The Dragon's Doom (dragonlance)

by Ed Greenwood

  "We have the 'where,' now, but what shall we be doing there?" Tshamarra asked quietly, after they'd galloped along the road for some time, leaving Osklodge behind and losing all sight of Stornbridge.

  Craer shrugged. "What we always do-draw our swords and chase them around the kingdom."

  Tshamarra smiled and sighed. "Yes, but doing what?"

  "Causing trouble, blundering along not knowing what to do next, and offering ourselves as targets for all foes of the crown."

  "Craer!"

  "Well," the procurer told her with an ingenuous grin, "it's worked so far."

  Brother Landrun came up beside him, and Hanenhather sighed. "What do you think, Landrun?"

  The tentacle that slapped across the Serpent-lord's mouth did not- quite-break his neck. A second tentacle was already ensnaring his wrists, crushing them ruthlessly even as it garnered them in, and a third wrapped around his waist and snatched him up into the air, to stare helplessly down at-at something that no longer looked much like Landrun at all.

  For one thing, it had no face. Just smooth flesh where eyes, nose, and mouth should be… yet its voice was clear enough as it said coldly, "We Koglaur are feared and hated enough in the Vale without your shapeshifting mischief, Serpent-priest. Plague-monsters are one thing, but making doubles of tersepts and overdukes-or kings-is our province. The, overclever Lord of the Serpent."

  The last thing Melvar Hanenhather saw, as tentacles slammed his head floorwards at breath-snatching speed, was a trickle of blood coming around the corner from the side passage. Landrun's, of course.

  "Well, Brother Landrun?"

  "Ah… isn't Overduke Anharu taller than that, Lord?"

  The Lord of the Serpent peered at his most recent transformation. The armaragor did seem to loom a little less than the real Anharu did, in his remembrances, but…

  "You may be right, Landrun," he said slowly. "Make it stand beside our Embra. I should have done Blackgult first, because he's about half a head taller than his daughter, and Anharu overtops him by about the same… or a little less, perhaps. Hmm."

  Brother Landrun hastened to obey-so quickly that there was a stumbling thud as he hastened down the side passage.

  He strode into view soon enough, looking none the worse for wear, and towed the shuffling Anharu over to where the false Embra stood. Neither of the transformations looked at the other, but stood shifting aimlessly from one foot to another. Landrun gazed at them for a moment, and then returned to the passage.

  Lord of the Serpent Hanenhather peered narrowly at the two false overdukes. How much of the real Anharu's hulking size was his armor, bulking up those massive shoulders? Or did folk really look closely enough at him for it to matter? Casting the spell took but a moment, but getting the results right, now…

  There was a guard at the Rowfoam docks that hadn't been there before- with ready strung bows, too, the customary spears relegated to the banner-display stands at the back of the docks. The dockloaders and pages were frightened and eager for news; barely had the Silver Fin tied up at the jetty than excited whispers arose in a hissing chorus, as every passenger and bargehand was queried.

  Flaeros Delcamper bounded up the steps before any servant could ply him with questions of fires and slaughter and marauding monsters. His haste earned him a barrier of crossed spears at the first terrace, with an officer of the guard aiming a bowgun at him from behind them. "Hold hard! Your name and business?"

  Flaeros frowned. "I am the bard Flaeros Delcamper, of Ragalar; here in Flowfoam at the personal invitation of my friend, the King."

  "Your 'friend'?" a spear-wielding guard asked skeptically, but his older fellow guard had already lifted his spear and stepped back.

  "He tells truth," the veteran told both the officer and his fellow spearman. "This is the man who faced down the nobles, and made them swear fealty to our new King. He practically ran this palace for a month or so, until things settled down."

  The enlightened guards eyed Flaeros with new respect, and the officer clapped his hand to his shoulder in salute as the bard nodded and resumed his ascent to the palace. As he glanced up at Flowfoam, its ravages now entirely repaired or concealed, he was aware of cold and unfriendly scrutiny from several sides-but who was so regarding him, he could not see. He gave his unseen observers a smile and a shrug, and went on into the waiting bustle of the court.

  The request to present himself to the king earned Flaeros a hard-eyed escort of suspicious guards, before and behind, and a thorough search of his person for weapons. Lighter by the weight of his dagger, his best quill-case, and the tiny trimming knife he used for cutting quills, Flaeros was taken through three guarded doors, so weighed down by the glares of guards that he found himself moving slowly.

  Even when he reached Raulin-seated behind a small desk, head down and writing furiously, with piles of parchments on both sides of him-the blades of two bared swords separated them. "May fairer days come, Your Majesty," he said gently.

  Raulin Castlecloaks looked up with a frown, trying to place the voice- and when he saw Flaeros, he smiled broadly, tossed down his pen, and strode around the desk to embrace his visitor, laughing in delight.

  Even then, the guards kept their blades pointed at the bard's back. When he turned, hugging the king, they moved in haste to keep behind him-until Raulin shooed them away with sharp words and waving hands.

  They took up positions about four strides distant, swords still drawn, as the king gleefully swept a pile of writs and proclamations onto the floor to free up a stool, and presented it to Flaeros with a flourish. Grinning, the bard took his seat.

  "Wine, some of that Craulbec, and apples!" the king called, to a servant nervously hovering just beyond the ring of guards.

  Flaeros raised an eyebrow. "Craulbec? Since when did you take a liking for cheese strong enough to outreek dead goat?"

  "Since you left some behind in the larder when you went home. Three Above, but I'm glad to see you, Flaer! I… I've been going wizard-witted here, what with all"-Castlecloaks lowered his voice abruptly-"the troubles in these halls. Writs and treaties are bad enough as daily fare, without all this…"

  "Yes," Flaeros murmured, leaning in close to the king despite the stiffening, advancing reaction of the guards. "Tell me: What troubles? What's been going on? Why all the menacing swords?"

  "Snakes," Raulin murmured. "Slithering into my chambers at night.

  Three guards have died from their venom, and more have been bitten. They must come by magic-and you know who that means-because it matters not where I sleep, and how carefully the walls are chinked and sealed. I've even ended up in bare chambers on rope-sling mattresses with nothing but blankets, and still they come. And folk here in Flowfoam are going mad! Without warning, time and again, a servant or courtier or guard who's been perfectly pleasant to me for months will draw a blade and start stabbing and hacking-at me, or whoever's nearest!"

  As if the king's words had been a cue, an approaching platter of wine, cheese, and apples suddenly went flying, two terrified servants were flung aside, and a guard burst forward, waving his sword and howling.

  Astonished, Flaeros stared as the man charged right at them, wild-eyed. Two guards stabbed him from either side, were dragged along, and then frantically wrestled with the roaring man, who staggered up to the desk, battering the heads of the men clinging to him with his sword, and thrust out at the king.

  Flaeros swept up his stool and smashed the steel aside-and as Raulin reluctantly drew his own sword and the snarling man tried to claw his way along the desk toward it, Flaeros swung the stool again, as hard as he could, into the man's head.

  There was a dull crack, and the guard crashed down face-first onto the heaps of proclamations, riding them bloodily to the floor and trailing the pair of grimly clinging fellow guards.

  The bard and the king stared at each other and then down at the lifeless man at their feet. Then they lifted gazes to stare at each other again, helplessly.

  "I wish th
e Four were back here with us," King Raulin whispered. "They'll know what to do."

  13

  Too Many Monsters

  Tshamarra sighed as carrion-birds napped heavily away from something sprawled in the muddy trail ahead, and slowed her nervous mount. "I knew Glarond was a populous barony, but-gods-this many corpses? Is there anyone left?"

  "Yes," Craer told her brightly, turning in his saddle. "The survivors!"

  "And the worst of it all is," Embra murmured from beside the Lady Talasorn, "he thinks himself funny."

  "He is," Blackgult said from behind them both, "so long as we're speaking purely of looks. 'Tis his words and deeds that swiftly stray from amusing to annoying. Yet the Three must love him dearly-what other procurer takes such care to be memorable and ever noticed? Most skulk through life in hopes of going unnoticed and living longer. Yet this mad Delnbone…"

  Tshamarra nodded. "Truth, bluntly put. So can my Beloved-of-the-gods see us all safely through this Blood Plague, do you think?" She waved a small and slender hand at carrion-birds pecking busily at several motionless lumps in a field, and added quietly, "Or repopulate Glarond?"

  Craer turned in his saddle, growing a broad grin, and without sparing a glance from his ceaseless peering at their surroundings, Hawkril growled, "Lady, encourage him not! D'you know what you said? 'Repopulate' hath but one means, remember?"

  Tshamarra rolled her eyes. "Spare us your comments and gestures," she told her beaming man firmly, as he opened his mouth to say something clever. "Just-spare us."

  "Shields up," Hawkril snapped. "Folk watching us, in the trees."

  The two sorceresses hauled at the unaccustomed weight of the shields the armaragor had insisted on strapping to their saddlebags ere leaving Stornbridge, and looked at the trees ahead. The road plunged into their midst, and the two women exchanged wary glances, remembering arrows hissing… and thudding home…

  Tshamarra caught sight of fearful eyes and cowering bodies. "By the Forefather, Hawk, they're just… frightened folk, staring at us!"

  "Aye," Hawkril agreed, waving his drawn sword so that everyone could see it and standing tall in his saddle to peer farther into the treegloom ahead. "The problem with this plague is-"

  Someone in the trees suddenly snarled and pounced on the man beside him. An unfortunate head was jerked back by a cruel tug on hair, a throat was cut, and in its wake that same someone howled and lashed out in all directions, steel flashing under the boughs amid wild screams and the crashings of fleeing folk.

  "-this sudden falling into madness," the armaragor added grimly. "Prudence is swept away, threats and good sense mean nothing, and so 'tis wise to keep your shields up!"

  His last few words were snapped back over his shoulder as he spurred forward to meet a wild-eyed man running out of the trees fumbling with a loaded crossbow. Shaking hands checked the quarrel, a ceaselessly murmuring mouth spoke reassurances to itself as the weapon was aimed-and Hawkril's warsword slashed the bow aside in a whirl of sliced strings, tumbling quarrel, and severed fingers.

  The man screamed and ran, shaking his gory ruin of a hand and staring at nothing.

  Embra winced, even as Blackgult snapped, "Craer! Guard the ladies!" and spurred past them to join Hawkril. Many folk were coining along the winding road ahead-fast. Eyes wild and unseeing, running hard, too winded for their screams to be much more than endless, raw groaning…

  "What're they running from?" Embra muttered, clutching the Dwaer in one hand and trying to manage reins and shield in the other.

  Hawkril looked back, guiding his nervously sidestepping horse, and the Lady Silvertree saw that he and her father were carefully positioning themselves to shield Tash and herself. She looked to the other sorceress, and found Tshamarra's eyes already on her. Tshamarra's face held the same helpless sadness she knew must be written across her own.

  "Easy, now," Craer said from behind them. "Just don't go blasting things if it bids fair to involve trees toppling on us, hey?"

  Embra risked a withering glance back at the procurer, and saw that the slender little man had a dagger ready in one hand to throw, and a fistful of glittering replacement fangs in the other.

  And then the panting, stumbling tide of Aglirtans was upon them, Hawkril grunting under the battering of so many men impaling themselves on his lowered swords at full run. Blackgult was using a broken length of banner-pole he'd found at the stables like a quarterstaff, leaning low in his saddle to thrust and fend off. All the overduchal horses were rearing, Craer cursing as he fought to hold the lead reins of the riderless spare mounts. Tshamarra turned to help him, Embra gathered herself to try to quell equine minds with the Dwaer in despair at her own ignorance of how to properly do such a thing, and-

  The running people were gone, crashing on through the brush and down the road behind the overdukes. Several of the stragglers howled and fell as the five riders watched, only to rise sprouting claws and snouts, limbs shifting and twisting sickeningly under their skins.

  Hawkril grimly kicked a dead but still gurgling man off his warsword and told the Vale around him, "This is the worst foulness the Serpents have worked yet-making war on all Aglirtans, war-trained or not."

  "Perhaps they've wearied of failing to conquer the realm," Tshamarra said a little wearily, "and have decided to just destroy it. The wolves'll dine well this year."

  "Aye," Craer agreed from behind her, somber for once, "but I wonder if, having done so, they'll remain wolves?"

  "Three forfend!" Embra gasped. "If birds and beasts can carry this plague, the land will never be cleansed of it!"

  "We could just keep riding," the Lady Talasorn suggested in a small voice, "to other lands, and…"

  "Aye," Hawkril snapped, "and do what? Wait for the plague to reach us there? Leaving Aglirta torn and laid waste? We've got to stop this, even if it means begging and promising every last mage in Darsar whatever they want to aid us in breaking this magic!"

  "Father," Embra asked quietly, "are they all dead? Or is there someone down but alive and likely to remain so until, say, dusk, that you could bring me?"

  "Quite likely," the Golden Griffon replied, swinging out of his saddle and tossing her the reins to hold.

  "Lady Embra," Craer snapped, "I thought we Band of Four were leaving the 'Obey me, fools, for I am a great and mysterious mage' act behind us! We trust you, yes, but I do expect you to tell us why? Why d'you need some poor wounded idiot?"

  "Well, I could say we have an immediate and pressing need to learn what lies ahead of us, mat drove all these folk to flight, but the truth is, Craer, I can't learn anything more about this plague-magic unless I can probe an afflicted mind with this" Embra hefted the Dwaer, and added bitterly, "Whereupon I'll probably learn more about my own ignorance than anything else."

  "You'll be sharing their wound-pain, if you probe someone who's hurt," Tshamarra murmured, struggling to keep her horse quiet. "That much I do know, from my own mind-touch magics."

  Embra nodded grimly. " 'Tis all right. I won't get lost in agony-I'll have the remarks of an overclever procurer to anchor and goad me."

  Craer looked down, and then away into the trees, and sighed. "I'm sorry, Em. I-My tongue, it just rides away with me…"

  He fell silent, and so missed the looks of amazement both sorceresses gave him. They'd never thought to hear any sort of apology from Overduke Delnbone, who delighted in saying the most merrily rude or scornful things to the wrong folk at the very worst of moments, and-

  Blackgult was turning over moaning, twitching bodies as Hawkril watched over him, a sword held ready to throw. Suddenly there came a fresh crashing through the trees, and the Golden Griffon hastily backed away to where he could stand free of corpses or almost-corpses, and took up a defensive stance.

  Another man burst into view, running raggedly. He was barefoot and straggle-bearded, and the homespun of a backcountry Aglirtan farmer, torn and covered with mud and blood, hung from his limbs. He groaned with each breath, his eyes wild-
>
  "Craer!" Hawkril snapped. The procurer plunged from his saddle, raced through the underbrush, and took the running farmer's legs from under him in a deft tackle that spilled both of them through a thornbush, into a welter of wet dead leaves and moss-cloaked, rotten deadfalls.

  The man tried to rise and run on, arms flailing, but was too weak and dazed to resist Craer's swift ensnarement of his wrists. The procurer hooked a leg around the man's thigh, rolled him over into a helpless trussed state, and kept him there, panting, as Embra rode carefully over and dismounted.

  "Thank you, Craer," she said warmly, clapping a hand to the procurer's arm as she knelt beside them both.

  " 'Ware! He's changing!" Tshamarra snapped, pointing. The fallen man's limbs were acquiring scales, here and there-and as the overdukes stared, they thickened and shortened.

  "But of course," Blackgult murmured sarcastically. "The Three cease not to smile upon us, hmm?"

  "You stand guard," Hawkril told him, "and I'll hold the horses. Tash, watch for anyone approaching, hey?"

  "My," Craer said, shifting his grip to keep tight hold of the panting body in his grasp as its shape altered, "this is a new feeling. Very strange."

  "Don't get any ideas," the Lady Talasorn told him in a voice at once both soft and iron-hard. 'Just don't."

  The procurer gave her a swift, fierce grin. "I hadn't. Truly. But thanks for that one. Hmm."

  "Belt up, Lightfingers," Embra snapped, busily casting swift, wary glances at the trees above and all around. Satisfied, she held out the Dwaer and put a firm hand on the brow of the moaning farmer.

  The Stone in her hand glowed, silence fell, everything was falling and…

  She was plunging into warm red darkness, at once pulsing with life and quivering with fear. It was a darkness that should be brighter, that knew this and was alarmed, and yet could not think, could not hold to thoughts, could not…

  Could not…

  Shuddering, the Lady of Jewels threw herself over onto her face in the forest loam, breaking the contact.