The Solamnic knight commander was probably lost to him now, he suspected. He doubted she would understand or condone his dealings with the dead. Perhaps he could contact the spirits of some famous longdead Solamnic knights. That might impress her. He could give them form as he had to his wraiths, and maybe he could convince them to reason with her.
"Goldmoon?" he whispered. "She might forgive me on her own. Forgiveness is in her nature. She'd probably accept me back into the settlement, but she certainly wouldn't teach me any more mystical spells." He thrust his sword into the ground between his feet. "She'd try to stop me from using dark mysticism, and that I could not tolerate."
A shadow moved away from him and clung to the trunk of a thick willow tree. It was Darkhunter. The wraith was still recovering from the wounds Orvago had inflicted with the magical sword.
The elf allowed himself a wry smile. "My sword. With my sword that damnable gnoll dashed an entire day's worth of work-slaying five spirits I painstakingly brought through the doorway. One was my father, and that is a spirit I will bring back again."
Would it be easier the second time? he wondered, or harder, given that the elder Graymist had been slain by an enchanted weapon?
"By the vanished gods, why did I leave that sword hanging up in my tent where the gnoll could get it?"
No matter. He would try to get the sword back. He had to return to the Silver Stair sometime anyway, since he needed to use the energy that coursed through the ruin to bring back his father, and more. Perhaps on that trip he would liberate the sword. He had purchased it, after all. Perhaps he would kill the gnoll with it.
He dropped his head into his hands and sobbed.
"What am I saying? What's wrong with me? Kill Orvago?" The elf's shoulders shook. "I only intended to deal with the dead, not to add to the dead. What's happening to me?"
You are becoming stronger, the shadow of Darkhunter whispered.
It took the gnoll several hours to make his way back to the settlement. There was little life left in him when he collapsed at the base of the Silver Stair. His chest rose and fell raggedly, and his eyes fluttered closed.
It was dawn before he was discovered.
The entire settlement was ringed around him. Camilla stood over him, talking to Goldmoon and to Willum. Orvago couldn't make out the words. He hurt all over, and he felt terribly cold and weak. He couldn't move his arms or legs, couldn't feel them.
Goldmoon's face appeared above his, ringed by a fur-trimmed hood. He vaguely registered the feel of her hands on his chest. He sensed a warmth in those hands and in her smile. The dawning sun touched a few stray locks of her hair, making it glisten like gold. In the early morning light, she looked younger to the gnoll, beautiful for a human, and she made him feel warm. She was taking some of the hurt away.
The healer concentrated, focusing the power of her heart on Orvago. He was injured far worse now than when he had been gored by the huge boar. She prayed fervently to the memory of Mishakal that she could find the power to heal him.
The medallion about her neck tingled. Magical, she began drawing on its power. The warmth continued to surge from the necklace, from her heart, down her arms and into her fingers, into Orvago. In strengthening him, pouring all of her energy into the effort, she was weakening herself.
The gnoll moaned, and his chest began to rise and fall somewhat regularly now. The wound on his abdomen started to heal.
He heard Camilla above him. She gasped in surprise as his wounds closed. He heard Willum and the others who had gathered exchange words of amazement. He heard words of concern from Goldmoon's students and the dwarven builders, and this pleased him. The people of the settlement seemed to actually care about him. They were frightened for him, no longer frightened of him.
"Goldmoon," Orvago croaked. "Goldmoon… thank you."
"He talks!" This from Redstone, who hovered nearby. "When did he learn to talk?"
"Goldmoon…"
She shushed him to be still, and he felt blankets being draped across him. Something soft was being edged under his head by the dwarf, Jasper. Goldmoon's hands remained on his chest, continuing to warm him. He could breathe deeper with her here. The ache was lessening.
"Stay quiet," she said, drawing back. "You will be all right, but I don't want to move you for a while. I want you to get a little stronger first."
Jasper edged closer and placed his hands on Orvago's chest. The dwarf took over for Goldmoon, continuing to mend the gnoll's wounds. "We'll move you to your tent in a little while," the dwarf said. "You'll have to stay there for a few days. What did you run into that chewed you up like this?"
"Indeed. What happened?" It was Camilla's voice. "Who… what… did this to you?"
"Gair," he croaked. "Gair and the whisperers did this."
13
They were shadows against shadows, deep in the Que-Nal woods. The wraiths, recently given life by Gair, slipped across the drifts and clung to the darkened tree trunks, chasing their prey toward the ruins of Castle Vila and reveling in the fear the men radiated.
The elf followed the wraiths, moving almost silently across the hard-packed snow and down the winding path of a frozen stream. Darkhunter was at his side, his father floating somewhere above them beneath the spidery branches of dormant maples.
"They stood their ground longer than most men would," Gair said. "Knights are like that, uncharacteristically brave. I know two of them."
You knew them, Darkhunter corrected. The wraith floated through a tree stump that Gair had to step around. You knew them when you were with Goldmoon and her doting disciples, but you are beyond them now, as far beyond them as the stars are above the face of Krynn.
A part of Gair shuddered at the thought, the part that was being smothered by the darkness still growing inside him. That small part regretted his hand last night in killing a half-dozen Solamnic knights who had been sent to search for him, and that small part had suspected that sweet Camilla, concerned about him, sent the men. The darkness within the elf had relished watching the knights die.
The darkness helped Gair understand Goldmoon better now than he ever had before. She was too caring and sympathetic. She put other people's welfare before her own, and all of that made her emotionally weak. The night that she taught him to open the door to the realm of the dead-because she believed it would give him peace-he sensed that he had forged a bond with her. He wondered if she sensed the link as well. He could somehow tell when she was thinking about him, which she was now. However, he hadn't yet been able to divine precisely what she was thinking.
"That will come," he said to himself. "I will strengthen our bond, Goldmoon, use the magic in the Silver Stair. I will learn what you are up to and if-and how-you intend to stop me." He realized it was a newfound obsession, this wanting to know what Goldmoon was planning. "Perhaps I will question these men about Goldmoon's plans and about where she takes her walks now with Riverwind."
The elf continued to glide along after the wraiths, talking to Darkhunter. The trees were thinning out, giving way to scrub and small oaks bent by the weight of the snow on their branches. The sky loomed dark to the west, with only a smattering of stars poking through the clouds. Gair strained his eyes and saw a finger of blackness prodding up from the flat expanse of snow-covered ground.
Castle Vila, Darkhunter announced, where we chase our prey.