by Robert Beers
“Yes.” Ethan echoed. “How?”
Circumstance shrugged. “I'm very fast.”
“I'm not sure I understand what you're getting at, boy.” The engineer frowned.
Circumstance stood up, arms held akimbo. “Try to hit me.” He said to Lemmic-Pries.
The engineer shook his head. “No, lad. I'm not going to do that. I'll injure you.”
“You won't touch me.” Circumstance shifted his stance slightly. “Just like Gaspic wouldn't have.”
Lemmic-Pries cocked an eye at Ethan, who threw up his hands in defeat. “Go ahead. Do as he asks. I'm coming to regret my promise. Go ahead, try to hit him.”
This time both eyebrows went up. The engineer shifted his own stance and balled his fist. “Very well...” He swung and his fist blurred, but the boy wasn't there to be hit.
“Try again.” Circumstance said.
He did, with the same result. Ethan thought it wasn't so much that the boy was amazingly quick, but he seemed to know just where to be at the right time to avoid being struck.
“Try again.”
Lemmic-Pries shook his head. “No. No need. You've convinced me. I'd almost like to see Gaspic make a go at him,” he said, half to himself. “The fool would wear himself to a frazzle swinging at air.”
Ethan smiled broadly. “I think I'd like to see that myself. So Circumstance will be allowed to stay with you, then?”
“I think so.” Lemmic-Pries nodded. “To satisfy my own curiosity, at least. No, I think he'll prove useful, and he'll be safe from the conscriptors.”
“Conscriptors? What are the conscriptors?” Circumstance asked, looking at the sour expression on Ethan's face.
“A bad memory.” Ethan replied.
The Chief Engineer crossed his arms in front of his chest and nodded. “To us, it's a sad reality of war. No one can keep an army large enough on payroll to prosecute a war during peacetime, so they send out teams of conscriptors to forcibly enlist the manpower needed for the war. Not too many escape their net.”
He focused his eye on Ethan. “You need to be going soon, otherwise you may be staying here for much longer than you intended.”
Ethan nodded. “I suppose you're right, at that. Circumstance and I said our good-byes a couple of days ago.” He stuck his hand out for the engineer to take. “I want to thank you for your kindness, Lemmic-Pries. I won't forget it.”
As the engineer reached out to take Ethan's hand, one of the company of engineers came in through the tent flap. He was dressed as a cook, complete with the white floppy hat, and held a silver serving tray in his hands. “Your tea and biscuits, my lord.” He set it down on the cot, and left the tent.
“Tea? You drink that stuff?” Ethan exclaimed. “You're not concerned about what it does to a man's....” He glanced at Circumstance. “...uh ... manliness?”
Lemmic-Pries poured himself a cup and sipped from it. He smiled at Ethan's wince. “I'm aware of the tales, but that's all they are, old wives tales, because they didn't like the idea of something new brought in from foreign lands. It's shipped in from the lands of the Maraggar. I've grown to like the taste, myself. It has a nutty, enlivening flavor I prefer over the fruitiness of tisane. It may help you to wake up in the morning, but that's all it will do.”
He held the cup out to Ethan. “Try some.”
Ethan recoiled. “No thanks. I'll stick with tisane, thank you.”
“The habits of a lifetime. I know.” The engineer held his hand out and Ethan took it. “Have a good journey back home, Ethan. Rest assured, your lad'll be safe with us.”
“You sure of this, Circumstance?” Ethan looked at the boy, who nodded. “All right. Then I'll be going. I'm sure Ellona must be holding supper for me.” He smiled briefly and left the tent.
Lemmic-Pries looked over at Circumstance, and handed him a biscuit with honey. “Well now, lad, what shall we do first?”
Chapter Thirty-Two
“Pour me another.” Bilardi, Duke of the City-State of Grisham, held out his crystal and ruby goblet for another measure of the red wine he favored for its strength and texture.
“Now, fool! Not when I'm in my dottage. Now!”
The wine steward rushed to fulfill his lord's request. Slowness in meeting Duke Bilardi's demands had killed more than one servant in times past.
“He's been like this all day. Woke up in a foul mood, and it's gotten worse,” one of the servers said to a busboy standing in the wing of the Duke's dining chamber.
“I know,” the busboy's voice quavered with his fright. “I'm dreadin’ havin’ to go in there agin.”
The steward looked over his shoulder at the Duke. Bilardi was guzzling the wine as rapidly as he could. Some of it spilled past the rim of the goblet and ran down his cheeks. “I overheard one of the guards sayin’ he's got somthin’ locked away below that's givin’ him the fits. Some say it's a demon that can't be kilt.”
“I don't care what it is. Anything's better than havin’ to face him when he's like that.” The busboy winced as a plate, thrown by the Duke, shattered against the wall to his right.
“You! Get you lazy arse in here and clear this bilge away. Where's my wine?!”
The wine steward started and slunk back into the chamber.
“About bloody time.” The Duke growled at the hapless steward. “Fill it.” He held out his empty goblet.
The steward lifted the bottle, but his hand shook, and he slopped some of the wine onto Bilardi's embroidered cuff. The Duke dropped the goblet with a curse as he surged to his feet. “Damn you to the pit, witless idiot! Look what you've done! Ruined! Ruined!”
The wine steward cringed, and vainly attempted to undo what he had done by patting at his lord's shirt cuff with the towel from his shoulder, but the Duke would have none of it.
Driven to a wrath near madness, he pulled his rapier from its sheath on the bench and drove it through the steward's heart. Blood gushed from the man's mouth, and the hole in his chest as he fell, and was kicked off the razor-edged blade by a thrust from Bilardi's boot.
The duke spat on the body of the steward while it was still twitching. “Gnomic headed skrud!”
He looked at the body of the former wine steward for a moment and then speared the quaking busboy with an eye. “You! You're the new steward! Bring me a bottle, any bottle.” The rest of what he would have uttered stayed unsaid as the newly appointed steward sprinted from the room.
Bilardi turned his back on the door to his dining chamber and cleared his table of its contents with a sweep of his hand. “Wuest!” He bellowed his personal secretary's name at the top of his lungs. “Wuest. Where are you? Damn your hide! Wuest! Wuest!”
“Milord?” Bilardi's secretary and aide de camp stuck his head into the chamber's door. “I came as fast as I cou ... Milord Duke! What has happened? Are you injured?”
The room was strewn with the debris of Bilardi's temper, as well as the cooling body of the ex-wine steward.
The Duke sniffed, mollified by the placating concern shown to him by his secretary and the release the destruction had given to his rage. “Thank you, Wuest, but I am quite all right. Have someone clear this mess away, will you?”
Wuest turned to carry out his Lord's command when he was called back. “Oh, yes, Wuest?”
“Yes, Milord?”
“Any news from the Ortian Embassy?”
“No, Milord. Should I watch for something?” Wuest caught the sight of one of the busboys running toward them down the hall with a wine bottle in his hand.
Bilardi gave his secretary a short nod of his head. “Anything of a diplomatic nature is to be brought to my attention at once, regardless of what I'm involved in.”
The busboy passed Wuest with a hurried, “Pardon, pardon.”
Wuest ignored the busboy handing the Duke his bottle with the long practice of years. He turned again to carry out his task. “As you wish, Milord.”
Bilardi dismissed the busboy, now wine steward, and removed the cork himself. He was rath
er pleased with the decisiveness of the thrust he used to kill one who had spilled wine on him. As firm and sure as it was back in the days when he achieved his sword master ranking.
He patted his paunch. The years had not been kind to his figure. A bit of self-indulgence now and then will do that to a man, he supposed. “Damn those Ortians. Why won't they take the bait?”
* * * *
Cobain pushed open the door to his master's meditation chamber in the very peak of Pestilence with his rear as he balanced the heavy, covered serving tray in his hands.
The sorcerer was wont to retreat to this high spot during times of trouble or stress, or when fasting. He'd been spending the majority of his time in the chamber recently, gazing out of the floor to ceiling crystalline window, since that day he released the Seeker into the world.
“Your repast, master.” Cobain set the covered tray onto a table with elaborately fluted legs ending in clawed feet, each of them grasping an opal sphere.
Gilgafed turned from the window with his hands clasped behind his back. “Excellent.”
He looked a second time at the table. “Where's the wine I requested?”
Cobain hurried to the door. “Just outside, master. I had to make two trips.”
“Perhaps I should do something about that.” The Sorcerer mused. “How would you like a second set of arms?”
Cobain blanched. “Master, no!”
Gilgafed laughed. “Oh, settle down, Cobain. I'm just having some fun with you. You're ugly enough with one pair alone.”
“Eh heh. Thank you, master. Very droll. Very droll, indeed.” Cobain set up the wine service alongside the serving tray, and took his accustomed place along the edge of the chamber.
Gilgafed lifted the cover off the tray and breathed in the savory aroma deeply. “Ahhhh yesss. This is what I've been needing.”
“I hope it is to your liking, master,” Cobain said from his place along the wall.
The entree’ portion of the meal lay in the center of the tray, ringed by an assortment of grilled tubers and vegetables. A garnish of herbs finished the dish.
The sorcerer pinched a small piece off of the golden brown entree’ and placed it into his mouth. He chewed with relish. “It is always to my liking, Cobain. You know how much I adore roast fetus.”
* * * *
“And I say we send our armies up into Grisham now!” Jarl-Tysyn slammed his fist onto the marble of the conference table. “What they did to Hypatia was an act of war, not to mention being against every tenet of Ortian law.”
“In this discussion, General, what was done to my niece is secondary to the fact that Ortian law, as you are so fond of saying, demands that a formal declaration of war be sent first.” Alford leaned forward and favored Jarl-Tysyn with his best glare.
The General glared back at his Emperor for several seconds, and then threw up his hands in exasperation. “Aaaarrrggghhh!”
Alford straightened and picked up the sheet of embossed parchment that lay before him. “I know how you feel, Jarl-Tysyn. I would like nothing more than to send in a team of night stalkers, and burn the Duke's palace to the ground, and then sift the ashes, but I can't.” He held up the parchment. “This has to be delivered into the Duke of Grisham's hands before we can release one arrow. What kind of Emperor would I be if I descended to my enemies’ level?
The General turned back to face Alford. “But, Sire...”
“You know I'm right, Jarl-Tysyn. You know I am.” Alford placed the parchment back onto the table. “Now, according to our law, I must have your witness to my affixing the Imperial Seal to this declaration. When that's done, we can get down to the business of planning just how we're going to hand Duke Bilardi his balls on a platter.”
Jarl-Tysyn turned his left hand toward his eyes, and looked at the massive signet ring adorning his fourth finger for a moment, and then a wide smile split his homely face. “Yes, yes! Scrood the bastard for a mongrel, Yes!”
He slammed the face of the signet ring into the soft wax applied to the bottom right corner of the parchment, and then pulled it away, leaving an impression of the military branch of Ortian authority next to that of the Royal house.
Alford took the parchment again and held it before him. “Now, to send this north. I will need your swiftest rider, General. Be sure he has coins enough to exchange mounts at the way stations along the highway.”
“Pigeon'd be faster, your Majesty.” The General pulled at his lower lip.
“Pigeons can also be eaten by any number of hawks or eagles. A rider willing to lose a few nights sleep is slower, but far surer. We can use the time it takes this...” He rustled the declaration in his hand. “...to reach its destination on planning and strategy.”
Jarl-Tysyn nodded his chin on his chest as he thought. “Aye, probably for the best. Better to be sure.”
He looked back into his Emperor's face with a small smile curling the left side of his mouth. “I wonder what that paunchy fool in Grisham's going to do when he reads it?”
* * * *
Thaylli walked alongside the dragon with her thoughts awhirl. She still wasn't completely convinced, even though Drinaugh, that was what the dragon said his name was, steadily insisted dragons did not eat meat. After all, it was traveling with a pack of wolves!
The wolves made her nervous. Why wasn't Adam here to protect her? The thought of Adam's thoughtlessness raised her temper enough that her nerves vanished.
“Our friend's cubless she is timid.” The Alpha Wolf said to his mate as they padded along the highway just behind Thaylli.
“Yet she walks with the pack, my mate, in spite of her fear,” the she wolf replied. “I think better of our packmate's choice than I did before.”
One of the pack behind them, the onetime Beta Wolf whom Adam befriended, spoke up. “We are watched.”
The Alpha Wolf and his mate stopped, causing the rest of the pack to do so. They sniffed the air.
“Two-legs, hiding in the trees.” The Alpha Wolf's mate pointed her nose toward a copse of Beech trees at the top of a knoll to the left of the highway.
“I smell them.”
“Dragon!” The Alpha Wolf called to Drinaugh, as he and Thaylli continued along the highway, apparently oblivious to the wolves stopping behind them.
Drinaugh halted and turned to look at the wolf pack. Thaylli stopped with him, thankful of the chance to rest her feet. The stone slabs of the highway proved to be much harder on her feet than the soft loam of the woods and plains she'd walked on her journey from Access.
Drinaugh lowered his head to a level with the wolves. “Why do you call me?”
“We have a pack of two legs watching us from those trees, there.” The Alpha Wolf's nose indicated the copse on the knoll.
Drinaugh looked in the direction the wolf pointed and nodded his head. “Oh, that. They're not the first to watch us from hiding. Two others did so yesterday and a large group did the day before.”
The Alpha wolf opened his mouth in a laugh. “So, they are hunters afraid to face their prey.”
Drinaugh chuckled, “perhaps they aren't used to seeing a pack with dragon in it.”
Thaylli looked up at the dragon. “Why'd you laugh? What's going on?”
* * * *
“I don't know about this, Brill.” The older bandit tugged on the ear with the missing lobe.
“Why not, Fretin? Look at ‘er. Ripe as the day's long. She'd bring a pretty penny. The four of us could spook ‘er dogs, no worries.” Brill fingered the edge of his long knife.
“I dunno, Brill. Them's don't look like no dog I ever seen, and what about that thing?” Fretin pointed to Drinaugh's bulk in the middle of the pack.
“That's a dragon, iffn I don't miss me guess.” Drynn, a bandit with barely enough teeth to chew his food, lisped. He scratched at the greasy mat of hair on top of his head. Dandruff flew.
Brill turned to the last of the foursome. “Whatta you think, Ruggels? Do we, or don't we?”
Rug
gels peered over the bush they were crouched behind, and then parted a portion of it to gain another angle. He nodded, made noise in his throat, and then closed the bush back up.
“Well?” Brill scratched himself, dislodging a family of lice at dinner.
Ruggels took the twig he was chewing on out of his mouth and spat. “Them's wolves, and that's a dragon. I ain't going up ‘gainst no wolves and no dragons, nohow.” He stood his lanky form to its full six foot plus and walked back into the woods.
“Y'all best do the same, iffn y'all wanna see the morrow.”
The others rose and followed Ruggels. Brill parted the bush one last time, and undressed Thaylli once more with his eyes. “Yer right, Ruggels,” he thought. “It's a bleedin’ shame, but yer right.”
* * * *
“Ow!” Thaylli stopped to hold her right foot in her hands as she hopped on her left to keep from falling over.
Drinaugh looked down at her in concern. “What's wrong? Are you hurt?”
She looked up at the dragon. His expression showed nothing but genuine concern for her welfare. At that point, all her fears about dragons vanished, and affection began to take their place.
She leaned against the soft hide of Drinaugh's thigh. “My feet. They're all swollen and bruised. Every step is painful.”
“Oh you poor thing. Here, climb up onto my back. As small as you are, I won't even feel your weight.” Drinaugh turned and pointed at a spot above his shoulders between two of the blunt ridges that ran from neck to tail.
“Can I?” Thaylli clapped her hands in joy like a little girl getting to ride her first pony.
Drinaugh smiled. “Of course, you can. I invited you, didn't I?”
He leaned over and placed his hands on either side of Thaylli. “Here. Hold still now.”
Thaylli squealed as the dragon gently lifted her up and placed her onto his back. The ridges in front of, and behind her, fit as nicely as any saddle.
The young dragon cocked an eye in her direction and asked, “are you comfortable?”
“This is so high!” Thaylli laughed, and then she hugged Drinaugh's neck. “Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.”
She didn't see the dragon's smile. “My first successful diplomatic conquest,” he thought.