It always began like this. Smoke twisted into the air in dark gray columns, a strange contrast against a blue autumn sky. It was not the first time that Donavan had witnessed such silent testimony to a night-time terror, but he had prayed he would never see it here. This place had become home to him. The village of Standwell.
The craggy-faced ranger looked down on the smoking ruins of the village, much as he had just fifteen months ago when last he came this way with his apprentice, Hank. Then, it had been weather-beaten but serviceable, same as it had looked every year since Donovan first settled in the area. Now its gray walls had been pulled down in places. Broken arrows bloomed from the hillside like bunches of wildflowers. There was the stink of burning and gravedirt in the air.
Donavan crouched by the roadside before advancing further, examining the tracks. "Undead," he grumbled, making out the marks of dragging, stumbling feet and rotting boots. "The villagers must have fired the buildings."
His only response was the heavy buzzing of a few flies nearby. The Ranger did not bother to see what they had settled on.
Donavan avoided the village center. There would be time later to bury the bodies of those who had not managed to flee. Instead, he followed the path he'd come a year ago with his apprentice, to a pretty cottage and a lush garden on the outskirts of town.
The cottage was not burning, and the garden still could have been a jungle with its riots of roses and daylilies. But it was not unscarred. The fence by the road had been broken in a couple of places, and many of the chrysanthemums and daisies had been crushed. To his trained eye, it was easy to see the signs of combat. There were no signs of movement outside, however. Donavan pushed through the broken garden gate, up the pathway to the house.
The grisly spectacle of a giant creeper vine wrapped tightly around the broken remnants of a zombie corpse greeted him on the path to the house. 'Still holding your own, Madeline?' he thought as he edged around it. There was further evidence of floral warfare. Tattered clothing ripped on rose thorns, and suspicious shaped mounds under the dark mulched earth. The door hung canted on its hinges, but a bar held it shut. The ranger hooked the end of his bow under the bar and pushed it up and aside, readying himself for anything. A wave of relief washed over him, though, to see his old friend again. He allowed himself to hope.
The house still smelled of dried rosepetals and herbal tea. The bed had been tossed up against the wall, and his feet cracked against the shards of pottery on the floor. Relief flooded through him when he saw the figure, wrapped in a blanket, seated comfortably in the old rocking chair.
"Madeline."
"Donovan. So good of you to come." The plump woman sat in her rocking chair, a blanket wrapped around her shoulders and another across her lap. "I'm sorry if I don't get up." Her voice was like the crumbling of dried rose petals.
The ranger lowered his bow and knelt by her chair, "I'm sorry I didn't come sooner. Are you all right?"
Madeline smiled, resting her hand over the top of his. "Well enough. The dead...zombies from the river, skeletons from the graveyard, attacked. Hundreds of them, fighting together. As if commanded by a higher will. The village..." She trailed off., looking pained.
"I saw. I think survivors made their way south." He would not say how many.
"Good. Good." The healer turned away, hiding her expression. "I don't suppose you could make me a cup of tea, could you?"
"Of course." He got to his feet, and went to the fireplace to start the kindling. "Do you know what they were after?"
Madeline sagged when his back was turned, closing her eyes. "No. My garden could barely hold them off. We were fighting hand to hand at the door. I think...I think they just wanted to kill. To add to their numbers. They only retreated with the dawn."
Donovan set the kettle over the small fire he had built. "I have sensed...a corruption in the earth. And the undead have never been coordinated like this before."
The healer was quiet for a long moment, enough so that Donovan grew concerned as he turned to look at her. Finally she spoke. "I have heard of an artifact...a thing that could raise and command the dead." She looked up at Donovan and gave him a wan smile. "A crystal skull. I did try to pay attention to the Dungeon Master when he was teaching, after all."
Donovan smiled at that. "You always tried hard, Madeline, to impress him. To impress the rest of us. You never needed to. You always impressed me."
The healer did not answer, but her breath caught short with a gasp of pain.
Donavan turn toward her in alarm. "Madeline...you..."
She lifted her hand to silence him, saying nothing.
"Tell me," the wary ranger insisted.
Madeline sighed. She let the blanket over her shoulders drop, revealing her unbuttoned blouse. Donavan reached forward, and, like a cautious lover, gently pushed the shirt aside to reveal the black and red mottled smear that was the healer's crushed torso. His eyes widened with horror.
Madeline tenderly cupped his rough hand in both of hers. "One had a mace. My old friend...Donovan...there is nothing that can be done."
The ranger jerked his hand away. "There must be some magic...something I can do."
She let the blanket fall to hide her disfigured side, then reached up to lay her other hand against Donovan's bearded cheek. "There is nothing. It is beyond my skills for healing, my poor Woodsman. Or yours. I would know. Some things simply...take more time than others." Again she gave her sad smile, the one that did not reach her eyes. "I wouldn't mind a cup of tea...and a little company. For a while."
A tear trickled down Donovan's cheek, coming to rest against the curve of the healer's palm. "I just said you need not try to impress me, Madeline."
Madeline let her hand fall. "We can remember those days. The days when I was so sure that if I just convinced him we were trying hard, it would be enough. He'd let us go back home again."
The kettle began to steam. Donovan turned away and found a cup that was still unbroken, and scooped some tea into it. "Was that what you and Randale fought about? Before Simon's death?" Perhaps the long years of watching the eternal cycles of nature had made their mark on him. He could say the name without his voice catching in his throat. Perhaps the bitter pain that was clawing at his heart now would similarly find ease. With time.
Madeline allowed her eyes to drift shut. "I...need to tell you about the skull. Remember when we had to return the artifacts to the Dragon's Graveyard, to keep them out of Venger's hands?"
Donovan nodded, pouring the hot water over the tea leaves.
"Once we'd gotten to the Hall of the Ancients, after the Dungeon Master had arrived and told us which artifacts to take, I saw him pick up another artifact...a crystal skull. I asked him if he wanted us to take that too." Her voice was beginning to grow softer. "He said that it was far too dangerous a thing to leave in the Dragon's Graveyard. That a soul within would command the soulless, that the undying would reign over the undead to the despair of the Realm." Madeline shook her head. "More riddles. But since he took it away, I did not worry about it any more."
Donovan knelt at the woman's side again, setting the cup of tea into her hands, and steadying her so she could drink. "Maybe you should lie down. I can set up the bed."
Madeline carefully raised the tea to her lips. "Oh, my dearest friend. You still don't understand. You must take word of the skull to my duckling Presto, and to Hank, and Melchior in Coulone. They've fought Venger before, poor things, and they may have to again if there is no one else. I," she paused, her voice filled with regret. "I cannot go on this adventure to impress you again, Donovan. I'm too badly hurt. Let me go. "
Fresh tears trickled down the haggard Ranger's cheeks, but he did not reply. There was nothing to be said. He sat quietly with her as she remembered all she knew of the crystal skull. They spoke quietly of six children from another world, brought to the Realm by Dungeon Master, fighting for a way home until one died and they realized that there was no way to return to the childhood they had once known. They whispered their hopes for their students and for the world to come. Without words, they let the unspoken love of decades pass between them one last time.
The first hues of an orange sunset were just beginning to color the sky as Donovan walked away from the burning cottage, another column of smoke and the perfume of roses.
It was a bad habit, she knew, to go running alone late at night. But the apartment was so quiet and empty, so lonely without her boy. It was hard to face the silence without Hank. Sometimes she called Steven Montgomery, who seemed to understand the danger of silence. But other nights, like this one, she ran.
The streetlights reflected off the glossy, dark roadway, still wet from the recent rain. Occasionally, the brilliant flash and roar of a car would rush past her, but none stopped. The raw-boned blonde woman glanced up at the tall wire fence to her left, letting her feet splash against the wet sidewalk. In the darkness beyond, strange warped shapes loomed, shapes like grinning monsters and flying beasts. The amusement park. Her midnight runs always lead her here in the end.
The park in the darkness seemed much the same as it had been the last four times she'd been running. The fence was the same, scattered with stern warnings about Private Property. The grassy bank was still littered with broken bottles and cigarette butts. However, the woman's running footsteps slowed as she realized there was a change, at least on this rainy night. A gate in the fence, partially concealed by a weathered juniper, normally was locked with a heavy padlock. Tonight, however, it stood partially ajar.
Unable to resist the urge to look closer, Amanda staggered to a halt. She glanced up and down the street, but for the moment, the roads were silent. With only a moment of hesitation, she climbed the bank, slid behind the bushes, and pushed the gate open with a creak. The park beyond was dark and silent. Unable to resist the opportunity to once more look for the answers she had been unable to find for six years, she slipped inside.
'I shouldn't be here.' Vague guilt washed over her, but the thin blonde woman had grown so used to the feeling that it settled like fine sediment over the layers of guilt already blanketing her spirit. The empty amusement park, with its dragon's eyes and coiling roller coasters, did not respond. She pushed the gate open with a creak and stepped through.
Amanda Grayson could not remember a time when she did not feel guilty. She'd still been in high school when she had Hank, and with his birth, she lost everything. Her parents' love. Her college aspirations. Her popularity and her childhood. The dark feelings twisted in her heart again, and she shoved them aside as she walked away from the gate. The park was dark. This long after midnight, the gaudy neon that lit the park at twilight had given way to faint shapes in the moonlight. The smell of stale popcorn hung in the air.
More than anyone, she knew the park by heart. She had once been the queen of the midway, when the Beatles ruled the airwaves. Then came Hank, and her struggle to raise him as best she could, bringing him here to feed the ducks on the wide pond. She watched him grow to become everything she'd wanted to be; the smart, handsome, responsible boy who took care of his friends. Who took care of her, as she let herself fade into the twilight under the midway. She'd haunted the amusement park all her life. For the last six years, it haunted her back.
There were no guards. That was unusual, from what she had seen from outside. Still, Amanda kept to the shadows, ready to slip into the carefully-pruned shrubberies if need arose. She approached the side of the leering maw of the Dungeons and Dragons ride.
"What is that?" she gasped aloud as she turned the corner to stand by the entrance. From just inside the dragon's mouth, Amanda could make out the outline of a doorway, shedding light into the darkness. It was a doorway she had never seen before, despite the painful hours standing in this very spot while the park was open. After a furtive glance around, she slipped between the dragon's teeth and approached the door.
The door itself was red and textured identical to the wall on either side. Beyond it, a steel ladder affixed to the wall led down into the light below. Amanda listened, but could hear no sound other than a quiet hum of machinery.
She slipped in the doorway, and tested the ladder. It held true. 'Well, if they catch me, I'm just one of those crazy distraught parents' she thought, climbing down the steps. 'They must be used to us by now.' The ladder led to a tunnel with metal-lined walls, though there were small ventilation grates near the ceiling. Small, round lights protected by metal cages illuminated the corridor in either direction, though she could see that the passage towards her left ended abruptly in a solid wall. She crept to the right, feeling terribly exposed and vulnerable.
At the end of the corridor, a heavy, round steel door with a complex-looking lock on the front stood ajar. There was still no sound coming from within, so, taking a deep breath, Amanda Grayson slipped inside.
'I think I've seen this movie' she thought. 'Das Boot?' The circular walls were metal bulkheads, painted a dreary Navy blue-gray, in front of which were stations and a number of chairs anchored firmly to the floor. Dials and cranks ran what seemed like some sort of primitive computer system, though what it did, she couldn't begin to tell. A clunky headset rested in front of some sort of radar station with switches marked 'Transmitting' 'Receiving' and 'Transferring'. Glass and steel columns marked the four corners of the room, and a faint, red electricity seemed to ripple up through the columns. In the center of the room, a circular-rail shielded a round, black sheet of glass that could not be seen through. Large stenciled labels marked the walls. WARNING: RADIATION DANGER. AUTHORIZED PERSONELLE ONLY. U.S. GOVT. DYMOCORP. Everything was covered with a fine layer of dust.
Three file cabinets, stuffed to overflowing with documents and records, seemed to promise answers. However, as she stepped past one of the tall columns to reach them, a loud siren blared. Amanda gasped and jumped. A red light began to flash and the klaxon warning wailed. Panicked, the woman grabbed the stack of documents that sat on top of the nearest file cabinet and dashed for the doorway.
The sound of sirens followed her as she raced up the ladder and fled the Dungeons and Dragons ride. She didn't know what would come...men in black suits and sunglasses. Marines with machine guns. Or something worse. She did not wait to find out. Clutching the stolen papers to her chest, she raced towards the open amusement park gate, broke out, shut the gate behind her, and raced home as fast as she was able.
The Queen lowered her heads in silent mourning as she felt the last two of her children die.
"There is always death at the end of an age," one sibilant voice hissed.
Another responded, offering comfort, "Very soon now, there will be new birth."
A third answered, "It is the way of nature."
She cast her gaze out to watch the last gasps of her two remaining children: a mighty green dragon, ancient as the black-hearted forest in which it dwelled, and a strong young silver dragon, torn down from the sky by a flock of roc driven to frenzy.
But her voices changed to a scream of pain and helpless rage as she watched their broken, battered bodies rise again. Gaping wounds draining of blood, they turned away from her and disappeared from her view forever.
"So, what does this one do?" The raven-haired girl's voice was as warm as the desert sunshine, and bright as the sparkle on the waters of a desert oasis.
"Ah, Princess Ayisha. That is the fruit of the Maid-of-Tusinda blossom. If you consume it, you will be granted a vision of your best friend's true love." The old gardener, wrinkled and so thin that every rib was visible, smiled a gap-tooth smile at the two girls.
The other girl, a stark opposite with pale skin and hair like flame, smiled shyly. "Why your best friend's? Why not your own?"
The gardener threw up his hands. "Who am I, a poor gardener, to know such things? Perhaps it is because the knowing would make true love not come. Were you to know that a handsome, strong warrior with hair like the golden sands of Agrippa and eyes like the summer sky were waiting for you, you might turn aside from your destiny and then it should never come to pass!"
The pale rose turned deep pink. "How did you...?"
The dark bloom giggled out loud at the expression on the other's face. "I'm sure it's only hypothetical, my sister."
Sheila laughed and gave Aiysha a playful nudge. "You told him. I know it!" she exclaimed with mock anger.
The King watched them from the shade of the veranda and rejoiced deep in his heart to hear the sound of their laughter. The last two years had been difficult. When Sheila had been brought to him, her soul was so wounded that it took much patience and much understanding to help her come to realize that neither she nor her friends were to blame for her brother's death. Though she'd known it in her head, Ramoud knew, better than anyone, how long it took for the heart to believe.
Still, she had come to blossom like the healing herbs of the palace gardens, and it brought the king great joy in a time of growing despair.
"I know what that one is. It's the foot of a yellow dragon, isn't it?"
The wizened gardener, maintaining his posture of complete sincerity and innocence, nodded. "The Princess Sheila is as wise as she is beautiful. The yellow dragon will cure any poison, just as this, the tongue of the purple dragon, will cure any disease." He led the girls to a large, ugly flower, purple with blue spots, from which protruded the long, orange tongue.
Ramoud could see Sheila pause, as if recollecting something long past. "Any disease? Does it cure witch fever? Can it be found in the lands to the west?"
The gardener looked confused, glancing from Sheila to Aiysha. "It can be found in special places to the west, of course, and it does cure any disease. But witch fever is not a disease...." He trailed off.
Ramoud knew immediately, from long observation, the turmoil expressed in Sheila's face at the gardener's answer. He threw down the latest reports from the oases and strode out into the garden, allowing his booming laughter to fill the uncomfortable silence that had momentarily arisen.
"So, my children! You have spent all morning speaking of flowers, and have none to show me? Come. I must see what is most beautiful in the garden today, other than these two lovely blossoms I see before me!"
Sheila looked up at him with blue eyes moist with concern, but he shook his head back at her. She nodded. If ever there was a man she could trust with the painful questions of the heart, it was this one. He would answer her questions very soon, at least those she did not have to answer for herself.
The night's silence was shattered by the ringing of the alarm bell just as the door was shattered by the rusted axe of its skeletal attacker. Eric leapt to his feet, grabbing his shield just in time to catch the blow that was about to cleave his head in two.
"Ack!!" he yelled, twisting away from the blade and flailing with his right hand to grasp his sword. Despite nearly seven years in the Realm, his panic hadn't changed much. At least when being surprised by undead in the middle of the night.
"Eric! NOW!" Diana flipped up to her feet in a single, graceful bound, her spear instantly in her hand. She thrust it forward and to the side, where it caught the inner edge of the creature's skull and was shoved forcibly out of the doorway. Eric didn't hesitate. His hands grasping the hilt of his sword, he jumped through the shattered ruin of the doorway and was free of the confining hut. He swung his sword around, knocking the skeleton free of Diana's spear and allowing the ex-Acrobat to get out of the cottage too.
The village was in chaos. The Red Blades had been settled there for three days, and the villagers welcomed their protection and coin. But now, soldiers and villagers were emerging from the buildings, still groggy from sleep, to find themselves under attack. The dead had clawed their way up from the nearby graveyard and had arrived to add the locals to their numbers. Throughout the town square, moaning skeletons hacked at doorways and clawed at window frames, pursuing every living being with unexpected speed and agility. Most were armed with weapons of the fallen or farm implements. Some people were wounded and screaming with pain. Others lay on the ground, still, for the moment.
"Soldiers, ATTENTION!!" Eric bellowed over the clash of weapons. "Get the villagers to the center of town! Block the roads! Use the flat of your blades!" His voice cut through the confusion, and the Red Blades responded. They paired up, picking up weapons and backing through the streets shielding the villagers as they fought their way towards the center of town.
Eric smashed the skeleton for good with his shield, grunting with the effort. Near him, Diana had used her spear to club another to pieces, offering the pair a second of respite. She gave him a reassuring smile to let him know she was all right, and then her eyes drifted down his chest, past his waist. She looked up with a wicked grin. Before he could ask, however, she used the spear's shaft to vault back into the fray.
Confused, Eric looked down, and a crimson blush sped across his cheeks. "Oh no! Pants! Where are my pants?" He turned back towards the cottage from which they'd come, but he was separated from it by more attackers every minute. He ducked the blow of a heavy hoe that was about to dig a furrow in his forehead and was forced back into the fight, swearing profusely as he did so.
The skeletal fighters did not seem willing to let him linger on the problem. The Red Blades managed to clear the houses on the edge of town, helping the villagers escape towards the square. Eric finally reached the square just as two men were rolling a cart across the street to channel the skeletons tighter. A bonfire of bedding and broken timbers from nearby houses flamed to life, providing enough light to fight by. Barrels and benches were added to the cart, erecting a hasty barricade, while the armed mercenaries clashed with the undead above and beside the barricades, keeping them from coming any closer. The alarm bell finally fell silent. The village was ready to make it stand.
The Cavalier scanned the crowd in the square. The women and children were huddled in the center, and the Blades had every road well guarded. However, his heart made a sudden leap for his throat when he realized that Diana was not in the circle of firelight. He knew she was a capable warrior; she'd fought on her own in worse predicaments many times before. But things had changed between them. He had never felt this frightened by her absence before. He'd let Bobby down, and they'd lost each other. His thoughts were rushing faster and faster, a rising tide of fear. He'd only just found Diana again. He couldn't afford to lose her now....
A brown blur soared over the barrier like an eagle, landing with a solid thump behind Eric. A warm cinnamon-and-smoke voice said, "Hey, Commander!" He turned, joy already pushing the panic away. Something soft flew through the air and hit him in the chest. He fumbled, but managed to catch the bundle. "You might want those if we're going to fight Undead today."
Eric hastily pulled on his pants, to the nervous laughter of the men nearby. Once they were on, he straightened, and redrew his sword. "Have a good laugh now, Boys! It's a long time until morning!" With that, he attacked the undead outside the barricade, Diana at his side.
"Here it is again. Transatlantic Tunnel. I believe that is the project name." The stern, dark-eyed gentleman looked up from another of the large stack of papers that lay on the heavy mahogany desk.
Amanda Grayson rubbed her eyes with her wrists. She was dressed in an old track suit, though her raincoat was hung over the high back chair behind her. The office was dark, lit by a single desk lamp which left the corners in shadows. The heavy velvet curtains were drawn, shutting out the light of the early morning. "Who's running it, Steven?"
Steven Montgomery, despite the hour, was wearing a fine, if slightly rumpled, French-cuff shirt and tailored suit. He picked up a piece of graying carbon-leaf paper. "It says here the corporation is Dymocorp, with contract to the US Government. I'm familiar with the company. Its stocks have seen extraordinary growth with the recent crisis in the Middle East. Their government projects are primarily Department of Defense, but they are an umbrella corporation with major interests in resource development and transportation."
"Resource development?" Amanda picked up another of the documents, something that looked like a general health report for some man named 'Josef Mueller'. The man looked like he would be healthy as far as she could tell, or used to be in 1949.
"Oil, gas, and mineral exploration and extraction in the third world. They don't do much work in the United States. Too many environmental regulations." Steven stood, spreading his hands across the desk. "That is the puzzling part. These documents are all dated after the end of World War Two. The United States had finished developing the fission bomb, and work on the Hydrogen bomb was almost complete. The Soviets had not developed similar technology yet."
Amanda nodded. "So, there wouldn't be much use for another big weapon system. And even if there were, why build it here instead of some island in the South Pacific or something?"
Steven leaned forward against the desk, sighing wearily. "Exactly. And what does this have to do with our children? And who can we speak to about this?"
"Do you think we should tell Detective Pendleton? Or do you think he'll think we're crazy?" The slim woman glanced over at the curtains nervously. "I don't want to get in trouble. And all of these forms say 'Top Secret'. I'm kind of frightened someone might come...."
"We do not know if anyone heard you. You should be fine. I will have my chauffer drive you back home in a few minutes. If you like, you can keep him there for the day, just in case you have any problems. He can resolve any difficulties." He sat back down again. "As to the rest. I think maybe I can call the O'Brien's. If we explain the situation to Margaret, I know she can convince Pendleton to re-examine the doorway you found. Pendleton can bring the police in or not after that, and keep you out of it completely."
"Th...thanks, Steven." A wan smiled curved her lips. "I'd feel safer with someone there." After a moment, she added, "I think we should tell the others. No matter what Pendleton discovers."
"I prefer not to cause them undue concern," the businessman stated flatly.
Amanda got to her feet, picking up her coat. "I know you're just trying to protect me. Protect all of us. But wouldn't you have wanted to be told? If only to see if there was something you could do to help?"
Steven Montgomery sighed. "Very well." He paused. "I hadn't said, before. Thank you for coming to me with this. If you hadn't...." He trailed off.
The slender woman leaned forward to give Steven a quick peck on the cheek. "Until we see our kids again, we just have to take care of each other. Thank you."
He watched her leave the dim office, and began making phone calls...to the chauffer, to the O'Brien's, and to his executive assistant to cancel all morning meetings. It had been a long night.
Nights in the deserts of Kadish could be cold. But King Ramoud's study remained warm. A coal fire burned in an open iron firebowl, and cushions were scattered among the carved racks of scrolls and maps. Ramoud waited patiently. A few brittle scrolls were laid out in front of him. He was examining an illuminated letter E on one of them when he heard a soft voice behind him.
"Ramoud?"
The king looked up and smiled. "I will convince you to call me Father one day. Perhaps the day I will be able to see you enter the room I am in. Please, sit, my Daughter Sheila."
The red-haired thief stepped out of the shadows and sank into a cushion. Her time in the desert had tanned her fair skin and brought out her freckles stronger than before. She did not fidget, but there was a thoughtful, but guarded, concern in her expression. It was a far cry from the indifferent hardness he had seen when she first came to the palace. It was also very different than the open innocence she had when he first gave her his daughter's doll. Ramoud sighed softly. He felt old.
"I came to ask about Witch Fever. What is it, Ramoud? Aiysha wouldn't tell me."
Ramoud spread his hands over the scrolls in front of him. "I found these. They are the best explanations that I can give you. I am not a magician. If you read, you will find that it is...a special kind of sickness...that those gifted with the ability to work magic suffer. Now, please, tell me why this troubles you, my child."
Sheila hung her head. "A couple of months after...we split up...I was with Randale, and we were camping. We saw this light. And it was Presto. Or maybe not. He was transparent, like a ghost. He said...some things. About how he knew that Dungeon Master had trapped us here. I said some stuff I probably shouldn't have. I was angry. Randale said the word 'Witch Fever', and that Dungeon Master would take care of it."
"I see." Ramoud's voice was gentle and understanding, but sad. "Have you seen young Presto since?"
"No."
"And you want to make sure that he really is well?"
"Yes."
Ramoud sighed again, audibly this time. "I...did not know. I was certain he was too old." He opened one of the scrolls. "Witch fever has usually passed a child by by the age of ten or eleven. It happens to all children with the gift of magic. They grow gravely ill for some time. Weeks or months. During the end that time, certain...magical occurrences happen around them, or to those they love, similar to what you describe. They are delirious, as with a high fever, and from that it gets its name."
Sheila looked down at the document herself. "How...Presto, I mean...he'd be okay, wouldn't he?"
Ramoud reached forward to tilt her head up and look the young woman steadily in the eye. "I will not lie to you. Very few who have witch fever live to see their twelfth year. There is no cure."
A tear welled up in the corner of Sheila's eye. Ramoud wiped it away with his thumb as it began to trickle down her cheek. "No tears, my daughter. Randale could have been mistaken; he was in many ways. Some do survive the witch fever. And your friend was older, and stronger, much stronger than even he realized."
Sheila sucked in a breath and nodded. "I hope you're right. He apprenticed to a healer too. Even if Dungeon Master did not help him, his teacher could have." She pulled back, away from his hand, and straightened. "I need to find out for certain, though. I need to go back."
Silence fell between them. A spark leapt from the bed of coals, and outside the room, a guard's weapon belt jingled as he walked past.
Eventually, Ramoud answered. The words were difficult for him to say, but he gave them the sound of trust and confidence. "I think, my daughter, that you are right. I do not want you to leave, but it has been four years since you have seen the rest of your brothers and sisters. I am certain they are worried for you, as you are worried for them."
Sheila looked relieved, and determined. She started to get to her feet, but Ramoud reached out his hand to stop her.
"I will send you with an armed caravan." He reached to the side of his cushion and picked up a piece of paper. "With you, also, I must entrust this message. For Dungeon Master, if possible, but for the rulers of the kingdoms to the west if not. And, of course, your brothers and sisters, the Young Ones. This plague of undead grows every day. People are fleeing to the cities to escape them. I fear they are forming an army, but we cannot fight an army of the dead forever. Not one that grows each day. I must know what causes this phenomenon. And what I must do to stop it."
Sheila accepted the folded letter from Ramoud. "I'll find out for you. We will stop this."
The king stood, and helped the thief to her feet. "I want you to know. I am so very proud of you." He wrapped the girl tightly in his arms in a warm bear-hug.
She embraced him tightly back. Sheila whispered a heartfelt, "Thank you." And disappeared into the shadows of the palace.