Dragon Stones (11 page)

Ponn nodded.  What was this all about?

"How long ago?"

"Not long!"

The man cast a worried glance at the sinking sun.  "They must hurry!" he cried.  "We can't land here, and hovering tires the birds out!"

"Well there's nothing
I
can do about it," Ponn said.  "You'll just have to wait."  But even as he spoke, Gelt emerged from the tunnel, followed by the others, carrying bulging sacks over their shoulders.  They made their way unsteadily down the ledge, stopping at the edge of the shelf in front of the hovering eagles.  The rider brought his formation in low and close, maneuvering the net within reach.  The men transferred their burdens to the webbing, using the hooks to secure the load.  Then Gelt climbed into it himself, crawling across the ropes and clambering into an open saddle.  Tolsus followed, then Horm.  Ponn took a step forward, but the eagles rose and retreated out of his reach.  "I apologize, innkeeper," Gelt called, "We don't want to overburden the eagles with unnecessary weight.  We've a long flight ahead of us!"

Ponn stared at him.

"Come now.  Don't look at me like that.  I'm leaving you a perfectly seaworthy ship to sail home in."

"But my daughter—"

"We'll keep her safe," Gelt said.  "If she grows up to look like her mother, she'll never want for company!"  Gelt laughed and waved a farewell as the birds wheeled back and banked away to the north.  Ponn ran around to the front of the shelf, where the rope dangled down the cliff.  In the waning light he could still see his ship, but the deck was clear of men; the vessel appeared to be deserted.  Where had the other sailors gone?  He could hardly sail it all by himself.

The canoe.  Perhaps he could get back to shore in it, or at least reach one of the inhabited islands.  But not tonight; it was too near dark, he probably could not reach the lagoon before nightfall.  Stumbling blindly across the lava field, he would likely fall and split his skull open; he would have to wait until morning to begin that arduous trek.

By then, Gelt—and his daughter—would be far, far away.

Tolaria wondered if it was possible to actually die of boredom.

Her prison contained nothing to amuse her; no paper for sketching or writing, no books to read, no plants to tend, no instruments to play.  Instead, she engaged in her new favorite pastime:  Sitting on her bed, watching darkness gather outside her window, envisioning the princes dead in a dozen different ways.  Then, because it was more diverting, she began ordering the manners of their death alphabetically.

She had reached
hanging
, picturing the two of them dangling by thick, creaking ropes from the twisted limbs of a barren tree,
when the door opened and one of the victims of her imagination came in.  It was the first time she'd seen them apart, and she found it oddly disconcerting, as if half a person had entered the room.

"Good evening, Tolaria," he said.  "How are you feeling?"

"Bored."

"Understandable.  I'm sorry we haven't come to entertain you in the last few days, but we have been quite busy, and you needed time to rest."  He stepped away from the door.  "How are you feeling?  Have you recovered from your exposure to the vapors?"

He was getting at something, she thought; what had he heard?  "Yes," she said.  "I feel fine."

"Really?  I understand you've been unusually … truthful."

"I am not by nature a liar," she said.  "Would you mind telling me who you are?"

"Of course; forgive my lack of manners.  You don't know us well enough yet to tell us apart.  I am Torrant."

She'd suspected as much.  "So tell me, Torrant.  How did you come to know so much about the ways of oracles?  The herbs, the powders, the vapors?"

Torrant smiled.  "Perhaps I'll tell you someday."

"Why not tell me now?"

He seemed to consider this, and then said:  "Indeed, why not?"  He went to the chair in which they had bound her and sat down in it, tracing one of the iron loops with his finger.  "When I was ten years old, I started falling into trances.  At first my father called in his physicians, thinking that I had some variation of the twitching disease, but their potions and concoctions did nothing to help me.  So he brought me to the Crosswaters, where they concluded that my spells were predictive in nature, that I could well become an oracle.  That was unheard of, of course—a noble becoming an oracle!—but my father sent me to Flaurent in the Salt Flats to develop my talent, if such it was.  I spent three years there, stranded in the wasteland, shaking salt dust out of my clothes and writing letters asking to come home.  But I also learned everything I could about your rituals and powers.  By the time the Headmaster decided that whatever ability I'd had as a child was lost in puberty and sent me on my way, I was quite conversant with your secrets."

"But when you left, did they not give you a draught to make you forget everything you'd learned?"

"They did," he said.  "But Qalor, Father's alchemist, devised a remedy.  He's quite clever; you'll meet him soon."

"Will I?  When I'm released from this prison, perhaps?"

"Prison?  You wound me.  Is this not a finer accommodation than your hovel at the Crosswaters?"

"It's certainly more sumptuous, but the bars and locked door do give one pause."

Torrant chuckled.  "You won't be confined to this room forever.  In time, you may even enjoy the run of the castle.  But for now you must stay here."  He stood.  "If you'll excuse me; much as I enjoy your lovely presence, there are decisions to be made, and my brother cannot be trusted to make them on his own."  He strode out of the room, pausing at the door to give her a smile and a bow before locking her in again.

She gave a strangled shriek, picked up a pillow, and threw it at the closed door, then turned and went to the window, clutching at the ornate bars.  She was so tired of this room, of this castle, of the twins and their machinations!

"Arrogant pup."

Tolaria gasped and whirled, seeing a man in a hooded red cloak standing in the corner near the door.  He knelt and picked up the pillow she had thrown, held it in his hands, examining it.  "I could have struck him down where he sat."

"Who … who are you?"

"How unconscionably rude of me."  The man tossed the pillow onto the bed, then slipped off his hood, revealing a narrow face, hollow cheeks, gleaming eyes.  He sported a scruffy growth of beard; it looked out of place there, as if it had wandered over from someone else's chin and couldn't find its way back.  "Most call me Orioke."

"A speaker of Words," she murmured.

"Why do you say that?"

Why had she?  It had just come from her lips, unbidden, like an unexpected sneeze.  "I don't know."

The man took a step forward.  "Have you heard my name?"

"I don't think so."

"Well, I have heard yours.  You are Tolaria, an oracle from the Crosswaters.  You are an
honored guest
; that is to say, a prisoner."

"Yes.  
What do you want with me?  Why are you here?"

"I haven't decided yet."  He studied her, idly scratching at his stubble.  "Lord Dunshandrin hired me, along with several others, to remove some stones from a dragon's lair.  We chose a time when the large dragon was away, slew its hatchlings, and made off with our prize.  We returned in triumph to camp; but that night, Dunshandrin's men attempted to murder us in our sleep.  I escaped and stayed hidden until the next day, then returned here along with Dunshandrin's booty."

"They brought you back after trying to kill you?"

The wizard smiled.  "Dunshandrin's men didn't know I had accompanied them.  They still don't.  I have been going about the castle, uncovering what I can of their plans."

"Their
plans
are
to start a war," she said.

"Yes, I know."

"It's madness.  Barbareth will crush them, and hundreds or thousands will die for no reason."

"Is that what you predicted for them?"

"I don't remember what they asked or how I answered, but for some reason, they think they might win such a conflict."

"Indeed, they do think that.  And I have learned some of the reasons for their confidence.  One of them, fair lady, is you."

She watched as he went to the window and looked through the iron grillwork at the night beyond.  Did he intend to harm her?  If she screamed, her room would quickly fill up with guards; but she had the unsettling impression that this man was not concerned with being discovered.

"If I were to kill you," he said, "that would disrupt their plans, wouldn't it?"  He spoke without looking at her; for some reason, this frightened her more than it would have had he said it while gazing into her eyes.

"Yes.  I don't know how badly."  Then:  "Are you going to?"

After a long moment, he said:  "I don't think so."

"Will you help me to escape?"

"No."

"Then why have you come?"  Tolaria thought for a moment, considered everything the man had told her, what he had been doing, what he had learned; and suddenly she understood.  "You are going to join forces with them."

He looked at her, not answering, half his mouth turned up in a smirk.  Evidently she had pleased him.

"Are you mad?  They tried to have you killed!"

"If I approach them as an ally in their larger cause, I am no longer a hireling to be disposed of.  Instead, I am a supporter who deserves to be rewarded."

"They won't reward you.  They'll murder you."

"They tried that once; I doubt they'll make that mistake a second time.  Not once I have … persuaded them."  He walked to the door, turned, and bowed to her, the gesture a clear mockery of Torrant's mannerism.  "If all oracles were as fair as you, Tolaria, I would have stayed longer at Flaurent."

"You were at Flaurent?"

But he only smiled, and leaned toward the door, covering his mouth, speaking words she could not hear.  A moment later his body shimmered and faded, became nothing more than an outline, a haze, like heat rising from a fire; then he moved from where he had been and she could not find him again.

The door opened and a guard entered.  "Yes?" he said.

"What?"

"You called."

"No," Tolaria said.  Should she tell him about her visitor?  She opened her mouth, then shut it again, almost as if someone had reached out with unseen fingers and pushed her jaw closed.

"You did," he said.  "I heard you."

Tolaria shook her head.

"But—"

She heard herself say:  "I need nothing.  Everything is fine.  Please leave me alone."

She couldn't tell if the man was confused, or angry, or both.  "All right, then."  He backed out of the room and shut the door, locking it behind himself.

Tolaria sat down on the edge of her bed.  Had she completely lost her mind?  She picked up her pillow.  "There was a wizard in my room," she told it, "but now he's gone."

Silence.

"Has
everyone
been at Flaurent?"

But the pillow, uncooperative as it was, refused to answer.

CHAPTER FIVE

T'Sian plunged from the lowest layer of clouds, lines of vapor trailing along behind her.  The ocean lay far below, glimmering in the last shreds of daylight that trickled over the horizon.  She could see the islands off to the southeast, smoldering blotches of crimson against the cooler waters.

She banked to the left and began descending.  In the many years since her last flight to the archipelago, the islands would have changed, reshaped themselves; but the crystals would still be there, as always, pushed to the surface by heat and pressure.  They could be found within any of the volcanoes, but the largest and most accessible formation grew within the hollow mountain of the easternmost island.  As she neared it, she noticed that a lagoon had developed where two arms of the lava flow had extended into the sea, forming a small, sheltered harbor.  A human ship lay moored there, leaning on its side; the tide had gone out, stranding the vessel in water too shallow to support it.

Astonished, She veered in that direction, landing on the rough stone that surrounded the cove.  She peered at the vessel, finding no sign of activity, no movement on the deck, no warm bodies hiding from her gaze.  She splashed out into the warm water and sniffed around the ship.  It was redolent of birds, the same type of scents that she had encountered at her lair.

How very interesting.

T'Sian dug her talons into the hull and tore it open, breaking it apart.  Bodies fell out, men, dead of cut throats and stab wounds; but there were no birds.  She continued to dismantle the ship, ripping out interior walls, lifting up sections and shaking their contents out into the water.  Before long, the lagoon was awash in drifting wreckage and floating corpses; she found none alive to tell her what the ship was doing here or why it smelled the way it did.