The Dragons of Argonath (9 page)

She slipped into the bushes with the others.

"Up here," said Thorn, indicating the darkness beyond. "There is a gulley deep enough for us to hide in."

Brush cloaked the ground along the gulley, and they stole away quickly up the rocky slope and were soon out of view from the ambush site.

"Quickly," whispered Thorn. "There's a way up the hill here."

"What were those things?" asked the emperor.

"I have no idea, Your Majesty. I have never seen anything like them."

"Where are we, then? Anyone have any idea?"

"This is Capbern's Gap, Your Majesty," said the trooper with the bloody head. "Brennans town is a few miles away. The town of Quosh is over there."

"Quosh, did you say?"

"Yes, Lady. I believe that is what it's called."

Lessis nodded, as if this knowledge confirmed something of great import.

"They meant to kill us by crushing the coach with us inside it," she said.

Pascal had a haunted look in his eyes.

"You were right, Lady Grey. I underestimated our enemies' urge to kill me." He took her slender hand in his large, powerful one. "Still, all this will play strongly to our advantage in the Argonath. We will rouse the nine cities with the tale of our escape."

"Your Majesty, we will only have the chance to do that if we escape and we aren't safe yet. The pursuit will not be long in coming."

Pascal looked back. The fierce light was visible, tinging the trees pale and stark. Imps and other things were milling around while harsh voices yelled orders. A search party was being organized.

"Yes, of course."

Thorn waved them on, out of the gulley and across a flat area of bare rock, with patches of tiny gnarled trees and thick clumped moss. The light was suddenly extinguished.

"Those things, were they some new kind of troll?"

"Possibly, Your Majesty," replied Lessis. "But I have never seen their like before. They moved more quickly than trolls."

"Hush!" whispered Blade.

There came the clatter of hooves, and a horseman came riding by. The horse was panting heavily, and the man was hunched over his pommel.

"It is Ambassador Koring," said Thorn.

"Ambassador!"

Koring pulled up.

"Your Majesty! You are alive, thanks to the Mother."

"Thanks to the quick reflexes of those who protect me."

"You must get away at once, Your Majesty. The enemy has dozens of those things. They will soon learn that they failed to kill you."

"What are they?"

"I don't know, but they are eating the fallen."

"That is what trolls do…"

"What caused that light? It was brighter than the sun."

"Powerful magic," said Lessis. "We face a new enemy, and he has many powers beyond those we possess."

"Come, lords," Thorn was anxious now. "We must not linger."

They went on, toiling over the rocks, following a winding path through heather and cliff. The Emperor of the Rose, titular overlord of the Isles of Cunfshon, the Argonath city-states and the land of Kenor, had been reduced to a fugitive, scurrying through the wild dark.

On their second and last morning in Quosh, Bazil and Relkin rose early, not long after dawn. They breakfasted at the inn and then washed up at the village pump house. There they said hellos and farewells to as many folk as walked by, which was about half the village by the time they'd finished, for the word had gone out quickly that the famous Broketail was taking a good scrub at the pump. Everyone who could take the time made a beeline for the spot. By now the famous pair had become used to the gracious attentions of those who would barely have nodded to them in the old days, and they replied to everyone with good humor and manners.

A large lunch, packed in two hampers, was waiting for them at the inn when they returned, talked out and very clean. One hamper, designed to be carried by a donkey, held a pair of choice hams from Farmer Pigget and his wife, plus a smoked turkey, taken off the bone, a bushel of potato salad sauced with akh, and a dozen country pasties. There was also a small hamper with a country pie, more akh, and some sausage and cabbage pickle. Relkin also carried six long loaves, fresh out of Baker Matuseis's oven and bound with string.

They set out around the ninth hour, under a patchy sky with towering cumulus riding up from the south. Ahead loomed the Rack, five knobs of bare rock standing up like the vertebra of a long-dead giant. The most northerly knob, known as "Old Baldy" or "Baldermegi," was famous as a place haunted by fairies. Descending southward, and growing smaller came Little Baldy, Thick Neck, Big Rack, and Beggars Hill.

They would go back the way they had come. Across Quosh Common into Bramble Woods, then ascending through the Dingle to the Cutback Valley, which offered a good route past Beggars Hill. The trail here was narrow, used mainly by hunters out for the abundant rabbits. Beyond Beggars lay the pony trail that ran up from Barley Mow. The road bent northward there and traveled along the flank of the hills to join with the cart road that led over the Rack and down to Cross Treys camp. With good weather Relkin was sure they would easily make it back to camp in time for the evening boil, something that would be very important to a certain leatherback dragon. If they made good time in the morning, they'd have lunch on Neck Hill.

They said their farewells to the folk who gathered along the Market Way and Brennans Road until they reached the Bull and Bush. The regulars poured out to surround them and sing a fare-thee-well from the old song book. Then Bazil thanked them and was applauded for doing so. At last they set off across the common, still accompanied by a few younger boys and dogs. After a mile or so the youngsters dropped back, and a little later so did their dogs, with a last cluster of mournful barks.

Relkin's stride was cheerful and confident that morning. The visit home had been a great success. He felt something strong and deep had been renewed for him. Perhaps he really did belong, despite his orphan status. He and his dragon had become village heroes, and it felt good. Of course, he checked himself, he wouldn't want to be treated like that all the time, but it had been nice for a day or so. Every pretty girl in town had been keen to talk with him, and many had flirted outrageously, unlike when he was younger. Then they had been haughty little princesses, secure within their families, and would have nothing to do with any dragonboy.

He laughed to himself. The dragon raised an eyebrow.

"What make boy laugh?"

"I was just thinking about how things have changed… How it used to be in the village, and what it was like on this visit."

Bazil chuckled, a deep rumbling sound, and snorted a little. He too was enjoying the morning.

"The innkeepers never volunteer to feed this dragon before, that for certain."

Relkin laughed aloud, recalling the luncheon in their honor held at the Bridge House Inn the day before. Bazil had gone through a side of beef, buckets of ale, and a tremendous tart, filled with cheese and tomatoes. Castilion had planned to cut the tart in small pieces and sell it to the village folk outside his Inn, but Bazil had devoured the whole thing in the matter of a few minutes, while adding more akh with a liberal hand from the tureen on the table. Castilion, to his credit, had endured the sight with a brave smile.

"Still, they were spared a lot of taxes because of us," said Relkin.

"They do well."

"So do we."

Relkin thought of the gold tabis and doubloons they'd brought back from Eigo and deposited in banks in Kadein and Marneri. For a dragon and dragonboy pair, they were exceptionally well set up, even wealthy.

The dragon, by dint of great mental effort, had finally come to grips with the human concept of money, or at least the idea that pieces of shiny metal were exchangeable for considerable supplies of food.

He clacked his jaws happily at the thought of all the food they could buy. Relkin laughed, knowing exactly what Bazil was thinking.

Up through Brumble Woods they went, climbing through stands of hemlock and pine to flatter areas covered in oak and beech. The day continued fair, with towering clouds passing northward through the blue sky. After a while the woods began to thin on the higher ground, and they could glimpse the cliffs of Beggars Hill looming above, a series of grey limestone faces thirty to fifty feet high.

Soon they came to the bottom of the dingle, a steep-sided canyon cut into the limestone by a strong spring. There were slabs and blocks of tumbled stone stacked like giant childs' blocks all the way up. For the agile and fit, it represented a good shortcut up onto the higher slopes of the Rack. For Bazil, after two nights and one whole day of eating and drinking, it was something of an ordeal, and he was huffing and puffing loudly by the time they reached the top. Relkin was waiting for him, discounting the complaints about dragonboys that pushed old dragons past their limit and the like.

"You didn't have to eat quite so much for dinner last night. And three kegs of beer? Isn't that a little too much?"

"Dragon cannot drink beer in the afterlife."

"Afterlife?"

"You think dragonboy is only creature that goes to heaven?"

Relkin raised his hands, palms up.

"I don't know if they take dragonboys in heaven. Maybe you have to believe in heaven before they'll let you in."

"Well, take it from this dragon, there's no beer in heaven."

Relkin had to agree that this was probably very likely. Heaven didn't sound all that heavenly sometimes. He wondered if a dragon boy who still called to the old gods would be granted admission to heaven. Then again maybe not going to heaven would be a blessing. Relkin liked a certain amount of peace and harmony, since there'd been a pronounced shortage of them in his own life; however, nothing but peace and harmony, forever and forever? He wasn't sure about that. And no beer? Very dubious proposition.

From the top of the dingle they took a rocky path along the side of a steep bank. The path angled upward along the cliffside, and soon they were atop the cliff, walking in open heathland. The sky offered patches of blue, but away to the south, past Pawlers Hill, the Ersoi glowered beneath heavy clouds. Relkin had a premonition that they might get a soaking before they got back to Cross Treys.

Just his luck, he thought as he considered the way fate always seemed to arrange these things for him. Just when everything was going well, you got soaked. Being someone who tended to look for hands on the tiller of fate, Relkin always wondered whether someone much greater than himself had it in for him.

Suddenly there came a strange, quavering cry echoing off rocks above them. Relkin spun around.

"What was that?"

Bazil had stood up on his hind legs and raised his head to stare around himself.

"This dragon never heard that before."

"The something that was worrying the sheep over on Pawlers Hill?"

"Not wolf. No cat that I know of either."

Together they carefully scanned their surroundings, but failed to locate any sign of the creature that had made the noise.

"Bear?"

"Never."

"Yes, you right. That not noise of bear."

The cry was not repeated.

They moved on, alert to anything unusual in the hills around them. Nothing showed itself, and though the clouds to the south were slowly thickening, Relkin was beginning to believe that they might get all the way to Cross Treys before it rained.

Suddenly they both became aware of a rumbling sound also coming up from the south, but it wasn't thunder. Relkin put his head to the ground.

"Riders, many riders."

"A posse from Farmer Pigget?"

"I don't know."

The rumble grew much louder suddenly. Some sixth sense made Relkin uneasy.

"Get down," he said. The hooves were drawing closer. Rolling up from the south through the heather behind them.

"Get down!" Relkin tugged on Bazil's arm. The dragon chose not to argue. He ducked down into a cut in the rock, using ancient dwarf pine trees for handholds. Relkin dropped down beside him, then scrambled up to peer over the edge.

A moment or two later the riders came into view, first three men, clad in black leather, then other figures, smaller, squarer than men, riding horses. A dozen of them, then more.

Relkin sucked in a breath with an involuntary oath.

"Imps!" he said in a harsh whisper.

"Imps never ride. Forbidden to them."

"Well, these do."

"Never seen that. They don't do that at Padmasa…"

"But, wait a moment, what is this? Imps on the Rack? How could imps get all this way without being detected?"

"Maybe they land from sea, down in Ersoi."

The riders, twenty strong, rolled on over the open ground at a canter and disappeared downslope heading north.

Dragon and dragonboy looked at each other.

"Need cavalry for this."

Without more ado, Relkin strung his bow and readied a set of arrows.

"Got to get to Cross Treys and pass on the information. They ought to send a cavalry patrol down here. Something is definitely wrong."

"This dragon not like to see imp in these hills."

"Then, we better step up the pace." Relkin loaded shafts into the bow.

"Why not take hunters trail? Go over Big Rack way past Lion Rocks."

"Then down to Touzan and Minden. Get on the north road there and save an hour or more."

"Boy thinks it out."

"Well, well, here's one dragon who knows how to plan ahead."

"Thank you." There was a loud wyvern jaw clack. "This dragon learn to think for himself."

They set off northward, uneasily following in the trail of the imp riders. The riders had gone along through the heather then down a sheep track, where they'd had to go in single file. They were now below Bazil and Relkin, moving along a lower trail that ran up to the ford across the Inth Stream. When they reached the place where the upper trail split in two, the two caught sight of the troop of imp riders, passing under the trees toward the ford, several hundred feet farther down. Here the trail they were following started to zigzag down toward the ford. The less used fork in the trail was a hunters' trail that ran on to higher ground heading eastward. Eventually it would take them up the row of nobs that represented the crest of Big Rack Hill. Past the Big Rack loomed the mass of Old Baldy, by far the biggest of the nobs that made up Rack Hill.