Dragons of the Watch (9 page)

As Ellie followed with Tak, she craned her neck to survey the towering bookcases. Elaborate leather bindings covered most of the books. The rich colors with embossed lettering outnumbered the plainer jackets. The size varied from books she could almost handle to ones that might kill her if they fell from the shelves and landed on her. Suddenly she laughed.

Bealomondore stopped and turned around, tilting his head in a quizzical gesture.

Ellie smiled at him. “I just remembered what you said earlier—that once inside the library, I would realize the enormity of the problem.” She glanced around at the books. “Now I understand.”

Bealomondore laughed and gestured for her to follow. At that moment, she thought the tumanhofer made a good escort. Tak tugged, and she skipped a step as they maneuvered between the library stacks.

A black wrought-iron gate gave them entrance to the block-sized yard. Statues lurked among overgrown shrubbery. Ellie heard but couldn’t see a fountain among the bushes gone wild.

She let Tak go inside the fence and explored on her own. Bealomondore stayed close, and she appreciated his presence. Her little brothers would have chosen a place such as this to jump out and scare the wits out of her. She understood Old One’s aversion to being surprised.

When she came upon several sculptures, she shook her head in wonder. “There are so many statues.”

“From what I’ve seen,” said Bealomondore, “Rumbard City was a cultural center. There’s a museum, an opera house, and a university. All empty. The architecture of the city, and the numerous parks with fountains and statuary, indicates an interest in higher forms of civilization. The restaurants represent different ethnicities and speak of refinement and sophistication. And even the quality and variety of the books in the library signify a concern for philosophy and opportunities for broad education. This was by no means a backward society when it met its end.”

“What could have caused it?” Ellie climbed on a bench to sit down and studied her tumanhofer companion. “There’s no sign of death or destruction. It’s as if a portion of the populace just left, taking nothing with them and leaving behind one man and a crew of untamed children.”

“No,” said Bealomondore. “I’ve read enough to know that the city was separated from the outside world. The adults grew older and died. The children matured to the age of six and then remained that age.”

“That still leaves the questions why and how.”

“Correct. And I believe when we find those answers, the key to our escape will be close at hand.”

“I certainly hope so.”

They spent the afternoon spreading the books out on the carpet in the library and opening them one by one. Many contained lists and summaries of books Old One had read. Some of the books had Old One’s
concise opinions of their literary worth. Both Bealomondore and Ellie were confused by entries such as,
Imanderron is a worthy friend, one who begs my attention and calls me back for more musing over the worth of life and the injustice of time
.

Imanderron
turned out to be one of the books by the chair and clued them in to Old One’s habit of sometimes referring to favorite volumes as friends.

Ellie and Bealomondore each took a journal to peruse, hoping to cover more territory and find something that would help. Occasionally one would call to the other to share an interesting entry, but most of Old One’s accounts detailed tedious days with nothing relevant to their predicament. They discovered that the older journals had much more lively reports.

“He probably hadn’t yet succumbed to the melancholy of being alone,” said Ellie.

Bealomondore stood and stretched. “It’s time to collect our dinner.”

Ellie looked up to the domed skylight. “Oh my! It’s gotten dark.” She frowned and looked around. “Where is our light coming from?” The tops of the pillars glowed.

“Lightrocks. The library is almost too well lit at night. I have to find a dark corner to sleep in.”

“You sleep here?”

“Yes, it is the only place I know the grimy masses will not invade. If I oversleep in the morning, I won’t be awakened by grubby paws mauling my person.”

She looked again at the dark sky. “But we have to go out to fetch our meal?”

“Not to worry,” said Bealomondore in good humor. “The brats must be afraid of the dark. I’ve never seen one after the sun goes down.”

He came and offered her his arm. “Would you care to go for a stroll, Miss Ellicinderpart Clarenbessipawl?”

She smiled and nodded as she took his arm. She was hungry, and the prospect of dinner with Bealomondore delighted her. Bealomondore would also protect her from naughty children should this be the one time they ignored curfew. Tonight she could relax and enjoy the moment. Tomorrow she would put more thought into how to escape.

When they left the library, they found the pavement wet and raindrops clinging to leaves and flowers.

“The evening shower,” said Bealomondore. “Most nights—not all—a gentle rain washes the dust from the air and waters the plants.”

Tak attacked a bush, munching the vegetation, clean and sparkling with raindrops. Ellie looked up, watching wisps of clouds trail across the sky. The moon backlit the ethereal tresses, causing them to glow. She tilted her head and studied the moon.

“It’s bent,” she said.

Bealomondore stood beside her and followed her gaze.

“Yes, I’ve noticed that from time to time. As the evening progresses and the moon’s position changes, it will lose that odd shape.”

“What causes it?”

“The bottle effect.”

Ellie shifted her eyes to examine the tumanhofer’s face.

“I found it in a book in the library beside Old One’s chair. I think he has researched the phenomenon, and it is fortunate for me that he left the books out. Can you imagine climbing the bookshelves, locating a book, then trying to get it down?”

“The bottle effect?”

“Remember I said that Rumbard City is under some kind of wizardry?”

“Yes.”

“It would seem that whoever cast the spell put the city in a bottle. We’re looking at the moon through the glass, and when the moon is positioned so that it is beyond a corner, it looks bent.”

Ellie admitted to herself that at one time she had thought the glinting object she’d seen in the distance looked like a bottle, but the whole thing in reality was absurd.

She didn’t try to keep the sarcasm from her voice. “The rain comes through the neck of the bottle and spreads out to make a shower?” She arched her eyebrows. “Are the clouds inside or outside the bottle?”

He chose to answer her question without rancor. “The climate within the bottle is delivered in the same manner as the food—the right kind, in the right amount, at the right time.”

“But we don’t know who delivers the food and weather?”

He shook his head slowly. “No, we don’t. But we shall continue to explore the possibilities.”

The two tumanhofers and one goat strolled toward their destination. Ellie strained her ears, but heard nothing more than night sounds, mostly insects, with the occasional hoot of a nightflyer.

During the day, even in the safety of the library, she’d felt uneasy, as if at any moment the children might break in and ransack the solemn stillness and order of the building. Her other fear stemmed from the possibility of Old One suddenly stepping out from between the stacks. While he’d hinted that they might scare him to death, she was more concerned that he would frighten a year or two off her own life.

Nighttime in the city had a different feel, serene and pleasant. She thought of all the six-year-olds, tucked in bed and sleeping soundly.

“Where are they?” she asked.

“Who?”

“The children.”

“In bed.”

“But where?”

Bealomondore looked around as if the buildings would give him a clue. “I don’t know.”

“You’ve never looked for them?”

He shrugged, furrowed his brow, and shook his head. “Why should I?”

“So they are probably sleeping in boxes, or on the floor, or someplace totally unsuitable.”

“As long as they are asleep, what does it matter?”

“It does matter. Children should have their hands and faces washed, if not a whole bath. They should have a good-night story and be tucked into a cozy bed. They should have a kiss on the cheek or forehead and someone to smile at them. The last thing they see at night should be the happy face of someone who loves them.”

“These children would bite the hand that tucked them in.”

“Maybe not.” She paused as they walked past several shops. “Perhaps they might bite the first night or two, but I bet they’d like being loved.”

Tak trotted ahead and reached the fountain first. He drank and then, with water dripping from his beard, went to investigate the box on the butcher’s stoop.

For dinner they had hot bowls of stew, a loaf of buttered bread, and two peaches. They sat by the fountain to eat, then cleaned up by returning things to the box.

“Shall we go home by a different route?” asked Bealomondore. “I thought we could go by the town circle and collect your carpetbag if it is still sailing the turbulent sea around the stone ladies.”

“And you’re sure the children won’t be lying in wait?”

“Positive.”

Ellie called Tak to leave the bush he was chewing on and come with them. They traveled a street she didn’t think she had seen during her frantic route that day. She and Tak had crisscrossed much of the inner city during their attempts to elude the children that morning. Bealomondore’s guidance brought them back to the central fountain after only a ten-minute walk.

The moon was no longer bent, and lightrocks glowed from the tops of lampposts. Along the way, they picked up a few of her discarded garments. She hoped to find enough garments to change her clothes when they reached the library.

They came to the empty circle. Ellie sighed her relief. She trusted her tumanhofer companion more and more as she grew to know him, but the lengthy chase that had begun her day had her wary of running into the hunters.

Her valise floated low, having taken on water. Bealomondore took off his shoes and socks, rolled up his trousers, and waded in to rescue the listing ship. He then climbed several of the statues to retrieve her shoes, a bonnet, and her lacy slip.

As he returned her slip, she blushed in the moonlight and dropped her chin to avoid his eyes. He laughed and made a sweeping bow. “I consider this to be the sail to the ship, milady, nothing more.”

She wrapped her clothes in one skirt to make an easily carried bundle. None of her new clothes would ever be the same, but at least she’d have a change of clothes again. She carried the clothing while Bealomondore held the carpetbag away from his side to prevent the drips from staining his trousers.

Feeling much better about Rumbard City, Bealomondore, and
their chances of finding an escape, Ellie walked happily beside her escort as they made their way back to the library.

Tak wandered ahead of them, poking his nose into whatever interested him and nibbling whatever grew from the flower boxes. Bealomondore stopped at a corner.

He motioned toward Tak, who had gone on in a straight line.

“We turn here.”

“Tak,” Ellie called. “Come back. We’re going this way.”

The goat turned his head and started back, then stopped. He looked at them and then down an alley.

“This way,” Ellie insisted.

Tak shook his head so that the hair on his whole body shimmied in the moonlight, then took off down the side alley.

Ellie turned to look at Bealomondore with a shrug. “I’m sorry. But I can’t leave him out here. When the children come out tomorrow, they would love to catch the ‘dog.’ ”

“I understand.” He put her bag down and took her bundle to place next to it. “We’ll leave these here. It’ll be easier to give chase without any encumbrances.”

The goat let out a plaintive “Maa!”

“He sounds upset,” said Ellie.

They hurried to the point where Tak had disappeared around a corner. Tak stood just a few feet into the alley. At his feet, a pile of clothing lay in the shadow of the building. The moonlight touched the white hair of the goat and part of the cloth.