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“By the Golden Tree, it is the Gray Dragon,” the dwarf muttered to the wraxapod herder. The dwarf raised his mask. He had the staring look of one who had seen much fighting.
“Dragon, I’ve spent so much time cursing your kind, I’ve forgotten your name. But I’ve seen you before, among the towers and in battle. I was there when you stopped the charge of the Ironriders with your fire.”
“AuRon is the name, and thank you for coming.”
“Altran is mine, once on the staff of Djer, may his vest sprout gold.”
“May I see him?”
“Best if you don’t. He was hurt in the last battle. He needs quiet.”
“To heal?”
“To die, the physikers say.”
AuRon’s claws closed on the wet earth, tearing soil and worms. “Take me to him. If you love your master, if you remember me in the fight by the river, you’ll do as I ask.”
Altran dragged grimy fingernails across what was left of his beard. “I will. My charter means nothing to me anymore, with the great Caravan gone. They’ve laid him out with the others beyond hope. Come, the burial cave is not far.” Altran sent the herder ahead and led AuRon into the forest.
“What happened to the Caravan?”
“Last year we were on the steppe. The same story as everywhere: six dragons came with the horsemen this time, bearing that cursed banner of the figure in the golden circle again. They burned the towers. The survivors went west with Djer. The Ironriders began to gather. He wouldn’t stop. He drove us, wouldn’t give a full night’s rest even, but we made Wallander before the snow flew. Thinner, but alive.”
“How are matters at the Delvings?”
“The Partners built it sound. The dragons have burned out the upper galleries, and not a dowel still remains on the balconies, but no dragon has made it past the first inner door. We’ve got all the water we need, and food for a year or more if it comes to that.”
“Has it been just dragons, or have men attacked with them?”
“No men, no blighters—yet. The Underroad is held by our best dwarves; if they do come in force, we have a hundred ton of rock to close Deep Passage. I’m for moving to the mountains or across. The Delvings are strong, but to me it just means we die a year from now, like rats in a watched hole.”
“I’m sorry. It grieves me to see the Delvings as they are now.”
“That was a good year, when Djer landed at Wallander with you. You brought us luck before, maybe you will again.”
“But too late for Djer, it seems.”
This last came as AuRon spied the burial cave, set well away from the rest of the Delvings. Thankfully only two lanterns lit the place, hiding most of the agony in shadow. Moaning dwarves lay under blankets stretched above, to shield them from the sun. Flies buzzed everywhere, thick enough on the dead to give the bodies a blue-green carpet. Two hollow-eyed dwarves wandered among the dying, giving water in response to weak pleas but deaf to all other requests. The charnel house smell of burning flesh filled AuRon’s nostrils from a fire pit where wisps of blue-black smoke despoiled the clear glint of the stars above.
The buzzing of the flies made AuRon narrow his eyes and fold his ears.
“Skin of the Golden Tree, it’s worse than ever,” Altran said. “They must have brought up the batch from the last attack. They had Djer in the cave when I last saw him.”
Altran picked among the bodies, dead and near-dead.
“Have we surrendered?” one of the attendants said in a tone that marked him as one who didn’t care either way.
“No, this is a friend. An old friend. Where’s Djer?”
“Djer who?”
“The Partner. Djer Highboots. Come, dwarf, pull your helm on straight.”
AuRon stepped carefully over the prostrate dwarves, and put his head into the shadow of the cave. He found Djer, not by smell, not by sight, but by the cloak hung to separate him from the other dying dwarves. A blazoning of a dragon, akin to the one on the ring, marked the cloak and what was left of the vest on the wheezing body.
Altran removed his hat and bent next to the dwarf. AuRon forced himself to look at what remained of his old friend. Djer’s skin was blackened and flaked like that of a spit-roasted pig. His eyes were withered, lifeless things in horribly empty sockets streaming pus down his nose and cheeks, and his lips burned back to reveal teeth belonging to a corpse.
Yet he still breathed.
