The sivak propped the shield against a bookcase, angled toward the old woman so she could glance at it.
“Then I’ll die trying to find and slay her.”
“You exist for revenge,” she cackled lightly. “My sister says life has little meaning to a sivak without wings. Is she right?”
For the next few hours Ragh dozed lightly as Maab continued to page through the books, making notes in the air with her fingers and mumbling softly in an odd language. When he woke she was standing on one of the old sea chests, though she shouldn’t have been able to tug it from beneath the table given her size and age. Several small ceramic bowls were lined up by Dhamon’s side, each filled with a different colored powder. One was filled with what looked on first inspection, to be beads but that revealed themselves to the sivak as tiny lizard eyes. There was a small jar filled with a viscous green liquid and near it the curled foot of a raven. The draconian shook his head. Long ago he had decided that the trappings of a wizard were unfathomable. He watched her arrange the materials, consult a few pages that had fallen out of a book, then look over her shoulder at the shield.
“We are ready, sister.” To the draconian, she added, “You’ll have to rip his leggings for me. I don’t have much strength in my hands any more.”
The sivak did not reply but slid a talon along the fabric and tore it from ankle to hip, revealing Dhamon’s scales.
“Looks black to me,” Maab said. She was looking at her reflection in the scales. “From a black dragon.”
“It was from a red dragon.”
“I heard you—and him—the first time,” she said. “Mad, the both of you are. Still, it doesn’t matter what color the dragon was. This should do it.” She let out a deep sigh, like fall leaves chasing each other across the dry ground.
“Magic was so easy before. You could so easily see the energy in the air, in the ground, feel it wrap around you like a blanket at night. Not much left anymore, my dear sister, but with Raistlin’s gift we might find just enough to help this young man. Mind, we will charge him exorbitantly for our services.”
The sivak stepped back, watching as she poured one powder after the next over Dhamon’s leg, mumbling the entire time. She paused, took a handful of the lizard eyes, and popped them in her mouth before continuing with her ritual until not an inch of skin or scale could be seen beneath the colorful mixture.
“Exorbitantly,” she cackled, as she reached for the pages and began reading, the paper magically dissolving as she went. When there was nothing left of it, she snatched up the bone tube and thumbed the end off, tilting it so something slid into her palm. The sivak stared at it. The thing was a hunk of jade the size of a large plum, carved in the shape of a frog. Its eyes were holes through which a leather thong was strung. She put it over her head, and it dangled down almost to her waist. The sivak moved around to the other side of the table for a better look.
Maab was talking again, rapidly, only a few words of which were discernible: Lunitari, Solinari, Nuitari, the moons no longer present in Krynn’s skies; Black Robes; Malys; Sable; and names that meant nothing to the sivak. As she continued to prattle, the frog on her neck pulsed as if it was breathing. As the sivak stared, he saw its legs move, its head swivel. The jade carving’s mouth opened and bit through Maab’s robe until it had made a hole. It burrowed through it and into her skin, disappearing inside of her, leaving behind only the dangling leather thong. Within seconds, the wound made by the object healed over and the fabric magically mended itself.
“I feel the magic deep in my belly,” she murmured. “It moves to my heart.”
Beneath the old woman’s hands, Dhamon began to stir.
“I feel power in Raistlin’s gift. Already some of the dragon-poison is leaving your friend, moving far away.”
Dhamon’s body was on the table, but his mind was far away from this underground wizard’s laboratory and far from this town. He saw himself in a forest south of Palanthas, fighting a Knight of Takhisis—and he was winning. Several Knights lay around him, slain by him and his companions. One man was the only enemy remaining. Dhamon’s heart pumped with the exhilaration of battle, and his swings were precise, honed from years in the Dark Knights and then under the tutelage of an old Solamnic-who had saved his life. A few strokes more and he severely wounded the man. A minute later and he knelt at the dying man’s side. Dhamon held his enemy’s hand and offered comfort during those last breaths of life. He was rewarded when his enemy tugged a blood-red dragon scale from his chest and thrust it on Dhamon’s thigh. The pain overwhelmed him, while at the same time a dragon filled his vision, red and so powerful that she took control of his mind and body. She let him think he had beaten her for a time, holding herself in the back of his mind, waiting for the right opportunity to reassert herself. That time came when he was in Goldmoon’s presence and the Red ordered him to slay the famed healer. Dhamon almost succeeded, but Rig and Jasper, Feril and others did their best to try to stop him—and succeeded.
Other dragons flitted across his feverish mind—a mysterious shadow dragon who pinned Dhamon beneath an immense claw, and a silver dragon. Both worked to break the Red’s control. His mind drifted back to the laboratory, seeming to perch on the ceiling and survey all that was below, including himself.
He watched the mad old woman hover over his body, drawing designs in the powders she had spread on his leg. It was an odd sensation, watching the woman, glancing across this old laboratory, spying the sivak. Dhamon felt pain, not from what she was doing, but from the alternating jolts of hot and cold that speared him. Other images superimposed themselves over Maab—the Knight of Takhisis who cursed him with the scale, Malys, and the shadow dragon, who grew larger and darker. Its body became black, its eyes a dull, glowing yellow. His chest felt tight, as if he were being squeezed in a vise, and his breathing became ragged. He heard a voice intrude on his pain, a hoarse whisper. The sivak.
“Will he live? Will he be cured?”
“Too early to tell,” Maab said. “My spell is not complete, and it has not yet broken through the magic that curses him. See, some of the smaller scales have vanished. Let us hope my sister and I are successful. Let the spell continue. We have decided on a price for our assistance.”
The visions of the shadow dragon and the Red faded, the lab turned to darkness, and Dhamon felt his mind sucked back into a feverish body that could not move. All he saw through closed eyelids was a muted light from the glowing orb on the ceiling. All he heard was his heart pounding in his ears.
Maab sat on the old sea chest next to Dhamon’s table. She stared at the draconian, who sat on the floor and stared back. The frog had returned to its place on the leather thong. Ragh held the sword in front of him, the pommel a little too small to fit comfortably in his hand. He dropped his gaze to the blade and saw part of his visage reflected back at him. “The naga, old woman,” he said. “Nura Bint-Drax. What do you know of her? Do you know where I can find her?”
Several minutes passed before the old woman broke the silence. “I know Nura Bint-Drax. I met the naga years ago, when my sister did not insist that I stay at her side. I found her rude. Too bad that she is expected in town tomorrow. I am certain she is still… bad-mannered.”
“Nura Bint-Drax,” the sivak pressed. “Where can I find her when she returns?”
When Maab would not answer, the sivak made a move toward the wall, selecting a spot between two book cases, Maab sliding off the chest and shuffling after him.
“This is where we came in. I know it.”
“Creature, you are not going anywhere. Your human companion—”