After the Dragon

by Wendy Palmer

  He tripped over a body, fell, and could not get up again. He heard his attacker thundering down at him and lay still, eyes shut. If it could be quick and clean, he would be grateful.

  The hoofbeats faltered. Trick opened his eyes to see the man topple out of the saddle with a sword stuck clean through him. The horse fled and he saw that giant of a man Mouse had set on him outside the old couple's cottage.

  The Illusion vanished as Mizzle strode through it. She looked down at him. ‘Get up.'

  Trick managed to sit up, and looked around. The few surviving attackers drove their horses back the way they had come, outpaced by the unburdened horses of their fallen comrades.

  Faustus and Mouse rode over. Mouse had hold of Skye as well. Trick could not look him in the eye, because he'd first wished him under attack to help himself and then been saved by his Illusion.

  'Fortune.’ Faustus slid off Coal, wiped his sword off and sheathed it. ‘I knew Livania had a problem with bandits, but really.'

  'They were no bandits,’ said Mizzle. She had yet to make her swords shrink away.

  'No,’ Trick said. They couldn't have been, when the habit of Livanian bandits was to threaten the weak and not risk fighting the strong. And not when most of them had had swords rather than a more eclectic mix of weapons.

  He went through the pockets of the dead men under the disapproving eyes of Faustus. He found a good purseful of gold and silver spread among them, and pocketed it all, but nothing to identify them. He checked the swords and picked up San's again as the one with the best weight and quality. That alone said they were Livanian soldiers—they were not equipped with better than a Bourchian bandit could steal.

  He voiced his guesses. ‘Not bandits. A remnant of Mikcul's men, perhaps, knowing a DarkElf defeated him. Or even Dalton's men acting without orders since they must know Lithia or Filipe didn't punish us for killing their lord.'

  That ‘us’ was carefully chosen, with Mizzle silent and tense. He had one other thought and kept it quiet. But Faustus said, ‘Or acting with orders. Filipe, trying to force us back to him.'

  Faustus could be pious and straightlaced and mazed with allure. He'd still been at court enough to think in corkscrews.

  'It worked,’ said Trick to that. ‘We can't go on like this. Either the army behind us is flushing them out and they're running into us or they're deliberately seeking us out.'

  'We move faster,’ Mizzle said. A shadow was about her, a chill. He realised, then. She had been pushed too hard, finally, and fell to using the stone against her own good intentions. He could not blame her.

  He could still seek to turn her decision. ‘We should wait for the Imperial army,’ he said. ‘We can't do anything else, unless you want to fight your way south?'

  'We will move beyond this.’ She swung up on Skye and started her walking away so Trick got himself up in front of Mouse and Faustus mounted Coal.

  'Mizzle, the word is out that a DarkElf aided Mikcul and then turned to Lithia's side. We don't know yet how the southern lords will react to Mikcul's fall.'

  'You wish to oblige Lithia by going to the capital with her?’ Mizzle could not have helped but overhear Lithia's whisper in his ear, even if Faustus had to guess.

  He could not give a straight answer to that. ‘Jealous?’ he said instead.

  She was using the DarkStone for sure, when she turned away from that provocation.

  But he persuaded her, for she reined Skye to a halt and dismounted. Or perhaps she had always meant to wait and rode on only to be away from the flies and crows of a battlefield. He followed her lead and so did Faustus.

  While Trick was helping Mouse down, Faustus bumped into him, knocking him into the saddle hard enough to hurt. He could not think that was a mistake. Faustus took Mizzle's revenge for her.

  He rubbed his shoulder and exchanged glances with silent Mouse. The boy shrugged and Trick had to agree.

  Mizzle shared out more food from last night's feast, silently and with eyes glowing. She was more annoyed than he had guessed.

  They ate in the pall of that cat's stare. Afterwards, Trick went into the shade of a tree and tried to sleep, lying in mud and not caring. He felt someone settle near him, and opened his eyes to see Mouse sitting beside him. He was obscurely glad the boy was there to watch Mizzle and Faustus while he slept.

  * * * *

  Mouse woke him, and once he was awake he did not know how he could have slept through the approach of the army. They were close enough that he could make out Lithia and Filipe riding at the head. A carriage behind them had to be how Jarrett was travelling comfortably in the daytime.

  Thinking of Jarrett made Trick think of Jarrett's parting comment to Mizzle. He realised now that Jarrett had meant him to understand it, calling it out in DarkElvish when he himself had taught Trick that language. Had he been trying to warn Trick not to succumb to a female DarkElf?

  And he realised something else now, with a jolt. ‘How do you know what Lithia said to me?’ he asked Mizzle. ‘She spoke Livanian.'

  She blinked at him, with no answer. So he had his answer. The DarkElves were ever good with languages, and he had been waiting for her to hear enough Livanian to be able to understand it. It had happened sooner than he had thought, but it was not unexpected.

  He walked forward to meet Lithia and Filipe. They rode off the road to join him and a hand gesture from Lithia sent her guards onward. The army kept moving with Lithia's guard, Lord Crethen and the carriage at its head, horse and foot following in a long snake whose tail might not yet be out of sight of Kitira.

  'Those bodies back there are yours?’ asked Filipe, looking down at him from horseback. Trick wished he had ridden over on Bet, a horse big enough to make him taller than anyone.

  'Are any of you hurt?’ asked Lithia. She did sound genuinely concerned.

  Trick's back and shoulder were on fire. He said, ‘We're all fine.'

  'Would you like to travel with us?'

  Filipe might have gloated about it, but Lithia had taken the chance away from him with a simple invitation.

  Trick had enough grace to smile and nod at Lithia before turning to Filipe. ‘Before we join you,’ he said, low and in Bourchian. ‘You tell me exactly why you want Mizzle with you.'

  Filipe considered. ‘I never wanted Mizzle,’ he said finally. ‘I just said that.'

  Trick blinked at him and the older man went on with a faint smile. ‘I know who you are, Trick. I thought we could use the Luck. I knew if you got Mizzle to come, you would come.'

  Trick was aghast. ‘How? How do you know that?'

  Filipe shrugged. ‘I just know. The same way I know where Sparrow is.'

  'I don't accept that.’ It was not beyond Filipe to truly still want Mizzle and pretend Trick was his real aim, but he wouldn't mislead him by wastefully letting slip that he knew such a well-kept secret. He could not just know. Nothing marked Trick as Fortune's Favourite and only the Ullwyns and Sparrow and Mizzle knew him as that.

  Linnet had known and it had gained her nothing.

  She slipped into his thoughts with such ease. He shook her off and turned a hard look on Faustus then. But Filipe said, ‘I didn't find out from him.'

  'But an Ullwyn did tell you?'

  Filipe shrugged and relented. ‘Yes. To look for an Ullwyn of Livanian appearance.'

  A chill struck him. ‘Did they know I was in the Company?'

  'No, Trick,’ said Filipe. ‘Don't worry about it.'

  Easy for Filipe to say. He shook his head and remembered what else he had come over to ask. ‘Did you set an ambush on us to force us to your protection?'

  'No,’ said Filipe, without surprise or outrage.

  Filipe was a better liar than that. Trick assumed he'd spoken truth and went back to Mizzle and Faustus, waiting beside their horses, and Mouse already sitting atop Bet. ‘We'll ride with them.'

  They all mounted and joined Lithia and Filipe, then went at a trot towards the head of the army.

  As t
hey passed the carriage, Mizzle looked at it. ‘Jarrett is there.'

  'Yes,’ Filipe said.

  She rode close to the carriage. The door opened for her and she slipped across. The door closed behind her and Trick caught Skye's reins.

  Faustus's face was a picture of dismay but Trick could not be surprised. She had been angry when she had seen Jarrett as a partisan of Mikcul but before that, in the forest, they had been intimately friendly. He had worked to persuade her to trust Jarrett again, and succeeded. And of course she would feel more comfortable with him than with humans.

  He could tell himself this, and still fight to keep the dismay from his own face.

  Chapter Nine

  Kintore stands naked with his back to the open window. The night breeze stirs his gold hair and raises goose bumps across his shoulders and chest. He watches Jacoby. She lies on the bed, not sleeping but very still.

  'Now?’ he asks at last.

  She opens her eyes. ‘Now?’ she echoes. ‘You have what you wanted.'

  A ghost of a smile touches his face and is gone. ‘Do you?'

  Jacoby sits up, her head on one side. Moonlight reflects into her violet eyes and she winces. Kintore turns and draws the curtains. In the darkness of the room, the scratches scoring his back glimmer wetly.

  'I apologise,’ she says. ‘Habit.'

  'It was not without its pleasures,’ Kintore says with great equanimity. He sits beside her on the bed.

  'I should think so.'

  Kintore rests his forehead on her shoulder for an intimate moment. ‘Tell me what happens now?'

  'What is it you expect? I have promised not to harm you.'

  'For some unspecified time.'

  'I did not get any sort of promise from you.'

  Kintore laughs, low and derisive. ‘You think you need it?'

  Jacoby runs light fingers through his hair. ‘Accept the gift, ‘Tore. Your conference with the king is done. I must go home soon also. We meet not again except in war. Until then—accept the gift.'

  Kintore arches into her stroking hand. One arm steals up to lie across her smooth stomach. ‘How often can I accept this gift?'

  Jacoby smiles and bends to kiss him.

  * * * *

  Lsuana came into sight after a quarter-moon of steady slow travel. It was distant on the shores of Livana's Haven, the water reflecting the sky like a great shining pearl.

  Livana bathed in the lake, went the legend, dipping her toes and tempting shepherds with her naked virginal body.

  Mizzle spent most of this time with Jarrett, in the carriage during the day, and ranging out from the army on foot at night. Trick took to riding Skye, letting placid Bet carry Mouse.

  'Is she in love with him?’ Faustus insisted to know, and Lithia looked interested.

  Trick suspected that the answer he really wanted was to a question slightly different from that one. But he said, ‘That's a human word.’ So was jealous but she had got the meaning of that.

  He was still sore. He had dared to search through Mizzle's saddlebags to find her salve, and found the jar empty. Either those herbs he had bought for her in Kitira were not to make the salve, she hadn't yet had time, or the herbs had to go through some other process before she could use them. Either way the muscles in his back and shoulder had to heal the long way. He made sure no one saw the bruising.

  The day they reached Lsuana was grey and full of rain. All of them were soaked through—none would dare the carriage. Filipe sighed as he took in Lithia's appearance. Her pretty white mare was speckled with mud, her riding clothes were filthy and her pale hair hung in rat-tails around her face.

  'You don't look much better, Filipe,’ she said. ‘Why didn't you bring me a carriage?'

  'You have to be seen by your people,’ he told her. ‘But I had forgotten how quickly Livanian weather can change.'

  'I have to be seen, but not like this.'

  Lord Crethen leant forward. ‘Why do we not stop at my manor at the outskirts? We can meet my daughter there and all bathe and change.'

  Filipe nodded just once but Lithia said, ‘Thank you Crethen, that's a good idea,’ with her sweet smile.

  Trick suspected she thought she was safe to smile like that because Crethen was long married. His reward had to be other than the hand of the Empress. In the meantime, it could not hurt to exert a little weak human glamour, even if it could never compare to the DarkElf kind.

  It could not hurt. Trick looked at Lord Crethen's cold eyes and thought otherwise.

  Lithia, kind soul, sent the Imperial army on to their barracks inside the palace compound, retaining only her own personal guard and a single regiment, one hundred men. The soldiers would spread news of her arrival from gutter to palace as they marched across the city.

  Would some southern lord dare to shut the palace gates to the Empress? Not now the Imperial army was inside and loyal to her. Perhaps Lithia was not all kindness after all.

  'They couldn't be bribed away from her, could they?’ Trick asked Filipe as they followed the interior of the city wall around to Crethen's manor. The streets were crowded despite the rain. People stared at the large guard that marched around them but none of them seemed to realise they saw the Empress.

  'Probably not. She hasn't cut their pay yet,’ said Filipe.

  'Yet?’ asked Crethen.

  'She wants to make tax cuts,’ said Filipe. ‘So she has to make spending cuts. They're the obvious target.'

  'She can't downgrade her military,’ said Crethen.

  'She's the Empress,’ said Lithia. ‘She can do whatever she wants.'

  Trick hadn't realised she was listening, and Crethen hadn't either. He flushed a deep red. ‘I apologise, Your Majesty. But you have to realise King Fillip is a formidable opponent. You must maintain the strength of your army.'

  'Am I so automatically his enemy?'

  'Yes,’ said Crethen.

  Filipe said, ‘Lithia does not plan to cut the size of the army, just their pay.'

  Filipe was trying to push the topic away from King Fillip, Trick realised. He glanced around. Mouse caught his eye with a solemn nod. So he had noticed, clever boy. But Faustus sat silent and uninterested as the conversation flowed in Livanian over his head.

  Crethen took the bait. ‘Which will cut the size.'

  'My lords will have their armies back and they can be called upon in the event of war.'

  'In which case, you will certainly have war, among themselves and with you. And then Bourchia will strike.'

  'Crethen,’ said Lithia. ‘I will do this. I am not Mikcul.'

  'Your Majesty, I apologise,’ said Crethen again but his hands were fists on the reins.

  Lithia tried to be conciliatory. ‘How much does King Fillip pay his soldiers?'

  'Not enough,’ said Trick.

  Filipe said, ‘About half of what you do.’ He shot a sharp look at Trick.

  Trick was not deterred. ‘As I said.'

  'But his soldiers are better equipped.’ That was true enough. Mikcul was notorious for skimping, except on bribes.

  'He only pays so little because he does not have access to his treasury,’ said Crethen. ‘Expenses have to come out of taxes as they are collected because he cannot invest his treasury.'

  'So what are his taxes like?’ asked Lithia.

  'Much lower than yours,’ Filipe answered.

  'Then how does he afford anything?'

  Filipe shrugged, Trick shrugged.

  'Maybe the treasury thing is a myth,’ Trick said. He was never sure he believed it.

  Lithia finally bit. ‘What is this treasury thing?'

  Filipe sighed. ‘The previous king, Fillip's uncle, lost the Second Day War to Livania and had to cede land north of the Salding River.'

  'Yes,’ said Lithia. All Livanians knew that. It was a point of pride.

  'Fillip's uncle had the treasury door sealed with a spell which will only break once a Bourchian king has won that land back.'

  'Oh,’ said L
ithia. ‘That's unlucky.'

  'So,’ said Trick in Bourchian. ‘How is it that the Company has had her for three years and you never bothered telling her about that?'

  'Same reason I didn't teach her Bourchian,’ said Filipe without remorse. ‘Some things are just better that way.'

  Crethen called a halt in front of a large manor house, marble façade with broad steps.

  The carriage door opened and Mizzle climbed out. ‘What do we do?'

  'We're resting here a while before we go on to the palace,’ Filipe said.

  Faustus dismounted silently to land beside Mizzle with wide and hurt eyes. The rest of them followed suit, while Lithia's soldiers fanned out to take position around and opposite the manor.

  As they went up the stairs, one of the double doors slammed open and a girl of about thirteen, younger than Trick had expected, flung herself down into Crethen's arms.

  'Father,’ she said, her voice thick with tears and attempted control. ‘Mother's dead. She's dead.’ She dissolved into sobbing.

  Trick saw Crethen look up and followed his gaze to the top of the stairs, where the man he had sent out from Kitira stood. The coldness between them infected him. Crethen had never sent a messenger to get his wife to Lsuana. He had sent his agent to get her dead.

  'He murdered his wife so he would be free to marry Lithia.'

  He said it in Bourchian, on failing breath. Mizzle turned and looked at him. Her eyes did not doubt him.

  'Oh, Crethen, I'm so sorry,’ said Lithia. She took a step towards him, putting a hand on his shoulder and the girl's.

  'Not as sorry as you will be,’ said Trick, but still very quietly.

  Crethen urged his daughter up the stairs and inside. The rest of them followed. The messenger had disappeared. Crethen took his daughter up the stairs.

  'Filipe—’ began Trick, while Crethen was away and before his servants could reach them.

  'I know,’ said Filipe.

  Then the servants descended on them and they had no more time for private conversation.

  * * * *