“Hmmm,” Galelin said. He rubbed at his chin and leaned forward on his stool to examine the pendant. “A key, she said?”
“And you’re welcome to come in?” Paege asked. “To the end of the world?”
“And so this would be a key to the end of the world, then?” Galelin asked.
“It was certainly the end for the hordesmen who wore those pendants into battle,” Caron said.
“By the scale,” Mardoc said. “You don’t think that’s what they meant, do you? That that is the end of the world? Her death?”
“It would be the end of the world for you,” Galelin said to Trysten.
“But what about the keyhole?” Paege asked. “Where have we been peeping?”
Galelin sat back on his stool and rubbed at his chin some more.
Yallit let out a pitiful whine and scratched at the door.
“Oh, that poor thing,” Caron cooed.
Galelin shook his head and drew his hand through the air as if to cut off all mercy for the creature. “He is not coming in here.”
“What if... No,” Paege said.
“Keyhole...” Galelin murmured. “Keyhole. A keyhole is a passage. Death might be seen as a passageway?”
“That she can peer through?” Paege asked.
“Enough of this,” Trysten said as she tucked the pendant back into her tunic. “We can sit around and speculate all night, but I don’t think we are going to accomplish anything. I’ll get the book. Paege, you get as many people as Jurdun wants out to the outpost, and make sure they are armed. Send flight armor. Send even the stuff we took from the Western riders. It will help the people at the outpost should they come under attack again. I will talk to Kaylar and Rodden, and,” Trysten said as she turned on Galelin, “if you would, please tell Clemens that his sling is brilliant. I want another one made and ready to go by the morning. We will use one to retrieve the wounded man at the outpost, and Clemens will accompany Kaylar and a few others out to The Wilds to retrieve Rast. I want Rast home, in bed, and examined by yourself by sunset. Clear?”
Galelin grinned, then gave a smart salute. “As you command!”
Trysten looked at the others. “All right. Let’s get moving, then.”
Chapter 27
The horde was ready to fly as soon as dawn spread across the heather and stone. With a sweep of her arm, Trysten ordered them into the air. Twenty of Aerona’s dragons spread their wings and pushed themselves and their riders into the early sky.
Below, the dragons remaining in the weyr leaned forward in their stalls and craned their necks to watch their sisters fly off to the west. Pangs of envy washed up against Trysten’s back like the heat from a fire. She didn’t like to break up the horde, but she had the dragons to do so and felt better knowing Aerona was still protected while she was away. Vanon was perfectly capable of commanding the dragons in the weyr should the village fall under attack.
Trysten looked over her shoulder at Paege. She gave the order for him and his team to proceed. He acknowledged her order, then signaled for the left leg of the V formation to follow him. The formation broke, then reformed into two, smaller V’s. Paege and Kaylar led a horde off to the southwest where they would retrieve Rast using the sling Clemens had designed. Trysten and her horde continued along the river, heading for the outpost with a few more volunteers, as well as another sling to evacuate the man who had been wounded in the skirmish with the locals from The Wilds.
After Paege’s half of the horde flew out of sight, Trysten turned her attention to the looming mountains ahead, and the white and silver of the river rolling in the dawn light beneath her. She recalled what Kaylar and Rodden had told her the previous night after she met with them following her family meeting. They had discovered that after Trysten had abandoned the prisoners off to the north, they decided to split up. Half of them made their way back to Aerona, but not before getting lost and walking nearly to the valley of Carathia where they realized their mistake. They came to Aerona to serve Sa Yalla.
The other half of the abandoned hordesmen were to make their way back to Opplenot, taking word to their king that Sa Yalla had been found.
Trysten’s grip tightened on the lip of the saddle. She shook her head at the ridiculous notion that she was the queen of the Westerners. What good is a queen who can’t speak the same language as her subjects?
The day Trysten had scouted for a site for the outpost, she had found a cold campfire at the base of the cliff. Was that the remains of the prisoners’ camp? Had they made it that far, then slipped through the pass?
And if they did make it to the Western king, what would happen? Was the horde sent to the south a band of couriers? A horde sent to spread the news to those at the fort? And if so, what would their response be?
Trysten shook her head to clear it of useless questions. Distractions! Caron had warned her.
Her hand strayed to the pendant beneath her riding armor as she looked back to Karno on her right. The hordesman sat slightly hunched over his saddle and squinted into the wind, his hair captured beneath a close-fitting leather cap. His long, salt-and-pepper beard writhed and twitched across his chest in the wind. He met her eyes, then nodded in assurance of something.
Trysten nodded back, then twisted herself around just a little further in the saddle to see behind them. Yallit flapped his wings hard to keep up. He kept pace at the moment, fresh in the air, but he would fall behind before they reached the outpost. She had considered speaking to the blacksmith about a collar and chain to keep the little dragon secured to a beam in the weyr, but she didn’t have the heart to do it. The hordesmen would be aghast if she tried to do such a thing. Yet if Yallit followed them everywhere, it would merely be a matter of time before he got hurt, or worse. By the time they reached the mountains, the wild dragon was little more than a speck in the sky behind them, a little black dot moving against the mid-dawn sky.
Trysten turned her attention to the slopes before her. Something was out of place. Wrong. She leaned forward slightly as Elevera climbed into the sky, gaining altitude to bring her up to the elevation of the outpost.
She should be sensing Ambeoda, Jurdun’s dragon. Her thoughts and feelings should be tickling Trysten, filtering into her, lighting up as the dragon sensed Elevera’s presence.
Nothing.
Trysten signaled for the others to be vigilant. She scanned the tops of the trees and peered into the breaks of the canopy. She could see only rocks and the burnt gold of pine needles.
With a flick of her heel, Trysten directed Elevera to drift slightly to the left. They flew in a semi-circle and approached the outpost at an oblique angle, rather than head-on. Their approach allowed Trysten to peer up into the opening of Gul Pass. Its bare rock shone bright and hard in the dawn light, but there was nothing amiss or unusual in the heights above.
As the clearing came into view, Trysten peered down. The solid form of Ambeoda lay still and lifeless beside the pool. It appeared that she had been felled by more than a dozen arrows.
Trysten ordered the horde to circle once. The outpost grounds appeared empty, no sign of anyone, nor any bodies. If it weren’t for Ambeoda, the site would simply look abandoned.
As Elevera banked off to her left to circle around again, Trysten signaled for Karno and Brand to descend with her.
Elevera didn’t resist the order to land in the pool. She didn’t grumble her displeasure, but simply adjusted her bulk to set down with a splash as she had before while Ollym and Belara slipped into the narrow area between Ambeoda and the edges of the clearing.
Brand and Karno grabbed their bows and quivers and slid from their saddles to the ground. Trysten waded out to the shore of the pool, holding her bow out of the water, her attention darting to every tree trunk and shadow. Ollym and Belara blocked her view of the encampment.
“I’m sending them back up,” Trysten said, and without hesitation, the two dragons lifted into the sky and resumed their places in the holding pattern above.
Karno and Brand stood back-to-back in the space that had been between the two dragons. Each held a bow and a notched arrow as they scanned the area.
Aside from the fallen form of Ambeoda, there was no sign of the workers who had been erecting the outpost. Orderly stacks of logs and neat piles of limbs dotted the area. The tools were gone, however. Even the tents the workers had slept in were missing. Nothing remained to suggest what had happened except for Ambeoda, a few broken arrows on the ground, and a wood splitting ax stuck in the trunk of a tree. A cloth cap hung from the back of the ax head as if the man who had swung it had placed his cap there before wandering off.
“What happened here?” Trysten asked as she rounded the fallen form of Ambeoda. The dragon lay on her side, her eyes staring sightlessly at the waterfall. Arrows bristled from her neck. Whoever had killed her knew what they were doing. On the ground, a dragon’s firebreath was its most formidable feature, and puncturing a dragon’s throat was the fastest way to guard against it. It seemed unlikely that a band of rogues in the woods would know such details.
Trysten sniffed the air around the dragon. She laid a hand upon the scales. She could neither smell the sulfurous scent of spent firebreath nor could she feel any residual heat in the dragon’s flesh. Ambeoda had been dead a while, at least through the night.
“Westerners?” Brand asked, his voice hardly above a whisper.
Karno lowered his bow but did not return the arrow to its quiver. He stepped away from Brand and looked around. “Whoever did this has been gone for some time.”
“Where did everyone go, do you think?” Brand asked.
“I don’t know,” Trysten said. She began to walk the perimeter, studying the ground around her and casting periodic glances into the woods. She stepped past a few tree trunks, then stopped to examine an arrow lodged in a tree. She looked back over her shoulder, to the south where the arrow had come from.
Trysten yanked the arrow from the tree. Its tip was iron and looked similar to their own, forged in a fashion like theirs. The fletchings, however, were blue and white with tips of black. They had come from birds native to The Wilds.
“The wildmen did this,” Trysten said, her voice calm and cold as the iron arrow tip.
She looked back to the south, and the woods neither confirmed nor denied her accusation. The trees stood in silence, mute and blind witnesses to whatever had happened to her people and Ambeoda.
Her fist tightened around the arrow shaft. For all the sky! Why hadn’t she ordered more protection? More guards? She should have sent them the second Paege returned and told her what happened.
Her hand fell to her side. Whatever had happened, it wouldn’t happen again. She’d return with enough resources to erect a defensible position, a fortification at breakneck speed. She would not be chased out of here. She would not allow the Gul Pass to go unguarded. Not when they needed so many answers.
“Hey!” Brand called out, his voice tight with surprise.
Trysten dropped the arrow and reached for the hilt of her sword as she looked back at the young man. He pointed up into the trees. Her eyes followed his outstretched finger and there, upon a bough of a pine, sat the male Original.
“What is it?” Karno called, running up from the other side of the clearing.
“A coward in a tree,” Trysten spat. She drew the dragonslayer sword as she rushed forward.
“Oh, I’m hurt,” the Original said, his hand over his heart. “And I was in such a good mood, too.” He swung his feet slightly as they dangled in the air below him.
“I don’t care what kind of mood you’re in. What happened to my people?” Trysten demanded as she stopped before the tree, her neck craned back.
“Your people? You mean the ones working around here, making all that noise and ruining our good forest?” the Original asked, grinning slightly.
“Are you responsible?” Trysten asked. “Did you kill them?”
The Original’s grin widened. “Kill them? Of course not.” He shook his head. “I didn’t kill anyone. Why do you always assume the worst of me?”
“But you are responsible for their disappearance,” she stated, ignoring his question.
“Responsible? Me?” The Original shook his head and his edges blurred. “How many times do I have to tell you that you are responsible for all of this.” He waved his hand in a dismissive manner at the woods behind her.
“Tell me what happened to them.” Trysten’s hands tightened on the hilt of her sword.
The Original shrugged. “They ran off. That way.” He fluttered a hand to the east and a steep hill that dropped away from the small, flat grounds.
Trysten glanced back at Karno and Brand. She nodded in the direction of the hill. Karno began moving to the edge of the hill, walking sideways in order to keep both an eye and the tip of his arrow on the Original.
“He can’t hurt me,” Trysten announced as she turned her attention back to the Original. “That’s why he’s cowering up there in the boughs.”
The Original threw his head back and laughed. “Cower? Oh, how little you understand us. I’m not cowering from you, I’ve been waiting for you.”
“Waiting for me? Why up there? Did I get too close for your comfort in my den?” she taunted.
The Original brought one of his feet up to the bough, then grabbed a branch above him. As he stood, Trysten saw the same, disconcerting movement she’d seen in her den. He leaned forward, transferring his weight to the branch in his hands as he got his feet beneath him. For a second, it looked as if he was about to leap down upon Trysten.
Her knees flexed. She held the sword in front of her, the curved point aimed at the creature.
The thwip of an arrow sang in Trysten’s ear. The Original’s left arm shot up, his fist near his shoulder. The suddenness of his movement made Trysten’s head swim with the sickening sight of two things occupying the same space, and for a brief flash, the arm of a dragon emerged through the Original’s arm. An arm of dark scales and muscle, its talons clenched in a claw. His rage coursed through Trysten, nearly overpowering her with sensation as she struggled to keep her face calm.
The arrow smacked off the Original’s arm, then flipped back and fell to the pine needles below. The dragon’s arm disappeared into the human arm, which the Original lowered back to his side as he looked over at Brand. He shook his head and tsked as if deeply disappointed.
“A little jumpy, are we?” he asked. “Put your bow away. You have my word that I’m not here to hurt you.” He looked back to Trysten and added, “Any of you.”
“What is your word worth?” Brand called.
“Nothing,” Trysten snapped. “Nothing at all.”
“More than your aim, I assure you,” the Original barked at Brand.
“And you,” the Original said turning back to Trysten, a pout on his face. “You claim my word is worth nothing yet you demand information from me. I get so confused. But, you’ve always been that way. So full of contradictions. It is tiring.”
“Well, then don’t let me keep you. I don’t have time for your games. Is there something you want?” Trysten asked.
“I always want something from you, my dear Dragoneer. Is that the right title? Or is it Dragon Lord, or Queen of the Western kingdom? How am I supposed to keep it all straight?” The Original smiled widely, and Trysten nearly gagged to see the second row of dragon teeth right behind his yellowed, human teeth.
“Leave,” she said. “Just leave. I cannot stand to be around you. I have work to do.”
“Leave?” the Original asked. “Before I tell you what I want? I know you want to know. You are dying to know what the Originals want from you. Why it’s all you can talk about some days.”
“Then just tell me! Tell me what you want. Tell me what you’ve done to my people. Just tell me! Trysten gripped the sword so hard her hand began to hurt.
“Come with me,” the Original said. “Come with me, and I will tell you everything you want to know. Bring that beautifu
l golden alpha, and I will answer all of your questions.”
Elevera! Trysten gasped, remembering Galelin’s theory that the Originals were not after her at all, but instead they wanted or needed Elevera. Trysten spun around and looked toward the pool. Elevera was studying her, aware of Trysten’s distress, and eager to get out of the pool, but otherwise, she was fine.
“Never!” Trysten shouted, turning back to the Original. “I will never go with you, and Elevera will never leave me.”
“Pity,” the Original said. “How will you ever know what’s become of your people, as you call them? Or the hordesman who goes with that fallen dragon over there? The workers who labored so hard to build your pathetic fort so that you can stick your nose where it doesn’t belong?”
The Original leaned over slightly and looked down at Trysten with a sly smile. “Or the royal one who never stops talking and his ridiculously oversized horde? Really, what was he going to do with all of those dragons?”
Trysten stopped breathing, and all she could hear was the thudding of her own heartbeat, fast and hard in her chest.
“Aymon?” she asked, her voice tight. “What have you done with Aymon?”
“Come with me and you can ask him yourself. Oh, I forgot, you will never do that,” the Original said. He leaned forward and grasped the branch above his head again. The tree shook slightly. A reddish brown sliver of a squirrel leaped from the end of the branch, landed with a bound in the next tree, and sped away.
“He is alive then?” Trysten asked.
The Original’s grin widened more. “When you are ready to come with me, Trysten of Aerona, we will be ready to answer your questions. Until then, keep your people in Aerona where they belong. They are starting to irritate me.” He leaped upward, and his feet landed upon the next bough with unreal grace, and then he was gone, scrambling up through the tree. The branches shook and quivered and betrayed his location until the top of the tree shook, and then was still.
Outposts Page 19
