by Dragon Lance
Spears of sunlight poked through the low-lying clouds, raking the frosted landscape with light. Amero waited for an answer. After several seconds, he turned away.
“He’s not coming,” he said, annoyed.
Konza clutched his arm. “No, Arkuden! See. The Protector comes!”
Amero looked up in time to see Duranix bursting through the wall of plunging water, wings spread wide.
A concerted “Oh!” rose from the people below. In the years since he’d saved them from the nomad attack, Duranix had not appeared very often in broad daylight. The Sensarku offered their sacrifices at dusk or dawn when most villagers were at work or asleep.
Duranix put his massive bronze head down and dived straight at the Offertory. Wings folded, he plummeted directly toward Amero and Konza. He grew larger and larger, showing no sign of slowing or turning. Konza let out a yelp and crouched as low as his stiff back would allow, sure they were about to be smashed flat.
At the last moment, the dragon flung open his wings and swooped up, his claws missing the crown of Amero’s head by less than a span. Unimpressed by his friend’s display, Amero remained standing. The icy wind of Duranix’s passing tore at his cloak and blasted his face.
They’re already afraid of you, Amero told him. You don’t have to show off.
Duranix beat his wings hard and dropped his clawed feet. He came to rest on the platform, which creaked under the weight of his nearly fifteen-pace length. Curling his wings tight around his chest, the dragon spoke. “Thunder and lightning! It’s too cold to be outside!”
“That’s the problem,” Amero said. “The planters planted their seedlings, and now they’re afraid the ice will kill them.”
“Well, it’s winter,” Duranix said.
Konza made a surprised sound.
“When you spoke last with Tiphan,” Amero said, “did you tell him there would be no more snow?”
The dragon flicked his tongue impatiently. “You know I didn’t. Let them take it up with Tiphan. He’s at fault here.”
Amero turned to Konza. “Where is Tiphan?”
The old man, neck craned back, couldn’t take his eyes off Duranix. Something akin to worship lit up his face. “I don’t know,” he said. “He left before dawn this morning. Something about an important journey.”
“He left Yala-tene?”
Konza nodded. Amero was incredulous. Tiphan was openly scornful of the wandering life. The old ways of the plainsman held no appeal for him.
Duranix exhaled on his foreclaws. Out came an arc of brilliant blue-white fire, like lightning. Konza’s adulation turned to fear, and he crouched in terror, his hands coming up to cover his head. There were screams from the people below.
Duranix paid no attention to them. “That’s better,” he said, clapping his smoking claws together. “It’s too cold out here. You should get inside, Amero.”
I will, as soon as you speak to the people.
Duranix finally noticed the villagers milling around the Offertory entrance. As his angular reptilian head turned in their direction, many people pushed their neighbors, intent on escape. The rest seemed rooted in place, staring back at him in shock.
I see I shall get no rest until I do, Duranix replied. From the center of the platform, he sprang to the top of the Offertory’s surrounding wall. Gripping the top of the wall with his rear claws, Duranix flapped his wings and stretched out his long neck for balance. The villagers’ fear turned to near panic.
Once he’d settled himself, Duranix gazed down implacably.
“People of Yala-tene!” he boomed. The villagers froze in place. “Some of you think I told Tiphan, Konza’s son, that no more cold weather could be expected. This is not true. He asked me if I thought it would snow again this season, and I said I didn’t want any more snow. That is all.”
A figure clad in baggy woolens cautiously approached the perching dragon. “Tiphan mistook you?” Jenla asked loudly.
Duranix looked the old woman straight in the eye. “Yes.”
“Then our quarrel is with Tiphan!” she declared.
Amero hurried down from the platform and emerged from the Offertory. “Tiphan is gone,” he announced. “He left Yala-tene this morning.”
The villagers digested this with puzzled, unhappy mutters. A young Sensarku, as much in the dark as anyone, asked, “Will he come back?”
“I don’t know, but we must act quickly to save the orchard,” Amero said. “Everyone must lend a hand. Gather all the hay you can find and take it to the orchard. We’ll spread it over the seedlings to keep them warm.”
Konza, also down from the altar, added, “We can build fires between the rows to warm the soil.”
Amero slapped the old man’s thin shoulder. “Good thinking! Let’s get to it. Duranix, will you start a fire for us across the lake?”
The bronze dragon agreed.
“But if we use our hay,” said a fellow in a herder’s apron, “what will the oxen eat?”
“Moss and lichens,” said another. “It keeps the elk alive all winter. Why not oxen?”
Buoyed with hope, the villagers dispersed. Amero watched them with relief. What looked like sure violence had been diffused by a unifying task.
Children.
“What?” Amero looked up at Duranix.
They’re such children. One minute furious, the next minute happy.
“They’re good people. They’re your people.”
“So they are.” The dragon spread his wings in preparation for flight. He shivered, and the tips of his wings curled as a massive sneeze erupted from his nostrils, followed by wisps of steam. “But in the future, can you arrange to have these little dramas during warmer weather?”
Chapter 4
The Edge of the World, according to the plainsmen, was not a range of sky-piercing mountains or a trackless, endless sea. For them, the Edge of the World was a forest, one so dense, dark, and thickly grown that it forever blocked the way westward.
There were stories of lone hunters or small bands of plainsmen who had tried to penetrate the mysterious woodland. So far as anyone knew, none had ever returned. The east was better understood and less feared, even with the menace of the Silvanesti there. Humans had explored all lands to the north, east, and south, but the forest at the Edge of the World remained an impenetrable barrier.
The raiders drove their prisoners into this fearsome territory without hesitation. Beramun and her fellow captives quickly realized Zannian’s men had secret trails marked out in the underbrush. Many times the plainsmen were guided through a barely visible opening in a thick hedge or made to climb over a heap of fallen logs, and there on the other side would be a hidden path.
Sthenn left them before sunrise. For such a powerful creature, he showed increasing anxiety as the sky lightened, his voice growing more and more shrill, his orders becoming wild and contradictory. Beramun imagined the dragon spent most of his time in the deep forest and thus found the full light of day hard to bear. When the first pink rays of dawn appeared in the east, Sthenn halted the band of humans trailing in his wake.
“Zannian!” he snarled. “Zannian, where are you?”
“Here, Master. I’m here.” The raider chief, on foot, stood close to the dragon’s haunch.
“Ah. Quiet, aren’t you? Rodents are so stealthy.”
“What is your will, Master?”
“I return to my den. Hurry your cattle to Almurk. You shall wait upon me tonight.”
Some of the raiders let out mutters of surprise, and Zannian said, “Tonight, Master? It’s at least twelve leagues to Almurk. I counted us there by tomorrow morning.”
Sthenn flexed his leathery wings and hissed, “Do not dispute me! Do as I command! Use the whip on the captives and your men if you must, but be in Almurk before the sun next rises!”
Zannian could only bow and say, “I do your will, Master.”
“See that you do.”
Before the eyes of the amazed captives, the dragon’s body
grew thin and pale. His extremities changed to green mist, which the day’s early breeze dissipated. His wings followed, then his massive torso. The last thing to vanish were the dragon’s malign black eyes, slowly blinking until they faded from sight.
Roki, shoulder to shoulder with Beramun, shuddered. “We are lost,” the older woman said hopelessly. “If we remain in that creature’s power, our lives will be measured in days.”
Beramun forced herself to be cheerful, for her friend’s sake. “Don’t speak of it,” she said, clasping Roki’s chill hand. “Whatever his power, the stormbird must be mortal and have some weakness. So long as we live, there is hope.”
Her gallant sentiments were cut short by Zannian’s shouts. He ordered the prisoners’ hobbles cut so they could move faster.
“You’re in Sthenn’s realm now,” he warned, gesturing to the gloomy trees around them. “Try to run away, and you won’t last ten steps off the path. Our Master has filled the forest with beasts of his own making. Their only purpose is to kill the unwary, so keep to the track and do as you’re told!”
Tired but fearful, the captives moved down the narrow trail in a column of twos. It wasn’t long before they had proof of the forest’s deadly purpose. One of the raiders fell asleep while riding, and his horse strayed off the path. It ambled to a short bush growing beneath a leafless tree. Slim yellow fruit hung from the bush, and a temptingly sweet aroma wafted to the hungry prisoners as they passed by. Before Zannian or the other riders had noticed their sleeping comrade, the horse nosed into the bush and nibbled a yellow fruit.
A snap louder than any whipcrack split the air. Hairy brown tentacles burst from the ground, enveloping the horse. The raider was thrown to the ground. Two tentacles seized the startled man around the waist and neck, drawing him under the seemingly solid soil and putting an abrupt end to his hoarse screams.
“Hoten! Kukul!” Zannian yelled. “Save the horse!”
Warily, the two riders jabbed their long spears into the ground around the bush. Beramun heard a high, keening shriek of pain. Blackish fluid oozed out of the dirt where Kukul’s spear penetrated. The tentacles loosened their grip on the horse, and Hoten snagged its bridle, leading the animal to safety. Grinning, Kukul gave the ground one last jab. Foul-smelling liquid spurted out, drenching his spear and arm. Kukul jerked his weapon free and rode back to the waiting band.
“It’s gonna be sore for a while,” he boasted. Extending the reeking spear, Kukul deliberately wiped the vile ooze across the backs of two prisoners. “Faw! The takti smells a lot better above the ground than below.”
Takti was a south plains word meaning “fisherman.” Beramun understood the wry reference. The creature buried itself under loose soil and extended a lure that had the appearance of a fruit-bearing bush. When unsuspecting prey tried to eat the fruit, tentacles seized them and dragged them into the takti’s maw. The comparison to a fisherman’s baited hook was grimly appropriate.
The prisoners needed little goading to get them moving again. They stumbled deeper into the forest. Slowly their surroundings changed. The oak, yew, and alder of the upland woods gradually gave way to cypress, juniper, and elm. The dry brown soil became black and soft, and an air of decay permeated the forest. Wispy gray widows’ hair moss hung in long clumps from the branches of trees.
Midday came, and still the column lurched onward. The raiders’ horses began to pant from exhaustion and thirst. Still Zannian would not let anyone stop, lest they incur the wrath of Sthenn. Instead, he ordered his men to dismount and lead their horses.
Red-eyed vipers as thick as Beramun’s thigh occupied low branches above the trail. Spiderwebs two paces wide filled the gaps between some trees. Other dark things scurried away as they passed, a thousand rustlings and stirrings in the thick mat of rotting leaves covering the forest floor.
Beramun noticed they’d been going downhill for quite some time. Worn, white tree roots snaked across the trail like bleached bones. That and the smell of decay reinforced the impression they were passing through a burial ground. The widow’s hair was so thick on the trees that very little sunlight reached the ground.
She lost track of time in the perpetual gloom. The trail seemed endless, sometimes winding left, sometimes right, but always down and down. The ground grew damper until it squished between her toes with every step. The air was warmer, wetter, and heavier.
Something touched her arm. Beramun flinched, thoughts of vipers and carnivorous monsters flashing through her numbed brain. Looking up, she saw Zannian riding alongside her. He’d tapped her with the butt of his spear.
“Water?” he said, holding a hide-wrapped gourd. He shook it to show her it was full. The sound was nearly more than she could bear. Her parched mouth yearned for water, but Beramun saw her fellow prisoners eyeing the gourd as well, licking their cracked lips.
Swallowing hard, she shook her head. “Not unless there’s some for all.”
Zannian’s face hardened. “Be thirsty then!” He trotted back to the head of the line.
“Next time take what he offers,” said the man behind her. “He wants you. You can use that.”
“I want no favors from him,” Beramun replied in a low voice.
The man shrugged and muttered something that ended with “stupid girl.” Roki, at least, gave her a heartening smile.
The last leagues passed in blur. The trail changed from a path worn into the hard soil to a raised hillock of dry ground surrounded by a stinking morass of rotting vegetation. Night fell, and still they blundered on. Prisoners began to collapse from exhaustion and thirst, some dropping in mid-stride. The raiders were in no better straits. More than one toppled from his mount. Those who fell off the trail into the brush never emerged again. A brief grunt, a thrash of limbs, and it was over. No one had the strength to help them.
Some inner power kept Beramun going. Her arms and legs felt carved from wood. To keep herself moving she blotted out all thoughts – her murdered family, Zannian, his terrible dragon master. The world narrowed to the patch of ground in front of her. Nothing else existed but her next footfall.
Finally the awful trek ended. At the head of the struggling column, Zannian reined up. His men followed suit, some of them actually weeping with joy. The prisoners, insensible to commands or curses, kept tramping forward until the foremost fetched up against the halted horses, tripped, and fell. Those behind fell over them, and so on, until the whole wretched column lay gasping on the ground.
“This is Almurk,” Zannian rasped. He cleared his parched throat. “This will be your home until you die.”
In spite of the fatigue that dragged at her limbs, Beramun couldn’t resist lifting her head for a look. They were in a clearing about sixty paces wide. A broad dirt path divided the clearing in two. On each side were clusters of rude huts made from lashed saplings and sheathed in leaves, mud, and bark. Smoke hung in the still, dank air, blending the fetid odor of the swamp with the smell of burnt wood and unwashed humanity.
Though the clearing was free of trees, a heavy canopy of vines growing across the branches that ringed the settlement blotted out the sky. The canopy held in the smoke and smells and probably kept Almurk as dark as twilight all day long.
Hoten, Kukul, and the rest of the raiders dismounted and began shouting at the prisoners. When the wretched folk did not comply fast enough, they were whipped and kicked until they got moving. Many of the prisoners could do no better than crawl on hands and knees, heads hanging, sides heaving.
The continued mistreatment of her fellow captives made anger flare in Beramun’s heart. She staggered to her feet, staring coldly at the men trying to drive her into a penlike enclosure. They knew she had found favor in their chiefs eyes, so they hesitated to strike her. Captives clustered around her, using Beramun as a shield against their tormentors. The pitiful group clung to each other as the girl’s dark eyes remained fixed in silent fury on the raiders.
Kukul rode over, scowling at the clump of unmoving captives. “
Why are you standing there?” he snarled. “Get moving!”
“Water,” Beramun croaked. “We need water and food.”
“You get what we give you when we give it to you!”
“No! Now!” Her shout was tinged with a courage brought on by exhaustion, fear, and outrage. “If you mean to kill us, then do it. We won’t be starved and parched to death!”
Infuriated by her defiance, Kukul snatched a long obsidian knife from his belt. Beramun’s flash of courage faltered at the sight of the naked black blade, but when she glanced backward for a way to flee, she saw instead her fellow captives. Their gray, suffering faces had been transformed by her desperate defiance.
Their need transformed her too, giving her new strength. Pulling Zannian’s blanket from her shoulders, Beramun twisted it quickly around her left arm. Kukul slashed at her, and she used the blanket to ward off the blow. She felt the stone blade snag on the coarse cloth. Backing up, she dropped awkwardly to a fighting crouch. The humid air was heavy and thick, and she had no strength left after the long forced march. Her best hope was that Kukul was spent, too.
Kukul uttered an obscenity and cut at her backhanded. Beramun fended this off with her padded wrist, then used her free hand to punch the raider’s face. Blood flowed from his nose. He howled and jabbed at her exposed belly. Beramun twisted away, lost her footing, and fell hard.
Grinning triumphantly, Kukul advanced until he was standing over her. He pinned her blanket-wrapped arm to the ground with one foot, then raised his knife.
Beramun, gasping for breath, squeezed her eyes shut.
Death did not arrive. Instead, she heard a gurgling noise and the astonished cries of her fellow captives. Opening her eyes, she saw a slender, flint-tipped spear protruding from Kukul’s throat. Dark red blood covered his chest. The obsidian knife fell from his fingers, his knees folded, and down he went, falling backward across Beramun’s ankles.
She kicked free of the dead man. Zannian appeared. He picked up Kukul’s knife. In his right hand he held a strange device: a carved stick as long as his forearm, fitted with a leather strap on one end and a small leather cup on the other. A short spear like the one that had killed Kukul fit loosely in the leather cup. She saw immediately how it worked – by whipping it overhand, the stick hurled the small spear with great force.
