Margaret Weis - The War of the Lance

"No, no!" Fizban muttered, and his eyes sparkled in quite a cunning and sneaky manner. "We won't bother Theros. He's over firing up the forge. You and I'll just sneak in and borrow a lance or two. He'll never notice."

Now if there's one thing I'm good at, it's borrowing. You won't find a better borrower than me, except maybe Uncle Trapspringer, but that's another story.

Fizban and I sneaked out of the shadows where we'd been hiding and crept quiet as mice over to where the lances lay by the shining pool of silver. Once I got close to the lances, I had to admit they were beautiful things, whether they worked or not. I wanted one very badly and I was glad Fizban had decided he wanted one, too. I was a bit uncertain, at first, as to how we were going to make off with them, for they were long and big and heavy, and I couldn't very well stuff one in my pouch.

"I'll carry the butt-end," said Fizban, "and you carry the spear-end. Balance it on our shoulders, like this."

I saw that would work, though I couldn't quite balance my end on my shoulders, since Fizban's shoulders are higher than mine. But I held my end up in the air and Fizban managed the butt-end. We lifted up two of the lances and ran off with them.

And while we were running, Fizban said some more of those spider-foot words and the next thing I knew I was running straight into…

You guessed it. Huma's Tomb.

"Oh, now, really!" I began, quite put out. But I didn't get the rest of my sentence finished, which was probably just as well, since it would have most likely made Fizban angry and he might have sent my topknot to join my eyebrows.

The reason I didn't get the rest of my sentence finished was that we weren't alone in Huma's Tomb anymore. A knight was there. A knight in full battle armor and he was kneeling beside the bier in the silver moonlight, with tears rolling down his cheeks.

"Thank you, Paladine!" he was saying, over and over again in a tone that made me feel I'd like to go off somewhere and be very, very quiet for a long time.

But the lances were growing extremely heavy, and I'm afraid I dropped my end, which caused Fizban to overbalance and nearly tumble over backward, and he dropped his butt-end. Which meant we both dropped the middles. The lances fell to the stone floor with quite a remarkable-sounding clatter.

The knight nearly leapt out of his armor. Jumping to his feet, he drew his sword and whipped right around and glared at us.

He had taken off his helmet to pray. He was older, about thirty, I guess. His hair was dark red and he wore it in two long braids. His eyes were green as the vallenwood leaves in Solace, where I live when I'm not out adventuring or residing in jails. Only his eyes didn't look green as leaves just at the moment. They looked hard and cold as the ice in Ice Wall.

I don't know what the knight expected — maybe a dragon or at least a draconian, or possibly a goblin or two. What he obviously didn't expect was Fizban and me.

The knight's face, when he saw us, slipped from fierce into muddled and puzzled, but it hardened again right off.

"A wizard," he said in the same tone of voice he might have said "ogre dung." "And a kender." (I won't tell you what THAT sounded like!) "What are you two doing here? How dare you defile this sacred place?"

He was getting himself all worked up and waving his sword around in a way that was quite careless and might have hurt somebody — namely me, because I was suddenly closest, Fizban having reached out and pulled me in front of him.

"Now wait just a minute, Sir Knight," said Fizban, quite bravely, I thought, especially since he was using me for a shield, and my small body wouldn't have done much to stop that knight's sharp sword, "we're not defiling anything. We came in here to pay our respects, same as you, only Huma was out. Not in, you see," the wizard added, gesturing vaguely to the empty bier. "So we… er… decided to wait a bit, give him a chance to come back."

The knight stared at us for quite a long time. He would have stroked his moustaches, I thought, like Sturm did when he was thinking hard, except that this knight didn't have any moustaches, yet. Only the beginnings of some, like he was just starting to grow them out. He lowered the sword a little, little bit.

"You are a white-robed wizard?" he asked.

Fizban held out his sleeve. "White as snow." Actually it wasn't, having been draggled through the mud and spotted with blood from my nose and slobber from both of us and ashes from the burning tree and some soot we'd picked up in the dragonlance forge.

Fizban's robes didn't impress the knight. He raised his sword again and his face was extremely grim. "I don't trust wizards of any color robe. And I don't like kender."

Well, I was just about to express my opinion of knights, which I thought might help him — (Tanis says we should come to know our own faults, to be better persons) — but Fizban grabbed hold of my topknot and lifted me up like you pick up a rabbit by the ears and shuffled me off to one side.

"How did you find this sacred place, Sir Knight?" Fizban asked, and I saw his eyes go cunning and shrewd like they do sometimes when they're not vague and confused.

"I was led here by the light of the fire of two burning trees and a celestial shower of white and purple stars…" The knight's voice faded to an awed breath.

Fizban smirked at me. "And you said I wasn't much of a wizard!"

The knight appeared dazed. He lowered his sword again. "You did that? You led me here purposefully?"

"Well, of course," said Fizban. "Knew you were coming all along."

I was about to explain to the knight about my singed eyebrows and even offer to show him where they'd been, in case he was interested, but Fizban accidently trod on my foot at that moment.

You wouldn't think one old man, especially one who looks as frail and skinny as Fizban, could be so heavy, but he was. And I couldn't make him understand that he was standing on my foot — he kept shushing me and telling me to have respect for my elders and that kender should be seen and not heard and maybe not even seen — and by the time I managed to pull my foot out from under his, he and the knight were talking about something else.

"Tell me exactly what happened," Fizban was saying. "Very important, from a wizard's standpoint."

"You might tell us your name, too," I suggested.

"I am Owen of the House of Glendower," said the knight but that was all he would tell us. He was still holding his sword and still staring at Fizban as if trying to decide whether to clap him heartily on the shoulder or clout him a good one on the headbone.

"I'm Tasslehoff Burroot," I said, holding out my hand politely, "and I have a house myself, in Solace, only it doesn't have a name. And maybe I don't even have a house anymore now," I added, remembering what I'd seen of Solace the last time I was there and growing kind of sad at the thought.

The knight raised his eyebrows (HE had eyebrows) and was staring at me now.

"But that's all right," I said, thinking Owen Glendower might be feeling sorry for me because my house had most likely been burned down by dragons. "Tika said I could come live with her, if I ever see Tika again," I added, and that made me sadder still, because I hadn't seen Tika in a long time either.

"You came all the way from Solace?" asked Owen Glendower, and he sounded no end astonished.

"Some of us came a lot farther than that," Fizban said solemnly, only the knight didn't hear him, which was probably just as well.

"Yes, we came from Solace," I explained. "A large group of us, only some of us aren't with us anymore. There was Tanis and Raistlin and Caramon and Tika, only we lost them in Tarsis, and that left Sturm and Elistan and Derek Crownguard and they went to — "