Exhaustion claimed Faeterus and Favaronas immediately after their arrival. Unfortunately Faeterus didn’t rest long. He kicked Favaronas awake only an hour or so after sunrise then set him to collecting various items with no explanation of their purpose. As Favaronas gathered loose stones and long tree branches, he watched his captor.
Seemingly from nowhere (for he carried no baggage), Faeterus produced a surveyor’s transit and a slender tripod. He set it up, carefully aligning it with the far-off Tympanum. Then he moved from spot to spot, making notes on a piece of parchment with a small charcoal stick. He continued for so long that Favaronas, having gathered the required amount of stones and branches, settled himself out of the way and slept.
Thankfully, Faeterus had no immediate need of him, and be was able to rest for several hours before the sorcerer woke him again. When Faeterus did rouse him, the sorcerer sounded almost genial.
“Stand up,” he said. “Behold a wonder no other living soul has seen in four thousand years!”
Obediently, Favaronas got to his feet. The sun was low over the western peaks, the brilliant disk suspended between a thick layer of clouds above and the gray mountains below. Its light gave the valley a deep golden sheen. Shielding his eyes against the glare of the low sun, Favaronas could see the Tympaflum in the valley’s heart glowing with reflected sunlight. A pretty sight to be sure, but surely not what the sorcerer had worked so hard to witness. Yet Faeterus stood transfixed. Perhaps only mages could see whatever it was that-
Favaronas gasped.
As the sun descended further, the monoliths throughout Inath-Wakenti began to shine vividly red. The thousands of stone blocks blazed like a mosaic of fire. The sun sank further, and the reflected glory became so intense that Favaronas was forced to put a hand over his eyes and view the scene through gaps in his fingers. His squinted eyes teared up, bringing on the final revelation.
When the individual points of crimson light blurred together, they formed an image. Not a picture, not writing, but some sort of gigantic hieroglyphic symbol. He could not see it very well. Looking at the array of shining monoliths was like trying to stare directly at the noonday sun. But he had an impression of a complex interweaving of wavy lines and single points. Oddly enough, it reminded him of Silvanesti musical notation but far removed from that ancient art.
The effect lasted only a few seconds. The sun continued its downward journey, and the blazing hieroglyph faded, leaving only a forest of faintly glowing stones. The line of twilight encroached on the valley floor, slowly submerging the monoliths in shadow.
“Amazing,” Favaronas breathed. “Does this occur every year on this date?”
The sorcerer flicked a contemptuous look at him. “Barring clouds, it occurs at every sunset, but it is visible only from this exact point in the valley.”
That seemed unlikely to Favaronas, knowing what he did about the movement of celestial bodies during the course of a year, but Faeterus’s next words explained the discrepancy: magic was at work.
“The glory of the sign,” the sorcerer said, “is not a natural occurrence, and no mortal mind can retain its detail. I must make an impression of it when it appears. It is the key to my quest.”
The apparition’s words echoed in Favaronas’s memory:
Seize the keg before tire door opens.
Faeterus gave him new instructions. He wanted a small fire kindled at a particular spot on the Stair. Favaronas scurried away to gather tinder. He made several trips, dumping fistfuls of dry leaves and twigs by a waist-high block of dark blue basalt. The block had a shallow depression in its top. While FavatOflas fetched and carried, Faeterus produced tiny flasks and small suede bags from inside his ponderous robes. These he arranged atop the stone block, then added a large, shiny coin and a small trinket on a chain. Favaronas managed to pass close enough to identify the coin as a Khurish begon, a silver piece whose name meant “loaf of bread.” The trinket and chain carried the black patina of tarnish, and the archivist deduced it must be silver too. it resembled a four-footed animal, perhaps a cat.
When Favaronas had the fire burning, Faeterus ordered him to find water. Favaronas’s stomach chose that moment to offer a loud grumble. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d eaten.
“Care to share my fare, elf spawn?”
Favaronas looked away from the mocking voice and blank hood and went to search for water.
They’d passed no springs on their ascent. He’d have to go higher. With much puffing, he climbed the steep slope behind the Stair. The sun was down, and the growing dark made his quest all the more difficult. He poked among thorny shrubs and peered under rock ledges. All he found were patches of leathery lichen.
Pausing to rest, he looked down on the Stair. The notion of escape was alluring, but be couldn’t muster the nerve. Faeterus was in no better physical shape than he and likely couldn’t catch him if it came to a foot race. But the sorcerer might hurl a thunderbolt at him or blind him or lame him. Favaronas shuddered at the possibilities his imagination conjured. If a warrior had stood in his place, that worthy might have found an opportunity to escape or to kill his captor. Favaronas was no warrior.
It wasn’t only fear that held him back. Weak and beaten as he was, he still clung to a faint hope that he could foil Faeterus’s evil machinations. Perhaps he might yet be able to serve his people.
A force tugged on the hem of his robe, pulling him off balance and forcing him to scrabble wildly to avoid a fall. The invisible hand of Faeterus beckoned. Favaronas hurried back down the mountainside and reported his failure to find water.
“A pity. I’ll have to use the drinking supply.”
Favaronas’s throat was terribly dry, but he maintained a prudent silence.
The sorcerer was grinding powders in the hollow atop the basalt block. The tarnished silver necklace and the begon sat in a shallow pan. Into the pan, he poured liquid from a pottery flask. The silver items hissed and bubbled, sending an ugly stench into the evening air. Some sort of vitriol. Favaronas edged upwind from it.
The contents of their only water bottle went into the pot. Faeterus sprinkled in the powders he’d mixed then added the hissing, stinking contents of the shallow pan. The vitriol had completely dissolved the silver coin and necklace.
A light breeze had come up, and the fire wavered. A sharp command from Faeterus sent Favaronas hurrying to add more wood.
Faeterus next produced a parchment, one very long, continuous sheet. “Set the pot by the fire,” he said. “Stoke the flames to medium intensity. And mind what you do! Spill that pot, and you’ll die right now!”
Favaronas placed the pot carefully next to the fire. The corrosive mixture continued to swirl as if stirred by an unseen hand. Its noxious fumes set Favaronas to coughing. Faeterus pointed a finger at him, and the archivist was horrified to feel his lips seal themselves shut again. He inhaled and exhaled rapidly through his nose and retreated to the far side of the platforms but Faeterus wasn’t done with him. The finger pointed again, and Favaronas’s legs fused at the ankles. As with his mouth, there was no outward trace of a seam. His ankles were welded together as though he’d been born that way. Caught completely by surprise, he lost his balance and fell.
The scroll proved long enough to stretch from one side of the Stair to the other. Unrolling it, Faeterus made use of the stones and tree branches Favaronas had collected. At intervals along the parchment’s length, he erected the spindly branches, supporting each with a pile of stones. He lifted the parchment, turned it on its edge, and wove it in and out of the natural forks in the branches. With a scrap of cloth from his robe and a short branch, he fashioned a makeshift swab and dipped it into the liquid simmering by the fire. He painted the liquid onto the upright sheet of parchment, covering only the side facing the valley. Then he settled himself by the dying fire.
“Now we shall see what we shall see.”
A wave of his hand brought Favaronas’s eyelids down and sealed them. That was a new horr
or. Blind, mouthless, hobbled, Favaronas screamed against his own flesh until he could scream no more.
Chapter 15
The sun bathed the city in gentle, golden warmth. Trees spread their shading canopies over broad streets and slender paths. Towers and other buildings rose above the trees, not competing with them, but coexisting in close harmony. Warm stone set off green leaves that exactly matched the green copper sheathing on the tower roofs. Four especially tall towers rose from the city’s outer corners. Arching crystalline bridges, delicate as lace, connected the four towers and enclosed the city like a glittering crown.
From the lofty vantage point of the palace’s highest terrace, Qualinost seemed unreal in its serenity and impossible beauty. Gilthas stood alone on the terrace, looking out on the city he ruled. He was filled with such peace, he felt his heart would burst from the sheer joy of it. He would be content to remain here forever, drinking in that view. He’d read once that when the emperors of old Ergoth passed away, their bodies were converted by magic into stone statues. Perhaps when his life drew to a close, he could become a statue, and be placed here, forever overlooking the city and its people.
Smiling, he chided himself for such morbid thoughts. A Speaker’s duty was to the living. However much he wished to linger, matters of state would not wait. He delayed only a moment longer, drinking in the blue of the sky and the infinite varieties of green in the trees, breathing deeply of the scents of jasmine and orange blossom carried by the breeze. Finally, like a reluctant swain, he turned away, his fingers reaching out for one last touch of the smooth wood of the balcony’s railing.
The palace was alive with activity. Servants moved swiftly through side corridors bearing food and drink, hampers of linen, or pots of living flowers. In the main passages, soldiers of the royal guard kept watch as all manner of people strolled the elegant halls. The Speaker’s daily audience would commence soon, and favor-seekers already were jockeying for position.
From the seaside provinces came mariners wearing wide canvas pants and carrying rolled-up maps. They wanted royal backing for trading voyages to distant lands. A pair of emissaries from Thorbardin and a trio from Ergoth stood in private conclave. The two dwarves were unrelated to each other yet alike as mirror images: each with a thick, brown beard, bulbous nose, and green eyes. The Ergothians retained an air of imperial hauteur even though their empire had long since fragmented into insignificance. Solamnic Knights, broad shouldered and perpetually serious, conversed in measured tones with lavishly dressed merchants from Palanthas.
Gilthas nodded and smiled to everyone but received little recognition in return. He was accustomed to that. To the world, he was a fool and a dreamer, dismissed as the Puppet King, his strings controlled by Prefect Palthainon. Ostensibly the Speaker’s advisor, Palthainon had been installed by the Knights of Neraka as the true power in Qualinesti. The ease with which everyone accepted Gilthas in the weakling’s role had worried him at first. He knew the unspoken reason most believed him to be a dupe: he was not a pureblooded elf. His father, valiant Tanis, had been half human. Although Gilthas’s pedigree was otherwise impeccable, many assumed his seemingly pliant nature sprang from the human taint.
He put aside this worry. The Puppet King was a masquerade, a necessary one if he were to save his people. Someday the world would know the truth. Someday they would see his true self. A very different Gilthas would lead the elves of Qualinesti to peace, freedom, and plenty.
The reactions of strangers no longer bothered him. However, when several important senators passed him by without speaking, he was perturbed. When his long-time bodyguard and valet Planchet strolled by without so much as a nod, perturbation grew into anger. He turned and hailed Planchet, but his staunch friend did not even turn around.
“He cannot hear you.”
Someone was standing in the shadow of one of the columns that supported the high ceiling. He stepped into the light, I showing himself to be an elf of above-average height. He had dark blond hair and the elegantly tall ears common among the oldest families of Silvanesti. Gilthas was taken aback. No one from Silvanost had come to his court in a very long time. More unusual still, the visitor was dressed in a curiously old- fashioned style, like a warrior from one of Silvanesti’s epic poems. He wore a banded cuirass, separated pauldrons on each shoulder, and a mail kilt rather than divided trews. Short suede gloves covered his hands. His eyes were an arresting shade of blue. Gilthas had never seen such brilliant eyes in an elf, even a Silvanesti.
“Who are you?”
The stranger bowed, bending deeply from the waist. “Greetings, Great Speaker. My name is Balif, Lord of Thalas-bec and First Warrior of House Protector.”
“You bear an ancient name, my lord. I thought it had fallen out of favor long ago among the Silvanesti.”
Lord Balif smiled. “It did indeed.”
Gilthas gestured at the throng behind him. “What goes on here? Why am I being ignored?”
“They aren’t ignoring you. They cannot see or hear you.”
Gilthas demanded the reason for this. Had a spell been used to render him invisible? He wanted it stopped immediately and the proper order restored. Balif shrugged.
“I cannot change what has been. I have come to guide you. I sought the privilege, and it was granted.”
“Guide me where? Speak plainly, sir!”
Sadness shadowed those remarkable eyes. “I am Balif, right arm of Speaker Silvanos. Do you understand? I am he who enlarged the realm, carried the standard of Silvanos to the great mountains of the north, fought-”
Gilthas’s laughter interrupted him. “It will take more than antique armor and a quaint accent to convince me of such nonsense. What’s the matter, couldn’t Kith-Kanan come?” Gilthas joked.
“No, he could not,” was the utterly serious reply. “You shall meet him, if you wish. He is an elf among elves.”
It was too much. Gilthas dismissed the mad fellow with a wave and walked away. “Play your games with someone else. I have a kingdom to tend.”
“No, you don’t.”
Gilthas’s smile faltered and he looked back. “What did you say?”
“This kingdom no longer exists. As we speak, you lie dying on a pallet in the Vale of Silence.”
Despite the outrageous words, Gilthas did not laugh. The calm certainty in the stranger’s voice gave him pause. But the palace was solid around him, the faint breeze of a courtier’s passage ruffled his hair, and he clung to the reality he saw.
“If you’re Balif, why do you look so fair? The champion of Silvanos was afflicted with a terrible curse and died in exile.”
“My mortal life ended long ago. My appearance is as I choose it to be, just as yours is. You appear now in vigorous good health, but in truth, you’re little more than skin and bones, and you can scarcely draw a breath, your lungs are so devastated.”
Denying all of it, Gilthas made to turn away again, but Balif took his arm. With gentle yet inexorable pressure, Gilthas’s hand was lifted to his own throat. The pulse beating there was indeed very slow, very labored.
“Your life is ebbing. When it is done, you may accompany me to the next world.”
“And if I refuse?”
“Then you will wander the land forever, another of the restless spirits in the Vale of Silence.”
Gilthas remembered the terrible loneliness he had sensed from the ghosts in the valley. That memory brought with it all the others. His beloved city, the palace, all these people-they were not products of magic, but illusions of his own making. His city had been wiped from the face of Krynn. Alone and gravely ill, his mind had sought a last few moments of peace before succumbing to death.
“This is not how I expected to die,” he whispered.
“It rarely is. Come.”
Gilthas avoided Balif’s outstretched hand but followed the Silvanesti into the throne room. Empty of people, the room was nothing more than an echo in his mind, a faint replica of something lost forever. Balif craned
his neck back, taking in the hall’s mighty dimensions and the gold and polished crystal columns that soared up to a vaulted ceiling painted to mimic the summer sky.
“Beautiful,” he said, like anyone new to the grandeur of Qualinost.
“It was.” Tears dampened Gilthas’s cheeks. “May I ask something?”
“You may ask. I may not answer.”
“Why is your fate such a mystery? You were among the greatest elves of the age. Why were you cast into such obscurity?”
The handsome Silvanesti regarded him with such a fixed stare Gilthas wondered if he had given offense.
“You’re embarking on a journey into the unknown, and that is the question burning inside you?” Balif said.
Gilthas shrugged, embarrassed. “I’ve always wondered.”
Balif told the story of his rise, his fall, and his life after that fall. Much of it fit the rumors and speculations to which the Speaker of the Sun and Stars was privy, but the cause and final outcome of Balif’s exile shocked him to his core. He looked away, at the floor, the columns, anywhere but at the shade of the ancient hero.
“I pity you,” he said.
“Once you pass out of the mortal sphere, life’s concerns are mere vanities and completely unimportant. As it was with me, so it will be with you. Come, little time remains.”
The throne of Qualinesti stood on its dais, bathed in golden light. Its gilded back, carved in the shape of the sun, reflected the light with painful intensity. Balif held out a hand to the empty chair.
“That is your portal, Speaker of the Sun and Stars. You have but to take it, and all your cares shall end.”
All his cares would end. It was a notion both comforting and terrifying. Gilthas didn’t want to die, didn’t want to leave Kerianseray. And there was so much left undone. A brave, suffering people looked to him for leadership. But he was so sick. Illusion or not, the feeling of drawing an unencumbered breath was intoxicating. He felt young and healthy, just as be should. All he need do was sit his throne and the struggle would be over.
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