It had been a lonely winter, twenty years ago, despite the warmth of the hearth and the companionship at the Inn of the Last Home; the following spring, he had found his thoughts turning toward the forests to the south, and Qualinost, wondering how Tanis was.
Not a week later, Flint had encountered a stranger in the Inn who turned out to be none other than a Qualinesti elf bearing a message from the Speaker: Flint was welcome to return, should he wish it. And he did. His next stay in Qualinost lasted more than a year before he grew lonely for human folk again. Eventually, with some variation, he'd worked into the pattern of visits that he found himself in now, living in Qualinost from the earliest spring to the latest autumn. Lately, he'd begun to wonder why he returned to his joyless little home in Solace at all.
The Speaker of the Sun had given up bothering to send for the dwarf each spring, knowing that Flint's love of the city would draw him back south, until one spring morning would find the dwarf clattering across the bridge west of Qualinost. Flint, queasy about heights, never crossed the structure without paragraphs of oaths that would make a Caergoth longshoreman's skin blister.
His entrance never ceased to amuse the elves.
Now, though, he still had several hours' ride ahead of him. He prodded the laden Fleetfoot in the flanks with his booted heels, hoping that for once she would pick up the pace without protest.
Naturally, she balked.
Han-Telio Teften had had a good trading expedition. He whistled tunelessly and, not for the first time, blessed the Speaker of the Sun, whose relaxed attitudes toward relations with nonelves had made it easier in recent years to make a living by trade.
The young elf's brown eyes glowed as, for the fiftieth time this trip, he slipped a slender hand into his canvas saddlebags, each time unwittingly tightening the knot in the thong that held the bag nearly shut. As he and his horse entered a widening of the trail, a small clearing, he drew out a small leather sack and shook the contents into his palm. Three white opals shone translucent against his weathered, tanned hand.
"Beautiful," he breathed. "And the key to my future."
A rustle off to his left brought his head up, a wary look on his face. Brigands had been virtually unknown on the inland trails of Qualinesti for years, but recent months had brought reports of lost travelers. After minutes without incident, however, Han-Telio returned to admiring the opals and fell to listing the wonderful things they would buy.
"A home, that's first," he mused. "And furnishings, of course. And a plot of land for my Ginevra to grow fragrant herbs on."
Then, of course, there was Ginevra herself, the sloe-eyed elf who had promised to marry him once he could handle his part of the wedding expenses. Her practical-minded vow had spurred him to spend months on the road, trading fine elven jewelry, silken cloth, quartz sculptings, and, of course, her popular herbal remedies. And now he had finally earned enough to meet his half of the arrangement.
He didn't see the creature right away. It was the smell that first caught his notice-a sweet smell of rotting garbage. The odor, and the sudden shiver of his horse, caught his attention.
Han-Telio looked up and felt his limbs go leaden. Waiting in the trail not twenty paces ahead stood a huge lizardlike creature. Its hide was dun-colored, the same hue as the worn dirt path behind it. Horns about the length of the elf's arm tilted back from the lizard's horny brow. It sported five toes with six-inch claws on both front feet. Its mouth was slightly open; each exhalation sent another cloud of fetid breath swirling toward the elven trader. The creature, resembling a wingless dragon, had a horned body as long as four elves, with a thin, whiplike tail only slightly shorter.
"A tylor!" the trader said. The beasts were rare even in the arid regions they preferred. None had ever inhabited the forests of Qualinesti. And even though the trader had ranged far from the elven homeland in his travels, he'd never seen a tylor.
But he knew they were strong, capable of great magic if brute force didn't succeed,… and deadly.
Beneath him, Han-Telio's horse stood stock-still in fright, eyes wide, nostrils flaring, forelegs locked. Han-Telio sawed at the reins, but the animal was heedless of his commands and kicks. The woods lay silent of all sounds except the creaking of the oak branches overhead.
"Your steed will not move, elf."
Han-Telio looked around wildly, hoping that a rescuer- preferably one armed more heavily than an elven trader-stood ready to pitch into battle with him. The voice had been deep but raspy, as though air flowed over scales of sandstone. Over scales… Han-Telio felt another flood of fear pitch through him. He looked at the lizard.
"That's right, elf. I speak."
The tylor spoke Common.
The sounds spurred Han-Telio into quavery action; he slipped the opals into a pocket of his split tunic, and, hands shaking as the creature advanced two paces, its dangerous, sharp-edged tail twitching, the elven trader attempted to draw his canvas saddlebags open wider, to draw forth the short sword that he kept there.
But the knot in the thong that bound the saddlebags resisted his efforts, tangled hopelessly. The tylor moved another step forward; the smell grew stronger. Han-Telio recognized the odor.
It was the stench of rotting meat.
The voice rumbled again. "Where are you going, elf? Your horse does not appear willing to carry you."
Han-Telio was not sure why he answered. Perhaps to win time. "To Ginevra," he replied, yanking with one hand at the reins and with the other at the saddlebags. He breathed raggedly. "I must get home to Ginevra."
Finally, the trader, with strength born of fear, snapped the ' thong and drew forth his short sword.
When Han-Telio looked up again, the tylor, head weaving as it sought to mesmerize its target, stood mere paces away. As the trader watched, fascinated despite himself, the creature passed before a spruce tree, then before a boulder of quartz, and its flesh turned first green, then rose-pink, then back to dun as the gray-brown path once again comprised the creature's background. Camouflage, the elf found himself thinking, irrelevantly. With a burst of bravado, he pointed his sword at the beast.
"A slender pig-sticker like that short sword will do you little against the likes of me, elf," the monster thundered, its plated face two arm lengths away. Then the tylor rent the clearing with a screech that shook Han-Telio to his spine.
The trader's horse, terrified finally into movement, reared and wheeled to flee. But the tylor lunged and caught the horse by the neck in its jagged jaws as Han-Telio screamed and leaped from the animal. The trader screamed again as the tail of the tylor lashed with cobralike speed.
The elven body that hit the rocklike floor of the path was split nearly in two.
Three opals rolled to a stop in a pool of blood.
The roar came from a distance as Flint tugged vainly on the reins of his mule, trying fruitlessly to browbeat the beast into resuming the trip to Qualinost. For a moment, Flint stood frozen, his alert blue eyes inches from Fleetfoot's dumb brown ones. Then a thin scream rocketed through the forest, and Flint's hand went to his battle-axe as he twisted on the trail, seeking to locate the direction of the sound. Behind him, Fleetfoot shuffled nervously.
The scream came again, louder, but ended abruptly. It came from directly in front.
"Reorx's thunder!" the dwarf exclaimed, throwing himself on Fleetfoot's back. "Move, you cursed mule, or I'll see you fed to a minotaur and enjoy the sight!"