The Hidden Fire (Book 2) (17 page)

The
dragon opened its mouth in an imitation of a smile, wisps of fog roiling out
from between its teeth.  It leaped into the air and began to circle above them.

Rolirra
took his wrist and turned him toward her.  “I don’t understand.”

“There,”
he said, looking down.  They approached a land of trees and streams.  He
pointed at a perfectly square lake with a square island in the middle, the
ancient city.  “I’m going to cause a ripple.”

She
had questions she couldn’t form.  She tried to speak but no words would come
out.

“I
don’t know how to say it either,” he said.  “It has to do with why I am in this
world.  This is my reason to be.”  He knelt in front of her and took her hand. 
“I must find the way for the stone as it falls.  I must ride the island down.”

“You
will be killed.”  She found that she could whisper.

He
nodded gently, but it was not all sadness.  “Yes.  That is why you have to stay
here.  You must live on this side of the dream.  I couldn’t go on without
knowing that.”

He
could see her thinking quickly, searching frantically for an argument that
would hold.  She turned this way and that, as if she could find it lying near,
turning back to him with a pleading look when she saw that it was useless.

“What
will I do without you?”

“You
will find your way.”

He
turned and jumped straight up, spreading his arms and letting the current carry
him.  He leaned forward, arching his back and it was like flying as he bobbed
and floated with the debris trailing the islands.  Lowering his head made him
go faster and he closed with the monstrous block of granite.

The
dragon met him there.  “Are you ready, master dreamer?”

“This
service satisfies all honor,” Kyric said.  “Rolirra will return the fairweather
flute to you when you have completed this task.  Yet I ask for a boon.  I ask
you to favor me when this is done and take her home.  There is nothing for her
here.  She will become lost here.  I ask this humbly.”

The
storm dragon didn’t answer.  It leapt backward, performing an aerial loop. 
Then another, then another, the loops getting tighter and tighter before it
broke away into a complex pattern of turns and rolls.  It was shaping the
current.  Kyric could see it reforming, outlined in the dust and snow flurries.

With
a hard bank the dragon deflected the newly-formed cross-current into the
granite island.  At first there was only a rush of wind.  Then slowly it tilted
and began to ease toward the fringe of the current.  As it slipped from the
stream and began its downward plunge, Kyric looked back.  The dragon soared
higher, throwing lightning into the black sky.  He thought he heard an echo of
laughter inside the rolling thunder.

Kyric’s
stomach went hollow as the great stone nosed down, dropping faster and faster. 
He crouched near the leading point where he could see the lake of the ancient
city, holding tight to cracks in the granite.  Screaming downward at a
tremendous speed, the front end of the boulder began to glow red hot, bits of
molten rock flying away.  Kyric’s focus on the lake never wavered, and the
falling island followed the track of his vision.

The
lake grew larger by the second.  His trajectory was perfect — the boulder would
strike right where he had aimed, in the water near the eastern embankment. 
There was no chance it would miss.

He
let go and leaned back against the hurtling stone.  There was nothing more. 
Everything was done.  It would only be a few moments now.

A
shadow blotted out the sun.  Something yanked him violently upward, knocking
the wind out of him.  He hung in the grip of the storm dragon, soaring swiftly
over the rainforest at canopy level.  Dark clouds rose where they passed.  A
familiar pulse of electricity ran along his body.

Behind
him, red-hot granite exploded as it struck water, sending out a tidal wave that
topped the levee, washing away a huge slice of earth.  Then it was like a
domino trick, the embankment collapsing in sections along its length.

Kyric
had a thought, suddenly lucid, the memory of his waking life returning with a
jolt.  Would it be enough on the other side?  It only needed to make the
slightest cut there, just enough to let a trickle through.  The weight of the
water would do the rest.

He
gasped for breath as they raced along the treetops.  The dragon held him too
tightly.  Ahead, a curtain of mist draped down from a cloudbank.  They flew
into it, and for a time they were enveloped in its grey folds.  They broke free
of the mist, the dragon banking, raising its huge wings to slow them, and they glided
toward a tree on the crest of a gentle hill, a hill surrounded by houses and
gardens.

“No!”
Kyric shouted, “Not here!”

The
dragon tossed him into the grass at the foot of the dream tree and flew on
without pause.  Kyric tumbled to a stop and rolled to his knees.

“Not
me!” he yelled after the dragon.  “Not me.  It was to be her.  She will be lost
there.  She will be lost.”

The dragon disappeared into the clouds
with a flicker of lightning.  Kyric threw himself down on the grass and closed
his eyes against a flood of tears.

He
rolled over to see Aiyan’s face in the first grey light of dawn.  “It has
stopped raining.  They’re coming with all their guns.”

“Did
you see anything,” Kyric said hoarsely, “anything in the sky?”

“I
saw a falling star,” said Lerica.  She crouched nearby behind a thick, bushy
plant.

“Did
it make a sound?”

“I
only heard thunder from the storm as it moved away.”

“How
long ago?”

“Maybe
a quarter hour.”

Kyric
sat up.  “I guess it wasn’t enough.”

Aiyan
pulled him behind a tree.  “Stay under cover.”  He peeked out for a split
second.  “Breed is leading them.  He has Thurlun’s pistols.  Pacey and the one-eared
musketeer are right behind him along with Snaker.”

He
placed one hand on Kyric’s shoulder.  “I will ambush them at the bridge.  I
want the two of you to stay here, stay low, and watch.  If I can get them to
discharge all of their firearms, there may be an opportunity, but keep a cool
head and don’t be foolish.”  He aimed the last bit at Lerica.

He
turned, crawling quickly to the far end of the island, and lowered himself into
the water.

“What
are you doing?” Kyric whispered fiercely.  “The
crocodiles
.”

Aiyan’s
eyes brightened.  “I have communed with the Unknowable Forces, and I have
atoned myself with the animal master of the swamps.  No creature here may touch
me. 
I
am the crocodile.”  And he slipped beneath the murky green water.

Kyric
could hear voices at the bridge now, and he peered out between leafy branches
to see Harlon and Ral pulling away the cart that had blocked the bridge.  Pacey
and One-ear took position on each flank, and all the others lined up behind
Breed.  There was no sign of Thurlun.

Breed
carried one of Thurlun’s pistols in each fist, held ready to fire.  He stepped
slowly onto the bridge, stopping and listening, scanning the high grass for
anyone lurking there.  He took another cautious step, looking everywhere,
holding the pistols at arm’s length.

He’s
too wary
,
Kyric thought. 
He has some knowledge of the weird arts and senses his
danger
.

Breed
took one more step, suddenly pointing one pistol at the water to his right.

Aiyan
burst out of the moat on his left, his sword aflame, swinging with both hands. 
Breed’s lower leg spun away from his body.  Aiyan had severed it at the knee,
and as Breed fell into the swamp he fired both weapons uselessly into the air. 
Snaker ran up to the moat, just now cocking his pistol.  One-ear took a snap
shot at Aiyan, but he had already dived back under the water.

Pacey
kept his head.  “Reload!” he said to One-ear, standing still with his musket,
aiming down the sight, ready for Aiyan to pop up again.  The other men backed
away from the bridge.  Breed didn’t surface.

The
Ilven were all on their feet now.  Pacey searched for a target among them,
uncertain about what was happening.

“Push
the cart back in place,” he said.  “We have to — “  But the sound of its coming
silenced him.

It
was louder than Kyric had imagined.  Strangely, there was some flooding ahead
of the main body, so the river and the swamp began to rise even as they turned
to face the roar of the coming wave.

To
his credit, Pacey reacted quickly.  “The longboat!” he called as he broke into
a run, not waiting to see if anyone had heard him.  “Get to the longboat!”  The
others didn’t hesitate.  Most of them
scrambled for the boat, seeing their
fate even as they ran to avoid it.  They would not reach the longboat in time.

Even
so, Pacey cut away from the pack and ducked into a hut, coming out with
Thurlun, who stumbled along with one arm over Pacey’s shoulder.  None of the
others looked back at them.

The
tree that had been One-ear’s post stood closer to the bridge than did the boat,
and One-ear, along with Ral, ran for it instead.  Ral sprinted past him as they
reached it, but there were no low branches — the only way up was shallow
notches carved into the trunk.  In his panic he tried to climb too fast and his
feet slipped out of the notches.  He did little more than peddle against the
side of the tree.

The
Ilven knew what to do.  They gathered at the two strands of trees, taking hold
of them and each other, making sure the wounded were secure against a trunk of
the buttress-root trees.  A handful of younger ones made it into the upper
branches of the largest one.  A few of them held Rolirra’s body, so that it
would not wash away.  It was like someone had prepared them for this.

Lerica
managed to find a seat in the branches of a sapling that could barely hold her
weight.  Kyric tied himself to it with his sash.  Aiyan surfaced as the wave
struck the huts, vaulting from the water and diving for a hold on the root of
the sapling.

The
wave was not nearly so great as the sound of it.  It had a gradation to it, as
if the levee hadn’t collapsed all at once.  Kyric had thought to see a wall of
churning foam.  Then he saw what the weight of water could do.

Without
a great deal of violence, the tables were broken and drawn beneath the wave. 
As they neared the longboat, the slavers had their legs torn from under them,
and they were carried along, some of them futilely trying to swim to the boat. 
The huts were torn down in one swipe, reduced to driftwood.  One-ear tried to
climb over Ral only to fall back into the oncoming wave, taking Ral with him. 
The longboat spun lazily in the flood until it was crushed against a tree. 
Kyric saw a man, Harlon maybe, impaled on that wreckage.  Thurlun and Pacey had
vanished beneath the wave.

Some
of the wave was dissipated by the lagoon.  Part of it crested the island of
peat where they all clung tightly, and Kyric knew at once that he could not have
kept his feet had he nothing to hold to.  The flood covered the entire island,
and then the island seemed to let go and it rose, bobbing as the rush of water
pushed it along.

The
bridge was gone.  Everything except the island was underwater now.  They
drifted across what had been the clear strip of land, where the huts had been,
and into the main current of the flooded river.  It carried them downstream at
a good pace, the island spinning very slowly as they went.  They could all let
go of their holds now, and Kyric walked the island’s edge looking for survivors
on the water.  He thought it one of the strangest moments in his life, riding
through the jungle on a floating island with a group of ex-slaves who all thought
they were dreaming.  At the moment, it did feel more like a dream.

It
was only a mile to the ocean.  They saw no one at all, and very little wreckage
from the camp.  A handful of forested islands separated the river from the sea,
dividing it into several channels.  The floating island of peat came to rest
against the shore of one of these, where lay a tangle of sticks and the remains
of a table.  The dingy they had used to lay the nets sat upside down on the
ground beyond, completely intact.

While
Aiyan searched the island for surviving slavers, Kyric use his machete to
fashion a crude paddle from part of the broken table.

Lerica
watched him.  “Going to paddle up the coast to the Dorigano estate?”

Kyric
shook his head.  “I’m going back to find my bow.”

“How
are you going to do that?  Everything has been washed away.”

“I
know how to find it.”

“Hmff,”
said Lerica, “and everyone thinks that
I’m
overconfident.”

He
sat down next to her.  “My bow means more to me than I know how to tell you. 
When I was growing up, it was more than the only thing I owned; it was the only
thing I
had
.  Archery was my only escape from the constant lessons and
labor, and loneliness, of convent life.  When the pressure seemed too much I could
practice with my bow.  I would go to an empty place where the world couldn’t
crash in on me.  It was my lifeline.”

Lerica
didn’t say anything and Kyric worked in silence, finishing the paddle and
righting the dingy.

Aiyan
came striding out of the woods.  “The Ilven are moving to the other side of the
island.  It’s better over there.”  He looked at the rough-cut paddle Kyric had
made.

“Going
to get your bow, are you?” he said casually, like there could be no other reason
for making it.  He tore another board from the ruined table.  “If you don’t
mind, I’ll go with you.”

The
floodwaters had receded little, and most the forest still lay underwater.  They
paddled along the tree line where the waters were quiet, avoiding the current
in the middle of the river.  Kyric didn’t realize that they had come to the
camp until he saw the sniper platforms where Pacey and One-ear had kept guard.

“We’ve
come too far,” he told Aiyan as he shipped his paddle.  He held out one hand, entering
the temple of the Unknowable, opening a door.  Something took hold of his hand
and swung his arm around.

“That
way,” he said.

Aiyan
paddled in that direction.  It wasn’t long before Kyric’s hand moved a few
inches to the side.  “There,” he said, pointing to where a nest of debris lay
tangled in the branches of a fallen silk-cotton.

And
it was there, half buried in a wad of thatch from the roof of a hut.  The bow
was scratched in a few places, and the string hung uselessly slack, but it was
in one piece.  Kyric gingerly lifted it from the water.

“Well
done,” said Aiyan, patting him on the back.

Aiyan
had them circle the flooded camp twice before they went back.  He said nothing,
but Kyric thought he must be searching for evidence of Thurlun’s fate.  By the
time they returned to the others, the Ilven had begun to build a funeral pyre
in one of the clearings.

Aiyan
cut their chains to make it easier for them.  A fair amount of deadwood lay
scattered across the island, and they gathered this while Kyric and Lerica cut
greenwood with their machetes.  They piled the firewood high.  The rune sisters
who had died at the convent were without family, and unlike most Aessians they
cremated their dead, so Kyric had seen it before.  He knew that it took a great
deal of fuel to reduce a body to ashes.

They
laid Rolirra’s body on the pyre that afternoon along with some wild flowers
they had found.  The Ilven sang a sweet little song, a tune that reminded Kyric
of those songs about young love that were so popular at home.  And that was
all.  Aiyan lighted the pyre with his sword, and soon it became a column of
flame billowing black smoke, the heat driving them back.

Later,
as the sun set, the three of them hauled the dingy away from the shore and set
their camp next to it.  Aiyan asked Lerica to stay with the Ilven while he and
Kyric went to Dorigano for help.  They would leave at first light.

“You
had better be back the next day,” Lerica answered.  “We only have a few pots of
water — the regular overnight ration.  Enough for everyone to have one good
drink in the morning and that’s it.”

Kyric
found a sandy place to lay as soon as the sun set.  The Ilven had made
campfires and torches, delighted to have light after sundown.  They sat up
talking as night came on, and he even heard a bit of laughter.  It felt strange
to hear it.

He closed his eyes, wishing hard for
black sleep.  He didn’t want to dream tonight, not in any way.  He let his mind
float on the sing-song speech of the Ilven.  Tonight he would rest.  Then he would
—

—
open his eyes to the warm light of morning.  He sat up, the iridescent grass of
the dream tree beneath him.

No
one was there.  Of course not, the Ilven were still awake, telling stories and
wondering what would happen next.  Then Rolirra stepped from behind the tree.

“You
came to see me,” she said.  “I hoped that you would.”

She
wore a wrapped dress of dyed cloth, and looked twenty years older, a few lines
forming around her eyes, her fingers a little more boney, a grey streak in her
hair, which she wore cut to the shoulder now.  Kyric wanted to go to her, but
he couldn’t move.

“How,”
he stammered, “how is it you are here?”

She
smiled.  “I only did what you did — I asked the dragon for a favor.  I couldn’t
watch you be killed.”

“And
after he saved me, he returned you as well?”

She
nodded.  “I did hold his bane in my hand.”

Kyric
chuckled.  “That had to be risky, changing the deal with the dragon.  I guess
you had nothing to lose.”

She
shook her head solemnly.  “I had you to lose.”

He
blinked hard, a lump forming in his throat.  “I’m sorry, Rolirra.  I am so
sorry.  You saved my life on this side of the dream, but I could not save yours
on the other side.  It’s my fault.  Lerica was right — I should have done
something sooner.”  It was hard to look at her, but he did it anyway.  “I swear
by all the powers that I will never again wait and do nothing while — “

She
held her fingers to his lips.  “Shhh.  Do not make such an oath — it is almost
always unwise.  And you did so very much on this side.  You traveled with me,
and we passed through wonders.  I would have been lost without you.”