While the two men ate, Lucy and Aylesworthy curbed their impatience. Lucy told the innkeeper the treasure had been secured, but both of them wanted to hear about the dragon’s lair and the theft.
At last Ulin pushed his ale aside and asked for wine. When it was brought, he stretched out his long legs and took a long, appreciative sip.
“So?” Lucy prompted. “What happened at Fyremantle’s lair?”
“It wasn’t technically a lair,” Kethril answered. “It was only a stash of his stolen goods. He could not keep it at his known lair for fear of Malys finding it.”
Ulin chuckled and glanced at the gambler with something akin to respect. “Your father may be a thief, a gambler, and a morally poor example of a man,” he told Lucy, “but he has courage, imagination, and a lot of gall. His observations of the hiding place were accurate up to the small matter of booby-traps.”
“Booby-traps?” Lucy and Aylesworthy said together.
Pulling the map out of his tunic, Ulin tapped a finger on the spot marked Secar’s Point. “The stash was exactly where the map is marked, in a dormant volcano just to the west of the Point. It was down in an old volcanic tube that you could not see unless you were standing right on top of it. Malys would never have seen it from the air. We would never have found it if Kethril hadn’t known where it was. He was right, too, about the guards. There were none. I guess Fyremantle didn’t trust anyone with the location of his secret hoard.”
Some of the other customers in the inn, hearing Ulin’s voice, moved their chairs closer to listen to the tale. Aylesworthy hurriedly refilled Ulin’s wine goblet.
“We arrived at the Point shortly after sunset and hid Notwen’s boat in a small cove. At daybreak, we hiked up to the volcano to find the cave and determine what was needed to remove the treasure.”
“Fyremantle was there,” Kethril interrupted him. “That greedy little worm was adding to his stash from taxes collected at one of the Khur settlements. He stayed there all day, counting and gloating. It was disgusting.” He broke off and saw Lucy, Ulin, and Aylesworthy staring at him. “What?”
“You’re a fine one to talk about counting and gloating,” Lucy said.
Ulin took up the tale again. “We had to wait until Fyremantle left before we could enter the cave. One of the Vigilance fighters found the first booby-trap when he tried to open the stone that blocks the entrance. A cloud of acid burned his lungs and ate his skin. His death was slow and agonizing. That made us think twice about moving too quickly, so we waited until the next day when we could use the daylight to help us see. It was a good thing we did. Once we got the stone door open, we found the tube was infested with cave lizards.” He stopped and shuddered. “I don’t know if you’ve ever seen one, but they’re nasty creatures. These were about three feet long, mottled gray, and very aggressive. They scooted over the ceiling of the tube and were on us before we even knew they were there. They use their long tongues to grab a victim and pull him in range of their teeth. One of those lizards isn’t too difficult to beat off, but five or six of those things chewing on your arms or legs is very frightening. They almost killed one of the dwarves before we got to him.”
“What did you do?” Lucy asked, wide-eyed.
“Light,” Ulin replied. “They hate light. The sunlight drove them from the entrance and I used some magnesium flashpowder in the interior.”
“The tube is quite long,” Kethril added. “And there were scorpions and several pitfalls and a sand trap. Fyremantle was taking no chances. It was hours before we finally found the chamber where he hid his stash. We worked for a full day to neutralize the booby-traps, crate up the goods, and haul it out of there. By the time we finished, there wasn’t so much as a coin to toss to the lizards. It was a beautiful operation,” he finished enthusiastically. Like most thieves, he enjoyed a good heist.
Ulin gave Lucy a slow weary smile. “It was a successful attempt. Except for Lysandros’s man and the wounded dwarf, we got out of there with little injury or loss.”
“So what do we do now?” Aylesworthy asked as he topped off Ulin’s wine.
Lucy looked at her father and her betrothed and said, “Sleep. We can work tomorrow.”
“No, no. I need to help Notwen,” Ulin said, but he made no move to stand up.
“He probably needs sleep as much as you. I will go check on him. Aylesworthy, if you could see these two to bed, I would appreciate it.”
“Absolutely, Miss Lucy.”
Kethril started to argue, but the food, the ale, and the lack of sleep finally caught up with him. He sagged back in his chair and grinned at nothing. “It was a good heist,” he murmured.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
The eve of Visiting Day came on a brisk wind and a warm sun. While the kender prepared for the picnic and festivities, the Vigilance Force set quietly about removing the elderly, the lame, the sick, and the younger children to safe camps in the dusty hills. The number of sentinels on the Rock and around the town was doubled. Most of the fishing boats moved out into the bay and sailed east for the open waters of the sea, leaving behind a few older and damaged boats tied at the docks. Traveling merchants, visiting Khurs, and other transients quickly abandoned the town, as did a few dozen of the permanent residents.
Those who remained swallowed hard and went to work creating a new festival ground on the south side of town around the large area of bare ground where the large hole had been dug. The hole was prepared and filled in now, and Notwen’s dragon trap was carefully camouflaged among the abandoned buildings. In and around the open street and buildings the men scythed the scrubby grass and the weeds and cleaned out the debris. They put in a large fire pit at the edge of the trap, and at Notwen’s direction, the women set out trestle tables over the tamped earth of the excavation. The plan, he said, was to lure the dragon between the buildings and onto the trap. Other folks cooked food and hung lanterns and decorations of flowers, dried grasses, and ribbons. Two large oxen were butchered and left to roast overnight in the fire pit. The smell of roasting meat soon filled the town, and Lucy thought that alone would distract Fyremantle and lure him from his perch on the Rock.
Meanwhile, Ulin and Notwen remained hidden in Notwen’s laboratory, poring over plans and working on concoctions only they could understand. The trap was as ready as they could make it, but they spent hours double-checking figures and thinking of more ways to slow the huge beast.
Lucy retreated to her room and spent that evening perfecting half a dozen spells until she could cast them in her sleep. Most of them were spells she had done years ago at the Academy. A few were new ones she devised to protect herself or others from the dragon, and one was a special spell Ulin asked her learn. Her spellcasting was flawless, but to her dismay, even with the help of the turban, the spells went awry or failed more than half the time. Exhaustion finally forced her to stop, but she was frustrated at her failures and deeply worried. She could not afford to fail tomorrow when the red dragon appeared for his tribute.
Challie woke her the next morning with a mug of cooled cider and two hard-boiled eggs. “There’s more if you want it, but if your stomach is like mine, you won’t be able to eat it.”
Lucy quickly found Challie was right. As soon as she got out of bed and went to the small table, the enormity of their task for that day sank in its claws and twisted her stomach into knots. She drank the cider, ate one egg, and had to give up. “Do you want the other?” she offered.