enough, so I put my own hand over my own mouth to save
him the trouble.
“Probably a white dragon,” murmured Fizban, whose
eyes were about ready to roll out of his head. “Oh, my hat!
My hat!” He wrung his hands.
Perhaps I should stop here and explain where we were
in relation to the dragon. I’m not certain, but I think we
were probably in a small cave that was right next to an
extremely large cave where the dragon lived. A wall of
snow separated us and I began to think that it wasn’t a very
thick wall of snow. I mean, when one is trapped in a cave
with a white dragon, one would like a wall of snow to be
about a zillion miles thick, and I had the unfortunate
feeling that this one wasn’t.
So there we were, in a snow cave, slowly freezing to
death (did I mention that?) and we couldn’t move, not a
muscle, for fear the dragon would hear us. Fizban couldn’t
work his magic because he didn’t have his hat. Owen
didn’t look like he knew what to do, and I guess I couldn’t
blame him because he’d probably never come across a
dragon before now. So we didn’t do anything except stand
there and breathe and we didn’t even do much of that. Just
what we had to.
“Go on with your report,” said the dragon.
“Yes, 0 Master.” The draconian sounded a lot more
respectful, probably not wanting to make the dragon
nervous. “I scouted the village, like you said. It’s fat – lots
of food laid in for the winter. One of those (the draconian
said a bad word here) Solamnic Knights has a manor near
it, but he’s off on some sort of errand.”
“Has he left behind men-at-arms to guard his manor?”
The draconian made a rude noise. “This knight’s poor
as dirt, Master. He can’t afford to keep men-at-arms. The
manor’s empty, except for his wife and kid.”
Owen’s face lost some of its color at this. I felt sorry
for him because I knew he must be thinking of his own
wife and child.
“The villagers?”
“Peasants!” The draconian spit. “They’ll fall down and
wet themselves when our raiding parties attack. It’ll be
easy pickings.”
“Excellent. We will store the food here, to be used
when the main force arrives to take the High Clerist’s
Tower. Are there more villages beyond this?”
“Yes, O Master. I will show you on the map.
Glendower is here. And then beyond that there are – ”
But I didn’t hear anymore because I was afraid
suddenly that Owen Glendower was going to fall over. His
face had gone whiter than the snow and he shook so that
his armor rattled.
“My family!” he groaned, and I saw his knees start to
buckle.
I can move awfully quietly when I have to and I
figured that this was one time I had to. I crept over to him,
put my arm around him, and propped him up until he quit
shaking.
He was grateful, I think, because he held onto me very
tightly, uncomfortably tightly (did I mention he was really
strong) and my breath almost left me again before he
relaxed and let loose.
By now some blood had come back into his cheeks
and he didn’t look sick anymore. He looked grim and
determined and resolved, and I knew then and there what
he was planning to do. It was not conducive to a long life.
The dragon and draconian had gone into a rather
heated discussion over which village they should burn and
pillage and loot next after Glendower.
I took advantage of the noise they were making to
whisper to Owen, “Have you ever seen a dragon?”
He shook his head. He was tightening buckles on his
armor and pulling at straps and things and, having seen
Sturm do this before a battle, I knew what it meant.
“They’re huge,” I said, feeling a snuffle coming on,
“and extremely big. And enormous. And they have terrible
sharp teeth and they’re magical. More magical than
Fizban. More magical than Raistlin, even, only you don’t