“I found a mountain goat just before the light left the hilltops,” Stegoman grumbled. “He was small and tough. I am hungry, Matthew.”
“Help yourself.” Matt gestured at the hams then stepped back. Stegoman stepped forward, lowering his head, and started gulping. Five minutes later, he sighed and nodded. “Well done. I shall be content for the day now. Will you fetch your packs and mount?”
“We’ll be glad to,” Matt said. “Thanks for the invitation.”
They went back inside the mill, and Matt found himself suddenly wondering if their belongings would be where they’d left them… but he did Callio an injustice, everything was there. They left the mill with their packs on their backs, then realized that their footsteps had developed an odd echo.
Chapter Twenty-One
Matt turned around, holding out a hand. “Well, Callio, it’s been nice meeting you. Have a nice trip.”
“Why, thank you, Lord Wizard!” Callio seized his hand and began pumping. “It’s so good of you to invite me!”
“Sarcasm is sometimes ill placed, Matthew,” Papa muttered in an undertone.
Even more silently, Matt cursed his own stupidity. In desperation, he said, “Oh, how silly of me! I can’t invite you… I’m not the one who’d be carrying you!” He looked up at the dragon and shook his head as he said, “Stegoman, you don’t really want to carry one more, do you?”
His heart sank when the dragon didn’t answer, but studied Callio long and hard.
Callio, no doubt wondering whether he’d been added to the menu, began to back away.
“There is a need to bring him,” the dragon rumbled. “I sense a Rightness in his joining us.”
Callio looked relieved, then realized that he might have been dropped from the menu only to be put in the larder.
“Are you sure?” Matt wasn’t used to Stegoman having hunches.
“I know not how or why, only that he must come with us,” Stegoman said slowly. “But know, slight man, that your cart must stay here.”
Callio’s face twisted in agony.
“Yeah, can’t be without that,” Matt said quickly. “How would you carry your loot? But you can’t pack a cart on top of a dragon, not with three men along. Too bad, Callio. Guess you’ll have to stay here. Good meeting you, though.” He turned away to Stegoman… fast.
“If I must do without it, I must,” Callio cried. “I shall come, Lord Wizard!”
Matt slowed and muttered something under his breath.
“No, no, Matthew, he is only a thief,” Papa said, grinning. “I am sure he will prove invaluable in helping us find dinner. Let us accept your scaly friend’s invitation, and fly.”
Apparently Callio hadn’t really thought out the flying part. He clung to a back-plate, staring down in terror, rigid as a board the whole way. Matt’s reassurance that he wouldn’t let the thief fall didn’t seem to console him much.
“It is better if you don’t look down,” Papa said helpfully.
Callio tore his eyes away from the ground and stared ahead. “I would never have dreamed that I would ride a dragon!”
“Takes a little getting used to,” Matt called over the roar of the wind. “Just be glad he’s flying low.”
To be on the safe side, he touched his purse. Yes, it was still there. He tucked it down inside his hose and called, “Papa, how many fingers do you have?”
Saul and Mama patrolled the battlements, fidgeting. “Anyway, it’s quiet, Lady Mantrell.”
“Yes. That worries me.” Mama frowned. “I would expect them to attack now and then from sheer boredom, if nothing else.”
“Well, they’ve tried all the basic assaults and found that they don’t work. Sooner or later, every siege boils down to sitting still and trying to wait out the defenders.”
“But not so soon,” Mama said. “It has scarcely been a fortnight. Perhaps we should have men stab the earth with rods, all around the inside of the wall.”
“Checking for miners, you mean? Good thought.” Saul frowned. “Seems as though we ought to be able to do better than that, though. Maybe a magical equivalent of sonar… “
“Yes, and a warding spell! You can make a magical fence, no?”
“Yes. I mean, it’s fairly easy… but it’s also easy to bypass, since every magician knows about it.”
“But if they are stopped by a warding spell underground, they will not be looking for your alarm system! They will bypass the wards, but we will still know they are coming!”
“Great idea.” But Saul eyed Mama warily “You have problems with home security?”
“No, I have Ramon,” Mama said absently. Her brows were knit, she was still worrying over some problem. “What’s bothering you?”
“The commander of this assault,” Mama said. “You mean the guy with the big gaudy turban and the huge gaudy pavilion? What about him?”
“He is too obvious,” Mama said, “and he is a general. Sorcerers began this war… does it not make sense that sorcerers would still command it?”
And Saul had thought he was paranoid! On second thought, maybe he was… Mama was just being rational, given the circumstances. “Why do you think there has to be a ruler behind the ruler, milady?
Why won’t the obvious do?”
“Because we deal with a wily enemy, one who specializes in feints and diversions,” Mama said. “His drawing Alisande away from the city before the attack shows that… and his soldiers descending in force the day after she was gone. Additionally, he must know we have sent couriers after her and, even if his minions stop the riders, that we have magical means of sending. Would he not fear that she would turn back and attack him from the rear?”
“It makes sense, now that you mention it,” Saul said slowly, “but I would keep on going, trusting my castellans to hold the city for me.”
“You are not a general, though. We must ask Sir Guy. Before that, however, humor me, Saul… make your gazing bowl again and tell it to show us who truly commands this army.”
Saul looked down at her a moment, considering. She hadn’t been wrong yet, and she was a scholar who had read virtually all the medieval literature there was, with its descriptions of treacheries and double-dealing. Somehow, he didn’t doubt her hunches. “Right away, Lady Mantrell.”
So he filled the bowl, made the passes, and chanted the spell, then told the water,
The pool clouded, then cleared, and they found themselves staring at the gorgeous pavilion, all right… but it was to the side of the bowl. In its center stood a small, unassuming tent, bigger than most, but nowhere near as big as many. An ordinary soldier sat at its door, dressed in a camel rider’s robe and head cloth held by a braided camel-hair rope… but he was studying a huge old book in his lap.
“Now may my spells his book engage” Saul improvised
“Let us see and read his page.”
The picture swelled until one leaf filled the bowl, but they still couldn’t read it… it was in Arabic. But they could understand the geometric symbols they saw, at least the pentagram and the elaborate, curlicued decahedron. “He’s thinking about warding spells, all right!” Saul said. The book slammed shut.
Mama cried,