by James Wyatt
Of course, the closer Darraun got to any dragons, the larger he realized they were. Again, as they circled in the sky above, it was easy to imagine they were no larger than eagles. But when he rounded a corner and found himself face-to-flank with a red dragon, it struck him that many of these creatures were the size of a horse, and a few were larger than Vaskar. He stumbled away from a blast of flame that he was pretty sure had been meant merely as a warning, and retreated to the camp.
He caught enough snippets of dragon conversation on his brief stroll outside the camp to confirm that the dragons gathered here shared Vaskar’s philosophy, more or less.
“We’re not mercenaries,” a large black dragon had protested within his earshot. They spoke Draconic, of course, which made Darraun a little unsure of his understanding.
“Of course not,” a smaller silver had answered. “This isn’t about serving a human army. It’s about the Prophecy.”
Darraun stared into the fire. What part of the Prophecy did the dragons think they were accomplishing by fighting for Haldren? He thought he remembered Gaven saying something in the City of the Dead about a “clash of dragons,” but that seemed to imply dragons fighting other dragons. Or dragons fighting people with dragonmarks. Or dragons fighting the Storm Dragon. Or the Storm Dragon fighting Vaskar, for that matter.
“Thinking about the Prophecy makes my head spin,” he muttered.
“That’s why I don’t think about it,” Cart said. His voice startled Darraun, who had been so wrapped up in his thoughts he’d forgotten the warforged was there.
Darraun arched an eyebrow. “Just do as Haldren says, and trust everything to work itself out?”
“Trust Haldren to make everything work out. That’s why he’s a general.”
“What’s that all about, Cart? You’re anything but stupid. You could think for yourself, but you choose not to.”
Cart stood a little straighter, still staring away from the fire as if he were on watch. “I think for myself where it’s appropriate, and I obey orders where that’s called for. That’s why I was part of the general’s trusted staff.”
“But you’re not in the army anymore. And Haldren isn’t a general any more. By obeying Haldren, you’re disobeying his superiors. You’re disobeying the queen.”
“My loyalty is to Haldren, not to Aundair or Queen Aurala.”
“I see.” Darraun picked up a stick and stirred the embers of the fire.
“It’s what I was made to do,” Cart added.
Darraun watched the sparks rise from the coals and climb into the sky, glowing with all the brightness they could muster before winking out.
* * * * *
The first light of dawn gleamed in the sky when Haldren’s grand pavilion opened, vomiting a stream of drunken generals, majors, and captains, staggering and weaving their way to bed. Their tents were safely away from the dragons’ roosts, so there were no ugly encounters between belligerent commanders and short-tempered dragons. Darraun watched them emerge and disperse, making sure to keep his disgust from showing on his face.
“Well, I suppose that’s my cue to go to bed,” he said to Cart.
The warforged nodded, still staring into the distance. Darraun stood and shuffled out of Cart’s sight. With a tent between himself and the warforged, Darraun rubbed the fatigue from his eyes and circled back as quietly as he could manage. As he approached the pavilion, he heard Haldren’s voice, and he hurried closer.
“… interested in celebrating,” the sorcerer was saying. “Now that they’ve seen the dragons, they have no doubt of our victory.”
There was another voice, this one quieter—but Darraun couldn’t make it out from behind the tent. He made his way to a flap, dropped to the ground, and crawled inside, disturbing the fabric of the pavilion as little as he could. He stayed on the ground, behind the great table Haldren had set up for the feast.
“I am exceedingly grateful,” Haldren said. It was a protest. “You have certainly fulfilled your end of our arrangement, and I believe my plans are assured of success as a result. And in turn, I have performed my obligations to you. If your plans are not turning out as well—”
A harsh growl cut him off. “You let him get away from you.” The voice was Vaskar’s. Darraun risked raising his head above the table to scan the inside of the tent. He was relieved to see an image of Vaskar’s face floating in a large silver mirror, not the dragon himself.
“You hardly seemed concerned about that at the time,” Haldren said. “You told me the Sky Caves would render him obsolete.”
“I admit that I did not consider the possibility that he would appear at the Sky Caves and wrest their secrets from me.”
Darraun’s mouth fell open. No, he thought, I didn’t consider that possibility either. Well done, Gaven.
“And you did not destroy him?”
“Do not mock me, Haldren. He acquired tremendous power in the Sky Caves, power that should have been mine. He could not have done that if he had remained in your custody.”
Haldren’s voice dropped to barely a whisper. “In case you have forgotten, he kidnapped Senya when he made his escape. I would have pursued him across the Ten Seas, but you dismissed them both as irrelevant. I owe you nothing.”
“Idiot,” Vaskar snorted. “I have seen two mates and half a dozen hatchlings die. They are irrelevant. We seek greater things. Would you abandon the throne of Khorvaire for her? Should I put aside a chance at godhood for the sake of your lust or love or whatever you call it?”
Darraun heard the rustle of cloth. Haldren did not answer for a breath—two breaths, five. Darraun began to panic. Had Haldren heard him somehow? His heart beat so hard he was sure Haldren could hear it in the silence.
Ten breaths, and still neither Haldren nor Vaskar had spoken. Keeping his head sideways, Darraun raised one eye above the table to see what was going on.
Vaskar’s head still hovered in the mirror, but Haldren had turned away from it, his hands clenched over his temples. Unfortunately, that meant he stared right at the table where Darraun hid. Darraun ducked his head back down, but it was too late.
“A spy? Darraun?”
Haldren’s confusion lasted only an instant, and in the next, a blast of fire exploded around Darraun, engulfing him as well as the table and the wall of the tent behind him. Searing pain shot through his body as he rolled away, under the flaming edge of the tent, and up to his feet outside. Clenching his teeth to quell the pain, he scrambled to the nearest tent.
“Darraun!” Haldren cried behind him. “Traitor! Coward!”
Darraun ducked into the nearest tent, hoping Haldren’s cries hadn’t woken the occupant.
“Who’s there?” A man’s voice came from the ground at his feet—very close. The inside of the tent was pitch dark, and the man’s voice was thick with sleep and drink.
Darraun took a deep breath, focused his mind, and changed.
Quickly. Hair long, height the same in case the tent’s occupant could make out his outline. Breasts, waist, hips—the face could wait a moment. The new form made certain parts of his clothing too tight, but in this case that was an advantage. Voice—soft, husky, seductive. “Haldren sent me to see if you need anything.” Pose—chest out, one hand on a cocked hip. “Sovereigns, is he trying to kill me?”
Darraun heard the man lie back on his furs. He changed his face—round and soft, with full lips and heavy-lidded eyes. It was a face he’d used many times, and it had proven its effectiveness. He started peeling off his clothes, glad he hadn’t been wearing his leather cuirass.
“No, no. Go away, girl.”
Darraun stepped out of his breeches. Haldren hadn’t shouted again, but Darraun knew that didn’t mean he’d abandoned the chase. Haldren was too smart and too angry to continue yelling. There was some commotion outside, a susurrus of voices trying to stay quiet.
“What’s going on out there?” the man on the ground murmured. “Is something burning?”
“Give me a blanke
t,” Darraun said. “I’ll go see.”
The man grunted. Darraun bent down and felt around for a blanket. He pulled one off the pile and wrapped it around himself, making a few adjustments to his body as he did so. His new identity complete, he stepped out of the tent.
* * * * *
“How much did he hear?” Vaskar asked.
“I have no idea,” Haldren said. “He certainly wasn’t there during the feast, and I made sure I was alone in the pavilion before I contacted you. But he could have come in at any point after that.”
“We spoke mostly of Gaven. Why should he care?”
“I don’t know.”
“Perhaps your success is not as certain as you believed,” Vaskar said.
“Nonsense. Everything is set in motion. Nothing can rob me of victory now.”
“Nothing? You’ve had a spy in your midst since you escaped from Dreadhold. How many other conversations has he heard? You told me yourself he had intelligence contacts. It’s possible the queen knows every detail of your plans.”
“Indeed.”
“Perhaps now you will reconsider my request.”
Haldren sighed. “Very well, Vaskar. We will choose a different field of battle. We’ll conform to your damned Prophecy.”
* * * * *
Getting away from Haldren had been easy enough. Finding a new suit of armor to fit a new body shape and blending in among the hundreds of camping soldiers was not too difficult. The real challenge would be getting out of a military camp located miles from civilization and surrounded by dragons.
The changeling who had been Darraun was getting comfortable in her new body, new identity, and new name—Private Caura Fannam, an enlisted soldier under the command of Major Rennic Arak. She wore her tawny hair pulled awkwardly into a tail down her back, a fashion popular with many female soldiers. A long shirt of leather studded with heavy steel rivets was standard issue for Aundair’s light infantry. She carried a short spear—not her favorite weapon, but easy enough to use: “Put the sharp end into the enemy,” she’d heard a training sergeant say once. In practice, she knew the hard part was pulling it back out in time to put it in the next enemy, which was why she preferred shorter weapons. But if all went well, she’d have no reason to use her spear as anything but a part of her disguise.
Even with dragons surrounding the camp, soldiers couldn’t abandon military protocols—sentries were posted at various spots around the edge of the camp and patrolling the perimeter, probably at least as much to make sure no one left as to intercept anyone coming in. Caura knew they’d be on heightened alert since Haldren had discovered Darraun spying on him. She smiled—how easy it was to think of Darraun as another person entirely.
“Where are you supposed to be, soldier?” A sentry’s voice rang out nearby, and Caura started. She’d thought she was well hidden in the shadow of a supply cache. She couldn’t see the sentry.
“Uh—I … I …” The voice was a young man’s, just on the other side of the supplies. The pieces of a plan started to come together in her mind. Jumping to a decision, she stepped out of her hiding place.
“I’m ready,” she announced. She looked expectantly at the other young soldier, hoping he would follow her lead. She spotted the sentry at the edge of her vision, but tried to act as if she hadn’t noticed him.
“What’s this?” the sentry demanded. “What are you two up to?”
Feigning surprise, Caura turned to face the sentry. She stood at attention and gave a salute. “Private Caura Fannam, sir.”
“Answer the question, Private, since your lover here seems to have lost his tongue.”
“Lover?” An instant of concentration brought a flush of color to her cheeks. “Oh, no, sir. We’re on our way to report for sentry duty, and I had to stop to, ah, use the latrine, sir. He was just waiting for me.” She saw a second sentry hanging back from the scene, ready to get help if a situation developed.
“What’s your name, soldier?” The sentry addressed the man beside her, who had fumbled his way to attention as well.
“P-p-p—”
“Do you have a problem with your tongue, Private?”
“Yes, sir, he does,” Caura interjected. “A terrible stutter. That’s why he’s not in Communications.”
That drew a harsh laugh from both sentries, and a blush she suspected was genuine from the other soldier. But it covered her new friend’s initial hesitation in responding to the sentry—one more step toward getting out of the camp alive.
“Private Jenns Solven, s-s-sir.” Jenns saluted. He seemed to be warming up.
“All right,” the sentry said, “get where you’re supposed to be. Don’t let me see you sneaking around like that again, Solven. And keep your eyes open tonight, the both of you. Word is a spy’s been discovered—pretty high up, too. So don’t go fooling around when you’re supposed to be on watch! The Lord General’s depending on you.”
“Yes, sir!” Caura and Jenns said in unison, saluting again. The sentry returned the salute and turned to rejoin his partner. She and Jenns stayed at attention until the two sentries were well on their way. She heard more laughter, then the sentries were gone. Jenns let out his breath and visibly sagged.
“Thank you,” he said. “I don’t know who you are or why you helped me, but I think you just saved my life.”
“Well, now it’s time for you to return the favor,” Caura said with a smile.
CHAPTER
28
Bluevine was exactly the kind of place that Phaine despised. A village small enough that everyone knew each other meant that strangers like him drew attention. The people loved to talk, they were never satisfied with terse answers, and they took umbrage at his habitual silence. On top of that, the weather stayed warm and bright. He vastly preferred the shadowy alleys, darkened skies, and comfortable anonymity of Khorvaire’s large cities.
The flip side, though, was that even a secret meeting like the one Haldren had held in Bluevine could hardly be kept secret in such a small town. The fugitive had admitted only a few people inside the room during the feast and had sworn them to silence, which of course meant that everyone in the village knew some version of what had happened inside. Getting information wasn’t difficult; just sorting out the truth from the wild speculation and rumors was problematic.
Almost everyone he interviewed claimed to know someone who knew someone who had been in the room, but few could name the source of their information, and those that were named denied that they’d been present. Several times, between interviews, he told Leina he wished he could just find a throat to slit and be done with Bluevine for good.
Through all the gossip and exaggeration, some hints of a consistent picture eventually began to emerge. Haldren had clearly stayed in Bluevine for several days. He had been accompanied by another human man, younger, and a warforged. There was no indication that the elf woman or the Lyrandar excoriate had been there. After the first day, other strangers had arrived: seven men and women, some of them clearly of noble birth, though all of them acted like they were entitled to royal treatment.
Beyond those bare facts, Phaine found little agreement, which made sense to him. Many people in the town would have had occasion to interact with these ten outsiders in various ways, so it was natural that a consistent picture of them would emerge. He had yet to find anyone who claimed they had actually been present at their gatherings, though, which would explain why there were so many different stories about what had actually taken place.
Given that all the stories were probably the inventions of various villagers, it amused him that every one attributed some sinister purpose to the gathering. He figured that adequately summarized the village’s attitude toward outsiders. If a group of strangers came to town and met in secret, it was almost certainly for a cultic ritual, a political conspiracy, a depraved orgy, or an arcane summoning. At least, those made for better stories, more likely to get repeated. Phaine supposed that if it had been a casual gathering of old mili
tary friends sharing war stories over glasses of Bluevine’s famous vintage, that story would hardly have captured much interest.
Finally, Leina pointed him to a promising lead—a dour old farmer who acknowledged, after some badgering, that his grandson had been pressed into service pouring wine for the strangers. He refused to come into the village center, so Phaine followed Leina out to his farmstead. He knocked at the door and waited, knocked louder and waited more, and finally saw the farmer for himself as the door swung open. The man’s face was leathery and deeply lined, and one big hand was clutched around the handle of a scythe.
“What do you want?” the farmer demanded.
“Good afternoon,” Phaine said, forcing a smile. “My associate tells me that your family has some information about the strangers who visited your charming village a few weeks ago.”
The man’s hand clenched his scythe harder. “I told her we don’t want to talk about it.”
“Perhaps Leina neglected to mention that some of these people are fugitives. One of them escaped from Dreadhold.”
“She told me. I’m not surprised.”
“It is very important that I learn everything I can about these people and what they were doing here. If your grandson has information that might help find them, it’s imperative that I speak to him.”
The farmer’s knuckles whitened on this handle of his scythe. “Listen. My boy was there, and maybe he heard things that would help you. But we’ll never know, see? The bastards cut out his tongue.”
* * * * *
Under normal circumstances, Senya did not sleep. She was an elf, and four hours spent in quiet meditation rested her body and mind like a full night’s sleep. During this trance, her mind would run through a series of mental exercises of memory and reflection that she had practiced tens of thousands of times. Humans would call them dreams.
