by Samuel Marshall
Endless rain fell solidly, consistently, in a dull week-old monotony. The inn was packed this night, its customers gathered together in shared comfort against the gloom. It seemed half the people of Solace were there, laughing and drinking and gossiping and telling tales, in a boisterous noise that - not coincidentally - almost blotted out the rattle of raindrops against the roof.
So it was no great surprise when one more person entered. Gray-cloaked, he stepped inside swiftly and neatly, shutting the door behind him before any heat could flee. Conversations did not stop, laughter continued, many never spared a glance for the newcomer. Only the inn's proprietor, Caramon Majere, broke off his discussion in a welcoming wave and what was going to be a call of greeting - until the big man caught sight of the stranger's cold elven eyes and the set of his face, and was caught into thought for a second, enough for the moment to pass.
The elf did not hang his cloak to dry, but went straight to the bar to order bread and ale. These obtained, he sat at the end of a table, among a small cluster of unoccupied places, and proceeded to eat. His silent manner attracted little attention, those who noticed being happy to leave him alone. Except for one.
Yan was almost bored. Not quite - some pockets remained unsearched - but very little had happened to brighten his evening. This stranger at least seemed a little different: even though he wore dull, plain clothing, ate a common meal, and was probably as distant and self-righteous as any other elf, still a certain attitude hung about him. Maybe, the kender thought, he was an assassin! Or a thief. Now that would be terrible, a thief here in Solace!
He jumped from his seat, absent-mindedly palming a neighbor's belt-dagger, and strode over to sit opposite the newcomer.
"Hello," he offered, "my name's Yan."
He waited expectantly, but the stranger didn't even look up, a minute nod the only sign of attention.
Sighing, Yan tried again. "Are you an assassin? Or a thief?"
This time, the elf at least spoke. His voice was quiet but clear, the type you could hear over a distance even though it seemed like a whisper. "Neither."
"What are you, then?" the kender asked doubtfully.
"I?" At last the stranger fixed his eyes on Yan for an instant, a piercing stare that left a deep feeling of unease wherever it touched. "I am a storyteller."
The kender blinked in blank surprise. He looked over the elf again - the dark, rain-sodden cloak, the ragged black hair cut short in an untidy line, the pale, thin face that seemed only a thin skimming of flesh over bleached skull, the mouth caught in a tight frown, the half-closed eyes that now avoided scrutiny.
He said, "You don't look much like a storyteller."
"Pah!" the stranger said. His voice was still quiet, but vehement, accompanied by a scowl that - in an uncouth human - would have translated to spitting on the ground. "Those fools who call themselves bards and tale-spinners, who court the gaze of children and pretty ladies, who perform to crowds for the few coppers they require to drink themselves into a stupor on cheap spirits... they are not true storytellers. Rumormongers, pure and simple, living off the gullible nature of Krynn's people."
He took a small, terse sip from his ale and looked up at the kender for another brief moment. "Where do you think they get their tales?"
Yan considered. "From other bards, I guess."
"And those other bards? Where, precisely, do you imagine the stories originate?"
"Somebody must have seen it happening," the kender theorized. "And told the story originally."
"Tales, no doubt, of war, of betrayal, of great monsters, of feats of endurance." The stranger closed his eyes a second, reopened them for another glancing, caustic stare. "And you imagine these fops, with their fondness for drink and women and a good night's entertainment" - he sneered - "you imagine it is they who creep around battle lines to discover the truth, past men who will kill another quick as breathing, through fields of corpses that lie speckled with carrion birds? Or they who eavesdrop on the powerful and the decision-makers, who climb rain-slick walls to hang perilously outside a window, when discovery would mean certain death?"
"I- I guess," Yan said. He added, with a flash of pique, "But you're going to tell me it's not, aren't you? Why keep asking if you already know? Just to make me feel silly and stupid? It won't work, you know. Why, Uncle Trapspringer himself, or at least his second cousin, once described me-"
The stranger cut off the kender's chatter with a slow, measured wave of his hand in a gesture which - though it held no magical force and no apparent meaning - nevertheless was sufficient to command silence.
"It is not those buffoons who take the risks and brave the dangers. They crave popularity. How popular, do you think, is the one who returns alone from a battle in which thousands died, having never fought but only observed? How popular - indeed, safe - is he who hears the secrets of rulers and of rebels, of crime-lords and of guardsmen, and then proceeds to spread the tale through the streets?"
"Not very," Yan admitted. He'd got the point and this topic was getting, in his estimation, dull. "Hey, did you know the innkeeper there was a Hero of the Lance?"
"Of course." The elf's voice became speculative. "I think, on my entrance, he was reminded of his brother..."
"Raistlin. Do you know anything about him?" Yan always liked tales of the dark mage; told well, they brought a good ghost-story chill.
"Oh yes. I know his story very well indeed."
There was such certainty in his voice that the kender suddenly wondered, "You weren't there, were you?"
He didn't even know what he meant by 'there', but the stranger was shaking his head anyway. "No. There have been dozens of cases where a disaster could have destroyed Krynn; some of those I have watched, and some I have not. That particular time, I was absent..."
"Why?"
He looked at the kender again, this time less sharply, seeming to see Yan almost as a person. "As I said, on numerous occasions disaster was averted. I plan to be there when it happens."
There was a brief silence, and the stranger took advantage of it to drain his mug, finishing the meal. He stood, pulling up the cloak's hood.
"It's still raining," the kender pointed out. "And it's night." Jumping from his seat, Yan hurried to keep up, following across the inn.
"Notable events still occur, despite rain and darkness."
"Aren't you even going to tell a story?" the kender asked, incredulous and feeling somehow cheated.
Unsmiling, the elf caught Yan's gaze for a final time in that piercing stare. "I already have."
He shut the door, leaving a brief draught of bitter, chill wind and a speckling of raindrops in his wake.
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