Dragon's Ring (40 page)

"It's very smart! No, Díleas, it's not too tight. I can get two fingers under it. It looks beautiful on you, boy," she cooed and cuddled him.

"Good. And here is a chain that'll do for a leash. Use it as a belt in the meantime. It's got one of those glow-baubles on it too, to match."

"Thank you, Finn." She beamed and glowed more brightly than the microscopic pieces of hell-flame.

"It's time, however, for us to put aside our gleeman motley, Anghared," he said. "Before you panic, you are still my apprentice, and still to dress as a boy. Just to follow a slightly different trade for now."

She smiled. "I've been a gleeman, a honey-bucketer on a nightsoil cart, an arsonist's assistant, and even a thief. I am getting used to changes and strangeness, Finn. Just not to my name. I am your Scrap."

"I shall do my best, Scrap," he said seriously, and then his quizzical self reasserted itself. "Strictly speaking is theft from a thief theft? And too often taxation is little more than theft and extortion with menaces. But anyway, the centaurs are altogether too serious for gleemen. However, right now they are in dire need of water. We're water diviners. I have suitable garments in my pack."

"No wonder it weighed so much!" said Meb.

"That was the cast-iron skillet. But nothing else cooks mushrooms quite as well."

"I'd like to do that again one day," she said, her face intent. "With Díleas. I am sure he'd make a champion mushroom finder."

"For heaven's sake don't daydream about it. Your magic works best then. Anyway, it is winter now. Not mushroom time," said Finn.

"My magic?"

"Yes," said Finn, looking at her with a half-smile. "It must have occurred to you by now, Scrap, that you cause some completely unnatural things to happen. I have to start teaching you, but I am not sure how human magic works."

She snorted. "I'm as magical as Díleas, Finn."

Fionn had been working on the best way to teach her for a while, and had come no closer. Suddenly he was struck by a moment of pure genius. He could use the gift of the dvergar to his advantage. "That's a pity," he said. "It's a much needed skill in my apprentice. Something they must be good at and careful with too."

She wanted that. "But . . . but humans can't do magic," she said, doubtfully.

"Not humans from Tasmarin, no. The ability is in the blood and rare at that normally. The dragons here made sure that they could not be challenged by it. But as I have said, you came from further afield. I am just not sure where or how. But if you try, you will find that you can work magics," said Fionn, using his most matter-of-fact tone to keep her calm and collected.

"I was cast ashore on the beach as a baby. So in one way I don't know where I came from, Finn. But it can't be that far. Babies die quite easily if they're cold. I saw a dead baby . . ." She swallowed. "He was very small. And even I nearly died in the sea, grown up."

In the complex mechanisms of Fionn's mind several pieces of the mystery of just where she'd come from became clearer. The merrows said that she could not drown. They would know. He'd wager a large sum of his own gold that she had arrived here almost exactly when the first tower had fallen. There would have been a little balancing of power and energy then, and one of the imbalances was in the earth-magics.

Meb found the idea of working magic terrifying . . . and compellingly fascinating. And, well, she had been cast up on the beach as a baby. Maybe from some place where magic was still common among humans? Her life had got stranger and stranger, ever since she'd met Finn. But surely that was because he was strange? "Um. What should I try?"

"Make a coin appear," said Fionn.

She shrugged. Clapped her hands together. Held out a copper penny. "I can already make coins appear. But that's not magic. It's just a gleeman thing. They do that."

"Yes. But in the case of most gleemen, they actually have the coin first. They don't just make it appear."

"Oh. I thought . . . well, I suppose I never did think. I just saw you do it. So I tried it and it worked."

Fionn took the coin from her. Somewhere a dead man's eye was missing a penny . . . He made it vanish.

"Is that magic?" he asked.

She nodded. "I think so."

He clapped his hands and made it appear again. "Now you do it."

She did.

"Where is it?"

"I don't know. Gone."

"When I made it look like it disappeared it was in my sleeve. It's a trick. A sleight of the hand." He grinned. "Except for you it wasn't. If ordinary gleemen could make coins appear from nowhere I don't think that they'd work, walking from place to place, sleeping rough, and entertaining for pennies."

Meb blinked. "I feel very stupid now. I thought they did it because they loved it. I did. I did think about the money, and maybe wonder . . . but, well, I was concentrating on juggling. You always had money. So, I thought that was maybe where it came from."

"That comes from my hoard. I have accumulated a bit over the years. At times I have to spend some. Just not gold, if I can help it."

"Oh. So . . . what else can I do, Finn?"

He shrugged. "I don't know. You seem adept at summonsing things. But humans are generally strong with earth magics. Rather different from dragons like me. Humans are good at making things grow. The trick is to always remember that you can do too much. That will kill you. But right now you need to be adept at changing your clothes, because Port Lapith is close."

He was so . . . matter-of-fact about being a dragon. Sensible Meb knew it was silly. People were not dragons. Sensible Meb that knew all the other things didn't happen either. The other dreamer Meb in her head said, "You were there. The magic works. You've talked to mountains. Why not the rest?"

And a little part of her still said, "Why me?" and was very afraid.

Meb felt that she was becoming quite a seasoned traveler with a knowledge of ports by now. This was her third, after all. It was also the most chaotic. There were armed centaurs running about everywhere—without, it appeared, any logical reason for doing so. The captain was not prepared to let the passengers disembark until the centaurs had given permission, and this took a long time. Eventually a centaur trotted up to the gangplank. "You can put to sea again, captain. The berths are needed. Or we will buy your ship. We want transports."

"Excuse me," said Finn. "Can we disembark? I believe you want us, more than transports."

"Why would we want you?" asked the centaur, looking down his nose at them.

"Because we're water diviners," said Finn. "And it was foretold that you'd need us."

The centaur stood stock still for a moment. And then took a deep breath. "Foretold? Come with me."

He set off at a hasty canter. Finn put a hand on Meb's shoulder. "Walk. He'll be back."

He was, with three others a few moments later. "We're not as fleet of foot as centaurs, friends," said Finn calmly.

One of the accompanying centaurs asked: "Who foretold that you would be needed?"

Finn smiled up at him. "A black dragon."

It is not really possible for the man-half of a centaur to fall off the horse-half's back. But the centaurs tried. Eventually one of the centaurs spoke. "What did he say?"

"He said that predictions are usually wrong, unless your understanding is complete. And he said that I was to give you something. This bag." He hauled a leather bladder out of his pack. "He says you could either play games with it, or let the contents loose. Doing the latter was his advice. And I was to ask you for a piece of stick, because that was what my assistant and I will need to find your water."

It was like tossing a deadly sea-snake out of a basket of fish onto the gutting table. Half-horses exploded away from them yelling, calling. Others came galloping, crowding around them. Shouting. Asking questions. Eventually a centaur with gray touches to his beard restored it all to some semblance of order. "I am Ixion," he said in a deep carrying voice. "I command the battle phalanxes. Tell me who you are and why you are here." He looked at the old leather bag in Finn's hand. "And what you are doing with our ancient treasure."

"Bringing it back to you. I thought that was quite obvious," said Finn. "Here. Catch." And he tossed the bladder to Ixion.

"It is a holy object! It should be treated with great respect. Not flung!" said the catcher in a choked voice, holding it as if it were very fragile.

"Chuck it back to me and I'll try again," said Finn, sardonically. "Now we're here to deal with your water problem. Can we get on with it? We have other work to do."

It was obvious that this Ixion too just had no idea what to do in the circumstances. "I . . . I will have to consult with the others."

"Go ahead. But it's a long way inland. And uphill. And we're in a hurry and so are you. Mind if we start walking?"

Ixion took a deep breath. Nodded. "Abraxis. Will you see that they are suitably escorted? I must take this to the high plains." He held the old leather bag aloft.

So, surrounded by a phalanx of centaurs, Finn, Meb and Díleas started walking. It was a long, steep, winding trail up to the escarpment, so Meb was very relieved when some more centaurs led a horse-drawn cart up to them. The horses seemed less pleased than she was.

The cart reached the top eventually, and the horses were unhitched, while more were led up. Along with them came a delegation of older centaurs. They were respectful, but wary. "Stranger. You say you come from the black dragon, the destroyer."

"Sometimes in order to fix things, you have to break them," said Finn, cheerfully. "What have you done with the leather bladder I brought you? The black dragon thought it would be a good idea if you opened it and let the contents go. Good for the centaur people in the troubled times that lie ahead."

"Can we consult with the black dragon?" asked one of the elders timorously.

"He's not where I last saw him anymore," said Finn. "He was just passing through, and he gave me this job to do, and paid me well for doing it too. Now, he said we were to ask you for a special piece of stick. We use them for divining, you know."

It was plain the centaur knew exactly what he meant—and was terribly shocked at the suggestion. "But . . . we hold it in sacred trust."

"It's a stick. I'll probably give it back to the owners, when we're done," said Finn. "If you want your water, that is?"

There was much stamping and muttering.

"How do we know you'll give it back to them?" asked the elderly centaur doubtfully.

"You don't. Or you can fill your pool with buckets and try to see."

Vorlian lay on his gold and brooded and healed. He looked out of the cavern mouth of his eyrie across Starsey and to the purple bulk of Yenfar across the ocean. A visit from Belet was the only thing to interrupt his dark thoughts.

The fire-being was of course his usual apparently respectful self. Vorlian right now felt that he could use some respect, but that of the demon was . . . wanting. "Greetings, great Lord Vorlian."

"Spare me the flattery. What do you want?"

"Merely that you had sent a message to say that you had found out more about our fugitive human. We are finding her very hard to track down. She vanishes in our auguries."

"She's sailed from here, going West. She is in the company of a black dragon called Fionn. There are two other humans with her. An innkeeper's daughter called Keri and a man called Justin—he's a petty criminal and informer."

"West. I will alert our contacts," said the fire-being.

"Do that," said Vorlian, tersely. "Tell the tree-women too. I told the centaur. He broke my mirror."

"One of my informants tells me he has sailed for Lapithidia. I thought that he was in exile," said Belet.

"Umph," said Vorlian, deciding for now to keep his council about the centaur and the mirror. "Well, now we need a centaur and the human mage, and of course the merrow and the dvergar."

"The sprites can always constrain the merrows and we can deal with the dvergar."

The fire-being took his leave, and Vorlian continued his dark thoughts about Myrcupa and even the doings of that rogue Fionn. Then he spotted a dragon. Far off-shore, making no attempt to come closer. But plainly intending to be seen.

Fury roused Vorlian and, despite still being in some pain, he flew out. However, distance cooled his temper, added caution. What if it was a trap? The other dragon was not attempting to gain altitude and in the clear sky Vorlian could see no other dragons. He flapped slowly out. The other dragon was considerably smaller, but not black. He placed her. Tessara. He had nothing against her, and he would have thought she had nothing against him. They had mated once.

"What do you want?" he asked from a safe distance, still keeping a weather eye out for other dragons.