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“This may have been a dragon-throne,” DharSii said.
Wistala didn’t know what he was talking about, but rather than ask DharSii to explain yet again she just cocked her head.
“Before the founding of Silverhigh, after the dragons had tamed the blighters, they worshiped us. Again, I suspect your parents knew something of the Star Order if he chose this as a place to land and die.”
“He had a little help with the dying,” Wistala said. “I led hunters right to him. Unwittingly.”
“Did he ever mention anything about a crystal?”
“No. Never. I’m sure of it. I hardly knew what the word meant until I saw the crystal ball—wait. Intanta. She had a ball. She claimed it was part of the old sun-shard. Why didn’t I remember—Oh, I’m a fool!”
DharSii stared hard at her. “You’re many things, Wistala, but you’re not a fool.”
“This Intanta traveled with a circus, it belongs to a dwarf named Brok now—she and her gang of humans never mixed much with the rest. They were—shady, I suppose you would call them. I think they cheated people and stole. But she had this crystal. It was most strange. It helped a woman—Rayg’s mother, in fact—with the nausea she suffered while carrying child. It also comforted her during birth.”
“I wonder if Rayg knows more than he’s saying. He’s studying the sun-shard,” DharSii said.
“I hardly know him,” Wistala said. “I doubt Lada would even recognize him. She’s old now, too, worn down with work as a priestess.”
“Then this Intanta is surely dead. Do you suppose the crystal is still with the circus?”
“Intanta’s people had left when last I met the circus. Her granddaughter, Iatella, inherited it, I believe. She read my fortune with it when she was just a little girl. She told me AuRon was still alive when I thought him dead.”
“I wonder how it ended up in the hands of that human? You say they were a strange tribe?”
“I always had the feeling they traveled with the circus, rather than as part of it. They dressed oddly, even for humans. Lots of metallic pieces on their clothing. They sewed layers of coins onto bandannas and belts and such.”
“Like they were imitating dragon-scale?”
“Perhaps, I thought they just wanted them to rattle together when they walked.”
“Just as Silverhigh still has its loyalists who still keep the faith, so too are the men who served it and later rebelled, passing their traditions on. It appears,” DharSii said. “I have a new quarry to hunt. Thank you, Wistala, you’ve given me hope.”
“I should return to the Lavadome. I have promises to keep.”
“And oaths that must never be broken,” DharSii said, a touch of fire in his voice. “We part for now, Wistala. If you think of anything else, or learn more from Rayg, you can leave a message with Scabia at the Sadda-Vale. Coin is no doubt growing short and I must return with more.”
He gave a brief bow to the altar Father had lain bleeding on, spread his wings, and launched himself off the precipice Wistala had fallen down all those years ago. Dogs with teeth locked into her tearing at her flesh. DharSii caught an updraft, turned, and swooped over her, gently running the end of his tail down her fringe. With that, he was gone once again.
BOOK THREE
Charity
“The only succor a dragon gives freely is death.”
—From Hazeleye’s notes on dragons
Chapter 15
Wistala slept in the luxury of the Tyr’s chamber. Her brother was away; she felt she deserved the rich bed of the finest damasks, so tightly woven to the cushioning they were guaranteed not to catch on scale.
Also, there was less of a chance that a messenger would seek her here instead of the Queen’s chamber. Nilrasha was a fine dragon, but she had garish tastes; there were far too many skins and interesting bone sculptures of various animals and hominids for Wistala to relax. It was like trying to sleep in an abattoir.
Exhausted from travel, from revived grief in visiting the deathscapes of her parents, and from calls to her attention from NoSohoth so frequent that they invaded her dreams.
The Firemaids and Drakwatch are having a mock battle beneath the griffaran columns you must judge, my Queen. CoTathanagar wishes an audience, he has heard there must be a second messenger for NoFhyriticus in Hypatia and is wondering if the position has been filled yet. There are three new hatchlings in Wyrr Hill you must view. The Tyr’s Demen Legion is appointing a new captain and the dwarfs are attaching the Lavadome from the river ring…
Dwarfs? Attacking from the river ring?
