"Of course I'll stay," Bram said firmly.

He stayed to put flour sacks over the last two limbs to turn into writhing snakes. He stayed through the long, cruel afternoon, the stillness broken only by the muffled hissing of the snakes and Nahamkin's pain- racked gasps. It was increasingly difficult, then impossible, for Nahamkin to speak through the pain. Bram couldn't even hold the dying man's hand.

The light through the rotted thatch faded quickly. As darkness grew in the hut, Nahamkin began whimpering and mumbling softly. Bram leaned in close to hear.

I'm dying, Bram, and I can feel it. It's spreading, I can feel it moving up my legs. It's death."

Bram pulled back the thin cover from Nahamkin's legs. Instead of flesh, he saw gray stone. The snakes still moved listlessly, but as the grayness crept along the limbs, the snakes' movements slowed and finally stopped. Bram touched Nahamkin's leg; it was stone, hard and cold. Looking up, he saw that the change had advanced all the way up Nahamkin's torso to his neck and jaw. Numb, Bram watched without flinching as his friend's eyes slowly clouded over and turned black as coals. "Close your lids, Nahamkin," he said gently. The old man complied, for he could no longer see. Within moments, as Krynn's three moons rose and the last traces of sunlight slipped away, his face, too, transformed to ashen gray stone.

Bram scarcely breathed. The snakes were deathly still beneath their bags, so Bram risked removing the flour sacks. The snakes on Nahamkin's arms popped up like whips, snapping at Bram. He stumbled back and nearly fell from the loft. "Guerrrannnd," they hissed. In unison, they fell like limp rope back to the cot, turned gray, and were silent.

Heart hammering, Bram knew there could be no

doubt now that the illness was magical.

The light in the refectory was dim, coming from two listing, bad-smelling candles. The castle had not seen beeswax, or even good-quality tallow, in at least a year. It was just as well, because the room looked less shabby when so little of it was visible beyond the long table. Rietta had moved the last of the castle's finely crafted furniture from the large formal dining hall to this communal eating area because this room was smaller and more easily heated. Also, it was closer to the kitchen, important now that they had only one downstairs servant, Gildee the cook.

There were no tapestries here to prevent drafts, and no point in moving the rotted and faded ones from the formal hall. The bare limestone blocks radiated cold, even on the hottest summer day.

"I couldn't help noticing you have new boots, dear," Bram's mother was saying.

"Hmmm?" He turned unseeing eyes to his right, where Rietta was seated at the head of the table. Her black hair was pulled back in a severe knot, and her gown was an old, dun-colored, high-necked affair with grease at the embroidered cuffs.

"Your boots," she prompted, delicately spooning up her carrot soup. "They're new. Where did you get them?"

"Kirah gave them to me for my birthday six days ago," he supplied absently.

"I wonder where the little lunatic got the coin for iiuit," muttered Rietta. "Very likely she stole them."

"I doubt it." Bram knew better than to do much more to defend his aunt to his mother; both of them always came away believing what they would.

"Anyway," Rietta continued in her loud, authoritative voice, "I hope you're not considering going back to the village again to help any of those people."

"You mean your subjects?" Bram asked with a bite in his tone. He shrugged. "I hadn't thought that far, but I 11 go if summoned again." Fiddling his spoon in his thin orangy soup, he gave a self-deprecating snort.

Not that I'll be able to help any of them."

Gildee set a pot of mashed winter parsnips on the table between Bram and Rietta, then backed away.

There's been two more cases in the village since old Nahamkin passed on," she breathed, her fear evident.

Who are-were they?" Bram asked quickly.

That will be all, Gildee," Rietta snapped. The ner- •• ou› cook continued backing through the door to the kitchen. Rietta turned dark eyes upon her son. "The DtThons have not sunk so low that we are now converses with the servants at the table, Bram." Rietta gave a dismissive twitch of her lips. "You forget, there's a perfectly competent physicker in the village-"

'Competent?" howled Bram. "Herus's solution is to kill the victims."

"I hear he's ordered people to kill every snake they can find," Rietta remarked. "Still, people say it hasn't reduced the unusual number of them this spring."

Bram's expression was still troubled. "He's addressing the symptoms of the disease, not the cause of it."

Rietta leaned back in astonishment. "And what, may I ask, is wrong with that?"

Bram could only gape at her in disbelief.

Rietta's nose lifted in the air. "I don't care to speak further of such hideous things at the dinner table."

Bram laughed. "Which of us won't be at the dinner table tomorrow?" He shrugged carelessly and fell against the back of his chair. "It's impossible to predict."

Rietta gasped, a hand pressed to her lips. "We're all fine at Castle DiThon. The disease doesn't exist here."

"Yet."

She looked at her son with annoyance. "You've been moody and distracted since you returned from that cotter's."

Bram flushed, his gaze fastened to his soup bowl. Since Nahamkin's death the night before, he had thought of nothing but the snakes who had hissed his Uncle Guerrand's name.

"Why have you taken so much of the burden of this illness on yourself, Bram?" his mother pressed. "You aren't responsible for the cause or cure of this affliction."

"I'm not so sure of that." Still, Bram held in the secret. "I remember a day when a lord's primary responsibility was the welfare of his subjects."

"Is that what this is about?" she demanded. "You think I should expose myself to illness just to help some peasants? Well, I won't do it! Mark my words," Rietta continued, "this plague is heavenly retribution against the villagers for their lazy and dissolute ways. It can be no accident that it hasn't struck here yet."

Bram's temper exploded. "You've practically sealed

off the castle, that's why!"

Rietta's thin shoulders lifted dismissively. "We lead virtuous, worthwhile lives."

Bram laughed without humor. "Do you really believe we DiThons are anything but blue-blooded peasants?" He waved his hands at the squalor in the refectory. Bram couldn't help reflecting that, in many ways, Nahamkin's drafty hovel was more appealing. At least it had a surplus of straight candles.

Rietta frowned darkly at her son. "I didn't raise you to speak to me this way," she said. "You are not so old, nor have we sunk so far, that I'll allow it now." Her tone, meant more to inspire guilt than fear, had been rehearsed to perfection on Bram his entire lifetime.

"The cause of this curse is obvious."

Both Bram and Rietta turned in surprise to look at Cormac, alone in shadow at the far end of the long table. The tall man's head was slumped onto his barrel- shaped chest as usual. Even in the dark Bram could see his father's red-veined nose and that his clothing was way too small for his obese trunk. At least his words weren't slurred, which suggested Cormac had gone easier on the watered-down bottle he usually nursed.

"Who said anything about a curse?" demanded Rietta. "You haven't left the castle walls in four years, Cormac. What could you possibly know about this illness-or anything, for that matter?"

Bram had long since stopped wincing when his mother sliced into his father like this. When he was young, his parents had always bickered. Bram had accepted early on that there was no love lost between them, had seen it as the way of things. But all the bluster had been knocked out of Cormac. Rietta's spiteful remarks, or even Bram's own thoughtful comments, usually went unnoticed.