"And what if you find nothing here?" Marthaen asked.
"Then we go back to Braejr," Sir George said as he joined them. "Alessa Vyledaar is still working on the problem. She might have learned something by now."
CHAPTER THREE
On the southern coast of the small continent of Alphatia, by the temperate waters of the Bellisarian Sea, stood the city of Archport. As its name suggests, Archport was a busy commercial port serving the trade between the great island of Bellisaria to the east, the Isle of Dawn to the west, and the scattering of lesser islands to the south. Large merchant ships from many nations could always be seen tied to the piers or anchored at wait in the harbor, ships from as far away as the sea kingdom of Ierendi far to the west or the wild and little-known continent of Skothar in the distant east.
Archport was also at that time one of the most important ports for the Alphatian navy, where many of the empire's sleek galleys and sturdy troop ships were kept and maintained. By virtue of its location, Archport was as important to Alphatia's commercial interest as it was to the island continent's appetite for conquest. Of course, the previous year's ill-advised war with the dragons had put a considerable dent in the size of the imperial navy, a fact that could be clearly seen by the unusual lack of military vessels to be found in port.
Most foreigners either did not know or else tended to forget that Alphatia was not a single nation, but a collection of eighteen semiautonomous kingdoms bound together by their shared greed and insatiable drive for conquest. Alphatia was a nation of sorcerers, a land where spellcasters were the aristocracy and common folk possessed few rights or little wealth. The land had first been settled by the ancient enemies of the Flaem, and the true Alphatians still dominated the continent. But many elves and dwarves had settled there as well in the centuries that had followed, and they now shared many of the customs and the ambitions of the original people of Alphatia.
The attack came in the deepest part of the night, and it came completely without warning. Ships standing at the piers or at anchor suddenly burst into flames, some catching fire so quickly and violently that they literally exploded. Indeed, since there was no immediate sign of any enemy, the first assumption of many was that a perfectly normal if disastrous fire was sweeping over the piers, spread by bits of burning canvas carried on the brisk sea breeze. But the fires seemed too selective, striking mostly at the swift war galleys and other naval vessels in the harbor, as well as the forts that stood guard over the port.
Defenders hurried to their stations, but there still was no enemy to be seen. No foreign warships stood out at sea, nor were any invading warriors in the streets of the city. The attack itself was swift and over in a matter of minutes. Only afterward did a few of the defenders speak of seeing vast, dark shapes passing below the stars in the moonless night sky, creatures with broad, dark wings, long necks, and tails.
Two other major ports in Alphatia were attacked that same night in similar fashion. The attack in each case was directed at, but not limited to, the ships and facilities of the imperial navy. And in every case, people spoke of seeing the dark shapes passing in the night. Of course, there was little question in anyone's mind that it was the dragons who were behind the attack. The dragons had been provoked into war with the empire the previous year; the Alphatians had treacherously broken their own truce when they thought the dragons were preoccupied with the Dragonlord in the west. But the dragons had kept to themselves since they had destroyed the last invasion force at sea, and there had been little reason to believe that they would retaliate further.
Indeed, the first thing that officials within the empire did following the attack was to make certain that their own people had not provoked the dragons yet again. Alphatians tended to be tenacious in their desire for conquest, even in the face of certain disaster. One problem with an empire of such great size as Alphatia was that one branch of the government or the military often did not know what the other parts might be doing.
Unfortunately, the dragons themselves remained very much an unknown factor. In the past, they had attacked only in just response to provocation, so that the Alphatians were inclined to wonder if they themselves were at fault. As a part of their first treaty with the Alphatians, the dragons had demanded the right to search all of Alphatia for some artifact of magic that had been taken from them. Alphatian spies reported that the dragons had made similar demands upon the Flaem in the distant west. Whatever it was the dragons wanted, they seemed to be returning for a second look. But whatever the cause of the attacks, whether in response to some threat, in retaliation for past transgressions, or merely for sport, all the Alphatians could do was to
prepare themselves as best they could and wait.
* * * * *
On that same night, a cold, restless wind whipped through the narrow Sardal Pass in the mountains of southern Rock-home, the kingdom of the dwarves. The pennants above Kar-rak Castle snapped sharply in the breeze, the only sound to be heard in the night. But the great fortress of Karrak was not entirely asleep, for this was one of the three great fortresses guarding the only passes into Rockhome. Sardal Pass was the most direct way into the desert lands of the Ylaruam and Thy-atis beyond. Sentries patrolled the walkways along the pass and manned the parapets of the massive form of the castle itself. The dwarves guarded their borders as if they were always expecting an attack, and they prided themselves upon the fact that they were almost never taken by surprise.
That night, however, even the dwarves were taken by surprise.
A great blast of intense flames seemed to explode from one of the tall, slender central towers of the castle. The blast hurled the tiles of the cone-shaped roof of the tower in all directions, great slabs of slate that were intended to deflect flaming arrows and even common dragonfire. The timbers and wood floors within the tower began to burn furiously, and even some of the stones of the outer wall began to crack and loosen from the intense heat. The sentries hardly needed to ring the watch bells to sound the alarm; the blast had shaken the castle to its core. The ranks of dwarvish warriors leapt from their beds, pausing only long enough to grab their armor and weapons as they hurried to the defense of the castle.
The top of the second tower of the main portion of the castle also exploded in flame. Then a couple of the lesser towers along the outer wall of the pass were all but shattered in sudden bursts of fire. The massive tower above the circular gate fort proved more solid than the others, withstanding three blasts before it began to burn like a great torch in the night. Only moments after the first attack, the dwarves began to rush out onto the upper walls, ready for battle. But there was no enemy to be seen; indeed, the assault upon Karrak Castle seemed to be over.
There was, of course, only one enemy who could have come and gone again so quickly in the night. The sentries who had witnessed the attack pointed to the sky and spoke of great winged shapes that had moved quickly across the stars of the moonless sky as they had hurtled along the twisting length of the pass.
The sudden and seemingly unprovoked attack was a dire mystery to Daric, son of Kuric, the young commander of the garrison at Karrak Castle. There was little he could do at first except to have the fires brought under control and repairs begun on the damaged towers. The garrison remained at full battle alert; catapults and large crossbows, at least all such weapons that were on hand, were brought out onto the walls and made ready. But Daric had to doubt that a second attack would come any time soon. This had obviously not been an attempt to capture or destroy the castle. The damage to the defenses of the castle had been minimal, and there had been no loss of life. He was inclined to believe that this had been a warning, although he did not understand the intended message.