AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Her sister Ayafeeia looked at him with new eyes. She flicked a griff at him, one warrior to another. He turned away.
“Now I know why he walks so oddly,” SiMevolant said. But softly. “It’s that lance stuck up his tailvent.”
He left the party and sought out Tighlia. One of her thralls admitted him.
“No, no more visitors,” he heard her cry, followed by a low humming hominid voice. “Oh. Well, I can stand him,” she said a little more quietly.
The elderly female thrall brought him into the cheery little room. Now a bronzed tooth and a scale and a claw from, he guessed, her mate stood on a special pedestal in the center of the room. Other than that it was largely unchanged, though perhaps the air was a little heavier, as though she rarely left the room.
“I’ve come to pay my respects, Tighlia,” the Copper said.
“Wine?” she asked, indicating a deep cistern next to her low shelf. She took a tongueful. “It’s good. Go ahead! I’ve never poisoned a guest’s wine, and I’m not going to start today.”
“A little, thank you.” The Copper took a tongueful. “Why aren’t you at the mating banquet?”
“Because my brother’s going to be there,” she said a little thickly. “I suppose you find that odd.”
“I grew tired of the banquet myself.”
“You know what he’s done with the Gardens, I expect.”
She’s even drunk! All I have to do is make one good leap. I’ve got enough strength in my good sii to— “Made them into a private park for himself and—”
“Yes, that’s bad enough,” she said, taking such a great slurp of wine a little ran out of the corners of her mouth. The spill somehow disarmed him, and he relaxed. “Oh, how sloppy of me. Yes, bad enough to deny decent dragons the view, but do you know he’s stocked it with his precious, plump human females? Brought at great expense, oh, yes, the demen slave traders and ferrymen are happy with him. He’s in there all day sniffing around like some wretched dog. Getting himself puffed up for a night with Imfamnia.”
“She’s an energetic young dragonelle—er, dragon-dame,” the Copper said.
“There’s something sad about that mating. Of course, there always is with a dragon his age and some bright thing with her wings fresh out. Happened before, just not in the Imperial line. If you must dilly-dally you can at least be discreet about it and not bring the jade-scale into company.”
“Manners have never been my specialty.”
“He hardly visits me anymore,” she said, and paused for a little more wine. “Doesn’t care for my advice. You know what he told me, once we had things sorted in the Rock? I brought him a whole bellyful of matters needing attention. He said, ‘I’m Tyr now; I can do what I want.’”
She paused.
“‘I can do what I want.’ What a child. What an old, foolish child. It’s quite the opposite, you know. Perhaps he never really understood what it meant to lead.”
“I came to tell you about some improvements I have in mind for the western road,” the Copper said. “I was wondering if you had any advice about stonecutters.”
“Oh, I’ve had too much wine for any of that. How is your mate?”
The Copper tried to find the proper words. “I’m…I’m content.”
“Good for you, RuGaard. I hope you will be able to stay content. As for me…oh, I must do some serious thinking. But first, a little more wine. It is the day of my brother’s mating, after all. Oh. Stonecutters. Yes, come tomorrow and I’ll give you a name. Fat human, smelly as a pig’s arse and dripping fleas, but he does good work with his crew.”
The stonecutter’s name was Hiriyal, and he did excellent work and regulated an efficient crew. With their quick—albeit expensive—help, each day saw the tunneling progress and the slag pile grow. Hiriyal was a “free slave,” which sounded like a contradiction, but he made his strange social position work for the benefit of himself and his men.
The Firemaidens had carried out their orders a little too enthusiastically, and he found Rayg chained by the ankle to a heavy boulder. He got around by having a blighter help him lift it into a barrow, and together they could move it to the next site, though negotiating the catwalk was obviously impossible.
The Copper had the chain struck off and set up a temporary household while the most difficult element of the work, the stonecutting, was carried out under Rayg’s supervision. After a few arguments about methods with Hiriyal, they made good progress.
The Copper was surveying the first span with Rayg when the young man suggested that he fly below and look at the supports.
“I can’t fly.”
“Is it that wing? The one that hangs?”
“Yes, useless. Not even good to glide; it’s more of a swooping fall, I’m afraid.”
