The Dragons of Argonath (3 page)

The green gave a shriek and tumbled backward, clutching his arm. The other dragons seized Gryf and subdued him by brute strength. They dragged him over to the pool and dunked him headfirst to cool him off, then they escorted him to the infirmary. Along the way they let him know that if he wanted to survive in the 109th Marneri, he would never draw steel on a dragon again like that. Next time he would die.

Gryf was silent under their chastisement, his head hung low. The enormity of his folly was coming home to him.

Later the old core group of the unit gathered by the pump house to talk it over.

"This can't go on," said Bazil. "Trouble every day. That green is just the worst of it. We're all getting grouchy."

"I know, I have occasionally wanted to draw steel on the Purple Green myself these past few days," said Alsebra, the green freemartin renowned for her skill with dragonsword.

The Purple Green just glowered at her, but bit back his retort.

Bazil noted the wild one's restraint.

"You are quiet, this is unusual."

The Purple Green exhaled slowly and ominously. Sometimes Bazil could easily imagine the wild dragon venting the fiery breath of the great ancestors.

"I am insulted, but I understand. She is right. We are all upset."

"Does the Red Star ride high?"

"Not yet."

"Is Gryf unstable?"

They shrugged. Greens were all a little odd. The Purple Green hunkered down.

"This dragon tire of Gryf and sharp tongue."

"We've noticed," said Alsebra, who had broken a few things over the Purple Green's big head to stop him from attacking Gryf.

"We have to make Gryf part of the squadron," said Bazil. "He not fitting in yet."

"The other new dragons are fine. Churn is a good brass, very strong," said Alsebra.

"Ah, this dragon see," gurgled the Purple Green. "You have the eggs to fertilize. You wish to go to the mountain-top with young Churn."

Alsebra flushed somewhat purplish herself, then swung to Bazil with wide, staring eyes. The most sensitive thing to any infertile female dragon, known as freemartins, was her lack of eggs.

"You see?" she said. "He provokes me."

Bazil shrugged in sympathy and turned harsh eyes on the wild dragon. "Alsebra has no eggs, she freemartin, you know that. Why upset her? She take sword and kill you right quick. She very good with a sword, as you know."

The Purple Green withdrew into himself. His sword work, though improved over the years, was still crude, but his vast strength and utter ferocity had compensated. He had burst clean through lines of trolls with his mighty shield alone. Still, he knew that in a sword fight with Alsebra, he could only lose. Along the way he had learned to be quiet sometimes. This had not been easy for the former Lord of Hook Mountain, but this he recognized was one of those times when he was better off keeping quiet.

Bazil sighed, glad to see his wild friend withdraw. "Gryf remains a problem. Good with a sword and bad with his temper. Perhaps this time he learn a lesson."

"He knows now that he isn't the best dragon with sword in this squadron," said Alsebra. "Maybe he learn a lesson from that."

They all nodded in agreement.

"Good thing that Cuzo didn't see."

"Very good thing," agreed Alsebra.

"So much trouble and why? We have nice quiet life here. No marching, no fighting, very quiet. Food is adequate."

"Maybe that's the problem," said the freemartin.

"I think she right," said the Purple Green. "We bored."

"Good legion food. Good beer."

"Bah, legion food is bland. Noodles day after day. Not enough akh."

"I want to eat horse again."

"Oh, no, not that again. We ate horse."

"It was good. I had never had it roasted before. This roasting of meat is best thing men ever invent."

"That's why the ancestors had the fiery breath. They roasted their own meat on the spot."

The Purple Green looked at Alsebra with astonished eyes.

"I think you are right."

The bell was ringing to announce the first boil of the evening. They set off for the refectory in a group, the ground shaking beneath their heavy tread.

"Never enough akh!"

Afterward, in the stall, while Relkin worked on the seams of Bazil's new joboquin, which was now broken in and had started breaking up, Bazil sharpened Ecator's edge on the whetstone.

"So how did Gryf bruise his arm?" asked Relkin. "Rakama's working up compresses like crazy."

"Vlok did it."

"Oh, really? Vlok?"

Relkin worked on for a few moments.

"So Gryf picked a fight because of Swane and Rakama?"

"Are there seals on the ice floes?"

Relkin shook his head. "We've got to put a stop to this fighting. Thank the gods that Cuzo was busy and doesn't seem to have connected it all up. Yet."

"Swane has broken nose?"

"Oh, yes. They're both pretty seriously beat up. Rakama has a broken rib."

"Mmm."

There was a rap at the entrance, and the curtain was pulled aside to admit little Jak.

"Have you heard the news?" he said with a conspiratorial smile.

"About what?"

"Marneri, we're going back to Marneri in a week's time."

"Mmm, and then?"

"And then we're going to ship out to Kadein."

"You know what that means."

All three youths were suddenly glum.

"That's going to be a long march."

If they were shipping out to Kadein, it could only mean they were being sent to the siege at far distant Axoxo. They would be traveling for months, and then they would have to endure a winter in the appalling conditions of the White Bones Mountains.

"Maybe it will help settle down the unit."

Jak left them to spread his news among the rest of the Dragon House. Relkin turned to Bazil, a determined look in his eyes.

"We better ask for special leave. We can't miss the opportunity while we're down here."

"We go to village? Have good dinner!"

"The dinner of our lives probably. We haven't been back to Quosh in years. The village has become famous because we were at Sprian's Ridge. Earned them a few bonuses too."

"We pay our way."

"Have to go back, see the farmers and the families."

"It is only over the Rack Hill. We get there in four hours' march."

"Right. I'll ask Cuzo. It's a good thing that you weren't involved in the fray with Gryf, right? He's got no good reason to say no."

"Very good thing," said Bazil with a twitch of the tail tip.

The fortified city of Andiquant was the nerve center of the Empire of the Rose. Here too was the headquarters of the little-known Office of Unusual Insight. In a shabby back room in a nondescript office building, two women of markedly different appearance met to drink tea and talk.

"You visited them?" said the one dressed in a black velvet grown trimmed with silver mouse skulls. Her long black hair was pulled back behind her head. Accentuated with cosmetics, her eyes appeared enormous. A sense of shadowy power was about her at all times.

"Yes. A pleasant house, very nice surroundings." The other, clad in plain grey garb, shift, pantaloons, sandals, and a robe, was a slender, unremarkable woman of indeterminate age. Her hair was a stringy grey-white, her face slightly haggard. "There's a road down to Ilka Park from there. So beautiful, Ilka Park."

"I know that. But their story?"

"It is what we have feared. What you have long predicted."

"He makes his move at last."

"This evil has hung over the world since the beginning, since before the coming of man."

"The Sinni have warned us. They can do little more. They too fear the Dominator."

There was a long silence. They exchanged a long frank look, black eyes boring into grey eyes that accepted and melted in understanding.

"Then, I must return to service." There, it was said. Lessis felt the huge burden sag back onto her shoulders. For a few precious months she had been free of it, now it was back. She groaned as she felt the weight of the world once more.

"You must. I have come to realize, dear Lessis, that you are far better at running the Office than I could ever be. I underestimated your abilities, my dear, and humbly crave your pardon."

The Queen of Mice inclined her head in a bow to the Queen of Birds.

Lessis smiled. "Pardoned," she said quietly, and allowed herself the pleasure of accepting this apology.

It had rankled, all those years, those centuries of providing swift efficient service from the central office, and never, ever to have it appreciated, or praised, or even understood. Well, at least the grand Ribela now understood what was involved.

"I found Prince Evander very convincing," she said. "Yourself?"

"Yes. I have no doubt that he and Princess Serena were catapulted between worlds. The Old Red Aeon has left many dangerous relics. This wizard that haunted the city of Monjon was the same gzug that was driven from the magic isle by our dragons during the voyage to Eigo. He was a cruel, monstrous creature, grown contemptuous of all life."

"He will repay his debt a thousandfold. They have made of him a most powerful thymnal, strong enough to raise the city and set a million lamps aglow."

"Yes. I've always wondered what one might be able to do with a thymnal. Such power to work for the good of the world. But now I think I will do without; they are dangerous to acquire."

They exchanged a small smile.

"The prince and princess, though, they are an even more precious relic. They have seen the world of Orthond crushed under the feet of the Dominator, and by a miracle they have returned to warn us."

"I imagine the Sinni were involved somehow. But they dare do nothing overt."

"Have you told the emperor?"

"He has been informed. He intends to make an Imperial Progress through the nine cities. It has been many years since an emperor visited all the cities; perhaps it is time. There are considerable tensions between Kadein and the rest."

"It is a hideous risk." Lessis was aghast.

"We must see to security."

"Does the emperor know that I am here?"

"No, dear Lessis, but he will be glad. He finds it difficult to deal with me. In truth, we have mutual difficulty. I find it hard to accept that he must rule, that he must make the decisions. Sometimes he will not do what must be done."

"He is concerned also with the people. He must represent them. If he goes too much against their will, his rule is weakened. The people cannot be ridden like a mare, they can only be guided with a gentle hand. Since Eigo, I am sure he has been overly cautious with the legions. But it is to be expected, we took terrible casualties there. It is not easy to send men to die in such numbers." She paused. "He must rule, because he is of the people in a way that we no longer are. We have lived too long."

"I know this with my head, but not with my heart. You are far better for this role than I."

"And how does Irene fare in your old shoes?"

"She has learned much, I believe. In time she will know enough."

"In time?"

Ribela grinned mirthlessly. "Considerable time."

"She will return to her old position strengthened by her experiences in the higher planes, I'm sure."

"And you, dear Lessis?"

"I will return to office. This threat cannot be ignored."

Cuzo made him wait outside the squadron office. Relkin had applied for special leave after breakfast. He'd pointed out that they were only twelve miles from the Broketail's home village, and that both he and his dragon were way overdue a visit to their home village. Cuzo told him to return at the fourth-hour bell for his answer. Relkin was there when the last echoes were still fading away.

There he waited outside the door, standing at attention while others came and went. Cuzo was telling him something, and Relkin knew what it was. Cuzo was dragon leader, not Relkin, even though both of them knew that Relkin should have been a dragon leader by now. With any justice in the world, Relkin should have had command of the 109th Marneri, the unit with which he was so identified by the world.

But there was no justice in the world, and Cuzo had been given the post when dragon Leader Wiliger resigned his commission and returned to civilian life. At that time Relkin was thousands of miles away and presumed dead. Thus went the missed opportunities of life.

So Relkin waited.

Finally the door opened, and Cuzo waved him in.

"Stand at ease, Dragoneer." Cuzo sat behind the big pinewood desk. He toyed with a stencil, gave Relkin a long, slow inspection. It was a moment that both of them knew was important, even though Relkin had been back in the unit for months and he and Cuzo had already formed strong impressions of each other.

Cuzo dropped the stencil, crossed his hands, and pursed his lips.

"All right. I was inclined to say no when you asked me this morning, because I heard that you were involved in these fights that took place yesterday. I had the medical reports at breakfast. Swane has a broken nose. Rakama is swathed in bandages. Gryf has a bruised arm. The list is long, and I was very angry."

Relkin sighed inwardly. Sometimes it seemed he was always cursed with Dragon leaders who hated him. They always found a way. There'd been Turrent, then Wiliger, now this new man, Cuzo.

"But I wasn't satisfied with just the initial reports. I know how things go in a squadron. I served five years as dragonboy."

Ah. Hope flickered briefly.

"So I did some digging. It wasn't easy, but finally I put it all together. Swane and Rakama have been butting heads for a while. And being dragonboys, with the collective wit of one flea, they did this outside the ring, outside supervision. Thank the Mother they didn't resort to weapons; that is the only consolation we can take from this debacle. And you, young Master Relkin, you broke it up."

Relkin eyed the dragon leader with mingled apprehension and curiosity. This was not taking quite the expected route.

"Gryf, on the other hand, was the Broketail's work. I ought to order him detained to the fort; no dragon may strike another outside the combat ring. It's virtually the same rules as for men; you know it. We have to enforce that, just to keep order."