The Dragon At War

by Gordon R. Dickson

  Jim held his breath.

  The hand made its complete circle to the vertical position and stopped. Son Won Phon stepped forward and began to unroll the screen. There was a confident air about him as he began, but this disappeared as the widening gap in the screen showed more and more empty space within.

  By the time he was a third of the way around, Jim could see there was no elephant within.

  Son Won Phon suddenly threw up both arms in what seemed to Jim to be a gesture of both despair and anger. The screen vanished. There was no elephant there. The Observer vanished. Carolinus and Son Won Phon were left facing each other on the sand.

  All about Jim, seats began to empty as magicians also vanished; evidently leaving for their own places in typical magicians' manner. Jim felt suddenly free of the restraint that had held him in the seat. He tried to get up, and discovered the feeling had been correct.

  "Thanks for everything!" he said hastily to Lahti. "Got to go now!"

  He turned and began to run down the nearest aisle toward the bottom of the amphitheater and the open sand. Son Won Phon was ceremoniously bowing to Carolinus.

  Carolinus bowed back.

  Jim reached the bottom of the amphitheater and a stone barrier there, about waist high, that barred off the ranked seats from the sand below. He put a hand on the barrier and vaulted it neatly. Son Won Phon was once more bowing to Carolinus. Jim started toward them just as Carolinus returned the bow. Son Won Phon bowed a third time, Carolinus completed his return bow just as Jim reached him. Son Won Phon disappeared.

  Jim reached Carolinus's side, panting.

  "Carolinus—" he gasped, "Dafydd and Brian may be dying, right now. We need you right away—"

  "All right, all right," said Carolinus, still gazing with a smile at the empty patch of sand where the elephant had stood. "You can tell me all about it once we're back at Malencontri."

  "But they're not at Malencontri!" said Jim. "They're on a boat in the English Channel—"

  "Well, I'll simply bring them to Malencontri, then," said Carolinus, with an undertone of unusual savagery. "We'll deal with that in a moment. Did you notice how neatly I handled that? Accuse a AAA+ magician of not being able to handle eastern magic, will he? This taught him a lesson he'll never forget."

  "Never mind that! Brian and Dafydd—" Jim suddenly broke off, remembering that this duel had been all his fault for using hypnosis; and that Carolinus had been putting at risk essentially the greater part of what he owned, as well as the rank that went with it. It might have taken him—Jim really had no idea—years, possibly, to win back enough magical credit to regain his original rank of AAA+ magician—"if he could…" Lahti had said.

  Instead of blaming, Jim should be apologizing. Even better, instead of apologizing, he should be trying to get Carolinus on his side.

  A touch of congratulations might help.

  "Carolinus," he said, "that was magnificent, the way you made that elephant disappear. The magician sitting next to me didn't really believe, I think, that you'd be able to find the key to doing it in the time they gave you. So, you were an expert in eastern magic all the time!"

  "Was?" said Carolinus. "I was not at all. But as I keep telling you, magic is creative. Theoretically, if you knew all languages, you would find newer ones easier and easier to learn until you could pick up one more in no time at all. You'd get to the point where you'd only have to hear just a few words in an unknown language, to understand how it was put together and how to speak it."

  "Just that?" said Jim. "I can't believe anyone ever—"

  "Of course there's been!" snapped Carolinus. "There was a linguist who did just that, either in the fairly near future or the fairly recent past—I forget which. He was employed—by the King of Prussia, I think—because of his great knowledge of languages; and the first time the King met him, one morning, the king spoke to him in a tongue he didn't know. One the King himself knew it because it was the tongue of a very small area where he'd grown up; but it was unknown elsewhere. To the King's surprise, at dinner time the linguist spoke to him in the same tongue."

  "He did?" said Jim.

  "Of course!" said Carolinus. "Knowledge and creativity. Once you've mastered a certain amount of both, the rest of it has to lie inside boundaries you know. Now that's your trouble, as I keep telling you. You have to learn to think magic. You have to think directly in magic—as if it was another language. Eventually, you ought to be able to translate from one magic to another, with no trouble whatsoever. Oh, yes, I know everybody around here and all the animals, nowadays, speak the same language. But this world has known different tongues and will know different tongues again in the future. The principle still holds."

  "I see," said Jim humbly. He hurried to back up his agreement. "I know what you're talking about, I think. Back in the world I come from, in the mathematics department, there were people who could literally think in mathematics—"

  "Mathematics?" Carolinus stared at him.

  "Well, it's a sort of advanced arithmetic," explained Jim. "You see—"

  "No, no!" said Carolinus. There was suddenly that unusual sour, almost angry, note in his voice that had started to appear there since his illness. "Don't try explaining it to me. I've got too many things to think about already, without lumbering my brain with information I'll never use, anyway. If you understand, that's the main thing. Think magic. Knowledge and creativity. Knowledge and creativity. Drum those things into your brain and you can do anything in an area you've started to explore—after you've reached a certain level of knowledge and experience, of course. Again, I doubt that you, Jim, ever will."

  "You're probably right," said Jim wistfully.

  "Well, what are we standing around for?" said Carolinus. About them the amphitheater was empty, except for a handful of figures that were vanishing even as he spoke. They were vanishing in all sorts of ways. Some winked out, some faded out, some went transparent for a while, then suddenly disappeared. But all were going; and in a second Jim and Carolinus would be alone here.

  "That's what I say!" said Jim. "Let's go. I was sitting next to a magician named Lahti—"

  "Ah, yes, the Finnish lad," said Carolinus.

  "—And he was able to stop time for half an hour for both Dafydd and Brian. But that time is going to run out before you—"

  Jim never finished. For the very good reason that they were no longer in the amphitheater. They were now standing on the catwalk just inside the top of the curtain wall that encircled Castle Malencontri, just inside its moat. The curtain wall that would be the first line of defense against sea serpents if they came.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Possibly because of having made two shifts close together by magic, to distant destinations, on arrival at Malencontri Jim experienced a moment's disorientation at finding himself back home. It took a few seconds to adjust to his familiar, but changed, surroundings.

  In this case, if anything, the disorientation was made worse because with him on the battlements were a couple of people, one of which, at least, he had not expected to find there.

  The other, the one he was not astonished to find there, was Angie; and at the moment he was so glad to see her that if she had been at all within arm's reach he would have hugged her, in spite of the fact that she probably would have screamed and struggled at suddenly being seized by someone appearing where there had been no one before.

  But, as luck would have it, she was the farther from him, perhaps twenty feet away. In between her and him was the unexpected visitor on the battlements. He was Sir John Chandos; and he was talking animatedly to Angie.

  In fact, he continued talking for a few moments, before the fact that Angie was staring, transfixed, at Jim, past the older knight's shoulder, caused Chandos to turn, catch sight of Jim and Carolinus himself, and break off abruptly.

  What Jim had just heard him say was:

  "—the levies have been ordered from all of south England. These will raise quickly; but it'll still
be a matter of at least a week for them to gather into an army. Luckily, we probably have another week or two before King Jean of France makes any move across the Channel—"

  It was at this point that Angie left him with a rush.

  "Not two weeks. Five days, Sir John—" began Jim, and then Angie was in his arms. After a long moment he was able, without letting her go, to speak over her shoulder to Carolinus.

  "Carolinus," he said. "Dafydd and Brian! Remember? They're both badly wounded, and probably dying, on a ship in the English Channel. I didn't know how to bring them here magically, or else—"

  "I'll bring them!" said Carolinus. He whirled on Angie. "Do you have a chamber ready to take them?"

  "They can go in our room for now—in the solar—" said Angie, letting go of Jim. "Bring them quickly, Carolinus. I'll get some men to carry them up to the room." She turned and headed toward the stairs from the platform above the main gates.

  "If I may say a word or two to you, Mage Carolinus—" Chandos was beginning, when Carolinus interrupted him without even looking at him.

  "You may not!" he said sharply. "No time. Never mind getting men to carry them, Angela—"

  He was interrupted in his turn by a massive shadow that fell over all of them. Jim turned to look behind him, and realized that at his back all this time, making one of the group, was Rrrnlf. His height was such that he could simply stand on the ground inside the battlements and look out over them. Now he reached out and took hold of Angie, who was already starting to run down the stairs from the battlements, picked her up gently in one hand as wide as a pair of double barn doors, and bent to place her on the ground below by his feet.

  Angie shrieked as her skirt billowed out about her during her descent. He set her gently on the ground, but her face was furious.

  "Don't do that!" she shouted up at Rrrnlf. "Do you hear me? Never do that!"

  She emphasized her words by kicking Rrrnlf's big toe, which stuck out from the sandals he wore. Rrrnlf's great face looked confused.

  "I only thought to save you time, wee Lady," he said.

  "Well, just don't!" cried Angie.

  She turned her back on him to head toward the entrance of the Great Hall, that would lead her into the castle proper; but suddenly she was back on the catwalk. She gasped, reached for the stones of the battlement that were nearest, to steady herself; and now she glared at Carolinus.

  "And don't you do that!" she shouted at him.

  "I started to tell you," said Carolinus, completely undismayed by her tone or words, "that there was no need for you to fetch men to carry Brian and Dafydd. They are already in your solar."

  Now he glared at Angie.

  "Oh," said Angie.

  "I'll go there immediately," went on Carolinus, "and see what I can do about their wounds. Do you intend to come with me?"

  "Of course!" said Angie, recovering the indignation she had lost for a moment. "Of course I want to go with you!"

  They both disappeared.

  John Chandos looked across the empty space between himself and Jim. The knight's face, for the first time in any of their meetings that Jim could remember, was bewildered.

  "I don't really understand all this…" he said, somewhat unsteadily.

  "I'm sorry, Sir John," said Jim. "But Sir Brian and Dafydd are in dire need; and Carolinus is the only person who can possibly help them. There wasn't any time to waste."

  Seeing that Chandos still stared at him without understanding, Jim added.

  "I mean," he said, "that's why it all happened—what just happened."

  "Oh," said the unbelievably deep bass voice of Rrrnlf behind him. "Now I understand. They were in need of aid from the wee Mage."

  Jim glanced over his shoulder at the giant Sea Devil.

  "That's right, Rrrnlf," he said, and turned back to Chandos, who looked at him, still with some traces of the bewilderment on his face.

  "Did you say the invasion was planned for five days from now, Sir James?"

  "Yes, Sir John," said Jim. "We were just coming back to tell you when we were attacked by pirates in the Channel waters."

  Sir John was clearly not interested in pirates, attacking or otherwise.

  "Where did you learn this?" demanded Chandos.

  "From King Jean himself," said Jim. "I won't bother you with the whole story, but it ended up with my using a little—er—magic on both him and his sorcerer Ecotti to see if I couldn't get them to talk. Ecotti really knew nothing. But King Jean told me, under magic, that his invasion was to begin in five days, weather permitting."

  "Why, it's impossible!" said Chandos with what—for him—was almost a note of irritation in his voice. "It would take him a week and a half to two weeks to embark his troops. Did you see any signs of his troops embarking while you were in France? Where were you in France?"

  "At Brest," answered Jim. "No, there were no signs of troops embarking, although the town was full of them and the ships were there—all sorts of ships; since I suppose he is simply pulling together every merchant ship he can find to carry troops."

  "I tell you, it makes no sense!" Chandos took a turn up and down the walkway, almost stamping his feet as he went. "But of course, he must have been lying to you."

  "He couldn't," said Jim. "As I told you, I had him under magic compulsion. He had no choice to tell me anything but the truth."

  "What under heaven can he have meant?" fumed Chandos.

  "He has the sea serpents as allies," said Jim. "Has there been any activity on their part? Perhaps he was simply answering my question as simply and directly as possible and considering them part of the invasion."

  "Well, there's no doubt they've been around here—they, or something like them!" said Chandos, stopping right in front of him and looking fiercely at him. "Certainly there have been cattle, and even men, women and children, eaten; or so the stories run. No one will leave a place of safety. I believe your Lady has nearly every tenant and serf on your land within these walls at present, since that's the only place they feel safe. But why would the fact they were here… ?"

  Chandos's anger collapsed.

  "I don't understand," he said helplessly.

  "People may have been eaten, and cattle and so forth," said Jim, "but I would think that was only because the serpents simply eat anything they run across."

  He turned to Rrrnlf.

  "Am I right, Rrrnlf?"

  "Of course," said Rrrnlf. "I mean, anyone has to eat; and in the sea you eat whenever you get a chance. You saw it in Granfer. He spends all his time eating. I told you that."

  "Who's Granfer?" demanded Chandos.

  "A—you'd call him a sea monster I think, Sir John," said Jim, deciding that the word "squid," or even "kraken," would only start the knight to asking all sorts of questions. "He's so old and experienced he acts as sort of an advisor to other creatures in the sea—the ones he doesn't eat, I mean. With his long tentacles he drags fish to him and swallows them whole. Some of them are very big fish, too. I think he stays on the sea bottom all the time."

  "He used to come up on the surface sometimes, when he was younger and smaller," put in Rrrnlf. "But I think he thinks it's too much trouble now."

  "He told us he advised one of the sea serpents—I think probably the sea serpent who's leading all this attack on our island," said Jim, "against doing it. But the sea serpent—Essessili—didn't listen to him."

  "Yes," growled Rrrnlf dangerously behind and above Jim, "he's the one who has my Lady, I know it!"

  "But you see, Sir John," said Jim, "the sea serpents really aren't after us humans. They want to find and kill off all the dragons in England and anywhere they can find them. Because we're an island we're easier for them to come ashore on."

  "Don't like being dry, the serpents don't," said Rrrnlf. "Don't like fresh water either. Now, we Sea Devils don't care whether it's salt or fresh; and we can go anywhere on land we like—except there's no point to it. Not very interesting, this dry land of yours; and just wee little
fish in the lakes and rivers if you want a bite."

  A thought had just occurred to Jim. He looked at Rrrnlf curiously.

  "What brought you here—I mean to the castle?" he asked.

  "Essessili wants the dragons," said Rrrnlf, deep in his throat. "You're the link to the dragons. He's got my Lady; and if he comes he has to come to you, sooner or later. When he does, I'll—"

  He made twisting motions, his two great hands turning in opposite directions. Jim winced at the image of the serpent caught in them.

  "Take my Lady, will he…" Rrrnlf was trailing off into a grumble, when a flapping noise made them suddenly all look up, and see a dragon descending toward them at an angle. He landed on the (for him) narrow catwalk, teetered for a moment flapping his wings in alarm to keep his balance, then found it and folded them. It was Secoh.

  "Secoh!" said Jim. "How'd you get here so fast?"

  "Fast, m'Lord?" said Secoh, panting slightly. "Well, yes. It was far past noon when I left the ship last, and the sun is more than halfway toward the horizon now. Look!"

  Jim looked.

  In truth, the sun was already past its afternoon mid-point. Jim guessed that it was at least four o'clock. Perhaps, counting the longer summer days they had here in the British Isles, which was north of the latitude at which Riveroak had been back on his own world, it might even be five o'clock. If so, where had the time gone to? He had instantly translated himself here—

  A sudden thought stopped the direction in which his mind was going.

  "Secoh," he said, "how did you know I was here?"

  "I chased after the young dragons; but they were too deep in fear of the serpents to come back. So I gave up," answered Secoh. "Of course I came here next. But if you don't mind, m'Lord, there are urgent matters—"

  He broke off and looked over Jim's shoulder at Chandos.

  "If you don't mind, sir knight," he said, in a somewhat lofty tone, "what I must say to m'Lord involves dragon matters, not to be overheard by everyone."