Dragonlance 02 - Dragons of Winter Night Read Online Free PDF Page A

bear, his arsenal of weapons clanking around him, carrying his armor and his share of supplies, as well as those of his twin brother, Raistlin, on his back. Just watching Caramon made Tanis weary, for the big warrior was not only walking through the deep snow with ease but was also managing to widen the trail for the others behind him.
    Of all of the companions the one Tanis might have felt closest to, since they had been raised together as brothers, was the next, Gilthanas. But Gilthanas was an elflord, younger son of the Speaker of the Suns, ruler of the Qualinesti elves, while Tanis was a bastard and only half elven, product of a brutal rape by a human warrior. Worse, Tanis had dared to find himself attracted—even if in a childish, immature fashion—to Gilthanas’s sister, Laurana. And so, far from being friends,Tanis always had the uneasy impression that Gilthanas might well be pleased to see him dead.
    Riverwind and Goldmoon walked together behind the elflord. Cloaked in their furskin capes, the cold was little to the Plainsmen. Certainly the cold was nothing compared to the flame in their hearts. They had been married only a little over a month, and the deep love and compassion each felt for the other, a self-sacrificing love that had led the world to the discovery of the ancient gods, now achieved greater depths as they discovered new ways to express it.
    Then came Elistan and Laurana. Elistan and Laurana. Tanis found it odd that, thinking enviously of the happiness of Riverwind and Goldmoon, his eyes should encounter these two. Elistan and Laurana. Always together. Always deeply involved in serious conversation. Elistan, cleric of Paladine, resplendent in white robes that gleamed even against the snow. White-bearded, his hair thinning, he was still an imposing figure. The kind of man who might well attract a young girl. Few men or women could look into Elistan’s ice-blue eyes and not feel stirred, awed in the presence of one who had walked the realms of death and found a new and stronger faith.
    With him walked his faithful ‘assistant,’ Laurana. The young elfmaid had run away from her home in Qualinesti to follow Tanis in childish infatuation. She had been forced to grow up rapidly, her eyes opened to the pain and suffering in the world. Knowing that many of the party—Tanis among them—considered her a nuisance, Laurana struggled to prove her worth. With Elistan she found her chance. Daughter to the Speaker of the Suns of the Qualinesti, she had been born and bred to politics. When Elistan was foundering among the rocks of trying to feed and clothe and control eight hundred men, women, and children, it was Laurana who stepped in and eased his burden. She had become indispensable to him, a fact Tanis found difficult to deal with. The half-elf gritted his teeth, letting his glance flick over Laurana to fall on Tika.
    The barmaid turned adventuress walked through the snow with Raistlin, having been asked by his brother to stay near the frail mage, since Caramon was needed up front. Neither Tika nor Raistlin seemed happy with this arrangement. The red-robed mage walked along sullenly, his head bowed against the wind. He was often forced to stop, coughing untilhe nearly fell. At these times, Tika would start to put her arm around him hesitantly, her eyes seeing Caramon’s worry. But Raistlin always pulled away from her with a snarl.
    The ancient dwarf came next, bowling along through the snow; the tip of his helm and the tassel “from the mane of a griffon” were all that were visible above the snow. Tanis had tried to tell him that griffons had no manes, that the tassel was horsehair. But Flint, stoutly maintaining that his hatred of horses stemmed from the fact that they made him sneeze violently, believed none of it. Tanis smiled, shaking his head. Flint had insisted on being at the front of the line. It was only after Caramon had pulled him out of three snow drifts that Flint agreed, grumbling, to walk