A Sword for a Dragon (13 page)

Now they marched around the city, through suburbs of villas and gardens until they emerged onto a broad, open plain on the western approach to the city.

They found that they stood on a crescent-shaped plateau with the city in the center and the two horns trailing off westwards. On either side of them were vast numbers of Imperial soldiers in the white and the red, and then, ahead of them they saw the standards of the Kadein First Legion, and the regiments of Kadein soldiers in green coats and grey trousers.

The Kadeini greeted them with a thunderous cheer, and the men of the Second Legion returned it with one of their own that was just as loud.

At last came the order to halt. The men and dragons fell out and set to final preparations for combat. The question on everyone’s lips was “Where were the enemy?”

General Paxion rode up to General Hektor’s headquarters, a white tent, set a little ways apart from a collection of huge red and purple tents that marked the emperor’s personal headquarters.

Paxion found General Hektor standing bent over a table, a map spread out in front of him.

Hektor greeted him with a firm handshake and a gesture toward the map.

“Well done Paxion, a splendid piece of marching. The Marneri Second should be known henceforth as the ‘Iron Foots’.”

“Thank you, General, thank you very much.”

“Forty miles in a little more than twenty-four hours. Excellent! Now I think we really might give our enemies a surprise.”

“Shall I deploy to face attack?”

“Not just yet, the enemy has yet to show himself today. Yesterday they were demonstrating up and down on our front here, but today appears to be the calm before the storm. I expect our enemy is trying to sort himself out. Such huge numbers can make even the simplest maneuver chaotic.”

Paxion breathed a sigh of relief.

“Then possibly we won’t fight today?”

Hektor hunched over the map.

“Anything’s possible, but I rather think he will attack today sometime. Look here, this is Salpalangum,” he stabbed the map with a thick forefinger. “The emperor and his army are supplied from the south, from Kwa down here. The enemy are trying to cut off the communications with the south. They are very confident, and they know that the Imperial Army is shaky. If they attack here now, they can possibly take the emperor himself, and if they did that, they would win everything.”

Paxion’s face fell. “I see. I had hoped the men might rest a while before combat; they’ve given everything on the march.”

Hektor nodded and chuckled. “You haven’t been in battle for a while, eh, General? Once they smell blood and terror in the air, they’ll find the strength. It’s either that or death. It always amazes me how much energy men can find for battle when they must. Don’t worry about your men. But pay attention here now, this is my plan and I will need your close cooperation.”

General Paxion sighed inwardly. Bending close, he fought to overcome the fatigue and comprehend General Hektor’s instructions.

The Second Legion stood down in its position. The men dropped to the ground and most of them contrived to sleep at once. The plain was suddenly carpeted with prone forms except where the cooks started boiling up a fresh supply of Ourdhi kalut, the dark coffee of the southlands that was so vital to the legions. Elsewhere the surgeons were at work on the most severe exhaustion cases, and dragonboys ran up and down on errands of their own.

Beyond the prone figures of the Second Legion of Marneri were the ranks of the Kadein First Legion in their distinctive green shirts and grey breeches. They were standing to in loose rank while they drank hot dark kalut and discussed the coming battle.

On the other side, past a strip of clear ground began the formations of the Imperial Army, a vast mass of men in white with colored sashes denoting their regiments and brigades. There were thousands upon thousands of them, arrayed into the distance on both flanks.

Behind this huge army lay the ocher walls of Salpalangum, studded with turrets and towers. In front stretched a flat terrain, cleared of vegetation for a hundred yards before the first palm trees arose.

Here they would stand for the great battle. This was what they had come so far to find. And yet the significance of the event was not uppermost in the minds of the men and the dragons of the legion. Uppermost were concerns about their feet and their aching legs. That is when they remained conscious long enough to have concerns at all.

But for dragonboys, there was no rest. Dragons had to be fed, watered, and tended. Relkin ignored the pains in his own legs and rolled a water keg down the lines to refresh his pair of dragons. While they drank, he took a look at the Purple Green’s battered feet.

There were blisters and a lot of sore places, but nothing was actually bleeding. The huge sandals had done their job. Feeling pleased with himself, he worked quickly with blister sherbet and some medicinal honey, then rubbed a toner cream into the massive, clawed reptile feet that had gone pink from irritation. The Purple Green meanwhile drank water in long, slow sips that took down about half a gallon at a time. Then he set the keg aside, closed his enormous eyes, and sighed in unmistakable contentment.

The broketail dragon noted the Purple Green’s state of near ecstasy. “So my wild friend, welcome to the legion life.”

The Purple Green’s eyes popped open and narrowed. “We walk all night, and we have come the distance of ten wing beats. This is one terrible way to live.”

“The boy is good, though. He knows how to work on a dragon’s feet.”

The Purple Green, in fact, had forgotten he even had feet. They had been very sore a few minutes earlier, and now he scarcely felt them. He looked up, but the boy was already gone, trundling the empty keg down the lines to the water wagon. It was a strange sensation to have someone who brought one water and tended to one’s sore and blistered feet. Instinctively the Purple Green felt annoyance, his big forehands clenched. It would be good to fight soon. By the old gods of Dragon Home, it would be good to fight the enemy!

The other dragons were stretched out around them, Vlok and Chektor, and the young ones. It was a strangely peaceful sight.

“We will, fight now?” said the Purple Green.

“We will fight,” said Chektor with a sour grunt. Old Chek’s feet were in bad shape now, but he knew there was no point in complaining about it.

“Good,” said Vlok, always combative. “Where are the enemy?”

The broketail pointed out across the flat plain toward a distant windbreak of palm trees. “Out there.”

“Will there be trolls?”

“No. At least that is what Dragoneer Hatlin says.”

“Mmm.” The dragons thought about this. With no trolls to fight, there would only be men or imps to face them. Men had little chance against a dragon unless they were well trained and armed with long lances. Imps would be driven at them in swarms seeking to overwhelm with sheer weight of numbers. The dragons had been trained in methods for dealing with both techniques.

Relkin meanwhile had returned the keg to the water wagon and gone over to the cook fires where he begged a cup of hot kalut.

The soldiers there were grumbling about their feet and their sore legs. Relkin had heard enough such talk so he left them and strolled over to the smith’s fire, which was blazing high, while burly Cordwain, the smith for the Eighth Regiment, struck sparks from steel as he straightened spearheads on his anvil. Relkin stood there, sipped kalut, and watched the smith work, admiring his skill.

Suddenly he felt a sharp pain across his shoulder and spun about while his hand went to his dirk. A white carriage pulled by a pair of dainty white ponies had come to a halt behind him. A youth with golden curls sat on the driver’s seat and made play with a long whip.

Relkin rubbed his shoulder and studied the youth. Nobody struck Relkin Dragoneer First Class like that and got away with it. This golden-haired coach boy would soon learn this.

The blind across the carriage’s side window was pulled aside, and a young Ourdhi woman of aristocratic bearing thrust out her head. She wore a black velvet hat shaped like a small box, and a shimmering veil and a purple gown.

“You,” she said in Ourdhi accented Verio, “the boy standing there drinking. Where is the headquarters of the Imperial Army?”

Relkin stared back truculently, disinclined to answer after being struck with golden hair’s whip.

“That’s a military secret, madam, and I can’t be giving it away to just anyone who goes by, now can I?”

The woman stared at him perplexed.

“What is this? You won’t tell me! Who are you, boy?”

“Relkin of Quosh, Dragoneer First Class, one hundred and ninth of Marneri, at your service, lady.”

Suddenly she smiled, a not altogether reassuring sight.

“Well, Dragoneer”—the accent was very nasal but the command of the language was complete—“I am the Princess Zettila, and I have an urgent message for the emperor himself. Please help me now, and I will put in a good word for you at your court-martial. Because when I have finished reporting the disrespect you show me, I am sure you will be put on trial for your life.”

Relkin shrugged. Maybe she really was a princess, maybe she could get him in big trouble, but he doubted it. He had done nothing wrong. General Hektor would pay no attention to such demands. Still, it would be better not to antagonize her any further if he could help it. Powerful people could sometimes be highly vindictive.

“My apologies, Your Highness. We’ve only just arrived here. We marched in overnight, and I had no idea that someone like yourself would be up here in our lines. Anyway, I expect that you’ll need to turn back and go around the legion standard over there. I think the Imperial headquarters are in that direction.” He pointed beyond the standards set behind the two Argonath legions.

The princess frowned. “Why should I not just continue in this direction, going through the ranks of these men?” she pointed toward the rows of sleeping soldiers of the Second Legion.

Relkin shut his mouth until his first reply was stifled. It was going to be difficult to keep out of trouble if he had to speak with this princess very long.

“One good reason for not going in that direction, Your Highness, is that it would take your ponies right past two squadrons of dragons.”

Princess Zettila paled slightly at this news, then she leaned forward and spoke sharply to the youth in the driver’s seat in Ourdhi.

“Aimlor, turn the coach around, we’ll go back and get directions from someone less addled than this surly youth.”

Golden Hair on the driving board made a face and began the process of shifting the ponies around within a confined space. Since Aimlor had not been chosen for his skills with horses, he soon made a hash of this complex maneuver. The ponies became quite boisterous. Aimlor cracked his whip and went red in the face, shouting at them to no avail.

Relkin glanced back over his shoulder and groaned. A huge, familiar form was lumbering down the lines.

“Aimlor!” he shouted in Verio. “Pull back harder on the rein. Stop using the whip.” He danced in front of the carriage waving his hands.

Aimlor understood none of this, and cursed him and struck at him with the whip. The princess leaned out of the carriage and screamed invective at him in Ourdhi.

Relkin could see the Purple Green getting closer, heading toward the water wagon for a refill. The ponies caught the scent of dragon and went mad. They plunged and kicked and shattered the front paneling of the little white carriage. The princess screamed as the carriage bounced backward and she was thrown to the floor.

Aimlor lashed out with his whip, striking the ponies again and again and whipping them into a further frenzy. They turned and began to run away from the dragons right past Relkin. He could see that they were out of Aimlor’s control. Relkin dropped his kalut, vaulted onto the running board, and climbed up onto the driver’s seat. Aimlor turned on him with a furious expression and yelled something in Ourdhi. With no further ado, Relkin lifted a foot and kicked him in the belly. Aimlor tumbled backward and fell off the carriage with a cry of woe.

Relkin took the reins and hauled back on them with a steady pressure. The ponies shook hard and heavy, but were unable to break his grip. Still they continued to try and bolt away from the approaching dragon. They bucked suddenly and the right-side pony broke his grip momentarily and almost got the bit between its teeth. Relkin was jerked up onto his feet. For a moment he hung there close to falling out, then he regained his balance and yanked hard on the reins, hauling the horses’ heads around and forcing them to slow to a complete stop.

He held them for a moment and then let them out a little. They moved, but at a trot and no longer at a breakneck run. Behind them the Purple Green had passed by en route to the water wagon seeking another keg of water. Disaster had been averted.

Eventually Relkin brought them to a walk and rounded the legion standards, which were set up beside General Paxion’s command tent.

Ahead lay the larger tent of General Hektor, another plain white expanse of canvas. Past that was the Imperial headquarters, a cluster of purple and scarlet tents, with waving golden pennons.

Aimlor ran up in front and caught the left pony’s bridle. Breathing hard, he threw Relkin a murderous look.

Relkin pulled the ponies to a halt, tied the reins off, and then stepped down and bowed with a flourish. Aimlor faced him angrily, but, though he was the bigger of the two, he did nothing. There was that dirk, and something in Relkin’s steady gaze that deterred Aimlor. Sullenly, Aimlor climbed up into the driver’s seat.

Relkin found the Princess Zettila staring at him with a frighteningly intense expression on her face. She pointed a finger and said two Ourdhi words, one of which sounded like “ah-weez.”

“Glad to be able to be of service, Your Highness.” Relkin doffed his cap, turned, and slipped away through the small crowd of soldiers and camp followers that had formed around the carriage.

Aimlor whipped up the ponies, and they quickly bore the princess away. There had been something strange about the Princess Zettila’s stare, an intensity beyond normal. It left Relkin with vague uneasiness.