“Really, old man?” Fire gazes at Djawara sideways, framing his incredulity in theatrical scale. “Though she lived in a dying town in a dying country on a collision course with the end of the world? Though she suffered in poverty and lost all but one of her sons to the greed and violence and corruption of the time? Not in harm’s way? Really? Could a sage like yourself have birthed a fool?”
“Enough!” Sedou rises, taking Paia gently by the shoulders and setting her down in the chair he has just vacated. “Give us something more creative than a coward’s whine of denial! You are steeped in blood, my brother, be it by your own hand or otherwise. Not a one of us doubts it. The only question is why, and you haven’t yet made that fully clear.”
“I told you . . .”
“But you didn’t convince me.”
Fire watches Water-as-Sedou place both hands on Paia’s shoulders. Longing and reluctance shine through the veil of irritation shading his golden eyes. “Must I?”
“Do you mean, must you, with the humans present?”
Fire’s jaw hardens. “And you consider me heartless.”
“It’s only reasonable that all of us know the fate all will share.”
Fire’s lip twitches in an unborn snarl. He says, slowly, deliberately, “All right. If you insist. Does the phrase ‘mutual annihilation’ bring anything to mind?”
N’Doch thinks it brings a lot of things to mind, and none of them good. But his repeated subliminal calls to the dragon for an explanation go unanswered. The sense of foreboding he’s been shoving aside for a while comes flooding back big-time. His grandfather takes a half step forward, as if unsure he’s heard correctly. Paia shifts slightly in her chair, maybe because Sedou’s grip has tightened. Protection or restraint? N’Doch can’t be sure, for the big man’s outward manner is completely calm.
“How? Why?”
“Ask our sister Air, if you can find her. Which you never will. A shame really, since she appears to be in possession of all the facts which have been hidden from the rest of us.”
“But some of which she shared with you.”
“When she sent me off to collect you and our brother.”
“Perhaps you misunderstood. She’s not the clearest . . .”
“No. It was unequivocal.” After this suddenly reasonable and direct exchange, like actual conversation among siblings, Fire seems uneasy under Paia’s expectant stare. He turns away. “So I took other steps . . .”
“Ah,” says Sedou. “Ah.”
A moment follows that’s so still, so lacking in purpose, so much as if the entire world has stopped, that N’Doch wonders if it means a stalemate. The two dragons have reached some sort of understanding, that much is obvious. But the light seems different, and there’s a new rigidity in Fire’s red-clad back as he lifts one clawed hand to the misted glass. Thin curls of steam rise as he swirls his palm against it to clear his view. N’Doch would swear he’s seen Fire shudder. Quick and hard, like he’s gotten a bad shock but mastered it instantly. His hand drops like dead weight to his side as he moves back from the window, one step, then two, and turns on his heel.
“Well, I think it’s time I left. A delightful diversion, but I really must get home. I have a war to fight.”
N’Doch is disappointed. Is the Fire dude really giving up so easily? Sidestepping the central issue? N’Doch has expected him to be bigger, badder than that.
Fire’s glance slews sideways toward Djawara, but slides on past to rest intently on Paia the whole time he’s talking. “Are you sure you won’t reconsider my offer, old man? The religious life can be very rewarding, I assure you. A measure of comfort and luxury to ease your old age? I know my priestess would appreciate your company. Far more stimulating than any she’s had up till now. Myself excepted, of course.”
Something’s happened. N’Doch feels the change blow through the room, as palpable as a storm gust off the Atlantic, but he’s got no sense of what it means. He glances at Sedou, sees him straighten, watches his attention move outward, past the café walls, into the street and beyond.
“And of course,” Fire continues, “I can promise a bevy of lovely ladies to decorate your days and nights.”
Paia shakes her head, her tone almost as mocking as Fire’s. “Shame, shame! How do you ever expect to win any credibility if you go on like that?”
A long look passes between them. Then the satirical light blooms as wildly as hope in Fire’s eyes. He lifts his sculpted chin and pounds his chest like a cartoon despot. “Because I am the God.”
Paia smiles sadly. “But you’re not. You’re only a dragon.”
“Yes, and you are my guide.”
N’Doch’s glance swivels from one to the other. What is it? What’s happened? They could be errant lovers, reconciling.
Sedou shakes his head, listening, but not for any sound audible to human ears.
Paia sighs, rising from the table, politely disengaging Sedou’s grip. “If only you’d let yourself be guided by me.”
“We could work on that,” says Fire agreeably.
She laughs, as if he’s made a frivolous joke.
He returns a charming, deprecatory smile. “Of course, I’m not making any promises.”
“No. For then, you might be forced to make good on them.”
“I see you understand me now.” Fire holds out his hand. His gilded nails gleam in the light from the window, which seems warmer than before, as if the sun has risen. “It’s time, isn’t it?”
N’Doch sees the tide turn in the priestess’ eyes. It spooks him badly.
What the hell is going on?
LISTEN!
To what? I don’t hear a thing!
“Unless you mean that humming,” he says aloud. Getting no response, he turns to his grandfather. “You hear anything weird, Papa Dja?”
Djawara is grinning like an old fool. “I believe the ‘never’ has just become a ‘now.’ I wonder how that happened.”
“What are you talking . . . oh.”
And now he hears it, too. Voices. A flurry of voices on the dragon internet. New voices. What does it mean?
HUSH!
Fire says, more urgently, “Are you coming, beloved?”
“It seems that I have no choice.” She looks to Djawara.
Djawara nods. “You are our only chance.”
Fire barks a laugh, a desperate, uneasy guffaw. “Ha, old man! You’re convinced she’ll convert me?”
Djawara smiles up at the towering man dragon, then very decorously lays a hand on his glittering cuff. N’Doch tenses, ready to spring to the rescue, but smoke does not rise, and there’s no stink of burning flesh.
“Here is my hope, lad,” says the old man earnestly. “That she will help you to see reason and accept the inevitable. And if more can be expected, that she will lead you to find that deep place in your dragon’s heart where compassion and honor lie waiting in chains, and convince you to set them free.”
Paia nods, and places her pale hand in the dragon’s red-and-gilt palm.
“No!” N’Doch cries out, but too late. The pair has vanished before the protest leaves his mouth. “No!” He spreads his arms to his grandfather in fear and loss and frustration. “Why? How could she? Why did she go with him?”
Djawara’s face is solemn and shining. “She knows it’s only a matter of time.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
The carved wooden beams of the library at Deep Moor resound with the glad laughter of unsuspecting women. Though warmed by Raven’s cheerful affection and the women’s awed and grateful smiles, Erde is sure that she’s never felt lonelier. Deep Moor is not the home she hoped it would be, and tried so hard to make it. Even if the real Deep Moor did not lie in ruins, it could never be.
Not now. Now that I’ve been where I’ve been, seen what I’ve seen, know what I know.
Deep Moor stands for all that’s good and right about humanity. But her life has become—she has become—something not quite human. Something only her
fellow dragon guides can comprehend.
My home, my fate, whatever it is to be, is with them.
As she is contemplating all this and feeling sorry for herself, which she admits is one of her least favorable characteristics, a sudden imperative from the dragon outside banishes all other thoughts.
WE MUST GO.
What? Where?
A NEW SUMMONS. FROM THE GROVE.
A trill of fear roughens Erde’s reply. No, dragon, surely not there!
YES! WE MUST LEAVE IMMEDIATELY!
For the Grove? But Fra Guill is in the Grove! And all his minions! Have you forgotten?
MY SISTER AIR IS THERE.
Erde is so astounded that her mind blanks momentarily, like a mill gear slipping its cog. Impossible! We would . . . you would have known!
I DIDN’T SAY SHE WAS THERE BEFORE. I SAID SHE IS THERE NOW. I HAVE JUST RECEIVED THE SUMMONS. WE ARE ALL TO GATHER THERE.
Surely there is some mistake! Did she say the Grove, exactly?
OF COURSE NOT. HER SUMMONSES DON’T COME IN WORDS. BUT I KNOW THE GROVE WHEN I SEE IT.
We can’t go back there, thinks Erde desperately. We just can’t!
“Erde? Sweetling? Are you all right?” Raven laughs. “You really have become the most distracted child!”
“I’m sorry, I . . . I was just talking with the dragon. He . . .” Erde knows she cannot share this news with Raven. She might insist on coming along. “Will you excuse me for a moment? I think I’ll go speak to him in person.”
“By all means. Give him my best.”
Erde puts on her best calm face as she eases casually through the throng of celebrating women, receiving their thanks and congratulations as she goes. So many of them now! What a refuge Deep Moor had become in her absence, for the battered, mistreated, and misunderstood. Erde wishes she better comprehended the nature of the illusory Deep Moor that the City has created here. It would do her heart good to be able to promise these women a permanent place of safety, though surely even an illusion is better than the horrors they fled from.
Erde’s heart pounds as she imagines those horrors: starvation and servitude, beatings and witch burnings. It could have been her own life, but for the coming of the dragon. She gains the library door, hurries across the dappled garden courtyard and through the shaded arbor, wrapped in the heavy fragrance of roses.
She finds the dragon lumbering up and down the open lawn, the closest thing he can manage to pacing impatiently.
“Look at that, dragon!” she scolds, hoping to lighten his urgent mood at least a little. “You’re wearing a great mud track in that tender green grass!” But she also notices, to her amazement, that the bruised grass at the farthest extent of his pacing has healed itself completely by the time he returns to it.
ARE YOU READY?
Ready?
TO LEAVE. WE MUST GO IMMEDIATELY.
Dragon, please. We must think this one over carefully.
She has never refused him before, never withheld from him the mental image he needs to guide his transport, or as N’Doch would say, his “homing device.” She can sense his surprise.
WHY ARE WE LINGERING? MY SISTER CALLS!
But Fra Guill . . .
PERHAPS SHE HAS VANQUISHED HIM.
But are you sure it’s her? How do you know?
Earth halts in his tracks and pulls his massive bronze body up to its full monumental height. HOW CAN YOU ASK SUCH A THING!
He towers over Erde like a rugged cliff face. His scimitar horns could almost tangle with the clouds and brush the dome of the sky.
That is, she muses, if it was the real sky . . .
He lowers his great head, letting his horns sweep through the sunlit air like the vanes of an ivory windmill. His plated snout swoops toward the ground and settles inches from Erde’s toes with a hearty snort. The warm gale of his breath tousles her hair like an unseen hand.
“Dragon!” she exclaims fondly. “You did everything but roar! Are you trying to intimidate me?”
Earth’s fierce demeanor wilts. AM I NOT SUCCEEDING?
Of course not! Now, let’s discuss this new summons of yours.
“A matter of time, sure, but after all the trouble we went to, getting her away from him? I can’t believe this!” N’Doch scrubs his face with both palms like a sleeper waking. Surely he must be dreaming. “What’s Dolph gonna say? What am I gonna tell him?”
Sedou stands at the window with his back to them, as the Fire-breather had done before. “The knight has already played his role. It’s endgame now.”
“Endgame, huh?” N’Doch laughs nervously. “Sounds a little too much like ‘mutual annihilation’ for me.”
“I mean that it’s time for the major pieces to do their part.”
“Easy for you to say, bro. It’s not your head the good baron’s gonna be after.”
“Hush, boy!” Djawara hisses. “It’s no time now to be playing the fool!”
“I’m not. I was only . . .”
“You are. I know it’s only your apprehension babbling away, but now’s not the time for it.”
“Yeah?” N’Doch glares sullenly at his grandfather, who always manages to hold a man’s face to the mirror just when he’s least interested in looking at himself. “What time is it, then?”
“Time to meet my sister.” Sedou turns back to them with an elated grin. “We’ve been summoned!”
“Just now? You heard . . .?” Djawara clasps both hands as if in prayer.
“Air? She got out? She’s free?” N’Doch exclaims. “Wow! How?”
“Unclear,” Sedou admits. “But we’ll find out soon enough!”
N’Doch puts two and two together. “So that’s why the Fire dude split so suddenly.” He rounds on Djawara. “How’d you know?”
“It seemed the only logical explanation.”
“Nah. C’mon!” N’Doch doesn’t want it to be so simple. Truth is, he doesn’t want it to be so at all. If it’s so, if the last dragon is out of the hatch, it means they’re on to the next stage of the Quest, the stage Fire’s been working so hard to prevent. It means finally finding out what he means by “mutual annihilation.” “You got some kind of magic, right, Papa?”
Djawara ignores him. “To where are we summoned?”
Sedou gazes at the far wall, as if the message was printed there. “Now, there’s the problem. No words, only images, and it looks like . . . the Grove at Deep Moor.”
N’Doch offers his grandfather a brief explanation, then shrugs, hoping his relief isn’t too obvious. “Well, that’s a no-go until we hook up with the Big Guy again. He’s our only mode of transportation.”
“Easily done. He’s only a few blocks away.” Sedou heads for the door. But the instant his hand touches the knob, the gale starts up again outside, as if it had been lying in wait until someone ventured into the street. Violent gusts lift and tip the café tables, and slam the chairs against the base of the facade. Then, louder than the wind, a roaring and pummeling sound. The door and the windows vibrate in their frames. Sedou clears a circle of condensation and peers through the glass.
“Hunh. Not so easily.”
Djawara quickly joins him. “Oh, my.”
And then there’s nothing left for N’Doch to do but follow. Besides, he’d like to know what all the noise is about. He clears his own little view port, and looks out on a hail of stones. Not hailstones, which he’s only seen once in his life anyway. These are actual stones. Rocks the size of chicken eggs, falling from the sky in a steady downpour, like petrified rain. More than just falling, each stone seems to have been flung downward by force, so that when they hit the street, they bounce. N’Doch sees there are two hazards out there: the stones coming down hard on your head, and the stones careening back up in your face. The quaint old striped awning that had led him down the street in the first place is already in shreds and tatters.
“That’d lay us all flat in a second,” he observes with as much neutrality as he can muster. So they won�
�t be leaving the safe haven of the Rive for a while yet. He strolls back to the bar and picks up the guitar. He’ll want to take it with him anyway, when the time comes. “It’ll stop, probably. Let’s just kick back till it does.”
“I can go, and come back for you.” The outline of Sedou’s body shimmers as the dragon contemplates a shape change.
“But is that wise?” Djawara asks. “From what you’ve said, separating us seems to have been his most successful delaying strategy.”
Sedou scowls, shimmers again, then retreats from the window and flings himself disconsolately into a chair. “What, then? We can’t just sit here! Earth will be summoned, too, but will he think to search us out before he goes?”
Djawara settles beside him quietly, as if keeping vigil over an ailing relative. “We’ll think of something.”
Suddenly, a knock at the door. N’Doch nearly drops the guitar. Three evenly spaced raps, neither demanding nor impatient. Formal, N’Doch decides. “Who’s it gonna be this time?” he wonders unnecessarily.
Nobody moves, as if all of them expect the door to burst open of its own accord. Finally, Djawara nods and rises to answer it. “Seems I’m the Gatekeeper here . . .”
An ordinary looking man in a plain gray uniform, neatly pressed, waits beneath the shredded awning, his billed cap in his hands. The stones are still falling, but none of them seem to be falling on him. “Your car, sir,” says the man helpfully.
Djawara’s impeccable poise finally wavers. “My . . . car?”
“Yes, sir.” The man glances down at a slip of paper tucked inside his hat. “Says here, two passengers for the Grove, sir.”
“Did you say, the Grove?”
“Yes, sir.” He skins a look past Djawara’s shoulder at the two staring faces inside. “Will that be three, sir?”
N’Doch comes up behind his grandfather. Out in the narrow street, a long, gleaming, sky-blue limo waits with its engine running. The stones aren’t hitting it either. N’Doch shivers.
Djawara rolls marveling eyes toward Sedou. “Will we be three?”
Sedou nods.
The Book of Air: Volume Four of the Dragon Quartet Page 28
