City of Dragons

“Sweet Sa!” Carson breathed, and at that moment the rumbling Sedric had felt became a full-voiced trumpeting from a dozen dragon throats.



“What is it?” he demanded of everyone and no one, and he felt Relpda echo his query. His dragon had wakened to the lights and trumpeting. For a moment, he sensed only her disorientation, and then he felt her thought, both joyous and anguished. The city awakens and welcomes us. It is time we went home.



But we cannot get there.



Alise awakened to dragons trumpeting in the night. She put her feet over the side of the bed and winced as they hit the cold floor. She slept in the Elderling gown that Leftrin had given her, as much as to feel it as his touch as for the unfailing warmth it gave her. She hurried to the door of the hut that seemed so much larger and emptier without the captain, opening the door to rain and darkness.



No. Not complete darkness. Stars had blossomed across the river. She stared, rubbed her eyes, and then looked again. Not stars. Not fires. Windows lit with the sort of light that could come only from Elderling magic. Something had happened over there, something had been triggered. She stared in awe and frustration. “I should have been there when this happened. Who did this, and how?”



But she knew. Rapskal had been impulsive since she first met him, reminding her of a mischievous boy from the very start of the expedition. She knew that he had continued to visit the city in Leftrin’s absence and strongly suspected that he had ignored the captain’s warnings about immersing himself in the memory stone dreams. Now he had discovered something and had done something to waken that reaction in the city. If it was like other Elderling magic she had witnessed, it would last for a time and then, as abruptly as it had begun, it would fail and be gone, never to be seen again.



And here she was, on the wrong side of the river.



Tears pricked her eyes. She shook her face angrily, denying them. No time to weep. Instead, it was time to stare, to try to mark in her memory which of the distant buildings had lit and which had remained dark. It all had to be recorded. If this was as much as she could witness of this last great display of Elderling magic, then witness it she would and make a record for any who came after her to study the ancient ruins.



“I think the first thing is to rig a better shelter for the Elderling and her child,” Hennesey suggested. He was sitting at the galley table. He glanced at the veiled woman beside him as if awaiting her confirmation. She remained silent and still.



Leftrin nodded numbly. He was exhausted, but there was no time to rest now. His ears buzzed with weariness, and he shook his head, trying to clear his thoughts. “Is there any coffee left?”



“A little,” Bellin replied. She took the pot from the iron stove and brought it to the galley table. She poured more for him, and when Reyn nudged his mug to the middle of the table, she refilled his as well. Leftrin looked at the Elderling who sat across from him, so weary and so anxious. He wanted Leftrin’s help. He needed him and his ship, for the sake of his child. But from the story that Reyn had told, helping him could involve him in thwarting the Chalcedean spies. And he feared he knew at least one of those spies by name. If he openly defied him, what might Arich do? Betray that not only had Leftrin made illegal use of wizardwood to supplement his ship’s life, but that he had been the one to smuggle Sinad Arich up the Rain Wild River? He saw the guilt in the eyes of his crew. They’d done something wicked to protect their ship’s secret. At the time, they’d accepted their captain’s word that they had had no choice. When Arich had vanished from the ship when it docked, none of them had questioned him about it. But they all felt it now. Their wickedness had come right back at them. The very thing they’d done to try to protect themselves was what would damn them further. No one would excuse him on the grounds that he’d done it to protect his secret. Either of those crimes was scandalous. If both became known, he could not think of a Rain Wild faction that would not be furious with them. Alise among them. He wondered if Reyn or Tillamon felt their nervousness.



Skelly spoke hesitantly. “Malta the Elderling didn’t do anything wrong! They were going to kill her and her baby. Why can’t we just go to the Council? Shouldn’t we warn them, shouldn’t we tell someone so they can go hunt down that other fellow?”



He gave Skelly a warning look. Time for her to be quiet. “The Council is corrupt.” Leftrin felt the certainty of that now. Someone was turning a blind eye to Chalcedeans in Cassarick. It was not that big a town. If they were moving about as Malta had said they were, coming and going, buying supplies, one of them living in a brothel, then people knew. And someone was shielding them, either for money or because they were being threatened.