Stephen Deas - The adamantine palace

'Well, Biyr, what happened here?'

'A dragon came out of nowhere. We had no warning. It burned us. I was walking away from our tree shelters when the fire came.'

'Did you see the dragon?'

'Yes.'

'And, er, what colour was it?'

'White.'

The alchemist nodded, pleased. 'Did you see who was riding it?'

'No one was riding it.'

Huros frowned and shook his head. 'Ah. There must have been a, um, rider. Perhaps you missed it? Um… When did you see the dragon? When it was in the air? Did it land?'

'It came down in the river after it burned us. I saw it then, between the trees.'

'Did you see it in the air?'

'No.'

The alchemist nodded. 'There, you see. Um… whoever was riding her had probably already dismounted. Besides, it's not a good view from here through the trees to the river. I'm sure you could see something the size of a, ah, dragon clearly enough, but it would be very easy to miss a man.'

'I didn't see anyone get on its back before it went,' said Sollos quietly.

'That's because it didn't have a harness on,' grumbled Kemir. 'I kept telling-'

'It spoke,' murmured the dead man.

Huros shook his head. 'Dragons don't speak.'

'It spoke in my head. I heard it. It came for Maryk.'

'Um, no. You must be mistaken. That cannot be. Dragons do not speak.'

The alchemist's knuckles had gone very white.

Sollos asked, 'Who's Maryk?'

'One of us,' said the dead man. 'The dragon came after him.'

'How do you know?'

'That's what it said. It had come for Maryk. I heard its voice inside me, full of hate and fury.'

The alchemist shifted uncomfortably and frowned.

'Was this Maryk here?' asked Kemir.

'Yes. He was in the shelters,' said the dead man.

The alchemist raised a hand. 'Enough. Um… sell-sword, go and bring Rider Semian to me.'

'So he's probably dead then.' Sollos made a face. 'Pity.'

'You should leave now,' said the alchemist.

Kemir grunted. 'I want to know about this Maryk. Where did he come from? Why did the dragon want him?'

'I want you to, um, leave us now, sell-sword. Bring Rider Semian. Um, right now.' The alchemist was chewing his lip in agitation.

'Do dead men lie?'

The alchemist turned and looked at Kemir. For a timid man, there was something very fierce in his eyes. And frightened too. 'About as much as living ones do, sell-sword. I said go!'

Kemir rolled his eyes. 'I'm only asking. Maybe when Rider Rod comes back, you could ask Crispy here whether we stabbed him. Just to make sure, you know.'

'There are no, er, wounds,' said Huros, between gritted teeth. 'It is patently obvious that you did not kill him. Now go!'

Sollos turned and left, pulling Kemir away with him.

Kemir chuckled to himself.

'Well he didn't seem very happy.'

'Do you have to annoy them so much?'

'Do I annoy them?'

'Does the sun rise in the morning? One day, one of those dragon-knights is going to lose his temper with you.'

'Let him. I'll put an arrow through him before he can remember which side he buckled his sword.'

'Yes. And what will you do about the other five?'

'Run like buggery, I expect.' Kemir laughed again and slapped Sollos on the back.

'I'm not finding this funny.' Sollos wrinkled his nose and loosened his shoulders. 'Something isn't right about this.'

'You keep saying that. As far as I'm concerned, what's not right is that we're helping dragon-knights.'

'We've been helping dragon-knights for months, remember?'

'Then let's just say I liked this work much better when we were helping dragon-knights by killing other dragon-knights. They're so stupid. They deserve to die.'

Sollos shook his head and pulled away, walking briskly towards the river.

'Well they are,' Kemir shouted after him. 'No obvious wounds? That's easy. Force open a man's mouth, drive a skewer up into the soft bit in the roof of his mouth and wiggle it about a bit. Or in through his nose, if he's totally out of it. Or up his arse, like Rider Rod. Need a bigger skewer for that, of course.'

'Will you shut up!' Sollos shook himself in exasperation. Whatever they both thought of dragon-knights, a fight wasn't going to help anyone, and Kemir was going to have to understand that sooner or later. Preferably sooner.

'Sell-sword!' Sollos emerged from the trees. Rider Semian was there, waiting for him. Sollos sighed. He couldn't bring himself to bow, so he settled for a slight nod.

'Rider. Master Huros has requested your presence. I suppose he has information he thinks you should hear.'

Semian looked at him askance and Sollos braced himself for the inevitable scornful tirade, but it didn't come. 'Very well, sell-sword. You can make yourself useful here instead. I require a fire.'

Sollos looked around at the smouldering embers all around him. 'That shouldn't be too difficult.' Even for a dragon-knight.

'I need smoke, sell-sword, and lots of it. No more walking through these cursed river beds. We're finishing this search as we should have started it. On dragonback.'

Nadira

The Outsiders came while Snow was hunting. She'd taken Kailin down from the snows of the mountainside into the rain and the constant damp of the mountain valleys. Water was everywhere. Tiny streams boiled down the forested slopes into wide rushing rivers and long still lakes. Whatever wasn't a river or a lake or a sheer piece of rock had a tree growing out of it. Vines grew on the trees and tufts of grass grew on the vines, and all of it was moving and alive.

Kailin was sunning himself on a boulder beside a river when he heard the first scream. He looked up and saw a woman running through the river towards him, leaping from one stone to the next. As he sat and stared at her, he saw that she wasn't alone. Half a dozen men were a little way behind her.

'Help me!' she shouted.

Heading straight for him, she reached his boulder and fell to her knees, clutching his hand. She looked exhausted and terrified. 'I don't know who you are, but help me, please. They're going to kill me.' Then she looked at him, saw him properly, saw his hard flaking skin and screamed.

Kailin screwed up his face and thought of Snow, but he felt nothing. The dragon must be miles away. He stood, paralysed. As the men came closer, they slowed down. There were six of them and they were armed with clubs and knives. Evil anticipation spread across their faces. He stared back, unable to move.

One of the men looked him up and down with obvious revulsion. 'What the fuck are you?' Then he jumped forward and swung a club at Kailin's head. Kailin raised his arms to fend off the blow. The club glanced off his elbow. Everything from his fingers to his shoulder erupted in pain and then went numb. He whimpered, and then the rest were on him, beating him down to the ground until everything faded away into a sea of pain. 'Nice one, Maryk,' he heard someone say.

Kailin returned to the world gradually, reluctantly. His arms felt as thought they were being wrenched out of their sockets. His ribs ached. His head was filled with thunder and lightning.

He opened his eyes. He was hanging from a branch by a rope tied around his wrists, about ten feet off the ground. A thick canopy of leaves and branches blotted out the sky above, filtering the sunlight to gloomy shadows. He was facing the river, overlooking the boulder where the men had beaten him senseless. They were still there, taking it in turns with the woman. Her face was puffy and swollen, and there were fresh scars on her back. They were cursing her, but they swore with such venomous hate that Kailin could barely understand them. Whore. Thief. That was all.

When they were finally finished with her, two of them held her down while a third pulled out a knotted length of rope and started to whip her. She spat and kicked at them then, but it was a short one-sided fight, and in the end all that was left were her screams. Eventually even those stopped. Her back was a bloody mess, but the man with the rope only stopped when one of the others put a hand on his arm.