“Flint! Release the lance! Flint…” Tas didn’t even know what he was saying anymore. The ground was rushing up to meet him as the weakened dragons toppled from the skies. He couldn’t think. White flashes of light burst in his head as he clung with all his strength to the officer, who was still struggling beneath him.
Then a great metallic bang sounded.
The lance released. The dragons were freed.
Spreading his wings, Khirsah pulled out of his spinning dive and leveled off. The sky and ground resumed their proper, correct positions. Tears streamed down Tas’s cheeks. He hadn’t been frightened, he told himself, sobbing. But nothing had ever looked so beautiful as that blue, blue sky-back up where it should be!
“Are you all right, Fireflash?” Tas yelled.
The bronze nodded wearily.
“I’ve got a prisoner,” Tas called, suddenly realizing that fact himself. Slowly he let go of the man, who shook his head dizzily, half-choked.
“I guess you’re not going anywhere,” Tas muttered. Sliding off the man’s back, the kender crawled down the mane toward the dragon’s shoulders. Tas saw the officer look up into the skies, and clench his fist in bitter rage as he watched his dragons being slowly driven from the skies by Laurana and her forces. In particular, the officer’s gaze fixed on Laurana-and suddenly Tas knew where he had seen him before.
The kender caught his breath. “You better take us down to the ground, Fireflash!” he cried, his hands shaking. “Hurry!”
The dragon arched his head to look around at his riders, and Tas saw that one eye was swollen shut. There were scorch and burn marks all along one side of the bronze head, and blood dripped from a torn nostril. Tas glanced around for the blue. He was nowhere to be seen.
Looking back at the officer, Tas suddenly felt wonderful. It occurred to him what he had done.
“Hey!” he yelled in elation, turning around to Flint. “We did it! We fought a dragon and I captured a prisoner! Single-handed!”
Flint nodded slowly. Turning back, Tas watched as the ground rose up to meet him, and the kender thought it had never looked so … so wonderfully groundlike before!
Khirsah landed. The foot soldiers gathered around them, yelling and cheering. Someone led the officer away-Tas was not sorry to see him go; noticing that the officer gave him a sharp, penetrating look before he was led off. But then the kender forgot him as he glanced up at Flint.
The dwarf was slumped over the saddle, his face old and tired-looking, his lips blue.
“What’s the matter?”
“Nothing.”
“But you’re holding your chest. Are you wounded?”
“No, I’m not.”
“Then why are you holding your chest?”
Flint scowled. “I suppose I’ll have no peace until I answer you. Well, if you must know, it’s that confounded lance! And whoever designed this stupid vest was a bigger ninny that you are! The shaft of the lance drove right into my collarbone. I’ll be black and blue for a week. And as for your prisoner, it’s a wonder you weren’t both killed, you rattlebrain! Captured, humpf! More like an accident, if you ask me. And I’ll tell you something else! I’m never getting on another one of those great beasts as long as I live!”
Flint shut his lips with an angry snap, glaring at the kender so fiercely that Tas turned around and walked quickly away, knowing that when Flint was in that kind of mood, it was best to leave him alone to cool off. He’d feel better after lunch.
It wasn’t until that night, when Tasslehoff was curled up next to Khirsah, resting comfortably against the dragon’s great bronze flank, that he remembered Flint had been clutching the left side of his chest.
The lance had been on the old dwarf’s right.
10
Spring Dawning.
The day dawned, pink and golden light spreading across the land, the citizens of Kalaman woke to the sound of bells. Leaping out of bed, children invaded parental bedrooms, demanding that mother and father arise so that this special day could get underway. Though some grumbled and feigned to pull the blankets over their heads, most parents laughingly climbed out of bed, not less eager than their children.
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