Test of the Twins by Tracy Hickman & Margaret Weis

Author:Tracy Hickman & Margaret Weis [Hickman, Tracy & Weis, Margaret]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Dragonlance, young adult, Fantasy, .Correct&Complete, .Reading List, Science Fiction, Adventure
ISBN: 9780786918065
Google: bRYydidW8IEC
Goodreads: 774517
Publisher: Wizards of the Coast
Published: 1986-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 12

Propelled by his powerful hind legs, Khirsah leaped into the air and soared over the walls of the High Clerist’s Tower with graceful ease. The dragon’s strong wing strokes soon caused himself and his rider to overtake the slowly moving citadel. And yet, noted Tanis grimly, the fortress is moving rapidly enough to arrive in Palanthas by dawn tomorrow.

“Not too close,” he cautioned Khirsah.

A black dragon flew over, circling overhead in large, lazy spirals to keep an eye on them. Other blacks hovered in the distance and, now that he was on the same level as the citadel, Tanis could see the blue dragons as well, flying around the gray turrets of the floating castle. One particularly large blue dragon Tanis recognized as Kitiara’s own mount, Skie.

Where is Kit? Tanis wondered, trying unsuccessfully to peer into the windows, crowded with milling draconians, who were pointing at him and jeering. He had a sudden fear she might recognize him, if she were watching, and he pulled his cloak hood over his head. Then, smiling ruefully, he scratched his beard. At this distance, Kit would see nothing more than a lone rider on dragonback, probably a messenger for the knights.

He could picture clearly what would be occurring within the citadel.

“We could shoot him from the skies, Lord Kitiara,” one of her commanders would say.

Kitiara’s remembered laughter rang in Tanis’s ears. “No, let him carry the news to Palanthas, tell them what to expect. Give them time to sweat.”

Time to sweat. Tanis wiped his face. Even in the chill air above the mountains, the shirt beneath his leather tunic and armor was damp and clammy. He shivered with the cold and pulled his cloak more closely about him. His muscles ached; he was accustomed to riding in carriages, not on dragons, and he briefly thought with longing of his warm carriage. Then he sneered at himself. Shaking his head to clear it (why should missing one night’s sleep affect him so?), he forced his mind from his discomfort to the impossible problem confronting him.

Khirsah was trying his best to ignore the black dragon still hovering near them. The bronze increased his speed, and eventually the black, who had been sent simply to keep an eye on them, turned back. The citadel was left far behind, drifting effortlessly above mountain peaks that would have stopped an army dead.

Tanis tried to make plans, but everything he thought of doing involved doing something more important first until he felt like one of those trained mice in a fair who runs round and round upon the little wheel, getting nowhere in a tremendous hurry. At least Lord Gunthar had actually bullied and badgered Amothus’s generals (an honorary title in Palanthas, granted for outstanding community service; not one general now serving had actually been in a battle) into mobilizing the local militia. Unfortunately, the mobilization had been regarded as merely an excuse for a holiday.

Gunthar and his knights had stood around, laughing and nudging each other as they watched the civilian soldiers stumble through the drills.

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