Dragons of Winter Noght by Weis, Margaret

Of course, what the Kaganesti could not know was that the Speaker’s home in exile became the central headquarters for all the business of the Qualinesti. The ceremonial guards assumed exactly the same positions as they had in the sculptured halls of the palace in Qualinost. The Speaker held audience at the same time and in the same courtly manner, save that his ceiling was a mud-covered dome of thatched grass instead of glittering mosaic, his walls wood instead of crystal quartz.

The Speaker sat in state every day, his wife’s sister’s daughter by his side acting as his scribe. He wore the same robes, conducted business with same cold aplomb. But there were differences. The Speaker had changed dramatically in the past few months. There were none in the Qualinesti who marveled at this, however. The Speaker had sent his younger son on a mission that most considered suicidal. Worse, his beloved daughter had run away to chase after her half-elven lover. The Speaker expected never to see either of these children again.

He could have accepted the loss of his son, Gilthanas. It was, after all, a heroic, noble act. The young man had led a group of adventurers into the mines of Pax Tharkas to free the humans imprisoned there and draw off the dragonarmies threatening Qualinesti. This plan had been a success-an unexpected success. The dragonarmies had been recalled to Pax Tharkas, giving the elves time to escape to the western shores of their land, and from there across the sea to Southern Ergoth.

The Speaker could not, however, accept his daughter’s loss-or her dishonor.

It was the Speaker’s elder son, Porthios, who had coldly explained the matter to him after Laurana had been discovered missing. She had run off after her childhood friend-Tanis Half-Elven. The Speaker was heartsick, consumed with grief. How could she do this? How could she bring disgrace upon their household? A princess of her people chasing after a bastard half-breed!

Laurana’s flight quenched the light of the sun for her father. Fortunately, the need to lead his people gave him the strength to carry on. But there were times when the Speaker asked what was the use? He could retire, turn the throne over to has eldest son. Porthios ran almost everything anyway, deferring to his father in all that was proper, but making most decisions himself. The young elflord, serious beyond his years, was proving an excellent leader, although some considered him too harsh in his dealings with the Silvanesti and the Kaganesti.

The Speaker was among these, which was the main reason he did not turn things over to Porthios. Occasionally he tried to point out to his elder son that moderation and patience won more victories than threats and sword-rattling. But Porthios believed his father to be soft and sentimental. The Silvanesti, with their rigid caste structure, considered the Qualinesti barely part of the elven race and the Kaganesti no part of the elven race at all, viewing them as a subrace of elves, much as gully dwarves were seen as a subrace of the dwarves. Porthios firmly believed, although he did not tell his father, that it must end in bloodshed.

His views were matched on the other side of the Thon-Tsalarian by a stiff-necked, cold-blooded lord named Quinath, who, it was rumored, was the betrothed of the Princess Alhana Starbreeze. Lord Quinath was now leader of the Silvanesti in her unexplained absence, and it was he and Porthios who divided the isle between the two warring nations of elves, disregarding the third race entirely.

The border lines were patronizingly communicated to the Kaganesti, as one might communicate to a dog that it is not to enter the kitchen. The Kaganesti, notable for their volatile tempers, were outraged to find their land being divided up and parceled out. Already the hunting was growing bad. The animals the Wilder elves depended on for their survival were being wiped out in great numbers to feed the refugees. As Laurana had said, the River of the Dead could, at any moment, run red with blood, and its name change tragically.

And so the Speaker found himself living in an armed camp. But if he grieved over this fact at all, it was lost in such a multitude of griefs that eventually he grew numb. Nothing touched him. He withdrew into his mud home and allowed Porthios to handle more and more.