Dragonlinks (42 page)

‘If my skill is not equal to the task, I shall call you back.'

Gemoti and Kelricka left, and Jelindel worked slowly and clumsily at the forge and anvil. After a full half hour she finally called the priestess back in but told Gemoti to
remain outside. She had laid the mailshirt out on a bench, and it was no longer glowing.

‘At last, it is complete,' said Jelindel. ‘How do we dispose of it?'

‘Oh no,
you
must wear it,' said Kelricka as if any other suggestion was offensive.

Jelindel had been standing back with her hands on her hips, admiring her handiwork. At Kelricka's words her arms flopped down and she turned, staring, her eyes wide.

‘What? Are you seriously suggesting that I should put that
thing
on?' exclaimed Jelindel. ‘I mean it's like a loaded crossbow now. It's not just a mailshirt. It's dangerous.'

The priestess just nodded solemnly.

‘Why me?' asked Jelindel.

‘You had the power to seize Korok's dragon machine and become ruler of more kingdoms and people than I could imagine, yet you chose to destroy it.'

‘The dragon craft could indeed do everything that he promised me, but I could barely comprehend such power, much less use it wisely. It is the same with this thing, only worse.'

‘And that is why only you can wear the mailshirt. Put it on, Jelindel. It is a tool as well as a weapon. It's complete now, and you will be able to learn all its secrets. Tell us why folk have sought after this thing and its links for so long. It can't be just for the gaining of specialised skills from people who wear it.'

Jelindel picked up the cold, shimmering metal fabric. Somehow it now felt far, far heavier.

‘I can tell you without putting it on,' she said. ‘I have done a lot of study over the year past.
The Book of Wars
holds the teachings of Hawtarnas, who was reputed to
have green blood and was probably of the same race as Korok. He wrote “The wardragon dwells in fabric that calls to itself!”'

‘Fabric that calls to itself!' exclaimed Kelricka. ‘The dragonlinks that are the fabric of the mailshirt. Yet what did he mean by wardragon?'

‘The skills and powers that this thing offers are almost without limit, and can awake the wardragon that dwells in all of us. It would give me the power to set the world right, but that would be “right” as I, Jelindel, think it. What a boring world that would be.'

Kelricka laughed. ‘Oh Jelindel, put it on. Power can corrupt, but it does so slowly. Think of all that you can learn.'

Slowly Jelindel raised the heavy mailshirt. This was knowledge, and thus it was
her
price. She knew now that she had her price, just as her brother Lutiar – at the thought of Lutiar her body convulsed, and the mailshirt fell to her feet.

‘Jelindel! Are you all right?' gasped Kelricka.

‘Yes – actually, no. The events of this day have been a terrible strain and I feel weak, far too weak to wear the mailshirt just now.
You
could try wearing it, however.'

Jelindel was stooped and haggard, and so her words were quite convincing.

‘Me? Kelricka's face betrayed shock, even though she smiled. ‘What sort of joke is that?'

‘You want to tap its knowledge for the sake of scholarship, and you are a far better scholar than me.'

‘I do not have your strength,' Kelricka replied, staring down at the pile of shining links.

‘If anyone is drained of strength just now it is I,'
replied Jelindel. ‘Besides, I have a feeling that strength is not necessary. Pick it up, and put it on. Come now, quickly, before your fears bind your hands. Come, I'll help. Sit on the bench and raise your arms.'

Jelindel stood behind Kelricka and held the mailshirt up over her arms. There was a definite change in the feel of the thing as she lowered it; some quality was present that had not been there before the last link had been added.

‘Just sit there while I straighten it and pull your hair free,' Jelindel said, looping a length of thonging through a link and letting it dangle. She then stepped over the bench and walked around in front of Kelricka. ‘How does it feel?'

Kelricka did not reply at once, but just sat with her hands in her lap. The mailshirt took on a faint violet shimmer. In a way it seemed to be moving, or winking in and out of existence very rapidly. After what were in fact seconds but seemed like hours, she raised her right hand to her face, spread her fingers, rotated her hand, then made a fist and returned it to her lap.

Kelricka tried to speak. Her lips parted and she made a sound between a grunt and a snarl. Her jaw worked, and she began slowly speaking strings of unfamiliar, alien words. Lastly she made as if to stand, teetered for a moment, then sat back down heavily.

She moved her head a trifle and stared at Jelindel.

‘Walking always takes longest,' said Kelricka. With each word the tone of her voice dropped deeper.

‘Kelricka, what is the matter?' Jelindel asked, taking a step forward. Kelricka's hand came up, its palm facing Jelindel.

‘The host body is satisfactory,' said a commanding voice at least two octaves deeper than Kelricka's. ‘Who are you?'

Jelindel swallowed, trying to comprehend what sat before her. ‘I am, ah, the Custodian of the Mailshirt,' she improvised quickly. ‘I … chose your host.'

‘You chose well, Custodian. The mind of a scholar is far more deadly than the brawn of a warrior. Stand back and wait now, while I optimise my control of the host body.'

The truth now shone luridly bright in Jelindel's mind. The wardragon was not just some scholarly allegory for the temptations of power, it was a real being, a spirit that lived within the mailshirt itself. Only when the thing was complete to the very last link could the wardragon awake and seize control of the body of the wearer, however.

Jelindel watched Kelricka's arms and legs move under the direction of the wardragon as it accustomised itself to her. It moved her head up and down, turned it to one side as far as it would go, then – Jelindel darted forward.

‘Stop!' boomed the wardragon, snapping Kelricka's head around. ‘I ordered you to stay clear.'

Now Jelindel hurriedly drew the thundercast and pointed it squarely at the centre of the priestess's chest. Kelricka's lips parted for a booming laugh.

‘Interesting. A remote singularity GVG, as grown by the Gh'viv hatchery. How has it come to be in such an obviously backward world?'

‘No questions, just sit still!' snapped Jelindel.

The thundercast was shaking in her hand as she fumbled with the settings. It was all bluff, she already suspected that the mailshirt would absorb the weapon's fire as it absorbed sorcerers' magic.

‘No answers, Custodian?' the wardragon replied. ‘Well, I shall find out soon enough as I explore the mind of the host.'

‘Wardragon, I am willing to kill your host to keep you confined,' Jelindel warned.

‘Indeed? This – is an odd test. Well, fire at me,' it taunted.

Just as I suspected, it does not fear the thundercast, Jelindel thought. Her eyes narrowed, her aim shifted to the left.

‘You will not make me kill my friend,' she said. ‘I have set the thundercast to a thin, hot setting. I can slice a few links away from one shoulder and render you harmless again. Kelricka will get no more than a fleshwound.'

Jelindel squeezed the trigger bar, pointing at the shoulder of the priestess. Nothing happened, except for a slight surge in the aura of the mailshirt.

‘Energy weapons are easy to control,' mocked the wardragon's voice. ‘My makers were using them when your ancestors were using bones as clubs.'

‘Liar, the thundercast is merely mis-set,' stammered Jelindel.

Please, please be proud and boastful, Jelindel thought.

‘Oh so? Point to one side and fire.'

Thank you, thought Jelindel with such relief that she nearly spoke the words aloud. Slowly, deliberately, she lowered the thundercast to the left.

‘Here?' she asked.

‘Yes, your little toy is armed again, and it will work. You can even try to point it back at me if you wish, and if you wished I could then show how I can turn the beam about and burn your arm off at the shoulder. I could even reattach it, such are my powers.'

Jelindel fired – but swept down and sliced away the end of the bench where Kelricka sat possessed by the wardragon. Kelricka toppled, and as she fell Jelindel dropped the thundercast and leaped for her, sending her sprawling again as she tried to get up. Jelindel tried to hold her in a headlock, but Kelricka's strength had suddenly been magnified to greater than even that of Daretor. The priestess stood up, holding Jelindel above her with one hand.

‘I am master of all weapons, from GVGs to mere muscles,' began the wardragon as Jelindel reached down and seized the leather thonging that dangled from the mailshirt's shoulder. She pulled with all her strength.

There was a brilliant flash of violet light. Kelricka collapsed like a ragdoll and Jelindel crashed down on top of her. At once Jelindel rolled clear, but the priestess just lay still. The mailshirt glowed a soft orange, and Jelindel saw that a link dangled from the thonging that was still in her grasp. It was ripped open, and also glowing.

‘Come, we must get that thing off you,' she said as she crawled over to the priestess.

‘How … how did you stop it?' groaned the real Kelricka, who had been a helpless witness to what had just happened.

‘I only pressed the ends of the last link together with a little iron clip that I fashioned. I did it so that the link would tear apart easily, and I looped that thonging in as I helped you into the mailshirt. All that I needed to do was get close enough to jerk the thonging and the mailshirt would be incomplete again.'

‘That's clever,' Kelricka panted as she sat up. ‘But why?'

‘Would you conjure a god and expect it to behave and
cooperate?' asked Jelindel as she got to her knees. ‘I wouldn't. I had no clear plan, but one weakened link seemed like a good idea in case … well, just in case.'

Kelricka bent forward while Jelindel peeled off the mailshirt – taking a few strands of the priestess's hair in her haste. Jelindel lay back against the leg of a workbench, her emotions exhausted by having to fight the unknown a second time in the same day. Kelricka sat quietly on the floor with her chin on her knees. She was aware that it was her unqualified curiosity that had nearly unleashed the wardragon upon their world. The glowing orange mound that was the mailshirt lay on the floor between them.

‘I'm sorry,' whispered Kelricka.

‘You were not to know.'

‘Your wisdom saved me.'

‘Just commonsense, not wisdom. I had to learn it to stay alive in the D'loom market.' Jelindel nudged the mailshirt with her foot. ‘It was probably damaged when its last wearer fell from the sky. This is surely the first time it has been complete in a long time. Whoever tried to repair it probably slipped a link about his finger and discovered its properties, so naturally there was more incentive to take links out than put them back. The memories, the soul, the willpower of what Hawtarnas called “the wardragon” is a live thing within the mailshirt. All that it needs is a wearer to possess.'

Kelricka shivered and hugged her knees. ‘Who would give up their very soul to a wardragon-thing, and why?' she asked, incredulous.

‘People serve kings without aspiring to be kings,' said Jelindel. ‘Being host to a wardragon is probably the most
intimate way of being a monarch's servant, and to everyone's gaze the host
is
the monarch.'

Kelricka shook her head. ‘I learned something of its powers,' she admitted. ‘They have no place on this world.'

‘I'll melt it to slag,' Jelindel decided.

They went outside and set off for the shrinestone steps where the wedding had been conducted only hours earlier. Gemoti joined them.

‘And, ah, what might ye be doing?' he asked. ‘Is everything all right? I thought ye might be fighting in there.'

‘We are just making sure that we don't set your smithy on fire,' said Kelricka.

They reached the steps. Jelindel took out her thundercast, double-checked the settings against notes she had written down, then aimed it at the mailshirt.

‘The wardragon said your thundercast cannot harm the mailshirt,' Kelricka pointed out.

‘It said nothing of the sort,' said Jelindel tersely, flicking a stud. ‘I have seen it absorb magical power, but not the power of this weapon.'

‘But the wardragon –'

‘The wardragon was awake when it robbed the thundercast's power. Now it is asleep again, so this may be our chance. Pray that I am right, Kelricka.'

Jelindel squeezed the trigger bar. The setting was for wide-beam heat, such as would melt without bursting the stone beneath. Within moments the links began to glow red, brightened to yellow, then became white. Finally they melted. Jelindel did not release the trigger bar until the last of the links had flowed down the stone steps as molten metal. A crowd of villagers gathered at a distance to watch and point.

‘It's just a harmless lump now,' Jelindel began, but even as she spoke the molten pool began to resolve back into the woven links of a mailshirt.

Kelricka stared with her mouth hanging open, and she made the holy circle in the air before her. Gradually the mailshirt cooled, and Jelindel picked it up on the blade of her shortsword. One link fell free and jingled on the steps. The loose link had not been incorporated, so the metal fabric glowed faintly in the sunlight. The villagers crowded a little closer, fearful yet curious to see what the dangerous sorceress was doing now.

Kelricka sat back down on a cool part of the steps, her fist pressed hard against her lips for a moment. Jelindel peered closely at the most recently reattached links, then dropped the mailshirt and picked up the loose link. It was no longer split.