Joust dj-1

by Mercedes Lackey

  When he woke, the pool of sun was all the way across the floor, and what woke him was the sound of voices overhead.

  His heart leaped in his chest with fear. Voices! Can anyone see down here?

  He pressed himself back against overhanging wall of the pocket, and peered up. He couldn't see anything, but some peculiarity of the shape of the pocket brought the voices clearly down to him.

  "… saw him fall about there," came Ari's voice.

  The terror of discovery held him pinned against the wall.

  And his first thought was that Ari had betrayed him, betrayed them both—

  He should have lied! He should have told Ari that he was going west, east, south—anything but admitting he was going to try to make it to Altai Now Ari had brought people from the compound, guards or soldiers—

  But before he could move a strange voice answered.

  "Not a sign of him. Not that the jackals would leave anything, and they probably dragged the body off to a den, anyway," came that other voice. "And the dragonet flew off?"

  Ari again. "That way."

  "Towards the breeding valleys. Well, she'll be back with her mother by now, and we won't see her again. By now, the other dragons will have chewed the harness and saddle off her, and no captured dragonet ever gets caught twice. You're right, Ari. It had to have been an accident, poor boy, and we jumped to an unwarranted conclusion. If he'd been planning to steal a dragon, he'd have taken one of the older ones, not an unflighted dragonet."

  "Of course he would have; of what use is a first-year dragonet to the Altans? They can't carry a man for at least another two years," Ari replied, sounding mournful. "My Kashet would have carried him. I wouldn't be the least surprised to find that Coresan would have, or a half dozen others. What's more, you saw for yourself that there was nothing about his gear that looked as if he was getting ready to run away. There were no provisions, nothing packed, and he didn't even have a firestarter or a waterskin. He didn't even take the funerary shrine."

  "No, he didn't—and if nothing else, that's a pretty convincing argument for pure accident. Poor child. He must have underestimated how close that dragonet was to First Flight. Baken is shattered; he thinks it's his fault, showing the youngster how to train the dragonets to carry a man. He thinks Vetch was trying to find a way to prove to Haraket that he deserved the same sort of reward that Baken had been promised."

  "It's more like to be mine," Ari said, and if Vetch hadn't known better, he'd have believed in his own demise, Ari was doing so good a job of sounding guilty. "If I'd just followed at a distance instead of chasing him, when the dragonet got tired, I could have retrieved him. Instead, I frightened her into throwing him before 1 was close enough to catch him. Which is why—

  A long silence.

  "Ah. I'd wondered. Well, the Great King is hardly likely to begrudge you that."

  "Indeed. Well, I've brought the shrine, and I got another figure for it. You head on back. I'll see if 1 can find something like remains, and even if I can't, I'll still place the shrine and the offerings for the boy and his father. It's the least I can do."

  "And you don't want to find yourself haunted either," the voice said shrewdly. "1 don't blame you. No, get that shrine placed out here so his spirit won't try to come back to the compound. I don't want to see any wandering ghosts in the corridors! See you back at the compound."

  Vetch sat there with his mouth falling open, hardly able to believe what he was hearing. Was—Ari had reported him dead? And had he just heard Ari and another Jouster agreeing that he was?

  A shadow passed across the opening above, and the familiar sound of dragon wings echoed down where Vetch waited.

  And for some time, nothing more happened, as Vetch strained his ears and his nerves went tight as lute string. Then, when he was ready to scream with the tension, he heard something in the passage. It sounded like footfalls. Two light feet, and four very, very heavy ones.

  That "something" was indeed Ari and Kashet. The dragon had a large bag strapped across the back of his saddle.

  "Ah, awake. I don't suppose you overheard me up there?" Ari said cheerfully. "Down, Kashet."

  The dragon stretched himself alongside Avatre, who was still sleeping.

  "Uh—most of it. I'm dead?" Vetch hazarded.

  "As the god-king Arsani-kat-hamun," Ari agreed. He took the bag from the back of his saddle and tossed it to Vetch; it was a lot heavier than it looked. "Your grave goods. I told everyone you'd been thrown and the dragonet escaped, then suggested that I ought to go set up a funerary shrine to you and your father where I last saw your body. So to avoid having you come back to haunt us, virtually everyone in the compound rushed to put together a rather motley assortment of funerary offerings. I, of course, put together a very select assortment of my own choosing as well, but I saw no reason to refuse their gifts. There might actually be something worth keeping in them."

  He felt rather as if he'd been run over by a chariot. Why had he not confided in Ari in the first place? His fears seemed baseless now. Ari had taken a chaotic situation in hand, and had taken care of every possible consideration. "You want me to leave these things for my father?" he hazarded.

  "Some of them," Ari said cryptically. "There's another bag back up there—" he jerked his head at the opening, "—where the obliging Dethet-re left it. And yes, I did bring your father's shrine, but I strongly suggest that you set it up here and leave it, or you'll only have to hunt a place to leave it later, and that place will not be nearly as secure. You'll find, I think, that it isn't the sort of item you can afford to take along on a journey the length of the one you have elected to make."

  "I can always set up another for him when I get there," Vetch said, after a pause.

  "Indeed. Now, I'll go get the other bag, you rummage through that and see what's useful. What isn't—that, you can just leave for your father's spirit."

  Ari strode off down the crevice. Kashet remained where he was, since Ari hadn't ordered him to his feet. Vetch knelt down beside the coarse canvas bag and opened it.

  On the top of the bag was a roll of his own bedding, with something hard and squarish in it. The shrine? Yes, he discovered as he carefully unrolled the bedding, that the shrine was wrapped in it, so his first act was to deal with it. Ari had been marvelously careful; he quickly set the shrine to rights and looked around the little refuge for somewhere to put it. Finally he climbed up to a kind of shallow niche, high above what he hoped would be the high-water mark in the rainy season. He set the shrine on that ledge, after chasing out sand, a few dead leaves, and the shell of a beetle or two.

  He scrambled down from his perch, and returned to unpacking the bag. Under the bedding were the woolen cape he'd been given for cold weather, and the canvas rain cape, both of which he had kept with his bedding. Tied up in a square of cloth were the little treasures he had accumulated while he was at the compound. There weren't many of them, some faience amulets, a carved knife-handle that someone had discarded, a horn spoon he'd made himself, a very small oil lamp he had modeled from clay. A little box proved to be a tinder-box with a firestriker; then came a couple of small knives—a sling and a pouch of stones—a wineskin that sloshed when he shook it. And on the bottom, barley bread and honey cakes, a bit squashed, but he wasn't going to complain.

  Ari reappeared with that second bag. "I have no idea what's in this one," he said, bringing it over to where Vetch had spread out his loot. "1 packed the first one; the gods only know what the others thought was suitable as your grave goods." He chuckled. "I'm afraid that your fellow dragon boys recalled that rumor about you being the focus for Altan sea witch magic, and stuffed anything they could think of in there to placate your spirit, because it's cursed heavy!"

  The first thing out of the top was a gameboard and counters. "Well, that's useful," Ari said sarcastically. "But I'm sure your father's spirit will appreciate it. "Now what—ah, that's more like it! Someone was feeling very guilty, indeed!"

  He pul
led out two more wineskins, both full. "Pour those out, rinse them, and fill them with water," Ari directed. "Avatre can't drink wine, and in the desert, water is more precious than the Great King's own vintages." After a moment of thought, Vetch emptied and refilled all three. He had never much liked wine, anyway, and the water here was very clear and good.

  A net bag full of more bread. A flute—a pair of sandals far too big for Vetch—a set of jackstones, a set of dice—

  —evidently they hope you will occupy your spectral time with drinking and gaming rather than haunting—

  —a cone of perfume and a bundle of incense—a set of twelve abshati slaves, meant to serve tirelessly in the afterlife—

  —and apparently, with a dozen slaves to work for you, you'll have the leisure to gamble and drink—

  Kilts, and loincloths, which Ari shook his head over. "Not that Haraket would grudge them, but he's going to have the head of whoever had the audacity to take these from stores without asking. Still, at least you'll have some spare clothing. And speaking of heads, here's some headcloths. Good; you'll need them to keep the sun off you in the desert."

  Yet another net bag of bread, a jar of oil, a clay lamp and some wicks, a bow and a quiver of hunting arrows.

  "Can you shoot?" Ari asked, and when Vetch shook his head, he laid the bow aside with the objects deemed useless. "Don't bother taking this. Not only can you master the sling a great deal more quickly, but the ammunition is just stones, or clay pellets you can bake in your evening fire. You won't have to worry about losing or breaking arrows or arrowheads, and any fool can roll clay pellets. It takes a master hand to knap arrowheads and fletch the shafts."

  Fishing line and hooks, a fishing net. "Not much use in the desert—but they're small and light, so you might as well take them."

  Another knife, this one rather longer, a small ax. And last of all, in the very bottom of the back, a small sack that—jingled.

  "What's this?" Ari said in surprise as he poured out the contents.

  Coins and a little jewelry. Copper coins, copper rings, a copper bracelet, two very small silver pieces, several amulets of different gods made of enameled copper or soapstone or some other stone. Vetch expected Ari to deem that useless as well, but after pouring it all back in the pouch, he put it with the rest of the gear. "You might need that when you're across the border, to buy provisions," the Jouster said. "Now, let's get you packed, because I'll have to bring the bags back with me, if I'm going to maintain the story about laying all this out as grave offerings."

  In the end, the clothing went rolled into the bedding, all but the two capes, which Ari fashioned into crude bags to hold the rest of the goods. One knife went on Vetch's belt, the others into the bags. When they tried the bags experimentally on Avatre, she didn't like them, but it appeared she would tolerate them. She craned her neck around to stare at the offending objects, quite affronted by their presence, sniffed them, then decided to ignore them. Vetch climbed back up to the niche, and Ari handed up the things they had decided to leave. When Vetch climbed back down again, the niche was tightly packed, and Vetch was satisfied that his father's spirit was going to be rather pleased, for though the leavings might be impractical stuff for his journey, they were fine funerary goods.

  "Time to go," Ari decreed. "We need to go east, far and fast, to get out of patrol range before the next scouting wave goes out today."

  "East?" Vetch asked, now supremely puzzled. Of course, Avatre had gone east, into these hills, but he'd had no choice about where she went. Alta was in the north, not the east. "But—

  "Whether you make up your mind to go to Alta, or elect to live in the wilderness after all of my warnings, you need to get out of where we're patrolling, or you'll only be caught," Ari said firmly. He nodded, as Vetch bit his lip. "So you'll have to go east before you can go north. Besides— Well, never mind. You'll see when we get there."

  "We?" he asked.

  "I'm going to take you somewhere," he said, again surprising Vetch, who thought he had come to the end of surprises. "Just follow me and Kashet, and don't drop back; it's going to be cursed hot, and you're going to want to get out of the sky, but that's the last thing we can afford to do. Up, Kashet."

  The great dragon rose; Ari led him into the crevice. Vetch called to Avatre, and followed.

  Instead of taking immediately into the hard, blue sky as Vetch had expected, Ari took hold of Kashet's harness and led them on foot. Outside that crevice, the sun beat down on Vetch's head with unrelenting heat; under his bare feet, that he had thought were callused and toughened, the hard, baked soil, full of stones and hotter than the sands of the wallows, was very difficult to climb. But he didn't complain—how could he? He owed Ari much, much more than simple obedience without complaint, and it appeared that before this day was over, he was going to owe him a great deal more.

  Both of them laboring in the heat, sweating like lathered horses, they led their dragons over the top of next ridge. Only there, just below the crest, did Ari mount up. Sweat poured down his face, but he ignored it.

  "Remember what I said. Don't lag," he cautioned, as Vetch clambered into Avatre's saddle. "Now, let's get going. We have a long way to go."

  At his signal, Kashet spread his wings, and leaped—forward, not up. Avatre, purely by instinct, followed, both of them coasting down the slope of the hill like a pair of ducks skimming over the surface of the Great Mother River.

  Up the following slope and down the next, Kashet skimmed along the surface of the hills, staying low, and after some confusion, Vetch thought he knew the reason. If they went up, there was the chance that someone might spot them in the distance, even if all they could see were two dots, and wonder why there were two dragons in the place where there should be only one.

  Despite the concerns that Ari had voiced, he wasn't pressing Kashet to any great speed. Avatre fell in behind him, just off his right wing, and it seemed as if it was easier for her to fly there, in his wake. It occurred to Vetch that flocks of geese and ducks flew that way, in formation. Did dragons? Well, why not?

  It was, as Ari said, "cursed hot." Avatre seemed to revel in the heat, taking new strength from it, but it wasn't long before Vetch was thinking longingly of the bathing pools of the compound.

  Ari and Kashet set up a kind of pattern in their flying that Avatre imitated—heavy, jouncing wing beats on the upslopes, and a long glide down the other side. Whenever the kamiseen came roaring down a draw or around a hill, and caught them unexpectedly, they side-slipped in a way that sent Vetch's stomach into a tumble. None of these modes of flying was especially comfortable for the rider, and Vetch found a new respect for the Jousters, who did this day after day, twice a day, for most of the year. No wonder they were as muscular as the best warriors!

  They went on—forever, it seemed—up one slope, down another, on and on, as the sun god's boat slowly crawled across the heavens, and Vetch began to wonder just how far was far enough.

  Then they topped another rise, and this time there was nothing more in front of them but the long slope, down into arid, rock-strewn wilderness and more desert—

  Except that off in the distance, there did seem to be a little green—

  Now Kashet took a bit more height, and Avatre followed him, Vetch clutching the saddle, his stomach lurching all the way. Once aloft, Kashet began a long, stately glide, spiraled up a thermal, then took a glide down until he reached the next thermal to spiral up it, all of it taking them indirectly toward that speck of green.

  It was farther away than Vetch had thought; distances were deceptive in the clear desert air. Which was probably why Kashet had gotten the height to enable him to glide in; laboring that far, wing beat by wing beat, was a lot harder than getting up to where he could maneuver from one thermal to another, even if it was the longer route, measured in distance.

  That speck of green eventually resolved itself into trees. Not just any trees; Vetch soon recognized them for what they were. Date palms.

&n
bsp; It was an orchard around an oasis.

  And there were people there, and tents—people garbed head to toe in long, indigo-blue robes—

  The Veiled Ones! he realized, as they began a final spiral down.

  He didn't know much about the Bedu, but he knew that much— their customary garb, and the fact that they made their home out here, where there was nothing that a Tian would recognize as civilization. He was able to make out their flocks, now, sheep and goats, a few donkeys.

  So here was his first glimpse of the mysterious desert nomads of which he had only heard, who had no king and no land of their own. He wished he wasn't so preoccupied with flying; he would have liked to pay more attention to the exotic encampment.

  They didn't seem particularly surprised to see two dragons coming to land at their camping place, although there was some pointing going on down there. Vetch was just glad to see the well that irrigated the date palms. At the moment, his mouth was as dry as the desert sands they were about to land in.