Lord Soth (35 page)

“Yes. It survived. Only it was hideously deformed.”

“If mother and child survived the birth, then how did they both come to die a short time later?”

“Soth entered my chambers and sent me from the room. When I saw him again he reported to me that they had both died during the birth.”

The silence continued.

“Did anyone else enter the room after you allowed Lord Soth into the chamber?”

“No.”

“What did the bodies look like when you saw them next?”

“Hacked to bits. It was hard to recognize any of the pieces as being human.”

Lord Caladen took a breath and nodded to the mage.

The wizard stepped forward and released Istvan from the spell.

Istvan looked about the room as if he were unsure of what had happened.

Soth had watched the proceedings with his mouth agape, unable to say a word. Now he simply stood defiantly, shoulders straight, lips tight, chin thrust forward—a classic portrait of the noble and gallant Knight of Solamnia.

However, the image of the great knight, of strength and gallantry, did little to mask the truth.

Soth was a murderer.

“Knights of Solamnia,” said Lord Caladen, addressing
the seven knights in the jury. “You’ve heard the words of Istvan the healer, words spoken under the power of a spell of truth. How do you judge the accused?”

The seven knights spoke quietly between themselves for several moments before Lord Walter Dukane, a Knight of the Rose, stood up and addressed the high justice.

“Guilty on all counts,” said Lord Dukane. “By a unanimous vote.”

Lord Caladen nodded solemnly, then turned slowly to face Soth. “Loren Soth,” he said, stripping Soth of the title of Lord Soth. “I hereby find you to be in gross defiance of the Oath and the Measure and guilty of the murders of your wife and child, crimes punishable by death. You are to be immediately held in custody and will be duly executed at a public beheading in the center of Palanthas at precisely noon tomorrow.”

Soth, his face a rigid mask devoid of any emotion, was led from the hall by way of a side door.

At the rear of the hall, people shook their heads in disbelief.

Several others wept.

Chapter 23

A kender father stood on the front steps of his cottage on the outskirts
of the village of Mid-O-Hylo, watching the foglike clouds descend from the high mountains in the west and the low mountains in the east.

The light gray mist was covering the land in a shroud that, unlike other fogs he had seen, seemed very dark and gloomy.

“What’s happening father?” asked the kender’s young son as he ran up the path toward the cottage, his ponytail bobbing and swishing behind him.

“Something.”

“What something?” asked the boy.

“Something,” repeated the kender. “But what something, I do not know.”

“Something strange, I bet,” said the boy, watching the mist continue to invade the lands surrounding the village, further blotting out the light from the sun.

“Yes,” said the kender.

“Something weird, I’d say.”

“Yes.”

“It reminds me a lot of the snowy crystal glass I found in the hand of that sleeping knight on our last trip to Thelgaard.”

The elder kender said nothing, his eyes fixed on the mist. The swirling tendrils of smokelike fog seemed to have taken hold of him, quashing his usually carefree attitude. It was an attitude that had served him well for all of his years, even when things had looked most grim.

For the first time in his life, the kender knew fear.

“Get inside the cottage,” the kender told his son.

“But this is creepy, father,” said the young one. “Can’t we stay out and watch the fog some more?”

The kender began to step backward in the direction of his home. His son, however, remained where he stood, waving his hand through the mist as if trying to catch it between his fingers.

“All right,” said the father. “You can stay outside and watch it if you like, but I’m going inside to watch it through the windows. It looks even spookier that way.”

“Spookier?” said the youngster. “I want to see. Let me in.”

The young kender gleefully ran into the house, followed closely by his somber father.

When they were both inside, the father shut the door and locked it tight for the first time since he’d installed the shiny brass lock that he’d found improperly appreciated in the door of a tavern in Caergoth.

He knew he was insulting the door’s purpose by locking it, but he was much too afraid of the overspreading doom-filled pall to care.

Chapter 24

“Obviously there has been some grave error in justice,” said
Caradoc, standing before the knights in The Drookit Duck, one foot on his chair and another atop the table.

“Injustice indeed,” cried one of the knights. He couldn’t tell which one of the knights had spoken, and therefore couldn’t tell if the words were said in support or condemnation of Lord Soth.

Most of the knights were still in shock over what had transpired. They had journeyed to Palanthas on a matter of routine business, only to have their leader sentenced to death.

It seemed like madness.

After all, Lord Soth was the epitome of everything the Knights of Solamnia stood for, a shining example of everything that was good and honorable about the knighthood.

But there were those among the knights who were beginning to question their lord. And with good reason. They had seen the elf-maid Isolde Denissa after the ogre
attack and although none had said so at the time, many thought it odd that Soth insisted he bring her back to the keep. And then there was the sentencing itself. Soth had been questioned in the Hall of High Justice and found guilty by seven fellow Knights of Solamnia. Unanimous decisions in such matters were rare, so the outcome of the proceedings had to be respected. And what of the high justice? Would he sentence a Knight of Solamnia, a Knight of the Rose, to death, if such action wasn’t warranted?

Caradoc considered the death sentence against Lord Soth. If Soth were gone, it might clear the way for Caradoc himself to take control of the keep. An intriguing possibility, but unlikely. As a base of operations for the Knights of the Rose, Dargaard Keep would likely be taken over by another Rose knight and Caradoc would quickly fade into the background as an anonymous Knight of the Crown. No, his status was tied indelibly to the fate of Lord Soth and, even if Soth were disgraced, it would be better to be his seneschal than just another Knight of Solamnia.

In the interim, the gathered knights had begun to mutter and grumble, and Caradoc sensed an insurgence gaining momentum. He could not let such thoughts take up root in the minds of his fellow knights. If he did, all hope of Soth returning to Dargaard Keep would be lost.

“There isn’t one of us who doesn’t owe his life to Lord Soth,” he said. “I know he’s saved mine several times and I suspect the same holds true for all of us.”

The majority of knights were leaning toward supporting Caradoc, but there were still a few who remained unconvinced.

“You, Knight Krejlgaard,” continued Caradoc. “Did he not pull you from the darkest depths of the Vingaard River after you fell from your mount during a crossing?”

The Crown knight lowered his head and was silent.

“Meyer Seril, didn’t Lord Soth provide food for your family when their entire crop was destroyed by locusts?”

“Aye,” said Seril. “That he did.”

“And you, Derik Grimscribe, didn’t our lord sponsor your petition to the knighthood when all the others felt you too weak for the order?”

“I’m ashamed to admit I had forgotten,” said Grimscribe.

“Seems many of us have!” shouted Caradoc. “And we should all be ashamed for doubting—even for a second—the innocence of our lord. For I know, with a certainty and a strength of conviction I have never felt before on any matter”—Caradoc paused and lowered the volume of his voice—“if one of us had been found guilty of such a crime and sentenced to death, Lord Soth wouldn’t be wasting time debating our guilt or innocence.”

The knights spoke among themselves and it appeared to Caradoc that he had managed to persuade the last few dissenters to see the other side of the sword.

“What have you got in mind, Knight Caradoc?” asked Colm Farold.

Caradoc looked right and left even though the tavern had been cleared and no one was in the room except for his fellow knights. Still, he spoke in a hushed voice. “I propose we rescue him.”

“But he’s being guarded by knights such as ourselves,” said Farold.

“Tonight, he is. Yes,” said Caradoc. “But perhaps not so tomorrow morning.”

Farold nodded. “I’m with you.”

The confidence and conviction exhibited by Farold seemed to inspire the others.

“I’m with you as well,” said Meyer Seril.

“And I,” nodded Derik Grimscribe.

Until one by one, all of Soth’s knights were in agreement.

The morning sun was nowhere to be seen. It remained hidden behind a layer of dark and heavy clouds that
caused the night’s darkness to linger far longer than usual.

To add to the chill in the air, a cold wind was blowing in over the Bay of Branchala, something more than a few residents of Palanthas interpreted as an omen, convincing them to spend the day indoors. Others simply refused to watch, not wanting their memory of the gallant knight to be tainted by the humiliating spectacle of a public execution.