“Dogah and his forces will be able to march rapidly,” Mina replied. “He will meet no resistance. The elven border patrol was pulled back to deal with us. Their army is in disarray. Their general is dead. The shield has fallen.”
“How, Mina?” Galdar asked and others echoed his wonder.
“Tell us how you brought down the shield?”
“I told the king the truth,” Mina said. “I told him that the shield was killing his people. Their king himself brought down the shield.”
The Knights laughed, enjoying the fine irony. They were in excellent spirits, cheered and heartened by Mina’s return and the miraculous lowering of the magical shield, which had for so long kept them from striking at their enemy.
Turning to ask Mina a question, Galdar saw that she had fallen asleep. Gently, he lifted her in his arms and carried her—she was a light as a child—to the bed he had made for her himself, a blanket spread over dried pine needles in a niche in the rock wall. He eased her down, covered her with a blanket. She never opened her eyes.
The minotaur settled himself near her, seated with his broad back against the rocky wall to guard her sleep.
Captain Samuval came to keep watch beside Galdar. The captain offered the minotaur more rat meat, and this time Galdar did not refuse.
“Why would the king lower the shield?” Galdar wondered, crunching the rat, bones and all. “Why would he bring down the elves’ only defense? It doesn’t make any sense. Elves are sneaky. Perhaps it is a trap.”
“No trap,” said Samuval. Bunching up a blanket, he shoved it beneath his head and stretched himself out on the cold cavern floor. “You will see, my friend. In a week’s time, we’ll be walking arm and arm down the streets of Silvanost.”
“But why would he do such a thing?” Galdar persisted.
“Why else?” Samuval said, yawning until his jaws cracked.
“You saw the way he looked at her. You saw her take him captive. He did it for love of her, of course.”
Galdar settled himself. He considered the answer, decided that his comrade was right. Before he slept, he whispered the words softly to the night.
“For love of Mina.”
Epilogue
Far from where Mina slept, guarded by her troops, Gilthas watched from a window of the Tower of the Speaker of the Sun as the sun lifted higher into the sky. He imagined its rays gilding the spears of the armies of Beryl as that army marched across the border into Qualinesti. The Solamnic, Gerard, had suggested a plan, a desperate plan, and now he and Marshal Medan waited for Gilthas to make a decision, a decision that would either mean salvation for his people or would end in their ultimate destruction. Gilthas would make that decision. He would make it because he was their king. But he would put off the decision for the moment. He would spend this moment watching the sun shimmer on the green leaves of the trees of his homeland On Schallsea, Tasslehoff and Palin watched Beryl and her minions fly closer and closer. They heard the trumpets blasting, heard people crying out in terror, They heard them cry for Goldmoon, but she was gone. The broken bits of the magical Device of Time Journeying lay scattered on the floor, the light of the jewels dimmed by the shadows of the wings of dragons.
Goldmoon did not see the sun. She did not! see the dragons.
She was far beneath the ocean, wrapped in Its darkness. The gnome expostulated and sweated and raced here and dashed there, mopping up water, sopping up oil, cranking cranks and pumping bellows. Goldmoon paid no attention to him. She had been absorbed by the darkness. She traveled northward with the river of the dead.
Silvanoshei stood alone in the Garden of Astarin, beside the dying Shield Tree, and watched the new-made blazing sun wither the tree’s roots.
Poised on the borders of Silvanesti, General Dogah of the Knights of Neraka watched the sun emerge from the crystals of the fallen shield. The next morning, when the sun had mounted into the sky, when it shone clear and bright, General Dogah gave his army the order to march.