Dragon Stones (25 page)

Adaran finally focused on the men in the room.  He recognized two of them, Gelt and Orioke, but had never before seen the third.  He would have remembered such a scabrous creature, with skin marred by oozing sores and hair growing in small, odd tufts, as if he had numerous tiny brushes glued to his skull.  Orioke and the misshapen fellow stood directly in front of him; Gelt leaned against the wall near the far corner, holding up a torch to provide some light.

The pustulate man said:  "He looks disoriented."

"It's the spell," Orioke said.  "Have you never awakened from a deep sleep and wondered where you were?"

"I don't have deep sleeps."

"This is all a very interesting demonstration of how you put a man to sleep and wake him up again," Gelt said, "but remind me why you brought him back, instead of just killing him?"

"I have my reasons," Orioke said.

Gelt said:  "I can only imagine what they might be."

"I hope there's no disloyalty brewing here," the other man said.  "I will have no part of it."

"Your fealty does you credit, Qalor, and will, I'm sure, be richly rewarded," Orioke said.  Gelt coughed, then snorted as if he'd choked on something.  "In any event, you needn't worry.  Does this pathetic fool strike you as a threat?"

"Perhaps you've forgotten that he evaded an entire camp full of guards, killing a number of them in the process, then slew Dosen and escaped on a stolen eagle."

"No, indeed, I have not, but he will not escape this time."  Orioke put his hand on Qalor's shoulder.  "Enough lingering in the dungeon!  The cold and damp is not good for our lungs.  We three can retire to your chambers, Qalor, and discuss matters of importance to us all."

Qalor sighed.  "Very well."

Orioke smiled and steered Qalor toward the door.  They departed through it; Gelt followed, shutting the door behind him.  Adaran heard a bar being thrown and a bolt turned as they locked him in.

As the lantern light receded, it became quite dark in the cell; the only illumination came from a flickering torch somewhere outside, flowing wanly through a narrow, barred opening in the door.  Adaran jogged the manacles at his wrist, listening to the noise that the chains made.  They sounded thick and sturdy, lacking the dull scratch of rust or the tinkle of shoddy manufacture.  The irons at his ankles seemed just as strong.

He tested the amount of play in the chains that held his wrists.  Not as much as he would have liked.  He shook the manacles again, wondering if he could get his hands free.  He judged that the left manacle was the looser, and so started on that one first.  He pulled his hand as far into it as it would go, then slowly rotated it, searching for the angle where the cuff was widest; he had yet to encounter one that was perfectly round.  He soon found the most promising position, and set about making his hand as uniformly straight as possible, to eliminate the curves and bulges that kept the manacle from sliding off.  That meant doing something with his thumb.  He worked it in and out, left and right, trying to dislocate the bone from its socket.  In, out.  Left, right.

Abruptly, it popped.

Agony shot up Adaran's arm, as if he'd put his fingers on an anvil as the smith struck a blow.  Clenching his teeth, he slowly began to draw his hand out of the confining band of metal.  The sharp edge of the cuff peeled off layers of skin as if it were a potato bound for the pot; the manacle was above his shoulder, so the blood that could have lubricated his effort was wasted, flowing down his arm to drip from his elbow.  The pain became too great and he had to stop, sweating from hurt and tension, holding steady for a little while before starting to pull again.

At last, his hand popped free of the manacle.  He slammed it against his chest, popping the thumb back into position.  He looked at it for a few seconds, then wriggled all his digits.  Everything still worked, though the flesh was scraped and raw and bleeding.

He patted himself down, feeling for his hidden pockets, looking for a tool.  Nothing.  He realized that he wasn't dressed in his own clothing anymore, but instead wore prison rags like a common criminal.  He would have to do the same thing to right hand that he had done to his left.

Well, if the price of escape was a little pain and a little lost skin, he would pay it gladly.

Tolaria stood at her tall windows, in her usual spot, and looked out at the placid surface of the lake, far below, past the town.  Dawn had stolen across it, lending the warmth of its ruddy colors to the steel-grey water.  The forested hilltops to the north and east were afire with light as the sun climbed over them.  The town itself looked quiet, thin trails of smoke rising into the sky from hearths and chimneys, pushed off across the plains by a gentle wind.  Dunshandrin hardly seemed like a nation that was mobilizing for war; but then again, the people in that village didn't know that war was imminent, did they?

Tolaria started as someone draped a blanket over her shoulders:  Wyst, creeping up, silent as the sun moving through the sky.  "It's a chill morning, my lady," she said.  "You'll take sick."

"I'm quite warm enough, thank you," Tolaria said.  "I did manage to survive for a number of years without anyone to bring me furs and slippers whenever I shivered."

Wyst mumbled some sort of apology and fled back to her corner.  The oracle shook her head.  She shouldn't take her frustrations out on the girl; Wyst was a simple creature, doing as she was told, and terrified of punishment.  She must think Tolaria a horribly ungrateful mistress.

Tolaria turned away from the window and padded back to her bed.  She sank onto its softness and contemplated the vision that had jolted her from sleep and sent her to stare out into the darkness as it lightened into day.  She had dreamed of Flaurent, where she'd been taught to control her gifts.  The walled oasis in the Salt Flats had been her home for many years; she'd learned letters there, lost her virginity, gained her vision.

In her dream, she had returned to the college, gliding up the grey river on a flat-bottomed boat with no pilot; but she had not found the school intact.  Its walls lay in ruin and rubble, its buildings crumbled and half-buried in dust and salt.  The waters of its broken fountains had flowed in short, dark dribbles before vanishing into the thirsty earth.  Stepping off the boat, she had wandered through the devastated college, seeing in the ruins the traces of places she had once known.  She called and called for her teachers and her friends, but her voice merely echoed off the dead walls and blew away in the wind.  Eventually, she found a single body:  The headmistress, buried up to her neck in sand and rubble, her face blistered and peeling from the relentless sun and the stinging clouds of salt.  Tolaria had stood, looking down at the dead woman, and suddenly the dry eyes had opened and the silenced mouth had spoken to her, using a language she had never heard before.  She began to grow dizzy and it seemed as if the words were in the air, flying around her like angry insects, cutting her with their sharp sounds, stinging her with their pointed meanings; despite this, she had no idea what the headmistress was trying to convey.

Tolaria knew they had sent Orioke to Flaurent; she feared that this nightmare was something more than the workings of her ignorant imagination.

Suddenly the door to Torrant's room banged open, rousing her from her thoughts.  The prince stood in the open doorway, wearing his purple nightshirt and a matching pair of soft slippers, ornamented to the point of absurdity with gold thread and tassels.  "Good morning, Tolaria," he said.  "I heard you moving about.  Why are you up so early?"

"I couldn't sleep."

"Ah, yes.  Sleep can be elusive when great events are underway."  He stepped into the room, stretched, yawned, and scratched himself, making it painfully obvious that he wore no undergarments beneath the nightshirt.  "If you would care to come into my chambers, perhaps we could while away the morning in pursuit of something other than rest."

"No, thank you," Tolaria said.  "I believe I will stay here and count the cracks in the ceiling again.  I think some new ones may have formed since yesterday."

Torrant chuckled.  "As you wish.  Of course, I will be back again tomorrow to make the same proposal."  Then his face grew serious and he added:  "Eventually it will
not
be a request."  He withdrew, shutting the door behind him.

Tolaria threw one of her pillows at the closed portal, but missed, instead striking the porcelain bowl and pitcher that stood on a table beside it.  The impact knocked them off the table and they fell to the floor, shattering.  Water darkened the stone.  Wyst gave a little shriek and scurried over.  "Oh, look what's happened," she said, picking up the pieces.  "Your basin fell off the table."

"It didn't
fall
," Tolaria said, coming over to help Wyst collect the fragments.  "I knocked it off."

"Stay away, my lady!  You may cut your feet."

"Perhaps Torrant will come back and cut
his
feet," she said, with malicious hope.

"Oh, no, the prince mustn't do that!" Wyst exclaimed.  She continued picking up shards, down to the most minuscule slivers of white, collecting them on the table.  "There, now we needn't worry about the prince's poor feet.  You stay where you are, my lady.  There may be more pieces across the floor.  I'll fetch a broom and a new basin."

Wyst crossed the room, reached into the neckline of her shift, and pulled out a key.  Using it, she unlocked the door and exited into the hallway, closing the door behind her.  Tolaria sat on the bed, staring at the door, too astonished to move.  
Wyst had a key!  Why hadn't she noticed that before?  Well, the simple reason was that Wyst had never left her side before.  She had seen the string around the girl's neck, and had assumed it carried some worthless trinket.  But a key … now
that
was something interesting.

Tolaria went to the door and tried the knob.  Wyst had locked it again, of course.  But that was actually a good thing; she would hear the key turning before the door opened, giving her a chance to react.  She quickly moved about the room, seeking something to use as a weapon.  Not the chairs; they were huge and ornate, far too heavy for her to lift.  She could scarcely manage to drag them.  The basin and pitcher were smashed, the pieces too small to be of any use.  A candlestick?  Three stood on the mantel, silver and solid-looking, gifts from Torrant not long after they'd moved her to this room.  To help lighten her mood, he'd said, trying to make a little joke.  She grabbed one, hefted it, swung it a couple of times.  She could manage this.  Clutching the candelabrum, she hurried back to the door, flattened herself against the wall beside it, and waited.

And waited.

And waited.

She began to wonder if Wyst were really coming back.  How long did it take to get a basin and a pitcher?  Where did they keep them, in the kitchen?  Where
was
the kitchen, anyway?  Had the girl found something better to do?  Perhaps she had stolen away to meet a boyfriend?  No, Tolaria couldn't believe that.  Wyst was far too cowed to neglect her duty in such a fashion.  If she had not returned yet, it was because something or someone had prevented her.

She heard a low voice, nothing like Wyst's, mumbling in the hallway just outside her door.  She raised the candlestick just as the lock unfastened and the door opened, then brought it down hard on her
visitor's head.  It connected with a solid
thump
; the man crumpled to the floor like a heap of unwashed laundry.  She quickly dragged him inside, shut the door, and rolled him over.  Orioke.  Why would
he
be sneaking into her chambers?  Had he met Wyst in the castle halls and interfered with her?  Well, no matter.  The wizard had decided to join forces with her captors instead of rescuing her; now he would help her unwittingly, by lending her his garments.  She quickly stripped him of his hooded cloak and the robe beneath, leaving him naked except for his underclothes.  He turned out to be a pallid, scrawny, thin-limbed creature, not much larger than she was; if she'd found him in the gutter, she would have taken him for a pathetic wastrel rather than a dangerous magician.

She trussed his wrists and ankles with cords from the draperies around the window, gagged him with a pillowcase, and shoved him as far as she could under the bed.  Then she donned his clothes; they smelled of sweat and dust and salt, reminding her of Flaurent.  She went to the door, opened it a crack, and looked around.  The hallway was quiet, deserted; it was very early, and few denizens of the castle would be awake.  Her door was not guarded.  Perhaps the twins thought it unnecessary to have her watched so closely now that she was in the royal wing, or perhaps Orioke had sent the sentry away.

Tolaria pulled the hood of her stolen robe over her head and slipped out of the room.

She soon found herself hopelessly lost in the castle corridors.  She had no idea where any of these hallways went or where an exit might be, and didn't dare speak to the guards or servants she met for fear of being asked a question.  As she had hoped, they took her for the wizard and made no attempt to engage her, instead pretending to look elsewhere as she passed; Orioke had obviously made himself well-loved during his time in the castle.

She wandered a while, following breezes that felt like they came from outside in hopes of finding an exit; but the castle was so drafty that this was fruitless.  Draughts came through chinks in the wall, ill-fitting shutters, arrow slits, gaps beneath barred doors.  Tolaria began to grow anxious.  Wyst may have returned, found her gone, and raised the alarm; even now there could be men scouring the castle in search of an impostor dressed in wizardly garb.