Dragons of the Fallen Sun

Chapter Eleven The Song of Lorac

While Tasslehoff was near dying of boredom on the road to Qualinesti and while Sir Roderick was returning to Sanction, blissfully unaware that he had just delivered his commander into the jaws of the dragon, Silvanoshei and Rolan of the kirath began their journey to place Silvanoshei upon the throne of Silvanesti. Rolan’s plan was to move close to the capital city of Silvanost, but not to enter it until word spread through the city that the true head of House Royal was returning to claim his rightful place as Speaker of the Stars.

“How long will that take?” Silvan asked with the impatience and impetuosity of youth.

“The news will travel faster than we will, Your Majesty,”

Rolan replied. “Drinel and the other kirath who were with us two nights ago have already left to spread it. They will tell every other kirath they meet and any of the Wildrunners they feel that they can trust. Most of the soldiers are loyal to General Konnal, but there are a few who are starting to doubt him. They do not openly state their opposition yet, but Your Majesty’s arrival should do much to change that. The Wildrunners have always sworn allegiance to House Royal. As Konnal himself will be obliged to do—or at least make a show of doing.”

“How long will it take us to reach Silvanost, then?” Silvanoshei asked.

“We will leave the trail and travel the Thon-Thalas by boat,”

Rolan responded. “I plan to take you to my house, which IS located on the outskirts of the city. We should arrive in two days time. We ‘will take a third day to rest and to receive the reports that will be coming in by then. Four days from now, Your Majesty, if all goes well, you will enter the capital in triumph.”

“Four days!” Silvan was skeptical. “Can so much be accomplished that fast?”

“In the days when we fought the dream, we kirath could send a message from the north of Silvanesti into the far reaches of the south in a single day. I am not exaggerating, Your Majesty,” Rolan said, smiling at Silvanoshei’s obvious skepticism. “We accomplished such a feat many times over. We were highly organized then, and there were many more of us than there are now. But I believe that Your Majesty will be impressed, nevertheless.”

“I am already impressed, Rolan,” Silvanoshei replied. “I am deeply indebted to you and the others of the kirath. I will find some way of repaying you.”

“Free our people from this dreadful scourge, Your Majesty,”

Rolan answered, his eyes shadowed with sorrow, “and that will be payment enough.”

Despite his praise, Silvanoshei still harbored doubts, though he kept them to himself. His mother’s army was well organized, yet even she would make plans, only to see them go awry. Ill luck, miscommunication, bad weather, anyone of these or a host of other misfortunes could turn a day that had seemed meant for victory into disaster.

“No plan ever survives contact with the enemy,” was one of Samar’s dictums, a dictum that had proven tragically true.

Silvan anticipated disasters, delays. If the boat Rolan promised even existed, it would have a hole in it or it would have been burned to cinders. The river would be too low or too high, run too swift or too slow. Winds would blow them upstream instead of down or down when they wanted to travel up.

Silvan was vastly astonished to find the small boat at the river landing where Rolan had said it would be, perfectly sound and in good repair. Not only that, but the boat had bee? filled with food packed ill waterproof sacks and stowed neatly ill the prow.

“As you see, Your Majesty,” Rolan said, “the kirath have been here ahead of us.”

The Thon-Thalas River was calm and meandering this time of year. The boat, made of tree bark, was small and light and so well balanced that one would have to actively work to tip it over. Well knowing that Rolan would never think of asking the future Speaker of the Stars to help row, Silvan volunteered his assistance. Rolan at first demurred, but he could not argue with his future ruler and so at last he agreed and handed Silvanoshei a paddle. Silvan saw that he had earned the elder elf’s respect by this act, a pleasant change for the young man, who, it seemed, had always earned Samar’s disrespect.

Silvan enjoyed the exercise that burned away some of his pent-up energy. The river was placid, the forests through which it flowed were green and verdant. The weather was fine, but Silvan could not say that the day was beautiful. The sun shone through the shield. He could see blue sky through the shield.

But the sun that shone on Silvanesti was not the same fiercely burning orb of orange fire that shone on the rest of Ansalon. The sun Silvan looked upon was a pale and sickly yellow, the yellow of jaundiced skin, the yellow of an ugly bruise. It was as if he were looking at a reflection of the sun, floating facedown, drowned in a pool of stagnant, oily water. The yellow sun altered the color of the sky from azure blue to a hard metallic blue-green. Silvan did not look long at the sun but instead shifted his gaze to the forest.

“Do you know a song to ease our labors?” he called out to Rolan who was seated in the front of the boat.

The kirath paddled with quick, strong strokes, digging his paddle deep into the water. The far-younger Silvan was hard pressed to keep pace with his elder.

Rolan hesitated, glanced back over his shoulder. “There is a song that is a favorite of the kirath, but I fear it may displease His Majesty. It is a song that tells the story of your honored grandfather, King Lorac.”

“Does it start out, ‘The Age of Might it was, the Age of the Kingpriest and his minions,’” Silvan asked, singing the melody tentatively. He had only heard the song once before.

“That is the beginning, Your Majesty,” Rolan replied.

“Sing it for me,” Silvan said. “My mother sang it once to me on the day I turned thirty. That was the first time I had ever heard the story of my grandfather. My mother never spoke of him before, nor has she spoken of him since. To honor her, none of the other elves speaks of him either.”

“I too, honor your mother, who gathered roses in the Garden of Astarin when she was your age. And I understand her pain. We share in that pain every time we sing this song, for as Lorac was snared by his own hubris into betraying his country, so we who took the easy way out, who fled our land and left him to do battle alone, were also at fault.

“If all our people had stayed to fight, if all our people—those of House Royal to House Servitor, those of House Protector, House Mystic, House Mason—if we had all joined together and stood shoulder to shoulder, regardless of caste, against the Dragonarmies, then I believe that we could have saved our land.

“But you shall hear the full tale in the song.

“I can understand why my mother does not like to hear that song,” Silvan said when the last long-held, sweet, sad note drifted over the water, to be echoed by a sparrow. “And why our people do not like to remember it.”

“Yet, they should remember it,” said Rolan. “The song would be sung daily, if I had my way. Who knows but that the song of our own days will be just as tragic, just as terrible? We have not changed. Lorac Caladon believed that he was strong enough to wield the dragon orb, though he had been warned against it by all the wise. Thus he was snared, and thus he fell. Our people, in their fear, chose to flee rather than to stand and fight. And thus in fear today we cower under this shield, sacrificing the lives of some of our people in order to save a dream.”

“ A dream?” Silvan asked. He was thinking of Lorac’s dream, the dream of the song.

“I do not refer to the whispers of the dragon,” said Rolan.

“That dream is gone, but the sleeper refuses to wake and thus another dream has come to take its place. A dream of the past. A dream of the glories of days that have gone. I do not blame them,”

Rolan added, sighing. “I, too, love to think upon what has gone and long to regain it. But those of us who fought alongside your father know that the past can never be recovered, nor should it be. The world has changed, and we must change with it. We must become a part of it, else we will sicken and die in the prison house in which we have locked ourselves.”

Rolan ceased paddling for a moment. He turned in the boat to face Silvan. “Do you understand what I am saying, Your Majesty?”

“I think so,” said Silvan cautiously. “I am of the world, so to speak. I come from the outside. I am the one who can lead our people out into the world.”

“Yes, Your Majesty.” Rolan smiled.

“So long as I avoid the sin of hubris,” Silvan. said, ceasing his paddling, thankful for the rest. He grinned when he said it for he meant it teasingly, but on reflection, he became more serious.

“Pride, the family failing,” Silvan said, half to himself. “I am forewarned, and that is forearmed, they say.”

Picking up his paddle, he fell to work with a will.

The pallid sun sank down behind the trees. Day languished, as if it too was one of the victims of the wasting sickness. Rolan watched the bank, searching for a suitable site to moor for the night. Silvan watched the opposite shore and so he saw first what the kirath missed.

“Rolan!” Silvan whispered urgently. “Pull for the western shore! Quickly!”

“What is it, Your Majesty?” Rolan was quick to take alarm.

“What do you see?”

“There! on the eastern bank! Don’t you see them? Hurry! We are nearly within arrow range!”

Rolan halted his rapid stroking. He turned around to smile sympathetically at Silvan. “You are no longer among the hunted, Your Majesty. Those people you see gathered on that bank are your own. They have come to look upon you and do you honor.”

Silvan was astonished. “But. . . how do they know?”

“The kirath have been here, Your Majesty.”

“So soon?”

“I told Your Majesty that we would spread the word rapidly.”

Silvan blushed. “I am sorry, Rolan. I did not mean to doubt you. It’s just that. . . My mother uses runners. They travel in secret, carrying messages between my mother and her sister by marriage, Laurana, in Qualinesti. Thus we are kept apprised of what is happening with our people in that realm. But it would take them many days to cover the same number of miles. . . . I had thought—”

“You thought I was exaggerating. You need make no apology for that, Your Majesty. You are accustomed to the world beyond the shield, a world that is large and filled with dangers that wax and wane daily, like the moon. Here in Silvanesti, we kirath know every path, every tree that stands on that path, every flower that grows beside it, ever squirrel that crosses it, every bird that sings in every branch, so many times have we run them. If that bird sings one false note, if that squirrel twitches its ears in alarm, we are aware of it. Nothing can surprise us. Nothing can stop us.”

Rolan frowned. “That is why we of the kirath find it troubling that the dragon Cyan Bloodbane has so long eluded us. It is not possible that he should. And yet it is possible that he has.”

The river carried them within sight of the elves standing on the western shoreline. Their houses were in the trees, houses a human would have probably never seen, for they were made of the living tree, whose branches had been lovingly coaxed into forming walls and roofs. Their nets were spread out upon the ground to dry, their boats pulled up onto the shore. There were not many elves, this was only a small fishing village, and yet it was apparent that the entire population had turned out. The sick had even been carried to the river’s edge, where they lay wrapped in blankets and propped up with pillows.

Self-conscious, Silvan ceased paddling and rested his oar at the bottom of the boat.

“What do I do, Rolan?” he asked nervously.

Rolan looked back, smiled reassuringly. “You need only be yourself, Your Majesty. That is what they expect.”

Rolan steered closer to the bank. The river seemed to run faster here, rushed Silvan toward the people before he was quite ready. He had ridden on parade with his mother to review the troops and had experienced the same uneasiness and sense of unworthiness that assailed him now.

The river brought him level with his people. He looked at them and nodded slightly and raised his hand in a shy wave. No one waved back. No one cheered, as he had been half-expecting.

They watched him float upon the river in silence, a silence that was poignant and touched Silvan more deeply than the wildest cheering. He saw in their eyes, he heard in their silence, a wistful hopefulness, a hope in which they did not want to believe, for they had felt hope before and been betrayed.

Profoundly moved, Silvan ceased his waving and stretched out his hand to them, as if he saw them sinking and he could keep them above the water. The river bore him away from them, took him around a hill, and they were lost to his sight.

Humbled, he huddled in the stem and did not move nor speak. For the first time, he came to the full realization of the crushing burden he had taken upon himself. What could he do to help them? What did they expect of him? Too much, perhaps.

Much too much.

Rolan glanced back every now and again in concern, but he said nothing, made no comment. He continued to paddle alone until he found a suitable place to beach the boat. Silvan roused himself and jumped into the water, helped to drag the boat up onto the bank. The water was icy cold and came as a pleasant shock. He submerged his worries and fears of his own inadequacies in the Thon-Thalas, was glad to have something to do to keep himself busy.

Accustomed to living out of doors, Silvan knew what needed to be done to set up camp. He unloaded the supplies, spread out the bedrolls, and began to prepare their light supper of fruit and flatbread, while Rolan secured the boat. They ate for the most part in silence, Silvan still subdued by the enormity of the responsibility he had accepted so blithely just two nights before and Rolan respecting his ruler’s wish for quiet. The two made an early night of it. Wrapping themselves in their blankets, they left the woodland animals and night birds to stand watch over their slumbers.

Silvan fell asleep much sooner than he’d anticipated. He was wakened in the night by the hooting of an owl and sat up in fear, but Rolan, stirring, said the owl was merely calling to a neighbor, sharing the gossip of the darkness.

Silvan lay awake, listening to the mournful, haunting call and its answer, a solemn echo in some distant part of the forest. He lay awake, long, staring up at the stars that shimmered uneasily above the shield, the Song of Lorac running swift like the river water through his mind.

The tears of Lorac, held in thrall by the orb and by Cyan Bloodbane, minion of Queen Takhisis, minion of evil, who alone has the power.

The words and melody of the song were at this moment being echoed by a minstrel singing to entertain guests at a party in the capital city of Silvanost.

The party was being held in the Garden of Astarin on the grounds of the Tower of the Stars, where the Speaker of the Stars would live had there been a Speaker. The setting was beautiful. The Tower of the Stars was magically shaped of marble, for the elves will not cut or otherwise harm any part of the land, and thus the Tower had a fluid, organic feel to it, looking almost as if someone had formed it of melted wax. During Lorac’s dream, the Tower had been hideously transformed, as were all the other structures in Silvanost. Elven mages worked long years to reshape the dwelling.

They replaced the myriad jewels in the walls of the tall building, jewels which had once captured the light of the silver moon, Solinari, and the red moon, Lunitari, and used their blessed moonlight to illuminate the Tower’s interior so that it seemed bathed in silver and in flame. The moons were gone now. A single moon only shone on Krynn and for some reason that the wise among the elves could not explain, the pale light of this single moon glittered in each jewel—like a staring eye, bringing no light at all to the Tower, so that the elves were forced to resort to candles and torches.

Chairs had been placed among the plants in the Garden of Astarin. The plants appeared to be flourishing. They filled the air with their fragrance. Only Konnal and his gardeners knew that the plants in the garden had not grown there but had been carried there by the Woodshapers from their own private gardens, for no plants lived long now in the Garden of Astarin. No plants except one, a tree. A tree surrounded by a magical shield. A tree known as the Shield Tree, for from its root was said to have sprung the magical shield that protected Silvanesti.

The minstrel was singing the Song of Lorac in answer to a request from a guest at the party. The minstrel finished, ending the song on its sad note, her hand brushing lightly the strings of her lute.

“Bravo! Well sung! Let the song be sung again,” came a lilting voice from the back row of seats.

The minstrel looked uncertainly at her host. The elven audience was much too polite and too well bred to indicate overt shock at the request, but a performer comes to know the mood of the audience by various subtle signs. The minstrel noted faintly flushed cheeks and sidelong embarrassed glances cast at their host. Once around for this song was quite enough.

“Who said that?” General Reyl Konnal, military governor of Silvanesti, twisted in his seat.

“Whom do you suppose, Uncle?” his nephew replied with a dark glance for the seats behind them. “The person who requested it be sung in the first place. Your friend, Glaucous.”

General Konnal rose abruptly to his feet, a move that ended the evening’s musical entertainment. The minstrel bowed, thankful to be spared so arduous a task as singing that song again. The audience applauded politely but without enthusiasm. A sigh that might have been expressive of relief joined the night breeze in rustling the trees whose intertwined branches formed a barren canopy above them, for many of the leaves had dropped off. Lanterns of silver filigree hung from the boughs, lighting the night. The guests left the small amphitheater, moved to a table that had been set up beside a reflecting pool, there to dine on sugared fruits and buttery shortbreads and to drink chilled wine.

Konnal invited the minstrel to partake of a late night morsel and personally escorted the woman to the table. The elf named Glaucous who had requested the song was already there, a cup of wine in his hand. Raising a toast to the minstrel, he was lavish in her praise.

“ A pity you were not permitted to sing the song again,” he said, glancing in the general’s direction. “I never tire of that particular melody. And the poetry! My favorite part is when—”

“Might I offer you food and drink, Madame?” the nephew asked, responding to a nudge from his uncle.

The minstrel cast him a grateful glance and accepted his invitation. He led her to the table, where she was graciously received by the other guests. The grassy area on which Glaucous and the general stood was soon empty. Although many of the guests would have been pleased to bask in the the presence of the charming and attractive Glaucous and pay their share of flattery to General Konnal, they could tell at a glance that the general was angry.

“I don’t know why I invite you to these parties, Glaucous,”

Konnal said, seething. “You always do something to embarrass me. It was bad enough you requested she sing that piece, and then to ask for it a second time!”

“Considered in light of the rumors I heard today,” Glaucous returned languidly, “I thought the song of Lorac Caladon most appropriate.”

Konnal shot his friend a sharp glance from beneath lowered brows. “I heard. . .” He paused, glanced at his guests. “Come, walk with me around the pond.”

The two moved away from the other guests. Now free of the constraint of the general’s presence, the elves gathered in small groups, their voices sibilant with suppressed excitement, eager to discuss the rumors that were the talk of the capital..

“We need not have left,” Glaucous observed, looking back upon the refreshment table. “Everyone has heard the same thing.”

“Yes, but they speak of it as rumor. I have confirmation,”

Konnal said grimly.

Glaucous halted. “You know this for a fact?”

“I have my sources among the kirath. The man saw him, spoke to him. The young man is said to be the image of his father. He is Silvanoshei Caladon, son of Alhana Starbreeze, grandson of the late and unlamented King Lorac.”

“But that is impossible!” Glaucous stated. “The last we heard of the whereabouts of that accursed witch, his mother, she was lurking about outside the shield and her son was with her. He could not have come through the shield. Nothing and no one can penetrate the shield.” Glaucous was quite firm on that point.

“Then his arrival must be a miracle, as they are claiming,”

Konnal said dryly, with a wave of his hand at his whispering guests.

“Bah! It is some imposter. You shake your head.” Glaucous regarded the governor in disbelief. “You have actually swallowed this!”

“My source is Drinel. As you know, he has the skill of truth-seek,” Konnal replied. “There can be no doubt. The young man passed the test. Drinel saw into his heart. He knows more about what happened to him than the young man does, apparently.”

“So what did happen to him?” Glaucous asked with a slight lift of a delicate eyebrow.

“The night of that terrible storm, Alhana and her rebels were preparing to launch an all-out assault on the shield when their camp was overrun by ogres. The young man went running to the Legion of Steel to beg the help of the humans—witness how low this woman has sunk—when he was dazzled by a lightning bolt. He slipped and fell down an embankment. He lost consciousness. Apparently, when he awoke, he was inside the shield.”

Glaucous stroked his chin with his hand. The chin was well-formed, the face handsome. His almond eyes were large and penetrating. He could make no move that was not graceful. His complexion was flawless, his skin smooth and pale. His features were perfectly molded.

To human eyes, all elves are beautiful. The wise say this accounts for the animosity between the two races. Humans—even the most beautiful among them—cannot help but feel that they are ugly by comparison. The elves, who worship beauty, see gradations of beauty among their own kind, but they always see beauty. In a land of beauty, Glaucous was the most beautiful.

At this moment, Glaucous’s beauty, his perfection, irritated Konnal beyond measure.

The general shifted his gaze to his pond. Two new swans glided over its mirrorlike surface. He wondered how long these two would live, hoped it would be longer than the last pair. He was spending a fortune in swans, but the pond was bleak and empty without them.

Glaucous was a favorite at court, which was odd considering that he was responsible for many members of the elven court losing their positions, influence, and power. But then, no one ever blamed Glaucous. They blamed Konnal, the one responsible for their dismissal.

Yet, what choice do I have? Konnal would ask himself. These people were untrustworthy. Some of them even plotting against me! If it hadn’t been for Glaucous, I might have never known.

Upon first being introduced into the general’s retinue, Glaucous had ferreted out something bad about every person Konnal had ever trusted. One minister had been heard defending Porthios. Another was said to have once, when she was a youth, been in love with Dalamar the Dark. Still another was called to account because he had disagreed with Konnal over a matter of taxation.

Then came the day when Konnal woke to the realization that he had only one advisor left and that advisor was Glaucous.

The exception was Konnal’s nephew Kiryn. Glaucous made no secret of his affection for Kiryn. Glaucous flattered the young man, brought him little gifts, laughed heartily at his jokes, and was effusive in his attention to him. Courtiers who courted Glaucous’s favor were intensely jealous of the young man.

Kiryn himself would have much preferred Glaucous’s dislike.

Kiryn distrusted Glaucous, though the young man could give no reason why.

Kiryn dared say no word against Glaucous, however. No one dared say anything against him. Glaucous was a powerful wizard, the most powerful wizard the Silvanesti had ever known among their kind, even counting the dark elf Dalamar.

Glaucous had arrived in Silvanost one day shortly after the dragon purge began. He was, he said, a representative of those elves who served in the Tower of Shalost, a monument in western Silvanesti, where lay the body of the druid Waylorn Wyvernsbane. Although the gods of magic had departed, the enchantment remained around the crystal bier on which the hero of the elves lay enshrined. Careful not to disturb the rest of the dead, the elven sorcerers, desperate to regain their magic, had attempted to capture and use some of the enchantment.

“We succeeded,” Glaucous had reported to the general. “That is,” he had added with becoming modesty, “I succeeded.”

Fearing the great dragons that were decimating the rest of Ansalon, Glaucous had worked with the Woodshapers to devise a means by which Silvanesti could be protected from the ravages of the dragons. The Woodshapers, acting under Glaucous’s direction, had grown the tree now known as the Shield Tree. Surrounded by its own magical barrier through which nothing could penetrate to do it harm, the tree was planted in the Garden of Astarin and was much admired.

When Glaucous had proposed to the governor-general that he could raise a magical shield over all of Silvanesti, Konnal had experienced an overwhelming sense of thankfulness and relief. He had felt a weight lifted from his shoulders. Silvanesti would be safe, truly safe. Safe from dragons, safe from ogres, safe from humans, dark elves, safe from the rest of the world. He had put the matter to a vote by the Heads of House. The vote had been unanimous.

Glaucous had raised the shield and become the hero of the elves, some of whom were already talking about building him his own monument. Then plants in the Garden of Astarin began to die. Reports came that trees and plants and animals that lived within the borders touched by the magical shield were also dying. People in Silvanost and other elven villages started to die of a strange wasting sickness. The kirath and other rebels said it was the shield. Glaucous said it was a plague brought to their land by humans before the raising of the shield and that only the shield kept the rest of the populace from dying.

Konnal could not do without Glaucous now. Glaucous was his friend, his trusted adviser, his only trusted adviser. Glaucous’s magic was responsible for placing the shield over Silvanesti and Glaucous could use his magic to remove the shield anytime he wanted. Remove the shield and leave the Silvanesti open to the terrors of the world beyond.

“Mmmm? I beg your pardon? What were you saying?” General Konnal tore his attention from his swans, returned it to Glaucous, who had been speaking all this time.

“I said, ‘You are not listening to me,’” Glaucous repeated with a sweet smile.

“No, I am sorry. There is one thing I want to know, Glaucous. How did this young man come through the shield?” He lowered his voice to a whisper, though there was no one within earshot.

“Is the shield’s magic failing, too?”

Glaucous’s expression darkened. “No,” he replied.

“How can you be certain?” Konnal demanded. “Tell me honestly—have you not felt a weakening of your power over the past year? All other wizards have.”

“That may be. I have not,” Glaucous said coldly.

Konnal gazed at his friend intently. Glaucous refused to meet his gaze and Konnal guessed that the wizard was lying.

“Then what explanation do we have for this phenomenon?”

“A very simple one,” Glaucous returned, unperturbed. “I brought him through.”

“You?” Konnal was so shocked he shouted the word. Many in the crowd halted their conversations to turn and stare.

Glaucous smiled at them reassuringly and took hold of his friend’s arm, led him to a more secluded area of the garden.

“Why would you do this? What do you plan to do with this young man, Glaucous?” Konnal demanded.

“I will do what you should have done,” Glaucous said, smoothing back the flowing sleeves of his white robes. “I will put a Caladon on the throne. I remind you, my friend, that if you had proclaimed your nephew Speaker as I recommended there would be no problem with Silvanoshei.”

“You know perfectly well that Kiryn refused to accept the position,” Konnal returned.

“Due to misguided loyalty to his Aunt Alhana.” Glaucous sighed. “I have tried to counsel him on this matter. He refuses to listen to me.”

“He will not listen to me, either, if that is what you are implying, my friend,” Konnal said. “And might I point out that it is your insistence on maintaining the right of the Caladon family to rule Silvanesti that has landed us in this stew. I am of House Royal myself—”

“You are not a Caladon, Reyl,” Glaucous murmured.

“I can trace my lineage back beyond the Caladons!” Konnal said indignantly. “Back to Quinari, wife of Silvanos! I have as much right to rule as the Caladons. Perhaps more.”

“I know that, my dear friend,” said Glaucous softly, placing a soothing hand upon Konnal’s arm. “But you would have a difficult time persuading the Heads of House.”

“Lorac Caladon plunged this nation into ruin,” Konnal continued bitterly. “His daughter Alhana Starbreeze took us from ruination to near destruction with her marriage to Porthios, a Qualinesti. If we had not acted quickly to rid ourselves of both these vipers, we would have found Silvanesti under the heel of that half-breed, dim-witted Speaker of Suns Gilthas, son of Tanis. Yet the people continue to argue that a Caladon should sit upon the throne! I do not understand it!”

“My friend,” Glaucous said gently, “that bloodline has ruled Silvanesti for hundreds of years. The people would be content to accept another Caladon as ruler without a murmur. But if you put yourself forward as a ruler, there would be months or even years of endless arguments and jealousies, researchings of family histories, perhaps even rival claims to the throne. Who knows but that some powerful figure might arise who would oust you and seize control for himself? No, no. This is the best possible solution. I remind you again that your nephew is a Caladon and that he would be the perfect choice. The people would be quite willing to see your nephew take the position. His mother, your sister, married into the Caladon family. It is a compromise the Heads of House would accept.

“But this is all water beneath the bridge. In two days time, Silvanoshei Caladon will be in Silvanost. You have proclaimed publicly that you would support a member of the Caladon family as Speaker of the Stars.”

“Because you advised that I do so!” Konnal returned.

“I have my reasons,” Glaucous said. He glanced at the guests, who continued to talk, their voices rising in their excitement. The name “Silvanoshei” could be heard now, coming to them through the starlit darkness. “Reasons that will become clear to you someday, my friend. You must trust me.”

“Very well, what do you recommend that I do about Silvanoshei ?”

“You will make him Speaker of the Stars.”

“What are you saying?” Konnal was thunderstruck. “This. . . this son of dark elves. . . Speaker of the Stars. . .”

“Calm yourself, my dear friend,” Glaucous admonished in placating tones. “We will borrow a leaf out of the book of the Qualinesti. Silvanoshei will rule in name only. You will remain the general of the Wildrunners. You will retain control over all the military. You will be the true ruler of Silvanesti. And in the interim, Silvanesti will have a Speaker of the Stars. The people will be joyful. Silvanoshei’s ascension to the throne will put a stop to the unrest that has developed of late. Once their goal is achieved, the militant factions among our people—most notably the kirath—will cease to cause trouble.”

“I cannot believe you are serious, Glaucous.” Konnal was shaking his head.

“Never more serious in my life, dear friend. The people will bring their cares and woes to the king now instead of you. You will be free to accomplish the real work of ruling Silvanesti. Someone must be proclaimed regent, of course. Silvanoshei is young, very young for such a vast responsibility.”

“ Ah!” Konnal looked quite knowing. “I begin to see what you have in mind. I suppose that I—”

He stopped. Glaucous was shaking his head.

“You cannot be regent and general of the Wildrunners,” he said.

“ And whom do you suggest?” Konnal asked.

Glaucous bowed with graceful humility. “I offer myself. I will undertake to counsel the young king. You have found my advice useful from time to time, I believe.”

“But you have no qualifications!” Konnal protested. “You are not of House Royal. You have not served in the Senate. Before this you were a wizard serving in the Tower of Shalost,” he stated brusquely.

“Oh, but you yourself will recommend me,” said Glaucous, resting his hand on Konnal’s arm.

“ And what am I to say by way of recommendation?”

“Only this—you will remind them that the Shield Tree grows in the Garden of Astarin, a garden that I oversee. You will remind them that I am the one who helped plant the Shield Tree. You will remind them that I am the one currently responsible for keeping the shield in place.”

“ A threat?” Konnal glowered.

Glaucous gazed long at the general, who began to feel uncomfortable. “It is my fate never to be trusted,” Glaucous said at last. “To have my motives questioned. I accept that, a sacrifice I make to serve my people.”

“I am sorry,” Konnal said gruffly. “It’s just that—”

“Apology accepted. And now,” Glaucous continued, “we should make preparations to welcome the young king to Silvanost. You will declare a national holiday. We will spare no expense. The people need something to celebrate. We will have that minstrel who sang tonight sing something in honor of our new Speaker. What a lovely voice she has.”

“Yes,” Konnal agreed absently, abstracted. He was beginning to think that this plan of Glaucous’s wasn’t a bad plan after all.

“ Ah, how very sad, my friend,” Glaucous said, pointing to the pond. “One of your swans is dying.”