The Dragon Caller

by Pauline M. Ross

  “So I can’t stop you following me?”

  “Not until you transition and—”He gave a great screech, and another, human, shriek from the door made Ruell jump up in alarm. He found Garrett huddled by the door.

  “Oh, sorry.Yannali, time to go.”

  The dragon leapt with surprising agility to the window sill and flew off into the rain.

  “Shit, Ruell, you can’t keep that thing in here. Another few days and he’ll not be able to squeeze through that window and we’ll have to dismantle the inn to get him out.”

  “I’m notkeepinghim here,” Ruell said crossly. “He just came to see me, that’s all. He likes my company, and I like his,if that’s all right with you.” He knew he was being childish, but it riled him to have Garrett pointing out the obvious. As if he wasn’t fully aware that Yannali would soon be too big to climb into the room. All the more reason to take advantage of the time when he was still small enough.

  “Sorry, sorry,” Garrett said, raising his hands placatingly. “Didn’t mean to criticise, but that thing gave me the shock of my life, that’s all. Just as well I didn’t have my sword with me or I might have taken its head off.”

  “You’d have been dead before you could raise a sword,” Ruell said coldly. “Don’t get clever with a dragon, Garrett.”

  “All right, all right, I’ve said I’m sorry. No need to get snippy. I came to see if you were awake, because the cook’s getting restless keeping the porridge hot for you.”

  “Well, I never asked him to.”

  Garrett’s eyes flashed with anger, but he visibly controlled his temper with no more than a heavy exhalation.

  “Sorry,” Ruell said guiltily. “It’s hard, sometimes, to switch from being a dragon caller to just another human keeping the kitchen staff waiting.”

  Garrett chuckled. “Don’t worry about it. You’ve had a difficult transition, these last few days.”

  Transition… What did that make him think of? But the wisp of an idea was gone. Ruell shook his head, as if to clear the last dregs of dragon-fuelled dreams from his mind. “Right. I’m ready for that porridge.”

  Garrett had paid for a private parlour so that they could have a degree of privacy from the wagoners and farmers who congregated in the public tap room.

  “I thought we’d be off with the sun this morning,” he said, “but the nearest smith is three hours away, and there’s not even a shepherd’s pony hereabouts that we could buy, so Mikah, Gryke and Brannin have taken the horses to be shod. If we’re lucky, they’ll be back this evening and we can be on our way tomorrow.”

  “Best to be sitting indoors by a warm fire today anyway,” Elestra said cheerily. “I don’t envy Mikah his day in the rain.”

  “But the delay…” Ruell said, dismayed by this news. “We need to get to Drakk’alona as soon as we can.”

  “We have to meet up with theSundancer there,” Garrett said. “No point being there before them and having to hang about waiting for them.”

  “But they might be there already.”

  “No, they’re not.” He hesitated, then pulled out his glass ball. “I can see it with this.”

  “You can see theSundancer?”

  “I can see Drakk’alona, and theSundancerisn’t in the harbour yet. Ball, show me Drakk’alona.” The ball flared with light in Garrett’s hands, and he gazed intently into its depths. “No, still noSundancer.”

  Ruell stared at him, awed into silence.

  Very little induced silence in Elestra. “That’s fascinating! May I see? Oh, it’s just clear glass. Why can’t I see anything? May I hold it? Please?”

  Garrett’s face was an entertaining maelstrom of indecision. “I’m not sure… You see, if… Oh, why not? Here, hold it. Ball, show Elestra Drakk’alona.”

  “Ohhhh,” she breathed. “So many ships! It’shuge – I always knew it was a great city, but this is enormous. So many towers! And people! And all the carriages on that bridge, and every road packed so tight nothing can move. Oh, look at the peculiar clothes they wear…” And for a long time, they couldn’t get any sense out of her.

  “But it should be there by now, shouldn’t it?” Ruell whispered, after a while. “We’ve been very slow, so they should be there. And we know the wind-blowers stopped interfering with them.”

  Garrett chewed a lip worriedly. “I’d have expected them to have made it through the straits by now, yes. But we don’t know what trouble they might have had. I can only see Drakk’alona in this part of the world.”

  “But I can see more,” Ruell said excitedly. “Wait a moment…” He cast about in his mind for one of the dragonets near the water, and soon found Gheessha sitting on rocky cliff devouring a fish.

  “Gheessha? I need a favour.”

  A burst of excitement shot through him.“Ruell? You are in danger?”

  “No, no! Nothing like that. I need to find a particular ship on the straits. Can you fly over the water for me, please?”

  Now her mind was full of enthusiasm. She threw away the rest of her fish at once, the silvery carcase bouncing down the rocks and into the foaming sea below with a tiny splash. Then the dragon hurled herself off the rock with a stomach-churning drop that caused Ruell to close his eyes in fear of an imminent collision. Then they were gliding low over the water, wings wide, and a few lazy flaps brought them up to the level of the headland.

  “Now where, Ruell dear?”

  “Higher, please. I need to see where we are.”

  Obediently, Gheessha rose, spiralling up into the rain-heavy sky. When she flew into the lowest wisps of cloud, Ruell brought her down a little and gazed at the view as she hovered, turning her head this way and that at his command. There was a thread of pleasure in her mind, delighting to be of service, that made him smile. How thrilling to be a dragon caller, to have these magnificent beasts at his command. Although sometimes he suspected that they only obeyed him when they chose to. They were not slaves, after all.

  Below him, ships moved north and south through the strait. To the west, the homeland with its peculiar constructions cramming every available space. To the east, the coves and fields of the Golden Coast, with the forest beyond. To the north, he could just make out the dark smudge that must be Drakk’alona. But where was theSundancer?

  He ordered Gheessha to fly down so that he could examine the ships more closely, but even from cloud height he could recognise the bulk of the goods ships and the small dots of fishing boats. But the slender, fleet littleSundancer was nowhere to be seen.

  But as they circled downwards, down and down towards the grey, wind-tossed water, he saw something that drew his attention – a cluster of small boats all gathered around the rocks at one end of a narrow promontory. Lower and lower, until he could see a ship heeled over on the rocks, its mast torn away, its hull split open, its sailors bobbing in the water, swimming for the rescuing arms of the fishermen.

  He didn’t need to read the name on the prow or see the flag to know the name of the ship, for nothing else in these waters was so elegant. He howled in anguish.

  TheSundancer was destroyed.

  26: The Hayloft (Garrett)

  Garrett bore the news with resignation. “It seems the sailors were safe, at any event.”

  “I can’t speak for all of them, but there were a lot being pulled from the water,” Ruell said.

  “Although – it’s been very wet, but not stormy,” Garrett said, with a frown. “The captain seemed competent, too. I don’t really understand how it could run aground. Some problem with the sails, maybe?”

  “Some problem with wind-blowers, more likely,” Elestra said. “The Tre’annatha have three of them, and without anything to counter their power, the ship would have been helpless.”

  “Ah, revenge, then?” Garrett said. “They couldn’t take Ruell so they’re spitting back at us by sinking our ship? They’ve worked out that we planned to meet up at Drakk’alona, presumably. But what would be the point? There are thousands of ships moving back
and forth along the north coast. They’re not going to stop us reaching Mesanthia by sinking one ship.”

  “Vengeance is not a Tre’annatha characteristic,” Elestra said. “Nor is violence, yet three times now they’ve acted aggressively towards us. That is a worry.”

  “Four times,” Ruell said. “They attacked me so they could mark me, then the wind-blowers on the ship, last night in the woods, and now this. The first three times were designed to capture me and bring me into their Program, and there was no real harm done to anyone. But sinking a ship is a different level of violence. People might have died when the ship was dashed against the rocks, and that isn’t like the Tre’annatha at all. They are supposed to be non-violent.”

  “Towards outsiders, that is true,” Elestra said. “With their own people they’re ruthless, but elsewhere they work within the law, and they’re peaceful.”

  “That may be true along the coast and the northern plains,” Garrett said. “In the Karningplain, they were pretty callous about the people they ruled. Although… now that I think about it, they never directly killed anyone. Just sent us off to fight an endless war. A strange people – no offence, Elestra.”

  “Oh, I agree. You can say what you like about them, and I won’t mind. My mother was lovely, but the rest of her people—” She smiled at Ruell’s shocked expression. “Oh, you didn’t guess, either? I’m so used to people knowing my history, I forget to explain it. My mother was Tre’annatha, and let me assure you, they have no ounce of compassion for any of their own people who step out of line. But this is not productive. What are we to do now, Garrett? We have no ship awaiting us at Drakk’alona. How hard will it be to get to Mesanthia?”

  Garrett liked her easy acceptance of his authority. There was no question of Mikah or Ruell, she was appealing tohim for ideas.

  “I think we have to reconsider the whole journey,” he said. “You’re right that this is uncharacteristic for the Tre’annatha. It may be that the ship went aground without any interference from them. But if itwas them, then I want to know why. What would they gain by destroying the ship?”

  “It’s not just any ship,” Elestra said. “It’s a very fast ship, and they know you have a wind-blower to keep it moving and dragons to deter any interference. Once aboard, they would have no power to prevent us reaching Mesanthia.”

  “Excellent logic,” he said. “So now there’s no fast ship. We can still take a slower ship, perhaps, or we can go overland to Minaar and pick up the Coastway – the big canal that connects all the coastal cities. That will get us to Mesanthia, but…” He frowned. “Our own ship would be safer, there’s no doubt about it. On someone else’s ship, there’s no knowing who else is on board, and who they might be secretly working for. It’s problematic. If we only knew what the Tre’annatha are planning…”

  “Did you find anything in the saddlebags from their horse?” Ruell said.

  Garrett gave an exclamation of dismay. “What an imbecile I am! I’d quite forgotten we had some of their things. I’ll fetch them and we can have a look.”

  He fetched the saddlebags, sleeping roll, saddle and harness from the room he shared with Ruell, and brought them back to the parlour.

  “Why did you bring all this stuff?” Ruell said, gesturing at the harness. “It’s just horse things, isn’t it?”

  “It is, but a clever traveller will use these to hide things – money, very often, or small things, like a quantity of poison, for instance, or secret papers. Sometimes a weapon. Anything you don’t want anyone to find.”

  But although he went over every single piece of harness, he found nothing. The saddle revealed several small purses of coins, but none that anyone recognised. The bedroll was just a bedroll, although it looked as if it hadn’t been used. There remained only the saddle bags. He tipped the contents of both onto the table in a glorious jumble, and the three of them sorted carefully through everything, laying aside anything recognisable but mundane, like food, water flasks or clothing. That left a small but interesting collection of objects. Garrett rummaged through them, but few of the items were familiar to him. Even the books were different, scrolls of paper in little leather bags, and written in a strange and unreadable script.

  To Elestra, though, nothing was a mystery. “This is their order of marks,” she said, picking up a slender tube of filigreed silver and shaking out a scroll covered with seemingly random patterns. “It lists the tattoos they put all over their backs as part of their religion.”

  “In green ink?” Garrett said, and she laughed.

  “I don’t know. That would be just like the Tre’annatha, to track their own people. And these are their scrying stones – like your glass ball, only flat. I don’t know how they work, my mother’s had lost its magic. A history book written in the familiar form, and some poetry. Aha! Travel notebook – he’ll be sorry he lost this. Let me see…”

  This was a more familiar style of book, with paper pages in a wooden binding. Perhaps the Tre’annatha had bought it from one of the towns, not having anything of his own suitable. It was filled with the same script as the books, in neat vertical lines, with an occasional map or drawing.

  “Ah, here we are,” she said. “Listen to this.‘Reported in. New orders from Supreme Body – take the boy at once, if possible, by any means necessary. Must not gather dragons. Must not return to speedship. Permitted to enter D. where those committed to us will take him for us. In the event of failure, permission granted for cessation.’” She looked up. “Or‘termination’or‘ending’ perhaps. Not sure of the exact meaning here.”

  “We get the general idea,” Garrett said grimly. “I’d say‘execution’, myself.”

  ~~~~~

  Garrett left Elestra poring over the rest of the Tre’annatha belongings for further hints to their plans, but he’d heard enough to make it plain what their intentions were. Alive if possible, dead otherwise. And killing someone was a far easier prospect than taking him alive. They wouldn’t even have to do it themselves, for paid assassins lurked in the shadows everywhere you went. And such a simple job. An arrow in the woods. A dagger on the streets of Drakk’alona. Poisoned water on board a ship. Nothing to it.

  But had the Tre’annatha reached that point yet? They hadn’t managed to stop Ruell gathering his dragons, but they’d eliminated theSundancer – the aptly described ‘speedship’. Would they try again to capture him? Or let him continue unhindered to Drakk’alona? Hard to say.

  He went down to the stables to check on the rest of their horses, and when he was satisfied, he climbed the ladder to the haystore, stretched out on the straw and tried to get his thoughts in order. Reasoning things out wasn’t his greatest talent, but it had to be done, sometimes. So he went through it all again in his mind, considering every point very carefully, trying to put himself in the mind of the Tre’annatha. They had tracked Ruell – indeed, had gone to a great deal of trouble to ensure he could be tracked – which meant they wanted him alive. The first dragon caller in thousands of years, of course they wanted him. They wanted everything magic.

  Yet they were prepared to kill him. If he gathered his dragons, if he had access to theSundancer, if the committed of D – Drakk’alona, presumably – failed to capture him, he must be killed. Yet why? But he knew the answer – to prevent him taking his ability and his dragons to Mesanthia. The dragons, and their caller, were so important that it was imperative they shouldn’t fall into the hands of the enemy, of those who might use them to rebuild their empire. And yet—

  Voices below disturbed his thoughts. Instinctively he lay still and silent. It might just be passing travellers, or the inn’s stable workers, or even a couple looking for a quiet place for an assignation, but the years of living on the streets and surviving a war and spying for Kestimar had imbued him with an excess of caution. Keep out of sight, and see if there’s anything useful to be learnt.

  “These are their horses – some of them, anyway. This one is quite distinctive, you should be able to spot
that star on the forehead from some distance. But you’ll see them easily enough – six riders.” The voice was low and urgent, with a Tre’annatha accent.

  A second voice, speaking normally, quite at his ease. “Armed?”

  “Four guards, yes, but self-trained, not military. And a woman. The boy has a sword, but no idea how to use it.”

  “And you want the boy alive and undamaged?”

  “He is no use to us dead, but you will need to keep him unconscious so he has no opportunity to summon his dragons. If they come anyway, let him go – no need to be a hero. We have him marked, so we can pick him up in Drakk’alona.”

  “Any other magic?”

  “The woman is a wind-mage, so you should probably take her out first.”

  “Understood. Where are the rest of the horses?”

  “Three of the guards took them down to the smithy. They will be back this evening, and then the whole party will be on the road early tomorrow.”

  “So there’s just the three of them here at the moment? I might take advantage of that. Three’s easier to deal with than six.”

  A pause, boots scraping. “You would kill them here, at a public inn?” Surprise in the tone.

  “Why not? I know how to be quick and silent. I’ll go and sit in the taproom and get a feel for the layout. We agreed half beforehand, I believe.”

  The chink of coins, then the assassin said, “Excellent. A pleasure doing business with you.”

  Booted feet paced back down the stable, a door latch rattled once, twice, then silence.

  Garrett released the breath he hadn’t been aware he was holding. He half-slid down the loft ladder and raced to the door, opening it a crack. Two figures were just rounding a corner to the front of the inn. As he watched, they stopped, exchanged a few words and then parted, the Tre’annatha with his distinctive leather coat heading off down the road and the other, a small, dark man wearing a nondescript cloak, turning into the inn.