"If Paladine's given you to know the knight has a secret, why doesn't Paladine just tell you what the damn secret is?" Tanis asked, and he sounded a bit testy. He gets put out at the gods sometimes.
Laurana cleared her throat and gave him one of Those Looks that married people give each other sometimes. One reason I've never been married myself.
"Paladine has done so," said Lady Crysania with a smile.
And you may believe this or not, but she turned her head and looked straight at me, even though she couldn't see me and she couldn't have had any idea that I was in the room for I was being as quiet as the time I accidentally turned myself into a mouse.
"Tasslehoff!" Tanis said, and he didn't sound at all pleased. "Do you know anything about this?"
"Me?" I asked, looking around. I didn't think it likely he could have been talking to any other Tasslehoff, but I could always hope.
He meant me, however.
"Yeeessss," I said, drawing out the word a long time, as long as possible, and not looking at him. I don't like it when he looks so stern. "But I promised not to tell."
Tanis sighed. "All right, Tas. You promised not to tell. Now I'm certain you must have told this story a dozen times since then so it won't hurt if you tell it — "
"No, Tanis." I interrupted him, which was not very po lite, but he truly had it all wrong. I looked up at him and I was extremely solemn and serious. "I haven't told. Not ever. Not anyone. I promised, you see."
He stared at me real hard. Then his eyes crinkled. He looked worried. Kneeling down, he put his hand on my shoulder. "You haven't told anyone?"
"No, Tanis," I said, and for some reason a tear slid out of my eye. "I never have. I promised him I wouldn't."
"Promised who?"
"Fizban," I said.
Tanis groaned. (I told you, he always groans when I mention FB.)
"I, too, know," said a voice unexpectedly.
And at this we all turned to look at Theros. And he was as grim and dour and stern as I've ever seen Theros, who is usually quite nice, even if he does pick me up by the topknot sometimes, which isn't at all dignified.
"Sir Owen Glendower and I have discussed it between ourselves, often, each looking for his own truth. I have found mine. And I thought he had found his. Perhaps I was wrong. It- is not for me to tell his tale, however. If he had wanted it told, he would have done so before now."
"But surely," Tanis said, growing more irritated than ever, "if the man's life is at stake…"
"I can tell you nothing," Theros said. "I wasn't there." He turned and stalked out of the Upper Gallery.
Which left me. You see, I was there.
"C'mon, Tas," said Caramon in that wheedling way of his that makes me feel like I'd like to hit him sometimes. "You can tell me."
"I promised not to tell anyone," I said. They were all standing around me now, and I had never in my life felt more miserable, except maybe when I was in the Abyss. "I promised Fizban I wouldn't."
Tanis started to get red in the face and he would have yelled at me for sure but two things — a sneeze and Laurana digging her elbow into his ribs — put a stop to it. I didn't even remember to give him his handkerchief, I was so unhappy.
Lady Crysania came over to me and put out her hand and touched me. Her touch was soft and gentle. I wanted to run into her arms and cry like a big baby. I didn't, because that wouldn't have been dignified for a kender my age and a hero, to boot, but I wanted to, most desperately.
"Tas," she said to me, "how did you happen to come here?"
I thought that was a strange question, since I was invited, so I told her about the sausages and the jail and the message and the invitation from Fizban.
Tanis groaned and sneezed again.
"Don't you see, Tasslehoff?" asked Lady Crysania. "It was Fizban who sent you here. You know who Fizban really is, don't you?"
"I know who he thinks he is," I said, because Raistlin told me once that he wasn't really certain himself if the wacky old wizard was telling the truth or not. "Fizban thinks he's the god Paladine."
"Whether he is or he isn't" — Lady Crysania smiled again — "he sent you here for a reason, you may be sure. I think he wants you to tell us the story."
"Do you?" I asked hopefully. "I'd like to, because it's been weighing on my mind."
I handed Tanis his handkerchief and gave the matter some thought. "But you don't know that for sure, Lady Crysania," I said, starting to feel miserable again. "I'm always NOT doing the right thing. I wouldn't want to not do the right thing now."
I thought some more. "But I wouldn't want Sir Owen to die either."
I had an idea. "I know! I'll tell you all the secret, then you can tell me whether or not I should tell anyone. And if you say I shouldn't, then I won't."
"But Tas, if you tell us — " Caramon began.
At which point Laurana gave him a nudge on one side and Tanis gave him a nudge on the other, so that Caramon coughed and was all sort of nudged out, I guess, because he didn't say anymore.
"I think that is very wise," said Lady Crysania, and she said she wanted to keep near Owen Glendower, so we all followed her. There weren't any chairs. We sat down on the floor in a circle, with Lady Crysania keeping beside Owen and everyone else around her and me opposite.
And it was there, sitting on the floor next to Owen Glendower, stretched out in his armor on the fur cloaks, that I told the story I had sworn by my topknot I would never, ever, ever tell.
I took hold of my topknot and held it fast, because I thought this might be the last time I'd ever see it.
CHAPTER THREE
Well, I'm certain you must remember the part in the old story where most of us went to the Silver Dragon Mountain. There was me and Flint and Laurana and her brother Gilthanas and Theros Ironfeld and Silvara, the silver dragon, except we didn't know she was a silver dragon then.
Silvara took us to the Silver Dragon Mountain on purpose to find the dragonlances and to tell us how to forge them. But once we got there, she began to have second thoughts about telling us, because of the oath the good dragons had taken.
It's all very complicated and doesn't have anything much to do with my story, but it sets the scene for you, so speak. While we were inside Huma's Tomb, Silvara cast a spell on everyone, except she missed me, because I was hiding under a shield. I went to get help for my friends, who were under her sleep spell, and I got sucked up inside the Silver Dragon Mountain. And it was there that I found Fizban, who was dead. Only he wasn't.
I brought him down, and he had a talk with Silvara. It was after that talk that she decided to tell everyone who she was really. And she led Theros Ironfeld to the pool of dragonmetal that would be used to forge the lances. Only that comes later. Where I'm starting now is the part right after Fizban had the talk with Silvara. He'd decided that he had to leave.
"Good-bye, good-bye," Fizban told us. We were all inside Huma's Tomb, in the Silver Dragon Mountain. "Nice seeing you again. I'm a bit miffed about the chicken feathers" — (I could explain that part but it would take too long. Astinus has it written down in his Chronicles2.) — "but no hard feelings."
Then Fizban glared at me.
"Are you coming?" he demanded. "I haven't got all night."
The chance to travel with a wizard! Especially a dead wizard! I couldn't pass it up. (Though I guess he wasn't really dead but none of us were sure of that at the time, especially Fizban.)
"Coming? With you!" I cried.
I was all excited and would have left right then and there, but it occurred to me that if I left, who would look out for everyone else in the group? (If I had known then that Silvara was really a silver dragon, I wouldn't have felt so bad, but I didn't.) I had no idea what sort of trouble my friends would get into without me. Especially Flint, my best friend, the dwarf.