison in the Abyss, you would be in it now.”

Tas looked around. As usual, there was nothing there simply a vast barren stretch of eerie emptiness. There were no walls, no cells, no barred windows, no doors, no locks, no jailer. And he knew, with deep certainty, that—this time there was no escape.

“Am I supposed to just stand here until I drop?” Tas asked in a small voice. “I mean, couldn’t I at least have a bed and a—a stool—oh!”

As he spoke, a bed materialized before his eyes, as did a three-legged, wooden stool. But even these familiar objects appeared so horrifying, sitting in the middle of nothing, that Tas could not bear to look at them long.

“Th—thank you,” he stammered, walking over to sit down upon the stool with a sigh. “What about food and water?”

He waited a moment, to see if these, too, would appear. But they didn’t. The cleric shook his head, his gray hair forming a swirling cloud around him.

“No, the needs of your mortal body will be cared for while you are here. You will feel no hunger or thirst. I have even healed your wounds.”

Tas suddenly noticed that his ribs had stopped hurting and the pain in his head was gone. The iron collar had vanished from around his neck.

“There is no need for your thanks,” the cleric continued, seeing Tas open his mouth. “We do this so that you will not interrupt us in our work. And, so, farewell—”

The dark cleric raised his hands, obviously preparing to depart.

“Wait!” Tas cried, leaping up from his stool and clutching at the dark, flowing robes. “Wont I see you again? Don’t leave me alone!” But he might as well have tried to grab smoke. The flowing robes slipped through his fingers, and the dark cleric disappeared.

“When you are dead, we will return your body to lands above and see that your soul speeds on its way... or stays here, as you may be judged. Until that time, we have no more need of contact with you.”

“I’m alone!” Tas said, glancing around his bleak surroundings in despair. “Truly alone... alone until I die... Which won’t be long,” he added sadly. Walking over, he sat down upon his stool. “I might as well die as fast as possible and get it over with. At least I’ll probably go someplace different—I hope.” He looked up into the empty vastness.

“Fizban,” Tas said softly, “you probably can’t hear me from clear down here. And I don’t suppose there’s anything you could do for me anyway, but I did want to tell you, before I die, that I didn’t mean to cause all this trouble, disrupting Par-Salian’s spell and going back in time when I wasn’t supposed to go and all that.”

Heaving a sigh, Tas pressed his small hands together, his lower lip quivering. “Maybe that doesn’t count for much... and I suppose that—if I must be honest—part of me went along with Caramon just because”—he swallowed the tears that were beginning to trickle down his nose—“just because it sounded like so much fun! But, truly, part of me went with him because he had no business going back into the past alone! He was fuddled because of the dwarf spirits, you see. And I promised Tika I’d look after him. Oh, Fizban! If there were just some way out of this mess, I’d try my best to straighten everything out. Honestly—”

“Hullothere.”

“What?” Tas nearly fell off his stool. Whirling around, half thinking he might see Fizban, he saw, instead, only a short figure—shorter even than himself— dressed in brown britches, a gray tunic, and a brown leather apron.

“Isaidhullothere,” repeated the voice, rather irritably.

“Oh, he—hello,” Tas stammered, staring at the figure. It certainly didn’t look like a dark cleric, at least Tas had never heard of any that wore brown leather aprons. But, he supposed, there could always be exceptions especially considering the fact that brown leather aprons are such useful things. Still, this person bore a strong resemblance to someone he knew, if only he could remember...

“Gnosh!” Tas exclaimed suddenly, snapping his fingers. “You’re a gnome! Uh, pardon me for asking such a personal question”—the kender flushed in embarrassment— “but are you—uh—dead?”

“Areyou?” the gnome asked, eyeing the kender suspiciously.

“No,” said Tas, rather indignantly.

“WellI’mnoteither!” snapped the gnome.

“Uh, could you slow down a bit?” Tas suggested. “I know your people talk rapidly, but it makes it hard for us to understand, sometimes—”

“I said I’m not either!” the gnome shouted loudly.

“Thank you,” Tas said politely. “And I’m not hard of hearing. You can talk in a normal tone of voice—er, talk slowly in a normal tone of voice,” the kender hurried to add, seeing the gnome draw in a breath.

“What’s... your... name?” the gnome asked, speaking at a snail’s pace.

“Tasslehoff... Burrfoot.” The kender extended a small hand, which the gnome took and shook heartily. “What’s... yours? I mean—what’s yours? Oh, no! I didn’t mean—”

But it was too late. The gnome was off.

“Gnimshmarigongalesefrahootsputhturandotsamanella—”

“The short form!” Tas cried when the gnome stopped for breath.

“Oh.” The gnome appeared downcast. “Gnimsh.”

“Thank you. Nice meeting you—uh—Gnimsh,” Tas said, sighing in relief. He had completely forgotten that every gnome’s name provides the unwary listener with a complete account of the gnome’s family’s life history, beginning with his earliest known (or imagined) ancestor.

“Nice meeting you, Burrfoot,” the gnome said, and they shook hands again.

“Will you be seated?” Tas said, sitting down on the bed and gesturing politely toward the stool.

But Gnimsh gave the stool a scathing glance and sat down in a chair that materialized right beneath him. Tas gasped at the sight. It was truly a remarkable chair—it had a footrest that went up and down and rockers on the bottom that let the chair rock back and forth and it even tilted completely backward, letting the person sitting in it lie down if so inclined.

Unfortunately, as Gnimsh sat down, the chair tilted too far backward, flipping the gnome out on his head. Grumbling, he climbed back in it and pressed a lever. This time, the footrest flew up, striking him in the nose. At the same time, the back came forward and, before long, Tas had to help rescue Gnimsh from the chair, which appeared to be eating him.

“Drat,” said the gnome and, with a wave of his hand, he sent the chair back to wherever it had come from, and sat down, disconsolately, on Tasslehoff’s stool.

Having visited gnomes and seen their inventions before, Tasslehoff mumbled what was proper.

“Quite interesting... truly an advanced design in chairs...

“No, it isn’t,” Gnimsh snapped, much to Tas’s amazement. “It’s a rotten design. Belonged to my wife’s first cousin. I should have known better than to think of it. But”—he sighed “sometimes I get homesick.”

“I know,” Tas said, swallowing a sudden lump in his throat. “If—if you don’t mind my asking, what are you doing here, if you’re—uh—not dead?”

“Will you tell me what you’re doing here?” Gnimsh countered.

“Of course,” said Tas, then he had a sudden thought. Glancing around warily, he leaned forward. “No one minds, do they?” he asked in a whisper. “That we’re talking, I mean? Maybe we’re not supposed to—”

“Oh, they don’t care,” Gnimsh said scornfully. “As long as we leave them alone, we’re free to go around anywhere. Of course,” he added, “anywhere looks about the same as here, so there’s not much point.”

“I see,” Tas said with interest. “How do you travel?”

“With your mind. Haven’t you figured that out yet? No, probably not.” The gnome snorted. “Kender were never noted for their brains.”

“Gnomes and kender are related,” Tas pointed out in miffed tones.

“So I’ve heard,” Gnimsh replied skeptically, obviously not believing any of it.

Tasslehoff decided, in the interests of maintaining peace, to change the subject. “So, if I want to go somewhere, I just think of that place and I’m there?”

“Within limits, of course,” Gnimsh said. “You can’t, for example, enter any of the holy precincts where the dark clerics go—”

“Oh.” Tas sighed, that having been right up at the top of his list of tourist attractions. Then he cheered up again. “You made that chair come out of nothing and, come to think of it, I made this bed and this stool. If I think of something, will it just appear?”

“Try it,” Gnimsh suggested.

Tas thought of something.

Gnimsh snorted as a hatrack appeared at the end of the bed. “Now that’s handy.”

“I was just practicing,” Tas said in hurt tones.

“You better watch it,” the gnome said, seeing Tas’s face light up. “Sometimes things appear, but not quite the way you expected.”

“Yeah.” Tas suddenly remembered the tree and the dwarf. He shivered. “I guess you’re right. Well, at least we have each other. Someone to talk to. You can’t imagine how boring it was.” The kender settled back on the bed, first imagining—with caution—a pillow. “Well, go ahead. Tell me your story.”

“You start.” Gnimsh glanced at Tas out of the corner of his eye.

“No, you’re my guest.”

“I insist.”

“I insist.”

“You. After all, I’ve been here longer.”

“How do you know?”

“I just do... Go on.”

“But—” Tas suddenly saw this was getting nowhere, and though they apparently had all eternity, he didn’t plan on spending it arguing with a gnome. Besides, there was no real reason why he shouldn’t tell his story. He enjoyed telling stories, anyway. So, leaning back comfortably, he told his tale. Gnimsh listened with interest, though he did rather irritate Tas by constantly interrupting and telling him to “get on with it,” just at the most exciting parts.

Finally, Tas came to his conclusion. “And so here I am. Now yours,” he said, glad to pause for breath.

“Well,” Gnimsh said hesitantly, looking around darkly as though afraid someone might be listening, “it all began years and years ago with my family’s Life Quest. You do know”—he glared at Tas—“what a Life Quest is?”

“Sure,” said Tas glibly. “My friend Gnosh had a Life Quest. Only his was dragon orbs. Each gnome has assigned to him a particular project that he must complete successfully or never get into the Afterlife.” Tas had a sudden thought. “That’s not why you’re here, is it?”

“No.” The gnome shook his wispy-haired head. “My family’s Life Quest was developing an invention that could take us from one dimensional plane of existence to another. And”—Gnimsh heaved a sigh— “mine worked.”

“It worked?” Tas said, sitting up in astonishment.

“Perfectly,” Gnimsh answered with increasing despondency. Tasslehoff was stunned. He’d never before heard of such a thing—a gnomish invention that worked... and perfectly, too! Gnimsh glanced at him. “Oh, I know what you’re thinking,” he said. “I’m a failure. You don’t know the half of it. You see all of my inventions work. Every one.”

Gnimsh put his head in his hands.

“How—how does that make you a Failure?” Tas asked, confused.

Gnimsh raised his head, staring at him. “Well, what good is inventing something if it works? Where’s the challenge? The need for creativity? For forward thinking? What would become of progress? You know,” he said with deepening gloom, “that if I hadn’t come here, they were getting ready to exile me. They said I was a distinct threat to society. I set scientific exploration back a hundred years.”

Gnimsh’s head drooped. “That’s why I don’t mind being here. Like you, I deserve it. It’s where I’m likely to wind up anyway.”

“Where is your device?” Tas asked in sudden excitement. “Oh, they took it away, of course,” Gnimsh answered, waving his hand.

“Well”—the kender thought—“can’t you imagine one? You imagined up that chair?”

“And you saw what it did!” Gnimsh replied. “Likely I’d end up with my father’s invention. It took him to another plane of existence, all right. The Committee on Exploding Devices is studying it now, in fact, or at least they were when I got stuck here. What are you trying to do? Find a way out of the Abyss?”

“I have to,” Tas said resolutely. “The Queen of Darkness will win the war, otherwise, and it will all be my fault. Plus, I’ve got some friends who are in terrible danger. Well, one of them isn’t exactly a friend, but he is an interesting person and, while he did try to kill me by making me break the magical device, I’m certain it was nothing personal. He had a good reason... .”

Tas stopped.

“That’s it!” he said, springing up off the bed. “That’s it!” he cried in such excitement that a whole forest of hatracks appeared around the bed, much to the gnome’s alarm.

Gnimsh slid off his stool, eyeing Tas warily. “What’s it?” he demanded, bumping into a hatrack.

“Look!” Tas said, fumbling with his pouches. He opened one, then another. “Here it is!” he said, holding a pouch open to show Gnimsh. But, just as the gnome was peering into it, Tas suddenly slammed it shut. “Wait!”

“What?” Gnimsh asked, startled.

“Are they watching?” Tas asked breathlessly. “Will they know?”

“Know what?”

“Just—will they know?”

“No, I don’t suppose so,” Gnimsh answered hesitantly. “I can’t say for sure, since I don’t know what it is they’re not supposed to know. But I do know that they’re all pretty busy, right now, from what I can tell. Waking up evil dragons and that sort of thing. Takes a lot of work.”

“Good,” Tas said grimly, sitting on the bed. “Now, look at this.” He opened his pouch and dumped out the contents. “What does that remind you of?”

“The year my mother invented the device designed to wash dishes,” the gnome said. “The kitchen was knee—deep in broken crockery. We had to—”

“No!” Tas snapped irritably. “Look, hold this piece next to this one and—”

“My dimensional traveling device!” Gnimsh gasped. “You’re right! It did look something like this. Mine didn’t have all these gewgaw jewels, but... No, look. You’ve got it all wrong. I think that goes here, not there. Yes. See? And then this chain hooks on here and wraps around like so. No, that’s not quite the way. It must go... Wait, I see. This has to fit in there first.” Sitting down on the bed, Gnimsh picked up one of the jewels and stuck it into place. “Now, I need another one of these red gizmos.” He began sorting through the jewels. “What did you do to this thing, anyway?” he muttered. “Put it into a meat grinder?”

But the gnome, absorbed in his task, completely ignored Tas’s answer. The kender, meanwhile, took advantage of the opportunity to tell his story again. Perching on the stool, Tas talked blissfully and without interruption while, totally forgetting the kender’s existence, Gnimsh began to arrange the myriad jewels and little gold and silver things and chains, stacking them into neat piles.

All the while Tas was talking, though, he was watching Gnimsh, hope filling his heart. Of course, he thought with a pang, he had prayed to Fizban, and there was every possibility that, if Gnimsh got this device working, it might whisk them onto a moon or t urn them both into chickens or something. But, Tas decided, he’d just have to take that chance. After all, he’d promised he’d try to straighten things out, and though finding a failed gnome wasn’t quite what he’d had in mind, it was better than sitting around, waiting to die.

Gnimsh, meanwhile, had imagined up a piece of slate and a bit of chalk and was sketching diagrams, muttering, “Slide jewel A into golden gizmo B—”

9

“A wretched place, my brother,” Raistlin remarked softly as he slowly and stiffly dismounted from his horse.

“We’ve stayed in worse,” Caramon commented, helping Lady Crysania from her mount. “It’s warm and dry inside, which makes it one hundred times better than out here. Besides,” he added gruffly, glancing at his brother, who had collapsed against the side of his horse, coughing and shivering, “we none of us can ride farther without rest. I’ll see to the horses. You two go on in.”

Crysania, huddled in her sodden cloak, stood in the foot deep mud and stared dully at the inn. It was, as Raistlin said, a wretched place.

What the name might have been, no one knew, for no sign hung above the door. The only thing, in fact, that marked it as an inn at all was a crudely lettered slate stuck in the broken front window that read, “WayFarrers WelCum”. The stone building itself was old and sturdily constructed. But the roof was falling in, though attempts had been made, here and there, to patch it with thatch. One window was broken. An old felt hat covered it, supposedly to keep out the rain. The yard was nothing but mud and a few bedraggled weeds.

Raistlin had gone ahead. Now he stood in the open doorway, looking back at Crysania. Light glowed from inside, and the smell of wood smoke promised a fire. As Raistlin’s face hardened into an expression of impatience, a gust of wind blew back the hood of Crysania’s cloak, driving the slashing rain into her face. With a sigh, she slogged through the mud to reach the front door.

“Welcome, master. Welcome, missus.”

Crysania started at the voice that came from beside her—she had not seen anyone when she entered. Turning, she saw an ill-favored man huddling in the shadows behind the door, just as it slammed shut.

“A raw day, master,” the man said, rubbing his hands together in a servile manner. That, a grease-stained apron, and a torn rag thrown over his arm marked him as the innkeeper. Glancing around the filthy, shabby inn, Crysania thought it appropriate enough. The man drew nearer to them, still rubbing his hands, until he was so close to Crysania that she could smell the foul odor of his beery breath. Covering her face with her cloak, she drew away from him. He seemed to grin at this, a drunken grin that might have appeared foolish had it not been for the cunning expression in his squinty eyes.

Looking at him, Crysania felt for a moment that she would almost prefer to go back out into the storm. But Raistlin, with only a sharp, penetrating glance at the innkeeper, said coldly, “A table near the fire.”

“Aye, master, aye. A table near the fire, aye. Good on such a wicked day as this be. Come, master, missus, this way.” Bobbing and bowing in a fawning manner that was, once again, belied by the look in his eyes, the man shuffled sideways across the floor, never taking his gaze from them, herding them toward a dirty table.

“A wizard be ye, master?” asked the innkeeper, reaching out a hand to touch Raistlin’s black robes but withdrawing it immediately at the mage’s piercing glance. “One of the Black ’uns, too. It’s been a long while since we’ve seen the like, that it has,” he continued. Raistlin did not answer. Overcome by another fit of coughing, he leaned heavily upon his staff. Crysania helped him to a chair near the fire. Sinking down into it, he huddled gratefully toward the warmth.

“Hot water,” ordered Crysania, untying her wet cloak.

“What be the matter with ’im?” the innkeeper asked suspiciously, drawing back. “Not the burning fever, is it? Cause if it is, ye can go back out—”

“No,” Crysania snapped, throwing off her cloak. “His illness is his own, of no harm to others.” Leaning down near the mage, she glanced back up at the innkeeper. “I asked for hot water,” she said peremptorily.

“Aye.” His lip curled. He no longer rubbed his hands but shoved them beneath the greasy apron before he shuffled off.

Her disgust lost in her concern for Raistlin, Crysania forgot the innkeeper as she tried to make the mage more comfortable. She unfastened his traveling cloak and helped him remove it, then spread it to dry before the fire. Searching the inn’s common room, she discovered several shabby chair cushions and, trying to ignore the dirt that covered them, brought them back to arrange around Raistlin so that he could lean back and breathe more easily.

Kneeling beside him to help remove his wet boots, she felt a hand touch her hair.

“Thank you,” Raistlin whispered, as she looked up.

Crysania flushed with pleasure. His brown eyes seemed warmer than the fire, and his hand brushed back the wet hair from her face with a gentle touch. She could not speak or move but remained, kneeling at his side, held fast by his gaze.

“Be you his woman?”

The innkeepers harsh voice, coming from behind her, made Crysania start. She had neither seen him approach nor heard his shuffling step. Rising to her feet, unable to look at Raistlin, she turned abruptly to face the fire, saying nothing.

“She is a lady of one of the royal houses of Palanthas,” said a deep voice from the doorway. “And I’ll thank you to speak of her with respect, innkeep.”

“Aye, master, aye,” muttered the innkeeper, seemingly daunted by Caramon’s massive girth as the big man came inside, bringing in a gust of wind and rain with him. “I’m sure I intended no disrespect and I hopes none was taken.”

Crysania did not answer. Half-turning, she said in a muffled voice, “Here, bring that water to the table.”

As Caramon shut the door and came over to join them, Raistlin drew forth the pouch that contained the herbal concoction for his potion. Tossing it onto the table, he directed Crysania, with a gesture, to prepare his drink. Then he sank back among the cushions, his breath wheezing, gazing into the flames. Conscious of Caramon’s troubled gaze upon her, Crysania kept her gaze on the potion she was preparing.

“The horses are fed and watered. We’ve ridden them easy enough, so they’ll be able to go on after an hour’s rest. I want to reach Solanthus before nightfall,” Caramon said after a moment’s uncomfortable silence. He spread his cloak before the fire. The steam rose from it in clouds. “Have you ordered food?” he asked Crysania abruptly.

“No, just the—the hot water,” she murmured, handing Raistlin his drink.

“Innkeep, wine for the lady and the mage, water for me, and whatever you have to eat,” Caramon said, sitting down near the fire on the opposite side of the table from his brother. After weeks of traveling this barren land toward the Plains of Dergoth, they had all learned that one ate what was on hand at these roadside inns, if—indeed— there was anything at all.

“This is only the beginning of the fall storms,” Caramon said quietly to his brother as the innkeeper slouched out of the room again. “They will get worse the farther south we travel. Are you resolved on this course of action? It could be the death of you.”

“What do you mean by that?” Raistlin’s voice cracked. Starting up, he sloshed some of the hot potion from the cup.

“Nothing, Raistlin,” Caramon said, taken aback by his brother’s piercing stare. “Just—just... your cough. It’s always worse in the damp.”

Staring sharply at his twin, and seeing that, apparently, Caramon meant no more than he had said, Raistlin leaned back into the cushions once more. “Yes, I am resolved upon this course of action. So should you be too, my brother. For it is the only way you will ever see your precious home again.”

“A lot of good it will do me if you die on the way,” Caramon growled.

Crysania looked at Caramon in shock, but Raistlin only smiled bitterly. “Your concern touches me, brother. But do not fear for my health. My strength will be sufficient to get there and cast the final spell, if I do not tax myself overly in the meantime’”

“It seems you have someone who will take care you do not do that,” Caramon replied gravely, his gaze on Crysania.

She flushed again and would have made some remark, but the innkeeper returned. Standing beside them, a kettle of some steaming substance in one hand and a cracked pitcher in the other, he regarded them warily.

“Pardon my asking, masters,” he whined, “but I’ll see the color of yer money first. Times being what they are—”

“Here,” said Caramon, taking a coin from his purse and tossing it upon the table. “Will that suit?”

“Aye, masters, aye.” The innkeeper’s eyes shone nearly as brightly as the silver piece. Setting down the kettle and pitcher, slopping stew onto the table, he grabbed the coin greedily, watching the mage all the while as though fearful he might make it disappear.

Thrusting the coin into his pocket, the innkeeper shuffled behind the slovenly bar and returned with three bowls, three horn spoons, and three mugs. These he also slapped down on the table, then stood back, his hands once more rubbing together. Crysania picked up the bowls and, staring at them in disgust, immediately began to wash them in the remaining hot water.

“Will there be anything else, masters, missus?” the innkeeper asked in such fawning tones that Caramon grimaced.

“Do you have bread and cheese?”

“Yes, master.”

“Wrap some up then, in a basket.”

“Ye’ll be... traveling on, will ye?” the innkeeper asked.

Placing the bowls back upon the table, Crysania looked up, aware of a subtle change in the man’s voice. She glanced at Caramon to see if he noticed, but the big man was stirring the stew, sniffing at it hungrily. Raistlin, seeming not to have heard, stared fixedly into the fire, his hands clasping the empty mug limply.

“We’re certainly not spending the night here,” Caramon said, ladling stew into the bowls.

“Ye’ll find no better lodgings in—Where did you say you was headed?” the innkeeper asked.

“It’s no concern of yours,” Crysania replied coldly. Taking a full bowl of stew, she brought it to Raistlin. But the mage, after one look at the thick, grease-covered substance, waved it away.

Hungry as she was, Crysania could only choke down a few mouthfuls of the mixture. Shoving the bowl aside, she wrapped herself in her still-damp cloak and curled up in her chair, closing her eyes and trying not to think that in an hour she’d be back on her horse, riding through the bleak, storm-ridden land once again.

Raistlin had already fallen asleep. The only sounds made were by Caramon, eating the stew with the appetite of an old campaigner, and by the innkeeper, returning to the kitchen to fix the basket as ordered.

Within an hour, Caramon brought the horses round from the stable—three riding horses and one pack horse, heavily laden, its burden covered with a blanket and secured with strong ropes.

Helping his brother and Lady Crysania to mount, and seeing them both settled wearily into their saddles, Caramon mounted his own gigantic steed. The innkeeper stood out in the rain, bareheaded, holding the basket. He handed it up to Caramon, grinning and bobb ing as the rain soaked through his clothes.

With curt thanks, and tossing another coin that landed in the mud at the innkeeper’s feet, Caramon grabbed the reins of the pack horse and started off. Crysania and Raistlin followed, heavily muffled in their cloaks against the downpour.

The innkeeper, apparently oblivious to the rain, picked up the coin and stood watching them ride away. Two figures emerged from the confines of the stables, joining him.

Tossing the coin in the air, the innkeeper glanced at them. “Tell ’im—they travel the Solanthus road.”

They fell easy victims to the ambush.

Riding in the failing light of the dismal day, beneath thick trees whose branches dripped water monotonously and whose fallen leaves obscured even the sound of their own horses’ footfalls, each was lost in his or her own gloomy thoughts. None heard the galloping of hooves or the ring of bright steel until it was too late.

Before they knew what was happening, dark shapes dropped out of the trees like huge, terrifying birds, smothering them with their black-cloaked wings. It was all done quietly, skillfully.

One clambered up behind Raistlin, knocking the mage unconscious before he could turn. Another dropped from a branch beside Crysania, clasping his hand over her mouth and holding the point of his dagger to her throat. But it took three of them to drag Caramon from his horse and wrestle the big man to the ground, and, when the struggle was finally over, one of the robbers did not get to his feet. Nor would he, ever again, it seemed. He lay quite still in the mud, his head facing the wrong direction.

“Neck’s broke,” reported one of the robbers to a figure who came up—after all was over—to survey the handiwork.

“Neat job of it, too,” the robber commented coolly, eyeing Caramon, who was being held in the grip of four men, his big arms bound with bowstrings. A deep cut on his head bled freely, the rainwater washing the blood down his face. Shaking his head, trying to clear it, Caramon continued to struggle.

The leader, noticing the bulging muscles that strained the strong, wet bowstrings until several of his guards looked at them apprehensively, shook his head in admiration.

Caramon, finally clearing the fuzziness from his head and shaking the blood and rainwater from his eyes, glanced around. At least twenty or thirty heavily armed men stood around them. Looking up at their leader, Caramon breathed a muttered oath. This man was easily the biggest human Caramon had ever seen!

His thoughts went instantly back to Raag and the gladiator arena in Istar. “Part ogre,” he said to himself, spitting out a tooth that had been knocked loose in the fight. Remembering vividly the huge ogre who had helped Arack train the gladiators for the Games, Caramon saw that, though obviously human, this man had a yellow, ogre-ish cast to his skin and the same, flat-nosed face.

He was larger than most humans, too towering head and shoulders over the tall Caramon—with arms like tree trunks. But he walked with an odd gait, Caramon noticed, and he wore a long cloak that dragged the ground, hiding his feet.

Having been taught in the arena to size up an enemy and search out every weakness, Caramon watched the man closely. When the wind blew aside the thick fur cloak that covered him, Caramon saw in astonishment that the man had only one leg. The other was a steel pegleg.

Noticing Caramon’s glance at his pegleg, the half-ogre grinned broadly and took a step nearer the big man. Reaching out a huge hand, the robber patted Caramon tenderly on the cheek.

“I admire a man who puts up a good fight,” he said in a soft voice. Then, with startling swiftness, he doubled his hand into a fist, drew back his arm, and slugged Caramon in the jaw. The force of the blow knocked the big warrior backward, nearly causing those who held him to fall over, too.

“But you’ll pay for the death of my man.”

Gathering his long, fur cloak around him, the half-ogre stumped over to where Crysania stood, held securely in the arms of one of the robbers. Her captor still had his hand over her mouth, and, though her face was pale, her eyes were dark and filled with anger.

“Isn’t this nice,” the half-ogre said softly. “A present, and it’s not even Yule.” His laughter boomed through the trees. Reaching out, he caught hold of her cloak and ripped it from her neck. His gaze flicked rapidly over her curving figure, well revealed as the rain soaked instantly through her white robes. His smile widened and his eyes glinted. He reached out a huge hand.

Crysania shrank away from him, but the half-ogre grabbed hold of her easily, laughing.

“Why, what’s this bauble you wear, sweet one?” he asked, his gaze going to the medallion of Paladine she wore around her slender neck. “I find it... unbecoming. Pure platinum, it is!” He whistled. “Best let me keep it For you, dear. I fear that, in the pleasures of our passion, it might get lost—”

Caramon had recovered enough by now to see the half-ogre grasp the medallion in his hand.

There was a glint of grim amusement in Crysania’s eyes, though she shuddered visibly at the man’s touch. A flash of pure, white light crackled through the driving rain. The half-ogre clutched at his hand. Drawing it back with a snarl of pain, he released Crysania.

There was a muttering among the men standing watching. The man holding Crysania suddenly loosened his grip and she jerked free, glaring at him angrily and pulling her cloak back around her.

The half-ogre raised his hand, his face twisted in rage. Caramon feared he would strike Crysania, when, at that moment, one of the man yelled out.

“The wizard, he’s comin’ to!”

The half-ogre’s eyes were still on Crysania, but he lowered his hand. Then, he smiled. “Well, witch, you have won the first round, it seems.” He glanced back at Caramon. “I enjoy contests—both in fighting and in love. This promises to be a night of amusement, all around.”

Giving a gesture, he ordered the man who had been holding Crysania to take her in hand again, and the man did, though Caramon noticed it was with extreme reluctance. The half-ogre walked over to where Raistlin lay upon the ground, groaning in pain.

“Of all of them, the wizard’s the most dangerous. Bind his hands behind his back and gag him,” ordered the robber in a grating voice. “If he so much as croaks, cut out his tongue. That’ll end his spellcasting days for good.”

“Why don’t we just kill him now?” one of the men growled.

“Go ahead, Brack,” said the half-ogre pleasantly, turning swiftly to regard the man who had spoken. “Take your knife and slit his throat.”

“Not with my hands,” the man muttered, backing up a step.

“No? You’d rather I was the one cursed for murdering a Black Robe?” the leader continued, still in the same, pleasant tone. “You’d enjoy seeing my sword hand wither and drop off?”

“I—I didn’t mean that, of course, Steeltoe. I—I wasn’t thinking, that’s all.”

“Then start thinking. He can’t harm us now. Look at him.” Steeltoe gestured to Raistlin. The mage lay on his back, his hands bound in front of him. His jaws had been forced open and a gag tied around his mouth. However, his eyes gleamed from the shadows of his hood in a baleful rage, and his hands clenched in such impotent fury that more than one of the strong men standing about wondered uneasily if such measures were adequate.

Perhaps feeling something of this himself, Steeltoe limped over to where Raistlin lay staring up at him with bitter hatred. As he stopped near the mage, a smile creased the half-ogre’s yellowish face, and he suddenly slammed the steel toe of his pegleg against the side of Raistlin’s head.

The mage went limp. Crysania cried out in alarm, but her captor held her fast. Even Caramon was amazed to feel swift, sharp pain contract his heart as he saw his brother’s form lying huddled in the mud.

“That should keep him quiet for a while. When we reach camp, we’ll blindfold him and take him for a walk up on the Rock. If he slips and falls over the cliff, well, that’s the way of things, isn’t it, men? His blood won’t be on our hands.”

There was some scattered laughter, but Caramon saw more than a few glance uneasily at each other, shaking their heads.

Steeltoe turned away from Raistlin to examine with gleaming eyes the heavily laden pack horse.

“We’ve made a rich haul this day, men,” he said in satisfaction. Stumping back around, he came to where Crysania stood, pinned in the arms of her somewhat nervous captor.

“A rich haul, indeed,” he murmured. One huge hand grasped Crysania’s chin roughly. Bending down, he pressed his lips against hers in a brutal kiss. Trapped in the arms of her captor, Crysania could do nothing. She did not struggle; perhaps some inner sense told her this was precisely what the man wanted. She stood straight, her body rigid. But Caramon saw her hands clench and, when Steeltoe released her, she could not help but avert her face, her dark hair falling across her cheek.

“You know my policy, men,” Steeltoe said, fondling her hair coarsely, “share the spoils among us—after I’ve taken my cut, of course.”

There was more laughter at this and, here and there, some scattered cheering. Caramon had no doubt of the man’s meaning and he guessed, from the few comments he heard, that this wouldn’t be the first time “spoils” had been “shared.”

But there were some young faces who frowned, glancing at each other in disquiet, shaking their heads. And there were even a few muttered comments, such as, “I’ll have nought to do with a witch!” and “I’d sooner bed the wizard!”

Witch! There was that term again. Vague memories stirred in Caramon’s mind—memories of the days when he and Raistlin had traveled with Flint, the dwarven metalsmith; days before the return of the true gods. Caramon shivered, suddenly remembering with vivid clarity the time they had come into a town that was going to burn an old woman at the stake for witchcraft. He recalled how his brother and Sturm, the ever noble knight, had risked their lives to save the old crone, who turned out to be nothing more than a second-rate illusionist.

But Caramon had forgotten, until now, how the people of this time viewed any type of magical powers, and Crysania’s clerical powers—in these days when there were no true clerics—would be even more suspect. He shuddered, then forced himself to think with cold logic. Burning was a harsh death, but it was a far quicker one than...

“Bring the witch to me.” Steeltoe limped across the trail to where one of his men held his horse. Mounting, he gestured. “Then follow with the others.”

Crysania’s captor dragged her forward. Reaching down, Steeltoe grabbed her under the arms and lifted her onto the horse, seating her in front of him. Grasping the reins in his hands, his thick arms wrapped around her, completely engulfing her. Crysania sat staring straight ahead, her face cold and impassive.

Does she know? Caramon wondered, watching helplessly as Steeltoe rode past him, the mans yellowish face twisted into a leer. She’s always been sheltered, protected from things like this.

Perhaps she doesn’t realize what dreadful acts these men are capable of commiting.

And then Crysania glanced back at Caramon. Her face was calm and pale, but there was a look of such horror in her eyes, horror and pleading, that he hung his head, his heart aching.

She knows... The gods help her. She knows...

Someone shoved Caramon from behind. Several men grabbed him and flung him, headfirst, over the saddle of his horse. Hanging upside down, his strong arms bound with the bowstrings that were cutting into his flesh, Caramon saw the men lift his brother’s limp body and throw it over his own horse’s saddle. Then the bandits mounted up and led their captives deeper into the forest.

The rain streamed down on Caramon’s bare head as the horse plodded through the mud, jouncing him roughly. The pommel of the saddle jabbed him in the side; the blood rushing to his head made him dizzy. But all he could see in his mind as they rode were those dark, terror-filled eyes, pleading with him for help.

And Caramon knew, with sick certainty, that no help would come.

10

Raistlin walked across a burning desert. A line of footsteps stretched before him in the sand, and he was walking in these footsteps. On and on the footsteps led him, up and down dunes of brilliant white, blazing in the sun. He was hot and tired and terribly thirsty. His head hurt, his chest ached, and he wanted to lie down and rest. In the distance was a water hole, cooled by shady trees. But, try as he might; he could not reach it. The footsteps did not go that way, and he could not move his feet any other direction.

On and on he plodded, his black robes hanging heavily about him. And then, nearly spent, he looked up and gasped in terror. The footsteps led to a scaffold! A black-hooded figure knelt with its head upon the block. And, though he could not see the face, he knew with terrible certainty that it was he himself who knelt there, about to die. The executioner stood above him, a bloody axe in his hand. The executioner, too, wore a black hood that covered his face. He raised the axe and held it poised above Raistlin’s neck. And as the axe fell, Raistlin saw in his last moments a glimpse of his executioner’s face...

“Raist!” whispered a voice.

The mage shook his aching head. With the voice came the comforting realization that he had been dreaming. He struggled to wake up, fighting off the nightmare.

“Raist!” hissed the voice, more urgently.

A sense of real danger, not dreamed danger, roused the mage further. Waking fully, he lay still for a moment, keeping his eyes closed until he was more completely aware of what was going on.

He lay on wet ground, his hands bound in front of him, his mouth gagged. There was throbbing pain in his head and Caramon’s voice in his ears.

Around him, he could hear sounds of voices and laughter, he could smell the smoke of cooking fires. But none of the voices seemed very near, except his brothers. And then everything came back to him. He remembered the attack, he remembered a man with a steel leg... Cautiously, Raistlin opened his eyes.

Caramon lay near him in the mud, stretched out on his stomach, his arms bound tightly with bowstrings. There was a familiar glint in his twin’s brown eyes, a glint that brought back a rush of memories of old days, times long past—fighting together, combining steel and magic.

And, despite the pain and the darkness around them, Raistlin felt a sense of exhilaration he had not experienced in a long time.

Brought together by danger, the bond between the two was strong now, letting them communicate with both word and thought. Seeing his brother fully cognizant of their plight, Caramon wriggled as close as he dared, his voice barely a breath.

“Is there any way you can free your hands? Do you still carry the silver dagger?”

Raistlin nodded once, briefly. At the beginning of time, magic-users were prohibited by the gods from carrying any type of weapon or wearing any sort of armor. The reason being, ostensibly, that they needed to devote time to study that could not be spent achieving proficiency in the art of weaponry. But, after the magic-users had helped Huma defeat the Queen of Darkness by creating the magical dragon orbs, the gods granted them the right to carry daggers upon their persons—in memory of Huma’s lance.

Bound to his wrist by a cunning leather thong that would allow the weapon to slip down into his hand when needed, the silver dagger was Raistlin’s last means of defense, to be used only when all his spells were cast... or at a time like this.

“Are you strong enough to use your magic?” Caramon whispered.

Raistlin closed his eyes wearily for a moment. Yes, he was strong enough. But—this meant a further weakening, this meant more time would be needed to regain strength to face the Guardians of the Portal. Still, if he didn’t live that long...

Of course, he must live! he thought bitterly. Fistandantilus had lived! He was doing nothing more than following footsteps through the sand.

Angrily, Raistlin banished the thought. Opening his eyes, he nodded. I am strong enough, he told his brother mentally, and Caramon sighed in relief.

“Raist,” the big man whispered, his face suddenly grave and serious, “you... you can guess what... what they plan for Crysania.”

Raistlin had a sudden vision of that hulking, ogre-ish human’s rough hands upon Crysania, and he felt a startling sensation—rage and anger such as he had rarely experienced gripped him. His heart contracted painfully and, for a moment, he was blinded by a blood-dimmed haze.

Seeing Caramon regarding him with astonishment, Raistlin realized that his emotions must be apparent on his face. He scowled, and Caramon continued hurriedly. “I have a plan.”

Raistlin nodded irritably, already aware of what his brother had in mind.

Caramon whispered, “If I fail—”

“—I’ll kill her first, then myself, Raistlin finished. But, of course, there would be no need. He was safe... protected...”

Then, hearing men approaching, the mage closed his eyes, thankfully feigning unconsciousness again. It gave him time to sort his tangled emotions and force himself to regain control. The silver dagger was cold against his arm. He flexed the muscles that would release the thong. And, all the while, he pondered that strange reaction he’d felt about a woman he cared nothing for... except her usefulness to him as a cleric, of course.

Two men jerked Caramon to his feet and shoved him forward. Caramon was thankful to notice that, beyond a quick glance to make certain the mage was still unconscious, neither man paid any attention to his twin. Stumbling along over the uneven ground, gritting his teeth against the pain from cramped, chilled leg muscles, Caramon found himself thinking about that odd expression on his brothers face when he mentioned Lady Crysania. Caramon would have called it the outraged expression of a lover, if seen on the face of any other man. But his brother? Was Raistlin capable of such an emotion? Caramon had decided in Istar that Raistlin wasn’t, that he had been completely consumed by evil.

But now, his twin seemed different, much more like the old Raistlin, the brother he had fought side by side with so many times before, their lives in each others keeping. What Raistlin had told Caramon about Tas made sense. So he hadn’t killed the kender after all. And, though sometimes irritable, Raistlin was always unfailingly gentle with Crysania. Perhaps...

One of the guards jabbed him painfully in the ribs, recalling Caramon to the desperateness of their situation. Perhaps! He snorted. Perhaps it would all end here and now. Perhaps the only thing he would buy with his life would be swift death for the other two.

Walking through the camp, thinking over all he had seen and heard since the ambush, Caramon mentally reviewed his plan. The bandit’s camp was more like a small town than a thieves’ hideout.

They lived in crudely built log huts, keeping their animals sheltered in a large cave. They had obviously been here some time, and apparently feared no law—giving mute testimony to the strength and leadership capabilities of the half ogre, Steeltoe.

But Caramon, having had more than a few run-ins with thieves in his day, saw that many of these men were not loutish ruffians. He had seen several glance at Crysania and shake their heads in obvious distaste for what was to come. Though dressed in little more than rags, several carried fine weapons steel swords of the kind passed down from father to son, and they handled them with the care given a family heirloom, not booty. And, though he could not be certain in the failing light of the stormy day, Caramon thought he had noted on many of the swords the Rose and the Kingfisher—the ancient symbol of the Solamnic Knights.

The men were clean-shaven, without the long mustaches that marked such knights, but Caramon could detect in their stern, young faces traces of his friend, the knight, Sturm Brightblade. And, reminded of Sturm, Caramon was reminded, too, of what he knew of the history of the knighthood following the Cataclysm.

Blamed by most of their neighbors for bringing about the dreadful calamity, the knights had been driven from their homes by angry mobs. Many had been murdered, their families killed before their eyes. Those who survived went into hiding, roaming the land on their own or joining outlaw bands—like this one.

Glancing at the men as they stood about the camp cleaning their weapons and talking in low voices, Caramon saw the mark of evil deeds upon many faces, but he also saw looks of resignation and hopelessness. He had known hard times himself. He knew what it could drive a man to do.

All this gave him hope that his plan might succeed.

A bonfire blazed in the center of the encampment, not far from where he and Raistlin had been dumped on the ground. Glancing behind, he saw his brother still feigning unconsciousness. But he also saw, knowing what to look for, that the mage had managed to twist his body around into a position where he could both see and hear clearly.

As Caramon stepped forward into the fire’s light, most of the men stopped what they were doing and followed, forming a half-circle around him. Sitting in a large wooden chair near the blaze was Steeltoe, a flagon in his hand. Standing near him, laughing and joking, were several men Caramon recognized at once as typical toadies, fawning over their leader. And he was not surprised to see, at the edge of the crowd, the grinning, ill-favored face of their innkeeper.

Sitting in a chair beside Steeltoe was Crysania. Her cloak had been taken from her. Her dress was ripped open at the bodice he could imagine by whose hands. And, Caramon saw with growing anger, there was a purplish blotch on her cheek. One corner of her mouth was swollen.

But she held herself with rigid dignity, staring straight ahead and trying to ignore the crude jokes and frightful tales being bandied back and forth. Caramon smiled grimly in admiration.

Remembering the panic-stricken state of near madness to which she had been reduced during the last days of Istar, and thinking of her previous soft and sheltered life, he was pleased, if amazed, to see her reacting to this dangerous situation with a coolness Tika might have envied.

Tika... . Caramon scowled. He had not meant to think of Tika—especially not in connection with Lady Crysania! Forcing his thoughts to the present, he coldly averted his eyes from the woman to his enemy, concentrating on him.

Seeing Caramon, Steeltoe turned from his conversation and gestured broadly for the warrior to approach.

“Time to die, warrior,” Steeltoe said to him, still in the same pleasant tone of voice. He glanced over lazily at Crysania. “I’m certain, lady, you won’t mind if our tryst is postponed a few moments while I take care of this matter. Just think of this as a little before—bed entertainment, my dear.” He stroked Crysania’s cheek with his hand. When she moved away from him, her dark eyes flashing in anger, he changed his caress to a slap, hitting her across the face.

Crysania did not cry out. Raising her head, she stared back at her tormenter with grim pride.

Knowing that he could not let himself be distracted by concern for her, Caramon kept his gaze on the leader, studying him calmly. This man rules by fear and brute force, he thought to himself. Of those who follow, many do so reluctantly. They’re all afraid of him; he’s probably the only law in this godforsaken land. But he’s obviously kept them well fed and alive when they would otherwise have perished. So they’re loyal, but just how far will their loyalty go?

Keeping his voice evenly modulated, Caramon drew himself up, regarding the half-ogre with a look of disdain. “Is this how you show your bravery? Beating up women?” Caramon sneered.

“Untie me and give me my sword, and we’ll see what kind of man you really are!”

Steeltoe regarded him with interest and, Caramon saw uneasily, a look of intelligence on his brutish face.

“I had thought to have something more original out of you, warrior,” Steeltoe said with a sigh that was part show and part not as he rose to his feet. “Perhaps you will not be such a challenge to me as I first thought. Still, I have nothing better to do this evening. Early, in the evening, that is,” he amended, with a leer and a rakish bow to Crysania, who ignored him.

The half-ogre threw aside the great fur cloak he wore and, turning, commanded one of his men to bring him his sword. The toadies scattered to do his bidding, while the other men moved to surround a cleared space to one side of the bonfire obviously this was a sport that had been enjoyed before. During the confusion, Caramon managed to catch Crysania’s eye.

Inclining his head, he glanced meaningfully toward where Raistlin lay. Crysania understood his meaning at once. Looking over at the mage, she smiled sadly and nodded. Her hand closed about the medallion of Paladine and her swollen lips moved.

Caramon’s guards shoved him into the circle, and he lost sight of her. “It’ll take more than prayers to Paladine to get us out of this one, lady,” he muttered, wondering with a certain amount of amusement, if his brother was, at that moment, praying to the Queen of Darkness for help as well.

Well, he had no one to pray to, nothing to help him but his own muscle and bone and sinew.

They cut the bindings on his arms. Caramon flinched at the pain of blood returning to his limbs, but he flexed his stiff muscles, rubbing them to help the circulation and to warm himself. Then he stripped off his soaking—wet shirt and his breeches to fight naked. Clothes gave the enemy a chance for a hand-hold, so his old instructor, Arack the dwarf, had taught him in the Games Arena in Istar.

At the sight of Caramon’s magnificent physique, there was a murmur of admiration from the men standing around the circle. The rain streamed down over his tan, well-muscled body, the fire gleamed on his strong chest and shoulders, glinting off his numerous battle scars. Someone handed Caramon a sword, and the warrior swung it with practiced ease and obvious skill. Even Steeltoe, entering the ring of men, seemed a bit disconcerted at the sight of the former gladiator.

But if Steeltoe was—momentarily—startled at the appearance of his opponent, Caramon was no less taken aback at the appearance of Steeltoe. Half-ogre and half-human, the man had inherited the best traits of both races. He had the girth and muscle of the ogres, but he was quick on his feet and agile, while, in his eyes, was the dangerous intelligence of a human. He, too, fought almost naked, wearing nothing but a leather loincloth. But what made Caramon’s breath whistle between his teeth was the weapon the half-ogre carried—easily the most wonderful sword the warrior had ever seen in his life.

A gigantic blade, it was designed for use as a two-handed weapon. Indeed, Caramon thought, eyeing it expertly, there were few men he knew who could even have lifted it, much less wielded it. But, not only did Steeltoe heft it with ease, he used it with one hand! And he used it well, that much Caramon could tell from the half-ogre’s practiced, well-timed swings. The steel blade caught the fire’s light as he slashed the air. It hummed as it sliced through the darkness, leaving a blazing trail of light behind it.

As his opponent limped into the ring, his steel pegleg gleaming, Caramon saw with despair that he faced not the brutish, stupid opponent he had expected, but a skilled swordsman, an intelligent man, who had overcome his handicap to fight with a mastery two-legged men might well envy.

Not only had Steeltoe overcome his handicap, Caramon discovered after their first pass, but the half-ogre made use of it in a most deadly fashion.

The two stalked each other, feinting, each watching for any weakness in the opponent’s defense.

Then, suddenly, balancing himself easily on his good leg, Steeltoe used his steel leg as another weapon. Whirling around, he struck Caramon with the steel leg with such force that it sent the big man crashing to the ground. His sword flew from his hands.

Quickly regaining his balance, Steeltoe advanced with his huge sword, obviously intending to end the battle and get on to other amusements. But, though caught off guard, Caramon had seen this type of move in the arena. Lying on the ground, gasping for breath, feigning having had the wind knocked out of him, Caramon waited until his enemy closed on him. Then, reaching out, he grabbed hold of Steeltoe’s good leg and jerked it out from beneath him.

The men standing around cheered and applauded. As the sound brought back vivid memories of the arena at Istar, Caramon felt his blood race. Worries about black-robed brothers and white-robed clerics vanished. So did thoughts of home. His self-doubts disappeared. The thrill of fighting, the intoxicating drug of danger, coursed through his veins, filling him with an ecstasy much like his twin felt using his magic.

Scrambling to his feet, seeing his enemy do the same, Caramon made a sudden, desperate lunge for his sword, which lay several feet from him. But Steeltoe was quicker. Reaching Caramon s sword first, he kicked it, sending it flying.

Even as he kept an eye on his opponent, Caramon glanced about for another weapon and saw the bonfire, blazing at the far end of the ring.

But Steeltoe saw Caramon s glance. Instantly guessing his objective, the half-ogre moved to block him.

Caramon made a run for it. The half-ogre’s slashing blade sliced through the skin on his abdomen, leaving a glistening trail of blood behind. With a leaping dive, Caramon rolled near the logs, grabbed one by the end, and was on his feet as Steeltoe drove his blade into the ground where the big man’s head had been only seconds before.

The sword arced through the air again. Caramon heard it humming and barely was able to parry the blow with the log in time. Chips and sparks flew as the sword bit into the wood, Caramon having grabbed a log that was burning at one end. The force of Steeltoe’s blow was tremendous, making Caramon’s hands ring and the sharp edges of the log dig painfully into his flesh. But he held fast, using his great strength to drive the half-ogre backward as Steeltoe fought to recover his balance.

The half-ogre held firm, finally shoving his pegleg into the ground and pushing Caramon back.

The two men slowly took up their positions again, circling each other. Then the air was filled with the flashing light of steel and flaming cinders.

How long they fought, Caramon had no idea. Time drowned in a haze of stinging pain and fear and exhaustion. His breath came in ragged gasps. His lungs burned like the end of the log, his hands were raw and bleeding. But still he gained no advantage. He had never in his life faced such an opponent. Steeltoe, too, who had entered the fight with a sneer of confidence, now faced his enemy with grim determination. Around them, the men stood silently now, enthralled by the deadly contest.

The only sounds at all, in fact, were the crackling of the fire, the heavy breathing of the opponents, or perhaps the splash of a body as one went down into the mud, or the grunt of pain when a blow told.

The circle of men and the firelight began to blur in Caramon’s eyes. To his aching arms, the log felt heavier than a whole tree, now. Breathing was agony. His opponent was as exhausted as he, Caramon knew, from the fact that Steeltoe had neglected to follow up an advantageous blow, being forced to simply stand and catch his breath. The half-ogre had an ugly purple welt running along his side where Caramon’s log had caught him. Everyone in the circle had heard the snapping of his ribs and seen the yellowish face contort in pain.

But he came back with a swipe of his sword that sent Caramon staggering backward, flailing away with the log in a frantic attempt to parry the stroke. Now the two stalked each other, neither hearing nor caring about anything else but the enemy across from him. Both knew that the next mistake would be fatal.

And then Steeltoe slipped in the mud. It was just a small slip, sending him down on his good knee, balancing on his pegleg. At the beginning of the battle, he would have been up in seconds.

But his strength was giving out and it took a moment longer to struggle up again.

That second was what Caramon had been waiting for. Lurching forward, using the last bit of strength in his own body, Caramon lifted the log and drove it down as hard as he could on the knee to which the pegleg was attached. As a hammer strikes a nail, Caramon’s blow drove the pegleg deep into the sodden ground.

Snarling in fury and pain, the half-ogre turned and twisted, trying desperately to drag his leg free, all the while attempting to keep Caramon back with slashing blows of his sword. Such was his tremendous strength that he almost succeeded. Even now, seeing his opponent trapped, Caramon had to fight the temptation to let his hurting body rest, to let his opponent go.

But there could be only one end to this contest. Bot h men had known that from the beginning.

Staggering forward, grimly swinging his log, Caramon caught the half-ogre’s blade and sent it flying from his hands. Seeing death in Caramon’s eyes, Steeltoe still fought defiantly to free himself. Even at the last moment, as the log in the big man’s hands whistled through the air, the half-ogre’s huge hands made a clutching grasp for Caramon’s arms.

The log smashed into the half-ogre’s head with a wet, sodden thud and the crunch of bone, flinging the half-ogre backward. The body twitched, then was still. Steeltoe lay in the mud, his steel pegleg still pinning him to the ground, the rain washing away the blood and brains that oozed from the cracks in his skull.

Stumbling in weariness and pain, Caramon sank to his knees, leaning on the blood—and rain-soaked log, trying to catch his breath. There was a roaring in his ears—the angry shouts of men surging forward to kill him. He didn’t care. It didn’t matter. Let them come...

But no one attacked.

Confused by this, Caramon raised his blurred gaze to a black-robed figure kneeling down beside him. He felt his brother’s slender arm encircle him protectively, and he saw flickering darts of lightning flash warningly from the mage’s fingers. Closing his eyes, Caramon leaned his head against his brother’s frail chest and drew a deep, shuddering breath.

Then he felt cool hands touch his skin and he heard a soft voice murmur a prayer to Paladine.

Caramon’s eyes flared open. He shoved the startled Crysania away, but it was too late. Her healing influence spread through his body. He could hear the men gathered around him gasp as the bleeding wounds vanished, the bruises disappeared, and the color returned to his deathly pale face. Even the archmage’s pyrotechnics had not created the outburst of alarm and shocked cries the healing did.

“Witchcraft! She healed him! Burn the witch!”

“Burn them both, witch and wizard!”

“They hold the warrior in thrall. We’ll take them and free his soul!”

Glancing at his brother, he saw—from the grim expression on Raistlin’s face—that the mage, too, was reliving old memories and understood the danger.

“Wait!” Caramon gasped, rising to his feet as the crowd of muttering men drew near. Only the fear of Raistlin’s magic kept the men from rushing them, he knew, and—hearing his brother’s sudden racking cough—Caramon feared Raistlin’s strength might soon give out.

Catching hold of the confused Crysania, Caramon thrust her protectively behind him as he confronted the crowd of frightened, angry men.

“Touch this woman, and you will die as your leader died,” he shouted, his voice loud and clear above the driving rain. “Why should we let a witch live?” snarled one, and there were mutters of agreement.

“Because she’s my witch!” Caramon said sternly, casting a defiant gaze around. Behind him, he heard Crysania draw in a sharp breath, but Raistlin gave her a warning glance and, if she had been going to speak, she sensibly kept quiet. “She does not hold me in thrall but obeys my commands and those of the wizard. She will do you no harm, I swear.”

There were murmurs among the men, but their eyes, as they looked at Caramon, were no longer threatening. Admiration there had been—now he could see grudging respect and a willingness to listen.

“Let us be on our way,” Raistlin began in his soft voice, “and we—”

“Wait!” rasped Caramon. Gripping his brother’s arm, he drew him near and whispered. “I’ve got an idea. Watch over Crysania!”

Nodding, Raistlin moved to stand near Crysania, who stood quietly, her eyes on the now silent group of bandits. Caramon walked over to where the body of the half-ogre lay in the reddening mud. Leaning down, he wrested the great sword from Steeltoe’s deathgrip and raised it high over his head. The big warrior was a magnificent sight, the firelight reflecting off his bronze skin, the muscles rippling in his arms as he stood in triumph above the body of his slain enemy.

“I have destroyed your leader. Now I claim the right to take his place!” Caramon shouted, his voice echoing among the trees. “I ask only one thing—that you leave this life of butchery and rape and robbery. We travel south—”

That got an unexpected reaction. “South! They travel south!” several voices cried and there was scattered cheering. Caramon stared at them, taken aback, not understanding. Raistlin, coming forward, clutched at him.

“What are you doing?” the mage demanded, his face pale.

Caramon shrugged, looking about in puzzled amazement at the enthusiasm he had created. “It just seemed a good idea to have an armed escort, Raistlin,” he said. “The lands south of here are, by all accounts, wilder than those we have ridden through. I figured we could take a few of these men with us, that’s all. I don’t understand—”

A young man of noble bearing, who more than any of the others, recalled Sturm to Caramon’s mind, stepped forward. Motioning the others to quiet down, he asked, “You’re going south? Do you, perchance, seek the fabled wealth of the dwarves in Thorbardin?”

Raistlin scowled. “Now do you understand?” he snarled. Choking, he was shaken by a fit of coughing that left him weak and gasping. Had it not been for Crysania hurrying to support him, he might have fallen.

“I understand you need rest,” Caramon replied grimly. “We all do. And unless we come up with some sort of armed escort, we’ll never have a peaceful night’s sleep. What do the dwarves in Thorbardin have to do with anything? What’s going on?”

Raistlin stared at the ground, his face hidden by the shadows of his hood. Finally, sighing, he said coldly, “Tell them yes, we go south. We’re going to attack the dwarves.”

Caramon’s eyes opened wide. “Attack Thorbardin?”

“I’ll explain later,” Raistlin snarled softly. “Do as I tell you.”

Caramon hesitated.

Shrugging his thin shoulders, Raistlin smiled unpleasantly. “It is your only way home, my brother! And maybe our only way out of here alive.”

Caramon glanced around. The men had begun to mutter again during this brief exchange, obviously suspicious of their intentions. Realizing he had to make a decision quickly or lose them for good—and maybe even face another attack—he turned back, vying for time to try to think things through further.

“We go south,” he said, “it is true. But for our own reasons. What is this you say of wealth in Thorbardin?”

“It is said that the dwarves have stored great wealth in the kingdom beneath the mountain,” the young man answered readily. Others around him nodded.

“Wealth they stole from humans,” added one.

“Aye! Not just money,” cried out a third, “but grain and cattle and sheep. They’ll eat like kings this winter, while our bellies go empty!”

“We have talked before of going south to take our share,” the young man continued, “but Steeltoe said things were well enough here. There are some, though, who were having second thoughts.”

Caramon pondered, wishing he knew more of history. He had heard of the Great Dwarfgate Wars, of course. His old dwarf friend, Flint, talked of little else. Flint was a hill dwarf. He had filled Caramon’s head with tales of the cruelty of the mountain dwarves of Thorbardin, saying much the same things these men said. But to hear Flint tell it, the wealth the mountain dwarves stole had been taken from their cousins, the hill dwarves.

If this were true, then Caramon might well be justified in making this decision. He could, of course, do as his brother commanded. But something inside Caramon had snapped in Istar. Even though he was beginning to think he had misjudged his brother, he knew him well enough to continue to distrust him. Never again would he obey Raistlin blindly.

But then he sensed Raistlin’s glittering eyes upon him, and he heard his brother’s voice echo in his mind. Your only way back home!

Caramon clenched his fist in swift anger, but Raistlin had him, he knew. “We go south to Thorbardin,” he said harshly, his troubled gaze on the sword in his hand. Then he raised his head to look at the men around him. “Will you come with us?”

There was a moment’s hesitation. Several of the men came forward to talk to the young nobleman, who was now apparently their spokesman. He listened, nodded, then faced Caramon once more.

“We would follow you without hesitation, great warrior,” said the young man, “but what have you to do with this blackrobed wizard? Who is he, that we should follow him?”

“My name is Raistlin,” the mage replied. “This man is my bodyguard.”

There was no response, only dubious frowns and doubtful looks.

“I am his bodyguard, that is true,” Caramon said quietly, “but the mage’s real name is Fistandantilus.”

At this, there were sharp intakes of breath among the men. The frowns changed to looks of respect, even fear and awe.

“My name is Garic,” the young man said, bowing to the archmage with the old-fashioned courtesy of the Knights of Solamnia. “We have heard of you, Great One. And though your deeds are dark as your robes, we live in a time of dark deeds, it seems. We will follow you and the great warrior you bring with you.”

Stepping forward, Garic laid his sword at Caramon’s feet. Others followed suit, some eagerly, others more warily. A few slunk off into the shadows. Knowing them for the cowardly ruffians they were, Caramon let them go.

He was left with about thirty men; a few of the same noble bearing as Garic, but most of them were ragged, dirty thieves and scoundrels.

“My army,” Caramon said to himself with a grim smile that night as he spread his blanket in Steeltoe’s but the half-ogre had built for his own personal use. Outside the door, he could hear Garic talking to the other man Caramon had decided looked trustworthy enough to stand watch.

Bone-weary, Caramon had assumed he’d fall asleep quickly. But he found himself lying awake in the darkness, thinking, making plans.

Like most young soldiers, Caramon had often dreamed of becoming an officer. Now, unexpectedly, here was his chance. It wasn’t much of a command, maybe, but it was a start. For the first time since they’d arrived in this god-forsaken time, he felt a glimmer of pleasure.

Plans tumbled over and over in his mind. Training, the best routes south, provisioning, supplies...

These were new and different problems for the former mercenary soldier. Even in the War of the Lance, he had generally followed Tanis’s lead. His brother knew nothing of these matters; Raistlin had informed Caramon coldly that he was on his own in this. Caramon found this challenging and—oddly—refreshing. These were flesh-and-blood problems, driving the dark and shadowy problems with his brother from his mind.

Thinking of his twin, Caramon glanced over to where Raistlin lay huddled near a fire that blazed in a huge stone fireplace. Despite the heat, he was wrapped in his cloak and as many blankets as Crysania had been able to find. Caramon could hear his brothers breath rattle in his lungs, occasionally he coughed in his sleep.

Crysania slept on the other side of the fire. Although exhausted, her sleep was troubled and broken. More than once she cried out and sat up suddenly, pale and trembling. Caramon sighed.

He would have liked to comfort her—to take her in his arms and soothe her to sleep. For the first time, in fact, he realized how much he would like to do this. Perhaps it had been telling the men she was his. Perhaps it was seeing the half-ogre’s hands on her, feeling the same sense of outrage he had seen reflected on his brother’s face.

Whatever the reason, Caramon caught himself watching her that night in a much different way than he had watched her before, thinking thoughts that, even now, made his skin burn and his pulse quicken.

Closing his eyes, he willed images of Tika, his wife, to come to his mind. But he had banished these memories for so long that they were unsatisfying. Tika was a hazy, misty picture and she was far away. Crysania was flesh and blood and she was here! He was very much aware of her soft, even breathing...

Damn! Women! Irritably, Caramon flopped over on his stomach, determined to sweep all thoughts of females beneath the rug of his other problems. It worked. Weariness finally stole over him.

As he drifted into sleep, one thing remained to trouble him, hovering in the back of his mind. It was not logistics, or red-haired warrior women, or even lovely, white-robed clerics.

It was nothing more than a look—the strange look he had seen Raistlin give him when Caramon had said the name “Fistandantilus.”

It had not been a look of anger or irritation, as Caramon might have expected. The last thing Caramon saw before sleep erased the memory was Raistlin’s look of stark, abject terror.