by Andre Norton
But the temptation did not last for more than the time it took for the thought to be born, for it wouldn't be real freedom, would it? She would still be constrained; by custom, by law. She might not be forced to marry a dolt, but she still would not be free to follow her own heart.
But most of all, it would be wrong. She would have bought all of it with blood.
She would be as bad as the worst of her kind if she did that. Worse, maybe. They had built their estates on the blood and bodies of their slaves and underlings. She would not buy hers with the blood and bodies of people who called her sister and friend.
She might be a coward and weak, but she could not be a traitor.
The talk had gone on without her, but she was well aware that she was of no particular help at this point She closed her will around the fear settling in throat, heart, and soul, and listened with an outwardly calm face.
There would be several days of travel before they even reached the edge of the wizards' lands. She had that much more time to try and find some courage. Hopefully it would be time enough.
Keman grew impatient with them all long before the others talked themselves out. Perhaps it was the excitement—he'd noticed that humans had to run a thing to ground before they tired of it if they were excited. Finally they talked themselves into circles, repeating the same things over and over, and Diric declared that they were all too tired to even think properly. He sent them to Jamal's tent, which he had commandeered for them, since the new War Chief was happy with her own home and had no wish to change. Keman was pleased to see that each of them had his or her own little chamber, now cleared of all the personal possessions of the previous owner, and furnished with comfortable pallets and other niceties.
That's probably Kola's doing, he decided, after surveying his own little pie-slice of carpeted tent. She must have been taking care of all of this while we were talking. What an amazing woman! She and Diric work so well together—
It would be so wonderful if he could find someone like Kala…
He lay down on his pallet and waited, listening with every fiber for the sounds of the other people in the tent to die away. He didn't think that Mero and Sheyrena were likely to wander off hand in hand under the moon; not tonight, anyway. If they were as exhausted as he was—
Well, maybe they weren't. They hadn't fought; he had. Unless, of course, they'd all pitched in to subdue Jamal while he - and Myre fought in the skies.
Gradually, though, the murmurs of conversation and the sounds of people moving about, the little shifts in the floor and creak of wood as people walked, died away.
Finally.
He needed to get out. Dora must be frantic by now. And he was starving. He hadn't wanted to take the easy way out and ask for a cow or two; people were frightened enough of him and he didn't want to frighten them further by eating in front of them.
He slipped out of the darkened tent, wound his way through the camp as silent as a cat, moving from shadow to shadow with all of the skill of any predator. There was no moon tonight, which was a help, and most people were so bewildered and agitated by the turn of events today that they were keeping to their own dwellings while they sorted things out.
In some ways, Keman felt rather sorry for them. The Iron People were so ruled by tradition—and yet today so many things had happened that didn't fit within that tradition that they must feel almost as confused as if they had awakened to find themselves camped in the midst of a glacier, floating on the ocean, or perched atop a mountain-peak.
It certainly wasn't every day that you found a pair of dragons fighting over your head—then saw them both turn into people afterwards—and one of them was someone you knew. Then you discovered that your War Chief had been consorting with the other one in order to get you into a war against demons, and your Priest had been consorting with the one you knew, in order to trade with the demons. Poor things. No wonder every tent buzzed with talk, and most of it sounded confused.
Still, Diric has them convinced, 1 think. He'd have had more trouble if Shana had asked him for direct help against the elves, but I think he can manage to get them calmed down under the current circumstances.
But now he was going to have to force a confrontation on Dora. He hadn't wanted to, not this early, but there wasn't going to be much choice.
She's going to have to choose between running back to her own Lair—and—
And what? And him?
But what choice did he have?
With her help we can all travel back to the Citadel in a few days. Sheyrena is light enough that Kalamadea can carry her double with Lorryn. But without Dora—we'll have to make
double trips, because I can't carry two people for very long. That's going to take time that we just don't have.
Besides that, in the morning all six of them were leaving this place. Dora would have to reveal herself sooner or later, so why not sooner? She couldn't hide her presence forever.
He stopped at the edge of the herds, and sent out a questing tendril of thought.
:Here. At the edge of the herds.:
Well, he no longer needed to hide what he was—and he wasn't going to have to explain to any of the herdsmen what he was doing out here! He shifted—slowly, and with a bit of the pain that weariness always caused when he shifted—and lumbered into the air. Muscles ached and joints creaked as he flew.
I am going to have to stay in better shape from now on.
A moment later, Dora met him in the sky above the camp. They flew together, neither one saying a word, as she led him off into the low hills beyond the encampment.
To his surprise and delight, she led him to a cache of freshly killed plains deer, and she waited patiently while he sated his ravenous hunger.
Oh, he said fervently, when hunger-rage had worn off enough for him to be able to think clearly, I needed that. Thank you.
I knew you would, she replied, gravely. Keman—I didn't know what to think when I saw that strange female! And then when she spoke—and you fought—I was so afraid for you!
The words came out of her reluctantly, as if she was as afraid to voice her feelings as he was.
I wanted to help you, she continued, but I didn't know how.
You couldn't have done anything, he told her, bluntly. Myre has resented me from the time she was born, I think. That resentment curdled into hate long before we met, you and I. Anything you could have done to help me would just have delayed things between Myre and me.
Oh. Her head sagged, deflated. All I could think of was that you'd be hungry.
I was. Thank you. He sat down on his haunches, wondering what to say next. Well, better get it out of the way at once.
We're leaving tomorrow.
Her head shot up, her eyes wide. Is it because of what she said, your sister? About the elves, and your wizard friends?
She didn't have any reason to lie, and plenty of reasons to tell the truth. We have to assume that's what she did, he replied. We have to get back—Shana has to settle things with the wizards in case the elves do mount an attack, and Lorryn and Rena both think they have a plan to disrupt the situation in the elven lords' ranks. But we haven't much time.
So you're leaving. She looked as if she'd bitten into something bitter. I promised to help you escape, but it doesn't look as if you need me now.
Was that all that was troubling her? We need you more than ever, he told her. With your help, if you let Shana ride you, we can fly at something close to our normal speed. Without you, Kalamadea and I will have to make double-trips.
She looked into his eyes. You're asking me to—to show myself.
He nodded. Dora, you have to, sooner or later, or else just go home. And what would be the point of that? I'll be telling my Lair about yours. Some of our dragons are going to go looking for yours. And you'll be telling your Lair about all the other Lairs up here! Eventually our Kin are going to meet, whether or not you show yourself to my friends.
But she looked troubled. Our laws have
always said never to show ourselves to two-leggers as we are.
He snorted. My two-leggers already know what we are, and Myre certainly took the matter of the Iron People out of both of our hands! As my two-legger friends say, 'the horse has been stolen, so what's the point of locking the barn?' You won't be accomplishing anything.
She sighed. I said I wanted to help you——-
But not necessarily my friends? he asked shrewdly.
She nodded. I can't help it, she confessed. It's hard to think of them as people.
You have to start somewhere, he told her softly, or you end up like the elves, who don't count anyone who hasn't got full elven blood as 'people.' Or like Myre, who sees anything that isn't a dragon as rightful prey. Can't you see that?
I wouldn't want to be like them. Her skin shuddered, and she looked away. Especially not your sister.
Then help us, Dora, he said, weariness creeping into his voice. He wasn't as good at this persuasion thing as Shana. He really wished he had Lorryn's gift for it. Not me, help us.
She still didn't look at him. I have to think about it, she said slowly. I don't know what else to tell you.
All right. He sighed, but what else could he say? He certainly couldn't coerce her, and he didn't want to use a different kind of coercion on her by telling her how very, very much he liked her…
So instead, he stretched weary and aching muscles, and prepared to take flight again, back to the tent, and some well-earned sleep. Thank you for everything that you have done, Dora; I really appreciate it, he told her as he stretched out his wings. Just remember; we take off a little past dawn tomorrow.
I'll—remember, she said slowly, making no move to take to the air herself, keeping her wings furled against her sides. Good night, Keman.
Good night, Dora. He forced himself not to add anything. She had to make up her mind by herself. Instead, he launched himself into the dark, star-spangled sky, and made a slow, weary flight back to the tents of the clan. From this height, the lights from their lanterns looked as if stars had dropped down out of the sky to arrange themselves in concentric rings on the plain.
This might be the last time he'd see it, too. From here on, they moved into unknown territory. Lorryn, Mero, and Rena would not be the only ones going into elven lands. Someone would have to set up shops to sell the silver-plated iron jewelry. It would be very dangerous for wizards to even attempt such a thing.
But shifted dragons, now… there was a possibility.
There was another possibility as well, something he hadn't bothered telling to Shana, because he didn't want to get her hopes up. But with Myre out of the way, his way was clear to return to the old Lair and recruit more of the Kin. In fact, there was nothing stopping him from going to other Lairs. That would free the original rebels, as many of them as were willing, to shift into two-legger forms to run those jewelry shops, because there would be other recruits to take their places at the Citadel to help the wizards defend themselves. It wouldn't matter if they shifted to the forms of human slaves; only slaves ran shops anyway. And certainly none of the elven lords would be looking for trouble among the fat and contented merchanter-slaves!
That, he had decided, would be his responsibility, as soon as he was free to pursue it—which would be as soon as they reached the Citadel.
Already he felt the stirrings of impatience. He wanted to be at the job; he had the sensation of time pressing in on them from all directions, the feeling that he was only now beginning a race that had started without him.
Perhaps he had. Perhaps they all had.
No matter. They were in it now. They had no choice but to run this race full-out, and hope that they could finish it.
Dawn came much, much too soon for Keman; despite eating to beyond satiation, and sleeping as only a thoroughly bloated dragon could sleep, no matter what form he took, Keman felt as if he would have been a lot happier with a great deal more sleep.
Two or three weeks' worth, as a start.
He politely refused breakfast, and went out to the cleared space that Diric had arranged for them so that they would not frighten the cattle as he and Myre had with their shifts and appearance yesterday. He'd been told they nearly started a stampede… and one was only prevented because all of the warriors were out near the herds playing their war games. Certainly Jamal had not anticipated that, and yet it had been the one action he had taken that had a positive outcome yesterday.
He had half-expected a circle of curious onlookers, but there was no one there, and it wasn't because the Iron People weren't used to getting up at dawn.
They're afraid. I can't really blame them.
That was probably just as well. He planned to take his shift slowly, and that could be very unnerving to two-leggers at the best of times. At the worst—well, he'd seen one or two of Shana's friends grow rather green, and sometimes lose whatever they had in their stomachs.
Queasiness was not generally a draconic problem, unless one was very ill. He still had a hard time understanding creatures that were so quick to lose what they'd eaten. It seemed a very counterproductive trait.
When he completed his shift, he began stretching his muscles, slowly, as his mother, Alara, had taught him to do before he undertook anything that was going to be physically taxing. And this flight would be physically taxing, there was no doubt of that. Besides his burden of Shana and Mero, he would be carrying bundles of heavy iron jewelry, gathered last night by Kala from all the women she could persuade to give it up. Kalamadea would be doing the same, though his riding-burden would be Lorryn and Rena, and he could carry far, far more than Keman.
It was just too bad that no one had ever learned the trick of shifting the mass of something other than himself into the Out, as a dragon did when he had to shift to a smaller, lighter form. Perhaps it simply couldn't be done. It would have been useful, though.
The rising sun gilded the grass, and a light breeze blew up out of the South. His shadow reached to the tents and mingled with their shadows. He stretched each limb separately, several times, warming up the muscles and making them more flexible with each stretch. As he began the series of integrated stretches that would finish his warm-up, some of the Iron People began bringing the bundles of jewelry and supplies he and Kalamadea would be carrying. He watched them out of the corner of his eye and tried not to chuckle. They were very funny, really. They eased up to the edge of the area with one eye on him and the other on where they were going. They tried to look comfortable, casual, but they generally failed utterly. They would always drop the bundle as soon as it was humanly possible, and scuttle away as if they had heard he'd refused breakfast and were afraid that he intended to break his fast with one of them.
The others arrived at about the same time as the bundles. Kalamadea, who had not been the one fighting and flying yesterday, shifted quickly into his draconic form of Father Dragon. He was huge, easily twice the size of Keman, perhaps larger, and Keman was large enough to easily carry one two-legger rider. Dragons grew for as long as they were alive, and Father Dragon was the oldest dragon Keman knew of. Not even Alara knew exactly how old he was. He had been alive at the time of the very first Gate-opening, when the dragons had lived in a world with far more perils in it than this one.
We've grown soft and lazy, Keman thought, contemplating Kalamadea's huge wings fanning the morning air. If those old ones could see us, hiding in our Lairs from mere two-leggers, they'd laugh at us. They had to worry about things so deadly that they would burrow into Lairs to kill and eat the occupants!
Kalamadea might have read his thoughts. :The elven lords, given enough incentive, could be just as deadly to us as the perils our kind once escaped from, Keman,: he said quietly, so that no one else would overhear. :Don't think too badly of those who only want to hide. That was why we escaped here, after all. To hide. We were running away, technically speaking.:
Well, maybe.
He was resolutely keeping his mind on anything and anyone except Dora. He awoke
this morning resolved to assume that she would not be coining along. He had tried not to feel too disappointed or hurt.
Unfortunately, as he had learned all too often in the past, resolutions are usually not heeded by the emotions. All the resolve in the world did not help the feeling of disappointment and—yes—loss as the sun rose higher and Dora did not appear. He wasn't sure if it was his heart that was aching, but there was certainly something holding a core of dull pain, deep inside him.
He waited patiently while the others rigged him and Kalamadea with harnesses, both for the benefit of their passengers and to strap the bundles of supplies to.
You aren't going to like this at all, Shana was telling Lorryn and his sister, as she explained how the harnesses worked. He sensed her tightly wound nerves, and guessed that she was chattering to relieve them. Poor Shana! It was not only the threat of the elven lords that disturbed her, it was, he knew, the threat of revolt from within the wizards' ranks. That was what had undone the wizards in the first war. He only hoped history was not about to repeat that tragedy. And don't listen to Kalamadea or Keman—dragons don't get flying-sick. I mean, think about it; they couldn't fly if they got sick every time they took wing. But here's the problem. The first thing that happens is that the dragon jumps into the air; if you've ever jumped a horse over a huge obstacle, you'll have a very slight idea of what that feels like.
So unless we are strapped in, we're going to go tumbling over his back, Lorryn observed dispassionately. He turned a little to look Keman in the eye. I hope you'll forgive me, my friend, but I have a very hard time reconciling this— he slapped Keman's shoulder —with the young wizard who snored all last night.