The other Yatols began talking amongst themselves nervously, exclaiming “dragon!” or “sandstorm!” repeatedly, but Yakim Douan was less impressed. He had been hearing these stories over and over again, about every war that had been fought in the last few centuries. Without fail, those fleeing exaggerated the strength of the enemy, if only to put aside any blame they might otherwise have to shoulder for running away in the first place.
Still, Yakim Douan understood that he had to take this threat seriously, though he doubted that the To-gai-ru, even if all of their tribes had combined into a singular force, could have any chance of doing much harm at all to mighty Jacintha.
But there remained the issue of this dragon …
“You saw the wurm yourself?” he asked Doyugga, and the man’s head began to bob.
“God-Voice, it was as large as a great house! Its breath was fire, its tail thunder! Its claws dug the stone as easily as if it was mud! It pulled my friend Yuzeth, Yatol embrace him, right from out beside me, crushed him in its great jaws and swallowed him! I saw, God-Voice, I saw!”
He was bobbing up and down and sobbing uncontrollably as he recounted the story, and so Yakim Douan motioned for a pair of guards to come and gather him up and drag him out of there.
“Where is Yatol Tohen Bardoh?” the Chezru Chieftain asked his attendant.
“He marches north along the plateau ridge, and should make Dharyan in a few days, God-Voice.”
“Will you send him, too, into To-gai?” came a question from Yatol De Hamman, and only when Yakim Douan fixed him with a threatening stare did he seem to realize that he was way over the line of good judgment. The fact that Shauntil and fifteen thousand Jacintha warriors were running about the seemingly empty steppes of To-gai, while this Dragon and her army were cutting a swath of destruction across Behren did not sit well with Yakim Douan—and Yatols offering sarcasm on the matter might well find themselves hanging by their necks outside the Chezru temple.
Yakim Douan’s stare reminded the upstart and angry De Hamman of just that.
“Send word to Governor Pestle to turn Yatol Bardoh and his forces straight east for Jacintha,” the Chezru Chieftain commanded. That brought murmurs of discontent among the gathered Yatols, most of whom commanded cities in the western provinces of the country, and who would depend upon that great combined force now led by the fearsome Bardoh for protection from the Dragon of To-gai.
“They wish to lead us on a fruitless chase about the desert, but Yatol will show me the way to them, and this unpleasant business can be finished once and for all,” Yakim Douan said to quiet them. He glared at Yatol De Hamman before the man could utter a word.
“You were going to note that Yatol led me errantly in sending Shauntil into To-gai?” he asked.
The man blanched. “No, God-Voice. Never would I—”
“Spare me your lies, Yatol,” Douan replied. “I understand your fears.”
“If you were in our tentative position, you would feel the same,” Yatol De Hamman said defensively. “The pirates that Yatol Peridan has coddled have been bought by the Dragon of To-gai’s ill-gotten gains, and now attack my coastline mercilessly.”
“No,” the Chezru Chieftain insisted. “If I were in your position, I would trust in Yatol, and hold all confidence that this Dragon of To-gai would soon enough run out of tricks and out of luck. I will find her, and I will destroy her and all of her followers. And if there is truly a dragon, a great beast of mythology, flying beside her, then I will destroy it as well, and what a fine trophy its horned head will make upon my wall!”
That brought some murmurs of excitement, even a bit of laughter, from the gathered Yatols. But Douan ended it abruptly by fixing Yatol De Hamman with an imposing stare. “And when I am done with her and her followers, I will indeed send Yatol Tohen Bardoh into To-gai, to join with Chezhou-Lei Shauntil to punish the upstart To-gai-ru for the trouble they have caused to me.”
The next day, a report came in from southern Behren that a band of outlaws had attacked a small settlement before being hunted down by the local Yatol’s forces. One of the captured raiders had invoked the name of the Dragon of To-gai, and had carried a pouch bulging with coins bearing the Pruda stamp.
A few days later, an emissary from Avrou Eesa, Yatol Bardoh’s own city, arrived with news that demands of ransom had been sent to prominent merchant families, payment for the return of a band of merchants captured at Garou when they had been denied entrance to the fortress.
“Find Doyugga Doy and learn if this is true, that a band of merchants visiting Garou Oasis had been denied entrance to the fortress at the time of attack,” Douan instructed Took.
“I will return with the response, God-Voice,” Took said obediently, offering yet another series of his ridiculous bows. Watching him, Yakim Douan could only think of a drunken stork, and how he missed Merwan Ma at that time!
“That is not necessary,” he said to the attendant. “Ask the question and hear Doyugga Doy’s answer.”
“And if it is true?”
“Have him hung in the square, publicly, and speak his crime as cowardice,” Yakim Douan declared. “This is not the time for cowards, my friend. I’ll not suffer them to live.”
“Yes, God-Voice,” the obviously shaken Shepherd said repeatedly, backing out of the room and continuing his endless series of ridiculous bows.
Douan, glad to be alone, slumped back and blew a frustrated sigh. This one was getting the better of him. She, if it truly was a woman, was hitting helter-skelter, and finding perfect tactics to overwhelm each target. Douan had spent the morning with some of his Chezhou-Lei, going over the reported descriptions of the battles, and they had all agreed that this Dragon of To-gai was a cunning adversary.
Two weeks earlier, Garou Oasis had fallen, which meant that even now, the Dragon of To-gai might be looking across the sands at Jacintha.
So Yakim Douan had sent his Chezhou-Lei out to gather every garrison within the area and form a defensive perimeter about Jacintha, even before the arrival of Yatol Tohen Bardoh and fifteen thousand soldiers. He expected that many of the outlying Yatols would soon be crying for an audience—and De Hamman would scream loudest of all—fearful that he was protecting himself at their expense, but so be it. He certainly could not let Jacintha fall!
But while Yakim Douan could feel secure in his own safety and in that of Jacintha, he understood well that he could not allow the Dragon of To-gai to continue her rampage through the outer provinces. So far, his scouts had been unable to find her.
Reports of the fall of another city, Teramen, located between Garou and Dahdah Oasis, came in the next day.
Yakim Douan huddled about a large map with the newly arrived Yatol Tohen Bardoh and a few of his Chezhou-Lei commanders. All of them were surprised indeed at this latest choice of target.
“But it does make sense, God-Voice,” one did admit. “From Teramen, the Dragon of To-gai can resupply, and can then hit back to the northeast, at Dahdah Oasis, or can even turn back to the northwest and strike at Dharyan once more, within a week.”
Yakim Douan let his head loll forward at that prospect. Had he not just brought in Yatol Bardoh and fifteen thousand soldiers from Dharyan?
“I will force march back for Dharyan, God-Voice,” offered Yatol Bardoh, a man of nearly sixty years, but in fine physical condition and with angry fires burning bright in his dark eyes.
“To Dahdah Oasis,” Yakim Douan corrected. “Then split your force, with one contingent marching fast for Dharyan, and the other turning southwest to cut off any escape by the Dragon of To-gai to the south. If she hits at Dahdah, you will have her. If at Dharyan, then force her north into the mountains, or back to the To-gai steppes, where your forces and Shauntil’s can close about her and destroy her.”
“Yes, God-Voice,” the man replied, and he stormed out of the room, his hard soles echoing loudly against the white-and-pink marble.
“She will beat us to either location, and so she may get o
ne more victory, perhaps even two,” Yakim Douan told his warlords. “But then she will be mine.”
They all seemed quite pleased with themselves.
Of course, when Yatol Bardoh and his force arrived at Dahdah Oasis, they found the place perfectly quiet and secure. Those who force-marched ahead down the western road were greeted at Dharyan by the blowing horns of intact Governor Carwan Pestle. And those who hastened along a southwesterly route traveled all the way to the foot of the plateau divide without any sign of the invading To-gai-ru army.
A few weeks later, with the summer of God’s Year 843 fast turning to autumn, Abellican reckoning, a fleet of many ships—mostly Behrenese pirates—sailed out of Entel for the open Mirianic. The fleet bore Aydrian Wyndon, Brynn Dharielle’s friend of old—and all of old Abbot Olin’s hopes—to a distant island that was rumored to be covered with millions of valuable gemstones. That same day, in Jacintha, Yakim Douan heard the first reports of lines of beleaguered refugees streaming down the road from the conquered southern city of Alzuth.
“They fought well,” Pagonel remarked to Brynn, when he caught up to the woman outside the conquered city of Alzuth. The place had been fully looted and gutted, with all Behrenese survivors sent on the road to the northeast.
Alzuth had proven to be the toughest battle yet. Brynn had used her bait-and-ambush tactic, and indeed, a force had come charging out the gate behind her fleeing force.
But a second force, great in number, had followed the first, coming on the battle even as Brynn’s main army had descended upon the pursuing Alzuth force. While the fierce To-gai-ru had won the day anyway, several hundred had fallen out in the desert, prompting Brynn to use Agradeleous once more in the attack upon the city.
So Alzuth had fallen, yet another great victory for the Dragon of To-gai, and greater still because her followers understood that her ploy of unpredictability had worked yet again, luring thousands of Behrenese soldiers out along the road much farther north, far from the actual fighting. With Agradeleous continuing to supply the To-gai-ru, their mobility could not be matched and their route could not be predicted.
Still, they were only five thousand strong, and so a city like Alzuth, braced for battle, proved a formidable foe.
“The Behrenese defended their homes well,” Brynn admitted, and the mystic nodded.
“The Chezru Chieftain will begin a sweep south, likely,” Pagonel said. “And one west and south from Jacintha. Soon enough, I expect, he will recognize that he cannot hope to outguess you.”
“My warriors are weary and battered,” said Brynn. “Many carry wounds that require rest, though they’ll not rest if I show them a city to conquer.”
Pagonel nodded again. It was true enough—nearly every To-gai-ru warrior had been wounded at one point or another, and many of the horses carried scars.
“We should turn south and take respite,” Brynn decided. “In the fields about the Mountains of Fire, perhaps. We rest and heal, and then Behren will be an open slate upon which we can strike our next mark.”
“As long as you keep the wealth flowing to the mercenaries and the pirates, the Behrenese will know no rest,” said Pagonel. “Though your delay may allow the Chezru Chieftain finally to pull his wayward force out of To-gai.”
“Unless we make him believe that we have returned to the steppes,” Brynn said with a wry grin. “I will take Agradeleous out there and level several outposter settlements. Perhaps we can lure even more of the Chezru Chieftain’s soldiers out onto the open steppes, where the winter winds will find them and bite at them.”
The mystic nodded, then he motioned to a pair of diminutive forms walking toward them.
Brynn’s smile was genuine, and only then did she realize that she had not spoken with Juraviel and Cazzira in many days.
“A fine morning,” the elf greeted. “Though Agradeleous warned us of a dust storm growing in the west.”
“And where is Agradeleous?” Brynn asked, glancing all about.
“Out fetching water,” Cazzira replied.
“We have all the water we can carry from Alzuth,” said Brynn, a bit of suspicion creeping into her voice. As she hadn’t seen the elves of late, she hadn’t seen the dragon since the fall of Alzuth.
“Perhaps he has found nomads to destroy,” Juraviel remarked, and when Brynn looked at him with obvious alarm, he merely shrugged. “It is his nature.”
“He will go back to his hole when I instruct him to do so,” said Brynn. “I have his word.”
“And the word of a dragon is to be trusted,” Juraviel assured her. “But did Agradeleous give to you his word that he would not fly out and take any offered opportunities to attack our enemies?”
Brynn shook her head. “I will have that word next.”
“Take care how tight you hold the leash about Agradeleous,” Cazzira warned. “The dragon’s curiosity and loneliness has brought some conciliation from him, but that is not the nature of such beasts. And Agradeleous is well aware that you need him as much as he needs you—more so, perhaps, both in tilting the course of difficult fights and in keeping your army supplied well enough to move freely about the desert. The dragon understands his value, even if he does not enjoy his role as supplier and not warrior. If you push too far, Agradeleous will use that value against you, do not doubt.”
It was good advice, Brynn knew.
“I have heard whispers that we will break now from the battle,” said Juraviel.
Brynn nodded. “We are weary and wounded. It is time for some rest, both for our health and to put our enemies further off-balance. Let them march hard against the windstorms, and the snows of the steppes, while we prepare for renewed battle in the spring.”
Juraviel and Cazzira exchanged looks which struck Brynn as somewhat out of place.
“What?” she prompted.
“Perhaps the break in the fighting would be the proper time for me and Cazzira to take our leave of Behren,” Juraviel replied. “We have become no more than observers in this fight, for now your hold over Agradeleous is even greater than our own. Cazzira longs for Tymwyvenne, as do I, for another adventure awaits us in the north, one more pressing to both our peoples.”
Brynn winced at the unexpected words, and for a moment, true panic set in. How could she continue to wage the war without the counsel of Belli’mar Juraviel? Even though she spoke with him less and less, she had always taken great comfort that he would be there for her when she most needed him. She looked to her human companion, at first desperately, as if silently asking him to intervene and argue against that course. But then, in just seeing Pagonel, Brynn came to understand that he, and not Juraviel, had become her true advisor.
Still, when she looked back at the elves, at Juraviel, who had been her companion for years, she feared that she would miss them terribly.
But she understood, as well, their desire to be gone, for a great adventure indeed awaited them in the lands north of the mountains. Brynn had no doubt that these two, so spiritually joined, so alike of mind and temperament, would find a way to unite their peoples. Then how much stronger Lady Dasslerond’s position would become, should the demon dactyl’s stain push the Touel’alfar out of Andur’Blough Inninness, if she had Tymwyvenne’s strength and friendship behind her.
It occurred to Brynn then, for the very first time, that the discovery of the Doc’alfar had greatly lessened the importance of her journey to free To-gai, from the perspective of the Touel’alfar. She looked at Belli’mar Juraviel curiously, and then appreciatively, recognizing that he could have left her long ago, that he could have left the dragon’s lair heading north and not south.
“What will you tell Lady Dasslerond about my efforts?” she asked.
“I will tell her that you have performed amazingly well,” the elf answered without hesitation. “I will tell her that if To-gai is not free by the hand of Brynn Dharielle, then Behren is simply too great a foe for To-gai to break. There is nothing more that you, or anyone, could possibly do to faci
litate a successful revolution. Every course you have taken is the correct one, from dodging the Behrenese armies to outguessing the leaders of each walled city, to enlisting mercenaries and pirates in the south and east. Even your actions in controlling and utilizing Agradeleous have been beyond anything I could have expected.”
Brynn took all the compliments with the severe caveat that they were being given as justification for Juraviel, perhaps her greatest friend in all the world, to leave her.
“It is a story not yet fully told,” she countered. “Though one that will likely be completed, for good or for ill, within the next year. Are you not bound to see it through to the end?”
Juraviel paused and stared ahead blankly for a bit, digesting it all. “Would you have me stay?” he asked, simply and sincerely, and Brynn understood that if she said that she would, then he would not leave.
But the honesty of that question evoked a sense of true responsibility in the woman. She understood the emotions driving Juraviel, for a return to Tymwyvenne, and then with the Doc’alfar to Andur’Blough Inninness, could be as important to the elves as these battles in Behren were to the To-gai-ru. Given that, was she acting responsibly as a friend by imploring Juraviel to stay here with her?
“When the war is complete, if we are victorious, I will send couriers to the land about Tymwyvenne to give a full recounting of the events,” she offered, and then she smiled widely, “But only if I have Cazzira’s promise that my couriers will not join the army of the Tylwyn Doc!”
Both elves laughed at that, as did Brynn, but Pagonel just looked from one to the other curiously.
“I will explain it another day,” Brynn offered to the Jhesta Tu.
“A day when I am far, far away, no doubt,” said Cazzira, and the three shared another laugh.
They chatted easily for some time then, about the adventures that had taken them to To-gai, and with many promises that one day they would meet again. Then Juraviel walked up to Brynn and took her hands in his own.
DemonWars Saga Volume 2: Mortalis - Ascendance - Transcendence - Immortalis (The DemonWars Saga) Page 165
