"And they wage war, now-unsuspected by men?"
"No-there is no war at the present. But they will come again. Dragons of red and blue, of black, green, and white. All the children of Takhisis will once more take to the skies in her name!"
"And these dragons of metal will be their enemies?"
"Yes!" Wryllish exclaimed. "The dragons who, with the same arrogance that brought the Cataclysm, call themselves the 'good' dragons." The high priest's voice was heavy with scorn. "In their righteous blindness they invite the same kind of disaster on themselves. And to think, they would call us 'evil'."
"How do you-do we-come to have these eggs here?" asked the warrior.
The priest was positively beaming. "The Queen's agents have brought them here, into this temple. Come, allow me…."
Wryllish led Ariakas from the chamber, still holding his glowing scepter high. They came to another door and the priest unlocked it. The warrior stepped inside to see another mountain of metallic eggs, these a shining cop shy;per color that was only slightly less brilliant than the gold.
"Eggs from all the clans of dragons who stood against our queen are now held in her temple!" crowed the high priest. "We have the ultimate weapon against our ene shy;mies-for we hold the fate of their children in our hands."
"It is indeed a commanding leverage," Ariakas allowed. He shook his head and turned to the priest. "Given the evidence of the eggs, you force me to admit the existence of dragons. Still, what assurance do we have that they will fight as our allies?"
"It is by her command." Wryllish talked as he led Ari-akas onward, showing him a room full of eggs in a deep, bronze hue, and finally to a chamber that contained more eggs than any of the others he had seen. "The brass dragons-most common of all the enemy wyrms, and thus they have given us the greatest number of eggs."
"But the dragons of color, those called 'evil'-they, too, exist still?"
"More than exist!" Wryllish replied. "They are present on Krynn, only awaiting the commands of our mistress. And when they surge forth, all the world will tremble in fear."
The priest nodded meaningfully at Ariakas's huge sword, which jutted upward over his shoulder. A small swatch of the white blade showed above the scabbard. "I see," Wryllish Parkane said, significantly, "that you have already been blessed by a gift from our lady."
Ariakas was jolted by the word. "Our 'queen', you called her. I don't think of her as my lady!"
The cleric seemed surprised by his vehemence, shrug shy;ging the distinction away as if it were a little thing. "You will," was all he said.
"What did you mean about my sword?" Ariakas pressed, returning to the priest's observation. "As a gift from… the queen?"
"It has been blessed, very powerfully," Wryllish ex shy;plained. "Soon, I'm sure, the fact will be clear to your eyes as well. If you should call on her name in a cause that pleases her, the great fury of her vengeance will be revealed in your hand."
Ariakas vividly recalled the transformation of the huge sword, the weapon he had sharpened and honed over the long winter. With each blow against his lady, it had changed color-color to match the blood flowing from the wound. It had become this pristine white, and he had assumed that the blade was permanently marked. It hadn't in any sense lost its sharpness or strength, but
neither had it gained any obvious property or power. Yet now this priest repeated the words of Takhisis herself. What shape would the blessing of the Dark Queen take? He was not entirely sure that he wanted to find out.
"But all these rooms are just introductory," said Par-kane, "to the place I truly wanted you to see."
"Lead on," said Ariakas.
Wryllish Parkane turned down a narrow corridor, a natural stone passage that had been hewn into more or less rectangular proportions. Still, the passageway snaked this way and that, so that the cleric's light was often reflected from walls twisting before and behind them. Ariakas sensed a slight descent in the floor beneath his feet, though the sharp turns of the hall made it hard to see any distance to the front or rear.
They reached another door, similar to the portals to the various egg rooms, but smaller, and remote from those chambers. Wryllish removed his key ring, but then paused before inserting a key into the lock.
"This was merely a small overflow chamber," the priest explained, taking a deep breath. "There were too many brass eggs to fit in the storage room, so some of them were brought down here."
Still the priest hesitated. He turned to Ariakas and looked the warrior directly in the eye. "What I am about to show you is known to only two other persons. myself and a wizard of the black robes named Dracart, whom we consulted for advice. The very knowledge of this room's existence would be enough to cost a novice his life."
"Open the door!" Ariakas snapped, growing tired of the priest's hesitation. He was gratified to see that Wryl shy;lish hastened to obey, inserting the tiny key into a metal keyhole and twisting. The latch clicked, and the door swung inward a crack.
Ariakas reached out, ready to push the portal all the way, when the stench emerging from the room struck him like a physical blow. A sickening odor flooded the air, swarming almost visibly around him, suggesting corpses long dead or food that had been given over to mold. He gagged and stepped backward, turning to spit the pungent film from his tongue.
"What in the name of the Abyss is in there?" he de shy;manded, throwing his hand over his nose and mouth in an inadequate attempt to filter the air.
"You'll have to see for yourself," replied the cleric.
"Tell me, damn it!"
"The truth is, Lord Ariakas, that I can't tell you, because I don't know. You'll really have to see for your shy;self." Raising the light over his head, the priest overcame his hesitation, pushed the door open, and stepped boldly into the room beyond.
Ariakas followed, pausing at the door to draw a deep breath. What he saw within the room sickened him almost as much as the scent of its air. The floor seethed with small, lizardlike creatures, squirming and wrig shy;gling pathetically over each other. The longest were nearly three feet from nose to tail, and many of them dis shy;played razor-sharp teeth along ridged and bony jaws. As he watched, one of the lizards chomped down on another, crushing its body. While the killer began to chew on its cannibalistic prey, an even larger lizard bit the predator on the head and then tried to swallow both of the. corpses.
In other places the tiny serpents butted against the wall, or tried to claw their way through each other. The presence of Wryllish's light didn't seem to affect them in any way, though the priest kicked several of the crea shy;tures away from his feet. Only then did Ariakas realize that the miserable serpents were blind. He noted, too, that several were missing their rear legs, and others bore webbed, batlike stubs of flesh that might have been wings if they had been allowed to develop fully.
In a far corner of the room, more of the slithering creatures caught his attention. A bundle of them-per shy;haps a dozen or more-all squirmed outward from one leathery egg. The shell was slit and withered along sev shy;eral openings, and the little reptiles, their bodies coated with a thick, oily film, twisted and clawed their way free of the ragged sphere. All around the room were the frag shy;ments of these great eggs, though the metallic sheen had corroded so much that Ariakas never would have been able to discern the original color.
"Are these… dragons?" inquired Ariakas. He couldn't believe that something he'd always pictured as power and nobility personified could begin life in this pathetic state.
"Most assuredly not!" Wryllish Parkane confirmed. "They are corruptions of dragons, which so far have occurred only in this room."