"Lacunae," Dannelle said, taking the old man's hand again as the passage narrowed and darkened. "They call those gaps 'lacunae.' "
"Gaps or lacunae or mysteries, the ways of Sargonnas are more unknown than known. The Plainsmen pair him with the great snake Tellus, who is said to lie in timeless slumber beneath the continent of Ansalon, only to stir at the end of all things. Others see him as a scavenging red bird-a vulture, perhaps, or an enormous condor who dines on the entrails of those who offend his consort, Takhisis."
"This is not pleasant fare for a dark road, Shardos," Dannelle protested. And yet she marveled at Shardos's steadiness, the occasional "Step over, miss," and "Lower the head here, miss."
Around them, small creatures cried out in the darkness, surprised by the strange noises and speed of the two rushing by them, the big dog at their heels. Once Dannelle heard a flutter of wings, once a terrified whirring sound directly under her feet.
So by a dark sense the juggler steered, a sense born of sad years wandering blind over the face of Krynn, Dannelle figured. It was one of those times, rare though they may be, when loss becomes advantage, and weakness strength.
She was surprised to think of Galen in the same thought, surprised to find herself smiling in the darkness.
Years ago, Dannelle di Caela had taken on the betterment of Galen Pathwarden as a kind of quest, for he had come to Castle di Caela in need of every imaginable improvement. When he seated himself on the mahogany chairs in the Great Hall, he would fling his leg over an armrest, and formal dining was a complete embarrassment, for it seemed that up in Coastlund, they had never heard of the fork, thinking it was placed on the table as aesthetic balance to the very real and useful knife and spoon on the other side of the plate.
Like a gully dwarf he ate, or how she had imagined a gully dwarf would eat. In the first months of Galen's stay at the castle, before he looked around him and began to catch on to the etiquette, Dannelle di Caela would shudder when the lad shoveled gristles of pork beneath the table for the benefit of his most recently befriended dog.
Indeed, befriending was one of Galen Pathwarden's greatest skills. Marigold, Dannelle di Caela's most distant cousin, had befriended the lad when she had grown tired of befriending two of the younger and more handsome palace guards. Galen had been next in line, for some unknown reason, but Dannelle suspected it had something to do with his knightly prospects. Marigold did love a man in armor.
For months, Dannelle had stewed while the two of them simmered in the chambers of the other tower. Galen, it seems, had found the whole arrangement entirely new and altogether fascinating, and Dannelle would watch with rising irritation as lights went on and off in various windows across the courtyard.
And yet that dalliance, too, had gradually stopped, like the sport with the dogs and gristles. Nonetheless, Dannelle had thought to herself not a month ago that the young man's
She had continued to dream of that knighthood, through the stumbling in battle and the uncertain command, through the misguided visions in the opals and the disasters that seemed to follow when the boy was guided by stone and brooch and omen.
It had been a world of the possible, even when faced with monsters and the dark Que-Tana. That was why it could not end the way it was preparing to end.
In Shardos's stories, the promise of a boy was always realfeed, the magical sword was eventually unsheathed and its power displayed, and the talking bird had something magnificent and important to say. The lost book was found, the wandering ship came home, and the third son prospered despite his unlikely inheritance.
Dannelle di Caela would see Galen again. It was the way that stories ended.
The trail turned sharply upward, and the three of them, dog and juggler and lady of the court, embarked on the last half-mile or so that would bring them to the surface and to as much safety as they could expect here at the borders of imperiled Solamnia.
Dannelle could discern the outline of stone and corridor in a deep, settled grayness. Now she could follow the juggler without being led like a child or a donkey.
"We are nearing the surface, my dear," Shardos said. "Can you smell it?"
Dannelle breathed more easily, taking in the sweet, metallic smell of rain, and beyond it the green of juniper and aeterna.
It was midnight there in the upper mountains, but even the light of the moon seemed unbearably brilliant. Dannelle shielded her face for a moment, covered her head with her cloak. Beside her, Birgis sneezed, no doubt bewildered by the brightness himself.
Shardos took the girl's hand once more and whispered to her kindly.
"Rest, my dear. But only a while. Though the odds seem longer than the distances, I'll wager you have a part to play before the story has ended. But you'll not do it alone, that's for certain. Rest awhile, and aid will come to you."
Her head still covered, her eyes still closed against the moonlight, Dannelle heard the old man turn and descend. He was going back down into the darkness.
"Shardos!" she cried turning around to follow him. He was already at the mouth of the cavern, once again half-hidden by shadow.
"Did you think I would walk you home, m'lady?" he asked, pausing at the edge of the entrance. 'Though the prospect is charming, more charming by far than returning to Firebrand and his pasty underlings, it is nonetheless a walk I cannot make. I am afraid I am needed more below than above."
She took one step toward him, but with a broad wave of his hand, he motioned her back.
"Be of good heart!" he urged. "The time is fast approaching when all of us are called upon to do the hard things. You have a breathing space, Dannelle di Caela, before your hardest travels are at hand. As I said to you but a moment ago, rest awhile and aid will come to you."
Dannelle sat with her face in her hands for a long while. Birgis looked up at her with a strange, wise look of concern, cocking his big head and resting his long, badger-killing snout on her lap. Finally she rubbed the animal's ear in an idle, circular motion, as heedlessly as if this journey, this adventure, were all a daydream over the laundry tubs in Castle di Caela.
Longwalker found Dannelle rubbing the ears of the dog, her eyes staring off into high country. He smiled and led her into the clearing to the little mare-the one who had stayed behind when the other Solamnic horses scattered.
Dreaming girls, he realized, are not the most durable of riders. And the road to Castle di Caela was a long, rough one for a cavalryman, not to mention a sheltered girl used to the attentions of servants and finaglings of courtiers.
But then, he told himself, he must trust on all counts to the most unlikely of heroes: a blind juggler, a bedazzled cleric, and a long-nosed dog. An unlikely trio, who trust their safety to even more unlikely Solamnic Knights: a four-hundred-pound epicure more bent on sirloin and sherry than sword and shield, and the leader, who seemed anything but skilled and experienced and resourceful.
Trust in the likes of these, Longwalker thought, is the beginnings of the strongest faith. The girl started as he laid his hand softly on her shoulder.