Aerie

by Mercedes Lackey

  “A wall—” Kiron began, then shook his head.

  “No, that is just as foolish. How can we wall a whole border? A wall will not keep out magic, and any man can find a place to go under, over, or around it.”

  “And we do not have the time to build a wall even if we could,” Rakaten-te said bluntly. “Which we cannot. The cost would bankrupt both nations. Whatever the solution that the Great King and Queen arrive at, it will not be any of those. Meanwhile, we must try and accomplish the task that was set for us. We must find one of the amulets that sent our people out into the wilderness, sure that this was the thing they wanted to do the most.”

  Once again, Aket-ten and Kiron found themselves standing by while the Chosen performed a series of arcane rituals, things which appeared absurdly simple. Some chanting to a shaken sistrum, the burning of pungent incense, a few gestures with hand or staff, and a great deal of sitting or standing in silence. Aket-ten had the distinct feeling, however, that this impression was deceptive, and as the morning wore on, she found herself thinking that if one of the powerful Magi of Alta had gone head-to-head against Rakaten-te, the Magus would have come off distinctly second-best.

  But the old man was definitely flagging. And when, in midmorning, he exploded in a fit of temper and threw his staff to the ground, she was not entirely surprised.

  “Curse it!” he swore. “How can an amulet move? And more, how can it waft through the air? I find them, I have found three of them, and yet they are traveling all over this town! Twice now I have sensed one over my head for a moment, before it moved off! I cannot pin these things to a place! This is impossible!”

  Waft through the air . . . How could an amulet fly? Perhaps part of the magic was to make it fly? Like the enchanted rug in the tale? Aket-ten thought for a moment, then went outside. She looked about in the kitchen-court, where a flock of pigeons was pecking at the remains of the stale flatbread she had torn up and thrown to them—as she did every day. Her presence startled them into flight, and as they circled above the roof of the Temple, she heard Rakaten-te howl, “And there it is again!”

  Waft—

  It struck her like a blow to the head, and she ran inside. “An amulet can fly, when it is bound to the leg of a pigeon,” she shouted, as soon as she was in the sanctuary.

  Both Kiron, who was picking up the much-abused staff, and the Chosen, who had both hands cupped to his head, shaking it in frustration, stopped dead. For one long moment, both stood frozen, without saying a word. The Chosen was the first to speak.

  “A pigeon?” he exclaimed, for the first time in Aket-ten’s knowledge looking honestly bewildered. “But—how would—” He shook his head. “These things came in from outside, as the amulets that ate magic did. How—”

  “By putting out bread and netting one,” Aket-ten said excitedly. “Or grain. Or making a sticky-trap. Whoever did this would have to take care that no one saw him, because I am sure all the pigeons in this town belong to someone, but it is not hard to take a pigeon.” Pigeons were a good source of meat for anyone who could afford the bit of grain it took to bring them home to roost at night. During the day, they could scavenge whatever food they could peck up. And of course, there were dove sellers who raised doves and pigeons to offer as sacrifices for those who could afford a slightly better gift to the gods than a loaf of bread, a bunch of latas flowers, or a jar of beer.

  “And pigeons always come home to roost,” said Kiron, straightening, and handing the Chosen his staff. “That was one of my jobs as a serf, tending to the pigeon cote. They always come home to roost. If you sell one and the buyer is foolish enough to turn it loose, it will come back to you. Khefti-the-Fat, my old master, gulled many a fool in that way.”

  “In Alta, traders sometimes carry pigeons with them to send messages home,” Aket-ten explained with growing, if weary, satisfaction. “It is a one-way journey, of course, which is why a dragon courier is so much better. But—if I wanted to slip amulets bearing spells into a city, I would buy some pigeons from a cheat, and I would tie the amulets to their legs, and then turn them loose. Or I would buy doves from a dove seller in the temple court, and instead of taking it inside to sacrifice, tie the amulet to its leg and turn it loose.”

  “By all the gods . . .” The Chosen stood stark still, but then his face darkened. “And how are we to get our hands on one of these birds? You cannot sense which one it is, I cannot see to aim a sling or a bow! We cannot net every bird in the town!”

  Aket-ten laughed, and both Kiron and the Chosen stared at her as if they thought she had gone mad. “You cried out ‘there it is again’ as I startled the flock that was feeding in the kitchen court. They will already have settled again and are surely the ones that eat here every day. We have more bread, do we not?” she countered, with memories of birds lurching around her mother’s courtyard after feasting on fermented berries flashing through her mind. “And we have palm wine? Trust me. We will have one of those birds before the sun sets.”

  Every scrap of their bread was soon soaking up the wine as Rakaten-te made certain that the flock that held his amulet did not venture off somewhere else, by the simple expedient of sitting in the courtyard and distributing a miserly few grains of barley at intervals. The continued promise of food held the flock on the roof until the bread was ready. Then Kiron and Aket-ten carried it out in platters, and the three of them retired to the shade of the kitchen to wait.

  It did not take long. The pigeons quickly swarmed the pans of bread, gobbling it as fast as they could, and before very long, the entire flock was lurching around the courtyard completely unable to fly. It would have been funny at any time, but in their exhausted state, Kiron and Aket-ten found it hilarious. Aket-ten laughed herself weak in the knees, watching the poor birds stagger, flap, and fall over. Rakaten-te was in the sanctuary, which was just as well in a way, since he would never be able to appreciate the sight.

  Even funnier, in a macabre way, was what they did next.

  Kiron had gotten a pair of bird nets used for taking up pigeons from the cote, and he and Aket-ten slowly made their way around the courtyard, scooping up birds, examining them for anything fastened to them, then tossing them over the wall to avoid netting them up a second time. After a while, Aket-ten began hearing snarling and spitting, then barking. Curious, she tossed the bird she had rejected over the wall, and found a box to stand on so she could see what was going on.

  She was just in time to see an uneasy standoff between one of the dog packs, and a loose conglomeration of cats end in a swirl of angry barking and flashing claws, as one of the cats darted in, snatched the poor bird, then whisked itself over the rooftops with the pigeon in its mouth as about a third of the cats arrowed off in hot pursuit. There was some more snarling and spitting, then the fight resolved itself, and about two dozen pairs of hopeful eyes turned back to the top of the wall where Aket-ten was looking over. She began laughing helplessly, and Kiron climbed up beside her to see what was going on.

  “Oh, dear—” Kiron shoved his hand up to his mouth to smother his own reaction. “I should be appalled—”

  Aket-ten giggled. “I know. But it’s funny—”

  “It’s hardly fair,” Kiron pointed out. “I know the dogs and cats are hungry, but it still seems unfair—”

  “So maybe we should stop tossing them over the wall—”

  Kiron looked around, and shrugged helplessly. “Where do we toss them, then? If we throw them on the roof—”

  “Maybe the cats will get them, but at least the dogs won’t,” she said, still giggling, and then broke up into gales of laughter, until her sides ached and tears came, as something else occurred to her. “Bounty from the temple court! They must think that the god Anbas and the goddess Pashet have come here to reward their creatures!”

  But as it happened, the poor pigeons got a reprieve, and were permitted to recover from their inebriation without further decimation of their numbers, since the very next bird that Kiron took up proved to hav
e a tiny scroll of leather so thin it was translucent bound to its left leg. Kiron tried not to touch the thing. It was magic, and it was not something he wanted to take a chance on. For all he knew, this was the same amulet that had sent him and Aket-ten off to wander. Would the spell work now that they knew about it? There was no telling, but he wasn’t going to risk it.

  Bearing the bird, scroll and all, they hurried into the Sanctuary.

  The Chosen “examined” the bird without touching it. “Kill the bird,” he said shortly. “Get the scroll off the bird without cutting the binding or letting it unroll. Then put the scroll in one of those empty unguent jars we found and seal the jar.”

  Kiron and Aket-ten exchanged a glance, and Kiron took the bird from her while she hurried off after a jar. When she returned, the bird was gone, and Kiron was just cutting the foot off the birdless leg, carefully not touching the scroll, leaving only the bit of skin and bone with the amulet attached. Wordlessly, she held out the jar; he dropped it in, and she gave the jar to the Chosen.

  With heavy weariness, Rakaten-te made some gestures and muttered something and a bit of that odd darkness billowed up out of the ground at his feet and wrapped itself around the jar, vanishing as it did so.

  “Have we enough provisions for the journey?” he asked, raising his head slowly as if it ached. “Now, I mean. This very moment.”

  Kiron shrugged, then seemed to remember that the Chosen couldn’t see the gesture, and coughed. “We’ve got no bread, but other than that—”

  “Then call your dragons, gather no more than what we need, and let us be gone from here,” Rakaten-te said grimly. “I do not believe this city will be safe for us to be in for much longer.”

  Rather than flying back to Mefis, the Chosen of Seft insisted that they go to Sanctuary. Kiron could not have been happier; though Aket-ten fretted about leaving her wing for so long. Sanctuary was closer by far, and after the ordeal of the scorpions, Kiron wanted nothing more than to be able to get a sound night’s sleep in a place that had so many priests and priest-mages in it that surely not even the strongest magician could slip an attack inside. Or even if they could, there were hordes of acolytes and servants to deal with it.

  They pushed the dragons to the limit, taking straight off as soon as there was light, pausing to hunt the moment they saw something large enough to be prey rather than hunting first before going on, and stopping to make camp and hunt again well before sunset. Each night the Chosen settled for wordless communion with other priests long into the night. He slept little, ate little, and spoke no more than a few words at a time.

  They reached Sanctuary as the last of the light left the sky on the third day. The dragons were ravenous, and it was with profound relief that Kiron saw the servants waiting below as he and Aket-ten spiraled down to the pens. Rakaten-te slid off the saddle as soon as he could unbuckle the strap holding him; two acolytes led him away without a word, with his hand on the shoulder of one of them.

  Kiron did not give the Chosen another thought, for more servants arrived with meat for the dragons, who fell on it avidly, snatching the chunks out of the barrows and wolfing them down so fast that one chunk was still visible traveling down as a lump in their necks while they were gulping down a second. For the first time in Kiron’s memory, there was some jostling and snapping between Re-eth-ke and Avatre over the food. It took Aket-ten to get them to settle again, but Kiron took this as a warning of trouble if dragons were ever allowed to go hungry. Even tame dragons had their limits.

  And so did even the strongest of Jousters. As he pulled the harness from Avatre’s back, he felt himself flagging. Food was not his need, of course, but oh, sleep, sleep—

  He grabbed the arm of one of the servants as the man passed. “Are we needed, Aket-ten and I?” he asked, more harshly and abruptly than he intended.

  The man shook his head. “I have no orders—” he ventured.

  Avatre finished the last of her meat, and with an enormous sigh, settled into her hot sand, wiggled a little to work herself into it, and was instantly asleep. That was all Kiron needed.

  “Good. Then until someone comes to fetch us, I will be here,” he replied, and without even pausing to fetch bedding or ask the servant for some, he settled in next to Avatre’s warm bulk, as he had when she was just an unfledged baby, and grabbed for sleep with both hands.

  SEVENTEEN

  THE baby dragons were not such babies anymore.

  All of the things that Ari, Kiron, and the Altan wing had learned when raising their babies were showing impressive results with the babies of the Queen’s Wing. They were growing faster and stronger than any wild dragon could. Sutema was already flying short distances with a weighted saddle, although she was not yet up to Peri’s full weight. The others were at the same flapping stage that Sutema had reached a few days ago. They would all be flying soon.

  That was what was really on her mind, when she came back to her courtyard to have a bath before dinner. She had not expected to find Letis waiting for her.

  “I am told,” the older woman said, without preamble, “That my son is in the place called Sanctuary. What is this place?”

  Peri was spared having to answer by the timely appearance of Helet-ani, which was just as well, since she didn’t actually know the answer.

  “Sanctuary is the desert city of priests,” the former priestess said. “Priests of both Tian and Altan gods gather there. It was the refuge for the Altan priests against the depredations of the Altan Magi, and when those Magi tempted the Great King of Tia and became his advisers and the same troubles began here, as many as could escaped to its shelter.

  “Ah,” Letis said enigmatically. Helet-ani gave her a curious look, but when nothing else was forthcoming, shrugged and went on her way.

  Peri, who wanted a bath far more than she wanted to be polite and deferential, went on her way to her quarters. The sun was very hot, and she had just spent far too long in it, exercising Sutema. Letis followed her, the mulish look on her face telling Peri that her putative mother-in-law had something to say and was not going to leave until she had delivered her lecture.

  Peri pulled her tunic over her head as soon as she entered the door of her own rooms and dropped it on the floor. Once, it would have been she who would have scuttled in afterward to retrieve the soiled garment and take it off to be cleaned. Now that was someone else’s duty. She reflected, as Letis’ lips tightened, that she was getting used to being waited on instead of doing the servants’ work herself. Not that long ago she had tried to tidy her own quarters and make as little work for the servants as possible. That was, until the Overseer for the Dragons’ Court took her aside and explained to her, in the kindliest possible manner, that she was making the servant assigned to her unhappy by doing that servant’s job.

  “If you do not let her tend to you, not only does she lose pride in thinking that you feel she will not do her work properly, she then, because there are no idle hands here, has to do work she would really rather not do. Much harder and less pleasant work.”

  So now she made as much light work as possible for the nearly invisible girl to do.

  But Letis, of course, frowned, then with an exaggerated sigh, picked up the tunic, folded it neatly, and put it on the bed before following Peri into the bathing room. This place was a true wonder to Peri, what with cool water appearing like magic in the bath jars every day. It wasn’t magic, of course; it was the servants, but it might as well have been magic.

  Peri dipped out water and cleaned herself, sighing with relief to feel the sweat and grime sluice away. This was usually a peaceful part of the day for her, but Letis clearly had something on her mind, so Peri thought it best to get it over with.

  “So Lord Kiron is in Sanctuary?” she said quietly.

  “And I would like to know why he is not here, with his mother!” Letis said angrily.

  “I presume because his duty took him there. He was escorting a priest, after all. Is there something that you need?”
Peri asked. “I can certainly see that you get it—”

  Letis gave her a withering look. “Only my son. And what of you? Are you not anxious for him to return?”

  Peri flushed a little. Letis took that for maidenly blushes, and finally smiled and nodded knowingly. But the truth was that Peri had been so busy with Sutema that she hadn’t actually thought much about Kiron.

  “It would be good to have him here, but his duties truly rest in Aerie,” she pointed out. “And that is likely where he will return.”

  That made Letis frown again, and she was off on a scolding plaint about filial duty, the lost farm, and all the worn old complaints, until Peri was close to telling her to hold her tongue.

  And long before the screed was over, Peri wished she had.

  “Kiron . . .” Aket-ten was shaking his shoulder, as Kiron swam up out of dreamless sleep. He vaguely recalled someone rousing him earlier, about dawn, and steering him into the darkened comfort of the little room attached to the pen and the bed therein. Just as well; he’d have been turned to a strip of dried leather if he had slept out in the sun.

  He yawned, stretched, and in a burst of mischief, started to reach for Aket-ten to pull her down beside him.

  But the seriousness of her expression made him halt that impulsive gesture before it began. “You look as if we’re needed,” he said instead.

  She nodded. “We are. There are three other Jousters here, and Kaleth has a task for us.”

  Kiron made a face. “More courier duty—”

  She shook her head. “I don’t think so. At least, it didn’t seem that way to me. But he wanted me to get you, so he can explain it to all of us at the same time.”