Weavespinner Read online

  The man she seemed to endless argue with was himself rather unusual. Even his name was strange, an odd name for an odd fellow. His name was Phandebrass, and everything about him was an absolute puzzle. He looked very young, with narrow features, but had white hair like an old man. He was thin and bony and that made him look old, but he moved with a spry step that made him appear young. His blue eyes were befuddled at times, but they didn't have the look about them of a man debilitated by senility. In his case, that befuddled look came from the fact that his mind was sometimes so occupied by one thing that it seemed to lose track of everything else. Things like where he was, what he was doing, what his name was, who other people were, that kind of thing. He seemed absolutely scattered at times, asking the same questions over and over, looking for things that were oftentimes right in his hand, and behaving like some kind of insane old man that got loose from his keeper. But Tarrin could tell that he actually was rather smart. It was just that it seemed that his mind had to concentrate on one thing at a time, that was all. He was kind of funny, and Tarrin rather liked him, even if he did tend to be annoying at times. Phandebrass was a Wizard who was absolutely consumed by the passion of learning, and he had gotten himself bounced out of Tarrin's room when he showed up with all kinds of bottles and odd things with the intent of studying Tarrin's condition. Triana barely tolerated him for about three minutes, until he mentioned that he wanted to get a sample of Tarrin's brain tissue. It was about then that he got tossed out on his rump. Tarrin found it hard to believe that they were all absolutely depending on that odd fellow to find a cure for Tarrin's amnesia, and even Camara Tal, who seemed endlessly irritated by the man's scattered nature, admitted that Phandebrass was probably one of the best Wizards alive. Once he did settle down and focus his attention on one thing, he was capable of startling intelligence and wisdom, and had quite a knack for solving very complicated or unusual problems. Kimmie was a Wizard too, and she had been tutoring under Phandebrass. She defended her mentor passionately whenever someone talked bad about him in her presence.

  There were those people...and then there was that dragon. Tarrin nearly suffered a seizure when they told him about Sapphire. He had found her and thought she was a drake, a little reptile that looked like a dragon, but was only about five spans long. He had taken her in and taken care of her after she had been attacked by a pack of other drakes, and she had become quite attached to him. Little did any of them know, even Sapphire, that she was actually a dragon, hiding in the form of a drake because of what had happened during the Breaking. It sounded complicated and he didn't understand it, but when the Weave tore, all the dragons had to magically change themselves into drakes to avoid getting killed. And when they did, they were stuck that way, even taking on the minds of drakes. But the Weave was mended now, it was whole, and that meant that all the dragons had come out of their hiding places again. Tarrin had yet to see her in her dragon form, though. She had visited him three times over the last few days looking like a drake. Small enough to fit in his lap. She nuzzled him and even licked him once, and he found her affection to be quite contagious. He liked her alot, was surprised that she knew how to talk and was actually very smart, but he just couldn't believe that that cute little animal in his lap was actually bigger than the house in which he'd been staying. Kimmie had used a magic spell to make her small again, and she used the time under the effects of the spell to visit with what she called her "little friend." He was hoping to get a look at her now, his first time out of the house, in her real shape, but Kimmie said that she stayed on the far side of the volcano when not visiting him. She didn't want to terrorize the Sha'Kar, and her moving around tended to dislodge buildings from their foundations like miniature earthquakes when she did move around in town. Tarrin found that hard to believe until he remembered feeling the bed shake about ten minutes before Sapphire came in for one of her visits. If she was big enough to shake the ground with a step, then she really had to be that big.

  Kimmie showed him her footprints when they came out, and that was proof beyond anything. The footprint she showed him was about ten spans long and was two spans deep, three wide fingers and a duke finger like an opposed thumb. That paw was so big that he'd fit inside it.

  And they'd all come together to find the Firestaff. The story of their adventure seemed almost unbelievable at times, and the most unbelievable of all was that he was personal friends with a god. That stripe-haired woman with the glowing eyes was not a queen or the Keeper as he thought, but the mortal manisfestation of that goddess. That blew his mind. Absolutely blew his mind. She was the goddess of the Sorcerers, and Tarrin had been her personal choice for undertaking the mission of recovering the ancient artifact. She certainly didn't seem like a god. No glowing aura, no trumpet fanfare, no displays of her godly might. She was almost chatty with him, he remembered. But Dolanna looked at her like she was a goddess, he remembered. She seemed on the verge of falling down and worshipping her at any moment. Dolanna told him that their Goddess didn't like such displays, that it was how they felt about her in their heart that mattered more to her than what they displayed to her. She seemed very nice, and Tarrin had certainly felt that she loved him. He wasn't sure how he knew that, but he did. That goddess woman loved him, and loved him very much. And he knew that he loved her too. That was more than a flash of memory, that was a feeling that came from deep inside him. It took him a while to understand that, but now he did. No matter how outlandish it seemed, he knew that it was the truth.

  It was just a part of that most intriguing story. A life of danger, magic, and excitement. The story certainly lived up to that. It seemed almost unbelievable, some of the things he'd done, the people he'd met, the things he'd seen. And he had some very unusual friends out there, friends that made Sapphire seem...normal. There was a Faerie named Sarraya who'd travelled with him as he crossed the desert. He couldn't remember her at all, but there was a flash, an impression of a very tiny thing with blue skin. That had to be her. There was Shiika, the Demoness, who was now the undisputed ruler of Yar Arak. That relationship was a very wary one, they told him. The Demoness seemed to like him, but he wasn't too keen on her. Tarrin didn't remember her either, but she certainly sounded like an exciting sort of person to know. He wondered what she looked like. There were Var and Denai, two Selani he'd come to befriend while crossing the desert, and again, he couldn't remember anything of them. There was Ariana, an Aeradalla, an extremely rare and exotic race of human-like, winged beings. Now her he did vaguely recall, but it was little more than the briefest of images, a memory of a tall slender woman with blue hair and large feathery wings. Like all those images, it came with a splitting headache, as if it caused him pain to try to dredge up those lost memories. There were the Were-cats he'd befriended. Thean and Singer, Rahnee and Shirazi, Jeri and Triana's other children, Shayle and Nikki. They said he'd met her son, but he and her son didn't get along very well. He couldn't remember any of them either.

  Quite a story. Quite a big story. But that part of it was over. Tarrin had the Firestaff with him at that very moment, in a magical place that Dolanna had explained to him. It was a magical function of the amulet around his neck, a special magical place where he could put things and not have to carry them around. The first thing she did was teach him about that magical device and show him how to use it. He'd put the Firestaff in that magical place, what Dolanna called the elsewhere, so that it wasn't visible. She told him never to take it out of the elsewhere, never to tell anyone else about the elsewhere, and never tell anyone at all that he had the Firestaff in the first place. It was the most sought-after thing in the entire world, the most valued and prized artifact of them all, and she warned him quite bluntly that people he thought were his friends would kill him to take it away from him. The only people who knew that he even had the Firestaff were those in his private circle of forgotten friends. And Dolanna made it clear to him that only they should know.

  Not that he'd tell anyone else. He couldn't rememb
er very much, but he'd been told what the Firestaff was and what it would do. It would turn someone into a god if they had it on a certain day, and that's why his goddess had sent him out to find it. The gods didn't want that to happen, because they couldn't let another god come to power. They'd have to try to destroy the invader, and that would cause a war between the gods that would ravage the world. That was a very terrifying thought, conjuring an image of a firestorm sweeping across the whole world, even setting fire to rocks and water, and it made him very serious about protecting what he had with him. The idea of being a god had a kind of dream-like appeal, but not if it would cost the world such a heavy price.

  Besides, the Firestaff was creepy. It didn't look creepy, being nothing but a length of petrified reddish wood, stone but looking like wood, even with the grain and a few old nicks and dings visible along its length. But when he touched it, it was hot,almost throbbing under his fingers, and there were these whispers coming from it. Strange whispers that seemed to be inside his head, promising all kinds of wild things to him. It promised him all sorts of things. Money, land, power, a harem of pretty girls to do anything he wanted--that made him blush a bit--magical might, absolute dominion. Promises to unlock the secrets of the universe, promises to show him things beyond the rational understanding of mortal man. Those whispers were frightening, but after listening to them for a few moments, they became more and more tempting. He'd told Dolanna about it, and that was when she was even more adamant about teaching him about the elsewhere. When the Firestaff was there, he couldn't hear the whispering. It was an artifact of great power, and that power had a corrupting effect on anyone that held it for too long, making them want to use that power. It was part of the diabolical nature of the thing, twisting even the most pure motives by exploiting the weaknesses of the one holding it. Dolanna had him get around that corrupting effect by sticking it where it couldn't reach him. Not even its power could reach outside of the elsewhere. And she told him to never take it out, not for any reason. Every moment he held it, it gave it that much more time to try to dominate him.

  And so he carried it with him, even without carrying it. He thought about it alot, whenever someone wasn't keeping him occupied, wondering at just what those whispers meant, and if they could really do what they promised. They didn't say that he'd have to become a god to find out, either. He didn't really want to be a king or have a harem or be rich, but he did have an interest in learning about magic. He'd been one of the strongest Sorcerers alive, they all told him, but now he couldn't remember any of it. He still had his power, they said, but he had no idea how to use it, and Dolanna had refused to try to teach him. She told him that he'd get it back when he got back his memory, but he wanted to know now. Had he really had the power to blow up buildings? That seemed pretty impressive, but it was the stories of him healing people that held his interest the most. That seemed a much more useful ability than blowing things up. Helping friends was much more rewarding the exploding buildings and setting enemies on fire.

  A Sha'Kar woman curtsied to as they passed her, and he had to admire her silently. All these Sha'Kar were very handsome or very beautiful. The women were nowhere as pretty as Allia, but they were still very attractive. They had large eyes and delicate bones, those pointed ears and four-fingered hands, and most of them were very voluptuous. He'd yet to see one woman that had a flat chest or narrow hips. They all wore shimmering robes that clung to those curves in a most appealing manner, and he'd started wondering what was under those gowns. That felt a bit dirty, but even he had to admit that a thinking about it was just fine so long as he didn't try to do anything about it. Tarrin was raised right, but he wasn't dead, and those Sha'Kar were very beautiful girls. And they always smiled at him so invitingly, almost like they knew he was admiring them, and they liked it. More than once he caught himself wondering what would happen if they knew he wanted to see what was under those robes.

  Kimmie elbowed him sharply as he watched the Sha'Kar girl go by, his eyes dropping down to her posterior almost unconsciously. Her jab hit him right in the ribs, and it knocked the breath out of him and staggered him to the side. "Hey!" he wheezed.

  "Keep your eyes in your head," she told him sharply. "If you want to look at a girl's butt, I'll pull my dress up for you, but you're not going to ogle those other girls."

  Tarrin knew that Kimmie had feelings for him, but that was the first time she had ever displayed jealousy. Her bold statement caught him off guard. He had the feeling that if he said anything, she would pull her her dress and show him her bottom. He wasn't used to a girl saying things like that. Boys said them in jest all the time, but not girls. It would be a scandal if a girl even joked about pulling up her skirts back home.

  "You didn't have to break my ribs, you know," he said breathlessly, putting a hand to his side.

  "Sorry," she said contritely, reaching under his shirt, and putting one of those big furry hands on his side. As always, her touch was very gentle, very intimate, and it always confused him. He had slept with this woman, but he didn't remember her, or it. That made him a little embrassed. She'd seen him naked, knew all kinds of very intimate things about him, and they'd done the most private things a boy and a girl could do together. Kimmie was around him all the time, either she or Triana, he'd noticed, almost hovering over him almost all the time. They'd even slept in his room for those two nights, Triana curled up on his bed in her cat form--it had been amazing to see her do that! Too bad she took off all her clothes beforehand, which made him blush to the roots of his hair. Triana was even more handsome naked, but even thinking that about her seemed absolutely scandalous to him. She was his mother, for goodness' sake! They wouldn't let him out of their sight, and he could see how defensive they got whenever stranger Sha'Kar or servants came close to him. They were being protective over him, as if he couldn't protect himself anymore. He knew that him not being a Were-cat anymore worried them and they thought it was unnatural, but he was getting tired of them thinking that he was helpless. When he finally got Triana to let him out of the house, Kimmie simply invited herself along and trampled over his desire to take a walk by himself. He found their hovering starting to get a little annoying, but he wasn't going to yell at them. No way he'd sass Triana, and Kimmie was just too sweet-natured for him to be mad at her for long.

  Alot of their peculiar customs seemed strange to him. Were-cat women seemed blunt, direct, outspoken, alot like human men. Triana was rough and rather harsh, but Kimmie was sweet and charming. That didn't mean that she wasn't as forward as Triana, though. They spoke their minds, and they had no qualms about talking about all sorts of very embarassing things around him, almost like it didn't matter if he was there or not. When Triana checked Kimmie's belly, checking the progression of her pregnancy, she made some frank, downright nasty observations about Tarrin's ability to father children. He'd been absolutely mortified. And Kimmie had just given her a naughty grin and agreed with every word she said! Then she gave him this wicked smile, like she knew he was embarassed by their talk, and winked at him. They were having fun with him, but he was just too embarassed to try to fight back.

  It still surprised him. Kimmie was carrying a baby, and he was the father. She'd told him all about what would happen when the baby was born, how it would grow so quickly, how it would have some of the Were-cat traits at birth but would have to mature to gain the rest.

  "Well, nothing seems broken," she said, keeping her paw against his bare side lingeringly. The pads on the palm of her hand were both rough and smooth, and they were very warm. Tarrin grabbed her wrist and pulled her hand out, then pulled her hand up to where he could see it. He hadn't looked closely at her hand before. She even had short fur on her fingers and on the fringes of her palms, with those dark brown pads on her palm and on the tips and middle sections of her fingers. She allowed him to run his fingers along those pads, touch the fur between them, and then she slowly extended the finger-long claws that recessed into those big fingers. He couldn't figu
re out for the life of him where they went. They were too big to not be noticable when they were in her hands, but there was no sign of them once they disappeared into the slots at the very tips of her fingers. She had no fingernails, which made her hands look a little strange.

  "Where do the claws go?" he asked her as those claws fully extended.

  "The bones in the tips of our fingers are forked," she replied. "The claw slides up between them. That's why our claws aren't longer than the tips."