“Yes, several people have noticed that characteristic about Jhren,” Delno said. “I’m glad he will be helping us, but had I stopped to think before I sent word to him, I would have realized he’d do something like this, and I wouldn’t have sent the letter to Palamore. He is a powerful magic user, but even his magical expertise can’t save him from his own folly.”
“I think he will be all right, Delno. I have examined him, and he has been drinking the herbal teas I prepared before I left him. He is doing quite a bit better, and sitting at the palace in Palamore dealing with Lark’s constant bickering with her advisors was wearing on him.”
“That would be enough to wear on anyone. It wore on me enough to make me flee to the safety of another war,” Delno said. He chuckled a bit before continuing. “Nat, the reason I wanted to find you tonight is simple. We, meaning Brock, Rita, Will, Nassari, and two others you haven’t met, are now traveling to Horne. Since we are close to you, I think it is best if we travel together. Geneva knows where you are in relation to where we are now, so if you will wait for us, we will join you sometime tomorrow.”
“It will do us all some good to rest for a day. We will wait for you here. We are camped by a little stream and there are pan-sized fish for catching. There is also plenty of game, and the dragons have hunted and eaten well. Waiting shouldn’t be too bad, and it will give Jhren another day of rest, though he will not like it.”
“Like it or not, he will wait,” Delno replied. “One last thing, my friend; if Geneva can find you, then other dragons can, too: be damn careful about keeping watch. Now is the time for Marlo to use all of that superb skill she developed for spotting other dragons before they spot her.”
Marlo, who had been conversing with Geneva, said, “No dragons will approach that I don’t know about, Delno Okonan. You may set your mind at ease on that count.”
“I am aware of your prowess at detecting nearby dragons, Marlo, and that makes me doubly glad that you are one of my friends and bonded to Nat. Remember though, I don’t want you and Nat to engage unless there is absolutely no alternative. You are both too important to be common soldiers in this war. Nat is the best healer in all of the human kingdoms.” Both Nat and Marlo nearly glowed with pride at the compliment. Delno added, “I have specific plans for your incredible abilities also, Marlo, so don’t risk injury in a skirmish if it can be avoided: I need you to gather intelligence once we actually find our enemies.”
Marlo puffed up proudly and said, “I will keep my Rider safe and be ready when you need me, Delno Okonan.”
“Very good, I knew I could count on you both,” Delno responded. “Now I will let you get some sleep. Geneva and I need to see if we can contact the un-bonded dragons who are watching over our ground troops.”
“Damn me for an easily distracted fool,” Nat exclaimed. Delno looked at him quizzically. “An un-bonded female showed up in our camp when we stopped this afternoon.” Then he quickly added, “Marlo, of course, saw her coming long before she saw us. Since she was not carrying a rider, and Marlo had met her before, we let her join us. She is older and has heard of our mission in Horne. She has lost two sisters to Roracks and, most interesting of all; she also lost one sister to bonded dragons and was injured in the battle. She has quite a story to tell about how that happened, but I will let her tell it when you get here.”
“Nathaniel,” Delno said, “I love you like one of my own family, but we have to do something about that associative memory of yours. Start tying strings around your fingers or something. . . .”
“I tried that once,” Nat replied. “I forgot to look at the strings.”
Delno laughed out loud. “At any rate, my somewhat absent-minded friend, had you started this conversation with that bit of news, I would have already been in the air for ten minutes by now. Any chance I have to gather more intelligence on our enemies must be exploited at once. Oh, don’t look so down, Nat, I’m not angry with you, and you did tell me the news. A few minutes delay won’t actually make any difference. I really am quite proud of all that you have done so far; you and Marlo both.” Nat smiled sheepishly and Delno added, “I will take my leave now, and we will get airborne.”
Nat waved and faded from view as Delno pushed hard to wake himself up. He came fully awake as if he had been dowsed with cold water. Rita was startled out of her sleep and bolted up reaching for her sword.
“Relax,” he said, “It isn’t that kind of an emergency.” Then he said out loud to Geneva, “Wake Leera and have her rouse Brock. We will need to discuss this immediately.”
“I have already woken Leera. Brock is walking toward you now.”
“Wanda woke me,” Nassari said from a few feet away. “What’s all the commotion about?”
“I’m only going to explain this once, so wait until Brock gets here.”
“I’m here, Delno,” Brock said coming up behind him. “What is going on?”
Delno quickly told them of Nat’s news concerning the new un-bonded dragon.
“Is this something that has to be handled now?” Rita asked. “Surely she will still be there when the sun comes up in the morning.”
“Yes, she may be there with Nat, but the bonded dragons who attacked her sister may move to prevent themselves from being found now that they have given away their position,” Nassari said, before Delno could explain it.
“Exactly,” Delno replied. “I want to get Will into the area as quickly as possible to do some scouting: perhaps Marlo, too.”
“Marlo?” Brock asked. “I thought we wanted to keep Nat out of harm’s way as much as possible.”
“Marlo doesn’t have Will’s talent of disappearing, but she is superb at scouting without being detected. She has honed her skills at spotting other dragons before they spot her for over a hundred years. She is a logical choice to go on this mission. With the two pairs flying in separately, and from different directions, we double our chances of getting some useful information.”
They all just stared at him.
“Damn it! Don’t stare at me like that. Do you think I don’t know that I am talking about ordering my brother and one of my best friends to go on a mission that could result in their deaths? This is war. We need the information this sortie could give us to save lives. If I could go myself I would, but the mission is too vital, and Geneva doesn’t have Marlo’s skills, and I don’t have Will’s talent. I don’t like it any more than any of you, but that is the way it is, and I don’t have a choice.”
“No, Brother, you don’t have a choice,” Will said as he suddenly appeared nearly in the middle of the group. “You don’t have a choice because I would go regardless of what you said. So, since I am going anyway, I may as well do it with the blessings of my commander rather than against his orders.”
Will smiled at the astonished looks of both Nassari and Brock who had not had the opportunity to see his talent at work before at such close range. Rita had been mildly surprised but recovered quickly.
“Well,” Nassari, who had recoiled only slightly from the shock of seeing Will suddenly appear like that, said in his nonchalant manner, “I guess that settles that.”
Delno turned on his brother and said, “We don’t know for sure that there will be a mission yet. I have to talk to this new dragon first. If there is a mission, you will stay in contact with me, or Brock, or Nassari.” Will nodded and Delno added, “Oh, and Brother, remember I can heal injuries quite well, so if you ever use your talent to sneak into one of my commanders’ meetings again, I will break one of your legs. You won’t be incapacitated long until I heal you, but the pain should teach you a lesson.”
Will smiled at his older brother and said, “I’m sorry, Brother, old habits die hard. I used to follow you and Nassari for hours when we were kids. I guess I just slipped back into that tonight.” Then he added seriously, “It won’t happen again, I promise.”
“Good,” Delno replied. “Well, since the leaders of this troop are already up, I suggest that we wake up t
he rest of the soldiers and get into the air and find Nathaniel.”
“No need to wake me up, sir.” Nadia said from the shadows. She stepped into the half light of the dying fire, but with their dragon-enhanced sight they could all see that she was indeed awake and armed to the teeth. Her powerful recurved bow was in her hands with an arrow nocked but not drawn. “When I saw my commander,” she indicated Nassari, “get up quietly and slip around the camp, I armed myself and moved to cover his back.”
“Nadia, you are a constant source of amazement to me. There is definitely more to you than first meets the eye. I am glad you came along and didn’t stay in Larimar,” Delno said.
“I grew up in a home with my father and five brothers, so I’m a good fighter. I was the youngest and my mother died while giving birth to me. My brothers and I shared the household duties, so I can cook too. Therefore, since my gear is all ready to go, why don’t I get us some breakfast while the rest of you pack?” Saying that, she put the arrow she had nocked away in her quiver and moved toward the fire and the supplies to make food.
Fifteen minutes later, Delno sat down to a meal of jerky sautéed in coffee and herbs served with hard bread. There was also coffee to drink, though they had no milk or cream to lighten it. Everyone was surprised to find that the coffee gravy was actually quite good. The beverage was much milder when used in cooking than they would have expected.
“Yes, Nadia,” Delno said while mopping up the last bit of gravy off of his plate, “there is more to you than meets the eye. This is delicious, thank you.”
“She really is quite a gem, Del,” Nassari said. “She is one of the most competent people I have met in a long time. I’m glad she is on our side, or we would be hard pressed to beat her, at anything.”
Nadia hadn’t done more than nod at Delno’s compliment, but she straightened noticeably when Nassari praised her. Delno just smiled. Normally he would discourage a relationship between two such soldiers, but he couldn’t very well tell Nassari not to get involved with a subordinate when he was having just such a relationship with Rita, especially since Nassari was Rider to a lineage holder himself.
Ten minutes later they were aloft. The predawn chill on the ground had been nippy but it was downright cold several hundred feet up in the air. Delno had Geneva relay his thanks once again to Nadia for the hot meal. Then they made a straight-line course toward Nat’s camp. The sun wouldn’t be up for at least another two hours, and they should meet up with Nat and Jhren well before noon.
Chapter 36
“Marlo has just informed me that she has spotted us and that we are the only dragons in the sky for at least five leagues,” Geneva said. “She really is quite good at spotting any dragons approaching. Even knowing they are near, I can only get the faintest trace of Rhonna at this distance. I wish I knew exactly how she does it.”
“Perhaps I was wrong about it being a learned skill, and it is an inborn talent,” he replied. “Perhaps, it’s a little of both. Whatever it is, it is a useful skill, and it makes me glad that she is on our side.”
“I wonder why our side appears to be getting humans and dragons with such skills. I would have thought that Warrick would be glad to find help like that.”
“It’s possible that he has teams who can do such things and is just too arrogant to notice,” Delno answered. “It’s also possible that he discourages such talents because he fears that he may be overthrown by his own troops. What we need to watch out for most, though, is that he does have talented teams he plans on using, and we don’t know about them yet.”
“Yes, Dear One, you are right. If we want to keep our assets a secret, so would he. We will have to be doubly on our guard now that we know such things are possible. We’ll be landing in less than a quarter of an hour at this rate. I will relay that everyone should get down quickly and disturb the surroundings as little as possible.”
Once they were on the ground, Nat came to greet them at a trot. “You made good time,” he said. “It’s still three hours before noon.”
“We had favorable winds for the trip, though it was cold up there. If you have anything hot to drink, we could all use something,” Delno responded.
As they all gathered around the fire and Nat poured tea and coffee, Delno made introductions. Jhren was conspicuously absent.
“Where is Jhren?” Delno asked, “I would have thought that he would be here to yell at me for holding him up and wasting time.”
“Ah yes, Jhren,” Nat said, while Lawrence pointedly found something to occupy himself rather than look at Delno.
“Now what?” Delno asked sternly.
“Well, it seems that our good magic user decided to spend some of his leisure time talking with the un-bonded dragon. Sometime during their conversation, she bonded with him.”
“She what?” Delno and Brock both exclaimed.
“Jhren is nearly a hundred years old!” Brock sputtered.
“Carra is over a thousand years old, but that didn’t seem to prevent them from becoming bonded,” Nat replied.
Brock thought for a moment and then said, “Well, I believe it’s possible, but I’m just not sure I like the idea of a magic user that powerful bonding with a dragon.”
“Afraid I might take it into my head to kill Warrick and take his place?” Jhren asked as he approached the group. Delno noticed that the old man was walking a bit straighter, though whether that was due to the bond with Carra or Nat’s herbal medicine, he didn’t know.
To his credit, Brock stood his ground, “To be brutally honest with you, Jhren, yes. I do believe that magic should have its limits, and a magic user with your abilities increasing his power by bonding to a dragon is, quite simply, scary.”
Jhren was silent for a moment, and then he spoke very carefully. “I have to admit that if our positions were reversed I would probably feel the same way, Brock. There are limits on magical power because humans and elves put them there to prevent people from doing just what Warrick is trying to do. With my power, I could possibly bide my time and wait until you destroy him or he destroys you and then seize control of what’s left. Fortunately, I don’t want that kind of power. I’ve seen what it does to men, most recently my own apprentice.”
“Still,” Brock said, “what is to keep you from changing your mind?”
“Only this: I’ve had nearly a century of life to observe the people of this world. Many of them want to be ruled. But they want to be ruled by benign leaders. I have no interest in ruling anyone. Not only do I think it’s high time I start giving back to the world, but I just don’t have the patience to put up with the politics. However, all I can give you is my word that I don’t want power. If that isn’t good enough, then I guess you will have to kill me now before I become a threat.”
“That is enough!” Delno said. “No one is going to be killed here today. Jhren, I’m glad you see our concerns and accept that they have some validity.” Before Brock, or anyone else, could object, he added, “Of course we will watch you; we watch each other all the time. Simcha, who was always a good man and a good Rider, was corrupted, and we didn’t want to believe that he had turned so far against us. Not seeing the truth that was staring us in the face led to the deaths of three dragons, and their Riders. I believe those persons could have been saved if we had not let ourselves be blinded because of the fact that Simcha was once a good Rider. The power that the Riders wield can be used to do great things, but it can also corrupt if the wielder of that power if he is not careful. For now, we welcome you as we would welcome any new Rider.”
“Very well, Delno, I accept that. I didn’t set out to get myself bonded to a dragon. In fact, I have steadfastly avoided dragons for a long time for fear that my magical connections might result in something like this.” At everyone’s astounded looks he continued. “Oh yes, Corolan and I talked about it. Geneva’s mother said I should be presented as a candidate at a hatching. I was twenty-three at the time, and even then I knew that I was afraid of that much power.
I refused to go anywhere near a hatching after that, despite repeated attempts by Corolan and Geneva’s mother to get me to do so.”
“So, what changed your mind?” Nassari asked.
“My mind was changed for me. I just wanted to talk with Carra and get some information concerning how she and her sister were attacked by those bonded dragons. I figured that at my age, and in my state of health, I was well beyond bonding,” the old conjurer replied. “Carra has always stayed as near to her sisters as they would allow because she feels the loneliness so badly. For over a thousand years she has sought companionship among her own kind even though her instincts told her not to. As we talked, it just kind of happened. I didn’t really notice anything other than a brief flash of light, and my left shoulder felt like I’d gotten hot water splashed on it. Then it dawned on both of us that we were together and would be until death. I spent the rest of the night just being with her.”
As Jhren said the last sentence his features softened and he suddenly looked more like someone’s kindly elderly grandfather than the taciturn old wizard Delno had come to know. Seeing that change and the caring in Jhren’s eyes was even enough to allay some of Brock’s fears about the old man’s motives.
“Well, if you would lead the way, I would like to meet Carra and talk to both of you,” Delno said.
There was definitely a spring in the old man’s step as he walked ahead of Delno toward Carra. Perhaps the magic was working on him and making him feel younger. He glanced at Nat as he walked by and realized that the half-elf’s hair was a bit more platinum-blonde and less gray. He wouldn’t have noticed if he hadn’t been looking for it, but it was there.
“The magic is changing their bodies to come into line with their new life spans,” Geneva said, reading his thoughts. “Nat had spent about half of his life by the time he bonded with a dragon who is only a little over a century old. He now has well over half of his current life span left, so instead of being a middle aged half-elf, he is a fairly young Rider. Don’t be surprised when all of the gray is gone from his hair. As for Jhren, he has bonded to a dragon who is over one thousand years old. He is walking straighter because instead of being an old man with a few years left to live he isn’t even middle aged any more. Carra had four to six thousand years left to her and Jhren has received half of that, his body will also adjust to match his true age.”
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