Hell's Gate m-1

by David Weber

  "I've never seen Windclaw react like that, Sir," Muthok Salmeer said. "Never! He's an old fellow, smart as a transport dragon gets, with plenty of lessons in good manners. He's no war dragon, to be hissing at everyone but his pilot. He's spent his entire life in Transport and Search and Rescue work. It beats hell out of me, Hundred, and that's no lie. It's like he took one look at the girl there, and went berserk."

  The squire's tone sounded as confused and upset as Jasak felt. It was obvious Salmeer was completely and totally perplexed, but the pilot had reacted quickly and decisively to his dragon's impossible-to-predict rage. That fact, coupled with his obvious concern, disarmed much of Jasak's initial fury.

  The hundred made himself step back mentally and draw a deep breath. He glanced back at his prisoner, who sat huddled against Gadrial. Shaylar looked up, her face ashen as she risked a glance at Windclaw, then instantly pressed her face back against the magister, and he frowned as he got past his immediate reaction and started considering the implications of the dragon's behavior.

  "That's … interesting, Muthok," he said after a moment, turning back to the pilot. "Damned interesting."

  "You don't have any idea who they are, Sir?" Salmeer asked. "You could've knocked me down with a puff of air when that hummer message arrived, and that's a fact."

  "No, we don't know who they are. But I intend to find out, and we won't do that if we lose them. The girl's hurt?I don't know how badly?but the man's critical. He won't last the night if we don't get him to a true healer, and some of my own men are almost as bad."

  "Then it's a good thing I brought you one, Sir," Salmeer said with a smile. He gestured to the passengers still strapped to the saddles on the Windclaw's back, and Jasak's eyes followed the gesture. The dragon's reaction to Shaylar had kept him from paying much attention to Windclaw's other riders, but now his face lit with delight as he recognized Sword Morikan.

  "Naf!"

  "Good to see you on your feet, Sir," the healer replied. "And Muthok brought more than just me. I've got Vormak and two good herbalists riding the evacuation deck, and Traith and two more herbalists are waiting back at the base camp. Muthok needed to lighten Windclaw, and I figured it would be better to avoid doing any surgery we don't absolutely have to do out here. It's a hell of a lot warmer on that side of the portal, and we'll have tents to work in, as well."

  "Good man!" Jasak said, nodding hard. "Good work, both of you."

  "Least we could do, Sir," Salmeer said. "On the other hand, this isn't exactly what I'd call a proper landing ground you've got out here, if you'll pardon my saying so. We can probably take out most of your critically wounded now, but getting airborne before we run into the trees is going to be tricky, and Windclaw's already flown a long way today. He's going to need at least several hours rest after we get back to camp, so we'll have to come back for the others tomorrow." His eyes glinted. "Next time you decide to fight a battle, Sir, try to pick a spot easier to get dragons into, eh?"

  "I'll bear that in mind," Jasak replied, with a smile he hoped didn't look forced. Then he smiled more naturally. "And I'm more grateful than you'll ever know to you for reaching us this quickly."

  Jasak angled his head up to watch as Morikan, the surgeon, and the herbalists started to dismount. They hauled their gear down Windclaw's shoulder, then stepped across from his foreleg to the stream bank, where several of First Platoon's troopers waited to help them with their baggage.

  Firelight caught the dragon's iridescent scales and set him aglow when he rustled his wing pinions or took a breath. He still looked agitated, and the sound of his breathing, the deep rush of air through cavernous lungs which no one could ever forget, once he'd heard it, was faster than usual. It was also higher pitched, almost whistling.

  It's the sound a fighting dragon makes just before battle, Jasak realized with a sudden, shocking flash of insight. Humanity hadn't pitted dragons against one another in almost two centuries, and no one living had ever heard that pre-battle steam-kettle sound. Not in earnest, at any rate. But it had been too frequently described in the history books and the aerial training volumes?even in those silly romances his younger sister mooned over?for him to mistake what he was hearing now.

  Which didn't make any more sense than all the other impossible things which had already happened this day.

  Jasak stared up at the furious transport beast, towering over him, and wondered a little wildly what had set off Windclaw's battle stress. Salmeer had been right about one thing, though; he was sure of that. Shaylar Nargra was the source of the dragon's anger. Yet what in all the myriad universes about that terrified, injured girl could cause a dragon to react so violently to her mere presence?

  The question simmered in the back of his brain. Intuition and logic alike argued that it was an important one, but he had more immediately urgent problems at the moment.

  "Can you keep him under control well enough to put her on his back?" he asked Salmeer, twitching his head at Shaylar. "Her and the others?"

  The pilot had been gazing at Shaylar, as well, obviously asking himself the same questions which had occurred to Jasak. Now he refocused his attention on the hundred, and his jaw muscles bunched.

  "Oh, yeah, Sir. I'll keep him in line, all right. He might get around some greenhorn handler, but he won't try any tricks with me. If I might make a suggestion, though, Hundred?"

  "Suggest away," Jasak said with a sharp nod. "You know your beast?and your job?better than I ever will."

  Salmeer's eyes narrowed, as if Jasak's tone had surprised him. Then he twitched his own head in Shaylar's direction.

  "Put her up last," he said. "He won't try anything that would endanger his passengers once he's got wounded aboard. He's a smart old beast, Windclaw is, Sir, and he knows his duty. He's responsible for the safe transport of wounded men, and he knows it. Not like a man would, you understand, but he's smarter than any dog you'll ever own, and dogs are smart enough to look out for those under their care."

  "Yes, they are. It's a good suggestion, Muthok, and one I appreciate. Deeply."

  Salmeer ducked his head in an abbreviated nod of acknowledgment, then gave Jasak a grim little smile.

  "I've answered the call of more than a few commanders of one hundred, Sir, and I'll tell you plain?you're the first who's ever given a good godsdamn about the opinions of a transport pilot."

  Jasak frowned, his gaze locking with Salmeer's, and his nostrils flared.

  "I can't say that fact makes me very happy, Muthok. But thank you for the information. It won't be wasted."

  Salmeer blinked. Then his eyes narrowed as he remembered whose son he was speaking to. Jasak saw the memory in the pilot's eye and felt a flicker of harsh inner amusement.

  No, Muthok, he thought. It won't be wasted, I assure you.

  The Duke of Garth Showma, who also happened to be Commander of Five Thousand Thankhar Olderhan (retired), would light quite a few fires under certain officers when that piece of intelligence hit his desk. Officers too haughty?or stupid?to consider the insights of specialists with experience far superior to their own were officers who got their men killed when things went to hell.

  Rather like I managed to do this afternoon, he thought, and felt his face tighten for an instant.

  Salmeer met Jasak's gaze for a moment longer, almost as if he could hear the younger man's thoughts, then gave him a sharp salute.

  "You take care of the wounded then, Sir. I'll start prepping the platform cocoons."

  Jasak nodded, then turned as Naf Morikan finished passing his own equipment over to Sword Harnak and waded ashore.

  Morikan was a North Shalomarian?one of the towering variety. A big, rawboned man, nearly six-foot-seven in his bare feet, he still managed to move so quietly, almost noiselessly, that Jasak had sometimes wondered if it was a part of his Gift. The healer had huge shoulders, enormous physical strength, and a Gift for healing which made the hulking giant one of the gentlest souls Jasak had ever known. He'd never pursued the research
necessary to earn the formal title of magistron, the healer's equivalent of Gadrial's magister's rank, so he was technically only a journeyman, which also explained why he wasn't a commissioned officer in the Healer's Corps, himself. But Jasak wasn't about to complain about that today. Not when it meant having a healer as powerfully Gifted as Morikan out at the sharp end when the remnants of First Platoon needed one so desperately.

  "It's good to see you, Naf," he said quietly, clasping the sword's hand. "I've got four men in comas, and one of them's the only male survivor from the people we ran into out here. That girl there," he pointed at Shaylar, "was with him."

  Morikan's eyes glinted. Jasak could almost physically feel the questions simmering under the big noncom's skin, but the healer visibly suppressed them.

  "Five Hundred Klian wants a full briefing, Sir. I'm dying of curiosity myself, for that matter. But that can wait, and the wounded can't. Which one is most critical?"

  Jasak led him straight to Jathmar. Morikan knelt beside the injured man's litter, then hissed aloud when he touched him.

  "Gods, Sir! I'm a healer, not a miracle worker! He's holding on by a thread! And it's so frayed, it's about to snap!"

  "You think I don't know that?" Jasak snapped back. "Magister Gadrial is the only reason he still alive at all!"

  The big healer looked up, then whistled softly.

  "Magister Gadrial kept him alive? With nothing but a minor arcana for healing?" He glanced at Gadrial, who'd given him a demonstration of her minor Gift when she'd first arrived in-universe. "Magister, you have my deep respect, ma'am. I wouldn't have believed this was possible."

  He gestured at Jathmar, and Gadrial nodded to him across Shaylar's shoulder.

  "Thank you," she said quietly. "And for Rahil's sake, do whatever it takes to save him. I'm convinced he's this girl's husband." She tightened her embrace around Shaylar, who was watching them, her hazy eyes wide and frightened. "She's hurt, herself, and she's in a fragile state. If she loses him?"

  The magister broke off, her mouth tight, and Morikan nodded in comprehension.

  "Their last names are the same," Jasak added. "I found that out when she woke up. They're either married or brother and sister, and I'm inclined to agree with Magister Gadrial's theory that they're married."

  The big healer looked into Shaylar's eyes, took in the ghastly bruises that had turned half her face into a swollen, black mass of pain, and his jaw turned to granite.

  "Start getting your less critically wounded onto the dragon, Sir Jasak," he said briskly. "I'll tend to them once we get back to the base camp, but I don't dare wait that long with this one."

  Jasak nodded tightly and turned away to begin giving orders, and Naf Morikan crouched down over Jathmar's still form. He drew a deep breath, closed his eyes, and reached out, summoning the healing trance that gave him the power to work the occasional miracle.

  Shaylar had no clear idea what the giant leaning over her husband was doing, but it was obvious he was the person Jasak Olderhan had been waiting for so anxiously. The newcomer was so huge he reminded her painfully of Fanthi chan Himidi, but the difference in his personality and chan Himidi's was blindingly evident, even to her presently crippled Talent. chan Himidi had been one of Shaylar's dearest friends, yet she'd always been aware of his capacity for violence. Trained and disciplined, it had always been firmly under control, yet it had always been there, as well.

  This man might wear the uniform of a soldier, and his personality was certainly just as strong as chan Himidi's had ever been, but his battles weren't the sort one fought with weapons.

  The newcomer had lifted the blanket off Jathmar's burnt back and hissed aloud at the damage he'd found. But he didn't appear to be doing anything else at all. He was just kneeling there, hands extended over Jathmar's stretcher, eyes unfocused, staring at nothing… .

  And then, suddenly, Jathmar began to glow.

  Shaylar gasped. Light poured from the big man's hands, enveloping Jathmar's entire body. Then, despite the whirling black pain in her head, the marriage bond roared wide. Shaylar flinched violently in Gadrial's arms as Jathmar's pain blasted through her. She sensed Gadrial's sudden twitch of hurt as her fingers sank deep into the other woman's upper arms, but she couldn't help it. Her back was a mass of fire, her chest a broken heap of agony wrapped around ribs shattered like china someone had dropped to the floor, and her insides were bleeding.

  Then she felt an odd presence, like a tide of warm syrup flowing over her?into her?and there was intelligence in the syrup. There were thoughts and emotions, a sense of awe that she was alive at all, and a determination to keep her among the living.

  A soothing wave of light and energy she could sense but couldn't see sank down into her blistered back. The sensations were soul-shaking. She could literally feel her skin growing as blisters popped, drained, vanished. The damage ran deep … and so did whatever was sinking into her, repairing the deep layers of skin and tissue damaged in the hellish vortex of the enemy's fire.

  It sank deeper still, down into her bleeding abdomen. She felt half-glued wounds knitting themselves together as new tissue closed the gaps and fissures in blood vessels, intestinal walls, muscles and organs. Pain flashed through her, bright and terrible, as ribs shifted, moving on their own, grating back into proper alignment. She writhed, whimpering, and the pain in her chest burst free in an agonized cry.

  Shaylar's sudden scream yanked Naf Morikan straight out of healing trance. His head whipped around, and he stared, shaken and confused, as Shaylar writhed in Gadrial's arms. Motion under his hands jerked his attention back to Jathmar, and his eyes went wider still as he realized Jathmar was moving in exactly the same way.

  "What the living hell is going on?" the healer breathed in shock.

  "I don't know," Gadrial Kelbryan gasped, her own face wrung with pain from the crushing grip of Shaylar's daggered fingers as they sank into her biceps. "I don't know, but for pity's sake, man, finish the job! They're both in agony!"

  The magister was right, and Morikan returned to the trance. He was shaken, intrigued, and utterly mystified, but he forced all of that aside, out of the forefront of his attention, and reached out to that healing flood of power once more.

  Now that Jathmar was semi-conscious, the healer took care to stimulate the centers of the brain and spinal cord that produced natural pain killers. The patient's body flooded with his own internally produced pain-fighting serum in moments, which quickly put an end to his semi-aware thrashing about, and Morikan was dimly aware that his wife's cries had faded as well.

  By the time the job was done, Morikan felt as if he'd spent the day slogging through a jungle under a hundred-pound pack. But Jathmar's grievous wounds were healed, and the healer let his hands drop into his lap.

  "He's sleeping naturally," he sighed, sitting up from his hunched position over the stretcher. "He'll sleep for several hours, while his body replenishes its energy, mending itself. We'll need to wake him briefly to take some nourishment, but I'd rather wait until we've got him back to our side of the portal before doing that."

  Jasak Olderhan had returned from overseeing the loading of his other wounded, and he arrived in time to overhear the healer's last sentence.

  "Thank you, Naf. Thank you." He clasped the sword's hand in a firm grip. "Now let's get you back into the saddle. And let's get Shaylar onto the dragon, too. Magister Gadrial, I'd like you to go with us. Shaylar trusts you more than anyone else, and she'll need you to keep her steady."

  "I'll just get my pack," Gadrial agreed, and bent her head, murmuring into Shaylar's ear.

  Shaylar roused from deep confusion and the oddest dreams of her life and realized Gadrial was urging her to get up. She managed to obey, still supported by the other woman's arms, and realized Jathmar's stretcher had moved. She looked around, quick alarm cutting through her confusion, then relaxed?slightly?as she discovered that several men were maneuvering Jathmar and his stretcher upwards, toward a long platform strapped to the back
of the immense animal still crouched in the stream.

  At least the beast that couldn't possibly exist?the dragon, her mind insisted, because that fairytale label was the only one she could think of?wasn't still staring at her. That was a massive relief.

  It had swiveled its head to watch the men climbing up its side with an almost absurdly attentive air, instead. The way its head was cocked, the intentness with which it watched what was going on, reminded her of the freight master on one of the famous Trans-Temporal Express' endless trains.

  Cinches like the belly bands of an ordinary saddle, but far larger, were drawn up tight every four feet and buckled securely, securing the platform on its back. Sidewalls around the top of the platform, a foot and a half high, bore plenty of cleats for ropes or straps, and the purpose became clear as Jathmar's stretcher was hoisted up and roped into place so that his "bed" couldn't shift. They fastened straps to Jathmar, as well, so that he wouldn't roll off the stretcher.

  It's a mobile hospital, Shaylar marveled. Or, rather, an aerial ambulance for evacuating wounded to the nearest real hospital.

  They didn't load all the wounded soldiers onto it, however; only those with wounds serious enough to prevent them from walking out on their own. There were quite a lot of them, and she was glad of that. So fiercely glad it frightened her that Sharonian lives hadn't been sold cheaply. She only wished there were more dead soldiers, because however kindly Gadrial might treat her, however gentle and patient Jasak might be, she could not forget the slaughter they'd perpetrated. She would never forget it. Whether or not she could ever forgive it was a question for the future, and she was too battered to think even a few minutes ahead, far less weeks or months.

  Then it was her turn.

  Any faint hope Shaylar had nourished that they might release her, at least, died when Jasak himself escorted her toward the waiting dragon. She didn't want to go near that beast. Didn't want to come within striking distance of those lethal bronze claws, or those dagger-sized teeth. She was three or four yards away when it angled its head back around to glare at her. It started to hiss?