Emperor Mage (28 page)

The Hag
sighed "You don't understand."

"I
don't want to understand!"

"We
can't just do whatever we feel like," the goddess said "There are
rules, even for us. We can only work on something like this through a mortal
vessel, for one thing. Do you know how/nv mortals can be used as a god's vessel
without dying on us? And I was reluctant to act, I confess. That nice boy
Ozorne wooed me like a maiden—flowers on my altar every day, precious oils,
public feasts in my honor—oh, it was grand! So, maybe I wasn't strict with him,
and now he's too big for his breeches. It hurt when he stopped leaving flowers,
you know. I was the last god still defending him in Mithros's court." She
sighed and shook her head. "These men say they care for me, and I fall for
it every time. Too good-hearted—that's me."

"My
heart bleeds buttermilk," Daine snapped

The
Graveyard Hag shook her stick at the girl. "If I didn't need you—"

"But
you do. You said it yourself—vessels are hard to come by. So, can we get on
with it, please? I need strength enough to wake up all these big ones."

"Strength."
The Hag rubbed her chin. "There's always the rats. You'll have to offer
them something, though. Even / can't make them help for nothing. There's—"

"Rules,
yes, you told me."

The Hag
tapped her on the head with her stick. "Don't be impudent, Weiryn's
daughter! And think up something nice to offer my rats!"

The tap
made her ears ring and her eyes burn. She rubbed both; when she looked around
again, the Graveyard Hag was gone.

Zek
poked his head out of her shirt. Are you all right? he asked. Your bones are
humming.

"I'm
not surprised," she murmured, patting the three-horn's neck frill when he
nudged her. "Zek, what can I offer rats?"

Food, he
replied immediately. Rats are always hungry. I could do with a bite myself.

She dug
in her pocket for raisins left from the meal Tano had given her in the tunnels.
As the marmoset nibbled them, she thought hard and fast. On the edges of her
awareness, she could feel rats approaching, hundreds of them. Where could she
get enough food to bribe them all?

She was
in a palace. Most of the provisions for Varice's fancy dinners were already
here. Of course, the food stores were guarded by an army of rat catchers.

Smiling
grimly, she called to the hundreds of cats and dogs who worked the palace and
grounds.

As she
conferred with them, rats streamed into the Hall of Bones through every hole,
vent, and crack. Once the dogs and cats agreed to her request,

she
looked around. The great dinosaur skeletons now bore passengers: rats, black
ones and brown, large and small; well-fed, glossy ones and scrawny river rats
decorated with scars.

A brown
female with one missing eye stood at Daine's feet. Herself told us you want to
make a deal, she said. Something to trade for our wild magic, so you can wake
these old bone piles.

The
three-horn apparently heard this. It looked down and nudged the rat with its
nose horn.

The rat
bared yellow incisors. You don't scare me, dead beastl she snarled. There's
enough of us here to do for you!

Daine
patted the skeletons neck frill. "It's all right. They're on our side—I
think,"

We
don't side with anybody that ain't a rat, the female snapped. From the darkness
all around them came chittering agreement from the others. Pipe down! ordered
the rat chieftain. So what's the deal, then, two-legger?

"I
plan to leave this palace a wreck; plenty of supplies buried under stone and in
rooms the men can't reach," replied Daine. "So, if you give me what I
need, the dogs and cats agree not to hunt anywhere in the palace or on the
grounds for a year and a day, I can't get rid of die human mages, but the dogs
and cats will go—if you help me. That's the deal,"

The
rats conferred, their whispers loud in the echoing hall. Finally the one-eyed
female—who looked like the Graveyard Hag herself—squealed, We have a bargain!

The
rats moved into the second hall, where the smaller dinosaurs were kept. Once
they were settled, Daine got to work, drawing on the power they gave her as,
one by one, she woke the great skeletons. Down the row of horn-faced reptiles
she went, rousing each of their kindred: the bull, spiked, close-horned,
one-horned, thick-nosed, and well-horned dinosaurs. None were shorter than a
man's height at the shoulder, and some were half again as tall. Each came to
life at a white-fired touch, and stretched lazily. They seemed to know she had
business with them, for while they flexed limbs, tails, and bodies, they stayed
in place, waiting.

Next
she went to the armored lizards, with their back and head spikes and their
bone-tail clubs. Mixed in among them were their cousins, armored lizards, who
had traded the tail club for heavy side spikes. Most of the armored lizards were
as taU as the horn-faces. They, too, woke readily at her call, working kinks
out of muscle and cartilage that were no longer there.

o
After
 
them
 
she
  
went
 
to
  
the
 
plated
 
lizards, remembering their macelike tails.
Next she woke the snake-necks. While they weren't armored as the others were,
their bulk and long tails would make fast work of obstacles.

At last
she reached the tyrant lizard and his kin, the meat eaters. Originally she'd
thought they would be little help, since their arms were so weak-looking, but
she had reconsidered. Something about those great skulls, with their
forward-pointed eyes and saw-edged teeth, told her they would make excellent
hunters. Their cousins the wounding lizards had stronger arms, with large
claws.

Once they
and the eight mammoths were awake, sne went to the front of the hall Now she
heard booming sounds at the doors; evidently someone had raised an alarm, and
humans were trying to come in. Even if they had a mage to speak the opening
spell, it would still take them awhile to enter. The bull three-horn leaned
against the inward-opening doors, holding them shut.

"Friends,"
the girl said, voice echoing, "the master of this palace killed my friend,
stole a dragon, and tried to cage me. He is a thief and a murderer. He needs a
lesson. You can't be hurt as my mortal friends can. You are ancient and
powerful. Will you help me get revenge? I would like to rip this palace apart,
stone by stone. I want to topple the columns, break the walls, crush the
fountains. Will you do it?"

From
tyrant lizards to horn-faceds, the skulls of her allies pointed to the ceiling
as one. She couldn't hear their roar of agreement, but she felt it in the
quiver of the ground under her feet.

A
four-toothed elephant wrapped his trunk around her waist, and placed her gently
on the back of a shaggy mammoth, out of harm's way. "Thank you," she
told him. To the others she said, "I'd druther not kill any two-leggers,
but I know if you're attacked, you'll fight back. Just, please, look where you
step, and don't hurt anyone who's smart enough to run."

The
bull three-horn backed away from the doors. Both leaves slammed open, to reveal
a very young mage and a squad of men from the Red Legion, The Hall of Bones was
still unlit: the mage clapped to waken the light-globes. When they blazed into
life, they revealed nearly seventy long-dead creatures who had left their
pedestals and were walking toward the intruders.

The
mage screamed and ran. The guardsmen followed, dropping their spears.

Outside
the Hall of Bones, Daine's army split into three groups. One, led by the great
three-horn she had awakened first, turned in the direction of the wing in which
the palace records were kept. The second group, led by the chief tyrant lizard,
began in the great haU where they now stood, smashing pottery, windows, and
benches; ramming the walls; and toppling fountains. A plated lizard discovered
the anchor chain of an immense light-globe chandelier and began to tug it from
its mooring.

The
third group, which included Daine, her mammoth, the bull three-horn who had
blocked the door into the Hall of Bones, and others, was ready to go.
"Zek," she asked the marmoset, "could you find the way back to
the emperor's chambers?"

He
clambered down the front of her shirt and along the mammoth's back until he
perched in solitary grandeur on the creature's head. That way, he said,
pointing left.

Daine
tapped the mammoth with her left foot, and he obediently moved forward. The
tiny animal on his skull lurched and almost fell, then grabbed tufts of the
mammoth s fur to use as reins.

Two
snake-necks, each over eighty feet long, wound their tails through the door
handles to the Hall of Bones, and began to walk away. They didn't stop, even
when their tails were stretched as far as possible. In the end, it was the
doors that gave way, snapping out of the frame and leaving it in splinters. The
snake-necks then followed Daine, freeing their tails from the wreckage.

Behind
them a ringing crash signaled the end of the plated lizards attention to the
chandelier.

Zek s
next turn brought them into a long gallery lined with niches. In each stood a
gold statue of a Carthaki emperor, decorated with gems and designed to show the
monarch with those things that symbolized his reign. The dinosaurs got to work,
pulling statues down and trampling them flat. One plated lizard made the
windows his sole task, smashing each and every one with his spiky tail. A

four-toothed
elephant ripped doors off hinges with his trunk. People spilled from the rooms
that opened into the statuary hall, stared at the dinosaurs, and fled.

Near
the end of the gallery, a side door leading to the nobles' wing crashed open.
Five people rushed in. Two of the women were veiled; a female slave carried a
baby. When the women saw Daines friends, they began to scream. The old man and
the boy put themselves between their womenfolk and the threat, though their
hands trembled as they gripped their weapons.

"Stop
that noise," Daine ordered. "No one's hurting you." The only one
to listen was the slave, who tried to calm the shrieking infant. "Get out
of here," the girl went on. "My friends won't hurt you if you don't
attack them and don't get under their feet. Now move!" The humans ran.

Daine
looked at Zek. "Do we go the way they did?"

Zek
shook his head. Straight, he said, pointing to the doors at the end of the
hall.

In the
distance they heard the crash of falling stone. Behind them the thick-nosed
horn-faced dinosaur leaned on the marble wall. When an armored lizard joined
him, the blocks of stone began to give way.

Zek led
them through a tree garden, which they left as it was. The next turn brought
them into one of the palace s many bathhouses, this one set aside for nobles.
It seemed that those inside had not heard the distant sounds of mayhem. They
were taken completely by surprise and fled without recovering their clothes.
Tyrant lizards ripped up sections of the tile floor, laying bare a forest of
gleaming pipes. A mammoth and a four-toothed elephant seized these, yanking
them from their moorings and showering everything with hot and cold water.
Armored lizards walked through rooms where clothing, robes, and towels were
kept, catching them on their side spikes and dragging them along. Mud baths
were overset, rubbing tables torn apart, steam rooms dismantled.

Their
next turn led them through storerooms. Snake-necks destroyed countless jars of
raisins, olives, dates, fresh fruits, and vegetables, wielding their tails like
whips. Tyrant lizards tore their sharp teeth through pounds of dried and salted
meat. Daine noticed coolly that the food vanished once it had entered their
mouths. The others preferred the grain stored in great burlap sacks.

The
last storeroom held drinkables in bottles, jars, and barrels. They had gone to
work when the other mammoth in their group lifted a screaming female from a
hiding place behind the casks. Pale blue fires danced around her body as she
fought the trunk around her waist, without success. The mammoth brought her to
Daine and set her gently on the floor.