The Dragons Revenge (Tales from the New Earth #2) (19 page)

“
I assume so, sir
wizard,” the guard replied. It was the young woman, Lynn. She
looked tense and kept glancing up at the darkening sky.

“
Thanks,”
Simon said and urged Chief up the road at a trot.

Once he'd reached the town
hall and tied the horse outside, Simon slipped into the building,
savoring the sudden rush of heat that enveloped him. Aeris floated in
with him and looked across the large room to the central fire pit.

Clara was pacing near the
fire, hands behind her back, staring down at the floor as she walked.
Standing on a bench nearby was a little craggy figure who was
watching her with his arms folded. It was Kronk.

Simon grinned as he saw
his friend and hurried over.

“
So you made it in
one piece, I see,” he said to the little guy as he approached.
Kronk jumped a bit in surprise and then his face split into a large
smile.

“
Master! You're
back. I am so pleased. The lady cleric told me that you had gone to
investigate the source of the undead. Against her wishes, I might
add. That was very reckless.”

The wizard greeted Clara
with a wink. She smiled tightly in return but looked relieved to see
him return unharmed.

“
I don't know about
reckless,” Simon said as he sat down next to the elemental. He
put his staff and saddlebags next to him. “But you're right.
Clara was very...vigorous in her objections to my going. But as you
both can see,” he looked from Kronk to the cleric, “I'm
back safe and sound.”

Clara stopped pacing.

“
And what did you
find out?” she asked as she took a seat on a bench across from
Simon.

“
That we wasted our
time,” Aeris said tartly as he floated over to hover beside
Kronk. The two elementals exchanged nods.

“
What?”

“
Aeris, you're
wrong,” Simon told him. “We learned that the undead are
not coming from the town to the west, Clara. Their tracks cut through
the settlement, but come from somewhere beyond that.”

The cleric leaned forward,
resting her elbows on her knees.

“
Any idea where?”

“
Nope. My
sweet-tongued friend here has offered to scout it out tomorrow, once
the sun has risen, so maybe we'll find out.”

Simon stood up and
stretched, working the kinks out after his long ride. Clara watched
him with some amusement.

“
Hard day in the
saddle?”

Simon chuckled and rubbed
his backside.

“
You could say that.
I haven't ridden that much in months. I'm going to be sore tomorrow.”

“
Well, I may be able
to help with that,” she said. “But in the meantime, we've
got about an hour before full dark and I've made some stew to warm
you up.” She stood up. “Come on back and we'll eat while
we have time.”

“
Stew sounds
wonderful right about now,” the wizard said and, grabbing his
gear, followed her to her quarters, the elementals trailing along
behind them.

As they ate the hearty
venison stew, along with freshly baked bread and the inevitable tea,
Clara explained the town's defenses.

“
We've got a routine
now,” she told him. “Richard and the other guards try to
sleep in the afternoon so that they'll be fresh overnight. We're down
to less than forty souls now in Nottinghill, of which ten are willing
to act as guards.”

She offered Simon some
bread and then buttered a slice for herself.

“
I wish we didn't
need any troops at all, you know.”

“
I understand.”
Simon chewed reflectively. “It seems like we're repeating the
patterns of the old world, doesn't it? The need for police and then
soldiers and then, well, who know?”

“
Exactly. But we
need protection, so guardsmen we must have. At any rate, Richard and
three of his people will man the front gate and four more will watch
the smaller one in the back. The two daytime guards will get some
sleep, but are ready to be called out if we need them.”

Clara cleaned her plate
with a slice of bread and then sipped some tea.

“
I'll be checking
both gates regularly all night, in case my powers are needed,”
she added.

Simon sat back with a
sigh.

“
Wonderful meal,
Clara. Thank you.”

She nodded and smiled
appreciatively.

“
But how can you
stay up all day and all night?” he asked. “You need sleep
too, don't you?”

“
I slept today,”
she said. “And I nap at night, Don't worry, Simon. The old gods
have given me the strength to get through this.”

Clara got up and started
to clear the table, waving Simon back into his seat when he tried to
help. When she was done, they sat companionably with their tea, each
thinking their own thoughts.

“
What about your
defenses, lady?” Aeris asked suddenly. He and Kronk were
watching from the couch. “How are your guards driving the
undead back?”

“
Driving them back?”
Clara looked a little confused. “You can't drive them back,
Aeris. They are relentless. They only stop if they are destroyed, or
when the sun rises.”

“
So you use fire?”
Simon asked grimly.

“
Yes, fire. All of
the guards will be on the wall, each armed with arrows dipped in tar.
They burn well. Torches in front of the gates are kept lit all night
so they have light to shoot by. We have a line of hay bales soaked in
oil just inside the gates if they somehow get through the fire
arrows.” She scowled. “They hate fire, obviously. If they
manage to get over the gates, lighting the bales will hold them back
long enough for the guards to deal with them.”

“
Does that actually
work?” Kronk spoke up in his rumbling voice.

“
It has so far,”
Clara said. “They don't attack in a group, you know. One or two
stagger out of the darkness to attack. They are fairly easy to
manage.”

Simon stared thoughtfully
at the darkened window framed by pretty drapes covered in flowers.

“
So it's like they
are each being raised in turn and sent off to attack you,” he
mused. “That's interesting.”

The cleric looked at him
in surprise.

“
I hadn't thought of
it like that. But you're right. It is as if someone or something
starts the undead moving one by one.”

She shivered suddenly and
Simon raised an eyebrow.

“
It's nothing,”
Clara said with a tight smile. “It's just that you make it
sound like we're being deliberately attacked. As if something out
there in the darkness is consciously trying to destroy us.”

“
Perhaps something
is,” he said soberly. “Those corpses are coming from
somewhere, and it isn't from that town that Aeris and I checked out.
Where are they coming from? And why? And why now? Maybe I'm overly
suspicious, but my being attacked by those dragons and now the town
being attacked by the undead seems a little too coincidental.”

“
You think they're
related?”

He shrugged.

“
Anything's possible
in this crazy new world we live in.”

Clara finished her tea and
got up.

“
I hope you're
wrong, Simon. I really do. The dead rising to attack is a nightmare,
but it's somehow easier to accept than the thought of them being
animated for the sole purpose of attacking Nottinghill.”

“
I agree,” he
said. “But until we find the source of these things, we won't
know for sure.”

“
Don't worry, my
dear wizard,” Aeris said from the couch. “I'll locate the
source for you. And then you'll have your answers.”

“
I hope so,”
Clara told them. “But let's worry about all of that tomorrow.
I've made up the bed in the room you stayed in before, Simon. You
should get some sleep, my friend. You're barely staying awake as it
is.”

“
Sleep?”

Simon rose a bit
unsteadily and squinted at her, his vision foggy with exhaustion.

“
I can't sleep while
the town is being attacked!”

Clara took his arm and led
him to the guest bedroom. Inside, a candle burned by the bed, its
flame flickering and making the shadows jump and move.

“
Of course you can,”
she told him. “Look, if we need your help, I'll call you.
There's no reason to overexert yourself after the long day you've
had. Get your rest and, the gods willing, tomorrow we'll get some
answers to this whole thing.”

The bed does look
comfortable, Simon thought. He gave in with a tired smile.

“
Okay, you've got a
point. But you will call me if you need me, right?”

The cleric gave him a
gentle push toward the bed.

“
Yes Simon, I will.
Now, good night. I'll see you in the morning. Sleep well.”

“
Thanks, Clara. Good
luck out there.”

Simon awoke in pitch
darkness to someone shouting in his ear.

“
Wake up, master.
Please wake up.”

“
Hmmf. Wha..?”
he mumbled, groping at the air above him.

Suddenly he yelped as he
was hit by a sharp blow to the head.

“
Hey!” Simon
exclaimed as he sat up abruptly, staring wildly around. The candle
had gone out and the drapes were tightly closed over the window.

“
Don't hit him!”
a voice protested. It was Kronk.

“
It woke him up,
didn't it?” Aeris asked sharply.

There was a sudden
radiance that lit the room weakly. Simon realized with some surprise
that the air elemental had taken on a shine that illuminated the area
enough to see by.

“
Hey, I didn't know
you could do that,” Simon said thickly.

“
Well, I can. Now
for goodness sake, get your skinny wizardly ass out of bed!”

Simon pushed back the
covers and planted his feet on the cold wooden floor. Kronk jumped
off of the pillow where he'd been trying to wake up the wizard and
thumped to the ground.

“
Now, what is going
on? What time is it?” Simon asked, still groggy and weak from
lack of sleep.

“
We're under attack,
master,” Kronk told him quickly. He was bouncing with anxiety.

Simon ran his fingers
through his tangled hair, wincing as he pulled out knots.

“
But surely Clara
and the others expected that, didn't they? If they needed help, they
were supposed to call me.”

As he spoke, the wizard
stood up and groped around until he found his robe. The glow from
Aeris didn't light things up very much.

“
They can't call
you, Simon,” Aeris told him. He watched as the wizard got
dressed, bobbing in midair.

“
Why not?”

Simon found his socks,
pulled them on and reached for his boots.

“
They are too busy,
master. The undead are about to overwhelm them.”

“
What?” Simon
exclaimed as he grabbed his saddlebags and searched through them
until he found his spell-book.

“
Clara said that
there were only a handful of undead that had attacked over the last
few nights.”

He picked up Bene-Dunn-Gal
and hurried into the main room of Clara's quarters. Her small
fireplace glowed with barely burning embers and, as he entered, Simon
could hear shouts and screaming coming from outside.

“
That may have been
true, but tonight they have come in force,” Aeris told him as
the two elementals followed the wizard.

Simon took his coat off of
a hook on the wall and turned to look at them.

“
In force? How
many?” he asked as he struggled into his jacket.

“
Dozens, master,”
Kronk said gravely. “They are attacking in waves. All of the
townspeople have been called out to help, but I fear they will not be
able to contain the monsters at the gates.”

“
Damn it!”
Simon muttered. He opened the door to the hall and hurried out. The
fire was still burning brightly in the fire pit and he hurried to
this light source and knelt down, opening his spell-book frantically.

“
Hurry up!”
Aeris barked at him. “They don't have much time out there.”

“
Hang on a minute,”
Simon said as he flipped through the pages. “Unless you just
want me out there beating the damned things over the head with my
staff, I have to memorize some spells.”

“
Leave him alone,”
Kronk told Aeris crossly. “Master knows what he is doing.”

“
Let's hope so,”
Aeris muttered.

Simon ignored him as he
scanned the spells.

“
Fire. Anything to
do with fire,” he said to himself. He found the spells he
thought would be most useful and set them in his memory as quickly as
possible. After firmly locking three into his mind, Simon paused as a
wild idea came to him.