Brechalon (13 page)

“
Yuah,” she called.

A moment later the dressing maid
arrived.

“
Yes, Miss?”

“
I’ll have my white and yellow day
dress.”

“
Yes Miss.”

“
My brother has gone.” Iolanthe
watched her dressing maid’s back stiffen.

“
Yes Miss?”

“
Did he stop to say
goodbye?”

“
No Miss.”

“
Pity. No doubt he
forgot.”

* * * * *

Zeah carried the mail from the morning post
into the servant’s hall and sat down with a sigh.

“
Well, he’s off to the train
station.”

“
Maybe Miss D will be less
distracted now,” offered Saba.

“
If anything, I think she could use
with a bit more distraction,” said Barrymore.

“
Barrymore, you have a letter,”
said Zeah, handing the younger man an envelope. “And you have
another letter from Mrs. Godwin, Mrs. C.”

“
Bless her heart,” said Mrs.
Colbshallow, opening her mail. “You know she’s gone half wobbly in
that great big house by herself.”

“
Mother, you say that every time
you get a letter from her,” said Saba, then under his breath.
“People are going to think you’re going all wobbly.”

“
My goodness!” Mrs. Colbshallow
exclaimed. “She says that Miss D has sold Mooreworth cottage and
the lands around it.”

“
Really,” said Zeah. “That’s a
surprise. The old master enjoyed that house.”

“
Probably why she’s selling it,”
said Saba, voicing what the older members of the staff would never
have put to tongue.

“
Still,” said Zeah. “The family
owns a dozen properties in the area. You don’t imagine she’s
planning to sell them all, do you?”

No one in the servant’s hall dared to make a
guess, not even Saba.

* * * * *

“
Kafira, help me!” pleaded Arthur
McTeague, as he hung his face over the railing and vomited once
again into the white-tipped waves of the open ocean.

“
Buck up, my friend,” said Augie,
slapping him on the back. “Kafira helps those who help
themselves.”

McTeague rolled over, hanging so precariously
over the railing that Augie felt compelled to grab him by the
collar and pull him back. Though he had been fine for the first two
days of the voyage from Birmisia, once they had hit a bit of rough
weather McTeague’s seasickness had surfaced. He hadn’t been able to
keep a meal down in almost a week.

“
Curse you, Dechantagne. How can
you look so pleasant?”

“
Well, I am pleasant, come to that.
You’ll be right as rain in um… well, a week or two. A week or two
in Mallontah and then home to Brechalon. And when we get to
Mallontah, I’ll make you forget all about it. I’ve still got that
check from my sister. Remember? Wine, women, good food.”

At the word food, McTeague turned around again
and spewed toward the ocean.

“
I didn’t think you could have any
more in you.”

“
I should have just stayed in
Birmisia.”

“
You liked it there?”

“
God no. I hated it, but at least I
didn’t puke my livers out there.”

“
I’m pretty sure I’m coming back,”
said Augie. “You could come with me.”

“
If I survive this trip, I’m never
setting foot on a ship again.”

* * * * *

The inside of the divination shop was dim and
smoky, but the room was rent by daylight, seemingly as bright as
lightning, as Wizard Smedley Bassington swept in from the street,
his rifle frock coat trailing behind him like a black cape. In two
long steps he was at the comfortable chair by the fireplace.
Sweeping the coat to one side, he sat down and placed first one
black hob nail boot and then the other on the corner of the
sorceress’s desk. He crossed his arms and stared, his horn-rimmed
glasses making his beady eyes seem even beadier.

“
Madame de la Rosa,” he
said.

The old sorceress behind the desk looked as
though her skin was made of dried apples. She was small and hunched
over, even sitting there. She raised a wrinkled hand and waved at
the strikingly beautiful olive-skinned woman behind her.

“
Amadea, get the wizard a cup of
tea.”

Bassington waved the girl off, though his gaze
carefully took in all of her curves.

“
So what do you know?” Though his
eyes were still on the young woman, his question was for her
mistress.

The old woman reached beneath the desk and
pulled out the perfectly round pearly white orb, precisely thirteen
and three fifths inches in diameter that Bassington had left in her
care two days prior. Given that Madame de la Rosa was a diviner,
one could have been excused for assuming that it was a crystal ball
of some type, but it wasn’t. From its complex swirly white, silver,
and grey appearance it might have seemed a pearl taken from some
gigantic oyster, but it wasn’t.

“
It is a dragon egg,” said Madame
de la Rosa.

“
Don’t waste my time.”

“
Watch your mouth, Wizard,” hissed
the young woman.

“
Don’t mind Bassington, Amadea,”
the old woman soothed. “You may leave us.”

“
What kind of dragon is it?” asked
the wizard, once the girl had left. “Gold? Silver? Flame? Red?
Green? Night?”

“
Is is a Mirlughth
Dragon.”

“
Never heard of it.”

“
Mirlughth is an ancient shiny
substance. That’s all I can tell you about it.” Madame de la Rosa
pressed her fingertips together creating a steeple. “There hasn’t
been a Mirlughth Dragon seen in millennia. This particular dragon
will be very powerful and important. He is destined to rule a vast
land and be worshipped as a god.”

“
Maybe we should destroy it
now.”

“
If you did, and I’m not sure you
could, but if you did, you would be destroying an important ally of
the Kingdom of Greater Brechalon.”

“
Oh? What else did you
see?”

“
The dragon will be raised and
protected. He has to be, you see. He has to be raised and protected
by someone powerful enough to be the surrogate parent to a dragon.
Do you know anyone like that?”

“
I know who you’re talking about,
but she’s in Schwarztogrube.”

“
She won’t stay there.”

A look of panic briefly crossed the wizard’s
face.

“
Don’t worry. She won’t get out for
some time. You have plenty of time to get out of the country.” Her
laugh was like seeds rattling inside a gourd. “I don’t blame you. I
wouldn’t want her after me either. But I know a magister we can
trust, who will sell her the egg. She’ll never know that either of
us had anything to do with it.”

“
How do you know she’ll even want a
dragon?” asked Bassington.

“
Come now.”

“
Alright, but Zurfina’s not going
to stay in Brechalon if… when she gets out. What if she takes it to
Freedonia or Mirsanna? We certainly don’t want either of them to
have a pet dragon.”

“
You don’t want that,” replied the
old sorceress. “I don’t care one way or the other. But there is an
easy answer. Do you know the name Dechantagne?”

“
Vaguely.”

“
The Dechantagne family is planning
to build a Brech colony in Mallon or some other distant place. A
Brech colony would be the best of both worlds. The dragon would be
safe from Brechalon’s enemies and Zurfina would be safe from you
and your masters.”

“
How do you know that she’ll go to
this new colony?”

“
I’ll put a bug in her ear. I feel
certain that when she hears about it, she’ll be very
interested.”

“
I’ll leave it to you then,” said
Bassington, getting to his feet. “And don’t even think about
playing any games. I know where that egg is at all times, and you
know what will happen to you if you cross me.”

“
I couldn’t if I wanted to,” said
Madame de la Rosa, her eyes looking at some distant object. “It’s
future, like my own, is foreordained.”

“
And keep an eye on that pretty
little apprentice,” he said as he got to his feet and headed for
the door. “She’s already steeling from you.”

“
I know.” The old woman cackled
again. “Oh, Wizard Bassington?”

“
Yes?”

“
Wouldn’t you like me to answer the
question that everyone else who comes to see me wants
answered?”

“
I’m not everyone else.” He
crinkled his forehead. “What is it?”

“
How you will die.”

“
Alright. Tell me.”

“
Wouldn’t it be ironic if you, who
have dealt such a blow to dragons by stealing their eggs, were to
be killed by a dragon?”

“
No. It would be, um… whatever the
opposite of ironic is.”

“
Well, this is how you will die.
You will be killed by a dragon.”

Bassington looked thoughtful. “Good,” he said,
and left.

* * * * *

“
Welcome to Schwarztogrube, Mr.
Halifax,” said Sergeant Halser, saluting.

“
Thank you. No need to salute. I’m
a civilian after all.”

Mr. Halifax held out a hand and Sergeant Halser
helped him out of the small boat and up onto the shaped stone dock
on the lowest section of the ancient castle. He was a short, rotund
man wearing a white suit, the shirt of which was still stained with
his lunch, eaten aboard the ship that had brought him. Halifax led
him up the stone stairway to the upper levels.

“
Can you explain to me what
happened? The Judge Advocate General was rather vague in his
description.”

“
As far as anyone can tell, it was
some kind of disease. It could have been brought here by one of the
guards returning from leave. They were all killed. Most of the
prisoners. A few of the boys. The boys might have been less
affected because of age or because they were all down near the
water. No one really knows.”

“
I have no doubt it was due to
mismanagement of some form or another,” opined Halifax. “That’s why
operations were taken away from the Ministry of War and were given
to us.”

They reached a fork in the
passageway.

“
The north wing is this way, Sir.
It’s where the offices and kitchen are and most of the
prisoners.”

“
How many prisoners are
there?”

“
There are twelve surviving
prisoners in the north wing; one in the south wing.”

“
Only one?”

“
Yes. Prisoner eighty nine was
segregated from the others. There’s no record of why. Perhaps it is
because she is the only woman.”

“
A woman? Here?” Halifax frowned
and licked his lips.

Halser nodded.

“
Take me to her cell.”

Halser led his new superior up another set of
stairs and down the stone hallway to a door with a single small,
barred window. Halifax had to stand on his tip-toes to peer
through. He could see a blond woman inside, dressed in rags,
sweeping the floor of the cell with a broom.

“
Open it.”

Halser unlocked the door and followed Halifax
inside. The woman immediately stopped sweeping and stood demurely
with her head bowed. The room was clean but Spartan. Only a single
window high up on the wall let in a square of sunlight. Halifax
glared accusingly at Halser.

“
It was worse, when I got here,
Sir. I had the cot brought in and a chamber pot, and a broom so
that she could clean the place up.”

“
It’s true, Sir. Sergeant Halser
has been very kind.”

“
Still, it seems poor treatment for
a young lady, regardless of your crimes. What is it you are here
for?”

“
I used magic without approval,
Sir. And when they tried to arrest me, I fought back. I may have
injured a wizard, Sir.”

Halifax’s expression said all too clearly that
he thought the injury or death of a wizard to be a relatively minor
offense. “Well, you can’t do any magic here, so we don’t have to
worry about that. And what is your name, my dear?”

“
Zurfina, Sir.”

“
Zurfina. Like the daughter of
Magnus the Great?”

“
Yes, Sir.” Zurfina
curtsied.

“
Is there anything you need right
now?”

“
If it’s not too much trouble, Sir,
I would appreciate a bucket of water so that I could bathe. And if
a needle and thread could be had, and some scraps of cloth so that
I could make myself something to wear.”

“
Sergeant Halser, see if you can
find a bucket of water and some soap for the young lady, and a
washrag too. You can leave the keys with me. I’ll lock
up.”

“
Yes, Sir.”

After the Sergeant had left, Halifax stepped
close to the woman and reaching out, brushed the hair from her
face.