“Worried? No. Why do you ask?”
“It was the expression on your face… like something was wrong.”
Kerrick shook his head. “I was thinking about the dream I’ve been having. I’ve had it several times now, variations of the same message. It’s a dream about my father and my homeland.”
She was silent for a moment, gazing across the wind-tossed waters of the strait. “You haven’t spoken of Silvanesti since you came back to Brackenrock, but I know you must miss your home, don’t you?”
.Kerrick shrugged. “Actually, I’m not so sure I miss the place as it is right now. It’s more as though I long for the place it was when I was a child, when my father was there.”
Her laughter was wry. “You’re not the only one to have such longings.” Her gaze turned ahead and her eyes narrowed as she peered at the horizon. “You know, you’ve never told me much about your father-only that he was captain of that galley, Silvanos Oak, that sailed to the Icereach.”
“He was captured by ogres,” the elf declared bluntly. “Grimwar Bane renamed my father’s ship, made it Gold-wing, the ogre flagship. My father suffered-the gods know how he must have suffered!-in the king’s dungeon. If he was lucky, he died quickly. At best, he could have survived a year or two. This is all I’ve been able to find out over the last several years. Only tidbits and rumor. But the notion that he might have escaped and returned home… ridiculous! Just ridiculous.”
Kerrick sighed. “What’s the point in knowing how he died? Or who killed him? There are some revelations better left in the dark.”
Moreen shook her head with a slight grimace. “When I saw my father killed by the ogre’s spear it was a horror, a nightmare, but at least I was there, I saw it, and I know he’s gone. There’s a comfort in that.”
“Maybe it was the same thing for me when I saw the galley under Grimwar Bane’s control. Did you know, my father drew the plans for Silvanos Oak himself? He helped with every phase of the construction. To see that beautiful vessel corrupted to the ends of the ogre king… that was proof enough of my father’s death.”
“If you hadn’t come here when you did, that ship in our enemy’s hands probably would have been our undoing. The gods work in strange ways,” Moreen replied. “I don’t know if I ever really thanked you for designing and installing the harbor boom.” The chiefwoman changed the subject quietly. She looked at Kerrick with dark eyes, soft and pensive, and he felt a stab of irrational guilt.
“It was little enough,” he declared, not very truthfully. “Now you’ll get help from the Highlanders, too. Strongwind was eager to meet with you, or he wouldn’t have agreed to come to the bay on such short notice.”
“No doubt he’s worried about the possibility of a new ogre weapon; I warned him about that in the message. He’s got his own interests to look out for and will want to know everything we can tell him,” she said pensively.
“Yes. Some new horror of unspeakable power.” The elf found himself wishing that he had interrogated the thanoi aggressively, had learned more-something useful! But the creature was in such a bad way, and Kerrick had felt only pity for him.
Moreen looked past the cabin, along the bow. “It’s possible that Strongwind will already know something about it. He surprises me, sometimes, with his sources of information… with…”
“Will… will your meeting with him take very long, do you think?” asked the elf warily.
“I’d like to get back to Brackenrock by tomorrow night,” she replied quickly. “There’s so much to do.”
“Okay, fine. I’ll stay at the bay, probably sleep on the boat. We can go whenever you want to leave in the morning.”
All too soon, for the elf, the forested ridges of the strait’s eastern shore darkened the horizon. Long familiar with this section of coast, Kerrick needed only a slight course adjustment to bring them sailing directly toward the little cove that in the past eight years had become home to a small but prosperous fishing village.
Tall Cedar Bay was sheltered by the promontories of evergreen-studded cliffs that reached out to enclose the anchorage in protective arms. Only when Cutter glided though the gap between those sheltering ridges did Kerrick relax his grip on the tiller and allow Moreen to haul in more sail. The wind and storm, blocked by the flanking heights, dropped away almost to nothing, and the jarring motion of the boat settled into a smooth glide.
As Cutter sliced through the calm water, Kerrick looked to the shore and reflected on how much this place had changed. It had been his first landfall when he had reached the Icereach, nine summers ago, though then it was merely a grove of wild evergreens and a rocky, wild shore.
Now he sailed past five fishing curraghs, the sturdy boats anchored just offshore, a stone’s throw from the solid rock piers that flanked the small waterfront. On one of the banks a stone fishhouse belched smoke from its squat chimney, while the odor of salmon hung in the air.
Nearer to the anchorage, the wide log facade of the Tall Cedar Inn occupied a commanding position on a small rise of land, overlooking the bay. Several burly Highlanders were lounging about on the veranda, and they came down to the wharf as the sailboat slowed and finally came to a stop. Kerrick glanced at them, then turned his attention to the front door of the inn.
Strongwind Whalebone, king of the Highlanders, stood there, his arms planted on his hips, his straw-bearded face split by a wide grin of welcome. To Kerrick, as he turned the boat to allow the wind to flow past the sail, the day suddenly seemed to get much colder.
* * * * *
Moreen walked up the gentle hill and accepted Strongwind’s warm embrace, the bristly kiss on each of her cheeks. She even returned the hug with enough pressure to let him know that she was glad to see him.
Surprisingly enough, she was. There was a sense of competence and strength in his familiar, bearlike presence. Here, with his arms around her, she felt safer than she had in a long time. Here was the only place she where she could let someone else take charge, at least for awhile.
“I see Randall’s tent over there,” Kerrick said, when she finally broke away to look at the elf. His expression was strangely pinched, and she wondered, again, about the secret pain that lurked within him.
For now she only nodded, looking at Strongwind. “We’ll talk at the inn?” Tall Cedar Bay boasted but one sprawling inn, the large cabin on the rise above the waterfront and the bay.
Strongwind nodded. “Yes-Dannard has turned it over to me for as long as we need it.” He turned to Kerrick. “Randall was hoping to see you, I know. I daresay I’d rather spend the evening with you men around the fire, drinking and tell tales, than to have to bear these burdens of state.” He smiled, but Moreen saw little humor in the expression-it was more the smile of the wolf who has tired his prey and now closes in for the kill.
Kerrick smiled gamely in return, and his humor seemed genuine. “The crown weighs heavy, eh, my lord? Well, we’ll save you a draught in case you can slip away.”
“No chance of that,” said the king, turning and wrapping a lanky arm around Moreen’s shoulders. She twisted slightly to break free of his grip, taking his elbow and walking at his side to the inn. Kerrick headed in the opposite direction.
At the door to the inn Strongwind bowed, and extended a hand. “My lady, know that all the hospitality of this little den is available to your merest whim.”
“Why, thank you my lord,” she said, slightly mocking him as she passed inside. Taking a deep breath, she waited as Strongwind poured several large glasses of warqat. He led her to a pair of comfortable chairs before the hearth, where a low fire burned. Then she began to talk.
She told him of Kerrick’s encounter with the dying thanoi, the missive from the ogre king to his mother on mysterious Dracoheim. She said she was convinced of the truth of the threat, that the ogres had some powerful new weapon. Moreen related the results of Dinekki’s auguries, indicating they still had some time to prepare their defense. The king listened thoughtfully, drinking slowly from his goblet, until at last Moreen was done talking and ready for his reaction.
“Will you stand with us against this new threat?” she asked. “If you will send warriors to Brackenrock to reinforce our own fighters, we can present a united front-and give the ogres a serious defeat if they do come against us.”
Strongwind nodded solemnly, and for a few moments Moreen wondered if he was going to say anything at all. She took a sip of her warqat, feeling the warmth slide down her gullet, surprised to note that her glass was nearly empty. Finally he looked up at her and spoke.
“I remember Dinekki,” Strongwind said softly. “It was she who brought our two gods together, caused the very ground to shake-and helped save our lives when the ogres attacked eight years ago. If Dinekki is convinced of the threat, that is enough for me. Added to the elf’s story about saving the thanoi, I agree that we are in for some dangerous times. For now, of course we will help,” he said, “but I beg you to think of this alliance more for the long term.”
“What do you mean?”
“Become my queen!” Strongwind pleaded in a burst of emotion. “Marry me, and unite our peoples in a way that will bind them together through the future. Certainly, I will send warriors to aid you now. I assume you would do the same, if we learned of any threat against us. That is to be expected of old friends, but that is not enough! If we were wed, our descendants would be linked forever, and we would present a front against the ogres they would never shatter!”
“You make a compelling case, politically, at least,” Moreen said dryly, feeling more touched by his proposal than she cared to admit-even to herself. “But I had always hoped that, if I married, it would be for a more personal reason. I am my people’s leader, but I am also a woman… a woman who wants to love and be loved.”
“I do love you!” proclaimed the king. He set down his goblet and kneeled beside Moreen’s chair, taking one of her hands in both of his. “I’ve loved you since I first saw you. I only wish I had told you the truth then, rather than speaking in political riddles. Speak, lady chief-woman: Could there be any glimmer of love in your soul, for me?”
Moreen drew a deep breath. Strongwind’s words were seductive, and his blue eyes, so close to hers, were overpowering.
“You are a good man, Your Majesty,” she said softly. “Perhaps the best I have ever known.” But she felt it was wiser for them to defeat the enemy first, and then talk about marriage afterward. “We have time to talk about these things,” she said. “For now, would you fill my glass again and join me in a toast to this summer’s alliance?”
* * * * *
“A new weapon, hmm?” Randall speculated. “Something to blow Brackenrock right off the face of Krynn. Of course, if it can destroy that citadel, it could blow up anything else, too. Guess I’ll be there with ye to stand against the bastards, if they come.”
The Highlander drew from his mug of warqat and instead of swallowing spat a stream into the fire. Blue flames surged upward, and Kerrick relished the feel of the sudden heat against his face. The waters of Tall Cedar Bay shimmered in the twilight, and the salt smell of the sea mingled with sweet pine smoke. Dry logs crackled as the flames devoured them, mingling with the lapping of waves against the shore-the only sounds in the still summer night.
Furtively, the elf looked up the hill, toward the inn. Subdued lights, like a fire fading low in the hearth, still glowed in the windows. Moreen Bayguard and Strong-wind Whalebone were in there, alone, had been for many hours. It was past midnight, though it had never really grown dark.
Randall saw his glance and shook his head. Lars Redbeard, the third of the companionable trio gathered around the fire, sighed sympathetically. “Don’t know what they can be talking about for so… long,” he said without much conviction.