AllFreeNovel
Share Us
The night was foggy and turning cold, the moisture thick enough to collect at the branch-tips and drop with soft, wet taps into the fallen leaves. There would be a thick frost by morning, she expected.
“You dragons are supposed to be able to sing,” Stog said. “I’d like to hear a song of the merits of mules. What horse could carry this burden at this pace?”
“Is he complaining about the weight?” Rainfall asked. “My beast-tongue is not that of my forefathers—I’ve been too long in tamer lands.”
“He wants a song,” Wistala said.
“Perhaps it would help pass the time,” Rainfall said. “Beside, I don’t think I’ve ever heard you sing.”
Wistala cleared her throat. “Drakes and dragons are more fond of these kind of displays, and more skilled, but I’ll do my best:
While a horse will carry any fool
If the going’s hard you’ll want a mule!
Twice the load on half the feed,
A mule is tougher than any steed!
But treat him well when put to task
Or he’ll knock you on your—
“Ask no more verses of me, I’m out,” Wistala finished.
“Prettier than any nightingale,” Rainfall said. “And a good deal louder.”
“Let’s have it again,” Stog said. “While a horse will carry any fool . . .” he brayed in time to his hoofbeats.
And so, with Stog repeating the verses until dogs whined in complaint, they came into the Quarryness around the midnight hour.
The town was bordered by Rainfall’s road to the east and a great hill to the west. The hillside facing the town was one long cliff, with some wooden scaffolding up the side where men took building stone. A small watercourse cut through the town, bridged in two places by stone. There were several constructs of two or three levels at the center of town around a rather muddy common and a few leafless trees, but the rest of the town was a small warren of narrow, twisting streets.
“The thane allows for division and subdivision of the town parcels,” Rainfall said. “He forgets that the old Hypatian engineering, while somewhat wasteful of space, also prevents fires.”
There were still a few lights in some of the upper windows and galleries of the town, but none strode the streets save for a pair of men Rainfall identified as firewardens—also charged with keeping the peace. Downstream Wistala heard faint notes of music and song.
Rainfall turned Stog into the center of town, just off the main road. He stopped Stog before a stout, triangle-topped building with a silver banner-staff at the peak. “High temple,” Rainfall said, pointing to a grand, round-topped building. “Low temple,” he said, referring to a long, flat-roofed stone-walled building opposite. “Courthouse and muster-hall.”
Ranks of carved men carrying spears and shields decorated the sides. “Bring me right up the steps to the door,” Rainfall said, in beast-tongue, to Stog.
The doors were metal-covered and fitted in such a way that the hinges were concealed.
“There will be a low judge or two within,” Rainfall said. “The law never sleeps, as old Arfold, my law-teacher used to say. Strike the door with your tail, Wistala, and wake them.”
Her scales rang on the metal surface, and the pounding echoed within.
The pair of firewardens watched from the common, talking to each other quietly. One hurried away toward the road.
“Again, please,” Rainfall said.
Wistala pounded on the door again.
A decorative panel in the door suddenly opened. “I rise, I rise. What have you to say that can’t wait until a daylight hour? Is there a murderer to be celled?”
“Good evening, Sobyor,” Rainfall said.
The man’s rather small eyes widened. “Your Honor!”
