Amber and Ashes

by Margaret Weis

  The death knight was impressed by the move. Krell leaned over the board, started to move a piece, thought better of it. Drumming his gloved fingers on the chair’s carved wooden arm, he sat back and stared at the board.

  Nightshade stole a glance at Rhys. The monk was very pale, his face covered with a sheen of sweat. He sat with his right hand cradled in his left. His robes were spattered with his own blood. He made no sound, did not groan, though the pain must have been excruciating. Every so often, Nightshade heard that soft, sharp intake of breath.

  Kender are by nature easy-going folk, willing to let bygones be bygones, live and let live, turn the other cheek, never judge a book by its cover or cry over spilt milk. But sometimes they get mad. And anyone on Krynn can tell you that there is nothing in the world quite as dangerous as a kender with his dander up.

  “Here we are,” Nightshade said to himself, “risking our lives to rescue this knight, only to find out the steel-plated jackass refuses to be rescued. Well,” he stated grimly, “we’ll see about that!”

  No kender “borrowing” required. No artful sleight-of-hand, no sly maneuvering. Just a crude snatch-and-grab. Nightshade didn’t have any way to alert Rhys to the change of plans. He could only hope that his partner would take the hint, which—after all—was going to be an extremely broad one.

  Krell reached out his gloved hand to make a move. As Nightshade had anticipated, the death knight was about to pick up the dark knight piece. He was going to move Lord Ariakan.

  Nightshade lowered his head like a bull he’d seen at a fair and charged.

  ome part of Rhys was cognizant of the khas board and the pieces on it and what was going on in the game. Another part of him was not. That part of him was on the hillside, bare feet cool in the dew-sparkled green grass, the sun warm on his shoulders. He was finding it increasingly hard to stay on the hillside, though.

  Jagged flashes of agony disrupted his meditative state. Every time Krell laid his cold and fleshless hand upon Rhys, the horrible touch further depleted his strength and his will.

  According to their plan, he had several more moves to go. He would have to lose more pieces.

  Night had fallen outside. Through the window, Rhys could see the flicker of lightning on the horizon; Zeboim waiting impatiently for news.

  Inside, no fire burned, no candle flared. The board was illuminated by the red glow of Krell’s eyes. Rhys tried to focus … but he was finding it impossible to make sense of a game that had never made sense. Trying to remember what piece he was supposed to move, he was alarmed to see the black hexes rise up from the board and float a good three inches off the surface. Rhys blinked his eyes and drew in a deep breath, and the black hexes returned to their normal position.

  Krell’s fingers drummed on the chair. He leaned forward, his hand reaching for one of the dark knight pieces.

  When Nightshade first broke into a run, Rhys feared his eyes were again deceiving him. He stared at the khas piece, willing it to return to normal.

  Krell gave a startled grunt and Rhys realized that he wasn’t seeing things. Nightshade had taken the game into his own hands. The pawn was making his own move.

  Dodging in and out among the khas pieces, Nightshade barreled across the board and launched himself straight at the dark knight khas piece. The kender wrapped both arms around the legs of the blue dragon and kept going.

  Pawn and knight tumbled off the board.

  “Here now,” Krell said sternly. “That’s against the rules.”

  Rhys could not see the khas pieces, but he could hear them land on the floor, one with a clatter and the other with a yelp.

  Krell gave a low rumble of anger. His red eyes turned on Rhys.

  Snatching up his staff, holding it in both hands, Rhys rose from his chair and drove the staff with all his might into the center of the death knight’s helm, hitting Krell between the fiery eyes.

  Rhys hoped that the jab in the heavy steel helm would distract the death knight, slow him long enough for Rhys to find Nightshade and Lord Ariakan. Rhys did not anticipate doing any damage to Krell.

  But the staff was holy, blessed by Majere, the last gift of the god to his lost sheep.

  Acting on its own accord, the staff flew out of Rhys’s hands. As he stared, amazed, the staff altered form, changing into an enormous mantis, the insect sacred to the god Majere.

  The mantis was ten feet tall, with bulbous eyes and a green shell body, and six huge green legs. The huge praying mantis grasped the death knight’s head with its spiny forelegs. The mantis clamped its mandibles over Krell’s cringing spirit and began to feed off him, the jaws of the god tearing through the armor to reach the accursed soul beneath.

  Caught in the grip of the gigantic insect, Krell screamed in horror, his coward’s heart shriveling.

  Rhys whispered a quick prayer of thanksgiving to the god and knelt down swiftly to recover the khas piece and the kender. He found them easily enough, for Nightshade was jumping up and down and waving his arms and shrieking. Rhys picked up Nightshade.

  “He doesn’t want to be rescued!” the kender yelled.

  Rhys thrust Nightshade into the leather scrip, then picked up the dark knight khas piece. The pewter was hot to the touch, as though it had just come molten from the fire.

  Rhys glanced at Krell, grappling with the god, and guessed that Ariakan’s vengeance-thirsting soul would continue to remain bound to this world for a long time to come.

  Her son’s spirit was Zeboim’s concern. Rhys deposited the khas piece into the pouch, wincing at the kender’s yelp as Nightshade came into contact with the blazing metal. Rhys had no time to help. Krell was starting to recover from the first horrific shock of the mantis’s attack and was now fighting back, slugging the insect’s green body with his fists, kicking it savagely, trying to fling it off him. Rhys had to make good their escape while Krell and the mantis were still battling. Rhys hoped that the mantis would destroy Krell, but he dared not stay around to see the final outcome.

  He turned to run. He’d only taken a few steps when he realized he wouldn’t be able to run far. He was too weak.

  Gasping for breath, sick and dizzy, he staggered into the night. His legs trembled, his feet stumbled on the uneven cobblestones and he tripped over a broken stone. He was so weak he could not recover his balance. He fell forward onto his hands and knees. He tried to keep going. All he could do was pant. He was sick. He was exhausted. He was finished. He lacked the strength to run anymore, and behind him, he heard fell heavy footfalls and Krell roaring in fury.

  Rhys looked up at the starlit heavens.

  “Zeboim,” he cried, his breath torn and ragged. “Your son is safe in my possession. It is up to you now.”

  The sea rose. Gray clouds, massed on the horizon, waited for the command to attack. Rhys also waited, confident that at any moment the goddess would carry them off this island.

  A single stroke of lightning zinged from sky to ground. Striking the top of the tower, the bolt blasted off a great chunk of rock. Thunder rumbled, distant and far away. Rhys stood in the courtyard, the kender and the khas piece in his pouch.

  The death knight’s heavy boots pounded closer.

  The mantis’s horrific attack had scared Krell witless. No mortal could inflict pain on a death knight, but a god could and Krell knew agony and terror as the insect’s mandibles chomped down on his soul, as the hideous, bulbous eyes reflected back the nothingness of the death knight’s cursed existence.

  Krell had always detested bugs.

  He managed to land a few panic-stricken punches against the mantis and those were enough to dislodge it. Krell yanked his sword from its sheathe and thrust the blade into the insect’s body. Green blood oozed. The mantis’s jaws clicked horribly. Its spiny claws lashed out at him.

  Krell slashed wildly at the mantis, hitting it again and again. He struck blindly, flailing away at it, not aware of what he was hitting, only wanting the horrible bug dead, dead, dead. It took him a few momen
ts to realize he was stabbing thin air.

  Krell halted, looked fearfully around.

  The mantis was gone. The monk’s staff was there, lying on the floor. Krell lifted his foot, prepared to stomp on the staff and grind it to splinters. He held his foot poised in the air. Suppose he touched it and the bug came back? Slowly, Krell lowered his foot to the floor and edged away. Keeping as far from the staff as possible, he circled warily around it.

  Krell peered under the table. The knight piece was not there, nor was the kender.

  Krell looked at the board. The other knight piece remained, standing on its hex. He snatched it up, stared at it hopefully, then flung it from him with a bitter curse.

  The death’s knight’s view of the theft having been blocked by a giant mantis trying to eat his head, Krell had not actually seen Rhys run off with the khas piece. But the death knight had no problem figuring out what had happened. He set off in pursuit of the monk, spurred on by the dreadful knowledge of what Chemosh would do to him if he lost Ariakan.

  Krell dashed into the courtyard. He could see Rhys some distance away, running for his life. He could also see storm clouds, gray and menacing, gathering overhead. A bolt of lightning struck one of the towers. The next bolt, he had the feeling, would be aimed at him.

  “Don’t you lay a hand on me, Zeboim!” Krell bellowed, desperately dissembling. “Your monk stole the wrong khas piece. Your son is still in my possession. If you do anything to help this thief escape, Chemosh will melt down your pretty pewter boy and hammer his soul into oblivion!”

  Lightning flickered from cloud to cloud; thunder gave a low, ominous growl. The wind rose, the skies grew darker and still darker. A few spatters of rain fell, along with a couple of hail stones.

  And that was all.

  Krell chuckled and, rubbing his hands, he went after the monk.

  Rhys heard Krell’s bellow and his heart sank.

  “Zeboim!” Rhys called urgently. “He’s lying. I have your son! Take us away from here!”

  Lightning flickered. The rumble of thunder was muted. The clouds swirling about overhead were confused, unsure. The death knight raced across the parade ground. His fists clenched, his red eyes flaring, Krell advanced, incensed. When he caught Rhys, he would do more than break a few fingers.

  “Majesty,” Rhys prayed, “We risked our lives for you. Now is time for you to risk something for us.”

  Rain drizzled down in desultory ploppings all around him. The wind sighed and gave up. The clouds began to retreat.

  “Very well, Majesty,” said Rhys. He yanked the scrip from his belt. “Forgive me for what I’m about to do, but you’ve left me no choice.”

  Grasping the pouch in his one good hand, Rhys looked around, getting his bearings, judging distance. This would be his last move, use up all his remaining strength. He broke into his final sprint.

  The heavens opened. The rain fell heavily, pounding at him. Rhys ignored the goddess’s warning. She could bluster and blow and threaten all she wanted. She dared not do anything drastic to him, for he might, in truth, have her son in his possession.

  Zeboim tried blowing him off his feet. Rhys picked himself up and kept on running. She threw hail stones at his face. He flung up his arm to protect his eyes and kept going.

  Krell pounded after him. The death knight’s footfalls shook the ground.

  Rhys slipped and stumbled, his strength flagging. He did not have far to go, however. The parade ground ended in a jumble of rocks, and beyond that, the sea.

  Krell saw the danger and his pace increased.

  “Stop him, Zeboim,” Krell shouted angrily. “If you don’t, you’ll be sorry!”

  Rhys thrust the scrip containing the kender and the khas piece into the bosom of his robe and climbed out onto the jagged rocks that were wet and slick from the rain. He slipped, had to use both hands to steady himself, and he sobbed in agony from the pain of his broken fingers.

  He could hear Krell’s hissing breath behind him and feel his rage. Rhys pressed on.

  His strength was gone by the time he reached the island’s edge. He didn’t need it by then, anyway. He had only one more step to take and that would not require much energy.

  Rhys looked down. He stood at the top of a sheer cliff. Below him—far below him—the sea heaved and swelled and crashed up against the rock face. The goddess’s anger and fear lit the night until it was as bright as day. Rhys noted small details—the swirling foam, the green sweep of algae trialing off a glistening rock, floating on the surface like the hair of a drowned man.

  Rhys looked out over the ocean to the horizon, shrouded in mist and driving rain.

  Krell had reached the rocks and was blundering his way through them, cursing and swearing and waving his sword.

  Moving carefully, so as not to slip, Rhys climbed up onto a promontory extending out over the sea. He stood poised, his soul calm.

  “Hold on, Nightshade,” Rhys said. “This is going to get a little rough.”

  “Rhys!” the kender wailed, terrified. “What are you doing? I can’t see!”

  “Just as well.”

  Rhys lifted his face to heaven.

  “Zeboim, we are in your hands.”

  He stood as though on the green hill, the sheep flowing over it in a mass of white, Atta poised at his side, looking into his face, her tail wagging, waiting eagerly for the command.

  “Atta, come bye,” Rhys said and jumped.

  ight seeped from the Blood Sea’s depths, spreading ink-like through the water, drifting gently toward the surface. Mina gazed upward, watching the last vestige of flickering sunlight shimmer on the water’s surface. Then it vanished, and she was in utter darkness.

  During the hours they had spent waiting and watching the tower in the Blood Sea, she and Chemosh had seen no one enter it, no one leave. The sea creatures swam past the crystal walls as carelessly as they swam past the coral reef or the hulk of a wrecked ship lying on the ocean floors. Fish brushed up against the walls, traveling up and down the smooth surface, either finding food or entranced by their own reflections. None appeared afraid of the Tower, though Mina did notice that the sea creatures avoided the strange circlet of red-yellow gold and silver at the top. None would come near the dark hole in the center.

  With the coming of night beneath the waves, Chemosh watched to see if any lights appeared in the Tower.

  “There were windows in the Tower of Istar,” he recalled, “though you could not see them by day. All you could see was the smooth, sheer, crystal walls. When night fell, however, the wizards in their chambers would light their lamps. The Tower would gleam with pinpoints of fire. The people of Istar used to say that the wizards had captured the stars and brought them to the city for her own regal glory.”

  “The Tower must be deserted, my lord,” said Mina. She fumbled for his hand in the darkness, glad to feel his touch, hear the sound of his voice. The darkness was so absolute she was beginning to doubt her own reality. She needed to know he was with her. “There seems nothing sinister about it. The fish go right up to it.”

  “Fish are not noted for their intelligence, no matter what Habakkuk says to the contrary. Still, as you say, we’ve seen no one come near the place. Let us investigate.” He released her hand from his grasp and was gone.

  “My lord,” Mina called, reaching out to him. “My mortal eyes are blind in this murk. I cannot see you. I cannot see myself! More to the point, I cannot see where I am going. Is there some way you can light my path?”

  “Those who can see can also be seen,” said Chemosh. “I prefer to remain cloaked in darkness.”

  “Then you must guide me, Lord, as the dog guides a blind beggar.”

  Chemosh grasped her hand and pulled her swiftly through the water, making no difference between it and air. The water flowed past Mina, washing over her body. Once, tentacles brushed her arm and she jerked away. The tentacled creature did not pursue her. Perhaps she tasted bad. If Chemosh noticed the creature, he paid no a
ttention. He pressed forward, eager and impatient.

  As they drew nearer the Tower, Mina became aware that the walls were shining with a faint phosphorescence, greenish blue in color. The eerie light covered the crystal walls, giving the Tower a ghostly appearance.

  “Wait here for me,” Chemosh said, letting go her hand.

  Mina floated in the darkness, watched as the god drew near the Tower. He ran his hands over the smooth surface of the walls and peered through the crystal walls, trying to see inside.

  The crystal reflected his own image back to him.

  Chemosh craned his neck. He looked up and he looked down and around. He shook his head, profoundly perplexed.

  “There are no windows,” he said to Mina. “No doors. No way inside that I can see, yet there must be. The entrance is hidden, that is all.”

  He moved along the walls, searching with his hands as well as his eyes. She could see his silhouette, black against the green phosphorous glow. She kept him in sight as long as she could, and then he disappeared, drifting around a corner of the building.

  Mina was alone, utterly alone, as if she stood on the brink of Chaos.

  She was parched with thirst and hungry. The hunger she could endure; she’d gone without food on many long marches with her army. Thirst was a different matter. She wondered how she could be thirsty, when her mouth was filled with water, except that the water tasted of salt and the salt was increasing her thirst. She did not know how long she could survive without drinking, before the need for water would become critical and she would have to admit to Chemosh that she could no longer go on. She would have to remind him, once again, that she was mortal.

  Chemosh returned suddenly, looming out of the darkness.

  “Admittedly, it has been many centuries since I last saw this Tower, yet something about it did not look right to me. I have figured out what is wrong. At least one third of it remains buried beneath the ocean floor. That includes the entrance presumably. In the old days, a single door led inside the Tower and now that door is buried in the sand. I can find no other way—”