“I am Razor’s trainer, sir,” said the old man. “I’ve never known the Marshal to allow another person on his dragon’s back. What’s going on?”
Gerard handed over Medan’s orders. The old man stared at them with equal intensity, held the seal close to his nose to see it with what was probably his single good eye. Gerard thought for a moment that the old man was going to keep him from leaving, and he didn’t know whether to be glad or disappointed.
“Well, there’s a first time for everything,” the old man muttered and handed back the orders. He looked at Gerard’s armor, raised an eyebrow. “You’re not thinking of taking to the air in that, are you, sir?”
“I … I suppose …” Gerard stammered.
The old man was scandalized. “You’d freeze your privates off!” He shook his head. “Now if you was going into battle on dragonback, yes, you’d want all that there metal, but you’re not. You’re flying far and you’re flying fast. I have some old leathers of the Marshal’s that’ll fit you. Might be a trifle big, but they’ll do. Is there any special way you would like us to place the saddle, sir? The Marshal prefers it set just back of the shoulder blades, but I’ve known other riders who want it between the wings. They claim the flight is smoother.”
“I … I don’t really know.…” Gerard looked at the dragon, and the knowledge struck home that he was really going to have go through with this.
“By Our Queen,” stated the old man, amazed. “You’ve never sat a dragon afore, have you?”
Gerard confessed, red-faced, that he had not. “I hope it is not difficult,” he added, remembering vividly learning to ride a horse. If he fell off the dragon as many times as he fell off the horse …
“Razor is a veteran, Sir Knight,” stated the old man proudly. “He is a thorough soldier. Disciplined, obeys orders. Not temperamental like some of these blues can be. He and the general fought together as a team during the Chaos War and after. But when those freakish, bloated dragons came and began killing their own kind, the Marshal kept Razor hidden away. Razor wasn’t happy about that, mind you. The rows they had.”
The old man shook his head. He squinted up at Gerard. “I think I’m beginning to understand after all.” He nodded his wizened head. “I’ve heard the rumors that the Green Bitch was heading this way.”
He leaned close to Gerard, spoke in a loud whisper. “Don’t let on to Razor, though, sir. If he thought he’d have a chance at that green beast what killed his mate, he’d stay and fight, Marshal or no Marshal. You just take him safe away from here, Sir Knight. Good luck to the both of you.”
Gerard opened his mouth to say that he and Razor would be returning to fight just as soon as he had delivered his message, but he shut it again, fearing to say too much. Let the old man think what he wanted.
“Will … Razor mind that I am not Marshal Medan?” Gerard asked hesitantly. “I wouldn’t want to upset the dragon. He might refuse to carry me.”
“Razor is dedicated to the Marshal, sir, but once he understands that Medan has sent you, he will serve you well. This way, sir. I’ll introduce you.”
Razor listened attentively as a nearly tongue-tied Gerard haltingly explained his mission and exhibited Medan’s orders.
“Where is our destination?” Razor demanded.
“I am not permitted to reveal that, yet,” Gerard said apologetically. “I am to tell you once we are airborne. The fewer who know, the better.”
The dragon gave a shake of his head to indicate his readiness to obey. He was not the talkative sort, apparently, and after that single question, he lapsed into disciplined silence.
Saddling the dragon took some time, not because Razor in any way hindered the operation, but the act of positioning the saddle and the harness with its innumerable buckles and straps was a complex and time-consuming procedure. Gerard put on the “leathers,” consisting of a padded leather tunic with long sleeves that he pulled on over a pair of thick leather breeches. Leather gloves protected the hands. A leather cap that resembled an executioner’s hood fit over his head, protected both head and neck. The leather tunic was overlarge, the leather pants were stiff, the leather helm stifling. Gerard found it almost impossible to see out of the eye-slits and wondered why they even bothered. The insignia of the Dark Knights—the death lily and the skull—had been incorporated into the stitching of the padding.
Other than that and his sword, nothing else marked Gerard as a Dark Knight. He placed the precious letter safely in a leather pack, tied the pack tightly to the dragon’s saddle.
The sun was high in the sky by the time both dragon and rider were ready to leave. Gerard mounted the dragon awkwardly, requiring assistance from the stable hands and the dragon, who bore his incompetence with exemplary patience. Red-faced and embarrassed, Gerard had barely grasped the reins in his hand when Razor gave a galvanized leap straight into the air, powering himself upward with the strong muscles of his hind legs.
The jolt drove Gerard’s stomach down somewhere around his boots, and he held on so tightly his fingers lost all feeling and went numb. But when the dragon spread his wings and soared into the morning, Gerard’s spirit soared with him.
He had never before understood why anyone would want to be a part of a dragon-wing. He understood then. The experience of flight was exhilarating as well as terrifying. Memories came to him of childish dreams of flying like the eagles. He had even attempted to do so himself by jumping off the barn roof with arms extended, only to crash into a hayrick, nearly breaking his neck. A thrill of excitement warmed his blood and diluted the fear in his belly.
Watching the ground fall away beneath him, he marveled at the strange feeling that it was the world that was leaving him, not the other way around. He was entranced by the silence, a silence that was whole and complete, not what is termed silence by the land-bound. That silence is made up of various small sounds that are so constant we no longer hear them: the chirping of birds, the rustling of the wind in the leaves, the sound of distant voices, the murmur of brook and stream.
Gerard could hear nothing except the creak of the tendons of the dragon’s wings, and when the dragon floated on the thermals, he could not hear even that. The silence filled him with a sensation of peace, euphoria. He was no longer a part of the world. He floated above its cares, its woes, its problems. He felt weightless, as if he had shed his bulky flesh and bone. The thought of going back down, of gaining back the weight, of resuming the burden, was suddenly abhorrent. He could have flown forever, flown to the place the sun went when it set, flown to places where the moon hid.
The dragon cleared the treetops.
“What direction?” Razor shouted, his voice booming, shaking Gerard out of his reverie.
“North,” Gerard shouted. The wind rushing past his head whipped the words from his mouth. The dragon turned his head to hear better. “Solanthus.”
Razor’s eye regarded him askance, and Gerard was afraid the dragon might refuse. Solanthus was in nominally free territory. The Solamnic Knights had transformed Solanthus into a heavily fortified city, probably the most heavily fortified in all of Ansalon. Razor might very well wonder why he was being ordered to fly into an enemy stronghold, and if he didn’t like the answer he might decide to dump Gerard from the saddle.
Gerard was ready with an explanation, but the dragon explained the situation to himself.
“Ah, a reconnaissance mission,” he said and adjusted his course.
Razor maintained silence during the flight. This suited Gerard, who was preoccupied with his own thoughts, dark thoughts that cast a shadow over the beautiful panorama of the landscape sliding away far beneath him. He had spoken hopefully, positively of being able to persuade the Solamnic Knights to come to Qualinesti’s aid, but now that he was on his way, he began to doubt that he would be able to persuade them.
“Sir,” said Razor, “look below.”
Gerard looked, and his heart seemed to plummet to the ground.
“Drop down,” he orde
red the dragon. He didn’t know if he could be heard, and he accompanied his words with a gesture of his gloved hand. “I want a better view.”
The dragon swooped out of the clouds, circled slowly in a descending spiral.
“That’s close enough,” said Gerard, indicating with a gesture that the dragon was to remain stationary.
Gerard bent over the saddle, grasping it with his gloved hands, and looked out over the dragon’s left wing.
A vast army swarmed across the land, its numbers so large that it stretched like a great black snake for as far as he could see. A ribbon of blue that wound through the green forests was surely the White-rage River that formed the border of Qualinesti. The head of the black snake had already crawled over the border, was well inland.
Gerard leaned forward. “Would it be possible for you to increase your speed?” he shouted and illustrated his question with a jabbing finger, pointing north.
Razor grunted. “I can fly faster,” he shouted, “but you will not find it comfortable.”
Gerard looked down, estimating numbers, counting companies, supply wagons, gaining all the information he could. He gritted his teeth, bent in the saddle and gave the nod to proceed.
The dragon’s enormous wings began to beat. Razor lifted his head to the clouds, soared up to reach them.
The sudden acceleration pressed Gerard into the saddle. He blessed the designer of the leather helm, understood the need for the eye-slits. Even then, the rushing wind half-blinded him, brought tears to his eyes. The motion of the dragon’s wings caused the saddle to rock back and forth. Gerard’s stomach heaved. Grimly he hung on and prayed that somewhere there were gods to pray to.
6
The March on Silvanost
o one quite knew how word came to spread throughout the capital city of Silvanost that the hands of the human girl named Mina were the hands of a healer. The elves might have heard news of her from the outside world, except that they had been long cut off from the outside world, covered by the shield that had been presumably protecting them but had been, in reality, slowly killing them. No elf could say where he had first heard this rumor, but he credited it to neighbor, cousin, or passerby.
The rumor started with the fall of darkness. It spread through the night, whispered on the flower-scented night breeze, sung by the nightingale, mentioned by the owl. The rumor spread with excitement and joy among the young, yet there were those among the older elves who frowned to hear it and who cautioned against it.
Strong among these were the kirath, the elves who had long patrolled and guarded the borders of Silvanesti. These elves had watched with grief as the shield killed every living thing along the border. They had fought the cruel dream cast by the dragon Cyan Bloodbane many years ago during the War of the Lance. The kirath knew from their bitter experience with the dream that evil can come in lovely forms, only to grow hideous and murderous when confronted. The kirath warned against this human girl. They tried to halt the rumors that were spreading through the city, as fast and bright and slippery as quicksilver. But every time the rumor came to a house where a young elven mother held to her breast her dying child, the rumor was believed. The warnings of the kirath went unheeded.
That night, when the moon lifted high in the heavens, the single moon, the moon that the elves had never grown accustomed to seeing in a sky where once the silver and the red moons had swung among the stars, the guards on the gates of Silvanost looked out along the highway leading into their city, a highway of moondust, to see a force of humans marching on Silvanost. The force was small, twenty Knights clad in the black armor of the Knights of Neraka and several hundred foot soldiers marching behind. The army was a shabby one. The foot soldiers stumbled, they limped, footsore and weary. Even the Knights were afoot, their horses having died in battle or been eaten by their starving riders. Only one Knight rode, and that was their leader, a slender figure mounted on a horse the color of blood.
A thousand elven archers, armed with the storied elven longbow, legendary for its accuracy, looked down upon this advancing army, and each picked out his or her target. There were so many archers that had the order been given to fire, each one of those advancing soldiers would have been stuck full with as many arrows as there are quills on the porcupine.
The elven archers looked uncertainly to their commanders. The archers had heard the rumors, as had their commanders. The archers had sick at home: wives, husbands, mothers, fathers, children, all dying of the wasting disease. Many of the archers themselves were in the first stages of the illness and remained at their posts only through sheer effort of will. So too with their commanders. The kirath, who were not members of the elven army, stood among the archers, wrapped in their cloaks that could blend in with the leaves and trees of the forests they loved, and watched grimly.
Mina rode unerringly straight toward the silver gates, rode into arrow range unflinching, her horse carrying its head proudly, neck arched, tail flicking. At her side walked a giant minotaur. Her Knights came behind her, the foot soldiers followed after. Now within sight of the elves, the soldiers took some pains to dress their lines, straighten their backs, march upright and tall with the appearance of being unafraid, although many must have quaked and shivered at the sight of the arrow tips shining in the moonlight.
Mina halted her horse before the gate. She raised her voice, and it carried as clear and ringing as the notes of a silver bell.
“I am called Mina. I come to Silvanost in the name of the One God. I come to Silvanost to teach my elven brothers and sisters of the One God and to accept them into the service of the One God. I call upon you, the people of Silvanost, to open the gates, that I may enter in peace.”
“Do not trust her,” urged the kirath. “Do not believe her!”
No one listened, and when one of the kirath, a man named Rolan, lifted his bow and would have fired a shaft at the human girl, those standing around him struck him down so that he fell bloody and dazed to the pavement. Finding that no one paid them any heed, the kirath picked up their fallen comrade and left the city of Silvanost, retreated back to their woodlands.
A herald advanced and read aloud a proclamation.
“His Majesty the king orders that the gates of Silvanost be opened to Mina, whom His Majesty names Dragonslayer, Savior of the Silvanesti.”
The elven archers flung down their bows and gave a ragged cheer. The elven gatekeepers hastened to the gates that were made of steel and silver and magic. Though these gates looked as frail and fragile as spun cobweb, they were so bound by ancient magicks that no force on Krynn could break them, unless it was the breath of a dragon. But Mina, it seemed, had only to set her hand to the gates, and they opened.
Mina rode slowly into Silvanost. The minotaur walked at her stirrup, glowering distrustfully at the elves, his hand on his sword. Her soldiers came after, nervous, watchful, wary. The elves, after their initial cheer, fell silent. Crowds of elves lined the highway that was chalk-white in the moonlight. No one spoke, and all that could be heard was the jingle of chain mail and the rattle of armor and sword, the steady shuffling march of booted feet.
Mina had gone only a short distance, and some of the army still remained outside the gate, when she drew her horse to a halt. She heard a sound, and now she looked out into the crowd.
Dismounting, she left the highway and walked straight into the crowd of elves. The huge minotaur drew his sword and would have followed to guard her back, but she raised her hand in a wordless command, and he halted as though she had struck him. Mina came to a young elven woman trying vainly to stifle the whimperings of fretful child of about three years. It was the child’s wail that had caught Mina’s ears.
The elves drew aside to let Mina pass, flinching from her as though her touch pained them. Yet, after she had passed, some of the younger reached out hesitatingly to touch her again. She paid them no heed.
Approaching the elf woman, Mina said, speaking in Elvish, “Your baby cries. She burns with fever. What
is wrong with her?”
The mother held the child protectively in her arms, bowed her head over the little girl. Her tears fell on the child’s hot forehead.
“She has the wasting sickness. She has been ill for days now. She grows worse all the time. I fear that … she is dying.”
“Give me the child,” said Mina, holding out her hands.
“No!” The elven woman clasped the child to her. “No, do not harm her!”
“Give me the child,” said Mina gently.
The mother lifted fearful eyes and looked into Mina’s. The warm liquid amber flowed around the mother and the child. The mother handed the baby to Mina.
The little girl weighed almost nothing. She was as light as a will-o’-the-wisp in Mina’s arms.
“I bless you in the name of the One God,” said Mina, “and I call you back to this life.”
The child’s whimpering ceased. She went limp in Mina’s arms, and the elder elves drew in hissing breaths.
“She is well now,” Mina said, handing back the child to the mother. “The fever has broken. Take her home and keep her warm. She will live.”
The mother looked fearfully into the face of her child and gave a cry of joy. The child’s whimpering had ceased, and she had gone limp because she now slept peacefully. Her forehead was cool to the touch, her breathing easy.
“Mina!” the elf woman cried, falling to her knees. “Bless you, Mina!”
“Not me,” said Mina. “The One God.”
“The One God,” the mother cried. “I thank the One God.”
“Lies!” cried an elf, thrusting his way forward through the crowd. “Lies and blasphemy. The only true god is Paladine.”
“Paladine forsook you,” Mina said. “Paladine left you. The One God is with you. The One God cares for you.”
The elf opened his mouth to make an angry rejoinder. Before he could speak, Mina said to him, “Your beloved wife is not with you here this night.”
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