Jean Rabe - The Eve of the Maelstrom

Usha desperately fought the urge to reveal more of her past, but it was a futile battle. In the space of a few heartbeats, she and the elf witnessed a young Usha walking among the Irda, learning from them, growing older, but always different from her adopted people.

“Then they turned you away,” the elf noted flatly. The Irda called the Protector led a lithe young woman with golden eyes to a boat along the shore, pushing her off, bidding her a farewell. Then the boat was gliding across the water, Usha in it, clutching a bag she’d been given, holding on earnestly to the memories of her Irda upbringing.

Within a day the Palanthas shore came into view. Usha, still clutching her bag, climbed up on the docks, drinking in the sights and sounds of the human city. Those first wondrous impressions came rushing at her anew like a strong wind, overwhelming her. Through a haze, Usha noticed that the elf was also affected by the powerful vision. Her expression showed curiosity and excitement.

Then weeks melted in moments, and young Usha’s path crossed with Palin’s. Usha relived the moment, her heart beating with exhilaration, a flush rising to her face. She was flooded with emotions and hopes, private feelings she did not want to share with the elf. She recalled all the little half-truths she had first told Palin and the others she met. She remembered Tasslehoff Burrfoot and how he believed she was Raistlin’s daughter because of her golden eyes. She had not corrected him, but had let the kender believe what he wanted.

At the time she’d wanted her new friends to believe whatever they desired—so long as they would accept her and help chase away her loneliness.

More time melted away, and she found herself, Raistlin, and Palin standing in a burnt clearing and wishing she had told the younger Majere that she wasn’t related to his uncle. She could have admitted her emotions then, could have learned if he felt anything similar toward her. She feared she would never see Palin again, that he would die and so many things would remain unsaid between them.

Someone was sending Palin to the Abyss where the war against Chaos raged. The younger Majere was quickly swept up in a spell, transported to another dimension. Her eyes met Palin’s for what might be a last time. Then suddenly she was traveling with Raistlin.

The world ran like watercolors around her and the elf. Rocky spires and cavern walls appeared, turning brown, orange, and slate gray. The air was instantly dry, though some part of Usha’s mind knew that she was still in the Qualinesti forest, with trees all around her and the air damp and sweet. But her memory felt the heat and smelled the sulphur of the Abyss. The elf too experienced everything. Her eyes drank it all in, as her mind continued to draw the images from Usha.

Shadows fell across them, heralds of the dragons overhead. Usha and the elf raced them along the ground. Many dragons were with riders—Knights of Solamnia and Knights of Takhisis. Far ahead Usha thought she recognized the form of Steel Brightblade, Palin’s cousin.

The air was filled with the sounds of battle, and men’s screams echoed off the walls. There was blood and death everywhere, wounded dragons and men who were crumpled and discarded like dolls. And there was Chaos, giant and impressive beyond human words.

The elf was captivated by the incredible scene. Tears spilled from Usha’s eyes as she recognized Tas, so full of life and moving up behind the Father of All and of Nothing. She saw the halves of the Graygem in her hands and remembered that somehow she’d been entrusted with them.

“Draw a drop of Chaos’s blood and put it in the gem,” she recalled Dougan Redhammer saying. Their first attempt to do that had failed. But Tas inched into position for a second try.

Palin opened an ancient book. It was a powerful tome, Raistlin had told his nephew, the enchantments inside penned by one of Krynn’s greatest war-wizards.

Usha hadn’t understood it all then. She’d been thrust into this world from her protected home, where war was only a word and dragons were creatures unseen.

But she trusted Dougan’s words about the force in the broken halves of the Graygem, and she had placed all her faith in Palin Majere, for whom she felt more than friendship. She found herself praying.

She watched as words tumbled from Palin’s lips and saw from the corner of her eye Tas’s dagger glowing with the eldritch light Palin had called forth to blind Chaos.

The young sorcerer’s spell ended and a dragon fell from the sky, slain by Chaos. Its tail struck Palin and pressed him to the floor of the Abyss, sending him beyond the brink of consciousness.

But Usha was still alert, and she rejoiced to watch Tas’s dagger pierce the god-boot of Chaos. It cut through the thickness to the god-skin below. The dagger sliced at the form taken by the Father of All and of Nothing.

The dagger drew blood, and she was there, halves of the Graygem extended. One crimson drop, that was all they needed. One crimson drop fell into the shattered gem. One drop. Her hands closed the broken halves.

She and Palin lived. How? The feeling of the Graygem in her hands disappeared, and the forest of the Green Peril again sprang up around her and the elf.

“My apologies for making you relive that remarkable experience,” the elf said simply. “It held questions you cannot answer.”

Usha felt the spell lessen and then withdraw altogether. She blinked her eyes, dry from being open so long, and fixed them on the elf’s. She looked away and caught more than a dozen faces staring at her through the ferns and bushes. Had the elven archers also experienced her life story that began on the isle of the Irda and climaxed in the battle in the Abyss? Had they been privy to her innermost thoughts?

“The Abyss,” Usha whispered. “There was so much death.”

“There is still so much death,” the elf said sadly. “Beryl, whom we call the Green Peril, has slain so many of our kinsmen. Our numbers are less than half what they were a few years ago. It will take us centuries to recover, to become as strong as we once were. Perhaps we will never be the same nation again.”

“But if Palin gains the scepter—”

“If,” the elf cut in. “This item Palin seeks, this scepter... the Fist of E’li.” The elf paused, stared at Usha. “Your thoughts revealed that you are uncertain about it. You don’t even know if the power of the scepter is real.”

Usha’s eyes narrowed. Was the elf, even now, still reading her thoughts? “It doesn’t matter what I think. It’s more important what Palin believes.”

“Oh, the scepter is real enough. It is indeed called the Fist of E’li, an ancient thing once wielded by Silvanos himself. Ornate, it is said, bejeweled and pulsing with strength. Perhaps if we had the Fist, we could do something against the dragon’s minions. But so far, the draconians have kept us from that treasure.”

“If Palin gains it, you can’t take it away from him!” Usha raised her voice for the first time against her hosts. “We need...”

“I’ll not take it— if he finds it. I’ll be glad enough if the Fist is kept from the occupants of the tower. Who knows what terrors the draconians could inflict upon us with it. But I’ll extract a promise from you.” The elf’s eyes practically glowed. Usha felt weak, her tired mind unable to defend itself as the elven woman continued her mental magic. “If the scepter is not consumed by whatever your husband has planned, you will do everything in your power, Usha Majere, to keep it safe and eventually to return it to us. You will risk your life for this scepter—the Fist of E’li—if need be. You will risk your very spirit, for the scepter is far more precious to Krynn than you are. Do you understand?”