As he climbed the knoll to the observation post, he spotted his son. Val, young, strapping, and magnificent in his armor, was standing beside Treynaf, Keron's cousin.
"Father," Val called, "we've been expecting you."
Keron clasped his offspring by the forearms, smiled, and turned to scan the view. Down in the valley, the invading army was assuming its formation, readying for the command to plunge into the river. On the near bank, the men of Tamisan were lining up behind their barricades. On the left flank they were reinforced by Keron's army of exiles, on the right by a small contingent sent by the shah of neighboring Simorilia.
Keron was surprised to see Treynaf. His dour relative seldom emerged from his quarters for any reason, as shown by his pasty complexion. As usual, he had the globe of Alemar nestled in his palms, and was staring into it. Curiously, he lifted his gaze every few seconds toward the battlefield, as if comparing the scene in the valley to that within the talisman.
"What do you see, cousin?" Keron asked.
"The sultan has deployed too many men to the flanks," Treynaf replied with surprising certainty. "He has weakened the center."
Keron had only been half-listening. It was a joke among the Elandri refugees, from the common troops to the king himself, that Treynaf only foresaw the obvious. This was not the prince's usual type of prediction.
"That's ridiculous," Val said. "There are plenty of men in the center. The sultan has to placesome elsewhere. The Dragon's army won't all cross at the ford. They have boats. See for yourself."
There were dozens of dinghies and canoes among the Dragon's entrenchments. As they watched, soldiers carried more to the front.
"Well, Treynaf? What is your answer to that?" Keron asked.
"I see no boats," he replied. He was looking in the crystal ball, not at the river. Keron could smell an acrid, narcotic aroma each time his cousin exhaled. Treynaf was so drugged it was a wonder he could still talk.
"The Dragon is moving quickly," Val said. "I'd say they'll mount the charge within a quarter hour."
Keron scanned the increasingly organized rows on the far bank. "Better get down there. Enret will need you."
One of the pikemen brought Val his mount. "Keep in mind what Treynaf said," Keron added as his son climbed into the saddle.
The young man barely disguised his disdain. "I will," he said respectfully, and snapped the reins.
His countrymen would take heart to see their crown prince riding among them. Keron envied Val that role. As king, Keron could only look down and note how insignificant his band of refugees seemed beside the battalions of fresh, never-defeated Tamisanese. He had barely more than ten thousand men left after the fall of Elandris and the Dragon's subsequent campaigns through Thiagra. Down on the plain the sultan emerged from his pavilion. This was a Tamisanese fight now. Keron was little more than an old navy man driven to dry land.
He ran his fingers along the length of his scepter. He could feel its sorcery, latent, waiting for him to activate it. It was tangible evidence that the Dragon had not won everything. The talismans of Alemar Dragonslayer were still in free Elandri hands. The scepter was with him, the globe with Treynaf, the belt with Val, the amulets and the gauntlets with Alemar and Elenya, and the other, as yet inactivated articles kept by the royal cadre of sorcerers. Gloroc might yet be destroyed, and the wizard's dynasty returned to power.
Keron held on to that thought as tightly as he held the scepter. Perhaps the tide would turn here, in this land that even the Calinin had not been able to conquer.
The Dragon's army was not moving, though it had long been gathered into position. The horde was waiting. For what? Suddenly Treynaf snapped out of his meditation.
"'Ware the eastern sky," he said.
A dragon plummeted out of the clouds, its huge, batlike wings half-tucked at its sides, serpentine tail trailing arrow-straight behind. It streaked toward the defenders on the Tamisan side of the ford, toward their barricades, siege towers, and rows of upraised pikes. High-pitched screams rose as men caught one brief glimpse of the beast's deep, indigo eyes. Dragonfire obliterated the front ranks.
Keron gasped. Gloroc himself! The Dragon had come inland! Away from the sea, the source of his magical power.
The attackers rushed into the river, driving toward the opening the Dragon had created. No one took to the boats. They dropped the craft on the banks and concentrated their manpower into a single phalanx. Treynaf had foreseen correctly. The attack was not spread widely. It would pound the center, where there were not enough defenders to bear the full brunt of it.
The Dragon blasted the barricades. This time some of the sorcerers of Tamisan overcame their shock and managed to erect wards. But the flames they deflected merely struck elsewhere, and at least one ward failed altogether. It was a rare wizard who could fend off a direct bolt of dragonfire. Archers shot their pitiful missiles at the Dragon's hurtling body, but if by some miracle their aim was true, the Dragon's own ward thwarted them.
The Dragon dived three times more, wreaking havoc, though less each time, as a sorcerer here or there remembered the ancient lore that a dragon's powers are weakened by the energies stored in dry land. The magicians called upon the spirits of the soil and their wards began to withstand, bouncing the blazes back up into the air. The Dragon trumpeted his mockery and abandoned the tactic. He had no more than one burst left anyway.
He raced toward the knoll, straight for Keron.
Keron anchored the scepter in the earth. A ward spread, covering him, Treynaf, the pikemen, and most of the hilltop. The dragonfire enveloped them, raged for a moment, and withered without harming them. The Dragon seemed unconcerned. He flew back across the river, landing at the rear of his army.
Within moments, he had risen again, clutching something in his great talons. Keron felt a pang of recognition. Gloroc carried his burden over the Tamisanese trenches and dropped it. A curtain of flame leaped around a ward, dancing off it to lick at a siege tower. Oil. The Dragon was employing the tactic that had made his presence against the ships of Elandris so formidable. He could fly high above arrows and other projectiles, dropping fire bombs until the wards of the victims gave out.
He destroyed the cohesiveness of the Tamisanese forces. His phalanx crossed the ford, splitting the defenders down the middle. Unless stopped they would continue straight up the slopes and attain the high ground.
"Sound the retreat," Keron yelled.
Trumpets blared. The sultan, if he survived, would curse him for a coward, but there was no choice. The Elandri troops responded to the signal, and gradually the Tamisanese and Simorilian forces also ceased their panicked scurrying and began to organize themselves, surrendering ground in an orderly fashion. The Dragon's army would win the river crossing, but it would not break Tamisan's back in one stroke.
Gloroc himself was the problem.
But even the Dragon was vulnerable. He was apparently drawing power from the storm clouds, but it could not be nearly as much as he drew from the sea. With him over land, several superb sorcerers working together could spin a trap, perhaps negate the fundamental spells that allowed his massive body to fly. Keron sent for his head magicians. He would gather them on the knoll and use the scepter to protect them during the casting.
Gloroc rose into the clouds, his laughter blanketing the battlefield, and was gone.
Keron drooped like an eighty-year-old man. The Dragon had gained what he wanted: a beachhead for his army. He would let his human minions mop up, risk their lives, expand his empire. He had breached the last country on the coast of the Dragon Sea still free of his domination. Fear and time would finish the job for him.
Treynaf had stood like a statue throughout the battle, even when Gloroc had aimed his breath at the knoll. Now he stirred, spoke, his voice resonant, unclouded, poetic: