Irate, he stomped off, leaving Tanis to solve the problem. At length, the half-elf picked up Flint’s pick-axe and laid it down beside the keystone with its point facing the boulder. Anyone happening upon it would think they had either dropped it or abandoned it. Riverwind, he hoped, would remember that Flint had specifically mentioned pickaxes and would realize that this was a clue. Whether he realized it was a clue to blocking the trail behind them if they were being pursued was another matter.
He found Flint comfortably ensconced among the rocks, chewing on strips of dried venison.
“I was thinking about what you said, about dwarves sharing their secrets with humans. It seems to me that if we could all see ourselves as one ‘people’, this would be a better world.”
“What are you grousing about, Half-Elven?” Flint demanded.
“I was saying it’s a damn shame we can’t trust each other.”
“Ah, if we all trusted each other, we’d all be kender,” Flint said. “Then where would we be? I’m going to sleep. You take first watch.”
Flint finished his meal, then wrapped himself in his blanket, and lay down on his back among the rocks.
Tanis propped himself up against a sloping wall, and, unable to get comfortable, he gazed into the starlit night.
“If there is no other way out of the valley, how will Raistlin reach Skullcap?” he asked.
“Fly there on his broomstick, most likely,” Flint muttered, and giving a great yawn, he shoved a stone out from beneath his shoulders, closed his eyes, and sighed in deep contentment.
“This feels like home,” he said, lacing his fingers over his chest. He was soon snoring.
Raistlin, Caramon, and Sturm continued their trek across the valley, walking all through the afternoon. Raistlin seemed infused with an unnatural energy that would not permit him to rest but kept driving him on. Caramon often insisted that they stop, but he wasted his time, for Raistlin would sit down for only a few moments, then he would be back on his feet, pacing restlessly, his gaze going to the sun now starting its descent into afternoon.
“Sunset,” was all he would say and kept walking.
The forested part of the valley ended. Open grassland spread before them. The trail they had been following through the trees disappeared, yet Raistlin kept going, moving out onto the snowcovered grass. He walked with his head down, leaning heavily on his staff. He looked neither to the right nor the left but kept his gaze fixed on his feet, as though all his will was bent on placing one foot in front of the other. His hand pressed against his chest. His breath rattled in his lungs. Sturm expected the mage to collapse at any moment. He knew better than to say anything, however, knowing that any attempt to try to make Raistlin rest would result in a venomous look and a sarcastic gibe.
“This will be the death of your brother,” Sturm warned Caramon in a low voice.
“I know,” said Caramon, worried, “but he won’t stop. I’ve tried to talk to him. He just gets mad.”
“Where is he going in such a hurry? There’s nothing ahead of us but a solid stone wall!” The grass lands, smooth and trackless, stretched on for about two miles, coming to an abrupt end at a sheer wall of rock jutting up from the valley floor. The rock wall formed a span, like a natural bridge, between two mountains.
“Once we step out from under the cover of the trees and onto the empty grasslands, a blind gully dwarf could spot us.”
Caramon acknowledged the truth of this with a slow nod and kept walking.
“I don’t like this, Caramon,” Sturm continued. “There’s something strange at work here.” He had been going to say “evil,” but he changed it at the last moment, fearing to upset Caramon, who nodded again and kept walking.
Sturm halted to draw breath. Gazing after the twins, he shook his head.
“I think Raistlin could order Caramon to follow him into the Abyss and he’d never hesitate,” he said to himself. Loyalty to a brother was admirable, but loyalty should see with clear eyes, not stumble along blind.
Caramon peered around over his shoulder. “Sturm? You coming?”
Sturm hefted his pack and walked on. Loyalty to friends went unquestioned.
Chapter 9
Pheragas Who? Wake Me if you see a Ghost.
As the sun waned and Flint and Tanis bedded down for the night on the mountain, Sturm, Caramon and Raistlin reached the end of their day’s journey—a blank wall.
Both Caramon and Sturm could see quite clearly their sojourn across a snow-covered meadow was headed straight for a dead end. The rays of the setting sun struck the immense stone wall full on. Caramon thought they might climb it, but the bright sunlight revealed that the wall was smooth-sided with nary a hand or foot-hold in sight. The wall was slightly curved, like the side of a bowl, and so high that the tallest siege engines ever constructed would have reached only to its midpoint. There were no caves, no cracks, no way through it or over it, yet Raistlin made for the wall with dogged determination.
Caramon said nothing about the fact that they were on a journey to nowhere, for he was loathe to cross his brother. Sturm said nothing to Raistlin aloud, though he said plenty beneath his breath. Caramon could hear the knight muttering to himself as he slogged along behind him. Caramon knew Sturm was angry with him as well as his brother. Sturm believed Caramon should call a halt to this and force Raistlin to turn back. Sturm assumed that Caramon didn’t because he feared his twin.
Sturm was only half-right. Caramon did fear his brother’s anger, but he would have willingly risked his twin’s snide comments and disparaging remarks if he thought that Raistlin was doing something wrong or putting himself in danger. Caramon was not so sure that was the case. Raistlin was acting very strangely, but he was also acting with purpose and resolve. Caramon felt compelled to respect his brother’s decisions.
If it turns out he’s wrong and we’ve come all this way for nothing, Caramon reflected wryly, Sturm will at least have the satisfaction of saying, “I told you so.” They continued to march across the grassland. Raistlin increased his pace as the shadows of coming night spread across the valley. They came at last to the base of the great gray wall. The land was silent with that eerie, heavy silence that comes with a blanket of snow. The sky was empty, as was the land around them. They might have been the only living beings in the world.
Raistlin shoved back the cowl so that it fell around his shoulders and stared at the wall before him. He blinked and looked vaguely astonished, very much like he was seeing it for the first time, with no clear idea how he came to be here.
His confusion was not lost on Sturm.
The knight dropped his pack containing his armor with a clang and a clatter that echoed off the mountainside and jarred every tooth in Caramon’s head.
“Your brother has no idea where he is, does he?” Sturm said flatly. “Or what he’s doing here?” He glanced over shoulder. “It will be dark soon. We can make camp back in the woods. If we start now—”
He stopped talking because no one was listening to him. Raistlin had begun to walk along the base of the wall, his gaze intently scanning the gray rock that glimmered orange in the light of a flaring sunset. He walked several paces in one direction, then, not finding what he was seeking, he turned around and walked back. His gaze never left the wall. At length he paused. He brushed off snow that had stuck to the wall and smiled.
“This is it,” he said.
Caramon walked over to look. His brother had uncovered a mark chiseled into stone at about waist-height. Caramon recognized the mark as a rune, one of the letters of the language of magic. His gut twisted, and his flesh crawled. He longed to ask his brother how he had known to trek miles across an unfamiliar, desolate valley and walk up to this vast wall of stone at precisely this location. He did not ask, however, perhaps because he feared Raistlin might tell him.