Shoofteelee took a deep breath and stood up. "But I keep you from your meal," he said, heading for the door. "My apologies."
"That's all right," Alison assured him, standing up as well. "Did the humans say anything else of interest?"
Shoofteelee eyed her a moment, perhaps wondering if she was even worth talking to anymore. "The older one—Mr. Arthur—told the other that he had heard that a Judge-Paladin had arrived at a place called Semaline. He seemed concerned about it."
"What did the other one say?" Alison asked.
Shoofteelee shrugged. "He seemed unconcerned," he said. "Perhaps even amused."
Alison nodded. Which implied whatever was going on with Semaline wasn't connected to their plot against the K'da and Shontine. Something from Neverlin's personal past, then?
She hoped so. At this stage, anything that distracted Neverlin worked to her advantage.
On the other hand, Semaline was where Jack and Draycos had disappeared. Having Neverlin's attention dragged that direction might not be such a good thing after all. "Thank you," she said. "I'd appreciate it if you'd let me know anything else you hear from them."
An ember of hope seemed to touch Shoofteelee's eyes. "I will do so, Alison Kayna, friend of Jack Morgan and the dragon," he said. "Farewell."
"Go in peace and merriment," Alison said.
The other frowned. "What?"
"I said go in peace and merriment," Alison said, suddenly feeling foolish. "It's a traditional Wistawk farewell."
There was another flicker of emotional coloring, a softer one this time. "I would not know of such things," he said. Turning again, he left the room.
With a sigh, Alison sat down again. "You hungry?" she asked Taneem.
One eye emerged from beneath the bed. "Not right now," she said, and then disappeared again.
Gone off for a private sulk, apparently. Shaking her head in mild disgust, Alison sliced off a corner of the meat with the edge of her fork. Sulking, because Alison wasn't ready to jump on a white horse and charge through an army of Brummgas she couldn't stop, toward a gate she couldn't open, for a bunch of slaves who probably wouldn't follow her anyway.
Fine. Let her sulk. Sooner or later, like it or not, she'd have no choice but admit there wasn't a thing the two of them could do for these people.
Until then, Alison would just enjoy the silence.
Carefully dividing the food in each of the tray's sections in half for when the K'da did decide she was hungry, Alison settled down to her meal.
CHAPTER 15
Draycos had hoped to be recovered from his injuries a day or two after falling down the shaft. But the damage was worse than he'd realized. It wasn't until the evening of the third day that he finally felt ready for a proper night's work.
"Remember, you're just supposed to find him," Jack warned as the K'da ran carefully through a final set of stretching exercises. "No questions, no comments, no interrogation."
"I understand," Draycos said.
Jack raised his eyebrows. "And no singing," he added.
Draycos tilted his head questioningly to the side. "Are you still annoyed that I sang to Noy when he was ill?"
"No, not since it all worked out okay," Jack said. "I just don't want you making a habit of it."
"Not a single stanza or chorus," Draycos promised. "I'll be back as soon as I can."
Jack stepped to the door and eased the fringe aside a little. "Looks clear," he murmured. "Be careful."
A moment later Draycos was on the bridge, lying flat against the cold stone as he looked around. The Golvin community had indeed settled down for the night. Slipping down the side of the bridge, wedging the tips of his claws into the cracks, he made it to the ground.
At first glance, the task ahead of him seemed immense. There were thirty-eight stone pillars in the canyon, the tallest of them three hundred feet tall. With the apartment doors indicating approximately eight feet per level, and most levels with two separate apartments, there were nearly three thousand homes here. Theoretically, the prisoner could be in any one of them.
But Draycos was betting he wasn't. After all, they'd tried putting him in one of the apartments, halfway from ground to sky, with no way out. He'd responded by digging a hole into a ready-made tunnel. Draycos didn't know if all the pillars were built with light shafts to the lower apartments, but it didn't seem likely that the Golvins would risk being tricked the same way twice.
He also doubted they would have taken him outside the canyon. The westward distance across the desert, seventy miles, was daunting, but it might be possible for a determined man to cross, especially if there were oases along the way.
Which left exactly one other option.
The last time he'd scouted the eastern part of the canyon, three nights ago, the area had been deserted. Now, in contrast, there were two pairs of Golvins standing guard beneath the line of cliffside caves. Each of the guards carried a quiver of arrows and one of the compact bows Jack had told him about.
Draycos spent a few minutes studying the situation from behind a stand of tall plants. The two pairs of guards were about fifty feet apart, their positions bracketing one particular cave. They were standing amid the crumbled rock in a fifty-foot-wide corridor running between the line of fruit trees and the cliff face itself, with no cover anywhere for a stealthy approach from any direction.
Mentally, Draycos gave a warrior's nod to their setup. Even if the prisoner managed to get out of his cave, he wasn't going to get any farther than the canyon floor.
Which didn't mean, however, that someone else couldn't get in.
He had to travel about a quarter mile upstream before he found a good spot to climb the cliff. Keeping a wary eye on the guards below, he made his way up and then crossed over to the line of caves.
He was still a hundred feet short of his target cave when he picked up the prisoner's scent. Directly over the opening he paused for a moment, tasting the air and listening. He could hear no movement or other signs of wakefulness from inside. With one final look at the guards below, he slipped inside.
The cave was dark except for the moonlight slicing across the entrance. But there was enough light for Draycos to see the signs of the Golvins' hasty conversion of a storage cave into a prison. Several large bags were still stacked against the back wall, and there were a few scatterings of loose grain here and there against the side walls. In the center of the cave were a cot, a single chair, and a compact toilet/sink setup similar to the one in Jack's apartment. There was no galley, no shower, no battery-powered lights.
Lying on his side on the cot, the blankets wrapped tightly around him and pulled up to his ear against the night chill, was the prisoner.
Silently, Draycos padded across the cave for a closer look. The man, as near as he could tell from half a face and an angled lump beneath the blankets, was around thirty years old, though not much taller or heavier than Jack. He had long, tangled dark hair and a beard to match. Draycos leaned over him for a closer look.
And abruptly the man's breathing changed and his eyes snapped open.
Instantly Draycos dropped out of sight to the side of the bed. "Be quiet and don't move," he ordered in a low voice.
"Who is it?" the man asked tentatively, the cot shaking as he rolled over onto his back.
Draycos crouched lower. "I said don't move," he said again. "I merely wish to talk to you."
The movement stopped. "Who are you?" the man asked, a new wariness in his voice. "Is this some kind of stupid trick?"
"It's no trick," Draycos said. "I'm with the Judge-Paladin who arrived in the canyon nine days ago."
"Yeah, I saw him," the prisoner said. "What do you mean, you're with him?"