Brothers in Arms

by Margaret Weis

  The young are made of dreams.

  Peering through the slight part in the tent flap opening, Raistlin could catch just a glimpse of red by the light of a dip set in a bowl of perfumed oil. He heard the sound of what seemed hissing breath. He had regained his composure, was prepared to represent himself as cool and competent and professional. Raistlin shifted the basket with the chicken and dumplings onto the arm that was also holding the Staff of Magius and knocked on the tent post with his free hand.

  “Is that you, worm?” came a deep voice from within the tent. “If so, quit shaking the tent and come inside and make your report. What did you find in that damn temple?”

  Raistlin was in an extremely awkward situation. He had to admit that he was not the expected “worm” and, from that unpropitious start, go on to introduce himself. Worse, he felt his lungs starting to clog. He made a desperate attempt to clear his throat with a single, harsh cough, and decided to pretend he hadn’t heard.

  “Excuse me for disturbing you, Master,” he called, thankful to feel the smothering sensation in his lungs recede. “My name is Raistlin Majere. I am a red-robed wizard connected with the army of Baron Ivor Langtree. I have with me various scrolls, magical artifacts, and potions. I’ve come to see if you might be interested in making a trade.”

  “Go to the Abyss.”

  Considerably taken aback by the rude remark, Raistlin stared at the tent post in speechless amazement. Whatever he had expected, it wasn’t this.

  He had never met the wizard, not even the powerful and puissant Par-Salian himself, who would pass up an opportunity to acquire new magic. Curiosity alone would have had any wizard of Raistlin’s acquaintance barging out of that tent to rummage through the scroll cases and bag of artifacts. Perhaps the Red Robe wasn’t in the market for trading. But, damn it, at the very least, the man should be interested to see what Raistlin had brought with him.

  Raistlin risked peeping inside the tent, hoping to see the wizard. The Red Robe was leaning back in his chair, apparently, for he was lost in the shadows.

  “Perhaps you did not understand me, Master,” Raistlin said, speaking with the utmost respect. “I have brought with me many magical items, some of which are quite powerful, in hopes that you—”

  He heard a sound as of a kettle boiling over, an angry rustling of robes and suddenly the tent flap jerked aside. A face—livid, with glaring red eyes—thrust out of the tent. Anger like a hot wind struck Raistlin, caused him to retreat a step.

  “Leave me in peace,” the Red Robe snarled, “or, by the Dark Queen, I’ll send you to the Abyss myself—”

  The Red Robe’s glaring red eyes widened in shock. The furious oath died on his lips. The wizard glared, not at Raistlin, but at the staff in Raistlin’s hands. As for Raistlin, he gazed intently at the wizard. Neither spoke a word, both were struck dumb, each seeing something he had not expected.

  “Why are you staring at me!” the wizard demanded.

  “I might ask the same question, sir!” Raistlin countered, shaken.

  “I’m not staring at you, worm,” Immolatus growled, and that was true enough. He had barely glanced at the human. The dragon’s gaze was riveted upon the staff.

  Immolatus’s first dragonish impulse was simply to snatch the staff and incinerate the human. His fingers twitched, the words of the spell flared in his throat, burned on his tongue. He resisted the impulse, after a struggle. Killing the human would invite unwanted attention, require tedious explanations, and leave a blackened, greasy mark on the ground outside his tent. Most important in his decision to allow the human to live—at least temporarily—was the dragon’s curiosity about the staff. One could not gain information from a greasy spot on the grass.

  Immolatus realized, much to his ire, that in order to find out the answers to the questions boiling in his mind he would actually have to be—what was the word uth Matar was always using? “Diplomatic.” He would have to be diplomatic in his dealings with the human. Difficult to manage when what Immolatus really wanted to do was to rip open the creature, yank out its brain, and pick through it with a sharpened foreclaw.

  “You had better come inside,” Immolatus muttered and he actually considered that a gracious invitation.

  Raistlin remained where he was standing, outside the tent. He had grown accustomed to his accursed eyesight, to looking at the world through the spell-laden eyes, which saw all things as they were affected by time, saw youth wither, saw beauty brought to dust. Looking at this man, who was, perhaps, in his early forties, Raistlin should have seen the Red Robe wrinkled and elderly. What Raistlin saw was a blurred portrait, two faces instead of one, two faces in a botched painting, as if the artist had allowed all the colors to run together.

  One face was the face of a human wizard. The other face was more difficult to see, but Raistlin had a fleeting impression of red, vibrant red, glittering red. There was something reptilian about the man, something reptilian about his second face.

  Raistlin had the feeling that if he could just focus on that second face, he would see it clearly and understand what he saw. But every time he tried to concentrate, the second face flowed into the lines of the first.

  Two faces, he noticed, yet both regarded him with a single pair of red-flame eyes. The man was dangerous, but then all wizards are dangerous.

  Wary, cautious, Raistlin accepted the invitation to enter the tent for exactly the same reason that he’d been invited. Curiosity.

  The Red Robe was tall and thin, his clothes rich and expensive. He walked to a small camp table, sat down in a folding chair and made an abrupt gesture at the table. His movements were both graceful and awkward at the same time, rather like the blurred double image of the face. Small movements—the flutter of the long fingers, for example, or the slight inclination of the head—were performed easily and with fluid motion. Larger movements—seating himself in the chair—were clumsy, as if he were unaccustomed to such motions and had to stop to think about what he was doing.

  “Let’s see what you’ve brought,” Immolatus said.

  Absorbed in trying to sort out this mystery, Raistlin did not respond. He stood and stared, clutching the basket and the scroll cases and the staff.

  “Why in the Abyss do you look at me with those freakish eyes of yours?” Immolatus demanded irritably. “Have you come to deal or not? Let us see what you have.” He tapped impatiently on the table with the long, sharp nail of a forefinger.

  Actually there was only one artifact in the tent in which Immolatus was truly interested and that was the staff. But he needed to find out a few things about it first, most especially—how much did the human know about what he held? To look at him, not much. Certainly not like the first human Immolatus had met who had wielded that staff. Immolatus ground his teeth at the memory.

  Raistlin lowered his gaze, ignored the insult about his eyes. He could have made a few choice remarks about this man’s appearance had he chosen. He refrained. The wizard was his elder and his better, no question about that. Raistlin felt himself standing in the center of a veritable vortex of magical power. The magic whirled and crackled and sparked around him and all of that power emanated from this man. Raistlin had experienced nothing like this magical storm before, not even in the presence of the Head of the Conclave. He was humbled and consumed with envy and resolved to learn from this man or perish in the attempt.

  In order to have both hands free to divest himself of the trade goods, Raistlin leaned the Staff of Magius against the small camp table.

  Immolatus’s hand snaked across the table toward it.

  Raistlin saw the move and dropped the basket. He caught hold of the staff, stood clutching it close to his body.

  “A fine walking staff,” said Immolatus, baring his teeth in what he meant for a friendly, disarming smile. “How did you come by it?”

  Raistlin had no intention of discussing the staff and so he pretended he had not heard. Keeping fast hold of the staff in one hand, he spread out the scrolls
, the artifacts, unpacked the jars of potions, much like a peddler at a fair.

  “We have several very interesting items, sir. Here is a scroll captured from a Black Robe whom we have reason to believe was of extremely high rank and here is—”

  Immolatus thrust out his arm and swept all the objects—scrolls, potions, basket, and crock—off the table. “There is only one magical item I am interested in obtaining,” he said, and his gaze went to the staff.

  The scroll cases rolled under the table, the artifacts scattered in every direction. The crock crashed to the hard-packed ground and broke, splashing chicken broth on the hem of Raistlin’s robes.

  “This is one magical artifact which I have no intention of trading, sir,” Raistlin said, holding on to the staff so tightly that the muscles of his hand and forearm began to ache with the strain. “Some of the rest of these are quite powerful—”

  “Bah!” Immolatus seethed. He rose to his feet with a twist of his body, uncoiling, not standing. “I have more power in my little finger than is contained in any one of the paltry trinkets you have the temerity to try to palm off on me. Except the staff. I might possibly be interested in that staff. How did you come by it?”

  It was on the tip of Raistlin’s tongue to tell the truth, to say—with some pride—that the staff had been a gift from the great Par-Salian. His natural proclivity to secrecy stopped the words in his throat. Describing the staff as a gift from the Head of the Conclave would only invite more discussion, more questions, perhaps increase the value of the staff in this wizard’s eyes. Raistlin wanted nothing more to do with this wizard, wanted to leave this strange man’s presence as soon as possible.

  “The staff has been in my family for generations,” he said, edging backward toward the tent flap. “Thus, you see, sir, I am constrained by family tradition and honor not to part with it. Since it seems we cannot do business, sir, I bid you good day.”

  By accident, Raistlin said the right words, words that probably saved his life. Immolatus immediately jumped to the conclusion that Raistlin was a descendant of the powerful wizard Magius. Magius must have left a written account of the powers of the staff with his relations or at least handed down such an account by word of mouth. Now that Immolatus looked at the young man, he did seem to bear a certain family resemblance to Magius of accursed memory.

  For it was Magius who had defeated the red dragon Immolatus. Magius and the magical power of that very staff had come very near slaying Immolatus, had wounded him grievously, wounds that, though healed, still pained him. Immolatus dreamed of that staff, its magic flaring, blinding, searing, killing, for long centuries. He would have traded all his lost treasure for that staff, to seize it, hold it, dote on it, use it to strike back at his enemies, use it to slay them as it had very nearly slain him. Use it to slay the descendant of Magius.

  Immolatus could not battle the heir to the staff in this puny, human body. He considered changing back to his dragon form, decided against it. He would have his revenge upon all those who had wronged him—the gold dragons and the silver, his duplicitous queen, and now Magius. The dragon had waited years upon years for his revenge, a few more days were drops of water in the ocean of his waiting.

  “You forget your wares, Peddler,” Immolatus said, casting a scathing glance at the magical paraphernalia that lay scattered at his feet.

  Raistlin was not about to start crawling on the ground, gathering up the scrolls and jars and rings, leaving himself vulnerable to attack.

  “Keep them, sir. As you have said, they are of little value.”

  Raistlin made a slight bow to the wizard, a bow that was more than mere politeness, for he was able to use the bow as an excuse to depart the tent gracefully, without turning his back on the wizard.

  Immolatus made no response, but watched Raistlin leave—or rather watched the staff leave—with red eyes whose gaze, like that of a crystal absorbing and focusing the energy of sun upon a straw, might have set the staff ablaze.

  Raistlin walked from the tent and kept walking with a rapid pace, seeing nothing in his path and not even very certain of the direction he was taking. His one thought was to put as much distance as possible between himself and the fey man with the blurred face and lethal eyes.

  Only when he was safely in sight of the bonfires of his own camp, the comforting sight of hundreds of well-armed soldiers, did Raistlin slow his pace. As thankful as he was to be back among friends, Raistlin pulled his hood over his head and took a circuitous route back to his tent. He did not want to talk to anyone, especially not Horkin.

  Once safely hidden from view, Raistlin sank, exhausted, upon his bed. Sweat bathed his body, he felt dizzy and light-headed and sick to his stomach. Holding on to the staff, still afraid to let go, he stared down at his boots, wet with chicken broth.

  The smell sickened him, brought back to Raistlin the terror of the encounter in the tent, the memory of the red-fire eyes of the wizard, the horror-filled, helpless knowledge that if the Red Robe had chosen, he could have taken the precious staff and Raistlin would have been powerless to prevent him.

  Raistlin choked and retched. Months after, the very sight of a stewed chicken would fail to render him so nauseous that he would be forced to leave the table, making Caramon the one clear winner in the encounter.

  Once the sickness passed and he felt more equal to the task, Raistlin went to make his report to Horkin. Raistlin pondered long over what to say. His first impulse was to lie about the incident, which made him appear a fool at best.

  In the end, Raistlin decided to tell Horkin the truth, not from any noble aspirations, but because he could not think of a lie that would adequately explain the loss of their magewares. Where were kender when you needed them?

  Horkin was astonished to see Raistlin return empty-handed. Astonishment gave way to glowering anger when Raistlin admitted calmly and steadily that he had fled the tent of the Red Robe, leaving the magewares behind.

  “I think you better explain yourself, Red,” Horkin said grimly.

  Raistlin did explain, portraying the meeting in vivid detail. He described the Red Robe, described his own fear and the almost blind panic that had overtaken him when he was certain that the Red Robe was going to attack him to gain the staff. Raistlin kept to himself only one thing and that was the appearance of the two faces, merging and separating and merging again. He could never explain that, not even to himself.

  Horkin listened to the tale with suspicion at first. He was truly disappointed in his apprentice, suspected that the young mage had sold the goods himself and was intent on keeping what he had earned, though—Horkin admitted—he found such a deed difficult to believe of a young man he’d come to grudgingly respect and even like a little. Horkin eyed Raistlin closely, well aware that this young man would have no compunction about lying if he thought a lie might be to his gain. But Horkin saw no lie here. Raistlin’s complexion paled when he spoke of the encounter, a shudder shook the frail body, the shadow of remembered fear haunted his eyes.

  The longer Raistlin talked—and once he had overcome his reluctance to speak of the matter, he talked with an almost feverish compulsion—the more Horkin came to believe the young man was telling the truth, strange as that truth might be.

  “This wizard is powerful, you say.” Horkin rubbed his chin, an action that apparently aided him in thinking, for he often resorted to it when puzzled.

  Raistlin halted his pacing of the wizard tent. Though he was dead tired, he could not sit still, but walked the length and breadth of the small tent restlessly, leaning upon the staff, which he had resolved not to let out of his sight or his grasp.

  “Powerful!” Raistlin exclaimed. “I have stood in the presence of the Head of the Conclave himself, the great Par-Salian, purportedly one of the most powerful archmages ever to have lived, and the magic I felt emanate from him was as a summer shower compared to a cyclone in the presence of this man!”

  “And a Red Robe, for all that.”

  Raist
lin hesitated before replying. “Let me say, sir, that although this wizard wore red robes, I had the distinct impression that they were not worn out of allegiance to one of the gods of magic so much as they were … well”—he shrugged helplessly—“like his skin.”

  “Red eyes and orange-colored skin. He’s an albino, maybe. I knew an albino once. A soldier when I first joined up with the baron. In C Company, I think it was. He—”

  “Begging your pardon, sir.” Raistlin cut off Horkin’s reminiscences impatiently. “But what should we do?”

  “Do? About what? The wizard?” Horkin shook his head. “Leave him alone, I should say. Sure, he stole our stuff, but, let’s face it, Red, there was nothing there of any value except your staff, which he spotted right off, small blame to him. If you don’t mind, though, I think I will mention the incident to the baron.”

  “Tell the baron that I ran away in a panic, sir?” Raistlin asked bitterly.

  “Of course not, Red,” Horkin replied gently. “Given the circumstances, it seems to me that you acted with good, plain common sense. No, I’ll just mention to the baron that we think there’s something a bit sinister about this wizard. Judging by what else I’ve heard of our allies, I doubt if his lordship will be much surprised,” Horkin added dryly.

  “There’s a possibility that this wizard is a renegade, sir,” Raistlin said.

  “Aye, Red, there is,” Horkin returned.

  Renegade wizards did not follow the laws laid down by the Conclave of Wizards, laws designed to assure that powerful magicks would not be used recklessly or with abandon. Such laws were meant to protect not only the general populace but wizards themselves. A renegade wizard was a danger to every other wizard, and it was the avowed duty and responsibility of every wizard, who was a member of the Conclave to seek out renegades and either attempt to persuade them to join the Conclave or to destroy them if they refused.

  “What do you intend to do about it, Red?” Horkin continued. “Challenge him? Call him out?”