Mackeli still seemed dazed by the tale of his abduction, Finally he asked, rather hesitantly, “Will you have to find a girl to raise to be keeper after you?”
Anaya looked beyond him to Kith-Kanan. “No. This time the Keeper of the Forest will give birth to her successor.” Kith-Kanan held out a hand to her. When she took it, Mackeli quietly clasped his small hands around both of theirs.
15 — Three Moons’ Day, Year of the Hawk
The ambassador from Thorbardin arrived in Silvanost on Three-Moons’ Day, midway between the autumnal equinox and the winter solstice. The dwarf’s name was Dunbarth, but he was called Ironthumb by most who knew him. In his youth he had been a champion wrestler. Now, in old age, he was esteemed as the most level-headed of all the counselors to the king of Thorbardin.
Dunbarth traveled with a small entourage: his secretary, four scribes, four dispatch riders, a crate of carrier pigeons, and sixteen warrior dwarves as his personal guard. The ambassador rode in a tall, closed coach made entirely of metal. Even though the brass, iron, and bronze panels were hammered quite thin, with all the skill characteristic of the dwarven race, the coach was still enormously heavy. A team of eight horses drew the conveyance, which held not only Dunbarth, but his staff. The warrior escort rode sturdy, short-legged horses, not swift but blessed with phenomenal endurance. The dwarven party was met on the western bank of the Thon-Thalas by Sithas and an honor guard of twelve warriors.
“Good morrow to you, Lord Dunbarth!” Sithas said heartily. The ambassador stood on one of the steps hanging below the coach door. From there he was high enough to clasp arms with Sithas without the embarrassment of making the far taller elf bend over.
“Life and health to you, speaker’s son,” Dunbarth rumbled. His leggings and tunic were brown cloth and leather, but he sported a short purple cape and broad-brimmed light brown hat. A short feather plumed out from his hatband and matched in color the wide, bright blue belt at his waist. His attire offered a striking contrast to the elegant simplicity of Sithas’s robe and sandals.
The prince smiled. “We have arranged ferries for your company.” With a sweep of his hand he indicated the two large barges moored at the river’s edge.
“Will you ride with me, son of Sithel?” asked Dunbarth importantly.
“I would be honored.”
The dwarf climbed back into his coach, then Sithas grasped the handrail and stepped up into the metal wagon. The top was high enough for him to stand erect in. Nevertheless, Dunbarth ordered his secretary, a swarthy young dwarf, to surrender his seat to Sithas. The elf prince sat. The escort filed in behind the coach, pennants whipping from the tips of their gilded pikes.
“A remarkable thing, this coach,” Sithas said politely. “Is it made entirely of metal?”
“Indeed, noble prince. Not one speck of wood or cloth in the whole contraption!”
Sithas felt the silver curtains that hung in front of the side windows. The dwarves had woven them of metal so fine it felt like cloth.
“Why build it so?” he asked. “Wouldn’t wood be lighter?”
Dunbarth folded his hands across his broad, round belly. “It would indeed, but this is an official coach for Thorbardin ambassadors traveling abroad, so it was made to show off the skills of my people in metal-working,” he replied proudly.
With much shouting and cracking of whips, the ponderous coach rolled onto a barge. The team of horses was cut loose and brought alongside it. Finally, the coach and the warrior escorts were distributed on board.
Dunbarth leaned forward to the coach window. “I would like to see the elves who are going to row this ferry!”
“We have no need for such crude methods,” Sithas said smoothly. “But watch, if it pleases your lordship.”
Dunbarth leaned his elbow on the window edge and looked out over the starboard side of the barge. The ferry master, an elf long in years with yellow hair and mahogany skin, mounted the wooden bulwark and put a brass trumpet to his lips. A long, single note blurted out, sliding down the scale.
In the center of the river, a round green hump broke the surface for an instant, then disappeared again. Large ripples spread out from that point—large enough that when they reached the riverbank they all but swamped a string of canoes tied to the stone pier. The great barge rocked only slightly in the swell.
Again the green hump broke the surface, and this time it rose. The hump became a dome, green and glistening, made up of a hundred angular plates. In front of the dome, the brow of a massive, green head appeared. A large, orange eye with a vertical black pupil the size of a full-grown dwarf appraised the stationary barge. At the tip of the triangular head, two nostrils as big as barrels spewed mist into the air.
“It’s a monster!” Dunbarth cried. “By Reorx!” His hand went to his waist, reaching for a sword he’d forgotten he did not wear.
“No, my lord,” Sithas said soothingly. “A monster it may be, but a tame one. It is our tow to the far shore.”
The dwarven warriors on the barge fingered their heavy axes and muttered to each other. The giant turtle, bred by the elves for just this job, swam to the blunt bow of the ferry and waited patiently as the ferry master and two helpers walked across its huge shell to attach lines to a stout brass chain that encircled the monster’s shell. One of the turtle’s hind legs bumped the barge, knocking the feet out from under the nervous warrior dwarves. The coach creaked backward an inch or two on its iron axles.
“What a brute!” Dunbarth exclaimed, fascinated. “Do such monsters roam freely in the river, Prince Sithas?”
“No, my lord. At the command of my grandfather, Speaker Silvanos, the priests of the Blue Phoenix used their magic to breed a race of giant turtles to serve as beasts of burden on the river. They are enormously strong, of course, and quite longlived.” Sithas sat back imperiously in his springy metal seat.
The ferry master blew his horn again, and the great reptile swung toward the shore of Fallan Island, a mile away. The slack went out of the tow line, and the barge lurched into motion. Sithas heard a loud clatter and knew that the warriors had been thrown off their feet again. He suppressed a smile. “Have you ever been to Silvanost before, Lord Dunbarth?” he asked deferentially.
“No, I’ve not had the pleasure. My uncle, Dundevin Stonefoot, did come to the city once on behalf of our king.”
“I remember,” Sithas mused. “I was but a boy.” It had been fifty years before.
The ferry pitched up and down as they crossed the midpoint of the river. A freshening wind blew the barge sideways, but the turtle paid no attention, paddling steadily on its familiar course. The barge, loaded with tons of coach, dwarves, Dunbarth, Sithas, and the prince’s small honor guard, bobbed on its lines like a cork.
Gray clouds scudded before the scouring wind, hurrying off to the north. Sithas watched them warily, for winter was usually the time of storms in Silvanost. Vast cyclones, often lasting for days, sometimes boiled up out of the Courrain Ocean and lashed across Silvanesti. Wind and rain would drive everyone indoors and the sun would appear only once in two or three weeks. While the countryside suffered during these winter storms, the city was protected by spells woven by the clerics of E’li. Their spells deflected most of the natural fury away to the western mountains, but casting them for each new storm was a severe trial for the priests.
Dunbarth took the bumpy ride in good stride, as befits an ambassador, but his young secretary was not at all happy. He clutched his recording book to his chest and his face went from swarthy to pale to light green as the barge rocked.
“Drollo here hates water,” Dunbarth explained with an amused glint in his eye. “He closes his eyes to take a bath!”
“My lord!” protested the secretary.
“Never fear, Master Drollo,” Sithas said. “It would take far worse wind than this to upset a craft of this size.”