by Roland Green
“I was not city-born, but as for the rest-”
Haimya rose, with much of her old grace and assurance. “Then the first thing we do is gather up all loose gear, and the second is hide ourselves.”
Hipparan saw the black dragon climbing away from the tower long before he saw that the dragon was burdened. He saw that the other was encumbered long before he saw that his teeth and claws were bloody. And he saw the blood long before he recognized the scent of human gore, and realized that the burden was Fustiar in one claw and a Frostreaver in the other.
“Do we have a quarrel?” the black dragon called. If it was a challenge, it was phrased so politely that Hipparan knew he had the freedom to refuse it.
If he did so, the only two dragons awake in all the world would not fight each other.
Not now, at least. But what about later? The black dragon was sworn to an evil mage, and the mage was not going to abandon his perverted work. Filling the world with Frostreavers might be only the first of his works.
“I have a quarrel with Fustiar the Mage,” Hipparan said. “I owe that much to my friends, who have suffered at Fustiar’s hands.”
“Argggh!” Fustiar snarled. His words were barely coherent, but the venom in them made Hipparan want to flinch away. “It was good work, freeing the woman of that lout! She wrought better than she knew, even if she ruined my Frostreaver. “Now she can seek a proper mate. Show me where she is, little copper dragon, and I will offer for her. She can stand beside me-”
Hipparan screamed. The black dragon flinched. So did Fustiar.
“Only one man has any claim on Haimya now, and you can never be he!” Hipparan roared. It seemed that his fury echoed from the clouds to the mountains and back again.
He lunged at Fustiar, before the black dragon could lower his head to use either his fangs or his breath weapon-not that a stream of acid was all that useful, this high in the air. Fustiar not only flinched, he writhed, screamed-and tore himself loose from the black dragon’s claws.
Both dragons dived after the falling man. Hipparan was lower, and the black dragon had to stoop before he could see his master vanishing into the darkness.
Hipparan was the first to reach Fustiar, and after that it no longer mattered what the black dragon might do. The copper dragon’s jaws closed on Fustiar’s skull, and his teeth pierced to the man’s brain. Hipparan opened his mouth, and a corpse weighted with spellbooks tumbled away out of sight.
Then Hipparan had to swerve sharply to avoid colliding with the plummeting black dragon. He opened the distance and called, “Remember, my quarrel is with one who is about to make a hole in the mud, not with you, flying strong and free.”
The black dragon replied with his breath weapon. The acid sprayed wide on the wind, but even the few drops that struck Hipparan’s right wing burned as though he had thrust the wing into a fire. He changed from a right turn to a left turn, as the other would most likely expect him to turn into the damaged wing.
Such ruses kept the fight between the two dragons going so long that Hipparan lost all sense of time or place. He had to look down once, to find that they were almost directly over the lake in the summit crater of the extinct volcano.
That look reassured him, and also nearly ended the fight with the black dragon’s victory. The elder dragon lunged, teeth scraping across Hipparan’s neck, nearly piercing scales into flesh. Hipparan folded his wings, and his dead weight tore him free; he kept them folded until he had dived clear.
That gave the other the advantage of altitude, which Hipparan realized might not have been the safest gift. The black dragon was remarkably fit for his age, skilled in battle, and actually seemed to be enjoying the fight. Perhaps he had some thought of avenging his master, but even more of simply proving himself against a younger dragon.
Hipparan had nothing to prove, and no wish to kill the other if he had any choice-which it seemed he did not. That and fear of leading the other dragon to Pirvan and Haimya was all that kept Hipparan in the fight.
He tried twice to use his breath weapon, but the slowness gas blew away even more thoroughly than the acid stream. The black dragon did not miss a single beat of his vast wings, or strike less surely with teeth and claws.
Which of them would overreach himself first, only the gods could know. Hipparan dimly remembered the dangerous art of the wing-bite, which would cripple but not kill. The black dragon remembered that he had another weapon, a legacy from his dead master. Hipparan would display his skill; the black dragon his loyalty.
So Hipparan dived upon the black dragon, striking at a wing, and the other rolled on his back and swung the Frostreaver in both foreclaws. Hipparan’s teeth sank into the black dragon’s left wing as the Frostreaver’s edge sank into Hipparan’s skull.
Hipparan died without knowing that he was in danger, the Frostreaver’s embodied spells pierced all his own magic as easily as its physical being pierced his skull. The black dragon lived a trifle longer-long enough to realize that his dead foe’s teeth were locked in his wing, and that both of them were falling out of the sky into the lake.
The black dragon’s last sensation was of striking what had to be water but felt like stone-cold stone, as repulsive as it was painful to a creature of wet, warm forests.
Pirvan and Haimya had used most of their strength finding a hiding place. They had not realized that it gave them a good view across the river toward the extinct volcano. At least not until the aerial duel of dragons began, when they saw it clearly, then hurried out of cover to where they could watch.
Pirvan would have given an empire for Hipparan’s victory, a kingdom to be able to help their friend, and a respectable barony to spare Haimya the sight of the dragon’s death. The one person he loved ought to be spared more pain tonight.
The one person I love.
He repeated that in his mind so often that he began to fear he would say it out loud, which would break his promise to stand just where Haimya wished him. He had just clamped his lips shut when the battle reached its grisly climax.
Both dragons glowed in their death fall, so the watchers saw them plunge all the way down from the sky into the lake. Then they saw a glow from the lake that made the last light from the dragons seem as pitiful as a firefly’s. An eye-searing blue glare poured over the rim of the crater, and blue mist rose from it as if the crater were boiling. Then Pirvan felt a chill breeze that had not been there a heartbeat earlier, and he knew what was happening.
The lake was not boiling, but freezing. One of the dragons must have been carrying a Frostreaver, or perhaps Fustiar had cast a spell, and the crater lake was turning to ice.
Ice expanded. Expanding, the lake would push the crater walls outward. Pushed far enough-
Haimya threw back her head and hurled a death keen at the sky, the mountain, the jungle, perhaps the gods. A goddess mourning the death of a mortal lover might have uttered such a cry.
Pirvan stood silently and still. He could no more have touched or spoken to her now than he could have molested that goddess.
She nocked an arrow to her bow and shot it at the stars. To Pirvan’s eyes it seemed to rise out of sight before it began to fall-if it fell.
Haimya keened again-and this time she went on keening, until her last breath wheezed out of her throat and he finally had to hold her upright.
They were turning away from the volcano when they heard the mad god’s thunder of a mountain splitting apart and falling.
Chapter 22
Pirvan climbed out of the stream and pulled on his rawhide loinguard.
“I need to splice the lines before I set them out,” he called to Haimya. “So you can bathe as long as you wish.”
“Thank you,” she called over her shoulder. “Do you think we can try making soap, after we finish the fish trap?”
Not waiting for an answer, she removed her clothing, which consisted of a loinguard similar to Pirvan’s and a rawhide strip tied around her torso, and ran down to the stream. Her hair was a
chopped and raddled mess, her skin was nearly as dark as Jemar the Fair’s with sun, dirt, and grease, she was more thin-flanked than Pirvan had ever seen her, and he thought she as the most beautiful woman in the world.
As for himself, Pirvan had begun with darker skin and hair, so the near month they’d spent in the wilderness had not changed his looks as much. He had lost weight, though not having much to lose, his arm still ached in wet weather (which meant a good part of the time), and he had never felt better in his life.
He turned away from the stream as Haimya dived in, a graceful pale arc against the green water, ending in a silvery splash. Neither of them was self-conscious about “standing close” as they had to do to survive, but at times a veil would come down over Haimya’s eyes or even her whole face. Pirvan respected those moments and kept his eyes and thoughts in order.
Gerik had left a vacant spot in Haimya. It could well be that it would never be filled. This was because there had been a great and undying love between them, but because Haimya could not forgive herself for killing Gerik through carelessness. Gerik’s death had taken something from her sense of honor, and only time (if that) could put it back.
Pirvan, on the other hand, knew exactly what he wanted out of life. There was a place within him that would never be filled if Haimya did not fill it-whether she came back to do so next year, or fifty years from now, when all that would be left for them was to nurse each other.
The path up from the stream forked. Pirvan realized that he’d taken the right fork only when he saw the sundered mountain, half the cone now gone. He paused to see how the vegetation was recovering from the wave that had roared down the river, to drown most of Synsaga’s men and smash most of the ships to kindling wood.
Much of the ground along the river was still bare and gray. The wave must have scoured a good part of the banks down to bare rock. That kind of power probably also explained why Pirvan and Haimya had neither seen nor heard another human soul since the night the mountain had fallen.
It was the left-hand path Pirvan really wanted, leading up to the hollow tree where they had their fire. Cooking as much as they could eat and smoking the rest had given them more meat and fish in their diet, though nuts, roots, fruits, and even edible grubs also played their part. (Pirvan had not thought that some kind of nut, a sweet root, and smoked grubs could make a fine meal, but Haimya had taught him otherwise.)
He was turning back toward the fork, when a man stepped out onto the path.
Pirvan had a spear (the bow was with Haimya, in case she needed to defend herself or pick off some fresh fish). It whipped up, ready to throw, before he knew more than the man’s being where no man ought to be.
Then the man laughed, and Pirvan recognized him.
“Brother Grimsoar! You’ve learned a good deal about silent movement since we last met. I didn’t hear a single footfall.”
“You’ve forgotten a good deal about listening, Brother Pirvan,” the big man replied. He looked more weathered and even hairier than usual, but well fed and clad in sea barbarian garb and armor. His sword, however, was his old familiar blade.
“Well met, regardless,” Pirvan said. “I suppose it’s too much to hope for that you are here alone?”
“Here, on this path, yes, I am, but the rest of my party is down at the foot of the hill. Once we’d cleaned out the rest of Synsaga’s pirates, the ones who hadn’t died in the flood or fled in the surviving ships, we divided our landing party and began seriously searching-”
“When did you come?”
“Why don’t we go back to camp, you tell your tale from the beginning, and then I will tell mine?”
That made sense, eager as Pirvan was to find out how it had fared with Golden Cup. The sea barbarian garb spoke of further dealings with Jemar the Fair, and Grimsoar would have been downcast if Eskaia or Tarothin were dead, but otherwise Pirvan could only guess.
The two men reached the fork again just as Haimya came up the slope. She was clad in sunlight and drops of water, and Grimsoar actually flushed and turned his head.
He also muttered, “Sorry to have to drag you back to the world,” loud enough for Haimya to hear him. She promptly snatched up a stick and flung it, so that it clanged off his helmet.
“What the-?” he growled.
“It’s not as you think,” Pirvan said. “Now apologize to the lady, or she will hit you with a bigger stick in a more important spot than your head.”
“I crave your forgiveness,” Grimsoar said, not quite keeping a straight face but at least looking elsewhere while Haimya resumed her garb.
“Granted.” She ran her fingers through her hair, which only rearranged the disorder. “If we are leaving here, there is no reason to stint the hospitality. We have food for all your comrades and even you, unless you eat even more than I remember.”
“Thank you, but we’ve been living off the land since we came ashore. I’m beginning to crave some honest salt meat and ship’s biscuit again.”
Pirvan and Haimya exchanged looks that suggested Grimsoar was mad, and went to gather the little that they did not care to leave behind.
Only the ruined mountain where the two dragons had died now rose above the mists of Crater Gulf. Jemar turned away from the shore and studied his squadron.
They were coming out of the gulf in battle formation, under sail to take advantage of the offshore breeze and save the men’s strength for any fighting yet to come. Jemar did not think there was much danger of that. Minotaurs would be giving these waters a wide berth, and so would the three of Synsaga’s ships that survived the wave roaring down the river after the mountain had fallen. Some of the starving survivors rounded up by Jemar’s landing parties spoke of a fourth ship, and doubtless some bold souls were heading for their deaths in small craft.
Both the quest and the fighting were over. What remained was mostly matters better left to clerks, and Jemar could do very little about much of the rest. (Well, he could pray for Pirvan and Haimya, if he could be sure where to direct the prayers!)
One matter was very close to him, and therefore in his hands to settle. He had his command chair brought on deck, and then sent a messenger, saying that he wished to speak to Lady Eskaia, and would wait for her at her convenience.
Instead, the next thing he saw was Eskaia coming toward him. She wore sea barbarian garb, with a light jacket over her shirt. Jemar wondered if she had donned one of the low-cut tunics she had favored for a day or two, until sunburn had taught her otherwise.
He would miss her in a way he had never expected he would miss a woman, and Shilriya would tease him about it even if she accepted the offer he would soon be making. But he had not taken his betrothal rights, so there was no impediment to setting her free from a promise that did her honor but which he could not in good conscience accept.
“I wished to see you, I think, as much as you wished to see me,” she said. As there was only one chair, she sat on the deck, cross-legged and as much at ease in the pose as if she’d been a sailor for years. Jemar had to look away briefly in order to compose himself enough to speak.
“My lady-no, let me call you by that title until I have finished what I wish to say-you made a most generous offer, if I would lead my ships south to rescue your friends. This I have done. They are as safe as they can be, at least in their bodies. Their spirits-that is in the gods’ gift. But I have kept my bargain. What I want to say-what I must say-”
He took a deep breath. “I will not hold you to your part of the bargain. You are free to return to Istar, with no duties to me now or ever again.”
A silence came down upon the sea, in which it seemed that even the creak of timber and the soft whine of the breeze in the rigging were hushed and listening. Eskaia looked up, and Jemar saw that she had tears in her eyes.
“Is this a … command?” The last word was almost a sob.
“No. It is-a gift, one might say-if you wish to accept it.”
She rose, came over to him, and sat down on his
lap. Instead of embracing him, she crossed her arms on her breast.
“Well, I do not accept that gift. What I wish is that we complete the bargain. Jemar, do I have to go down on my knees and beg you to marry me?”
It took some while for Jemar to convince her otherwise, with hands and lips, since the words would not come. He was rising from the third kiss when he saw that they had an audience.
“Tarothin! Wizard, what do you here?”
“Ah-I came on deck and-” He took a deep breath. “I thought I might be needed, to keep one of you from throwing the other overboard.”
“If anybody is going to be thrown overboard, Tarothin, it is you,” Eskaia said firmly.
“I forbid that,” Jemar said.
“Who are you to forbid-?” Eskaia began, then laughed. “It seems we are already having our first quarrel.” The men joined the laughter.
“I believe I can now bless this wedding,” Tarothin said. “Eskaia, I will have to regret the loss of a good cleric, as you might have been. But I suppose you will be even more adept as a pirate’s woman-”
“Sea barbarian’s lady,” the couple said, in unison.
“Sea barbarian’s lady,” Tarothin corrected himself, “than you would have been as a cleric. Although whether your father’s blessing will be on this wedding, I am less sure.”
“He will surely bless it if we have a second ceremony in Istar or some other place where he can attend it,” Eskaia said. “And he will bless it several times over when Jemar’s ships protect those of House Encuintras from pirates and minotaur raiders.”
“And when will that start?” Jemar asked, eyebrows rising as he fought to keep more laughter inside.
“As soon as the marriage is consummated,” Eskaia said primly, “and thereafter as long as we both shall live.”
