Gold Dragon Codex (14 page)

The first page of the journal was dated about fifteen years before Baroness Lehna’s death. It, and every page thereafter, was written in her curling hand. Sandon started reading, flipping through the pages eagerly. Early entries talked about her life in the castle, how much she missed her parents, and about her suitors. Among them, Sandon recognized both his father’s name and Vilfrand’s. Vilfrand courted my mother? he pondered. It explained why Camiel’s brother had been so devoted to the barony that he’d become captain of its guard.

Then Sandon came across a name he didn’t recognize: Kadastrofee. Frowning, Sandon flipped ahead, looking for other instances of the name. The date was about a year before his birth, and his mother apparently had a visitor in the palace. A female visitor, someone who stayed in the baroness’s chambers with her while she was here. When she mentioned Kadastrofee’s tools (as in, they needed to get an extra wrench from the village), Sandon stabbed the page with his finger. “She must have been the gnome who built the constructs!”

Yet there was nothing about the constructs or even about the cave. Sandon kept reading. His mother and Kadastrofee spent a lot of time together building—or fixing?—something. The references were really vague, and Sandon could tell only because he already knew that his mother was referring to the constructs.

Here was something interesting: his mother hinted that a very large sum of money had been entrusted to her by someone named Acinyoshu. Although she didn’t mention who that was, she did say that he had left her a great deal of wealth, from gems to ancient coins, to steel weapons and beautiful pieces of art. That sounded like a dragon’s hoard! So this Acinyoshu who gave her the riches … maybe there was a gold dragon once after all!

Sandon scanned the pages greedily, trying to find any other references. His mother apparently hid the wealth after Acinyoshu gave it to her, and then brought in Kadastrofee.

Even though the journal carefully hid any details, anyone who had seen the construct and knew what it was could put two and two together to get the answer. And Sandon did just that. “She used the dragon’s hoard to make the constructs,” he mused. “Melted down the steel for the frame … used the gold for the scales … probably
even melted down the statue in the center of the square for raw materials. My mother was a genius.”

Kadastrofee left just after Baroness Lehna married Sandon’s father, Camiel. Judging the next several pages to be boring love stuff, Sandon flipped on until he saw another mention of the name Acinyoshu. He paused and read the page.

Sandon pondered this. So the gold dragon never came back, and his mother used the hoard to make the gold construct in order to protect the valley and keep Acinyoshu’s legend alive. As long as people still thought there was a gold dragon living in the cave, she didn’t have to do much to keep the valley safe—bandits avoided the place because of Hartfall’s reputation. She would make a few flights here and there, respond when the horn was blown and look very showy in the sky, and then everything else took care of itself.

Then she died, and when the baron blew the ancestral horn—the sky stayed empty.

Sandon had found a lot of the answers he had been looking for, and the journal certainly confirmed a lot of things he believed, but it still didn’t explain who killed her. The boy frowned. Maybe she suspected something and wrote about it closer to the end of the journal. Sandon closed the book and opened it from the rear, looking at the last few pages. They were wrinkled together as if the book had been crushing them where it lay for so long behind the headboard of the bed. Obviously, she hadn’t stored the book back
there, not if it ruined the pages like this.

Sandon read from the last pages of the journal.

Uh-oh. That didn’t sound good. Sandon skimmed on. He stopped on a page just before the end of the entries.

The next page had been ripped out, the crumpled edges worn and raw. Sandon fingered the rough scraps of paper jutting out from the inner spine of the journal, wondering what had been written on that page. Had his mother removed it? Had someone else? The book was wrinkled and had been jammed behind the bed …

Jammed quickly. If someone was really trying to hide the journal, they could have done a better job putting it in a drawer or beneath loose floorboards. Stuffing it behind the headboard was a desperate move. Sandon looked up and scanned the room, his eyes resting on the table by the fireplace. He’d found it tipped over when he and Kine came from the secret closet into the bedroom, as if someone had been surprised while in the room and hadn’t had time to set it upright again. It was likely that someone found the book, read it, and then stuffed it behind the headboard when the guard—or someone else—came into the room. They’d had just enough time to rip out a page. A page could be hidden in your hand, Sandon decided, but the journal was too big to pocket.

Then the doors were locked, and they couldn’t get back inside to right the table … or take the journal away. Sandon closed the book and tapped it against his hand.
Was Kine right? Had his father done the unthinkable? Camiel had obviously known that his wife was keeping secrets. He probably knew about the dragon’s hoard too, though he didn’t know about the secret door or the gnome-made contraption that transported the baroness to the dragon’s cave with the constructs. There had been a gold dragon, that much was true, but Camiel obviously didn’t know it had left—or when—or that it had been a fake for so long. The baroness hadn’t shared any of that with him. She didn’t trust her husband, and this journal gave some very good reasons why. Camiel knew she was hiding something. He’d even searched her rooms. And now, Sandon had seen a vial of the same poison in his father’s chamber that was used to kill his mother! Nobody had ever told Sandon anything about this, but his mother must have raised some of her suspicions with the house staff. Were any other people involved?

Torentine was a crafter—he probably knew when a gnome was in town, and he might have talked to Kadastrofee enough to get a picture of what she was doing. He would want to find the constructs to prove what they had done. Or, Sandon thought, he might be trying to find the gold dragon. Torentine was the only person Sandon knew who was still dedicated to the idea of the dragon’s return. He wouldn’t give up, even when
everyone told him the gold dragon was gone forever, even when the horn was sounded and nothing came. Then again, Torentine might know exactly what the constructs were, but not where to find them. He might have murdered the baroness out of professional jealousy, and his loyalty to the dragon’s memory might be nothing more than an act.

Then again, Yattak had been acting suspiciously too, always skulking about, showing up where he wasn’t wanted. He was the one who had heard Kine and Sandon in his mother’s room. Why had he been lurking around in that particular hallway? Umar could make an invisible servant. Could such a person slip inside the baroness’s room, perhaps knock over a table? How smart were those servants anyway? Could one of them have been ordered to get something so specific that he or she tore out a single page and left the rest of the journal behind?

Sandon put his head in his hands. None of it mattered. He was avoiding the truth. His mother knew the others, but she suspected only one person of working against her—his father. Sandon had to start there—where his mother had left off her investigation.

Could he really accuse his father? The picture of his father as a young man, jealous and controlling, was too compelling to ignore. Camiel was a ferocious
fighter and a good politician, ambitious enough to woo a baroness and intelligent enough to beat out all the others who wanted her hand. He’d stop at nothing to get what he wanted. The question, of course, was: What was his goal? To get the money and run? To rule the barony alone? He’d certainly managed that, until the blue dragon came along.

His father could have had the poison because it was evidence in his mother’s death. He might have been genuinely worried about his wife, with the war going on, and he might have been in her room for some other reason. This whole thing was getting out of control, and Sandon had only eight or so hours to figure everything out before his father blew the ancestral horn and invited Lazuli into the valley. If that happened, they’d never get the blue dragon to leave, and the barony would fall into Lazuli’s claws forever.

All right. Sandon slammed the book down on the bed. I have to stop being overdramatic. This is a puzzle, and puzzles can be solved.

His father wouldn’t answer his questions. His mother was dead. Vilfrand … well, there was no helping Vilfrand. He’d probably just lock Sandon in his room again. Sandon had done everything he could think of. He was completely out of options. With nobody to talk to
and no one in the palace he could trust, he was well and truly stuck. He had to bend a little bit and go down to the prisons. After all, Kine had been right about the baron, even if Sandon hadn’t wanted to admit it. He was smart enough to hide the doorway and trustworthy enough to keep it hidden even when Vilfrand was arresting him. Kine might not be a Knight of Solamnia, but he’d saved Sandon from that stone guardian, and he sure knew a lot about dragons. Most of all, though, Sandon was sure Kine wasn’t involved because the soldier hadn’t been anywhere near the palace when his mother was killed. He was Sandon’s only option.

The boy slipped out the bedroom door, closing it tight behind him. He couldn’t lock it without the key, but so long as no one tested it …

“Sandon!”

He nearly jumped out of his skin, spinning to place his back against the door. Coming around the corner was Yattak, followed by his shadow, Umar. The wizard’s red robes fluttered unevenly around his feet as his stubby legs churned to an awkward halt. Umar nearly plowed into him.

“Good morning, Yattak.” Sandon had the presence of mind to greet him. Swords afire, he cursed himself. I made sure to check that the guards were outside, but
I never thought to look for the wizards!

“What are you …” The wizard took in the scene, recognizing the door behind Sandon. “Ah. My poor, poor lad.” Without being asked, Yattak strode forward, his chubby arms spread wide. He engulfed Sandon in an awkward hug. Sandon was suddenly overcome with the thick smell of wine and the heaviness of Yattak’s elbows on his shoulders. The red robe didn’t hide the wine stains, nor could he stop the obvious slurring of his speech. Tears trickled down the wizard’s cheeks onto Sandon’s forehead. “I know what it’s like to miss a loved one,” Yattak whispered huskily.

“Master, please.” His face as red as Yattak’s robe, Umar gripped the wizard’s wide waist and pulled him off Sandon.

“Look at him, Umar. Standing by his mother’s door like a puppy waiting for its master to come home. She won’t come! She’s gone, gone forever …”

Umar desperately tried to shove Yattak’s wineskin into his hands, shooting Sandon an apologetic look. Sandon put his hands under the wizard’s arms and pushed up, gasping in a breath when the wizard’s weight lifted at last. “I’m fine, Wizard Yattak, really.”

Yattak stumbled back against the door, shifting his weight unevenly. The door, barely closed from
Sandon’s exit, popped open again. “Oh!” Yattak’s beady eyes flashed to the inner chamber. “Well, just a bit of a rest then. I suppose that couldn’t hurt.” Before either Umar or Sandon could stop him, Yattak fumbled inside and thumped down onto the stuffed chair near the cold fireplace.

“Died from the drink, your sainted mother did. Poor thing,” he said, “poor thing.”

“She was poisoned, actually.” Sandon shared a beleaguered look with Umar.

“That’s what I said.” Yattak flapped one meaty palm against the arm of the chair. “The drink!”

Sandon rolled his eyes, feeling increasingly uncomfortable. He whispered to Umar, “We’ve got to get him out of here. The baron doesn’t allow anyone in this room.”

“You tell him that. He never listens to me,” Umar groused.

“Sweet lady. Dear lady. Sweet as sugar. Just give me a moment to catch my breath.” Yattak’s eyes flickered over the room, investigating every surface with a canny glint. “How I miss … uhm …”—he paused, as if his train of thought had been swallowed by the wine—“ … Her.”

Yeah, right. More like you were hoping she’d had a bottle of wine or brandy locked in this room. Sandon rolled his eyes at the indulgent mage. Logic wasn’t going
to work. Begging wasn’t going to work. Obviously, he’d have to use something more straightforward. Sandon moved to the front of the chair, taking the wizard’s hands in his own. “Hey, Yattak! Gallia told me she found another keg of wine in the pantry! We should hurry down there and see if she’s opened it yet.”