Brothers in Arms

by Margaret Weis

  “I know what they said!” Raistlin snapped. “They’re trying to provoke us into starting a fight. Then we’ll be the ones who get into trouble with the baron’s guards.”

  “Yeah, I guess you’re right,” said Caramon unhappily. They were out of range of the teasing now, the soldiers having found something else to amuse them. But more soldiers filled the streets, and being in high spirits, they were looking for fun, and the young men were easy targets. They were forced to endure insults and derogatory remarks at every street corner.

  “Maybe we should leave this place, Raist,” Caramon said. He had entered the city proudly, filled with excitement. Now, completely crushed, he hung his head, hunched his shoulders, and tried to make himself as small as possible. “No one wants us here.”

  “We have not come this far to give up before we start,” Raistlin returned with more confidence than he felt. “Look, my brother,” he added quietly. “We’re not alone.”

  A young man of indeterminate age, somewhere between fifteen and twenty, walked on the opposite of the street. Carrot-red hair, ragged and lanky, fell past his shoulders. His clothes were patched and too small for him; he had outgrown them but probably could not afford to purchase new. As he came near the twins, his attention fixed on Raistlin. The youngster stared at the mage with frank and open curiosity.

  A soldier emerged from a tavern, his face flushed with drink. The long carrot-red hair proved too great a temptation. The soldier reached out, grabbed hold of a hank of hair and twisted, jerking the young man backward.

  The youngster yelped and grabbed hold of his head. He must have felt as if his hair was being yanked out at the roots.

  “What have we here?” the soldier demanded, chortling.

  Wildcat was the answer.

  Moving with marvelous agility, the youngster twisted in the man’s grasp and lashed out at his molester, spitting and clawing and kicking. The attack was so savage and sudden, so completely unexpected, that the youngster landed four punches on the soldier’s face and two kicks—one to the shin and one to the knee—before the man knew what had hit him.

  “Look at that!” His drunken cohorts roared. “Rogar’s been whipped by a baby!”

  Furious, blood dribbling from a broken nose, the soldier landed a punch on the jaw that sent the youngster tumbling head over heels into the gutter.

  Straddling his victim, the enraged soldier grabbed hold of the boy’s shirt—tearing it—and yanked him, groggy and dazed and bleeding, out of the gutter. The soldier raised a meaty fist—his next blow might well kill the young man.

  “I don’t like this, Raist,” said Caramon sternly. “I think we should do something.”

  “This time I agree with you, my brother.” Raistlin was already opening one of the many small pouches that hung from his belt, pouches that held his spell components. “You take care of the bully. I will deal with his friends.”

  Rogar was intent on his prey, his friends were intent upon their wit. Rogar never saw Caramon, who loomed up from behind him, his large shadow falling over the man like a thundercloud passing before the sun, his fist landing on him like a bolt from the heavens. The soldier fell facefirst into the gutter. He would later waken with a ringing in his ears, swearing he’d been struck by lightning.

  Rogar’s two friends had their mouths open, laughing. Raistlin tossed a handful of sand into their faces, recited the words to a spell. The soldiers slumped to the street and lay there, snoring loudly.

  “Fight!” screamed a barmaid, coming to the door with a tray of mugs, which she promptly dropped with a crash.

  Soldiers clambered to their feet, jostling with each other to be first out the door, eager to join the fray. From down the street came whistles and shouts, and someone yelled that the guards were coming.

  “Let’s go!” Raistlin cried to his brother.

  “Aw, c’mon, Raist! We can handle these bastards!” Caramon’s face was flushed with pleasure. His fists clenched, he was ready to take on all comers.

  “I said, we are going, Caramon!”

  When Raistlin spoke in that tone, sharp and cold as a chunk of ice, Caramon knew better than to disobey. Reaching out, he caught hold of the youngster, who was swaying on his feet, and hauled him off as easily as if the young man had been a sack of potatoes.

  Raistlin dashed off down the street, his red robes flapping around his ankles, clutching the Staff of Magius in his hand. He could hear Caramon thudding behind him and a parcel of drunken soldiers haring along after them.

  “This way!” he yelled and, veering suddenly, made a sharp right turn and darted into a shadowy alley.

  Caramon followed. The alley opened into another bustling street, but Raistlin halted about halfway down, in front of a wall made of wooden planks. The smell of horse and hay was strong. Raistlin tossed the Staff of Magius over the wall. Caramon heaved the young man, arms and legs flying, over afterward.

  “Give me a boost!” Raistlin ordered, reaching up his hands to catch hold of the top of the wall.

  Caramon grabbed hold of his twin around his waist and boosted him with such energy that Raistlin missed his grasp and shot over the wall to land headfirst in a bale of straw. Caramon lifted himself by his hands, peered over the wall.

  “You all right, Raist?”

  “Yes! Yes! Hurry up before they see you!”

  Caramon heaved himself up and over, tumbled into the straw.

  “They went down the alley!” yelled a voice.

  The clamor came their direction. The brothers crouched deeper into the straw. Raistlin put his finger to his lips, counseling silence. The young man Caramon had rescued lay in the straw beside them, gasping quietly for breath and watching them both with bright, dark eyes.

  Booted feet stomped past the stable. Their pursuers ran by, burst into the street at the end of the alley, where someone shouted that the three had been seen heading toward the city gate.

  Raistlin relaxed. By the time the soldiers realized they had lost their prey, they would have found another tavern. As for the guards, all they cared about was restoring order, not making arrests. They would not waste their time tracking down the participants in a bar fight.

  “We are safe now,” Raistlin was about to say, when dust from the dry straw flew into his mouth and set him coughing.

  The spasm was a bad one, doubling him over in pain. He was thankful the attack had not struck him as he was fleeing, wondered vaguely that he had been able to run with such ease, run without even thinking about his infirmity.

  Both Caramon and the young man they had rescued watched Raistlin anxiously.

  “I am all right!” Raistlin gasped, striking away his brother’s solicitous hand. “It’s this blasted straw! Where’s my staff?” he demanded suddenly, looking for it and not finding it. A pang of unreasoning terror constricted his heart.

  “Here it is,” said the young man, squirming and fishing for something beneath him. “I think I’m sitting on it.”

  “Don’t touch it!” Raistlin demanded in a half-choked voice, lunging forward and thrusting out his hand.

  Startled, recoiling from the mage as if he’d been a striking snake, the young man—wide-eyed—moved his hand away from the staff.

  Raistlin clutched at it, and only when he had the staff safely in hand did he relax.

  “I am sorry if I startled you,” Raistlin said gruffly, clearing his throat. “The staff is quite valuable. We should leave here before someone comes. Are you all right?” he asked the young man curtly.

  The young man glanced over his legs and arms, wiggled his fingers and his bare toes. “Nothing broken. Just a split lip. And I’ve had worse than this from Pa,” he added cheerfully, wiping away blood.

  Caramon peered out the front of the horse stall. A long line of stalls stretched off in both directions, another row stood across from them. About half the stalls were filled. Horses snorted and snuffled and shuffled their feet, munched hay. In the stall across from theirs, a big bay companionably rubbe
d heads with a chestnut. Sparrows flew in and out of the eaves, darting into the stalls to snitch a bit of straw for nest repair.

  “No one around,” Caramon reported.

  “Excellent. Caramon, pick the hay out of your hair.”

  Raistlin brushed off his robes, the young man assisting him helpfully. After a brief inspection, Raistlin pronounced them in suitable condition to leave. Caramon took one more look, then the three emerged from the stall and walked along the row of horses.

  “I really miss Nightsky,” said Caramon, heaving a sigh. The sight and smell of horses brought back his loss. “He was a great horse.”

  “How did he die?” asked the young man in sympathetic tones.

  “He didn’t,” Raistlin said. “We sold our horses to have money to buy our passage across New Sea. Ah,” he added loudly, “thank you for allowing us to look around, sir!”

  A stable hand clad in leather breeches and homespun shirt was leading two horses, saddled and bridled, out of their stalls. Two men, well dressed, waited in the stable yard. The stable hand came to a dead stop on seeing the odd-looking trio.

  “Hey, what the—”

  “We saw nothing we liked,” Raistlin said, waving his hand. “I thank you all the same. Caramon, give the man something for his trouble.”

  With a courteous nod, Raistlin passed by the stable hand, who stared at them open-mouthed.

  “Here you are, my good man,” said Caramon, handing over one of their precious coins with as much nonchalance as if he scattered gold through the streets on a daily basis.

  The three sauntered out of the stables. The stable hand glanced at his coin suspiciously and, finding it good, thrust it into a pocket with a grin.

  “Come again!” he called out loudly. “Anytime!”

  “There goes a night’s lodging,” Caramon said gloomily.

  “Worth the price, my brother,” Raistlin returned. “Otherwise we might have lodged in the baron’s dungeons.” He cast a sidelong glance from out his hood at the young man who walked alongside them.

  In Raistlin’s cursed vision, the young man seemed to wither and age and die as Raistlin watched. But as the flesh melted from the bones and the skin stretched taut, Raistlin detected some interesting features in the young man’s face. A thin face, far too thin and older than the boy’s years, which Raistlin guessed at about fifteen. He had a thin body, an oddly constructed body. The young man was short, he came to about Raistlin’s shoulder. Fine-boned hands hung from large wristbones, his bare feet were small for his height. His clothes were worn and ill assorted, but they were clean—at least they had been before he’d landed in a gutter and hidden in a stable. Now that he came to think of it, Raistlin noticed that all of them bore a distinct odor of manure and horse piss.

  “Caramon,” Raistlin announced, pausing at the door to a likely-looking tavern, “the unaccustomed exercise has made me hungry. I propose that we stop for supper.”

  Caramon stared, gaping, at his brother. Never in their twenty-one years together had he ever heard his twin—who didn’t eat enough to keep a good-sized cricket alive—say that he was hungry. Admittedly, it had been a long time since Caramon had seen his twin run like that; in fact, he couldn’t recall ever having seen Raistlin run anywhere. Caramon was about to say something expressive of his astonishment when he saw Raistlin’s eyes narrow, a frown line crease his brow.

  Caramon knew immediately that something was going on, something beyond his comprehension and that he was not to do or say anything that might imperil the situation.

  “Uh, sure, Raist,” Caramon said, gulping, adding weakly, “This seems like a decent enough place.”

  “I guess this is good-bye, then. Thanks for the help,” said the young man, holding out his thin hand to each of them. He cast a wistful glance at the tavern. The smell of fresh-baked bread and smoked meats filled the air. “I’m here to join the army. Perhaps we’ll see each other again.” Shoving his hands in his pockets, his empty pockets, he stared down at his feet. “Well, good-bye. Thanks again.”

  “We are here to join the baron’s army, as well,” Raistlin said. “Since we are all strangers in town, we could dine together.”

  “No, thanks, I couldn’t,” said the young man. He stood straight, his head tossed back. Pride flushed his thin cheeks.

  “You would be doing my brother and me a great favor,” Raistlin said. “We have traveled a long distance, and we grow weary of each other’s company.”

  “That’s true enough!” said Caramon enthusiastically. A little too enthusiastically. “Raist and I, we sure do get tired of talking to each other. Why, only the other day—”

  “That will do, Brother,” Raistlin said coldly.

  “C’mon,” said Caramon, putting his arm around the young man’s shoulders, the big man’s arm practically swallowing him up. “Don’t worry about money. You’ll be our guest.”

  “No, please, really—” The young man stubbornly stood his ground. “I don’t want charity. …”

  “It’s not charity!” Caramon said, looking shocked at the mere suggestion. “We’re brothers-in-arms now. Men who’ve spilt blood together share everything. Didn’t you know that? It’s an old Solamnic tradition. Who knows? Maybe next time Raist and I won’t have any money, and then it’ll be your turn to take care of us.”

  The young man’s face flushed again, this time with shy pleasure. “Do you mean that? Are we really brothers?”

  “Sure we are. We’ll take the oath. What’s your name?”

  “Scrounger,” said the young man.

  “That’s an odd sort of name,” Caramon said.

  “It’s my name, nonetheless,” the young man returned cheerfully.

  “Oh, well. Each to his own.” Caramon drew his sword, lifted it solemnly, the hilt in the air. His voice was deep and reverent. “We have spilt blood together. By Solamnic tradition, we are bound closer than brothers. What you have is mine. What I have is yours.”

  “That may be truer than you know, Brother,” Raistlin said wryly, plucking at Caramon’s sleeve as the three entered the tavern with Scrounger in the lead. “In case you hadn’t noticed, our new young friend is part kender.”

  11

  THE TAVERN, LOCATED ON A SIDE STREET, WAS KNOWN AS THE Swelling Ham and featured a pink and apoplectic-looking pig on its hinged sign. To judge by the smell, the Swelling Ham had only one thing to recommend it and that was the cheap prices, which were posted on a board in the window.

  The Swelling Ham attracted a poorer crowd than the more prosperous taverns along the main street. There were few veterans, only those who had squandered their earnings, but many hungry hopefuls. Caramon looked over the crowd carefully before entering, saw no one who looked familiar, and pronounced it safe to enter.

  The three found seats at a dirty table. Caramon was forced to appropriate a chair, first removing a slumbering drunk from it and depositing him on the floor. The barmaids, busy and distracted, let the drunk lie, stepping either on him or over him. One of the barmaids hurled three bowls of ham and beans in their direction and left to draw two ales for Caramon and Scrounger and a glass of wine for Raistlin.

  “My mother was a kender,” said Scrounger readily, talking between mouthfuls of white beans and ham and corn bread. “Or at least mostly kender. I think there was human blood in her somewhere, for she was like me, she looked more human than she did kender. If there was human blood in her, she didn’t let it hinder her. She was kender through and through. Like everything else in her life, she had no idea how she came by me. That tasted really good.” He shoved aside his empty bowl regretfully.

  Raistlin passed his bowl, still full, to the young man.

  “No, thank you.” Scrounger shook his head.

  “Take it. I am finished,” Raistlin said. He had eaten only three mouthfuls. “It would go to waste otherwise.”

  “Well, if you’re sure you don’t want any more …” Scrounger seized the bowl, scooped up a large spoonful of beans, and chewed on i
t with a deep sigh of satisfaction. “I can’t tell you when I’ve eaten anything that tastes this good!”

  The beans were underdone, the ham rancid, the bread moldy. Raistlin cast an expressive glance at his brother, who was devouring his food with as much gusto as Scrounger. Caramon paused with the spoon to his mouth. Raistlin jerked his head at the young man.

  Caramon looked stricken. “Ah, but, Raist …”

  Raistlin’s eyes narrowed.

  Caramon sighed. “Here you go,” he said, shoving his half-full bowl over to the young man. “I ate a big lunch.”

  “Are you sure?”

  Caramon eyed the bowl sadly. “Yes, I’m sure.”

  “Gee, thanks!” Scrounger started in on his third bowl. “What were we talking about?”

  “Your mother,” Raistlin prompted, sipping at his wine.

  “Oh, yeah. Mother had sort of a vague memory of a human having been kind to her once, but she couldn’t remember where or when or even his name. She didn’t know I was coming until one day I just popped out. She was never so surprised in her life. But she thought it was great fun, having a baby, and she took me with her, only sometimes she’d forget about me and leave me behind. But people would always find me and run after her to return me. She was glad to have me back, though I think that sometimes she didn’t exactly remember who I was. When I got older, I used to return myself, which worked out fine.

  “Then one day, when I was eight, I guess, she left me outside an herb shop to wait for her while she went in to try to sell the herbalist some mushrooms we’d found. We’d walked a long way that day. It was warm and sunny outside the shop, and I fell asleep. The next thing I knew, Mother was running out of the shop, with the shopkeeper yelling that they weren’t mushrooms, they were toadstools and that she was going to poison him.

  “I tried to keep up with her, but mother had a good head start, and I lost sight of her. The shopkeeper quit the chase and came back, cursing, for it seems that Mother had made off with a jar of cinnamon sticks in the bargain. I was going to follow her, but when the shopkeeper saw me, he was so mad that he knocked me down. I hit my head on a door stoop, and when I woke up it was night and Mother was long gone. I looked for her all along the road, but I never did find her.”