looking for a way to protect Chessenta from the blue fire, although no one truly knows.”
“So, if he was in enemy territory, it’s also possible his greatest enemy managed to kill him at last.”
“Yes, but recently, some rumors have come out of the northeast. Allegedly, certain folk, while wandering somewhere in the mountains, have heard a dragon roaring on the darkest nights. A few even claim to have seen one sprawled on the ground, with flames flickering from its mouth and nostrils.”
“Threskel’s full of wyrms, isn’t it? There’s a dracolich running the place, and a bunch of living wyrms who pay homage to him. I imagine some of them are fire-breathers. So what makes you think this particular dragon is Tchazzar?”
“The reports say the dragon is huge and old, like Tchazzar. They also say he’s emaciated, and looks like he can’t stand up for some reason. If he’s crippled, or imprisoned somehow, that would explain why he never returned to Luthcheq.”
“But it doesn’t explain why, over the course of nearly a century, Alasklerbanbastos never found him and finished him off. Or why, if he’s been lying helpless for all that time, you just heard about it ‘recently.’ ”
Nicos scowled. “I don’t simply assume the dragon in question is Tchazzar. But it could be.”
“And you want to find out for sure.”
“Yes.”
“Without Shala realizing you have someone looking into it. Because she’d take it to mean you lack confidence in her rule.”
“Yes. Although it would be completely unfair to take it that way, considering that Tchazzar was a living god. Obviously, he could provide for his people in a way no mortal sovereign could. And he might not even want to resume the throne. It’s possible he’s beyond such things.”
And possible he’s not, thought Aoth, in the highly unlikely event he’s still alive. “I have to say, I never spotted you for a member of the Church of Tchazzar.”
“I’m not. But you don’t have to be to revere Chessenta’s savior. Or to look into every possible source of aid now that our enemies are pressing us hard. Will you help me?”
Aoth deferred the necessity of answering by taking another sip of liqueur. The cordial suddenly tasted too sweet, and burned in the pit of his stomach.
He had an unpleasant sense of being caught up in matters he didn’t understand. There were too many anomalies. The unanswered questions about the Green Hands and the apparent treacheries of the dragonborn. Nicos’s unexpected mystical skills, and his claim that after almost a hundred years, rumors of Tchazzar’s survival had reached him only now, just when Chessenta was in urgent need of its champion. To say the least, it was a remarkable coincidence.
But did Aoth need to understand? Did he even want to? Or did he want to keep to his… well, definitely not his place. Though he observed the proper forms of respect to the lords of the world, particularly if they were employing him, he’d long since forsaken true subservience to anyone. But his role, the one he’d freely chosen for himself, was to be the sellsword captain who fought for gold and reputation without caring or having to care about the plots and maneuvers that sent realms to war in the first place.
That role was in jeopardy now. If he pushed Nicos for further answers, gave the nobleman reason to suspect his loyalty, it might slip from his grasp forever.
“You realize,” he said, “that even if a spy did find Tchazzar alive, that doesn’t mean a mere man could fix whatever problem is holding a dragon helpless.”
“I wouldn’t expect him to try,” Nicos replied. “He just needs to report his findings, and then I’ll decide what to do next.”
Aoth grunted. “All right. I’ll send someone to run this errand too. If anyone notices, I’ll just say I’m dispatching scouts across the border to gather intelligence on Alasklerbanbastos’s forces.”
Khouryn sat with his feet stretched out toward the campfire and his back against Vigilant’s flank. The griffon’s body heat prevented the chill of the evening fog from sinking into her rider’s bones, and keeping her close discouraged her from taking an inappropriate interest in the horses and mules.
Naturally he wouldn’t have done it if any of his companions minded having such a big, potentially deadly animal lounging close at hand, but none of the dragonborn did. In the main they seemed to be hearty, practical folk like dwarves or sellswords, and he liked them more every day they traveled together.
And that had been long enough that he was starting to feel like he could relax and enjoy their company. They’d journeyed at a good pace. Maybe fast enough to outrun the news that Tymanther had supposedly betrayed Chessenta.
Balasar, who justly took pride in his camp cooking, handed him a grilled trout fillet wrapped in a big leaf from some aquatic plant. The best route from Luthcheq into Tymanther ran along the northern shore of the Methmere. The frequent mists were one of the inconveniences. The fresh fish were one of the advantages.
Khouryn took a bite. Too quickly-it burned his mouth. But it was tasty, sweet, moist, and spiced with something he didn’t recognize. Vigilant gave a little squawk, begging, and he told her to shut up. “You had your supper before the sun went down.”
“Yes,” said Balasar, grinning, fog blurring his features even though he was just a few feet away. “Do be quiet, Vigilant. Your master has to keep up his strength to protect us poor, helpless dragonborn from harm.”
Khouryn chuckled. “Peace. I think you realize we didn’t tag along because anyone doubts your prowess. It’s just that a few extra spears are never a bad idea. And if we run into angry peasants, well, it’s you they hate, not us. So maybe we can persuade them to back off without needing to kill any.”
Medrash scowled. “I still can’t believe it’s come to this. And, stuck back in Tymanther, we’ll have no way of uncovering the truth.”
“It’s not your fault,” Balasar said. “Although maybe that god of yours is to blame. If he’s what really set you on the trail of the Green Hands.”
Medrash glared. “Torm charged me to further the cause of good. But somehow I bungled the task, and because I did, the alliance fell apart.”
“How?” Balasar asked. “How would any sane person say you botched the job?”
“Perhaps stopping the Green Hands wasn’t the job. Maybe I misunderstood Torm’s prompting from the start. I just don’t know!”
Khouryn decided he didn’t want to watch two friends quarrel, or Medrash wallow in self-recrimination either. Hoping to divert the conversation, he asked, “How did you get to be a paladin, anyway? I always heard that dragonborn don’t worship the gods.”
Medrash smiled like he too was glad of a distraction. “Back in Abeir, where we lived before the Blue Breath of Change hurled us across space, none of us did. But we’ve been in Faerun for a while now. We’re picking up some of your ideas.”
“A pointless craving for novelty that corrupts the old traditions.” Balasar’s tone was severe past the point of pomposity, but then he grinned. “Or at least that’s what the clan elders say. Me, I just think all this praying and such is silly. As far as I can see, all it does is fill fools like my clan brother here with fretting and discontent.”
A coil of the steadily thickening fog billowed across Medrash’s face, half obscuring it. “It gives us purpose.”
“What better reason to avoid it?”
Once again, Khouryn intervened. “All right, that explains how some dragonborn come to embrace the gods. But how did you receive the call to be a paladin?”
“I suppose I heard it,” Medrash said, “because I needed to. As a youngling, I was the shame of my parents and of Clan Daardendrien. Weak, clumsy, and-worst of all-timid in a kindred famous for its warriors.”
Khouryn snorted. “That’s hard to believe.”
“Maybe, but it’s true. All the other youths despised me. Everyone but Balasar.”
“Ascribe it to my kindly nature,” Balasar said. “Or maybe my contrariness.”
“Anyway,” Medrash continued, “I was well embarked on a wretched life. It was even possible Daardendrien would cast me out. But then I started dreaming of a warrior with a steel gauntlet. At the start, I didn’t even realize he was Torm, or a god at all. But I could feel his magnificence, and when he urged me to put my trust in him, what
