by Aerie (lit)
As Kiron sent Avatre up again, the fires seemed to be going out; the plumes of smoke were thinning, flames no longer visible above the rim of the wadi. And there was no more screaming. Maybe the men hit with the stuff had managed to smother it; water didn't extinguish it, but sand would.
There wasn't much to burn down there, perhaps a few cloth tents and shelters. It wasn't going to become the kind of raging inferno a wooden house, a village of papyrus huts, or a ship would be. But anyone that stuff splashed onto—and from the screams, it had splashed onto a great many men—was going to have terrible burns.
Without a healer, they would probably die of those burns.
The only healers nearby were the Blue People.
Kiron did not think that the bandits would find much of a welcome in the Bedu camp.
Both Wings landed at the oasis to rest their dragons until there were good thermals, and tell the Mouth of the People, the individuals who spoke for each tribe with outsiders, what they had done.
The Mouth seemed somewhat taken aback. Swathed in veils it was hard to tell what he was thinking, but he was silent for a long time.
"This Fire—" he said at last, as the rest of the encampment went on about its business, with curious glances at the dragons. "It is a cruel thing."
Kiron bit his lip. He'd had second and third thoughts about this as he had led the Wings away from the burning wadi. "It is," he admitted. "And it was not an—honorable sort of attack."
The Mouth considered his words. "Neither was theirs," he replied finally. "They did not kill any of us directly—but there are children going short of milk, because they stole milch goats. And we will need to call upon favors from other tribes to make up for our losses. We will not starve… but we will not prosper either, for some time to come."
That was an extraordinary admission from a Mouth of the Bedu, who were so notoriously secretive that they generally had only one person in each tribe—the Mouth—to speak to outsiders.
"Starvation is a cruel death," the Mouth said, meditatively. "It is why we left the tents of stone."
And then he walked off leaving Kiron puzzled at his meaning.
Kiron sent his Jousters off one at a time to hunt. He also didn't want the temptation of the nearby flocks to overcome the dragons' training. Once they were all fully fed, they lazed about in the sun while their Jousters napped. It had been an early morning for them, with their flight beginning in false dawn rather than when the sun was well up and the flying was good, and it was catching up to them. The Bedu went about their business as soon as they were certain that the dragons weren't going to do anything or anyone a mischief Huras gazed at them with curiosity, but at Kiron's silent headshake elected not to approach any of them.
By midmorning the thermals were strong enough for the dragons to take to the air again, spiraling up them lazily, looking for all the world like bits of debris caught in a dust-demon, only moving much slower than that. On a whim, Kiron decided to lead the wings a little off the direct route back to Aerie, to cover part of the route between there and the eastern border. Not that there was an actual road; there was not enough traffic for that. There might once have been a trade route, but that had ended when Aerie had been abandoned. Now anyone who wanted to cross that expanse of wasteland did so navigating by the stars and the sun, or went farther south or north to an established route. Even the garrisons of the army there went farther south, though straight across would have been far faster.
He was glad that he had when they were roughly halfway home.
The dot of color on the bleached earth caught his eye first; curious, he veered Avatre toward it. But as soon as he was able to make out what it was, he urged her to greater speed.
Because the blot below that lay without moving was the combined bodies of a man and a camel, the man slumped over the camel's neck, the camel collapsed sideways. And as soon as Kiron landed, slid down Avatre's shoulder and ran to them, he knew that both were dead. But the most critical thing about the bodies, aside from the terrible arrow wounds, was that the man wore the simple kilt, headcloth, and armband of a Tian border guard. And the last of the trail in the sand made it clear that he had come from the eastern border.
The rest landed, and stared with him at the poor victim, most showing at least as much alarm as he felt, if not more.
"Who—who did this?" someone ventured at last.
Kiron shook his head. The bodies were hit with several arrows, wounds that the victim had tried to bind up without much success. Kiron's heart was thudding with alarm. There had been no stirrings of trouble from the eastern border in centuries. The position of border guard was, as a consequence, not sought for. The guards were far from most of the amenities of civilized life, and spent most of their time walking exceedingly boring patrols, and occasionally sorting out the altercations in tiny villages dotted along their jurisdiction.
But now—
This—this was a very bad sign. This did not look like the result of a private quarrel. If it had been—the man would have been tended to by his own garrison healer. If he had done murder, he would not have been trying to get back to civilization. Could it be the work of bandits?
Well it could, but if they had gotten fierce enough to take down the border guards… it would need the army to take them.
"Whoever did it, this fellow tried to get word back—" Huras ventured.
They all looked at Kiron.
"Huras," he said finally, "you go to Sanctuary and get a priest to look at this body, or at least someone to fetch it back there. The rest of you go on back to Aerie. I'll take word to Mefis."
No one argued. Kiron remounted Avatre and sent her up, his mouth dry, his heart pounding.
It wasn't that the man was dead. Kiron had seen dead men in plenty, far more than he liked to think about. He'd killed before today; not gladly, and certainly not easily, but he had done so. No, his fear was due to the fact that this was a sign, a sign that something was very wrong on the eastern border. If this man was the lone survivor of a massacre—
Well, that was high on the list of what could have happened. He must have been the only one left, or the only one still mobile, otherwise there would have been someone else with him. Something had gone badly wrong out there, and it must have come with no warning.
He stopped only long enough to claim a meal for Avatre at a temple; he was in such a hurry that he didn't even notice which god the temple enshrined. Once she had eaten, he pushed her ruthlessly into the sky. She was in good condition; though tired, she was far from winded, and she obeyed his commands without a protest. She did keep glancing over her shoulder at him as she flew, as if she was picking up some of his anxiety. His mouth felt dry, no matter how many times he pulled at his waterskin, and he tried to reckon how long it would have taken that border guard to get to where he had been found. It didn't look to Kiron as if he had been lying there for more than a day—and he would have thought, with all of the dragons in the sky, someone would have spotted him if he had been lying there for much longer.
I wish someone had spotted him before he died, Kiron thought, and then, with a flash of anger at himself he realized that someone might have. But lone riders crossed that stretch of desert all the time, and none of his Jousters had ever been instructed to examine or even make a close pass to try to identify them, if they had… they would have seen the dried streaks of blood on the camel, the man… they would have known both were dying, and might have been able to get the man to a Healing-Priest in Sanctuary in time to save him.
Now all they had was a mystery.
Just as the sun-disk touched the horizon, the first of the buildings of Mefis came into view and recognizing that rest and food were close in reach, Avatre found a little more energy and pushed herself to a little more speed.
He welcomed her effort and urged her on, leaning down over her shoulder to help her. She recognized her old pen and back-winged straight down into it, landing lightly.
The two pens on either s
ide of hers showed recent occupation, and those on the right both held blue-and-green dragons, two of the four he had sent here as couriers. Their Jousters were, as he had trained them, giving their charges the final grooming of the day—more for affection and bonding than for any practical purpose. They both ran into the pen as Avatre landed, clearly recognizing him.
"Find me someone who knows who is in charge of the border guards," he said without preamble, sliding down out of the saddle.
"That would be the vizier—" said the first, Wesh-ta-he, doubtfully. "Nef-kham-het. But he is surely at his meal—"
"Kiron would not have flown here if it had not been urgent, you goose!" exclaimed Aket-ten from the doorway. "Come on, Kiron, I'll take you to him."
"Take care of Avatre!" Kiron ordered. "She has flown long since her last meal."
Aket-ten turned and trotted down the long, high-walled corridor between the mostly empty pens. Even though the complex was empty, someone had still stocked all the torch holders along the walls with torches, and as they turned a corner, they passed a servant lighting them. The passages had a haunting familiarity to them; the beautiful, larger-than-life-sized paintings of gods and goddesses and dragons, the flickering torches, the smell of hot sand…
He wanted to ask Aket-ten what she was doing here, but she didn't slow down long enough for him to get in a word. As soon as they left the Dragon Courts, she broke into a run, pelting down the broad avenue leading to the Palace as if she were a runner-courier herself.
She headed not for the Palace itself but for the row of Great Houses near it, where important officials lived. Kiron almost balked at that; this might not be a matter for an overseer as important as that—
But then again, it might. And it was not his call to judge.
There were a few people out on the avenue in the dusk, one or two servants trotting along, and some of those important folks in their litters, borne aloft by slaves and lit by servants with torches. None of them even glanced at the two Jousters. Those servants had errands on their minds, and the important folk were likely thinking about what they were going to say and do at whatever banquet or meeting they were going to.
Aket-ten slowed down and stopped at the gate of one of those houses, speaking briefly to the servant on guard there. By the time Kiron arrived, the servant had stepped aside, and Aket-ten waved him on to follow her.
Another servant escorted them into the house, Kiron acutely aware of his disheveled and filthy state. He hoped that the servant was not going to take them to the dining chamber—he was in no fit condition to be seen in such a place.
But as they passed through the antechamber, lined with benches for those who would be waiting on the Vizier's attention, and painted with murals of the Vizier supervising the Queen's household, receiving the Gold of Honor, and dictating to a small army of scribes, another servant appeared at a door, followed by the Vizier himself.
He was not someone that Kiron knew, but evidently Aket-ten did, for the man greeted her warmly.
"I know you would not have summoned me from my meal if this had not been urgent," he said, with a wry smile. "You are not given to hysterics."
'Actually, my lord, I don't know what the situation is," Aket-ten admitted. "But I do know that Kiron would not have flown all the way from Aerie himself if it was not a serious problem—"
Now she glanced at him, and there was something else in that glance that made him uneasy. Something personal.
Still nothing to be done about that. He saluted the Vizier. "My lord… while returning from an action against bandits, my wings discovered a body."
He went on to describe everything that he could remember about the body and its disposition while the vizier listened carefully, arms folded over his chest. Torchlight flickering over the murals gave them a strange semblance of life, making it doubly odd to be talking to one Vizier while four more went about their business.
When he finished, the vizier nodded, face expressionless. Kiron's heart sank. He had disturbed a very important man for nothing—
"This could be of no consequence," the vizier said, and Kiron's heart sank further. "But—we cannot take that chance. The gods may have placed a warning in our laps, and we ignore it at our peril. You acted properly in bringing this to me."
Kiron felt a weight lifting from his shoulders. "Then I will leave it in the wise hands of Vizier Nef-kham-het," he said. And he left it at that, bowing himself out, Aket-ten coming with him. He wanted to be sure Avatre had been properly tended, and he wanted a meal and a bath in that order.
However, he knew he wasn't going to get any of those things soon when Aket-ten turned to him just outside the vizier's gate and said somberly, "We need to talk…"
SEVEN
« ^ »
"NOW?" he asked, wishing he dared walk on, but knowing—unless he wanted a quarrel—he had better stop where he was.
Ah, but he had forgotten one thing. Aket-ten was a Jouster as well as a young woman. She pursed her lips and shook her head.
"Not this moment. Go see to Avatre." But she wasn't about to let him off that easily. "Once you're bathed, I'll have one of the servants bring food to your room in the Dragon Courts. We can talk then."
So he had a little respite anyway. He nodded, stifled a sigh, and tried to look something other than apprehensive. Then something struck him about what she had just said. And something that had been nagging him about the Dragon Courts occurred to him as well.
She had said she was going to have a servant bring food to his room. Now he usually stayed in one of the old Jousters' quarters in the Dragon Court on the rare occasions when he turned up here, but…
But there had never been servants here. Why should there be? There was no one here. And he didn't think that four self-sufficient young men here could justify installing servants again.
Could it?
Or was there something more going on?
Or was he just tired and overreacting to something that had no meaning?
He talked to her about little nothings as they walked together back to the dragon pens. How progress had just speeded up apace since the merchants had taken to being grateful… how he was even going to have a kitchen in his own dwelling before long… how some enterprising soul was planning to create some bathing and swimming pools… all of this to try and make her see just how much more livable Aerie was becoming, to tempt her back.
For her part, she responded with a neutral interest that would have been frustrating if he hadn't been too tired to be frustrated by anything. Flying was hard work; not as hard as it was for the dragon, of course, but there were constant adjustments of weight, shifting balance, and accounting for wind resistance going on to make things easier for the dragon. A Jouster didn't just sit there like a sack of sand. At least, a good Jouster didn't just sit there like a sack of sand.
It was dark in the pens, but Hem-serit was waiting for him. "We gave her a quick sand scrub, fed her as much as she would eat, and she flopped down and went straight to sleep," the courier said, anxious to assure Kiron that everything possible had been done to make Avatre happy.
"I'll just check on her," he replied, easing into the pen.
Had Avatre been hungry, anxious, or even just a little restless, her head would have been up the moment she heard his voice and footstep. Instead, all he heard was her steady, deep breathing. She was sleeping like a stone.
He dropped down into the hot sand and stroked her head anyway. She didn't awaken. She had been well-tended and now she slept the sleep of the exhausted.
But then he raised his head, because he distinctly heard the mutterings and meepings of—baby dragons?
Aket-ten heard them, too, and suddenly her demeanor changed—he sensed ¡t in the shift of her posture. Guilt?
Was this what her odd behavior had been all about?
"Why are there baby dragons here?" he asked, treading carefully. If she felt guilty about something, she would be angry too. Whatever she was up to—
&n
bsp; Then it struck him, what she must have done. It was the only reason he could think of that she might be feeling guilty. And why she had not so much as brought a single couriered message in too long. And why Ari would have asked for four Jousters to serve as couriers. Oh, blessed gods. She's started her own—
"I have permission and the patronage of Great Queen Nofret," Aket-ten said, head raised, her voice taking on an edge. She was already starting an argument that he had no intention of getting involved in; whatever was done was done, and there was no point in fighting over it.
"I never said—"
Well, he might not want an argument, but she clearly was determined to have one with or without his participation. "I got my own babies." Now there was defiance in her voice, and challenge.
"I never said—"
Apparently, it did not matter what he did or did not say. She had the argument in her mouth, and she was going to get it all out. All that was required was his mere presence, it seemed. "And all but one of the new lady Jousters are priestesses with the gift of communing with animals!"
He gave up. She had marshaled her forces and was going to charge the battlefield. If there was no opposing force there, her chariots were going to run down warriors of air.
She went on at great length about how she was not depriving anyone of anything, not even a scrap of meat. How her little priestess-riders were so completely in communion with their charges and devoted to them that it made his young Jousters look as if they were neglecting their dragons. How Queen Nofret thought this was an excellent idea and that eventually all the Jousters flying courier duty could be replaced with the "Queens Wing." These were, of course, all good points. They would do nothing to silence the mouths of those who would not approve of female Jousters; they would do nothing to still the anger of those who had been waiting to become Jousters and would see any dragon gotten by the women as one that "should" have gone to them. There might be some who would be quieted when the women began flying courier duty, but there would still be plenty who would say that the dragons were a costlier alternative to runners and chariot drivers doing the same duty. And there were probably other things she had not even considered and he had not thought of.