The Dragon At War

by Gordon R. Dickson

  Carolinus snorted.

  "Indeed!" said Carolinus. "As a dragon, you're large, Jim. But an ordinary sea serpent is easily twice your weight and at least double your length. It's simply much bigger and stronger than you. They've always taken it for granted that no dragon can stand up to one of them. Also, in fact, the battle to which you're referring is one I remember very well. It's rankled in the minds of all sea serpents ever since. Possibly that's why they were so quick to agree to help the invasion. The land doesn't matter to them, but the dragons of the land do. They want revenge—to say nothing of the fact that, like the dragons, each has a hoard. They also look forward to plundering dragon hoards. To that end, once in England they'll try to kill off every dragon here."

  He drained his cup and glared aside at the kettle.

  "Refill!" he snapped.

  The kettle floated over through the air to him and poured what appeared to be water into his cup, but which changed to a dark tea-color as soon as it hit the cup. The liquid stopped a fraction of an inch short of the rim. Carolinus glared at the cup itself again.

  "Milk and sugar," he said.

  The liquid immediately turned milky. He sipped at it. "Right temperature this time," he remarked.

  "Ecotti," echoed Jim, frowning. "It's a funny name."

  "Not at all funny!" growled Carolinus. "It's a typical name in the mountains in Italy from which he comes. The people there have taken a sort of sneaking pride in themselves, for the sorcerers and witches they've produced over the centuries. He's no match for someone like myself, as I say; but as a sorcerer he's potent, very potent. I'd rate him in the very top rank of sorcerers—far above your level, Jim. Keep that in mind. Now, also keep in mind that as far as the sea serpents are concerned that invasion's already begun. There'll possibly be some in England, right now."

  "England!" said Jim, starting. "Of course! That would explain what happened to poor Amyth. And Hubert's cows! That'd make the serpents a lot closer than just in the sea around us."

  "Amyth? Hubert? What about Amyth and Hubert?" queried Angie sharply.

  "It could well have been a sea serpent that ate Sir Hubert's cows," said Jim, "and got Amyth. Swallowed him whole at one gulp, I'd guess. That's another thing I wanted to talk to you about, Carolinus—"

  "A sea serpent got Amyth, you say!" interrupted Carolinus. "Here?"

  "I think so. See what you think," said Jim. "I had him carry torches for me, last night when I put the signal cloth out for Aargh. It was dark enough so we couldn't see beyond the torchlight. But he was afraid of being too close to magic—I put a ward around the post and the cloth, so no other animal or person would come along and pull it out. Only Angie, myself or Aargh. Anyway, Amyth backed off. I had my back turned. I heard him scream—"

  He broke off at the memory.

  "When I went to look," he said, "I could only find his sword. Nothing else. I hid the sword."

  "Jim!" Angie said. "Oh, poor Amyth."

  "He wasn't necessarily the nicest person, you know," Jim said to her. "Few of our men-at-arms are."

  "I don't care," said Angie. "It's horrible, anyone being swallowed like that!"

  "Indeed, what you did was very foolish of you, Jim," said Carolinus. "Going looking practically into the mouth of a sea serpent. What if he'd still been there?"

  "How could it be foolish if I didn't know then that sea serpents were around?" retorted Jim with some heat. "As far as I knew then, the largest things here were dragons. I can't see a dragon coming and getting Amyth. For one thing, a dragon can't swallow or even lift a full-grown man or woman, and fly off. Besides, dragons don't like to fly at night. I'm the only exception to that I know of. I didn't know—and that's what I've been trying to ask you about! There's also the matter of this giant—"

  "Will you stop maundering about giants!" snapped Carolinus. "We've got serious things to talk about here."

  "I WILL NOT!" roared Jim suddenly.

  Carolinus, he was glad to see, was startled. So was Angie. Jim had never shouted at Carolinus before. In fact, he seldom shouted at anyone. He took advantage of the moment to go on.

  "This giant," he said clearly and firmly, "called himself a Sea Devil; and, from what you tell me about sea serpents, Carolinus, he may be part of the whole business. But you haven't let me get a word in edgewise about him. He came out of a pond near where I was picking flowers. He was at least twice the height of a dragon—maybe three times the height. And he was built like a wedge, point down. He had a great big head, enormous shoulders and he sort of tapered to a pair of feet that were—oh, maybe three or four times the size of mine."

  "A Sea Devil. Hmm," said Carolinus, suddenly thoughtful. "Did he say what his name was?"

  "Rrrnlf," said Jim, trying to trill the first letter of the Sea Devil's name. He was not very successful. He tried it again, with a Scot-like roll to his tongue; and came out with something a little closer to what he had heard from the Sea Devil himself. "Actually, he didn't seem a bad sort. He just wanted to know in which direction the sea was, and I told him. He was hunting somebody who had stolen some lady or other from him, he said. I'm not quite sure what he was talking about."

  "Neither am I," said Carolinus mildly. "The Sea Devils are Naturals, of course. The most powerful creatures in the ocean, and the most intelligent—with one exception. You said he struck you as a not unfriendly type of individual?"

  "That's right," said Jim. "In fact, he struck me as very friendly. He told me he was in my debt for my pointing out to him where the sea was; and said that now he would know his way all through the underground waters of this island. He said I could call on him if I ever needed him. I didn't know the underground waters were connected."

  "They aren't—the surface waters aren't," said Carolinus. "But the Sea Devils, with a combination of their strength and their superhuman abilities as Naturals, can go right through earth, as well as water, without any trouble at all. He'd have been talking about the deep-down layers of water trapped between rock levels as much as thousands of feet underground."

  Jim and Angie both stared at him. Carolinus went on, as if this ability was not at all startling.

  "Yes," he said, "they've actually made themselves a sort of underground, water-filled tunnel between the Mediterranean and the Red Sea, that gives them a short route to the Indian Ocean. I wonder what kind of lady it was he was talking about; and who'd have the courage to steal her from him? Even a sea serpent will back off from a Sea Devil. One of the great whales, of course, would outweigh a Sea Devil many times over; but whales never go looking for trouble. I'm under the impression they and the Sea Devils get along very well together—even the killer whales and the Sea Devils. Of course, the Sea Devil is really too big a mouthful for any killer whale. Even a male killer whale is only about thirty feet long; and even if it's a carnivore, there's still plenty of dolphins and sea lions and such that the killers can take with relative ease."

  He seemed to come back to present problems with a jerk.

  "I'm intrigued," he said, putting his cup and saucer aside to hang in empty air, "by his being here at this particular time, though. I wonder if there's a connection between him and the sea serpents helping the King of France. But the point is, there'd be nothing in it for the Sea Devils. Unlike the sea serpents, they can stay out of water as long as they like; but they've really nothing against dragons—or humans."

  He checked himself.

  "But—back to what I was talking about," he said. "The Mastermind behind this Ecotti must be found, and I can't do it. So, Jim, it's up to you—with that future-trained mind of yours—to sniff out whoever it is!"

  Chapter Ten

  "No!" roared Angie.

  It is not easy for women to roar. To raise their voices, yes; but to roar—difficult. It is largely a matter of the deepness of their voice tones. Jim had just roared a few minutes before—somewhat to his surprise—but then he was a fairly passable baritone. Angie was not even a contralto. Nonetheless, there was no mistaking o
n the part of her two hearers in that small room. Angie had roared.

  Jim started and turned to see his wife's face. But, instead of the daggers in her glance being directed at him, he was deeply relieved to see that they were all directed now at Carolinus. He looked at Carolinus and saw the old magician also looking startled. Whether he had also jumped or not, it was too late to tell. Jim had been looking the other way at the time.

  "I beg your pardon?" said Carolinus, in a somewhat stunned voice.

  "I say he's not going to uncover whoever this is that you're talking about!" said Angie. She was no longer roaring but she was very definitely furious. "It's always Jim! Jim! Are we in danger of having the Scots invade England? Send Jim to fix it!"

  "I didn't—" Carolinus was beginning.

  "Well, you had a hand in it somewhere. I'm sure of that!" snapped Angie. "Is the Crown Prince of England missing? Send Jim! Send Jim and his friends to France to recover the Prince! Have I been stolen away from the Loathly Tower, in a move by the Dark Powers that threatens everybody? Let Jim find Companions to fight with him and handle it!"

  "But," said Carolinus, regaining some of his self-possession, "I've just finished explaining why I can't be the one. And there's only myself or Jim."

  "I don't care—" Angie was beginning; but this time Carolinus interrupted.

  "You'd rather have this castle burned about your ears, by licentious French soldiery?" asked Carolinus. "All the men within it slaughtered and the women killed in unmentionable ways?"

  There was a moment's silence. Jim stole a glance at his wife again. She had been stopped; but the fire was not out. They had both been in the fourteenth century long enough to know what Carolinus meant by the type of unmentionable deaths that were visited on women—and, to a certain extent, men as well. Vertical impalement was one example.

  She glanced for a moment at Jim; but Jim was suddenly glad to see that all anger was gone from that glance. The Great Wall of Silence had evidently gone down; and they were once more on the same side.

  "There must be some way that doesn't involve Jim," Angie said, after the long moment of silence. "You're the one with all the magic, all the knowledge. You grew up on this world. You've lived here for I don't know how many years. You should be the one with the answers."

  All these words were addressed to Carolinus. The feeling of something missing in the older man that Jim had sensed once before came back on him now, more strongly. Carolinus shook his head slowly—but at that moment Jim had an inspiration of his own.

  "As a matter of fact, Carolinus," he said, "I wouldn't be able to do anything for you right away, anyway, Sir John Chandos is here, along with Sir Giles. In fact—though you probably don't remember it—they were the ones who helped us get away from that bunch of vagabonds. Chandos wants Giles and me to go to France for him and find out why the King of France is so certain that he can have a successful invasion. Apparently he's going right on building ships and gathering men, as if it was a settled matter—when everybody knows that a Channel crossing isn't the easiest thing in the world."

  "I knew that," said Carolinus, suddenly so mild that Jim immediately became wary. "It's part of the same thing."

  "I don't understand you," said Jim.

  "Neither do I," chimed in Angie.

  "It's quite simple," said Carolinus. "Sir John is after exactly the same information I'm after. But he's aiming at the box. I want the key to that box. You're going to have to go after the key first, Jim. I repeat, I can't. I'm older, now. My diminished strength, many things, keep me from doing what you could do. Not only are you from another place, another time, you also are still—as I pointed out earlier—within the bounds of apprenticeship. You can be pardoned for doing some things. I couldn't. And that's exactly what you may have to do."

  "I still don't understand you," said Jim. "What exactly do you want me to do?"

  "I want to find out who put Ecotti in touch with the sea serpents and got them to agree to an invasion. He could never have done it, alone. Why, three of those monsters could tow one of King Jean's ships out of trouble; and there's more sea serpents in the oceans than there are dragons in the world."

  "How are all these sea serpents going to get here?" asked Angie.

  "Sea serpents come from the sea," snapped Carolinus. He had evidently recovered completely from her roar.

  Jim looked at Angie. Angie looked back at him wordlessly.

  "All right," said Jim, "how do I go about looking for this whoever-it-is?"

  "You go to the bottom of the sea," said Carolinus.

  Angie and Jim started at him.

  "Bottom of the sea?" echoed Angie.

  "I'm afraid so," said Carolinus. "There's only one individual whom all the creatures of the sea—including the serpents—have always listened to, even if not all the time; and that's the oldest kraken—you'd call him a squid. The oldest and largest in the ocean. I've no idea what his name was to begin with; but your friend the Sea Devil and the sea serpents call him Granfer."

  "Granfer…" said Jim wonderingly. The name rang a bell. Hadn't Rrrnlf mentioned something about a Granfer?

  "You'll find him on the sea bottom; well away from shore but not in too deep water, since he's so big now that he has to eat steadily just to keep himself alive; even though with ten tentacles, some of which are two or three hundred feet long, he can snare anything that comes reasonably close to him. That includes some fairly good-sized creatures indeed—those killer whales I mentioned earlier, for example—one of those would make just a decent meal for Granfer."

  Carolinus paused, thoughtfully.

  "In fact," he went on, "even one of the largest whales isn't too big for Granfer to tackle. But I think his diet mainly consists of quantities of such fish as two-hundred-pound tuna; and others on down to smaller fish. You'd make a sort of minimum-sized bite for Granfer, Jim."

  "He's not going," said Angie quickly.

  "He will!" snapped Carolinus. "He's a magician; and even Granfer knows better than to touch one of our people. Besides, Granfer will find him and his questions much more interesting than appetizing. Oh, he'll ramble a bit. All older creatures do… except me, that is—"

  He was interrupted. Noise was floating in through the unglazed arrow slits of his room—which naturally overlooked the courtyard, though from a lofty height. These noises were the shouts and cries of men and the hammering of metal on metal—noises Jim had heard before when multiple swords had been at work on other swords, shields and armor.

  Jim started for the door.

  "Wait!" cried Angie.

  "Never mind that out there," said Carolinus quickly. "You said Sir John is here. I'll talk to him. Help me down to the high table right away."

  "Don't be silly!" said Angie, turning on him. "You're in no condition to go anywhere."

  "Oh, no?" said Carolinus, and vanished. So did his bed.

  Jim and Angie looked at each other again and together ran out into the corridor and down the tower stairs, through the Great Hall past an empty high table beside which Carolinus was sitting in his bed, looking annoyed, and out into the courtyard.

  Before them there was a swirl of men in close combat. Chandos was one, as was Sir Giles. But so also was Sir Brian Neville-Smythe, Jim's closest friend and Companion, whom Chandos had expressed a wish to see, in connection with the present matter that concerned him.

  Sir Brian and Giles, with some of the castle's men-at-arms, seemed to be attacking the entrance to the Great Hall. They were trying to break through Sir John and some of the other men-at-arms, who were stoutly defending it.

  Standing watching, from a safe distance, were some of the other men-at-arms and a great many of the servants. With them, and towering a head or more above the tallest of them, was Dafydd ap Hywel, the fourth of Jim's human Companions, who had been with Jim at the Loathly Tower and on the expedition to France to rescue England's Crown Prince. He must, thought Jim, have ridden fast to make the nearly day's journey from the outlaw camp this quic
kly.

  Dafydd was standing well back and leaning casually on his tall bow stave. His slim body, deceptive beneath the wide, powerful shoulders above it, showed an almost laziness, at sharp odds with the intent professionalism of his handsome face, as he studied the combatants. He showed no sign of joining either side of the fray, however; unlike Brian and Giles, who—unthinkable as it was—seemed to have become determined to force their way back into the castle.

  But Jim and Angie had now begun to be noticed by those watching. Cries of "M'Lord!" and "M'Lady!" were heard, and the servants began to vanish almost as expertly as Aargh was able to do.

  The voices reached through to those who were fighting; slowly it ceased. Their faces turned to look up at the doorway end of the portcullis.

  They were definitely shame-faced, as they recognized Jim and Angie. Neither Giles nor Brian could meet his eye, and even Sir John's still-handsome face looked somewhat abashed. Jim's gaze grew more bleak as he looked beyond them and saw several of his men-at-arms, lying either unconscious or dead on the ground a little farther out.

  He stepped out into the courtyard, growing more angry with every moment.

  "What's going on here—"

  He got no further. John Chandos had already pushed back his visor and was smiling at him.

  "My deepest apologies, Sir James!" Chandos's voice rang out. "If fault is involved in this, it is mine. It was my suggestion in a moment of thoughtlessness, on seeing Sir Brian here, again—since I have known him at many tourneys and think so highly of him. It was merely a bit of game playing; a bit of exercise in which I, and some of those of your men-at-arms who were also interested in a bit of play, should hold the door of your hall with blunted arms, while Sir Giles and Sir Brian and an equal number of others should make an effort to break through us."

  "I see," said Jim grimly.

  "Yes," went on Chandos. "If any attacking were able to touch the first timber of the portcullis, they would have been deemed to have won. But I take it, we have somehow earned your disapproval; and I most abjectly beg your pardon and that of your Lady whom I see at the entrance to the Hall, there. It was foolish of us, perhaps, to arouse an alarum within the castle. In any case, as I say, you must blame me entirely—"