Tina Daniell: The Companions

Meanwhile, the minotaur soldier recovered his balance. Indeed he had never lost his hold on Raistlin.

The young mage could think of no spell which he could unleash without the use of his hands. Still bound and tied, Raistlin could do little but intently watch the scene unfold.

"Great privilege"-hiccup-"pfooey!" Tasslehoff spat into the smelly bull face of Fesz. "You cowheads wouldn't know honor from"-hiccup-"cow dung. I've had it with your cave breath, your exalted horns that any dumb ox could grow"-hiccup-"your smelly wardrobe, your barnyard manners"-hiccup, hiccup…

Tas was practically purple from being shaken so violently.

Suddenly a thunderous roar stilled both of them. Everyone looked up to the top of the scaffold, where the Nightmaster, who had been momentarily forgotten in the melee. With his fists clenched and his jagged teeth bared in a snarl, the Nightmaster personified rage.

"Silence!" screamed down the Nightmaster. "You are interrupting the spell!"

"But-" rumbled Fesz plaintively, "but the kender-"

"Be done with him," commanded the Nightmaster. "Throw him into the crater!"

"Yes," said Fesz meekly.

"No!" roared a different voice.

Raistlin, who had been looking up at the Nightmaster, turned his head just in time to see Fesz clutch at his throat. Embedded there, so deeply that the shaman couldn't budge it, was a dagger with an H-shaped hilt, Dogz's well-polished katar. Fesz dropped Tasslehoff, who landed with a thud. Then the shaman minotaur unceremoniously keeled over, quite dead.

From the scaffolding, the Nightmaster shouted, "Seize him!"

Dogz didn't even try to run away, nor did he resist when several soldiers surrounded him, pointing their spears and swords threateningly. In truth, the minotaur couldn't have said why he did what he had done-the unthinkable, treason-except that he liked the kender, Tasslehoff Burrfoot. Especially now that Tas seemed to be back to his old self. Dogz had reacted out of an instinct that he didn't know he possessed-the instinct of friendship.

Dogz sank to his knees.

The kender got up from his.

Hiccup.

Thoroughly pinioned by the remaining minotaur guard, Raistlin was trying to think of a spell he could manage in this desperate situation when Tasslehoff's hiccup suggested one: the invisibility spell that Raistlin had used to get past the minotaur guards earlier that day. It wouldn't do Raistlin much good now, but if he could pass it on to someone else… It wouldn't last for long, but long enough for Tas to get away. The young mage concentrated. Behind his back, he moved his fingers underneath their bonds.

Raistlin murmured the words to the spell, substituting Tasslehoff's name and throwing all of his focus and energy in Tas's direction.

With a soft popping sound, the kender vanished.

The Nightmaster, who had been preparing to cast a bolt of lightning at Tasslehoff, cursed himself. "Fool! I'm a fool!" he raged. "I should have thought of that." The high shaman leaned over the scaffold railing and shouted to the soldier who was holding Raistlin. "Put a gag around his mouth and make sure the mage can't speak. Then bring him up the steps and give him to me."

The guard hurled Raistlin down on the ground and bound his mouth roughly with a dirty strip of cloth. Then he began to drag Raistlin toward the scaffold steps.

The Nightmaster leaned over the railing in the opposite direction and yelled at several of his disciples who stood outside the line of minotaur soldiers. "The kender is invisible! Find him and kill him!"

Four of the minotaurs burst into the staging area, then stopped, confused. After a moment, they began stalking around, bending and peering suspiciously at thin air.

Hiccup.

Every time the soldiers heard a hiccup, they whirled and raced to another spot, lunging for something that wasn't there, colliding with each other.

The Nightmaster leaned over the railing toward the High Three, who had been reduced to the High Two with Fesz's death, and shouted, "Continue! The spell is almost completed!"

The two shaman minotaurs, taken aback by the unexpected death of Fesz, successor to the Nightmaster, had stopped their chanting. They appeared to be confused. But the murderous look the Nightmaster wore was enough to galvanize them into action. Once again they took up their supportive roles in the spell, intoning the required phrases.

the Nightmaster returned his attention to Raistlin, who was just then being yanked to the top of the steps by the armed minotaur. The high shaman grasped the young mage's arm, ordering the soldier to rejoin the forces below. The minotaur soldier gladly did so.

Raistlin couldn't move his arms or legs. His mouth was sealed so tightly he could barely breathe. The Nightmaster brought him to the edge of the scaffold, dangling him over the edge.

From this vantage, the volcanic pit seemed about to overflow with liquid fire. The heat seared the young mage's face.

"Mark it well, mage," hissed the Nightmaster, "for soon you will be swallowed up by the Lord of Volcanoes!"

With a muscular spin, the Nightmaster hurled Raistlin into one corner of the scaffold. The high shaman turned back to the massive magic tome and picked up where he had been forced to break off.

Hiccup.

Down below, the Nightmaster's acolytes scurried to track the hiccupping and catch the invisible kender. They missed again and again.

The Nightmaster blocked out the sounds. Nothing could stop him now that he was so close. Again he began to rumble in an ancient dialect. Again he moved his arms, weaving the powerful spell.

Crumpled in the corner of the platform, Raistlin felt defeated. With his sensitive hearing, he could hear the hiccupping below. The young mage wished that Tas would go for help, or escape, or at the very least stop hiccupping.

The Nightmaster turned a page.

Hiccup.

The hiccups were fewer and farther between now, like thunder after a storm has passed. The minions of the Nightmaster had given up. They had no idea how to catch an invisible kender. Those who were searching for Tas grouped together off to one side, distracted by the sight of the Nightmaster above on the scaffold, resuming his display of spellcasting.

Hiccup.

A minotaur soldier felt his sword being pulled from its sheath. He grabbed at the hilt just in time and wrested it back after a tug-of-war with something invisible. The minotaur swatted at the something and missed. One by one, each of the soldiers around him swatted and missed. Then a soldier unsheathed his sword and swung wildly, cutting off the ear of the minotaur standing next to him.

Hiccup.

The noise sounded close to where Dogz knelt on both knees, guarded by a knot of minotaur soldiers. The soldiers started at the hiccup, but couldn't tell precisely where it had come from. A couple of them moved away from Dogz, gripping their weapons and sniffing suspiciously. That left three watching the turncoat.

On the scaffold, the Nightmaster turned another page, continuing to read aloud the mysterious phrases of long-ago magic in his deep voice.

"Psst, Dogz! It's me, Tas!"

Dogz's mournful eyes widened, more concerned for the kender's sake than he was for himself. The three guards stood a couple of feet away, their backs to him, watching the Nightmaster. They hadn't heard Tasslehoff.

With his eyes, Dogz showed that he had heard.

"Hey, I want to thank you for killing Fesz! That was a swell thing to do. What a friend you are! Of course, I would have done it myself long ago if only-"

With his eyes, Dogz tried to tell the kender that he ought to get away from him-far away from him-before the armed guards turned around.

"Say, Dogz, you wouldn't happen to have a small dagger or anything-"

"Fesz," rumbled Dogz as softly as he could.