Crack! A loud, sharp noise, a splintering of wood, and then the crunch of stone on stone as our entire load listed sideways and slid onto the pavement.
We stared at our capsized sled in disbelief. One heavy plate wheel had simply split in half, and the front axle rested directly on the cobbles now.
Gerik came charging up.
“What happened?” he cried.
We didn’t say anything. Nico just waved a hand at the wrecked sled, a dumb and helpless gesture.
“Can we get a new wheel?” I asked.
Gerik looked about ready to cry, and I had to repeat my question before he heard me.
“A new wheel? Before Erlan’s lot get done? No.”
“But if we can’t get the stones to Imrik…” I didn’t finish my sentence. There was no need. We all knew what I meant: if we couldn’t get the stones to Imrik and his masons, the wall would not be finished.
“We’ll have to use the wheelbarrow,” said Nico.
“Are you crazy?” said Gerik. “It’s not made for that. It’ll break. And it only has one wheel. It’ll be hell on whoever has to drive it.”
“Do we have a choice?”
Gerik was silent for a little while. Then he shook his head. “I don’t suppose we have.”
We did our best. And for a while it really did seem as if our narrow lead might hold. But while we were still feverishly working to get the last two blocks into place, there was a roar of triumph from the other side of the Lion Tower. Erlan’s gang were done. They had finished before us.
The Wallmaster noted it on his damn tablet and sent it off to the Educators.
Most of our gang stood there, stoop-shouldered and gasping for breath. I let myself collapse onto one of the two not-yet-laid blocks.
“Now what?” I said, looking up at Mascha.
“Now? Now we finish the damn wall. And then we face whatever game it is the Educators have prepared for us.”
There was such hatred, such bitter gall in the last words that it sounded as if the words had been soaked in acid before he spoke them.
The next morning they took Gerik.
It wasn’t the usual lot of guards. These were cleaner and more stylish, with boots and mail that glittered with spit and polish, and shiny buttons and buckles everywhere. The double dragon had been enameled on their breast plates, not just painted on as with the regulars.
“Prince’s Own Guards,” whispered Carle. “Don’t usually mix with our lot down here. Might get their boots dirty, see?”
The captain of the Prince’s Own threw a quick look in our direction.
“That one,” he said, pointing at Gerik. And one of the usuals came over to unchain Gerik.
“Where am I going?” asked Gerik.
“Shut up, dog,” said the captain.
Mascha glared angrily at the guard he knew. “Where is he going?” he growled.
But the guard just grinned. “You’ll find out soon enough, dragon fodder,” he said.
And they took Gerik away.
“Why do they call us dragon fodder?” I asked Mascha, because it wasn’t the first time I had heard them do so.
He nodded toward the grille at the other end of our tunnel. “That gate? It leads into the dragon pits. If we tried to rebel or escape, all they’d have to do would be to open the gate and let the dragons finish us. They like to remind us of that. You know why they call this place the Gullet? Same reason. We’re half in the dragon’s gullet already. And when someone down here dies, why waste time and effort burying scum like us? And why waste a perfectly good cadaver, when dragons are quite happy to eat carrion?”
My stomach turned over. It was better than being served up to the dragons alive, I supposed, but a disgusting thought all the same.
“How many dragons does he have? Prince Arthos?”
“Don’t know. A lot. Scores of them.”
The only other dragon owner I knew of, Drakan, only had about seven or eight now that Nico had killed off one of them. And his dragons had come from here, I knew, as part of a wedding present when Dama Lizea came to Dunark to be married. How on earth had they managed to bring them all that way? They were big beasts, from what Dina had said. But perhaps they had been younger and smaller then.
“What do you think they want with Gerik?”
“How should I know?” said Mascha. “Now, shut up with the questions, can’t you, boy?”
Somewhat later, an hour or two perhaps, they came to get the rest of us. They led us into the outer courtyard, in the shadow of the wall we ourselves had toiled to make higher. Up there on the wall stood a very pale Gerik with a couple of the Prince’s Own. And what had happened to the wall itself? It bristled like a hedgehog with spikes that had been hammered into the cracks between the stones. On each spike hung a key. There were… well, at least thirty.
Walls, galleries, and windows were crowded with onlookers. Guards, courtiers, and other castle folk. Educators and children. Quite an audience, all in all. Up there, beneath the red silk hanging… might that be Prince Arthos himself? Obviously, they were expecting some form of entertainment. I wondered what shape it might take.
An Educator stepped out into the courtyard. I thought it might be Master Vardo, who had received us the first night, but I was far from certain. They looked so alike, with their beardless faces and black hoods.
Master Vardo—if it was him—raised his voice.
“These men have failed,” he said. “They have not done their work with a diligence worthy of the Prince’s servants. But the Prince is lenient. The Prince is just. He gives to each of us the chance to learn. And if these men are capable of learning their lesson, then tonight they shall dine at the Prince’s own table. If they cannot, a just punishment will fall on them.” He pointed at Gerik. “This man will be lowered into the dragon pits. These men”—this time he was pointing at us—“may be his saviors. If they can find the key to wisdom.”
The key to wisdom? I glanced up at the many keys on the wall. Was it one of those? Next to each key a letter had been painted, I noticed. What was that supposed to mean?
From the courtyard a gate led into the dragon pits, probably so that the beasts could be let loose in the courtyard if an enemy ever succeeded in breaching the outer wall. Was it this key we were supposed to find?
“The essential key lies within this casket,” said Master Vardo, waving forth two boys from the House of Teaching, who set down a large black casket in the courtyard and hurriedly withdrew. “To find it, all you must do is answer one question: what is the true name of the Prince?”
A faint smiled curled his lips, as if he was quite happy with himself and the little game he had arranged. He raised his hand to signal the guards who were standing on the wall with Gerik.
“Begin,” he said.
Begin. Yes, but how? The guards had already started lowering Gerik into the pit out there.
Mascha’s jaw was bunched like a mastiff’s.
“We’ll just get the damn keys,” he said. “All of them. And try them one at a time until we find the right one.”
But the keys hung high, some of them extremely high, on the wall, and a good distance apart; just getting to them, particularly the topmost ones, would be a somewhat daring feat.
“There isn’t time,” said Nico. “Davin, help me, damn it. What is the true name of the Prince?”
What was he on about? How should I know? And then a small dim light did begin to dawn after all, something to do with Mira and a silly song about a frog.
“You were the one who taught her,” I hissed, trying to remember the words. Who is the ruler of the land? Prince Arthos Draconis. What are the true names of the Prince? My mind stood still. Completely and utterly. “Nico, you must have said it a hundred times!”
“I can’t think,” he said, looking pale. “I can’t think at all.”
What are the true names of the Prince? What are the true names…? Goodness? No.
Courage, Wisdom, and Justice.
Suddenly I knew.
“Courage, Wisdom, and Justice,” I said. “Nico, that’s how it goes!”
“Yes,” he said softly. “Yes. Mascha—get me the key next to the C.”
Mascha glared at him. “The C? Do I look like a damn clerk? I can’t read, boy!”
“There,” I said, pointing. “Far left, three spikes up.”
One of the easy ones, luckily. Imrik perched on Mascha’s shoulders, picked the key off the spike, and threw it to Nico.
“Here!”
Nico stuck the key into the lock of the casket—or tried to. It didn’t fit. He threw me a stricken look.
“It’s not the right one!”
“All right, so it’s not Courage. Try Wisdom.”
Carle climbed up to get the W key, which was another of the low ones.
“No good either.”
“Justice,” I said. “It has to be. And the Educator said so himself, didn’t he? The Prince is just!”
J was one of the high ones, so high that Imrik had to stand on Mascha’s shoulders, balancing precariously. He threw the key to me, and I tossed it to Nico. If it didn’t fit—If it didn’t fit, I didn’t know what to do.
Nico shoved the key into the lock and tried to turn it.
Nothing happened.
“It’s no good,” he said. “It’s not the one.”
I sank to my knees. I felt like ripping the damn key out of Nico’s hands and forcing it to turn. It had to be the one.
Nico’s eyes were flickering across the wall, as if he was expecting the letters up there to flow together and make sense.
“There,” he suddenly said. “There’s another J.”
And there was. And this time there was a loud, blessed click, and Nico could throw open the casket.
Inside was… not a key. Another, smaller casket. Locked, of course.
Nico and I stared at each other.
“All of it,” he said. “We have to spell the entire word.”
And I knew the same thought was going through both our heads: would there be time?
Nico and I were the only ones who even knew what the letters looked like. We had to direct the others to the right keys.
J. U. S.
Casket within casket.
Some of the onlookers, those who could read, at least, were realizing what we were doing. A murmur ran around the galleries, and a few of the castle’s people, commoners mostly, even began to cheer, as though this was a cockfight they were watching.
T.
I had a small hope that just would be enough, but no. Yet another casket.
We could hear Gerik shouting from the pit, now.
“Hurry,” he shouted. “Hurry, damn it!” There was an edge of sheer panic in his voice.
The I key was close to the top of the wall. Not even by standing on Mascha’s shoulders was Imrik able to reach it.
“Wait,” said Nico. “Let me. Davin, give me a hand.”
And he climbed up, nimble as a cat. A foot on my shoulder, a hand pressed into a crack in the wall, a foot cradled by Imrik’s hand… and there he was, balancing on Imrik’s shoulder, reaching for the key. And I remembered how once he had balanced on the back of his bay mare like a market juggler to douse our burning cottage roof.
There were certainly things he did without clumsiness.
He threw down the key. I grabbed it and ran to the casket and left it to Carle to help Nico get down again.
“Hurry!” screamed Gerik. “It’s coming!”
I shoved the I key into the lock and opened it to find the smallest casket yet.
“C!” I called. “Give me C!”
“We already have it,” said Nico breathlessly, slamming it into my hand. “The first key we tried… Courage, remember?”
C key in. Casket open, and this time, not yet another casket, but a key.
Mascha seized it.
“Is this the one to the gate?”
There was a scream from the pit, a scream completely without words.
“Try,” said Nico. But both he and I were thinking: JUSTIC.
What about E?
“Get it,” hissed Nico. “We’re sure to need it.”
And while Mascha unlocked the gate to the dragon pit, Nico leaped onto my shoulders and fetched down the E key.
“He’s chained,” roared Mascha from the pit. “We need another key. Now!”
I sprinted through the tunnel. And came to an abrupt halt. Right outside, a few steps away from Mascha and the shackled Gerik, was a dragon. It opened its jaws and hissed at us, and a stench of carrion and rotting meat washed over us. A single drop of pearly white venom hung from the point of each fang.
I stared at the dragon’s purply gullet and the dragon’s yellow eyes, and for a long moment was unable to move.
“A spear!” roared Mascha at the guards on top of the wall. “Give us a spear, for the love of the Lady!”
At first it seemed no one would. But then a long spear dropped to the ground right at Mascha’s feet. He snatched it up and advanced a step toward the dragon.
“Get that chain off him, boy,” he hissed, “before the beast eats all of us.”
Gerik had his arms shackled above his head, the way they had lowered him down. There was no color at all in his face, and his breath was coming in great, heaving gasps. I turned my back on the dragon, hoping to all the saints that Mascha could keep it at bay long enough, and that the key would fit the lock.
It did. The shackles came open, and Gerik’s arms fell bloodlessly to his sides like two pieces of dead meat.
“Now!” I yelled at Mascha.
He threw the spear at the dragon, turned, and ran. We all rushed through the brief darkness of the tunnel and slammed the gate in the monster’s face. And Gerik fell to his knees, as if someone had chopped his legs in half.
Around the galleries, walls, and windows, people began to cheer and clap their hands as if we’d won a race. Some of the courtiers were tossing things down into the courtyard, some coins and a ring, a glove and a fluttery silk scarf. I stood there with my heart hammering against my ribs, staring at them, and what I felt most was disgust. Would they have applauded as loudly if the dragon had eaten Gerik?
Once more, Master Vardo came into the courtyard. So did what looked like an entire company of guards. Apparently they didn’t want us to get any ideas just because people were cheering at us.
“What is the true name of the Prince?” asked the Educator, staring straight at Nico.
Nico stared right back. But the guards had us surrounded now, and he said what the Educator wanted him to say.
“Justice. J, U, S, T, I, C, E.” He spelled out the word slowly and carefully, each letter dripping with contempt. Master Vardo heard the contempt, but there was nothing he could do about it right now. We had won his twisted game, and now he had to deliver. He looked up at the row of children hanging from the windows of the House of Teaching.
“These men have learned a precious lesson. And tonight they shall receive their reward and dine at the Prince’s own table. May you also learn from what you have seen: the key to wisdom is the key to life, and the Prince’s justice is all!”
Children and castle folk applauded once more. But as the guards took us away, I couldn’t help thinking that that was hardly the speech Master Vardo had expected to deliver. Just how many prisoners could read? Apart from Nico and me, perhaps only one or two in the entire Sagisburg. No, the lesson he had meant the children to see was quite a different one: prisoners are stupid and ignorant. And those who don’t learn to read will be eaten.
DAVIN
At the Prince’s Table
“Dinner at the Prince’s very own table,” said Carle. “That’s something, isn’t it?”
His voice sounded weird, somewhere between cocky and not-so-confident-after-all. On the whole, the gang was in a strange mood. There was relief that we had all survived Master Vardo’s lesson, of course, and exhilaration at our victory and the cheering. Some were fe
eling expectant, perhaps. And yet there was also this odd anxiety, as if this couldn’t be true, there had to be a catch… like waiting for the hammer to drop.
“If they’re really serious about this Prince’s-own-table stuff,” I whispered to Nico, “will that be all right? I mean, does he know you?”
Nico shook his head. “He’s never seen me before,” he said. “But… it might be better not to be too noticeable.”
The hours were long that afternoon in the Gullet. The flies were buzzing, and the fleas seemed to bite worse than usual. I almost missed the work. It was too murky in here, even in the middle of the day, for us to do anything other than talk. Tell a few stories. Sing a few dirty songs. Or sleep, as Nico did, now that he finally had a chance to rest during the daylight hours.
In the early evening they came to get us, but not to take us to the banquet hall, or at least not right away. No, before we were allowed to set foot on such polished floors, we had to be cleaned up thoroughly, of course. They led us out into the narrow yard behind the stables and ordered us to scrub each other down with cold water from the pump.
That was almost the best part. To throw away the miserable rags of shirts gone stiff with sweat and dirt and Gullet filth and become clean again, really clean, so that one’s skin felt smooth and warm, and not scaly and scruffy like the hide of some kind of reptile. They even gave us soap, two whole bars of it, which foamed and smelled of flowers.
Mascha sniffed suspiciously. “What’s that smell?” he asked.
“Lavender, I think,” said Nico.
Mascha snorted. “Thought that kind of thing was just for the ladies,” he said.
Nico shook his head. “No, at court everybody uses stuff like that. Some of the men even use rosewater and perfumed hair oils.”
“Well, well. Sounds like you know all about it, eh?”
“So I’ve heard,” said Nico quickly.
When we were more or less dry, they gave us clean shirts like the ones the guards wore under their armor, and loose gray trousers that reminded me a bit of the Foundation grays. No one would take us for courtiers, of course, especially not as we were immediately fettered again, but it was still a great improvement. Even my sore back was feeling better, and for the first time since I had been kicked, I could breathe without feeling my ribs.
The Serpent Gift Page 22
