Fistandantilus Reborn - Douglas Niles [82]
After he had concealed a hundred paces or more of the connecting trail, Danyal tossed his broom-branch aside and jogged after his companions, following footsteps that were barely visible in the smooth forest floor.
However, he would have gone right past the clump of brambly wild rose that clustered at the base of a low rock promontory, except for the fact that the bush seemed to call out to him as he went by.
“Sssst! Dan-this way.”
He stopped and stared, finally perceiving the outlines of a dark opening at the base of the rocky knoll. Gingerly he stepped around the prickly bushes, avoiding the thorns while at the same time taking care not to leave any sign of his passage.
Foryth, Mirabeth, and Emilo were huddled within a small alcove in the rock. The place was too tiny to be called a cave, but it was spacious enough to hold them all as long as nobody wanted to lie down, and, more importantly, it was well concealed from the woods beyond.
“You’re Danyal, they told me,” Emilo said as soon as the youth made himself comfortable in the small enclosure. “Pleased to make your acquaintance… again.”
“Urn, me, too.” It was strange, this loss of memory, but the lad was glad to see that Emilo seemed to have regained his vitality. Dan wanted to ask questions: Why, for example, had Emilo taken it into his head to rescue them? But he doubted that the kender would know the answers, at least not now, and he didn’t want to upset him further by posing queries that would only highlight the unfortunate fellow’s loss of memory.
In any event, it seemed to be the kender who was determined to ask questions.
“Foryth said you were traveling into the mountains by yourself, and then Mirabeth told me that your village was burned by a dragon. I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. It wasn’t your fault,” Danyal declared curtly, even as he was surprised by his own snide reaction. Still, one thing he knew was that he didn’t want sympathy. He laughed bitterly as he remembered his plans in that long ago time-was it just four days ago?– when his world had died.
“I was on my way to kill that dragon,” he admitted, sheepish over his earlier brusque attitude. “I guess I never gave any thought about how I was going to do it. All I had was a fishing pole and a little knife, and I don’t even have those anymore!” Again he laughed, trying to sound harsh, sensing that he had wandered dangerously close to the brink of tears.
“And what about you?” Emilo, to Danyal’s relief, had turned to Foryth.
“Do your studies often bring you this far away from the temple library?”
“Er, no.” Foryth cleared his throat, then repeated the mannerism, and Danyal sensed that he was reluctant to talk, a reluctance that made the lad all that much more curious about the historian’s tale.
“Actually, I have been given a chance-sort of a last chance, to tell the truth-to be ordained into the priesthood of Gilean.”
“This is some kind of a test?” Danyal guessed. “Getting to Loreloch?”
“Not that, specifically. You see, I have studied the priestly doctrines for many years, but I have never been able to master the casting of a spell. I pray to Gilean with utmost sincerity, asking for guidance, for a hint of power. But there is nothing there.”
“And if you don’t cast this spell…?” probed the youth.
“Then I shall never become a priest. My life’s objective, all the fruits of my labors, the volumes of my writing, shall have been for naught.”
“I don’t think so!” objected Danyal. “You told me that story about Fistandantilus. It was good. You don’t have to cast a spell in order to make the words you write on paper, the histories you tell, mean something. To make them be important, I mean.”
“But the most highly regarded historians of Krynn have been priests of Gilean,” moaned Foryth. “And all I need is one spell, a single, simple enchantment that would prove my faith. Then I could join their numbers!”
“I wouldn’t count on a priest