Miles Cameron - The Red Knight

‘Ah,’ said the captain. ‘I’ll wait my turn.’

The Wyrm smiled. ‘I can talk to you all at once,’ he said. ‘It is you who needs the feeling that there is structure, not me.’ He took a pull on his pipe.

The captain nodded.

Of course time means nothing to them, Harmodius said.

‘Are the two of you together?’ the Wyrm asked.

‘There’s just one of me,’ the captain said. ‘I can’t speak for Harmodius.’

The Wyrm smiled again. ‘Very wise of you to see that. You know that if you do not rid yourself of him, he will, in time, demand control. He cannot help himself. I offer this information free of obligation.’

The captain nodded. A cup of mulled wine appeared at his elbow. He picked it up and drank it gratefully.

‘Why have you come?’ asked the Wyrm. ‘You, at least, had to know what I was.’

The captain nodded. ‘I guessed.’ He looked around. ‘Are there rules? Do I have three questions? Fifty?’

The Wyrm shrugged. ‘I don’t want visitors. I try never to look into the future. All that is for my busy, busy kin. They plot, and strive. I live. I seek truth.’ He smiled. ‘Sometimes I grow lonely, and a lucky traveller is brought in for entertainment.’ His smile became a feral grin.

The captain drank more wine. ‘What of the Lachlans?’

The Wyrm pulled on his pipe, and smoke wound to the ceiling and up into the draught of the roaring fire. ‘That is your question?’

The captain shook his head. ‘No, but they are my sworn men and I need to know they are being well served.’

The Wyrm smiled. ‘The concept of fealty comes so naturally to men and I am having a difficult time being bound by it. But I will deal fairly with Tom and Ranald. Ask your own.’

The captain swirled his wine, and clamped down on a question about Amicia. ‘Can the conflict between Man and Wild be resolved?’ he asked.

‘Is that your question?’ asked the Wyrm.

‘Yes,’ said the captain.

The seated figure smoked. ‘How delightful.’ He walked to the mantelpiece and opened a stone jar, took out a handful of old leaves and tamped them into the bowl of his pipe. ‘Do you believe in free will, prince?’

The captain was growing hot, and he stood up and took off his cote and hung it by the mantel to dry with a muttered ‘beg your pardon’ to his host. He sat again.

‘Yes,’ he said.

‘Why?’ asked the Wyrm.

The captain shrugged. ‘Either I have free will, or there’s no point in playing.’

The Wyrm rocked its head back and forth. ‘What if I were to tell you that you only had free will in some things, and not in others?’

The captain found he was chewing one of his riding gloves. He stopped. ‘I’d suggest that my power to affect the universe is about the same whether I have free will in every action or only in one.’

‘Interesting,’ said the Wyrm. ‘Man and the Wild are merely concepts. Philosophical constructs. If they were created to represent – to symbolize – opposition, then could they ever be reconciled? Can alpha and omega switch places in the alphabet?’

‘Next you will tell me there is no Wild. And there is no Man.’ The captain smiled.

The Wyrm laughed. ‘You’ve taken this class before, I take it.’

‘I sat at the feet of some philosophers in the East,’ the captain said. ‘I had no idea they were dragons, although, now that I think of it-’

The Wyrm laughed again. ‘You please me. So I will answer your question. Man and the Wild, while being two sides of a coin, can live together – just as the coin lives perfectly well in the purse.’

‘Separate?’ the captain asked.

The Wyrm shrugged. ‘Nothing about a coin is separate, is it?’ he asked.

The captain leaned back in his very comfortable chair.

‘My brother died,’ Tom said. ‘He was your liege man, and he died. Tell us who killed him?’

The Wyrm shrugged. ‘He died outside my circle,’ he said. ‘I concede that I wasn’t paying very much attention. I further concede that while my mind was taken with other affairs, some of the Wild peoples crossed my lands without my leave. But in truth, Tom, and Ranald, my circle is a creation for my own convenience. I scarcely trouble men, in or out of it, and you two are the first to demand some sort of action of me in a long enough amount of time to be meaningless.’

‘So you won’t avenge him,’ Tom said. ‘Just tell me who killed him?’ he asked.

‘Are you telling me what I’m doing, or asking?’ the Wyrm asked politely. ‘Is this your question?’

Ranald leaned forward. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘It sounds odd but it isn’t the Sossag I’m after, though they slayed Hector and me, too. It’s Thorn. Thorn sent them – he summoned them. Drove them to war.’

The Wyrm threw back his head and laughed. ‘Are you simple, Ranald Lachlan? The Wild Peoples do exactly as they please. They are not children. If they raided your brother, they did so apurpose.’

‘They’d never ha’ been at the fords if it hadn’t been for Thorn.’ Tom was insistent.

The Wyrm put his chin in his right hand. ‘How much of the truth would you like, hillman? Shall I tell you enough to spark an epic revenge? Or shall I tell you enough to render you incapable of action? Which would you prefer?’

Ranald chewed the end of his moustache. ‘What could you tell us that would make us unable to act?’ he asked.

Tom glowered.

The Wyrm sat back and put his pipe down, put his hands behind his head. ‘The Sossag who killed Hector is called Ota Qwan. He is a worthy enemy for you, Tom – driven, passionate, highly skilled. Your riddle is that, in time, your captain will want him as an ally.’ The Wyrm smiled.

‘And so you render Tom incapable of action?’ Ranald asked. ‘You don’t know Tom.’

The Wyrm shook his head. ‘No. Because behind Ota Qwan was Skadai, who made the decision to risk my wrath and raid the hillmen and the drove. He’s already dead, though. Behind Skadai is Thorn, who was pushed into war-’ the Wyrm was smiling, ‘-by one of my kind, to whom you and your brother are less than ants, and who wishes to encompass not just the end of your brother, but the death of every man and woman in the entire circle of the world. I should offer you my thanks – I have just realised that I have slept through a cycle of drama. Things are moving out in the world. Damn the lot of you.’

‘His name?’ Tom said.

‘Tom Lachlan, you are a name of fear among men from East to West. Daemons and wyverns wet themselves in fear at the mere mention of your name.’ The Wyrm gazed at Tom with affection. ‘But my kind – nothing in your arsenal can harm us.’

‘His name?’ asked Tom.

The Wyrm leaned forward. ‘I would like to deal with this myself.’

Tom slapped his thigh. ‘Now you’re talking, Wyrm. A good lord stands up for his man. But I’ll help ye. Tell me his name, and together we’ll put him down in the dust.’

The Wyrm shook his head. ‘Are you to be drover, Tom?’

Tom shook his head. ‘I doubt I could. I’d kill every loon as bade me nay.’

The Wyrm nodded. ‘Ranald?’

‘I’d be proud to be drover. But I seek to be knighted by the king – to have a little treasure – so I may wed a lady.’ Ranald felt like a small boy confessing to stealing apples.

‘None of these things is my concern,’ said the Wyrm. ‘Although the two of you are a pleasure to converse with.’

‘He’s the man of reason,’ Tom said. ‘I’m the man of war. Two sides of a coin.’

‘Nothing about a coin is separate,’ the Wyrm said.

Mag sat with her hands folded in her lap.

‘And how may I help you?’ the Wyrm asked her.

‘I’d like to defeat and destroy the sorcerer known as Thorn,’ she said.