Lemuel found him sound asleep. The mage kindly covered the young man with a blanket, then left him sleeping.

Raistlin woke in late afternoon, groggy and stupid from a nap he had never intended to take. He had a stiff neck, and

the back of his head ached where he had leaned

against the chair. A sudden fear seized him that he had slept too long and missed the "miracle" slated for tonight at

the temple. A glance at a pool of sunshine, meandering lazily through a screen of window-climbing ivy, reassured

him. Rubbing the back of his neck, he threw off the blanket and went in search of his host. Fortunately he knew

where to find him.

Lemuel was in his garden, working diligently, although he did not appear to have made much progress in his

preparations for moving.

He confessed as much to Raistlin. "I start to do one thing, and then I think of another and I drop the first and

move to the second, only to recall that I simply must do a third before either of them, so I leave to attend to that, only

to recall that the first had to be done in advance He sighed. "I'm not getting along very fast."

He gazed sadly at the upheaval that surrounded him-overturned pots, mounds of dirt, holes where plants had

been uprooted. The plants themselves, looking forlorn and naked, lying on the ground with their roots shivering.

"I suppose it's because I've never been anywhere else but here. And I don't want to be anywhere else. To tell you

the truth, I haven't even decided yet where I'm going. Do you think I would like Solace?"

"Perhapsyou won't have to move after all," Raistlin said, unable to witness Lemuel's suffering without making

some attempt to alleviate it. He couldn't tell his intent, but he could hint. "Perhaps something will happen that will

cause Belzor's faithful to leave you alone."

"A second Cataclysm? Fiery mountains raining down on their heads?" Lemuel smiled wanly. "That's too much to

hope for, but thank you for the thought. Did you find what you were looking for?"

"My studies went well," said Raistlin gravely. "And will you stay for supper?"

"No thank you, sir. 1 must return to the fairgrounds. My friends will be concerned about me. And please, sir,"

Raistlin said by way of farewell, "do not give up hope. I have a feeling you will be here long after Belzor has gone."

Lemuel was considerably astonished at this and would have asked more questions had not Raistlin pointed out

that the tulip bulbs were in danger of being carried away by a squirrel. Lemuel dashed off to the rescue. Raistlin

checked for the twentieth time to make certain the scroll case hung from his belt, took his grateful leave, and

departed.

"I wonder what he's up to..." Lemuel mused. Having chased off the thief, he watched Raistlin walk up the road in

the direction of the fairgrounds. "He wasn't copying out any sleep spell, that's for certain. I may not be much of a

mage, but even I could pull off a snooze without writing it down. No, he was copying something far more advanced,

well beyond his novitiate rank. And all that about something happening to the Belzorites..."

Lemuel chewed worriedly on a sprig of mint. "I suppose I should try to stop him...." He considered this option,

shook his head. "No. It would be like trying to stop a gnomish juggernaut once it's in gear and rolling downhill. He

would not listen to me, and of course there's no reason why he should. What do I know? And he might have a chance

of succeeding. There's a lot going on behind those fox-fire eyes of his. A lot going on."

Muttering to himself, Lemuel started to return to his digging. He stood a moment, holding the trowel and staring

down at his once tranquil garden, now in a state of chaos.

"Perhaps I should just wait and see what tomorrow brings," he said to himself, and after covering the roots of the

plants he had already dug up, making certain that they were warm and damp, he went inside to eat his supper.

Raistlin arrived back at the fairgrounds just in time to prevent Caramon from turning out the town guard in

search of him. "I was busy," he replied testily, in response to his brother's

persistent questioning. "Have you done as I ordered?"

"Kept hold of Tasslehoff?" Caramon heaved a long-suffering sigh. "Yes, between Sturm and me, we've

managed, but I never want to have to go through anything like that again so long as I live. We had him occupied

this morning, or at least we thought we did. Sturm said he wanted to look at Tas's maps. Tas dumped them all

out, and he and Sturm spent an hour going over them. I guess I must have dozed off. Sturm got interested in

looking at a map of Solamnia, and by the time I woke up and we realized what was what, the kender was gone."

Raistlin frowned.