Dragons of Spring Dawning - Margaret Weis [134]
“Do you remember arresting a dragonarmy officer this afternoon on charges of desertion?”
The captain remembered questioning many officers today … he was a busy man … they all looked alike. Gakhan gestured to the draconians, who responded promptly and efficiently.
The captain screamed in agony. Yes, yes! He remembered! But it wasn’t just one officer. There had been two of them.
“Two?” Gakhan’s eyes glittered. “Describe the other officer.”
“A big human, really big. Bulging out of his uniform. And there had been prisoners.…”
“Prisoners!” Gakhan’s reptilian tongue flicked in and out of his mouth. “Describe them!”
The captain was only too happy to describe. “A human woman, red curls, breasts the size of …”
“Get on with it,” Gakhan snarled. His clawed hands trembled. He glanced at his escorts and the draconians tightened their grip.
Sobbing, the captain gave hurried descriptions of the other two prisoners, his words falling over themselves.
“A kender,” Gakhan repeated, growing more and more excited. “Go on! An old man, white beard—” He paused, puzzled. The old magic-user? Surely they would not have allowed that decrepit old fool to accompany them on a mission so important and fraught with peril. If not, then who? Someone else they had picked up?
“Tell me more about the old man,” Gakhan ordered.
The captain cast desperately about in his liquor-soaked and pain-stupefied brain. The old man … white beard …
“Stooped?”
No … tall, broad shoulders … blue eyes. Queer eyes—The captain was on the verge of passing out. Gakhan clutched the man in his clawed hand, squeezing his neck.
“What about the eyes?”
Fearfully the captain stared at the draconian who was slowly choking the life from him. He babbled something.
“Young … too young!” Gakhan repeated in exultation. Now he knew! “Where are they?”
The captain gasped out a word, then Gakhan hurled him to the floor with a crash.
The whirlwind was rising. Gakhan felt himself being swept upward. One thought beat in his brain like the wings of a dragon as he and his escorts left the tent, racing for the dungeons below the palace.
The Everman … the Everman … the Everman!
7
The Temple of the Queen of Darkness.
T as!”
“Hurt … lemme ’lone …”
“I know, Tas. I’m sorry, but you’ve got to wake up. Please, Tas!”
An edge of fear and urgency in the voice pierced the pain-laden mists in the kender’s mind. Part of him was jumping up and down, yelling at him to wake up. But another part was all for drifting back into the darkness that, while unpleasant, was better than facing the pain he knew was lying in wait for him, ready to spring—
“Tas … Tas …” A hand patted his cheek. The whispered voice was tense, tight with terror kept under control. The kender knew suddenly that he had no choice. He had to wake up. Besides, the jumping-up-and-down part of his brain shouted, you might be missing something!
“Thank the gods!” Tika breathed as Tasslehoff’s eyes opened wide and stared up at her. “How do you feel?”
“Awful,” Tas said thickly, struggling to sit up. As he had foreseen, pain leaped out of a corner and pounced on him. Groaning, he clutched his head.
“I know … I’m sorry,” Tika said again, stroking back his hair with a gentle hand.
“I’m sure you mean well, Tika,” Tas said miserably, “but would you mind not doing that? It feels like dwarf hammers pounding on me.”
Tika drew back her hand hurriedly. The kender peered around as best he could through one good eye. The other had nearly swollen shut. “Where are we?”
“In the dungeons below the Temple,” Tika said softly. Tas, sitting next to her, could feel her shiver with fear and cold. Looking around, he could see why. The sight made him shudder, too. Wistfully he remembered the good old days when he hadn’t known the meaning of the word of fear. He should have felt a thrill of excitement. He was, after all, someplace he’d never been before and there