Ivory Lyre (16 page)

At last she was a solid, living dragon.

She breathed out flame slowly, testing
herself. Teb hugged her, pressing his face against her cheek. Soon
Starpounder began to change, then Windcaller.

The dragons lifted skyward into the night,
shaken, reaching with trembling effort for the clouds.

“Was it on purpose?” Teb shouted into the
wind later. “Did the unliving do that on purpose? Do they know
about you?”

“No, Tebriel. I think not. But there is more
evil upon Dacia, now the unliving are here.”

Once the dragons were away from Dacia and
out over the sea, their strength returned. They hunted shark and
fed, coiled on a marshy island. Here they spoke together of the
lyre of Bayzun, for the knowledge had flooded into the minds of the
dragons when it burst into Teb’s own conscious thought.

“The spell is broken,” Seastrider said. “The
spell Bayzun himself laid upon the lyre has been fulfilled.” She
eased into a new position among the boulders. Teb shifted, too, to
find the warmest spot against her scaly side.

“The lyre was fashioned from the claws of
Bayzun,” Seastrider said. “Three claws he tore from his own foot as
he lay old and weak, knowing he would soon die.

“Bayzun called forth the dwarf Eppennen,
master carver of all the dwarfs of the northern lands, and bade him
carve the lyre as he instructed. Eppennen did the work there in
Bayzun’s own cave, never leaving until the lyre was completed,
taking for his meals the small creatures that Bayzun was still able
to kill. When Eppennen completed the lyre, Bayzun clasped it to his
scaly chest and said spells over it to enhance its magic.

“The lyre was used only once,” Seastrider
said, “against the first dark invaders. Its powers are against dark
magic, Tebriel, not against normal human force. It will not weaken
a warrior, but it will weaken the dark evils that drive him. It
will strengthen the force of the bard magic. It will strengthen
dragon song and the visions we make.

“When the first unliving tried to take the
minds of Tirror and destroy the bards and dragons, Bayzun rose up
with the last of his great strength and sang, clutching the lyre to
his chest with his clawless foot. He drove the dark out with the
lyre’s magic—his own power and the lyre together drove it out, a
power that shattered the dark across
Tirror. . . .

“The dark retreated back into other worlds
for a while, though it would come again. Bayzun laid the lyre upon
a pile of leaves that often pillowed his head. There it remained
until Bayzun was mortally wounded by the spear of an evil man come
secretly in the night, killing Bayzun when he was too weak to
defend himself, stealing the lyre.

“But before he died,” Seastrider said,
“Bayzun laid a curse on the lyre: that even if the dark held it,
the dark could never use its power. All the dark could do in
holding the lyre would be to prevent its use by the dragons and
bards . . . or by anyone who would defeat the dark with
it.

“Then,” she said, her breath spurting little
flames, “then the un-men laid a countercurse: that the history of
the lyre of Bayzun, and of Bayzun himself, would vanish from all
bard memory and from the memory of all dragons, from the memory of
all men and animals. He did not know that the dwarf had carved a
tablet telling of the lyre.

“In his last gasping breath, Bayzun’s curse
was the final one: that there would come a time when the dragons
and bards would come together in force once more. At the beginning
of that time the memory of the lyre would come alive again, if even
one among us sought it.

“You sought it, Tebriel. Now,” she said,
turning her long silver head to look at him, “now we must recover
it from the treasure halls of Sardira. All dragons will know of the
lyre, now the spell is spent. Dawncloud will know. All bards will
know. . . . Your mother, your sister
. . .”

“But how did the tablet get out of the cave
to the palace where the lyre is? How did the lyre
itself . . . ?”

“You know all that I know, Tebriel. There
are still mysteries shrouded by the presence of the dark. But I see
the dwarf Eppennen returning to that cave, to the corpse of Bayzun,
and carrying the tablet away.” Seastrider licked a morsel of shark
from her claws. “You will find the lyre, Tebriel. You will
. . . among the treasure rooms of Sardira. Your powers
are growing stronger. You concealed your true self at supper
tonight very well. And you laid a strong mind-spell on
Accacia.”

He touched her pearl-colored nose. “How much
do
you see, lurking in your disguise in the stable?”

“Quite enough.” He could feel her silent
laugh like a small earthquake. “Sometimes I sense your thoughts
clearly in spite of the aura of the dark; sometimes I do not.
Though I sensed quite enough tonight to tell me that Lady Accacia’s
flirting and her charm undoes you.”

“If it undoes me,” he said crossly, “how
would I have been able to lay sufficient spell on her to learn of
the ivory lyre?”

“I have trained you well,” she said
smugly.

He leaped at her and pummeled her until she
took his shoulder in her sharp fangs. He held still then, staring
up at her eyes, like two green lakes above him. She did not press
down even enough to dent his skin. When she released him, he jumped
to her back and they were airborne in a wild release of craziness.
She dove and spun, then beat out fast across the night winds,
freeing them both in flight as wild as hurricanes.

She dove so close to waves that Teb was
drenched, and soared so high he grew faint from the thin air.
Windcaller and Starpounder did not follow them, and there was no
sense of Nightraider on the night sky. The black dragon followed
his search in deliberate isolation, all his strength turned toward
one being.

At last Seastrider returned to Dacia. They
both felt strengthened now by their absence from the dark power
concentrated there. They felt ready to face it again. Teb’s mind
was filled with the captive animals, and with Garit and Camery.

He had no idea whether the underground knew
the great cats had been captured. He had no plan. But as Seastrider
circled the stadium, they heard the harsh, angry scream of a great
cat, wild with pain. Teb stiffened, touched his sword, staring down
at the dark arena.

Seastrider dove so the stadium leaped up at
Teb out of blackness. The cat screamed again. Teb smelled burning
fur. They hovered over the stands. Metal rattled; a man laughed.
They could see two figures at a small fire at one end of the arena.
The bars of cages shone in the firelight. Chained animals crouched
behind them, eyes flashing as a third figure thrust a red hot poker
through. A great cat leaped away from it screaming, choked by the
chain that held it against the bars.

I can dive on them,
Seastrider
said.

No. The whole city would soon know there are
dragons. The main gate is ajar; I can get in there.

Seastrider chose a deserted hill beyond the
stadium, littered with fallen, rotted buildings and broken walls,
just above the river. She dropped down. “I will go with you.”

He slid down from her back. “The white mare
would be recognized. A wolf is too small, and maybe you couldn’t
change back. Go up, Seastrider, into the clouds.”

“I will try another shape. A bear—yes, I
remember bears; there are songs that hold the bears’ essence.” She
breathed out a snort of flame, and before he could argue, the night
rippled and twisted, the dragon shimmered, faded, and a dark hulk
reared over Teb, a blackness against the stars reaching out at him
with broad paws, growling.

When she dropped to all fours, he grabbed a
handful of her shaggy coat and swung aboard. She sped down the hill
at a fast rolling gait. He could see by the first touch of dawn
that her coat was not dark, but silver. He had never smelled a
bear—it was pungent and wild. The cat screamed again. Seastrider
reached the high wall. The iron gate was just ajar. She shouldered
through. Teb drew his sword as they swung toward the fire. Before
they were within its light, he slipped down.

Beyond the fire the cat twisted, screaming,
away from the burning poker. Teb leaped for the fire, grabbed one
of the men, and stabbed him. The bear tumbled the other, mauling
him and muffling his screams. The man at the cages turned to look,
but before Teb could reach him, a figure appeared out of nowhere,
out of the dark, leaping to the torturer’s back. There was a cry,
Teb saw the flash of a knife. By the time he reached the fight, the
torturer lay writhing and the smaller figure was running for the
gate.

Teb knelt over the soldier, glancing back
toward the fire, where the bear was flinging one of the dead
soldiers into the air, catching and battering him. He stared into
the dying soldier’s face for a moment, a youth no older than he but
sallow and evil, even in death. He removed the knife, wiped it
clean, and put it in his belt, where it would not identify its
owner; then he watched the soldier die.

He opened the gates to the cages and
unchained the five big cats and two wolves. No creature spoke; they
moved out quickly toward the gate, crowding around the bear as if
for safety. Beyond the gate they found the river quickly, and the
animals crouched among rubble and broken walls to drink. Panting,
the five big cats shivered with pain. The two wolves slunk as no
speaking animal should. The silver bear stood rearing beside them,
watching the stadium they had left and the barracks that formed one
side of it, turning her head back and forth, listening. When no
sound came from the stadium, she sat down at last and contemplated
the animals. One of the great cats came to her and Teb, limping
badly. Her voice was hardly a breath.

She was the sand-colored cat he had released
first, her body torn with fresh burns. She raised her face to Teb,
her green eyes caressing him, then licked his face, leaning her
head against him. At last she stood back, studying Teb and the bear
appraisingly.

“If you were riding a marvelous white mare,
I would think you Prince Tebmund of Thorley. But instead, you ride
a bear. . . . Do bears speak, my prince? I have
never known a bear.”

He laughed. “This bear speaks. She is
. . . kin to the white mare, you might say.”

The cat twitched a whisker. “I am Elmmira of
the colony of Gardel-Cloor. We are in your debt. Do you know
whether the girl escaped safely?”

“What girl?”

“The girl with the knife, who killed the
soldier.”

“She got out the gate safely. Who was
she?”

“That must remain our secret, even though
you saved us. We would not speak her name without her permission.”
Elmmira laid a soft paw against his chest. “My companions are
Domma, Jimmica, Xemmos, and Jerymm.” Each animal lifted its head as
Elmmira spoke its name. “Our wolf friends were brought here as
captives from Igness. Yallel and Zellig.”

“I am Tebmund of Thorley.” Teb felt ashamed
at giving these animals less than the truth. But if the great cats
felt the need for care, then so should he. “The bear does not give
her name. But tell me of Gardel-Cloor. That is an ancient
sanctuary. Are you free to tell me where it lies?”

“That, too, Prince Tebmund, we cannot reveal
even to you.” Elmmira began to lick at her burns. The bear turned
to look at the animals, then started up over the rubble-strewn
hill. They followed, Teb walking among them. But soon the sky began
to grow lighter, the bear’s silver shape becoming too visible among
the fallen houses.

“You’ll be seen if you stay with us,” Teb
told the animals. “Go quickly where you can hide, before Sardira
sends out his soldiers. He’ll be in a rage that you escaped; he’ll
get you back if he can.”

The animals raised their faces to him for a
moment, exchanged a long look with the bear, then angled off
quickly among the broken walls and ran, limping, down toward the
city and the sea cliffs. Teb did not see Elmmira pause, sniff for
scent among the rubble, then begin to track. He swung onto the
bear’s back and she moved at a fast, rolling walk up over the hill.
An empty valley lay beyond, rocky and desolate. Here the bear
plunged down, in a hurry now to change back and take to the sky
before dawn grew too light.

But in the valley she paused, agitated. Teb
slipped down. She began to pace, lumbering around boulders,
fighting something unseen. She returned to Teb at last, her head
down, shifting and backing uncomfortably.
I cannot change. I am
trapped, Tebriel.

He tried to help. It did no good. Seastrider
remained solidly a bear. Teb mounted at last and they went on, up
the cliff and onto open fields, back toward the course of the
river. It was too light now for her to take to the sky, even could
she have changed. In the shadows of a dense grove they hid
themselves—if such a huge, pale creature could hide anywhere. She
squeezed into the brambles, Teb lying along her back, his head
against her rough coat, trying with her, trying to
change. . . .

She clawed at the earth, combing ridges into
the soft forest mulch. She pressed her shoulder against a huge oak,
forcing to bring the magic, then in an agony of defeat she raked
great gashes down its bark so the wood beneath shone white in four
long strokes. And still she was a bear. The morning had come. Down
below the wood they could hear the city waking, bangs and thumps
and voices calling, and a squeaky cart.

The silver bear ceased fighting the dark.
Teb slid from her back. She faced him, very still.
I will go
away alone. Far from here across the inlets south, away from the
forces of the unliving. I will swim the sea to some deserted shore,
then I will be able to change back.

You won’t go alone.