Vagrants: Book 2 Circles of Light series (23 page)

‘We study the use of
such objects,’ said Lashek. ‘I do not recall anything resembling
this – it looks much like an egg don’t you think? But I would like
you to take a copy of this drawing back to your archives in Fira
and Kedara and see if you have any similar diagrams in your oldest
records. You also Thryssa.’

‘Of course,’ Thryssa
agreed. She sighed. ‘I confess I feel as though we have been
plunged into fog while trying to cross quicksand. I have this
sensation of great urgency about all this for which I can give no
reason.’

Orsim touched her arm
as he rose from his chair. ‘I think we all realise the need for
haste in coming up with some answers quickly Thryssa. And we will
hurry back to our Circles at once. We will send birds with copies
of any written evidence we may find difficult to interpret but
suspect may have a bearing on this matter. And I suggest we link
our minds at sunset each day to exchange our news.’

Kallema also stood with
her Councillor, Prilla, and both bowed to the others.

‘We will do all we can
in Fira and will join the mind link each sunset.’ Kallema
murmured.

The two water mages
flowed to the door rather than walked, their hair seeming to shift
and blur their shapes.

Orsim and Maressa made
their farewells and followed the Firans out of the council
chamber.

‘I will leave Imshish
here Thryssa. He was researching in the Cordiva before this problem
arose. Is that acceptable to you?’

‘Of course.’ Thryssa
smiled warmly at both men. ‘Imshish is always very welcome
here.’

‘I will leave at once
then.’ Lashek hitched his robe more tidily around his portly frame.
‘I suspect things will become even more interesting before we solve
this puzzle.’ He beamed at Thryssa and Alya and stumped from the
room.

‘More interesting?’
Alya echoed.

‘Stars forfend!’
groaned Thryssa.

Chapter
Sixteen

Hargon, Navan, and
Frinkel – included for his skills with both bow and writing stick -
and an escort of thirty armsmen maintained a fast pace north. By
the middle of the third day, they sighted the lodge that was their
destination, perched on its sheltered plateau in front of the
mountain face. As they paused at the crest of a ridge, an arms man
rode towards them from a stand of tall evergreens. He saluted
Hargon and Hargon nodded in satisfaction. The men set to protect
his children were taking their duties seriously. Not that he had
expected any less of them of course.

By the time the company
arrived, the sun was sinking behind the mountain protecting the
rear of the lodge and there was a distinct chill in the air. Smoke
trailed like thin scars across the reddening sky and Hargon was as
glad as he knew his men to be at the thought of a good hot meal and
a proper bed to sleep in, rather than another night on the open
trail this early in the season.

His sons were excited
by his arrival. The female child stood a distance apart as she
watched the hearty greetings her brothers exchanged with Lord
Hargon. Hargon moved towards the main room of the lodge where food
was already being set out, his hands on his sons’ shoulders. As he
sat at the long table and waved his sons to sit beside him, his
eyes met those of the small child. She dropped her gaze immediately
and pressed closer to the elderly females who had charge of her.
But Hargon believed he had seen gladness in Mena’s expression. He
decided he must risk speaking with her soon, as if she was a real
person like his sons and not just a female. Not right now
though.

When finally Bannor and
Bartos had been sent to their beds and the room was cleared and
tidied, Hargon dragged his carved wooden armchair closer to the
hearth. Tomorrow he would speak seriously to Bannor and tell him of
the Merig’s news. He frowned at the dying fire. Would Bannor be
able to grasp this news or would he think his father gone mad? And
the female - what of her? Navan had warned him of Rhaki’s interest
in Mena and the Merig had repeated that warning.

But of what importance
could a young female have in the scheme of things, he pondered.
Generations had passed since females had any say in the way the
world worked. They were for the breeding of sons now. History
taught that it was females who had brought destruction and chaos to
Sapphrea: what good could possibly come from allowing them to rise
even a finger’s width from their present insignificance? Fretting
over such unaccustomed ideas, Hargon slept the night in his hard
wooden chair.

The ashes were barely
warm when the Lord of Return jolted awake and groaned as he flexed
the stiffness from his arms and back. He turned to the window where
a faint greyness suggested dawn was near. A female servant came
into the room, halting with a gasp as she saw the Lord standing
there. He noted the pail of kindling in one hand and larger sticks
bundled in her apron.

‘Carry on,’ he
muttered. ‘No. Ask someone to fetch me some tea first.’

Pail and sticks
clattered to the floor as the female turned and fled to the
kitchen. Moments later a manservant appeared with a lidded jug of
spice tea and a drinking bowl on a tray, which he offered to the
Lord. Hargon dismissed him and poured some tea for himself. Sipping
the scalding tea, he opened the outer door and moved onto the wide
balcony that ran round three sides of the lodge.

He leaned against one
of the supporting pillars and watched as the sky changed from a
murky grey to pearl pink. A movement caught his eye and he looked
along the length of the balcony. He stiffened as he saw that a
Merig was perched at the corner. And sitting next to the Merig, her
back towards Hargon, was his female child, Mena. The Merig
clattered its beak and flapped heavily across the open space
fronting the lodge. It landed, muttering throatily, on a branch of
an evergreen.

Hargon moved hesitantly
towards his daughter. Her face was still a pale blur in the early
light as she looked up at him, but he saw apprehension in the
widening eyes. She kept quite still, as if hoping he might not
really have noticed her. Hargon lowered himself to sit on the
balcony’s edge near, but not too near, her. She ducked her head,
keeping her eyes on her hands.

The Lord cleared his
throat and glanced across at the Merig. The hunched black shape in
the tree glared back at him. Hargon offered his tea bowl to the
girl. She looked up quickly in surprise and shook her blonde head,
murmuring: ‘No thank you Sir Lord.’

‘Was that Merig talking
in your head?’ Hargon asked abruptly.

Mena’s hands clutched
each other in her lap as she nodded.

‘It spoke to me in
Return a few days past,’ he said casually.

‘He.’

‘What did you
say?’

‘He, Sir Lord. The
Merig is a he.’

‘Oh.’ Hargon was
nonplussed by the seemingly irrelevant remark but gathered his wits
firmly as the Merig’s rasping croak sounded again from the
evergreen.

‘Well. HE told me
several strange things. What could he have told you I wonder,’
Hargon asked in an unusually kind tone.

‘He says Dragons will
come here soon, bringing riders from Gaharn Sir Lord. He says all
the riders are to be trusted as true friends but one rider is of
great importance.’ Mena hesitated, her frown telling Hargon that
she was trying to remember the Merig’s words exactly. ‘One rider is
of great importance – in the destruction of the Grey Lord. Also
that many things will change in these lands Sir Lord.’

She glanced briefly up
at Hargon’s face then her gaze returned to her clasped
hands.

Hargon was fully aware
that the Merig had clearly chosen to tell this female child of his
more or less what he himself had been told. Was the Merig simple
minded that he should tell his messages to anyone who would listen,
Hargon wondered. There could surely be no purpose in a Merig
speaking to a child and a female one at that, in the same manner as
to a Lord of Sapphrea. Could there?

Sounds now indicated
that the household was awake and Hargon stood up. His finger lifted
Mena’s chin, forcing her face up to meet his eyes.

‘We will talk more of
this later when I have time to spare.’

He turned to walk
beside the balcony to the main door, reaching the shallow steps as
Bartos emerged.

‘Good morning.’ Lord
Hargon smiled at his younger son.

Bartos gave a cursory
bow. ‘Good morning Sir Lord. Will we go hunting this
day?’

Bannor had followed
Bartos out and nudged him with a sharp elbow as he bowed more
formally and greeted his father.

‘I think not this day,’
Hargon replied. ‘I have matters to attend to.’

Bartos stuck out his
lower lip discontentedly as Hargon passed both boys to go inside.
He re-emerged a few moments later to tell Bannor to stay nearby, as
he would call for him shortly. Bannor bowed again then stood
straight, making himself as tall as he could. Hargon turned away,
hiding a smile, but the smile disappeared as he saw Bartos at the
corner of the balcony, kicking something beneath its wooden
boards.

‘Bartos,’ he called
sharply. ‘What do you do there?’

Bartos jumped, but
looked up at Hargon with innocent eyes. Hargon went down the steps
and strode to his youngest child’s side, realising as he did that
the Merig was croaking furiously from its perch in the
evergreen.

‘Move aside,’ he
ordered Bartos curtly.

The boy moved slowly
away from the balcony’s overhang. Hargon stared down into the
shadowed darkness, seeing nothing. Then he bent lower and met wide
eyes staring back at him from under the boards. Hargon
straightened.

‘Take yourself to your
tutor at once boy. You will study with him until I send for
you.’

‘But. .’ Bartos’ eyes
filled with tears.

‘You question my
command?’ Hargon’s eyebrows rose in astonishment.

‘Nno Sir
Lord.’

Hargon watched as
Bartos trailed back to the lodge. He stared up at the rapidly
lightening sky and seemed to speak to empty air as he asked: ‘Are
you hurt?’

‘No Sir Lord, not
much.’ Mena’s shaky whisper just reached Hargon’s ears.

‘Come to my workroom
after your noonday meal.’ He moved away as Navan came round the
side of the building.

Navan saluted as he
reached Hargon, a question in his eyes as he studied his Lord’s
face.

‘Let us walk Navan. I
would see where these Dragons might land and how best we could hide
bowmen.’

Navan and Hargon spent
more than half of the morning surveying the open expanse before the
lodge. Evergreens curved like protective arms from each side of the
lodge and a few broad-leaved trees grew beyond them. Hargon
belatedly remembered to summon Bannor and had a difficult
conversation with his elder son. Bannor clearly had grave doubts as
to Merigs bringing messages, and peer as he might, Hargon could see
no sign of any Merigs who could just prove to the boy the truth of
what he had heard.

Hargon picked at his
food at midday, disheartened by the doubts he had seen in Bannor’s
face. Finally he ordered Navan to assemble all the men garrisoned
here as well as the escort they’d brought, and tell them there may
possibly be a visit from Dragons bearing riders. Navan grimaced and
Hargon grinned unsympathetically.

‘It is your job Navan,
the day to day dealings with armsmen’

‘Yes Sir Lord.’ Navan
didn’t sound comforted.

The Lord of Return made
his way upstairs to a small turret room on the north-eastern corner
of the lodge. Frinkel had already put parchment ready for use and
Hargon dropped into his chair despondently. A faint scratch at the
door reminded him that he had told Mena to attend him.

‘Come,’ he said
quietly.

The child slid around
the edge of the door, closed it and stood before his table, head
lowered. Again, all he could see was the top of the white-blonde
head. Hargon sighed.

‘Look at
me.’

Mena raised her face
and Hargon’s expression grew grim. Her lower lip was split and a
bruise darkened her left cheekbone.

‘And does Bartos often
treat you thus?’ he asked.

The huge violet blue
eyes met his steadily. ‘Not too often Sir Lord.’

‘Well then. Hmm. Well.
What do you know of these Dragon visitors we are to have
then?’

‘They come to help Sir
Lord.’ Mena’s eyes lit and she leaned forward against the table.
‘The Merig says. . .’ She stopped, her mouth slightly ajar and her
eyes unfocused. She smiled brilliantly and, formality forgotten,
dashed to the window, leaning out at a perilous angle. ‘They’re
nearly here!’ she cried, craning her head even further as Hargon
made an undignified grab at the back of her shirt. ‘Look! That’s
them! One of the Dragons spoke in my head.’ She twisted to stare
nose to nose at Hargon. ‘A Dragon spoke to me,’ she repeated.
Hargon squinted in the direction Mena pointed and saw four specks
in the far distance.