Margaret Weis - Test of the Twins

The gates were not shut, nor were they locked. One gate stood fast, as if still spellbound. But the other had broken, and now it swung by one hinge, back and forth, back and forth in the hot, unceasing wind. And, as it blew back and forth slowly in the breeze, it gave forth a shrill, high-pitched shriek.

“It’s not locked,” said Tas in disappointment. His small hand had already been reaching for his lockpicking tools.

“No,” said Caramon, staring up at the squeaking hinge. “And there’s the voice we heard—the voice of rusty metal.” He supposed he should have been relieved, but it only deepened the mystery. “If it wasn’t Par-Salian or someone up there”—his eyes went to the Tower that stood, black and apparently empty before them—“who got us through the Forest, then who was it?”

“Maybe no one,” Tas said hopefully. “If no one’s here, Caramon, can we leave?”

“There has to be someone,” Caramon muttered. “Something made those trees let us pass.”

Tas sighed, his head drooping. Caramon could see him in the moonlight, his small face pale and covered with grime. There were dark shadows beneath his eyes, his lower lip quivered, and a tear was sneaking down one side of his small nose.

Caramon patted him on the shoulder. “Just a little longer,” he said gently. “Hold out just a little longer, please, Tas?”

Looking up quickly, swallowing that traitor tear and its partner that had just dripped into his mouth, Tas grinned cheerfully. “Sure, Caramon,” he said. Not even the fact that his throat was aching and parched with thirst could keep him from adding, “You know me—always ready for adventure.

There’s bound to be lots of magical, wonderful things in there, don’t you think?” he added, glancing at the silent Tower. “Things no one would miss. Not magical rings, of course. I’m finished with magical rings. First one lands me in a wizard’s castle where I met a truly wicked demon, then the next turns me into a mouse. I—”

Letting Tas prattle on, glad that the kender was apparently feeling back to normal, Caramon hobbled forward and put his hand upon the swinging gate to shove it to one side. To his amazement, it broke off—the weakened hinge finally giving way The gate clattered to the gray paving stone beneath it with a clang that made both Tas and Caramon cringe. The echoes bounded off the black, polished walls of the Tower, resounding through the hot night and shattering the stillness.

“Well, now they know we’re here,” said Tas.

Caramon’s hand once again closed over his sword hilt, but he did not draw it. The echoes faded.

Silence closed in. Nothing happened. No one came. No voice spoke.

Tas turned to help Caramon limp ahead. “At least we won’t have to listen to that awful sound anymore,” he said, stepping over the broken gate. “I don’t mind saying so now, but that shriek was beginning to get on my nerves. It certainly sounded very ungate-like, if you know what I mean. It sounded just like... just like...”

“Like that,” Caramon whispered.

The scream split the air, shattering the moonlit darkness, only this time it was different. There were words in this scream—words that could be heard, if not defined.

Turning his head involuntary, though he knew what he would see, Caramon stared back at the gate. It lay on the stones, dead, lifeless.

“Caramon,” said Tas, swallowing, “it—it’s coming from there—the Tower... .”

“End it!” screamed Par-Salian. “End this torment! Do not force me to endure more!”

How much did you force me to endure, O Great One of the White Robes? came a soft, sneering voice into Par-Salian’s mind. The wizard writhed in agony, but the voice persisted, relentless, flaying his soul like a scourge. You brought me here and gave me up to him—Fistandantilus! You sat and watched as he wrenched the lifeforce from me, draining it so that he might live upon this plane.

“It was you who made the bargain,” Par-Salian cried, his ancient voice carrying through the empty hallways of the Tower. “You could have refused him—”

And what? Died honorably? The voice laughed. What kind of choice is that? I wanted to live! To grow in my Art! And I did live. And you, in your bitterness, gave me these hourglass eyes—these eyes that saw nothing but death and decay all around me. Now, you look, Par-Salian! What do you see around you? Nothing but death... Death and decay... So we are even.

Par-Salian moaned. The voice continued, mercilessly, pitilessly.

Even, yes. And now I will grind you into dust. For, in your last tortured moments, Par-Salian, you will witness my triumph. Already my constellation shines in the sky. The Queen dwindles. Soon she will fade and be gone forever. My final foe, Paladine, waits for me now. I see him approach.

But he is no challenge—an old man, bent, his face grieved and filled with the sorrow that will prove his undoing. For he is weak, weak and hurt beyond healing, as was Crysania, his poor cleric, who died upon the shifting planes of the Abyss. You will watch me destroy him, Par-Salian, and when that battle is ended, when the constellation of the Platinum Dragon plummets from the sky, when Solinari’s light is extinguished, when you have seen and acknowledged the power of the Black Moon and paid homage to the new and only god—to me then you will be released, Par-Salian, to find what solace you can in death!

Astinus of Palanthas recorded the words as he had recorded Par-Salian s scream, writing the crisp, black, bold letters in slow, unhurried style. He sat before the great Portal in the Tower of High Sorcery, staring into the Portal’s shadowy depths, seeing within those depths a figure blacker even than the darkness around him. All that was visible were two golden eyes, their pupils the shape of hourglasses, staring back at him and at the white-robed wizard trapped next to him.

For Par-Salian was a prisoner in his own Tower. From the waist up, he was living man—his white hair flowing about his shoulders, his white robes covering a body thin and emaciated, his dark eyes fixed upon the Portal. The sights he had seen had been dreadful and had, long ago, nearly destroyed his sanity. But he could not withdraw his gaze. From the waist up, Par-Salian was living man. From the waist down he was a marble pillar. Cursed by Raistlin, Par-Salian was forced to stand in the topmost room of his Tower and watch—in bitter agony—the end of the world.

Next to him sat Astinus—Historian of the World, Chronicler, writing this last chapter of Krynn’s brief, shining history. Palanthas the Beautiful, where Astinus had lived and where the Great Library had stood, was now nothing but a heap of ash and charred bodies. Astinus had come to this, the last place standing upon Krynn, to witness and record the world’s final, terrifying hours.

When all was finished, he would take the closed book and lay it upon the altar of Gilean, God of Neutrality. And that would be the end.

Sensing the black-robed figure within the Portal turning its gaze upon him, when he came to the end of a sentence, Astinus raised his eyes to meet the figure’s golden ones.

As you were first, Astinus, said the figure, so shall you be last. When you have recorded my ultimate victory, the book will be closed. I will rule unchallenged.

“True, you will rule unchallenged. You will rule a dead world. A world your magic destroyed. You will rule alone. And you will be alone, alone in the formless, eternal void,” Astinus replied coolly, writing even as he spoke. Beside him, Par-Salian moaned and tore at his white hair.

Seeing as he saw everything—without seeming to see Astinus watched the black-robed figure’s hands clench. That is a lie, old friend! I will create! New worlds will be mine. New peoples I will produce—new races who will worship me!