Troy Denning - The Veiled Dragon

The witch forced her eyes open and raised her head. Her two companions sat on the front of the raft, each facing the other from his own corner. Captain Fowler, who was holding a boarding axe in his fist, brought the weapon down and buried its head in the edge of a plank.

“It’s a good thing you were the one in the water, not me.” Fowler glared at his sailmender. “Do you think Arvold would’ve pulled us back? He’d have left us to the sharks and thanked Umberlee for the chum.”

Ruha let her head fall back to the deck, then rolled it to one side so she could study Arvold’s face. The sailmender had a sharp-featured face with a hawkish nose and dark, glistening eyes, and in his expression there was no denial of anything Fowler claimed. Still, whether he had done it willingly or not, Arvold had saved the witch at the peril of his own life, and she was not so far gone from Anauroch that she had forgotten what such an act meant to a Bedine.

“Perhaps what Captain Fowler claims is true, Arvold,” Ruha said. “But even so, you saved my life at the risk of your own. Until I have done the same, I am yours to command.”

Captain Fowler winced at the statement. Arvold’s lips curled into a lecherous grin, and he ran his dark gaze up the witch’s exposed leg, over her bare hip, and up to her dark, ripe lips.

Ruha’s cheeks burned with embarrassment, for she was unaccustomed to having men ogle her naked face. Save for her short tenure as a spy in Voonlar, she had ignored the Heartland women’s custom of baring their visages in public, preferring to keep her own face concealed beneath a heavy scarf. All that she usually showed were her brown eyes, her aquiline nose, and, when her veil slipped low, the tribal hash marks tattooed on her cheeks.

“Well now!” Arvold continued to leer. “That changes things.”

Ruha turned away, raising a hand to cover her face. “I did not mean I would …” The words caught in her dry throat. “My words did not imply what you think. In Anauroch, they are a pledge of allegiance and debt.”

“We’re not in the desert, witch!” Arvold snarled. “We’re in the middle of the bloody Dragonmere-and I say you owe me something for that, too!”

The raft bounced gently as Arvold crawled across the deck. Ruha let her hand drop to her jambiya , both angered by the fool’s lechery and frightened she would have to slay him to save her honor. He could not believe she had meant to offer herself as a woman-or could he? She raised herself on an elbow and looked toward the sailmender. He stopped just beyond her reach, his gaze fixed on the curved dagger at her belt.

As Arvold contemplated his next move, a dark fog began to gather at the edges of Ruha’s vision. The sharp angles of the sailmender’s face seemed to soften before her, and his rough complexion grew smooth and yellowish. His hawkish nose shrank to a more graceful size and curved upward at the end. Folds of skin appeared at the corner of his eyes, giving them a narrow, slanted appearance, and his hair turned black and silky.

Ruha’s hand loosened around her dagger, but she did not gasp, or even worry that she was falling into unconsciousness again. She had been suffering visions since before she could walk, so she recognized the change in Arvold’s face for what it was: a mirage from the future. Sometime soon, she would meet a man with the face that had appeared over the sailmender’s. She could not say what would happen then, but she doubted it would be anything good. It was never anything good.

Ruha’s first mirage had been of thousands of butterflies. Later that year, her tribe had been forced to camp at an oasis infested with moths, and soon every piece of cloth in the khowwan was full of holes. Later, the face of a handsome stranger had appeared over that of her husband, Ajaman. Ajaman had died that night; the handsome stranger had arrived soon after to help Ruha’s people fight the ones who had murdered her husband. She had eventually taken the stranger, the Harper named Lander, as a lover-only to see him felled by the same enemy that had slain Ajaman.

Noticing Ruha’s distraction, Arvold slid forward, still wearing the face of a slant-eyed stranger. When he stretched a hand toward her dagger, his fingers suddenly changed into sharp talons. The flesh of his arm turned black and scaly, and the pupils of his eyes narrowed into vertical slits with irises as black as obsidian. A crest of jet-colored fins sprouted along his back, and the long, lashing tail of a dragon appeared at the base of his spine.

Ruha tried to pull her jambiya , but the sailmender’s claw lashed out quick as a serpent and caught her wrist. She cried out and slammed her forehead into the strange face. Arvold raised his free hand to slap her, and it, too, was a black claw.

Captain Fowler appeared behind his sailmender and caught the man’s scaly arm. Arvold’s dragon tail disappeared instantly, as did his scales, his talons, and his crest of dark fins. His pupils grew round, the yellowish tint vanished from his skin, his nose grew hawkish again, and Fowler continued to hold his wrist.

“Arvold, you know what the witch meant to say. Do you really want to hold her to the letter of what she said, knowing what she’s liable to do if you anger her?”

The sailmender continued to stare at Ruha’s bare face, his leer more angry than lustful. Though she felt bashful and naked without her veil, the witch forced herself to return his gaze with an icy glare.

At last, Arvold released the witch’s arm. “Ah, Umberlee take you!” He pushed himself to his corner of the raft. “If that’s how you repay your debts, I’ll have nothing to do with you.”

Ruha let her head fall back onto the deck, weakened by both her vision and the trouble with Arvold.

Captain Fowler’s swinish face appeared over her.

“Sorry I didn’t move faster, Witch,” he whispered. “But after you nearly called me a coward, I-”

Ruha raised a hand. “Do not apologize, Captain. You warned me before not to question your judgment-and I should have been able to handle Arvold without your help.”

Fowler nodded. “Aye, any Harper should’ve, but you hesitated-and why you let him grab your dagger arm, I’ll never know.”

“I have lost a lot of blood,” Ruha said.

The witch balked at telling Fowler about the mirage, for she had long ago learned that few people understood her visions. Her own tribe had banished her from their camps, believing her wicked magic caused the calamities she foresaw. Even in the Heartlands, she had twice been stoned for warning people of disasters about to befall them, and once she had been accosted for not foreseeing a catastrophe that befell the flirtatious young daughter of the mayor of Teshwave.

The witch rolled her head away from Fowler. “Perhaps I was just too weak.”

The captain checked the tourniquet on her leg, then laid his leathery palm on her forehead. “You’re losing no more blood, but you do feel cold as a barnacle.” He grabbed her chin and pulled it around so he could look her in the eye. “You wouldn’t be thinking of dying on me, would you Witch?”

Ruha tried to chuckle and failed. “Not without your permission, Captain.”

Fowler glared at her from the corner of one eye. “Aye, that’s good.” He grabbed the collar of his tunic and turned it inside out, displaying the Harper’s pin Ruha had given to him. “I’ve every intention of collecting on your promise-and don’t think you can squirm out of it, like you did with Arvold.”

Ruha managed a weak smile. “Get me to Pros, and you shall have your ship.”

“That I shall, Witch-and it’ll be easier than you think.” The captain grinned broadly, then stood and turned toward the front of the raft. “Arvold, man your paddle!”