The White Dragon

by Laura Resnick

  The fire scorched her, hurting her. She tumbled out of the flames, rolling across the ground, escaping the fire before her distraction led to her own death.

  Darfire, I've killed a man.

  "By all the Fires..." Pyron's shocked voice pierced her whirling senses. "Mirabar?"

  Heat poured off her. She felt it. She opened her eyes and saw steam rising in a thick mist from her flesh. The shir wound on her arm—just a scratch really—throbbed with startling coldness against the heat consuming her. Blood flowed freely from it.

  "Sirana." Pyron knelt down beside her, his eyes wide with shock. "Are you... um..."

  "I thought..." She licked her cracked lips.

  "Someone get water!" Pyron instructed.

  "Now?"

  Mirabar tried again. "No." They should stay together as Najdan ordered. "I thought..."

  "What?"

  The cool night air washed over her. The heat exhaustion eased slightly, the consuming fire fading from her skin. "I thought..."

  "Yes? What, sirana?"

  The shir wound ached with bitter cold. "I thought you said they were retreating."

  Pyron sighed. "Oh, for the love of Dar."

  The girl was waiting where Ronall had left her. She helped Torena Chasimar off the horse and embraced her. The two women wept fitfully while Ronall staggered into the bushes and vomited until there was nothing left inside of him.

  They were both staring at him when he emerged. He stared back, his mind a complete blank, his limbs shaking in reaction to everything he'd seen and done tonight.

  "What do we do now?" the girl asked.

  "How in the Fires should I know?" Ronall said irritably. "You urged me to save her."

  "What about the toren?" the girl asked.

  When he didn't respond, the girl looked at the torena. Chasimar shook her head. The girl started weeping again.

  "Oh, stop that!" Ronall snapped. The girl wept harder. Ronall sighed and apologized. "I'm a little on edge," he explained. He could still hear Porsall's scream in his head, and he had a feeling he'd be hearing it for a long time to come. If he had a long time to come, which didn't seem likely.

  "Where will we go?" the torena asked, weeping.

  "What will we do?" the maid wailed.

  "Three pity me," Ronall mumbled.

  Elelar had her faults, but at least she didn't cry pathetically or fling herself on someone else's mercy when she was in trouble. Indeed, Ronall dearly wished she were here now, because despite the open insults and contempt she would subject him to, she would know what to do. And if she didn't, then she'd figure it out and get it done.

  "No one and nothing defeats Elelar," Ronall muttered. "Certainly not a pack of rabble, two weeping women, a nervous horse, a dead man, and nowhere to go on a dark-moon night."

  His wife, Ronall knew with bleak certainty, wouldn't have let them kill Porsall. She'd have thought of something.

  No, he was wrong, he realized. Porsall and Chasimar were Valdani. Elelar would have watched with pleasure—then urged the crowd to kill Ronall, too.

  "What shall we do?" The torena turned to Ronall.

  He sighed. "You're going to instruct your maid to give back the things she stole from me." He ignored Chasimar's gasp and continued, "Then we're going back to the inn where I paid for the privilege of bedding her earlier this evening. You two can sleep in my bedchamber. I won't be needing it, since I will be downstairs for the rest of the night, depleting the inn's liquor supply." Hearing no objection to these plans, Ronall added, "In the morning, we'll..." He stopped, scowled, and concluded, "We'll confront the morning only when we absolutely have to. Agreed?"

  The men helped Mirabar to her feet, and she worked on regaining control of her blazing wall of fire as it crept over the dark mountainside. But she couldn't drag it any farther, not by herself. Especially not after what she'd just been through.

  Darfire, I've killed a man.

  She was shaking. His screams, his struggles, the smell of his burning flesh...

  Tansen was right. Killing someone was not a thing to take lightly. Not a vow to make in haste and in anger.

  No more assassins came out of the dark to murder her, so it seemed that Pyron was right, after all. They were retreating.

  Eventually two shallaheen appeared out of the night; rebel inhabitants of the Guardian camp. They were bloodstained and battered, but still alive. Najdan had instructed them to bring Mirabar back to the encampment, which was now secure. The rest of the men were to round up survivors.

  Najdan was already in camp when Mirabar arrived. He observed her disheveled condition and scorched clothing, but he made no comment. It had been a battle, after all.

  He had succeeded in his attempt to capture an assassin. There was no time to shield Mirabar and the other Guardians from the brutal facts of war with the Society. Najdan staked out the prisoner in one of the caves and began interrogating him.

  It was a long, ugly night. Survivors trickled back into camp, wounded and dazed. All night long, Mirabar identified the dead when she could, and she prepared the bodies for the mass funeral pyre she would burn once everyone was accounted for.

  All night long, the screams and howls of Najdan's captive echoed around her and the other survivors.

  Tears poured hotly down Mirabar's face. More than once, she escaped to the bushes to be sick. More than once, she gazed down at the recovered corpse of someone she'd known since childhood.

  The morning sun was bright when Najdan finally emerged from the cave. He looked gray, grim, and exhausted. Mirabar thought she knew what the sudden silence meant.

  "The assassin is dead?" she asked hoarsely.

  Najdan nodded and accepted the hot tisane she offered him. No one else would even look in his direction. She ignored them and sat beside him.

  "Najdan..." She began, trying not to weep. More tears would not help now.

  "He admitted they'd been sent to capture some Guardians," Najdan said wearily. "At least two, no more than four."

  "Why?" she asked, cold with fear.

  "He insisted he didn't know." Najdan closed his eyes. They looked sunken. "I think he was telling the truth."

  "Who was the waterlord?"

  "Geriden."

  "I don't know that name."

  "He's very minor." Najdan opened his eyes again. "His allegiance is to Kiloran."

  She started trembling. "Kiloran wanted them captured?"

  "The assassin didn't know, but it's what I believe. Now that the sun is up, we can start tracking them. If, as I suspect, the trail leads to Lake Kandahar—"

  "Najdan." More tears flowed down her face. She couldn't stop them.

  He saw her tears, her trembling, her horror. "Sirana?"

  "Tashinar is gone."

  He knew what was worse than death. "No, the searchers have missed the body, that's all," he said quickly. "You and I will look—"

  "I've searched. I've made the men search again. She's gone." Mirabar shuddered. "They've taken Tashinar to Kiloran."

  Tansen knelt on the banks of the stream that ran between the smoldering ruins of Abidan's and Liadon's houses. He'd just ordered his people to prepare to retreat and scatter, in case unexpected Society reinforcements arrived later. Abidan and Liadon were dead, and the Shaljir River was free. Tansen didn't intend to lose any more people here, now that these goals were accomplished; the blazing funeral pyres were as big as he'd let them get today. The chanting of the Guardians shivered through him, darkening his mood even as the sun brightened the sky.

  However, this water was free now, and he was filthy and thirsty. So he pulled his tunic over his head and sluiced water over his torso, letting it wash away the blood, though the soot was more stubborn. Then, battle-weary and heartsick over lives lost, he drank...

  ...Josarian had helped Tansen down to the river when the fighting was over; but he had not yet spoken a word to him. Not since Tansen had slaughtered Zimran even as Josarian begged him not to.

  Feeling light-h
eaded and weak, Tansen let the icy waters of the Zilar wash the blood off his skin, knowing that Josarian would continue to see it there long after it was gone. The zanareen, who had sent Tansen's rescue party in the right direction in time to save Josarian's life, now stood guard around Josarian, chanting, praying, giving thanks that the Firebringer was safe. He ignored them. They elevated Tansen in their praises, for he had come to save their leader. He ignored them, too.

  Weak, exhausted, and in pain, Tansen barely had the strength to sluice the bitterly cold water over his body.

  "Here," Josarian said at last, his voice subdued, "let me. You're going to fall in headfirst in another minute."

  "No, I—"

  "Sit back," Josarian snapped.

  He sat back.

  Josarian soaked a cloth in the water and then wiped gingerly at the edges of Tansen's seeping shir wound. "It looks worse again."

  "Oh."

  "You should rest."

  "We must leave here."

  "Did you know about..." Josarian's voice broke. He looked away for a moment. "Did you know Zimran would be the one to lead me into the trap?"

  "I..." He took a shallow breath, trying not to strain the wound. "Yes, Josarian."

  "We were born only three months apart." Josarian dunked the cloth into the river again. "We shared everything as boys. As men, we..."

  "I'm sorry."

  I'm sorry he betrayed you. I'm sorry I had to kill him. I'm sorry.

  A tear streamed down Josarian's face, glistening beneath the brilliant light of the full twin moons. "I know."

  Tansen would not ask for forgiveness. "It had to be done."

  "If only..." Josarian bowed his head and gulped for air. He scrubbed at his face and finally said, "We will meet again in the Otherworld. Mirabar says that our earthly concerns and quarrels will not matter there."

  "Mirabar..."

  "Mirabar," Tansen murmured, trying to tear himself away from memories of the night Josarian had died. That sad, subdued conversation beside the Zilar River was the last time he'd ever spoken with his brother.

  After that, Josarian waded across the shallow, icily cold river, and Kiloran ambushed him with the White Dragon. Tansen was with Mirabar, insisting it was time to leave before more Outlookers came along.

  A blood-chilling scream split the night wide open. It came from the riverbank. Tansen was already running towards the sound when he heard more voices—screaming, shouting, crying out. Above it all, there was a terrible roaring unlike anything he'd ever heard in his life, a sound that was so terrifying it made his hair stand on end and a clammy sweat break out on his skin.

  His side was burning and his head was spinning by the time he reached the riverbank. What he saw there made him forget his pain, his exhaustion, his weakness. Made him forget everything but the horror confronting him.

  "Tan?"

  Tansen whirled around, ready for battle, startled into nearly attacking the intruder without conscious thought.

  "Radyan." Tansen froze.

  Radyan eyed the sword in his hand. "Something I said?" The joke sounded flat and tired.

  Tansen glanced down at the engraved blade. He didn't even remember seizing it. "Years of training," he muttered absently.

  "We're done here," Radyan said. "The last pyre is burning. Everyone is moving out now."

  Tansen nodded and donned his filthy tunic again. He didn't know why he bothered, since it was completely ruined. "Let's go."

  A hand on his arm stopped him. "Tansen."

  He glanced at Radyan's strained face. He knew that look. "Who?" he asked, dreading the answer.

  "Galian."

  "Galian," he repeated, sadness washing over him.

  "May Dar have mercy on his soul."

  Tansen wanted to curse Dar, but he didn't. "We will miss him," was all he said.

  They turned away from the river and began following their retreating companions, disappearing back into the mountains.

  "What now?" Radyan asked.

  "We'll announce the names of the dead in Zilar so their families can be notified. I'll send a runner to Lann at Dalishar to give him new instructions. You'll work with the Guardians. Now that we've freed the Shaljir River, they've got to try to prevent another waterlord from taking control of it."

  "Where will you be?"

  "Shaljir. But I'll be back as soon as I can. We've won Zilar. We must keep our presence there strong."

  "And the boy?"

  "Zarien? I'm taking him with me."

  "Ah. The stahra. He goes where you go."

  "He goes where I go," Tansen agreed.

  "I must admit, I've been wondering: Why?"

  Despite everything, Tansen smiled. "You wouldn't believe me if I told you."

  "And would I believe how that fresh wound became an old scar?" Radyan asked with a pointed glance at where Tansen's silvery shir scar lay beneath his shirt.

  "Are people talking about it?"

  "What do you think?"

  Tansen sighed. "It's a long story, and one without an ending. The truth is, I don't know how it healed."

  Radyan shrugged. "Have it your way." Then something caught his attention. "Look!"

  Someone had used heavy hemp rope to make a simple jashar that now hung like a banner from a free-standing, fire-blackened arch which had once been the entrance to Liadon's house.

  Tansen studied the knotted, woven cords. "'Free water for all.'"

  Radyan's gaze remained fixed on it for a long moment. "I like it," he announced with a grin. "Free water for all." He glanced at Tansen and urged, "Let's make it come true."

  "You might say," Tansen replied, "that it's been my life's work."

  Chapter Thirty-One

  He who has not carried your burden

  does not know what it weighs.

  —Silerian Proverb

  The boy was dawdling near the enormous old fig tree in the Sanctuary garden, staring moodily at his motionless stahra, when Tansen first saw him.

  Safe. Alive. Unharmed. Moderately obedient, it seemed, since he was, for once, right where he was supposed to be.

  And taller? Tansen thought incredulously. It had only been a few days, for the love of Dar!

  "I trust that Sisters Shannibar and Norimar are feeding you well?" Tansen said dryly.

  Startled, Zarien whirled around, letting the oar fall to the ground. "You're alive!"

  "I'm alive," Tansen agreed, smiling at the mingled relief and astonishment in the boy's expression.

  "You're—I thought... I mean... Waterlords."

  Tansen gathered from this garbled statement that Zarien hadn't expected him to survive his audacious plan. "Without water," he advised the boy, "they are only men."

  "But they had water. They had... They were... " Zarien started taking air in big gulps. "Even when the Shaljir River melted and flowed again yesterday, I... I thought you might not be... um..."

  Tansen surprised himself by putting his arms around Zarien and hugging him, much the way Josarian used hug him. Then, lest the boy's sense of manly fortitude be compromised, he slapped him on the back and said, "Is there any food left for me, or have you eaten it all?"

  "Sanctuary? But I don't want to go to Sanctuary!" Torena Chasimar protested.

  Ronall's head was pounding. His tongue tasted so vile he half-wished someone would cut it out. Sitting in the public room of the inn, he squinted against the sunlight which poured through a window—along with the fresh air that flooded his nostrils and made him want to vomit again. He had drunk himself unconscious, as planned, and was now feeling the effects of too little sleep gotten in an awkward position at the same table where he still sat—now facing the two women he had reluctantly rescued in the night.

  With any luck at all, things will look better after a generous quantity of ale, he decided.

  He ignored the scandalized scowls of the elderly innkeeper and his wife, to whom he hadn't bothered to explain why he now kept two women in his bedchamber. He had never explained his
actions to servants or peasants, and he didn't intend to start now.

  With enormous effort, Ronall focused his gaze on the two women who were now, for better or worse, his responsibility. He deeply regretted ever bedding the maid—Yenibar, as she'd informed him—and getting into this whole mess. Why hadn't he just let the wench steal his money and dreamweed? Or, having impetuously pursued her, why didn't he turn around and run away when he saw shallaheen killing Valdani? It seemed incredible that he, of all people, had come to Chasimar's rescue—and outrageously unfair that, refreshed by sleep and invigorated by the light of day, she didn't seem very appreciative of what was surely the sole heroic act of his life.

  "We can't stay here," he explained through gritted teeth. "I don't know who your husband's murderers were, but they were obviously local people. You can't seriously believe that she," he indicated the innkeeper's wife, "won't spread gossip about me to every ear in this area by sundown. Which means that everyone will also know that you're here. And it's just possible they'll reconsider letting you live."

  "So we have to leave here," Torena Chasimar conceded. "But I don't see why I have to go into Sanctuary."

  Ronall sighed. "Where do you want to go?"

  She gazed helplessly at him.

  "Do you have a family?" he prodded. "Someone who'll take you in?"

  "In Cavasar."

  "Now that's just lovely," he replied.

  "You won't take me there?"

  "Certainly not. Haven't you heard? Kiloran is in charge of the whole city now. If anyone hates Valdani even more than the shallaheen do, it's the Society."

  "My mother's people are there," Chasimar explained. "Full-blooded Silerians."

  "Just how safe do you think Silerian toreni will be in a district now controlled by Kiloran?" he demanded.

  "You think they're dead?" she gasped.

  "No, he won't kill them. He'll just make them pay whatever he asks." Ronall paused, then added, "And if they refuse, then he'll kill them. I don't want to go anywhere near a district where—"

  "Are you saying I can never see them again?" Tears welled up in her eyes.