The Book of Deacon (22 page)

"Do you have any idea how strong that snout
of hers is? She
always
smells something," he assured her.

"Even so," Myranda said, straining her eyes
on the horizon.

A sound, silent to the others, visibly shook
Myn. She launched herself out of the window and ran to the north
with a speed Myranda had never seen the little creature muster.
There was something more than hunger driving her as she streaked
through the snow. Myranda called out to her, but the dragon did not
even turn.

"It is about time . . ." Wolloff said.

"This is not normal. Something is definitely
wrong," she said.

"Oh, aye, but keeping a pet dragon in your
bed with you every night is the very picture of normality," Wolloff
said.

Soon Myn disappeared between the trees.
Myranda turned to the wizard, who was about to begin the day's
studies.

"I am serious. Something out there has got
her attention like nothing else I've seen before. We've got to see
where she's gone, and what she's gone after," she insisted.

"I do not see why--" he began.

"Please! You are a wizard. Surely you can do
something to find out," she begged.

Wolloff looked at the desperate apprentice.
Normally, he would be infuriated by the gall of a student
interrupting her teacher, but looking into her eyes he saw naught
but fear and worry. He heaved a frustrated sigh.

"I can see we are not likely to get anything
done while this mystery stands," he said.

He gripped the amulet and spoke some arcane
words. The crystal within began to glow.

"There is someone . . . a human . . ." he
said, mumbling a few more words. "Aye, quite a few."

"Who are they? What do they look like?" she
pleaded.

"I cannot actually see them. That would
require a distance-seeing spell, and I have not cast such a spell
in years. I am merely detecting their minds," he said, his next few
comments scattered among lengthy pauses. "I can tell you that they
are quite strong-willed. Not on the level of a wizard, or even you
for that matter, though . . . I sense that they are looking for
something. No, no they have found it. There is anger. Perhaps a . .
. yes, a battle . . . There are fewer of them now . . . fewer
still. Whatever they found is putting up quite a struggle."

"It could be Myn!" she said.

"Aye, it could be." He nodded. "I've focused
the spell on the discovery of human minds. Whatever they have
found, it is not human."

"Well, search for her! Search for Myn!" she
demanded.

Wolloff clenched his eyes tighter to maintain
concentration.

"This may come as a surprise to you, but
seeking out a dragon's mind has not been of tremendous usefulness
to me over the years. I would have to do a bit of research to
discover that particular inflection," he said. "At any rate, it
does not matter. The ill-intentioned invaders--or, at least, those
that remain--are leaving. Right, back to work then."

Myranda reluctantly turned her mind to the
task of learning again. She tried to imagine that Myn had just gone
off for the day as she had for weeks before. It was no use, though.
She could not pull her mind from the worry she felt. Her spells
fizzled and failed. Even spells she had mastered in her first days
of learning were beyond her ability. Finally, Wolloff grew
frustrated.

"Right. That is all for today then," he
said.

"I am sorry. I am just . . . I can't stop
thinking about Myn. She could be in trouble," she said.

"Aye, could be, and probably is. She is
probably flayed open on the side of a road, but that is of little
consequence. You are to be a white wizard. The tragedies of the
world must cease matter to you," he said.

"How dare you! My friend could be hurt. That
will always matter to me. A healer should have compassion," she
said.

"Caya sent you so that you could learn to
heal the injured. To that end, you've shown tremendous potential,
but mere potential means nothing. What matters is performance. Life
would be wonderful if we were only asked to perform in the most
pleasant of conditions, but the truth is that it in those places a
healer is useless. If you are to be helpful at all, you will need
to be treating men and women torn apart at the seams. Soldiers
screaming in pain. Faces you may recognize shrouded in a crimson
mask of blood--or, worse, faded white as a ghost with death's claws
about them. At times you will not have the opportunity or resources
to give help to all who need it. You will have to decide who must
die and who can live. What good will you be if the imagined fate of
a blasted meaningless creature renders you helpless? You are
useless!" he proclaimed.

Wolloff rose from his seat and opened the
door to leave. He slammed it angrily behind him as Myranda turned
back to the window. She was shaken by his words. Their truth had
struck her to the core. Casting the spell with nothing on the line
was difficult enough, but to attain the necessary state of mind
while a life hangs in the balance? Impossible. The emotions could
not be pushed aside.

Perhaps the true test of a wizard was the art
of detachment. Whenever tales of a wizard were told to her, they
were cold and unfeeling, minds set solely to task. A part of her
yearned to be free of the burden of her emotion--but in her heart,
she recoiled at the thought. The image of herself showing anger and
disdain in place of compassion and concern turned her stomach. Such
a fate was worse than death. To deny her heart now would be to turn
a deaf ear to it forever, and right now it was telling her that her
friend needed help.

She marched down the stairs, her course of
action clear.

"And what are you up to?" Wolloff asked
mockingly.

"I am going to help Myn," she declared.

"And how do you suppose you will find her?"
he asked.

"I don't know," she said, donning her worn
cloak and tattered boots.

"Well, off with you, then. I have taught you
the basics, and it was that which I was paid to do. My conscience
is clear. You, however, ought to bear one thing in mind. Caya has
invested a tidy sum and she is expecting a healer in return. How
will she feel when I tell her that her new mascot and only healer
has frozen to death seeking to rescue a beast from a danger that is
not even certain?" he said.

Myranda gave him a long, hard stare,
considering his words. Finally, she opened the door and set off
into the cold. A single look at the sky and whiff of the air
assured her that she could not have chosen a worse time to venture
into the woods alone. As was the curse of the north, snow had come
at least once a week for the whole of her time in Wolloff's tower.
Most were light flurries, but some brought with them wind and cold
sufficient to endanger any creature that could not find shelter.
Today would be such a day. A stiff breeze foreshadowed the harsh
winds that would be tearing at her face within the hour.

The sharp slicing of Myn's claws into the
snow left a clear path to follow, but the rising wind was quickly
wiping them away. Racing against time, Myranda trudged through the
snow, knee-deep at times, as quickly as her legs could manage. She
ignored the savage burning of the wind in her eyes, knowing that if
she lost sight of the trail for even a moment, she might never find
it again. All the while, she kept her left hand clenched angrily
about the front of her cloak, holding it closed and squeezing at
the mark that had brought her such misfortune, as though if she
punished it enough it would release her from its accursed
grasp.

The shadows lengthened as she trudged onward.
Long ago, the prints had been wiped away. She moved now on hope
alone. For once, luck did not fail her. Ahead, she found a patch of
snow stained red by the blood beneath it. The patch stood out
against the stark white that surrounded it. The snow, blown about
by the savage wind, had faded but not erased the remains of the
battle that Wolloff had described. It must have been a terrible
one. Though she could not be certain, the half-hidden footfalls
scattered about the clearing seemed to have belonged to a
half-dozen or so men.

Four did not live to see the end of the
battle. The bodies must have been taken; in their places, helmets
had been left, hung atop swords stuck into the earth in the center
of the bloody spill that marked their end. The helms were
elaborate, iron with dark blue enamel covering the whole surface,
save a few areas that bore gold detailing. Rising from the peak was
a white plume that looked to be horse hair.

"So they were soldiers," she said through
wind-burned lips.

She searched the ground with her eyes, but
there was no sign of Myn having even been there. The telltale
dimples in the snow left by the soldiers' horses all led almost
directly to the north. Myranda, with nowhere else to go, followed
them. If Myn had not reached them before the battle had ended, then
she might have met them further on.

It was not long before she found the site of
a different battle. More blood spilled, and a single helmet, left
seemingly out of carelessness rather than memorial. Beside the
blood-spattered helmet was a deep furrow left by the spirited
movements of a creature's claws. Further on, there was a deep pit
in the snow, almost to the ground, that bore its own stain, though
this blood was of a thicker, darker variety. Precisely the kind
that was left in the wake of the elder dragon's rampage. There was
no doubt. It was Myn's.

"No!" Myranda cried out.

She threw herself into the snow, digging her
fingers into the windblown flakes just as the first crystals of the
long impending storm began to fall. Myranda stood. The pit was
empty. Squinting, she made out a tiny speck of red, followed by
another, and another. She followed the trail of drops to its end.
There she found the prone, motionless form of the little dragon.
She was cold to the touch, nearly as cold as the snow that half
buried her. Two vicious injuries marred her hide, clearly the cause
of her collapse. Myranda dropped to her knees and placed her ear to
the dragon's chest. There was the weakest thump of a struggling
heart to be heard. The tiniest whisper of life, the smallest
glimmer of hope.

Myranda analyzed the wounds. There was a
horrid gash running along her neck and down her side, cleaving
whole scales and clotted with sticky, near-black blood. The second
injury was smaller, a notch cut into her crown scale. The thick
protective piece of armor had done its work. Only a trickle of
blood escaped the wound left by a blow that would have killed a
lesser creature.

The novice healer prepared to make use of her
fresh knowledge. Suddenly her heart dropped as she realized her
carelessness. A crystal! She'd forgotten to take one! She had never
been able to cast a spell without one. There was no time to lose
though. If she delayed for even a moment, she could lose her friend
forever. She placed her hands on the dragon's neck. The creature's
unique blood burned at her fingers, but she ignored it. Her mind
needed silence for the spell to work. Every thought had to be
washed away to provide a trance deep enough to allow her words to
reach the ears of those forces that could put them to reality. The
lack of a crystal made it difficult, but the high emotions made it
near impossible.

She tried, and tried, but she couldn't manage
to ignore the fear and sorrow she felt for the only creature that
cared for her. Tears flowed from her eyes and stung her cheeks as
the flood of powerful emotions fought back. The harder she tried to
focus, the more she thought of the danger her friend was in. Her
mind swirled, but she could not relent. The feelings intensified
until she could not bear it. Finally, she spoke the arcane words.
If she could not draw the strength from calm focus, then she had no
choice to try to draw it from the maelstrom in her mind.

The words began to do their work, though
weakly. Slowly she felt the gash begin to close beneath her
fingers, but not completely. She spoke the words again, and again.
Each speaking brought the wound closer to disappearing, and brought
Myranda closer to collapse. The last trickle of the blood escaped
the wound as the apprentice wizard finally passed the breaking
point, falling forward. Large, icy flakes of snow began to fall
with all of the force of a blizzard as the world faded from her
view.

#

In the city of Nidel, General Trigorah pored
over her notes of the weeks gone by. Progress had been slow,
painfully slow. Her duties had required her to track the path of
the sword and those who may have contacted it. To that end, she'd
been quite successful. Indeed, in front of her was a description of
the very weapon she sought, provided by an elderly weapon shop
owner who had agreed to buy it. The last of the prospective
witnesses had been identified, and their current whereabouts
noted.

Every last story that there was to hear had
been heard, and the last of the truth was being gleaned from them.
There was the strong indication, though not the certainty, that
Myranda . . . that the
target
had been in possession of the weapon when she
left the weapon shop, but not when she had arrived in the town of
Nidel, and certainly not when she had been captured.

It was here that things had ceased to fit
together. There was the church. Trigorah knew her target to visit
places of worship when seeking shelter. There had been a church,
burned, and four soldiers killed. That didn't make sense. Why burn
the church? To hide evidence? Perhaps, but the remains of the
soldiers, some of Demont's men, were left for all to find, when
they could easily have been thrown among the flames. If evidence
was
being
destroyed, it was evidence of some other crime.

From the descriptions of her target, it
seemed highly unlikely that she would have been capable of
defeating four soldiers. And then there was the fact of her escape.
The carriage was burned. More fire . . . but this time well-used.
Aside from requiring that the girl be captured as well as the
sword, the escape made it clear that she could not have been
working alone. No, there was another hand at work here.