by Dave Duncan
Gold? Two legs have gold?
The worm was close now. Its voice was a brass band inside Rap's head, and an earthquake also, and being crushed flat. His skull would fall apart.
Inos! He must think of Inos. He was doing this for her, and he sought to draw strength from her memory.
"Bright Water! You met the witch again?" Sagorn grimaced, baring his teeth like an angry skeleton. "Moron! Young idiot! You should have consulted me! You should have told Andor."
Rap began hauling himself upright, pushing himself up the rough black face of the cliff. It burned, hotter even than the sand. His head was still ringing from the dragon's last fanfare, and already the worm was much closer, sunlight flashing on silver scales as it soared swiftly over the forest. The beat of its wings was rhythmic thunder thudding against his eardrums. Huge! The next word it said was going to kill him. He cringed in expectation, waiting for the next bolt of agony like a felon hung on the whipping post, able to think of nothing but the coming lash.
"Too strong!" he muttered.
"Obviously!" Sagorn snapped. "Have you tried, though? Have you even tried to send it away?"
Rap shook his head. He was still leaning against the furnace of the rock, as he dared not trust his legs to support him. The dragon was close enough now that he could believe he was looking up at it, a silvery sky-snake, thrashing through the air on wings as wide as the courtyard of the castle in Krasnegar, its tail trailing behind it in long curves, two monstrous jeweled eyes flashing. Beneath it, trees were tumbling and shattering like matchwood in the blast.
"It wants gold," he mumbled. "It thinks we have gold."
Sagorn spun around and stalked off. "We must take cover!" he shouted over his shoulder. "I must find cover."
"Why you?" Gathmor followed, firing angry questions. "Just you? And where did you come from, anyway?"
Rap pushed himself erect and tottered after the other two. He ought to try sending a command to the dragon, he knew, but he was terrified that it might reply. That voice was worse agony than anything he had ever known. It would burn his brain to ashes.
Oh, Inos! I tried! I tried too hard.
Sagorn rounded a rock fragment as large as a cottage, which might have been a part of a fetlock. He was scanning the cliff that rose so high above, looking for an opening into that mythical cavern he hoped for. Even if he found it, it would be only a death trap.
Then a gigantic shadow flashed over them, and they all stopped.
The casement! This was the moment. Rap turned to stare across the heat-distorted sand, and for one tiny instant thought he saw a flicker of darkness there, where the observers must have been, where he must have been. If it was there, it had gone . . .
"This prophecy?" Gammor shouted. "What happens?"
"We don't know," Sagorn growled, watching the sky monster sweep around in a curve, coming in lower for another pass. "This is as far as it went."
"You mean we may die?"
"We probably shall. Unless Rap can sent it away."
It was up to him. Rap braced himself, trying to imagine he was dealing with Firedragon, the Krasnegar stallion—or a dog, maybe, like Fleabag. He tried to recall how he had influenced the fire chick. He took a deep breath. Go away! he commanded.
The response was even worse than he had expected—a shrill explosion of fright that struck like agony, that hurled him bodily backward to sprawl on the sand. His head came down a hands-breadth from a jagged rock, but he hardly noticed. The dragon shied like a foal, whirled around in the sky as if knotting itself, then spiraled down out of sight behind a hilltop. The forest exploded in a red-black mushroom of flame and smoke.
A moment later, a sound of thunder rolled over the clearing. The pillar of smoke roiled skyward, ever thicker, its feet bright with fire. Sharp booms suggested tree trunks exploding in the heat.
Gold?
That had been a quieter, almost timorous query, but there was tenacity in it. Rap did not think the dragon had given up. It was merely startled, and puzzled.
Sagorn loomed over Rap, staring down with grim fury. His ghostly pale face was slick with sweat, his bony nose and lantern jaw more skull-like than ever.
"Fool! You thought to frighten my word of power from me?"
Rap grunted and struggled to rise. In the back of his mind he could feel the dragon's thoughts now—low self-mutterings of gold and of two-legses by the ancestral relic. It was not even speech, just musings, and it filled his mind with metallic alien echoes so torturous that he could not think.
"You thought you could control dragons!" Sagorn snarled. "You were going to coerce me into telling you my word of power!"
Rap nodded miserably and forced himself to his knees. "I might have—but it believes we have gold."
Sagorn sneered. "The slightest hint of gold will drive a dragon crazy. Even you must know that! It puts them into a frenzy. They need metal to drive their metamorphoses, gold most of all."
"Have we gold?" Gathmor demanded suspiciously, appearing at the old man's side.
Sagorn kept his eyes on Rap. "Thinal has."
"What!" Rap shouted.
"In Finrain, he stole for Andor again; to bankroll more of his philanderings." The old man closed his eyes and seemed to crumple. "Before he went away, he put a coin in his mouth."
Rap howled. He struggled to his feet, swaying.
The fire beyond the hill was growing larger, and louder. Trees were exploding, smoke pulsing up in huge black clouds. High overhead, the column was drifting westward. The dragon was coming.
"Why?" Rap demanded. Frowning, Gathmor reached out a hand to steady him.
"He almost always does," Sagorn said sadly. "It is the only way any of us can keep anything for himself. What is inside us goes with us—so Thinal usually hides away a coin like that. When he returns, he has that much, at least. He is only a common sneak thief, remember."
"And the dragon can tell?"
"Maybe it can. Dragons are not wholly mundane. They have powers of their own. This one may be sensing Thinal's gold."
GOLD!
Rap staggered and almost fell as another twisting wave of torment tore at his mind. Could the dragon even hear his thoughts, as he seemed to be hearing its? He wished Sagorn had not told him about the gold.
"Then call Thinal! We'll throw the coin away and run!"
Fire was glowing through the forest at the crest of the hill as the dragon ascended the far slope.
Sagorn shook his head. "Useless! A taste of gold and the drake would devastate the countryside for leagues. Its frenzy would last for days while it went through another stage of metamorphosis. We should never escape."
"Then tell him the damned word!" Gathmor bellowed. Apparently he had gathered a fair idea of what was going on.
"No!" The old man glared stubbornly. "I am too old! I need it all!"
"You won't need it very long—here she comes!"
At the top of the hill, the last fringe of trees erupted in one brilliant flash, and the dragon emerged, its whole incredible length pouring out like a string. Not pausing at all, it continued down the slope, slithering at a speed that would have left a racehorse standing. With wings furled, it looked very much like a gigantic metal worm, every scale flashing color in the sunlight, and even at that distance, Rap could feel the heat from it.
In desperation he gathered all his strength and hurled a command: Go back!
The monster shied, spreading wings to brake and shooting out a hail of sand and rocks beneath its talons. It reared up on its hind legs, tall as a castle tower, jetting a deafening howl of white fire. Returning waves of power battered into Rap's mind with stunning force; he felt as helpless as he had in the surf and tide. Half stunned, he reeled back, and only Gathmor's steely grip stayed him from falling.
Ishist? came the thought. Two-legs speaks? Is Ishist? The silver form curled forward, front claws sinking into the ground. The great back was curved like a cat's as the dragon pondered, but Rap thought more of a dog encounter
ing its first porcupine. The massive triangular head swayed from side to side on the scaly neck, regarding the problem from different angles; while all around the sand darkened as it began to melt, then the closer regions started to glow. The whole monster was hotter than a smith's furnace. Heat wraiths blurred the air around it, molten glass puddled below.
"The word?" Rap cried.
"Tell me yours!" Sagorn demanded.
Rap tried to rally what little courage he had left. He felt ill and faint and very stupid. But he wasn't going to yield his word now. Not if he died for it.
"No! Remember what Andor said when we met the goblins? The tables are turned, Sagorn. It's my talent that's needed now, not his! Not yours! Mine! But I must have more power."
This was what he had planned, the reason he had let Jalon walk into the trap; but he had thought he would be bluffing. He had thought he would be able to control the dragon and bully Sagorn into telling him the gang's word. Now it was no bluff. He could no more control this monster than he could arm-wrestle it. He greatly doubted he would do any better as an adept, either. Probably only a full sorcerer could coerce a dragon.
Sagorn looked ill also, haggard and livid. His eyes flickered toward the cliff. "There may be a cave. If I can hide from it, it may not sense Thinal in me . . ."
"No!" Rap lurched forward and grabbed the old man by his bony shoulders. "That won't work, and you know it! It will blow fire in at you. Tell me! Tell me now, or we're all going to die."
Not Ishist! the dragon concluded. Two-legs not Ishist.
It hurtled forward, splashing molten rock behind it. It came seething down the slope. Thornbushes vanished in flashes of white flame as it went by.
Sagorn wailed, and bent his head near to Rap's.
"Well?" Rap screamed. "Speak!"
"I can't! It hurts!"
Rap shook him like a feather bolster. "It'll hurt a lot more in two seconds!"
The old man choked, staggered, and slumped over Rap's shoulder, suddenly a dead weight. Strange noises grated in his throat, as if he were having a fit. Rap was struggling to hold him up.
"Sagorn!" Rap yelled. "Doctor! Tell me!"
The dragon was on the flat and coming faster than anything Rap had ever seen, faster than a swooping falcon. Bigger and bigger, jewel eyes blazing . . .
And then Sagorn roused himself just enough to mumble his word of power into Rap's ear.
2
Being struck by lightning might be an experience like learning a word of power. Nothing else was.
For one eternal, lifeless moment, Rap thought he had blown apart. Lights seemed to soar all around in darkness, and there was music and a great silence. Fanfares and carillons and a deep, deep stillness like the musings of mountains. Solitude and whirling stars. There was pain. There was ecstasy.
There was no time to enjoy the experience. He looked up and the dragon's monstrous head was almost on top of him, its heat was blistering his face. He smelled burning cloth from his robe. Sagorn and Gathmor had turned and were staggering away, screaming. The giant gemlike eyes shone down on all of them with a deadly inhuman intelligence, with thoughts no man could think, with alien emotions no human would ever comprehend; the vast mouth was opening to reveal rows of crystalline teeth around an internal blaze like a captive sun. Scales shone like metal, radiating heat.
GO AWAY! Rap yelled, not knowing whether he spoke the words aloud or not.
Again the dragon reared up into the sky in shock, and this time it toppled backward. Claws grappled air; it impacted with a concussion that shook the world and blasted a belch of purple fire from its mouth. Boulders came crashing down from the ridge at Rap's back: scales and armored back plates and half a rib. He ignored those. The live dragon was much more perilous than the dead one.
A barrage of mental explosions seemed to pour from it, and at that range they should have burned out Rap's brain, but he blocked them.
"Go home!" he commanded fiercely. "There is no gold here. Go away!" He felt a shimmering response. It was unreal and outlandish, but vaguely reminiscent of Firedragon, the Krasnegar stallion: anger, and shame, and fear, and a juvenile silliness.
No gold?
"None! No metal! GO!"
The dragon spun around in coils, like a snake, and went rushing back up the slope, somehow seeming to slink at the same time. Its wings spread, flapped. Dust whirled up in thunderclaps as the monster rose to run on its hind legs. A few more hurricane beats and it took to the air. It veered past the column of smoke still rising from the burning forest, causing it to swirl and writhe like a candle flame, sending a wall of fire roaring through the trees. The dragon dwindled rapidly into the distance.
Rap heard tiny mutterings of complaint—no gold—and then even those faded away.
He stank of scorched cloth and hair, but cowl and stubble had protected most of his face. His tattoos hurt, and he could see tiny blisters on them. Apparently his farsight would now work like a mirror, and he couldn't remember being able to use it like that before. He could see the backs of the hills, though, which was certainly new. The whole world had a sparkle, a sharpness, that he could not recall noticing earlier, but some of that glamour might be the afterglow of a very narrow escape. Life felt extremely good right now.
He turned around to face Gathmor, who had his arms crossed over his chest, his feet well planted, and was glaring at Rap with intent to terrify. "So you planned all this, did you, sonny?"
The man was frightened of Rap! It was written all over him.
"I didn't plan to . . ." Rap sighed. "Yes, I did! Yes, I planned it." He could hardly believe that he was still alive. And he knew two words of power. He was an adept. The world spun brightly for him now.
"You knew that we would meet a dragon. You led us into a trap. What sort of shipmate would—"
"Yes. I lied to you, Cap'n, but—" But nothing, obviously. Rap ought to be quaking and quivering as the sailor talked himself up into fighting frenzy. The rage was draining all the color out of his face, even his lips. His hair seemed to bristle. Killer jotunn! What Rap saw, though, was a man frightened by the unknown powers of the occult, a man who was also furious at the fear he had felt before the dragon, who was desperate to restore his self-respect by taking out his rage on someone—or by suffering, perhaps. Now he must take the measure of this young upstart magician and establish who was the better man. Soon his rage had mounted until he was spitting more than he was speaking.
"Snake!" he screamed. "Ingrate! Reptile!"
Unable to get in a word, Rap turned and walked away. It didn't work. Behind him Gathmor tore off his gown and threw it away.
Rap wheeled. "Stop that!" he shouted. "It's all a big act! It's stupid and childish."
"I'll show you stupid and childish—I'm going to break every bone in your damned faun carcass!" Gathmor stepped out of his sandals. "Worm! You haven't any bones to break!" Keeping a steady glare on Rap, he balled his fists and stalked forward. A killer jotunn, out for blood.
Rap was not impressed. "You can control that damned temper of yours when you want to," he said sadly. "You were a sweet little bunny on Blood Wave." He kicked off his shoes, but he left his robe alone.
Gathmor leaped. Rap sidestepped in a swirl of sackcloth.
"I wish you'd listen a minute, Cap'n. I'm an adept now. You can’t expect—"
But Gathmor did expect. Gathmor was lightning fast. Every man in Durthing had agreed that others might punch harder or meaner or absorb punishment better, but as long as he was reasonably sober there was no one faster than Gathmor of Stormdancer. He seemed very slow now. Perhaps it was the sand, or the hard day, but when he pivoted and swung again, Rap was not there again. Screaming, the jotunn tried a third time, and now he was ready to grab, in either direction. That left him open. This time Rap stood his ground and laid a fist into that hard hairy abdomen with all the force he could muster. It felt like hitting Inisso's castle. Apparently it felt worse to Gathmor.
For a few moments he seemed to be de
ad, but then he began to breathe again, very noisily, curled up small on the sand. Rap stepped back into his sandals, because his toes were being fried like sausages. He studied the sailor for a moment and decided that he was in no danger. Sucking his throbbing knuckles, he wandered over to where Andor was watching.
Of course the gang would have chosen Andor at a time like this. Looking almost elegant in Jalon's brown robe, he was relaxing in the shade of an overhang, seated on a slab of black rock that had once been part of a spinal armor plate.
He greeted Rap with a white-tooth smile and a silent mime of hand clapping. "I'm sure that felt good?"
"Not really." Rap had not wanted to humiliate Gathmor. The defeat would hurt the sailor much more than victory pleased the faun. Not a faun—an adept! Fighting now was cheating. Almost anything was going to be cheating in future.
Andor's face, for example. The polished impish good looks no longer impressed. He wasn't ugly, but his charm didn't work on Rap anymore. He looked unpleasantly effeminate, in fact.
"I'd have enjoyed it! You're a good man, Master Rap. Most men would get a lot of pleasure out of stuffing that jotunn in a bottle." He nodded solemnly. "I don't think you do, though. You don't enjoy humiliating other people." The automatic compliment.
Rap shrugged. He ought to be finding pleasure in his new immunity to Andor, but he didn't think he was. Behind the quizzical smile he could see anger and fear, and cold calculations in progress. Andor was frightened that Rap was going to kill him to gain the rest of the word of power. Gods!
And now he was being disconcerted by Rap's silent scrutiny. A spurious twinkle came into his eye. "So what happens next, great sorcerer?" Under the humor, there was something long dead in those deep dark eyes. Andor had manipulated people until he couldn't think of them as people anymore.
"I'll make a deal with you," Rap said, and watched the surge of relief and pleasure. He even saw the calculations speed up. Probably Andor was wondering if he could kill Rap to regain the share of their power that Sagorn had given away.
"Name it! I told you on the ship, Rap—I think you have a destiny, so I'd like to stick around. More than that, though, I really do want to be your friend. I always have."