Palin raised his head, peered through the smoke. He was sick and faint, and when he saw his father, standing at the top of the Silver Stair, he did not wonder at the sight. Caramon had come to his son once before, in the Citadel of Light, come to him to urge him not to send Tasslehoff back to die. Caramon looked now as he had looked to his son before his death, old but still hearty and hale. His father’s face was different, though. Caramon’s face had always been quick to laughter, quick to smile. The eyes that had seen much sorrow and known much pain had always been light with hope. Caramon had changed. Now the eyes were different, lost, searching.
Tasslehoff was already clambering up the stairs, jabbering excitedly to Caramon, who said no word. There had been only a few stairs, when Tasslehoff began to climb. He was quite close to the top already. But when Palin placed his foot upon the first shining silver step, he looked up and saw the stairs appeared to be without number, never ending. He did not have the strength to climb all those stairs, and he feared he would be left behind. As his foot touched the stair, a breath of fresh air wafted over him. He gulped it eagerly. Lifting his face, he saw blue sky above him. He drew in another deep breath of fresh air and began to climb. The distance seemed short now.
Caramon stood at the top, waiting patiently. Lifting a ghostly hand, he beckoned to them.
Tasslehoff reached the top, only to find, as Palin had said, that the Silver Stair led nowhere. The staircase came to an abrupt end, his next step would carry him over the edge. Far below, the ugly black smoke of the dying hedge swirled like the waters of a maelstrom.
“What do I do now, Caramon?” Tas yelled.
Palin heard no reply, but apparently the kender did.
“How wonderful,” Tas cried. “I’ll fly just like the draconians!”
Palin shouted out in horror. He lunged, tried to grasp hold of the kender’s shirttail, and missed.
With a cry of glee, Tasslehoff spread his arms like a bird and leaped straight off the final stair. He plunged downward and disappeared into the smoke.
Palin clung to the stair. In his desperate attempt to grab hold of Tas, he had almost toppled off. He waited, his heart in his throat, to hear the kender’s death cry, but all he heard was the crackling of flame and the roaring of the dragons.
Palin looked into the swirling smoke and shuddered. He looked back at his father, but Caramon was not there. In his place flew the red dragon. Wings blotted out the patch of blue sky. The dragon reached out a talon, intending to pluck Palin from his stair and carry him back to his cell. He was tired, tired of being afraid. He wanted only to rest and to be rid of fear forever.
He knew now where the Silver Stair led.
Death.
Caramon was dead. His son would soon join him.
“At least,” Palin said calmly, grimly, “I will nevermore be a prisoner.”
He leaped off the stair—and fell heavily on his side on a hard stone floor.
The landing being completely unexpected, Palin made no attempt to break his fall. He rolled and tumbled, came up hard against a stone wall. Jolted by the impact, shocked and confused, he lay blinking at the ceiling and wondered that he was alive.
Tasslehoff bent over him.
“Are you all right?” he asked, but didn’t wait for an answer.
“Look, Palin! Isn’t it wonderful? You told me to find Dalamar and I have! He’s right here! But I can’t find Caramon anymore. He’s nowhere.”
Palin eased himself carefully to a sitting position. He was bruised and battered, his throat hurt, and his lungs wheezed as though they were still filled with smoke, but he felt no stabbing pains, heard no bones crunch together. His astonishment and shock at the sight of the elf caused him to forget his minor injuries. Palin was shocked not only to see Dalamar—
who had not been seen in this world for thirty years—he was shocked to see how Dalamar changed.
The long-lived elves do not appear to humans to age. Dalamar was an elf in the prime of manhood. He should have looked the same now as he had looked when Palin last saw him more than thirty years ago. He did not. So drastic was the change that Palin was not completely convinced that this apparition was Dalamar and not another ghost.
The elf’s long hair that had once been as black as the wing of a raven was streaked with gray. His face, though still elegantly carved and beautifully proportioned, was wasted. The elf’s pale skin was stretched tight over the bones of the skull, making it look as if his face were carved of ivory. The aquiline nose was beakish, the chin sharp. His robes hung loosely on an emaciated frame. His long-fingered, elegant hands were bony and chafed, the knuckles red and prominent. The veins on the backs of his hands traced a blue road map of illness and despair. Palin had always liked and admired Dalamar, though he could not say why. Their philosophies were not remotely the same. Dalamar had been the servant of Nuitari, god of the Dark Moon and darker magicks. Palin had served Solinari, god of the Silver Moon, god of the magic of light. Both men had been devastated when the gods of magic had departed, taking the magic with them. Palin had gone into the world to seek out the magic they called “wild” magic. Dalamar had withdrawn from other magi, withdrawn from the world. He had gone seeking magic in dark places.
“Are you injured?” Dalamar asked. He sounded annoyed, not concerned for Palin’s well-being, but only that Palin might require some sort of attention, an exertion of power on the part of the elf. Palin struggled to stand. Speaking was painful. His throat hurt abominably.
“I am all right,” he rasped, watching Dalamar as the elf watched him, wary, suspicious. “Thank you for helping us—”
Dalamar cut him off with a sharp, emphatic gesture of a pallid hand. The skin of the hand was so pale against the black robes that it seemed disembodied.
“I did what I had to do, considering the mess you had made of things.”
The pale hand snaked out, seized hold of Tas by the collar. “Come with me, kender.”
“I’d be glad to come with you, Dalamar,” Tas answered. “And, by the way, it really is me, Tasslehoff Burrfoot, so you needn’t keep calling me ‘kender’ in that nasty tone. I’m very glad to see you again, except, you’re pinching me. Actually you’re hurting me quite a bit—”
“In silence,” Dalamar said and gave the kender’s collar an expert twist that effectively caused Tas to obey the order by half-choking him. Dragging the squirming kender with him, Dalamar crossed the small, narrow room to a heavy wooden door. He beckoned with a pale hand, and the door swung silently open.
Keeping a tight grasp on Tas, Dalamar paused in the doorway and turned to face Palin.
“You have much to answer for, Majere.”
“Wait!” Palin croaked, wincing at the pain in his throat. “Where is my father? I saw him.”
“Where?” Dalamar demanded, frowning.
“At the top of the Silver Stair,” Tasslehoff volunteered. “We both saw him.”
“I have no idea. I did not send him, if that is what you are thinking,”
said Dalamar. “Although, I appreciate his help.”
He walked out, and the door slammed shut behind him. Alarmed, panicked, feeling himself start to suffocate, Palin hurled himself at the door.
“Dalamar!” he shouted, beating on the wood. “Don’t leave me in here!”
Dalamar spoke, but it was only to chant words of magic.
Palin recognized the spell—a wizard lock.
His strength gone, he slid down the door and slumped to the cold, stone floor.
A prisoner.
3
Sun Arise
In the dark hour before the dawn, Gilthas, the king of the Qualinesti stood on the balcony of his palace. Rather, his I body stood on the balcony. His soul walked the streets of the silent city. His soul walked every street, paused at every doorway, looked in every window. His soul saw a newlywed couple asleep, clasped in each other arms. His soul saw a mother sitting in a rocking chair, nursing her babe, the babe sleeping, the mother dozing, gently rocking. His soul saw young elf brothers sharing the same bed with a large hound. The two boys slept with their arms flung around the neck of the dog, all three dreaming of playing catch in sunlit meadows. His soul saw an elderly elf sleeping in the same house that his father had slept in and his father before him. Above his bed, a portrait of the wife who had passed on. In the next room, the son who would inherit the house, his wife by his side.