The Book of Earth (36 page)

Across the circle, the mule leaned in to nudge Hal’s shoulder. The dogs stirred and the she-goat stood up and shook herself. Erde thought Earth’s image at Rose as hard as she could, but only caught the edges of her attention. Rose frowned vaguely and glanced her way as if she’d mumbled something incomprehensible.

But by that time, the dragon’s approach was audible, the rhythmic swish of his bulk pushing through the tall grass, the sigh of his breath, so like the sighing of the wind in the berry bushes. All around the circle, the women drew up into postures of expectation. Those with their backs to him turned in place but the arc remained unbroken, a circle of lamps inside a circle of women. The solitary man leaned back on one arm and tried to look casual, but his waiting was as poignant as the rest.

Earth gained the top of the hill and halted when he saw the lantern light. He had expected to find Erde, but not the rest. He paused a moment in confusion, puffing slightly, then regained his dignity. Erde noted with a shock that he did seem bigger, even brighter. Another trick of the light? She would swear the dragon had grown substantially since noontime, when she’d sent him off to hunt. Even his color was bigger, more luminous. The moss greens and dirt browns were brighter and shone with highlights of bronze and gold. Admiring murmurs ran around the circle, and the dragon stretched and preened.

Erde was overjoyed to see him, and felt his own welcome rush through her like a fever. She gathered herself to leap up, but he sent her an image of waiting. So she held back, while Earth came forward to offer his formal greeting, a deep bow to the circle with ivory horns presented, gleaming like arcs of light in the reflected lamp glow.

But once he’d completed what he considered to be the
necessary formalities, he was all over the inside of her head like a puppy dog. Images raced past too fast for Erde to grasp.

—
Earth! Slow down!

She was stunned to see Rose clap her hands to her ears as if she’d shouted out loud. She offered a look of apology, hoping Rose would understand that sometimes she just had to yell at the dragon, or he wouldn’t listen. But Rose continued to hold her head, curling over her knees as if in real pain.

Hal leaned in. “Rose? Rosie? What is it?”

“It’s . . . him!” Rose gasped.

“What’s happening?” Hal turned to Erde. “What’s he doing?”

Frightened, she shook her head.

“Whatever it is, tell him to stop!”

She tried to get the dragon’s attention, but he was too caught up in what he wanted to tell her. Pictures flashed in and out of her head like the colors on a spinning top, all blending into incoherency. Erde considered more drastic measures. She built a detailed image of an open door, held it in her mind and with all her strength, slammed it shut.

The dragon started and blinked. His torrent of images stopped dead in astonishment.

—
You were hurting this woman here
.

Earth dismissed the possibility. He’d been nowhere near her.

—
She can hear you. Sometimes when you think too fast, it’s like . . . like that waterfall we nearly went over
.

The mention of the waterfall seemed to impress him. He went very quiet for a while.

Rose uncurled, massaging her temples in relief. “Is he always like that? How do you listen without burning your brain out?”

“You can hear him? You can hear the dragon? You can hear what he . . . ?” Hal foundered midway between pride and hopeless envy.

“Not very well.” Rose shook her head as if clearing it. “Not very well at all. Mostly his enormous power. It was how I imagine a god would speak.” She regarded Erde with new respect. “Child, you have a remarkable gift.”

“She is the Dragon Guide,” Hal reminded her simply.

“Will you introduce me?” Rose asked Erde. “Perhaps we can learn a way to talk together in a less painful fashion.”

The new deference in Rose’s rich and wonderful voice made Erde self-conscious. She wasn’t sure she deserved it. After all, it was the dragon who was remarkable, not she. But it was interesting to think about what it meant to be able to do something other people couldn’t do. There was a kind of power in that, especially if it was something other people wanted to be able to do.

—
Dragon, this is Rose of Deep Moor. She has a great hearing gift. I think if you think very small and quietly, she might be able to understand you. This might be useful right now, since she has a working voice, and could translate for you
.

Earth blinked again and turned his huge eyes on Rose in a deeply speculative gaze. Erde saw faint flickers in her mind, little whispers of image, but Rose smiled and sighed as if she’d been given the most wonderful treasure.

“Can you hear him?” Hal demanded. “What does he say?”

“He doesn’t exactly
say
 . . . anything.”

Hal nodded sagely, fighting to keep his envy in check. “No words. That’s what she told me.”

“He greets me, and you, the women of the circle. He’s very polite. But there is something he’s eager to tell us . . .”

New images ghosted into Erde’s mind, appearing slowly like the sun through a mist. The scale was small, the colors were bland, but she recognized the Mage City, a pale echo of itself.

Rose inhaled sharply. “It’s the city, the one you showed me! He says he knows where it is!”

The women exclaimed softly. Doritt let out a small cheer.

Then Esther said, “Listen!”

On the night wind came an insistent clanging, from the direction of the farmstead.

“The alarm bell!” breathed Doritt.

“It must be Lily and Margit come home,” said Raven, “wondering where we are.”

Rose raised her face to the breeze like a wary animal. “Oh, this is the darkness I’ve felt all day. It’s Lily, and she brings us bad news.”

The circle broke instantly. Raven and Doritt scrambled
up and took off down the dark hill at a run. The twins made quick arrangements for the return of the dogcart, and sped after them.

“Margit is the twins’ birth-mother,” Linden told Erde nervously as she helped the old lore-keepers into the cart. Hal had promised to pull them home so the others could hurry ahead. Rose thanked him gravely, then moved into his arms for the offered embrace.

His lips brushed her forehead. “All will be well, Rosie.”

“No, my love, it won’t. Not anymore.” Rose pressed her face briefly into his chest. “Deep Moor’s grace time is over, I feel it. The world has come to our doorstep. I only hope we’ve not waited too long to act.”

E
arth spent the whole trip down the hill babbling to Erde about his discovery. It wasn’t exactly true that he knew where the Mage City was—Rose had misunderstood some of the finer details. But lying out in the meadow enjoying himself after a satisfying meal, he had heard the Summoner’s voice for the first time while he was awake, in his head, not like a real sound, but the voice was now directional. It drew him like a lodestone. He was sure he could follow it to its source which, of course, was the city.

Erde told him what Rose had said about the city. He took this as further proof, which she would have been inclined to do also, were the Mage City not her own invention. She felt too deeply mired in her “righteous lie” to see a way out of it. Besides, she did have to wonder about what Rose had seen. Perhaps she had not made it up. Perhaps the image of the Mage City had come into her mind from somewhere else, from some
one
else. Once again, she decided to say nothing of this to the dragon. Even a fantasy destination was better than no destination at all.

*   *   *

The yard in front of the house was deserted when Hal and Erde reached the farmstead. The lanterns burned in scattered groups on the porch where they’d been hastily abandoned. The lore-keepers looked grim.

“All inside, I suspect,” said one. The other hung a lantern to either side of the door, then blew the rest out and replaced them neatly in their rack. Erde left the dragon pacing impatiently in the yard. She followed Hal into the house.

Inside, oil lamps flared around the stone hearth, where
the women were gathered. A young woman lay bleeding in Raven’s arms, struggling to speak while Linden sponged her wounds. Her clothing was torn and mud-spattered. Rose knelt alongside, holding the woman’s limp hand and bending close to hear her broken whisper.

Doritt caught Hal’s arm as he came up beside her. Her big dark eyes glimmered with unshed tears. “Margit’s been taken!”

“What! Where?”

“Erfurt,” she hissed. “Lily’s run back all the way alone.”

“How’s she doing?”

“She’ll be all right.”

“Who got Margit?”

“Adolphus of Köthen.”

“Of . . . Köthen?
Köthen?
”

Doritt nodded. “I’m sorry, Hal.”

“Köthen in Erfurt?”

“He’s leading the barons’ army.”

Hal seemed to wish he hadn’t heard her right. “What about the king?”

“The king has fled.”

His only response was a soft moan.

“Toward Nürnburg, with a few of his household. Prince Carl stayed with Köthen.”

“Willingly?”

“Willingly.”

Erde watched the knight’s entire body reel under this last piece of news. In their month together, she had never seen his manner go so hard and cold, and yet somehow so sad. “Köthen always did have an abnormal influence over the boy. Is Margit alive?”

Doritt’s mouth tightened. “So far. We don’t have a lot of details yet, but Lily’s afraid that Baron Köthen will use Margit to prove his loyalty when Fra Guill arrives next week to give his blessing to the barons’ coup.”

“The hell-priest in Erfurt, too? Oh, too close, Doritt, too close for comfort. I hope Lily covered her trail.”

Doritt looked offended. “Lily’s our most gifted Seeker. Of course she covered her trail.”

“Erfurt taken. The king’s own seat.” Hal glanced about furtively as if he were being held against his will. “I must get to Nürnburg. I must get to His Majesty.”

“What about Margit? You know he’ll burn her, Hal.”

“She knew the risk, as we all do. My duty is with the king.”

Doritt looked away, frowning, then nodded. “And Margit would surely agree. Will you leave the girl and her creature with us?”

His nod was businesslike. “They’re safer here than anywhere.”

Erde grabbed his sleeve and shook her head.

“Milady, please understand. Speed is essential now.”

She was sure from his posture that he was about to explain how this was men’s work ahead of him. She searched about, found a scrap of Raven’s paper in her pocket. EARTH WILL NOT STAY. HE IS CALLED.

“Ah, yes,” agreed Doritt. “He’s on his own quest, after all. They’ll just go off on their own without you.”

“And Fra Guill will have them in a blink of an eye. Ah, sweet Mother, help me. What do I do?” Hal paced away and back. “King or Dragon? Must I choose?”

Erde wrote: WE’LL ALL GO TO NÜRNBURG.

“Milady, our little walk in the woods has just become infinitely more dangerous.”

She nodded, once and briskly.

“Rose’s Seeing proves you’ve still a ways to go together,” Doritt pointed out.

“He moves too slowly! He’s like a snail!”

HE’LL MOVE FASTER, Erde promised.

Because the knight did not refuse her outright, she knew that the session up on the hill had changed something fundamental in his thinking about her and the dragon, a change she sensed in her own thinking as well. New sensations of confidence and potential were spreading through her like slow warmth, a growing need to act, to stand against the evil tide of events rather than be swept along by it. She had fallen in with this loose network of royalists by accident, if there was any such thing as accident (which she was beginning to doubt), but they were her natural allies. Her enemies were their enemies. Most importantly, she had a notion that the dragon was also readying himself to act. She had no idea what form his action might take, but as Dragon Guide, she might well influence his choice.

She had a strange moment of self-awareness, as if she
were standing across the room looking back. She saw a tall young woman with a ruddy boyish face and determined jaw, strong and lean from travel and the knight’s training exercises, clothed in a man’s pragmatic garb. The sallow longhaired child in slippers and velvet dresses was a fading memory. Her mouth twisted with reflective irony. She’d become what she’d always pretended to be in her fantasies, what her father had always feared and despised. Interesting that it had required the sacrifice of her entire life as she’d known it to accomplish the transformation.

Possessed by this new self as if by some benign but reckless demon, Erde grinned at Hal and scrawled: WE’LL SAVE THE KING TOGETHER.

Hal squeezed his eyes shut once, then nodded helplessly.