Untitled2 by Unknown

Author:Unknown
Language: eng
Format: epub

"We'll make a wide circle around the camp," Tanis added, putting his arm around Brandella's shoulder. "We'd better go."They traveled at a relentless pace, never knowing how close behind them the young Kishpa might be and never knowing when the blackness of death might snuff out their hope of leaving the ancient wizard's memory.

In two days' time, they reached the woods in which Tanis would one day, many years hence, survive a terrible fire and befriend a dying mage. The trees were not as tall as Tanis remembered them from before the fire, nor was the pond as wide. Yet the place where Kishpa would one day sit and set his magic in motion was easily found. Tanis brought Brandella to the spot and said, "He is thinking of you right now from this very place."

Brandella knelt there and stroked the cool, damp grass.

"I . . ." she began, and swallowed. "I have tried to imagine what Kishpa might have looked like as an old man."

Tanis could not help her without describing the ravages of the flames. He cast about for an answer.

Scowarr rescued him. "Are you leaving now?" the human called from the edge of the pond. He was doing his best to hide his sadness.

"We're going to try," Tanis replied. "Let us say goodbye, my friend." Scowarr, his new suit showing signs of wear but his tufted hair surprisingly tidy, tossed a last stone into the water and then walked to where the half-elf stood with Brandella. He hugged them both. "I hate farewells," he said. 'They're never funny."

Tanis nodded. "I will think of you often," he said.

Brandella kissed Little Shoulders on the cheek. He blushed.

"You can think of me all you want," Scowarr told the half-elf. "Me? I'll be thinking of her."

Despite—no, because of—the somber moment, they all laughed.

Scowarr's eyes dribbled tears—of laughter, he insisted. "Fine," he said, "Now you laugh. It took you long enough, Half-Elven."

And then it was time.

Scowarr stepped back to watch as Tanis and Brandella held hands and called out to Kishpa to take them out of his memory and deliver them to the present.

They chanted his name.

They sang to him.

They shouted to him. They pleaded with him.

Nothing happened.

"Back so soon?" quipped Scowarr. Tanis wandered into the woods, away from the pond. His limbs ached with fatigue, and his head hurt from trying to devise some other way to reach the old Kishpa. In the end, he realized that he had to face up to the truth: He was never leaving this place. He had tried and failed. The best Tanis could hope for was that the old mage would live a little longer so that Tanis might have time for himself before the inevitable plunge into darkness.

Knowing now that this would be the last world that he would see, Tanis felt a terrible loneliness. He had promised that he would meet his old friends in five years at the Inn of the Last Home. It was a reunion that would never be. When he failed to appear, they would all wonder what had become of him.

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