by Robert Beers
Cobain looked down at the slumbering sorcerer. A glint off to the side caught his eye. He bent to see what it was and found shards of glass. It was then he noticed the mirror Gilgafed used for scrying. Its frame was empty, the backing cracked, and what remained of the beveled mirror glass scattered across the floor.
He looked back at his master. The Sorcerer lay in a drunken stupor, snoring and hugging his empty bottle. Completely helpless, he would know nothing for days. Cobain bent and picked up a shard of glass and looked at his master. Then he bent once more and began picking up the rest.
* * * *
Milward leaned on his staff. It had worked. The boy was learning fast. Far, far faster than he had when he was apprenticing. The battle had completely worn him out, but his pride wouldn't allow him to ask Adam for help in walking.
“May I help?”
He turned to see Adam holding out his arm for him to take as if he were an invalid. Straightening his back, he strode off down the ravine, heels clicking against the stone. “No, thank you, boy. We've delayed here long enough.”
Adam followed the old Wizard shaking his head. He knew Milward was nearly drained, he could feel it. His perceptions were growing. If he strained them a bit, he could feel small snatches of shapings being worked. He didn't have the subtlety to be able to tell how far off or where they were, but it was a beginning.
The path continued downward at a steady rate, and the shadows grew deeper until Adam asked Milward. “Do you think I should try your torch trick? I can't see my hand in front of my nose.”
He heard the Wizard grunt. “First, it's not a trick. It's a shaping. Remember that. Ill-informed boobs call the things we do tricks. Secondly, additional practice wouldn't hurt, would it?”
“No, sir.” Adam began to glow, and the walls of the ravine came into focus. He felt a considerable relief in seeing the bare rock empty of Chivvin.
“You've got a good quality light there, lad, but does it have to be you all over? How about just a hand?”
Adam concentrated, trying to move the light to his right hand. “I can't get it to move. Sorry.”
Milward sighed. “Ah, well. I guess this will have to do. Mind you, it is a lot better than stubbing your toe in the dark.”
The ravine narrowed until there was just enough room for them to squeeze through with their packs. Milward had to unbuckle his beloved pocket belt with its many pouches and sling it over his shoulder.
He grumbled about Gilgafed while they made their way through what Milward called the narrows. “Egotistical idiot! What does he think he's playing at, a children's game? Didn't he realize what ... damn and blast him to perdition. Chivvin! What in the pit was he thinking?” And so on.
Adam listened to Milward's monologue with interest. The old Wizard had a marvelous grasp of language, and exercised his gift with paramount skill in describing the Sorcerer's many faults and failings.
At one point the narrows became too tight to traverse without inching up the wall and bracing the feet against one side and the back against the other and then covering the distance sideways like a crab.
They were able to get through the narrows without too many scrapes and bruises, but Adam developed a good strawberry on his right elbow, and Milward caught the back of his head against a protruding stone somewhere in the middle of the climb.
The Wizard felt the back of his head as they moved into a more comfortable area of the path. “Damn. It's gong to leave a knot. Of that, I'm sure.”
Adam felt his elbow gingerly. “Do we have enough water to make poultices?”
“No, and it's a good few hours before we reach Dragonglade.”
“I guess we'll just have to suffer through, then. Is your strength coming back?” Adam looked at Milward out of the corner of his eye.
“A little bit ... but after such a...” He stopped and gave Adam a suspicious look, then he headed on down the widening path, muttering about boys who are far too sharp for their own good.
The path's downward slope increased after a while and the ravine widened to a distance of yards instead of feet. The walls curved inward high above their heads, giving them the feeling of being in a massive hallway. The air grew moist and cooler as the sound of water rose up in the background.
A patch of light came into focus and Adam turned off the glow. He wondered why he felt none of the drain as Milward had, but that thought was swept away by what he saw as they entered the light.
“Behold, Adam, Whistle Bridge.”
Adam stood there, awestruck. What Milward had told him on the way was inadequate to prepare him for what he saw. The bridge was merely the centerpiece of a magnificent tableau as it stretched into the distance over the gorge that lay before them. An impossibly high waterfall lit by the sun fell from the gorge's cliff to the left of where they stood. Bushes and small trees stubbornly clung to the cliffs, sprouting from cracks and outcrops that jutted into the mist. White birds flew in and out of the mist, some of them skimming the waterfall itself. An incredible rainbow spread its arch between the bridge and the waterfall. The sounds of the falls, the birds and the breeze whistling across the bridge blended into an ethereal harmony. He could hear the small patter of drips of condensed mist hitting the stone, and the air had a sharp, washed scent like spring cleaning on a grand scale.
“Quite a sight isn't it?” Milward eased himself over to Adam's side.
“I ... never dreamed anything like this even existed.” Adam breathed.
“Well, it does, and has for tens of thousands of years. Some say it was here even before man came to be.”
The old wizard pointed to the waterfall. “No one knows how far it falls. The chasm underneath the gorge falls away from the cataract and gives it no wall to fall against.”
“What are those birds doing?” Adam pointed to them as they skimmed the falls.
“Fishing.”
“What?”
Milward smiled. “I know it sounds strange, but that is exactly what they're doing. They live off the small fish who come over the edge into the falls itself.”
“Amazing.” Adam stepped onto the bridge for a better angle to view the gorge.
Milward followed him onto the bridge. Whistle bridge was only wide enough for two to walk it side by side and he passed Adam carefully. “Heights don't bother you, lad?”
Adam bent to look over the edge of the bridge, resting his hands on his knees. A jewel lit fog hundreds of yards below obscured his view of the actual depth. “They don't seem to. Why?”
He didn't see the Wizard shudder as he bent over the drop. “Oh, no reason. Just asking.”
Adam straightened and shaded his eyes as he tried to see across the gorge to the other side of the bridge. “The other side's a long ways off. How long till we get to Dragonglade from here?”
Milward looked up at the light coming into the top of the gorge. “I had hoped we'd be there before summer's done. That's when the gate is shut.”
“Gate? What gate?”
* * * *
The sun rose in the east. The colors played across the Alpha Wolf's muzzle as he watched the day being born.
His mate came up beside him and sniffed the early morning air. The plain below them was filled with wildflowers and the sounds of birdsong greeting the rising sun. “You think of the old one's packmate.”
He turned and greeted her. “I smell you, my mate. Yes, I think of the young two legs. He learned quickly the way of the hunt and I feel as if a packmate of ours is journeying away from us for the first time.”
“I, too, miss him, but he will do well.”
The Alpha Wolf's mouth hung open in a wolf smile. “He will.”
* * * *
“This is the gate.” Milward rested a hand on Adam's shoulder as he pointed to the gate in question.
“Gate!?” Adam exclaimed. “This isn't a gate. It's a bloody edifice.”
He had his neck craned back so he could see the top of the gate. The dim light of the cavern made gauging th
e height of it difficult, but it had to be sixty feet if it was an inch. The designs worked into the metal of the gate were otherworldly to his eyes. They had a definite symmetry and balance, one side was a mirror image of the other, but the intricacy of the patterns was as complex as clockwork.
Milward sensed his young charge's bafflement. “Yes, I was struck much the same as you are now, the first time I saw them. I must have spent nearly a fortnight trying to trace the pattern. Used up every sheet of paper I had with me, if I recall. To this day, I don't know much about their history, maybe Mashglach will consent to tell it to you.”
“Why me if not to you? You're their friend.” Adam turned to look at the Wizard.
“You can never tell about Dragons, my boy. They have entirely different reasons for doing things than you or I or anyone else might, for that matter. Just because I'm considered a friend doesn't mean I'm considered a confidant.”
“This is another one of those times where I'm not sure I understand you.”
“Never mind. Once you meet the Dragons, you'll have a better understanding of what I'm talking about.”
Adam walked up to the gate. The metal shone a dull yellow. “Gold? Are these gates ... gold?”
Milward was looking in one of the pouches on his belt. “Hmm? Oh, yes. They're gold, and some other metal to give them strength. If they were solid gold, they'd collapse of their own weight. Now, where was that ... ah!”
Adam came over to see what the Wizard was pleased about finding.
“The key. I knew I had it somewhere. You don't use something for about a hundred years, and it gets hard to find for, some reason.”
“Uh huh, yeah.” Adam looked at the key the Wizard was holding. It was, if anything, remarkable in its plainness. It appeared to be made of simple brass with no engraving to be seen on either side. One end was a simple open loop and the other held the teeth of a standard door key. “This little thing opens that gate?”
“Seems a bit lopsided, doesn't it?” Milward chuckled, as he walked over to the joining of the two gate halves and turned the key in the lock.
A snick sounded and the gate doors began to swing inward in a silent, stately fashion.
The open gate revealed an intimidatingly large hallway lit by unseen lamps giving a soft natural light. The ceiling curved into an arch along its entire length with decorations and moldings of a size that give Adam the impression he was a mouse entering a giant's home. Inset into the ceiling arch about a hundred feet above them were highly detailed frescos of what appeared to be a timeline of Dragon history. One showed a large number of Dragons building something, using logs as rollers, with some of the workers pulling on ropes as others pushed the huge stone blocks.
“These paintings show the Dragons with hands.” Adam pointed one out to the Wizard.
“Of course. What did you expect, hooves? I told you about their legendary city, remember?”
“Oh, yes ... What is that thing?” Adam indicated a portion of a fresco that showed a three-sided platform of some kind floating in the air above a gathering of Dragons waving large, feathered fronds decorated with some of the same highly complex designs that covered the gate.
“I've never really been sure. This is one of those things Mashglach keeps silent about. It could be the craft they used to sail to the stars, but there is no method of moving the craft that I can see. It could be one of their legends. You'll notice it's hovering over the crowd there. It could be one of their ancient explorers getting a send-off.”
Adam wasn't convinced of the legend theory. All the other frescos showed events that had to be part of a living history instead of legend. Why would the Dragons have placed something fictional within a factual timeline?
They passed under more frescos that showed elaborate feasts and ceremonies. Scenes of tragedy and triumph where nature's immense destructive power was overcome and a flattened city rebuilt.
Adam noticed something missing from the history. There were no scenes of battle. He considered asking Milward why, but didn't want another lecture about missing the obvious, so he tried to piece an answer together from the frescos. An idea was beginning to formulate when they came to an interior door. The top of the door, though not as high as the gate, was still four times as high as a man on horseback. There was a knob and a latch, but unless Milward had a way of levitating himself, as Adam suspected he did, the knob could not be reached to turn it.
“Over here, Adam.”
Adam turned from his inspection of the door to see why Milward called him.
“We go in through here.” Milward showed him a keyhole similar to the one in the gate set into the lower right corner of the main door.
“They certainly are accommodating,” Adam remarked, as they passed through the smaller door.
“And why would we not be, young human? We are DRAGONS, after all.”
The voice was inhumanly deep to Adam's ears, resonant and full of subsonics, but with a quality that said welcome. He found he liked the voice and it fit the speaker like a well-tailored suit of clothes.
The Dragon door warden bent down to look at each of them closely. “Ah, it's that young Wizard. And you've brought a friend! Welcome. Welcome to Dragonglade.”
Chapter Twenty-One
Adam sat on the garden bench under the branches of a flowering Cherry tree. Across the plaza, Milward huddled deep in conversation with three immense Dragons, one of who wore a medallion encrusted with white and red gems around its edge. The center of it looked to be a firestone more than a span in diameter. Dragons’ coloring was different from what he'd expected. It seemed as if they'd been dusted with a fine coating of diamond that lay over their scales as minute prisms. A cloud passing over the park-like setting caused a dimming, as if an internal light had been extinguished. Orange and red, brown and yellow, and blue and green were the predominant colors, but each one had them in their own unique patterns.
The wings were incredible. They lay along a Dragon's back like cloaks, and the huge pectoral muscles that drove them gave the Dragons a rather chesty appearance, though at an average height of sixty feet when standing on their hind legs, the proportions fit.
Their tails were carried off the ground as a balance. No fins or series of ridges ran down the spine like those of the Firewyrm, though there was a change in the color pattern similar to the stripes in a tabby cat.
He found Dragon faces to be pleasing and very expressive. They had a somewhat horsy appearance, if a horse had a mouth that could smile like a man's. He had no notion of what Dragons ate, but from what he could see of their teeth they were probably vegetarian, for the teeth were blocky, like those of a cow.
Their forelegs had hands that could easily double as feet, and a few Dragons passed him walking on all fours. The six toes were as long as fingers, and had opposing digits on either side. Their claws were rounded, nothing like the set of daggers the Firewyrm sported back in the caverns, and the palms were long and narrow like the base of a foot.
He heard the word Garloc mentioned and saw the Dragon's heads nod. “Milward must be telling them of the journey to get here,” he thought.
The old Wizard made a gesture where he threw his arms wide as if describing an explosion, and the Dragon heads turned to look in Adam's direction. “Uh oh,” he thought. “What did he tell them about me?”
The Dragon with the medallion turned and started to walk over to where Adam sat. Milward followed by jogging alongside, hitching up the skirt of his robe in one hand.
Adam stood to his feet and stepped out from under the Cherry tree as Milward and the Dragon approached. He leaned forward and whispered into the Wizard's ear. “What did you tell them about me? Did you tell them about me blowing up the Garloc's?”
“He did, young Adam.” The Dragon spoke. His voice was deeper even than the one that met them at the door. “Though we sorrow at the loss of life, we rejoice at your triumph of survival.”
“You heard that?” Adam looked up at the Dragon. Its eyes were a
rich, reddish brown, with golden flecks scattered around the edge of the iris.
The Dragon nodded solemnly. “Accept my apologies for listening in. It was inconsiderate, but I must confess, you have raised my interest, and I've not found anything of man interesting since I first noticed my young Wizard friend these few centuries ago.”
Milward raised his eyebrows at Adam, beaming like a proud father at the county fair.
“You find me interesting? Why?” Adam felt very insignificant in the shadow of the huge Dragon. The idea that such a creature would find him interesting was more than a little disturbing.
“The way you dealt with the problem of the Chivvin. I find your choice of solution ingenious. Other men, and most Wizards, would have used violence, and died. You used light, an element of life. Why?”
Adam thought about his meeting with the Chivvin and tried to bring up the reason why. He knew he reacted mostly by gut instinct. They were frantically trying to keep alive at the time, and it had just come to him, so he did it.
The Dragon waited for his answer with the patience of one whose life spanned thousands of years.
Adam noticed Milward was starting to fidget, so he tried to put his feeling into words. “I saw them being pushed back by the lightening Milward was casting from his staff. But I also saw it wasn't just the ones the lightening was striking, it was also those light from the flashes shone on. I thought that maybe a brighter light would move them back far enough for us to escape, so I made one.”
He waited for the Dragon to respond to his answer. He tried to give the same impression of patience the Dragon had given him.
The Dragon looked at Milward. “He has courtesy as well as reasoning. Your King chose well.”
Milward looked insufferably proud. “I thought so, too. In spite of his continual questions.”