Dragonlance 16 - Dragons Of A Lost Star (47 page)

What can I do? Palin asked himself helplessly. Tasslehoff must go back to die. I have no choice in the matter. The kender must return to his own time and die beneath the heel of Chaos. I cannot make the promise he asks of me. No matter how much I want to.

What Palin found perplexing was that Tasslehoff had seen his own ghost. Palin might have thought this a ruse, an attempt by the kender to distract Palin from finding the device. But while Palin knew that Tas would never hesitate to tell a lie—either out of self-interest or for its entertainment value—Palin was convinced that this was the truth. Palin had seen fear in the kender’s eyes, an uncommon sight, and one that Palin found heart-wrenching.

At least this answered one nagging question: Had Tasslehoff truly died or had he just been roaming about the world for all those years? The fact that he had seen his own ghost proved the answer conclusively. Tasslehoff Burrfoot had died in the final battle against Chaos. He was dead. Or at least, he should be dead.

The gnome left his corner, walked up and poked Palin in the ribs. “Didn’t somebody mention food?”

The significance of the gnome. What was the significance of this irritating gnome?

Disengaging Tas’s clutching hands, Palin knelt down in front of Tas. “Look at me, Tas,” he said. “Yes, that’s it. Look at me and listen to what I am saying. I don’t understand what is going on. I don’t understand what is happening in the world and neither does Dalamar. But I know this. The only way we can find out what has gone wrong and maybe fix it is if you are honest with us.”

“If I am honest,” said Tas, wiping away his tears, “will you still send me back?”

“I am afraid I have to, Tas,” Palin said reluctantly. “You must understand. I don’t want to. I would do anything or give anything not to have to. You’ve seen the dead souls, Tas. You’ve seen for yourself that they are desperately unhappy. They aren’t supposed to be here in the world. Something or someone is keeping them prisoner.”

“You mean I’m not supposed to be here?” Tas asked. “Not the live me. The dead me?”

“I don’t know for sure, Tas. No one does. But I don’t think so. Don’t you remember what Lady Crysania used to say—that death was not the end but the beginning of a whole new life? That we would join our loved ones who have passed beyond, and we would be together and make new friends—”

“I always thought I’d be with Flint,” Tas said. “I know he misses me.” He was quiet a moment, then said, “Well . . . if you think it will help . . .”

He unhooked the strap of his pouch and, before Palin could stop him, upended the bag, spilling its contents onto the floor.

Amid the birds’ eggs and the chicken feathers and ink pots and jam jars and apple cores and what appeared to be a peg someone had been using for an artificial leg, the gears and jewels and wheels and chain of the Device of Time Journeying winked and sparkled in the candlelight.

“Why, what’s this?” said the gnome, squatting down and sorting through the pile. “Cogs, a widget and a whatsit and a thinga-majig. Technical terms, you know,” he added, glancing at Tas and Palin to see if they were impressed. “Not understandable to the amateur. I’m not sure what it was.” He gathered up the pieces one by one, eyeing each in turn. “But it doesn’t appear to be in proper working order. That’s not a guess, mind you. That’s the opinion of a professional.”

Making a tray of his robe, the gnome carried the pieces of the device to a table. Bringing out the remarkable knife that was also a screwdriver, he settled down to work.

“You, there, boy,” he said, waving his hand at Palin. “Bring us some lunch. Sandwiches. And a pot of tarbean tea. Strong as you can make it. Going to be an all-nighter.”

And, then, of course, Palin remembered the device’s history. He understood the significance of the gnome.

Apparently, so did Tasslehoff, who was staring at Conundrum with a hopeless and woebegone expression.

“Where have you been, Majere?” Dalamar demanded, confronting Palin as he came through the library door. The dark elf was nervous, on edge. He’d obviously been pacing the floor. “You took long enough! Did you find the Device?”

“Yes, and so did the gnome.” Palin looked intently at Dalamar. “His coming here—”

“—completes the circle,” Dalamar finished.

Palin shook his head, unconvinced. He glanced around the room. “Where is Goldmoon?”

“She asked to be taken to the old laboratory. She said she was given to know that the meeting would be held there.”

“The laboratory? Is that safe?”

Dalamar shrugged. “Unless she’s afraid of dust bunnies. They’re the only danger I can see.”

“Once a chamber of mystery and power, the laboratory is now a repository of dust, the refuge of two impotent old men,” Palin said bitterly.

“Speak for yourself.” Dalamar laid a hand on Palin’s arm. “And keep your voice down. Mina is here. We must go. Bring the light.”

“Here? But how—”

“Apparently she has free run of my Tower.”

“Aren’t you going to be there with them?”

“No,” said Dalamar shortly. “I was dismissed to go about my business. Are you coming or not?” he demanded impatiently. “There’s nothing we can do, either of us. Goldmoon is on her own.”

Still Palin hesitated, but then he decided that he might best serve Goldmoon by keeping an eye on Dalamar. “Where are we going?”

“Through here,” Dalamar said, halting Palin as he was continuing on down the stairs.

Making a turning, Dalamar passed his hand over the wall and whispered a word of magic. A single rune began to glow faintly on the stone. Dalamar put his hand over the rune, and a section of the wall slid to one side, revealing a staircase. As they entered, they could hear heavy footfalls echoing through the Tower. The minotaur, or so they guessed. The door slid shut after them, and they could hear nothing more.

“Where does this lead?” Palin whispered, holding up the lamp to illuminate the stairs.

“The Chamber of the Live Ones,” Dalamar replied. “Hand me the lamp. I’ll go first. I know the way.” He descended the stairs rapidly, his robes fluttering around his ankles.

“I trust none of the ‘Live Ones’ are left alive,” said Palin with a grimace, remembering what he had heard of some of his uncle’s more gruesome experiments.

“No, they died a long time ago, poor wretches.” Dalamar paused and looked up at Palin. His dark eyes glittered in the lamplight. “But the Chamber of Seeing remains.”

“Ah!” Palin breathed, understanding.

When Raistlin Majere became Master of the Tower of High Sorcery of Palanthas, he also became a recluse. Rarely leaving his Tower, he spent his time concentrating on increasing his powers: magical, temporal, and political. In order to keep current on what was happening in the world, especially those events that might affect him, Raistlin used his magic to create a window onto the world. In the lowest regions of the Tower, he carved out a pool and filled it with enchanted water. Whoever looked into the pool could call to mind a location, and he would both see and hear what was transpiring in the location.

“Did you question the kender?” Dalamar asked, as they wound round and round down the hidden staircase.

“Yes. He has the device. He said something else that I found interesting, Dalamar”—Palin reached out his hand, touched the elf on the shoulder—”Tasslehoff saw his own ghost.”

Dalamar swung the lamp around. “He did?” The elf was skeptical. “This isn’t another of his swimming bird stories, is it?”

“No,” said Palin. He could see again the fear and terror in the kender’s bright eyes. “No, he was telling the truth. He’s afraid, Dalamar. I’ve never see Tasslehoff afraid before.”

“At least this proves he died,” Dalamar said, offhandedly, and resumed his descent.

Palin sighed. “The gnome is trying to fix the device. That’s what you meant, wasn’t it? The significance of the gnome. A gnome fixed the device the last time it was broken. Gnimsh. The gnome my uncle murdered.”

Dalamar said nothing. He continued hurrying down the stairs.

“Listen to me, Dalamar!” Palin said, moving so close to the elf that he had to be careful not to trip on the skirts of his robes. “How did the gnome come to be here? This is . . . this is not some simple coincidence, is it?”

“No,” Dalamar murmured. “Not coincidence.” ^

“Then what?” Palin demanded, exasperated.

Dalamar halted again, held up the light to illuminate Palin’s face. He drew back, half-blinded.

“You don’t understand?” Dalamar asked. “Not even now?”

“No,” Palin retorted angrily. “And I don’t think you do, either.”

“Not entirely,” Dalamar admitted. “Not entirely. This meeting should explain much, however.”

Lowering the lamp, he turned back to the descent. He said nothing more, and neither did Palin, who had no intention of demeaning himself further by continuing to ask questions that would be answered only in riddles.

“I no longer keep the wizard-lock functional,” Dalamar remarked. He gave the rune-covered door an impatient shove. “A waste of time and effort.”

“You’ve obviously used this chamber once or twice yourself,” Palin observed.

“Oh, yes,” said Dalamar with a smile. “I keep close watch on all my friends.”

He blew out the lamplight.

They stood on the edge of a pool of water that was as quiet and dark as the chamber in which they were standing. A jet of blue flame burned in the center of the pool. The flame gave no light. It seemed to exist in another place, another time, and at first Palin saw nothing except the reflection of the blue flame in the water. Then the two merged in his vision. The flame flared, and he could see the interior of the laboratory as clearly as if he had been inside.

Goldmoon stood by the long stone table. . . .

35

The One God

Goldmoon stood by the long stone table, staring down unseeing at several books that had been left lying about. She heard voices coming nearer. The voice of the person she was meeting, the person she had been summoned by the dead to meet.

Shivering, Goldmoon clasped her hands tightly around her arms. The Tower was cold with a chill that could never be warmed. A place of darkness, a place of sorrow, a place of overreaching ambition, a place of suffering and of death. Her destination. The culmination of her strange journey.

Dalamar had given her a lamp, but its feeble light could not banish the immense darkness. The glow of the lamplight did nothing more than keep her company. Yet, for that she was grateful, and she kept near the lamp. She did not regret sending Dalamar away. She had never liked, never trusted the dark elf. His sudden reappearance here in this forest of death only increased her suspicions of him. He used the dead. . . . “But then,” said Goldmoon softly, “so do I.” Amazing power . . . for a person. A mere mortal.

Goldmoon began to tremble. She had stood before in the presence of a god, and her soul remembered. But something about this was not right. . . .

The door opened, thrust aside by an impatient hand.

“I can see nothing in this wizard’s murk,” said a girl’s voice, a child’s voice whose melody sang through Goldmoon’s dreams. “We need more light.”

The light grew brighter gradually. Soft and warm, at first, the flames of a few dozen candles. The light grew brighter still, until it seemed that the limbs of the cypress trees had parted, the top of the Tower had been lifted, and sunlight poured down into the chamber.

A girl stood in the doorway. She was tall and well-muscled. She wore a chain-mail shirt, a black tunic and black hose and over that a black tabard decorated with a white death lily, the symbol of a Dark Knight. Her head was covered with a light down of red. Goldmoon would not have recognized her but for the amber eyes and the voice that sent a thrill through her body.

So terrible and wonderful was the shock that she caught hold of the table and leaned against it to support herself.

“Mina?” Goldmoon faltered, not daring to believe.

The girl’s face was suddenly illuminated, as if she were the sun, and the sun shone from within.

“You. . . you are so beautiful, Mother,” Mina said softly, awed. “You look just as I imagined.”

Sinking to her knees, the girl extended her hands. “Come, kiss me, Mother,” she cried, tears falling. “Kiss me as you used to. For I am Mina. Your Mina.”

Bewildered, her heart made whole by joy and riven by a strange and terrible fear, Goldmoon could feel nothing except the wild and painful beating of her heart. Unable to take her eyes from Mina, she stumbled forward and fell to her knees before her. She clasped the sobbing girl in her arms.

“Mina,” Goldmoon whispered, rocking her as she used to rock her when Mina woke crying in the night. “Mina. Child . . . why did you leave us, when we all loved you so much?”

Mina raised her tearstained face. The amber eyes gleamed. “I left for love of you, Mother. I left to seek what you wanted so desperately. And I found it, Mother! I found it for you.

“Dearest Mother.” Mina took hold of Goldmoon’s cold and trembling hands and pressed them to her lips. “All that I am and all that I have done, I have done for you.”

“I . . . don’t understand, child.” Goldmoon kept hold of Mina’s hands, but her eyes went to the dark armor. “You wear the symbol of evil, of darkness. . . . Where did you go? Where have you been? What has happened to you?”

Mina laughed. She glittered with happiness and excitement. “Where I went and where I have been is not important. What happened to me along the way—that is what you must hear.

“Do you remember, Mother, the stories you used to tell me? The story about how you traveled into darkness to search for the gods? How you found the gods and brought faith in the gods back to the people of the world?”

“Yes,” said Goldmoon, but the word was a breath, not spoken. She had ceased trembling and begun to shiver.

“You told me the gods were gone, Mother,” said Mina, her eyes shining like those of a child who has a delightful surprise. “You told me that because the gods were gone we had to rely on ourselves to find our way in the world. But I didn’t believe that story, Mother.

“Oh”—Mina placed her hand over Goldmoon’s mouth, silencing her—’’I don’t think you lied to me. You were mistaken, that was all. You see, I knew better. I knew there was a god, for I heard the voice of the god when I was little and our boat, sank and I was cast alone into the sea. You found me on the shore, do you remember, Mother? But you never knew how I came to be there, because I promised I would never tell. The others drowned, but I was saved. The god held me and supported me and sang to me when I was afraid of the loneliness and dark.

“You said there were no gods, Mother, but I knew you were wrong. And so I did what you did. I went to find God and bring God back to you. And I’ve done that, Mother.” Mina was flushed with joy and pride in her achievement. The amber eyes were radiant. “The miracle of the storm. That is the One God. The miracle of your youth and beauty. That is the One God, Mother.”

“You asked for this,” Goldmoon cried, lifting her hand to touch her face, the face that had always seemed strange to her. “This is not me. It is your vision of me. . . .”

“Of course, Mother.” Mina laughed delightedly. “Aren’t you pleased? I have so much to tell you that will please you. I’ve brought the miracle of healing back into the world with the power of the One God. With the blessing of the One, I felled the shield the elves had raised over Silvanesti, and I killed the treacherous dragon Cyan Bloodbane. Another truly monstrous green dragon, Beryl, is dead by the power of the One God. The elven nations, which were corrupt and faithless, have both been destroyed. In death, the elves will find redemption. Death will lead them to the One God.”

“Ah, child!” Goldmoon gasped. Casting off Mina’s hands, which had been wrapped tightly around her own, Goldmoon stared at her in horror. “I see blood on these hands. The blood of thousands! This god you have found is a terrible god. A god of darkness and evil!”

“The One God told me you would feel this way, Mother,” Mina said patiently. “When the other gods departed and you thought you were left alone, you were angry and afraid. You felt betrayed, and that was only natural. For you had been betrayed.”

Mina’s voice hardened. “The gods in which you had so misguidedly placed your faith fled in fear . . .”

“No!” Goldmoon rose unsteadily to her feet. She fell back, away from Mina, held out her hand in warding. “No, child, I don’t believe it. I won’t listen you.”

Mina followed after her, seized hold of Goldmoon’s hand. “You will listen, Mother. You must so that you will understand. The gods fled in fear of Chaos. All except one. One god remained loyal to the people she had helped to create. One only had the courage to face the terror of the Father of All and of Nothing. The battle left her weak. Too weak for her to make manifest her presence in the world. Too weak to fight the strange dragons who came to take her place. But although she could not be with her people, she gave gifts to her people to help them. The magic that they call the wild magic. The power of healing that you know as the power of the heart. . . . Those were her gifts. Her gifts to you.

“There is her sign.” Mina pointed to the heads of the five dragons that guarded the Portal.

Shuddering, Goldmoon turned. Dark and lifeless, the heads began to glow with an eerie radiance, one red, one blue, one green, one white, one black.

She moaned and averted her eyes.

“Mother,” said Mina, gently rebuking, “the One God does not ask you for thanks for these past gifts. Rest assured, she has more gifts to bestow on her faithful in the future. But she does require service, Mother. She wants you to serve her and to love her, as she has served you and loved you. Do this, Mother. Kneel down and offer your prayers of faith and thanksgiving to the One True God. The One God who remained faithful to her creation.”

“No! I don’t believe what you are telling me!” Goldmoon said through lips so stiff she could barely cause them to form the words. “You have been deceived, child. I know this One God. I know her of old. I know her tricks and her lies and deceits.”

Goldmoon looked back at the five-headed dragon, whose terrible radiance shone undimmed, for no other opposing force existed that could cloud it.

“I do not believe your lies, Takhisis!” Goldmoon cried defiantly. “I will never believe that the blessed Paladine and Mishakal left us to your mercy! You are what you have always been—a God of Evil who does not want worshipers but slaves. I will never bow down to you. I will never serve you.”

Fire flared from the eyes of the five dragons. The fire was white hot, and Goldmoon withered in the terrible heat. Her body shrank and shriveled. Her strength ebbed, and she collapsed to the floor. Her hands shook with palsy. The skin stretched tight over tendon and bone. Her arms grew thin and splotched with age. Her face wrinkled. Her beautiful silver-gold hair was white and wispy. She was an old woman, her pulse feeble, her heartbeat slowing.

“See, Mother,” Mina said and her voice was sorrowful and afraid, “see what will happen if you continue to deny the One God what is due her?”

Kneeling beside Goldmoon, Mina took hold of the old woman’s palsied hands and pressed them again to her lips. “Please, Mother. I can restore your youth. I can bring back your beauty. You can begin life all over again. You will walk with me, and together we will rule the world in the name of the One God. All you have to do is to come to the One God in humility and ask this favor of her, and it will be done.”

Goldmoon closed her eyes. Her lips did not move.

Mina bent close. “Mother,” she begged, and she sounded fearful. “Mother, do this for me if not for yourself. Do this for love of me!”

“I pray,” said Goldmoon. “I pray to Paladine and Mishakal that they forgive me for my lack of faith. I should have known the truth,” she said softly, her voice weakening as she spoke the words with her dying breath, “I pray that Paladine will hear my words, and he will come . . . for love of Mina . . . For love of all. . . .”

Goldmoon sank, lifeless, to the floor.

“Mother,” said Mina, as bewildered as a lost child, “I did this for you. . . .”