By the time he passed through the gate from the garden onto the street he was in fairly high spirits. The lift station was quite a few blocks away, and as he walked he met and greeted many Hylar on the uncrowded streets. Yet he moved without a bodyguard or an escort of any kind; mountain dwarves at peace were an unpretentious people.
But were they in fact at peace? He allowed his worries to intrude into his thoughts, wondering about his cousin Glade Hornfel Kytil. How fared the true thane and his mighty army? Had they encountered the enemy they had marched forth to face? And when would they be back?
These questions bothered him as he rode the smooth mechanism down the shaft bored through the bedrock of the Life-Tree.
As if in answer to his silent fears, at the Level Ten lift station he met a messenger, a young dwarf on his way from the Thane's Atrium to Baker's residence far above.
"My lord! There is a missive, from Thane Hornfel! He sent a courier on dragonback, and he arrived in the Life-Tree but this past hour!"
In a few more minutes Baker had hurried to the Atrium where he learned that a brave Hylar courier had in fact risked many dangers to bring this letter to Thorbardin. After insuring that the weary and travel-stained dwarf was getting a hot meal and a much-needed bath, Baker took his seat on the royal throne. A servant handed him a parchment and then respectfully withdrew.
Baker Whitegranite looked at the parchment and drew a deep breath, certain that he wasn't going to like what he was about to read. He removed his crystal spectacles, polishing them carefully as he stared around the blurred surroundings of the thane's royal receiving room. Puffing on the lenses, he made sure they were meticulously clean before perching them once more on the bridge of his large nose. For a moment he stared at the wall, at the display of weapons and shields that had snapped back into focus.
But he knew there was nothing to be gained by delay.
My Dearest Cousin,
I will be blunt: We arrived too late in Palanthas. Blame it on the storms that hampered our passage around the Cape of Caergoth, or curse the blue dragons that struck our fleet on the approaches to the Bay of Branchala. Or say it was the fault of fractious Thorbardin, if you will, because the mountain dwarves of all the clans cried the danger to the world but in the end allowed the Hylar to march alone to face the legions of the Dark Queen. (I am still aggrieved that even the Daewar, a clan I had come to trust almost as our own kin, could not find a way to think beyond the stone walls that enclose them.)
Or call it bad timing and leave it at that. In any event, we arrived on northern shores to find that the great city, our objective, the capital of Solamnia and leading beacon of light in the modern world, had fallen. Yes, my cousin, Palanthas is in the hands of the Knights of Takhisis. I can guess your distress as you read these words, for it is the same anguish that gripped my heart and chilled my soul as we drew near to those alabaster walls.
To compound our failure, I must admit that we never reached them. Inevitably, the dragons drove us back. They came in numbers such as we have not seen since the War of the Lance, and they splintered the hull of our flagship with their blasts of lightning. My own son, Annan Kharas, was drowned by this onslaught. I would ask that you hold that piece of news close to your heart, as the times are too troubled for us to reveal that my throne now lacks an heir.
Baker lowered the paper; his hand shook too badly for him to continue reading. Arman, his own cousin-the promise of Thorbardin, a dwarf whose destiny had been to raise the Hylar and the rest of the five clans to heights dwarvenkind had not enjoyed since before the Cataclysm-Arman Kharas was slain. And he'd been killed in a manner more horrifying to a dwarf than any other, for he had died at sea, his feet planted upon a frail wooden hull.
Such a death was a dire event in its own right, but Baker saw immediately that it was also rife with grim omens. With the reluctance of the Daewar to serve in their customary role as trustworthy ally, the clan Hylar was terribly vulnerable to its dark dwarf neighbors.
He looked down at the parchment, at the letters inked in Hornfel's thin, precise hand. Baker knew the slender handwriting was paradoxical, for his thane's brawny forearms and well-muscled shoulders were the clear signs of a fighting man.
"Yet you make your letters like a poet, my cousin," he had told Hornfel, more than once.
Baker again regarded the parchment with apprehension. For the space of several heartbeats he almost believed that, if he failed to read the news in the letter it would be as though those events had not occurred. But these were the fantasies of a kender or a human child-certainly not fit subjects for the meditations of a dwarf. Especially not one who suddenly felt the burden of unwanted responsibilities weighing upon himself with suffocating force.
With the rest of the army, as well as the able accompaniment of the Ten, I retired to the north, making landfall in one of the small coves along the coast. From there, we gleaned word of news to the south.
Not only Palanthas had fallen. So, too, had the Knights of Takhisis taken the High Clerist's Keep. It is the grim truth, cousin: The bastion that stood as such as symbol of might during the last war has been forced to lower the Solamnic banner. Now the five-headed dragon of Takhisis flies from the upper battlements, and the Knights of Solamnia face execution, torture, and worse.
But even as you grieve I must tell you that this is not the worst of my news, for it was not long after debarking that we received word of a new threat.
In fact, the entire world seems wrenched by forces beyond my comprehension. There is no other way to say it: The sky has begun to burn, air and cloud consumed by living flame. It began over the ocean to the north, and as of this writing it has not ceased nor shown any sign of waning. During the day crackling heat seethes between the clouds. At night it is as if half the heavens are ablaze, and we gape with wonder and horror at the terrifying portent. All intelligence, and the prognostications of every wizardry and priestly augury as well, suggest that monstrous horrors are looming.
I send this missive now as a summer of unnatural heat lies heavily upon Krynn. Cousin, I long to feel the cool shade of Thorbardin, to ride the still darkness of the Urkhan Sea. But alas, it is not to be-not now and not in the foreseeable future. For, as you may have guessed, we Hylar are going still farther to the north. We remain on watch against an enemy we cannot imagine. We have as our goal a ridge of islands, hitherto unknown, that have erupted from the sea and stand as barrier isles beyond the northern coast of Ansalon. The Teeth of Chaos these rocky outposts have been called, and the name seems apt.
I know not whether we shall meet with success, or even face a prospect of real survival. But I do know this, O Wise and Thoughtful Cousin: If these Storms of Chaos are allowed to swell unchecked, the future of Krynn will no longer be numbered in ages, nor centuries, nor even years. If we and those who prepare to fight beside us (including knights of both Solamnia and Takhisis-how's that for irony?) cannot hold this wild force at bay, I do not believe our world can survive another winter.
For a long time Baker sat still, unaware of the low hum of Hybardin that penetrated even the stone walls of his study. Not my study, he reminded himself; this is the office of the true thane! His stomach burned, as if these unpalatable truths were eating away at his insides. And with that grim image in his mind he forced himself to read the rest of the letter, knowing-and dreading-what would be revealed.
This last I impart not to fill you with admiration for our boldness nor to place overmuch fear upon your shoulders. It is simply this: I shall be gone from Hybardin until this task is done, be it one year, five, or ten. It may cost me my army and my life. There is quite simply no other alternative.