The Gully Dwarves

Chapter 7

It was incredible. Verden felt suddenly dizzy, as though powers far greater than her own had entered her mind. Was this some more of Takhisis’s cruelty? Did the dark goddess have further tricks to play upon her even more cruel than the one that she had played?

Yet she sensed no evil here. The “feel” of the strangeness that spoke to her was neither good nor evil, as she understood these qualities. Instead it was almost indifferent, except for a factor that was lacking in both absolute good and absolute evil. It cared! It cared for them, the little creatures to whom she was bound and it cared for her as well.

The sheer, sensed power of the emanation left her dazed. What kind of power, on this or any world, could it be except one of the gods? The dark goddess had disowned her. So who, then? Her eyes traveled upward, to the designs on the far wall-ancient designs surrounding nine metallic shields-nine counting the one under the glowing Grand Notioner’s feet. Nine shields, of nine metals, representing the nine gods. She closed her eyes in confusion, then looked again at the glowing being before her.

“Revised?” she hissed. “A curse? Revised? By gully dwarves?”

“Of course not,” the red glow said, amused. “The Aghar are as helpless to change a god’s will as any mortal thing. But you above all, you with your skills at subterfuge and deceit, should know that even what cannot be changed can be viewed from many perspectives.” The glow raised the Grand Notioner’s arm to point at the inscripted wall with his mop handle. “A thrown spear, seen by its target, is only a dot, until it strikes. But seen from aside, it is a fleeting shaft that passes by and has no effect upon the viewer.”

“This is no spear I bear within me,” Verden pointed out. “It is a god’s curse.”

“The principle is the same,” the voice said through Gandy’s lips. “Like a spear, a curse is harmful only to the one standing where it strikes.”

On Verden’s snout, the Highbulp’s snores became a snort and he rolled over, not waking up. “What does all that have to do with this wart on my nose?” Verden demanded. Glaring at the sleeping Glitch made her a bit cross-eyed.

“The dark way has failed on Krynn.” The glowing gully dwarf stood as though in a trance, and the strange voice from his lips sounded distant. “But chaos left chaos in its wake. Much remains to be resolved, and many weights must be shifted before a balance is restored. Small weights as well as big ones.”

There was a pause, then the voice continued, more distant now as though its speaker had turned away. “From the least of the least,” it said, “a hero shall arise, the first of his kind, at just such time as he is needed.” For a moment there was silence again. Then the odd voice went on. “You have a role to play here, Verden Leafglow, and you will play it. But how you play it is vital to you.”

“What does that mean?”

“To avoid the spear’s thrust, the target must choose to step aside. No one else except the target can make that choice.”

The eerie voice faded, and the reddish glow dimmed and was gone. Old Gandy sagged, leaning on his mop handle, and wavered on the “stew bowl’s” edge as though he might fall.

“What choice?” Verden demanded.

The Grand Notioner’s eyes popped open. He blinked and steadied himself. “What what?”

“What you were saying! What does it mean?”

“Oh.” Gandy looked confused. “ ’bout Highbulp need wife? Mean he oughtta get married. Wife might keep him busy. Keep him outta ever’body’s hair.”

He shrugged, turned and his foot slipped off the iron rim. He sat down hard on the edge of the bowl and it flipped up and turned over, covering him. There were panicked taps from inside, and Verden Leafglow shook her head, accidentally dislodging the snoring Highbulp. Glitch bounced on the stone beneath the dragon’s head, let out a yelp, then rolled over and went back to sleep. Verden extended a talon to raise the bowl so that Gandy could crawl out.

The Grand Notioner muttered something unintelligible, dusted himself off and hobbled away. Verden glanced at the upside-down bowl, then stared at it. Her eyes went again to the sculpted wall across the chamber. The plaques on the murder holes were of various metals, each ornately decorated in the ancient Ergothian style in which a pattern could be seen in many ways, apparently all different, but all signifying the same concept.

The shields still in place on the wall depicted six of the nine deities the human monks of Tare had called the “Fundament Triad.” The gods. Solinari was there, flanked by Majere and Paladine. Then Sargonnas, then three open holes, then Lunitari and Gilean. The two inverted shields, hanging below their openings, by their places in the circle she took to be Nuitari and Takhisis. They hung on their hinges, blank ovals with upside-down faces unseen, turned toward the wall. Those, and one hole with no shield.

Again she looked at the “stew bowl” beside her, and recognized it. It was the missing plaque-an oval shield of iron, with an intricate symbol worked into the metal. The symbol of the missing god.

“Reorx,” she whispered, and the iron oval rang softly as though echoing the name.

Glitch the Most awakened abruptly, sat up and yawned mightily. “Time for Highbulp’s breakfast, dragon,” he said, glancing up at her. “You got stew?”

“Shut up!” Verden snapped. “Listen!”

He listened, then shook his head. “Don’ hear a thing,” he said.

But Verden heard something. In her mind now, and near at hand, was another voice, the taunting rasp of Flame Searclaw.

I have found you, green snake, the red dragon’s mind purred viciously. And I see you are still dawdling with those pathetic creatures. Shall I kill you first, green snake? Or might it be amusing to let you watch me fry your little friends before you die? It doesn’t matter to me, green snake. I have found you, at last.

Somewhere within Xak Tsaroth, somewhere not very far away, there was a roar of sound like a hundred dwarven forges, their bellows going full or like flames from a blast furnace whipping through stone corridors.

The Highbulp shrieked, bumped his head on Verden’s chin and scrambled up her face, heading for shelter beyond her. He shrieked again and clung to her rising crest as she flexed massive sinews and stood, spreading her wings.

All of the frustration, the pent-up anger and humiliation within her rose to a crescendo in savage joy as green eyes glittered and slitted. She hissed a battle cry. She had been powerless, powerless to deal with the dim beings around her. But nothing in the curse upon her made her powerless against Flame Searclaw.

An intense joy like waves of wondrous heat flooded over her, and she picked up the Reorx shield and pressed it to her breast, only vaguely aware that she had picked up another gully dwarf with it. That one clung to her glittering scales and climbed, agile as a tree lizard, up her shoulder and along her neck, toward the clinging, burbling Highbulp.

Verden Leafglow pressed the iron shield to her breast, and it clung there, seeming to bond itself to her scales. It rested between massive emerald shoulders like a rust-red iron medallion on a field of green.

I asked for the help of a god, she thought. Reorx, I welcome your presence.

Verden Leafglow didn’t wait for Flame Searclaw to come to her. With a mighty beat of spread wings, she rose and went to meet him.

A gaggle of fleeing, babbling gully dwarves, their shirttails smoldering, issued from the main corridor just as she reached it. With a chorus of shrieks, they hit the floor and skidded aside as the green dragon passed over them, inches above, and arrowed into the tunnel winding upward and away.

Stone surfaces shot past as Verden threw herself into the winding corridor, her swept-back wings whispering against the dark walls at each side, arms folded close and legs trailing alongside her whipping tail.

Atop her head, just at the rise of her great crest, two Aghar clung in wild-eyed desperation, bouncing this way and that as their fingers clenched her crest for dear life. Just past the first turn, the Highbulp almost lost his grasp until Lidda bit him on the ear to make him pay attention.

Another bend, and Flame Searclaw was there, huge and ruby red in the dimness, flames trickling from between his swordlike fangs. Nearly twice the size of the green dragon, he seemed to fill the tunnel. At sight of Verden he opened his mouth wider, readying another blast of fire when she slowed to meet him.

But Verden didn’t slow. Instead she lashed her tail, put on a new burst of speed and, at the last instant, did a barrel roll in the tunnel to shoot directly under the surprised red, upside-down, raking him viciously with razor talons. Deep gashes appeared on his soft underbelly as she passed beneath him. The red roared and spat flames, but they had no target. Smaller, faster and more agile than the great red dragon, Verden Leafglow was now behind him, righting herself and coming around to attack.