“Then why keep her with us?” Urulani said to him with surprising softness in her voice. “I do not ask you this to be cruel, Drakis, but what kind of a life can you have together without trust? She is clearly a danger to you and perhaps to us all. What kind of a life can she have beyond the forgetful lie that the elves offer to all their slaves?”
“You make sense, Urulani,” Drakis responded. “In fact, all of you make sense . . . even Ethis is starting to make sense to me. I cannot explain it, but I feel responsible for her.”
“You did not break her, Drakis,” the captain said. “It is not your fault that she is how she is.”
“Yes, I know,” he said gazing out over the bow. “But I made promises to her when she was whole—when I thought she was mine—and now that she is no longer whole, I feel that those promises should still mean something. Maybe it wasn’t real for her, but it was for me—or at least as real as I believe anything to be any more.”
“So, are you this Drakis they all want you to be?” Urulani asked through a smile.
“You really want to know?”
“Yes.”
“Then I’ll really tell you . . . I don’t know.”
“That’s no answer,” Urulani scoffed.
“That’s all the answer I’ve got,” Drakis said, reaching up for one of the back stays and leaning against it. “There’s only one thing that I’m certain of and that is that I need to know—one way or the other—if this is my destiny. So much has happened, so many people have sacrificed so much—even their lives from time to time—that I have to wonder if all of this has some meaning . . . some purpose. Belag once told me that he had to believe in me or his brother’s death would have had no meaning. All I’m left with now is that thought and this terrible song in my . . . wait! Look ahead, just around this bend!”
The bow was swinging around another turn in the river.
Urulani’s face shifted into a crooked smile.
“Is that a road?” she asked.
“Ethis! Jugar!” Drakis shouted. “Break out the packs and make sure they’re stocked! We’re going on a little trip.”
“Master Ganja, you are in charge,” Urulani said, checking her pack and closing it. “I’ve got six of the crew with me . . . the rest are to stay here.”
There was a groan among those left behind. They would have liked the opportunity to see this new land.
“Drakis, are you ready?” she asked as she shouldered her pack.
“We’re all ready,” he replied.
Urulani turned to acknowledge him when she was caught up short. “You’re not serious!”
The captain had expected Ethis and Jugar to be joining the expedition but there, too, was a brightly beaming Lyric and, most surprising of all, Mala holding her pack and looked down at the deck, seemingly avoiding anyone’s eyes.
“There is no way they are coming with us!” she said.
“There is no way they cannot,” Drakis replied.
“I’m not dragging those women across the Sand Sea!”
“You’re not dragging anyone,” Drakis said. “Both the Lyric and Mala need to be watched . . . and not out of my sight.”
“You don’t trust my crew?”
“Not with Mala,” he replied.
“Fine!” Urulani shouted. “But if she so much as spits in my direction, I’m going to kill her myself, and I promise you I will not be asking your permission ahead of time, you understand?”
“I understand,” Drakis answered.
Urulani turned on Mala, jabbing her finger at her collarbone. “And do you understand, princess?”
“Yes,” Mala answered, not looking up.
“Well, what a happy crew,” Urulani said though there was nothing happy in her tone at all.
Urulani had beached the Cydron on the riverbank, so they jumped from the bow of the boat onto the sands of the shore. Their feet sank down into the warm sands, causing them to struggle slightly until they managed to clamber up onto the remains of the roadway. There was some concern about the dwarf, who panicked for a time in the sands trying to get his footing, but in the end they managed to pull him onto the path as well.
The road of tightly fitted stones was broken in many places and completely obscured by drifting sand in so many more that Jugar feared they would lose it altogether, but in time they followed it up, at last cresting the sand dune at the edge of the river’s channel.
They were greeted with the sight of a chain of towering mountains that seemed to stretch from horizon to horizon. Purple-blue in the distance and appearing to waver in the heat of day, their peaks were sharp, jagged pinnacles whose crests were still draped in the white of perpetual snow. They looked as though they had been pushed up angrily from below, rising abruptly from the sands at their base in sheer granite crags and towers—the savage teeth of the world.
“The God’s Wall!” Jugar cried and began dancing a strange, dwarven step on the ancient stones.
“How did we miss that?” Ethis blurted out.
“We’ve been in the river channel,” Urulani shrugged. “The dunes must have hidden them from us.”
“That doesn’t prove anything, dwarf,” Drakis said, his eyes narrowing to try to examine the mountains better. He raised his arm and pointed. “What are those?”
“What?” Urulani asked.
“There at the base . . . those tall shapes at the base of the range. They’re too evenly spaced to be natural, and they seem to run down the length of the range.”
“They are my brothers,” the Lyric said with pride. “We are home!”
“The Sirens!” Jugar crowed. “Those are dragons, my boy! The dragons of the prophecy calling to you!”
“Is it . . . is it possible?” Drakis whispered.
“We came to find out,” Ethis said. “It must be four . . . maybe five leagues to the base. We could make it before dark, but we’d have to make camp and return in the morning.”
“You want to make camp . . . with dragons?” Urulani asked.
“Do dwarves float?” Drakis asked as he started down the road, which ran straight toward the base of the mountains.
Drakis stared up at the dragon.
The dragon’s dead, stone eyes stared back at him.
Drakis stood on a wide, black marble platform. The surface had been pitted and scarred by the blowing sands over time, scuffed to a dull finish. Fixed to it, the great carving of a dragon rose above him, its neck craning downward until its chin also rested on the pedestal. Enormous wings, also of stone, rose high above them nearly one hundred feet into the sky, brightly cast in the red light of the sunset. The front and back claws clutched enormous crystals in their talons that were embedded into the marble base. The crystals looked dark and common, but the dragon carving was intricate and detailed with pictograms of people now long dead and fallen to dust pursuing great deeds that were now otherwise forgotten.
Drakis considered the statue in silence.
“I . . . I’m sorry, my boy,” Jugar said next to him. “More sorry than I can say.”
Drakis started to speak, considered for a moment, and then continued. “It’s hollow. Can you see it? The head cavity all the way up the neck and into the body is entirely hollow.”
“Yes, lad,” Jugar said sadly.
Behind him, the rest of their party stood in the sand or sat on the edge of the pedestal. The Song of the Dragon rose and fell around them, a mournful, hollow sound. As far as they could see down both directions of the range, duplicates of this same statue stood on their own pedestals. Each of them in turn was making the same music across the Sand Sea to the south.
“The wind,” Drakis continued dispassionately, pointing toward the head. “It blows here constantly through that hole in the dragon’s mouth. I saw a musician once who played an instrument by blowing into it. It looked about the same size as that hole. You know, there must be some mechanism in the head that varies the pitch so that the song can be played over, and over, and over, and over . . .�
��
“Come, lad,” Jugar said, pulling at Drakis’ arm. “A little supper, perhaps, and a story or two . . .”
“There it is, dwarf!” Drakis shouted. “There’s the great destiny of humanity! There are no dragons to save us, just these lovely, marble dreams we created for ourselves. All myths and stories and lies we tell ourselves to comfort us and make us think there is some meaning to what we do. Well, here they are, dwarf! Here are the dragons that I’m supposed to raise from the storybook past and make war with on the elves! Here’s the source of the song that calls me back to a dead land filled with dead dragons! Here are your Sentinels—the sirens of the desolation—watching over us with stone eyes and weak songs!”
“Please, my boy,” Jugar tugged at the human’s belt. “Enough of this.”
“Enough?” Drakis’ laugh had a hysterical edge. “This weak, windy song? Let’s make a decent noise of it! Let’s call the whole world up here to see just how hollow this legend of yours is!”
Drakis turned back to the dragon’s head, drew in a deep breath and blew as hard as he could through the hole.
A thunderous blast of sound shook the ground, raising a pall of dust two feet high. Drakis staggered back from the statue, his hands clasped to his ears.
Mala stood up, her jaw dropping in wonder.
The crystals under the statue’s talons flared suddenly to life, brilliant light radiating outward, then curving back in on itself, forming a ball on the platform directly beneath the statue.
Ethis turned, his eye widening.
All down the range the other statues were answering in kind. Ethis watched as the bases of each, as far as he could see, were being illuminated by crystals as well.
Jugar’s cheers were entirely engulfed in the sound.
The progression of the song began, note after overwhelming note—Nine notes . . . Seven notes . . .shaping the globe beneath the dragon statue until it flashed once and stabilized.
The Lyric smiled.
Five notes . . . Five notes . . .
Drakis staggered back off the platform just as the song concluded, its final chords echoing off the sunset-glowing mountain peaks to the north.
He took his hands from his ears.
The song had stopped . . . it was gone from his mind.
“It’s a fold!” Ethis shouted.
The sphere of light beneath the dragon had become a portal. It was ancient—certainly older than any known in Rhonas. Beyond it was a land of dense green forests and bright towers in the distance.
Mala screamed.
Drakis looked up.
The peaks of the God’s Wall range suddenly began to move.
Drakis’ legs lost their strength.
As far as he could see, from every crag and mountaintop, dragons had awakened . . . and were filling the skies.
They answered the call.
They were coming for him.
CHAPTER 50
Celebrations
THE OLD ELVEN WOMAN had all the credentials of a Court Adjudicator of the Ministry of Occupation—a wizened post well suited to her age. If anyone looked more closely as she traveled the Northmarch Folds, they might discover that she bore the name of Liu Tsi-Feing, Third Court Adjudicator of the Arikasi Tjen-soi Prefecture and a Sight-maiden of the Paktan Order. Liu would tell you that she was a devout follower of Kiris, the elven Goddess of Light and Dark and that her mission on behalf of her master Arikasi dealt with trade disputes in the northern territories.
All of it was perfectly correct.
None of it was true.
The elven woman stepped uncertainly from the fold portal, gripping her walking stick tightly. The fold itself was guarded on both sides by rather impressive Warriors of the Nekara Order with a single Occuran Foldmaster sitting with his feet over the edge of the platform.
Young, the old woman thought, on his first posting for the Order and wondering if there was any part of the Empire more distant from all he wanted than this one.
The woman struggled forward, her staff dragging against the stone of the platform. The day was pleasantly cool. She could smell the breeze coming off the bay beyond the mud and stone walls of the town below. There was music rolling over the walls, and she could hear happy shouts and laughter punctuating the music drifting up the slope.
The Occuran Foldmaster did not bother to stand. He only turned to see who had come through and, seeing no one of importance, turned back to his idle consideration of his own importance.
The old woman would not be put off, however.
“Young Foldmaster,” she said in a quavering voice. “What town is this?”
“Yurani Keep,” the youth replied, though the effort seemed to pain him. “That stack of mud buildings is the capital city of this region.”
“They seem to be celebrating,” the woman noted. “Do you know the cause? Is it a holiday?”
“I do not know the cause . . . nor do I care.” The youth stretched at the aching in his limbs. “They have given us three days of rest and peace from their constant trafficking of their wares through this fold, and that is as good a cause as any to celebrate so far as I am concerned.”
The old woman smiled and nodded as she hobbled down off the platform and wound her way toward the city gates. The Foldmaster was typical of elven youth: spoiled, proud, lazy, whining, and lost in his self-importance.
She silently put him on her list.
In time she arrived at the gates through the city walls, finding them both open and unattended. The narrow, winding avenues with their cobblestone streets were filled with short, rust-brown gnome men, women, and children laughing and chattering at one another. Wherever there were small bands of drummers, lute players, trumpeters or other musicians playing together, they were surrounded by other gnomes who were invariably dancing and cavorting through the streets.
She came at last to the large, paved plaza of the city and climbed with stiff and pained strides the wide stairs up to the Great House Hall of the Caliphate of the Dje’kaarin. Several gnome guards stood before the great doorway that led into the hall. The Captain of the Guard stepped out from their number and held his hand up.
“Stop!”
“Yes?” the woman asked weakly.
“You wish to see the Caliph?”
“That is why I have come.”
The captain’s hand flipped palm up. “Ten Imperial decella for ten minutes. Hard coin only—no paper!”
“Could the Captain of the Guard manage to give me a private audience . . . undisturbed . . . for, say, twenty decella?”
The captain considered for a moment, then nodded. “He’s all yours . . . for twenty.”
The woman sighed, then produced the coins for the captain. He stepped aside and motioned the rest of the guards to do likewise. She passed through the large doors and turned her stooped form back to close the doors behind her.
As the doors rang shut, the old elf woman turned, gripping her staff firmly with both her hands. She took in the disgusting room with practiced eyes. Bent over and with shuffling steps, she moved slowly toward the throne of the Caliph.
Ch’drei was in no hurry; she knew how to play a part well.
Few alive remembered that the Keeper had been a great Inquisitor in her day. Down the years of her rise to the highest position in her Order, she had increasingly affected the roll of a withered elven matron. While it was true that her skills had diminished over time, it was not nearly to the extent that even her closest associates in the Order thought. She held them against those times when it was necessary that she travel alone.
This had become one of those times.
It had all gone wrong. She first knew it when reports came back of entire gnome cities being massacred by Iblisi Quorums in the Vestasian wasteland. Jukung had been her choice to quietly contain the problem; he became her mistake, and she could see that now. She thought his passion would give him strength to do the job; instead it consumed him to the point where he forgot what the mission was a
bout. The surviving members of Jukung’s Quorums whom she questioned confirmed her worst fears. He had substituted his own orders for hers. Now Jukung was dead, and all the Empire, it seemed, was talking about how the Iblisi had been hunting a human named Drakis . . . and succeeded only in killing everyone they met except him.
This disaster was bad enough—but not enough to bring her out of her lair. Ch’drei had come north for her own reasons: One of the Assesia she interviewed had given her a message from the one person she had no wish to hear from.
Soen.
He seemed to have vanished almost the moment after he had killed Jukung in some obscure human coastal village. The Codexia could not say where he had gone. They had followed rumors of an elven Iblisi tracking a manticore eastward along the Thetis Coast; there were other reports of him among the mud gnome cities, or passing east into Ephindria, or bartering for a ship in Menninos. None of it could be confirmed. All that remained was the message given her by the Codexia.
“Tell the Keeper I leave my answer with the Caliph of Yurani.”
She stopped and looked up at the foot of the throne.
At the sight, Ch’drei straightened at once, tossing back the hood from her head.
The Keeper of the Iblisi stood staring at the form of Argos Helm, the former Caliph of the Dje’kaarin and now a rapidly rotting corpse impaled on the top of his own throne.
“You always were a clever boy,” Ch’drei breathed through clenched teeth.
No wonder the town was celebrating. Argos Helm was a despot of the worst kind, but he had been a despot the elves could easily control. Now it would be only a matter of time—days perhaps—before the warlords of the Dje’kaarin threw the region into an uproar over which of them would be dominant. The guards outside were undoubtedly making their coin letting the jubilant citizens in for a peak at this freak show that . . .
A mark on the frame of the throne caught her eye. It would have been invisible to anyone else, but those trained in her Order had it so ingrained into them that it would call their attention even without an active search.
Ch’drei moved quickly around the throne. The blood of Argos Helm had dried down the back of the throne, but she paid no attention to it or the rotting corpse. She pried at the back board. It came away in one piece exposing a hollow space.
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