Doom of the Dragon (38 page)

He held on to her, not wanting to let her go. Something deep inside told him that once he did, he would never hold her again.

“Aylaen…,” he began, fear clutching at him.

She stopped his words with a kiss, then slipped out of his embrace. “Torval walk with you, my love, my husband.”

Skylan walked away from her, not letting himself look back, knowing that if he did, his heart would fail him.

*   *   *

Skylan joined Wulfe, who led him around the house to a different part of the garden, where a thick stand of walnut trees had been overrun by blackberry bushes, some grown to the height of a man.

“There's a door in the wall on the other side of those bushes,” said Wulfe.

The canes with their sharp thorns covered the ground and trailed up among the branches of the trees, so thick and tangled that Skylan started to draw his sword, prepared to chop his way through them.

Wulfe saw Skylan's hand on the hilt and hissed at him. “Stop it! No iron!”

“Then how do you propose we reach the door?” Skylan demanded.

“Magic,” said Wulfe, grinning, and he began to sing.

Wither leaves

And branches crack

I need to find

The right way back.

The canes began to writhe like snakes and a tunnel opened up, about large enough for a dog.

“You can fit through that,” Skylan said. “But what about me?”

“You just have to hunker down,” said Wulfe. He turned to wave to Owl Mother, Aylaen, and Farinn, who were watching from the doorway. “Good-bye!”

“Take a bath once in a while,” Aylaen called, waving back.

Wulfe started to duck through the blackberry bushes, then he stopped, turned, and dashed back to the dwelling. He flung his arms around Aylaen in a fierce hug, and then ran back.

Skylan looked at Aylaen. A ray of sunlight gilded her hair burnished red-gold. She put her hand to her lips, then waved farewell. He touched the amulet he wore.

“Torval, watch over my beloved wife, keep her safe.”

Wulfe dropped onto all fours and crawled through the hole in the bushes. Skylan hunkered down, as ordered, and squeezed through the canes, snapping off branches and scratching his arms on the thorns.

He found the door, which was old and weathered and looked as if a breath could blow it open. Skylan shoved on it and it did not budge, though he could see no sign of a bar or lock. Wulfe stood watching him with a grin on his face.

“More magic?” Skylan asked.

Wulfe nodded and, tapping on the door three times, he began to sing.

Realm of Fire

Realm of Stone

Take us back

To our home

“‘Home' and ‘stone' don't really rhyme,” Wulfe added in a whispered aside to Skylan. “But the magic doesn't know that.”

The door started to swing open. Wulfe looked back at Skylan. “Where are we going?”

“
I'm
going to my ship,” said Skylan. “You're going back to your mother.”

Wulfe thrust out his lower lip. “I'm not. I'm coming with you. You need me.”

“Like an arrow in my backside,” said Skylan. “Wulfe, there's going to be fighting, blood and swords…”

Wulfe cast him a sly glance. “Since Aylaen's gone, who's going to talk to the dragon?”

Skylan glared at him. “You claim the dragon doesn't like you.”

“He doesn't,” Wulfe conceeded. “But I can talk to him and you can't.”

“Dela Eden can talk to dragons…”

“But do you want her talking to
our
dragon?” Wulfe asked.

Skylan didn't. He had come to like Dela Eden, but he wasn't quite ready to trust her completely. She was a Cyclopes and their ways were not the ways of the Vindrasi.

“I don't think the Dragon Kahg would want to hear you call him ‘our' dragon,” said Skylan.

“Then I can come?” said Wulfe.

“So long as you'll do what I tell you to do,” said Skylan.

Wulfe grinned and, taking hold of Skylan's hand, led the way through the door and onto the deck of the
Venejekar
.

 

BOOK

3

 

CHAPTER

32

Raegar had ordered the commander of his flagship,
Aelon's Miracle
, to wait to make landfall until the troops were ready to receive him with the ceremony due to the Emperor of Oran. He needed to put on a show, not only for his soldiers and the priests. The Stormlords would be watching.

Raegar's barge, painted purple and adorned with gold, ferried him to shore, where slaves had spread red carpets so that he would not soil his feet on the sand.

He was wearing new ceremonial armor made of steel adorned with gold and silver serpents, matching shin guards and bracers, a purple cape that hung from golden clasps at his shoulders, and a golden crown fashioned in the form of a serpent biting its tail, with ruby eyes and glittering diamond scales.

He was accompanied by a personal guard in similar armor, though not decked out in gold, wearing helms trimmed with purple plumage. The men had been selected for their height, each standing well over six feet, and they were an impressive sight. His standard-bearers led the procession, followed by Aelon's standards and two priests with sour expressions, angry that Raegar's standards came first.

The two were wearing white robes with golden serpents embroidered on the back and they had their heads together, whispering as they walked. These two had been on board his ship as representatives of the priest-general, who had remained behind to rule Sinaria in the emperor's absence. The priests had always hated him and they did not believe his account of Treia's mysterious disappearance. He knew, because he had caught them questioning his slaves and servants, though, of course, the priests denied it.

Raegar made a mental note to see to it that their names headed the list of those who died in battle.

As he walked across the carpet, basking in the cheers of his soldiers, a winged shadow swept over him. He glanced up with pride to see Fala circling high above him, glaring down at him. Extending her feet, she curled her claws, like a hawk prepared to dive down on a mouse. Raegar hurriedly looked away.

Fala had been furious to hear of Treia's death. The dragon and Treia had formed a bond and when she heard Treia was dead, Fala had threatened to leave Raegar's service and take the other two dragons who had recently arrived with her. Aelon had been forced to intercede with Fala, promising the dragon her pick of the jewels from the rich city of the Stormlords. Fala had allowed herself to be persuaded on one condition—that he summon her using sand gathered from the beach, making her and the other two dragons out of earth, the strongest of the four elements.

Raegar had deemed a fire dragon more useful in fighting the Stormlords, but he dared not argue. Fala and the other two flew above the parade, their scales the brownish color of the mixture of sand and dirt he had slathered on the spiritbones.

Fala was scanning the skies; undoubtedly searching for her mortal foe, the Dragon Kahg. The traitor dragons had told him Skylan and his ragtag army of subhuman ogres and freakish Cyclopes had made landfall on the Spirit Coast. Unfortunately, they had lost track of them since. Fala and the other dragons were searching for Kahg and Raegar had sent out scouting parties to find Skylan.

He made an inspection of the troops and oversaw the preparations for war. This involved walking among the tents with the hot sun beating down on his head, and Raegar began to regret the purple cape and heavy armor. But only a few miles to the north of where he had established camp, thunder clouds boiled, lightning flared, and torrential rains fell on the plateau below.

The Stormlord's city of Tsa Kerestra hides among those clouds,
the spies had written.
When the magic of the stormhold is activated, the gate to the city will open.

“Let them bluster,” Raegar remarked as he observed with satisfaction the various types of war machines: ballistae and the stone-throwing onagers, siege towers and battering rams. “Much good a few rain clouds will do them.”

Once his inspection was complete, Raegar made a brief speech to his soldiers, then went to the royal pavilion, which had been outfitted with every luxury. Raegar looked around with pleasure. Slaves had spread soft rugs on the floor and carried in chairs and couches and his ornately carved wood-framed bed, so heavy it required ten men to haul it from the ship.

Looking at the bed, Raegar felt a cold qualm creep into his bowels, for he had been accustomed to sharing that bed with Treia. Her smell seemed to linger on the bedclothes, making him gag, and he longed to order the damn thing be hauled off and burned. He dared not do so, however, for that would cause talk and increase the suspicions of the priests.

He scowled, his pleasure in his tent gone and he cursed Treia roundly. Even dead, she continued to plague him. He found some consolation in the cradle they had set up for his son. The baby would remain on board his ship in the care of the wet nurse until the war was over. When Raegar was crowned king of Tsa Kerestra, he would carry his son with him as he rode his chariot through the city in triumph.

The heat in the tent was stifling. Raegar was sweating in his armor and he walked outside into the fresh air to find Eolus speaking to the commander in charge of the search detail.

“Have they located the dragonships of the Vindrasi?” Raegar demanded.

“They saw no sign of them, sir,” Eolus reported. “But they did find evidence that there was a battle.”

“Blood soaked into the sand, sir,” said the commander. “Shields and weapons, broken spears and arrows. The tide had washed much of the evidence away, but we did see some huge footprints that could belong only to ogres among others that were human.”

“Battle?” Raegar was puzzled. “Who did they fight?”

If the Stormlords would not fight him, he could not see why they should bother with Skylan.

“Looks to me as if they ended up fighting each other, sir,” said the commander. “Likely they had a falling out.”

“No bodies?” Raegar asked.

The commander shook his head. “If there had been, they would have been carried out to sea or devoured by wild beasts. Or worse.”

“Worse?” Raegar asked.

“Ghouls. We are very near the land of the fae, sir,” said Eolus.

“Too damn near,” Raegar muttered. “Once Aelon reigns supreme, she will wipe out that scourge.”

“They did find evidence that before the battle, the filthy savages paid a visit to the stormhold,” Eolus continued. “Perhaps that was what they fought over.”

Raegar grunted. Having been born one of those “filthy savages,” Raegar wondered if Eolus was aware that he had just insulted his emperor. Raegar had left that part of his life far behind him, but he knew others—especially among the noble classes and the upper echelons of the priesthood—remembered the days when the slave, Raegar, had walked ten paces behind his master.

Eolus returned Raegar's scrutiny with equanimity and Raegar relaxed. His soldiers admired him; perhaps for the very reason that the priests did not. Raegar was a warrior—one of them. Affairs of state either bored him or galled him. He likened the priests to Aelon's serpents; tangled in a writhing knot, each head striking at the others.

Although not a particularly good emperor, Raegar was a good general. His men deemed him strict, but fair. They liked and admired him because he looked out for their welfare. Raegar made certain that his soldiers, sailors, and rowers were well paid
and
well fed. An army marches on its belly, as the saying goes.

“Did they do any damage?” Raegar asked.

“As you commanded, sir, we did not enter the stormhold, but we saw no signs of damage,” the commander replied.

“Do you want the men to keep searching, sir?” Eolus asked.

Raegar was Emperor of Oran, commanding twelve thousand troops, the largest army ever assembled in the history of the world. He was about to force powerful wizards to kneel before him. If he continued to expend manpower and resources searching for a few hundred “filthy savages,” his soldiers would start to doubt his leadership, if not his sanity.

“So Skylan is out there,” Raegar muttered. “So he has four spiritbones. What of it? He won't get the fifth. And even
he
isn't stupid enough to attack an army that is better equipped, more skilled in fighting, and outnumbers him ten to one. It's just … I keep killing him and the bastard won't die!”

“What did you say, sir?” Eolus asked.

“I was going over battle plans,” Raegar responded. “What did you ask me?”

“If you wanted us to keep searching for the Vindrasi?”

“That won't be necessary,” Raegar answered. “As you say, it is obvious they had a falling out. What can you expect of savages?”

Eolus and the other commander both laughed.

Raegar glanced at the sun crawling toward its zenith. Morning was advancing. Time to get started.

“Assemble the troops,” he ordered. “And summon the priests. We are going to the stormhold.”

Eolus and his guard and the elite troops chosen to accompany the emperor to the stormhold were ready to depart within minutes. Raegar was forced to wait for the priests. He had told them to stay in one location so that they would be ready to leave and while a few had done as he ordered, most of the others had wandered off to gape at the siege machines or investigate and then complain about the fact that they had to sleep in tents.

Raegar was angered, but he feigned nonchalance. If the priests hoped to make him lose his temper in public, they were in for disappointment. He spent his time studying the stormhold on the promontory through a spyglass, commenting on its features and discussing strategy with Eolus and the other commanders, although all he could think about were the pain-twisted faces of the two dead spies. The traitor Baldev had assured him the spies had given him the secret of how to undo magic. But Baldev was a wizard and therefore not to be trusted. Aelon had claimed she had killed the priests, but she could also be lying in order to trick him into thinking he had nothing to fear from the magic. Raegar had not lost faith in Aelon, but he was starting to realize that he should be putting his own interests first.