Nightlord: Orb (81 page)

I decided not to ask.  When you get right down to it, Bronze is her own person.  If she wants to wear her hair differently or grow a unicorn’s horn, that’s up to her.  Although, if she’s going to do something blatant like the horn, I hope she would ask me, first.  I’m pretty sure she could do it if she wanted to, though.

Traveling at relatively high speed—twenty miles an hour?  Thirty?  More?—saw us closing in on the mountain-city before nightfall.

Overall, the place hadn’t changed much.  It was still a big wheel, almost flat, with a sudden, steep spike in the center.  There was supposed to be water pouring from four points, high up the central mountain-spire, but I saw no sign of them.  The upper portion of the mountain was smooth and unmarked.  I wondered what happened.  Were they inside the mountain, now, pouring down internal channels instead of down the mountainside?  That would be better, certainly.  If so, who decreed the change to the mountain?  Or did it think of the idea on its own?

The canals connected to the huge moat encircling the place; four bridges connected the city to the land.  I was pleased to see the main gates had developed nicely.  Each one was a huge slab of stone, balanced to pivot around a horizontal axis.  When the inner half of the slabs tilted up, the gates were closed; the outer half of the slabs tilted down, leaving massive pits in front of them instead of road.  When reversed, the slabs became part of the road.  They were huge and unwieldy and worked.  I liked them.

The one thing that stood out was a new road.  Well, I say a new road.  It was really the old Kingsway taken up a notch, or taken up by several arches.  Originally, to cut through all the circle-spiral streets running through town, I had a long, straight road run from the central mountain to the southwest gate.  Now the road stood on arches, presumably to let cross-traffic go by underneath, and ran as straight as a beam of light.  It was one long, single-lane bridge from the upper courtyard, near the peak, down to the market plaza behind the gate.

“What do you think?” Mary asked.  “Wait until after dark?  Or hurry in before sunset?”

“I’m torn.  If we hurry in, we’ll need to find someplace light-proof almost immediately, and I don’t know where they keep their inns, or even if they have shutters on the windows.  On the plus side, I can start getting to the bottom of this quickly.  If we sneak in, the only people who might possibly notice are the ones actively looking for us—well, me—but we might get away with poking around for a while before our presence becomes known.”

“Do you have any friends besides T’yl in town?”

“Tianna is here.”

“Anyone else?”

“Not that I know of.  Why?”

“You could let Tianna know, privately, if we sneak into town.”

“I could pay her a visit,” I agreed, “but Amber should have told her I was on my way.”

“On the other hand, if you want to see who your friends and enemies are, go on in.”

“There’s something tempting about that, too.  You’re not really helping.”

“Who asked the professional sneak-thief for advice?”

“Point taken,” I admitted.  “It’s hard to play if you don’t know who the other players are, so here’s my thought.  We’ll do both.”

“How?”

“I’ll march in boldly and draw fire.  You sneak in, watch what happens, and find out what you can while everything is stirred up.”

“I don’t know,” she said, dubiously.  “I don’t speak the language.  I mean I can, but I’ll instantly be marked as a tourist.  I won’t be able to follow fast conversations, understand idioms, or blend in.”

“I’ll give you a long-duration translation spell.”

“Well… I don’t like letting you out of my sight.  You have a tendency to go through magical gates and disappear.  And my feeble skills are no match for the power of your dark magic when it comes to locating you.  Is your cloaking spell still on?”

“Yes.  But I promise not to leave the world without you.  At least, if I have any say in the matter.  If they kill me you’re on your own.”

“All right.  Let’s pull over and camp for a bit.  I want to change and run through a cleaning spell one more time before I have to start doing it by myself.”

“Sure.  Want me to leave you our cash?”

“What for?”

“Expenses?”

Mary gave me a pitying look.

“Maybe you do actually need to sleep.  Your brain is definitely not firing on all cylinders.”

“What do you mean?”

“What do I do for fun?”

“Oh.”

She has a point, Boss,
Firebrand told me, privately. 
You do seem a little slow.

Thank you for the observation.  I’ll consider it.  In a bunker.  With guards.  And wards.  And both you and Bronze.

Thought I’d mention it,
Firebrand replied, amused. 
A dragon would have had a year-long nap by now.

You’re assuming my time in the basement counts as being awake.

You bet.

Why?

Because you’re not as sharp as you used to be.

That made me wonder.  If the psychic sword is saying I’m not at my sharpest, should I be concerned?

The central lane between canals ended at the moat.  A pair of high bridges from median to shore allowed barges to be towed out of the canals and to either side in the moat.  The city side of the moat had a long row of boat-pocket docks, presumably for barge loading and unloading, but I didn’t see a way to tow them over.  There were some barges in view, though; they approached the city shore slowly, rowed along like giant canoes.

We stopped the barge at the last rest stop before the bridges.  Mary and I unloaded Clomper for Bronze to babysit while we became corpses in body bags on the barge.

Karvalen—the city, not the kingdom—doesn’t close up shop for the night like smaller cities.  The place is lit like a Christmas tree set on fire.  Traffic flows via the roads and canals pretty much constantly.  Mary had no trouble docking or parking or whatever it is you do with a canal boat.

Who do they trade with?  What do they trade?  Why are people coming and going constantly?  I mean, sure, it’s a city.  Cities have traffic.  You put more than a hundred thousand people in an enclosed area to live their lives and
someone
is going to be awake and busy.  I wonder what’s going on, that’s all.

Anyway, getting in wasn’t a problem.  While Mary and Clomper parked the boat, Bronze and I walked over a bridge, along the outer road, and straight through the city gate.  Beyond was a big, square area.  It was relatively quiet, but hucksters, hustlers, and vendors of all sorts still pitched their wares.  Within a hundred yards, people tried to sell me knives, perfume, food of every description, magical talismans (fake), demon-repellent (probably fake), enchanted lights (spells, really, of limited duration, marketed as “eternal”), jewelry, clothing, horseshoes, rare wine (he claimed), rope, a backpack, a lantern with a spare flask of oil, and a ten-foot pole.

I can’t imagine the cacophony of the gate-market at its height during the day.  I’m glad I was seven feet above the crowd, riding Bronze.  It’s hard to pick a pocket when you can’t even reach it, or to stick merchandise in my face without a ladder.

We made our way across the square of the gate-market to the foot of the Kingsway.  The pitch was about one in ten or so.  It was narrow, barely wide enough for Bronze.  A street paralleled it on either side as it rose.  There were drains dotted all along the two straight streets, probably because when it rained, they would turn into rivers, otherwise.  I disliked it.  The gradual rise of the ramp blocked cross-traffic for hundreds of yards.  It would be better to have steps at this end, to quickly get some clearance underneath.  That would also further reduce the pitch of the ramp, at least a little… As soon as I could talk to the mountain, I’d mention it.

Bronze started up the Kingsway at a walk.  After a little bit, the noise of the market diminished.  In the relative quiet, someone shouted at me.

“You can’t go up there!”

We ignored this obviously erroneous impression.  Silence followed us, but no one else.

Was the Kingsway regarded as cursed?  Or was it too dangerous to travel?  It went straight to the upper courtyard around the peak of the mountain.  Maybe the destination was considered too dangerous?  Everything above the courtyard level was considered my personal quarters at one point.  Maybe it still was.

A few people followed us along the side-streets and even more came out to watch us go by.  A number of people cast light spells and shone illumination up to see us more clearly, but no one came after us.  I don’t think anyone even set foot on the Kingsway.

Maybe it’s the name that does it.  It’s the King’s Way, so stay off it.  That could be it.

On the other hand, it’s got no guardrails, not even curbs, and it dead-ends—possibly literally—at the front door of the Demon King.  It’s obviously not considered a safe road.

We reached the top of the road without incident.  No one threw anything or tried to shoot us.  I’m not sure they knew quite what to do.

At the top, the Kingsway ended in a sheer drop, about ten or twelve feet from the wall surrounding the uppermost part of the mountain—the outer wall of the courtyard, the face of the mountain spire.  It was a long way down.

There was no way to open the outer wall.  It didn’t even look as though it had a gate. I sank tendrils into the stone and spoke to the mountain; it’s alive, after all.  It took several minutes, but the section of wall in front of the Kingsway finally started to move.  A section of wall slowly tilted inward while matching section of cliff face swung out and up.  When it came to rest, lying flat, it formed a bridge to the courtyard.

I gave it another couple of minutes to merge with the Kingsway proper and affix itself.  I didn’t want Bronze and I to have a dramatic failure to enter, especially not one involving a plummet to the road some eighty or a hundred feet below.  We fall extremely well already.  We don’t need any more practice, thank you.  Nor do we need to demonstrate our exceptional skill at gravity-based acceleration in front of thousands of onlookers.

Bronze put a hoof on the bridge, carefully, and the stone held.  We entered the courtyard and circled the mountaintop to the left, clockwise, to take the short way around to the front door; the door into the great hall faced north while the Kingsway hit the edge of the courtyard in the southwest—from above, we entered the courtyard at seven-thirty and circled around to noon.

When we reached the pivot-door to the interior, Bronze nudged it with her forehead.  It rotated on its axis, swinging open, and she stepped back to let it open fully.

“Now, let’s see who’s home.”

Nobody.

Absolutely nobody.

Someone changed the layout again.  T’yl lived here for nine years or so while I was occupied.  It’s only to be expected he made some changes.  The silver inlay in the floor was new, for example.  It wasn’t magical, with mystical runes and symbols, but it was a pretty decoration.  Intricate knotwork, really, all over the floor and working its way up the walls, over the balcony, and on up to the mirror-polished gold of the arched ceiling.  I especially liked the way the metal content of the veins in the walls started as pure silver at the base and changed smoothly to gold.  It reminded me of trees and vines, somehow.  The silver veins at the base of the walls were thick.  They branched rapidly on their way up, spreading out, flowing over the gallery and up behind it, until there were thousands of fine, gold lines touching the polished gold of the arched ceiling.

How much of that was T’yl’s work?  Did he give the mountain detailed instructions?  How much of it was the mountain taking a basic instruction and running with it?  With suitable directions, could the mountain form a hollow space in the stone and fill it with metal?  Could it grow a metal object?

I’m discovering new ramifications of having an enormous pet rock.

For that matter, how smart is it?  It doesn’t seem intelligent—not like I think of intelligence—but insects are capable of immensely complicated behavior.  Computers aren’t intelligent, but they can be taught—programmed—to perform intricate functions.  Does the mountain learn?  If it does, what will it learn in a hundred more years?  A thousand?  Ten thousand?   

It’s starting to frighten me again, and this time it didn’t do anything.  I guess I’m a coward at heart.

At least the dragon’s-head throne-sculpture wasn’t much different.  It still came out of the southern wall as though the dragon stuck his head through.  It struck me that it was larger than before.  A quick butt-check confirmed my estimate.  It was actually more comfortable than I remembered.  I could sit on the length of the dragon’s snout, lean back between the dragon’s eyes, put my arms on the eye-ridges, even put my feet up on a nostril-ridge.

If I have to have a throne, at least it’s getting better as a seat.  I kind of wish it was a regular chair, if it has to be anything.  The dragon’s head is impressive, I grant you, especially with those rubies for the pupils.  They can glitter menacingly.  I’d still rather have a chair.

Bronze waited in the throne room while Firebrand and I searched the palace level of the undermountain.  Not only had the layout changed, but the doors weren’t quite tall or wide enough for Bronze to use anymore.  Someone shrank them, which I find annoying.  I took several minutes to mention this to the mountain and discovered it had already started enlarging things to make her feel more welcome.  I made it a point to mention the corridors and doors should
always
be large enough to accommodate her.