by E. E. Knight
Whatever his faults, SiDrakkon could at least act decisively when it came to war.
“Will you come yourself, Tyr?” the Copper asked.
“No. Anaea may be a feint. The griffaran have reported strange dragons above the Lavadome, but they always flee north at sunrise. If I wanted to attack the Lavadome, I’d strike the most distant Uphold too, and draw our forces as far from the main blow as possible.”
He shifted a little to let the women dry his underside, but he did it mechanically, grinding his teeth as he thought.
“You’ll be host commander, RuGaard. You’ve seen me at war and know what to do. Strike fast and strike hard, and keep striking until the war is over.”
“I’ve left my mate back in Anaea. I must return at once.”
“Of course. You can take my personal flying guard with you; the Skotl bodyguard can remain. AuBalagrave is in charge of the flying guard. You remember him from the Drakwatch. I believe you served together. That’ll give you an immediate force.”
“Thank you, Tyr.”
“Oh. I heard about this bat messenger service of yours. Let’s talk again when this is over. I’ve an idea that we could expand it.”
“They don’t do it for love of us, sir, but the taste of our blood.”
“Well, there are a few fat dragons here that could do with a little bleeding. Get back to your mate, Upholder, and keep me informed. Try to find out more about this enemy.”
Chapter 26
He rested for a few hours in a spare nook Imfamnia offered him. With the numbers of the Imperial line dropping, and the increased space closing off much of the top level of the Imperial Resort, there were rooms and cushions to spare.
She even offered him a bowlful of gold. “For family only,” she said, as though the gold could tell the difference. “Have as much as you like; my mate eats only silver these days.”
He ate but a few coins, not wanting to have to fly with a chest’s worth of heavy metals in his belly.
After checking with SiDrakkon one last time, to see if any additional orders or circumstances arose—“I’ll try to send as many as thirty dragons,” Tyr SiDrakkon promised—he departed with AuBalagrave and the other two dragons.
They were good fliers, lean and wide-winged, and he held them back the whole way. He wondered how many dragons would really be sent. Using NiVom’s old formula, perhaps six or seven might make it all the way to the Uphold.
They approached the plateau at night. The Copper, his hearts pounding, crossed the mountain line and looked first to the Upholder’s palace temple.
It looked intact.
“Have two dragons fly high. Just in case,” he called to AuBalagrave using mind-speech. “You follow.”
The words must not have come through clearly, because AuBalagrave took another dragon and gained altitude. Well, mind-speech wasn’t a perfect form of communication among dragons who hadn’t been long together.
If anything, the plateau was darker than usual at night. The hearth fires sometimes glowing out of windows didn’t give the city its usual ghostly glow. But there would be time to survey the damage in daylight.
The palace temple had been scorched about the roof, and one of the stone globes had been knocked off the roofing. Another was missing entirely, and judging from the cracks in the long set of stairs it had been sent bouncing down to the fields and woods beneath.
“Halaflora! Nilrasha!” he called as he landed, ready to tear into any dragon but his mate or guardian Firemaid.
Fourfang waved from behind a stone.
“All sleep be—”
“We’re in the lower chambers, as you asked, my love,” Halaflora called, surprisingly loudly for her small frame.
He looked at his escort. “Tell AuBalagrave that I’d like one dragon to stay aloft, keeping watch. The others may rest, and I’ll send food if there’s any to be had. Don’t go down into the valley to scavenge; the humans there are frightened enough.”
The Copper descended to the mouth of the Lower World. Two members of the Drakwatch stood guard at the tunnel, now partly blocked with piled stone and timbers. Nilrasha slept atop the blockage, but she winked at him with an eye and fluttered a griff.
“Asu-ra, that kern king, was up here,” Halaflora said. “He cried. He wanted to know why the dragons had loosed such fury on them.”
“You told him it wasn’t our doing, I hope.”
“I said there are good and evil dragons, just like there are good and evil weather gods. I think he understood.”
“That’s a better reply than I could have produced, with half the valley floor aflame.”
“They were after gold. They didn’t even steal any women or children, which I thought warriors always did.”
“What happened here?”
“They knocked down some statues and set fire to a few curtains. I believe they wanted to show their contempt for us more than to try to kill us. They never so much as ventured inside, though the upper level is entirely open, as you know.”
“Don’t forget the mess on the steps,” Nilrasha croaked.
“What happened on the steps?”
“They used it as a toilet pit,” Halaflora said. “Just a little water and scrubbing. Hardly worth mentioning.”
“Are you well, dear?” he asked his mate.
“Better than ever, my lord. You know, I think all this stimulation agrees with me. I almost feel as though I could fly, if I found a high enough ledge and caught a good updraft.”
“Let’s put the Uphold back in order before dropping you off any cliffs, shall we?” he said.
“How were things with Tyr SiDrakkon?”
“War always seems to put him in better spirits. He sent three dragons with me and promised more, and a grand commander of the Drakwatch.”
“Grand commander? I didn’t know there were as many in the Drakwatch as that anymore. So few of the drakes from the better families volunteer. You must tell me all the news of my sisters and brother.”
“Let’s save politics and family news until I’ve eaten.”
“I’ve been saving a fat calf the kern king offered just for you. Would you care for the liver, Nilrasha?”
The Firemaid yawned. “Very kind of you, lady. Yes, I could do with some dinner.”
“Fourfang,” the Copper said, “see about feeding the dragons who came with me. Where’s Rhea? I’m caked with grit.”
“Wonderful news, my lord. She and that clever man of yours are mated! She’s going to issue, or whatever they call it!”
“Whelp?” Nilrasha asked.
“I think it’s give birth,” the Copper said. “All the more reason for a dinner. We should send her some stewed brains and the tongue. I’ve heard that’s good for brooding.”
“Oh, I’m saving those for me, my love.”
“You don’t think—”
“We may have hatchlings. Isn’t it wonderful?”
“That could be dangerous for you. Your mother told me—”
“Oh, forget my mother. She’s always looking at the dark side of things. I’ll wager she’s back in the Lavadome now, foretelling a loss in the war against these riders and lamenting the weaknesses of dragons these days. Our cause is just, so we are sure to triumph, are we not, my lord?”
Perhaps that is why Tighlia mated us, the Copper thought. We both have what she called the simpleton’s faith.
Dinner passed in a more jovial mood than the Copper would have expected with destruction all around. Thanks to the guard overhead and outside, they ventured to the upper level and ate upon the feasting floor. Nilrasha made jokes, and Halaflora ate with unusual enthusiasm.
Or perhaps her expectations were forcing her appetite.
“A griffaran comes!” the watchdragon aloft outside bellowed. “He makes the signal-wing of bearing important news for the Upholder, from the Tyr himself.”
“A message? But you just got here,” Halaflora said. “Whatever could it mean?”
“I’d better see to
that,” the Copper said, rising and taking the exit that would bring him to the stairs.
The griffaran alighted on one of the globes-atop-squares flanking the long staircase down the mountainside.
“Yark! Upholder RuGaard?”
“Yes,” the Copper said. Fourfang trotted up with a torch.
“Written message. Sent yesterday.” The bird detached a tube from some sort of hook in its tail feathers and passed it to him.
“You must have flown straight here without a break. Have you eaten? Fourfang, go down to the pool and see if there are any fish there.”
“Read message first,” the griffaran said. “Then duty done.”
The tube was one of NoSohoth’s message tubes, certainly. He flicked off the sealing wax with a claw-tip and extracted the paper inside.
TYR DEAD. PEACE DECREED. TYR SIMEVOLANT RULES. RETURN AT ONCE.
The Copper blinked, unable to believe his eyes. Each pair of words was harder to believe than the last.
Bwaaaaaaak!
He started. That was a blighter alarm horn!
It blew again, sounding from the dining chamber. His hearts froze for a second; then he spread open his wings and flew up to the balcony on the upper level. He crashed through the tattered, burned remains of the evening curtains and saw Halaflora, stretched out and twitching on the floor.
Blood ran from a corner of her mouth. A white-faced Rhea stood in the corner, gasping for air, the horn hanging loose in her hand. Over his mate Nilrasha stood, the claws of one sii bloody, scratched about her eyes.
“Away from her!” he roared, feeling his fire bladder well. He tripped on his bad sii and sprawled next to his mate, but he didn’t care. He rolled her undersize head toward him, but Halaflora’s eyes were white and sightless.
“She’s dead, my lord,” Nilrasha said, breathing hard. “There’s nothing you can do for her.”
The Copper shook his mate, struck her face, turned her upside down, and shook her until scales fell off and skittered across the spotless feasting floor. Finally he dropped her limp corpse.
“What did you do?” he asked Nilrasha.
“Do?” she choked.
“Shwok’d?”
“Am I not speaking clearly enough, you lisping lizard? Yes, she tore off a big piece of thigh—I think it had a bone in it—and lifted her head and gobbled it right down, smiling and happy as can be. It stuck. I tried to get at it with my sii, but I couldn’t reach it without tearing her head off.”
“How did you get wounded?”
“She panicked. She was flailing this way and that instead of letting me help her, and she scratched me.”
“It’s not like her to take such a big—”
“She’s been delirious these last few days. She thought she was brooding, stupid thing.”
“Get out of here!”
“But, Ru—I’m sorry about the lisping thing. You do it when you get excited. I shouldn’t have said anything.”
“Just go.”
AuBalagrave and the other dragons arrived, looking for enemies, a fight, anything—but they just found the Upholder, lying against his mate. Nilrasha slipped out.
“Leave me alone!” the Copper said. “I’m staying with her until she cools! All of you, get out. No, not you, Rhea. Clear away this mess.”
The dragons departed, and Rhea bent to pick up the spilled platter of spitted calf.
“Rhea. Please speak to me. For once in your life, don’t be afraid and speak. Did you see this? What happened here?”
The pale girl—no, woman; she had a swelling at her midsection and the feeding sacs had enlarged—looked at him with terrified eyes. Then she fainted.
He buried Halaflora on the mountainside with a good view of the palace, the vale, and their sleeping chamber. Then he went to see Nilrasha and found her idling in her bathing pool.
“If I find that you had a sii in this, I’ll kill you,” the Copper said.
“You’re upset, your honor. I know what you think. Put it out of your mind. She choked. It was a terrible accident.”
“You’re such a careful huntress.”
“Wouldn’t I have killed her long ago? I had opportunities every other day. I could have done it easily when we where hiding together, listening to those cursed dragons smashing the upper level. A quick pounce and—snap! She was so slight, you could practically poke a claw through her. What did the griffaran messenger want?”
The Copper couldn’t decide whether she was being callous or just her usual practical self. She was a born warrior who left the dead behind and kept her regrets, if any, private. But maybe her instincts were such that when she had an enemy, she’d pounce. Grabbing a loin and shoving it down a rival’s throat would be too roundabout a way of doing it. And if she wanted an accidental death, she would have just tossed Halaflora down that endless flight of steep steps as they took in the view, and then claimed she slipped.
“We have a new Tyr. SiMevolant. I’m to return to the Lavadome. I suspect his first edict will be that everyone paint themselves blue or add stripes.”
“Si-SiMevolant? What happened to SiDrakkon?”
“He’s dead. When I saw him last, he looked healthy enough.”
“Is SiMevolant smart enough to execute an assassination?”
Would a killer be so ready to use that word? the Copper thought. His mind was turning quick enough circles, and he tried to put Halaflora out of his mind. “He may have just been pretending to be a fool so no one would suspect him. How did the title of Tyr fall on those golden haunches, I wonder?”
“Who will you leave in command here?”
“According to the message, there’s to be no war. Which sounds like SiMevolant. He’s just stupid enough to believe that it takes two to make a war.”
“Challenge him if you get the chance,” Nilrasha said. “You can defeat him. He’s big and thick-scaled, but he doesn’t know the first thing about fighting.”
“I’ve never had much luck with duels. I always seem to come off the worse,” the Copper said.
“Still angry with me?” she asked.
“Only if you killed my mate.”
“Do you forget what you said? We can’t be mated while she lives. She no longer lives. After a decent mourning period we can have our happiness. She would have died over your eggs. I can give you many.”
The Copper snorted. “This is not the time for that kind of talk.”
“I just…I just want to know that you don’t hate me. What must I do to make you believe I tried to save her? Stuff a horse down my throat and choke myself?”
“You’re too tough to choke on a horse. I must sleep. I’ve got a long flight tomorrow.”
“I wonder what SiMevolant has planned for you?”
“Tyr SiMevolant,” the Copper corrected.
“Not for long, I think. He won’t last his name-year.” She displayed her teeth and rattled her griff.
He left AuBalagrave at the Uphold, with instructions to defend the temple and inform the kern kings that he was in mourning over the death of his mate and would perform no functions, ceremonial or otherwise, until further notice.
Then he took to the sky. Thoughts of Halaflora took all the joy out of flying; now it was just a dull, exhausting routine. He broke his journey at the Tooth Cavern bridge to speak to Rayg and the Firemaidens and Firemaid.
“Supposedly there’ll be no war,” the Copper said. “But I want you watchful here nonetheless. I’m sure these hag-ridden dragons know of the existence of this bridge and this portal into the Lower World. They may use it to reach the Lavadome.”
The dragons nodded their agreement. Then the Copper pulled Rayg aside, to the little bench where he kept his plans and designs.
“I understand you’re to be congratulated,” the Copper said.
“For what? Construction on the bridge has stopped ever since that fight in the cavern.”
“Rhea. You’re mated, I hear.”
Rayg looked across at him, sucking on his fles
hy cheeks. “I didn’t know you paid attention to that kind of thing.”
“I do. How would you like Rhea freed with you?”
“Nothing more, your honor. You would do that?”
“I just need you to turn your brain to one final project.”
His shoulders dropped. “What’s that?”
“You worked for the dwarves, I understand?”
“Yes, well, it was sort of an apprenticeship.”
“They understand armor, I’m told. I want you to design some kind of armoring for the underside of a dragon. Enough to keep out one of those poisoned crossbow quarrels. It’s got to be light, though. No layers of chain mail.”
“It would help if I had one of their crossbows for a test firing.”
“A few may have been lost thanks to those riders the FeLissaraths downed. I’ll have Nilrasha hunt for them.” He reminded himself to send a messenger bat as soon as he finished with Rayg.
“Leather would be best, then,” Rayg said, eyes rolling in thought. “Perhaps if it were stiffened and reinforced with wire. Or wood flanges.”
“One more request. It’s got to look like a regular dragon’s underskin, at least from a distance.”
As there was no emergency, the Copper returned to the Lavadome by the more tiresome—and cramped—south passage. The entrance was well hidden by a thick, multicanopied forest, and he’d never seen it from the air, only from the ground in his orientation hikes in the Drakwatch. So he had to cast around a little before he found the right waterfall that led to it.
He found Angalia and another maid guarding the door.
“I come at Tyr SiMevolant’s request, Angalia, but I cry joy at seeing you again,” he said, figures of speech being just that. “How do you like your change of scenery?”
“Warmer, your honor, but still terrible. The air is so heavy and moist. I feel it creeping into my lungs. I’ll be dead of a fever in a year; mark my words.”
