Amber and Ashes Read online

  IN THE BLOODY AFTERMATH of the War of Souls, Mina buried her Dark Queen and her future. But then she fell in love with Chemosh, the charming, handsome god of death.

  As a vampiric cult sweeps across Krynn, heroes—including a monk pledged to the evil goddess of the sea and a kender who communicates with the dead—must thwart Mina’s pact with evil and stop the dark disciples.

  The first DRAGONLANCE® novel by The New York Times best-selling author Margaret Weis following her sensational War of Souls trilogy.

  “Offers plenty of fantasy action intermixed with a mythic feel that is appropriate to a book about fickle gods.”

  —VOYA

  “Margaret Weis is a legend in the world of fantasy fiction.”

  —Publishers Weekly

  AMBER AND ASHES

  AMBER AND IRON

  AMBER AND BLOOD

  Amber & Ashes

  The Dark Disciple, Volume I

  ©2005 Wizards of the Coast LLC

  All characters in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead is purely coincidental.

  This book is protected under the copyright laws of the United States of America. Any reproduction or unauthorized use of the material or artwork contained herein is prohibited without the express written permission of Wizards of the Coast LLC.

  Published by Wizards of the Coast LLC.

  DRAGONLANCE, Wizards of the Coast, and their respective logos are trademarks of Wizards of the Coast LLC in the U.S.A. and other countries. Other trademarks are property of their respective owners. Hasbro SA, Represented by Hasbro Europe, Stockley Park, UB11 1AZ. UK.

  All Wizards of the Coast characters and their distinctive likenesses are property of Wizards of the Coast LLC.

  Cover art by Matt Stawicki

  Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 2004116903

  eISBN: 978-0-7869-5451-3

  U.S., Canada, Asia, Pacific, & Latin America, Wizards of the Coast LLC, P.O. Box 707, Renton, WA 98057-0707, +1-800-324-6496, www.wizards.com/customerservice

  Europe, U.K., Eire & South Africa, Wizards of the Coast LLC, c/o Hasbro UK Ltd., P.O. Box 43, Newport, NP19 4YD, UK, Tel: +800 22 427276, Email: [email protected]

  Visit our web site at www.wizards.com

  v3.1

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  I would like to thank Deb Guzman of Delavan, Wisconsin, and her border collies, Coy, Tell, and Bizzy, for instructing me and my border collie Tess in the fascinating work of the herd dog.

  My thanks to Joshua Stewart of Beaumont, Texas, who suggested the word “emmide” for Rhys’s staff.

  I would like to thank Weldon Chen, “Granak” of Reno, Nevada, who made a khas board for me so that I could learn to play the game. Thanks also to Tom Wham of Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, who played numerous games of khas with me and helped me understand the rules.

  DEDICATION

  To Jamie and Renae Chambers.

  We’ve faced some severe storms at sea. Your friendship and dedication kept our ship afloat.

  With my love and thanks,

  Margaret

  Contents

  Cover

  Other Books by This Author

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Acknowledgements

  Dedication

  Introduction

  Prologue

  Book I - Amber

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Book II - Ashes

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Book III - Beloved of Chemosh

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Epilogue

  Appendix - Tower of the Blood Sea

  History

  The Tower Restored

  Description

  Basalt Darkeye

  Caele

  The God’s Eye

  About the Author

  remember the first time I came across Margaret’s work as clearly as if it was yesterday. It was the mid-’80s and I had just sent out the manuscript of my first novel, Echoes of the Fourth Magic. Making myself crazy watching the mailman every day, I decided to divert my attention. I had heard of some new fantasy books that were making quite a splash, so I went to my local book store and bought the first DRAGONLANCE® novel.

  I was immersed in that book when the bad news began to arrive. Rejection letter after rejection letter showed up at my door; I had no idea of how badly I wanted to get published! Frustration turned to outrage, which I took out on the book I happened to have in my hands at the time. I remember declaring in no uncertain terms that “I can write a better book than this!” And all the while, I didn’t even realize the declaration as an expression of my own pain.

  A few years later, I landed the deal with TSR and was subsequently asked to come out to Gen Con. My editor, Mary Kirchoff, took me aside to where two people, Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman, were preparing for a signing.

  “Watch these two,” she told me. “Learn how a pro handles a signing line.”

  I sat down, a bit embarrassed, given my reaction to that DRAGONLANCE book those years before. Let me say here that I hadn’t finished that novel then. I was just too angry and frustrated.

  I met Margaret and Tracy and we exchanged a few pleasant words. Nothing too substantial, because the line had started to form. The things that most struck me during that book signing were the questions and the remarks of the readers. Fan after fan came up and breathlessly and reverently spoke of Kitiara and Tanis and Raistlin. These people, numerous, intelligent and erudite, had been deeply touched by that book I had angrily tossed aside those years before.

  That moment remains an epiphany for me. The first thing I did when I got home was go back to the book store and buy all of those early DRAGONLANCE books. This time I read them honestly. When I got done, I could have been one of those people in that line, demanding to know more about Raistlin, worried about Tanis and in love with Flint and Tasslehoff. The tale was wonderful and wonderfully told, with characters rich and enchanting (okay, except for Sturm. Man, I hated Sturm and cheered for the dragon! Mwahahahaha!).

  Err, back on point … I am not surprised that Margaret draws lines of fans at every signing, nor am I the least bit surprised that after all these years, those original DRAGONLANCE books continue to sell tens of thousands of copies each year. They tell a tale familiar yet fresh. They show us heroes familiar yet unique. And they show us villains, wonderful and delicious. Of course, there’s also Raistlin, so multi-dimensional, so cool and so bad, so conflicted and so straightforward. The books are worthy of all the praise, to be sure.

  Wow.

  Just wow.

  Margaret Weis is one of my favorite writers. I wish I could put words together as beautifully as she. She’s also one of my favorite people. Too often we hear the cliché that someone’s smile “lights up a room.” Too rarely do we actually meet someone who has a smile that really does.

  Rock on, Margaret, and don’t you dare stop writing!

  —R.A. Salvatore

/>   he temple dedicated to his worship was located below the castle’s walls and ramparts, below the towers and spires, below the great hall with its moldering tapestries, below even the dungeons. The noble family to whom this castle had once belonged had buried their honored dead in this subterranean vault in order to maintain the holy sanctity of death, to keep the tombs safe from grave robbers and worse.

  The grave robbers came anyway.

  Eons ago, the noble and long forgotten family was consumed in some noble and long forgotten war. With the castle abandoned, there was no one left to protect the dead. Although the vault had been dug deep and the stairs that led to it were hidden, those who have a nose for treasure were able to sniff it out. The robbers pried loose the marble slabs, carved with the likeness of noble lord and noble lady, from the tops of the tombs and tossed them, broken, to the floor. They stripped the ruby rings from bony fingers, lifted the golden circlets from grinning skulls, snatched up the diamond pendants, and carried away the bejeweled swords.

  After the robbers came worse.

  Reviled throughout Ansalon, those who embraced the worship of Chemosh, Lord of Death, were forced to hold their sacred rites and rituals in places hidden from public view. Temples dedicated to the worship of Chemosh were established in caves, catacombs, and basements, and it was rumored that there was one in the sewers of Palanthas. The choicest of all locales for the god’s temple were those already dedicated to Death, for there the power of the god could be most keenly experienced. Local cemeteries were ideal, but these tended to be visible and were therefore often raided by local authorities seeking to eradicate the undead, thus making them dangerous places of worship for the clerics of Chemosh. The discovery of a family vault that was unknown to the rest of the world was an important find. Chemosh’s followers did all they could to keep it safe and keep it secret.

  Clad in their ceremonial black robes, their faces hidden by white skull masks—for these followers of Chemosh trusted no one, not even each other—the clerics of the Lord of Death performed the rituals that brought the bodies of the dead back to what they considered “life.” When they themselves died, the souls of these clerics were not free to join the River of Souls to the next stage of the wondrous journey. Having pledged their loyalty to the god in return for favors given to them while they were living, they were constrained by the god to remain in the world after death, forced to do his bidding, their mortal remains animated and ordered to guard temple or treasure and fight off invaders, their corpses dying over and over again, to be reanimated over and over again.

  When the Age of Mortals came and Takhisis stole the world out from the other gods—including Chemosh—his clerics lost their power. No longer would skeletons rise at their command and take up arms in their fleshless hands to guard them against their foes. Some of the clerics burned their black robes and white masks and blended in with the neighbors. Others kept the faith, kept it safe and secret. Trusting that someday their god would return, they locked up the vaults, the tombs, and the crypts and carried such secrets in their hearts. The living loyal to Chemosh bided their time, and so did the dead.

  When Takhisis, Queen of Darkness, came seeking souls to fuel her return to the world, she could not locate many of those souls who were bound to Chemosh. Hidden in the darkness of undeath, they kept silent when she called, waiting for their master.

  And now he was here, world found, treacherous Queen deposed and deceased. Chemosh was back, but he wasn’t happy.

  He stood in the family vault that had once been his temple, stood amidst the dust and the rat droppings and bits and pieces of dismembered bodies—a collar bone here, a shin bone there—and he looked at his followers, who were slowly making their shambling way out of dark corners or pulling themselves up out of coffins. His lip curled.

  “What an ugly lot you are,” he told them. “And you stink, too. Stink to high heaven. I’m surprised I couldn’t locate the world from your stench alone.”

  The corpses didn’t understand. They turned empty eye sockets in his direction and waited in tongueless silence for his command. As they stood, looking incredibly stupid, a finger bone dropped off one. Another lost its kneecap. An arm fell off another.

  Chemosh frowned. A rat ran across his boot. He was so plunged in gloom that he didn’t bother to kill it but let it go. The creature took refuge inside a skull, its tail sticking ludicrously out of the grinning mouth.

  “There you stand, awaiting my commands. And just what am I supposed to tell you to do? Go out and recruit followers for my worship? Wait!” he commanded irritably. Some of the decaying bodies, having mistaken this for a command, were heading for the exit. “That wasn’t an order, you brainless jumble of bones. I can imagine the sort of followers you are likely to bring me. Everyone is eager to worship a god whose devotees are in the last stages of rot.”

  Chemosh glowered at them, then made a sudden, impatient gesture. “Oh, go on! Get out of here. You turn my stomach. Go terrorize some village. With any luck,” he added, as they clanked and clattered and shuffled their way out, dropping body parts all the way, “some holy cleric of Mishakal will find the lot of you and smash you to bits.”

  Chemosh sat on the lid of a sarcophagus and flicked a fragment of bone off the black velvet of his breeches.

  “Where are the young, the strong, the beautiful?” he demanded. “Why don’t they come to me? I’ll tell you why.” He cast a disgusted glance at the departing skeletons. “The young don’t think of death. They think of life, of living, of joy and happiness, youth and beauty. Speak of Chemosh, and they laugh at the thought. ‘Come back to talk to me of him when I am old and ugly,’ they say. Those are the worshippers I attract—arthritic old geezers who haven’t a tooth in their heads, cackling old crones who chant my name and wave black cats at me. Cats!” he muttered. “What do I want with cats?”

  Chemosh kicked at the skull and sent it rolling. The rat went skittering off into a dusty corner. “What I want is youth, strength, power. Converts who come to me willingly, eagerly. Converts who will frequent my temples in broad daylight and proclaim that they are proud to worship me. That’s what I want. That’s what I need.” His fist clenched. “To gain the seat of power in the heavens, that is what I must have.”

  He stood up and roved restlessly about the vault. “Sargonnas has his minotaur empire that grows larger every day. The namby-pamby Mishakal. How they adore her, all flocking to her worship with cries of ‘Heal me, heal me!’ How can I compete with that?”

  He paused to brush strands of sticky cobweb from his black velvet coat. “Even Zeboim, that wanton trollop, has the heart of every sailor in the fleet. Me? I have large quantities of mold and mildew. And spiders. How can I become a king among the pantheon when the most intelligent of my followers are the maggots who feed off them?”

  Chemosh wiped the dust from his hands, shook the dirt and bone fragments from his boots, and stalked out the broken-down door that led into the vault. He wound his way up the stairwell that led back to the surface, back to sunshine and fresh air.

  “I am going to make changes,” he vowed. “Death will have a new face. A face with bright eyes and ruby lips.”

  He emerged into the night and paused to gaze up at the stars, the newly formed constellations, the newly returned three moons. Chemosh smiled.

  “Lips people will be dying to kiss.”

  ina buried her queen beneath a mountain.

  The queen had raised that mountain, molded it, shaped it, lifted it up with her immortal hands. And now she lay beneath it.

  The mountain would die. Gnawed by the teeth of the wind, savaged by the drops of rain, slowly, over time, century upon century, the magnificent mountain Takhisis had created would crumble into dust, mingle, and become lost among the ashes of its dead creator. The final ignominy. The final, bitter irony.

  “They will pay,” vowed Mina, watching the sun set beyond the mountain, watching its shadow steal across the valley. “They will pay—all those who had a h
and in this, mortal and immortal. I would make them pay, if I weren’t so tired. So very tired.”

  She woke up tired; if one could use the term “waking,” for she never truly slept. She passed the night in a restless doze in which she remained conscious of every shift in the wind, every animal grunt or cry, every dimming of the moonlight or flicker of the stars. Sleep lapped at her feet, ripples wetting her toes. Whenever sleep’s waves, silent and calm, restful and peaceful, would start to carry her away, she would jerk to wakefulness with a gasp, as though she were drowning, and sleep would recede.

  Mina spent the daylight hours guarding the Dark Queen’s burial site. She never moved far from that tomb beneath the mountain, though Galdar nagged at her constantly to leave, if only for a little while.

  “Go for a walk among the trees,” the minotaur begged her, “or bathe in the lake or climb the rocky cliffs to see the sunrise.”

  Mina could not leave. She had a terrible fear that some person of Ansalon would find this holy site, and once that happened, the gawkers would come to stare and poke at the body and giggle and smirk. The treasure seekers and despoilers would come to rip off the jewels and lug away the holy artifacts. Takhisis’s enemies would come to triumph over her. Her faithful would come, desperate to have their prayers answered, to try to bring her back.

  That would be worst of all, Mina decided. Takhisis, a queen who had ruled heaven and the Abyss, forever chained to the whining pleas of those who had done nothing to try to save her when she died except wring their hands and whimper, “What will become of me?”

  Day in and day out, Mina paced before the entrance to the tomb beneath the mountain where she had placed the body of the dead queen. She had worked hard, for weeks, for months maybe—she had no sense of time—to hide the fact that there was an entrance, planting trees, bushes, and wild flowers in front of it, training them to grow over it.

  Galdar helped her in her task, and so did the gods, though she was not aware of their help and would have scorned it if she’d known of it.