“And you have a beard,” Sturm said with amusement.
Then the knight turned to greet Caramon and Flint. Tasslehoff dashed off after more ale, Tika having been called away to serve others in the growing crowd.
“Greetings, Knight,” whispered Raistlin from his corner.
Sturm’s face grew solemn as he turned to greet the other twin. “Raistlin,” he said.
The mage drew back his hood, letting the light fall on his face. Sturm was too well-bred to let his astonishment show beyond a slight exclamation. But his eyes widened. Tanis realized the young mage was getting a cynical pleasure out of seeing his friends’ discomfiture.
“Can I get you something, Raistlin?” Tanis asked.
“No, thank you,” the mage answered, moving into the shadows once again.
“He eats practically nothing,” Caramon said in a worried tone. “I think he lives on air.”
“Some plants live on air,” Tasslehoff stated, returning with Sturm’s ale. “I’ve seen them. They hover up off the ground. Their roots suck food and water out of the atmosphere.”
“Really?” Caramon’s eyes were wide.
“I don’t know who’s the greater idiot,” said Flint in disgust.
“Well, we’re all here. What news?”
‘All?” Sturm looked at Tanis questioningly. “Kitiara?”
“Not coming,” Tanis replied steadily. “We were hoping perhaps you could tell us something.”
“Not I.” The knight frowned. “We traveled north together and parted soon after crossing the Sea Narrows into Old Solamnia. She was going to look up relatives of her father, she said. That was the last I saw of her.”
“Well, I suppose that’s that.” Tanis sighed. “What of your relatives, Sturm? Did you find your father?”
Sturm began to talk, but Tanis only half-listened to Sturm’s tale of his travels in his ancestral land of Solamnia. Tanis’s thoughts were on Kitiara. Of all his friends, she had been the one he most longed to see. After five years of trying to get her dark eyes and crooked smile out of his mind, he discovered that his longing for her grew daily. Wild, impetuous, hot-tempered -the swordswoman was everything Tanis was not. She was also human, and love between human and elf always ended in tragedy. Yet Tanis could no more get Kitiara out of his heart than he could get his human half out of his blood. Wrenching his mind free of memories, he began listening to Sturm.
“I heard rumors. Some say my father is dead. Some say he’s alive.” His face darkened. “But no one knows where he is.”
“Your inheritance?” Caramon asked.
Sturm smiled, a melancholy smile that softened the lines in his proud face. “I wear it,” he replied simply. “My armor and my weapon.”
Tanis looked down to see that the knight wore a splendid, if old-fashioned, two-handed sword.
Caramon stood up to peer over the table. “That’s a beauty,” he said. “They don’t make them like that these days. My sword broke in a fight with an ogre. Theros Ironfeld put a new blade on it today, but it cost me dearly. So you’re a knight now?”
Sturm’s smile vanished. Ignoring the question, he caressed the hilt of his sword lovingly. “According to the legend, this sword will break only if I do,” he said. “It was all that was left of my father’s-”
Suddenly Tas, who hadn’t been listening, interrupted. “Who are those people?” the kender asked in a shrill whisper.
Tanis looked up as the two barbarians walked past their table, heading for empty chairs that sat in the shadows of a corner near the firepit. The man was the tallest man Tanis had ever seen. Caramon-at six feet-would come only to this man’s shoulder. But Caramon’s chest was probably twice as big around, his arms three times as big. Although the man was bundled with the furs barbarian tribesmen live in, it was obvious that he was thin for his great height. His face, though dark-skinned, had the pale cast of one who has been ill or suffered greatly.
His companion-the woman Sturm had bowed to-was so muffled in a fur-trimmed-cape and hood that it was difficult to tell much about her. Neither she nor her tall escort glanced at Sturm as they passed. The woman carried a plain staff trimmed with feathers in barbaric fashion. The man carried a well-worn knapsack. They sat down in the chairs, huddled in their cloaks, and talked together in low voices.