Dragon's Bane

  about ready to believe anything. And I suppose it would

  be foolish to get rid of the dragon before so many of the

  gnomes have left the Realm—or some reason can be found

  for getting rid of the rest of 'em—that they can't reoccupy

  their stronghold, if so be it happened someone else wanted

  the place, that is."

  There was a moment's silence. Jenny could see the

  light slither quickly along the silk facing ofZyeme's sleeve,

  Dragonsbane 165

  where her small hand clenched it in anger, leaving a print

  of wrinkles like the track of invisible thoughts. "These

  are matters of high polity, Dragonsbane. It is nothing to

  you, after all. I tell you, be patient and wait until I tell

  you it is time for us to ride together to the Deep, you and

  1.1 promise that you shall not be cheated of this slaying."

  She stepped close to him again, and the diamonds on

  her hands threw little spits of fire against the dullness of

  leather and plaid.

  "No," Aversin said, his voice low. "Nor shall you be

  cheated of the Deep, after I've done your butchering for

  you. You summoned the dragon, didn't you?"

  "No." The word was brittle as the snap of a frost-killed

  twig. "Of course not."

  "Didn't you, love? Then it's gie lucky for you that it

  came along just when it did, when you were wanting a

  power base free of the King, in case he tired of you or

  died; not to speak of all that gold."

  Jenny felt the scorch of her wrath like an invisible

  explosion across the garden, even as Zyerne raised her

  hand. Jenny's throat closed on a cry of fear and warning,

  knowing she could never have moved in time to help and

  could not have stood against the younger woman's magic,

  if she did; Aversin, his back to the stone of the arch, could

  only throw his arm before his eyes as the white fire snaked

  from Zyeme's hand. The hissing crackle of it in the air

  was like lightning; the blaze of it, so white it seemed edged

  in violet, seared over every stone chink and moss tuft in

  the pavement and outlined each separate, waxy petal of

  the winter roses in colorless glare. In its aftermath, the

  air burned with the smell of ozone and scorched leaves.

  After a long moment, John raised his face from his

  protecting arms. Even across the garden. Jenny could see

  he was shaking; her own knees were so weak from shock

  and fear she felt she could have collapsed, except for her

  166 Barbara Hambly

  greater fear of Zyeme; and she cursed her own lack of

  power. John, standing before Zyeme, did not move.

  It was Zyeme who spoke, her voice dripping with

  triumph. "You get above yourself, Dragonsbane. I'm not

  that snaggle-haired trollop of yours, that you can speak

  to me with impunity. I am a true sorceress."

  Aversin said nothing, but carefully removed his spec-

  tacles and wiped his eyes. Then he replaced them and

  regarded her silently in the dim light of the garden lamp.

  "I am a true sorceress," she repeated softly. She held

  out her hands to him, the small fingers plucking at his

  sleeves, and a husky note crept into her sweet voice. "And

  who says our alliance must be so truculent, Dragonsbane?

  You need not spend your time here tugging with impa-

  tience to be gone. I can make the wait pleasant."

  As her delicate hands touched his face, however, Aver-

  sin caught the fragile wrists, forcing her away at arm's

  length. For an instant they stood so, facing one another,

  the silence absolute but for the racing draw of their breath.

  Her eyes were fixed upon his, probing at his mind. Jenny

  knew, the same way she had probed at Gareth's earlier,

  seeking some key of consent.

  With a curse she twisted free of his grip. "So," she

  whispered. "That raddled bitch can at least get her rutting-

  spells right, can she? With her looks, she'd have to. But

  let me tell you this, Dragonsbane. When you ride to meet

  the dragon, like it or not, it will be me who rides with

  you, not her. You shall need my aid, and you shall ride

  forth when I say so, when I tell the King to give you

  leave, and not before. So learn a little of the civilized art

  of patience, my barbarian—for without my aid against

  Morkeleb, you shall surely die."

  She stepped away from him and passed under the lamp-

  lit arch, reaching out to take the light with her as she

  went. In its honeyed brightness her face looked as gentle

  and guileless as that of a girl of seventeen, unmarked

  Dragonsbane 167

  by rage or perversion, pettiness or spite. John remained

  where he was, watching her go, sweat beading his face

  like a mist of diamonds, motionless save where he rubbed

  the thin, sharp flashburns on his hands.

  A moment later, the window behind him glowed into

  soft life- Through the fretted screen of scented shrubs and

  vine that twined its filigreed lattice. Jenny got a glimpse

  of the room beyond. She had an impression of half-seen

  frescoes on the walls, of expensive vessels of gold and

  silver, and of the glint of bullion embroidery thickly edging

  the hangings of the bed. A man lay in the bed, moving

  feebly in some restless dream, his gold hair faded and

  colorless where it lay in disorder over the embroidered

  pillows. His face was sunken and devoid of life, like the

  face of a man whom a vampire has kissed.

  "It would serve her right if you left tonight!" Gareth

  stormed. "Rode back north and left her to deal with her

  own miserable worm, if she wanted it so badly!"

  He swung around to pace the big chamber of the guest

  house again, so furious he could barely splutter. In his

  anger, he seemed to have forgotten his own fear of Zyeme

  and his desire for protection against her, forgotten his

  long quest to the Winterlands and his desperation to have

  it succeed. From her seat in the window. Jenny watched

  him fulminate, her own face outwardly calm but her mind

  racing.

  John looked up from tinkering with the keys of the

  hurdy-gurdy. "It wouldn't do, my hero," he said quietly.

  "However and whyever it got here, the dragon's here now.

  As Zyeme said, the people hereabouts are no concern of

  mine, but I can't be riding off and leaving them to the

  dragon. Leaving out the gnomes, there's the spring plant-

  ing to be thought of."

  The boy stopped in his pacing, staring at him. "Hunh?"

  John shrugged, his fingers stilling on the pegs. "The

  168 Barbara Hambly

  harvest's gone," he pointed out. "If the dragon's still abroad

  in the land in the spring, there'll be no crop, and then,

  my hero, you'll see real starvation in this town."

  Gareth was silent. It was something he had never

  thought of. Jenny guessed. He had clearly never gone

  short of food in his life.

  "Besides," John went on, "unless the gnomes can reoc-

  cupy the Deep pretty quick, Zyeme will destroy them

  here, a
s Dromar said, and your friend Polycarp in the

  Citadel as well. For all Dromar's hedging about keeping

  us out of the heart of the Deep, the gnomes have done

  for us what they can; and the way I see it, Polycarp saved

  your life, or at least kept you from ending up like your

  father, so deep under Zyeme's spells he can't tell one

  week from the next. No, the dragon's got to be killed."

  "But that's just it," Gareth argued. "If you kill the

  dragon, she'll be free to take over the Deep, and then the

  Citadel will fall because they'll be able to attack it from

  the rear." He looked worriedly over at Jenny. "Could she

  have summoned the dragon?"

  Jenny was silent, thinking about that terrible power

  she had felt in the garden, and the dreadful, perverted

  lour of it in the lamplit room at Zyeme's hunting lodge.

  She said, "I don't know. It's the first time I've heard of

  human magic being able to touch a dragon—but then,

  Zyeme derives her magic from the gnomes. I have never

  heard of such a thing..."

  "Cock by its feet, horse by its home..." repeated John.

  "Could she be holding the dragon by his name? She knows

  it, right enough."

  Jenny shook her head. "Morkeleb is only the name

  men give it, the way they call Azwylcartusherands Dro-

  mar, and Taseldwyn Mab. If she'd had his true name, his

  essence, she could send him away again; and she obviously

  can't, or she would have killed you in the garden tonight."

  She hitched her shawl up over her shoulders, a thin

  Dragonsbane 169

  and glittering spiderweb of South Islands silk, the thick

  masses of her hair lying over it like a second shawl. Cold

  seemed to breathe through the window at her back.

  Gareth went back to pacing, his hands shoved in the

  pockets of the old leather hunting breeches he'd put on

  to go burgling.

  "But she didn't know its name, did she?"

  "No," replied Jenny. "And in that case..." She paused,

  then frowned, dismissing the thought.

  "What?" John wanted to know, catching the doubt in

  her voice.

  "No," she repeated. "It's inconceivable that at her level

  of power she wouldn't have been taught Limitations. It's

  the first thing anyone learns." And seeing Gareth's incom-

  prehension, she explained. "It's one of the things that

  takes me so long when I weave spells. You have to limit

  the effect of any spell. If you call rain, you must specify

  a certain heaviness, so as not to flood the countryside. If

  you call a curse of destruction upon someone or some-

  thing, you have to set Limitations so that their destruction

  doesn't come in a generalized catastrophe that wipes out

  your own house and goods. Magic is very prodigal in its

  effects. Limitations are among the earliest things a mage

  is taught."

  "Even among the gnomes?" Gareth asked. "You said

  their magic is different."

  "It is taught differently—transmitted differently. There

  are things Mab has said that I do not understand and things

  that she refuses to tell me about how their power is formed.

  But it is still magic. Mab knows the Limitations—from

  what she has told me, I gather they are more important

  in the night below the ground. If she studied among the

  gnomes, Zyeme would have to have learned about them."

  John threw back his head and laughed in genuine

  amusement. "Gaw, it must be rotting her!" He chuckled.

  "Think of it, Jen. She wants to get rid of the gnomes, so

  170 Barbara Hambly

  she calls down a generalized every-worst-curse she can

  think of upon them—and gets a dragon she can't get rid

  of! It's gie beautiful!"

  "It's 'gie' frivolous," Jenny retorted.

  "No wonder she threw fire at me! She must be that

  furious just thinking about it!" His eyes were dancing

  under his singed brows.

  "It just isn't possible," Jenny insisted, in the cool voice

  she used to call their sons back from skylarking. Then,

  more seriously, "She can't have gotten to that degree of

  power untaught, John. It's impossible. All power must be

  paid for, somehow."

  "But it's the sort of thing that would happen if it hadn't

  been, isn't it?"

  Jenny didn't reply. For a long time she stared out the

  window at the dark shape of the battlements, visible

  beneath the chilly autumn stars. "I don't know," she said

  at last, stroking the spiderweb fringes other gauze shawl.

  "She has so much power. It's inconceivable that she hasn't

  paid for it in some fashion. The key to magic is magic.

  She has had all time and all power to study it fully. And

  yet..." She paused, identifying at last her own feelings

  toward what Zyeme was and did. "I thought that someone

  who had achieved that level of power would be different."

  "Ah," John said softly. Across the room, their eyes

  met. "But don't think that what she's done with her

  achievement has betrayed your striving, love. For it hasn't.

  It's only betrayed her own."

  Jenny sighed, reflecting once again on John's uncanny

  ability to touch the heart of any problem, then smiled a

  little at herself; and they traded a kiss in a glance.

  Gareth said quietly, "But what are we going to do? The

  dragon has to be destroyed; and, if you destroy it, you'll

  be playing right into her hands."

  A smile flicked across John's face, a glimpse of the

  bespectacled schoolboy peeking out from behind the com-

  Dragonsbane 171

  plex barricades raised by the hardships of the Winteriands

  and his father's embittered domination. Jenny felt his eyes

  on her again—the tip of one thick reddish brow and the

  question in the bright glance. After ten years, they had

  grown used to speaking without words.

  A qualm of fear passed over her, though she knew he

  was right. After a moment, she drew her breath in another

  sigh and nodded.

  "Good." John's impish smile widened, like that of a

  boy intent on doing mischief, and he rubbed his hands

  briskly. He turned to Gareth. "Get your socks packed,

  my hero. We leave for the Deep tonight."

  CHAPTER IX

  "STOP."

  Puzzled, Gareth and John drew rein on either side of

  Jenny, who sat Moon Horse where she had halted her in

  the middle of the leaf-drifted track. All around them the

  foothills of Nast Wall were deathly silent, save for the

  trickle of wind through the charred trunks of what had

  once been woods to either side of the road and the faint

  jingle of brass as Osprey tugged at his leading-rein and

  Clivy began foraging prosaically in the sedges of the ditch-

  side. Lower down the hills, the woods were still whole,

  denuded by coming winter rather than fire; under the

  pewter-gray trunks of the beeches, the rust-colored

  underbrush lay thick. Here it was only a tangle of brittle

  stems, ready to crumble at a touch. Half-hidden in the

  weeds near the scorched pavi
ng stones of the road were

  the blackened bones of fugitives from the dragon's first

  attack, mixed with shattered cooking vessels and the sil-

  ver coins that had been dropped in flight. The coins lay

  in the mud still. No one had ventured this close to the

  ruined town to retrieve them.

  Up ahead in the weak sunlight of winter, the remains

  172

  Dragonsbane 173

  of the first houses of Deeping could be seen. According

  to Gareth the place had never been walled. The road ran

  into the town under the archway below the broken clock

  tower.

  For a long while Jenny sat listening in silence, turning

  her head this way and that. Neither of the men spoke—

  indeed, ever since they had slipped out of the Palace in

  the small hours before dawn, Jenny had been acutely

  conscious of John's growing silence. She glanced across

  at him now, where he sat withdrawn into himself on his

  riding horse Cow, and remembered for the dozenth time

  that day Zyeme's words—that without her assistance,

  neither he nor Jenny would be capable of meeting the

  dragon Morkeleb.

  Beyond a doubt John was remembering them, too.

  "Gareth," Jenny said at last, her voice little more than

  a whisper, "is there another way into the town? Some

  place in the town that is farther from the Gates of the

  Deep than we are now?"

  Gareth frowned. "Why?"

  Jenny shook her head, not certain herself why she had