Margaret Weis - Dragons of a Lost Star

Laurana pressed her hands over her mouth and closed her eyes, aghast at the horror of the young elf’s death. She stood shivering, trying desperately to banish the sickening feeling of numbness that paralyzed her.

“I won’t give up,” she said to herself. “I won’t... Too much depends...”

“Madam...” Medan’s voice was weak.

He lay on the floor, his hand still pressed against his side, as if he could halt the flow of blood that was draining away his life. His face was ashen, his lips gray.

Tears dimming her eyes, Laurana sank down on her knees beside him and began frantically to thrust aside the folds of the bloody cloak to find the wound, to see if there was anything she could do to stop the bleeding. Medan caught her hand, held it fast, and shook his head.

“You weep for me,” he said softly, astonished.

Laurana could not reply. Her tears fell on his face.

He smiled and made a move as if he would kiss her hand, but he lacked the strength. His grip on her hand tightened. He struggled to speak through the tremors of pain that shook his body.

“You must go now,” he told her, using his remaining strength to force out each word. “Take the sword . . . and the lance. You are in command, Laurana.”

Laurana shivered. You are in command, Laurana. The words had a familiar sound, harkened back to another time of darkness and death. She could not think why that should be so or where she had heard them before. She shook her head.

“No,” she said brokenly. “I can’t. . . .”

“The Golden General,” Medan whispered. “I would have liked to have seen her. . . .”

He gave a sigh. The bloodstained hand loosed its grip, dropped limply to the floor. His eyes continued to look fixedly at her, and although no life was in them, she saw his faith in her, steadfast, unwavering. He meant what he had said. She was in command. Except it was not his voice speaking those words. Another voice... far away.

You can command, Laurana. Farewell, elfmaid. Your light will shine in this world... It is time for mine to darken.

“No, Sturm, I can’t do this,” she cried wretchedly. “I am alone!”

As Sturm had been alone, standing by himself at the top of another tower in the bright sunshine of a new day. He had faced certain death, and he had not faltered.

Laurana wept for him. She wept for Medan and for Kelevandros. She wept for the hatred that had destroyed them both and would keep on destroying until someone somewhere had the courage to love. She wept for herself, for her weakness. When she had no more tears left, she lifted her head. She was calm now, in command of herself.

“Sturm Brightblade.” Laurana clasped her hands together, praying to him, since there was no one else to hear her prayer. “True friend. I need your strength. I need your courage. Be with me, that I may save my people.”

Laurana wiped away her tears. With hands that were firm and did not tremble, she closed the Marshal’s eyes and kissed his cold forehead.

“You had the courage to love,” she said to him softly. “That will be your salvation and my own.”

Sunlight lit the alcove, gleamed on the dragonlance that stood against the wall, glistened in the splatters of blood on the floor. Laurana glanced out through the arched entrance to the blue sky, the empty blue sky. The minion dragons had departed. She did not rejoice. Their departure meant that Beryl was coming.

She thought despairingly of the plan she and the Marshal had made, then resolutely thrust aside both the thought and the despair. Kelevandros’s bow and the pitch-covered signal arrow, his flint and tinderbox lay abandoned in the alcove where he had dropped them. She had no one to fire the signal arrow. She could not do it herself, not do that and face the dragon. She had no way now to send word to Dumat, who would be watching for the flare to give his order.

“No matter,” she said to herself. “He will know when it is time. They will all know.”

She unbuckled the sword belt from around the Marshal’s waist. Trying to move hurriedly with fingers that were stiff and shaking, she fastened the belt with the heavy sword around her own waist and arranged the folds of her cloak over the sword. Her white cloak was stained red with the Marshal’s blood. Nothing she could do about that. She would have to find some way to explain it to the dragon, explain not only the blood but why she was here atop the tower, a hostage without a captor. Beryl would be suspicious. She would be a fool not to be, and the dragon was no fool. This is hopeless. There is no chance, Laurana told herself. She heard Beryl approaching, heard the creaking of enormous wings that obliterated the sun. Darkness descended. The air was tainted with the smell of the dragon’s poisonous breath.

The dragonfear overwhelmed Laurana. She began to tremble, her hands were numb with cold. The Marshal was wrong. She couldn’t do this. . . . A ray of sunlight escaped from beneath the dragon’s wings and shone bright on the dragonlance. The lance blazed with silver flame. Moved by the beauty, Laurana remembered those who had wielded the lances so long ago. She remembered standing over Sturm’s body, the lance in hand, defiantly facing his killer. She had been afraid then, too. Laurana reached out her hand to touch the lance. She did not intend to take it with her. The lance was eight feet long. She could not hide it from the dragon. She wanted only to touch it, for memory’s sake and in memory of Sturm.

Perhaps at this moment Sturm was with her. Perhaps the courage of those who wielded the lance was a part of the lance and now flowed through the metal and into her. Perhaps her own courage, the courage of the Golden General, the courage that had always been there, flowed from her into the dragonlance. All she knew was that when she touched the lance, her plan came to her. She knew what she would do.

Resolute, Laurana took hold of the dragonlance and carried it with her into the sunlight.

Once she had thought dragons beautiful.

The enemy dragons of Queen Takhisis. Beautiful they were, and deadly. The red dragons, whose scales flashed fire in the sunlight and whose breath was flame. The blue dragons with their swift and graceful flight, wheeling among the clouds, drifting with the thermals. White dragons, cold and glittering, and black dragons, shining, sinuous, and green dragons, emerald death. She feared them and hated them and loathed them, yet she never killed one but that she did not feel a flashing pang of remorse to see such a magnificent creature fall mortally wounded from the skies.

This dragon was not beautiful. Beryl was ugly, fat, and bloated—hideous. Her wings could barely support her hulking body. Her head was misshapen, the forehead jutting out over the eyes that were flat and opaque. Her lower jaw was underslung, the teeth snaggled and rotting. Her scales were not the shining green of emeralds but the green of putrid flesh, of maggot-ridden meat. Her eyes did not gleam with intelligence but flickered with the feeble flame of greed and low cunning. It was then Laurana knew with certainty that this dragon was not of Krynn. Beryl was not a dragon who had been touched by the minds of the gods. She worshiped nothing except her own brutish desire, reverenced nothing but herself.

The shadow of Beryl’s wings slid over Qualinost, covering the city in darkness. Laurana stood proudly on the balcony, looked out over the city, and saw that the darkness could not wither the aspen trees or cause the roses to wilt. That might come later, but for now the elven people and the elven homeland stood defiant.

“We will rid the world of one monster, at least,” Laurana said softly, as the first blast of wind from the dragon’s wings tore at her hair. “You were wrong, Kelevandros. This hour is not our doom. This hour is our glory.”