The Forging of the Dragon (Wizard and Dragon Book 1) (19 page)

“You didn’t know this was going to happen?” Seagryn smiled, genuinely pleased.

Dark shrugged. “Oh, I guess I did. I just hadn’t — noticed it. Other things on my mind. Shall we go?”

The party continued unabated. Only the Imperial House noted their departure. It was pleased.

Chapter Sixteen

DESPONDENT DREAM

THEY fled the golden city with mutual eagerness. Once past the mansions that seemed to line its perimeter, however. Dark slowed down. When Seagryn wanted to know why, the boy only frowned and shook his head. Something was soon to happen, evidently, something too critical to Seagryn’s future for the boy to reveal. The powershaper accepted the boy’s silence with a mixture of resignation and excitement. Only later did he remember this was how he’d always lived his life before meeting Dark in the Marwilds.

They slept the first night in a field, and Seagryn woke up shivering. For the last few days, the late summer had struggled vainly to hold back the attack of fall. On this morning autumn prevailed, its dry coolness invading his robes and taking his poor legs prisoner. He got to his feet quickly, crossing the lapels of his garment tightly across his chest while at the same time trying to blow warmth into his blue-tinted fingers. He was grateful now for the excessive sleeves of this ceremonial robe. It was warm, and his stopped-up nose prevented him from smelling its perfume. He glanced around for Dark and saw the boy tossing on the ground a few yards away, murmuring to some prominent character in his dreams. Seagryn wondered whether the lad’s dreams were set in the future or the past. And did he ever have trouble distinguishing between fictional dreams and truthful visions?

“Wake up, Dark. I’m freezing.”

“Eh?” The boy came awake and sat upright in the same motion. He, too, wound his arms around his shivering torso. “Did you know it would be this cold this morning?” Seagryn grumbled. Dark didn’t look at him. He just stared ahead, then nodded curtly. “Then why didn’t you warn me!” Dark still didn’t look his way, but he did shrug. Seagryn grew concerned.

“Are you all right?” In answer, the boy shivered again.

Seagryn reached down to grip Dark above the elbows and lifted him to his feet. “Come on. We’ve got to find something to warm you up!”

“You’ll find an inn across the field in that direction,” Dark chattered, gesturing with a nod of his head. Then he looked at Seagryn. “This time you know me well enough to know I’m telling the truth, so you lead me straight to it.” The prophet gritted his teeth together and fought to keep them from chattering. Moments later they were inside the inn, and Seagryn had him bedded down on the floor in a quiet corner by the fireplace.

“I suppose you knew you’d be getting sick?” Seagryn wondered aloud.

“Not sick,” Dark chattered. “I’m terrified!” Then the boy turned his face to the wall, and his body shook with shivers and silent sobs.

Seagryn knew nothing to do except withdraw. He spent the rest of the day watching Dark from one of the tables and speaking quietly with the few other travelers who had taken this day to rest. Although they studied his rich gown with curiosity, he didn’t reveal to them his identity, nor Dark’s. But it was from them he first learned his new title, as they gave him glowing reports of the great battle waged the day before above the Rangsfield Sluice. “Seagryn Bearsbane” they called him, and then quietly confided that this new wizard had personally skinned the fearsome old powershaper, had instantly cured Sheth’s furry pelt, and had then presented it to King Haran as a gift. “It now graces the wall of the throne room!” the tellers finished, then broke into a chorus of triumphant guffaws.

Seagryn heard the words soberly. Though he really didn’t know all that much about his rival, he could vouch personally for the man’s legendary conceit. And since one of Sheth’s chief tools was the fear inspired by his loathsome reputation, he would not abide such rumors cheerfully. There would be a price to be paid for this, and doubtless Seagryn would pay it. And yet he couldn’t deny the pleasure he took at hearing incognito the simple folk of the countryside singing his praises. Perhaps the slaughter did have value for human freedom — the freedom of Haranian humans, anyway. Perhaps he’d judged his own motives too harshly ...

Dark moaned, and Seagryn raced over to him. “Are you all right?” he asked quietly.

“No! No!” The hoy groaned weakly. “Sleep! I’ve got to sleep —” Then he rolled to the wall again, and Seagryn drew back.

“He’s seen his own death,” he thought to himself. Despite the roaring fire, he shivered in sympathy, then withdrew to an empty table to try to plan what to do next. He discovered that wasn’t easy and realized again just how much he’d come to depend on the boy.

It was not a good day; and, when he bundled up himself that night a few feet away from Dark, it was with an involuntary prayer that the Power would keep the young prophet safe. When he realized his own inconsistency, the spiritual disciplines he’d been taught from childhood clamored again for his attention. Seagryn shut them off. He was getting good at that.

“Seagryn?” a voice said quietly, and he came awake with a start. It was Dark. “I think we ought to be going.”

Daylight had come. Seagryn rubbed the sleep from his eyes and peered worriedly at the lad. “Are you well enough to —”

“Don’t ask,” the boy said quickly, then added, “What I’ve seen, you will experience for yourself soon enough.” Without another word the pair paid their bill and departed. For the three days of their journey to the Hovel, they barely spoke at all.

Paumer had done a good job of hiding the path up the side of the volcano. He had good reasons for discouraging the visits of surprise guests. Yet Dark led Seagryn unerringly up the trail, ignoring paved walkways that led nowhere, while finding the true way concealed behind the scrub brush. Seagryn marveled at the boy’s gift and marveled too at how courageously Dark climbed to his own misfortune. There seemed very little he could say. He felt helpless in the face of Dark’s dreaded certainty — whatever it was. He’d experienced this same impotence as a cleric when called upon to give counsel to the dying. It had always proved wiser, then, to just be — and to listen. He would have listened now, but Dark wasn’t talking. They climbed to the crater lake in silence, speaking at last only when they reached its shore.

“What do we do now?” Seagryn asked.

“We ring that bell,” Dark mumbled, pointing to their left, and Seagryn nodded and went to turn the huge bell’s wheel. Several minutes passed before they saw a barge push off from the dock below the Hovel, and they had plenty of time to gaze at the grand palace while waiting for the craft to reach them. It had been built to blend with the sharp spires of rock that stabbed up toward the sky on either side of it. At the same time it civilized those savage crags, sophisticating them somehow, rather like a tiny general surrounded by burly guards yet completely self-possessed. Four towers of uneven height rose gracefully from the Hovel proper, the roof of each crowned with glazed emerald tiles that glistened in the midday sunshine. The villa’s walls were a soothing tan that bespoke restrained good taste. This was an opulent house, but not the least bit gaudy.

“Have you ever seen anything like it?” Seagryn murmured, his voice full of rural wonder.

“Of course.” Dark shrugged. “I’ve seen it before. In my mind —”

“Always first in your mind,” Seagryn grumbled. “But tell me — when a future fact first pops into your mind, are you ever surprised then?”

Dark frowned at him. “You could go through the last few days with me and ask a question like that?”

Seagryn felt chastened — again the insensitive monster trampling upon the feelings of the doomed. He tried to contain his question, but found he couldn’t. “And the thing that you saw will come — it happens there?”

“Something happens at the Hovel. Several things happen — different things. I’ll tell you this much, Seagryn, and only because we’re now here. What happens to you, you’ll believe is not in your best interests.” The boy turned his gaze out to the approaching barge and added bitterly, “And, of course — what else? You’ll blame me.”

*

“Welcome! You’re welcome to my house!” Paumer lied effusively as the grim-faced pair stepped off the barge and onto the Hovel’s docks. “We’ve been anticipating your arrival for days! Dark, how are things with you, lad? And Seagryn! What spectacular reports we’ve been hearing of your exploits! Truly you are honored guests, honored guests. And I didn’t even need to provide you with a guide to show you the way!”

“That’s Dark’s talent,” Seagryn responded caustically. “He could find his way here in his sleep.”

“Ha!” Paumer laughed. “Oh that was a good one, I’ll need to remember that. Well come on, come on. I’m pleased to see you felt no need for baggage. Everything will be provided for you here, anything you want. Seagryn, I simply must have the story of your triumph from your own lips! Do you think after a refreshing bath you could join me for an iced-punch in the upper gardens? The sun has turned hot again today —” he added, squinting his eyes at the sky.

Seagryn glanced at Dark for some silent advice, but the boy gazed stonily back toward the lake. “Will — Dark be joining us?” he asked politely.

Paumer’s smile was equally polite. “Ah — no. My daughter — Uda’s her name, about the same age as the boy — she was there at the Grand Council meeting you attended — perhaps you remember?” Seagryn nodded slightly. “Well, Uda has plans for the two of them — exactly what I don’t know, but then I rarely know what my children are going to do, ha-ha!” Paumer looked at Dark, seeking out the lad’s gaze. “That’s all right with you, I hope?” he asked.

Dark turned his head slowly back from the lake to look deeply into Seagryn’s eyes. “That’s fine.” The boy sighed, and Seagryn saw such desperation there that he wanted to reach out and hug the lad protectively. Something was about to happen to Dark, something terrifying, and they both were powerless to stop it. The prophet looked down, then back up at Paumer, and said, “Shall I go on and meet her now?”

For just a moment, Paumer’s expression seemed to reveal his true feelings toward Dark — feelings he’d made public when they’d met before under the mountain. But like a tree snapping back upright after bending beneath the force of a gale, Paumer’s smile snapped quickly back onto his lips. “Of course! You two children have a lovely time!”

Dark needed no directions. He’d already started purposefully up the tile steps toward the mansion. He didn’t bother looking back.

Chapter Seventeen

PICNIC AT THE HOVEL

As the afternoon cooled at the insistence of a breeze from the sea, Paumer led his assembled guests up a flagstoned walk to a meadow that overlooked the Hovel’s towers. Once again Seagryn found himself in heady company, nodding to Chaom who had evidently arrived the day earlier, and to Wilker, the foppish representative of the Remnant who seemed capable only to himself. Seagryn hadn’t yet seen Garney, that fierce little Doorkeeper who had expelled them all from the cavern. Had the little man been dismissed from the Conspiracy for that act? Or was this just too trivial an enterprise for him to risk leaving his precious door?

Ognadzu was not in evidence either. Seagryn didn’t think he would miss the surly stares of Paumer’s only son. The shrewd merchant’s daughter was certainly present, however, dressed in a scandalous costume of sheer aqua lace, and she seemed to be wearing poor Dark every bit as much as she was wearing the gown. The girl had clamped her arm so tightly around Dark’s waist Seagryn wondered why the prophet wasn’t grimacing in pain. After a moment of astonished watching, however, he concluded the boy was too embarrassed to do anything other than blush.

With each step, Uda licked her trembling captive upon the cheek, the ear, or the back of the neck, while her free hand roamed brazenly across his upper body. Dark shot a glance back over his shoulder at Seagryn. That haunted expression remained fixed upon the boy’s features, and Seagryn suddenly realized that this girl would play some role in the young prophet’s destruction. For the moment, maintaining Dark’s full attention seemed to be her consuming passion. She grabbed him under the chin and jerked his head back to face hers, then gazed soul-fully into his eyes.

While Seagryn found this public spectacle shocking in the extreme, he still couldn’t keep from smiling, nor could he prevent his thoughts from turning once again to Elaryl, especially since her father walked only a few paces behind him.

He had wondered if the two representatives of Lamath would be here when he and Dark arrived. They’d had much further to travel to get here from the City of Lamath — indeed, they’d barely had time to get home from that infamous meeting inside the Remnant before receiving the summons to come again. Seagryn saw clearly now why on occasion Ranoth had been mysteriously absent from his priestly duties in the capital city. Talarath, too, had sometimes been gone, and Seagryn and Elaryl had taken advantage of these infrequent absences to spend long hours in conversation, a practice Talarath sought to discourage when he was present. The dour-faced elder had never liked him, Seagryn reflected. Of all the people in Lamath, probably no one had been more pleased by Seagryn’s spectacular fall from grace than Elaryl’s father.

And yet this afternoon, when Seagryn had met Ranoth and Talarath sitting under a gazebo in Paumer’s elaborately laid-out upper garden, old Talarath had been smiling. He’d even given a passing imitation of a warm greeting. Why, Seagryn wondered to himself? It was obvious that Paumer had been talking with the two elders before he and Dark had arrived. Had they been discussing him? These were all treacherous conspirators, Seagryn reminded himself. And Dark’s warning, albeit cryptic, had been clear. Something sinister was being planned, something not in Seagryn’s best interests.

As the column trooped up to encircle a sumptuous feast spread upon a damask-covered picnic table, Seagryn sought out Dark’s eyes once again, hoping for a signal of some kind. He saw nothing. The boy prophet no longer fought off Uda’s free-roaming hands. He’d given up. And he stared sullenly back at Seagryn as if it were the wizard’s fault he found himself in this predicament, instead of the other way around. The thought struck Seagryn with the force of a physical blow to the stomach — “I can trust
no
one here — not even Dark!”

“Uda, let the boy
alone
?” Paumer pleaded, and the raven-haired girl shrugged and reached out to toy with her golden flatware. Paumer sighed quietly and glanced around the table. “We’re not all here, of course — Garney is missing, as is Jarnel. He, I understand, is busy leading a very surprised fleet home to Arl. And — Ognadzu, my son, is — off in the north on an assignment for me ...”

Seagryn happened to be watching the girl as her father said this and he saw her roll her eyes in surprise. Indeed, Paumer had not said the words as if he’d intended them to be believed. They appeared, instead, a rather obvious plea to his guests not to bring up the subject of his son’s absence.

“And as to Sheth, well — who can guess where he might be? He’s like a mountain wind, gone one moment and present the next —”

As if by a carefully prearranged signal, Sheth suddenly popped into view, already seated in a vacant chair. “Hello.” He smiled graciously. “Am I too late?”

“Sheth! Welcome!” Paumer oozed. Seagryn had grown accustomed to Paumer’s artificial greetings, but there seemed to be an extra measure of falseness in this one. Too late he looked back at the daughter’s face, to see if her expression registered any shock at Sheth’s abrupt appearance. She was busy squeezing Dark’s hand as she peered at the lad, trying to get him to look at her. Dark just stared down into his gold plate. Seagryn looked back at Sheth — and met the powershaper’s eyes, gazing intently at him.

“I must congratulate you upon your startling victory at Rangsfield,” Sheth said. “You may have noticed — your tactics took me quite by surprise.”

Seagryn paused a moment before responding. “I understand that’s how shaper battles are usually won.”

“You’ve been talking to Nebalath!” Sheth smiled. “I miss him. Tell me, how is the old fellow?”

Seagryn glanced around the table. “Ask Chaom,” he said, picking up his napkin and sliding it out of its ornate ring. “He’s seen the man since I have.”

“That’s not exactly true, Seagryn,” Chaom put in as he speared a slab of meat on his knife and dropped it onto his plate. “In fact no one has seen him since the night of your party. Many of us thought you’d gone off together ...” The warrior left his sentence open-ended for Seagryn to provide more information if he so chose, but Seagryn made a great show of diving into his meal, and the subject was allowed to die.

A wind kicked up quite suddenly, rustling the grass and flapping the tablecloth, reminding them all that winter had sent fall ahead to announce its coming and would not be denied. Seagryn noticed then that the grass of this high meadow had already yellowed. Wasn’t choosing to picnic after summer’s end just one more example of this Conspiracy’s arrogance, as if even the weather could be required to bow to its wishes? He chanced a glance up from his plate and saw that the other diners seemed as uncomfortable as he. Still, no one mentioned the wind or the chill. The picnic continued with a forced gaiety, and Seagryn had to admit that he’d rarely tasted a meal more delicious.

“While this is
very
pleasant,” Paumer lied after most of his guests were nearly finished, “we do have important matters to discuss. Most critical, surely, is what we as the Grand Council intend to do to avoid the approaching world calamity —”

“What calamity?” Chaom interrupted.

“Why — the — the problem we’ve been facing for months! The impending conquest of the other fragments by Arl —”

“I thought that’s what you meant.” Chaom nodded. “But I’m afraid I don’t understand your continuing concern. We’ve maintained a balance of power between Arl and its neighbors for some time. With Seagryn’s arrival, it appears that balance has been restored once again.”

“With one victory he’s redressed the imbalance?” Sheth grinned. “You’ll pardon me for saying this, Seagryn, but I’m not certain our next encounter will prove so one-sided. And if it is, there’s every possibility you will be the wizard humiliated — or worse.”

Seagryn had just taken a bite. Stunned by this attack, he clenched his teeth a moment, then forced his jaws into motion and methodically chewed and swallowed. He refused to look at his rival or to take any public notice of the taunt.

“There is a way of knowing.” Ranoth shrugged. “Let’s just ask the boy.”

“No,” Paumer protested, “rather let us —”

“Be quiet for once, Paumer!” Ranoth snapped. “I, for one, would like to hear what he says. Dark? Who wins the next encounter? Dark?” Ranoth said again, for the lad still eyed his plate as if it were about to eat off him instead of the other way around. It was piled high with food — Uda had served him huge portions of every dish passed — but he had yet to touch it. Nor did he seem willing to partake of this conversation.

“There, you see?” Paumer smiled. “The boy does not choose to —”

“Dark!” Ranoth scolded. “You’ve pushed your way into our presence again and again! Now that you’ve been invited, do you suddenly refuse to speak?”

“What difference would it make if I did?” the boy mumbled.

“It could make a great deal of difference. You could help us choose wisely —”

“Choose what?” Dark barked, suddenly coming to life and meeting Ranoth’s eyes. “Your choices are already made, as everyone at this table save Seagryn and Chaom know already! Of course Sheth and Seagryn will battle again — they’re shapers, aren’t they? And isn’t it the nature of wizards to struggle? But that will make no difference to your careful scheme, which Sheth himself formulated and Seagryn will have to enact, and which the rest of you have already adopted as your own. And you,” Dark continued, turning to look into Seagryn’s astonished gaze, “Now that I’ve revealed my foreknowledge, I suppose that confirms for you that I cannot be trusted either?” Dark jumped up from his seat and fled down the incline toward the mansion. Uda frowned at her father in obvious frustration, then shot after him.

“Dark! Dark, you’d better get back up here!” Her voice faded as the two of them disappeared into the gardens below.

After a still moment, which Seagryn used to absorb this shock, Chaom spoke up for the two of them. “Now that the children have left us, I think it’s time Seagryn and I heard about this plan.”

Seagryn nodded and looked at Paumer. The merchant first glanced sidelong at Sheth, then smiled. “It’s not a secret, not really. We’ve just needed to meet like this in order to explain it fully to everyone. Ah — before I share the solution to our problem, let me make clear the need, as I understand it. The fragments of the old One Land — I’m sorry Wilker, but I must speak frankly,” he interjected, and Wilker waved at him to continue. “The fragments do not trust one another, for they have no common goal. They are seeking their own interests, not realizing how much more we would all be able to accomplish if we would simply work together!”

“And how much more easily you could enrich yourself,” Seagryn thought, but he didn’t interrupt.

“But why should we expect our respective fragments to work together? There’s no apparent reason for them to do so. What we of the Grand Council must do is provide such a reason. How? By creating a common menace!”

“I thought you had already done that, Paumer,” Chaom said, scooting his chair backward in the grass, then leaning back in it and lacing his fingers behind his thick neck. “Isn’t your trading concern our common menace?”

Paumer lost his temper. “My house has prevented more wars than you have fought battles, Chaom! Remove the House of Paumer from this society and the economy of every fragment would —”

“Please!” Ranoth shouted, slapping his hand on the table, and Paumer stopped. “I think Chaom was jesting. Go on, Paumer.”

“Very well.” The merchant sniffed. “As I said, to create a common problem for all fragments that none could solve alone would force them to join together.” Paumer warmed again to his subject. “And we have the means at our disposal to create just such a disturbance!”

He paused to smile into the eyes of every person at the table. When he got to Seagryn, the new wizard cleared his throat and asked, “Ah — how?”

Paumer looked triumphantly at Sheth. “Many of you don’t appreciate how much of himself our bear friend invests in pioneering new uses of his shaper power. Perhaps one of the reasons you defeated him so easily, Seagryn, was that his mind has been elsewhere in these past few months, creating — a dragon!” Paumer again paused theatrically, but this was not news to most of those assembled, and Seagryn was too much on guard to react visibly.

“What sort of dragon?” he asked.

“A small one,” Sheth offered, sounding almost modest for once. “It’s a furry little two-headed beast. Not much like the dragons of legend, perhaps, but it does have wings and it can incinerate its enemies.” Sheth dimpled handsomely. “I try always to stay on its good side, myself.”

Seagryn leaned over the table and frowned down at Talarath, curious to see how the old man was taking all this hideous talk of magic. Strange — was the elder actually smiling again?

“And that, friends, is just a small dragon,” Paumer said, picking up where he’d left off. “Imagine the chaos a large dragon might be expected to cause? Why the fragments will be seeking one another’s counsel immediately, and we will be ready with a solution!”

“Create the problem, then assume total control while solving it.” Chaom nodded. “That sounds like a merchant’s way of thinking. I consider it a loathsome suggestion!”

“Why?” Paumer shot back. “Worse than bodies floating down the river through the heart of Haranamous? Haranian bodies, next time? Our purpose is to stop destruction, not cause it! Certainly, by making a large dragon and releasing it, we will cause some suffering along the way, but isn’t it worth it? A safer, united One Land justifies any suffering needed to attain it!”