The name was so funny and the scene was so ludicrous-a mosquito scolding a bear-that Raistlin began to laugh. He laughed until he was weak from the exertion and was forced to sit down on the stump. Pleased and amazed to see his brother in such a good humor, Caramon burst out in a loud guffaw and clapped the kender on the back, kindly picked him up afterward.
"Come, my brother," said Raistlin, "we should gather our belongings and start for home. The fairgrounds will be closing soon. It was very good meeting you, Tasslehoff Burrfoot," he added with sincerity.
"I'll help," offered Tasslehoff, darting eager glances at the many colored balls, the brightly painted box.
"Thanks, but we can manage," Caramon said hurriedly, retrieving the rabbit just as it was disappearing into one of the kender's pouches. Sturm removed several of the silk scarves from the tender's pocket.
"You should be more careful of your possessions," Tasslehoff felt called upon to point out. "It's a good thing I was here to find them. I'm glad I was. You really are a wonderful magician, Raistlin.
May I call you Raistlin? Thanks. And I'll call you Caramon, if you'll call me Tasslehoff, which is my name, only my friends call me Tas, which you can, too, if you like. And I'll call you Sturm. Are you a knight? I was in Solamnia once and saw lots of knights. They all had mustaches like yours, only more of it-the mustache, I mean. Yours is a bit scrawny right now, but I can see you're working on it."
"Thank you," Sturm said, stroking his new mustache self-consciously.
The brothers started moving through the crowd, heading toward the exit. Saying that he'd seen all he cared to see for the day, Tasslehoff accompanied them. Not caring to be seen in public in company with a kender, Sturm had been about to take his leave of them when the kender mentioned Solamnia.
"Have you truly been there?" he asked.
"I've been all over Ansalon," said Tas proudly. "Solamnia's a very nice place. I'll tell you about it if you'd like. Say, I have an idea. Why don't you come home with me for supper? All of you. Flint won't mind."
"Who's Flint? Your wife?" Caramon asked.
Tasslehoff hooted. "My wife! Wait till I tell him! No, Flint's a dwarf and my very best friend in all the world, and I'm his best friend, no matter what he says, except for maybe Tanis Half-Elven, who is another friend of mine, only he's not here right now, he's gone to Qualinesti where the elves live." Tas stopped talking at this juncture, but only because he'd run out of breath.
"I remember now!" exclaimed Raistlin, coming to a halt. "I knew you looked familiar. You were there when Gilon died. You and the dwarf and the half-elf." He paused a moment, eyeing the kender thoughtfully, then said, "Thank you, Tasslehoff. We accept your invitation to supper."
"We do?" Caramon looked startled.
"Yes, my brother," said Raistlin.
"You'll come, too, won't you?" Tasslehoff asked Sturm eagerly.
Sturm was stroking his mustache. "My mother's expecting me at home, but I don't believe she'll mind if I join my friends. I'll stop by and tell her where I'm going. What part of Solamnia did you visit?"
"I'll show you." Tasslehoff reached around to a pouch he wore on his back-the kender was festooned with pouches and bags. He pulled out a map. "I do love maps, don't you? Would you mind holding that corner? There's Tarsis by the Sea. I've never been there, but I hope to go someday, when Flint doesn't need my help so much, which he does dreadfully right now. You wouldn't believe the trouble he gets into if I'm not there to keep an eye on things. Yes, that's Solamnia. They have awfully fine jails there."
The two continued walking, the tall Sturm bent to study the map, Tasslehoff pointing out various places of interest.
"Sturm's taken leave of his senses," said Caramon. "That kender's probably never been anywhere near Solamnia. They all lie like. well, like kender. And now you've got us eating supper with one of them and a dwarf! It's. it's not proper. We should stick to our own kind. Father says-"
"Not anymore he doesn't," Raistlin interrupted.
Caramon paled and lapsed into an unhappy silence.
Raistlin laid his hand on his brother's arm in silent apology. "We cannot stay cooped up forever in our home, wrapped in a safe little cocoon," he said gently. "We finally have a chance to break free of our bindings, Caramon, and we should take it! We'll need a little time for our wings to dry in the sun, but soon we'll be strong enough to fly. Do you understand?" "Yes, I think so. I'm not sure I want to fly, Raist. I get dizzy when I'm up too high." Caramon, added thoughtfully, "But if you're wet, you should definitely go home and dry off."
Raistlin sighed, patted his brother's arm. "Yes, Caramon. I'll change my clothes. And then we'll have dinner with the dwarf. And the kender."
Chapter 2
The house of Flint Fireforge was considered an oddity and one of the wonders of Solace. Not only was it built on the ground, but it was also made entirely of stone, which the dwarf had hauled all the way from Prayer's Eye Peak. Flint didn't care what people said about him or his house. In the long and proud history of dwarfdom, no dwarf had ever lived in a tree.
Birds lived in trees. Squirrels lived in trees. Elves lived in trees. Flint was neither bird, nor squirrel, nor elf, thanks be to Reorx the Forger. Flint did not have wings, nor a bushy tail, nor pointed ears- all of which, as everyone knows, are indigenous to tree-dwelling species. He considered living in trees unnatural as well as dangerous.
"Fall out of bed and that'll be the last fall you ever take," the dwarf was wont to say in dire tones.
It was useless to point out to him, as did his friend and business partner, Tanis Half-Elven, that even in a tree house one fell out of bed and landed on the floor, likely suffering nothing worse than a bruised backside.
Tree house floors were made of wood, Flint maintained, and wood was known to be an untrustworthy building material, subject to rot, mice, and termites, likely to catch fire at any moment, leaky in the rain, drafty in the cold. A good, stiff puff of wind would carry it away.
Stone, now. Nothing could beat good, solid stone. Cool in the summer, warm in the winter. Not a drop of rain could penetrate stone walls. The wind might blow as hard as it liked, blow until it was red in the face, and your stone blocks would never so much as quiver. It was well known that stone houses were the only houses to have survived the Cataclysm.
"Except in Istar," Tanis Half-Elven would tease.
"Not even stone houses can be expected to survive having a great bloody mountain dropped down on top of them," Flint would return, always adding, "Besides, I have no doubt that way down in the Blood Sea, where all know the city of Istar was cast, certain lucky fish are living quite comfortably."
On this particular day, Flint was inside his stone house attempting to make some sense of the disorder in which he lived. Disorder was a constant state of affairs ever since the kender had moved in.
The two unlikely roommates had met on market day. Flint was showing his wares, and Tasslehoff, passing through town on his way to anywhere interesting, had stopped at the dwarf's stall to admire a very fine bracelet.
What happened next is subject to who tells the story. According to Tas, he picked up the bracelet to try it on, discovered it fit perfectly, and was going off in search of someone to ask the price.
According to Flint, he came out of the back of the booth, after a refreshing nip of ale, to find Tasslehoff and the bracelet both disappearing rapidly into the crowd. Flint nabbed the kender, who loudly and shrilly proclaimed his innocence. People stopped to watch. Not to buy. Just to watch.