Mercedes Lackey - Sanctuary

“ Especially dragons where no dragons should be, you mean,” Oset-re said. “No, you’re right. Those miserable crocodiles wouldn’t spare a man to help a single person on the Outer Rings, but once they’re certain of being comfortable and safe, they’ll put spies back on the temple.” He thrust out his jaw belligerently. “All the more reason to get out as many tonight as we can. We know what to do now.”

“Which is, above all else, to not let your dragons fly past their strength.” Kiron glared at him. “You can’t afford to go to ground between here and the temple. But —it did come to me that if a dragon were to stop at round three or four, but regain enough strength to join the final round—I think it would be important enough to let him, or her, do so. But you must judge your dragon’s strength to the last wingbeat. Failure on the return leg—” He shook his head. “—landing in the dark, or in the river, with the crocodiles and the river horses so excited and upset by the earthshake—”

Most of them had seen men hurt or killed in a river horse hunt. All had seen the injuries men got from the seemingly soft and passive beasts. And a crocodile, or worse yet, a swarm of them—they’d take a man and a dragon to pieces in moments. Swamp dragons could hold their own against both river horse and crocodile, but these were desert dragons, and utterly unsuited to such foes.

“No, we can’t afford that,” Kalen agreed. “And I’ve got a horrible truth for you. There are a lot more Winged Ones than there are Jousters. We cannot go into this certain that we will get them all out; we must try, but we might not be able to. If someone has to be left behind, it had better not be a Jouster.”

Aket-ten made a little cry of protest, but Ari nodded, and so did Kiron. “An ugly truth, too, and that is what, as your wingleader, I am ordering you to do, if it comes to that,” he said, making his voice as hard as he could manage. “There are ten of us, and already we have saved six times that number of Winged Ones. I can’t replace one of you. I can probably replace a Winged One. Agreed?”

Aket-ten’s face crumpled and she looked utterly miserable, but glancing at Ari gave her no reprieve, so reluctantly, she nodded.

“With luck, it won’t come up,” he said, injecting a little cheer into his tone. “Haras give us strength and luck, we’ll succeed despite their ill will. Can anybody think of anything else?”

No one could, so at that point, it was just a matter of waiting.

Just! If there was anything harder than waiting, he certainly didn’t know what it was.

The first passenger was an imperious old woman, with a voice so exactly like Gan’s imitation that he had to catch himself to keep from laughing aloud. “Fly faster!” she demanded in his ear—at least she was making an effort to keep her commands quiet.

“Dragon’s flying as fast as she can, Great Lady,” he replied, taking a moment to remind himself who these people were, and how much respect they were due. And he heard the fear under the arrogance; perhaps the arrogance was born of fear. He wanted that respect in his voice before he answered her. “None of them are used to carrying double.”

The old woman mulled that over for a bit, then poked him in the ribs with a bony finger. “Then land beside Te-aten-ka’s apothecary shop on Fourth Ring. I need—”

“I’m sorry, Great Lady, but no landing until we get to Re-keron’s estate in the country,” he interrupted. “Lord Khumun’s orders. Even if I knew where the place was, which I don’t, and even if it’s still standing when we got there, which it probably isn’t. What Lady Re-keron doesn’t have you’ll have to do without until you can find a way to get it.”

She bristled, forgetting her fear in the shock of being thwarted by a mere boy. He could feel her back behind him, bristling up with indignation like a hedgehog. “Now see here, young man, I will not—”

“Great Lady, I’m afraid you must,” he interrupted again. “What you don’t have, you will have to do without, and anyone you wished to speak with to assure them of your safety will have to go unwarned. Avatre is not like a chariot; if you seize the reins, you will only confuse and upset her, and if you upset her, she may well decide you are too much trouble to carry.”

Astonished silence followed that revelation, “But—” she began again, this time with more uncertainty in her voice.

“Great Lady, can you swim?” Kiron interrupted again. “Because if Avatre decides to rid herself of you, there is very little I can do about it, but at least we will be above the Great Mother River’s daughter most of the way.”

Behind him, he sensed that the old woman was opening and closing her mouth silently, like a fish pulled up on the bank. Well, she could do whatever she wanted, as far as he was concerned, as long as she made no noise.

Her shock kept her silent the rest of the way; when he handed her down to her waiting attendants, she looked up as if she was about to say something, but didn’t get a chance to before they rushed her away.

The next trip, the man they put up behind him was silent and looked exhausted. He said not a word until they landed, and then it was only a whispered “thank you,” as he dismounted.

The third trip, however, and the passenger being a tall, cadaverous looking man with haunted eyes, the ones who helped him strap himself to Kiron looked faintly familiar. Enough so that he glanced back in puzzlement as Avatre took off.

“Think you know them, do you?” the Winged One said in his ear. “You probably do. They were two of your little friend Aket-ten’s teachers.”

But they weren’t wearing the medallions of the Winged Ones, his mind protested.

He didn’t say it aloud, but he had forgotten, for a moment, that with these people, he didn’t have to say something aloud to be heard. “They aren’t Winged anymore,” the bitter man said, in a tone of venomous anger.

Not Winged? But—that wasn’t possible, surely, you were either Winged or not—

“They fought the Magi. The Magi didn’t like that, so they kept the ones who fought instead of letting them come back to the temple to rest, and used them until they burned them out. Unfortunately for them, they didn’t die of it.” Not only hatred but fear, and the kind of anger that gripped Kiron like the talons of a vulture. “ Then , the Magi brought them back as a lesson to the rest of us. They’re no more god-touched now than you are.”

“At least they’re alive,” Kiron offered, feeling it was a weak solace, but still—they were alive when all those acolytes in Tia weren’t. They might not be Winged anymore but thousands of people weren’t Winged—

“I wouldn’t call it living,” the bitter man said, acid etching every word. “A man can live without a hand, a foot, even an eye, but what happens when you take part of what he is? He’s better off dead! I’d say that, and they’d say the same!”

Kiron had no good response for that. There was no good response for that. All he could do was to guide Avatre through the night, and wonder what, if anything, the angry man thought he could do about it.

“I’m sorry” seemed a bit inadequate, but it was all he had.

The man didn’t say anything more until they reached the estate and landed. Then, once he was down on the ground, he gave Kiron a searching gaze.

“You’re a good lad,” he said. “Just do what you came to do as best you can, and don’t take more on yourself than you can be responsible for.”

And with that he staggered away, limping heavily and leaning on the arm of an attendant, and if there had been time, Kiron would have hurried after him to demand a meaning for such cryptic remarks.