"And me," Duffy said, stung. He drew himself up to his full height, which put the top of his head just underneath the miller's white-daubed nose.
"And thee," Varney agreed, kindly. "And a ghost, for all the good that does us. Some are saying it's unlucky that it's come here. Orack thinks it means death for all of us."
"Well, it won't," Duffy said, wishing his voice wouldn't crack when he was under stress. "I swear it, by my father's name."
"Lad, if you don't have more in you than your father's name, all is lost," Varney said. "I'll help. But you'll have more trouble convincing the others."
As Varney had predicted, the men were skeptical of the dragon's warning but promised to cooperate just the same. The Hearthstone Tavern became headquarters for the defense of Greenton. The adults, men and women alike, clustered together to plan for the coming attack. It was difficult to make plans without knowing what for.
Barata, Orack's wife, stood up.
"What are we doing, mustering for war?" she asked. "Old folks and children! If only some of our fighters had survived, if only Sir Karal lived, this exercise would be reasonable. I say to stop the nonsense right now."
"Unless we defend ourselves, we'll have to flee," Duffy said from the foot of the table. "Evil things are marching this way. Soraya wouldn't lie. Silver dragons are the children of the One who protects us."
"Now, don't you quote your lessons at me!" Barata said furiously, leveling a finger at him.
Duffy's mother stood up.
"I offer the shields and spears which hang in my family's hall," she said quietly. "They are old, but there is still some virtue in them."
Duffy was proud of her upright carriage and dignity. He remembered that before their fortunes fell and Sir Karal died, she had been a court lady, trained to the sword and shield.
After such a generous beginning by the highest lady in the town, the others put up their donations.
"Strawing hooks!" "Cooking knives!" "Any of my hammers ye can wield!" "The millstone!"
Miller Varney looked around in satisfaction. "And the rest of you can offer your two good hands," he said. He glanced up at Duffy. "I'll start organizing this lot, with your permission, General, laddie. You take the rest." Gratefully, Duffy nodded.
"The rest" consisted mainly of the village children.
"Since we're without weapons or magic," Duffy said, leading his band of youngsters along the forest path toward the main road, "we have to outthink our attackers."
"When will we learn to fight?" one boy asked loudly, and was hushed by the others.
"Never, I hope," Duffy replied, wondering if blatant honesty helped in being a general. "You're going to set traps and act as spies."
"My mother doesn't want me out in the forest by myself," complained Dirk, the small son of Eise. Some of the others made fun of him, but their eyes were worried, too.
'"We'll work in teams," Duffy said, looking back over his shoulder at all of them. "Everybody will have a partner, and I'll go around between all of you to make sure nothing is going wrong. You're all being very brave. Between us we'll keep the village safe."
Soraya, glimmering like a star, flew through the tree boles across their path, her claws stretched out, and came to a perfect landing before Duffy.
"Time is short!" she cried, her great voice booming. "Ogres! Ogres from Voern's Minions are coming. The foe is within hours' march of here!"
Some of the children screamed. Orack's daughter snatched up her younger brother and sister and fled back toward the village. Her threshing footsteps resounded in the quiet forest, scaring small animals and birds into flight. The rest of the children remained, huddled together, staring at Soraya.
"Ogres," Duffy said, his eyes wide as saucers. "Then we're lost. We'll have to get everyone together and hide them in the caves along the rivercourse."
"No, we will fight them," Soraya said. Her eyes gleamed with a formidable inner fire that surprised Duffy into taking a step backward.
"How?" he asked helplessly.
The light in Soraya's eyes flared. "First, you must set your traps. Then we must make plans."
With difficulty, Duffy persuaded his small force to continue with their tasks. With coils of rope and sinew, they set snares at intervals where a foot might fall. Thanking the gods for the copious rain that Greenton had had recently, Duffy helped a group of boys deepen pits in the roadway and plant sharpened spikes in each. Carefully, an elder girl in hide gloves up to her elbows painted the stakes with brownish goo from a lidded pail. Very small girls and boys filled up the pits with debris to disguise the trap. The Wanderer was here, there, and everywhere, offering advice to the children, and telling them merry stories of her many years of travel. A few were distracted by the gnomelings silly talk, but most of the children couldn't forget that what they were doing was no longer a game. All of them had been brought up in wartime, and knew that those who fell in battle never came back.
Gillea comforted her best friend, who dashed the back of her hand at weeping eyes and nose even as she tied triplines around the boles of trees.
"I don't want to die," Loie said.
"Duffy won't let you," Gillea assured her, dabbing her friend's face with the edge of her own increasingly dirty apron. "If he did, Mother would kill him."
Duffy, a few yards away, helping another boy tie back a springy tree branch with a length of rope, hurried what he was doing and sought out Soraya. The silver specter hovered a man-height above the ground, watching each pair of children in turn. She settled disconcertingly through the undergrowth as the agitated boy approached.
"I'm responsible for the protection of all these children—in fact, all the people in the village," he burst out, guiltily. "What am I doing? We can't outfight ogres, or even outrun them. Varney was right. There are no warriors left in Greenton. What can a bunch of children and old people past their prime . . ."
"And a dragon," Soraya interjected calmly.
"Well . . . and a ghost dragon do to stop a force of ogres? You can't breathe on them or claw them or even stand in their way." Duffy put his hand out, passing it without obstruction into Soraya's muzzle. "There's nothing that will keep ogres from marching upon Greenton and tearing us to pieces."
"We've got you," Gillea said, coming up and tucking her hand into his. "The one shining hero who will save everyone, like in all the stories."
"Sounds familiar," the Wanderer said, intent on her bits and pieces of broken glass again. She seemed to like tumbling them over and over in her fingers. Duffy wondered in some irritation if she liked them so well to be interested in nothing else, why had she spent the fifty years she'd claimed wandering all the lands of the Dallen? "Sounds like the tale the old man was telling in the tavern t'other night."
"The story of Verrol and Liaya?" Duffy said. He turned to Soraya, whose giant eye grew even brighter.
"That is the answer," Soraya said.
"What?" Duffy demanded. The image that grew in the dragon's eye was such an obvious solution that it made the young man laugh out loud.
"What is it? What is it?" Gillea demanded, jumping up. Duffy caught her in his arms and swung her so she could see the dragon's face.
"Soraya is a spirit," Duffy said. "The enemy can fire arrows or swing clubs but they can't hit her. Anyone who sees her with a rider will think that he's a ghost, too. We'll be the ghosts of Verrol and Liaya. Ogres are terrifying warriors, but they're as superstitious as sailors."
Soraya blinked her approval, and turned her eye toward Gillea, so the child could see in it the image of a young man, all in white, a-dragonback and wielding a great spear. The children abandoned their tasks and gathered around the huge dragon's head, chattering excitedly. They all knew the tale by heart. Duffy himself had heard it several times a year since he was a baby.
"But you can't ride a ghost dragon," Gillea said, practically, pitching her shrill voice over the hubbub. Duffy's heart sank in dismay. He turned to the dragon.
"Leave that to me,"
Soraya said. "For now, we need what magic we may muster, and the disguise."
Duffy ran all the way back to the Hearthstone, and burst in through the door. The elders were holding their own worried conference over the hearthfire.
"Is it true, boy?" Perog asked. "Ogres are coming?"
"It is. Varney," Duffy panted, as the miller turned to stare at him. "I need a bag of flour, at once!"
"A what?" Varney asked. "Have you gone mad, son? We've things to do before the force gets here."
"It'll save our homes!" Duffy insisted. "A bag of flour. A small one. Please, Varney. Mikal," he said, catching his breath, "we need you, too."
The old mage rose to his feet and squared his shoulders proudly. "With pleasure, General Duffy. Lead the way."
Soraya stood by, enjoining them to hurry, while Mikal and the women of the village made Duffy up as the ghost of Verrol the hero. Eager to help, everyone donated something to the effort.
"Thank the gods for something to do," Cara the Weaver said.
She quickly stitched together a pair of breeches out of freshly bleached cloth and tied the waist shut around Duffy's middle. Barata brought out the white tunic Orack had worn when he married her. His own mother sacrificed a fine, snow-white tablecloth to make him a cloak. With a small kiss on the cheek for bravery, she tied the cloth around his neck and left him, to go help with the preparations for defense. For luck, Duffy tucked his father's silverheaded dagger into his belt.
"And the flour to make you a ghostly color," Mikal said, pressing it to Duffy's skin. By virtue of some cantrip the old hedge-wizard recited, the stuff adhered to Duffy's face and hands, leaving them looking chalky and dead.
Gillea sputtered with laughter. "You look like you got into a fight in the kitchen." Her brother made a face at her, which made her giggle more.
"It won't look so in the forest," her mother admonished her. "Have we time?" she asked the spirit, who was wavering around the edges in impatience.
"They are near. Four ogres and a handful of takkin," Soraya said. She vanished, and reappeared almost instantly, "They are a half-hour's march, no more!"
"Well, I'm ready," Duffy said, brandishing a washing pole that Cara had donated. The whitewash painted on it was still damp, but that tackiness would keep the makeshift lance from falling out of his hand.
"Wait, wait!" The Wanderer rushed up and planted something in his other hand. "It's only a loan, mind. I want it back, but it'll help you, I'm sure."
"What is it?" Duffy turned over the contraption of wires surrounding two round bits of glass.
"A gnomish invention," the Wanderer said. "Useless. Pretty, though. I liked it, and no one seemed to mind me taking it. Had it a long, long time. Thought I lost it once, but here it is again! Put it on. Over your eyes. It'll make them look like spirit eyes."
With the Wanderer's help, Duffy slid the half loop between the glass lenses over the bridge of his nose and hooked the loose pieces of wire over his ears.
The gnomish device must have retained some magical aura, because suddenly Duffy could see more clearly. Every object took on a deeper dimensionality than he had ever known.
"Why, thank you, Fernli," Duffy said, looking around in awe. He glanced down at his feet, shod in white riding boots saved from the bequest of someone's grandmother. They seemed very far away. He took a step and staggered because the ground was not where he expected it to be.
"Ooh, scary!" Gillea said, with delight. "You look like a week-dead fish."
"One more thing," the dragon said, her deep voice a murmur. "Find you a feather."
With difficulty, Duffy tottered toward the farmhouses, aiming unsteadily for Orack's goose pen. In a short while, he returned, clutching between his fingers the largest goose feather he could obtain, culled at great personal peril from the threshing wing of one of Orack's highly territorial geese. Soraya looked at it disappointedly.
"It is small but it'll have to do."
"Small?" Duffy exclaimed, measuring the feather. It was easily a foot long. "Compared with what?"
"A roc feather, an eagle feather," she said, trying to make him understand. When Duffy continued to look blankly at her, she brought forth images in her great eye of huge birds, perching next to a knight. Whereas the head of Orack's goose came up to Duffy's waist, the head of the man in the image barely touched the breast of the crouching roc.
"Uh," Duffy said, somewhat inadequately.
"Put the feather in the small of your back. Yes, under your clothes. There. You are ready," the deep voice said.
Duffy disliked the way the feather tickled, and the point dug into his spine like a guilty reminder. But he held himself upright, and walked into the town center proudly. Gillea, claiming the honor of serving as a squire, tagged along behind him. The fascinated Wanderer followed.
The villagers had bare moments to snatch up the elderly or makeshift weapons they possessed and get into their hiding places before Soraya's ghost swept through, warning them the enemy was upon them.
Duffy, hidden in the heart of a hollow tree at the edge of the village common, heard the force from the Red Horde before he saw them. The tramping of their feet sounded like a fire burning down the forest. In his mind's eye, he saw them coming nearer and nearer. The front line must be almost on top of the buried stakes—now!
Angry bellows ripped through the air. Some of the fell warriors at least had stepped into the hidden pits. More howling and yelling resounded as the rest of the enemy stomped by their wounded members, and stepped into more of the concealed traps. Pretty soon, those who had trodden on the stakes would be ailing, maybe dying, when the rodent poison took effect.
Not all the evil force stepped into the pits. Threshing footsteps grew closer. The foreline would be getting closer to the snares. Some of the triplines were set high, some low. Even if by chance, a few of them had to close on prey! Duffy clenched his hands closed against the damp, shreddy interior of the tree, and hoped.
Twang! Twang! A couple of the line traps went off before there was an outcry alerting others to the danger, followed by harsh orders from the enemy. Duffy heard the unmistakable clash of steel on steel as swords were drawn. Whistling and chopping noises followed, as the point guard slashed through the remaining snares. Duffy wondered how many had died, and how many remained. Soraya, who could have told him, was remaining concealed until the last moment.
The next obstacle was the most dangerous, but not for the ogres. Old Mikal, liberally daubed with flour, waited in a clump of bushes, to try and scare the warriors off—or at least put the fear of the unknown into them. He'd argued in conference that he was the only logical person for the job, being old and mostly expendable. Varney and Eise had shouted him down, insisting that one of them be the one to show his face. In the end, Mikal bluntly refused to enchant anyone else for the job. He was doing it, or no one was. Duffy could just see him flit out of his hiding place and take to the air.
"Bewarrrre!" the old mage cried, waving his arms, and then he floated out of Duffy's view. "Bewarrrre! Tuu-urrrrn baaack! Tuuurrrrn baaack lest the spirits of this place consuuuume you!"
The heavy footsteps halted, and Duffy heard muttering in the ranks. He fancied he could count at least eight voices, but only half were the ogrish grunt. The rest were a sibilant hissing that he remembered from his early childhood, and his insides turned to water.
"Tuurrrn baaack!" Mikal cried again. Then he screamed sharply and fell silent. There was harsh laughter. One of the bolder warriors must have called the seeming ghost's bluff. Duffy prayed that Mikal hadn't been killed.
"Be ready!" Soraya's voice hissed. One huge eye opened up inside his hiding place. Duffy gulped. "They come! Now!"
Summoning all his courage, Duffy stepped out of the tree trunk. Soraya manifested only her face so he could see where she was. The dragon's voice hissed out a rhyme in an ancient tongue that tasted of power.
"What do I do now—whoooaaa!" he cried, as he was lifted, scruff first, ten feet into the air.
"Don't lose your lance!" Soraya's voice warned. "Now, hold your legs apart—no one will care about proper riding form—and keep them that way."
His cloak flapping, Duffy hovered above the long silver back, trying to make it look like he was riding the dragon. He fought nervousness to keep hold of the washing pole, now glowing with the same fight as Soraya's scales. To his surprise, the light also issued from his borrowed clothes and his flour-covered hands.
"Here we go," the dragon said.
The effect was impressive even though he knew what was happening. A little at a time, the dragon emerged out of invisibility and glided smoothly into the open common. First the head, then the horns and ears, then the snakelike neck, then the gleaming scales of the breast, and finally the back apparently bearing Duffy issued smoothly into the sunlight. By the time the long tail emerged from shadow, the whole green was silent.
"Stop, foul spawn of Naehriia!" Soraya's melodious voice commanded.
"Go back, evil warriors! You are not welcome here!" a deep man's voice cried out. Duffy was astonished to realize it was his own. He straightened his back and proudly held the washing pole on high.
For the first time, he could see the Minion horde.
In the front hulked four ogres. He had heard stories of the ogres that served the usurper Voern, but had never seen one alive. Mikal's stories did not do them justice. The manlike giants were more fearsome and uglier and more evil than any illusion the herb-mage had drawn on the hearthstone. Easily seven feet tall, the monsters' massive arms and chests were clothed in leather armor covered in scales each the size of a man's hand. Their faces were studded with knobby bones that parodied the contours of human visage. Teeth bared, they ignored bleeding wounds in their feet and slashes from the whiplike strands of the snares, intent on their task of destruction.
Behind the ogres came two files of scaly beings with doglike faces—takkin. Those Duffy had seen before. The usurper sent a force through Greenton the first time, forcing his father and the other young men of the village to fight for their homes and families when Duffy was only a boy. These dragonchildren were canny warriors, much smarter and subtler than the ogres, and as evil as any creature created by the Queen of Darkness, the Red Dragon Nachriia.
Dragon's Eye Page 7
