Dragons of War (9 page)

Sausann of the Temple had her hand up.

"May I say something, a word of caution perhaps?"

Again the emperor smiled graciously, "Of course, Sausann, of course."

"May I suggest once more that we consider sending a smaller fleet than this. Six great ships, three frigates plus other smaller vessels. This is a great force that we risk."

"We must take risks to succeed, Sausann," said the emperor.

"This is understood, Your Majesty, but our forces are stretched thin as they are. We cannot afford any great losses."

"Which is one good reason for sending a sufficiently large fleet," the emperor responded. "Admiral, please, your comments again."

Cranx tugged briefly on his white beard.

"Stands to reason, Lady, if we send six white ships with some frigates for ranging around them, then no force in the world can challenge them, or even catch up to them. They will overawe any opposition, and thus more effectively extinguish any hostility before it can be expressed."

Sausann listened. "And still we do risk them, do we not? There may be some quite unknown danger waiting for them. Six great ships could be lost."

Cranx tugged on his beard some more. "Dear Lady, what danger can there be to a well-crewed white ship built in Cunfshon yards? They can outsail anything else on the ocean."

"A storm, a waterspout, who knows what perils there might be?"

"Dear Lady of the Temple, know you that the white ships have faced and survived every peril of the oceans, and have done so for many years."

"Hear, hear, Admiral, a good point I think," said the emperor.

"And yet ships have been lost," said Sausann stubbornly.

Pascal nodded. "Of course, Sausann, of course, but our ships have plied the oceans of the world for centuries now, and our losses have been few and far between in recent decades."

"Your Majesty." It was Lessis, raising her hand.

"Ah, the Lady in Grey, yes, please tell us your thought." The emperor beheld his greatest ally on the council. Now he could relax and let Lessis sway the conservatives on the council.

However, Lessis's words were a complete surprise, and not only to the emperor.

"For once I must agree with Sausann," she said, and Sausann's eyebrows shot up. "At this moment it may not be the wisest thing to give up the use of six white ships. The voyage to Czardha should be made, of course, but perhaps we must wait another year to send such a large force. Perhaps for now, we should send only a single ship, or a pair of frigates, no more."

The emperor's brows knitted.

"But," he began, "I thought we were all agreed that this year was to be the year?"

"Your Majesty, we in the Office of Unusual Insight have voiced our concern that the great enemy prepares some stroke against us. I know that we have no positive evidence, except the word concerning the enlargement of the breeding pens in Axoxo. However, with that concern in mind, it would be dangerous to weaken in any way our ability to reinforce the Argonath in the event of an emergency in the coming campaign season."

"What are you suggesting though? That all commerce come to a halt? That we hold white ships here in harbor in case they are needed to transport a legion?"

Lessis never employed witchcraft in her dealings with Emperor Pascal. She knew how sensitized he was to it. If she tried, he would never forgive her and their relationship would be forever changed for the worse. But now she wished that she could, because she feared his resistance. Of course she still refrained, she could not use any spell with an audience of Great Witches and not have them know at once what she did. It was forbidden.

"Your Majesty, we have examined the schedules of the larger white ships, and we are sure there will be sufficient bottoms to carry a legion in an emergency. But not if we send six of them halfway around the world."

"But what of our grand strategy? Now is the time to cement our relations with the nations of Czardha. They are eager for our technologies, our grain, our manufactured goods. With a fleet visit, we can bring them all in at once and form a powerful alliance. With that we can threaten Padmasa from either side of the continent. To send but a couple of ships would be like moving a pawn in timidity, when instead a bishop should be sent surging into the play."

"Indeed, an apt comparison, Your Majesty," said Petruda, who was alarmed at the thought of all her work on organizing the great fleet being destroyed because of some hunch from the Office of Unusual Insight. The Shipping Committee would be devastated.

The emperor compressed his lips, trying not to show obvious anger. He was committed to the great fleet to Czardha. It was his crowning ambition. He saw it as the one sure way to build an alliance that would be able to withstand the strength of Padmasa.

"My friends and advisers, we must consider our strategic goal. An alliance with the Czardhan nations will allow us to strengthen them and to stiffen their resistance to the power that works upon them. They will shut their doors to the enemy.

"We must remember that as they are now, they are in a fundamentally weak position for the coming struggle. They are completely at odds with each other over minor matters, ancestral struggles. But we have already our alliance with Lenkeiseen, we have worked to prepare for this for years. Everything is ripe. Should we not act? Should we not move our bishop?"

"Indeed," said Petruda, "the emperor is absolutely correct. Furthermore, we know that all the major parties in Anson and in the Trucial States are eager to improve trade relations. They have many things that we are interested in. Fine textiles, wine, leather work, many things that they hope to sell to us."

The emperor took over. "While we sell them our excess grain from Kenor, our olive oil from Kadein, and a hundred technologies that they have yet to master. With Cunfshon engineering skills, they will be able to rapidly improve their economies and thus improve their ability to withstand Padmasa." The emperor was alight with the fire of his vision.

"Your Majesty, we of the Office of Unusual Insight concur with your strategy. Our difficulty is that we lack effective intelligence on our enemy's intentions at this moment."

"Your Majesty," said Ribela. They all looked up. Ribela rarely spoke in such council meetings. Usually she agreed with Lessis and she let Lessis do all the talking, but sometimes she had radically different ideas.

"We do have intelligence, of a sort, and it leads me to foreboding. I think that Lessis's interpretation of the current situation is quite probably correct, in which case we must err on the side of caution and preparedness. Consider first, we have no intelligence operation from beyond the White Bones Mountains at this time. Following a disaster for our network of agents in Axoxo last year, we have lost our network in Padmasa as well. We know that the enemy made a massive, intensive counterespionage effort. That is what led to his breakthroughs into our networks. He put out extraordinary effort. Secondly, we had information that the breeding program in Axoxo was to be increased enormously. Third, we know that thousands of women were abducted from Ourdh last year. Fourth, we have nullified his plan for an invasion in concert with the Teetol. We have overthrown the Doom in Tummuz Orgmeen. We have checked his effort in Ourdh. We have hurt him badly."

"And if our fleet proceeds to Czardha, we will hurt him even worse," said the emperor with a smile. "In ten years, we could strengthen the Czardhans to the point where we could imagine coordinating an assault on the enemy."

Sausann and Valembre had been silenced by this unexpected turn. Lessis was on their side for once, and so was the Queen of Mice. Complete solidarity among the witches.

The men would soon start exchanging looks if this went on!

"We have hurt the enemy, Your Majesty, but we have not seriously damaged his ability to make war. We have infuriated him, however. I can inform you that the barriers on the higher planes that surround Padmasa have been more intense than anything I have ever experienced before. They have outdone themselves in this. I sense that they direct their rage against us. This is my fifth concern. Taken altogether, they indicate to me that the Masters prepare a massive stroke against us. We must mobilize to meet it."

"Mobilize?" muttered Sausann. "But that will cost a fortune."

"A fortune, indeed," said Garsk of the Treasury.

"If we disappoint our friends in Czardha, we will be set back for years. The loss of trust," said Pertruda.

Lessis sighed to herself. Of all known governing systems on Ryetelth, the Empire of the Rose was the most effective. A benevolent autocracy, balanced by systems designed to protect the populace and keep them strong in the face of adversity. And yet there were times when even this fine imperial system could not be made to work properly.

"If I may say something," she said. She was not heard.

Ribela raised a hand. Voices fell silent.

"My colleague wishes to speak."

Lessis leveled her grey eyes upon the emperor.

"We must at least convey an official warning to the Argonathi. In particular to Kadein."

"They have been warned," said the emperor. "You asked me to do that six months ago, and it was done. They have taken little heed. They trust their own intelligence, they say. They see no unusual activity along the White Bones."

"But they do not scout beyond the mountains, no one does. We cannot say what the enemy is preparing other than to guess that it will be a great army. We must get them to prepare themselves."

Pascal Iturgio sighed and spread his hands. The complexity of nudging the powerful Kadeini merchant class into accepting the need for war preparations and restrictions on trade as a result was a task that could try the patience of ten good men, and he was just a single emperor, with little practical power over the merchants of Kadein. Kadein had grown so great and powerful that the Kadeini had begun to think of themselves as separate from the empire in some degree. There was talk of independence. Another reason to send the great fleet to Czardha as soon as possible was to ensure that the subsequent trade boom would be overseen from Andiquant and not from Kadein.

"All right," he said with a quiet note of firmness. "I take note of Lessis's concern. It will be investigated. We will press the Kadeini to improve their preparedness. But I will not cancel the great fleet yet. It will not sail for another month anyway, and that gives us a little time to think all these matters through more carefully." He spread his hands over the table palms down.

Lessis bowed her head, as did everyone else. The emperor had given them his decision. Inwardly, Lessis uttered a small prayer of thanks to the Mother.

The plotters were a diverse group, three dragons and one dragonboy. They gathered in a remote corner of Fort Dalhousie near the southern wall, where firewood was stored and chopped. All was quiet now among the stacked wood. The chopping crew had just finished work and were busy hauling away two cords of split oak and ash, enough to cook the evening meal for the legion and its dragons and keep kettles boiling through the night.

The Purple Green and Bazil had been joined by Vlok, another leatherback, who had been with them through the campaign in Ourdh in the previous year. Vlok had brought his dragonboy. Bazil and the Purple Green were certain that this dragonboy, Swane of Revenant, was the right choice for the task at hand.

"He is bigger than the rest. Bigger than Relkin."

"He is stupid, too," replied the Purple Green.

"Hey," muttered Swane.

"No, my wild friend," said Bazil, "not stupid. No stupid dragonboy lives this long." Swane grinned at this.

"He is, however, foolish. Inclined to jump into things without thinking them through." Swane's grin disappeared.

"Mmm," the Purple Green rubbed his long jaw and considered these words carefully. "Humans are more complex than I ever imagined," he said.

"You are surely correct, since once you thought of men as not much more than food."

"That is true."

Vlok now spoke up for his tender. "Boy Swane is good with pick and clippers, I have no complaints."

Bazil snorted softly but refrained from comment. Both Baz and the Purple Green had had occasion to remark on Vlok's intellectual abilities before.

"So," said the Purple Green, leaning down to face Swane, "you will help us? Vlok has explained what we have to do?"

"Yeah, sure," said Swane. "I know Relkin will probably hate me for a while, but later he'll understand that we're doing this to help him. He'd do it for us if he had to."

Swane was getting a little bright-eyed. He'd come to feel like a brother to Relkin after the campaign in Ourdh and the climactic battle in the pit of the serpent god in ancient Dzu. He, like all the other dragonboys in the 109th, was determined that Relkin should not be hanged.

The dragons conversed among themselves briefly in dragon speech. Bazil and the Purple Green had to explain to Vlok that he could not accompany them. He had a career left in the legions. But the broketail and the wild dragon were done for, unless they saved the boy Relkin.

Vlok had to struggle with all this. He very much wanted to go with them. Being left behind in Fort Dalhousie to face Digal Turrent's wrath paled in comparison to running wild in the forest of Tunina and consorting with wild dragonesses.

Somewhere he had gained the idea that there was more than one dragoness out there in the dark woods across the river Argo. It was a pleasant belief, even if based on no facts at all, and Vlok was loath to let it go. Eventually, however, Bazil succeeded in getting Vlok to accept that he could not come with them, that he had to stay and uphold the honor of the 109th fighting dragons.

At length they turned to Swane, who had been struggling to understand what was going on. Swane's grasp of dragon speech was not as good as that of some dragonboys. Gradually he had come to realize that Vlok was being persuaded to remain behind. Swane felt a shot of relief. Helping Relkin to escape was one thing. Having one's own dragon running off into the woods was another.