Patricia Briggs - Dragon Bones

"He couldn't read it—illiterate bastard ." His voice hit the last word with raw hatred.

"It's in old Shavig. Not many people can read it," I commented.

"He had me beaten when I told him what it said." As he spoke, the threads of his shirt parted in a short, straight line down his back from his right shoulder to his right hip. He flinched, and another line of broken threads appeared. Incredulously, I saw blood darken the edges of the material, but Oreg didn't turn his attention from the wall.

"Oreg," I said, trying to keep my voice calm, though this time I could hear the snap of a whip as a third invisible blow hit him.

My mother could work illusions. Sometimes I'd walk into a room in the castle, and it would be filled with vines and exotic flowers from her homeland in southern Tallven. This didn't feel like an illusion: Blood dripped from his back to the dusty floor.

"Oreg, that was a long time ago. He can't hurt you anymore," I said.

"He could have killed me," continued Oreg in that unnaturally calm voice.

I stepped between him and the wall to catch his eyes, but when I saw his face, I couldn't say another word. His face was swollen past recognition, and white bone showed through his cheek.

"But he didn't. He had someone else use the whip. Do you know why?"

"No," I whispered. "Tell me."

"Because he didn't want to lose Hurog. He knew how much I wanted to die. He wore the ring so only he could kill me, and he knew that's why I baited him. So he had someone else do it."

"Oreg," I said, touching the top of his head gently, for it was the only place unmarked by ancient pain.

"Ward?" said my uncle just behind me. "Who are you talking to?" His voice was soft; it sounded very much like the voice I was using on Oreg, whom he obviously couldn't see.

So much for my plan to explain to Duraugh that I was really normal.

"I was reading the words on the wall," I said without looking around. "My brother Tosten tried to teach them to me once, but I only remember a little."

"Ah," said my uncle, sounding much relieved. "Garranon and his brother are here."

I turned abruptly from Oreg, trying not to react when he began a high-pitched keening as I pulled the shield of stupidity firmly around me. The visitors had hung back while my uncle approached, but it only took me a few strides to reach them.

"Garranon!" I grabbed his hand hard and shook it vigorously, despite his decorous attempts to escape. Then I slapped him on the back, holding him in position with the hand I still held.

He gave a muffled yelp. My uncle threw his arm around my shoulder and pulled me off unobtrusively. "Lord Garranon and his brother Landislaw have ridden all the way from court this past week," my uncle said.

Garranon was about average height with fine-boned features, curly brown hair, and thin lips that smiled too easily. He looked younger than he was, which I suppose was the attraction he still held for the king. His brother Landislaw looked very like him, but somehow Landislaw made the same features appear rugged rather than aristocratic. On Landislaw, Garranon's thin nose became strong and masculine. The narrow lips were firm, the smile charming. With the two of them together, one thought of scholar and warrior or stag and blooded bull—or so the ladies of the court said.

After I made everyone sufficiently uncomfortable by staring at them, I nodded my head. "Court is boring. I would have come here, too."

Landislaw laughed. "Truthfully said. I've enjoyed this past week more than any week at court. I'll be sorry to see it over." Landislaw was a panderer and a bully whom I disliked intensely.

Garranon was still rubbing his shoulder unobtrusively, but he had court manners. "I wish to express my condolences."

I looked at him inquiringly.

"For your father," he said.

"Oh," I said with sudden comprehension. "Yes, for my father. Died a few weeks ago."

Disconcerted at my lack of filial mourning, Garranon's practiced speech left him. I liked Garranon more than I wanted to like the high king's favorite. I liked him even better now when his presence meant I had to wait to tell Duraugh the truth.

My uncle stepped in smoothly. "Now that Ward's here, perhaps you will tell us what brings you here, my lords."

"Hunting?" I asked. Oreg had quit making any noise but soft grunts, but the sound of leather hitting flesh echoed in the hall, and the thick magic kept me from concentrating on our guests.

Garranon snorted sourly. "Yes, we're hunting—but not the kind you mean. Landislaw bought a slave from an acquaintance. Now he finds that the slave wasn't his friend's to sell." A slave? Poor abject things, they were commonplace in Estian at the high king's Tallvenish court as well as other parts of the Five Kingdoms. Shavigmen didn't own slaves.

"It belonged to his father," added Landislaw with a graceful grimace.

" His father," continued Garranon sourly, "is Black Ciernack."

"The moneylender?" asked my uncle, clearly shocked. Maybe he hadn't heard the rumors about Garranon's brother.

Oh, Landislaw was not in debt, quite the contrary. He brought friends from court into friendly gambling dens, just seedy enough to appeal to the jaded young courtiers. The dens belonged to Ciernack. If Landislaw's friends lost money there, it surely wasn't his fault. Just ask him.

"The moneylender," agreed Garranon. "Before Landislaw could return her, she ran away. So we've been chasing her ever since. Frankly, if Landislaw hadn't discovered that someone had been feeding her stories that Hurog is a refuge for slaves, we'd never have found her. From the tracks we've followed, she's in a tunnel down by the river. I don't know how she got in there: We couldn't move that grate. But her footprints continued beyond the grating."

Garranon was speaking to me rather than my uncle. It was one of the things that made me like him. Most people at court tried very hard to forget I was there, even if I was standing beside them.

I frowned at the floor. "Sewers."

Garranon snapped his fingers. "Of course. I was wondering what that tunnel was. I'd forgotten that this place—" He made a sweeping gesture around the room." — was dwarven made."

"No," I corrected. "Just the sewers."

"Ah." Garranon nodded. "Even so. We have an escaped slave in your sewers, and we can't get beyond the grate that seems to be sealed to the tunnel mouth."

Not when I'd been there last , I thought. As far as I knew, the grate should still be off its hinges, because I'd forgotten about it. Oreg must have sealed it after the slave ran inside. He had more reason than most to care for a runaway slave. Perhaps that was what had set him off on his fit.

Behind me, the sound of the whip had become rhythmical, though Oreg had quit making any sound at all.

"We left the men and dogs there and came here to see if you had a way into the sewers," said Garranon.

"No," I said.

"You've been in the sewers, Ward," reminded my uncle with a frown. "Certainly you know how to get into them."

I nodded. I did indeed. "No slaves at Hurog."

Garranon and his brother regarded me warily, but my uncle began frowning. He knew what I meant; I could see the apprehension in his eyes. I had no particular fondness for slavery or Landislaw. If Oreg wanted to save the poor thing, I felt no compunction about helping him.

"We followed her in," said Landislaw slowly, perhaps thinking I'd understand it better that way. "She went in through the grate. We could track her that far. But she won't be able to get back out that way, since we left men guarding the grate. We need a way in."

"Only way in is through the grates," I said mildly.

"You can open them?" snapped Landislaw, dropping his pleasant act. He must be really worried. It didn't bother me to see him sweat. One of the boys Landislaw had led into Black Ciernack's nets had killed himself. He'd been a good lad, kind to his stupid friends.