Dragon's Treasure (24 page)

Waste of time, teaching a bastard! No more. I forbid it!

Never mind, boy,
d'Andorra had said quietly.
We'll find you a teacher.
And he had arranged for Treion to take lessons from Lorin Befaccio, who made his living teaching the children of Sorvino how to hold a sword. Befaccio had fought for the Lemininkai—not Kalni Leminin, but his father. He had yellow eyes and a crooked nose. He was a good swordsman, and a good teacher.

The first rule of swordsmanship is, Watch everything,
he had said.
The second rule is, Move your feet!
Taran moved his feet in the way Befaccio had taught him. One hundred fifty, two hundred... He pictured an enemy cutting at his legs. He parried the deadly blows. Sweat coated the shirt beneath his heavy vest. When first he started to train like this, in secret, his arm had been clumsy, his wrist weak. It was stronger now.

Two hundred fifty, three hundred... His breath steamed in the night air. His lungs burned. The wooden stave felt heavy as iron.

His sword, when he got it, would be heavier.

Three hundred ten, three hundred twenty...

The door from the courtyard opened. A cold wind blew into the hall. The lamp's meager flame wavered in the draft. Then it sprang erect. A torch on the wall blazed into life.

Panting, Taran spun.

Karadur Atani stood in the doorway of the hall. Despite the ferocious cold, his arms were bare.

Taran let the tip of the stave drop to the stone. His heart thumped painfully.

The dragon-lord's face was unreadable.

Then he said, "It's late. Go to bed." He glanced at the torch. It went out. He let the heavy door close.

Taran stood still, catching his breath. The sweat dried on his skin. The chill made him shiver.

He went into the kitchen. The ovens still emanated warmth. He picked his way through the chamber to his pallet. Sliding the stave beneath the thin straw, he worked his boots off—it took a long time—and wound himself into his quilts. The wind, moaning softly, crept under the door.

The doleful sound made him think of Niello.

* * *

The illusionist came to Castria in a snowstorm.

He was a bright-eyed, genial fellow, portly, but nimble as a youth, and not so young, the folk of Castria agreed, as he appeared. He arrived on the back of a sturdy brown mule. He was, he explained to Gerda and Blaise Sorenson, a traveling entertainer, a maker of small whimsies, a sometime animal trainer. He had once, he claimed, traveled through Nakase from Averra to Merigny with a troupe of performing monkeys.

He paid for a room, and Gerda was delighted to rent it to him at quite a low rate, since he was, given that it was February, the inn's only tenant. He had a bag filled with coins beneath his cloak. Blaise Sorenson, who liked his creature comforts as well as the next man, insisted he had heard the ring of nobles amid the clink of less valuable coinage.

He was not, the stranger claimed, an outlaw, nor any sort of malefactor. Though he had, he confided privately to Blaise, fallen afoul of the watch a time or two.
(I have a deplorable weakness for wine. But it must be good wine, mind you!)
He had come north because—a foolish reason—he had never been north. His name was Nino Pecci. He was from Kameni, where his mother
(a wonderful woman)
and his half a dozen brothers and sisters still lived. That he had arrived in the midst of a snowstorm was his own fault. He had simply not heeded the advice he had received in Ujo. That advice had been that he should wait before crossing the border—preferably until April.

"This is nothing," Ferd Parisi told him. "In December the snow was four feet thick, and so hard that the cattle walked on top of it." Ferd then guffawed loudly, which spoiled the joke. Southerners would believe anything of a northern winter.

Dinas Altimura said, "Two years ago it snowed in May." This was not a joke. The listeners nodded soberly. Gerda signaled the girls to refill the mugs. There was a surprisingly large number of people in the Lizard's common room. Word had gotten out that there was a stranger at the inn, and that he was moderately entertaining.

"Three years ago the roads were closed by Harvest Moon, and it snowed every day from October clear through to June," said Blaise. "That was a terrible winter."

Nino Pecci nodded. "Aye. Even in Ujo we heard of it. There were stories of rivers of ice, and wargs, and dragons battling, and chests of gold.... I don't suppose you happen to have one of those chests lying about for the taking... a small one? No? I thought not." Grinning, he took a silver coin from beneath his cloak and walked it along his knuckles.

"What's that?" someone asked.

"A
dinado.
It's a Chuyo silver piece. Worth about six ridari." He walked it along his knuckles again. Then, grinning, he made it vanish. Expectantly they waited for it to reappear, which it did, in Blaise's hat.

"To tell the truth, it's kind of a good-luck piece. One time I was traveling with the monkeys in Taviz, down by the Chuyo border, and I met a girl from Dorry in the market...." The villagers drew their chairs closer.

Nino was full of stories. Sometimes they were about him, sometimes about his brothers and sisters and cousins, sometimes about other folk. Always he prefaced his most fantastic stories with:
"To tell the truth
..." He was a bit of a mountebank, but his stories kept the common room a good deal busier than it would ordinarily be in February, and for this Gerda was grateful. The tricks
were
entertaining. His manners were excellent; he left the women alone. Besides, Blaise liked the fellow. He was easy to like, for he listened as much as he talked, and seemed as interested in the exploits of Gerda's granddaughter Nell as in the deeds of the great and near great. The dogs liked him, too, and they were discerning beasts, known to snarl at folk they did not trust. Whenever he entered the common room they would trot to his side to have their muzzles rubbed. She would be sorry to see him go.

After the second week, Nino confided to Blaise that he was running out of money.

"I have enough to pay my room and board, never fear. But I had best find another source of income, or I shall be reduced to eating with the dogs, and sleeping with Bianca." Bianca was his mule. "Have you any recommendations?"

Blaise frowned. It was hard to see what work could be found for an itinerant illusionist.

"What can you do?" he asked bluntly. "Besides tell stories, and pull coins out of people's ears."

"I can teach a dog to dance on its hind legs. I know, it's not a skill you northerners have much use for. I can cook." He looked at Blaise hopefully. "I don't suppose..."

"We have a cook." Blaise thought. "Can you sing?"

"Why?"

"Dragon likes music, especially singers. If you could sing, you could ride to the Keep and earn a purse."

Nino shook his head. "Alas, I croak like a crow."

"They might have use for another undercook at the Keep. Though they say that Boris the head cook has a terrible temper. I can ask."

"I'm not overfond of castles," Nino said. "Too drafty."

"Well, we will see if we can find you something."

Quietly, he let it be known among his friends—Blaise had many friends—that the southerner was looking for some kind of employment.

It was Ferd Parisi who suggested that Nino might be able to find employment at the Amdur farm.

"We breed horses: the best warhorses in Ippa, we think, though there are folk in Mako who'd dispute that. There's a lot to do right now. There's the usual mucking and cleaning and feeding. But two of the lads are sick, and the rest of us are damn near run off our feet. Do you know anything about horses?"

"I have some experience with horses," Nino allowed.

"I'll take you there tomorrow."

"If the weather's clear."

"Even if it's not." Ferd clapped the smaller man on the shoulder. "Don't worry, man, you won't freeze."

"It's Bianca I worry about," Nino said gloomily.

* * *

But the next day indeed proved fair, and Bianca did not object to following Ferd's horse to the Amdur farm. Nino admired the barns, the house, the foaling stalls, the neatly fenced pastures, now lightly burnished with snow. The house was large, fronted in stone, with windows on the side as well as the front. It sported two chimneys.

"It looks new built."

"It is," Ferd said. "There was a fire. Outlaws."

"Aye. We have them in the south, too. What did they want? Gold?"

"They came to steal the horses. It was Unamira and his band: him that used to live on Coll's Ridge. They burned the barn and killed Thorin Amdur and Garth, his second son. But Mellia, his widow, and Hern, his third son, manage the farm between them. They are openhanded folk; you could not find a better place." He shouted to a man with a pitchfork over his shoulder, "Hoy! You know where the lady Mellia is?"

The man called back, "Try Swallow's stall."

"Trouble?"

"She's ailing."

"Now what?" Ferd led the way to a horse stall. Its occupant was clearly suffering: she stood shuddering, eyes wide. Her dun-colored coat was patchy with sweat. A grey-haired woman wearing a man's shirt and pants tried to coax a nosebag over her long face. Tossing her head, the mare backed away from the bag. The stall was hot and odorous.

"What happened?" Ferd asked.

"She ate some bad corn." The woman reached up. The mare bared her teeth. "She won't take the draught. Hern is in the north pasture. Six of the sheep got out last night." She grinned without humor. "The gods only know what they thought they would find in the north pasture in February. Spring, perhaps." She moved toward the mare again.

The animal tossed her head and bared her teeth. "Oh, my poor girl."

Nino said, "Let me try." He opened the door to the stall and sidled inside. A cat colored like a patchwork quilt sidled toward him. He bent to scratch its nose. Without hesitation, he extended a palm toward the mare.

"Hush, my sweetheart, my lovely lady, my buttercup darling, listen to me now, only listen...."

Mellia Amdur said ominously, "Whoever you are, if you disturb her further, I'll set the hounds on you." Nino murmured soothing nonsense to the mare. She rolled her eyes at him and snorted. He did not retreat, only continued to talk. She dropped her head toward him and snuffled at his hand.

"Good girl, that's a good girl. What a fine, pretty lady you are. I knew we should get along, you and I. What's her name?"

"Swallow."

"Swallow. What a pretty fine thing you are, Swallow darling. What's in the bag, ma'am?"

"Salicorn and sage in an oat mash."

"Give it to me." He reached a hand for it. The other stroked the horse's neck. "Listen, my lovely, this will make you feel better, it will. That's my girl, that's my dainty-footed darling. This will make the stomach trouble pass. Next time put some rosemary in it; it will further soothe her system. Aye, pretty girl, you shall have a fine foal come summertime, wait and see."

He slipped the nosebag over the mare's head. Her jaws moved.

"Good," Mellia Amdur said. "Very good. Ferd, who is this?"

"His name's Nino," Ferd said proudly. "He's looking for work, he's a southerner, he trains animals...."

Days later, when he had met Hern Amdur, and been told what his wages would be, and shown where to sleep, Nino Pecci reflected that luck, as usual, had flowed his way. His friends had often remarked that he had been born under a lucky star, and more than one astrologer had confirmed that yes, it was true. His mother, a devout woman, insisted that his good fortune devolved from her prayers, but Nino doubted that. She prayed equally for all her children, and his sisters and brothers had had no more than the ordinary amount of luck.

Swallow snuffled at his hair. He rubbed her nose.

"Hey, my pretty, are you feeling better now? Good girl, that's a good girl. I can see that you are." He had offered to bed with her for a few nights, in case she had a relapse and needed doctoring. The candle in the lantern flickered through the glass. The place was quite private, as he had known it would be.

He had been in the north less than three weeks, but he had learned a great deal. He had heard from many about the old bandit, Reo Unamira,
Him that used to live on Coll's Ridge....
He heard about the raid on the farm, and about the fire.

The leader of the raiders had been Treion Unamira.

Unamira had escaped Karadur Atani's wrath by taking with him a hostage, Herugin Dol, cavalry master at Dragon Keep. He had promised to send him back, and evidently, he kept the promise: thin and scarred, Herugin Dol had returned to Dragon Keep that winter. And that had been the end of it, until Karadur Atani returned from Ujo this very summer with Treion Unamira tied to the back of a horse. He had run all the way to Kameni, it seemed, to escape Dragon's justice.

"What happened to him?" he asked his informant.

"Dragon cut his arm off." The man refused to say more. Nino had not pressed him, though there was more he wanted to know.