by Melanie Rawn
He wove the sunlight south, over the Faolain and the salt marsh of Roelstra’s cruel making, and saw Rohan’s encampment well into its day’s work for all that it was only a little after dawn. He was tempted to find young Maarken and tell him about Feruche, but restrained himself. Andrade would have to know first, and she was busy at the moment observing Roelstra’s arrangements for the battle that everyone knew must come soon. The skies had cleared over the Veresch where the Father of Storms usually did his work, and for many measures out over the South Water the air was free of clouds. Pandsala would be reporting the same thing to her father that Andrade would soon tell Maarken: days of good weather lay ahead, and it was time to attack.
Returning to River Run, he opened his eyes to the silent walled garden and rested for a time before walking slowly to the bench where he had left Andrade. She sat with eyes closed and hands tightly clasped in intense concentration, the spun sunlight glowing very faintly around her as sometimes happened with powerful Master Sunrunners. Urival kept a respectful silence, considering how he would phrase the news about Feruche, remembering the cant of Sioned’s body around the small burden she carried.
All at once Andrade’s eyes opened, sparkling with mirth, and she laughed. “Urival! Come with me quickly or you’ll miss it!”
He obeyed, bewildered by her merriment that spilled over into her colors and danced around his own threads of light as she guided him. Some forty measures from River Run, well south of Roelstra’s main camp, about two hundred of his soldiers had established an outpost. But strict military discipline had utterly collapsed, for the fools had chosen a dragon hunting-ground, and the infuriated hatchlings were on the attack.
Horses stampeded in every direction as they fled sharp talons; men and women raced about with frantic speed or huddled on the ground with their cloaks pulled over them while the small dragons soared, wheeled, and darted down to chase the invaders from their territory. The plummeting green-bronze and dark gold and russet shapes were considerably grown since summer, but most of them retained the ability to spew fire enough to singe a few backsides.
It was absolute chaos, a total rout. A little gray dragon with blue underwings flailed angrily above a huge cauldron, and when the cook fled he perched daintily on its rim and helped himself to a free breakfast. After slurping up most of the stew, he lifted his head and let out a great fire-tinged belch. Two hatchlings, one nearly black and the other a dappled brown, were fighting over a violet cloak; it evidently retained enough scent from the sheep that had originally worn the wool to be of interest to dragons. Some of the little beasts had latched onto horses in the wildest rides of their lives; the horses seemed to have sprouted wings, about to fly. One dragon came up with a saddle, girth straps dangling, and let out a happy shriek, but when he craned his head down to take a bite of the cured leather, he spat in distaste and dropped the saddle right on the head of a soldier who staggered, clutched at her skull, and went over like a felled tree.
The detachment’s commander, wearing a violet cloak with a huge rent in its embroidered back, lunged desperately for a fleeing horse and scrambled up to rally his troops. He waved a hand high in the air—and nearly lost several fingers to a fierce little blue-green hatchling. Giving it up as useless, the man let the horse have its head and streaked away from the battlefield in frantic retreat, leaving the dragons in firm possession.
Back again at River Run, Urival and Andrade laughed themselves completely out of breath. “Perfect!” Andrade chortled. “Oh, the little darlings! Did you see the greenish one go for that man in his underwear?”
Urival sat on the bench beside her and wiped his streaming eyes. “That’s the best laugh I’ve had in years!”
“It’ll get better,” Andrade assured him. “We have to get word to Rohan about this. It’s an omen he can’t afford to pass up! I’ll send to Maarken and describe the whole thing while you get us ready to move. It seems our Dragon Prince has allies he never even dreamed of!”
It was only when Urival was nearing the gates that he remembered he had not told her about Feruche. After a moment’s hesitation, he shrugged and decided not to ruin her mood. She would find out soon enough. He pushed the gates open and walked across the field to where men wearing Roelstra’s regimentals lolled about in the sunshine. One of them rose to greet him, smiling.
“A fine day, my lord!”
“That it is, Cahl. And we’ll be on the move at last.”
“Out to sea?” he asked eagerly, then laughed when Urival shuddered. “Ah, I forgot—you Sunrunners! Well, it’ll be a relief to get out of the High Prince’s clothes, anyway.” Cahl plucked at the gold-embroidered tunic, freckled face screwed up in comical disgust.
“How’s our good friend the captain? Recovered yet from all those lies he’s told Roelstra’s messengers?”
“Oh, he’s become very philosophical, even about his losses at dice. Will you want him locked up with the rest of his men before we leave?”
“Yes. Lady Wisla will get a shock when she comes home.” Urival grinned. “We’ll take all the horses with us, so even if they do manage to escape, they won’t be able to warn Roelstra in time.”
Urival gave his instructions and returned to the courtyard, chuckling at the memory that teased his thoughts. Roelstra’s captain had received quite a shock one winter morning when the gates of River Run had opened to him and Lady Andrade had signaled her readiness to be escorted back to Goddess Keep. Lleyn’s sailors, their agility in climbing ship’s riggings put to good use in scaling the back walls of the keep one night, had deprived the captain and ten of his men of their weapons, their clothes, and their ability to warn their fellows. Others had come to investigate and been treated in like fashion. A minimum of blood had been shed before Roelstra’s men had been incarcerated with fine thoughtfulness in River Run’s wine cellar. Andrade had reasoned that Davvi wouldn’t begrudge the loss of a few casks, and she hadn’t wanted Roelstra’s men to complain of mistreatment, after all. Only the captain had been allowed back outside with several sharp-eyed sailors watching him at all times. When Roelstra’s couriers came, he had said all the right things—motivated by a knife held unobtrusively to his spine.
Thus Andrade had waited on her terms, not Roelstra’s. One cage was indeed very like another, except when the guards were on one’s own side and one could walk out whenever one pleased.
There had been only one sour thing about the whole satisfying proceeding: Chiana. She had been locked in her room to keep her quiet during the maneuver, but had subsided only when tied to a chair with a towel stuffed halfway down her throat. It had not been a pleasant experience for anyone, and daily Urival had expected some act of revenge. If the girl did not behave herself today, he was quite willing to tie her to her saddle with the gag back in her mouth.
But he forgot about her as he directed the preparations for departure. By midmorning all was ready—and Chiana had not been seen. Urival had the keep searched, and emerged puzzled and impatient into the courtyard to report his lack of success to Andrade.
She was stalking across the cobbles, practically spitting fire. “Do you know what Chiana’s done? Cozened one of those fool grooms into giving her a horse early! And now she’s gone!”
“Good riddance,” Urival muttered. “I hope she gets lost and falls in the river.” And then, because Andrade’s excellent humor had already been spoiled, he told her the bad news about Feruche.
High Prince Roelstra received three increasingly nasty shocks that day, and his daughter Pandsala was in a position to observe them all.
The first came when he had finished his breakfast and was taking a morning stroll through his camp. He had risen late, and Pandsala was kept waiting for some time outside his tent, for he liked to have her accompany him so the soldiers could see that they had their very own Sunrunner. Father and daughter had begun the rounds, exchanging remarks about the clear weather and the possibility of a battle soon, when a rider crested the low hill to the south and thunde
red down into camp. Stragglers followed in bad order behind him. He leaped from his horse, made frantic obeisance to his prince, and started babbling about dragons.
“More than ever before in the world—all of them after us! We fought them but it was no use, your grace. That wizard Prince Rohan has them under his spell, him or his Sunrunner witch of a wife! There were hundreds of them, your grace—with claws like swords and breathing fire—we had to retreat or all would have been lost! It’s surely Prince Rohan’s work!”
Pandsala watched her father gape speechlessly at the commander, who was now sucking on three bleeding fingers, having completed his story. The rest of the ragtag group that had once been the High Price’s finest mounted detachment galloped up in the interval and shouted out the same tale to their appalled compatriots. From them it was learned that most of the horses had fled beyond hope of recovery, and the other troops were walking back to camp. Pandsala made a quick count of the survivors, keeping stern control of her expression. Her father, not having had hard training at Goddess Keep, turned all the colors of the rainbow.
“Thirty-five!” he roared. “Out of two hundred, you bring me back thirty-five, and praise your own wisdom in the loss! You credulous idiot! Dragons! As if Rohan could order them into battle!”
The commander flung himself to his knees. “I beg forgiveness, your grace—but the others will tell you—the fierceness of the attack—had we stayed, there would not even be thirty-five left—”
“Moron!” Roelstra swung around and pointed a finger at Pandsala. “You! This is your doing!”
“Mine?” She countered, incensed. “Is it my fault he’s a fool? I advised you to send a detachment of horse against those Rohan is hiding in the woods to the south. I didn’t advise this imbecile to camp in a dragon feeding-ground, which is what it seems he did! How can this be my fault?”
The High Prince lashed out a booted foot and caught the prostrate commander in the ribs. “Get out of my sight,” he snarled. “And be grateful that I need everyone who can sit a horse!” He stormed off and Pandsala hurried along after him, keeping her distance but curious to see what he would do next.
He circled the perimeter of the camp, much more quickly than at his usual regal pace. He slowed as he reached the horse pickets, but she did not catch up, wisely assuming that he was counting the mounts available to him, an exercise that could only renew his fury.
Then he received his second shock of the morning.
It came in the form of a small, auburn-haired girl clinging to the neck of a sweating gray pony whose lungs were heaving like bellows. Soldiers tried to snatch the girl down, but she kicked and spat in a rage no less impressive for the fact that she was so young. A real royal tantrum, Pandsala told herself, a sick feeling in her stomach, for she knew her half-sister’s rampages of old.
“I want to see my father!” Chiana shrieked. “You don’t dare touch me! I’m the daughter of the High Prince!”
Roelstra turned on his heel and swore. Pandsala hurried to his side and he turned a killing look on her, green eyes like a frozen sea.
“Father,” she began.
“Where did that brat come from?” he grated.
“She was with me and Andrade and Urival—”
“What is that whore’s spawn doing here?” he shouted.
Chiana turned, gaze unerringly finding the sire she had never before seen. She leaped from the pony, eluded the soldiers, and flung her arms around Roelstra’s legs, lifting a pale, dirt-streaked face.
“You have to listen to me, Father, please! Andrade is coming, with soldiers—she can’t be very far behind me! I came to warn you!”
Roelstra stared down at this replica of himself and his dead mistress. Then he pried Chiana from his legs, took her by the shoulders, and raised her so he could inspect her face. She flinched slightly with pain but did not cry out.
“You’ve the look of your mother,” he said softly, dangerously. “My daughter, Treason—who’s spent her whole life in Andrade’s keeping.”
“I hate her! I hate her even more than Pandsala does!”
“Come, Treason, tell me how much.” Abruptly he loosened his grip and Chiana tumbled to the ground. She was up instantly, proud and straight.
“I’ve always hated her! And now I’m going to get back at her! She tricked your soldiers, Father, she’s coming here with Prince Lleyn’s troops and—”
“Lleyn?”
“They climbed the wall at night and Urival tied me up so I couldn’t scream and warn—”
“His ships were reported off the coast,” Roelstra mused. “I wouldn’t put it past Andrade, even to the reports that came back from River Run saying all was well.” He looked down at his youngest daughter and a thin smile curved his lips. “Very well, Treason. I’ll choose to believe you, but only because it doesn’t matter. Our dear Lady Andrade is helpless and powerless, even in her freedom. She can do nothing against me, but it’s interesting to know she’s loose. You were right to come to me, Treason.”
The child stared him directly in the eye. “My name is Chiana,” she said flatly. “And I am a princess.”
Roelstra’s eyes narrowed for an instant, and then he burst out laughing. “By the Father of Storms—so it is, and so you are! You must have given Andrade a time! I always knew Palila and I should have produced a wildcat instead of those mewling kittens at Castle Crag! Very well, Princess Chiana, go with your sister and make yourself presentable.” He pinched the girl’s chin. “My daughters do not appear in rags and dirt.”
Pandsala concealed her chagrin at hearing the child so openly acknowledged. She took Chiana away to her own small tent and gave the girl water, soap, and orders to scrub herself head to heels. A servant was dispatched to find something Chiana could put on in place of her filthy dress. Then Pandsala set off in search of her father again, needing to be at his side to hear his revised plans.
She had just glimpsed him leaving his tent when the third—but not the final—shock of the day appeared. A scout, arrow still in his shoulder and blood staining his tunic, fell to his knees in the grass and looked up at the High Prince.
“Your grace, the Desert attacks! Now!”
Chapter Thirty
Rohan gathered the reins more tightly in his gauntleted hands and shifted his shoulders against the restricting battle harness. The stiff leather tunic was dyed dark blue and decorated across chest and back with brass plating that shone as if made of gold. Chay was similarly attired in dark red leather, and Davvi wore the turquoise of Syrene princes. They were as gaudy as whill-birds and that was precisely the idea, for their soldiers would be able to see them a measure distant. So would the enemy, but Rohan only shrugged. The armor was for their protection, of course, but it was more ceremonial than anything else. They would not be in the thick of the battle today. This would be no swift fight, but a pitched battle according to all the traditional rules of war. They were to act as princes and battle commanders, not as warriors on the field.
Rohan quieted the restive Pashta, knowing the stallion was eager for a fight he would not be allowed to join—unless Chay was utterly wrong and they started to lose. Even then a wall of swords and shields would spring up around Rohan, protecting him. Others would die, he told himself, but not him. Not their Dragon Prince.
Davvi was still grinning at the news Maarken had supplied a little while ago; Andrade had told him about Roelstra’s troops and the dragons. “What I don’t understand is why they were in the south at all,” he remarked as they waited for Chay’s signal to begin the battle.
“Some sort of flanking action, I suppose. Although why he thought we’d send soldiers there and give them a hard ride uphill to the fight, I have no idea.” He chuckled in spite of himself. “A dragon feeding-ground! I wish I could’ve seen it!”
“Maybe we ought to drive them down that way so your dragons can finish them off,” Davvi mused.
“I’ll settle for a nice, clean fight on an open plain, thanks, without hatchlings biti
ng my nose. There’s no guarantee the little fiends would recognize their prince!”
The dragons had done Rohan a prodigious favor, weakening Roelstra’s host both in numbers and in morale. When the story had been spread through the Desert forces, the warriors had cheered their prince, completely certain now of victory. Rohan himself felt a strange excitement throbbing in his veins, not the anticipation of battle or even of winning the battle, though those things were part of it. He felt almost as Sioned had described her emotions when she rode the sunlight: swift, free, touched by the Goddess’ own colors.
With the army behind them, at Chay’s signal, he and Davvi crested a low rise overlooking Roelstra’s camp. Troops were spread out all over the plain, about five measures square of prime battleground. While no advantages would come to either side on it, neither did it present any difficulties. The routing of nearly two hundred by dragons that morning had made the numbers just about equal, still tilted in Roelstra’s favor but acceptable to Chay. For Rohan had the invaluable impact of surprise on his side. The alarm had just gone up in the camp below, and people scurried about in desperate haste.
Rohan caught the nod from Chay, and lifted his fist. The dragon horn sounded. Suddenly it was as if the battle maps had come alive before him. Seventy riders swept down from his right, while on his left foot soldiers marched forward in orderly ranks, framed by fifty archers on either side. The remaining eighty horse, one hundred foot, and one hundred archers fanned out on either side of Rohan, forming the arc of the half-circle he would tighten around Roelstra. He paused while his forces moved into position, watching the gleam of harness and sword and scythe, the bright fletching clumped in shoulder-slung quivers.
“This ends it,” he murmured in a voice only Chay heard, as Chay had been the only one to hear his promise never to kill another dragon. “My sword will rust, and I’ll be glad of it.”