Margaret Weis - Dragons of the Fallen Sun

His two daughters saw to the day—to-day workings of the Inn of the Last Home—this was the only concession Caramon made to his age—but he still tended the bar, still told his stories. Laura ran the Inn, while Dezra, who had a taste for adventure, traveled to markets in Haven and elsewhere, searching out the very best in hops for the Inn’s ale, honey for the Inn’s legendary mead, and even hauling dwarf spirits back from Thorbardin. The moment Caramon went outdoors he was swarmed over by the children of Solace, who one and all called him “Grampy” and who vied for rides on his broad shoulders or begged to hear him tell tales of long-ago heroes. He was a friend to the refugees who would have likely had no housing at all had not Caramon donated the wood and supervised the construction. He was currently overseeing a project to build permanent dwellings on the outskirts of Solace, pushing, cajoling, and browbeating the recalcitrant authorities into taking action. Caramon Majere never walked the streets of Solace but that he heard his name spoken and blessed.

Once the refugees were assisted, Caramon traveled about the rest of Solace, making certain that everyone was safe, raising hearts and spirits oppressed by the terrible night. This done, he went to his own breakfast, a breakfast he had come to share, of late, with a Knight of Solamnia, a man who reminded Caramon of his own two sons who had died in the Chaos War.

In the days immediately following the Chaos War, the Solamnic Knights had established a garrison in Solace. The garrison had been a small one in the early days, intended only to provide Knights to stand honor guard for the Tomb of the Last Heroes.

The garrison had been expanded to counter the threat of the great dragons, who were now the acknowledged, if hated, rulers of much of Ansalon.

So long as the humans of Solace and other cities and lands under her control continued to pay Beryl tribute, she allowed the people to continue on with their lives, allowed them to continue to generate more wealth so that they could pay even more tribute.

Unlike the evil dragons of earlier ages, who had delighted in burning and looting and killing, Beryl had discovered that burned-out cities did not generate profit. Dead people did not pay taxes.

There were many who wondered why Beryl and her cousins with their wondrous and terrible magicks should covet wealth, should demand tribute. Beryl and Malys were cunning creatures.

If they were rapaciously and wantonly cruel, indulging in wholesale slaughter of entire populations, the people of Ansalon would rise up out of desperation and march to destroy them. As it was, most humans found life under the dragon rule to be relatively comfortable. They were content to let well enough alone.

Bad things happened to some people, people who no doubt deserved their fate. If hundreds of kender were killed or driven from their homes, if rebellious Qualinesti elves were being tortured and imprisoned, what did this matter to humans? Beryl and Malys had minions and spies in every human town and village, placed there to foment discord and hatred and suspicion, as well as to make certain that no one was trying to hide so much as a cracked copper from the dragons.

Caramon Majere was one of the few outspoken in his hatred of paying tribute to the dragons and actually refused to do so.

“Not one drop of ale will I give to those fiends,” he said heatedly whenever anyone asked, which they rarely did, knowing that one of Beryl’s spies was probably taking down names.

He was staunch in his refusal, though much worried by it.

Solace was a wealthy town, now larger than Haven. The tribute demanded from Solace was quite high. Caramon’s wife Tika had pointed out that their share was being made up by the other citizens of Solace and that this was putting a hardship on the rest.

Caramon could see the wisdom of Tika’s argument. At length he came up with the novel idea of levying a special tax against himself, a tax that only the Inn paid, a tax whose monies were on no account to be sent to the dragon but that would be used to assist those who suffered unduly from having to pay what was come to be known as “the dragon tax.”

The people of Solace paid extra tax, the city fathers refunded them a portion out of Caramon’s contribution, and the tribute went to the dragon as demanded.

If they could have found a way to silence Caramon on the volatile subject, they would have done so, for he continued to be loud in his hatred of the dragons, continued to express his views that “if we just all got together we could poke out Beryl’s eye with a dragonlance.” Indeed, when the city of Haven was attacked by Beryl just a few weeks earlier—ostensibly for defaulting on its payments—the Solace town fathers actually came to Caramon and begged him on bended knee to cease his rabble-rousing remarks.

Impressed by their obvious fear and distress, Caramon agreed to tone down his rhetoric, and the town fathers left happy. Caramon did actually comply, expressing his views in a moderate tone of voice as opposed to the booming outrage he’d used previously.

He reiterated his unorthodox views that morning to his breakfast companion, the young Solamnic.

“ A terrible storm, sir,” said the Knight, seating himself opposite Caramon.

A group of his fellow Knights were breakfasting in another part of the Inn, but Gerard uth Mondar paid them scant attention.

They, in their turn, paid him no attention at all.

“It bodes dark days to come, to my mind,” Caramon agreed, settling his bulk into the high-backed wooden booth, a booth whose seat had been rubbed shiny by the old man’s backside.

“But all in all I found it exhilarating.”

“Father!” Laura was scandalized. She slapped down a plate of beefsteak and eggs for her father, a bowl of porridge for the Knight. “How can you say such things? With so many people hurt. Whole houses blown, from what I hear.”

“I didn’t mean that,” Caramon protested, contrite. “I’m sorry for the people who were hurt, of course, but, you know, it came to me in the night that this storm must be shaking Beryl’s lair about pretty good. Maybe even burned the evil old bitch out. That’s what I was thinking.” He looked worriedly at the young Knight’s bowl of porridge. “Are you certain that’s enough to eat, Gerard? I can have Laura fry you up some potatoes—”

“Thank you, sir, this is all I am accustomed to eat for breakfast,” Gerard said as he said every day in response to the same question.

Caramon sighed. Much as he had come to like this young man, Caramon could not understand anyone who did not enjoy food. A person who did not relish Otik’s famous spiced potatoes was a person who did not relish life. Only one time in his own life had Caramon ever ceased to enjoy his dinner and that was following the death several months earlier of his beloved wife Tika.

Caramon had refused to eat a mouthful for days after that, to the terrible worry and consternation of the entire town, which went on a cooking frenzy to try to come up with something that would tempt him.

He would eat nothing, do nothing, say nothing. He either roamed aimlessly about the town or sat staring dry-eyed out the stained glass windows of the Inn, the Inn where he had first met the red-haired and annoying little brat who had been his comrade in arms, his lover, his friend, his salvation. He shed no tears for her, he would not visit her grave beneath the vallenwoods. He would not sleep in their bed. He would not hear the messages of condolence that came from Laurana and Gilthas in Qualinesti, from Goldmoon in the Citadel of Light.

Caramon lost weight, his flesh sagged, his skin took on a gray hue.

“He will follow Tika soon,” said the townsfolk.