Lemborg started to frame a question, opening his mouth.
“I rule alone here,” said Kalkon. “No other beast or being will trouble us. They are not eager to challenge me for the privilege.”
Lemborg stopped walking and stared up at the dragon, mouth still open.
“I do not read minds, really,” said Kalkon without turning around, “but I know the mortal mind well enough to predict the more likely responses. Your thoughts are safe.”
“Oh,” said the gnome. He was silent as he walked into a particularly huge chamber behind the dragon. The dragon trod heavily toward the far end, half-turned toward Lemborg, and settled its great scaled belly on the dusty marble floor. Its tail slowly whipped back and forth through the air before settling to the floor as well.
“Welcome to my throne room,” Kalkon said, tossing its head in a gentle arc to take in the whole chamber. The dragon’s great voice echoed from the distant walls and pillars. No furniture was present. The paintings were too distant to make out clearly.
“Thanks,” mumbled Lemborg. He looked around, still anxious, and licked his dry lips. “Should be about time to go,” he added.
“There is still time,” said the dragon. “Come closer.”
The gnome hesitated, then did as he was told.
“Forgive me,” said Kalkon. “There is much I need to know in order to make a proper decision, and my personal method of investigation has always proven to be the best.”
“Wha-” said Lemborg.
The dragon uttered a word of power. Its eyes instantly grew in the gnome’s vision until they filled the entire world. Lemborg’s mind emptied and awaited a command.
“Remember now,” said Kalkon. “Think of the enemy. Think of what happened that brought you here.”
Lemborg rocked back on his heels but remained standing. His eyes were unfocused and glazed. He had a dream.
The dragon closed its own eyes and saw the dream:
There was fire and thunder, and the technojammer Spirit was aloft, a vessel that flew without magic. The gnomes had done the impossible. The pilot shouted with joy, pulled metal levers and twisted knobs. The cabin shook, but the sky outside steadily turned from blue to dark blue to black, and there were stars all around, stars like the glowing dust of gems, more stars than grains of sand in a desert. In the window was a vast globe across which blue seas and dark lands passed, and whorls of white turned like pinwheels. The pilot looked down in wonder, forgetful of all but the glory of his homeworld of Krynn.
But the pilot soon saw another ship there above the world, a spelljammer that flew by magic, and it moved faster than did the Spirit. It looked like a huge coiled shell, this other ship, with long straight tentacles reaching forward from the mouth of the great shell, and this ship moved alongside the gnome’s ship as crewmen caught it fast with ropes. With dull, lifeless eyes, the same crewmen then caught the gnome and forcibly brought him aboard the coiled ship to meet his new masters.
The gnome pilot had read about this type of ship, called a nautiloid. He had read of its masters and knew certain frightening rumors about them, and the men with lifeless eyes took the little pilot to those masters, who were preparing to eat a meal when their guest arrived.
It was the meal that the gnome pilot remembered most clearly and would never forget, the meal that fought as it was held down. The gnome saw one of the purple-skinned masters silently lower its tentacled face over the screaming man’s head and-
Kalkon leaped to all four feet, jaws apart and all teeth bare and gleaming. The dragon’s great tail lashed back and slapped a wall, shattering the painted plaster into white dust. For long minutes, the dragon’s breath bellowed hoarsely through the building, echoing down every hall.
Pushing aside the repellent image at last, Kalkon looked down at the entranced gnome who gazed up at her with glassy eyes.
He is just a gnome, she thought. He is like a child in the world, and wicked things are coming for him. But he is not my child. My children are gone. He is a gnome with no one to save him. I could leave him here, and the wicked things would surely find him, and I would think no more about it. I was not there for my own eggs, and a wicked thing took them. I let them be held for ransom, but the promise was a lie, and now my children are lost and gone. I was not there for them. I gave my children into the claws of evil and let them go. He is not my child. He is not my child. But-