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Evermore: The Gathering	By : RosaTenebrum Category: A through F > Dragonlance Views: 9663 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 1
Disclaimer: I do not own the Dragonlance series, nor any of the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
- 53
- 54
CHAPTER 53

They made their way down the ramp and over to the back of the Soaring Eagle where the passengers' horses were presently being unloaded together with a variety of barrels, crates and chests. For a quarter of an hour they waited on the wharf without speaking, surrounded by a riot of sound and motion - the sea crashing against the rocks; the cries of the swooping seagulls; the hoarse shouts of Abanasinian merchants and seamen - until at last their steeds emerged from the ship's hold, slightly disoriented and led by two robust dockers who, as Raistlin noticed with irritation, at once began staring at Crysania the way only classic dullards could, ogling her as if they were detecting a piece of meat, the filthy thoughts filtering through their half a brain as clearly visible as a flailing dragon on a sunlit hill. He took the reins, coldly, and sent the savages off with a hostile glare. With exaggerated haste, wanting to get Crysania away from this slimy lot as quickly as possible, he fastened Digby and Cora together by their bridles, and so once again they set off on their journey, heading towards the Kharolis Mountains looming vast and majestic on the horizon. As they passed the noticeboard at the town entrance, Raistlin flicked a slightly concerned look at the news-sheet pinned to it. But he was pleased and absolutely not surprised to find that the main piece of news today was the nightly escape of one Ottis Hawkshade's prize-winning sod.

Outside Crossing, the landscape turned to wasteland as soon as one strode through the portcullis. Even the air seemed to take an immediate turn for the worse here, the autumn wind blowing harsh and steady across the vast empty plains which stretched out as far as the eye could see. From a cloudless sky, the sun blazed down on the desolate land in a futile attempt to warm up the cold hard earth. Hunched in their saddles against the gale, Raistlin and Crysania rode on, occasinally going from walk to trot and back again. Behind them the silhouette of the town disappeared from view as the minutes accumulated into an hour; before them there was no sign of habitation, no isolated dwellings, no home fires burning. Scattered here and there were a few stunted trees and bushes, their branches twisted by the wind, and from time to time one might pass the remains of an abandoned plainsfolk camp or spot in the distance the outline of a wagon carrying people or transporting goods between the trading posts. Apart from these tiny flickers of life, it was a world of silence.

Huddled in his coat, yet constantly keeping an eye on Crysania in case she needed anything, Raistlin recalled his last visit six years ago, right before the war broke out. He had crossed these same plains with Caramon, journeyed through those same mountains after five years of absence. Everything had been so different then. He had still worn red, and he'd only known a few awkward spells; he had been ill, weak, aching with every step and hurting with every single breath, but hell-bent to make it count. And he did just that, did he not, building up his storm step by step, slowly forging his soul until he became the dark fire he had always yearned to be, scorching, supreme, bending the world to his will.

Glorious. That's what it had been. Glorious.

And yet there was that one moment in the end, a blink, like a thread fast unwinding: the utter emptiness beneath the glorious. He had taken everything, had reached his ultimate goal - the Queen was dying, behind the final gate his new world was dawning - so why was nothing different, why was it still the same? With magic rushing and pulsing through him, he had stood there panting, trying to feel.

And now - what was left? Relaxing his hold on the reins and slackening their pace almost unawares, Raistlin swept his gaze across the landscape, from left to right, as if the barren waste before him was a reflection, an afterimage, a natural continuation of the utter mess and horror of it all. What was left? What came out of it?

Abruptly Raistlin pulled the horses to a stop, and after vacantly staring for some moments at the emptiness around him, he turned in the saddle to properly look at Crysania in a quiet and slow amazement.

This. This came out of it. What he least would have expected, and certainly had never hoped to find in his life. After the end, a beginning. The thread had been rewinded, and there she was: the only one. This was what he needed to believe, not that icy wind blowing in his face and carrying echoes of the Queen's scornful lullaby: You lost her, my little wizard. You lost everything.

How could that be? How could he have been so wrong? Crysania was a puzzle he had thought he had solved, and only now did it occur to him that the final piece might have gone missing after all, never to be found, and on the heels of that thought came another, even stranger one: the piece had not in fact gone missing, but she was that piece, and it wasn't her who needed completing but him. That must be it. She was the same shape and size as some missing part of him. She was the piece that completed the puzzle, and in his arrogance he had trampled over her without noticing who or what she was.

But this was the truth: she was here, he was here, they were together.

And this was the truth: she was here because she wanted to be here. Not because he had made sure she had nowhere else to go.

She had been alerted by the sudden pause and the silence that had followed. "What are you doing?" she asked suspiciously.

"Thinking."

She frowned. "About what?"

"You."

"What about me?" Even more wary and suspicious.

"Everything."

"That's not an answer."

"Then what is?"

Perplexed, she lowered her gaze and sat clenching the reins nervously in her gloved fingers; then as nothing happened she again looked up and past him into the blue of the mountains, and said with aloof dignity, "Could we please move on?"

"Responding to a question with a question. Now that's even less of an answer."

Crysania tipped up her chin. "I do not need a lesson in rhetoric. I need a hot bath and a soft bed, so please - let us be on our way."

A smile was tugging at the corners of Raistlin's mouth. She had spoken the words in that stiff posh tone of hers that he had always found exceedingly sweet and amusing; it was the tone she had used when he had heard her voice for the very first time in the Great Library, as she had rebutted his greeting by remarking on the unnecessarity of meaningless social amenities.

He said, his smile growing wider at the memory, "And here's me thinking cold baths and hard beds were more up your alley. A sort of mortification of the flesh kind of thing?"

He said it lightly, but as soon as the words were out he figured he'd better put a stop to that particular line of inquiry. Otherwise he'd soon be back to leashes and collars again. And it didn't exactly help matters that Crysania's face unexpectedly fell at the question, clearly indicating a past involvement in a range of such mesmerising penitent activities. Dodging the subject, she attempted to nudge the horses forward, telling him that he could stay but she was going. But he hardly registered her words, captivated as he was by the image forming in his head of Holy Crysania doing penance on her knees. Whatever instruments did the church provide? Wooden pointers? Steel rods, perhaps?

Suppressing the thought with an effort, Raistlin pulled on the reins, making Cora stop and back up, so that the two horses stood side by side again.

"Don't you wanna take a break?" he asked. Whips? Floggers?

She shrugged, baffled. "What for?"

"What do people take breaks for? Stretch your legs. Make food. Make water."

"I'm not hungry."

"Me neither. But I do have some other urgent business, if the lady doesn't mind."

"What is it?"

"My stirrup. I think the leather just broke."

She looked puzzled. "Why? What did you do?"

"Nothing. Just hang on a second." Raistlin reached down for the iron and, turning the stirrup over in his hand, examined it closely. Well isn't this just great, he thought, seeing the state of it. The strap was so worn out that it was a miracle it had lasted this long. Bloody Seamus had sold him damaged goods.

"It's broken alright. I guess I'll have to get myself a new one in Solace." He crossed the busted iron over Digby's neck and was about to get them moving again, when Crysania's worried look made him pause. "It's just the strap, you know," he said reassuringly. "Nothing serious."

She did not look convinced. She seemed to hesitate a second before she said, "I'm just wondering if we might have been sabotaged. By the clerics who came looking for us at the manor."

"That's a good point," Raistlin admitted, noticing the way she brightened at the praise. Suddenly on impulse he thought of something which was actually pathetic. But he had the feeling that when it came to Crysania, he had a long time ago moved beyond pathetic well into the realm bordering on pure desperate, so he said, not even looking at the stirrup strap, "I don't see any knife marks, though. But I think I'd better get down and check the rest of the gear, just in case."

He dismounted swiftly, and just as swiftly inserted himself between the two horses in search of some non-existent sabotage by some non-existent clerics. It hadn't been a lie, not really, when he had told her that they had been ambushed at Winter Pines Hall, for how else, if not by cooking up a little bit of haste and exaggeration, could he have made her stubborn sweetheart appreciate the gravity of the situation? Not a lie, but a proactive step, for how the hell would he have tackled on his own, without magic, a search party consisting of at least ten bloodlusting clerics and mountain-sized city guards? Farag may be stupid but not that stupid; he certainly would not have overlooked the Tarinius manor as a possible hiding place.

"Shall I get down too?" Crysania asked hesitantly from above him.

"No need. Just swing that little leg of yours up front a bit, so I can take a look at the girth."

She did, and Raistlin lifted up the saddle flap, taking his own sweet time with each strap and buckle. Pathetic, yes, nothing short of desperate perhaps, but as accidental touching was the only heaven he ever seemed to get, he had every intention to prolong the moment for as long as possible, with Crysania sitting conveniently immobilised in her saddle, completely helpless to do anything about the press of his arm and elbow against her calf. It was highly pleasing to observe her expressions, or rather the lack of them, as she waited for him to finish with a fixed, wide-eyed stare, alert for flight like a startled rabbit and utterly rigid with tension, not knowing where and when the next touch would be.

"Good. Now the left side," he said after a moment, brushing his shoulder against her thigh as he passed. "Up with your leg."

Again she did as told; again he investigated the saddle with half interest, yanking and pulling here and there, and spending long moments on the part of the padding where Crysania's foot, clad in a white low-heeled lace-up boot, rested against the leather. The skirt of her dress had become tangled and slipped up, exposing most of her leg to the knee. Stopping, Raistlin stared at it for long moments in a kind of hypnosis. He could see himself sliding his hand up that leg and over the knee where the stocking ended and the skin began, then higher and higher until he was touching her where he had never touched her, where she had never been touched before, and he could see himself, very clearly indeed, swinging up on the saddle behind her and pinning her firmly in place against his hot lust, one hand on her throat and the other down her skirt, parting her, finding her as ready for him as he had always been for her, and so they would ride on through this abyssal wasteland towards a high tide bliss, and oh god she is such a lovely thing, she is his in complete compliance, her windpipe rippling with sweet little whimpers, the heat turning into a pulsing flood -

"Raistlin? Is everything alright?"

Startled, he glanced up and saw her looking down on him questioningly.

"Everything's great," he said when he thought his voice might come out normal, and letting go of the stirrup leather he added, "Trust me, I don't see any signs of sabotage."

He mounted - his own horse, his own saddle - and told himself to focus. On the two pillars of smoke, for example, which for a while now had stood tall and grey against the skyline. He looked along the horizon, a frown creasing his face. What was burning there at the foot of the mountains? Lastpond village? The small settlement was located right about where those statues were rising into the sky.

Crysania's voice drew him from his thoughts.

"Are you sure you can manage him with just one stirrup?"

Raistlin chuckled, kicking the horses to a slow amble, and said, "Lady, you forget that I've been astride a dragon. A massive, fire-breathing monster of a dragon. I think I can handle a docile grass-eating nag under me. I told you about it once, didn't I, how I rode Cyan Bloodbane and landed on top of my tower? You said you would have liked to have been there."

Crysania's face flinched, but she managed to retain a neutral expression which was quite at odds with the ardent excitement flushing her cheeks and making her eyes shine when she had first heard the story in his tent on one of their secret starry nights. Absolutely enthralled, cradling a goblet of wine in her hand and quite forgetting that she was not supposed to be impressed, that it was not very fitting for a cleric of Paladine to wish to join a Nuitari mage at his tower at night, she had hung on to his every word, so perfectly perfect and utterly responsive, her entire body signalling the inconvenient truth: she wanted the sin, the danger, the ultimate transgression.

Wanting to keep her talking, but knowing that pursuing the present subject would only make her shut herself off, Raistlin asked lightly, "So tell me - where did you learn to ride a horse? I've never thought of horsemanship as part of an aristocratic maiden's education."

She was surprised, not expecting such a question; her expression relaxed and with a little nostalgic shake of her head she said, half to him and half to herself, "My mother would have fallen in a faint if she'd seen me like this."

"And you named your horse after your aunt, to boot," said Raistlin teasingly, fully aware that restarting the silly little conversation they'd had on the road a couple of days ago about aunts and horses would send her into an outrage that he found just as sweet and amusing as her hoity-toity tone of voice.

Sure enough, her head shot up, immediately triggered. "No. No. I only said that what you said reminded me of something what my aunt had once said. You said 'we have to call her something,' and I briefly mentioned it was a sort of silly family phrase that had come down from my Aunt Cora. I never proposed to call her Cora," - she gestured vaguely at the horse under her - "That was your idea. You started calling her Cora, whilst I objected."

"Not very forcibly," he remarked, observing the funny little one with a playful grin. "That's what you always wanted though, right? To give your lot a bit of a turn. What better way than to -"

"I did not want to call her Cora," she repeated vehemently.

"Poor beast. Such a hideous name. Too short. I dislike short names. I like names with eight letters. Preferably beginning with a 'c-r-y' and ending with a 'nia.' Oh, and there should be an 's' and and an 'a' somewhere in the middle. Sort of goes well, I think, with names beginning with an 'R' and which also have eight letters."

She had been listening quietly, outrage melting into a kind of reluctant delight. "That's a bit... particular," she said timidly, trying to conceal her pleasure by evading the point.

"I've always been."

She replied with a quizzical raise of her brows. Then, as if realising she had been excessively chatty, she fell silent. But after a while she suddenly raised an alert face.

"Are we nearing a settlement? I think I can smell smoke."

"Yes. There's a couple of smoke pillars up ahead, and I think they're coming from the village near the mountain pass," Raistlin said, keeping his eye fixed on the two columns growing darker and darker against the sun.

"A plainsfolk village?"

"No, just some dairy farmers and their families. Lastpond, it's called."

"Oh. Yes. I remember now. I passed through it with Tanis Half-Elven."

He glanced at her. "Don't tell me it was he who taught you riding."

She shook her head. "It wasn't him."

"Who then?" The columns turned; the wind was changing direction.

"Elistan."

He glanced at her again. "But the man was a disaster on horseback."

"No he wasn't," she retorted cautiously. "And even if he had been, that wouldn't have changed the fact that he was a brilliant teacher."

"Right. So did he like keep horses at the temple, or did he take you someplace else to practice?"

"We had horses at the temple. Walking was of course preferred even in winter, but when some of the acolytes began experiencing health problems, Elistan decided it was time for a change."

Raistlin bit off the sarcastic impulse unfailingly provoked in him by the late Revered Father, and said instead, gently, "I imagine you never even considered taking a horse. Not even with snow and hail coming down on you with all the fury of a hurricane."

Without hesitation, with that same level of determination she had always shown, Crysania said, "It is only through fire that the soul is purified."

"Indeed," Raistlin replied quietly, urging the horses to a trot.

Half an hour passed, the gale becoming colder and stronger, howling mournfully across the plains. The sun had begun to set, and ever in the distance the two pillars of smoke fumed on dark and ominous, growing in size and scope the nearer they drew. For some time now Raistlin had been aware of a putrid undertone in the air, the unmistakable stench of burning flesh, which took on a particulary ripe quality as the wind once more turned.

"What is it? Do you see anything?" Crysania's voice was muffled; she was holding the back of her hand to her nose.

"I don't know. But let me tell you, it's not cooking fires."

Yet another forty minutes went by before the vast open plains started to bristle with stunted grass, soon turning into knee-high grass with man-made roads running through. The main one of them led towards a collection of houses nestled in the mountainside.

Raistlin frowned, reining Digby and Cora down to a walk and then to a full stop. "I think it's cows," he said to Crysania.

"Cows?"

"Yeah. Looks like they're burning cows outside the village."

She contemplated this and then said, "Must be some kind of outbreak."

There was no panic in her tone, and as Raistlin looked at her, he saw that there was no panic in her face either: she acknowledged the situation with utter calmness, not breaking down in some womanly fit of hysterics. Much pleased with his darling, he began to direct the horses to the side of the road. "Let's move aside. A wagon's approaching."

Driven by a sturdy-looking man in a straw hat and followed on foot by a thin middle-aged woman in a long grey dress, the wooden hay wagon advanced along the trail with agonising slowness. Between the planks, glimpses of white could be seen: the floor of the wagon seemed to be covered with a large sheet, which gave Raistlin a pretty good idea about the nature of the load.

They're gonna stop to greet us, he thought irritably, noticing the long, openly curious countryfolk looks the two villagers were casting their way. Not for the first time he found himself hoping he was wearing his robe - the world's fastest idiot repellent - but since that was not an option, all he could do was try to look as discouraging as possible and hope that would do the trick.

It didn't. Coming up beside them, the driver pulled the wagon to a stop and, lifting his ridiculous hat, called a greeting in a heavy Abanasinian accent.

"Bid you good day, sir. Ma'am."

The woman in the grey dress had also stopped walking and was peering at them with open-faced wonder from behind the pair of gold-rimmed spectacles perched on her nose.

Firmly avoiding eye contact, Raistlin returned the greeting with a curt nod, hoping to god that Crysania would have enough sense to not drift into a conversation.

"I can see you twos are fixin' to pass through our village," the man said helpfully. "Never mind the fires. It's just milk fever. Nothin' contageous."

Seeing Raistlin glance dubiously at the sheet-covered bed of the wagon, the woman instantly came to her companion's aid. "Silas speaks true, sir. You can pass through safely. It's what they ate made them sick." Her face looked strained and her voice was hoarse, as though she had been doing a good deal of shouting recently.

"Poor little mites," the man called Silas chimed in from the driver's seat. "Nothin' more left to be done but to give 'em a decent burial."

Out of the corner of his eye Raistlin could see Crysania perk up beside him. The woman in the goggles saw that too and, prompted by something in that attentive movement, she suddenly burst out babbling in desperation. "It's so terrible! Oh god, it's terrible! Twenty-five children, eleven of them dead over night and fourteen bedridden with fever and boils. Oh, why did I ever give them the milk? If I'd been more careful -"

"Hush, Milly," Silas ordered. "There's no way you could have known the milk was bad. You see," he went on, turning back to the two strangers on horseback, "we went out to investigate first thing in the mornin' and found the cows stone dead in their stalls. Turns out some of our cattle had an infection of the udders, and it would appear the milk got contaminated by pus and blood. It wasn't Milly's fault. She's our headteacher, and you couldn't find a person with more love and care for those children even if you tried. She'd never do anythin' to harm them. Everyone knows that."

Milly shot the man a grateful look, before saying to Raistlin with dreadful weariness, "Sir, I'm asking you, could you please spread the word where you're going, so perhaps they could send us a cleric or two? We need more hands, we really do."

"We'll do that," Raistlin said quickly, twisting his mouth in an unconvincing attempt at a commiserate smile, suddenly even more eager to leave than before. He was already nudging the horses into motion, when what he had feared happened.

"I'm a cleric, Miss Milly," Crysania said. "Do you think you could let me take a look at the children?"

Startled, yet somehow utterly unsurprised, Raistlin looked up at her. Platinum Father Almighty. Was she out of her mind?

As the words sank in, some of the strain left Milly's expression. For a moment she merely stared at the blind lady before her with a look of pure amazement, scrutinising her unclerical clothing and trying to decide whether she was speaking the truth, then shifting her gaze to the lady's companion, evidently suspicious of his all-black outfit.

With a kind of slow-motion horror, Raistlin watched as Crysania, sensing the woman's doubt, took out Paladine's holy pendant hidden beneath her bodice and held it out for the two to inspect.

"See that, Milly?" Silas said in awe, his eyes nailed on the shining necklace. "Your Holiness, we'd be all of us ever so grateful if you'd be willin' to help us out. Ain't that right, Milly?"

"Of course," said Milly hurriedly and swept a deep curtsey, any thought of distrust forgotten. "It would be an honour, my lady. Your Holiness. We'd be most grateful. If it's no trouble to you."

"It's no trouble at all. I firmly believe that Divine Providence has led me here to you in your hour of need. Just show me the way to the children, ma'am, and I will gladly pray for them."

"Tell you what," Raistlin cut in before anyone could move, the forced smile still in place. "Why don't you go on ahead, while I have a word with Her Holiness. We'll catch you up shortly."

Milly's gaze swept between them, undecided. Then she gave another curtsey and said, "As you wish, sir."

As soon as both the wagon and the woman were out of earshot, Raistlin turned to regard Crysania with narrowed eyes. "Could you have said it any louder? I'm afraid they didn't quite catch you over there in the village."

Her face was set in calm determination. "There are people out there in distress. If I can help them, I will."

He stared at her with utter disbelief. "You can't be serious."

Her voice was deliberately toneless. "So what would you rather do - walk by and leave them?"

Feeling a flash of irritation at the cheap dig, the bitchy reminder, he leaned closer to her in the saddle and spoke in a low, tight voice that grew more vicious and cutting as he went along. "Do you know what those people are thinking right now? Have you any idea? 'The cleric was blind,' that's what they're thinking, and 'isn't the next church leader supposed to be blind too; come to think of it, isn't the next leader supposed to be a young woman?' Add to this the fact that they'll also have marked the way you sound, together with the fact that they'll realise who I am the minute anyone gets a closer look. Now, if you take just a moment to consider all these things, you'll begin to notice that launching your goody-two-shoes routine perhaps wasn't the brightest of ideas."

He could see how the anger slipping into his voice made her cower; her calm defiance was gone, and she was now listening to him with her eyes turned down, her hands frozen around the reins. "You said the villagers will stand by their own," she tried in a tiny voice, not raising her head.

"I'm from Solace. This is not Solace. Solace is over yonder, behind the mountains," Raistlin replied fiercely, unable to tamper down his anger, although he felt furious at himself for having scared her.

She reflected silently for a moment, and when she next spoke it was in a voice that was quietly pleading. "I need to do this. I don't know what else to say. Please. Raistlin."

Her hazy eyes were very wide and very submissive, with their dark lashes standing out in contrast to her luminously pale skin, and her bowed lips were slightly parted; imploring, helpless, asking for his permission. He was entirely, infuriatingly aware that she was prompting him, but he found it downright impossible to deny her anything when she was like that; he could only look at her with what he knew must be an idiotic glassy stare, a kind of maniacal fixity, stunned and unable to stop and wanting her to say that again. Please. Raistlin. Master. I beseech you.

"Fine," he heard himself grunt in a strange, strangled sort of monotone. "Just... keep it down about everything."

"Thank you," she said in that small obedient voice of hers, and as Raistlin eased their horses forward towards Lastpond village he thought to himself, still stunned, that he really needed to a get a grip. But reconsidering, he began to feel that he might after all be able to turn the situation to their advantage, if - when - the news of Palanthas reached these shores. Perhaps this detour would serve as a sort of character evidence. He could picture the ensuing conversation with the bespectacled one: I could have set fire to this place. To you lot. I didn't, remember? I stopped by and helped you tend the sick children. As if that made any difference. For every piece of praise there were at least ten pointing fingers. Villagers standing by their own? Yeah, right. When they would learn about his crimes against humanity, as the arrest warrant had so unambiguously put it, all hell would break loose. But he still had a card up his sleeve: the choice in the end that really wasn't a choice, but which could be made to look like one with just a little bit of clipping and gluing. Why, as long as you didn't know the alternative - the dead dark void - you could almost take it for last-minute remorse.

They caught the teacher woman up halfway down the road. Explaining the details of the awful night to them all over again, as if telling it to herself time after time would somehow make it more comprehensible, she told them about the milk and the children starting to get sick at night - "you see, we're the only school in the area, so most of the children only go home for the weekends," she said - and she also told them how in the morning they had sent for the undertaker who had organised a convoy of wagons to pick up the dead, the last one of them driven by Silas, the school caretaker whom they had just met.

Repeatedly reduced to tears and touching an anxious hand to her heart, but somewhat brightened up by Crysania's sensitive responses to her anguished flow of words, Milly led them to the village square. Despite the gloomy circumstances, the place was buzzing with noise and activity; after dismounting, Crysania remained close to Cora's side, not letting go of the reins and afraid to take a step one way or another, trying hard to make sense of her chaotic surroundings. To her left, the steady clank of a hammer hitting an anvil; to her right, the clucking of chickens, someone sawing wood; doors, footsteps, babies crying and men shouting all around her, everywhere, and the smoke hanging heavily over the land like a stifling veil. With a panicky sensation, Crysania pressed closer to Cora's warm side, wondering where Raistlin was and why he hadn't come round to her yet. Was he still angry at her? He had not spoken a single word during the ride here. Maybe this was her punishment, him leaving her to tackle the situation on her own, even if she had done her best to try to appease him, using just the right tone of voice, just the right volume. Already she regretted having opened her mouth, but she also knew this was something she had to do. Today, in this small village, she would find out if Paladine was still hearing her.

A hand fell on her arm; she gave a start and heard Milly's voice.

"Your Holiness? May I escort you over into the infirmary now?"

Crysania paused for a moment, insecure, then nodded with a hesitant smile. At once a firm grip closed on her arm above the elbow, and Milly started to slowly walk her on across the crunching gravel.

"And you, sir - are you a man of the church yourself, if you don't mind my asking?" Milly said as they strode along, and then Crysania finally heard Raistlin again.

"I'm afraid not. But I happen to know a thing or two about wound-dressing. If you want, I can take a look at the children as well to see if their sores can be helped."

His voice came from somewhere on her left beside Milly, sounding casual, almost jovial, and after his enraged reaction on the roadside, it caught Crysania by surprise. She heard Milly accept the offer gratefully, and the next thing the woman said was a half statement, half question.

"Your accent tells me you're from around here, sir?"

"Keenly observed," said Raistlin cordially, but in a tone of restraint which did not encourage any further inquiries.

It was indeed keenly observed, Crysania mused as she walked. She did not think Raistlin had that much of an accent. At that same moment she realised that it was true what Raistlin had said: that her own polished parlance must stand out like a sore thumb. Just as she was thinking this, she heard Milly say to her, "But you, my lady - you must be from somewhere else," and now it occurred to Crysania that the woman already knew who Raistlin was but for some reason did not want them to know that she knew. Of course she did - it was naive to expect otherwise. These people must be particularly proud of their famous compatriots, and Raistlin's eyes and hair were such a complete giveaway that he might just as well have been holding up a banner with his name on it.

Before Crysania could think of a neutral answer, Raistlin said, "Careful on the stairs," and soon the headteacher was helping her navigate a staircase. They entered the house, and after a couple of turns Milly led her through into a room which felt spacious and warm and quiet. Only the crackle of fire and an occasional muffled cough could be heard.

"Your Holiness, I have brought you in our assembly hall that we're using as a makeshift infirmary. There are two rows of beds along both walls, one patient in each bed, fourteen in all. With your permission, I will guide you to them one by one." Milly spoke quietly and urgently, in the huffed tones one uses around the ill. Then suddenly she cried out, clapping her hands together in a seasoned schoolteacherly way, "Alright, listen up, children - we've got some visitors today. The lady here is a cleric, a real cleric, and she has kindly promised to pray for your recovery. The gentleman beside her will see to your sores."

"There is no need for fear," Crysania said with conviction, raising her voice to match Milly's, although she was starting to feel rigid with terror. What if there still was no answer? Just a cold silence inside her instead of Paladine's voice? "Paladine is with you all the time. He is everywhere. He is not afraid. But He sometimes needs a little help from His allies. That is why He has brought me here today. He wants me to come over to you to sit beside you for a while, and when I take your hand, all you have to do is simply lay back and close your eyes and listen to what I have to say." She finished with a smile she hoped would convey certainty and confidence.

"Thank you, Your Holiness. On behalf of us all, thank you," said Milly with heartfelt sincerity, and again Crysania could feel the tight grip land on her arm as the woman gently turned her over. But then, "Myrtle my dear - there you are!" Milly exclaimed, stopping. "Could you please show the gentleman what you've done with the boils? This is Myrtle, sir, my right-hand girl" - voice directed away from her now - "she's read a little bit about wound-care." Milly said it kindly, but from her tone of voice one could obtain that Myrtle was an amateur at best. "We'll start by the door. You start from the other end."

"Sir. Walk this way, please." That must be Myrtle. A young woman's voice; shy yet determinate.

"Right," said Milly and briskly continued to guide Crysania to the first patient. When they stopped, she said, "This is Pearl. She is eight. She's lucky not to have any sores, but she's been running a high fever and is very weak."

"May I sit down?" Crysania asked, promptly receiving instructions from Milly. As soon as she was seated on the bed, the teacher gently urged "Come on, my dear - give the lady your hand," and Crysania felt a clammy little hand placed in hers.

"I will give you some space," said Milly, tactfully withdrawing.

For some moments Crysania sat without speaking, trying to find the words and listening to the girl's laboured breathing. The hand resting in hers was very small and light, almost weightless, and she felt a wave of compassion for that suffering little girl. Laying her free hand on the child's thin chest, she spoke to her in a low soothing voice. "Listen, Pearl. My name is Sunny and I'm going to help you. Just close your eyes and listen to my voice."

Slowly the rise and fall of the child's breathing became easier, less wheezing, and after an instant of fearful hesitation, Crysania closed her eyes and softly began to pray.

"Platinum Father, light of the world, Your humble servant calls out to You. Watch over this child and exalt her with Your heavenly love. Provide her with Your holy light and let Your mercy shine upon her so that she might be alleviated from pain."

She paused. By now she should be falling into a brilliant white light, a sense of warmth encircling her soul. With slightly trembling fingers she closed her hand around her pendant and found it to be cold and unresponsive.

She tried again, her voice more commanding now.

"I request this of You with absolute devotion, oh Valiant Warrior. Watch over this child and let Your mercy shine upon her. Deliver her from all evil and harm as I place her in Your hands."

No light, no warmth. Fighting the hopelessness that was starting to fill her, Crysania repeated the words twice, then opened her eyes and with a mournful expression slowly returned Pearl's hand to her lap. Finally she bent down towards the little patient and whispered, "Put your faith in Paladine, darling girl. He won't ever abandon you, I promise."

But even as she spoke the words, she felt their awful emptiness. How could she promise her that? How could she sit here and promise to that little trusting girl that her pain would end?

Straightening herself up, Crysania lifted a seeking face and after a short moment heard Milly's voice.

"Are you finished, Your Holiness?"

Nodding wearily, she allowed Milly to take her to the next child. She heard the woman describe the patient - a boy of eleven, boils on face and chest, high fever - and again felt her hand grasped by dry coarse fingers: a desperate grip this time, hanging on to her for dear life. She said the same prayers in a voice she hardly recognised as her own, facing the same silence, the same terrible absence, only too aware of how little she could do for this boy and how distant Paladine seemed.

In a state of numbness Crysania moved from bed to bed, telling the children that their fever would break and that tomorrow they would rise and walk again, one promise after another falling from her lips, and she could imagine their gleaming restless eyes clinging to her and feel the damp matted hair stuck to their foreheads and cheeks as their burning little hands reached for hers in need of comfort. There were so many of them, too many; already she had lost count, because the smell was making her dizzy, it was the stench of the creeping death that they had asked her to stop but - suddenly, very far away, a voice was saying "Do you need a break, Your Holiness?" and she shook her head - but how could she hope to vanquish death, what arrogance and presumption, when everyone else, the other acolytes and the vestry elders too, had always seen her for who she really was: a rich bitch playing out of her league and pretending to belong, just a pampered blueblood trying to pass herself off as a cleric. Pressing a hand to her forehead, she struggled to keep herself from fainting; somehwere at the other end of the hall, as if through a tunnel but piercing through the pounding steps and the quiet whimpering, she could hear Raistlin talking and she grasped on to the sound of his voice like a lifeline; he was the only thing that made sense in her world anymore - now how sick was that - and she wanted him to come and take her away from here to a place where they could be alone together in their mad, mad world.

"What's this now? Your Holiness, will you excuse me a moment."

The words were spoken with impatience and exasperation by Milly right next to her ear; the grip on her arm disappeared, there were footsteps and then a door closed. Crysania stood with her hand on her forehead, slightly swaying, her breathing still shallow but the dizziness slowly leaving her. She realised she was alone; the teacher had left her standing on her own in a spot where the air was blissfully cool and clear. She wasn't far from the hall though: she could still hear Raistlin's voice out there, explaining to Myrtle rather patiently about sores and fractures, mingling with the sound of wood being sawed outside the window behind her.

Supporting herself against the wall with one hand, Crysania took a couple of deep breaths to get herself back on solid ground. Already her heartbeat was starting to slow down, when suddenly a bright little voice beckoned to her from somewhere not far away.

"Hullo? Can you hear me? Over here, pretty lady."

Startled, she turned her head.

"Over here," the voice said again. It was a young boy's voice. "The door's open."

Extending her hand and finding a door frame right in front of her, she took a cautious step forward.

"Come, pretty lady. Come in. The path's clear, I promise. There's no way you'll stumble."

"Who am I talking to?" Crysania asked with a curious smile.

"I'm Trevor. Trevor Wheeler. I'm seven."

"Nice to meet you, Trevor. I'm Sunny." Shivering, she hugged her arms to herself. "Aren't you cold in here?"

"I'm never cold. Will you pray for me too, please, pretty lady?"

"Of course," Crysania said after a pause, trying not to sound too much like a fraudulent phony. "Keep talking so I can find you. Take my hand."

She took a few more steps, following Trevor's voice, and then she felt the boy's fingers curl around hers. "Here, lady. You can sit now."

Groping, Crysania touched what appeared to be a mattress and finally seated herself upon the bed. Patting along the boy's arm to find his face, she briefly let her hand linger on his cheek. "There you are."

The cheek, like the fingers, felt cool under her touch, not feverish nor sweaty; clearly Trevor was not as ill as the rest of the children.

"No one's ever prayed for me. You pray for me now, please." He sounded excited almost, like he was waiting for his turn on a carnival slide.

Suppressing a smile, Crysania took his hand. But before she could start, the boy's bright, candid voice addressed her again.

"Why are you blind?"

For a moment she was taken aback, and then she spoke the first thing that came to her mind. "It was an accident."

"What kind of accident?"

"I... I was doing God's work and I got hurt."

"Is that why you're sad?"

Crysania raised her head, startled. "I'm not sad, Trevor. Why would you think I'm sad?"

Instead of an answer, there was a slight tug at her neck. She realised the boy was grasping her pendant, turning it over in his hand. She let him examine it, while she sat quietly and pondered his words.

"Do you sleep with your eyes open?" was Trevor's next question.

She suppressed another smile. "No, I don't."

"How old are you?"

"I'm two times ten, plus ten minus two."

There was a laborious silence, then, triumphantly, "Twenty-eight. Phew. That's old."

Now she smiled in amusement.

"That wizard you're with," Trevor inquired next, "is he as old as you?"

"He's even older. He's thirty-one. But how did you know he was a wizard?"

Trevor did not answer this at all, but said, "Is he nice?"

"Yes, he's very nice."

"As nice as you?"

"Yes."

"I don't believe you."

"Why don't you believe me?"

"Because no one can be as nice as you."

"That's a very kind thing to say, Trevor. Thank you."

The child fell quiet, but when Crysania was about to get started with the prayer, he spoke again.

"Is he your boyfriend?"

"No, he's not."

"Why not? You said he was nice, so why isn't he your boyfriend?"

"Just isn't," she said in tones of finality, but hearing how stern she sounded, she softened her voice. "I'm a cleric, Trevor. Clerics don't have boyfriends or girlfriends."

"Why not?" He thought of something else and, saving Crysania the trouble of searching for a child-friendly explanation, said, "My ma has a boyfriend. He comes around every week when my pa's out to work. They tell me to play outside. Only I'm not supposed to be tellin' this."

Outraged, yet keeping her reaction closely to herself, Crysania replied, "Don't worry. I won't say anything. Listen, Trevor. Has your father ever talked to you about Paladine? Or your mother? You said no one had ever prayed for you before."

"Da says Paladine never gived us nothin'. Once we went to a church in the big city, but they said we weren't supposed to go in."

"Who said?"

"Them priests. One of 'em said if we took a bath first and put on some restspectabel clothes they might reconsider lettin' us in."

It was so cruel and unjust that for a while Crysania did not even understand what she had just heard. Then her eyes filled with tears. "Those priests were wrong. Everyone's allowed in the church." Her voice nearly broke; she was holding the boy's hand in a firm yet gentle grip. "Never forget that, Trevor, no matter what anyone tells you. Paladine's house is always open for all. He will always be there for you."

"Then why don't He give us money? Why don't He cure my ma?"

"Is your mother ill, Trevor?"

"My da says she's got a screw loose. Sometimes she laughs and cries at the same time on the floor and won't even stop until bedtime. I try to calm her down, but she keeps cussin' and bawlin', and da shouts at her. Says he'll lock her away where she won't in-barass him."

The child's lively voice had grown very quiet and withdrawn. Crysania could hear him talking, she could feel the chill in the room and the hand in her grasp, but it was no longer this hand she was holding and not that voice she was listening to. She was in Solace, beyond the mountains, where a little boy was sitting by his mother's bedside, the mother screaming and the boy singing, trying to show her that the world around her wasn't falling apart, when it should have been the other way around, it should have been her comforting him, telling him a bedtime story and keeping the monsters from the door. But this was a world where there was no justice nor perfection; in this world the mother slipped away, her hand slowly turning cold in the boy's grip. I want to make it better, Crysania thought, and for a moment it was all she could think and feel, the thought growing stronger and wider in its pathetic simplicity, until she felt like dropping to the floor in a wailing tantrum, kicking and pounding the ground as if she was a child herself. Better I want to make it better Fix it. And the dark whisper rising like the rustle of leaves before a coming storm: You can't You're not enough You will never be enough.

She was trembling. Her shoulders, her hands, her whole inner being was in a state of disorder. But her voice had a terrifying stonelike steadiness to it, a detached, lifeless timbre, like the voice of one who had nothing left to lose. "I will pray for you now, and your mother as well. Is that alright with you, Trevor?"

She closed her eyes, already reaching out a hand, already opening her mouth to speak the hollow words, when a voice suddenly sounded and died away, like fireworks flashing and fading in the night sky.

"Don't give up."

Her movement ceased. What she had heard was a woman's voice, she was sure of it, just as she was equally sure that it had come from Trevor, right in front of her, where the boy was lying against the pillows. "What did you say?" Crysania asked, blinking in confusion.

"I didn't say anything."

Now it was the child's voice again. But she thought there was a strange insincere ring to it. She drew back from the boy with a sense of suspicion, asking, "Is there someone else here?"

The bed had not moved. No floorboard had creaked. If there was indeed someone else in the room, she must have been there the whole time. The hairs on the back of her neck stood up at the thought.

But, "It's just you and me, Lady Crysania," said Trevor.

She stayed still; she did not move. What was this now? She had never told the boy her name. She had given the old pet name her mother had used when in an exceptionally good mood - but even then only sparingly, for pet names, mind you, were a bit common - and there was no way a little boy of seven from an Abanasinian country village would know that Sunny came from Crysania, which was a name he probably would never even have heard.

"I didn't realise I'd left the door unlocked."

This was another voice speaking up from behind her now, quietly mournful, and this too was a woman's voice, but one Crysania recognised. Before she could respond, Milly stepped in closer, continuing to talk in that same hushed tone.

"His father wouldn't let him be taken away with the others. Said he would do it himself or not at all. We said it was impossible, that the sun was too much, but he insisted, so we hung up blankets at the windows to keep the little one cool until his father's finished with the coffin. He's a carpenter, you see, Lyman Wheeler is. The boy's mother was here just before you came. I don't think she quite understood that her son was gone. She talked about walking back home with him, how they would stop to pick apples on the way home and make the best pie ever. It was a right awful thing to see, Your Holiness. But I believe it will be a great comfort to her to know that a true cleric saw his dear Trevor off to the Great Beyond."

Crysania had listened to Milly unstirring on the bed, dazed, inert, with her limp half-open hand resting on her thigh like some inanimate alien object. Her face felt numb; her arm seemed unattached to her body. Outside the window the sawing and the hammering went on, tearful and furious, as the father prepared with his own hands the final resting place for his son. Plucking up courage, her heart pounding as loud as the carpenter's hammer, Crysania slowly extended her torpid hand, crawling along the blanket, until she found Trevor's little fingers.

They were ice cold and stiff, clenched in the rigor of death.

Drawing a sharp shuddering breath, Crysania pulled her hand away. It's happening at last, she thought, closing her eyes to try and steady the seesaw in her head. I'm losing my mind. Have lost it.

She did not turn until she had herself under control.

There was a quiet stillness, an expectant pause, as if Milly was waiting for her to speak up first. But then she spoke herself, fumbling for words. "Your Holiness, do you think... Is there any..."

The silence returned, and for a moment the two women stood awkwardly facing each other.

"I would take you back to the others now," said Milly at last, and from her voice Crysania could tell she was holding back a gush of tears.
*

It had grown dark by the time Crysania finished her round. The noise in the square had ceased, save for Lyman Wheeler's saw going back and forth against the wood, and the occasional shout of a mother calling her children home. Silas the caretaker had returned from his grim mission to the other villages. Losing a child, he said, was the absolute worst thing that could happen to you, with the second worst thing being the horror of having to tell someone they've lost their child. He had brought back with him the parents of some of the children that had survived the outbreak, and he said that it was only because he'd had good news to give to at least a handful of folks that he had managed to go knocking from door to door with his hat in his hand.

Walking towards Milly's house with the woman's grip firm on her arm, Crysania heard it all as if in a stupor. Before Silas, she had heard Milly insist that they stay the night at her place, and before Milly, Raistlin had said that he needed to ask the blacksmith for a stirrup leather for his saddle, and then Silas was saying that after everything you and your lady have done for us today you'll get one for free. She had opened her mouth to correct the man, then quite clearly had realised she did not know what to say.

Inside the house she found herself in the same situation, after Milly had shown them to their adjacent rooms and said apologetically, "But we do have a spare guest room for two upstairs. I could have the girls set it up -"

Again Crysania opened her mouth to put them straight, but Raistlin beat her to it, which, for reasons she had no desire to scrutinise, caused a surge of fury as sudden as it was fierce to spike up inside her.

"Thank you, Milly, but that won't be necessary," he said promptly, in a voice completely lacking in any degree of regret, as if he found the mere idea of them sharing a room nothing short of loathsome.

Upset, she closed her mouth. To her left, Milly went on explaining that, the circumstances being what they were, nobody had cooked a proper meal, but she would right away send one of her daughters over with some leftovers from the night before, and a wash basin, and some clean towels. Then the voices were already in motion, going away, and the next moment Crysania was standing in the room that had been appointed to her, exhausted, bewildered, and alone with Raistlin for the first time in at least three hours. With that realisation, the thought returned: she should never have said anything at all. She should have let him do the talking. They would already be in Dewtide by now.

She stood in strained alertness, not moving even when she heard Raistlin say, "Give me your cloak."

Was there irritation in his voice? The cloak was taken from her hands. She heard the door of what was probably a wardrobe, and after a pause Raistlin said from further away, "The bed's over here." When she still did not move, he said, "You need to rest."

She did not respond. A soft knock rapped on the door. The hinges creaked, and a girl's voice said, "Mother asked me to bring some spiced wine to warm you all up."

"Most kind. Tell her we said thanks."

The hinges creaked again, the door banged shut - loudly, angrily? - and then Raistlin was next to her. "Here. Take it. Take. It."

She reached out, eyes down, and let him place the cup in her hand. Then she merely went on standing before him, motionless and insecure, trying to decipher his stillness.

But his voice was completely normal when he said, "They know who I am. Knew it right away."

She did not know what she had expected. Partly out of relief, she took a sip from the cup. "And do they know who I am?"

"I'm fairly certain they've made an educated guess. Sunny," Raistlin added emphatically.

"But they don't know where that comes from. Who would? And even if they did... Well, I could be some other Crysania."

"Some other blind Revered Daughter Crysania from Palanthas? Right. These people may not know all that much about anything outside cows and cattle, but believe me, what they do know is that Her Holiness sipping spicy wine in their back room right now is the upcoming leader of Paladine's church."

Crysania hung her head, ashamed of her lack of judgement. "I don't know what got into me," she said wanly, squeezing the cup in her hand. "I knew it was a bad idea, I know I shouldn't have said anything, but I just wanted to -"

"Never mind that. It was only a matter of time anyway. But, you know, I think I might have to start calling myself Ray. Only fitting, don't you think?"

She raised her bowed head in surprise, even more relieved now and almost smiling, and said, "I thought you disliked short names."

Raistlin gave a laugh; one of his discreet chuckles that seemed to go straight inside her and turn her upside down. Then he said, more matter-of-factly, "The blacksmith's expecting me. If you need me, just knock on the wall."

She managed a nod, still standing with the cup in her grasp, disappointed and baffled that he was going, so abruptly, almost in the middle of the sentence. But go he did, and the door clicked shut behind him. It was only when the door next to hers had also clicked shut that Crysania stirred. Fumbling her hand along the furniture, she crossed the floor until she located the bed and sank onto it, slipping off her shoes and stretching her feet. The room was warm, smelling fresh with clean linens, and the house was full of noises, seeping into the room muffled and indistinguishable. She began to hear a clock, a good-sized mechanical clock with hands, ticking away somewhere to her left; she was surprised that they had one out here in the countryside. Someone mounted the stairs; the feet went past her door and disappeared. She discovered that she felt safe. For the first time in days, she actually felt safe.

She went on sitting cosily, listening to the world go by and occasionally sipping the wine, thinking about how everyone seemed to think they were lovers. They must see it in my face, she thought in dismay - in my every move, every gesture. Apparently she couldn't help it, so why resist it? What a fight. What a fight she always made of everything.

Upset, she lifted the cup to her lips, drank the last drop and suddenly found herself hoping for another drink, hoping, in fact, that instead of this house and all these people it was just the two of them, just Ray and Sunny, sitting across from one another again in a narrow tavern booth, with a bottle of wine between them. The wine would peel back her sense of self; she would say things to him, and go further this time, see how far she would go, to make him squirm in his seat, for she was a fast learner and she knew exactly what to do to turn him into a frenzied panting mess. She disliked herself for it. She disliked liking the way it made her own body pulse with that hideous, compelling lack he had imposed on her. She remembered it vividly - the moment in Istar when the word for that lack had suddenly entered her head as she watched and listened to Raistlin talking to her: it was a word she had sometimes heard at the Mayor's Ball, a dirty word that her mother and Paladine would not have approved of and that she herself had never in her life spoken or even thought of, except now -

Fuck I want him to fuck me

It was not nice and gentle, like it always was in her cousins' vague whisperings about wedding nights; it was raw and dark, like in her own vague imaginings about highwaymen and murderers, and all of a sudden those shameful, only half-understood night visions had broken through into daylight in the form of this dark mage who made her want to put her fingers inside her, any hard object that she could find, which was also something she had never done before and would never do, for it was impure and obscene, and so the only thing her fingers did that night in Istar and all the subsequent nights was to fold into prayer, as she chastised herself in tears of rage for her feeble unchaste thoughts.

But the lack had gone nowhere, nor the word.

She dropped her gaze to her hands as though she could see them, slowly opening and closing them, fancying she could feel the piece of rope that had chafed against the softness of her skin.

"Oh, god," she whispered out loud. Her cheeks were burning. Her heart was racing. Briskly pulling herself together, she instinctively made as if to start praying, but then right away she remembered; she let her hands fall back into her lap.

Crysania sat puzzled for a moment or two, searching herself and gradually realising that her ealier desperation had in fact been replaced by a slight shimmer of hopefulness. The memory of the voice that had spoken to her through the dead boy's mouth, although it should have made her recoil in disgust, filled her with a sense of calm and comfort even, and she now understood that it had given her the strength to do the impossible and pray for the rest of the children with her pendant resting cold and hollow against her chest.

Don't give up, the voice had said. Meaning, I am here still, hearing you. Someone is.

But who?

A part of Crysania's mind - sounding suspiciously like Elistan - was still trying to argue that a wicked spirit was enticing her with lies, that it was the Dragon Queen seeking to lead her astray, and only in the divine abode - not here, not in this realm of dust and dirt - did the voices of the pure dead peal like bells in supreme harmony. But another part of her was becoming ever more convinced that the sense of safety and comfort she had experienced today in this little village as well as in her dream in Relgoth partook of the sacred essence, for such consolation and calm could never be mimicked by the five-headed serpent.

Besides, they were not lies. She wished that they were. It turned her stomach every time she thought about the town crier's words. Two hundred and more. More than two hundred people had lost their lives because of her.

Closing her eyes tight against the horror and forming her hands into a prayer, Crysania spoke in a shaky half-whisper. "If it is You, Platinum Father, show her to me again. Show me Araminta. I need her, Platinum Father. Take me back to the In-between."

It was with a sense of defeat that she asked this, but at this point in time she felt she would have to grasp at any straws she could find, even if it meant admitting that Raistlin might have a point about Paladine opening up a new channel of communication and that she had been so reluctant to accept it only because it was Raistlin who had suggested it. But she could no longer keep dismissing the idea, just because she didn't want him to be right about her god.

So, vanquished yet cautiously hopeful, and more forcing than pleading, she kept talking with her forehead pressed against her praying hands. "Platinum Father. I'm begging You. Show her to me. Show her to me tonight." Then, after a pause, she added tensely, "Whoever it was that spoke to me today, hear me now."

Instead of an answer, a knock once again sounded at the door - the same soft, almost apologetic rap, followed by the same shy voice she had heard a moment before. "Your Holiness, may I come in? I bring food and refreshments."

Blinking at the sudden interruption, Crysania sprang up from the bed and told the girl to enter. She did, pushing what sounded like a tray cart. When the rattling had finally ceased, there was a discreet clearing of a throat, and then the girl explained to her that on the left-hand side she would find a service of chicken, bread and cheeses along with a jug of lemon juice, whereas on the right-hand side there lay a wash basin with a bar of soap and towels. Crysania noticed with dismay that the girl was nervous, stammering, like people around her sometimes, too often, were. Trying to put her at her ease, she asked the girl's name and talked to her, smiling, for some moments. But Odelina was still stammering when she left the room.

Plunging her hands into the hot, vanilla-smelling soap water, Crysania wondered, with a kind of dejected frustration, if Odelina, like Trevor Wheeler, had only ever met rude clerics. Again she pictured the situation: the two stuck-up clerics blocking the temple door, telling the boy and his parents that they were too smelly and rustic for the church. Again she felt the angry tears rising. How dare they? If she knew who those clerics had been, she would make sure they were most severely reprimanded for their unprofessional and ungodly behaviour. But then she remembered, drying her hands on the towel folded neatly beside the basin, that she no longer wielded such power. The man called Farag did. She tried to recall if she had ever met him or talked to him, later or as an acolyte perhaps, before everything; she tried, but she couldn't put a face to the name.

Absent-mindedly, Crysania began nibbling at the food before her, tasting a bit of this or that, every now and then taking a sip of the fresh lemon juice. She had almost finished when she suddenly raised her head, listening: Raistlin's door going shut, Raistlin's steps moving down the hallway towards the entrance. Raistlin had two kinds of walk, she thought, one so quiet that you never knew, until he spoke, that he was beside you, and the other much louder, the walk that she was hearing now: his I-know-where-I'm-going kind of stride, hard boot heels clicking against the ground, a storm of confidence and pure unbridled energy. Crysania listened in that same attitude, fearing, hoping, but the steps went straight past her, never slowing at all, and out the main door.

The blacksmith, she thought. He's gone to see the blacksmith about the stirrup.

She finished the lemon juice in a manner which to herself felt completely unhurried, not knowing that she had decided to go out even before she heard the carpenter's saw starting again after a period of silence. For a while Crysania sat and listened to the saw's back-and-forth wailing and the thunder-like banging of the hammer; then, with an air of absolute determination, she bent down and fumbled for her shoes - ah, shucks! she'd kicked the other one too far and had to spend an extra moment to locate it - and put on her cloak, and took the untouched basket of bread, and headed for the door, not even once allowing the thought to enter her head that she was using the carpenter as an excuse to bump into Raistlin again.

No sooner had she opened the door than Odelina's voice came from directly beside her, panicked and high. "Your Holiness. Is something wrong with the bread?"

"Oh no, not at all," Crysania replied with a smile, moving the basket to her other hand. "The food was excellent. And the room is very pleasant. But do you think you could take me to the carpenter? I'd like a word with him. Here, put my hand on your arm."

They proceeded along the hallway and out into the yard very slowly and politely, Crysania holding the basket out before her and constantly assuring Odelina that she wasn't going too fast, and Odelina calling Crysania "Your High Holiness" at the beginning and end of each sentence. After Odelina had said it for the sixth time in the short space between the house and the capenter's shed, Crysania found herself on the verge of a meltdown. Here they were, these villagers, bending over backwards to observe protocol, and here she was, excommunicated, defrocked, on the run with a practicer of the dark arts who was considered to be armed and extremely dangerous. She felt something building inside her, either a hysterical wail or a hysterical laugh, and she didn't know which one would come out if she opened her mouth.

"Thank you, Odelina. Could you give us a minute?" she said quietly to her guide when she had brought her within hearing distance of the carpenter.

"I will wait by the fountain, Your Holiness."

She could sense Odelina curtseying, not once but twice, and then the only sound that remained was the saw biting into the wood. Soon that too ceased, and from the way all movement suddenly stilled Crysania knew the carpenter had noticed her presence and was now looking at her.

"Hello," she said. "You're Lyman Wheeler, are you not? Trevor's father?"

"Correct. And you must be that priestess everyone's on about." It sounded like the voice of a sturdy middle-aged man. In a tone that was openly bitter and scornful, the man added, "I suppose you've come to tell me it was Paladine's will that my seven-year-old son be taken away from me."

The saw started again, dismissive and rejective.

Raising her voice above the racket, Crysania said, "Actually, I came to see if you needed anything. I brought some bread, and there's -"

The saw stopped, and the carpenter's voice returned, cold and angry. "I need my son. Unless you can give him to me, then you and I got nothin' to say to one another."

The saw went on.

"How about you and your wife?" Crysania said. "You both have suffered a great loss, and the night is drawing in."

There was a suspicious, aggressive pause as soon as the wife was mentioned, and then: "I ain't done yet, night or no night. I'll work till dawn if that's what it takes, and you, lady, have no say whatsoever in the matter."

"Your son is in no hurry anymore. He can wait. Your wife can't." She said this without flinching.

Lyman Wheeler was quiet for a moment, and the sound that came from him next was almost a laugh, except it was terribly hollow and entirely without mirth. "That so? You priests so damn good at runnin' other people's lives. You understand and you smile, and you quote a couple of words from your books. It's gotta be so easy tellin' folks what to do and how to act, when you sittin' all cosy like in them fancy temples where it's nice and warm and safe, come rain or snow, and life's just perfect from whichever angle you look. But I'm tellin' you, lady, the world's not a pretty place. You can't fix it with a poem from a book."

Finished with his tirade, the carpenter fell abruptly silent. Crysania had listened without interrupting, without telling him that he didn't know her at all, that if there was a game of comparing pains and hurts, her name would undoubtedly show up near the top of the scoreboard; she merely listened, allowing the distraught man to pour out his grief and disappointment. She waited to see if he would continue.

But instead of words, the silence was broken by an unexpected sound: the soft sound of weeping.

"Did you see him?" Lyman asked her in a voice heavy with tears; then, remembering, "I mean, did you -"

"Yes. I sat with him," Crysania said at once to save the man the bother of trying to think of a word that would best communicate the nature of interaction between a blind person and the surrounding world.

"He was so tiny and pale," the carpenter said, "but he looked like he were sleepin'. And I been havin' these weird thoughts."

"What kind of thoughts are they?"

"That they be lyin' to me. Mistress Milly Kyteler and the others. Tellin' me my boy's dead when he just sleepin'. And then I stop and I reckon I can hear him out there, callin' for me. Right there in that corner, behind the barrels. And then I think" - Lyman gave a wild laugh - "I think, 'now how can he be in that house and in that bed when he's here talkin' to me?' It don't make any sense."

"I sat with him, Lyman. I held his hand in mine. No one's lying to you."

Lyman contemplated this for a moment. Crysania was half expecting him to start blaming her for having talked religion to his son without his permission, which was why the carpenter's next words took her by complete surprise.

"Then is he at peace?" he said in a suffocated voice. "Do you know it for a fact?"

The question hit her like a dart. She stood quietly, in a dreamlike state, for what seemed to her like a terribly long time, trying to frame an answer, all the while feeling the father's pleading eyes and Paladine's snow-like silence coating her until she could hardly breathe.

Then she heard herself say, slowly and musingly, and with a smile that she somehow had managed to put on, "I know that there is nothing to be afraid of."

What Lyman Wheeler made of her answer, she couldn't say. What she herself made of the answer, she couldn't say either.

Preparing to leave, she put out her hand to see if there was a table or a shelf where she was standing; she found some kind of counter, and set the basket of bread on it. "I'll leave these here," she said. "In case you want to take a break."

She had already taken a few steps towards the sound of the fountain when Lyman spoke.

"Lady. Your Holiness."

She turned, waiting.

It took a while for the carpenter to sort out what it was that he wanted to say, or if he wanted to say anything at all.

"You... You have a safe journey home," he finally uttered, somewhat sullenly.

Nodding, turning, Crysania thought that it was the closest the man could bring himself to saying thank you to a cleric. She guessed it was better than nothing, but mostly she felt frustrated and disappointed at herself. It was just like it had always been with her and the rest of the world: no connection. She just couldn't connect with people. Even as a child she had seen it clearly, just as clearly as she again saw the simple truth in all its upsetting clarity: the only person she had ever felt a connection with was Raistlin.

Rubbing her arms against the chill autumn air biting into her bones, Crysania went back to Odelina, telling the girl that since it was such a beautiful night she would stay out on the porch for a while and would call at the door when she wanted to get back in. After the girl was gone, she stood alone in the dark, unmoving, the porch pillar cool and smooth beneath her hand. She could hear frogs croaking and behind the house in the distance Lyman's hammer kept going still, but other than that the night was quiet.

Crysania breathed in deeply, savouring the scent of the honeysuckle lingering in the air. At least she thought it was honeysuckle. She was fairly certain it was honeysuckle, because it was a scent familiar from her childhood. It made her feel as if she had come back home, except home no longer was where she thought it had been. You're crazy, she said to herself, letting her head fall against the pillar; crazy, crazy. Again she had that weird sensation that had been bothering her for weeks: the Abyss was there, but she would now remember it as something of which she had heard told, as having happened to someone else in another life. That can't be right, she thought, sternly, but never getting any further, because the oblivion was much too beautiful to be abandoned.

Now, finally, she could hear him coming up the stairs, heels clicking slow and hard and precise across the porch floor, and stopping beside her.

"It's so quiet out here," she said in a subdued voice. "So different from the city."

Raistlin huffed a quiet laugh. "You won't be saying that once the harvest festival kicks in."

"What's it like?" she said suddenly with genuine interest.

"Oh, you know. Lots of silly games and moronic competitions. Three-legged races and wheelbarrow contests, that sort of thing. Barn dances."

He had almost groaned the last part, and Crysania could not help a little inward smile, thinking that all Raistlin had said might have come from her own mouth. Never expecting an affirmative answer, but driven by a curious spirit and wanting so much to keep him talking in that relaxed tone, she asked, "And did you attend?"

"The dances? Caramon dragged me there a few times, yes."

Crysania raised an amused eyebrow. "He dragged you?"

"Oh, yes. Literally. After taking pains to teach me all the steps first."

That took Crysania by surprise, and she found herself unable to reply; she was struggling to get her head around the image. It was as if a small window had opened onto a world that she had never seen before, allowing her a glimpse of how it must once have been between the two brothers, before the animosity that she had only ever witnessed, before the charged resentment lurking just below the surface, ready to flare into anger at the slightest provocation.

"All that skipping and jumping in the hay," said Raistlin, bringing Crysania out of her thoughts. "A far cry from your poised upper-class dances, but just as loathsome, I can assure you."

"I have skipped and jumped," Crysania protested with mock gravity, having caught the wryly amused inflection in his pain-filled voice. "Skipping, jumping, trotting, bowing... I've suffered them all."

"Clapping, hopping..."

"Prancing and kicking..." she echoed.

"'One, two, turn around, touch the ground; hop, hop, now you stop.'"

They spoke the final line in unison, realising that they had been exposed to the same instruction, and then it was already too late to back down. Crysania had got completely caught up in the moment. Her voice had risen in excitement. She felt a childlike glee like she had not felt in years; she could sense a flush on her face and a stir in her heart, and a laughter escaped her. Raistlin laughed too. The sound was low and cheerful.

But when Raistlin said, "We would have made a perfect pair on the floor, you and I," that simple delight turned into a heavy grown-up thrill. He was standing so far away, she realised with a pang, on the other side of the steps leading up to the porch. What if, she thought dazedly, what if she were to cross that distance now and place her palms flat on his chest, very gently, very carefully, one at a time; if she made sure she did everything right this time, if she was very quiet and still, just feeling his chest rising and falling, putting herself in his hands and letting him take the lead - would he shout, would he yell, would he shove her from him? Or would he draw her to him, allow her to take a few dancing steps, not skipping or clapping, but swaying, slowly swaying in the autumn twilight, beneath the stars and the harvest moon? She remembered the stars, and how bright they were out here. She had gazed up at them, marvelling at their luminescent glow, when three years ago she had travelled through these mountains, on her way to him. She thought, I have been on my way to you all my life.

But then Raistlin spoke.

"It's getting late. They no longer need us, so we'll head out early tomorrow again."

It was as though she had run straight into an invisible wire that had tripped her, throwing her face forward into the ground. It was just a phrase, plain and simple, but the words Raistlin had used had set off a shock of memories in her system. She could hear the howling wind and taste the blood and dust in her mouth as she was burning, crawling on her hands and knees across the emptiness, knowing that she had been just a speckle of dust in the great scheme of things. Functional. Obliterated. Erased. Beyond the veil of oblivion another picture emerged: of herself, curled up in bed, only wanting to fade into non-existence, to poke a hole in her to bleed out the pain, to inhale water to drown the shame. Stumbling, fumbling, bumping into walls, having to learn everything anew: how to walk, how to eat, how to survive.

She was shaking; she felt a wave of nausea rising in her. But she drew herself up, pulled her cloak tighter around her and followed Raistlin into the house, walking straight on into her room, without stopping, without talking. Strained, weary, and in great tangled knots inside, she undressed herself and slipped between the cool sheets of the bed. She was still shaking.

You thought the pain had become worn-out. No harm done, no scar, no injury left anywhere. Stupid. You stupid shit.

Deriding herself, Crysania lay on her side under the covers, harshly breathing in and out, in and out, until sleep overtook her.

But in her sleep she was with him again, dancing, swaying in the desert, the wind howling, the sand stinging, the hurt everywhere. His grip on her wrists is getting tighter; the cuts on her hands have opened up and god how hard he is, rock-hard and throbbing between her legs, filling her up - my love, my love - and she can feel the darkness in him, the lust, the primitive need that drives away everything else, calling out to her.

Black Dragon From darkness to darkness My voice echoes in the emptiness

Love hurts, that's all she knows. True love leaves scars.

She tugs the rope tighter around her neck, the dull thud thud thud of her heart in her ears, on her lips the taste of blood and dust,

Good girl

and she tugs the rope tighter still,

because she likes it, you're not supposed to like it,

please don't leave me alone

wanting his rage, his twisted desire, wanting to be used fucked so hard that she can't even walk straight afterwards,

Farewell Revered Daughter

because it's wrong, it's a sin,

and he is different, and she is different, and together they are something else -

Her hands are bleeding, and she can feel a wetness on her cheeks, a trickling tear,

but he does not stop, he takes what he wants and is utterly merciless about it,

I need you no longer

he is all-powerful and his love is chaos black, now she remembers what colours look like, she remembers blood red and full dark,

and the lack inside her is subsiding, waning, finally dissolving into a sea of relief and shame -

and she lay trembling under the blanket, listening, fearing that the whole house must have woken up at the sound of the final ragged cry she had let out, convulsing, writhing, alone in the darkness.
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Evermore: The Gathering