The Dragon's Egg

by Pauline M. Ross

  “I think she’s the responsibility of the Mesanthians now,” I said. “Besides, it’s a difficult journey.”

  But she wasn’t the least bit deterred. I had an uneasy feeling she was more interested in these eggs than anything else.

  As for Drusinaar, she said nothing at all, spending her time reading any books she could get hold of, or else sitting gazing into the glowing glass ball, her face lit up like the moon. I had no idea what she saw in there, but it kept her occupied for hours at a time.

  ~~~~~

  Crenton Port was a dismal place, a no-account little town built where the canal system petered out in a murky lake below the Sky Mountains. The wharves were busy, and there were a few solid stone buildings beyond that, and some new construction going up, but a hundred paces further on was nothing but peasant huts and muddy fields scratched from poor soil.

  We’d brought two barges, one for Xando and his entourage, and a second full of armed guards, who patrolled at night while the barges were tied up. They weren’t allowed ashore at the port, which they accepted without complaint, but I don’t think they’d have found the usual facilities anyway – the only place that looked like a tavern was boarded up, and there were no women about at all. An odd sort of place.

  Xando led the way to the Mine Office, one of the stone buildings behind the warehouses, the skirts of his coat flying. He kept the accompanying minions to the bare minimum – a couple of secretaries, four guards, the barge captain and his deputy, and a man whose sole function seemed to be to hold Xando’s hat when he was indoors. Drusinaar, Hanni and I trailed along behind them, trying to be unobtrusive. Well, I was. Hanni smiled as if there was nothing odd about us at all, and Drusinaar was herself, as always, her eyes flickering darkly as she took everything in.

  We marched into the building as if we owned the place, everyone scuttling out of our way as we passed by. Inside, a big hall was cluttered up with ladders and raised platforms, as a horde of painters transformed the dull, brown walls to white. Xando stopped, and the secretaries rushed about finding out where we had to go to present the letters from the Keeper.

  And then it all fell apart.

  Two men emerged from some inner room. They wore the frilled shirts and long leather coats I’d seen so much in Mesanthia, and for the same reason – they were Tre’annatha. I hadn’t expected that, and the secretaries’ faces suggested they hadn’t, either. The Tre’annatha began a long discussion with the secretaries, and then Xando himself. There was a great deal of head-shaking going on. There were no voices raised – Xando never raised his voice – but there was a definite air of frustration. I could only see his back, but the rigid way he held himself told the story.

  Eventually, he turned and swept past us, face like a thundercloud. We had to scramble to catch up with him as he stormed back to the barge. We followed him into the table room, where he stood, eyes unfocused, gazing out of one of the small windows.

  “What is happening?” Hanni said in querulous tones.

  Xando flapped a hand to hush her, but she wasn’t about to be hushed.

  “I demand to know—” she began.

  Grabbing her arm to get her attention, I said, “He’s talking to the Keeper. Don’t interrupt him.”

  “What? Oh.”

  While we waited, I rummaged in a cabinet for wine glasses and made a start on the decanter which always stood on top of it. Several of the others signalled for some, too, and I was kept busy pouring and passing glasses around. Hanni stood, arms folded, her face serene, as usual, but one foot was tapping. Drusinaar, the cause of all this bother, chose a book from a shelf and sat herself down in a corner, quietly oblivious.

  When Xando eventually turned round again, he was smiling, but he reached for a glass of wine, all the same.

  “The Keeper wishes us to know that she will send the Imperial Army to teach these impudent people manners, if we wish it,” he said.

  “Tempting,” I said. “How impudent were they, precisely?”

  “Oh, they were very polite. Tre’annatha are unfailingly polite.” He sighed, rubbing one hand over his face. “Let us sit down. I did not expect to encounter a problem here. When last I visited the Mine Office, it was run by an independent company set up solely for the purpose of managing the mines. However, four years ago, two armies passed through here, and I suspect that the company bore the brunt of their displeasure. That created an opportunity to be exploited, and the Tre’annatha are exceptionally good at exploitation.”

  That was a surprising amount of bitterness against his own people, but there was clearly a lot of history behind Xando, and the Keeper, too, for hadn’t she been at the mine? That seemed strange for such a grand lady. But no one showed any inclination to explain it, so I guessed it was something they all preferred to keep in the past.

  I could see Hanni puzzling over it, so I jumped in before she could speak. “So I suppose they won’t let us go to the mine?”

  “No.” Xando pulled a face. “The mines have always been kept a secret, and few were allowed there apart from the mine workers, but they were accommodating towards researchers. Mesanthians have discovered several new mines, and also helped to develop extraction techniques, so we were welcomed.”

  “Really?” That was curious, since I’d have said Mesanthians were too refined to care much for digging tunnels in mountains. But they liked their jewelry. “Is it gemstones they mine for here, then? Pretty stuff?”

  There was a ripple of laughter around the room. “Pretty?” Xando said, smiling gently. “I would say so, but not everyone agrees. Many people are frightened of the mines and what comes out of them.”

  “Quite right, too,” one of the secretaries said, but Xando shook his head at them.

  “Mak’tersshikor, also known as flickers.” I’d forgotten Drusinaar, quietly absorbing everything in her corner. “The name means ‘creatures that flow from the stone in darkness’, but they have gained the colloquial name flickers by the many points of light emanating from them, which flicker through a cycle of colours as an expression of emotion. They are harvested—”

  Several people made exclamations of disgust, and Xando raised a hand.

  “Thank you, Drusinaar,” he said, then added softly, “I do not like to hear the word ‘harvested’ in this connection. Flickers are living souls, who are extracted from the rocks where they make their home, that is all. So long as they are not approached with hostile intent, they are quite harmless, and once they have bonded with a human, they are perfectly malleable.”

  Again, several people shuddered, but Hanni was practically quivering with excitement. “They are here? This is where they come from? I have always been fascinated by flickers! I should love to see one.”

  “If you ask the Second Protector nicely, you may get your wish,” the secretary said. “He is a thrower himself. Those little pockets in his coat all contain a flicker, and he talks to them sometimes. Just so long as they come nowhere near me. Those little things are lethal.”

  “Only when trained as weapons,” Xando said. “Mine are harmless, I assure you. But none of this is relevant. What we must decide is what to do next.”

  “What options do we have?” I said. “I thought the mine was our last hope. If we can’t get there, we’re finished, aren’t we?”

  “We cannot get there by the main path,” Xando said with a sudden grin. “But there is a back door, so to speak. We have to make our way to the other side of the mountain and find another entrance there. It will not be easy, because there is no path to where we want to go, but the Keeper and I left the mountain by that route, so it should be possible to find our way back in.”

  “So you will come with us, then?” I asked hopefully.

  “I will have to, since no one else knows the way. But my time is limited. I have to be back in Mesanthia for the Keeper’s next cycle.” He must have seen the mystification on my face, for he added, “The next pregnancy.”

  “Oh. Right.”

  I was stil
l mystified, since surely there were four other Protectors to take care of matters like that, but the talk turned to planning the next stage of our journey and no more was said about it. Sometimes the peculiarities of these coastal people made me feel like I was walking through fog.

  We were back onto the canals again, as if we weren’t all heartily sick of the water, and the snail-like pace of progress. At least we weren’t retracing our steps. This time we were heading north, and it was no more than a few days before we tied up at another dusty wharf at another, even smaller, nondescript waterside town. We’d passed a few decent-sized towns on our way through the canal system, but most of the inhabitants in the region lived a pitiful existence along the fringes of the canals. I’ve never seen so many goats and scrappy-looking fields, and not a decent cow anywhere.

  Xando hired horses for us, and a couple of ponies for the gear. Apart from Drusinaar, Hanni, Xando and me, we took four sturdy guards with us.

  “Not for defence,” Xando said. “We should not encounter any trouble in these deserted lands, but they will help us set up camp, and prepare food.”

  “You’ll still set a watch at night, I hope,” I said.

  “Of course.”

  “I can take my turn, too. Better than being useless baggage, as I have been up to now.”

  “Thank you, Garrett,” Xando said gravely. “That would be appreciated.”

  To tell truth, I could hardly wait to get moving. Sitting on the barge, being towed by a pair of horses at no better than walking pace, had nearly driven me mad. Drusinaar was happy enough with books or a game of dragon stones to while away the hours, but I was used to being active and all the sitting around made me as cross as a lion.

  At first we followed a decent track, dry and firm, with little stone bridges across the streams. This was a mine company road, and we passed a couple of wagons heading downhill, and once a mule train. There were places like inns where the mine workers stayed overnight, but they weren’t open to us. Once or twice, tracks branched off to the side, but there were signposts with odd little pictures carved into them. Xando could read them, and led us confidently up into the hills.

  But then we turned off the track into featureless valleys, and the going became harder. Not for the horses – they were bred for these hills, and coped admirably – but for Xando. There were no maps of this wilderness, and he had only travelled this way once before, in the opposite direction.

  “Coming down is easier,” he grumbled. “You can just follow the stream. But going uphill…”

  He waved his hand helplessly at the head of the valley we’d just come up, where three streams descended from the peaks to merge into one.

  “Don’t you remember which one you came down?”

  “No. I do not recognise any of this. Those twisted trees over there… I am sure I would have remembered seeing those before.”

  I had a bad feeling in my stomach. “Xando, are you saying what I think you’re saying?”

  He nodded miserably. “Yes. I believe we are lost.”

  29: The Refuge (Garrett)

  “Lost?” Hanni’s voice was shrill. “You cannot be serious. How can you get us lost? You really have made a mess of things.”

  “Not helpful,” I muttered. “But what about the Keeper? Would she know?”

  “She might but… I cannot talk to her now.”

  “Oh? Why not?”

  He chewed his lip, and flushed. The guard captain sniggered, and then I got it. “Oh. She’s… busy?”

  An embarrassed nod. “She’s with Zak.”

  “She’s with…? Oh, by all the Gods!” Zak, who was married to the blond swordsman. And how did it even work, when all those minds were connected and two of them were…? No, I would never understand these people. No use even trying. “Well, then,” I said briskly, “I suggest we make camp on that patch of flatter land over there, away from the stream, and see what the morning brings.”

  The guards and Drusinaar set about pitching our small tents, building a fire and preparing something to eat. Hanni wandered off to sit on a rock and watch them. Hard work wasn’t really her style.

  Xando hadn’t moved, still staring up the narrow valley as if inspiration might strike him suddenly.

  “If it comes to the worst, we can always go back down a way, until you find something you recognise,” I said.

  He sighed. “Perhaps. But time is getting on. I shall have to turn back soon, or I shall miss this cycle.”

  “Does it matter? There are other Protectors to get her pregnant, aren’t there? Or is it your turn, or something? I really don’t understand how it works.”

  He smiled then, his face softening. “It is not a question of turns. We all participate, over a five-day period.”

  “Like an orgy? Oh Gods, I’m sorry, it’s not my business. Didn’t mean to pry.”

  But he was laughing. “No, not like an orgy. It is a ritual, and it takes place at the equinox – spring or autumn, it does not matter. Each dawn and dusk, for five days, she takes one of the Protectors to her bed. Just one at a time! Having all five take part strengthens the bond between us all, and increases the likelihood of a successful outcome, which means several Children of the Spirit. This is the third and final cycle, but if I am not there…”

  “Sorry, sorry,” I said again. “I’m too nosy by half.”

  “No need to apologise. These matters are common knowledge. The Children of the Spirit grow up to be the Keeper’s eyes just as the Protectors are, so the more she produces, the better. However, I will not abandon this journey unless it becomes essential.”

  I took a turn on watch but around midnight I was relieved and settled down to sleep. The others were all in their tents, but I liked to sleep out in the open, with heather prickling my nose and the stars for a ceiling. Up there amongst the mountain peaks, we’d left behind the sticky end-of-summer heat of the plains but it wasn’t really cold, even at night. I wrapped myself in my cloak near the remains of the fire, my sword beside me, and drifted to sleep.

  It was still dark when I woke with a start, not sure what had disturbed me. A drift of woodsmoke tickled my nostrils, and there were crackles as someone fed wood to the fire, sending up a shower of sparks. When that died away, I became aware of another light, not flickering like the fire, and the wrong direction for the sunrise. A small, glowing light, close to the ground, and a ghostly face hunched over it.

  Drusinaar was sitting cross-legged a little distance away, perched on the rock where Hanni had sat yesterday. In her cupped hands, the glass ball shone steadily. Getting up, I ambled across to her.

  “What do you see in there that’s so fascinating?” I said.

  She didn’t look up. “A black tower. Look.”

  She moved her head so that I could lean over and gaze into the ball, and there it was, small but distinct, a round, squat tower of black stone, set on a promontory beside a golden beach. At first, I thought it was just a little watchtower, nothing of much interest, but then I caught sight of flags fluttering on the top and the building popped into a different scale. It was massive, as big as some of the Mesanthian giants, and now that I knew it, I could see a long line of horses emerging from some hidden gate. Down to the beach they went, and began to gallop, still in a long line. The riders’ cloaks billowed out behind them, and the low sun glinted on spots of metal. It could have been the horses’ harness, or it could have been swords, I couldn’t tell.

  “Where is that?”

  “No idea,” she said. “Long way away, I think. Not very interesting – black tower, black riders. I only watch it because the sun comes up earlier there than most of the others.”

  “The other… what, exactly?”

  “The other scrying towers. Like the Guardian’s tower.”

  “Like Drakk’alona’s tower?”

  “Yes.”

  “Can you show me the view from that one?”

  “Yes, but it’s still dark.”

  She didn’t move but the glass ball
turned black. When I looked closely, I could just make out a few lights glimmering here and there. Drakk’alona at night.

  “Can you see all of them? All twelve?”

  “Yes, but most of them aren’t interesting. No people.”

  True enough. Only five towers were known, so the other seven must be hidden away somewhere that civilisation had not yet penetrated.

  “That is fascinating, Drusinaar, but perhaps you should get some sleep now.”

  “All right.” She went off to her tent without another word.

  I wandered away from the camp to piss, and then went to warm myself by the fire.

  “Want a brew?” the guard captain said.

  “Those are magical words. Yes, please.”

  He laughed, passing me a steaming beaker, but then nodded towards Drusinaar’s tent. “Does she always do what you tell her?”

  “Mostly. She trusts me, for some unfathomable reason.”

  “Aye, but she knows you like her. Now me, I get the chills whenever I look at her. Nothing you can put a finger on, but she just unsettles me. Do you think she will find what she is looking for in this mine? Some way to make her normal?”

  “No. She’ll never be normal, and I don’t really see what finding more egg-people will do to help her. More like her in the world? Not a great idea.”

  “But if she really has mage power and if it can be unlocked—?”

  I shook my head. “She’s a mage experiment gone wrong, that’s all. She’s broken. But she is what she is, and I like her just fine that way.”

  Xando was up not long after dawn, and had a long discussion with the Keeper, but it didn’t help. She didn’t recognise the place, either, and couldn’t suggest anything better than backtracking further down the hill.

  “We should not lose more than a day – two at most,” he said. “I was quite certain of our route yesterday morning, so we need only go back that far.”

  There was a dampness in the air that wasn’t quite rain, but also wasn’t entirely dry. We packed up in gloomy silence, loaded up the ponies and saddled the horses. At least we would keep our feet dry in these increasingly boggy hills. They weren’t fast, but they were sturdy little beasts, who coped admirably with the rough ground.