“Goodman Neb,” she said. “May I ask you a favor?”
“Certainly, my lady.” Neb bowed again. “I’d be honored.”
“Could you give this to Lady Galla?” Solla handed him a message tube, sealed at both ends.
“Nothing would be easier, and I’d be glad to.” Neb tucked the tube inside his shirt and settled it against his belt to keep it there.
“I do hope she’s well? It seems like such a lonely life, out there on the border.”
“She’s doing well, indeed. And she has company now, her niece, Lady Branna.”
“Oh, how nice for her.” But Lady Solla’s voice had turned flat, and she bit her lower lip. “I’ve not seen Branna for many years now. She was such a pretty child. No doubt she’s grown into a great beauty.”
“Not precisely, my lady. Now, I happen to think she’s the most beautiful lass in all Deverry, but most men would call her pretty or handsome.”
“Ah, I see.” Solla smiled again. “And does Branna favor you, perhaps?”
Neb suddenly realized that he’d been indiscreet, perhaps dangerously so. “I’m but a scribe in her uncle’s dun,” Neb said. “I assure you I’m always mindful of that.”
“Oh, come now, there’s no need to despair! After all, she’s a lass with no dowry, no position to speak of. If she decides that her rank matters naught, well, then, it won’t matter, will it?” Solla lowered her voice. “Should I see her again, I’ll speak well of you to her.”
“Would you?” Neb could feel himself grin and hastily sobered his expression. “My thanks, my lady, my great thanks.”
As the warband was mounting up, Neb noticed the lady standing in the doorway and watching them. From the direction of her glance, he could tell that it was Gerran who drew her interest. Oho! he thought. No wonder she was so kind to me. She thinks Branna is her rival. And of course, in a way she’s quite right. Neb urged his horse up next to the captain’s.
“Do you see Lady Solla over there?” he said. “She’s certainly a lovely lass.”
“I suppose.” Gerran scowled at him. “What—”
“I think she favors you highly. You’re a lucky man, Captain.”
“Ye gods! You’re as bad as that babbling gerthddyn!”
But Gerran did look the lady’s way and make her a half-bow from the saddle, a gesture that made her smile and acknowledge the captain with a ladylike wave. In smug satisfaction, Neb clucked to his horse and rode back to his place, farther down the line of march.
Only later did he hear his own voice speaking in his memory, saying that to him Branna was “the most beautiful lass in all Deverry.” A rush of feeling came with the memory: elation, triumph, and fear, all tangled together. He knew that he’d solved the riddle, that the dead lass of his dreams was indeed Branna, but how they could be the same person was a second riddle, and one that would take him a long time to solve.
After some searching, Salamander found an inn that catered to humans, not dwarves, or to be precise, he found a reasonably clean room above a tavern with a stable for his horses. Most merchants of the taller sort came with caravans and camped outside the town gates. Before he went out to work the market, he changed from his shabby riding clothes into a pair of new brigga of fine gray wool and a linen shirt, as stiff as canvas from the luxurious embroideries of flowers and interlace ments on the sleeves and yokes. Inside the shirt, under the concealing embroideries, lay loops of thread and little pockets where he hid the various items for his sleight-of-hand tricks.
The rest of his gear he stowed in a corner, then stuck his head out of the door and called to the tavern owner’s lad, a boy who was trying, with very limited success, to raise his first mustache.
“A bargain for you, lad.” Salamander reached up into empty air and produced ten shiny copper coins, which he spread across his palm. “See these coins?”
“I do, sir.” The lad’s eyes had gone very wide.
“Good. Now, I desire to go out and walk around the market, but I also desire to find all of my possessions here when I get back. Do you think you can keep them safe?”
“I can, sir.”
“Very well. Here’s the bargain. If everything’s safe, you get the coins. However, if anything’s missing, I dock you one coin for each stolen good. Fair?”
“Very fair, sir.” The lad crossed his arms over his chest and leaned back against the door. “I’ll not have much work to do till later, so I can stay here.”
Up on the commons hill, the market swarmed with farmers selling produce, craftsmen manning little wooden booths, townsfolk haggling with peddlers, horse-traders parading their stock back and forth. Salamander wandered through, studying everyone and everything, and planned his strategy. From Dallandra he knew a fair bit about the dragons already, but they provided an excellent way to open conversations. To ask right out about Horsekin might be dangerous at worst, if they should have a spy in Cengarn, or at the least, a good way to frighten off any potential informants.
Eventually Salamander found an empty ale barrel. He rolled it to a level spot, then turned it upside down and climbed on top of it. When a few people paused to watch him, he took a pair of silk scarves from his shirt. He flung them in the air, caught them, made them disappear up his sleeve and produced them again from his collar. A dozen fascinated children flocked around. After a few more scarf tricks, the crowd swelled to include adults.
“Good morrow, good citizens of Cengarn,” Salamander said. “I am Salamander, a gerthddyn from Eldidd, come to amuse, distract, and delight you. Have you heard of Cadwallon, the mighty sorcerer who dwelt in the fabled halls of King Bran? Do you know that he once tamed a dragon with soft words alone?”
Most of those crowded around called out, “We don’t!” When they all sat down on the ground, Salamander climbed down from the barrel. He proceeded to tell the tale for free while the crowd grew to a profitable size. At that point he made a great show of coughing and clearing his throat.
“Alas, good people, I am far too thirsty, parched veri tably, to continue.”
The crowd laughed, and some flung copper coins his way. As he collected them, a small boy trotted over with a tankard of ale.
“From my da,” the boy said. “He’ll want the tankard back.”
“I’ll make sure he gets it.” Salamander took a long swallow. “And very good ale it is.”
He finished the tale and the tankard together, punctuating the one with sips from the other. More coins came his way, which he answered with profound thanks; then he gave the empty tankard back to the boy.
“Well, lad,” he said. “Did you enjoy the tale?”
“I did, sir. We’ve got dragons round here. Did you know that?”
“I’d heard it, truly. One black and one silver, is that right?”
“It is, but we don’t see the silver one much. Just the black one.” The boy sighed with a sad shake of his head. “She steals cows now and then. My da says there’s naught to be done about it. Dragons are just like that.”
Salamander sent the boy back to his father, then strolled through the market fair. Now that he’d made himself known as an entertainer—a rare and precious thing here on the edge of the kingdom—everyone was willing to strike up a conversation about the local dragons. While he learned little new, it did become clear that the silver dragon tended to shun human settlements, whether farm or town, while the black showed no fear of nor shyness around anyone or anything.
“A fair pest she can be,” said a woman who was selling chunks of roast pork on sticks. “I’m just glad she scorns pig when she can get beef.”
“She can’t take too many of your animals,” Salamander said. “Or she’d have eaten the town out of house and home by now.”
“True-spoken, good sir. She must hunt venison, mostly, and other wild creatures. I suppose a good cow is a treat, like, to her. The silver one must eat mostly deer, or maybe a nice fat bear now and again.”
Salamander smiled, but his stomach twisted in disgust
at the thought of his brother killing game and eating it raw. He’s not really Rhodry any longer, he reminded himself. But still, the image appalled him, especially the thought of eating bears, laden with worms and other parasites. He went searching for more ale to wash the mental taste away.
Down near the town gates he found a temporary tavern, a round canvas roof on poles sheltering a cluster of ale barrels in the center. Men stood around, drinking from pottery stoups chained to the barrels, but one white-haired fellow was sitting on a three-legged stool and holding an unchained mug. Salamander stood everyone a tankard, a good investment, since he at last found the informant he’d been hoping for.
“Dragons, eh?” One of the drinkers pointed to the seated elder. “Now, if it’s talk of dragons you want, our Mallo there’s the man to ask.”
When Mallo raised his mug in a friendly way, Salamander hunkered down in front of him.
“So you know a bit about dragons, do you?” Salamander said.
“I do, and more than a bit. I was captain of the town watch when the Horsekin sieged our town, and the black dragon was part of the relieving army. Arzosah, her name is.”
“Were you now? Well, I’ve had a bit of luck, then. How big is she?”
“Big as a house, I’d say. Not so big as the gwerbret’s broch tower, though there are some as will tell you so. But a good twenty-odd feet long, she were.” Mallo paused to grin, revealing a few black stumps of teeth. “Oh, it were a sight, gerthddyn! There were them there filthy Horsekin, arrogant as all get out, riding their cursed big horses. Parading around the walls, they were, thousands of ’em, thinking they were going to storm our gates.” Mallo leaned over and set his mug on the ground to free both hands. He crossed them, hooked his thumbs together, and waggled his spread fingers for wings. “Swoop! Down she comes, and that berserker silver dagger riding her. Oh, it were a sight and a half! The horses, they panicked and threw their blasted riders right off. I leaned against a merlon on the wall and laughed till I cursed near shat, I tell you. A beautiful sight, it were.”
“I wish I’d been there to see it.”
“Huh! You wouldn’t have wanted to have been trapped there, gerthddyn.” Mallo paused for a strengthening swig of ale. “Thought we were all doomed, we did, with them filthy dogs of Horsekin swarming round the walls, and their bitch of a goddess.”
“I think I’ve heard of that goddess,” Salamander said. “Alshandra’s her name?”
“It is. Or was, I should say. Heh, no goddess at all, truly. Some sort of trick, is what she was.” For a moment Mallo’s expression clouded, as if he were remembering something puzzling. “Don’t know how the filthy Horsekin did it, but some sort of trick.” He shrugged the puzzle away. “Some of the folk farther out believed in her, though, and them two traitor lords did, too.”
Dallandra had told Salamander about the two noble-born brothers who had worshiped Alshandra, but she’d never given him a clear idea of the geography around Cengarn. “These lords,” Salamander said, “they held demesnes off to the west, did they?”
“North, not west, up in on the edge of the wild country. A good thirty mile, I’d say, if not a bit more.”
“Near the foothills,” a skinny red-haired fellow put in. “The ones that rise up to the Roof of the World.”
“But not so far as all that,” Mallo said. “Now, the river that runs hard by Cengarn? Follow it, and it’ll take you there. Well, should you be a-wanting to go, of course.”
A few more well-phrased questions on Salamander’s part brought him to the captured priest of Alshandra. He’d died recently enough that all the men in the tavern knew the story.
“His name was Zaklof,” the red-haired fellow said. “A miserable excuse for a man, if you ask me, but he died bravely enough. The gwerbret’s men kept offering him food, more to tease him, like, than to save him, but he turned it all down. My daughter was working in the kitchen up at the dun, and she saw it all.”
“You know,” Salamander said. “Zaklof’s tale could be profitable for a man like me. I’ve heard somewhat about it, but not enough, truly. Did your daughter ever discuss this goddess of his? Or what he believed about her, truly?”
“She did. She was impressed, like, that he’d hold so true.” He rolled his eyes. “Easily impressed, she was, but what do you expect from a young lass, eh? She nattered on a good bit about his beliefs.”
Another round of ale, and the fellow was glad enough to repeat all he remembered on the subject. Some of the other men joined in with bits and pieces of information about this new kind of religion, though they all mocked it, and quite sincerely.
“Still,” Salamander said at last, “it makes a good story. Now, the Horsekin had taken some of our people prisoners, hadn’t they?”
“They had,” Mallo said. “Some lasses and children, but the gwerbret’s men rescued them.”
“Ah, that sounds promising. Lasses in danger always add life to a tale. Do they live in Cengarn?”
“Not that I know of. Farm women, they were, or so I heard.” He gestured at his stiff leg. “I wasn’t riding with the rescue party.”
“Now, one of them,” the red-haired fellow joined in, “she married a man who farms north of here, Canna her name is. They hold land in the old Mawrvelin demesne.”
“I’d like to talk to her,” Salamander said. “I need some details, you see, to make the tale a good one.”
“I don’t remember her man’s name.” He frowned into his tankard for a moment. “She was a pretty little thing back then. Red hair down to her waist.”
“Who holds those demesnes now, anyway?” Salamander said. “The ones that used to belong to the traitor lords, I mean. It sounds like there’s another good story in that.”
Mallo answered him this time. “The priests of Bel have the big ’un, the one that used to belong to that wormy dog of a Matyc. His brother Tren’s dun went to a cousin line. The current lord, now, let me think—Honelg, his name is.”
“Honelg? That’s a strange sort of name.”
“He’s a strange sort of man.” Mallo shrugged elaborately. “But then, that whole clan’s always been a bit strange, up there on the edge of nowhere like they are.”
Salamander spent the rest of the day wandering around the market, stopping now and then to chat with local farmers. By late afternoon he’d pieced together a fairly good idea of the country to the north of town as well as the details of Zaklof’s death, which had left a strong impression in everyone’s mind. He bought market fare for his dinner, then went back to his room over the tavern. He paid the tavern lad—all of his possessions were safe and sound—then took his meal inside and barred the door.
Once he’d eaten, he had dweomerwork to do, and he didn’t care to be interrupted. Since it was far too warm to light a fire, he sat in the window seat and looked out at the sunset sky. Wisps and streamers of clouds, caught in the scarlet light, made a serviceable scrying focus. He contacted Dallandra easily and told her what he’d learned at the market fair.
“So I’ll travel north on the morrow,” Salamander finished up. “There’s a woman up there who was taken prisoner by the Horsekin some years ago. She may know useful things, such as where she was when the warband rescued her.”
“That’s true,” Dallandra thought to him. “After you find her, what next?”
“It depends on what she tells me, but most likely I’ll keep going north. At one point there was quite a colony of Alshandra worshipers up there, thanks to a certain Lord Matyc, who seems to have been a traitor. His demesne is now in the hands of the priests of Bel, so I’m not going to find a flourishing temple or the like, but again, someone might remember some useful thing.”
“Matyc certainly was a traitor. Do you know why the priests have that land?”
“I don’t, why?”
Dallandra’s image appeared troubled. “Your brother killed Matyc in a trial by combat. The priests presided, and the demesne was their reward.”
“I’d better watch what
I say, then, about Rhodry and Alshandra both.”
“You should be careful, no matter where you are. It’s dangerous, scouting for Horsekin.”
“I do realize that, oh princess of powers perilous. If I’m going to find them before the summer’s out, I’ll need to work fast, too. It’s a pity that I have to ride or walk. If I could only fly—”
“It’s too soon for that.” In the cloud-vision her expression turned stern. “Your mind isn’t fully stable yet.”
“It never truly was, or so Nevyn always told me.”
“Don’t jest!” She shook her head in irritation. “Taking bird form’s a tremendous strain. Do you want to go mad again? You didn’t seem to much like it before.”
“True enough, O Mistress of Magicks Mysterious. Don’t worry. I’ll follow your orders.”
“I don’t want you to follow what I say like orders. I want you to understand why I’m saying it.”
“I do see. My apologies. I’m jesting, just as you said, and truly, I do know better.”
In the morning, Salamander left Cengarn and followed the river north. Close to town lay free farms, that is, those owned by freemen who owed loyalty directly to the gwerbrets of Cengarn with no tax-taking lords in between. Their lands, nestled between rolling hills, stretched green with pastures and burgeoning crops. Everywhere he stopped, Salamander heard stories about the dragons. A great many farmers had lost cows to them, or so they claimed with varying amounts of hard evidence. One man did show Salamander a cowhide he’d tanned. It bore the long gashes made by huge claws.
“I keep it to remember the cursed thing by,” the farmer said. “It’s not often you lose a cow to a dragon, and I thank all the gods for that! Look here, all I found was this hunk of leather, licked clean inside, and the horns and hooves. Blasted dragon had eaten everything else.”
“Was this the silver or the black?”
“The black. She carried the cow off in the twilight, so it was hard to see. The silver one would have stood out, like.”
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