The Rise and Fall of a Dragon King (8 page)

"And if it's my danger, and only mine, what then, Pavek?"

Once again, Pavek's mind cleared, like still water on a windless day. Short of slaying the man,
there was no way for Hamanu to extract an answer to his question from Pavek's thoughts. Murder was
easy; lowering his hand, letting Pavek rise unsteadily to his feet and leave the chamber alive—that was
the hardest thing Hamanu had done in a generation.

Windreaver! Hamanu cast the name into the netherworld along with Gallard's parchment.
Windreaver! Now!

He sat down on the marble bench, which, like the stone bench in his cloister, was strong enough
to support his true weight and proportions. Water flowed again over the boulder and down the walls.
The Lion-King buried his grotesque face in his malformed hands and tried not to think, or plan, or dread
until the air quickened, and the troll appeared.

"I hear, and I obey," Windreaver said. "I am the doomed servant of a doomed fool."

Hamanu didn't rise to the bait. "Did you search the Nibenese camp?"

"Of course. Four hundred ugly women surrounded by four thousand uglier men."

"Nothing more?" Hamanu betrayed nothing of his suspicions, his anger.

"Nothing, O Mighty One. Enlighten me, O Mighty One: What do you think I should have found?"

"This!" Hamanu brandished the remnant of the obsidian shard. It had shrunk to a fraction of its
former size, and the glass was pitted with soot. The troll leapt back, as if he still had life and substance.

"It was not there," Windreaver insisted, no longer insolent. "I would have known—"

"Nonsense!" Hamanu hurled the shard at his minion; it vanished at the top of its arc, swallowed
by the Gray. "You've grown deaf and blind, Windreaver—worse, you've grown careless."

"Never... not where he's concerned. I'd know the War-Bringer's scent anywhere."

Hamanu said nothing, merely waited for the troll to hear own his folly and self-deception.
Windreaver's hatred for the War-Bringer was greater than his hatred for the Troll-Scorcher but he hadn't
sensed the shard before Hamanu revealed it. He'd dreamed of watching the champions destroy each
other, and his dreams had, indeed, left him careless.

"Is Rajaat free?" the troll asked. "The Dark Lens—it's where the Tyrian sorceress put it five years
ago, isn't it? No one's stolen it, have they? The templars—? The medallions—?"
"Still work," Hamanu assured him. Without the Dark Lens, the champions could not channel
magic to their templars. "That shard didn't come from the Dark Lens."

"I don't know, Windreaver—but you'll tell me, when you come back from Ur Draxa."

He expected an argument: Borys's demolished stronghold was a long way away and dangerous,
even for a disembodied spirit. But Windreaver was gone before Hamanu finished speaking.

A pair of silvery rings surrounded the golden face of Guthay, Athas's larger moon, as it neared its
zenith in Urik's midnight sky. It was the fourth night in a row that Guthay had worn her crowns, and
though Hamanu was alone in his cloister, he knew he wasn't the only man staring at the sky. One more
beringed night, and farmers throughout his domain would go down to the parched gullies that ran around
and through their fields. They'd inspect each irrigation gate. They'd dig out the silt and make repairs as
necessary. Later, they'd meet with their neighbors and draw a numbered pebble out of a sacred urn to
determine the order in which the fields received their water.

The lottery was necessary because no one—not even the immortal Lion-King—could predict
how long the gullies would seethe with dark, fertile water from the distant mountains. Hamanu couldn't
even say for certain that the gullies would fill. A score of times during the last thirteen ages, the flood
hadn't come.

All Hamanu knew was what he'd learned from his mother and father long, long ago. When
Guthay wore her gossamer crowns for five nights running, it was time to prepare the fields for himali, and
the hardy grains, mise and gorm that had sustained the heartland since the rains stopped falling with any
regularity. And once the dry fields were planted with seeds more precious than gold or steel, it was time
to pray. The gullies would fill within twenty days, or they did not fill at all.

The folk of Urik prayed to their immortal, living god and entreated him with offerings. Already a
steady trickle of farmers—nobles, free-peasants, and slaves alike—made their way to the palace gate to
offer him a handful of grain. Sometimes the grain was knotted in a tattered rag, other times boxed in a
carved-bone casket or sealed in an enameled amphora. Regardless of the package, Hamanu's templars
emptied the grain into a huge, inix-hide sack. When the water came, Hamanu would sling the sack over
his shoulder and, in the guise of the glorious Lion-King, he'd sow four fields, one to the east of the city
walls, the others in the north, the west, and the south.

Tradition, which Hamanu didn't encourage, held that the gift-grain toward the bottom of me
sack—the grain that the Lion-King had received first and sowed last—was lucky grain, which presaged
great bounty for the farmer who'd donated it. The mortal mind being what it was, Urikite farmers didn't
wait for Guthay's fifth ringed night before they brought their gift-grain to the palace. They took the moon
on faith and brought their grain early, despite knowing that if the rings did not last for the full five nights,
the sack would be emptied, and any grain it had held would be burned.

None of this surprised Hamanu. He'd been one of them once. He knew that all farmers were men
of faith and gamblers in their hearts. They gambled every time they poked a seed in the ground. They
regarded the gift-grain as a faithful way of evening their odds.

It was an act of faith, as well, for Hamanu, the farmer's son, when he strode barefooted through
the fields, scattering the gift-grain. But a man who let himself be worshiped as a god could have faith only
in himself. He could never be seen with his head bowed in doubt or prayer. This year, with the
Shadow-King's armies dancing along Urik's borders and a pitted remnant of the first sorcerer's magic still
fresh in memory, Hamanu's doubts were especially strong. He'd pray if he knew the name of a god
who'd listen.

The longer he delayed summoning the second and third army levies, the greater the chance that
Urik's enemies would attack. If he summoned his citizen soldiers too soon, the fields wouldn't get sown,
the grain couldn't grow, and, win or lose on the battlefield, there'd be no High Sun harvest. And if the
waters didn't come at all...

For five years, I fought beside Jikkana in the army of Myron Troll-Scorcher. There was nothing
about her that reminded me of Dorean or Deche, which is probably why I stayed so long. She was a
hard and homely creature who cursed and swore and drank too much whenever she had the opportunity.
I never knew if in me she saw the son she'd never had or simply another farm boy with fire in his gut, who
would finish the brawls she started.

Jikkana taught me human script and how to fight with a knife or a club, with my teeth, fists or my
feet—or whatever else was available. She had a temperament like broken glass, and sooner or later, she
fought with everyone, me included. In all the years she marched with the Troll-Scorcher's army, though,
she came no closer to fighting trolls than that day I'd met her in Deche.

As the sun descended through the Year of Priest's Fury, two decades' dissipation in the
Troll-Scorcher's army caught up with Jikkana. Her lanky muscles melted like fat in the fire. Leathery flesh
hung in folds from her arms and chin. She coughed all night and spat out bloody bits of lung when
morning came. I carried both kits as we marched and foraged for herbs that might restore her, but it
made no difference. One afternoon, she collapsed by the side of the road.

I offered to carry her along with her kit.

"Don't be a fool, Manu," she answered me, adding a curse and a cough at the end. "I've gone as
far as I can go, farther than I'd've gone without you. No farther, boy. Let's get it over with."

Jikkana handed me her knife. I made the cut she wanted. I'd wrung bird necks when I helped
Mother prepare supper, and I'd held the ropes while Father slaughtered culls from our herd. I was no
stranger to death, but as men measure such things, Jikkana's death marked the first time I'd killed. Life's
light faded quickly from her eyes; she didn't suffer. I held her corpse until it had cooled and stiffened.
Then I carried her to that night's camp. Jikkana had been the first teacher in my life after Deche, and I
paid for what we drank as we sang her spirit off through the night. When the sky began to brighten, I dug
her a grave and piled stones atop it to keep the vermin from digging her up for supper.

The long shadows of dawn bound me to her grave.

I expected to weep, but my tears never flowed. There were none inside me. I had wept in terror
when Deche had been destroyed, but I hadn't wept for Dorean. I couldn't weep for anyone else.

I scratched Jikkana's name onto a shoulder bone, forming the letters the way she'd taught me,
then I shoved the narrow end among the rocks. I'd scratched a few words as well on the underside, using
the trollish script I'd learned in the ruins above Deche, which none of my companions could read.
Stretching the truth a bit, I wrote that Jikkana was an honorable woman and that she'd never laid hands
on a troll, which was true enough and might give the trolls a moment's pause before they desecrated her
grave.

There were trolls nearby. There were always trolls nearby in those years. After a generation of
retreat, Windreaver had brought his army back into human-held land. Deche was among the first of the
human villages that fell to Windreaver's wrath those five years while I marched beside Jikkana. We never
caught up the trolls that killed Dorean and my family, though we'd followed them for almost a year and
saw more examples of their handiwork than I had the heart to count.

But there were trolls nearby, and we'd learn to track them. We made reports to the
Troll-Scorcher or his officers when they rode their rounds.

We never fought trolls. Never. Neither Jikkana nor Bult, the yellow-haired man who led our
band, nor any of the veterans had a notion how to fight our gray-skinned enemies. That's how far the
Troll-Scorcher's army had sunk in the two ages since its founding.
Bult had told the truth that day in Deche. The Troll-Scorcher's army was divided into bands that
tracked trolls as they despoiled the heartland. We tracked them, and we told the officers where they
were. When it pleased him, if it pleased him, Myron of Yoram would come to kill them.

Oh, he was an imposing figure—our champion, Myron of Yoram, dressed in riding silks,
watching us parade across the choking dust from the back of his half-tamed erdland. He had magic, no
doubt of that.

Every year he'd haul a few trolls to the muster. He'd truss them up and scorch them good, right in
front of us. Flames would leap out of troll eyes and ears, out of their mouths when they screamed. Our
champion would do the same with any poor human sod who'd earned his wrath—usually by killing a troll
without permission.

We were impressed by what Myron of Yoram did to the trolls, but it was what he could
do—would do—to us that had kept the army in line for generation after human generation.

Things were beginning to change around the time that Jikkana died. Windreaver had measured
his enemy well and divided the trolls into bands that took ruthless advantage of the orders Myron of
Yoram had given us. Some human bands were deserting and more were fighting back, which meant that
the loyal bands—and Bult was nothing if not loyal to his pay—hunted humans more often than they
hunted trolls.

Everyone had to be careful. Everyone had to post guards at night and sleep with a weapon or
two beneath the blankets. Bult's band was no exception, and I pulled my share of nights on the picket
before Jikkana died. Afterward, I took the picket by choice, one night in four—as often as a man could
stay awake all night and still keep the pace. I wanted to be alone. Jikkana's death had raised the specter
of Deche and Dorean in my dreams. I didn't want to close my eyes or sleep. Hunting trolls—following
their bands and hoping the Troll-Scorcher would do us the honor of killing them— wasn't enough. I
wanted my own vengeance.

I wanted to kill trolls with my own weapons, my own hands.

I didn't have long to wait.

It was Nadir-Night of Priest's Fury, another year half-gone to memory, and the troll-hunters of
Bult's band celebrated the holiday as they celebrated everything: they drank until they couldn't stand, then
lay on their bellies and drank some more, until they'd all passed out around the fire. I thought about
leaving. Bult and the rest were the dregs of humanity, and they were the only folk who knew my name. In
those days, with trolls and deserters both prowling, a solitary man's life wasn't worth much. I took a
picket brand from the fire, wrapped the smoldering tip in oilcloth, and, with my blanket and club tucked
under my arm, climbed a nearby hill to keep watch.

The trolls knew our human holidays and our human habits; we'd all lived together peacefully until
the wars started. If I'd been a troll, I'd've taken advantage of Nadir-Night, so I was expecting trouble
and was ready for it when I heard straw crunching beneath big, heavy feet. Our picket drill was simple,
and I knew it well: at the first sound I was supposed to tear the cloth off my brand, then wave it in the air.
The flames would alert our band and blind the trolls, whose night vision was better than ours, but
vulnerable to sudden flashes of bright light. Once I'd waved my picket brand, though, my orders were to
run like wind-whipped fire. The whole band would be running, too—More orders from Myron of
Yoram.

I obeyed the first part of my orders, slashing the air to blind whatever was coming up my hill, but
Bult and the others weren't going to run anywhere this Nadir-Night. And neither was I. Switching the
torch to my off-weapon hand, I picked up a flint-headed club with a short, sharpened hook on one side
of the flint and a chiseled knob on the other. I shouted, "Here I am!" and made the guttural sounds I'd
been told were insults in the troll language.

The heavy-footed tread got louder, and a big chunk of sky grew darker as the troll hove into
view. Like me, he was armed with a stone club, though its haft was thicker than my wrist, and the stone
lashed to its tip was as large as my head. He shouted something I didn't understand while he brandished
that club over me. I shouted something I can't remember. Then his arm drew back for a killing strike.

I'd get one chance, one swing. To make the most of it, I tossed the torch aside and put both
hands on the shaft of my club. Against another human, the flint knob would have been the best choice: a
human could stun a man of his own race with the knob, men take him apart with the hook. But against a
thick-skinned troll, it was all or nothing. I spun the shaft as I lunged at my enemy and swung with the
hook leading.

My arm bones jammed my shoulders when the flint struck flesh. I nearly lost my grip. Nearly.
Somehow I kept my hands where they belonged as hook went in up to the leather thong that lashed the
stone to the shaft. The troll made a sound like a baby crying. His club grazed my arm as he toppled. He
was dead before he struck the ground.

Staggering, because my heart suddenly refused to beat and my lungs forgot to breathe, I dropped
to one knee and savored my victory by starlight. But the thoughts that rang in my mind were: What was
his name? Did he leave anyone behind who would remember his name? The army Windreaver had
loosed in the heartland wasn't made of outcasts, orphans and rootless veterans, like us. The trolls were
totally committed to their cause. The bands we trailed were families with fathers and grandfathers,
mothers and children.

I'd never know my troll's name or what had brought him, alone, to my hill, his death. Perhaps
he'd gotten lost in the night. Perhaps he'd been chasing his own dreams of vengeful glory. But it was a
safe bet that he wasn't the only troll in walking distance, and that some other troll was going to come
looking for him.

Even if there weren't any other trolls nearby to put the tang of danger in my victory and cut short
my celebration, the torch I'd tossed aside had set the straw-grass ablaze.

Fire was an enemy I'd known as long as I'd lived. Grabbing my blanket, I swung and stomped
those flames until they were gone and every ember was dark. Then, on my hands and knees, I raked the
hot ash with my fingers until it was as cool as the corpse behind me. Dawn was coming when I rested
and drained the last drops from my water-skin.