Dragon Prince 03 - Sunrunner's Fire

by Melanie Rawn

  “Ruala!” He grasped her shoulders again and turned her to face him. “Which one?”

  Her answer was an innocent smile and absolutely nothing else.

  “Hmph,” he replied.

  Controlling a fast horse in a headlong race up a mountainside while at the same time weaving sunlight to find a downed dragon were not recommended for the easily distracted. Pol shifted precariously between his body’s consciousness of the mare moving beneath him and his mind’s consciousness of the terrain moving beneath his fabric of plaited light far above. The doubled sensation should have made him as motion sick as crossing water, but all he felt was a vague dizziness. Thanking the Goddess for her mercies, he split his concentration in two neat, separate parts and didn’t have time to think about anything else.

  But Riyan did, and as they began the descent down into a ravine he deliberately slammed his horse into Pol’s to gain the prince’s attention. Reining in, Pol shook himself free of the weaving and glowered at Riyan. “What in all Hells did you do that for?” he shouted. “I nearly fell!”

  “You would’ve been worse off than that if you’d kept on Sunrunning. Have a look.” As the others pulled up, he gestured to the trail ahead which led into shadowy trees.

  Pol felt his stomach turn over. If his body had left the sunlight while his mind and gifts were tangled in it—Urival’s lectures on the Star Scroll gave him the ancient word for the most hideous death a Sunrunner could imagine: daltiya. Shadow-lost. An empty mind in a body that functioned for a few days and then died.

  “I’m sorry. It was careless of me,” Pol murmured. “Thank you, Riyan.”

  “Did you catch sight of the dragon?”

  “Not yet. Anybody hear anything?” Heads were shaken in the negative all around. “She can’t be that far from us. Riyan, will you take the south for about a measure? I’ll range north.”

  Only a few moments later Riyan gave a guttural cry. Instantly Pol was back on the slope, shocked by his friend’s expression of horror.

  “Can’t fly—afraid—kill him! Kill them! Can’t fly, wing broken—hurts hurts hurts—”

  Sorin kicked his horse over to Riyan’s. Shaking his friend hard with one hand, he shouted his name several times. At last sense returned to Riyan’s dark eyes. “Are you all right?” Sorin asked worriedly.

  A gulp, a curt nod. “Her pain . . . reached out to me. We must hurry, Pol. Just over that rise is a little box canyon with a waterfall at the east end. That’s where she is.”

  Pol frowned. “You said ‘them.’ ”

  “I did?” Riyan seemed to review memory of what he’d said—or seen, or felt, Pol wasn’t sure. “Yes. Another man—red hair is the only impression I got, along with her fear and pain. Pol, how did she do that? Catch me up in her feelings that way? For an instant, she and I almost . . . it was as if we touched minds, not just colors on sunlight. As if we were almost one being.”

  “We’ll get Feylin and my mother to speculate about it some other time. Though it’s killing me that you can do this and I can’t.” He turned to Rialt. “A box canyon presents interesting possibilities. You and Damayan ride up this ridge. If they try to escape this way—”

  “They shall be strongly discouraged, my lord,” Rialt replied at once. “But I hope you remember that whereas you taught me how to look as if I know how to use a sword, I’m really rather hopeless at it.”

  “I’m sure only the appearance will be needed,” Pol soothed. “Besides, Damayan has given me lessons in swordsmanship. If it comes to it, just protect yourself and don’t worry about attack. He’ll take care of that part of it.”

  “Of course, my lord,” Damayan said, never one for false modesty, glowing at his prince’s praise.

  “Anto, Zel,” he said to the remaining guards, “you’ll swing around to the other side and cut off any possible escape over those hills. Riyan and Sorin will come with me. If you see us getting in trouble, you have my full permission to come to our rescue.” He grinned tightly.

  “And me, my lord?” Edrel piped up. “Shall I come with you?”

  Pol was responsible to Lord Cladon for the boy’s safety. He also remembered what it was like to be thirteen. “You shall. A squire’s place is with his prince, as you so often point put to me.” As the boy’s face lit, Pol flicked a glance at Riyan, then at Anto. Both gave almost imperceptible nods. Edrel would be whisked out of danger by whoever was closest to him when and if danger threatened. Even if Anto had to gallop headlong down from the hilltop, or Riyan had to leave off battling the dragon killer, Edrel would be looked after. Pol had the distinct feeling that his companions had all made a similar and equally silent pact regarding Pol’s own safety. Yes, he remembered very well what it was like to be thirteen. It was very much like being twenty-four. “Off with you now. We’ll wait for you to get in position. And keep your eyes open. We don’t know if there’s anyone else waiting for us.”

  “For you,” Rialt corrected grimly. He and Damayan galloped away, followed by Anto and Zel. Pol turned to Sorin.

  “Sorcery is undoubtedly being used on this dragon, too, just like the one you found the other day. Sunrunners can’t work more than one spell at a time. And I’ve never read or heard anything to indicate that the diarmadh’im are capable of it. If he looses his hold on the dragon to deal with us, I want you to free the poor beast if she’s in the same state as the other one. Riyan, you and I will probably be rather busy.” The other Sunrunner arched his brows at the understatement. “But don’t kill him. My father will want him alive.”

  “I trust you won’t object if I singe him a little,” Riyan said.

  “Lightly browned around the edges and blood-rare in the middle. Let’s go.”

  Pol had been thinking up something princely and righteously wrathful to say on confronting “Aliadim.” But the words flew right out of his mind when he left the trees bunched at the canyon mouth and saw the dragon. She was still standing, hind claws dug into the grassy soil, one wind unfurled like a gleaming bronze-and-black sail. But the other wing hung limp. Awkward angles at the shoulder and halfway down the main wingbone confirmed what Riyan had said earlier: broken in two places, rendering not only the wing but the forearm useless. She hissed her fury of pain and fear, but did not move. She couldn’t; the tall, dark-haired man who stood within easy reach of her talons held her in terrible thrall. And he was laughing.

  The horses had flatly refused to go farther than the trees, and so Pol, Riyan, Sorin, and Edrel approached on foot. Unnoticed by the dark-haired man and his redheaded companion, whose backs were turned, they paused only long enough to make sure of their reinforcements’ positions on the hillsides. Then they advanced, and Pol’s glance at the others showed him rage to match his own.

  The dark-haired man taunted the dragon, striding up to poke the tip of his sword into her useless wing, drawing more pinpricks of blood. He could just reach her limp, wounded forearm, and abandoned sword for dagger in slicing out one talon. The other man, a bit shorter and built more heavily, kept a respectful distance, obviously not trusting even in diarmadhi spells. His companion turned to laugh derisively—and found Pol’s sword point an arm’s length from his throat.

  The dragon shuddered, her eyes like onyx shot through with silver, glittering suddenly as she looked down at Pol. He hoped the reaction was in response to an easing of the spell’s hold on her, but didn’t count on it. He saw out of the corner of his eye that Riyan was in charge of the red-haired man, who swore luridly and glared at them. Sorin had snatched up the sackful of spikes and looked as though he was contemplating using them on the dragon killer.

  “Your grace,” the man said, still smiling, laughter hovering around his eyes and mouth as if this really was too funny, “I assume you’ve come to forbid me, or arrest me, or some other nonsense.”

  Pol smiled back, a stretching of his lips from his teeth. “I’d rather kill you.”

  “Of course. But you won’t.” He tossed dagger, sword, and bloodied talon to the ground
, his movements casually elegant and reeking of insolence. “I think I ought to tell you that once I’m occupied with you, the dragon will be released from certain . . . restrictions. She’s not at all happy right now. In fact, she’s likely to rip any or all of us to shreds.”

  “Unquestionably,” Pol replied with perfect calm.

  “So rather than play other and, I’ll admit, equally interesting, games, why don’t you put up your sword and ride away like a good little prince? It’ll save everyone a great deal of bother.”

  “You understand that I can’t do that,” Pol said as if to a particularly slow child. “But while we’re discussing things, I’d like to know who you are and why you’re doing this. Neither my father nor I take kindly to persons who murder our dragons.”

  “As if they belong to you!” He laughed.

  “They are mine as Princemarch is mine—which is to say, they are under my protection as prince and Sunrunner.”

  “Ah, yes. Credentials must be presented, like good ambassadors. You already know mine, I gather. But I thought you’d puzzled this out by now. I wanted to meet you, and this seemed an invitation you couldn’t ignore.”

  “And my palace at Dragon’s Rest would have been a little too . . . confining.” Pol nodded. “Well, you’ve met me. What now?”

  “Nothing so crude as killing you. Not yet, anyway. I require a larger audience for that.” A short pause and a mocking smile. “Cousin.”

  “I thought you’d make some claim to that effect,” Pol mused. “And since it’s on the soil of Princemarch that you’ve chosen to perpetrate this outrage, it must be Princemarch you want.” He sighed tolerantly. “Another bastard son of Roelstra’s, no doubt, wearing a color you have no right to. That’s been tried before. Try to think up something more original.”

  “So you have reasonably quick wits. I’m glad—it will make this more interesting. I don’t like things made too easy. But as to originality. . . .” He grinned into Pol’s eyes. They were much of a height, Pol perhaps a finger-span shorter; the prince was as broad in the shoulders, but slimmer through waist, hip, and thigh. A trained warrior’s physical instinct had sized up his opponent earlier; a trained statesman’s cunning had given him the man’s intellectual measure; but more than either, the sensitivities of a faradhi fully trained in Sunrunner arts and conversant with the secret, dangerous Star Scroll chimed clear, shrill warning. When he met this man in battle, it would not be with swords, as his father had fought Roelstra, nor would it be with words, as he had confronted the pretender Masul nine years ago.

  The man gave Pol a slight, impertinent bow. “My name is Ruval, I was born at Feruche, and I have the honor to be the first-born of Ianthe of Princemarch.” He grinned then. “Not Roelstra’s son, you see, but his grandson.”

  Pol felt himself go very still. He should have laughed in the man’s face, told him that Ianthe’s sons had died with her the night Feruche had burned to the ground. But he could not, because he knew the truth. Urival, just before his death, had called him to his bedside in private.

  “No one knows what I’m about to tell you. Not Andry, not even your mother. Ostvel may suspect—he has access to Roelstra’s archives, remember. But you must tell no one until you believe the right time has come. You recall the boy who died at the Rialla, the sorcerer? I kept him anonymous, threw his body into the Faolain so no one could identify him as I had done. What I saw in his face was Ianthe. He was her son, Pol—the youngest, Segev. He called himself ‘Sejast’ but he was Ianthe’s son. The other two must also be alive. Ruval and Marron are their names. I don’t know where they are, though I’ve searched whenever I had the chance. I believe they’re in the Veresch somewhere, but—who can say? If they’re anything like her, and judging from Segev you can bet that they are, they are the greatest danger you could face. They are diarmadh’im, Pol. Princes, just as you are, but sorcerers as well. I’ve taught you all I know, all I safely could, of the Star Scroll, anticipating them. Now it appears I won’t be there, my prince, to help you face them. For they will come, Pol, never doubt that. Ianthe’s sons. When you find them, kill them. They must die. They deserve to die. Segev killed Andrade.”

  Pol stared at Ianthe’s eldest son, recognizing at last the distinctive shape of nose and chin. Urival had once conjured for him a representation of Roelstra’s face in Fire; two generations had altered the face subtly, changed the coloring a bit, added a narrower jaw and wider cheekbones—enough changes to foil identification unless one was looking for it. He knew that this man was who he said he was. And his companion must be Marron. But he could not admit it. Must not.

  “You’re no more Roelstra’s grandson than I am,” he snapped.

  “Then perhaps you truly are my cousin in fact, and not merely in courtesy between princes.” Ruval’s blue eyes were laughing again. “Which of my mother’s esteemed sisters could have spawned you?”

  “I’ve heard it said that of all the sisters, Ianthe was the most like Roelstra in her bedroom habits,” Pol riposted smoothly. “Which servant, squire, or groom do you claim as your father?”

  At last Ruval reacted with something other than amusement. His eyes lost their taunting glitter and narrowed dangerously. “My father was Lord Chelan, a highborn with bloodlines—”

  “—suitable for standing at stud,” Pol interrupted, beginning to enjoy himself.

  Ruval’s jaw clenched. But he swiftly regained control of himself. “In any case, you have many things that belong to me, but restoring to me my mother’s castle of Feruche will make a good start.”

  Pol smiled. “When dragons spend winters in Snowcoves,” he said.

  “There’ll be hatchlings riding icebergs next summer,” Ruval snarled.

  This time Pol was the one who laughed. “Sorin!”

  “My prince?” His cousin was beside him immediately.

  “I see a tree felled over there—obviously intended for securing the dragon. Slice off two branches an arm’s span long, if you would.”

  Sorin grinned, understanding Pol’s intention. “We already have the spikes, my prince.”

  “So I noticed.”

  Ruval had recovered his poise again. “You wouldn’t dare,” he commented easily.

  Pol eyed him. “No? Oh, go ahead, release the dragon. Do you think I don’t see that in your face? Let her go—and see what good it does you.”

  He hoped Riyan had heard and comprehended the challenge. The possibilities of sorcery worried him, but he was counting on timing. To work against Pol, Ruval would have to release the dragon—but the instant she was free, she would go wild with rage and the only thing on anyone’s mind would be getting out of her way. Riyan could, he hoped, subdue her before Ruval or Marron could either work any magic or use more conventional forms of attack. Besides, the brothers were outnumbered and Pol’s other allies were watching from the hilltops. Pol felt confident in his gamble; it was a wager Sioned would have taken at once, being inordinately fond of a good, dirty bet when almost all the odds were in her favor. It just might work, Pol told himself.

  And it would have, too, if not for the dragon. Dangerous enough at any other time, she was crazed by pain, terror, and her frantic consciousness of the eggs forming within her body. Increasingly through the spring and up until her chosen cave was walled up, she would focus more and more on the new lives slowly swelling her belly. Once she flew from her cave, she would forget all about them, and treat her own surviving hatchlings just as she would any others. Dragon parenting was a communal effort, shared by all females and sires. But until that wall was secured, she was concerned only with her instinct to protect her eggs—and right now that meant protecting herself.

  Thus when Ruval abruptly released her, she went mad. With a terrifying roar she threw her head back, then came down with her good foreleg clawing for Ruval. He made the mistake of grabbing for his sword; talons ripped through his tunic and shirt, tearing long slashes in his back. He cried out with the pain and fell, rolling onto his back with the sword r
aised to hack at her if she went for him again.

  But she turned her attention to Pol, raising up once more in preparation for disembowelment. It was how his grandfather Zehava had died. He thought this in the same instant he wove sunlight into a strong, tough fabric, not even lifting his sword. The dragon’s jaws opened wide and she bellowed her fury down at him, her massive body drawn to full height now and ready to descend on him.

  He heard a harsh scream nearby, wondered in anguish if it was Sorin or Riyan or Edrel; hoped it was Marron. Ruval was near him on the ground, his sword pointed up at the dragon, frozen in horrified fascination as she reared up. Her tail lashed, the uninjured wing folded to her back, the broken one dangling at her side. Pol stared up at her, protected by nothing more than the offered sunlight. She was magnificent and beautiful and lethal, and he knew he ought to be terrified of her.

  What felled him was not her talons or her dagger-sized teeth. He staggered as the full force of her sunwoven colors smashed into his. He went to his knees hard on the grass, gasping, using every bit of his strength to keep sane and whole. I won’t hurt you, I’d never harm any dragon—I’ll kill this other for you, I swear I will—The emotions flooded through him, undammed by contact with the pain-maddened dragon. Savage hatred, unspeakable agony, furious terror for her hatchlings’ safety—he tried to counter with his love for dragons, his fierce joy in their beauty, his determination to protect them—and to kill Ruval, who had done this hideous thing to her. He looked up, senses reeling, his mind close to shattering like fine Fironese crystal, expecting that at any instant those talons would gouge out his guts.

  The dragon never touched him.

  The contact gentled despite her terrible pain. Pol caught his breath as wordless questions tumbled over and over each other, pictures and feelings and demands all mixed up until he felt his grip on sanity weaken dangerously. She seemed to realize it and drew back a little. In the air between them his faradhi senses touched the brilliant pattern of her, more complex than anything he had ever felt before. His attempt at Dragon’s Rest had resulted in a shock that had well and truly scared him. Now he understood that there simply had not been enough time—or enough need.