Dragonlance 15 - Dragons Of A Fallen Sun (28 page)

result of the gods leaving us is just an excuse for our own failures."

"The gods left!" Tas's jaw dropped. "When?"

Gerard snorted. "I'm not playing games with you, kender."

Tas pondered all that Gerard had told him.

"Don't you have this whole Knight business backward?" Tas

asked finally. "Isn't Sanction being held by the Dark Knights and

Palanthas by your Knights?"

"No, I do not have it backward. More's the pity," Gerard said.

Tas sighed deeply. "I'm extremely confused."

Gerard grunted and prodded the kender, who was slowing

down a bit, his legs not being as young as they used to be either.

"Hurry up," he said. "We don't have much farther."

"We don't?" Task said meekly. "Did they move Qualinesti, too?"

"If you must know, Kender, I have two mounts waiting for us

at the Solace bridge. And before you can ask yet another question,

the reason we walked from the garrison and did not ride is that the

horse I am using is not my customary mount. The animal would

have occasioned comment, would have required explanation."

"I have a horse? A horse of my own! How thrilling! I haven't

ridden a horse in ever so long." Tasslehoff came to a halt, looked

up at the Knight. "I'm terribly sorry I misjudged you. I guess you

"do understand about adventuring, after all."

"Keep ll"!-oving." Gerard gave him a shove.

A thought occurred to the kender-a truly astonishing

thought that took away what little breath he had remaining. He

paused to find his breath again and then used it to ask the ques-

tion the thought had produced.

"You don't like me, do you, Sir Gerard?" Tas said. He wasn't

angry or accusing, jus.t surprised.

"No," said Gerard, "I do not." He took a drink of water from

a waterskin and handed the skin to Tas. "If it is any consolation,

there is nothing personal in my dislike. I feel this way about all

your kind."

Tas considered this as he drank the water, which was quite

tepid and tasted of the waterskin. "Maybe I'm wrong, but it

seems to me that I'd much rather be disliked for being me than to

be disliked just because I'm a kender. I can do something about

me, you see, but I can't do much about being a kender because

my mother was a kender and so was my father and that seems to

have a lot to do with me being a kender.

"I might have wanted to be a Knight," Tas continued, warm-

ing to his subject. "In fact, I'm pretty sure I probably did, but the

gods must have figured that my mother, being small, couldn't

very well give birth to someone as big as you, not without con-

siderable inconvenience to herself, and so I came out a kender.

Actually, no offense, but I take that back about being a Knight. I

think what I really wanted to be was a draconian-they are so

very fierce and scaly, and they have wings. I've always wanted

wings. But, of course, that would have been extremely difficult for

my mother to have managed."

"Keep moving," was all Gerard said in reply.

"I could help you carry that bundle if you'd take off these

manacles," Tas offered, thinking that if he made himself useful,

the Knight might come to like him.

"No" Gerard returned, and that was that. Not even a thank you.

"Why don't you like kender?" Tas pursued. "Flint always

said he didn't like kender, but I know deep down he did. I don't

think Raistlin liked kender much. He tried to murder me once,

which gave me sort of a hint as to his true feelings. But I forgave

him for that, although I'll never forgive him for murdering poor

Gnimsh, but that's another story. I'll tell you that later. Where

was I? Oh, yes. I was about to add that Sturm Brightblade was a

Knight, and he liked kender, so I was just wondering what you

have against us."

"Your people are frivolous and heedless," said Gerard, his

voice hard. "These are dark days. Life is serious business and

should be taken seriously. We do not have the luxury for joy and

merriment."

"But if there's no joy and merriment, then of course the days

will be dark," Tas argued. "What else do you expect?"

"How much joy did you feeL kender, when you heard the

news that hundreds of your people in Kendermore had been

slaughtered by the great dragon Malystrx?" Gerard asked grimly,

"and that those who survived were driven from their homes and

now seem to be under some sort of curse and are called afflicted

because they now know fear and they carry swords, not pouches.

Did you laugh when you heard that news, kender, and sing 'tra

la, how merry we are this day'?"

Tasslehoff came to a stop and rounded so suddenly that the

Knight very nearly tripped over him.

"Hundreds? Killed by a dragon?" Tas was aghast. "What do

you mean hundreds of kender died in Kendermore? I never

heard that. I never heard anything like that! It's not true. You're

lying. . . . No," he added miserably. "I take that back. You can't

lie. You're a Knight and while you may not like me you're honor'

bound not to lie to me."

Gerard said nothing. Putting his hand on Tas's shoulder he

turned the kender around bodily and started him, once again, on

his way.

Tas noticed a queer feeling in the vicinity of his heart a con-

stricting kind of feeling, as if he'd swallowed one of the more fe-

rocious constricting snakes. The feeling was uncomfortable and

not at all pleasant. Tas knew in that moment that the Knight had

indeed spoken truly. That hundreds of his people had died most

horribly and painfully. He did not know ,how this had happened,

but he knew it was true, as true as the grass growing along the

side of the road or the tree branches overhead or the sun gleam-

ing down through the green leaves.

It was true in this world where Caramon's funeral had been

different from what he remembered. But it hadn't been true in

that other world, the world of Caramon's first funeral.

"I feel sort of strange," Tas said in a small voice. "Kind of

dizzy. Like I might throw up. If you don't mind, I think I'm going

to be quiet for awhile."

"Praise be," said the Knight, adding, with another shove.

"Keep walking."

They walked in- silence and eventually, about mid-morning,

reached Solace Bridge. The bridge spanned Solace Stream, an

easy-going, meandering brook that wandered around the

foothills of the Sentinel Mountains and then tumbled blithely

through South Pass until it reached the White Rage River. The

bridge was wide in order to accommodate wagons and teams of

horses as well as foot traffic.

In the old days, the bridge had been free for the use of the

traveler, but as traffic increased over the bridge, so did the main-

tenance and the upkeep of the span. The Solace city fathers grew

weary of spending tax money to keep the bridge in operation

and so they erected a tollgate and added a toll-taker. The fee re-

quired was modest. Solace Stream was shallow, you could walk

across it in places, and travelers could always cross at other fords

along the route. However, the banks through which the stream

ran were steep and slippery. More than one wagon load of valu-

able merchandise had ended up in the water. Most travelers

elected to pay the toll.

The Knight and the kender were the only ones crossing this

time of day. The toll-taker was eating breakfast in his booth. Two

horses were tied up beneath a stand of cottonwood trees that

grew along the bank. A young lad who looked and smelled like a

stable hand dozed on the grass. One of the horses was glossy

black, his coat gleamed in the sunlight. He was restive, pawed the

ground and occasionally gave a jerk on the reins as a test to see if

he could free himself. The other mount was a small pony, dapple

gray, with a bright eye and twitching ears and nose. Her hooves

were almost completely covered by long strands of fur.

The constricting snake around Tas's heart eased up a good

deal at the sight of the pony, who seemed to regard the kender

with a friendly, if somewhat mischievous, eye.

"Is she mine!" Tas asked, thrilled beyond belief.

"No," said Gerard. "The horses have been hired for the jour-

ney, that is all."

He kicked at the stable hand, who woke up and, yawning and

scratching at himself, said that they owed him thirty steel for the

horses, saddles, and blankets, ten of which would be given back

to them upon the animals' safe return. Gerard took out his money

purse and counted out the coin. The stable hand-keeping as far

from Tasslehoff as possible-counted the money over again dis-

trustfully, deposited it in a sack and stuffed the sack in his straw-

covered shirt.

"What's the pony's name?" asked Tasslehoff, delighted.

"Little Gray," said the stable hand.

Tas frowned. "That doesn't show much imagination. I think

you could have come up with something more original than that.

What's the black horse's name?"

"Blackie," replied the stable hand, picking his teeth with a

straw.

Tasslehoff sighed deeply.

The tollbooth keeper emerged from his little house. Gerard

handed him the amount of the toll. The keeper raised the gate.

This done, he eyed the Knight and kender with intense curiosity

and seemed prepared to spend the rest of the morning discussing

where the two were headed and why.

Gerard answered shortly, "yay" or "nay" as might be re-

quired. He hoisted Tasslehoff onto the pony, who swiveled her

head to look back at him and winked at him as if they shared

some wonderful secret. Gerard placed the mysterious bundle and

the sword wrapped in the blanket on the back of his own horse,

tied them securely. He took hold of the reins of Tas's pony and

mounted his own horse, then rode off, leaving the toll-taker

standing on the bridge talking to himself.

The Knight rode in front, keeping hold of the pony's reins. Tas

rode behind, his manacled hands holding tight to the pommel of

the saddle. Blackie didn't seem to like the gray pony much better

than Gerard liked the kender. Perhaps Blackie was resentful of the

slow pace he was forced to set to accommodate the pony or per-

haps he was a horse of a stern and serious nature who took

umbrage at a certain friskiness exhibited by the pony. Whatever

the reason, if the black horse caught the gray pony doing a little

sideways shuffle for the sheer fun of it, or if he thought she might

be tempted to stop and nibble at some buttercups on the side of

the road, he would turn his head and regard her and her rider

with a cold eye.

They had ridden about five miles when Gerard called a halt.

He stood in his saddle, looked up and down the road. They had

not met any travelers since they had left the bridge, and now the

road was completely empty. Dismounting, Gerard removed his

cloak and rolling it up, he stuffed it in his bedroll. He was wear-

ing the black breastplate decorated with skulls and the death lily

of a Dark Knight.

"What a great disguise!" Tas exclaimed, charmed. "You told

Lord Warren you were going to be a Knight and you didn't lie.

You just didn't tell him what sort of Knight you were going to

become. Do I get to be disguised as a Dark Knight? I mean a

Neraka Knight? Oh, no, I get it! Don't tell me. I'm going to be

your prisoner!" Tasslehoff was quite proud of himself for having

figured this out. "This is going to be more fun- er, interesting-

than I'd expected."

Gerard did not smile. "This is not a joy ride, kender," he said

and his voice was stern and grim. "You hold my life and your

own in your hands, as well as the fate of our mission. I must be a

fool, to trust something so important to one of your kind, but I

have no choice. We will soon be entering the territory controlled

by the Knights of Neraka. If you breathe a word about my being

a Solamnic Knight, I will be arrested and executed as a spy. But

first, before they kill me, they will torture me to find out what I

know. They use the rack to torture people. Have you ever seen a~

man stretched upon the rack, kender?"

"No, but I saw Caramon do calisthenics once, and he said that

was torture. . . ."

Gerard ignored him. "They tie your hands and feet to the rack

and then pull them in opposite directions. Your arms and legs,

wrists and elbows, knees and ankles are pulled from their sock-

ets. The pain is excruciating, but the beauty of the torture is that

though the victim suffers terribly, he doesn't die. They can keep a

man on the rack for days. The bones never return to their proper

place. When they take a man off the rack, he is a cripple. They

have to carry him to the scaffold, put him in a chair in order to

hang him. That will be my fate if you betray me, kender. Do you

understand ?"

"Yes, Sir Gerard," said Tasslehoff. "And even though you

don't like me, which I have to tell you really hurts my feelings, I

wouldn't want to see you stretched on the rack. Maybe someone

else-because I never saw anyone's arm pulled out of its socket