Nightshade nodded. “We had a lot fun. We’d play at `nine-men Morris’, and `duck, duck, goose, goose, and `red rover’ and ‘king of the crypt’. A dead Solamnic knight taught me to play khas. A dead thief showed me how to hide a bean under three walnut shells and switch them around really fast, then have people try to guess where it’s hidden. Do you want to see that one?” he asked eagerly.
“Maybe later,” said Rhys politely.
Nightshade rummaged around the scrip and, not finding anything else to eat, handed it back. He leaned comfortably against the marker. Atta, seeing that no more meat was forthcoming, put her head on her paws and went to sleep.
“So now, Nightshade, you continue your parents’ work?” “I wish!” The kender heaved a gusty sigh.
“What happened?”
“Everything changed. Takhisis died. The gods came back. The souls were free to go on their journey again. And I don’t have anyone left to play with.”
“The dead are all leaving Krynn.”
“Well, not all,” Nightshade amended. “There’re still your spirits, poltergeists, dopplegängers, zombies, revenants, ghosts, skeletal warriors, phantoms, and so on. But they’re harder to come by these days. Generally the necromancers and the clerics of Chemosh snap them up before I can get to them.”
“Chemosh,” said Rhys. “What do you know of Chemosh? Are you a follower of his?”
“Yuck, no!” Nightshade stated, shuddering. “Chemosh is a not a nice god. He hurts the spirits, turns them into his slaves. I don’t worship any god. No offense.”
“Why should I be offended?”
“Because you’re a monk. I can tell by your robes, though they’re sort of strange. I’ve never seen that odd green color before. Who is your god?”
The name of Majere came readily and easily to Rhys’s lips. He paused, bit it back.
“Zeboim,” he said.
“The sea goddess? Are you a sailor? I’ve always thought I’d like to go to sea. There must be lots and lots of bodies underneath the ocean—all those who died in shipwrecks or were swept away in storms.”
“I’m not a sailor,” Rhys replied, and changed the subject. “So what have you been doing with yourself since the War of Souls?”
“I travel from town to town, searching for a dead person to talk to,” said the kender. “But mostly I just get thrown into jail. It’s not all that bad. At least they feed you.”
He was so thin and frail, and although he talked cheerfully, he seemed so unhappy that Rhys made up his mind. He still couldn’t figure out if the kender was crazy or sane, lying or honest (as kender go). He figured it would be worth his while to find out, however. And he preferred not to offend his temperamental goddess, who had given him this strange gift.
“The truth is, Nightshade,” said Rhys, “I was sent here to seek you out.”
The kender jumped up, startling Atta from her doze. “I knew it! You’re the sheriff in disguise!”
“No, no,” Rhys said hastily. “I really am a monk. Zeboim was the one who sent me.”
“A god looking for me?” Nightshade said, alarmed. “That’s worse than the sheriff.”
“Nightshade—” Rhys began.
He was too late. With a leap and a bound, the kender cleared the grave marker and took to his heels. Having spent a lifetime fleeing pursuers, the kender was fleet and agile. A good meal had given him strength. He was familiar with the surrounding territory. Rhys could never catch him. He had someone with him who could, however.
“Atta,” Rhys said, “away!”
Atta was on her feet. Hearing the familiar command, she instinctively started to obey, then stopped and looked back at Rhys in perplexity.
“I will do what you say, Master, but where are the sheep?” she seemed to be asking.
“Away,” he said firmly and gestured at the fleeing kender.
Atta regarded him for another second, just to make certain she understood, then she sped off, bounding through the grave yard in pursuit.
The dog used the same tactics with Nightshade that she would have used with sheep, coming up on his left flank, circling wide, not looking at him so as not to frighten him, steering around in front of him to turn him, force him back toward Rhys.
Seeing the black and white streak out of the corner of his eye, Nightshade veered from his course, heading off in another direction. Atta was there ahead of him and he was forced to turn again. She was there again and once more he had to turn.
She did not attack him. When he slowed, she slowed. When he came to a halt, she dropped to her belly, staring at him so intently with her brown eyes that he found it hard to look away. The moment he moved, she was on her feet again. Nightshade tried every dodge and dart he knew, but she was always in front of him, her lithe little body turning time and again to head him off. He could move freely only one direction and that was back the way he’d come.
Finally, panting, Nightshade climbed up on a grave marker and stood there, shivering.
“Get her away from me!” he howled.
“That’ll do, Atta,” said Rhys, and she relaxed and came over to him to have her head patted.
Rhys walked up to where he’d treed the kender.
“You are not in trouble, Nightshade. Quite the opposite. I am going on a quest and I need your help.”
Nightshade’s eyes widened. “A quest? My help? Are you sure?”
“Yes, that is why my god sent me to find you.”
Rhys told the kender everything that had happened, from his brother’s arrival at the monastery to the terrible crime he’d committed. Nightshade listened, fascinated, though he picked up on the wrong part of the quest. He jumped down from the grave marker and seized hold of Rhys’s hand.
“We have to go back there right away!” he said, trying to tug Rhys off. “Back to where you buried your friends!’
“No,” said Rhys, standing firm. “We need to search for my brother.”
“But all those uneasy spirits need me,” Nightshade said, pleading.
“They are with their god now,” said Rhys.
“You’re certain?”
“Yes,” said Rhys, and he was certain. “We have to find my brother and stop him before he harms anyone else. We need to find out what Chemosh did to him to turn him from a cleric of Kiri-Jolith to a follower of the Lord of Death. You can communicate with the dead, which might prove to be useful, and you can do so without rousing suspicion. I can’t pay you anything,” he added, “for we monks are forbidden to accept any reward except what we need for our survival.”
“More meat like what we just ate would be fine with me. And it will be good to have a friend,” Nightshade said excitedly. “A real live friend.”
He glanced at Atta with trepidation. “I suppose you have to take the dog?”
“Atta makes a good guardian as well as a good companion. Don’t worry.” Rhys rested his hand reassuringly on the kender on the shoulder. “She’s fond of you. That’s why she chased after you. She didn’t want you to leave.”
“Really?” Nightshade looked pleased. “I thought she was herding me like I was a sheep or something. If she likes me, that’s different. I like her, too.”
Rhys let the darkness hide his smile. “I am staying with a farmer whose home is nearby. We’ll spend the night there and get an early start in the morning.”
“Farmers don’t usually let me into their houses,” Nightshade pointed out, falling in beside Rhys, the kender’s short legs taking two strides to his one.
“I think this one will,” Rhys predicted. “Once I explain to him how fond Atta is of you.”
Atta was so fond of the kender that she lay across his legs all night, never letting him out of her sight.
9
Rhys had no difficulty picking up his brother’s trail. People remembered quite clearly a cleric of Kiri-Jolith who spent his nights carousing in the tavern and his days flirting with their daughters. Rhys had been grimly expecting to hear that his brother had done murder again and was surprised and relieved to hear no worse of him than he’d left town without paying his bar tab.