Dragons of Spring Dawning by Weis, Margaret

“Soth’s passions took hold of him, destroying his reason. In a jealous rage he rode back to Dargaard Keep. Entering his door, he accused the innocent girl of betraying him. Then the Cataclysm struck. The great chandelier in the entryway fell to the floor, consuming the elfmaid and her child in flames. As she died, she called down a curse upon the knight, condemning him to eternal, dreadful life. Soth and his followers perished in the fire, only to be reborn in hideous form.”

“So this is what he hears,” Ariakas murmured, listening.

And in the climate of dreams

When you recall her, when the world of the dream

expands, wavers in light,

when you stand at the edge of blessedness and sun.

Then we shall make you remember, shall make you live again through the long denial of body

For you were first dark in the light’s hollow, expanding like a stain, a cancer

For you were the shark in the slowed water beginning to move

For you were the notched head of a snake, sensing forever warmth and form

For you were inexplicable death in the crib, the long house in betrayal

And you were more terrible than this in a loud alley of visions, for you passed through unharmed, unchanging

As the women screamed, unraveling silence, halving the door of the world, bringing forth monsters

As a child opened in parabolas of fire There at the borders of two lands burning

As the world split, wanting to swallow you back willing to give up everything to lose you in darkness.

You passed through these unharmed, unchanging,

but now you see them

strung on our words-on your own conceiving

as you pass from night-to awareness of night

to know that hatred is the calm of philosophers

that its price is forever

that it draws you through meteors

through winter’s transfixion

through the blasted rose

through the sharks’ water

through the black compression of oceans

through rock-through magma

to yourself-to an abscess of nothing

that you will recognize as nothing

that you will know is coming again and again

under the same rules.

13

The trap.

Bakaris slept fitfully in his jail cell. Though haughty and insolent during the day, his nights were tortured by erotic dreams of Kitiara and fearful dreams of his execution at the hands of the Knights of Solamnia. Or perhaps it was his execution at Kitiara’s hands. He was never certain, when he woke in a cold sweat, which it had been. Lying in his cold cell in the still hours of the night when he could not sleep, Bakaris cursed the elven woman who had been the cause of his downfall. Over and over he plotted his revenge upon her-if only she would fall into his hands.

Bakaris was thinking of this, hovering between sleep and wakefulness, when the sound of a key in the lock of his cell door brought him to his feet. It was near dawn, near the hour of execution! Perhaps the knights were coming for him!

“Who is it?” Bakaris called harshly.

“Hush!” commanded a voice. “You are in no danger, if you keep quiet and do as you are told.”

Bakaris sat back down on his bed in astonishment. He recognized the voice. How not? Night after night it had spoken in his vengeful thoughts. The elf woman! And the commander could see two other figures in the shadows, small figures. The dwarf and the kender, most likely. They always hung around the elf woman.

The cell door opened. The elf woman glided inside. She was heavily cloaked and carried another cloak in her hand.

“Hurry,” she ordered coldly. “Put this on.”

“Not until I know what this is about,” Bakaris said suspiciously, though his soul sang for joy.

“We are exchanging you for … for another prisoner,” Laurana replied.

Bakaris frowned. He mustn’t seem too eager.

“I don’t believe you,” he stated, lying back down on his bed. “It’s a trap-”

“I don’t care what you believe!” Laurana snapped impatiently. “You’re coming if I have to knock you senseless! It won’t matter whether you are conscious or not, just so long as I’m able to exhibit you to Kiti-the one wants you!”