Caramon looked. The shadow of the Forest was gone. He and Tas were standing in a clearing.
Swiftly, fearfully, he glanced around.
At his feet yawned a dark chasm.
Behind them, the Forest waited. Caramon did not have to turn to see it, he knew it was there, just as he knew that they would never reenter it and get out alive. It had led them this far, here it would leave them. But where was here? The trees were behind them, but ahead of them lay nothing just a vast, dark void. They might have been standing on the very edge of a cliff, as Tas had said.
Storm clouds darkened the horizon, but—for the time being—none seemed close. Up above, he could see the moons and stars in the sky. Lunitari burned a fiery red, Solinari’s s silver light glowed with a radiant brilliance Caramon had never seen before. And now, perhaps because of the stark contrast between darkness and light, he could see Nuitari the black moon, the moon that had been visible only to his brother’s eyes. Around the moons, the stars shone fiercely, none brighter than the strange hourglass constellation.
The only sounds he could hear were the angry mutterings of the Forest behind him and, ahead of him, that shrill, horrible scream.
They had no choice, Caramon thought wearily. There was no turning back. The Forest would not permit that. And what was death anyhow except an end to this pain, this thirst, this bitter aching in his heart.
“Stay here, Tas,” he began, trying to disengage the kender’s small hand as he prepared to step forward into the darkness. “I’m going to go ahead a little way and scout—”
“Oh, no!” Tas cried. “You’re not going anywhere without me!” The kender’s hand gripped his even more firmly. “Why, just look at all the trouble you got into by yourself in the dwarf wars!” he added, trying to get rid of an annoying choking feeling in his throat. “And when I did get there, I had to save your life.” Tas looked down into the darkness that lay at their feet, then he gritted his teeth resolutely and raised his gaze to meet that of the big man. “I—I think it would be awfully lonely in—in the Afterlife without you and, besides, I can just hear Flint “Well, you doorknob, what have you gone and done this time? Managed to lose that great hulking hunk of lard, did you? It figures. Now, I suppose I’ll have to leave my nice soft seat here under this tree and set off in search of the muscle-bound idiot. Never did know when to come in out of the rain—”
“Very well, Tas,” Caramon interrupted with a smile, having a sudden vision of the crotchety old dwarf. “It would never do to disturb Flint. I’d never hear the end of it.”
“Besides,” Tas went on, feeling more cheerful, “why would they bring us all this way just to dump us in a pit?”
“Why, indeed?” Caramon said, reflecting. Gripping his crutch, feeling more confident, he took a step into the darkness, Tas following along behind.
“Unless,” the kender added with a gulp, “Par-Salian’s still mad at me...”
6
The Tower of High Sorcery loomed before them—a thing of darkness, silhouetted against the light of moon and stars, looking as though it had been created out of the night itself. For centuries it had stood, a bastion of magic, the repository of the books and artifacts of the Art, collected over the years.
Here the mages had come when they were driven from the Tower of High Sorcery in Palanthas by the Kingpriest, here they brought with them those most valued objects, saved from the attacking mobs. Here they dwelt in peace, guarded by the Forest of Wayreth. Young apprentice magic users took the Test here, the grueling Test that meant death to those who failed it.
Here Raistlin had come and lost his soul to Fistandantilus. Here Caramon had been forced to watch as Raistlin murdered an illusion of his twin brother.
Here Caramon and Tas had returned with the gully dwarf, Bupu, bearing the comatose body of Lady Crysania. Here they had attended a Conclave of the Three Robes—Black, Red, and White.
Here they had learned Raistlin’s s ambition to challenge the Queen of Darkness. Here they had met his apprentice and spy for the Conclave—Dalamar. Here the great archmage Par-Salian had cast a time-travel spell on Caramon and Lady Crysania, sending them back to Istar before the mountain fell.
Here, Tasslehoff had inadvertently upset the spell by jumping in to go with Caramon. Thus, the presence of the kender—forbidden by all the laws of magic—allowed time to be altered.
Now Caramon and Tas had returned—to find what? Caramon stared at the Tower, his heart heavy with foreboding and dread. His courage failed him. He could not enter, not with the sound of that pitiful, persistent screaming echoing in his ears. Better to go back, better to face quick death in the Forest. Besides, he had forgotten the gates. Made of silver and of gold, they still stood, steadfastly blocking his way into the Tower. Thin as cobweb they seemed, looking like black streaks painted down the starlit sky. A touch of a kender’s hand might have opened them. Yet magical spells were wound about them, spells so powerful an army of ogres could have hurled itself against those fragile seeming gates without effect.
Still the screaming, louder now and nearer. So near, in fact, that it might have come from Caramon took another step forward, his brow creased in a frown. As he did so, the gate came clearly into view.
And revealed the source of the screaming...
The gates were not shut, nor were they locked. One gate stood fast, as if still spellbound. But the other had broken, and now it swung by one hinge, back and forth, back and forth in the hot, unceasing wind. And, as it blew back and forth slowly in the breeze, it gave forth a shrill, high-pitched shriek.
“It’s not locked,” said Tas in disappointment. His small hand had already been reaching for his lockpicking tools.
“No,” said Caramon, staring up at the squeaking hinge. “And there’s the voice we heard—the voice of rusty metal.” He supposed he should have been relieved, but it only deepened the mystery. “If it wasn’t Par-Salian or someone up there”—his eyes went to the Tower that stood, black and apparently empty before them—“who got us through the Forest, then who was it?”
“Maybe no one,” Tas said hopefully. “If no one’s here, Caramon, can we leave?”
“There has to be someone,” Caramon muttered. “Something made those trees let us pass.”
Tas sighed, his head drooping. Caramon could see him in the moonlight, his small face pale and covered with grime. There were dark shadows beneath his eyes, his lower lip quivered, and a tear was sneaking down one side of his small nose.
Caramon patted him on the shoulder. “Just a little longer,” he said gently. “Hold out just a little longer, please, Tas?”
Looking up quickly, swallowing that traitor tear and its partner that had just dripped into his mouth, Tas grinned cheerfully. “Sure, Caramon,” he said. Not even the fact that his throat was aching and parched with thirst could keep him from adding, “You know me—always ready for adventure.
There’s bound to be lots of magical, wonderful things in there, don’t you think?” he added, glancing at the silent Tower. “Things no one would miss. Not magical rings, of course. I’m finished with magical rings. First one lands me in a wizard’s castle where I met a truly wicked demon, then the next turns me into a mouse. I—”
Letting Tas prattle on, glad that the kender was apparently feeling back to normal, Caramon hobbled forward and put his hand upon the swinging gate to shove it to one side. To his amazement, it broke off—the weakened hinge finally giving way The gate clattered to the gray paving stone beneath it with a clang that made both Tas and Caramon cringe. The echoes bounded off the black, polished walls of the Tower, resounding through the hot night and shattering the stillness.
“Well, now they know we’re here,” said Tas.