The Book of Deacon (32 page)

"Well, you see, the act of breathing fire is
not always a strictly voluntary one. Occasionally, they let loose a
puff or two in their sleep. Not enough to kill, mind you, but more
than enough to set the bed aflame. Thus, sleeping in a bed with a
dragon is generally inadvisable. However, if you have been doing so
for this long then it is clearly not an issue," he said. "In a
wardrobe in your bedroom, you will find a number of blue robes and
tunics. They should fit well enough until we can make some
specifically for you. I will make the necessary arrangements for
you. You just have a well-earned rest. When you wake, find the
nearest person and they will set you on your way."

"But where will you be?" she asked.

"Likely I will be scribing. It consumes most
of my time. Anyone in the village will be more than willing to help
you, you needn't come to me. However, if you need me, just say my
name and someone will point you in my direction," he said.

He took his leave and closed the door.
Myranda quickly changed into the fresh clothes. They were a bit too
large for her, but as the first change of clothes she'd had in
weeks, they were heavenly. She fell into the bed and was asleep
before Myn joined her a moment later.

As was too often the case, Myranda's dreams
were tortured. This time, though, they twisted at her mind in a new
way. Now she was taunted with images of Leo. Memories of all of the
good he had done for her intermingled with imagined instances of
lies and treachery. She was forced to relive her time captured in
the church with the role of her captor now recast with the face of
her former friend. The man she had trusted, who had given her the
help she needed, was now tying her up. The kind, thoughtful friend
was now striking down men and putting a blade to her throat. It was
agony.

She was jarred from her sleep by the
departure of Myn, who leapt from the bed and pushed the door open.
The golden light of sunrise and the sounds of morning filtered
through the doors. Myranda drifted in and out of sleep for a time.
Finally she heard a voice and opened her eyes. Standing before her
was Deacon. He had an amused and slightly apologetic look on his
face.

"I am sorry to wake you, but we have
something of a situation that you may be able to help with," he
said.

"Of course," she said, pulling herself
groggily to her feet.

Deacon again offered his arm, but she didn't
need the help anymore.

"Leo is undergoing a rather unpleasant
procedure. You see, his legs had been broken multiple times in the
past. They were left to heal naturally, and many did so poorly. We
have found that the best way to deal with such an ailment is to
allow the legs to heal correctly," he explained as the pair moved
toward the cluster of huts that had been painted white.

"Heal correctly? But you said they had
already healed," she said.

"Therein lies the issue. The legs must be
re-broken. Generally the patient would be put to sleep or at least
deprived of feeling for such a procedure, but Leo apparently asked
to have the work done free of aid. Two successful breaks had been
made when your other little friend made her appearance. She has
taken a stance atop Leo and will not allow any of our healers near.
We've tried to take care of the situation with magic, but it
appears our spells are not having an effect. A number of the
clerics were eager to put the more powerful spells to work, but I
thought perhaps you could handle it more easily," he said.

Myranda was led inside one of the huts. Five
white-robed healers were in a circle around the table upon which
Leo was lying. Standing over Leo was Myn, her jaws snapping at
anyone who approached from in front and her tail lashing anyone who
approached from behind. As soon as Myranda was in sight, Myn fairly
began to dance in place, anxiously shifting from foot to foot. Leo
whispered something in a language Myranda could not identify and
the healers filed out of the hut. Deacon lingered in the doorway
before leaving and shutting the door behind him.

"They tell me you have a problem," Myranda
said. "Deacon thought I could help."

"Myn will not let them do what needs to be
done," Leo said. "I have spoken to her, but she will not listen. I
doubt that there is anything that you can do that hasn't been
tried."

"Maybe she just doesn't believe you. You've
given
me
very
little reason to do so," she said angrily. "If you want me to help
you, you owe me the truth."

"I do not owe you anything," he said.

"I saved your life. You yourself said that
the favor needs to be returned," Myranda said.

"I led you to safety. If I had not shown you
the way into and out of the cave, you would be in the hands of the
Elites right now," he said. "No one will be able to enter or leave
this place until the falls relent, and months will pass before that
happens. The debt is repaid."

"I want the truth," she demanded.

"You wouldn't know the truth if you had it.
For all you know, I could simply replace one lie with another. If
you want the truth, find it for yourself. There is as much of me
here as there is anywhere else. If there is truth to be found, it
is here," he said.

"Then why should I help you?" she asked.

"You shouldn't, but you will. I know you
better than you know yourself. I know that you would like nothing
more than to see me suffer for this supposed injustice, but your
heart won't let you. That is your main weakness--your heart. You
care too much for those around you. One day it will cost you your
life," he said.

Myranda's eyes wandered to Leo's legs. They
were twisted and bent. She tried to be strong. She tried to think
of the wrongs he had done. The lies he had told. Alas, among all of
the half-truths and outright lies, there was one undeniable fact.
He was right about her. As angry as she was, she found herself
searching for some way to help him. It didn't take long for her to
realize that if there was something keeping their spells from
affecting Myn, there could be only one cause. There, on the little
dragon's neck, the cord that held her souvenir still held firm. The
trip through the water had twisted the trinket around, where it
came to be nestled between her folded wings.

With a bit of difficulty, Myranda managed to
untangle the charm and remove it. The dragon seemed upset, and
became more so when the door was opened to allow the healers back
in. Without the charm to protect her, Myn was quickly put into a
deep, harmless sleep. After a final, stern exchange of looks,
Myranda lifted the little dragon and took her leave. Outside,
Deacon gave her a hand with the sleeping creature.

"Might I ask what the problem was?" Deacon
wondered.

"A few days ago, Myn managed to chew this
little ornament off of a helmet she separated from its owner. I
gave it to her as a necklace, but apparently it had some sort of
enchantment," Myranda explained as the trio moved back to her
hut.

The dragon was set on Myranda's bed.

"Would you mind if I had a look at that
charm? If it was able to ward off our spells, it must be quite
powerful," he said.

She shrugged and handed it to him. Even
before it dropped into his hand, he assured her that it was the
work of an Entwellian. Looking it over only confirmed it.

"Yes. Yes. I know the man who invented this
technique. I believe he is still about if you would like to meet
him. Well, in time you will meet everyone," he said, before
returning it to Myranda, who affixed it to the sleeping beast's
neck.

"What do you do for food here?" Myranda
asked. Right now she was a mass of hunger and anger, and she had to
do something before one or the other overcame her.

"Oh, of course, you must be famished. This
way. I'll join you. I haven't eaten yet," he said.

Myranda was lead out of the hut and along a
well-worn path. Around the hut she had been given were a dozen
others just like it, simple structures of wood with a thatched
roof. Young people of every race lingered in the area, each wearing
a similar blue tunic. As they continued, Myranda came to realize
that the whole of the village, and a sizable one at that, was
arranged in small clusters around courtyards with a larger hut at
their center. Different groups of dwellings seemed to be populated
by different groups of similarly dressed residents. There were
people dressed in white, others in black. There were tunics of red,
brown, aqua, and yellow. Scattered among them were older figures,
some in deep conversation with one another, others trailing groups
of younger villagers. If this was a place of learning, as Deacon
had said, then these must be the teachers.

The pair came to a wide, stone-paved road
that divided the village down the middle. It ran from the
now-raging waterfall to a vast courtyard ringed with short walls.
At its center was a majestic-looking structure, the only place
she'd seen thus far that seemed to have been built as anything more
than a shelter. It had tall, glass windows, a shingled roof, and
painted patterns on its walls.

Myranda was led across the central path and
around the rim of the courtyard. The huts around her now were
somewhat different to those on the other side of the road. Targets
and training dummies could be found in the center of the gatherings
of huts. The students in this area wore sturdier clothing than the
simple tunics she'd seen thus far, each adorned with various
intricate badges and patches.

Finally she came to a long, curving hut with
smoke rising from a pair of chimneys at one side. The walls were
covered with windows, and a scattering of the village's people sat
at tables within. Once inside, a simple earthenware bowl for each
of them was filled with a thin vegetable stew and a coarse loaf of
wheat bread was split between them. Myranda made short work of the
stew, abandoning a spoon in favor of the bread, dipping and eating.
She had messily dispatched half of the bowl in this manner when she
realized the attention she was attracting. She smiled meekly when
Deacon handed her a spoon.

"I am sorry," she said.

"No need to apologize. I am always happy to
see a new technique," he said.

"The last thing I ate was a half-cooked bat
and a few raw ones, and I would hardly call them a meal," she said
with her mouth full.

"Ah, yes. Bat. Some of us here see it as a
rite of passage to have to resort to bat to survive. There is only
a handful who have managed to avoid it. I, alas, have never had the
pleasure. Already you fit in better than I," he said.

She merely smiled between bites.

"Correct me if I am wrong, but I believe I
heard a few harsh words tossed about behind the closed door. How
did things go in there?" he asked.

"He . . . I . . . That scoundrel has been
lying to me since I met him, and now he refuses to set things
straight! He tells me if I want it, I ought to find it myself!" she
raged.

"Well, that should be simple enough. It
hasn't been long since the three of you appeared, and already some
of the elder members have been telling tales of the last time he
was here," he said.

"What do they say?" she asked, taken aback by
the sudden source of new information.

"I am afraid I did not linger long enough to
hear the tale. It was Keller doing the recollection. He is a rather
narrow-minded member of the warrior school, and all of that hand to
hand miscellany just cannot hold my interest. I believe he called
him Lain more than once," Deacon recalled.

"Lain? Then Leo isn't even his real name?"
she fumed.

"Oh, it is . . . well, I don't know that it
is, but it certainly could be. You see, Lain is less a name and
more a title. The stealth masters tend to attach it to the most
prized of their pupils," Deacon explained. "If your friend is
rightly called Lain, then he would be the only living one. They are
a rare breed."

"I wish I knew more," she said.

"I will show you to the library one of these
days. You should be able to find something in his records," he
said.

"You keep records?" she said.

"Of course. Otherwise it would be very
difficult to assign credit where it is due," he said.

The promise of information about the
infuriating malthrope was enough to calm Myranda's anger for the
time being, and the first bowl of stew took the desperation from
her hunger. As she refilled her bowl, she became curious about her
newest friend. He was equally curious about her, and the two
decided to start what would turn out to be a lengthy question and
answer session.

"When I first came here, you called this
place Entwell . . . Entwell Num . . ." She struggled to
remember.

"Entwell Num Garastra," he said. "The Belly
of the Beast."

"That is it. Why do you call it that? And
what is this place?" she asked.

"Oh, well. You see . . . Are you sure you do
not know this story? What I am about to tell you is generally the
reason people find this place," he said.

"I came here because I was being followed and
Leo promised me safety," she said.

"Ah, well, then I will enlighten you. You
see, long, long ago, people began entering the cave and not
returning. Before long, people began to believe there was a
creature within that was taking their lives. Periodically, a
hideous roar would serve to support that theory. So it became a
test of skill. The king of . . . Ulvard at the time, called upon
the strongest warriors and mages to rid the kingdom of this foul
beast," he said.

"I do know this tale! The cave we just went
through . . . that was the cave of the beast!? I never would have
let him take me in if I had known that!" she said, flustered.

"I am told it is clearly marked," he
said.

"We rode by a number of signs on a horse. I
didn't have time to read them, and the rest were worn and faded,"
she said.