The Dragons of Argonath (5 page)

There was a bonfire lit in Brewery Yard, with old barrels, corn duff, and rotten wood out of the old brewery roof that Avil Bernarbo had set aside to be burned at Fundament Day. Children danced gleeful and wild around the fire while the elders stood in line, arms entwined, swaying gracefully to the ancient song of "Bluestone Hills."

And so it went, and on into "La Lili La Loo."

"A Fine Young Man from Marneri."

"The Kadein Waltz."

"Daniel Went a-courting," and even a round of "The Kenor Song," in which the dragons came in on the choruses and sent the volume up so loud you could hear it all the way to Twin Streams and more.

Then came a hammer of gongs as the pastry makers emerged from the inn, pushing out a huge cart laden with cakes, puffs, and tarts. The children converged on the cart with a collective scream of delight, and the fiddlers paused for refreshment.

Farmer Shon Pigget wiped the perspiration from his brow with a big red handkerchief and took a mug of ale in the large front room of the Blue Stone Inn. Around him gathered the informal court of the village. Tomas Birch, Avil Bernarbo, Farmer Haleham and old Macumber from the Dragon House. These were the largest producers and the largest consumers of the valley's wheat and barley.

Surrounding them were the lesser lights: Ivor Pigget, the Dorns, Farmer Tallo, Dernck Castilion, who was the proprietor of the other village inn, over at the Bridge House.

Together this informal group effectively governed the village, with reference to custom and occasionally to the Great Weal of Cunfshon, the constitutional texts that underlay the governing structures of the Argonath. Of course, matters of law were settled by the justices and matters of religion were settled by the temple.

"And so, how do you find your prodigy, Macumber?" said Farmer Pigget after he'd taken a wet.

"He has come through it all very well. The two of them make a fine team. You can see they have worked together for a long time."

"We had high hopes for them, I remember. The leatherback was quick and supple, clearly very good with the sword."

"Oh, yes, he was always good with the sword. But there was more to Bazil than just a sword fighter. He has that good soul, the very best trait of our wyverns."

"That boy was a scapegrace as a lad, but I always thought he'd make a good soldier," said Tomas Birch.

Farmer Pigget chuckled. "I seem to recall a time when you found your orchard just about stripped."

Birch pursed his lips and nodded. "I'd have taken rawhide to him if I'd have caught him that day!"

"Well, here's to them," Farmer Pigget raised his mug. "They've saved the village from legion taxes for many years now. They've served us all very well indeed."

The mugs were raised high, then drained.

For a while the talk was of more parochial things, the state of the planting after the heavy rains of the week before. Farmer Pigget was concerned about the bottom end of his main field.

"They should never have taken the elms out along the south road. It always gets muddy down there now."

"They were too old, Farmer Pigget, too old. There's young ones in there now. Give them a decade or so. It wasn't done right in your father's day." Thus spoke Farmer Haleham.

Pigget nodded at this criticism of his sire. "Aye, Haleham, I'm afraid you're right about that."

"Lukam up at Barley Mow has a wagon for sale," broke in Trader Joffi. "It's almost new, a Kadein make."

"I'm not yet ready to go buying wagons from anyone up at Barley Mow," groused Tomas Birch, who was known for his ungenerous opinions of the nearby villages.

"It's a fine wagon. Made in the wagon shop of Postover in Kadein."

"From Lukam at Barley Mow? You've got to be joking with me."

"Not at all. By the Hand, will you listen now. It's a fine wagon, and not that old at all."

"Would you talk of the devil," said Tomas Birch, pointing as Relkin entered the front room of the inn intent on refilling his mug.

A general caw of acclaim came up from the circle in the center of the room. All around the periphery other heads turned. Relkin felt the influence of so many eyes upon him and felt that odd unease again. His recent experiences in the mad elf-city of Mirchaz had left him rawly sensitive on the psychic plane. He could feel all these people staring at him and filling him with their preconceptions, their concerns, their desires. Their hungers seemed to burn him, as if he were too close to the flames. He could not satisfy these people. He was just a dragonboy, a good one perhaps, but no more than that. Not even a dragoneer or dragon leader yet, he thought a little bitterly. What these people wanted he didn't have, no answers to their questions, no balm for their wounds. He had to wall off their thoughts to keep his own turning smoothly.

Now he was drawn into their circle and made to shake hands with all the great men of the village. He thanked them with a grave bow. In his previous life here, he'd been just an orphan boy, paired with the dragon; the dragon was far more important than he. He'd been unlettered, unschooled, raised in the orphanage and then by Macumber in the Dragon House. Macumber wasn't bad. He was stern, but kinder than he seemed on the outside. His bark was much worse than his bite. And he had a lifetime of dragon lore to impart to a dragonboy who could sit still and listen.

But it remained the fact that in the old life Relkin had been outside society's walls, wild, hardly schooled, viewed with suspicion as a potential criminal. Now things were changed. It took a bit of getting used to. They were eager to know him now, where once he'd gained no more than curt little nods from such as Farmer Pigget or Farmer Haleham. Now they were beaming at him. Now he was the hero of the hour.

He gave an internal shrug. And so he was, he acknowledged to himself. Enough of bitterness, he and Bazil had earned their night of adulation. They'd fought their way across the world and back and accounted for themselves pretty well. Relkin decided that he could take this sudden elevation in his social status as his due. After all, he and Baz were known to a few kings, queens, and elf lords, and after such lofty connections, what were a few prosperous country yeomen?

"I thank you, kind sirs. Bazil and me have seen a few knocks in our time, but you know a lot of those stories. We had the luck, or the misfortune, to be in at the cutting edge of the war on more than one occasion."

"Aye, lad, and you two were at Sprian's Ridge."

"Sprian's Ridge!" They all raised their cups in memory of the battle that had saved the Argonath.

"Well, we made it through all that, and we're glad to be back home tonight."

"We're happy to welcome you home."

"And is it true you have to return tomorrow?" said Farmer Pigget.

"No, sir, we have tomorrow in the village, and we must be back the evening of the day after."

"Splendid!" said Demck Castilion of the Bridge House Inn. "Then, will you honor the Bridge House Inn by attending a luncheon tomorrow, beginning at the First Hour."

Relkin hesitated.

"Does that include the dragon?"

There were smiles. Trader Joffi giggled when he imagined a dragon devouring the fine viands that came from the kitchen of the Bridge House Tavern.

Dernck swallowed. "The dragon is invited too, of course."

"That's wonderful. Nothing he'd like better. And I would be honored, of course, Master Castilion."

"Good, that's settled, then." Castilion glanced around the group. "And may I extend this invitation to everyone present. We will fill the ballroom for luncheon tomorrow."

There were happy shouts of acceptance. Even Pigget nodded when pressed.

"Field's too damned wet to work anyway."

"I'll be there. The kitchen at the Bridge House Inn is justly famous," said Farmer Haleham.

"Excellent." Castilion looked back to Relkin. "I must go and start the preparations. There's much to do as you might expect." He left them, and the conversation resumed.

"Well, that was a bit of a surprise," murmured Farmer Pigget.

"I'll say," said Tomas Birch. "Don't see the Bridge House Inn thrown open like that very often."

"Dernck Castilion still has the first penny he was ever given."

"Oh, will you stop that!" snapped Avil Bernarbo.

"It's true," protested Joffi. "I've seen it. He keeps it nailed above the bar in the saloon at the inn."

Bernarbo blew air noisily through his teeth. "Bah."

"I had heard that rumor too," said Pigget.

"Well, 'tis true the prices are high, but the kitchen is excellent. Castilion has won the prize in Brennans three years running."

"Castilion should be running a restaurant in Marneri. Down in Blue Stone we don't pay those kind of prices."

"Ha!" snorted Joffi. "Castilion should go to Kadein. they would pay his prices there."

"Ah, prices—why do we spend our lives thinking about prices?" said Pigget.

"Aye, 'tis a rotten shame," agreed Birch. "What with the price of wool this year, we'll be lucky to put anything away."

Pigget sighed. "But wheat prices are high because of the Aubinans. That will help. We've got the makings of a grand wheat crop this year."

At this they all nodded. The Aubinans would help to keep the price of grain sky-high in Marneri this year.

"And yet that makes me feel guilty," said Birch. "We all owe the white city on the long sound a great deal. Our lives even."

Once again Sprian's Ridge rose up in their minds. The thin margin that had halted the likely destruction of their world in rapine and fire under the swarming mass of tens of thousands of imps and trolls.

"We owe the legions our lives. We owe the cities for much of our prosperity. Marneri has been a good market for our grain, enough to provide for all in our village."

"Aubinas has a short memory."

"Is Kadein behind the Aubinans?"

"No. This game is not in Kadein's favor either. The price of grain will hurt the poor in the great city."

"It makes one fear for the future of the Argonath, all this talk in Aubinas of a rebellion."

"The future must be faced, no matter what it brings."

"Whatever we do, we must try and provide for the future."

"And so we are governed by the prices of things. If we were to abandon all thought of the future, we could spend like princes."

"My wife already spends like a princess."

There was a grim chuckle.

"Ah, we all fare well enough," said Bernarbo. "The emperor is a good one, things go well in Blue Stone. We have been preserved, thanks be to the Mother."

" 'Tis correct," said Farmer Pigget. "But we must still invest in the future. There will be an issue of consols this month. Will you be taking any?"

"I am in the long bonds at the moment. I have wondered about the consols. The last issue did very well, I understand."

"Remember that it is a fine line between fair business and avarice," said Birch. "Ho ho, who preaches the temple line now?" responded Bernarbo.

"One must be careful with money," said Pigget. "You leave it in gold coins in a box under your bed? Of course not. You put it in a bank in Marneri. The bank is far more secure and is regulated by the Imperial Service. The bank can also lend out money and make a profit. We do the same when we buy bonds or consols."

"Farmer Pigget, you're absolutely right, and what we have to do is to get the wage earner, the small farmer, the small holder, even the laborer, to invest part of his wage."

"This is unlikely, they are improvident. Few see beyond the needs of the moment."

"True," said Bernarbo, "they drink their money at the bar and then complain that they were not paid enough."

"That is the way of the laboring classes…".

Seeing Relkin absorbed in their words, they turned to him.

"And how about you, Dragoneer Relkin," said Birch. "Have you saved your money while in the legions?"

Relkin pursed his lips.

"We have indeed, sir. We put our money in the consols, and also in the amalgamated."

"By the Hand!" exclaimed Farmer Birch.

Shon Pigget and the others merely stared, surprised at such financial sophistication from a dragonboy. Avil Bernarbo gave a hoarse chuckle.

"I see that we have a financial prodigy on our hands, gentlemen. Dragonboy Relkin, where did you learn about such matters?"

"Dragonboys are encouraged to invest their money, sir."

"Ah, this is legion policy."

"Yes, sir."

"An investor for a dragonboy! Sensational news. Well, Macumber, how d'you answer for that!"

"I've always tried to teach them careful management of their resources."

"Well, it appears to have been taken to heart by Master Relkin," said Pigget.

"Bah!" interrupted Haleham. "What about that thief Pixin? And that one last year? I forget the name. Stole a calf right out of my barn."

"They're more thieves than investors these days!" said Birch.

"What about this lad Pixin, Macumber? Caught stealing apples. Now it's candles. What next, gold?" Bernarbo pressed.

"They aren't bad at heart, Master Bernarbo. They just don't receive very much in their lives. Little in the way of comforts, small change, not much love."

"Bah, Macumber, you mollycoddle them down there. Don't try and tell me different."

"Avil's right," chipped in Birch. "Five dragon boys in five years, sent to jail for theft in the village. It's got to stop, Macumber."

They had forgotten Relkin for the moment. He turned away and found himself face-to-face with Farmer Pigget.

"You know, we came up to Marneri for your funeral, lad."

Relkin smiled politely. He'd heard all about his funeral, held at the memorial service that dedicated the monument to the fallen on the expedition to Eigo.

"I'm sorry you had to go so far for nothing."

"Don't be. It was good for us all to be there. The country came together then. Aubinans stood with the rest of us. It's easy for us to forget, kept safe and sound in this lovely land, that we owe our safety to the heroism of boys like yourself, and dragons like the Broketail."