Song of Sorcery (7 page)

“Uh—why?” A qualm made him pause before he picked the first of the reeds.

“Umm—just a little idea of mine,” she replied, as she energetically began to snatch up every reed in sight.

His qualm became an uneasy twinge as he dropped an armload of reeds on top of those she’d already gathered. She stopped gathering finally, but signaled him to continue, and sat down and began to weave the rushes into a large, flat coil.

“Funny time to make a rug,” Colin remarked, smiling at his own humor as he dumped more rushes on the pile.

“One does the best one can with the talents allotted one,” she replied with a suspicious expression of self-satisfied false humility.

His suspicion was confirmed. His twinge became absolute fear as the rush rug became a basket large enough to hold, technically speaking, either a man or a woman. Colin had the distinctly uncomfortable feeling it was intended to hold a man.

“It’s a boat!” Maggie exclaimed proudly, as pleased as if she were announcing the sex of her first-born babe, when she floated the flimsy-looking thing on the edge of the flood.

“Uh-uh,” the minstrel said firmly.

“Oh,
really
. It’s quite strong. I’m sure it will hold you.” She looked up at him with an expression of purest concern for his safety and comfort.

“Hold me while I do what?” He stood very still as he waited for her answer.

“While you rescue that poor stranded beastie, of course.”

“That DRAGON!?” The stillness exploded into an orgy of pacing and wild gesticulation and he changed octaves several times as he spoke. “Look here, Maggie. I’m every bit as much an animal lover as you are, but why in the name of all that’s sane would I want to rescue that dragon? I like it exactly where it is!”

“We have to rescue her because she flies, of course, is why.” She used the sort of voice she might use to explain to a small child why the sky is blue. She didn’t stay within earshot of his indignant sputterings, either, but went to the packhorse and began to unstrap their belongings.

“Well, see here, Maggie. Now just stop. Just because I don’t agree with you doesn’t mean I’m about to leave you here alone! Put those things back, won’t you?” By the fury with which she was unwinding the bindings of their packs, throwing the bundles indiscriminately on the ground to fall where they may, he reckoned she was ready to remain behind if he insisted on sensibly returning to civilization. He perceived her bizarre unpacking methods to be a demonstration both of the sorcerous passion, if not power, she’d discussed earlier, and also any possible determination to remain at the river as a means to make him guilty enough that he’d stay and do as she demanded.

She ignored him, however, as he flapped around putting things that fell off the horse back on whereupon they fell right back off again without the benefit of the length of braided leather rope that had bound them on. This rope Maggie was busying herself winding around her hand and elbow. After trying to replace the cat basket one more time to have it fall to his feet, spilling out the snug old piece of blanket intended to insure Ching’s comfort, Colin decided against trying to strap his fiddle back on and instead placed it gently on the ground, out of reach of the chestnut’s hooves should it decide to take a stomp or two.

Maggie was looking pleased as she wound the rope. Fortunately, they’d brought far more gear than they really needed and the rope was quite long. Rummaging in the pile of belongings, she removed the extra clothing she had brought from its sack, and stuffed it in with the foods. The sack she began to fill with mud from the banks of the swollen Troutroute, digging the stuff up in great gooey gobs, and depositing it in the sack with a sucking “plop.”

Colin had continued to pursue her progress with alarm and not a little personal interest. Perhaps she had not been entirely frank about the scope of her magical powers, and was capable of a great deal more than she’d admitted. Perhaps she was now concocting a gigantic, magical, enormously powerful, arcane—poultice—though whether its purpose might be for rescuing tangled dragons or chastising recalcitrant troubadours he was uncertain.

She lashed the muddy sack securely to the end of the rope and hefted it. Turning to him, she inquired sweetly. “I don’t suppose you’re a fantastic shot with a sling or anything like that?”

“Not particularly.”

“Alright then, stand back.” She began to sail the muddy sack in circles above her head, bits of mud decorating her hair and spattering her face, arms, clothing and companions as well as the inanimate environment in the immediate vicinity. Colin ducked and Ching took shelter behind a tree. When it seemed to her the proper impetus was reached, she let fly with the bag. It landed, splashing an upwardly exploding fountain of water a short distance from the dragon-inhabited tree.

Hauling the sopping bag back again, she inspected the rope and then the bag itself. The rope was braided for utility in a fashion that minimized its tendency to shrink. The bag was not in a condition ever to hold clothing again. By the time she finished her inspection, Maggie’s hands were so slippery with mud she had to wash them off in the river before resuming her sack-whirling stance. She let fly, and this time the bag snaked its way into the appropriate tree, and its weight wrapped it twice around a branch. Maggie leaned back on the rope, testing it with her entire weight. Satisfied, she took the end and tied it securely around the trunk of another tree.

She wiped her still far-from-immaculate hands on her skirt, and glared triumphantly at the minstrel, who had arranged himself in a nonchalant position against a tree that lent itself to lounging. Applauding slowly, he complimented her feat with mock graciousness. “Very ingenious, Mistress Brown. And nobly done. Nobly done, indeed. Now the only problem that remains, I suppose, is for person or persons unkown (unless, of course, and I can’t discount the possibility, you mean for that very remarkable cat of yours to do it) to surrender his or herself to the doubtfully enormous strength of your oversized poultry basket, haul themselves across that charming laundry line you’ve so cleverly employed, and reach the tree, where the dragon trapped therein will meekly cooperate in having its appendages broken and its wings mangled while its benefactor frees it, after which it will follow us all over Argonia in unending and everlasting gratitude. Providing, of course, one doesn’t overbalance that silly-looking boat, providing, too, that the clothesline doesn’t work its way loose from its moorings, and providing the dragon doesn’t immediately roast one well done before it learns of one’s beneficent intentions, just in case it’s interested in them.”

It was Maggie’s turn to applaud. “From your pretty words, minstrel, I gather you appreciate the possible difficulties of my scheme. However, I would like to point out that those things may just as well NOT go wrong, and, as they say, nothing ventured, nothing gained.”

“Whereas if I should venture in this case, I might stand to gain a charring?”

“As I was saying before you gave me the benefit of your immense wisdom, I do intend to get across this river and to the other shore, and I don’t intend to go the whole width by means of rope and basket. So if dragons frighten you, my faint-hearted friend, I suggest you stand back.”

“I still don’t see how you propose that that dragon will be of any benefit to us once you acquire it.”

“Once you have helped me rescue her, she will fly us across the river, naturally.”

“Oh, she’s agreed to that, has she?” He raised a questioning brow to the cat, who had sauntered over from behind his tree and was sniffing without interest at the spilled contents of the packs. Looking up, he met the minstrel’s eye, flipped his tail, and stalked off. He had better things to do than talk to tree-climbing aquatic dragons or, for that matter, to so-called musicians who talked to cats.

“Maggie, I know you want to see your sister, but this is rather extreme, isn’t it? I mean, the river
is
dangerously flooded, and the dragon and all—” He could hardly believe she meant to go on with it, and kept waiting for her to say that of course he was right and she would naturally go back to her father’s hall and wait like a good witch for conditions to improve.

“Have you another suggestion?” she asked with iciness that warned him he was likely to wait a long time for her to say what he wished. He coached her a little.

“We ought to wait a few days, perhaps, for the flood to subside, and then cross it the usual way.”

“No!”

“Why not? Oh, Maggie, what difference could a few days possibly make?”

“I don’t know—it all depends—it could make all sorts of difference. Abandoned lords have been known to do all sorts of awful things to wives who run off from them, and that gypsy is no gallant protector, believe me. He ran off with two of the dairy maids and then just left them to their—er—fate. What if he leaves Winnie stranded in the woods, or something? Even if Rowan doesn’t murder her, there’s robbers and wild animals and—”

“Dragons?” Colin suggested helpfully.

He received a glare for his trouble but she continued. “Of course, dragons. She’s quite alone, actually. Maybe hungry and cold, and most certainly confused and lonely. If the gypsy should run true to type and abandon her, she would simply not understand it. People are just never unkind to her—she wouldn’t know what to think. She’d be brooding about what she might have said that vexed him, and not be on the lookout for murderers or dragons at all…”

“If all of that’s true, she’ll probably be far beyond your help by the time we get there, anyway.”

Maggie’s eyes ate caustic holes in him. “She certainly will be, if we sit tamely by and wait for the river to go down—or I waste all my time debating the matter with craven minstrels.”

He shook his head stubbornly. “Stop debating then. I’m done trying to keep you from risking your life. But I’m certainly not going to risk mine.” He leaned with greater determination against the tree, looking if possible fiercely dedicated to languishing there for the duration. “I’m sorry, old girl. A lot of people have control over my life. My craftmaster has power over my music, your father and other aristocrats have power over my comings and goings, and your grandmother has power over my shape. You, however, don’t have any power over me at all, and I refuse to allow you to push me into something stupid and dangerous.”

“Coward.”

“At your service.”

With one last glare, she arranged herself in the boat, holding on to the rope for balance. Then she had to stand again, one foot on the basket and one on shore, to push the basket boat out into the water.

Her arms were almost yanked from their sockets as the tide jerked her and the boat downstream of the rope she clung to. She regained her seat and began hauling herself hand over hand down the rope, thinking stubbornly that she was certainly showing the minstrel that she was not a girl to stand around and wait for the men to do everything, as he obviously thought. Her ruminations were extremely brief, however, for the rope was slick and wet and her shoulders ached horribly with the strain of clinging to it against the current. In no way did the pain lessen as she strove to get enough purchase to pull herself and the boat against the tide, closer to the rope. Her body stretched so far between her lifeline and the boat that it arched, her belly almost grazing the water, her knees barely in the basket, head buried between wrenching shoulders and straining arms as she struggled for a better grip on the rope. A passing log swept the little rush boat out from under the precarious purchase her knees had maintained, and she dropped with a shocking icy splash into the river, the water soaking her to the waist. Inexperienced as she was at rivercraft, she did realize that her most desperate and immediate priority was to retain her grip on the rope at all costs.

She was actually only a few feet out from the shore, but even her work-hardened hands were not used to supporting her entire weight from slick, cold leather thongs against the force exerted by the river. The icy water chilled her to the top of her head, and she couldn’t feel her fingers after a short time.

Abruptly she sank to her armpits in the biting cold river. A weight jerked on the rope and it slipped agonizingly in her hands. She could not be sure when one hand slipped from the rope, but suddenly her body was floating on the surface, tossing and turning with the torrent, the arm that kept her from drowning an arrow of pain that felt as though it were breaking her back.

She was hauled partially out of the water as Colin’s arm caught her clothing, then her waist. “Got you!” he yelled above the river, nearly breaking his own hold on the rope with the shock of her added weight to his own. “Grab on, now!” He had slid along the rope far enough to catch hold of her. Flinging her free arm wildly in his direction as she tried to obey his order, she nearly throttled him, hooking her elbow around his neck.

He gargled at her.

They did so much thrashing around themselves that they scarcely noticed when the waves began to break over their shoulders, submerging the rope for a moment. Maggie clung to Colin’s belt, twisting her head to keep the water from her mouth and nose. Colin was finally able to get them back to the shore, and they lay there, half out of the water, just as the tension that had been fighting them for the rope went slack.

As Maggie clambered out of the water and up Colin’s legs and onto the bank, to lie panting and choking beside him, she heard Ching translate for the big green and turquoise dragon who was drying herself in what little sunlight there was. “Ah hah,” said the cat in his pseudo-dragon voice. “Dinner is served.”