Joust dj-1

by Mercedes Lackey

  He got unsteadily to his feet, and went over to Kashet's trough, and plunged his entire head under the water, keeping it there for as long as his breath held out. He came up with a gasp, and wiped his eyes.

  He couldn't help Ari; Ari would have to find his own solution to his conflict. But certainly his absence from the games would not go unnoticed.

  What Ari does about it is Art's business.

  He finished unharnessing Kashet with fingers that shook; he tried to comfort the unsettled creature as best he could. Avatre kept butting her head against him, anxiously, and he had to pause frequently to try and give her comfort, too.

  What comfort he had to offer, anyway.

  Snatches of raucous music came wafting incongruously from the landing court; muffled shouts from the training field where the games were still going on. His stomach turned over. He was glad that he didn't know the names of the Jousters who had participated in the atrocity; he didn't think he'd be able to restrain himself from trying to take some sort of revenge if he knew. Which would gain him nothing, of course; he'd be caught and probably executed, and then what would happen to Avatre?

  Poison? Where could he get hold of poison? Or at least, where could he get hold of poison that he could actually use? Nowhere, of course; there were plenty of things in the compound that were poisonous, but they tasted or smelled foul, or were only poisonous in such large quantities as to make their administration impractical. Knives in the dark? He snorted at that. As small as he was, even an ambush was out of the question, and he was no trained assassin, to sneak into the Jousters' quarters undetected to slit the throats of sleepers—

  —though the vision conjured up by that thought was vastly satisfying.

  No—he could do nothing for revenge.

  And he could do nothing for his own people either, not as he was now.

  But if he and Avatre could get away—

  I hold the knowledge of how to raise and train the most superior Jousters and dragons in the world in my head. What would happen to the Tians if every Altan Jouster was as good as Ari and Kashet?

  Until this moment, he'd had no real idea of what he was going to do with Avatre besides escape. Now he had a goal, a mission. He would go north, to Alta, to Bato, the heart of the ringed capital of the kingdom. He would present himself to the Altan Commander of Dragons. They surely knew about Ari already; tales of such a legendary Jouster would have come not only from their spies, and their Seers, but from their own Jousters who encountered him. Vetch would have the proof, in the form of Avatre, not only of how Ari had trained such a perfect dragon, but that the training could be duplicated.

  "It's all right," he reassured the anxious dragon and dragonet, taking a deep, unsteady breath. "Or, at least it will be."

  Chapter Sixteen

  IF Vetch had little stomach for the festival before, he had even less now. He could not bear to look at those cheerful faces and wonder which one of them knew what Ari had just revealed. Or worse—which ones had participated in some way.

  Or worse still, which ones approved.

  He led Avatre back to her pen, and as she settled anxiously back into her wallow, he wondered briefly if he was going to have to begin tethering her there to keep her from following him. But he soon realized, when she displayed no further interest in the entrance, that she had only come looking for him because she had heard his deep distress and had followed the sound of his voice; she had wanted to comfort him as he had so often comforted her.

  The very echoes of the celebrations made him feel ill. How could there be a festival going on, how could people be having a good time, when a massacre of innocents had just taken place? How could the people who had participated in it be joking about it and planning to make a game of killing the next time? How could they even bear to imagine a "next time?" And the part of him that longed for revenge writhed inside, urging him to go do something, now, while his enemies were all unwary.

  Was it weakness, or was it wisdom, that offered the counter to that anger in his soul? I'll do that, I am no better than they are…

  He hoped it was the latter, for the thought held him for a moment.

  Suppose he should go and do something horrible, not to the Jousters who had been the murderers, but to ordinary folk? That would be exact revenge—but that wouldn't be right either. And if he did something horrible, just how much worse would the next Tian atrocity be to "make the Altans pay?"

  He saw poor Kashet peering anxiously over the wall, and resolutely turned his heart away from vengeance. Ari's dragon was just as distressed as little Avatre; his rider had acted quite out-of-keeping with anything Kashet had come to expect, had run off from the games, been in deep anguish, had not paid any attention to Kashet, and had run off after shouting at Kashet's dragon boy. The bottom was out of Kashet's universe.

  Fortunately, Vetch knew what would make things at least partially right again, at least for the dragon and the dragonet.

  Because the butchers were going to have a holiday along with everyone else, priest-magicians had come yesterday to create the reverse of the magic that they worked on the dragon sands, taking the heat away from a huge room at the back of the butchery, presumably sending that heat into one of the pens. Or—perhaps putting it into one of the cook tents, to keep the hot food there warm without the use of charcoal or other fire. The butchers had worked at a frenzied pace to fill that room, and the result was that two days' worth of dragon fodder was stockpiled in the ensorcelled storage area, a curious place in which it was so cold that one could see one's breath, hanging in the air! This was no new thing, or so Vetch had been told; the Palace kitchens had such a place. But the magic was seldom used outside of the Palace, except for occasions such as this; it was much simpler just to have butchers to deal with the steady stream of carcasses that always came from Temple Row.

  The way to soothe a dragon's heart ran through his belly. Vetch went to get Kashet's favorite treats.

  He brought some for Avatre, too, the hearts of smaller beasts than cattle. Although it was not feeding time, Kashet always had room for beef hearts, and his favorite food relaxed and comforted him. When he finished his snack, he looked up at the sun speculatively, and yawned—then waded out into his wallow, and instead of burying himself as he did during the winter rains, he spread himself out to bask in the hot sun, with his wings stretched to their fullest extent.

  This was a contented dragon, and Vetch knew it was safe to leave him.

  He returned to Avatre, and introduced her to the delights of Kashet's favorite. She was dubious at first, but one taste convinced her. Rather than relaxing her, though, the snack energized her, and she began exercising her wings, flapping hard and making little jumps into the air.

  Unlike birds, who had to grow feathers and skin and bone before they could fly, dragons only had to grow enough skin and bone—the bone forming the support, the skin forming the wing surface. And unlike birds, whose feathers were fragile while they were growing, dragonets began hopping and flapping fairly early in their development. But they hovered far better than most birds could, and Vetch knew, from watching the older dragonets, that at some point Avatre would be able to hover for a few moments in place, even with extra weight on her back. When that happened, he would know that the moment for first flight was close.

  He watched her closely, and realized that the day was not far off. It was time to keep the harness on her during daylight hours, except when he was giving her a bath. And it was time to start edging the weight she was carrying upward, until it was heavier than he was.

  That way, when she actually made that first flight, she would have built up her strength to carry more than Vetch, and as a consequence, she should be able to go higher and farther than a dragonet of similar age. He had to plan on pursuit; he hoped it would not come until he and Avatre were out of sight, and those who came looking for him would cast their nets far short of where he and she eventually had to come to ground. With luck, pursuers would assume they had
no more strength and endurance than the average dragonet at first flight, and as a consequence, would never guess how far they could go.

  The best way to strengthen her was through play, so until she grew tired and wanted another nap, he resolutely closed his ears to the unwelcome noise of celebration and chased her around the pen until she tired of that, then let her chase him. The play was good for him, too—though he felt guilty at playing when he knew what he knew…

  But Avatre didn't know, and wouldn't understand if she knew. There was no reason to deprive her of the fun and exercise she needed.

  Like a puppy or a kitten, her energy seemed boundless right up until the point where she suddenly tired, flopped down where she stood, and was instantly asleep. At that point, he left the pens for what (he had already decided) would be his last foray out to the landing court until the festival was over.

  He brought a clean barrow with him, and wandered among the food tents, picking out items that would not need to be eaten warm. No one questioned him, oddly enough. Perhaps they assumed he had been sent to get provisions for several of the other boys over at the games. When he had enough to hold him for two days, he returned to the pens, and went straight to the butchery, stashing his provisions in that cold room. There he would not need to worry about them spoiling—and he would not have to venture among the celebrants in order to eat.

  Which was just as well, because to do so would have put the temptation to wreak anonymous harm too near to resist. It had come very, very close, as he had made his way around all of that unguarded food…

  The easiest, and safest route to revenge would be at the festival, through the medium of poison. If the droppings of dragons burned the skin, what would they do if ground as fine as flour and stirred into food? Put into a stew heavily flavored with pepper, onion, and garlic, it probably wouldn't even be tasted until too late.

  Ari was far away from the festival—and he could be certain that the only people who ate the poison would be those from within the Jousters' compound.

  But what if I poisoned Baken by accident? Or Haraket? Or one of the other serfs? That was the problem with such a plan; he knew the people who might be hurt, and there was no way to strike at the perpetrators without knowing who they really were. And if he went after them specifically, he couldn't act anonymously. It all got very complicated, and he could entirely sympathize with Ari's anguished cry of I do not make war on children!

  And he couldn't help remembering another plaint of Ari's. Haraket says I think too much.

  Maybe that was Vetch's problem, too. People who didn't think didn't seem to have any complicated and inconvenient problems of conscience.

  Kashet had gotten a full holiday out of it, after all; Ari did not return to the dragon pens until after the celebration was over. And when he did, he was close-mouthed and grim. Vetch wondered where he had been all that time; he hadn't been in his quarters when Vetch went to look, and Kashet had missed him sorely. He appeared, as usual, one of the first Jousters to come for his dragon on the morning after the festival. What was not usual was that he was wearing his helmet, rather than carrying it. It was difficult to see his face, impossible to make out his expression, but he didn't say anything at all as he inspected the harness and lance. Vetch didn't mind that—how could he? He knew Ari, and knew what it was like to have no recourse to the world's hurt but to retreat from it, put on a mask, hide anguish within. He couldn't blame Ari at all for retreating even (or especially?) from him. But what did bother him was that Kashet had so clearly missed those evening visits these past two nights, and Vetch had a good idea that the reason Ari had not come was because of his presence in Kashet's pen.

  What was more, he would be willing to hazard that Ari was in desperate need of the silent comfort of his dragon, too. As long as Ari thought he had to avoid Vetch, he wouldn't come to Kashet. And he wouldn't ask Vetch to absent himself either. It was up to Vetch to give Ari a way around the problem that salvaged his self-esteem.

  So before Ari could mount up and fly off on patrol that first morning after the festival, Vetch caught his Jouster's arm long enough to make Ari pause for a moment, his foot on Kashet's shoulder.

  "Sir, Baken wants me to sleep in the pen of one of the dragonets," he lied. "He doesn't want just anyone, he wants someone who's used to it, so that the dragonet isn't startled by someone who doesn't know how to act around them in the dark. It's the one they put in next to Kashet, so I'll still be here if Kashet needs me. He thinks she's so young that she'll tame amazingly if she accepts me as a kind of nest mate."

  "The little scarlet, over there?" Ari replied, with a tilt of his head, as he considered the request for a moment. "Well, I suppose I've no objection. I wanted you sleeping in here initially both to keep Kashet company and to keep you out of the reach of the other boys so they couldn't easily torment you—but Kashet will be able to scent you over the wall, you will be here if he calls out, and you'll still be out of reach of the other boys." He paused a moment. "Yes, I've no objection at all. Go ahead and move your gear."

  "Thank you— ' Vetch began, but Ari had already mounted, and before he could say more than that, Kashet was in the air.

  Huh. He thought that, under that veneer of coolness, he'd sensed relief in Ari's voice. Well, now he had every excuse to be with Avatre between sunset and sunrise, which was a help to him, too. This wasn't entirely bad; in all of the wretchedness he and Ari were feeling, there was one small grain of good, for at least he wouldn't have to wake up before first light to be in Kashet's pen by the time the sun crested the horizon anymore.

  And hopefully, Kashet would get his Jouster's attentions again. No matter what he felt, or Ari, the poor dragon shouldn't have to suffer. How could Kashet understand what was wrong? All he knew was that something was the matter, and that he was lonely.

  That night, as he lay along Avatre's side, waiting for sleep, he thought he heard Ari's footsteps outside in the corridor—and a few moments later, he definitely heard the Jouster's voice murmuring on the other side of the wall, though he couldn't make out the words. He sighed, and felt some tension move out of him. That was it; either Ari was embarrassed at having betrayed his feelings to a mere serf and dragon boy, or he was still so ashamed of what had been done to that Altan village that he found it difficult to face Vetch, another Altan. Or probably it was even more complicated than that, but whatever was wrong, it had been Vetch's presence that was keeping the Jouster from his nightly visits to the dragon.

  Vetch certainly found it hard to face Ari. No matter what Ari had said, the fact remained that he might well be in the next party ordered to "pacify" an Altan village in the same way. It was possible that, despite his anguished outburst, Ari would countenance such an atrocity if only by passive silence. Vetch didn't think he would—

  But he couldn't be sure.

  How much was Ari bound to his duty? How far did loyalty to orders go? What would really happen when he was caught between obedience and conscience?

  And Vetch was caught on the horns of a dilemma, because if that happened, on one hand he didn't want to know what Ari's ultimate decision about obeying such an order would be, but on the other—

  Knowing the truth about someone was important.

  But having your illusions smashed was painful.

  He couldn't pretend that nothing had happened if Ari did simply go along with more horrors.

  But losing what you thought was a friendship—even if it was only an odd sort of friendship—was more painful still.

  But did he want to maintain it when it was based on false perceptions? He didn't know what decisions Ari had come to, all by himself, over the past two days. Ari was clearly not going to tell him either. Except that he was going out on his usual patrol—

  —a patrol intended to keep innocent Tian farmers and their crops safe—

  —but at what cost?

  He had to concentrate on what he could affect, or he would go mad.

  And maybe that's how Ari feels. />
  At least now Kashet wasn't being deprived of Ari's attentions. That was something, anyway. It wasn't enough for Kashet to "just" get general petting and attention—a certain amount of that petting and attention had to come from his person, the one he had bonded to from the moment of hatching. And if the only way that Kashet could get that attention was for Vetch to absent himself into the next pen—well, that was all right. Curious, though, that Ari had known about Avatre, even identified her by her color. He wouldn't have thought that Ari'd had time to notice.

  I wonder if Ari guesses about Avatre— he thought, suddenly, alarm making him sit straight up in the darkness. Avatre murmured her objections to his movement, and he lay back down again, mind racing, as he went over every question or comment that Ari had made in the last few days, trying to divine whether there was a clue in what he'd said, some hint that Ari was probing, trying to discover if Vetch had followed in the Jouster's footsteps and hatched his own dragonet. Ah, don't be stupid, he thought at last, after he'd been over every detail that he could remember at least twice. As busy as the Jouster had been, how could Ari possibly guess? He just saw Avatre over the wall when he came in at some point. He hasn't said a word about her, and he hasn't caught me here with her. How could he guess that she's my hatchling?