And so, in the darkest hours of the Armistice night, a small longboat slipped away from the swan ship and struggled through the waves toward the forbidding shoreline of Rakhar.

Chapter Fifteen

Teldin was on the upper deck when the returning longboat was sighted. The search party brought water and tales of a hot spring inhabited by a monster similar to a remorhaz and guarded by yetilike creatures. The elves guessed that the yeti probably were bugbears-one of the more abundant goblinoid races-who had uniquely adapted to the climate of Armistice. These creatures had put up a token fight but had not given chase.

Vallus was puzzled by this uncharacteristic behavior. According to his theory, the Armistice goblins would do anything to obtain spelljamming materials. In addition to this, bugbears were notorious and vicious carnivores, highly unlikely to let such tempting game as an elven search party escape their stew pots. After a typically long-winded elven discussion, Vallus conceded that they should further investigate the situation on shore.

Teldin volunteered to lead the search party, a notion that Vallus quickly shot down. The elven wizard argued, convincingly, that taking the cloak into goblinoid territory was a foolhardy risk. Raven stepped in to fill the breach, and, with a uncharacteristic burst of bravado, Rozloom quickly signed on with her. Om followed the aperusa like a small brown shadow, and they rounded out the party with a couple of elves, both of them skilled rangers and fighters.

With a deep sense of unease, Teldin watched the longboat pull away a second time. It was difficult for him to send others into danger; he would have preferred to go himself.

Raven, on the other hand, felt grateful for a change of scenery. The swan ship was becoming much too confining, and her gold and silver eyes gleamed at the prospect of adventure. Her sojourn aboard the Trumpeter was tedious but necessary. She needed time to observe Teldin Moore, to make sure he really was the one she sought.

Think of it, she mused dreamily as she struggled with her oar. Her name, Celestial Nightpearl, forever a part of the Spelljammer legends. In every known sphere songs would be sung about her, and races not yet discovered would know her name and stand in awe of her glory. By Bahamut, it was wonderful! she mused, in praise of the god of good dragons.

She had learned something about the Spelljammer that few others had imagined: it was a living being of vast and mysterious intelligence. Centuries of study had brought her to the grudging conclusion that the ship-creature was even more powerful and brilliant than a radiant dragon, and she'd decided early on that the venerable Celestial Nightpearl would never play second zither to an overgrown boat.

Yet the pull of the great ship was difficult to resist, and several times the dragon had nearly succumbed to the seeking, compelling voice of the Spelljammer. In Teldin Moore she saw a possible solution: a captain to take her place. The way she saw it, the only other way to be free of the Spelljammer was to die, and she had no intention of doing that anytime in the next millennium or two.

The question remained: Was Teldin Moore an appropriate choice? After observing the human for many days, she'd become quite impressed with him. People tended to like and trust him, which was a mark in his favor. He had an honest, decent core to him, and she had little doubt that he'd stick with whatever bargain they struck. She'd had a hard time dragon-charming the man, which, though annoying, was another huge mark in his favor. The dragon was very close to offering him a deal, but something held her back. To her way of thinking, an aspirant to the captain's chair of the Spelljammer should have a deep, true love of adventure and a bold spirit. Teldin Moore did not lack strength, nor was he timid, but he didn't seem inclined to take charge. To her eye, he was drifting in the stream of events. She suspected that unless things changed, he would never survive the challenges that awaited a potential captain aboard the great ship. She knew a little of these things, enough to make her fear for the man she had chosen to be her surrogate. Guilt was out of the question, of course. Such trivial emotions were utterly foreign to a radiant dragon.

The scraping of rocks against the bottom of the longboat brought Raven's attention back to the mission. She wasn't exactly thrilled with her crew. Gaston Willowmere, the first mate, had an unreasonable grudge against moon elves. The other elf, a gorgeous female warrior of sorts who was named after some plant or other, had a nasty habit of upstaging her. Om was a gnome-enough said-though remarkably taciturn for the species, Bahamut be praised. Fear and cold had reduced the voluble Rozloom to silence, which was just fine with Raven. The aperusa had crossed the line between adulation and familiarity once too often.

The odd search party came ashore without incident and skirted the hot springs, not wanting to alert the bugbears to its presence. The night was uncommonly clear, and the winds were calm. After wading through the snow for an hour or so, the party members found two sets of bearlike tracks and followed them to the base of one of the two large mountains. Beneath a rocky overhang was a tunnel into the frozen ground. The search party exchanged uncertain glances.

"I say we go in," Raven voted, stooping down to peer into the opening. "That boring wizard of yours says the goblin people live underground."

"Agreed," Rozloom said firmly. He struck a heroic pose, one meaty fist clasped over his heart. "I will stand guard here."

With an amused smile, Raven nodded to the aperusa. A coward he undoubtedly was, but even if he were as brave as a dracon, he'd have to stay behind. Rozloom stood several inches above six feet and was prodigiously broad; she doubted he'd fit the tunnel ahead.

Rozloom forgotten, Raven turned her attention back to the tunnel. It sloped downhill at an alarming angle and rounded a sharp corner after a few feet. It was wide enough, but none too tall. Either the orcs on this world were a petite variety, or they'd stumbled upon the servant's entrance, noted the disguised dragon.

She slipped into the tunnel, followed by the elves and gnome. Fortunately her elven body came equipped with night vision, so she was able to discern patterns of heat in the rock. There was little heat to be had anywhere on Armistice, but a faint red glow gradually increased as they made their way along the winding path.

Finally they came out on a walkway that overlooked a vast, natural cavern. Raven grabbed Gaston's arm and pulled him down behind the cover of a large boulder, then she motioned for the others to do the same. Thus hidden, she turned her attention to the bizarre scene that sprawled out before them.

A large hot spring bubbled and gushed in the center of the chamber-that would account for the heat, Raven supposed, not counting the scattering of dung-fueled fires. Phosphorescent fungi grew along the base of the walls and lent a sickly green glow to the cavern. This light was augmented by a few oil lamps made from large mollusk shells. The lamps emitted more rancid smoke than light, but after the darkness of the tunnel the chamber seemed as bright as highsun.

Although the scenery was as dismal as any Raven had seen, more disturbing was the chamber's occupants. The place was littered with goblinkin of every description. There were the squat, deeply furred bugbears the first elven party had mistaken for yeti, packs of tiny, pale gray kobolds, and slightly larger goblins. The orcs were the most grotesque mutation. Although they still had the tusks, wolflike ears, and upturned snouts common to orcs, centuries of living underground had compacted more orc into less space. They appeared to be no taller than five feet, and their barrellike chests and large arms brought to mind dwarven warriors. They had no fur, but their hides appeared to have thickened to an unnatural degree. All of the creatures ranged in color from pale gray to dirty white, and almost without exception they were unclothed. Most of the weapons Raven saw were crude mallets: carved stone lashed to a long bone with a length of dried sinew. A few orcs carried deeply pitted blades or axes-family heirlooms or war trophies, Raven supposed. Armistice was metal-poor and lacked fur-bearing animals, so the goblin races didn't have much to work with. The "culture" that had evolved was squalid, brutal, and apparently chaotic.