Join me as I review Heroes and Fools edited by Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman live! Share your thoughts on this second Tales of the Fifth Age anthology, released by Wizards of the Coast on July 1, 1999. You can buy a copy here: https://amzn.to/3LAVI2M 

A submarine trip to an island of ghosts. A band of fugitive actors. A deadly draconian who has had too much holiday punch. And veritable onslaught of dryads, shadow wights, and that rarest of all monsters, the dread forest boojum.

Also, from the team of Margaret Weis and Don Perrin, the latest adventure of Kang and his wayward troop of draconians.

In the proud tradition of the best-selling Dragonlance anthologies, Heroes and Fools promises a sometimes heroic — sometimes foolish — visit to the world of Krynn.

This was a fun way to start the anthology. We are introduced by a squad of Dark Knights led by Commander Khedriss Mennarling. They are needing to test out their new Death Machine, a cannon, and hear about a local monster called the Boojum from a drunk Thistleknot Tangletoe, the kender. A local in their ranks, Realthas, confirms this monster is a tale that is supposedly living in the area. The Dark Knights take the kender with his maps and search for the creature to test their Death machine on. They get to where it should live and are confronted with the Boojum which is really the Solamnic Knight friend of the kender’s in disguise. He eventually steps down after seeing the damage the cannon does and confronts them to fight. That is when the real Boojum approaches and starts taunting them and killing them one at a time, even destroying the cannon’s wheel. Some Dark Knights run off, as the Boojum faces off against the Solamnic Knight, and the Dark Knights try to fire the cannon one last time. It explodes, killing most of th eKnights, and seemingly the Solamnic as well, which Thistleknott cries over, only to discover the Boojum is working with the Solamnic, and they are acting. Then they go to investigate the cannon and discover that it’s a patent pending popcorn popper made by a gnome. This was a great new story featuring the kender and knight team, and an interesting idea that a seemingly innocuous gnome invention could end up being an actual war machine like a cannon. You know if they meant to make a cannon the end result would’ve been the same as well.

This was an oddly intimate tale of a dying dryad and a dying Knight of Takhisis. The dryad’s tree was dying due to the intense heat of the summer, and it wasn’t getting any needed rain, which in turn meant that the tree’s dryad was dying and her movement away from the tree was severely restricted. Then a Dark Knight and his blue dragon crashed near the tree. The knight eventually came to and asked for help, which the dryad couldn’t give, but the dryad asked for some of the water the knight had. He was pinned under his dead dragon. They spoke of honor and honesty and the cycle of life, and the dark knight gave her little capfulls of water which she summarily emptied onto the exposed root of her tree. In the end she pleaded for the water but the knight refused, however the knight finally accepted that he would die here as well and the water wouldn’t save him. So after the dryad passed out near death, the knight emptied his waterskin which gave the tree enough strength to fight for survival, reviving the dryad who reflected on the knight’s last gift. This is such a great reminder of our place as human animals amid nature. Through our DNA we are connected to every living thing from plants to animals on this planet, yet we act as though we are separate from it all, witnessing it as if our actions have no impact on nature. Even when we are told that our actions have caused the sixth mass extinction, we take no meaningful action to prevent further death and destruction to the only place in this universe we know that we can live. I hope that our species will follow the dark knight’s actions in this tale, for when we go extinct ourselves, we do what we can to ensure other life will continue.

This story is about a bard named Dayn who is traveling the land, singing for his supper. He comes across a town which migrates to a temple of Paladine every year for berries and blessings. This year a young woman’s son stole berries before they were supposed to, and while the bard was singing for his supper, a mob began to form when the mother of the boy admonished the priests for trying to discipline the boy, as they haven’t healed or done anything for the people since the Chaos War. The mob started moving to the priests when the bard stepped in and tried to sing of the Heroes of the Lance to pacify the crowd, it only turned the mob against him. He was saved by a large warrior who rode them to safety. He told the bard to sing of current heroes, not past wars and events. Lift up spirits with modern tales of heroism. He told the bard he was en route to kill a dragon and the bard could accompany him. In truth th eman was going to kill a large lizard that was killing the farmer’s sheep, and used a poison pig and rockslide to kill it rather than fighting it, but when the bard questioned him about it, the warrior spoke of fighting smart not harder. On the way back he convinced the bard that people needed these embellished stories to lift their spirits and the bard came around and agreed. They were welcomed as heroes at supper when the song was sung of their victory over the dragon, and the duo decided to work together as they traveled across Ansalon. I like the story, we do need distractions in tumultuous times, I think that is why I am burying my head in these pulp fantasy novels, to distract myself from the current state of my country and the economy. But you know what, it works most of the time, and I appreciate the distraction.

This is a story about two sellswords who were former dragonarmy soldiers. One is telling the other a gnome story about the gnome Rumtuggle. The truth is, Rumtuggle was a made up gnome to explain random mishaps and theft in the green dragonarmy, but once the gnome was invented he took on a life of his own. Gnomes from nearby communities have learned of this Rumtuggle and since he wasn’t in their community, they believed the Green Dragon army must have him captive. They demanded his release, and since the gnome didn’t exist, they couldn’t release him. So the gnomes stole their cattle. This caused a massive supply problem and when the gnomes continued to refuse to give the cattle back until Rumtuggle was released, the soldier said he killed Rumtuggle. This led to the gnomes catapulting the cattle back one at a time. Now the Dragonarmy sent a new highlord to the camp to deal with this gnomish threat and they ended up fighting in the rain and fog, against themselves. They ended up believing it was gnomish sorcery that turned them against themselves, and the soldier who made it all up, quit the post. It was a really fun tale about a story taking on a life of its own and everyone willing to believe it, no matter how absurd it was. When I was in high school, I had a friend convince me that he gave me drugs when really he didn’t. I truly felt like I was high, and it was all the power of my mind, convincing me of it. I learned then the power of our imagination, and because of that, I could actually see this story happening. It was great!

Whoa. This was a brutal tale. It’s about a n assassin named Griff Rees, who began his career after a man murdered his family and took him into the service of the Dark Queen before the Chaos War. Now a hired assassin renowned across the land, he is hiring a dwarf named Broc to help him with a job. They are both approached by a young woman named Olwynn Haugh who needs a guard to Haven. They refuse as they have a job already then she shows them the money and jewels and memory strikes Griff. He immediately accepts the job and they go the following day. They are traveling past Prayers Eye Peak and a band of men and goblins attack. They fight their way through and go into Darken Wood. There they stay for a night when they are discovered again, and fight the bandits off, except Olwynn dies. It turns out Olwynn is the daughter of the man that killed Griff’s family, and Olwynn’s daughter Cae is now the only way for the two assassins to get to the man in Haven. They take the baby and over time work through Darken Wood into Haven. They locate Egil Adare, who used to be named Ash Guth as Griff knew him. They relay his daughter’s death and produce the granddaughter. Griff calls him by his old name and recognition then fear sets into the man’s eyes. He pleads for his life and Griff is relishing the moment then eventually murders the man. He ends up taking the child to Estwild and raising her there. His pain and loss of his family finally abated as he cares for this new child without a family. There was a time when I thought he was going to kill the child, but I really like the trope that innocent children can soften even the hardest men’s hearts. Especially men who lost their souls as children, see a vicarious life in the children. It was a bit of a long-winded story, but I appreciated it none-the-less.

Now this was a crazy story where characters kept swapping around. It was a bit much. Roder, a stableboy, but presenting as a Knight of Takhisis, is delivering a dispatch from one lord to another. He comes across a woman dressed as a man who tells him bandits have taken his sister. The knight goes after the bandits with this boy and is captured by the bandits in the middle of the night. The merchant is revealed to be Lord Sandys, the leader of one of the two brigand groups in the area. He is also a she. She believes Roder is  aspy as his dispatch doesn’t have any words on it. Roder has no idea about it, and tries to break free as knights charge in and arrest the Lord Sandys gang and some of the other rival gangs. They are all taken back to the castle and it is revealed Roder was distracted. As Teffen is revealed to be a female and Lord Sandys, she and her men are to be killed on the morrow. She praises Roder who his lord mocks as nothing but a stableboy, and this upsets Roder. The next day, Sandys escapes and is headed off by Roder who tells her he is letting her go because of what she said. She kisses him and runs into the forest saying she will see him again. This story set up a whole lot of potential tales. I really loved it. While it was obvious that the merchant was lord Sandys, her being a girl and her sister being a boy, and the knight Roder being a stableboy was all too pointless and seemed to make the story muddier than it needed to be, however, it did make me want to read more about Roder and Sandys.

This was a fun little tale. It starts with a Master wizard named Laudus and his apprentice Cedwick preparing to go to the Tower of High Sorcery for a conclave to discuss the missing magic. Then a kender appears at the door and Laudus tells Cedwick to get rid of him. The kender, Halivar Wizard Slayer says that he destroyed magic, and that he kills wizards. He has three spellbooks to prove it. While the apprentice is trying to figure out how the kender knows about the council to tell him that he is the reason magic is gone, a cannon explodes and a ball hits the tower. Gnomes come wheeling in saying that they captured magic in a gnomish device, and that is why magic is gone. They all reveal that they learned about the conclave from a drunk wizard. The kender and gnomes argue about who is right when a gully dwarf appears claiming that she had magic, and hands over a dead frog. Now all three begin fighting and Laudus appears, sends a smoke bomb out which pacifies the beings, and his apprentice is hauled inside to get a scolding. When he returns he tells them all that he truly appreciated their help and that they would have to all study really hard together to determine where magic went, forsaking their wanderlust, gully dwarf stew and gnomish lifequests in the process. One by one, each creature politely declines and leaves. When they are all gone, the master arrives with a horse and they head off to the conclave. It’s just a short, fun little moment that showcases the personalities of the three races perfectly, and puts them in the Age of Mortals in a delightful way.

This is a continuation of the story from the preceding anthology about Daev the heretic cleric who escaped death with the help of Kela, the fake pregnant woman. They are now on the road with the kender Frenni when they come across a man named Samael who wants them to print his Alchemist’s Handbook. He makes potions but can’t pay for the printing. So they decide to enlist him in their acting troupe and they head out to the next town. The play is written by Daev and it is a love story, but they use the potions to make sure the audience is invested in the plays. Back at their hometown, Palak of the Joyous and Faithful Guard who tried to have Daev executed, goes to Tulaen, an assassin, to hire him to find and kill Daev. As Tulaen heads out, the acting troupe begins printing the books, putting the protons together as ingredients and practicing the play. The kender accidentally misprints the handbook so the customers all mix the potions incorrectly and have random reactions to it as the play begins. Tulaen arrives in the final act and attacks Daev as the whole troupe attacks him, and the audience watches as if it’s part of the play, reacting crazily due to the potions they all took. In the end, Tulaen has a potion of love blown into his face and falls for a dominating woman from the crowd, and the troupe flees the city, planning on their next play and printing. It was a fun story, and I really like that it was a continuation of another story that I felt needed more. This certainly gave it more, and I hope there is yet another short story in the third anthology of this trilogy.

This story involves Deial, a young woman who is trying to get the  affection of a man named Quinn, who she has been in love with since childhood. Quin has loved a girl named Taya who has been absent, presumed dead. Demial recovered a magical staff from a grey wizard and has been using its magic to help her try to get Quinn’s attention. She helps clear a mine that was collapsed by Ariakan’s army, and once it’s clear, she will use the staff and Quinn will love her. That is her plan anyway. Then one day Taya shows up, but she is broken, nearly dead. Quinn immediately goes to pay her attention and care for her, and Demial is furious. Taya used to be a mean girl to her in youth. She takes her turn to watch over taya and sees how brutally she has been treated in the war. Eventually Taya wakes and tells Demial that she saw in the war, how she fought for Ariakan’s side, and picked up the grey wizards staff and continued fighting, inspiring all around her. She said that she wouldn’t tell anyone, but she wanted Demial to kill her. She is going to die anyway, and wants to be put out of her misery. It takes a lot, but eventually Demial uses the magic of her staff, the last magic it held, to kill Taya. She walked away and sat beside a fire and Quinn came. He told her Taya was dead and started laughing, saying that he killed her. He wished she was dead. He has always loved Demial, not Taya, but he saw how jealous it made Demial so he continued the ruse. His perfect plan to open the mine and become the town’s leader with Demial at his side was nearly complete. But Demial’s perfect plan of getting Quinn, opening the mine was not part of being his second. She told him she had to think, and left. This is great, how one person’s machinations are nearly aligned with another’s but doesn’t want to be subservient to another. She knew what she wanted till she got it, and quite frankly, Quinn is a shit ass for treating her like that their whole lives. I would be perfectly fine with Demial walking away from him. I enjoyed the love triangle story, but it was much longer than it had to be.

Now this was a wonderful story. Mendel is a Black Robed wizard losing his power in the Age of Mortals. He used existing magical items to bring him power as he drains them. One day a thief steals from him, and he sets a trap with a  black robe friend. The female offers the thief Vandor a job and it leads him into Mendle’s trap, making him a spectre in a mirror. He uses the promise of returning him to his body to force the spectre Vandor to steam magic items for him, as he can now live in any reflection and travel at his master’s whim. He is sent after The Acryan Crest, a magical brooch held by the red robe Thorin Prester. As Candor is searching he finds the brooch being used as a hair pin on a child. The shield’s mother and Prester’s wife gave it to her. Candor takes it, but the child wakes and nearly takes it back, but when she sees that Vandor starts burning up when out of the mirror, she lets him go. As he is traveling back, the brooch vanishes. When he returns empty handed he is punished, and is promised that if he finds the brooch in one day he will get his body back. If not he will be destroyed. So he goes back to Prester’s home, believing the brooch to be gone. But finds it in the girl’s hair again. She relays fairy tales about ancient wizards of evil and heroes of good, and says Vandor is like the good night and Mendel is like an evil wizard. She gives Vandor the brooch to alleviate his torment and when he delivers it, Mendel says his body was destroyed thirty years ago! Then the child wizard begins attacking Mendel through the brooch. This infuriates Vandor and he tries to attack Mendel to no effect, but it distracts him long enough for Mendel to be pulled into the brooch and it disappears, presumably back to the child. Now vandor is free as a ghost to wander. It was a nice tale by Knaak who, when he deviated from Huma and Kaz, proves that he still has great stories to tell. 

A Sivak draconian leaps out from hiding and attacks a dwarf who exclaims, great Reorx, as the draconian kills him. He needs the dwarfs’ visage to continue through the land. He passes into a town called Neidarbard and everyone is stinking drunk from a festival. The mayor is totally wasted and a kender asks the dwarf if he is Reorx. He recalls the dwarf whose body he took saying Reorx, and says yes, I am Reorx. This causes a massive drunken series of dwarves, and kender asking him if he is truly the god Reorx, and he says that he is, but he has to go and get the other gods. They all are too drunk to appreciate the urgency and praise him, begging him to taste their food and ale, and dance. The Sivak is thirsty and hungry, and relents. He has time before his form shifts back, so he indulges. Too much. Then two dwarves get stuck in a hive of honey and the town clamors for him to save them. He reluctantly goes into the hive and saves one, then on the way out kills the other, assumes his form, and tells the town that Reorx saved them and left to free the other gods. It was a clever story that brought about the realities of Draconians in an entertaining way, and leaves you wanting more. Just one more story proving Jean Rabe is a good author.

This was a touching continuation of the story The Last Thane, as the remaining Hylar clan leaves Thorbardin. They come to a massive ravine that, on the far side, has a bunch of Niedar dwarves guarding it. Tarn, Belicia and Barzak are surveying the bridge and decide to go talk with the dwarves to see if they can pass the bridge. But the Niedar refuse, bringing up old rivalries from the Cataclysm between hill and mountain dwarves. Barzak wants to just rush and kill the hill dwarves, but Tarn refuses, then Barzak suggests a duel on Reorx’s name. Whoever wins, decides the outcome. They approach the hill dwarves again and give the suggestion, they accept it. The battle is evenly matched between Barzak and Katzynn, and just when Katzynn is about to die, he crushes Barzak’s head with his hammer. Belicia breaks down in tears, and Tarn comforts her, not sure what will come of them. But then Katzynn returns a necklace to Tarn from Barzak’s corpse and throws his hammer over the bridge with tears in his eyes. He allows the Hylar to pass. This was such a touching tale which showed that even the most long lasting blood rivalries can be tossed aside if you just will it. There is no reason to hate others due to something that happened hundreds of years before, and there is no reason the death of a good Dwarf should condemn others. 

Wow this was a truly fantastic story, a real horror story! It’s all written as a memoir of a minotaur named Red Horn. He was hired by a human named Drommel who wanted to go to the island of Enstar and search for treasure there, knowing that there was a Lord Dwerlen who was wealthy. The island is uninhabited but it has shadow wights there, which erase you from the university, hence the horror story, and to counter them, Dromel had supposed Dragonlance spear heads. He had a shipwright build him an underwater boat, a gnome worked on inventing, and hired on a Kender named Twig, a Kagonesti named Hunter, and the gnome Pate. They all left and arrived at Enstar without problem. They started to explore and the gnome was disappeared by the wights, causing confusion. Then they found the keep of Lord Dwerlen and the Kagonesti disappeared. The story is so great as it presents the confusion of the missing people perfectly, and the horror of the survivors. The three remaining are chased out of the keep by wights and make a massive bonfire. The minotaur gives Twig some herbs that knock her out to prevent her from rambling as they are all terrified of the wights surrounding them, whispering to them. She doesn’t wake till the end. Then Dromel leaves red a note about how he’s sorry for bringing them here and he needs to atone for it, but he’s disappeared too, and red has no idea how they got to this ship, or who the author of the letter is. Finally, the minotaur leaves twig and disappears and the last entry is the kender waking to find herself on this strange ship in the middle of the ocean. I really loved this story as it highlights the terror of the Chaos War wonderfully, and how there are still places you have to avoid, or else!

This was a wonderful story. A welcome return to kang and the First Dragonarmy Field Engineers. They had just retrieved the draconian females from Thorbardin, and they are keeping them in sacks to protect them. They let them out once and nearly lost them all. Kang is overprotective and keeps them safe. They are traveling to a rumored city that could be their home once they clear out the undead. Suddenly goblins attack. It seems that the goblin commander has sent them after the draconians, a move that is uncommon. The draconian scouts report that there is a temple of Paladine nearby, and with the gods gone, they decide to take shelter and defense within it. It turns out that there is a basement that has a half-dozen sisters of Paladine within it. Kang is frustrated as the female draconian children are acting odd and not eating, so he thinks the women in the cellar will watch the babies for him, while they defend the temple from the goblins. The sisters are not having any of it, believing it to be a trick or that they are prisoners, but Kang makes it clear they are not. One of the sisters, Marsel, starts to question if they should be so vehemently against the draconians. She suggests the babies should be allowed to play and run, and that may be why they are acting strangely. She shares that her own father was over protective and that is how she came to be here. Then Slith goes on a raid and kills the goblin general, takes his form and leads the goblins away. Sister Hana threatens to kill the babies and is stopped when kang tries to trade his life for the babies and Marsel stops hana from killing him. They let the children play and move on, leaving the sisters of Paladine to their own fate. This was a great story that frames fatherhood perfectly for me. I do everything I can to protect my daughter, even to the point of nearly smothering her, but her mother, my wife, always warns me against it, and gives her space to individuate and experience life away from us. I was never this over protective of my son, but for some insane reason, I have to tell myself to stop being so over my daughter. So I get Kang’s fears at least a little. And I love that this story is a focus on that and religious conviction. That you can be one the side of good and still act in evil. Again, this rings true in our real world daily.

In all, I would highly recommend this collection. I am so pleased with the Age of Mortals storytelling in this series of anthologies, and I can’t wait to start the next one.