THAT WAS ODD, Keman thought, as he flew over the enemy campsite, trusting to the moonless night to keep him invisible. That was very odd—
Although fires were burning in every fire-pit, and torches flared beside the tents of the commanders, there was no movement in the camp. None whatsoever. And as Keman had come to learn, there was always some movement in a sleeping camp. Sentries and messengers came and went—men needed to relieve themselves—horses stirred in their sleep.
He took a deep breath and tested the air. Woodsmoke. Nothing more. It didn’t smell right, either. There should have been other odors; cooking, horses, the sweat of humans.
He swooped in lower for a better look.
No sentries. That was the first thing he noticed. Of course, they could be hidden, but why bother? He cast a sharp glance at the bivouacked troops. There were bundles lying beside the fires, but they weren’t moving either. Men did not just lie like logs when they slept, they twisted and tossed—
Lie like logs… He sharpened his eyes and focused in on those bundles. Those were logs! Logs, bundles of brush, grass… Where were the fighters?
He drove himself upward with strong wing-beats, and hovered, checking the forest beneath, changing his eyes again, so that they could see the heat of warm, living bodies—
And found what he was looking for, traveling in dark and silence through the forest, somehow able to see despite the moonless night and the stygian dark under the trees. The entire enemy army, moving on a line that pointed straight at the Citadel.
For a moment, his heart stopped beating.
Fire and Rain—
His wing-beats faltered—then, as shock gave way to panic, he drove himself upward in frantic haste.
:Shana!: he called, reaching as hard as he could.
Please, please let her hear me, let her answer. …
He drove himself higher, then turned his drive into a flat-out, high-speed run to the Citadel.
:Shana!:
Ordinarily Keman transformed as he landed, to avoid frightening people, but when he had reached Shana and sounded the alert, she had asked him to stay in draconic shape when he arrived. The only entrance large enough for him in that shape was the main one—and he saw as he landed that the illusion cloaking it was gone and it was lit as bright as day by hundreds of lamps and torches.
He heard children crying and being shushed; from within the cave, heard the echoing voices of people shouting directions. The smoke that swirled pale and gray from the cavern mouth tasted of other things than wood and oil.
There was a thin but steady stream of people heading northwards from the entrance—groups of two and three children and one adult, all carrying packs. He squeezed by a little knot of them, and they never even looked up at him as they passed, even though most of the children had only seen him once or twice, and at a distance. The children stumbled under their burdens, sleepy, heavy-eyed, and confused; the adults were awake enough, but grim-faced and frightened.
The Citadel itself buzzed with activity, with most of the adult and near-adult wizards rushing about, carrying things; the confusion looked random and chaotic at first, but after watching for a bit, Keman could see there was purpose behind it.
Some of them were carrying small brown bundles into the tunnels, and returning empty-handed. Some were taking larger packages into the Citadel, and returning with the small brown bundles. Some were going off down the tunnels and coming back laden—
Some were feeding the fires with papers and books.
Shana came running up, pack on her back, and her face white with strain and fear, hair tumbled all awry.
“Can you fly more tonight?” she asked, and at his nod, she reached for the back of his neck and grabbed his spinal crest, hauling herself up into place in front of his wings with practiced ease. In less time than it took to breathe, she had settled herself on his back.
“Where are we going?” he asked in Kin tongue, trotting back towards the mouth of the cavern, his mouth dry with anxiety, his stomach in one big knot. But he still couldn’t help thinking that if the conditions had been pleasant instead of panicked, he’d have purred a little—under the fear, the anxiety—it felt good to have Shana with him again. Good, and right .
“They’re never going to get everyone out in time, so we’re going to play rear guard,” she replied, as they passed another little group of children, slipped through the entrance, and reached the clearing outside. And at his start of surprise, she added, “We’re going to pull off a delaying action, but not by ourselves. Remember that herd of one-horns we found?”
“Biggest herd I’d ever seen,” he responded absently. “I didn’t know any of them were sociable enough to make a herd that size. They must be some variant on the breed. Hold on—”
He made a short run and launched himself strongly into the air, pumping his wings as hard as he could to make up for the lack of updrafts, noting as he gained altitude how Shana moved with him, and how she felt like a part of him—unlike Valyn, who’d felt inert and lifeless, like a sack of grain. And by the time he had breath to continue the conversation he knew what she wanted.
“You are the only creature I’ve ever heard of who can control those monsters,” he said over his shoulder. “But do you think you can control an entire herd?”
“Well,” she shouted back against the wind of his passage, “that’s what we’re going to find out.”
They did.
She could.
Without his night-sight to guide them, they would never have found the herd of one-horns, but once they located it, Shana didn’t need much time to wake them and bring them under her control. Keman wished Shana could see the herd as he did—the faint starlight gleaming on ivory and ebony coats, shining on the long, slender, pointed horns…
You could almost forget the fangs and the claws, and that they could kill even snatchers with that horn.
And of course, from here the mad, orange-red eyes were impossible to see.
Keman had to hover as rock-steady as he could, because all of Shana’s concentration was taken up with making sure that the herd followed her orders—that none of them turned maverick and broke away, because as soon as one broke, they all would. The herd moved along steadily, as docile as a herd of two-horns—and they needed to keep it that way. He kept his mind as silent as possible, knowing that the least little distraction on his part could ruin everything—
But everything went as perfectly as if it had been planned and practiced. Right up until the moment that the herd got downwind of the army.
Below him, Keman saw first one, then a dozen, throw up their heads and sniff the air suspiciously. The whole herd stopped dead in its tracks, and the lead stallion pawed the ground and snorted.
Then started to turn—
Oh no—Shana was losing them—
The rest of the herd pranced restively as the stallion hesitated, started forward, backed a pace, lowered his head, and squealed angrily; protesting, and rebelling against Shana’s unspoken commands.
Keman searched his memory desperately for everything he knew and had learned about one-horns—and dared a thought of his own, aimed at the stallion.
Not a thought, really—an image. The image of the two-leggers taking his mares. His mates. Stealing them—and giving them to another stallion. Shana caught his image, and added an illusory scent of strange stallion to what Keman projected.
The stallion’s head came up as he sniffed the air for what he thought he had scented—and he bugled a cry of maddened challenge. He reared and screamed again, his herd picking up his agitation, and now starting to mill. Keman sensed that Shana was holding him back, making him angrier.
Then he was plunging straight ahead, nothing in his mind but red murder, craving nothing more now than to destroy those who would dare to steal his mates, all earlier protests utterly forgotten. The rest of the herd followed, infected by his rage, with the scent of the humans now become the scent of the enemy , and blood-lust maddening them past all reason. Through the forest below Keman tumbled a frothing wave of black and silver manes and tails; the thunder of feet, the squeals and shrieks carrying clearly up to where he flew. In moments they had gained such momentum as to be next to unstoppable.
They hit the scouts and cut them down, pounding them to red dust, before they could even sound a warning.
Keman sped up, and moved ahead of the herd, reaching the oncoming army before the rage-maddened one-horns did. Below, the first ranks looked up at the sky, wondering if there was a storm coming in.
The herd encountered the leading edge of the army, and the real slaughter began.
Keman didn’t wait to see more than the initial contact; he veered off and headed northwards, feeling sick to his stomach and a little guilty. And he wasn’t certain which he felt more guilt over and sorrier for—the army of human slaves or the one-horns.
:I wish I hadn’t had to do that.: came Shana’s subdued thought.
:I know,: Keman replied, relieved that she shared his feelings of guilt. :Me, too .: He heaved a sigh that she echoed.: Well, if I know one-horns, at least half the herd is going to survive — and if the slaves have any sense at all, they’ll run.:
:If they have a choice,: Shana reminded him glumly. :Their masters may not give them one. The one-horns are going to run right over the top of them. And I don’t know if the one-horns are going to be so crazed that they turn and try to run down the entire army, or if they’re going to scatter as soon as the humans start to fight back .: She sighed again. :At least we gave the rest enough time to seal as much up as they could, destroy the rest, and get out of there .:
:.Where are we going?: he asked. :And — how did this happen? How did the elves find out about us?:
: We’re going north, to an old human fortress.: she told him, as he veered north at her direction, catching a rising thermal and gaining more height, ill’s in ruins, but it has a well, it’s on the top of a hill, and it’s defensible, which the Citadel isn’t; there are just too many bolt-holes and escape tunnels for us to block. The old wizards meant to use the new place for a second Citadel, but they never got the chance because of the plague .:
:Where did you find that out?: he asked.
It was in those old chronicles I found,: she replied. The ones back in the older tunnels .:
There was a lot about those old records she hadn’t said much about; he wasn’t sure why. Perhaps it was just that she hadn’t had time…
And they still didn’t have time, not if they were going to follow the fleeing wizards.
That inability to defend the Citadel was what he had been afraid of when he’d first seen the place. Many ways to escape meant just as many ways for enemies to get in. That was the one aspect in which it was not the kind of home a dragon would have built…
Hopefully, this new place had fewer exits.
:As for what happened—: she continued, with smothered anger, .-someone turned his coat. One of the older wizards. He was missing when you called in the alarm, and he hadn’t turned up by the time I left. We have to assume he’s told the elves everything there is to know about us — how many we are, what we can do. Since he was on the war council, even about you. Any edge we had because of surprise is gone.:
The feelings that came with her thoughts told him that she was not optimistic about this second refuge. He didn’t much blame her; it didn’t sound like anything other than it was—a last place to make a stand.
:Shana,: he said solemnly, :I want you to make my apologies to the others when we land .:
:Apologies?: she replied, startled. :For —:
:I’m going to leave for a little,: he told her. I can’t do much for you now, since the enemy knows about me — but there’s something Ican do that he won’t know about, and if I leave now, I can return in time to do some good .:
He took a deep breath, as she waited in expectant silence, her mind churning with unspoken speculations. : I can go get help,: he said. :From the Kin .:
Keman left Shana at dawn. He came winging in to the airspace above the Lair in the light of full day; tired, but determined to have satisfaction at long last. And desperately afraid for his friends. Desperation gave him extra strength to put up a good front.
: Who flies?: came the ritual question from the sentry, who had not recognized him.
:Kemanorell: Keman trumpeted back, following the thought-reply with a bugling cry of defiance. :I return to claim Challenge-Right !:
Chew on that a while, he thought with satisfaction, when the sentry’s reply was lost in confusion. He circled for a moment, pondering the best choice of ground, then landed on the top of one of the cliffs overlooking the Lair. He settled there, clung to the rocks with claws and tail, and took an aggressive stance, head high, spinal crest up, frill extended, mantling his wings, and waiting for his answer.
Down below he watched as several dragons emerged from their lairs, and stared upward at him. He had, deliberately, sent his reply to the sentry in an “open” mode for everyone in the Lair to hear—and it seemed that everyone had. More and more dragons either, appeared below, or poked their heads out of openings all along the sides of the canyon. Several of the Kin gathered in a knot—consulting, he supposed, on who was to deliver his answer. Finally it came.
:The Lair recognizes Kemanorei:
That voice he knew. Keoke .
The Elder launched himself laboriously into the air, then rose, slowly and with obvious effort, to hover just opposite Keman’s perch.
Keoke should fly more often. Father Dragon moves better than he does.
:The Lair recognizes the Right,: Keoke said. :What is it that you challenge ?:
Keman pulled himself even taller than before, getting all the height that he could, and spread his wings to the sun. . I challenge the old way of silence and isolation,: he replied. . I challenge the Law that is not written. I challenge those who would have the Kin bide in shameful sloth when there are those who need their help. That is what I challenge, Elder. Will the Lair hear me, or need I go elsewhere ?:
That last was customary, but hardly needful. No Lair would ever want to admit to the shame of not having answered a rightful challenge to custom—even though that particular right was seldom exercised by anyone but a shaman. Alara could have issued that challenge over Shana—
But in the process, she might have lost her Lair if she had lost the challenge.
Well, Keman had already exiled himself. And not for nothing was he a shaman’s son. This time the Lair, and the Kin, would at least see their responsibilities, even if they would not acknowledge them.
Keoke hovered a moment longer before answering, slowly and reluctantly, :The Lair will hear you .:
:Now,: Keman said quickly, before the Elder could name a later time. :-There is need for haste in this .:
Keoke’s wings missed a beat, as if he had not expected Keman’s demand. But it was within Keman’s right to insist on an immediate hearing, and Keoke answered even more reluctantly, :Now, then. I will summon the Lair .:
Then, without another word, the Elder sideslipped, turning on his wingtip, and began the spiral down to the bottom of the canyon. Keman waited until he had landed, then launched himself off the edge of the cliff and followed him straight down, wings folded in a stoop, backwinging at the last moment, sending sand and tumbleweeds flying as he braked to a spectacular landing on top of a rock outcropping near the center of the canyon.
Keoke’s frill flared in reluctant admiration, though he said nothing; he simply turned, and took a step in the direction of the gathering-cavern.
“No,” Keman said aloud. “Not in the dark. Not in a place where secrets breed. Up here. In the light, where truth belongs.”
Keoke half turned and looked over his shoulder, one eye-crest arched ironically. “Isn’t that a little melodramatic, Keman?” he said mildly.
Keman’s spinal crest flattened with embarrassment, but before he could reply, Alara spoke from behind him; his heart jumped when he heard his mother’s voice. He had been so afraid that she would be angry with him for what he had done—and yet, he’d had no other choice…
“Melodrama is the prerogative of the young and passionate, Keoke,” she said. “But I think he is right. This should be discussed in the open, not in hiding. The Kin are accustomed to hiding. Perhaps we ought to change the thinking that leads to hiding.”
As Keman turned to his mother with surprise and gratitude, she looked up at him and sent a wordless wash of love and welcome over him; and said softly, “I stand with you in this, Keman. I am only sorry that I was not free to do so before.”
He lowered his head to her, and she brushed his crest lightly with her wingtip, and silently sent him a bolstering tide of approval. And as the first of the Kin arrived, they turned to face them together, he on the rock, and she below him.
“… and there the matter stands,” Keman said, looking from face to face in his audience, and finding the visages of the Kin strange and difficult to read after all his time among the elves and halfbloods. “Through no one’s fault, elvenkind knows we exist; the need for secrecy is at an end, for the secret itself is out. The Kin took on a responsibility to Lashana which has been sadly neglected—and another to the halfbloods by our meddling. Would they be in such peril if it were not for the Prophecy that we took care to spread? I think not. I challenge the old ways; I call for an end to them, and for the Kin to come to the aid of the halfbloods, now, before it is too late.”
“I answer that challenge!” cried a female voice he did not recognize—though by Alara’s start of surprise, she did. “Are you willing to fight to defend it?”
“Who speaks?” Keoke called impatiently. “Who answers the challenge?”
“I do!” replied the same voice, and the dragons crowded around Keman moved aside to let the challenger through. For one moment, as the young female dragon pushed and shouldered her way to the front of the crowd, Keman did not recognize her, she had changed so much since he had left. But then her coloring, a certain sullen look in her eyes, and the petulant cast of her features gave her away.
“Myre?” he said, bewildered.
“What, you didn’t think that your sister would have the sense to see what a fool her brother is?” Myre sneered—sounding very like Rovylern. She cast a sideways, guilty glance at Alara, but did not show any sign of backing down. Instead she remained exactly where she was, feet planted stubbornly, spinal crest signaling her aggressive intentions. “The halfbloods have no call on us,” she said scornfully. “No two-legged animal does. Your brain has gone soft, brother, to think that we owe anything to animals. The Kin serve only the Kin. The Kin answer only to the Kin. That’s the way it should be.”
:.After you left, Rovylern changed his bullying from physical to verbal— and Myre left my lair and moved in with Lori and her son, and became every bit as much of a bully as he had been,: Alara told Keman quickly. .She and Lori are two of a kind, and with Rovylern lurking in the background, Myre can intimidate just about anyone. The only difference between Myre and Rovy is that she’s careful never to be caught harassing anyone. I sometimes think ,: she concluded bitterly, -.that I gave birth to a changeling .:
“How do you challenge me, sister?” Keman asked mildly. “A physical contest would be blatantly unfair, don’t you think?” Female dragons, once they matured, tended to be much larger than males, and Myre was no exception to that rule.
“Magic,” Myre said, and Keman thought she had an odd, sly look to her when she said it. “Your magic against mine. Here and now.”
“Done—” he said, without thinking—and realized from the smothered gasps around him that he had made a major mistake.
But it was too late to back out now—assuming he could have. A physical challenge was out—he was small even for a male, and Myre, though not yet at her full growth, was much bigger than he was—if he had turned down magic, what did that leave?
He leapt down from his rock to the ground, and faced her; the rest of the Kin cleared well away from the combat area—and he tried not to notice his mother’s glance of despair as she moved back out of the way.
He had learned things with Shana she couldn’t possibly know. He had an edge she couldn’t guess. He would beat her. He had to.
But the sly expression in her eyes did not change as he braced himself for the first trial. “Let the combat begin—” said Keoke.
Ahhh!
Keman shuddered as another shock convulsed him, holding him upright, although he could no longer see and could hardly hear.
— got to hold on— it hurts— hurts—
The sounds of the crowd of Kin were growing more and more indistinct, as he tried to break Myre’s hold on him, and failed.
“Enough!” Keoke roared—it sounded as if his voice were coming from the other side of the universe—
The pain stopped, and Keman collapsed in a boneless heap into the dust; dimly hearing Myre’s bugle of triumph, and no longer caring. He simply lay where he had fallen, head on one side, eyes closed, the bitter taste of defeat choking him, and no less an agony than the ache of his abused flesh.
He would live—in fact, in a while, he would be mostly recovered, for recovery from magically caused hurts came swiftly for a dragon. Right now he wasn’t certain if that was what he really wanted.
He’d lost. He told Shana he’d bring back help—but he’d lost. Myre didn’t even cheat; she didn’t have to. The magic he knew was no match for combative Kin-magic. And that was all she knew.
If he had been in halfblood form, he would have wept.
How could he face them again? How could he go back to them and tell them that the help he promised wasn’t coming?
But if he didn’t go back—they wouldn’t have even him.
He was exiled now beyond all recalling, as good as dead; if he were to approach anyone of the Kin, they would pretend he was not there.
He waited as sounds receded; as the last of the Kin left the arena, left the “dead one” to vanish discreetly. At least that would give him the privacy to pick himself up and take himself and his defeat away. Finally he opened his eyes, and slowly, aching in every fiber, got himself to his feet. He felt as if every scale had been separately hammered, then set on fire.
The canyon was completely empty; there wasn’t even a hint that anything lived here. Somehow, that made him feel worse. Contrary to the Law, he had hoped that at least Alara would have stayed.
But—perhaps it was just as well. Now he was free to do whatever he felt had to be done. He would do it alone—but he need no longer fear the censure of anyone of the Kin.
You couldn’t condemn a ghost, he told himself. You couldn’t punish someone who was already dead. He didn’t have anything else to bring Shana, so he would bring her what was left of his life.
Even though he was ready to give up, he would not begrudge her that. Whatever was left for him to do, he would. Even though it was probably not enough to save her.
He lifted his wings and spread them to the sun—and threw himself and his defeat into the cold, uncaring skies.
Alara climbed the back of the cliff to avoid being seen by any of the Kin. Right now, she was so angry that she could hardly think—she certainly wasn’t going to be coherent enough to come up with a convincing lie.
Keman should be flying very slowly—and he would without a doubt have to stop fairly soon to make a kill. The fight would have left him terribly depleted. It shouldn’t be too difficult to follow him.
She seethed with anger at the Kin of her Lair—at the Kin in general. Keman had been right; he’d been right since the beginning. His challenge should have been answered properly, with a responsible acknowledgment. The Kin should have protected him. It should never have come to trial-by-combat.
She reached the flat top of the cliff, and paused for a moment to rest and take in sun and the energy it supplied. She would need it; this was going to be a long flight.
The one thing that this sorry situation had done was to force her to set her priorities. What was the point of being shaman to a Lair full of bullies who did what they wished because no one stopped them, and cowards who abdicated their responsibilities because they were too lazy and too selfish to think of anything outside their own petty needs? What kind of a self-respecting shaman would remain in service to Kin like that?
What was important? To act on responsibilities, no matter what anyone else did. To do as Keman had done—stand up for what was right.
To stand behind the child who had the guts to do all of that, and shame to those who did not.
She climbed to the edge of the cliff, balanced there, and gathered herself for flight.
:Alara, wait.:
Alara stopped herself in midlaunch with a lurch, and turned to see who was behind her.
Keoke hauled himself laboriously up the cliff-face, and behind him, she saw the heads and snouts of a dozen others. She tightened her claws on the rocks and drew herself up stubbornly as they all climbed up over the edge and surrounded her.
“Don’t try to stop me,” she warned. “Keman was right—he’s been right all along, and no stupid trial-by-combat with a bully is going to make him wrong. I’m following him, I am going to help him and my fosterling, just as I should have when he first ran away, and the Lair can just find itself another shaman. There is nothing you can say or do that is going to make me change my mind.” .
“Change your mind?” Keoke repeated after her—and to her absolute astonishment, he was clearly surprised. “Change your mind? Fire and Rain—we don’t want you to change your mind, Alara—we want to go with you!”
“You—what?” She blinked, trying to make sense of what Keoke had just said.
“We want to go with you,” he repeated patiently. “Myre won, yes, but she was in the wrong, and she only won because she’s been working towards a challenge like this since the day she moved in with Lori . She plans on ruling the Lair. We all knew that! And we knew Keman was right, too—but there aren’t enough of us to make a majority.”
“I’m sick of this Lair,” said Orola, with obvious disgust. “I’m sick of the lazy ignoramuses that think all we need to do is keep our bellies full and sit in the sun, like a fat herd of sheep. And I am sick to death of the petty nonsense we’ve been wasting our time on—”
“We’retired of doing nothing,” chimed in one of the females, one of the young adults, about Keman’s age. “Every time any of us wants to do something out there”—she waved a wingtip in the general direction of the elven lands—”all we hear about is that we have to keep our existence secret. Well, it isn’t secret, and it hasn’t been for a while, and we don’t see any reason to go hide in a cave and nope nobody finds us!”
Her frill rose with agitation, but Keoke calmed the youngster with a look. “The real factor here is that Keman was right . We are at least partially responsible for the danger that the halfbloods are in now—and we are totally responsible for what happened to Lashana. The two-leggers are not thinking beasts; they are our equals. And the humans were here before we were; it’s their world, and we and the elves are the interlopers here. We owe it to the rightful inhabitants to at least try to set things right for them, since we have co-opted a part of their world. The oldest ways taught us that we must accept and act upon our responsibilities, but we haven’t done a thing. We’ve simply played with these beings as if they were markers on a gameboard. But they aren’t—and it’s time we made things right with them. Or at least tried.”
:I have been waiting most of my life to hear those words from the Kin, Keoke,: boomed a deep, yet gentle, mental voice.
As one, the Kin looked up—as a shadow half again larger than any of them could cast came between them and the sun—and the very last creature that Alara had ever expected to see winged down to a graceful and effortless landing on the cliff-top, beside her.
Father Dragon shone in his full colors, purple and scarlet, and as fit and young-looking as the most athletic of them all. He covered Alara affectionately with his scarlet wing, as the rest of the dragons gaped at him in surprise—
Even Keoke.
“I have,” he repeated, his frill rising, his huge eyes on all of them, “waited for hundreds of years to hear those words, Keoke.” His gaze now rested upon each of them in turn, and Alara saw an entirely new expression in his eyes than she was used to seeing from him. Excitement, anticipation, eagerness. “Many, many years ago, when first I explored this new world for our Kin, I took the form of a halfblood wizard, and I not only walked among them, I worked with them. I was in the company of those who organized the first uprising, and I remained with them to the end of the conflict—and not as an observer, nor as a simple meddler in their affairs. I was one of them. And had they not fallen to treachery, I would likely still be one of them.”
He raised his head proudly, and Keoke stared at him as if the Elder thought he had heard things amiss.
“You were with the wizards?” Keoke asked dazedly. “Truly?”
“Truly. I helped to plan the rebellion,” Father Drag on told him. “I have been hoping for many years now, ever since I realized that the wizards were multiplying again, that they would gather their courage and rise up against the elves. And I had planned to join them, if I could, in whatever shape I could.” He paused for a moment, then continued. “I could not in all conscience use my position as your chief shaman to urge you to help the halfbloods—but now that you have decided to do so”—he smiled toothily—”I trust you will permit me to join you?”
Shana scanned the sky anxiously. So far, the elven lords had not yet traced the fleeing wizards here. The traps they had left at the Citadel had certainly accounted for some of their followers (and with luck, one or two of the elves), and had, hopefully, disorganized and delayed the hunt.
The herds of deer and other beasts she had driven across the trail should have contributed to the delay.
But it was only delay, and everyone here knew that. They were on the very edge of mapped territory now, and there was a good reason for that. From here on, the terrain was so inhospitable no one other than the young and the fit could expect to pass through it. If they’d had time, perhaps they could have made their way across it, children and oldsters and all, by patiently exploring it one day at a time, and making safe trails. But they didn’t have that time.
The enemy was coming, and their stand would be made here, or not at all.
And many had resigned themselves to that stand being a futile one.
Shana had not told the others what Keman had said to her; she had not wanted to raise hopes, only to dash them again. She wanted to believe that he could persuade the Kin—but she remembered, only too well, how they had treated her. First he would have to persuade them to abandon centuries of secrecy. Then he would have to persuade them to act on behalf of creatures who were not Kin.
The prospects of doing both did not seem very likely to her.
If I can bring them, Keman had said, look for me to arrive in two days’ time. Three, at the most . Today was the third day since he had left, and Shana had been watching for him since the morning of the second.
This fortress was as ruinous as rumor had painted it—the outer wall was intact, but only because it had been constructed of stone blocks as wide as most men were tall. Within that outer wall were only the shells of buildings—and the few rooms that had been chipped from the stone of the mountain itself. Wind and weather and the passing of the years had taken care of roofs and any contents.
But the well was still clear, and once they had constructed a new gate of logs, the outer walls were enough to hold off any army. Now, anyone sound enough to thieve goods by magic was working as long as his strength would hold out, Shana included; those areas that were weatherproof or could be made that way were being stuffed to capacity. No one cared if magical alarms were tripped—and there were a great many elven lords who were complacently quarreling over whether or not the wizards were a danger, who would one day discover that they had been robbed even while they quarreled.
They wouldn’t be starved out, unless the elven lords found a way to prevent the thefts, she thought soberly. And the elves wouldn’t drive the wizards out with thirst. They would have to pry the rebels out. I hope that won’t be easier than I think it will .
But the legended weapons of the elven lords were terrible things—and she was not certain they would be able to defend against them this second time. Too many secrets had been lost with the old wizards. And even though their foes were fewer, so were they.
And worst of all, the wizards’ most clever and implacable enemy was heading the opposition again. They had no such experienced leader.
Dyran wouldn’t stop until they were all ashes.
She scanned the sky again, watching for the blue-on-blue dot that would be Keman—
And saw, instead, three—four—a dozen—
Led by one, larger by far than all the rest, large enough for her to see wings, long neck, a trailing tail…
Her heart leapt into her throat, and she clutched the top of the wall so tightly that her entire hand turned white.
They grew nearer and larger by the moment. And yes, there was little Keman—not really little, but dwarfed by his companion. Flying wearily, she could tell by the labored flapping of his wings, but gamely keeping up with the pace set by Father Dragon. For it was Father Dragon leading the way, royal purple scales shading into scarlet, blazing bravely in the sunlight—and now she saw Alara’s scarlet—Keoke’s green—Orola’s saffron—Liana’s green-into-yellow—
At least a dozen dragons in all, and a dozen times more than Shana had ever hoped to see.
:Is the hunting good here, Foster Daughter?: Alara asked, her voice warm with amusement. :I fear we have brought a number of very hungry guests, with quite alarming appetites .:
: I—I think so, Foster Mother,: she managed to reply.
:We will not be lazy guests, I pledge you, my child,: said another thought-voice, very deep and warm. :We understand you have some unwelcome visitors on the way. We will be pleased to help you send them away .:
:Thank you, Father Dragon,: she replied, in something of a daze.
:You may call me Kalamadea, child,: he replied, with amusement. :I think that name may not be entirely unknown to you —:
Her hand went to the amber globe in her pocket, that had come from the hoard of that same Kalamadea, the dragon who had, in his guise as a wizard, helped to lead the last Wizard War.
:So the Elvenbane found my message and my hoard? Excellent. You may keep your jewel, Shana,: he continued, following her thought. :You are making better use of it than I did. Oh, will you tell your friends that we are coming, so that no one mistakes us for overgrown geese for the pot, and shoots us ?:
:Yes, sir!: she replied, and turned to cup her hands around her mouth and shout down into the fortress below her the words she had never hoped to call.
“The dragons are coming! The dragons are coming!”