Return of the Exile l-3

by Mary H. Herbert

  “And what about now? Is he going to dump those eggs somewhere and leave again?” He stopped and listened to his own question. Eventually he wiped his damp face with his sleeve, and sighed. “Could I sound any more petulant?”

  She smiled at him in the dark, relieved by his change of mood. He really was exhausted. “You could add a little more whine.”

  He coughed hard but managed a smile. “You will have to tell me what has happened to you-and to him.” His voice dropped into sadness. “And what happened to Mariana.”

  “I will tell you everything when we have a few hours of peace. For now, we need to put as much distance between us and that city as possible. If Lanther really is here now, he will be after us with all the warriors at his command.”

  “Lanther,” he said. “The traitor. I can still hardly believe it.”

  Linsha did not reply. Her shock at Lanther’s betrayal had worn off the past months, mostly because of her constant proximity to him and the Tarmak people. But what had not worn off was the hurt and the outrage that he had so thoroughly deceived her to the detriment of everything she held dear in the Missing City. Crucible had deceived her about his identity, too, but whereas he had hidden his human shape out of the mistaken concern that she would hate him for his lie, Lanther had hidden his monstrous self in the desire to harm. She could forgive Crucible. She would never forgive Lanther.

  She glanced back into the wagon bed and saw Callista wrapping a crude bandage around a man’s slashed leg. The other wounded men were either unconscious or groaning on their rough pallets. The wagon jostled them over the rough road, but no one complained.

  They continued their journey through the night, taking a northerly course along the old rutted road that wound its way through the Rough, the rocky, scrubby grasslands on the outskirts of the city. A few miles beyond the end of the Rough, the road broke into a path that forked east and west. The company came to a halt, and some distance away Crucible flapped down to lay the net of eggs on the ground. He landed heavily beside them and tucked his wings against his sides. The weary riders dismounted to give their horses a rest.

  Callista earned the gratitude of one and all by revealing a supply of water, trail food, and a bottle of homemade blackberry brandy that Mae had left for them in the wagon.

  They passed the bottle around to salute their escape and the liberation of the eggs.

  The four elves drank their share and came to make their farewells to Linsha and Sir Hugh.

  “We must part ways here, Lady Knight,” the oldest said. “We shall go find our families.”

  “Although your undertaking is so intriguing, it is hard to leave,” quipped a younger one.

  The eldest elf nodded, his fair hair wet against his head. “Do you know yet where you will take the eggs?”

  “Away from the Tarmaks,” she said.

  “If I may make a suggestion, there is an old volcano called Flashfire to the west. It is only about two days’ ride from the source of the river. Perhaps the dragon could make a nest there that would be defensible and dry? Those eggs need to be settled as soon as possible.”

  Linsha bowed low in gratitude. It sounded like an excellent suggestion.

  The elves said good-bye to their fellow prisoners, bowed to Crucible, and trotted their horses onto the eastern path where the sun would soon rise. The heavy mist quickly swallowed them.

  “Did you hear that?” she said to Crucible.

  The dragon rumbled an assent. “I don’t know the volcano, but I will look for it. It might suit the eggs well. Will you come?”

  Looking at the men around her, at Callista and Sir Hugh, Linsha felt torn. She desperately wanted to stay with the eggs, but she had been responsible for freeing these men and centaurs. She had promised them she would help them escape if they came to help her get the eggs. She did not feel it would be right to leave them now, with days of travel still ahead and the Tarmaks in pursuit. She would at least see them to the safety of the rebel army. “I have to stay with them,” she said, hoping Crucible would understand.

  Her decision did not please him, but he did understand. She was a Knight of the Rose. She could not do otherwise. “I will be back,” he said. Rising on his wings, he lifted the net of eggs and flew west toward the headwaters of the Toranth River and a suggestion of a volcano.

  The rest of the company shared a quick meal and did what they could for the four wounded men in the wagon. One had died of his wounds during the flight from the city, so they piled rocks in a cairn over his body and left him behind. At dawn they hurried across the open grasslands while the sun lightened the sky to the east.

  21

  The Best Laid Plans

  Varia found them the afternoon of the second day of their journey. She came wheeling from the sky with a hoot of welcome and swooped in to land on Linsha’s outstretched wrist. Hopping off, she perched on Linsha’s knee and blinked up at the Lady Knight with wide, dark eyes.

  A few of the men stared in astonishment at the raptor on the woman’s lap, but most of them were familiar with Linsha and her talented “pet” and continued to ride without comment.

  “I have seen Falaius,” Varia said softly, so only Hugh and Linsha could hear her over the rattle and creak of the wagon. “He was so pleased to see me, he gave me a whole rat. He wants to know what you are planning.”

  “Where are they?” Linsha asked, scratching the back of the owl’s neck.

  Varia clicked her beak with pleasure and bent her head so Linsha could reach every part of her neck. “Coming south down the eastern Toranth River. They’re planning to ford the river in the next day or two, as soon as the water becomes shallow enough for the baggage wagons, and then strike eastward. They want to lure the Tarmaks out of the city. But how do you get those Brutes to come to a place of your choosing?”

  “Tell them where the eggs are,” Sir Hugh said.

  A glint of deviltry gleamed in Linsha’s eyes. “That would do it.”

  “Where are the eggs?” the owl asked. “And where is Crucible?”

  Linsha pursed her lips as she thought about Varia’s news, the eggs, and the probability of Lanther’s fury. She twisted around and studied the faint tracks unwinding behind their wagon as they moved over the wet ground. It had rained in fits and starts for two days, making the earth soft beneath the hooves of the horses. They had tried to hide their tracks and finally decided it was a waste of time. The ground was just too barren and too muddy. The only thing that would help would be cold weather to freeze the ground, but the late autumn had been surprisingly mild so far. The centaurs, natives to the plains, told her when the warm weather ended, it would probably end with a snowstorm.

  “What are you looking at?” Varia hooted, peering around Linsha’s cloak.

  “A way to lure Lanther to the eggs,” she replied. “Are you too tired to fly again?”

  “I just need a short rest,” the owl replied, fluffing her feathers.

  “Good. There here’s what I want you to tell Falaius.” She explained carefully, while Sir Hugh and Varia listened, and when she was finished both man and owl approved.

  While Varia fluttered down into the bed of the wagon to sit with Callista out of the wind and take her nap, Linsha turned the reins over to Hugh and hopped out of the wagon. She jogged over to a centaur she knew only as Menneferen. He was a grayish roan stallion of middle years, with reddish hair, deep brown eyes, and the long, powerful legs of a runner. He had seemed very steady to her, and he looked to be in the best condition of the escaped slaves. He glanced down at her jogging beside him and slowed to a walk so she could keep pace with him.

  “Would you be willing to take a message to Crucible?” she asked.

  “Of course, Lady,” he said in a deep, smooth voice. “Where has he gone?”

  She told him of the elves’ mention of a volcano somewhere near the source of the river. His grave expression never altered.

  “My clan is from the north, but I think I have heard of such a place.�
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  “If you can find it, tell Crucible to go seek Falaius, and tell him we are going to turn northwest.”

  “Are you going to lure the Tarmaks away from the new nest?” Menneferen asked.

  “Yes-and into a battle, I hope.” Linsha said, “so take an indirect route.”

  “Then I will go.” He bent low and winked at her. “But don’t have the battle without me.” He said his farewells to his companions and galloped away.

  The other riders and centaurs, about fifteen in all, gathered around Linsha to learn what was happening. She told them her plan.

  “Make no effort to hide your tracks,” she said. “We want Lanther to follow us.”

  “And what if he catches us?” one man said.

  She lifted her hand to her sword hilt. “Then we’d better make sure we are close to the rebel army.”

  “How do we know the Tarmaks will leave the city and come after us?” asked another.

  Linsha’s mouth tightened into a thin line and her expression turned bleak. “I know the Akkad-Dar. He’s probably already left.”

  “Perhaps, Lady,” said a light bay centaur with a sword cut on his flank, “it would be wise to leave a scout behind who could watch the rear and warn you if the Tarmaks are coming.”

  “That’s an excellent idea,” she said, glad he had mentioned it. “Do you feel well enough to volunteer?” She hated losing another good archer, but the centaurs were the best choice for scouts.

  “Of course.” He stamped a hoof, ready to go.

  Pleased, Linsha returned to the wagon and climbed back onto the driver’s bench beside Hugh. The party moved on, and a short while later the bay centaur fell back into a cluster of treeless hills and vanished into the eroded valleys between. The wagon and its escort began a gradual drift to the north. By evening they were traveling northwest toward the river but away from the eggs. If all went well, the Tarmaks would follow them to a place that Wanderer and Falaius chose, a place where a battle could be fought and won.

  A second wounded man died that night in spite of Callista and Linsha’s best efforts. His wounds had not been bad, but the constant travel in a rough wagon and the cool, wet weather had taken too much from him. They concealed his body in the deep crevice of a large rock outcropping and piled more stones on top. Instead of lightening the load of the wagon, they added rocks to the wagon bed to maintain the weight and the illusion of a load. They pressed hard the next day, knowing there were still many miles to go. Neither Varia nor the centaur scouts returned, and all Linsha could do was worry.

  Sir Hugh distracted her for a while by asking for her tale of Lanther and Ithin’carthia, and he told her about his capture, the terrible long march back to the Missing City, imprisonment, and slavery. He had changed, Linsha realized, in the time since he had tried to intervene for her during her trial those long months ago. Was it only months? It felt like years. All sense of boyishness in Hugh had disappeared. He was harder, withdrawn, and more angry. His once muscular body was tempered to lean muscle and bone, and sometimes when he moved, she caught glimpses of scars and whip marks on his legs, arms, and neck. What would he do, she wondered, if he survived this war? Would he stay in the Solamnic Knights? Was it all worth the pain and suffering? She didn’t ask him, but the thoughts stayed in her mind like an insidious weed, and she heard Crucible’s words again in her memory-Should you decide the Knights of Solamnia are no longer enough for you…

  By the gods, what was enough?

  On the fourth day, Crucible came, winging from the clouded sky to the west. He came without net or eggs, only an expression of satisfaction. His scarred wings backflapped carefully and lowered his bulk to the crown of windy hilltop some distance from the nervous horses.

  To prevent the wagon team from bolting in fear, Linsha climbed down from the wagon and ran to join the bronze on the hill. Hurrying to him, she could not help the smile that lit her face.

  He lowered his head to greet her and inhaled her scent with pleasure. “I found the volcano,” he said as they walked side-by-side paralleling the moving wagon. “It is an old one, but the cone is still there and I found some lava tubes and an ancient chamber that I rearranged to make a spacious nest. They will be warm in there for a while.”

  Linsha was pleased. She knew building a nest for brass eggs would not be a problem for him. He had tamed the ferocious forces of the three volcanoes around Sanction, allowing the city to grow and thrive, so he certainly had the skill and power to manipulate one old, extinct shell. She had just worried that he would not be able to find anything suitable. The volcano had been a gift.

  “Do they still look close to hatching?” she asked.

  “Too close. I don’t know what those priests used on the eggs, but it has sped up the development by forty years or more. I don’t want to leave them for too long. But Falaius has a message for you, and I could get here faster than anyone else.”

  A shiver of alarm chilled her. “Is Varia all right?”

  “She’s just worn out by all the flying back and forth. She came to find me, so I left her sitting with the eggs and brought you the message myself.”

  An image formed in Linsha’s mind of the small brown, spotted owl trying to sit on nine dragon eggs at the same time. She started to giggle and a breath later she laughed uproariously for the first time in a long dry stretch. “Can’t you just imagine?” she gasped between fits of hilarity.

  Crucible laughed with her, but he really didn’t see what was so funny. He hadn’t meant that the bird was literally sitting on the eggs. They were too hot for any avian. Nevertheless, he liked to hear her laughter and see her smile.

  She sobered down after a while and tried to breathe normally. “Sorry. I am so tired, some things just seem silly.” She rubbed her face, took a deep breath, and said, “Now, what was your message?”

  “Falaius and Wanderer will meet you here.” He scratched a rough map in the earth with his claw. “Here is the river. Here is the volcano, and here about twenty miles north is a low butte in a broad, fairly flat valley. The butte is a remnant of this ridge that stretches toward the river. There are low hills here and here. We will set up a trap in this valley, using the butte as our ‘dragon nest.’ ”

  “How do we find this place from here?”

  He dragged his claw through the dirt toward the east. “You are already due east of there. Turn west. If you stay on a straight track, you will soon see a string of buttes to your right hand. Stay to the south of those and you’ll find a runoff riverbed. It’s usually dry, but it’s sandy and has some water in it now, so you shouldn’t miss it. I think you’ll be able to get there in two days.”

  “Is Falaius there now?”

  “His vanguard is. He and his scouts just found the place last night. He is very pleased to hear you are back.”

  “Tell him I will see him soon,” Linsha said. “Does anyone know where the Tarmaks are?”

  “Not yet. The scouts haven’t come back yet, Varia is too tired from carrying messages, and I have been too busy. We need to find them. Perhaps a quick, high flight overhead? Lanther would expect that.”

  She put a hand on his leg and felt the warmth of his sleek, gleaming scales. “He still has the Abyssal Lance, Crucible. Be very careful.”

  “My back aches, my wings will never be right, and I still shudder at the memory of that lance. Trust me. I will be careful.”

  They said good-bye, and Linsha watched as the dragon took a running leap off the hilltop and glided into the air. She wanted so much to go with him, but she couldn’t. Not yet. She still had her duty.

  She jogged back down the hill to catch up with the wagon and told Sir Hugh what was being planned.

  They turned the company west and raced for the river and the comparative safety of the Plains army.

  Later that evening Crucible came back briefly to report he had found the Tarmak army. As Linsha had suspected, Lanther had gathered every warrior he dared spare from Missing City and sent them into the fiel
d. The army was stretched out in a long line and was a scant two days behind Linsha and the wagon.

  “Two days!” she exclaimed. The Tarmaks must have run all the way.

  “There is a unit of cavalry in the vanguard, and they are closest. They have almost reached the place where you turned north. We will soon see if they believe you have the eggs.”

  “What if they don’t follow us?”

  “I don’t know. I will talk to Falaius and Wanderer before I return to the peak to check on the eggs. We’ll let you know.”

  And he was gone again, flying away into the dusky blue skirts of evening.

  The Akkad-Dar did not bother to have his large tent erected that night. He ordered only a small camp tent and sat inside in the glow of a single lamp studying maps while his army gathered around him. He had sent orders down the line that the scattered units were to be moved up without rest until the entire army was together. The enemy, he knew, was coming to meet him, and he reveled in the thought of the coming battle. But he wanted all his forces at his disposal, not stretched across the plains. True, he had pulled this march together very quickly, thanks to the foresight of the officer in charge of the city’s garrison, but many of the ekwullik had needed weapons, arrows, food, and supplies for a long march. They had needed some time to ready themselves. Other units were ready to go. So the Akkad-Dar’s army had left the city in pieces. Now it was time to bring them together.

  He pored over his maps of the Plains, a legacy from the Akkad-Ur, and wondered for the thousandth time where Linsha and Crucible would take the eggs. He knew the eggs were close to hatching and would need to be nested very quickly. He also knew the dragon could not fly long distances.

  After the damage done to his wings, it was a wonder he could fly at all. So, where would they go? Did Crucible have the eggs? Or did Linsha? Was Linsha in this wagon his trackers were following? Were the eggs? And where was the text Afec had stolen?