Martin Scott - Thraxas and the Ice Dragon

«Hey!» yells Makri. «I'm not an Orc. And stop shouting to that imaginary saint.»

«Ignore her, Saint Quatinius. Do not punish an honest Turanian citizen because he has the misfortune to be cast adrift with an unbelieving Orc.»

Makri storms up and stands in front of me. «Will you stop calling me an Orc!»

Makri has one quarter Orcish blood. It can be a sensitive subject.

«Maybe if you said a prayer as well we might get somewhere.»

Makri sneers. «I don't believe in your Western gods.»

«Well how about your Orcish ones?»

«I don't believe in them either.»

I raise my hands in supplication. «You see what I have to put up with, Saint Quatinius? Send me back to land and I'll donate money to the nearest church.»

Makri growls in frustration. She looks up at the grey clouds above. «Saint Quatinius, I'll start believing in you if you just get me ashore so I can escape from this oaf.»

At that moment a wind springs up. Lisutaris rises to her feet. «It's coming from the south. If this keeps up it might get us back to land.»

«Aha!» says Makri, and looks smug. «Now who's the unbeliever?»

«What do you mean?»

«It was my prayer that brought the wind.»

«Stop talking nonsense,» I say.

«Nonsense? I didn't see the saints paying any attention to you shaking your fist. Hardly surprising. Then I make a polite request and here we are, on our way.» She turns to Lisutaris. «You remember that time I stopped the rain in Turai? Do you think I might have some hidden religious powers?»

I shake my head in disgust, then march to the bow to peer into the distance, hoping for a glimpse of land. There's no telling how far south we've drifted in the past week, but now at least we're heading in the right direction.

«So how much money do you have in mind?» asks Lisutaris.

«Pardon?»

«You promised to donate to the church if Saint Quatinius took us back to land.»

«If we make it ashore I'll give it some thought.»

Shrouded in mist, we drift northwards for a long time. Such a long time that I start to worry.

«What if we've gone so far west that there isn't any land left? We might just carry on till we»

I let the sentence hang unfinished. Makri looks at me.

«I keep telling you Thraxas, the world is round. You can't fall off the edge.»

«I don't see why you're so sure about that.»

«I heard Samanatius prove it with logic and mathematics.»

«That old fraud?» I snort with derision at Samanatius. He was Turai's leading philosopher, according to Makri. But he's most probably dead, along with any number of people we used to know. Gurd, Captain Rallee, Tanrose, all my old companions. Who knows what happened to them when the city fell? Lisutaris can't be sure that any of her fellow Sorcerers escaped. The Orcs overwhelmed us so suddenly that even the most powerful might have fallen. I feel the spirit draining from me. Makri is keen to march back to Turai the moment she reaches land, and take up the fight again. Myself, I'm not so sure. I'm wondering about just heading to the furthest West, and looking for somewhere peaceful to live.

«Land ahead,» says Makri

As well as her Orcish blood, Makri also has some Elvish in her. Her eyesight is far better than ours. Lisutaris and I peer through the ocean mist, but we can't see anything. We wait anxiously as we drift northwards. Finally a thin line appears on the dim horizon.

«The orange cliffs,» says Lisutaris.

The orange cliffs of Samsarina. A well known landmark. We haven't come nearly as far west as I feared. Just two countries along from Turai, in fact. Only Simnia separates us from home.

«At least we're not landing in Simnia,» I mutter.

«What are the Samsarinans like?» asks Makri.

«Not as bad as the Simnians. Which doesn't mean they're all that great.»

As we drift in towards Samsarina, Lisutaris, Mistress of the Sky, is pensive. It's weighing heavily on her mind that Turai fell while she was head of the Sorcerers Guild. I'd say she's being hard on herself. There were plenty of worse failures in the city. Our Royal Family, the intelligence services, the army. None of them covered themselves with glory. I did my part, of course, but as for the rest of the degenerate population, they crumbled under the pressure.

«News of Turai's fall will have reached here by now,» mutters Lisutaris. «I'm probably assumed to be dead. Lasat Axe of Gold will be rubbing his hands at the prospect of a new election.»

It's unfortunate for Lisutaris that we're heading into Samsarina, where Lasat is the Chief Sorcerer. During the recent election for Head of the Sorcerers Guild, the Turanian government blackmailed him to ensure Lisutaris's victory. I doubt he'll give us a friendly reception. Lisutaris lights up a thazis stick. She glances at the pouch in her hand. «I'm running out of thazis.»

Lisutaris is a devotee of thazis. Normally a mild narcotic, the Sorcerer has taken its consumption to new levels. She's developed spells to make the plants grow faster, producing a much stronger variety than is commonly available. I doubt she could function without it. I have a notion that thazis might not be so tolerated in Samsarina as it was in Turai, but decide not to mention it. We drift in towards the Orange Cliffs.

«I've been here before,» says Lisutaris. «We're not far from the port of Orosis. I know the harbour Sorcerer, Kublinos.»

«So what's Samsarina like?» asks Makri. «Is it like Turai?»

I shake my head. «Not at all. It's mostly farmland. Barons and peasants. Though it's quite wealthy. Good farmland.»

Lisutaris agrees with me. «It's not like Turai. No Senate, no Consul, no theatres, no university. Just a King and a lot of Barons vying for influence. Old-fashioned compared to our city.» Lisutaris purses her lips. «Their Sorcerers didn't like it when a woman was elected Head of the Guild.»

«Cheer up,» I tell her. «We're war refugees. They're bound to sympathise.»

«They won't sympathise if they think we let the Orcs beat us without a fight.»

«Without a fight?» I scoff. «No one has ever accused Thraxas of giving up without a fight. Thraxas Dragon Heart, they used to call me.»

«No they didn't,» says Makri.

«Yes they did. I tell you Makri, you're in for a surprise. Don't forget, I won the sword-fighting championship in Samsarina. I doubt I'll be able to walk down the street without people recognising me. Wouldn't surprise me if they've put up a statue.»

Makri looks at me dubiously. The sword-fighting championship in Samsarina is the most renowned contest of arms in the West. Makri never quite believes me when I tell her that I won it, twenty or so years ago. Of course I was in better shape in those days. Not so large around the waist.

«Just concentrate on not outraging the natives Makri, and we'll be fine. Don't act like a mad woman, a mad Orc, or any combination of the two. And keep your pointy ears hidden.»

«You'll offend them a lot quicker than me, you fat oaf,» retorts Makri. «How long till you're rolling around drunk?»

«That depends on how far we are from the nearest supply of beer.»

We drift slowly along the shore till the port of Orosis comes into view, large and grey, its sombre harbour walls protecting ships from the harsh winter conditions.

«I'll be glad to get ashore,» says Lisutaris. «I'm sick of eating fish.»

We come to rest on a grey, shingled beach a little way west of the harbour walls. A few seabirds squawk noisily overhead as we arrive. It's a cold morning and the sky is dull. Though we're nearing the end of winter there's no sign of the temperature rising.

«We should find Kublinos,» says Lisutaris.