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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
- 8
- 9
- 10
CHAPTER 8

Not one of the acolytes knew what they passed as they strolled along the garden path with their heads down, hands poised in front of them in imitation of Paladine's triangular symbol. A line of grey ghosts, they glided noiselessly towards the main temple, where they would go down on their knees in prayer and praise before the grand altar, only to stand up again in two hours' time to take a second walk around the temple gardens, in a symbolic reminder of the time when Paladine as a young man found wisdom by pondering the roses and ivy vines.

For the last in line, there would be no second walk today. From behind the potting shed, a pair of eyes followed the acolytes as they marched by, a dark hooded figure with a knife in his hand. The sun was beating down upon him, and the wind was completely still, like the calm before a storm; a bead of sweat trickled down his forehead, and he wiped it off with the back of his wrist, the knife glinting in the bright light.

He took a deep breath; his heart rate was steady as he prepared to strike. Soon. He squeezed the hilt of the knife, feeling a touch of frustration: how much easier it would be if he could just cast the sleep spell as in bygone days... But now was not the time for regret. Now was the time for action. He readjusted his position and would have stepped out to join the holy line, if not for the fact that one of the acolytes suddenly turned, left the path and headed straight for the shed.

Cursing under his breath, Raistlin scurried over to the opposite corner, turned right and pressed himself flat against the wall, dearly hoping that none of the marching acolytes in the front of the line would suddenly decide to look behind them.

The light, rattling steps behind the shed were coming closer very fast; in a few seconds the acolyte would find him. Raistlin glanced around him wildly, weighing his options. Once the line was past the shed, he could dart to the front and hide... But he knew immediately that it was a useless plan: the steps were too close, and the line too damn long and slow - dart to the front, and he would run straight into their arms. Arranging his face for the inevitable confrontation - oh, pardon me, your Grace, I didn't realize the temple entrance was that way - Raistlin turned around and had already taken one step, when he suddenly realized that the sound of the footfalls had stopped.

He waited tensely for a short moment, the knife cold against his palm.

But the sound he heard next nearly made him burst into laughter. The acolyte definitely was not out to get him: he had stepped aside from the path for nothing less profane than taking a piss behind the wall.

Raistlin peeked cautiously around the corner and saw the man. By a stroke of luck, the acolyte was standing with his back to Raistlin, the hem of his robe in one hand and his cock in the other, his naked arse flashing pale in the sunlight. He was taller than Raistlin, but young and scrawny, just the kind of prey he had been hoping for. It was almost too good to be true - if Raistlin had not known better, he would have almost thought Paladine had arranged things for his benefit.

Moving without a sound, Raistlin sneaked up behind the acolyte and with one graceful movement brought the knife to his throat. "Make one sound, just one, and I slit your windpipe," he said in a low and quiet voice.

The man's body stiffened. Not even the tiniest noise escaped his lips, but, absurdly, the sound of the urine hitting the ground continued.

"There'll be plenty of time for that later on," said Raistlin, putting his free hand on the man's shoulder and turning him towards the building. "Into the shed, mate. Now."

Clumsily hoisting up his trousers, the acolyte took a few hesitating steps between the hand on his back and the knife on his throat, and then stopped, as if wondering whether he should try to trip the man with the knife, or just bolt and flee.

"Oh, no," Raistlin said promptly, "just keep walking and don't try any funny business. Paladine wouldn't like that, would he?"

The man started to stumble forward and did not stop again, until he had been guided in through the shed door.

Raistlin drew the door shut with his his spare hand, and everything around was plunged in shadows. Only a small ray of light pierced its way into the little stone building through a narrow window high upon the wall. "Now, undress your robe," Raistlin said curtly to the shaking acolyte, moving the knife from his throat to his back.

The man sucked in an anxious breath, but industriously started to fumble the cord belt around his thin waist. "P-please... don't..." he began, but the words he tried to form melted into sobs. "Please don't... r-rape me."

Raistlin barked a laugh. "Rape you? Believe me, my friend, you couldn't get me hot and bothered even if my life depended on it."

"But... But what -"

"The undressing will be a whole lot easier without this knife jutting from your back, I assure you."

The acolyte fell silent at once and worked hard to untie the knot faster, breathing laboriously through his nose. The fact that he was shaking so badly considerably hindered his efforts, but eventually he did manage to pull the robe over his head and drop it to the floor at Raistlin's command.

"Good," said Raistlin slowly and steadily, gripping the acolyte's thin shoulder and pressing the knife a little closer to his skin. "Now, I want you to walk over to that shelf, nice and slow, and turn around and sit on the floor when I say so." He started to push the man across the shed.

"Paladine sees you," the acolyte gasped faintly, holding his hands helplessly in the air. "He sees you, and he will punish you."

"Yes, I was wondering when you'd get to that. Ten full minutes. Must be the new record."

After a few more steps Raistlin turned the man around and told him to sit. Then he extracted a piece of rope he had brought, and squatting down forced the man's sweaty hands behind his back. They were quivering still, and the rope was a little on the short side, but luckily Raistlin knew a thing or two about making knots; soon enough the acolyte was tightly tied to the large shelf behind him.

"I suggest you play it smart, and don't make any rash moves," Raistlin instructed the acolyte, standing up, "unless you want the full weight of the shelf to come down on your holy little head." By way of demonstration, he rapped with his knuckles one of the heavy flower pots housed on the upper shelf. "See?" he said, as the pot gave a deep toll. "Won't fit well with your skull, I'm afraid."

The acolyte's strained blubbers turned into pitiful groans.

Ignoring the man's plight, Raistlin looked about the shed, thinking. He had brought a rope, but not a gag - how could he have been so thoughtless? Someone must be smiling down upon him, though, for he spotted an empty grain sack lying in the dusty corner behind him. He picked it up, and while tearing it into shreds with his knife, he cast the panting acolyte a sidelong glance. So it was true that some of them wore rough hairshirts under their robes, by way of mortification and penance. This one was also barefooted, as the tradition required, and Raistlin wondered if he would be enough of a fool to remain shoeless even in winter. Acolytes of Paladine were often seen trudging through snow and slush with nothing on their feet but frostbitten skin.

On a second thought Raistlin collected two of the long shreds he had made - it was dark in the shed, but not dark enough, and it was not possible to make an exit without stepping straight into the acolyte's line of vision. Call him old-fashioned, but he did not think the man would agree to keep his eyes closed without the knife urging him.

Raistlin returned to where the man was sitting and again hunkered down behind him. "This one is for me," he said softly, slipping the makeshift blindfold over the acolyte's eyes, "and this one" - he looped the dusty strip of fabric across the man's mouth and deftly tied the ends behind his head, effectively suffocating the ragged moans and coughs that had started to pour out of his throat - "is for your friends. We don't want them to find you here half naked, do we now?"

Raistlin stood up and walked around the man, estimating what he had done, like an artist looking at his work. Magic would have been tidier and so much more sophisticated, of course, but nonetheless he was rather pleased with the result. The acolyte was securely tied and gagged with knots that would not come undone on their own, and the path was too far from the shed for the other acolytes to hear any muted cries on their second stroll around the garden.

Raistlin walked briskly over to the discarded robe that lay in a heap by the door and picked it up, but when he started to take off his coat he had to stop and lean his hand against the wall for a moment, eyes closed, as faintness washed over him - a sure sign of his new friend the headache lurking just around the corner, ready to dig its taloned claws into his skull.

He waited, annoyed and impatient beyond words, and eventually the dizziness passed. He flung his coat on a nearby table, then reached for the acolyte's grey raiment again and, hoping the owner was not afflicted with any contagious disease, put it on over his shirt and trousers. It was about the right size in terms of width, but there was an irritating delay as he had to fiddle with the waist cord in order to make the hem shorter.

The acolyte was whimpering quietly to himself in his corner. He sounded incoherent and disoriented, but as Raistlin listened more closely, he could hear the man was in fact praying under his gag.

"A good idea, that," Raistlin called over his shoulder, his fingers working frantically on the cord. "I'm sure that if you just pray your little tongue off, Paladine won't let me harm you in any way."

The man's answer consisted of distressed gasps and furious breathing.

Raistlin gave a little laugh. "Just relax," he said then, soothingly. "Everything's fine. It's not so different from what you usually do at this time of day, is it? I only ask you to wait here nice and quiet, and do a little bit of soul searching, while I borrow your lovely robe and... take care of some unfinished business. That's all. You understand? Nod if you do."

The man gave a weak nod, his nostrils anxiously flaring.

"Good. Very good. Who knows, perhaps this is your personal Test of Faith. Isn't that what all you acolytes hanker for?" Finally finished with the maddening belt, Raistlin drew up the deep hood which did a good job in hiding the wearer's identity, on condition that he kept his eyes piously lowered to the ground. He went over to the man, taking one more good look at him, at his naked, dirty feet and the crude shirt covering his chest. "Or, if Test of Faith is a bit too grand," he said thoughtfully, "you could always consider this a little addition to your practice of self-torture. What was that?" He bent forward to hear the man better, but it was nothing he hadn't heard before.

"The Platinum Father sees you," the acolyte worded again in a tearful voice, slowly and painfully through the rag across his mouth. "He won't let you get away with this."

Raistlin looked bleakly at the man. "Right. At which point do you think he'll step in?"

So saying, and without listening to the cleric-to-be's answer, Raistlin turned around and made his way to the exit. From there he turned to address the man once more. "Remember," he said merrily. "No rash moves. I have eyes on my back."

He closed the door, turned the rusty key and then tucked it into his boot, breathing a little sigh of relief. One part done, one more to go. Hiding his hands in the sleeves of the grey robe and lowering his gaze to his feet, Raistlin set off walking towards the main temple at a quick pace.

The only thing that kept him from increasing his speed to a light jog was that it would have attracted too much attention. His body, his entire being tingled with impatience that threatened to bloom into a thoughtless haste which might very well ruin everything. For two full days he had waited for a word from her - a message, an invitation, anything at all - but nothing had come, and he could wait no longer. Had her secretary told her about his visit? Raistlin did not think so, although a tiny part of his mind insisted that he had, that Crysania knew and really wanted nothing to do with him, that she was too wounded and too angry to even speak his name...

Ruthlessly, Raistlin knocked down his doubts. She prayed for you. Nothing's changed.

He walked on determinedly along the weedy path. Without stopping, without looking around, knowing exactly where he was going. Prying out the whereabouts of Crysania's private chambers had been almost too easy - the foolish maid scrubbing the floor had blurted out the information as soon as Raistlin had told her that he was a relative with a license from Gaspar Cloade to pay a personal visit to her Reverence. That was the easy part. But outside the temple he had seen that the rest of it would be far more complicated: without causing any notice, he would first have to climb through a window onto the narrow ledge next to Crysania's balcony, and then take a little leap from there.

That may have been a simple task for someone else, but he was not exactly made for such heroic feats of physical bravado. He heaved a little sigh as he walked: how utterly complicated the world was without magic.

Raistlin had reached the temple. He climbed the steps and proceeded straight to the main door, which was so heavy that he had to push it with both hands, until it swung slowly open on its great gold hinges.

Nobody paid attention as he walked down the great hall: people passed him without so much as a glance, intent on their own business. Raistlin felt relief was over him, but when he risked an upward glance from the depths of his hood he groaned: Cloade's girlfriend, the cow Morzol, stood in guard next to the secretary's unoccupied desk with his muscular arms crossed over his chest, keeping a sharp eye on everything that moved. Cloade himself was likely sitting in the back chamber, buried up to his neck in his all-important correspondence, but the cow of course had nothing better to do than stick his big hairy muzzle into things that did not concern him.

There was no time for further thought. Raistlin joined a group of acolytes and started to walk towards the rear of the hall in their wake. He could feel the minotaur's eyes on his back all the time, keen and suspicious, but he walked on, slowly and casually, keeping his eyes fixed on his marching feet.

He passed the door which the cleaning maid had showed him and which could be observed from the secretary's desk: the shortcut to Crysania's rooms, locked, of course, and passionately guarded by Morzol. Raistlin did not want that door: he wanted the third side corridor after it.

Upon reaching the right intersection Raistlin rounded the corner and immediately hastened his stride, now that he was safely out of sight. He hurried down the empty corridor, his heart pounding with the rush of excitement pumping through him. So far so good.

But his smile died halfway as he looked up and saw, who else, but Morzol. Raistlin stared, utterly dumbstruck and unable to believe his eyes. But it was true, gods help it: for some unimaginable reason, the minotaur, who only a moment ago had been standing in the hall, was now approaching from the opposite direction with heavy, clip-clopping steps.

Changing direction all of a sudden would have been a grave mistake indeed, at least that's what Raistlin thought, so he went on without stopping, eyes strictly on the ground and feigning an air of devotion.

He expected a large hand to grab him and spin him around at any moment, slowly removing the hood and revealing his identity. But nothing like that happened. The Kothian walked right past him, and Raistlin released his breath, picking up his speed again. But it was too soon: to his horror, he could hear the receding sound of Morzol's hooves suddenly coming to a halt... and turning back in his direction.

He held down the panic that threatened to rise in him and ordered himself to keep the pace steady - he was just an acolyte, on his way to his chamber, nothing else. He realized too late that his thick-soled boots were not the shoes of a cleric, and he tried to lighten his steps, cringing at the hard clacking noise his heels made on the polished marble floor. Maybe that was what had caught the guard's attention in the first place? It was also a possiblity that acolytes were not allowed in this part of the temple, and now the minotaur was coming after him to scold him and to throw him out. Or could it be that Morzol was somehow aware of the deceit? Perhaps they had trained the thing to sense any unwanted guests. Perhaps they had trained the thing to sense him.

Raistlin pushed on along the echoing corridor, trying to keep track of his surroundings. With Morzol behind him, he had to abandon the planned route, and he could only watch helplessly as his feet carried him past the corridor he was supposed to take. The hallway branched, and Raistlin chose the left fork, which turned out to be a bad decision: to know that he was going in the wrong direction was bad enough, but it got even worse when he saw he was actually walking into a dead end. He could turn neither left nor right, and there was no choice but to continue straight forward, down the flight of stairs at the end of the passage, ever deeper into the heart of the temple.

Raistlin turned right, left, then right again; blindly, without direction, not knowing which path might lead to another dead end. He was starting to get dead tired, too. The coarse robe felt heavy on his shoulders, and the hood smelled of musty incense; a thin sheet of sweat had already broken out on his forehead, and he was breathing hard. He could feel the headache's leaden fingers descending on him, slowly but surely.

There were dozens of passageways in the maze around him, and a claustrophobic fear of getting lost was beginning to creep over him. There was no denying that the further he would go, the more hopelessly lost he would become, and the more disoriented his wandering would appear to his suspicious follower. He thought of his knife, but abandoned the idea - it was a knife, and Morzol was a fucking minotaur. The footfalls behind him were strong and obstinate, growing ever closer without the slightest sign of fatigue. Raistlin tried to gain speed. He almost tripped but caught himself. His throat locked as he swallowed, dry like sandpaper, and he had to cough a few times. He did not think he could keep it up much longer. Amazing, he thought sourly, a man chased to his death by a cow.

Just when Raistlin was starting to feel that he would collapse from exhaustion, his luck changed for the better. He took a turn down a random side passage, his breath rasping harshly in and out of his lungs, so tired that he barely even noticed at first that Morzol actually continued on along the main corridor. At length the Kothian's steps faded completely into oblivion.

Raistlin slumped against the wall, gasping and sputtering for breath, so relieved he almost wanted to break out in a song. It was just a coincidence, then. Nothing but a silly coincidence. The minotaur had not recognized him.

When he felt his legs could carry him, he resumed his walk, retracing his path and keeping a wary eye out for Morzol's return. He was not as lost as he had thought in that moment of panic - quite the contrary, he found his way back up and to the right hallway with relative ease, and feeling newly energised began to walk in quick strides towards the window that was to be his secret passage to Crysania's chamber. Halfway through he made himself slow down against the fevered rush inside him: he could not screw it all up at the last moment, not when he was this close.

Once he had reached the window, he looked behind him calmly, making sure there was not a soul nearby. Seeing he was completely alone, he grabbed the window handle and turned it briskly, simultaneously pushing, and at once an ear-splitting sound rang through the air - a rusty, plaintive squeal that would have woken up the dead.

Raistlin froze, hanging on to the handle. Seconds passed, and then he tried again, more gently this time, making just enough room for him to squeeze through.

He climbed quietly over onto the wide ledge outside, sending the birds perching there into a fluttering flight. For days he had been hoping for rain to wash away the scorching heat, but now, under these circumstances, he thanked the sun for its vehemence. Rain would have made the ledge dangerously slippery, and he would have likely ended up breaking his neck.

Raistlin stayed where he was for a moment, inspecting the marble balcony that stood white amidst the green ivy climbing the walls. The balcony was not too far away: all he had to do was jump forward and lock his arms around the railing quickly enough. He glanced down at the ground below and was glad he had never been afraid of heights.

Let's get this over with, he thought, pulling up the hem of his robe and tucking it under his belt, before I start having second thoughts. Focusing all his concentration on the balcony, he took a few backward steps as well as several deep breaths, and told himself it would go swimmingly. Failure was not an option for him, never had been and never would be. Act now, worry about the consequences later - that was something most people never understood and consequently never got anywhere in their puny little lives. Hence, without giving it any further consideration, Raistlin charged forward, leaped, and in a patter of falling pebbles landed right where he was supposed to - on his stomach on the hard railing. The impact knocked the wind right out of him, but amazingly enough his grip held and he managed to steady himself. For one frightening moment he thought his left foot was going to slip, but he found a footing and slowly pushed himself up and over onto the safe side.

He stood bent over with his hands on his knees, catching his breath and studying the damages. His left hip and some of his ribs felt sore to the touch - royally bruised, probably -, his right hand had a slight chafe to it and his heart was still beating so hard and fast it felt like it would break out of his chest. Other than that he was in one piece, and feeling rather invincible. That's it. The hard part's over. But even as he thought it, he knew deep down it was not true. The hard part was only just beginning.

Raistlin straightened up slowly and took a few cautious steps towards the balcony door. He stopped to listen. Everything was quiet; only a breeze hissed in the branches of the trees.

He creeped closer very silently and peered in through the glass. He was pleased to see the room was empty, just like his source - the same unwitting cleaning maid - had said. He grabbed the doorknob and experienced a moment's hesitation: what if it was locked, after all the trouble? What then? Never mind. He had all the time in the world. Crysania would have to open it at some point, wouldn't she?

His fear proved futile: the door swung open smoothly. Everything seemed to work like a charm today. With a contented smile, Raistlin stepped in through the door and found himself in a tidy, ascetic room awash with sunlight that flooded in through the tall windows. It was immediately evident, however, that there was a sort of wintry bleakness to the room which the sunlight could not expel. The heart of the inglenook fireplace on the far wall was empty and hollow, and not even the many unlit candles placed on the altar of Paladine by the main door managed to evoke thoughts of warmth and comfort. Raistlin looked, but saw no mirrors, no tablecloths, no clothes stands piled with dresses and petticoats. The only detail that might have indicated this was a woman's dwelling were the lace curtains that moved lazily in the summer breeze.

Raistlin closed the balcony door and made his way further into the bland little room, his boots snapping against the flagstones. The floor beneath him was bare - no dangerous rugs to trip on, of course - and he could see that the sparse furniture had been deliberately arranged so as to keep the layout simple. His eye fixed on the altar ahead, with fresh white flowers in a pewter vase and Paladine's triangle upon it. He stopped by the altar, gazing down at it like the holiest of believers, and smirked a little. By an impulse, he put out his hand and touched the silver symbol lightly with the tips of his fingers. See, Paladine? You could not keep me away.

On the southern wall to the right hung a fine tapestry depicting Mishakal with her Disks, the ones that their merry little band had found in the ruins of Xak Tsaroth. Beneath the tapestry stood a plain table, displaying a single lamp with a green glass shade and a porcelain inkwell on a mahogany base, as well as a pile of letters. Curious, Raistlin glanced at the letters. They were written in a strong hand, with impeccable penmanship - an assistant's work, no doubt. Crysania's signature was at the bottom of each, beautifully looped, but shooting off at a diagonal angle.

He regarded the table for an instant, considering the two high-backed and highly uncomfortable-looking chairs, the general crudeness of the whole setting. The cleric he had seen on the street the other day - Zoltan, his name was - had spoken very bitterly of Crysania's inheritance, suggesting to the younger acolyte that she was sitting on a heap load of money. If she was, Raistlin thought, she certainly was not spending it on herself - her private chambers simply could not have been any further from a lavish aristocratic residence.

Raistlin turned heel and headed towards the bed on the opposite wall, his eyes taking in the silver triangle above it, the white bedlinen, the simple wooden headboards. Everything as plain as plain could be. He went slowly past the bed towards the bookshelf at the rear, running his hand along the footboard; his touch was almost a caress, light and gentle. With every passing minute, the tight, hot sensation inside him grew, like a fire set deep in his bones - the sense of expectation and excitement, the sense of purpose so strong it was almost tangible. She would come soon. He knew it. Every step he took brought him closer to her.

He gave a cursory look at the bookshelf, at the scrolls and tomes and writing materials housed on it, searching for he did not know what exactly - some traces of their past, of himself? Absurd, of course, to think that.

A large scroll between two bookstands piqued his curiosity. He pulled it out, unwound it and read the first lines. I stand here today not as a leader, but a servant, it began, very pompously, and went on in the same vein. It was a speech - an inaugural speech, to be exact, written in the same hand as the letters on the table. Our worldly eyes are attracted by the way precious stones reflect the light. We look up with wonder at the sky, the stars, the moons and the sun; yes, Creation is indeed very beautiful... But if one wants to follow truth and beauty, if one wants to judge righteously, one cannot afford to put one's trust in the world of images... Only the heart sees through the dark, just as the High God does...

Raistlin read the words with a growing certainty. Here it was: he had found their past, dressed up in pretentious poetic language. A moral tale for the faithful. Beware ye deceitful words, beware ye insincere gestures. Only the heart can see clearly into the dark soul of deception. Of the Abyss. Of the black-robed heretic that tricked you a little. Fill ye in your own place and name, o true believers.

So was that what he was to her now - an instrument of conversion, a fearful example? Raistlin kept on reading, annoyed but also a little worried.

Indeed, says Paladine, it is perverse to imagine that the ones who hurt us can do us more harm than we do ourselves by hating them, or that by persecuting the sinner we can damage him more fatally than we damage our own hearts in the process...

Raistlin read the words over twice and smiled. This sounded so much better. Forgiveness without repentance. Unconditional absolution. Preaching it was easy. Soon, very soon she would get an opportunity to put the virtue in the practice.

The doorknob rattled. Raistlin pushed the scroll back with haste and bolted across the room, past another door, pulling it open on the fly and hiding behind it just in time.

Standing in the narrow space between the door and the wall, he could hear the main door snap shut, and then steps started to move back and forth on the other side. Light steps, feminine steps - definitely not those of Cloade or his enormous pet. The tingling sensation inside him grew stronger. It was her. It had to be.

Raistlin closed his eyes, struggling against his eagerness, and waited.

After some moments, the steps ceased. Holding his breath against his pounding heart, Raistlin leaned to his left and took a discreet glance around the door.

It was Crysania. She was standing close to the altar, dipping her hands in a basin of water, washing them.

Under the cover of the water dribbling and flowing, Raistlin stepped out from his hiding place, very slowly and very silently. Then he just stood and watched.

Finished with the washing, Crysania paced softly to the altar. She kissed the holy pendant around her neck, pious as ever, and whispered a few words that Raistlin could not make out, her fingers brushing the little silver symbol, the same symbol he had touched a moment earlier. He could see her hair was done differently today; it was pulled back into a severe bun at her neck, secured by a single silver hairpin adorned with engraved flowers. He liked it that way. And he liked it in a plait, too, or loose around her shoulders, perhaps even better. Suddenly he felt a strangling need to do just that, to pull out that little pin and tangle his fingers in her dark hair. He could still remember, so vididly, how soft it felt to the touch.

Lost in that thought, he let out an involuntary sigh, very small and almost inaudible - to his own ears, at least - but Crysania must have heard it, because she turned around immediately, her misty eyes directed straight at him.

Raistlin looked back at her, not even daring to breathe. There was no apprehension on her face - no caution, no fear. Had she heard him or not?

Just when he was about to speak, Crysania's eyes left him, and, holding one hand out in front of her, she started across the room towards the door by which he was standing. When she was close to the door, she stopped in her tracks abruptly, giving a little frown. She groped to her right, the frown remaining on her face, and when her fingers struck the open door, she drew her hand back in consternation.

Raistlin understood at once. The door was supposed to be closed, of course. He bet everyone knew that - all the cleaning maids, all the couriers, all the people working for her - and never left it open, because it would have disrupted her sense of space. He supposed she needed cleanly divided and controllable entities: one large space without boundaries must be a pretty terrifying thing for someone who could not see.

Raistlin watched Crysania out of the corner of his eye, not daring to turn his head, certain that if he did his neck would make a popping, crunching sound. She stood by the door for a moment longer, disbelief clearly manifest on her face. Her lips were slightly parted, her head tilted a little to the side. She was so close Raistlin could have reached out and touched her, and her scent was in the air, all around him - a note of lily of the valley, a touch of jasmine. She was beautiful, so achingly beautiful, and her beauty did not fade. With Boino's amulet around his neck, Raistlin could look at her as long as he pleased, and he really would have liked to do so, save for the fact that he was getting very uncomfortable: his right leg was going to sleep beneath him, and he sort of needed to breathe.

Finally Crysania went in through the door, and Raistlin relesed his breath in a long exhale, shifting his weight from one foot to the other. He scolded himself for not speaking up. What was keeping him? Nothing difficult here, nothing he couldn't handle. Alright, he thought. When she comes out.

He did not say anything when she came out.

She had changed her conservative ceremonial robe for a simple pearly white dress with a square neck and a pleated skirt which left her arms bare. After closing the door - a cloakroom, likely - carefully behind her, she went back to the altar, and Raistlin watched in rapture as she removed the hairpin he had wanted to remove and let her hair fall down her back. Gathering all of it over one shoulder, she began weaving it into a single loose plait.

It was just all too... fascinating.

Raistlin watched without a word, drinking in the curve of Crysania's back and waist, the lines of her smooth, white arms, the slender nape of her graceful neck. He was perfectly aware that the whole thing was going wrong in so many ways: it had never been his plan to spy on her, especially not with her half-dressed like that, especially not in the all too physical state he now happened to be in.

But it was just too fascinating.

Too fascinating, and too fast, out of control. Raistlin could only watch in a dreamlike daze as Crysania abandoned the plait and began to unbutton her dress for a change, as if determined not to make it any easier on him. Her fingers worked down the tiny buttons slowly and gracefully, one after another, revealing seductive flashes of skin beneath. He could almost feel those hard little buttons under his own fingers, giving way to his touch...

Raistlin put his fist over his mouth to silence his breathing. The sun was scorching his back, getting too hot to bear. He was so painfully aroused by now that his hands had begun to tremble slightly; it coincided with a creeping sense of anger at what she had done, and was doing, to him. This had not been the plan. The plan was ruined.

Crysania turned his back on him, and Raistlin closed his eyes in a moment of pained reflection. Go to her, said one half of his mind coldly. No long-winded overtures. Just go to her and take her in your arms like before and... Yeah, and then what? Say what? Do what? Maybe come back tomorrow by the same route, said the other half, and speak with her then. She never needs to know you were here today... But the voices were distant, far away. He simply could not take his eyes off her. Already she was finished with the buttons, already she was shedding the dress, revealing one white shoulder...

But then her movements froze all of a sudden. She was still for a moment, then returned the sleeve back up to her shoulder, very slowly.

Just as slowly, in a manner that spoke of terrible certainty, she turned around and stared into the room, in the wrong direction.

"Is there someone there?" she asked. Her voice was tense and strained. Her face was badly frightened.

Raistlin remained silent for a while, searching for the right words.

"Revered Daughter," he said then, as calmly as he could, although he could hear the edges of his voice had a slight tremble.
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Evermore: The Gathering