Dragon Sword Series - Dragon Sword Part 13

But, as there was with the land, there was a sense of the insubstantial to the society. Everything Alouzon had seen had told her that custom had never been questioned here, and that, when it was, it proved less than monolithic.

And it seemed that others besides Alouzon Dragon-master were questioning.

Another spoke. "I ... I want to be a Dragonmaster, too."

"Do you want to be a Dragonmaster, or do you just want to be free?"

The girl struggled with the question for a moment. "I think that only Dragonmasters can be free."

Alouzon shook her head. She, free? Carrying a Dra-gonsword, able to call upon reflexes and instincts that seemed at times to be more than human, she was as much a slave as if she had been sold on the block in the market square of Bandon. Moreso, perhaps.

"I think I know how you feel," she said. "I don't like it either. I'm going to see if I can't make things a little better for everyone." Would Corrin turn the Tree upon such as these? Mernyl's words came back to her: The war has gone on for a long time, Dragonmaster. The Corri-nians are desperate.

"Can you?" said the red-haired girl. "I am promised already to a young man, and he is kind enough, but. . ." "I'll do what I can. I can't guarantee anything, but I'm here." And what was she going to do? Picket the hall at Kingsbury? The SDS had once sent agents out to infiltrate high schools, to radicalize the students while they were still pliable, and she wondered if that was what she was doing now, giving hope where there was really none, fostering an anger that had no resolution.

But Dythragor's arrogance was a nettle in her mind, and she resolved to do something. Trapped though she might be in Gryylth, she had a great deal of work to do. She did not know what she could accomplish, but she was sure it would be something other than what would .

121.

satisfy Dythragor. Maybe the Dragon had its reasons after all.

"Ho, girls! Girls of Bandon!" It was a woman's voice, calling softly from the direction of the town.

"It is Adyssa, the midwife," said one.

"Better her than my father," said another.

The midwife came through the half light. "Girls," she said, "what are you doing out here?"

The red-haired girl straightened pridefully. "Talking with Alouzon Dragonmaster."

"What? I have heard of such a person. Senon does not like her at all. Is she here?"

Alouzon stood up, extended a hand to the short, plump midwife. "Right here, Adyssa. The kids are all right, don't worry."

Adyssa's blond hair was a s.h.i.+mmer in the obscurity. She took Alouzon's hand. "I am honored, Dragonmaster. I saw the children sneaking through the gate, and I did not want them to find themselves in trouble, either in or outside of town.''

"They came to see me. I guess I'm pretty much a curiosity here."

"Indeed."

Adyssa, like Kallye, wore her hair loose, and her manner was matter-of-fact, but friendly. But the midwife of Bandon had something on her mind, and it went beyond the adventures of the girls that night. A weight, it seemed, had been hanging in the back of her thoughts for some time, and it added a cold edge to her smile.

She eyed Alouzon for a moment, then turned to the red-haired girl. "Gelyya, take your friends back to the town. If the guards challenge you, tell them ..." She thought, her small mouth a crooked line. "Tell them to talk to me in the morning. I will think of something."

Gelyya's face was serious. "Are you sure, Adyssa?"

"Do not worry yourselves. At need, I can talk more quickly than the best of you."

The girls moved off with a rustle of skirts, Gelyya keeping track of stragglers. Alouzon heard them talking 122.

123.

and giggling among themselves, but Gelyya's voice was subdued.

"I hope nothing happens to them," she said.

The midwife shrugged. "Their fathers are used to their behavior by now. Doubtless, I will have some talking to do in the morning, but . . . well . . . that is what a midwife does, it seems."

Alouzon found it comforting to be in the presence of a woman who did not shuffle about the house and cringe in fear. ' 'Do you like what you do?''

"I am a midwife," said Adyssa, as if that explained everything. "I do not recall ever being anything else." The sense of thoughtfulness about her deepened. "Do you?"

Alouzon could not read her tone, but there was more to her question than the words indicated. "I've been lots of things."

Adyssa's eyes were on her, bright and intent. "How? How have you been other things?"

"Well . . ." Alouzon was not sure how to take her words. "Where I come from, we're a little more free in some ways."

Adyssa shook her head. "No, that is not what I mean." Her mouth worked as though she were unsure whether to speak or not. "You are a Dragonmaster," she said at last. "You have seen other lands, and you come from a place with different customs. I am sure that you understand much more than I do. That is well, for there are things about Gryylth that I have begun to question, and no one here has answers for me."

Lady, you and me both. "Like . . . like what?"

She expected that Adyssa would talk about the war, and so she was taken aback by her subject. * 'This place . . . this world. I fear that there is something wrong with it."

"Wrong?"

"I do not recall being a child," said the midwife. "I do not recall growing up. I have spoken with others, and they share my failing. This seems to me to be other than reasonable."

"I . . ." Alouzon herself remembered too much about everything. She wished that she could forget "You've got a point, I guess."

"Gelyya, too ..." Adyssa wrung her hands in the manner of someone grateful to at last share a frightful secret. "Gelyya has seen thirteen summers. That is well known, for she is now old enough to be married. But . . ." Her face was a pale shadow, but Alouzon could see her confusion. "I fear you will think me a fool, Dragonmaster." "No, go ahead."

"I and the other midwives of Bandon have caught all the babies that have been born in our town. But one day, when we met all together to share knowledge, we found that no one had caught Gelyya, nor, for that matter, any of the children of the town who are older than ten years."

Alouzon shrugged. She was not following Adyssa's train of thought. "OK, so maybe your teachers? There must have been other midwives."

"No, Dragonmaster. There have been no other mid-wives. When we talked, we tried to remember who had trained us, who had given us our lore and knowledge, who had dictated to us the customs that require us to live celibate, to wear our hair so, to abide by certain traditional laws. We could not remember. It is . . ." Plainly, she did not want to speak, but, plainly, she had to. "It is as though the world began ten years ago."

What Adyssa was suggesting was ridiculous, but the midwife's manner conveyed her conviction, and Alouzon could not but believe her.

"There are children who are becoming men and women today," said Adyssa. "Who caught them?"

And the Dremords had come from across the sea . . . from lands that, apparently, did not exist. And the war: its reasons and origins were cloaked in an obscurity as deep as that which now veiled Adyssa's features.

The land . . . From the beginning, Alouzon had sensed something tenuous about it, as though it were not quite real. And Cvinthil had said that it ended in mist.

She rebelled at the thought. ' 'There must be some reasonable explanation, Adyssa. Worlds just don't begin out of thin air."

124.

125.

The midwife shook her head. "Doubtless you think me deranged."

"No, nothing like that. I can't give you a reason for what you're seeing, but I'm sure there must be one. Has this been bugging you for a long time?"

"Bugging me?"

"Upsetting you."

"It has, Dragonmaster. Most of the other midwives are inclined to your opinion, and therefore they give my words little weight. But, for myself ..." Adyssa fell silent for a moment. The distant glow of the wartroop's campfires flickered on her face. "I am glad that you have listened to me. The men will not listen."

"Yeah, I know." Alouzon smiled. "They never do, do they?" She felt sympathy for Adyssa, a woman as confused about Gryylth as she herself. And Adyssa even lived here. "I wouldn't worry about it. Just do your work. If I find out anything, I'll let you know."

The blond woman bowed slightly. "My thanks, Dragonmaster. G.o.ds bless. I hope I have been no trouble."

"No trouble at all," said Alouzon. Adyssa started to turn away. "What <3ods do="" you="" wors.h.i.+p,="">

The midwife paused and shook her head. "We do not know their names," she said. "We do not know who they are or what they might be like. That lack also afflicts me."

Adyssa's worries seemed almost comically strange, but as Alouzon walked back toward the camp, she found herself planting each foot deliberately, and with care, as though she were not sure that the land would not suddenly turn transparent and dissolve into a mist.

His name was Turi, and he was unconcerned about questions of existence or of history. He came weary, and he came in the middle of the night. His face was smeared with blood and battle, his lance nicked in a hundred places, his horse flecked with foam and sweating with the long miles.

He clattered along the road that led up the mountain to Kingsbury, his commotion startling the dozing guards out of sleep. He did not care. He wanted to be heard. He wanted to be challenged. All the better for his mission.

At his name and his word, the guards on the road let him by, calling loudly to their fellows farther up to let Turi pa.s.s, that Gryylth, the king, and everything depended upon it. Fires started up at his pa.s.sage, torchlight ruddy in the midnight darkness, and the sound of weapons being sharpened rang like a s.h.i.+ver all up and down the mountain.

Turi rode on and gained the level ground at the top. The guards at the city gate knew him, and they waved him through.

Shouts started up, shouts of alarm, shouts of confusion. Turi's horse took him to the town square, to the tocsin bell that hung, brazen and ponderous, from its wooden framework. He swung to the ground, seized its heavy rope, and rang it with what strength he had left.

"Arms!" he shouted hoa.r.s.ely, his throat parched and stubborn. "Arms, men of Gryylth! The Dremords are coming! They have breached the Great Dike! They make for the Circle!"

"In force, you say."

"Yes, my king. In force."

The news was grievous, especially since Dythragor and Marrget were well away to the north, and would have to be sent for. San the, too, was off with Mernyl.

Vorya stroked his beard, shaking off the remaining threads of sleep that still clung to his thoughts. No one was going to get very much sleep for some time to come- of that he was sure.

Turi was so spent by his ride that Vorya had ordered a chair brought for him. The soldier was plainly uncomfortable with the seeming violation of etiquette, but he had spoken bravely, telling of the devastating attack that had fallen upon the western end of the Dike at noon the previous day.

Vorya was still considering the news when Cvinthil, still tying the sash of a light robe, entered the Hall at a run. Vorya nodded to him, beckoned him to the dais, and 126.

127.

dismissed the councilor's formalities with a wave. Matters were too urgent. With Santhe, Marrget, and Dythra-gor away, he and Cvinthil would have to make all the decisions alone.

To spare Turi's voice, he briefed Cvinthil himself, admonis.h.i.+ng the soldier to correct him as to matters of detail. Turi blinked at the thought of correcting his king, but nodded slowly, listening to Vorya's account in the manner of a common soldier who suddenly finds himself thrust into councils of state.

"They have attacked in force, Cvinthil," the king concluded. "They seem to be making a concerted drive towards the Circle. Tireas has been seen well behind the lines, as have Tarwach and Darham. If ever there was a real fight to the death at hand, this is it."

Cvinthil pondered. "The Circle? Are you sure?"

"Unless they make for Kingsbury, lord," said Turi. ' 'But the course of the attack pushed toward the southwest, and Harrlan, the captain of my wartroop, made his judgment based upon that."

"If Tireas is with them, Cvinthil, I can see that their objective might well be the Circle. Tireas is concerned with magic and sorcery. The Circle would be his natural goal."

"What would he do there, my king?"

"Nay, I know not. If Mernyl were still in our confidences, we might have a better idea, but as things are . . ." The Circle had no direct tactical qualities to it other than that its construction made it defensible. But, like any man or woman of Gryylth, Vorya knew instinctively that the Circle was important, and that it embodied the stability and the continuance of the land.

For a moment, he wondered how he knew that. Mernyl had never said anything about it. He could not remember ever having been told. Strange ...

Dreams. Broken sleep. He pushed the inconsequential thoughts aside and returned to the task at hand.

He regretted that Dythragor had sent the sorcerer away. The Dragonmaster's decisions in that matter had seemed over-hasty-more the product of personal prejudice than of careful thought-and Vorya was chagrined that he had, through custom, allowed so much of the government of the land to slip into Dythragor's hands when the Drag-onmaster was present. Mernyl was gone, and the First Wartroop, and Marrget, and Santhe. Not a good position, not good at all.

"I would raise the countryside, Cvinthil," said the king. "Send messengers to all parts of Gryylth. The muster will be here at Kingsbury, as soon as possible. No later than day after tomorrow."

"What of the garrisons at the Dike?"

Turi spoke. "My lord Cvinthil, the garrisons are no longer at the Dike. Despite their best efforts, they have been pushed back."

"Are they holding at all?"

"Somewhat, lord. They are at least slowing the advance."

"We will send men with all possible expedience," said Vorya. "Cvinthil, what say you? Have you anything to add?"

"The question of Mernyl, my king."

The doe-eyed councilor was right. If Tireas was involved, Mernyl's presence would be of some help, even if he could provide nothing more than additional information. "Santhe will not laugh if he is sent back again to fetch the sorcerer.''

"Send someone else then, my king. I only make the suggestion."

But Tireas had not been seen working any magic. From Turi's report, the attack was on a purely mundane level. Sorcery was not involved. And in any battle, Dythragor was the man to have.

"I think," said Vorya, "that we will not summon Mernyl for now. We need Dythragor, and the Dragonmaster will not help us if Mernyl is present."