As the dark moon of Krynn eclipsed the first of the visible moons, the woman drew a thong from beneath her breastplate, a thong from which was suspended a dark, misshapen lump. "Caliban," she said.

The voice that responded was a dry, husky whisper, heard within her ears

– an ancient, querulous voice. "Why does she call me now," it breathed.

"She does not need me here. There is nothing here that she cannot do for herself."

The woman frowned. "Caliban, the moons. What does it mean?"

"The moons, she says," the dry voice had whispered.

"She wants to know the story of the moons."

"Tell me!"

"It is another of the Queen's omens," the husky voice rasped. "She tells the Highlords that the time is almost at hand for their invasion of

Ansalon, and she tells whatever gods may notice that she claims this time and this world as hers. She warns them not to interfere."

"Another omen," the armed woman snapped. "Is there a message there for me?"

"Ah," the dry voice said. "She seeks messages for herself."

"Tell me!" the armor-clad woman ordered.

"If there is a message for her, it is only this: she has promised the

Highlord that she will take and hold access to the fortress Thorbardin.

The Queen will not tolerate any who fail in what they promise on her behalf."

"I will not fail!" the woman said sharply. "Even though I have nothing but… these -" she swept her free arm contemptuously, indicating the dark camps of the waiting goblin horde "- to assist me. I asked the Highlord for a strike force. He gave me stinking goblins. But I will succeed.

Thorbardin will fall when he is ready."

"She has no need to tell me of this," the dry voice said. "It is her concern, not mine. Now she will let me rest until there is a better reason for me to awaken."

"I will do what I choose!" she started to say, then hissed through clenched teeth as tiny lightnings laced from the dark thing to sting her hand. Quickly, she dropped it back into the shelter of her armor. She could feel it pulsate slightly as it came to rest between her breasts.

"Omens," she muttered. "I need no omens to accomplish what I set out to do."

Her gaze fixed then on the sky, not where the moons were telling their story, but westward, where the line of ridges that formed the valley's east rim stood like jagged teeth against the night sky. There, far in the distance beyond the ridges, was a crimson glow – a light that was neither moonlight nor firelight, but that hung in the sky beyond the mountains like an echo of Lunitari's light.

Between her breasts the dark thing moved, and again she heard the dry, ancient voice. "Ah, but there is a message for her, it seems. Someone else is abroad this night, seeking the lost way to Thorbardin."

Full daylight lay on the valley when Chane Feldstone awoke. For an instant he didn't know where he was. He blinked and looked around. The hut was wide open, shutters thrown back and door standing ajar. Cabinets stood open and empty, and the cool breezes of autumn wafted through, carrying the sounds of birdcall and small creatures – sounds that Chane abruptly realized he hadn't heard since coming into this strange valley in the wilderness. Near the door, the wizard Glenshadow lay asleep on a rush mat.

Chane stretched and stood, feeling stiff from sleeping at the table, his hammer still slung on his back. Recalling the night before, he fumbled with the lashing on his pouch and looked inside. The red crystal was there, secure. He touched his forehead, then brought his hammer around, using its polished surface as a mirror. The red spot was still on his face, just above his nose, but it was less vivid now, less noticeable.

Still, his mind was full of information that he knew had not been there before.

He looked around at a small sound. The kender was just strolling in through the open door.

"The Irda is gone," the small creature said sadly. "I can't find her anywhere. And I guess she took her kitty cats with her, because I didn't find any of them, either."

'Then I guess she was through here," Chane said, assembling his packs and straps. "It doesn't matter, though. I know which way to go from here."

Part II

There was a time once, rumor had it, when trade routes had linked the realms of Ansalon in a more or less reliable fashion from Palanthas and

Vingaard Keep in the north, through Solamnia, Abanasinia, and Pax Tharkas, all the way south to Thorbardin. And maybe even beyond.

Wingover had heard the stories and felt that they probably were true, though he had never met anyone who could confirm them. He had seen a good bit of the known world in his forty or so years and had dealt with all kinds of people. He knew the value that the elves of Qualinost put on grains and foodstuffs from Solamnia. Mountain-bound Thorbardin traded for grains and spices, as did his own homeland of Abanasinia. And he had seen in Abanasinia and Solamnia – among those who could afford them – plenty of tools and weapons created by the dwarves of Thorbardin, as well as fine textiles from Qualinost.

Fibers and fabrics, feathers and furs… comestibles, combustibles, and exotic baubles – every land he had seen in his travels possessed an abundance in some commodities and shortages in others.

Somewhere in the past there had probably been extensive trade all over

Ansalon. But trade now – and for all the lifetime Wingover and those he knew could remember – was erratic and hazardous. "It's the way of the world," he himself had said more than once. "There's always someone more determined to make a killing than the rest are to make a living."

"Poor, ravaged Krynn," some poets called the world. But Wingover had no real quarrel with the nature of things. It was the only world he had ever known, and in some respects the very combativeness of its races aided him in his endeavors. Their aloofness, their distrust of one another, made the commodities they all sought even more precious. Sometimes Wingover hired out as a trail guide, sometimes as an escort for traders. And sometimes, as now, he carried a pack himself – usually on a bet.

This time the bet was with the mountain dwarf trader, Rogar Goldbuckle.

Over tankards of ale at the Inn of the Flying Pigs in Barter, Goldbuckle had wagered that Wingover could never make it alive from Barter to Pax

Tharkas and back, carrying a pack of goods from his agents at Pax Tharkas.

The return on the sealed pack would be small compared to what it would cost Rogar Goldbuckle to pay his gambling debt.

It had been no mean adventure, this journey. Wingover had chosen his routes with care, going north to Pax Tharkas by one route and returning by another to avoid ambushers and other unpleasantries of the wilderness. He had ridden alert and slept with his senses awake, and still there had been incidents – the cave ogre that had almost killed him on a mountain trail somewhere near Wayreth Forest; the landslide that had blocked his path just south of Pax Tharkas; the band of murderous thieves that had picked up his trail on Regret Ridge and pursued until he was forced to teach them some manners; the flooded ford that had forced him to change course. It was that flooded ford that led him into the hidden valley where the bird had screamed a warning at him, and where he had barely escaped with his life when a pack of huge hunting cats chased him.

All that, and goblins, too.

Wingover shook his head now in perplexity. Why were there goblins south of Pax Tharkas? He had never heard of goblins in these lands. Other places, of course, but not here. It reminded him of the talk he had heard in Pax Tharkas – dire rumors, all hazy and confusing, of omens and prophesies, of strange sightings in remote places.